Aurora Awakening – Part 5

 

The next week was torment, sure, but a different kind that it had been before. It was kind of fun, if I’m truthing.

Fa knew she had me, and recked it was just a matter of getting me to break. I most likely would have gone completely off-plumb if I hadn’t seen Fa looking at me that night – she was hopnear merciless. But I’d scanned how things stood now, and I nothing was going to make me abandon my plan, even Fa.

I sure enjoyed her trying, though.

Now that Fa knew I was sparky for her, she did everything she could get in my path. She found reasons to brush past me in tight corridors and leaned over my shoulder to watch me work, holding her cheek so close to mine that I could feel the heat radiating from her skin and letting her breasts brush against my back.

She pretended to forget her fresh linen ration and left it on the bed so that I’d have to come into the shower and give her towel to her. I’m not shamed to say I was close to dropping the whole thing and giving in right then. She looked perfect – shining with tiny water droplets and leaning just so against the shower door as I came in.

I pretended to still be shying away, of course, but I let myself have the pleasure of looking at her just enough to let the color creep into my cheeks – I recked seeing me react to her would stoke Fa’s engines, and it did. I made to scurry out quick like I would have before, but Fa playfully grabbed me by my shirt, pulled me toward her, and said “Thanks, Chief,” before dropping a little kiss on my cheek.

The look in her eyes when I just nodded and left was worth a week of station leave.

She was smart enough to know that just being naked around me would lose its power, so the devious little squib kept finding reasons to be half-dressed or in the middle of dressing as much as possible. If I was tinkering with mirrors on my bed, she found a reason to be reading on the floor with her shirt seam undone low. And of course she came over occasionally to bend way over and ask me how things were going.

I recked two could play at that game, so one night after Jamila had nailed me hard at spinhockey, I managed to be twisting around trying to smear antibruise on myself, high on my ribcage on my side, just as Fa got back to the cabin. As brazen as she’d been and as lightquick as she offered to help, I still felt Fa’s fingers tremble when she first touched me.

Fa had been chattering at me again lately, for which I was sore grateful, but we both got quiet as she smoothed the salve over my skin. Fa offered to massage my back and shoulder out – just so I wouldn’t be sore in the morning – and for once I let her, just to keep her hands on me. For just a second, I wondered about getting one of the fauna biologists into the cabin to take a pheromone count. I reck the place would have pegged her meter.

It almost wasn’t fair. I knew what was up, so I could give in to feeling how surprisingly strong Fa’s hands were, and how gently she used them on me. But poor Fa just about unspooled. She was inches away – one pass of her hand – from something that would either shatter all the pretense and finally have us kissing each other or get her fired and sent home in a stasis capsule.

On the other hand, when I thought about how just that afternoon she’d used the excuse of an overpacked lift to press up against me and gently roll her hips back and forth, I recked she deserved it.

Fa and Tazuma were deep in conversation at morning mess the next day, and I smiled into my caff because now I knew why – Tazuma was a friend, someone she could slide secrets to, not a lover. And if she was in any way responsible for the little gambits Fa was coming up with lately, I owed her a drink.

It wasn’t all teasing and quivering, though. Fa’s scratch near ruthless attempts to break me during the day – and what looked like some sort of noble resistance on my part – made her tender with me in unguarded moments. She found an excuse to bunk down after I did every night that week. Fa still thought I was a heavy sleeper, so she took the small risk of touching me, just once, before she bunked down herself. One night she stroked my hair, lightly as you can imagine, and on another she traced her fingers across my cheek. One night I felt her sit on the edge of the bunk and I had a sparky hope that she’d just lie down and sleep there with me. I’d calculated it out ages ago and recked she’d fit just perfectly with her head cuddled just below mine and my arm around her.

The day before we blasted planet, one of the skiff pilots did a low run over the area we’d been collecting from and sent a realtime scan up for everyone to watch. They played it on the huge screen in the main rec area and Fa and I went as a late mess break. We stood together, almost close enough for our shoulders to touch, and watched as beautiful green hills and meadows rolled by, then laughed at the lurching feeling when the pilot swooped back and forth to follow the path of a river.

The skiff pilot dove into a clearing in the woods and then she hovered there for a minute, slowly circling so we could see how strange and tall the trees were. As she gradually lifted the skiff up, up, up and back out into the sun, I realized that Fa and I were standing shoulder to shoulder, arm to arm. I recked anyone looking thought we were just being companionable, but you wouldn’t have made much scrap trying to sell that to the nerves up and down the right side of my body.

The skiff wheeled out and came down over the mass of huge leafy plants Fa and I had walked though. They looked hopnear magical in the late afternoon sun, and I felt Fa’s fingers twine through mine. I tried to control my pulse rate as the pilot circled the little lake. I could feel Fa looking at me, but I kept my eyes front. I knew I was only barely keeping myself soldered. No way either of us was thinking about a thing except for Fa naked underneath me and my thigh between hers.

The pilot pulled away and sped up to head for some nearby foothills, but Fa and I didn’t drop hands until the scan was done. When I finally turned and looked at her, she was scratch near ready to give up the game. Her cheeks were pink and her eyes were huge, looking up at me and just aching to go ahead and ask. I had to get out of there, so I told her gentle-gruffly to get back on shift, but then she looked so sad and confused that I couldn’t leave it at that.

“We have a full load to rack to get ready for tomorrow, Fa,” I said, looking into those big blue eyes, “but I promise you’ll enjoy it when we get there.”

Fa brightened a little, but if possible she looked even more confused than she had been. I touched her forearm and left the rec area as cool as you please, but hopnear broke into a run once I cleared the door.

I wasn’t kidding about the load of work we had, either. I spent the afternoon on the run to every section of the ship, checking to make sure no one had any last-minute requests and doing my best to rig something up for those who did. There were plenty of last-minute fixes up in Nav and on the bridge, as there always are. I was prepped for that, but making myself seem just a little busier than I really was helped me call in a favor or two.

The next day was set, and I recked it would be perfect.

I’d put Fa down in the big bay, supervising a team of engine grunts to make sure everything was shipshape before we blasted. She was still down there when I stuck my head in to check on her, and I recked she was doing a fine job. She made it clear she was leading a team that she was a part of, not an interloper who’d come in to give shouts, and she was using her brains and power to get her shouts followed, not her prettiness. I was so proud of her I was fit to blam.

I leaned back so I could watch Fa without interfering. Elspeth, an engine grunt I’d scrumbled with once or twice when we were both feeling unspooled caught the way I was looking at Fa and gave me a raised purple eyebrow and a grin. I tried to look innocent, but Elspeth just laughed and nodded her approval.

Well, hellscratch, I recked anyone who cared would find out soon anyway.

Once we hit evening mark, I had Fa give her last shouts to the team and then pulled her off – fixers get so busy when we blast planet that it’s against regs for us to work at all the night before. And that’s one set of regs I follow.

Fa and I had an unusually unrushed dinner at evening mess, then headed back to the cabin. I recked I had holes in my skull from the way she’d been staring at me. She knew something was up, but sure wasn’t making any scrap figuring it out.

I kicked back with a datastack of checklists to review before the mandatory preblast early lights out, but Fa wasn’t having it. She chattered at me, asking relevant questions about her first real shift in the key room, but also trying to figure out what I had idling in the back of my mind. I couldn’t help but grin as she asked me questions from every direction, trying to inkle what was up.

Finally, still asking questions and still looking me right in the eye, Fa stood up and peeled off her fullsuit. Slowly, making sure to bend over as she stepped out of the legs, so I could see down her tank. Then her tank, bra and skivs went. I’d steeled myself for that sort of thing, but I knew my cheeks were flushing, and my breathing wasn’t as steady as I would have liked.

Fa bent over to pick everything up then walked over to bundle it into the hamper. I recked I’d made it through the show, but then Fa sat down opposite me on her bunk and pulled out a bottle of lotion, and she began smoothing it over every inch of her pretty white skin, still talking, and smiling at me now, knowing she was gaining top hand. She reached her breasts and I watched her nipples stand and strain toward me.

I pretended to find something interesting in my datastack so I wasn’t looking right at her, but Fa knew she’d gotten me. She was smoothing the lotion over herself slowly, enjoying my agitation as much as the feeling of it against her skin, I reck. She kept chattering to pull my attention in her direction, then finally snapped on her reading light, snapped off the main, and said, “What do you think, Chief?”

I looked up and lost my breath again. The lotion made Fa look like she had a sheen of tiny diamonds all over her skin. It made her look like she was sparkling in perfect moonlight. I knew Fa had never been in real moonlight, and that was a shame. I recked it might be worth taking a real shore leave to walk through some with her.

“Well?” she asked, lifting up on her toes a bit and twirling around. And then she giggled at my first try at answering because my mouth had gone dry.

“Real nice, Fa,” I managed. “You look hoppretty.”

“Just pretty?” she asked with a beckoning little smile.

“Beautiful, if I’m truthing.”

Fa took a step toward me, and I wanted her to keep on stepping more than anything I’d ever thought of.

But if I gave in now, we’d both be up for hours. And one thing the Aurora couldn’t afford was to have both her engineers off-plumb on the morning of a planet blast.

It took every bit of will I had, but I turned and tucked myself into my own bunk and snapped off my reading light.

“Lights out, Fa. We both need to be at full charge in the morning.”

Fa stared at me with her mouth open. She’d been sure she had me.

“We both have to be ready for the key room tomorrow, Fa,” I said, and then I added, gently as I could without giving too much away, “You’ll like it more than you reck. I promise.”

Fa stared at me in disbelief for just another nano, then slipped between her sheets completely naked, making sure I got a good look at what I was missing as I did so.

Like any good fixer, I couldn’t resist one last little tweak:

“And make sure you get some real sleep tonight.”

I scrunched my eyes up tight, but I know Fa whipped her head around to stare at me before she snapped off her light.