From: elf@halcyon.com (Elf Sternberg)
Newsgroups: alt.sex,alt.sex.stories,alt.sex.furry
Subject: Journal Entry 179 / 0916 [ Rats And Engineers ]
Date: 19 Apr 1996 14:15:05 GMT
Organization: Pendor, UnLtd.
Lines: 1159
Message-ID: <4l8759$4ln@news.halcyon.com>
NNTP-Posting-Host: coho.halcyon.com
Anar, Urim 8, 0916
David stopped at the door marked "Captain," and listened
quietly for a few seconds. Hearing nothing, he pushed the doorbell
button. There was still no sound from inside. He turned the knob
and walked in.
His office was empty. He had begun checking it for occupants
ever since he had startled the chief engineer and the steward in a
less than delicate position on his desk. The memory made him
smile, and then it made him frown. He glanced down at the black
armband around his bicep and with a grimace tore it off, ignoring
the small shocks of pain when he grabbed a few strands of fur in
the process.
With a sigh he walked around his desk and sat down, easing his
tail through the hold between seat and back. Damn you, Mickey, he
thought. Why did you have to go and get yourself killed like that?
And now you leave me without a chief engineer. I can't let Pat do
it, she's not nearly qualified. I need a chief engineer, not
somebody with less than a thousand hours under a chief engineer.
David smiled. In Mickey's case he was sure Patricia had spent at
least a few hours literally under the chief engineer. Mickey had
always been a ladykiller.
David reached for the power switch on his terminal when the
reflection in the monitor's glass caught his attention. He
.tisked. himself under his breath. His eyes were dulled, his fur
matted, his whiskers droopy. There had been days when he had been
one fine-looking rat, but this was not going to be one of those
days. The funeral and the legal administration surrounding
Mickey's death had taken their toll. He pushed the switched.
The terminal beeped as it came up. David found the familiar
sound annoying today. He sighed again as he typed in his access
code and pulled up mail for the custom-request address he had
created yesterday morning. "Now then," he said, addressing the
monitor as he typed commands, "how many people applied for the
job?"
YOU HAVE MAIL WAITING (17 NEW), the monitor replied. David
didn't bother to look at the mail himself - there were other
criteria he had to satisfy before sifting through seventeen
resumes. From his terminal he typed "RESUME ASSESS."
The program ran for several seconds, then announced "RECORDS:
17. REJECTED: 17. 0 SUITABLE APPLICANTS BY PRESENT CRITERIA
DATABASE."
David blinked, then typed "RESUME ASSESS REASON FOR REJECTION."
The program ran much quicker this time-- the data it had
downloaded from various municipal facilities the first time were
still in its telecommunication buffer. "RECORDS: 17. REJECTED:
17. REASONS FOR REJECTION: ACTIVE FELONY RECORD: 16. OTHER: 1."
David knew he was a rarity among free trader captains because
he ran a clean ship. He never carried illegal cargo, never bought
questionable papers, and never took on crew who had active felony
records if he could avoid it.
Other? He blinked at the screen for a second. He'd never seen
"Other" as a reason before. "RESUME ASSESS DOCUMENT ALL REASONS
FOR REJECTION OTHER THAN FELONY RECORD."
"RECORDS: 1. REJECTED: 1. REASONS FOR REJECTION: OTHER: 1
CODE PO"
"Prag!" David cursed. This was more annoying than cleaning out
a broken sewage line. What the hell did "CODE PO" mean? "RESUME
ASSESS DATABASE CODE EXPLANATION PO," he tried.
"PO: Planet of Origin."
That was a new one to David, too. Usually, a planet of origin
warning would come up as something else, such as interdicted
species or incompatible biologies. He found his frustration being
supplanted by sudden curiosity. Where could the applicant have
come from that it wasn't one of the other categories? "RESUME
DISPLAY REJECTED RECORD CODE PO REASON PO."
"RECORD 14: Planet of Origin: PENDOR."
That, David thought, explains that. The last thing he wanted
on his ship was a Pendorian. Pendorians had their own form of
justice, and if one ever got in trouble they had their own law and
the strength to enforce it. A recent incident in which a Pendorian
girl had been taken hostage had resulted in the destruction of a
small city on Zephyr. As a planetary policy, they cared about
nothing but their own.
David leaned back in the chair and put the keyboard in his lap.
"RESUME DISPLAY RECORD 1 FLAG IGNORE."
- - -
Three hours later David stood up and stretched. He had sifted
through the records and not one of the sixteen others who had
applied for the job looked at all promising. Most of the offenses
were either weapon or controlled substance related, with a
scattering of violent and sexual assaults throughout. The ones
with the least amount of trouble also had the least amount of
experience.
The trouble was, he couldn't afford to pay enough to really
attract a good engineer. Times were hard recently, and he was as
far off the llerkin-Pendor-Terra trade route as he had ever been.
The ones who had applied also had to know he was in dire straits.
They wanted off this mudball and back into better-known territories
just as he did, and he presented a chance for them to get there.
He walked around his desk, stretched again, and sat down.
Against his better judgment, he typed "RESUME DISPLAY RECORD 14
FLAG IGNORE."
"NAME: Dennielle Satpulov." He read through the resume
quickly, glancing through her personal material to concentrate on
her professional record. It was more than a little impressive.
Six years with Pendor Naval Engineering, experience with a variety
of FTL drives, including his own. According to the resume, she
also had experience with computers of non-Pendor manufacture, a
rarity even in Terra-controlled space, and a skill he could use.
"Well, computer, do I hire her, or a crook?" There was no
answer; David had decided long ago that he disliked the idea of an
AI running his ship for him, especially since almost all AIs were
Pendorian in origin and were rumored to have divided loyalties.
The fact that he had a computer of Terran manufacture sometimes
earned him strange looks at customs points because usually only
pirates and smugglers used them.
After a few seconds of thought he hit the 'T' button. The
telephone light came on, and he waited.
The screen blinked, and the text of the resume was replaced
with a live picture of a tired and disheveled Mephit. "Hello?" she
asked quietly.
"Dennielle Satpulov? I'm Captain David Elohim, of the Rat's
Asking. You applied for the position of chief engineer on my
ship."
"Yes," the Mephit yawned, "I remember. What can I do for you?"
"I noticed on your resume you didn't put down a request for
salary. I was calling to ask you why."
"I'm not looking for a salary. I noticed that llerkin was one
of your major ports of call, and I'm looking for passage back into
Pendor Treaty Alliance space."
David paused. Work passage? It was unusual, but he had taken
on crew on a work passage basis before. Never a chief engineer,
but he figured there was a time for everything. It occurred to
David then that, as a Pendorian, this Mephit should have been able
to get credit for a ride on the basis of her name only. There was
no reason for her to be looking for a job, even this far from PTA
space. He would have offered her high passage rooms with a single
flash from a Pendor-rated bankcard.
"Miss Satpulov, could you come to my ship, say, ten this
morning?"
The Mephit blinked and said, "Ten's fine. I'll be there bright
and early."
"Goodnight," David said.
- - -
Patricia whistled low as she looked over the record David had
called up on the terminal for her. "She's good," she said.
"What's she asking for a salary?"
David pinched the bridge of his muzzle and closed his eyes.
"Work passage."
"You're kidding," Patricia said, glancing over at him. She
recognized that gesture-- David was getting another headache. "She
could command six figures on a real starliner. What's she doing
out here?"
"That's why I want you here when she shows. Tell me she's as
good as she says."
The door chimed, and David said "Come." It opened and the
Mephit David had seen the night before walked in. She was about
180 cm tall, gently overweight, with luxurious black fur and a
short muzzle. Her ears were quite large for a Mephit-- David knew
that was a trait of a sub-species of Mephit, a racial trait, but he
didn't know the name for it. She wore a standard grey crewman's
jumpsuit which did nothing to hide the fact that she was quite
buxom. Her eyes were large, oval, and colored gold, and the only
white fur he could see was a tiny shock about a centimeter wide and
four centimeters long that started just above her eyes. She held
her tail erect; he could see it over her shoulders, and what he
could see was solidly black.
"Captain Elohim?" she asked.
"You must be Dennielle Satpulov," he said. He felt
uncomfortable- she had to know he was in trouble, and her asking
price was so ridiculously low that he virtually had nothing to
haggle with. He held out a hand and she shook it in a friendly
manner. "You're punctual," he observed.
"I try," she said, smiling. "So, what do you think of my
resume?"
"It's impressive," he replied. "What can you tell me about my
ship?"
"From the outside? It's functional. You've got a standard
Terran model Voisma Jumpdrive, six Senoph-line fusion drives for
in-system maneuver, and a standard Vienn statis net over the whole
thing for emergency defense. Your guns are either IMI or
Cloudrunners, I couldn't tell which with blast shields down. What
have you got for power plants?"
"Four Morrow Industries model fives," Patricia answered.
"Four?" Dennielle asked. "That's quite a lot for a six-hundred
ton starship, isn't it?"
David shrugged. "I like having a lot of backup."
"And what computer are you running?"
"Hallmark 4000-bis plus."
Dennielle paused for a second. "That's a bit unusual, but I
think I can handle it. That's a Terran model."
"Something wrong with that?" David asked.
"Not at all. It just means I'm going to have to live without
an AI for a little longer."
David caught himself wondering what she looked like underneath
the same jumpsuit that Patricia wore everyday and almost missed
what she was saying. He heard Patricia ask Dennielle a question,
but he ignored it; his mind was more occupied with guilt and anger
at himself for thinking about either of them that way, and with
frustration at not having a choice in the matter.
"David!" he heard Patricia calling.
"Eh?" he said, looking up.
"What do you think?"
He looked flustered for a second, then sighed and said, "Miss
Satpulov, you're hired. As a rule, I don't normally hire
Pendorians, but in your case I'm going to make an exception. You
start right now. Pat, you've got the spare room. I'm sorry, but
I'm going to have to ask you to give her the space."
"I know, I know," Patricia answered. "It's okay."
"Thank you, Captain," Dennielle replied.
"On this ship, there's aren't enough people to call me
Captain," he said. "David will do fine."
"It is Day-vid, not Dah-veed?" she asked.
"Day-vid," he repeated. "Don't let the last name fool you, I'm
not particularly religious. Could you excuse us for a second, Miss
Satpulov?"
"Denni," she said.
"Denni, then." He gestured for the door, and she nodded,
closing it behind her.
He turned to Patricia and said, "Well?"
"She knows her stuff, I'll give her that. She's good."
"Better than Mickey?"
"Don't ask me to make that comparison, David. I'm not going to
do it."
"But she can do his job."
"That she can do."
- - -
David's fears that Denni may have lied on her resume quickly
vanished as she rather quickly proved to be a boon to their
engineering staff. The word "staff" was another word that made
David laugh when no one was around to hear, since the staff
consisted of Patricia, Marder, and now Denni. Most of his crew was
human. The only other recombinant on his crew was Tasha, his
pilot, a Katkin from Terra.
He had worked for the Rat's Asking for most of his life; being
a starship pilot had been his one and only dream since he had been
born. There were days when it got to him, the constant pressure to
maintain his ship. He had sunk a lot of cash into her, buying the
best he could.
He realized now that doing so may have been a mistake. At the
moment he didn't have the capital to effect some minor repairs
that, while not critical, were necessary. He was in no danger of
losing his hyperdrive, powerplants, or basic life support, but at
any moment his toilet might back up. And some of the life support
emergency circuitry was getting old. It had been an old hull when
he'd bought it, and some of the hardware had come with the deal.
They were nine light years out from Simaj. The jumpdrive was
on it's third recycle, and at present fuel reserves they were
faring better than he had estimated. Denni was doing one hell of a
job. The Fahrenheit starsystem was two more jumps, and then it was
back to BD+32 and Pendor Treaty Alliance space.
He sat in front of the computer screen on the bridge,
calculating costs on a spreadsheet. Tasha had long ago finished
any navigation checks, and David preferred using the lag time
between jumps to do his accounting work. Bored and tired, he hit
the SAVE button and said, "Tasha, I'm going down to the galley for
some coffee. Want some?"
Tasha had never been much for words or for coffee; she just
waved over her shoulder. Smiling, David rose and walked the tight
catwalk to the door when an explosion rocked his ship and threw him
to the floor. "What the hell?" he said quietly.
"Pirates!" Tasha shouted, pulling hard on the manual controls.
David swore that when she maneuvered like this he could feel the
gravity compensators making their millions of tiny changes per
second. His fur crawled with the images of hardware failure- puree
of rat as his body was forced through the grating of the catwalk.
"We lost a fusion line," Denni's voice came over the intercom.
"Tasha, tell Chico I want him on gun two, now!" David shouted.
"He's already there," she shouted back. David picked himself
up off the floor and leapt back into his chair, demanding access to
gun one and launching four racks of missiles from his console. The
screen shifted to an image of the ship, sighted along the front
panel, split in two to give as much of an image as it could.
The pirates swung around again. Pirating was a duel to death-
the victim's ship had to be completely disabled before any looting
could begin. Any maneuvering jet still functional that was capable
of moving the ship was capable of tearing airlock seals. David
fired.
The pirates released glitter into the space ahead of them, an
explosive cloud moving at a higher velocity, blocking energy
weapons fire.
The next time I have the money, I'm going to a Pendorian drive,
he swore. Using Jump drives made him a prime target for pirates,
and he knew it. But they were so much cheaper to buy and operate,
and the Terran model Stream drives were notoriously prone to
breakdown.
"We're losing pressure!" Tasha shouted. "David, I'm showing a
hole in bottle three!"
"Damn!" he shouted, launching another rack of missiles.
"Compensate! That's what the extra fusion plant's for!"
The pirate ship came around again, this time from the
underside, and in one small second the entire battle was over.
Chico managed to get a hit on a maneuvering drive and the pirates
careened wildly out of control, disintegrating in their own
spin-induced destruction.
David sat back hard in his control chair, every nerve afire
with fear and adrenaline. He wanted to do something as his body
quaked in fight-or-flight response, and he knew the only thing he
_could_ do was wait it out.
"David?" Tasha said from the Pilot's chair.
"Huh?" he said, jerking nervously to stare in her direction.
"You okay, Captain?"
"Yeah, yeah," he said rapidly. "No," he said. "I'm gonna be
sick." With that, he ran for the head.
- - -
Still trying to quell the shaking in his hands, David walked
down to engineering. Tasha's report of what was left of the
pirates vessel had depressed him further-- there hadn't been enough
left to make even materials salvage worth the effort. He had lost
a fusion plant and taken some serious scoring along the underbelly,
and even though they were still alive they had little to show for
their victory.
He wasn't within ten meters of the engineering blast-door when
he heard shouting from within. "Dammit, That's p73-RTS you've got
there! It doesn't go in the hyperdrive, it's designed for fusion
plants! While you're here, give it to me-- it'll go to repairing
bottle three." He walked in to find Marder rather sheepishly
handing a large coil of room-temperature superconductor to Denni.
The scene gave David his first smile since the attack. Marder was
physically impressive for a human, and the idea of him looking at
all uncomfortable in the presence of the smaller Mephit was almost
laughable. But David, at 150cm and the
shortest member of his own crew, had long ago learned not to laugh
at such differences.
"So," he said, addressing Denni, "How are things, Chief
Engineer?"
She laughed tersely and said, "They could be better. Come on,
I've got to patch Morrow number three." She turned, her tail
nearly hitting David in the process. "Actually," she continued,
"it could have been much worse. You keep good hardware, David."
"Thank you," he said. "Doesn't help turn a profit nowadays."
She pulled out a power ratchet and began spinning out the eight
bolts that secured the normally sealed fusion plant to the floor.
She pulled the casing off and tossed it aside easily, landing with
a clang on the floor. David caught himself envying her the
strength her creator had given her.
"Still," she said, scanning the guts quickly with a rad
counter, "It may have saved our lives. You may not buy Pendorian
computers, David, but using Parma hullmetal on your fusion plants
may have saved me and your two friends from rad poisoning."
He smiled. "Thank you." He wondered if her wording implied
she was not one of "his friends," and what that could mean to him.
Denni sighed as she reached in with a chip-puller and began
throwing individual chips and whole circuit boards to one side.
"Can't believe the processor power these things need. I'm going to
have to go through every one of those and find out what's still
working."
"I can do that," David offered.
"You?"
"I'm not incompetent, Denni. I know how to fix my own ship."
"I didn't mean that. I meant, well, you're the Captain. I
thought Terran ship's captains didn't 'lower' themselves to doing
repair and maintenance."
He frowned at her very Pendorian attitude and said, "This
ship's too small for me not to." He walked out of the room and
returned with a testbed console. Sitting himself on the floor, he
proceeded to type ident numbers from various chips and plug them
into the breadboard.
"You know what your problem is?" Denni said. "Your creators
are still herd animals. You put enough humans in a room together
and they'll all alpha-male each other until one's in charge, and
then they'll all follow him unquestioningly, no matter how lunatic
his ideas are."
David looked up at her for a second, trying to decide how to
respond to that. She was talking about his creators, his
gengineers. "At least," he started, "I wasn't gengineered to be a
sex toy."
Denni looked up sharply, staring at him. "Hey," she said.
"Don't take that attitude with me, David. You Terrans all make
those jokes about Shardik, talk about him as if he weren't even a
real person, just some thing, and you don't really know what he did
for us. You don't understand him at all. You don't understand
*us* at all."
"From the looks of his books, I'd say he created every single
species he's got just for so he could sleep with them." He felt
the tips of his ears getting hot. This was making him
uncomfortable.
Denni smiled a strange, crooked smile and said, "You don't
know, do you?"
"Don't know what?"
Denni paused for a second and said, "I can't tell you."
"Can't tell me what? What aren't you telling me?"
"Captain... David, How long are we going to stop at
Fahrenheit?"
"I don't know. A day at most. Why?"
"Can I get time away from the ship?" Her smile had changed.
David
found it pleasant to look at.
He thought about if for a second. In-system recycle was
something Pat could probably run by herself. "I suppose. Care to
tell me why?"
"No. It's... Personal. I have to pick something up."
He shrugged and resumed digging through his chips. Every once
in a while he would look up at her with a strange mixture of
longing, frustration, and confusion. Just once, he thought he
caught her looking
at him. He wondered if she felt at all like he did.
- - -
The bell to his office rang. David rubbed the bridge of his
nose again-- his headache was returning-- and said "Come." They
were on their way out of the stellar gravity well so they could
effect Jump, and he'd negotiated just half an hour ago a rather
steep price for the processed deuterium he'd taken on from the
Fahrenheit station's fuel office, and he didn't like the feeling
that he was getting screwed.
Dennielle entered and said, "Hi."
"Hello," he replied. "Did you get what you were looking for?"
She nodded and said, "Yeah, I think so." She dropped a small
packet of paper on his desk. "Don't bother to read it all right
now. Just the summary on Page 5.
David picked up the sheaf with a raised eyebrow, pulled off the
paperclip and rifled through to page 5. At the bottom, boxed off,
was a summary of the document. It read:
JANUARY 16, 2655. Persuant to Article XVI of the
Charter for Project Jersey, This United Nations Ad-Hoc
Committee for said Charter does agree to revise the ultimate
goal of said Project. Therefore, in agreement with Alpha
Laboratories of Pendor, Project Jersey agrees that NeoRattus
Norvegicus will be invested with full sentience, in exchange
for which Alpha Laboratories will provide the necessary
technical data and precision genetic CRX documentation
required to effect full sentience.
Signitaries: Lancombe', Petre, for the United Nations.
Slammas, Arraon, for Alpha Laboratories.
David looked up with a wide-eyed expression and said, "This is
real?"
"You can look it up yourself. As far as I can tell, it's not a
classified document. David, weren't you ever interested in your
own creation?"
David shrugged, embarrassed. "It never occurred to me that my
folks might lie. They said they were created by Project Jersey."
"And they never told you that Shardik or one his people
actually may have gone as far as writing the very code for their
brains?"
"Denni, get it straight. They probably didn't know! How do
you think the people at Project Jersey felt?"
"I know they didn't give much of a damn about NeoRattus. You
were originally intended to be slaves, you know that? You were
meant to be deltas, David, made just to follow orders. Shardik had
to literally *shame* them into making you full members of society."
"And how do you think they'd feel about that?" David was
nearly shouting. "How do think? He never lets up, Denni, he never
lets go. He had to embarrass them with their own lack of technical
knowledge. Do you think they appreciate that, especially when
every Terran hates Pendor so? When all we can do is envy you, your
bodies, wealth, power, and technology? When since forever we've
known that you were all immortal and we only got our own sort of
immortality years later? Denni, it's no wonder my parents hid that
from me, or their gengineers hid it from them." He sighed and sat
back in his chair, his headache getting much worse.
Denni's ears lay down against her head. "I'm sorry," she said.
"For what?" David snarled. "I didn't mean that... My head is
killing me."
He watched with a curious expression on his face as she walked
around the back of his chair and said, "May I?"
"Do what?" he asked.
"Give you a neckrub? My grandfather used to give me one when
my head hurt."
David closed his eyes and said, "Please."
Denni reached down placed her paws on his shoulders. She began
to gently rub, ruffling the reddish brown fur on the back of
David's neck, seeking out what she could of his tensions. "I'm
sorry," she said, "for telling you the truth. That's another thing
my grandfather used to tell me, that it's not always important to
tell the truth because you lose friends that way. What I wanted to
do was show you that you're wrong about Shardik, that he's not just
interested in... boffing... his kids." David laughed silently at
her "indelicate" vocabulary. "I mean, he really wants just to be
with people. It's loneliness, and the memories of loneliness, that
drive him. I mean, if he really was just interested in mechanical
sex, he could have made us all mindless idiots. Do you think I'm a
mindless idiot?"
David shook his head, trying not to interrupt her touch.
Although his head still hurt, it wasn't nearly as bad as it had
been when she had first walked into his office. His usual turmoil
in her presence was oddly missing, and he felt good about it.
An alarm went off. David recognized it instantly. "Fire," he
said, leaping out of the chair. "Damnit, that's a fire!" He
looked over the console and consulted the map. "Level three. The
galley! Let's go!"
He ran out the door, not waiting to see if Denni followed. He
heard footsteps behind him, assumed that that was her. He reached
level three, the alarms now screaming in his ears, rotating red
incandescent lights blazing every ten meters. He grabbed a fire
extinguisher from the wall, wondering where the internal AnaOx
system was. He threw open the door to the galley.
Whatever had ignited had started a blaze inside. The plastic
countertop by the ovens was burning brightly, and as he played the
fire extinguisher over it he realized he didn't have nearly enough
to douse the blaze. "Denni!" he shouted. There was no answer.
Where the hell was she? Where was the AnaOx?
The answer was immediate as a bright white gas erupted from the
floor and flooded the room. It struck the ceiling and swept over
everything, scavenging the oxygen from the room even faster than
the fire. David was standing on one of the vents, and the force of
its sudden expulsion toppled him, pushing him over. Impact with
the floor made him gasp, taking in a lungful of the gas. Fear
swept over him as he realized what it was he had breathed, and he
expelled as much as he could, but already he could feel his lungs
beginning to burn. He rose and made for the door. His head was
starting to spin, and he felt sick to his stomach. The door
opened.
The hallway was also full of the settling gas as he made his
way for the ladder. It was getting harder to think. He eyes
teared as he grabbed at a rung, trying to pull himself up. The
effort was enormous. He pulled another rung, and his body hurt,
his arms burned. His lungs screamed for another breath, and his
fingers let go of the ladder.
He fell back to the floor, painfully, into the swirling AnaOx.
It covered his vision, and then so did blackness.
- - -
"David?" He heard the voice from an eternity away.
There was a long silence as he was left alone, then the voice
returned. "David?" it said. He recognize the voice.
"Chico?" he asked, forcing his lips to move. They felt like
they were cast of clay.
"You're going to be just fine, David. You got a lungful of
AnaOx, and it's taken a while to purge your system. How do you
feel?"
"The ship?"
"There's nothing wrong with her. Just a little kitchen fire,
one we all handled badly."
David opened his eyes. They hurt, even in the lowered light of
sickbay. He looked up into Chico's face. "Good to see you again."
Chico laughed. "Don't thank me, David. Thank that Pendorian
girl. She's the one who saved your cojones." He gestured to the
other bed.
David glanced at the other bed, on which Denni sat, looking
nervous. "You saved me?" he asked.
"That she did," Chico continued, sweeping a lock of his
straight, black hair out of his eyes. "She walked right through
that AnaOx like it wasn't there and pulled you out of there. Threw
you over her shoulder and climbed the ladder like a trooper."
David looked over at her again. He held out one arm weakly in
her direction and said, "Thank you."
Denni leaned over slightly and took the hand. "You're
welcome," she said. "You Terrans, you think just because you have
Zaman transformation you're all as indestructible as we are."
Shaking her head slightly, she continued, "We know we're not
immortal, but we're harder to kill than you all are. You should
have known better than to run into the kitchen when you knew it was
going to flood with fire- control."
David sighed and said, "It wasn't that, Denni. I wanted to
save my ship."
"I know. Just be glad someone was there to pull you out." She
leaned over and gently kissed his throat, giving him a slight nip
as she did so. He recognized it as the Pendorian version of a kiss
to the forehead. "Get better," she said.
"I'll try." He watched her go with a wistful expression.
After the door had left he sagged back onto the bed, feeling
tired. Chico looked down at him with an amused expression. "She's
quite a hot looker, isn't she?"
David opened his eyes again to look at his chief Medical
officer and second gunner, remembering that Chico was from
Mahstitutta, a colony world that had been saved from starvation by
a massive starlift of supplies from Pendor, no conditions, no
questions asked.
"Frustrated that you can't get her attentions, Chico?" he
asked. Chico rarely had trouble attracting women. His sharp,
oriental features seemed to be a tractor-field for women. Unlike
Mickey, Chico just never put any effort into his womanizing.
"Hell, no," Chico replied. "Sleep with a Pendorian, David?
You know how often that happens? Not once in a lifetime, David."
He smiled. "Besides, she seems to like you. She slept the night
in that bunk, waiting for you, my rat friend."
David looked back at the door quickly to ensure it was still
closed. It was. He sighed and lay back. "Can I get some sleep,
Doc?"
Chico laughed and, in a mock-British accent, not unlike David's
"London Standard" that he'd picked up with his voice training, said
"As your doctor, it is my professional opinion that, once you have
received adequate rest, you are fit to return to duty." Chico's
smile widened as he spoke, and when he was done he broke out in a
laugh.
David laughed along and said "Goodnight, Chico."
"Goodnight, Captain."
- - -
"Pretty, isn't it?" he said, looking out the front window.
"Yah," Tasha replied. "llerkin, at last. Maybe I can get some
real chocolate here."
David laughed. "Too much of that will make you sick, Tash. Go
easy on it."
"I know. And you go easy on the women, David."
David laughed again, but this time the laugh was muted by
Tasha's gentle teasing. This was his ninth trip with Tasha as a
pilot. She was a good pilot, so good David had trouble figuring
out why she stayed with him when he paid so little. "I like the
company you keep," was all she had said when he'd asked. In all
that time, David had not once gone barhopping with his CMO or his
engineers, and he wasn't at all attracted to Patricia or any of the
many stewards he'd taken on in that time. He was actually somewhat
grateful that this trip his passenger holds were converted to hold
dry cargo. Passengers paid more, but it had been pleasant with
just his crew... and Denni. And if Tasha had any interest in him,
he hadn't seen it.
"Plot us a course and take us in. Fourth planet on the left."
He patted her shoulder in a friendly way and walked out, returning
to his office to look over the numbers. As it turned out, if he
managed to sell his free-trade material at 68% of commodity value
as he was getting over the intra-system Hoffman radio, he would
break even. David knew he could negotiate 80%, and at that
rate... He calculated the rate and realized that he might actually
have enough to pay the crew bonuses. That made him smile.
There was a knock at the door. He repeated the ritual "Come,"
and Denni walked in again. "Can I talk to you, Captain?"
"About?"
"We've reached llerkin and unless you intend on going to
Pendor, I'm getting off in a few hours." David looked her over
carefully. "I just wanted to thank you. It was... exciting."
He laughed wryly and said, "It was terrifying, Denni, for me as
well as for you."
She nodded. "Still, you have a good crew. Thanks for the
trip."
"That all?" he asked.
"That's all," she said, hesitantly. She rose and walked to the
door, putting her hand on the knob, then stopped, turned and said,
"I.. uhm, I wanted to know if you, uh, wanted me to finish that
neckrub I was giving you a few days ago."
David looked up at her, a dozen thoughts passing through his
mind in rapid succession. He tried to settle on one, found one
finally and said, "Just a neckrub...?"
She smiled, nervously, and said, "If that's all you want."
He looked up at her across his desk and nodded his head towards
here, a 'come hither' gesture. She nearly ran around his desk and
dropped into his lap. He let out a "Wuff!" She was heavier than
he'd expected.
Without saying a word, she leaned over him and kissed him
gently. David responded, opening his mouth slightly, feeling her
tongue rove over his two front teeth, the chisel teeth, and then
against his tongue in kind. He wrapped his arms around her and he
could feel her body shifting under the Rweave jumpsuit.
He pulled away from her slightly and said, "Denni... I want
you, but I don't understand why you would want me."
She looked down at him. "I don't either," she said. "I just
want you, David. Now?" She paused for a second. "Please?"
"Let's go into my cabin," he said. "It's more comfortable
there." Except, he told himself, I live like the bachelor I am,
and the place is a mess.
They walked out into the hallway, and Denni offered her paw.
David paused for a second. This was public, and holding hands with
a Pendorian in public tended to get one talked about. Then he
shook his head. This was just his crew. If any one of them saw,
so what? He doubted seriously any one of them would turn against
him just because they were holding hands. He took the offered paw,
and the two of them walked to his cabin.
"This is where you live?" Denni asked as they walked in.
"MyFa, but it's a disaster area."
David shrugged. "It's just cluttered. I don't leave food or
old laundry lying about. Nobody ever comes in here, except maybe
Chico, and his room looks like mine."
She smiled and pushed him against the bed. He sat down on.
"Well, now I'm in here. But I don't care what the room looks like.
Just it's owner." Bending over, she kissed him again.
He reached up with his hands and found the zipper securing her
jumpsuit. With an pull he eased it down past her belly until it
stopped, then slid a hand inside to touch her, to feel her thick,
rich fur against the pads of his paw. It felt silky and smooth,
not at all like his coarse, heavy fur, clipped short and tight.
Denni's hands found his jacket, tugging the small silver
buckles open, and he lowered his arms to allow her to ease it off
of him. Exposed as he was, the coolness of the room seeped in
through his fur and he was suddenly possessed with the desire to
have her near him, against him. He grabbed her by the waist and
pulled her around in a circle, against the edge of the bed until
she fell down next to him. She let out a "whoops!" as she fell.
He followed her fall and lay down by her side, snuggling close.
Her arms wrapped around him and held him close. He buried his
muzzle in the crook of her throat, nuzzling close and inhaling
deep, drinking in her musky, Mephit scent, sighing. Then an old
curiosity came to him and he said, "Denni?"
"Hmm?"
"Your ears... which Mephit racial trait is that?"
"Ictonyx," she said. "The others are Mephitis and Spilogale,
if that's what you're wondering. I got them from my father." She
laughed gently. "What makes you ask that now?"
He shrugged against her wonderful body. "Just curious. I
wondered about it the day you came on board, but I couldn't
remember the names."
She chuckled, her hands stroking along the length of his body.
He squirmed at her touch, moaning softly. "Ticklish, aren't we?"
she said.
"Very," he said. Actually, her touch was exciting him. "But I
like it," he said, encouraging her.
She fulfilled his hopes, running her paws against the grain of
his fur, making the nerves in his body sing. As her paws passed
over his bicep, he exploded in moans, involuntarily squirming to
get away from her, and she wrapped her legs around his, holding him
to her. He squirmed and groaned in her grip, her one arm holding
him to her chest solidly as she tickled him, just on the arm for a
short while then slowly making her way up to the fine fur on the
back of his neck. He shivered and groaned, burying his head in her
throat, trying not to scream.
She stopped. He let out a long sigh, sagging against her.
"You liked that, didn't you?" she said.
"Did I try to stop you?" he asked, still panting.
"No, but you did try to get away."
"But I didn't ask you to stop."
He felt her hand stroke against his groin, and he closed his
eyes with anticipation. "I guess you did like it," she said. He
heard the gentle ripping sound of velcro clasps giving way, and
felt her paw against his fur, his sex, gently closing her hand
around it. She smiled and said, "I know you liked it."
"Hard," he gasped, "Hard not to. Not with such a pretty
partner."
"Think so?" she said. "I don't know. I don't think I'm
pretty."
"You are," he said. "Oh, you are." He buried his muzzle
against her neck, rubbing his chin against her shoulder, nipping
her gently. She shuddered. "I like that," she said.
"Good," he said, the word muffled by her fur. He was falling
completely in love with her fur. He never would have fur like
this. He always thought of his own as rough, unpleasant.
She pushed against him gently, easing him away from her. He
looked up, worried for a brief instant that she was going to stop
things right here, but instead she just shrugged her way out of her
jumpsuit, tossing it aside. "How do I look?" she asked.
David's mouth went dry. Naked, she was gorgeous. Her tail
splayed out between her legs and down the bed, the tip quivering
slightly. Lying down, her breasts sank against gravity left and
right into two large mounds of fur, and the slight belly she had
when standing vanished, leaving her looking soft and lovely.
"God," he breathed, "your beautiful."
She smiled and said, "I'm fat."
"No, you're beautiful, Denni. I mean it." And he did. He
reached a hand out to touch her throat, easing down between her
breasts to her belly, pressing ever so slightly just to feel the
texture of her body. She sighed with pleasure as he did, squirming
almost unnoticeably.
"I'm glad you think so" She paused. "David?"
"Yeah?"
"Make love to me."
David looked along the length of her body, from her feet to her
eyes, then realized he still had his pants on. He kicked them off
quickly, trying not to look too anxious, then eased himself over
her body, between her thighs. With one easy push he slid inside
her.
"So good. So long," she sighed.
He smiled, feeling his need mount as they made love. Her hips
rose to meet his, her legs pressed against his sides. He leaned
over, smiling as he searched for her nipple at what he guessed was
the center of her breast, but there was so much fur it was hard to
tell.
"Feels so good," she said. "Gods, yes."
He found it, running his thin tongue around it quickly. He
could feel her bodyfur against his whiskers as he made love to her,
with her. She sighed a long "Yessss" as her body tensed and she
let out a small, deep groan of pleasure. David felt his own body
responding, becoming more tense, and when his climax hit him he
closed his eyes and tried not to scream. He didn't succeed.
He opened his eyes to look down at Denni. Her smile was happy
and her eyes were wild. "Yes, David, yes, thank you!" she said,
reaching up and pulling him down. He lay on top of her, holding
her fiercely.
After they had lain together for a while he said "Turn over."
"What?"
"Turn over. I want to do something." He rolled to the side
and off her body so she could. She complied, lying on her stomach.
He straddled her thighs and leaned over, digging his fingers under
her fur and rubbing the muscles of her shoulders. He pushed her
tail to his left and out of the way. "I want to return the favor
you did for me."
She sighed and said, "You're doing a good job." He took that
as a good sign and kept rubbing. As he did so, he felt his sex
responding to it's place, lying against her buttocks as it was, and
his excitement returned to him. He pivoted his hips against her
and pushed, entering her. "Again?" she asked with a whisper.
"Are you objecting?" he asked, smiling.
"Of course not, silly," she giggled, and as he stroked into her
the giggle dissolved into another sigh of pleasure.
This time he made love to her more slowly, enjoying the feeling
of her furry body against his, the tickling sensations as they
rubbed against each other. She lay her head against the pillow and
he delighted in her calm smile as he made love to her. This time
she was simply passive, letting him take his time, his pleasure.
He felt that pleasure mount again, and this time his climax wasn't
quite so loud.
"Like that?" she asked.
"Better than the first time," he replied with a laugh.
"Really?" she asked. "Why?"
He shrugged, lying against her back. "Dunno. It just was. I
guess I got to concentrate more."
She chuckled. "Let me turn over?"
They shifted apart, and he reached over to shut off the cabin
light. Then he returned to her, snuggling close, lying against her
side.
David tried to sort out the thoughts in his head. It was all a
jumble, and his brain didn't want to deal with a jumble just now.
He was still happy, enjoying this chance to touch and hold her,
since this would be the last time he'd see her, probably forever.
And other thoughts came to mind, thoughts he didn't want to deal
with. His musing was interrupted.
"David?" she asked quietly.
"Yeah?"
"When I first came on, you said you didn't hire Pendorians.
Why not?"
"Two reasons," he said quietly. Her question set a whole new
train of thoughts in motion, ones which brought to mind emotions he
didn't want to deal with. But he continued talking. "One was
tradition. I mean, even before you told me about that UN order, I
tried to stick with tradition and claimed to dislike Pendorians.
Terra doesn't like Pendor and that's that."
There was a long silence, and finally Denni asked, "And the
other reason?"
Another long silence. "I don't know why I feel safe telling
you this," he said, "but I do. When I was eleven years old-- And
you have to realize that rats grow up physically a lot faster than
most species-- I met my first fur-fetishist. He couldn't have
been, oh, more than sixteen himself. And he started coming on to
me, and I didn't know how to deal with it. It was at one of those
game arcades, you know, the kind most kids go to." He felt Denni
nod. "When I realized what he was talking about, I ran away from
him, ran home. And I told my mater, and she told me that what I
did was the right thing."
"But what got to me was just how _angry_ I felt. Not
frightened, angry. Because even though I was only eleven, I knew
that what that kid wanted was wrong. Not because I was too young,
or he was, or because we were both male, but because what he wanted
was just my fur. That was all he was after. He didn't care about
me. Just my fur." He paused again. "And if that was the kind of
attitude that created Pendor, I wanted no part of Pendor, or its
products."
She sighed and snuggled him close, hugging him tight. "Well I
hope you don't think of us as products."
"Not you. And probably not Pendor in general." He sighed.
"I'd really like to meet Shardik, but then I guess most people want
to."
"It could be arranged."
"How so? You're just another Pendorian. There must be
millions of _you_ who want to meet him."
"Except there aren't millions of Satpulovs."
"What do you mean?"
"Remember my grandfather I was talking about?" David nodded.
"My grandfather was Aaden Satpulov."
The name took a few seconds to register in David's brain.
"Shardik's lover? You're related to Shardik himself?"
Denni nodded. "I grew up at the Castle."
David shifted away from her and looked her in the face,
carefully. "Are you telling me your..."
"My last name is really Shardik. I don't use it, obviously."
"Obviously," David said, shuddering gently.
They were silent for a while. "You're afraid of me, aren't
you?"
David looked up at her and said, "It's hard not to be, Denni.
I want you to stay, to be with you, but I know I won't be able to
hold your hand in public, because species-mixing is really
considered 'cool' if it's just sex. But I'm not allowed to fall in
love with you. Especially not if you're a Pendorian." He sighed.
"And getting beyond dealing with _my_ people, what about yours?"
Denni sighed. "I know what you're thinking. And you're
probably right. If I were to get hurt, or wounded, Pendor would
have starships to us so fast... " She laughed. "Think of it as
insurance."
"I guess," he replied. He shook his head quietly and lay
against her. Despite his misgivings, he was still fascinated by
her.
"David?" she asked.
"Huh?"
"You said 'I'm not allowed to fall in love with you.' Are
you?"
David felt the heat of embarrassment return to the tips of his
ears. "Did I say that?"
"Yes, you did."
David couldn't think of any diplomatic way to word it. "Then
yes, I meant it. I am falling in love with you, Denni."
She smiled. "Remember that scene over the fusion plant?"
"Yeah?"
"I wanted you then. But I couldn't come up with how to tell
you. I think I love you, too."
"You think?" he chided playfully.
"Let me keep thinking about it."
"We make dock in--" he looked over at the clock-- "forty six
hours. Long enough?"
"We'll see," she replied, snuggling him close and kissing him.
David reached down and pulled up the blankets. Rat's tails don't
have fur, and his was getting cold.
--
"Journal Entry 179 / 0916 [ Rats And Engineers ]"
The Journal Entries of Kennet R'yal Shardik, et. al., and Related Tales
are copyright (C) 1989-1995 Elf Mathieu Sternberg. Redistribution of
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