Chapter 3: Bunk time
The credits from the Sslyssian demonstration bought us thirty cycles of pure, uncomplicated weirdness. No clients, unless Teela found someone “fascinating,” which usually meant something that wouldn’t pay.A gelatinous, psychic empath who communicated through shared emotional echoes? Fascinating.A cyber-augmented ex-miner whose hydraulic limbs needed constant calibration? That was just my day job.I didn’t mind. Seeing her curious, her large eyes wide with some new, inexplicable wonder, was its own reward.
My reputation as the fix-it guy who didn’t panic when a Grav-Nacelle spat plasma or a bio-filter gave birth to something aggressive solidified. The regular paycheck started. It felt strange, after so long living job-to-job, to see a number increment in my account every ten cycles with robotic consistency.
The offer of staff quarters came from Grimshaw, the grizzled, three-eyed chief of engineering. He found me wrist-deep in the guts of a malfunctioning sewerage recycler, a job no one else would touch.
“Hardin,” he grunted, his lower eye blinking against the foul smell. “You’re not squeamish. That’s useful.”
“Comes with the invulnerability,” I said, pulling a clog of unidentifiable fibrous muck from a pipe. “Can’t catch anything.”
“Hmm.Also useful.The department’s expanding. We need people who won’t flee a minor hull breach.You’re on permanent roster. Starts next cycle.” He tossed a data-chip at my chest.It pinged harmlessly off my sternum. “Staff quarters are in the Torus, section seven.Your own cabin. Don’t make a mess of it.”
He left before I could thank him. I wiped my hands, the slime vaporizing off my skin from my own body heat, and slotted the chip into my dataslate. A schematic bloomed.Two rooms.A private sanitation unit.A real, isolated environmental control panel. It wasn’t just a space; it was a domain.
I worked the rest of my shift with a new rhythm in my thoughts.I’d tell her tonight. I imagined her reaction—the bubbly excitement, the playful speculation about where she’d secrete her jelly-bed. I wanted to give her this.A place that was ours, not a rented closet she paid for with performances.
When I returned to our pulsating cocoon, she was in a state of perfect, optimized equilibrium. Her body was the ideal she’d crafted for me: a soft, inviting hourglass, her breasts full but not overly heavy, her hips wide, her ass a delightful, plush curve. She’d mastered the absorption rate, it seemed. The nightly feedings no longer left her swollen for hours; she processed it more efficiently, maintaining this lush, sustainable form. It was like she’d tuned herself to my production schedule.
“Long one today,” she said, floating over from where she’d been molding a bit of wall into a swirling, abstract sculpture. She pressed herself against me, her coolness a perfect contrast to the day’s accumulated warmth. I could feel the faint, eager pull of her, even through my clothes.“You’re buzzing. Fix something big?”
“Something like that,” I murmured into her hair, which smelled of ozone and that faint, sweet metallic rain. “I have news. But I want to tell you… properly.”
A glint sparked in her large, expressive eyes.She understood my language.“Demanding a ritual, are we? You’ve gotten spoiled, Ron.” Her fingers traced the waistband of my pants. “I suppose I can arrange a proper audience.”
She led me to the center of the room, where the floor was softest. She didn’t assume a pose; she simply flowed, her body rearranging itself with a soft, wet sound into a perfect lotus position, hovering slightly above the undulating gel. She opened herself, a smooth, seamless invitation. The interior of her channel glowed with a soft, promising blue light.I undressed slowly, letting the anticipation build. My cock, already thickening, lifted in the cool air, its sheer density always a slight surprise even to me. I stepped forward, and she reached down with a shaped hand to guide me in.The feeling was sublime. She’d optimized this, too. Her inner walls were silkier than ever, but with a subtle, textured ripple that mimicked perfect musculature. It was tight, a snug, glorious pressure from tip to base, but it yielded exactly where I needed it to. She was a bespoke instrument, and I was the only musician.I sank down into my own lotus, facing her, our bodies joined at the core. She began to move, a slow, undulating rise and fall, her translucent flesh allowing me a perfect view. My cock, thick and dark, was sheathed within her glowing blue-green, pulsing slightly with my heartbeat. It was a profoundly intimate pornography, a secret show only we could see so completely.I placed my hands on her hips, feeling the cool, resilient firmness of her. She set a lazy, devastating rhythm, her eyes locked on mine, her cartoonish lips parted in a soft smile.“Now?” she breathed, her internal muscles giving a gentle, milking squeeze. “Is this proper enough for your big news?”
The visual, the physical sensation, the closeness—it was the perfect moment.I took a deep breath.
“So, they put me on staff in the engineering department,” I said, my voice a little rough. I thrust up gently, meeting her downward slide.“Regular paycheck every ten cycles. No more getting paid by the job.”
Her rhythm hitched.“Oh.” Her eyes widened, not with surprise, but with calculation. Money, for her, was freedom, curiosity-fuel.This was good news.
“And,” I continued, holding her gaze, my hands tightening on her, “I get issued a proper cabin. Two full rooms and a private bathroom.”
She stopped moving entirely, frozen above me, impaled on my length. Her internal glow flickered, a brief surge of amber confusion amidst the blue. Through her translucent lower abdomen, I could see the outline of where I ended inside her, a fascinating, obscene snapshot.
“A… cabin?” she whispered.
“I’d like you to move in with me.” The words hung in the ozone-sweet air.I surged up into her stillness, emphasizing the point. “You can see… clients that you find interesting if you still want.I don’t mind. But you don’t have to keep paying for this closet. This can be ours.”
For a long moment, she just stared. Her face, usually so fluid in its expressions, was unreadable, a cartoon mask.Then, a tremor went through her. It started deep inside, where we were joined, a quick, fluttering series of contractions that made me groan. It spread outwards, a cascade of ripples across her skin. Her glow intensified, blazing from a soft blue to a vibrant, electric cyan.She wasn’t just processing my semen; she was processing the offer.
With a sudden, fluid motion, she leaned forward, wrapping her arms around my neck, her forehead resting against mine. Our connected bodies forced her even tighter onto me. “You want to house me?” she asked, her voice bubbling with emotion. “Like a… a pet?”
“No,” I said firmly, thrusting up into her, making her gasp.“Like a partner. Like the reason I bother getting out of bed in this rusty tin can.I want to give you a space. A real one.Our own gravity.”
She pulled back, searching my face. The bratty tease was gone, replaced by a raw, ancient vulnerability. Eighty years of floating, adapting, feeding, and surviving flashed in her large eyes.No one had ever offered her a gravity.
Then, the playfulness returned, but softer, more real. She began to move again, a slow, deep, loving rhythm. “Two rooms, you said?”
“Yeah.”
“I want the bigger one.”
I laughed, the sound catching in my throat as she clenched down particularly hard. “Deal.”
“And I’m keeping some clients.The interesting ones.The poets. The ones with unique… biochemical outputs.”
“I expect nothing less.”
“And you…” she said, her voice dropping to a husky, possessive whisper as she leaned close again, her breath cool on my lips, “…you will continue to be my primary.My foundation. My feast.” She rolled her hips, a slow, grinding circle that made my vision blur.“This happens every morning.And every night. Cabin or closet, that is non-negotiable.”
“It’s the best part of my day,” I groaned, my control starting to fray. The confession, the emotion, the physical perfection of her—it was all coalescing into a tight, urgent coil in my groin.
“Show me,” she demanded, her movements becoming more urgent, more demanding. “Show me what you’ll be bringing home to our new cabin.Claim it. Claim me.”
That was all the invitation I needed. My hands gripped her hips, and I took over, driving up into her with deep, piston-like strokes. The visual was insane, obscene, beautiful—my thick cock plunging in and out of her glowing form, each thrust visibly distending her inner walls before disappearing deep inside.I felt the first, unstoppable surge building. “Teela…”
“Do it,” she hissed, her body starting to glow incandescently. “Fill our new home!”
The orgasm wasn’t a release; it was a declaration. A thick, hot rope of cum shot deep into her core, visible through her skin as a blooming cloud of white. She cried out, her back arching, her channel clamping down in rhythmic, endless spasms.And I kept coming. The endless reservoir unleashed, jet after jet pumping into her, a symbolic endowment.She swelled. Not with the starved, desperate distension of before, but with a lush, proud fullness. Her stomach rounded, a smooth, taut dome pushing forward, filled with the tangible proof of my commitment. Her breasts grew heavier, fuller, swaying with each of my thrusts. Her hips widened further, becoming a cradle for the abundance I gave her.
I fucked her through the entire, shuddering, thirty-minute cataclysm, until we were both spent, a glowing, overfilled goddess trembling in the arms of her utterly drained, invulnerable man. We collapsed together onto the soft floor, a tangled, sticky, radiant mess.
Later, as she lay partially absorbed, her form returned to that optimized, beautiful curve, she traced patterns on my chest. “When do we see it?” she asked, her voice sleepy, sated.“Tomorrow. After my shift.”
“Good.” A pause. “Ron?”
“Yeah?”
“Thank you.” The words were simple, devoid of her usual theatrical flair.They meant everything.The next day crawled by. My repairs on a faulty plasma conduit felt trivial. My mind was in the Torus, in Section Seven, imagining where she’d put her… whatever she put places. Grimshaw grumbled about my distracted air, but his third eye held a knowing glint.Finally, the shift ended. I found her waiting outside the engineering bay, having shaped herself into a surprisingly conservative—for her—approximation of a station jumpsuit.It was still translucent and hinted at her curves, but it was an effort. It made my chest ache.
We took the central transit tube, her clinging to my arm, her head on a swivel, taking in every sight. “I haven’t been to the staff Torus in ages,” she whispered.“It’s so… clean.”
It was. The sterility was a shock after the organic, pulsating life of our closet and the grimy bustle of the lower decks.The door to Cabin 7-G hissed open at my dataslate’s command.
It was empty, echoing, and spotless. Two rectangular rooms connected by an archway, bare metal walls, a closed door to the san-unit, and a floor of neutral gray composite. A viewport looked out onto the swirling, silent gemfield of the Arcturus Nebula. It was austere.It was perfect.Teela drifted inside, her footsteps silent. She moved through the rooms like a ghost, trailing a finger along a wall. Her touch left a faint, shimmering, blue-green residue that quickly faded.She was testing the canvas.
“This one,” she announced, pointing to the larger rear room.“Mine.You can have the one with the view. You appreciate static beauty.I prefer to create my own.”
I smiled. “Fair.”
She turned to face me, her jumpsuit dissolving into her default, glowing form. She looked at the blank, sterile room, then at me, and a slow, wicked grin spread across her face. “It’s very… bare, don’t you think? Needs some homey touches.”
“What did you have in mind?”
Instead of answering, she walked to the center of her chosen room, knelt, and placed both palms flat on the floor. A deep, resonant hum filled the cabin, vibrating up through my feet. From her hands, a wave of her essence flowed out, not a puddle, but a living, spreading stain.It seeped into the metal, changing its color, its texture. The gray composite became a shimmering, deep blue gel that pulsed softly with its own light. It spread up the walls in creeping, vein-like patterns, transforming them into the familiar, breathing, jelly-like substance I knew so well.The ceiling softened, becoming a canopy of gentle bioluminescence.
In minutes, her room was a perfect replica of our old closet, but bigger, the pulsing more regular and serene.The sweet ozone-metallic scent filled the space.She had imported our world.
She stood, looking pleased with herself.“Better.”
“Much,” I agreed.
She glided into my room, the front room.She placed a single hand on the wall next to the viewport. Her essence spread from her touch, but this time it formed a intricate, fractal pattern, like a frozen blue-green lightning bolt or a delicate alien ivy. It framed the nebula perfectly, a living frame for the dead light of distant stars.She left the floor and the other walls bare.
“A compromise,” she said.“Your space. Our space.” She floated back to me, wrapping her cool arms around my neck.“Now, there’s a tradition. A housewarming.” Her large eyes glinted.“We must properly christen the new territory. Every corner.” Her gaze drifted meaningfully toward the still-pristine sanitary unit.“Especially the wet ones.”