“Me, too, though it’s not my favorite way for us to work together...”

  She bumped into me, and the two of us drifted together like two planetary bodies caught in an orbital dance. I smiled and rested a hand against her side, steadying her before she drifted away again. She leaned in, and for a moment, our lips almost touched.

  “We’re not done yet,” she whispered.

  A force like a giant hand hit me in the gut, and I was flung back across the room. Jade waved her force gun and laughed.

  “You low-down, sneaky...”

  I bounced off the wall and back toward her, flinging blasts of light and of air, throwing her around and disorienting her. She laughed and fired wildly as I hurtled past. I grabbed her collar as I went, and the two of us tangled around each other, wrestling for dominance.

  “What else did you learn down there?” she asked as she squirmed out of my grip and swung her laser club around.

  “That we’re more connected to this war than we thought.” I blocked her strike with an air shield, and as it spun Jade’s weapon aside, it flung her about, too.

  “How?” She tossed a light grenade to keep me occupied while she steadied herself.

  “Someone from Earth encouraged Gerdrun’s coup.”

  “Someone from Earth? Why would a human want to start an alien civil war?”

  We flew around each other, me using wind walking to guide me, Jade using a motor attached to her belt. As we passed, we exchanged blows as well as words.

  “Power maybe,” I said. “A politician who wants chaos out here before they send humanity to the stars.”

  “Profit, more like.” Jade fired her force gun, then held it possessively against her chest. “Some corporation has thought about all the lovely toys they could make with alien tech, and they see a war as a chance to grab some of it.”

  “Or to sell our tech to the aliens. Who knows which of our weapons could be useful.”

  “Maybe it’s a religious thing.”

  “What sort of religious thing?”

  “I don’t know, I’m just looking for ideas. I always think of tech, figured I should broaden my mind.”

  My earth sword smashed against her laser club as we fought each other to a standstill. Our melee had taken us to the edge of the room, and we rested against the wall, panting and sweaty, satisfied by the workout.

  “That was good,” Jade said, tapping her club against the force gun. “Thanks for giving me a chance to test these out.”

  “Thanks for giving me a chance to try out my new magic.”

  “It’s good when everybody ends the session satisfied.” She smiled and tapped the gun against my chest. “Though maybe there’s an even more satisfying option...”

  She leaned in, and I tensed, half expecting to get shot again, but this time she did kiss me.

  “I’m filthy,” she said, wiping sweat from her brow. “And so are you. I think it’s time we found out how the showers work on a spaceship.”

  Chapter 11

  Jade and I floated along the corridors toward the part of the ship where our quarters lay. She went ahead of me, her purple hair drifting around her head like a neon cloud. Dressed in her form-fitting superhero suit, the contours of her petite body were on display, and I enjoyed watching those curves. From the way she looked back over her shoulder, eyes half-closed and lips parted, I got the clear idea that she was enjoying watching me watching her.

  As we approached our quarters, she slowed down and took my hand before opening the door to her berth.

  “You coming in?” she asked in a sultry voice.

  “I thought you wanted to get cleaned up?” I asked with a grin.

  “Maybe I want some help with that. Or maybe I want to get properly dirty first.”

  She started slowly unzipping the front of her suit while drifting back through the open doorway. I followed her in and closed the door firmly behind us.

  Jade kept slowly drawing down the zipper, revealing her pert breasts and then the flatness of her belly. Her pale skin was decorated with a riot of tattoos.

  “Help me with this,” she said, turning in the air.

  Floating behind her, I wrapped my arms around and ran my hands across her breast, causing her to take a deep, excited breath. Then I caught the edges of her outfit and peeled it back, across her shoulders, down her arms and torso. As I drew it down, I kissed the skin that I exposed, running my lips down her back and the images inked there, tasting the salt of her skin.

  The super suit slid off her hips, revealing that she was wearing nothing underneath, and she kicked her legs free, eager to be bare. Having kissed my way down her back, I was facing her waist, and as she rotated in the air, her womanhood came into view. I ran my tongue across her mound, and she gasped in pleasure as I toyed with her.

  “Not fair,” she moaned. “You’re not naked.”

  “We can fix that.”

  By the time I’d shrugged off my outer robes, Jade was waiting eagerly for me. She practically tore off my T-shirt, then slid her hands through the waistband of my pants and took hold of my member, which was already ramrod stiff at the sight and taste of her.

  “Well,” she said, sliding down me with one hand, while with the other she slipped off my pants. “Somebody’s ready for action.”

  “For you?” I asked. “Always.”

  Our lips met, and we kissed, tongues slowly twisting together while we ran our hands over each other. Her movements became more urgent, and she pressed herself against me. I grabbed hold of her hips, ready to slide inside.

  “Not yet,” she whispered. “Alien shower, remember? That’s too good an opportunity to miss.”

  My pulse was racing, and I was throbbing with desire to have her, but I could wait a little longer for a session with an extra thrill. Taking my hand, she led me through the doorway into the small bathroom of her berth, where a glass-walled cubicle stood in the corner. We floated in, and a door hissed shut behind us.

  There was just about room for the two of us in the shower, and we were more than happy to be forced close together. Our hands kept running over each other as we looked at the alien controls.

  “I wonder what they do,” Jade said.

  “You’re the machine expert,” I said. “Shouldn’t you know?”

  “Machines, not alien languages.” Jade shrugged. “Let’s see what this does.”

  She pressed a button and warm streams of air blew out of the walls. They ran across my skin like a gentle massage.

  “I think that’s for drying off,” I said. “Maybe we should try something else?”

  I reached for the controls, but Jade stopped me.

  “Oh no,” she said. “I’ve found a current in just the right place.” She smiled as the current rippled the short hair between her legs. “Oh, that’s good.”

  She bent her knees and drifted down, closer to the origin of the current, smile widening as she went until she was level with my waist. Then she stopped, her breath running deep in pleasure as the machine worked at her, and ran her tongue around my length, then slid her lips down to take me in.

  I watched her perfect, petite body floating in front of me and ran a hand through her hair, encouraging her as she worked me, using her pierced tongue to great effect.

  The pleasure was mounting in me, but so was the desire to have her. She could tell by my moans because she looked up at me with a mischievous smile.

  “After something more?” she asked.

  “We are meant to be getting cleaned.”

  I hit a button, and soapy bubbles came streaming out of the walls. Jade laughed and floated up until we were face to face, hidden from the world in a growing cloud of foam. She blew the bubbles away from my face, then leaned in to kiss me. She wrapped her legs around my waist and lowered her hips, sinking onto me.

  We both moaned in pleasure as I slid inside her, then more as she moved her hips, the two of us sliding soapily against each other. I ran my fingers across her slippery body, over her back and ass and breasts, over every dip and swell of her skin, and she giggled in excitement.

  We wrapped our arms around each other and floated in a cloud of bliss as the pleasure rose in both of us, and our movements became ever more urgent. I grabbed Jade’s ass, and her fingers dug into my back as she clung on tight.

  Jade cried out in pleasure, and her body tightened around me as she came.

  “Oh God, oh God, yes!”

  She slammed a hand against the wall, accidentally triggering one of the buttons. Streaming bubbles were replaced by jets of water. She arched her back, and one of the jets sprayed across her chest, running down between her breasts, washing bubbles across her tattoos and down to where our bodies joined.

  Hair plastered to her head, she clung to the wall as I kept pushing in and out, my body tense with pleasure, every nerve straining toward the point of release. Jade’s body was a thing of beauty, the play of light through water across her tattoos, the way they accentuated her shape. I gripped her hips tight as I pushed faster, harder.

  Then Jade pushed me off, grinning that mischievous grin of hers.

  “I want to see what else these jets can achieve.”

  She spun around in the zero-gravity space until one of the water jets was aimed right between her legs, then she brought her lips to my member again. She moaned, and her eyelids fluttered as the machine massaged her while I groaned in excitement as her lips ran across my rigid flesh, and her tongue toyed with my tip. I was so hard I thought I might explode, grabbing onto the wall and onto Jade as my pleasure rose.

  Her lips pressed warm around me. Her tongue darted and danced. I clutched her hair tight. Then she cried out in excitement just as a great wave of physical pleasure ran through me. I shot my load across Jade’s lips and down her chest.

  Jade laughed. “At least we’re in the right place to clean that up.”

  She turned to run one of the jets across her front, washing the mess away. I wrapped my arms around her from behind, pressing our bodies together, and she turned her head so that I could kiss her over her shoulder.

  “That was amazing.” Her voice was a soft moan. “We should stay in space forever.”

  She found the button for the air streams. There was a real pleasure in feeling that warm artificial wind across my skin while I was still tingling from our encounter. I closed my eyes and floated in the air, letting the machine caress me. Then, once we were both dry, Jade opened the door to the shower, and we both floated out.

  We drifted from the bathroom out into her cabin. The air was warm, and no one else was around, with no prospect of being needed any time soon, so we just floated there naked in each other’s arms, Jade gasping and giggling as I traced the shapes of her tattoos with my fingertips.

  “In some ways, I wish we could stay out here together, too,” I said. “It would be pretty sweet, flying from planet to planet, seeing sights no human being has ever encountered, exploring the limitless possibilities of fucking without gravity.”

  “And the machines,” Jade said. “Not for the sex, though I’m sure there’s potential there, but the galaxy still has so many more different devices for me to learn about. I could live my life out here and never get bored.”

  “Maybe you really could do that.”

  “Just me?” She looked at me with a smile that was just a little sad. “You’re giving up on this dream already?”

  “I have responsibilities back on Earth.”

  “You don’t have your geas anymore.” She ran her fingers across the ghostly shape on my chest where my own tattoo had been—the magical tattoo that bound me to my mission. “Ashbearer’s gone. You can make what you like of your life now.”

  I shook my head. “Lord Lector’s still back there, and as a representative of my own world, I feel responsible for protecting yours from him. But even if it wasn’t for that, I’d want to go back. We might not have been doing it all that long, but our mission as the Offenders matters to me. I want to keep pushing us on, to keep people safe and protect Caliber City.”

  She slapped me gently on my belly. “Asshole.”

  “What?” I asked, confused.

  “Before I met you, I was perfectly happy looking after myself and my interests. But you...” She rolled her eyes. “This mission to do the right thing, it gets infectious. Here I am with the chance to live every tech nerd’s dream, and instead, I want to go back, too, to be an Offender and make life better and blah, blah, blah.” She stuck out her tongue. “It’s such a wasted opportunity.”

  I laughed. “So sorry for helping you become a better person.”

  “You should be. But it’s not all bad.”

  “And what in particular are you liking about it?”

  She shrugged and gazed out the window. We’d entered a planetary system, so the local star stood out larger and brighter than the rest.

  “Just thinking about the future, I guess,” she said. “The group’s been growing, which means there are more cool people to hang out with, and the fact that you keep picking up hot chicks adds to the fun of that.” She ran her tongue along her lip and put on that familiar grin. “But there’s the challenge as well. Fighting crime in Caliber is like building software. We might spend a bunch of time dealing with little bugs, but there are always bigger challenges ahead. Always something new we can take on.”

  “We’ll definitely have no trouble finding challenges now that we’re the biggest team in Caliber City,” I said. “Any time there’s a big supervillain event, we’ll be expected to step up. Hell, some of those guys will be aiming right at us, looking for a chance to weaken the city or to prove how tough they are.”

  “Bring it on.” Jade cracked her knuckles.

  I ran a finger up Jade’s side, across her shoulder, and along her cheek, lost in thought. She snapped at the finger, catching it between her teeth, and gave it a gentle squeeze. Meanwhile, her own fingers ran down my body and squeezed something else.

  “How about another round?” she asked.

  “Give me a minute.” I laughed. “I’ve got to get my energy back. And besides, there’s something I wanted to talk about.”

  “Sounds serious.” She looked me in the eye. “What’s up?”

  “As the team and our challenges grow bigger, things are going to change. It’s already getting difficult to keep our headquarters a secret, so we need to think about whether we keep doing that or just make our base public like Prime Guard.”

  “That could get messy,” she said. “We’ve got businesses and apartments there, remember? That place is tied to our civilian identities.”

  “We could get another base.”

  “Costly, and I like the one we have.”

  “Which is my point. This situation’s complicated; there aren’t easy answers. Unless we want someone else to make the big decisions for us, we need to start thinking them through in advance.”

  She bit her lip and stared out the window into space, fingers drifting aimlessly across my skin. The way my body reacted, it wouldn’t be much longer before I was ready for that return match she wanted.

  “It’s not just the base, is it?” she asked in a faraway voice. “It’s our identities.”

  “Yep.” I kissed her proudly on the top of the head. “Reckon you worked that out quicker than I did. I’d been thinking about the base for a while before I made that jump.”

  “Shit, I like things how they are.” She pursed her lips.

  “Me, too, but nothing ever stays the same forever. Sooner or later, half the heroes in Caliber get outed by some villain, journalist, or just an angry ex.”

  “We could give up on the secrets. More and more supes these days don’t have a double life. Some of them even fight crime under their real names. It could be a lot easier to deal with.”

  “And more dangerous. It’s easier for people to target you if you don’t have a fake identity to hide behind. Easier for them to dig up secrets and try to discredit you as well.”

  I ran my gaze down her, enjoying every inch of the view, every curve of her body and every swirl of her tattoos. I didn’t want to do anything that put Jade needlessly in danger, and that was an argument for secret identities. But maintaining those could be exhausting. In some ways, it might be safer to spend the effort and resources on our work as the Offenders.

  “What do you think we should do?” she asked at last.

  “I don’t know.” I looked past her at the darkness of space, a dark cloth littered with the bright gems of stars, a thing of beauty in its own right. “And you?”

  “I don’t know either.” She drew herself in closer to me, curling up against my side. “But we need to talk about it with the whole team, don’t we?”

  “Definitely. A decision by one member of the team could affect all the others. We have to face this together.”

  She kissed my shoulder, but it was a distant, instinctive movement, without the lustful energy that had driven us earlier.

  “Something else on your mind?” I asked.

  “Well, while we’re talking...” She let go of me and pushed off, drifting slowly across the room. “I’ve been thinking a lot about Caliber City’s tech industry.”

  “The tech industry?”

  That felt like it had come out of nowhere. I’d expected something more personal, tied to our lives and our work.

  “It’s a big deal for me,” she said. “Caliber produces some of the coolest tech in the world, which would be a big deal for me in itself, and then there are all the people I know who work in tech. A lot of my life away from you guys is grounded in that industry, and it’s in trouble.”

  “How come? I thought tech was doing well?”

  “Nationally, sure, but think about what’s been happening in Caliber. In the past few months, we’ve lost both Trillion Laboratories and Bladeline Industries, two of the city’s biggest innovators, and its biggest tech sector employers. And when I say we’ve lost them...”

  “You mean we, the Offenders, destroyed them when we took down the villains in charge. Which means that you feel responsible for clearing up that mess.” I rubbed my eyes. “And now I do, too.”

  “I told you, it’s infectious.”

 

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