People used to describe this world as a cold, dying planet. Actually, it wasn't like that at all. When the Passanger Liner moored with Nichols and the shuttles moved over to the planet, it was pretty obvious which people were visiting the planet frequently and which ones were there for the first time. The latter were prepared for visiting a planet like New Berlin, dressed like a marshmellow with puffy winter jackets. I had a smirk about that, but if I was to be honest to myself, dear diary, I was about to go there like that as well. Luckily, I read up on how Canaria actually is, and in what climatic zone the apparently second capital colony of Canaria, Los Dragos, lies. Other than those people, I decided to simply wear a nice dress in olive and beige.
The shuttle landed at the space port and, fuck, I underestimating the impact of a cloudy sky on the city. The wind was actually rather cold! Slightly annoyed, I made my way to the hovercab that five minutes later lead me to my actual destination. When the vehicle came to a halt, I took my two or three minutes to take my pocket mirror out of my handbag and check my appearance. Everything was fine. So I left the cab, paid the pilot and entered the, for a corporate headquarters, rather short-sized but still very inviting building. The company appeared out of nowhere about a year ago, and they somehow managed to be a very successful newcomer on the market. Basically that fact caused a few groups to have an eye on them. Military-grade technology in luxury and professional racing gear was something new.
I was met with a mix of service robots and polished human personnel in the lobby. Gave the receptionist girl my card and she lead me to the elevator, told me which story and where to go. Two minutes later, I found myself standing infront of the office of the chairwoman. The door was already open. I entered and Miss Hale stood up, walking around the table to greet me with a handshake. Now, dear diary, admittedly I was expecting something less impressive from a woman that, according to my background check, used to perform in a certain type of movies, and when I shook her hand I couldn't help but wonder where these hands already had been in the past, however Miss Hale actually, to my very surprise, made a serious impression on me. She wore a business suit in black, and other than in her videos, her hair was not punk-ish rainbow colored but simply brunette. She offered me a seat and the interview began. As I said, surprisingly professional. First the classic questions, double-checking on my references, then a sudden twist as she asked me about how I prepared myself for the job.
"Miss Ryan," Hale sounded, with a hinted smile on her lips as she had her eyes on my application port folio, "Hot Gear was only able to end up in the very admirable position it is now thanks to our investors. Generally we don't give away any information on our employees to third parties, however, I would like to ask you whether you would be willing to allow us to give our investors insight over your performance profile, should you start working for my company. The catch here would be that I am currently not permitted to actually tell you what investor we are currently talking about, meaning an unknown entity would have insight over your performance profile. Said profile would consist all work-related data on you. Reliability, loyalty, engagement, accuracy, these kind of things. On the other hand, if our investors see a certain potential in you, there are chances for you to climb the carrier ladder with a significant impact."
Her wording was slightly untypical and weird, but in the end, it peaked my interest. I mean, in times like these, one is used to companies giving and selling away personal data on oneself, so there was no real catch to it. And I came for the adventure in first place. "Color me intrigued, Miss Hale," I sounded back, and the interview went on for another ten minutes. I got my papers, set marks and signatures and for the next three months, I was Abigail Ryan, Hot Gear Counselor. I wish I could say it was an interesting time, but the company was mostly run with service robots and only so many actual humans. The latter were mostly for service and PR, and a few engineers and technicians. And a bunch of designers. Generally, I felt like the PR department was a bigger deal than the actual production department.
As I said, this lasted for three months. One day, I woke up in the morning in my hotel room on Los Dragos and had a message on my PDA.
FEEL THE RIDE
| HOT GEAR - Pineda Str. 3 - 684362 Los Dragos, Planet Gran Canaria - Omega-49 | Miss
Abigail Ryan
HOT GEAR Counseling Deparment
Summoning
Esteemed Miss Ryan,
please visit me in my office today at 15:00 local time. One of HOT GEAR's investors would like to meet you in person. If you have any plans for this evening, I would like to ask you politely to re-schedule them for another day.
September 20th, 825 - Los Dragos, Planet Gran Canaria
I liked the work for Hot Gear, but it was admittedly not anywhere as exciting as the following events promised to be. I lead supervising interviews, created personnel evaluation profiles and gave my input on some of the most recent PR campaigns. I was also offered to make use of certain assets of the company, but I never dared to touch those super expensive looking crafts. My hotel wasn't far away from the company building anyway, I simple asked for a robot drive me to work each morning and back home each evening.
Los Dragos and Las Palmas remained mostly untouched by the sudden unrest of the cretan population outside the corsair colonies on the planet. The loss of the connection to the Cayman system weakened the Corsair presence in the Omegas significantly, and rumors spread about experts expecting assaults on the corsair colonies, now that back-up couldn't move through Cayman. Still, kinda worrisome.
Yet nothing related to that was on my mind when I left the hovercab this afternoon. In fact, I closed the door and the cab moved on, only to have me realize I left my handbag inside. My PDA and the keys to my hotel room were in there. I believe, dear diary, my first reaction was a swear, then I tried to run after the hovercab, which was impossible in high heels and the purple dress I wore. Everything happened so fast. One of the heels broke off, but I cought myself, managing not to fall. Instead, I found myself bumping into the hoverbike that just showed up behind me. The guy was just turning the engine off. In surprise, I finally made it. I fell to the floor, butt-first into the only wet spot on the polished stone floor.
My feet hurt from the clumsy dance, my dress was dirty, I lost my handbag and would need to make a call at the management to have that cab searched for my stuff, and that fucking guy held there with his hoverbike just inches away from me. "Are you alright?" his muffled voice sounded through his impenetrable helmet. He still sat on the vehicle but looked down at me like a vulture. Well, his was wearin a helmet, so I actually didn't know how he looked down at me, but it felt like the world was against me in that moment, so I took off my high heels, stood up and looked at him and threw first the broken heel, then the broken shoe and then the other shoe at him while yelling at him.
"No, I'm fucking not alright, okay? I look like a piece of shit now and have an important meeting in like ten minutes!" I was mad in that moment. I had no clue what would expect me during that meeting, but I was certain that my visual presentation was incredibly important. After all, I'm a woman. Looking perfect was just as important as the push-up bra I forced myself to wear this day.
I heard his muffled laughter through the helmet. "Don't worry. You're beautiful and perfect the way you are. Just walk into the building, smile, ask for some clothes to change into and do your thing," the guy sounded. While he didn't catch my broken shoe, he caught the unbroken one and placed it on his lap. I caught myself looking there, but annoyed as I was, I just shook my head, trying to shake it off in a literal sense, and then heeded into the building, one hand at my wet bum, desperately trying and failing to cover the dirty spot on the dress. The guy was an idiot, but the idea to ask for some other clothes was good. Being a master of improvisation, I figured there would be a quick and easy alternative available.
15:00. I rushed to the elevator, the sound of rubbing leather now my constant companion as the Hot Gear hoverbiking suit I wore bent to my movement. I was certain I looked good enough in that thing, and men are into leather anyway. The elevator started to move, and I suddenly had a thought that irked me. Was I supposed to meet a man? What if the investor Paige mentioned was female? It was too late to panic, so I voiced my thought out loud when the evelator doors were about to open again. "Please let her be lesbian and into leather!" The elevator doors opened and Janette welcomed me with a flat look. Uh, I might add Janette was a service employee in the building. Blond hair, thin as a stick, legs for days, D-cups, no brain. She smirked at me and entered the elevator, and I swear she must have touched my butt as I moved to leave the elevator. The lift doors shut behind me and I looked down the hallway to Paige Hale's office.
After getting sexually harassed by one of the people I filed personnel evaluation profiles on, I made may way to the office. The door was open and I heard a voice inside. It was Paige, who must have seen me from the corner of her eyes. There was a blush in her face, as if she had been laughing a moment ago. Or something else. She waved me in, and with the posture of a brave adventurer I entered the room. Paige sat in her chair, as usual wearing a business outfit. The man at her side however wore a Hot Gear hoverbiking leather suit, just like I did right in that moment. My mouth formed the shape of a perfect O as I spotted the guy I threw my high heels at minutes earlier sat there, a small bowl of strawberries in his lap. He had one of those strawberries in his hand and lead it up to his lips. His head wasn't covered by the helmet this time, and my own face probably turned pale as I stared at him. His long blair hair, the scar at his eye, the sovereign smirk on his face. "Oh fuck."
"Miss Ryan," Paige sounded, her face still flushed, probably even more after I just thought out loud the first best thing that came to my mind when I saw the guy sitting there, "Please, take a seat." I didn't even get to impersonate the feeling of embarrassment when I moved to the seat to park my leather-wrapped butt on the leather-wrapped chair. I gulped, and I guess my eyes were trying to seek help when they glanced at Paige, however she smirked in an amused way at her companion to her left. To her right, actually, but from my perspective, to her left. "Miss Ryan, thank you for coming. I would like to introduce you to Mister Ezrael Vertiga, one of our main investors, design leader, co-founder, and just between the three of us, the actual CEO of Hot Gear."
I didn't get a second to let that roll of my own tongue as the guy started to let his golden voice shine. "A very pleasure to meet you, Miss Ryan."
September 20th, 825 - Los Dragos, Planet Gran Canaria
There I sat now, feeling a certain discomfort while my apparently real boss sat infront of me next to my boss-on-paper, both looking at me. He held a strawberry at his lips and bit a chunk of it off in a clean motion of his mouth. A moment passed. I realized I was staring at him. Then I realized he was staring at me as well. Then I thought about it. And came ot the conclusion that staring at me was an appropriate thing to do in his case, as I was the only person in his view. After all, this was an interview. He pushed the other half of the strawberry into his mouth, smirking slightly while chewing. Paige looked at me, then followed my glance to Mister Vertiga, who picked up another strawberry from the bowl in his lap. Then her look wandered back to me, and I threw a helpless glance at her. Why was nobody talking? It felt like a minute had passed of him just staring at me while eating strawberries. "Miss Ryan?" Paige then asked me.
I blinked, first at her, then back at Mister Vertiga who was chewing another strawberry. He sat there very relaxed, I realized, obviously amused by something. One leg was normal to the ground, the other in an angle over the knee of the other, creating a socket for the bowl of strawberries in his lap. His, from my perspective, left arm was laying loosely on the armrest, the hand holding the bowl at the rim, while the other arm was angled, the elbow at the armrest, the lower arm upwards as the hand had just lead the strawberry to his lips. He held the hand still in the air, the fingers kneading something imaginary between the tip of his thumb, the index finger and the middle finger. He was wearing his hoverbiking suit in black, the matching boots still covering his feet however he wasn't wearing the gloves anymore. I looked to the side, but didn't find the helmet or the gloves. He probably left them somewhere else. Maybe at his hoverbike.
I believe at this point ninety seconds had passend without me responding to Paige. Inappropiate, don't you think, dear diary? I just couldn't help it but stare at this man, and he obviously enjoyed scanning me with his eyes as well. That smirk. My guess was that he liked the hoverbiking suit I changed into. Maybe he was into leather? Why even asking. He is a man, of course he is into leather. "Miss Ryan." Paige's voice was more firm this time, and I believe it was absolutely required to get me back into the reality. I looked at her and for some reason smiled at her.
"Yes?" I simply returned. I almost squinted over to watch him eating another strawberry. Maybe I should have eaten something before the meeting? How much time had passed since lunch? I think I ate lunch around 12:30 in the canteen. But only a salad. Two salads, because one doesn't really satisfy. Cotton cheese, good dressing. And a donut. Just one though. And then it happened again. He took another strawberry. It was a fascinating sight at this point. Once more everything was silent. His teeth halved the strawberry as if they were as sharp as a knife. I didn't see it, but my inner eye projected the inside of the strawberry right infront of me. These lips. Must have been a juicy one, as Mister Vertiga's tongue slid out through his lips to lick along the fruity moisture the strawberry was bleeding down on his sweet receptors. Then he placed the strawberry on his tongue and let it return into his mouth.
My heart frequency must have been increased as I anticipated him secretly to take the next strawberry, but instead I found Paige's hand infront of my face, almost as if it had been fading in, and she snipped. The first sound was rather weak, but the second time she snipped it was loud and echoed in the office. In surprise I looked at her, as if she had been ripping me out of a dream. "Could you please sit down again?" Paige asked me.
"Sure!" I sounded. There was an awkward modulation of my voice, jumping from 1.5 octaves higher than usual down to the normal level as I carefully leaned back. Oh, yes, I forgot to add, I was leaning over the table, in Mister Vertiga's direction. As I said, I leaned back and sat down again.
"Mister Vertiga is here today as I recommended you for your psycho-analytical skills and your eye for the detail, bla bla bla. Bla bla bla, bla bla bla bla bla. Bla bla bla." Paige sounded and said a few other words I don't rightly remember. Probably not important. In the meantime, I watched him chewing on another strawberry. I don't know why Paige did it, but she took the bowl off his lap and put it out of his range. "... Miss Ryan, Mister Vertiga is here today with a proposal for you."
"Yes!" I sounded and looked at him, then at her. "Yes. I mean, I was looking forward to that. The proposal." I said. Paige gave me a questioning look, but at least Mister Vertiga seemed amused and smirked at me. I was about to ask myself why he was staring at me, but then I recalled being the only person in his view. Being me was pretty hard in that situation.
"Miss Hale probably mentioned that she shared your evaluation file with me once you showed promising values. It is not only that you are very skilled at what you do, and let me say I enjoy reading about your deductions, but it is also the fact that you are a woman that has her priorities aligned to her work. You are fit and healthy, not bound to any location, apparently you are single and don't have children and there haven't been any recordings of you mentioning your own family at any point." His golden voice. I liked it when he talked. I didn't like the part where I was supposed to talk. There was an awkward silence because of me not talking. I simply smirked at him, imagining him eating strawberries. "Another big plus is that you are obviously always focused on what you are doing. A good listener." I really wished Paige hadn't put the bowl away. "Bla bla bla bla bla bla. Bla bla bla bla bla bla!"
I smirked at him, nodding in agreement. I'm not really sure what he had said, come to think of it. "Yes!"
"I'm glad to hear that." To be honest, he had a rather excentric appearance, but it certainly wasn't unpleasant. The long black hair, the scar at his eye. Edgy. He was tall, athletic. His voice was so pure for a man of his appearance. I figured he never smoked at any time. His teeth were white, his lips smooth. His skin was clean and smooth as well. He said something about working in space. Was his chest hairy? I never liked it when men had hairy chests. Gross. Same with beards. He didn't have a beard. Not even stubbles. Maybe that was why his skin looked so smooth. Probably surgical removal of the roots. A few microlaser shots into the skin and boom. "So what do you say? Are you interested?"
"Of course I am!"
"Perfect. Couldn't be better. Alright, then let's not waste any more time." He stood up. He really was tall. 1.90 probably. Yes, diary, I am bretonian. Not a filthy libertonian who uses the imperial system. It appeared like he was waiting for me to stand up as well, so I did and walked by his side. God, I wished I had listened to him actively. I had no idea what we were going to do now. He took my hand and we walked to the elevator. I had no idea I wouldn't see Paige again for a long while.
In fact, I was sitting on a hoverbike only ten minutes later, hugging Mister Vertiga while fearing for my live as he rushed with me at high speed over the plains surrounding Los Dragos. Maybe I should have told him I never did that before, or I should have mentioned my acrophobia so he wouldn't have gained so much altitude. But no, I manned up as much as possible and embraced Mister Vertiga as tightly as possible. One could say I prefered Vertiga over my vertigo. Humoristic genius, am I not?
Half an hour later we arrived at the space port. My blond hair was all over the place when I took off the helmet, but for some reason, his hair was simply straight and perfectly aligned. I took a mental note to try and find out how he did that while he lead me to the shuttle. I looked behind us, where the hoverbike was simply standing there. Was he just leaving it there? Wasn't that pretty expensive? We were at a landing pad here. I figured something or someone would take care of it, and I figured that Mister Vertiga didn't care about what was about to happen to the vehicle. We entered the shuttle, and they seemed to have expected him, and by extension me as well, and we sat down in the first class. He sat close to me, I at the window, my helmet in my lap. He had his at his boots. He thoughtfully took off his gloves, throwing them elegantly into the helmet. Then his head turned to me. "I told Proxy to call the hovercab management so they send your handbag to Hot Gear. You'll have your stuff back in one week, together with your belongings in your apartment. It'll all be transfered to your new location," he said, and I only paid so much attention to his words but to the sound of them, mixed with his scent. I think it was a mix of moschus and fruits from Curacao. Both sweet and male.
"In the meantime, you'll get everything you need and want from our own storage. We have good food, clean water, three big meals per day in the canteen plus general access to snacks whenever you feel hungry. To get rid of excessive calories, we have a workout each morning, and all crew members have to attend at least three times per week, while I personally would like to encourage you to be there every day if your schedule allows it. There are only so many people there, so I would like you to socialize with them as soon as possible, to whatever extend you feel comfortable with. Before you ask, sexual relationships are permitted and fine as long as they don't impact negatively on your work performance." He smirked at me while I moved my head back away from his shoulder. Yes, I was trying to figure out what fruits he was smelling like. Pretty sure curacaoan passion fruit. "Your personal quarters will be on the bridge deck, where you will have access to water showers. That is the only difference to the other crew quarters, to be honest, expect for a few more square meters."
"I love square meters," was the most eloquent thing brain was willing to form under these circumstances. I believe I wanted to say water showers instead. Obviously, however, another great win for the metric system over the imperial system. Fuck you, imperals! The shuttle left the space port and headed up into the sky. I looked out of the window, and saw the mooring fixture up there. And something big. I finally came to realization what this was about.
September 20th, 825 - Battleship Apahanta, Omega-49
An actual warship! And such a unique one! I've been on the York and the Suffolk, but those bretonian warships were different. Much different from this here. An independent warship, captained by a guy without any obligations? When they told me to apply for a job at Hot Gear, I had no idea that the company was secretly affiliated with someone with a warship. But it was that point, my dear diary, when things started to become more clear to me. That being said, it was a very slow process. In fact, I had the feeling Mister Vertiga was, I guess unintentionally, doing his best to prevent me from overthinking things too much.
The shuttle landed in the hangar of the ship and I found myself in a surprisingly large bay. I was wondering how large the ship was, in numbers, but the impression was that everything was measured out perfectly for optimization. The shuttle barely fit into the hangar, as there was another ship over there, a bretonian design. Hussar, I believe? Never had much to do with ships. Couldn't even tell what type of battleship this was. I think it was smaller than a Bretonian Dunkirk, though.
The Captain took me by the hand and smiled at me while we left the hangar bay. I heard how the bay doors opened right after us having left the hangar. The shuttle was probably leaving again. To be perfectly honest, there was so much information for me to take in, I just walked with the Captain in wonder and awe, looking at the many service robots in our way. "The first stop will be the decontamination chamber. You'll need to stay there for ten minutes. Naked. In the meantime I'll organize a suit for you. You probably don't want to run around all day like this," he said and fingerpistoled my side once, which made me giggle like a child.
The room he lead me to was dark but flooded in dark blue light.
The air was dry and hot, unpleasant to breath in. It looked a bit like a prison cell, with a toilet and a shower in that one corner. There was this large bench reaching from one end to the other end of the room, A large closed tube filled with some gel was placed on it, and Captain Vertiga moved over to show it to me. "You'll need to apply this to your skin. Everywhere. It's good for your skin. Then you wait ten minutes. After that, I'll be back with your suit. Then we'll go to the medical bay for a check-in, and then to the canteen. And then I'll show you your room. Alright?"
I nodded, about to say something.
"Good. Enjoy the tanning studio," he said in jest with his charming smirk and headed out, not leaving me a chance to say anything further. Come to think of it, my audible participation so far had been rather weak. When the door shut, I did as he said and took off the hoverbiking suit, the boots, then undid my bra and whoop, undies gone. It was warm enough in there to be comfortable while being nude. I sat down on the bench and began to apply the gel to my skin. It felt incredibly neutral to the skin, which was okay as I didn't want it to burn when I smeared it at the more sensitive parts. He said apply it everywhere. That was the implication, right? I tried to apply my own logic to it. If I was a contaminated body, I'd smear that shit all over myself! I closed my eyes, applying it to my face as well. Would I have needed to smear it into my hair as well? Probably. But then I'd have looked stupid, so I didn't do that. A shower later would probably be enough for me to not be contagious anymore, right?
I was pretty sure I covered all skin-covered parts of my body with the gel, and then I decided to lay down on the bench. The heat and the air were somewhat nice to my skin. I felt relaxed. I closed my eyes for a moment. Simply listening to the sounds of the engine in the distance, echoing through the halls. "Miss Ryan?" There was probably some kind of ventilation system all over the ship as I heard some fans blowing. Air fans, blowing air. Dirty diary. Relaxation spread through my entire body, the muscles loosened. "Miss Ryan." I couldn't help but think about his golden voice again. How old was he? Probably around 30. Maybe a bit younger. 27 was my final guess. "Miss Ryan..." It was soothing. If I was a cat, I would purr each time he called my name. Just lying there, eyes closed, purring while everything around me was warm and cozy.
"Miss Ryan." That was my name. That was also said by Captain Vertiga. I opened my eyes again and saw his face not too far away from mine, maybe half a meter? He knelt there infront of the bench, his hand at my forehead. "You must have dozed off."
I was naked, and he sat there, looking at my eyes. I blushed in embarrassment and my hands rushed to my private parts to cover them. There was his scent again, skipping over to my nose. "Isn't this a rather heavy breach of privacy?" I asked him, trying to play it cool while I was actually considering to slap his charming handsome face for the intrusion. However...
"You didn't react to my previous attempts to wake you up. So I had to enter the chamber." And then he turned his head away from me, remaining on the floor, however. Blindly, he handed something in my direction. A black piece of rubber-esque looking material. Was it some kind of PVC? It was appealing to the eye, reflecting some light. "Your Apahanta suit. Please cover yourself."
So I did, and to my positive surprise, the so called Apahanta suit was fitting suspiciously well. I figured he knew my body measures from the Hot Gear personnel database. I was scanned last time half a month ago, I believe. The material felt like those diving suit materials at first, but it was very comfortable to the skin. I think there were thermal strands inside to regulate the temperature. The material was also easy to stretch. I was able to freely move without additional physical effort. It came really close to the literal sense of a second skin, and from what I saw, I looked good in it. Mabye a bit revealing. I looked at him, realizing he also had changed into an Apahanta suit. His had blue accents. Mine didn't, it was just plain black. I began to wonder what the meaning of it was. Maybe blue was marking him as Captain?
"You can wear other clothes over it, if you don't like it. However, for reasons of hygiene and physical safety, wearin these on the ship is a requirement. You can take it off when you sleep or leave the ship, though." He must have heard the sound of the zipper at the front of the suit having moved up, as he had turned around to me and scanned me again with his eyes, a smirk hinted as he talked to me. "We'll go to the medical bay now, where Doctor Adrianna Carr will scan your body in detail. Standard procedure for newcomers, both to have referential values of your body and to make sure you're not smuggling pocket nukes in your rectum to our engine room."
The latter was probably a joke, and he smirked at me when he said it, but I was more surprised about the blunt way of him saying that to a lady-like being like me. He generally seemed unbothered about certain things, like having seen me naked. But then again, I had no idea what kind of standards were held up here on the Apahanta.
September 20th, 825 - Battleship Apahanta, Omega-49
It was sort of embarrassing. Not only did he saw me naked once, but shortly after that, a second time. I lay on the med-bed, inside a 3D microcellular scanning device embedded in the wall of the medical bay, nude, while the weirdly grumpy woman in the little office checked on my body scans, together with Captain Vertiga. I lay there for ten minutes. It was weird, really, but at least it was rather warm all over the ship. I felt cozy. A blanket would have been nice, though, just to not lay there like that in the presence of a man.
Then the med-bed moved back into the room and while the Captain looked away from me, I slid back into my suit. That woman, Doctor Adrianna Carr, seemed to be rather hostile to him from what I could tell. Her body language was clearly showing her disliking for him, and I was wondering what that was about. So i made a mental note about it. If I was going to work here as the ship's counselor, I'd find out about the crew-specific relationships soon enough.
I think the best way to describe how I felt after having been naked infront of the Captain twice was "being dominated", since he was the "dominus" of the ship, which is latin for ruler. The decontamination and the medical check were something, according to him, that was all part of the protocol, and I had no reason to not believe him. I was treated well and kindly, actually. Still, it was sobering things up more with each minute. I realized I was not concentrated. My focus was off. Because of him.
Leaving the elderly woman behind in the medical bay, Captain Vertiga lead me to the canteen, where we sat down to have a more... collected talk about everything. Service robots served that expensive exotic tea from Curacao together with a fruit salad which was surprisingly fresh for non-planet-food. I would later find out why. We just sat there, and I looked down at the steaming cup of curacaoan tea while the scent it emitted caressed my nose, and his charming smirk my eyes. He was pleasant to look at, that much was for sure.
"Miss Ryan, you have been awfully quiet since we met. Are you feeling alright?" he asked me, smiling at me while holding his hot cup with his gloved hands. It was a weird sight, to be honest. Like in movies, a bit surreal. But then again, the stuff surrounding me was beyond normalcy. This was the stuff movies were based on. He lay his head a bit lopsided before I began to voice my response, which admittedly took longer than it was comfortable.
"I do have plenty of questions, Mister Vertiga, but I figured there was a better time for all that than just on the fly." It was more that I was horribly overwhelmed by everything and still thinking about him having seen me naked.
"It's sort of overwhelming, probably. An hour ago, we were on the planet and you watched me eat strawberries." Okay, he got me there. He smirked at me, then looked down at the tea cup. "If you have questions, now is the best time. I'll also have some questions for you."
"What is this ship? What is the mission of it?" I asked him, as I had literally no idea at this point.
He smiled at me for a few seconds, then chuckled voiceless. "This is the independent battleship Apahanta. It is a Core AP-605940 Mako-class Light Battleship chassis I, long story short, bought from the Core. Technically I bought the chassis and funded the restoration of the ship under the premise that I command it under the flag of the Core. Then Core started to wage war against the Zoners and my crew and I deserted, with the ship. It took a while for me to gain a neutral standing with the Core again but it eventually worked out." He took a sip of the steaming tea. Just a tiny slurp. Then he held the cup close to his face as he continued. "Ever since we left the Core, we simply tried everything to stay alive and find ways to pay the maintenance of a warship. Fuel, crew, supplies, repairs, upgrades. All pretty expensive."
It made click in my head. "You founded Hot Gear only to pay the ship, is that right?" I asked him from what I was able to deduce. Paige had said he founded the company and was secretly the CEO, and since I knew Hot Gear's crafts were using military-grade technology from the very beginning of my employment, I figured that the ship was there first - as it was the source of that technology.
"Correct," he simply replied and smiled at me as if he was admiring my deduction. "We're trying to maintain a neutrality to all bigger groups of Sirius and avoid combat. Right now our only enemies are the Lane Hackers, the Order who actively hunts us, the Cult of Technology and, in a more cautious way, the idiots in Bering and the Corsairs."
"And the Nomads, I take it," I said, as he hadn't mentioned them. His smirk grew wide and for a moment he looked down at his cup.
"We don't fight the Nomads anymore. We ignore them and avoid them. There is no reason to attack something that can cause damage to you while it itself can just regrow over time. They have infinite resources, and I have only one Apahanta, and only so many loyal crew members." Admittedly, that surprised me, and his body language was an interesting read as well as he said that. There was a certain frustration to it, and it was obvious to me that there must have been some impacting events that lead to the status quo. "We generally try to avoid all combat situations. I often fight the urge to interfere with situations we have been observing, but it is not our job to bring a balance to Sirius. It is not our job to play hero. Top priority is our survival, second priority is the defense of allied assets. In our case, that would be Zoners, Orbital, Bretonia and a bunch of individual people. We're prepared for the worst case but hope for the best and really only enter combat when our intervention is both required and has a chance for us to survive without much harm."
"Hot Gear was founded two years ago, so I take it the ship is in your hands for two years, too?" I asked him. He nodded.
"Right. Two very adventurous years." His smirk turned weaker. "If you're going to stay here, I demand your loyalty to its fullest from you. That means, if I ask you to do things for me, you will do them without hesitation. You will need to sharpen your skills here. There might be situations where you are required to have learned new skills to survive." I had to suppress a chuckle. "Your main duty here on the ship will be the maintenance of the mental health of all crew members and the creation of psychological profiles of each one. My crew is loyal to me and I want it to stay that way. If there are problems, you will need to figure them out so we can fix them. Secondary jobs are, as I said, various things all over the ship. You'll refresh your first-aid knowledge, learn some botanics, the basics of robotic maintenance and programming, you will learn how to handle a gun and how to survive worst-case-scenarios. Basically, you'll have a very cheap crash course of all things regular people learn over years on military academies. However, there are certain benefits to this way of living."
I tried to make it myself more comfortable on the bench and stretched out my legs under the table and awkwardly touched his legs like that, which caused both of us to become silent for a moment before he continued with a smirk.
"First of all, your paycheck will be so high that you will never need to work again, should you stay longer than a year. Second of all, the Apahanta is not bound by any laws, standards or restrictions you would have on any other battleship out there. We have expensive quality food here each day, not just Synth Foods rations and gel. Three big meals per day, hot and tasty and good for your body. We have a well equipped gym and training sessions every day. Each crew member has their own room, their own furniture, their own privacy and their own inventory. The Apahanta also had an extended hydroponics area which includes a large apple tree that ranges three decks in height, and it produces apples. We have many grow beds for fruits and vegetables and other useful flowers like medical herbs. We also have a medical bay and a bored and grumpy doctor that would love to treat anything else than just another headache or burn wound. Hard labor is usually executed by service robots, so the working conditions are humane as well. With other words, living on the Apahanta is luxurious, but comes with a certain risk."
He continued to explain things to me like that, and it was admittedly much to stomach and understand, but, well, dear diary, I signed the contract with him and became the new counselor. We sat there, enjoyed the tea and the fruit salad made with the Apahanta's own plants, and about an hour later, we stood up, as the Captain wanted to show me my room.
September 20th, 825 - Battleship Apahanta, Omega-49
This was something special. I have to admit, I always liked the sci-fi stories from books and movies, but when the Captain lead me through the Apahanta and finally showed me my own quarters, it all got so much more substance. It felt like I suddenly was living in such a fantasy. The door opened and Captain Vertiga and I entered my new room. Despite it being rather empty at this point of time, I loved it. There was this giant holographic window showing Gran Canaria and the two stations orbiting it, but without the incredibly bright Barrier that surrounded the system. He pointed at it, smirking at me afterwards. "Here, that thing can be connected with the Apahanta's external sensors to recreate the area we're currently moving in. That is an actual representation of Canaria. That is how the planet would look like without the Barrier. With other words, with a night cycle."
The fact that Gran Canaria had no nights was a very weird one to adapt to. Not only had the system two suns to shine at the planet, but the mere fact of Omega-49 being inside the Barrier meant that the Barrier was reflecting light to the planet all day. Literally. As a Bretonian, these amounts of light are slightly uncomfortable to the eye. The only bright world we have is Cambridge, with New London being rainy and cloudy most of the time and Leeds being Leeds. I moved over to the bed at the wall of the room and sat down at the edge of it. And I looked over to the Captain. "You know, this all is pretty impressive."
He simply smirked at me. "The Apahanta is unique in many ways, but it is still a battleship in a very hostile cluster of stars. Death approaches in very many ways, almost always. The least thing I can do is make use of the money I have to make life for us a bit more encouraging. But there will be times that will remind you of this not being a hotel or playground. Because of that, I need loyal people around me, and people with your talent to ensure they stay sane. To a certain degree, that includes me."
"How do you mean?" I had to ask him while my hands slid over the blanket. Fluff!
"It will be part of your job to join me on the bridge and provide a second opinion on things. From the perspective of a psychologist. I will need you to give me your take on the people we interact with, too. Not just the crew. You will have a seat on the bridge right next to me. Chances are there will be dilemmatic situations that require me to make uncomfortable decisions. With you at my side, it is your job to question my decisions and possibly prevent me of making a wrong decision, by voicing your opinion."
"On-spot profiling is only so reliable, Captain. What if my influence causes a bad decision?" I asked him, wanting to know what the consequences of it would be.
"Malta always pays good for healthy people," he said in a dead serious way. There was an awkward silence after that.
"I-"
"That was a joke." He smirked again. "We all make mistakes. As long as you are able to explain the foundations of your opinions, you can't really do anything wrong. I can do. As a Captain, I am used to make the decisions, good and bad ones. I'd say I'm a pretty good Captain, though, since I survived the multiple cases of extremely dangerous situations that could have killed me. We're all still alive and kicking. The Apahanta is still working and one hell of a warship." He moved a step closer. Then another. I looked up at him, slowly, taking my time to take in the view of him. The way I looked at him was inappropiately unprofessional in that moment, but I guess I was a bit taken away by the magic of the surroundings. With other words, I glanced at the bulge right infront of my eyes. The black color of his suit was concealing it well. From that perspective, though, it was figuratively poking into my eyes.
"You'll have access to voice commands. We have a simple trick here on the ship that can come in handy in a hostile take-over scenario. The Apahanta only carries out orders correctly if you are asking her politely. So add a 'please' to any requests to the ship, like, Apahanta, could you please change the holo window projection to a night-life cityscape of Manhattan's capital?"
I couldn't stop but smiling when I glanced at the holographic image. I liked it. Like in a novel. Even more magic. "I bought a shitton of these holographic settings for our windows. Just connect your PDA with the Apahanta database. You have a certain clearance to it. You will find a very wide variety of movies, series, music, games, programs and tools there as well. There is really much to explore for you, so I'll give you some time for yourself now. Dinner is in two hours, and I would love to see you there, to introduce you to the crew."
I loved all of this. This was so cool! I was simply overwhelmed with the situation, to be perfectly honest, my dear diary, and I stood up and couldn't help but smile at him widely. "Thank you!" I sounded and then just stood there, slightly awkward, a meter of distance between us. "I'll do my best, Captain."
"Just Ezrael. In private, that is."
"Alright. Ezrael!" I offered him a hand, and he took it, squeezing it slightly while staring into my eyes. There was something hypnoticising about it, as I simply couldn't look away. I even blushed, probably, which is funny. I'm fourty years old and that casanova managed to give me some insecurities. I made a mental note in that moment, and I imagined that analysing him was probably going to be fun. My first impression was positive. Very positive. Counseling sessions with him were going to be interesting.
I had to look at his gloved hand as it held mine rather tenderly. My own grip was rather firm, I believe, and when I thought about it right in that moment, I got a little carried away. He cleared his throat and I glanced into his eyes again. He smirked at me. An expectant look. Was I supposed to do something? He then solved the riddle. "You can let go now, if you want."
Oh! I let go of his hand after holding his more firm than him mine. Why didn't I notice it? I chuckled awkwardly and made a step back, yet there was no room for a step back. So I non-chalantly placed my butt on the bed. He chuckled. "Did Dr. Carr miss something? Are you alright?"
"It's fine. Just much to take in right now," I said and his lower body was on the same level as my eyes again, which made that statement significantly more weird, to me. He simply chuckled and turned to motion for the door.
"Decorate the room in any way you want. There are a bunch of replacement suits for you in the cabinet and some simple clothes until you get your stuff here. Take your time and get comfortable with everything. I'll see you at dinner in two hours." Then the turned to me again. "Welcome aboard, Abigail. It's good to have you with us!"
It was a nice introduction to the ship, and the fact that he turned around and faced the wall instead of the door was adding a certain note to it. He corrected his position and then left the room. The door closed and I immediately let myself fall into the bed. It was incredibly comfortable! I just lay there, looking at the ceiling. Metal plates. Again the purring of the ship's engines. And the holographic rain at the window. I loved all of this. This was my new home now for the next months!
Then I realized something. I was enjoying this too much. I had to report to the service somehow, but my own PDA wasn't on the ship and I probably wouldn't be able to send highly encrypted transmissions to Bretonia without raising some suspicion. I guess that was something that had to wait.
It's been a while. I didn't really get the time to continue this, but right now I think it is a good moment to recollect myself. So many things have happened, I don't really know where to start. In fact, I'm feeling awkward right now. First of all, we're in Omega-2 right now, and my holographic window is connected with the external sensors. My room is flooded in warm red light. It's really cozy, and this system is an eye candy. Generally, the Apahanta's journey is incredibly exciting as I got to see places I believe my superiors never heard of. I'm not exaggerating. We've been beyond.
I've joined this crew more than a month ago. It was overwhelming. The crew was integrating me rather quickly and without any prejudice or fear. All weirdly friendly people. Not that they are many. In fact, there are less than thirty people on this ship. Which is not much. Like, not at all. It's not even a tenth of what a ship of this size usually needs to be fully operational and secured. What the Apahanta lacks in manpower is provided by service robots. Those guys are literally all over the place. I think Ezrael spent multiple millions on all of these. I mean, not only the fourhundred on this ship, but also the others he bought for Hot Gear and the facility ships. But then again, he is a rich boy.
I literally can't say anything bad about living here. I don't really feel caught in here despite only so many places to go, and the crew seems to share that perception mostly. I also don't really feel endangered here. Since I'm here, we didn't have a single fight. There have been one or two tense situations, yes, but really not much more than that. The ship didn't take any damage. I mean, we're mostly roaming around in not-so-dangerous space anyway. That, or in uncharted territory.
Of course I didn't get to enjoy the sight-seeing all day. After the first week on the ship, I began with my counseling interviews, simply to get to know the crew better. And while these people are generally a joy to have around, their backstories are quite something. For example, Ezrael asked me to began with the more recent crew addition, a young man named Noel Bäker, from Rheinland. He joined not too many month ago. Ezrael found him and saved him from some gangsters and then took care of him. And now the interesting part: Before he was stranded on Livadia, where Ezrael picked him up, he lived with his parents on a rheinlandian home ship and they got attacked by nomads. He was the only survivor, in a rescue pod drifting in Omicron Delta. Zoners picked him up. If that isn't enough material to cause a heavy trauma, then just wait, because he was the only survivor for a reason. Nomads implanted a seed in his body, a so called incubus, which later left his body to take over the body of another crew member of the Apahanta, which was in a relationship with the young man. Things escalated when the then infected woman called Lorena Hawkins took the Apahanta hostage. She was killed, both the human and the incubus inside her. So with other words Noel not only lost his family and all his possessions but also his girlfriend he met here on the Apahanta when he thought things would finally become better for him.
Despite of that, the boy seems to be surprisingly happy right now. He is spending much time with the Captain and actually lives in his room with him, in a platonic friendship with him. He told me that he and Ezrael don't feel any shame infront of each other, and that they went to clubs on Gran Canaria together to end up in bed with, according to him, multiple women. Now that I know Ezrael a bit better and did my background research on him, I do believe that. Apparently, the Captain is not just a warship captain and adventurer, but also a butterfly that hops from one flower to the next. Multiple female crew members admitted that, when I asked them during counseling sessions, they slept with Ezrael multiple times and some of them still do. Most notably a woman called Sombra Hookier, a woman of Curacao that apparently has a shared past with Ezrael. Not only that, but also an unhealthy obsessions with him.
Another person with a shared past with Ezrael is Leon Isley, the Chief Engineer. A sunny-boy of 27 years. Talking with him was a bit difficult as he often tried to avoid topics until I managed to backdoor into them. He was mostly talking about a woman called Nancy Sweetwater. Yes, my diary. Her. Apparently, that Reaver bitch used to be a member of this crew, and according to Isley, she doesn't have any memory on her deeds as a Reaver. To be perfectly honest, I got more curious about her and the focus of the conversation shifted from him to her. There were a few things he tried to hide from me, which is okay. Apparently she is a friend of him and Ezrael for two years. Suffering from constant memory "resets". She is hiding somewhere on Canaria with a guy that apparently made her betray Isley. Poor boy. She told him she wanted a family with him.
I didn't contact the higher-ups yet. From what they know, I'm still on Canaria and work for Hot Gear. Didn't send a report yet. I want to find out mere for now. How trustworthy Ezrael is and what people he interacts with. I have a few suspicions, and would like to find out whether I can disregard them. To be honest, I hope so. I like to imagine that there is the perfect man somewhere out there, and I like to imagine him being the one. His good traits are undeniable, and the only thing his crew has been complaining about is the fact that they needed to share him.
Ezrael asked me to have interviews with Miss Thallia Thorn and a few other people, too. I'll prepare myself for that now, although there is only so much on the unrestricted database levels on her and the others. Meanwhile, the Captain and Hookier have left the ship for a visit of Liberty. Apparently some date on Manhattan. Knowing Hookier, she'll tell me about it later.
NAME: EZRAEL VERTIGA SEX: YES MALE ♂ BIRTHDATE: MARCH 14TH, 792 A.S. ORIGIN: NEO LAGUN, PLANET CURACAO PROFESSION: VARIOUS VCI: AVERAGE WMI: BELOW AVERAGE POI: HIGH PSI: ABOVE AVERAGE PHYSIS: MESOMORPHIC STRONG PERSONA: ENFJ-A PROTAGONIST SKILL: SEE NOTES AMBITION: 10 LOYALTY: SEE NOTES Notes
◈ Professions: Captain; CEO and Designer of Hot Gear; Teacher (College: Biology, Physical Education, Surfing); Actor (heterosexual porn)
◈ Skill-Rating can't be measured as Vertiga is performing in multiple roles. Given the Apahanta is still alive after two years of freelancing, he seems to be a capable captain.
◈ Loyalty-Rating can't be measured as the rating refers to a subjects loyalty to the captain. That being said, he appears loyal to his crew.
◈ Vertiga, while never voicing it directly, seems to be opposed to be the subject of a psychological interview. Attempts of backdooring anything coming close to it failed. Thus the report is based on every little bit of interaction and observation I was possible to gather.
PHYSIS AND APPEARANCE
Ezrael Vertiga is a caucasian male of thirty-three years age. His mesomorphic strong body is in an ideal shape and extremely well taken care of. His skin is smooth and clean, slightly pale despite being from Curacao. Facial skin is without any beard-related facial hair, apparently surgically removed permanently to have no need to shave. According to Dr. Carr's medical report this applies to arm pits, his chest and his pelvic region as well. His head is growing long jet-black straight hair which appears to be well taken care of. His body is well toned, strong but not jacked and he generally makes an energetic and fit impression. Body size is 1.85 meters in length and limbs match the mesomorphic norm and scale. Primary sex organ is above average in size and length, within reasonable measures. Status of his organs is average at least and higher, the only exception seems to be his heart which was reported to perform slightly but notably below average, especially in situations of mental stress.
From the observer's perspecitve, Vertiga's left eye area is scarred from a slash wound, probably a knife. The left eye is undamaged, however the scar was not removed. According to Dr. Carr's medical report, the flesh of his left shoulder was surgically replaced with synthetic muscles after a heavy plasma wound, caused in 823 during Vertiga's desertion from the Core. The flesh and skin of his arms had to be replaced similarly after an incident on the Apahanta in 824, where Vertiga had to manually shut down the Apahanta's power core by pushing safety shafts into it. By doing so, his hands and arms caught on fire. There is almost no indication of mentioned areas being of synthetic material. Even the hair grow appears to be normal.
Aboard the Apahanta, Vertiga usually wears his black and blue Apahanta suit. Exceptions are during the morning workout, where he prefers to merely wear black sweatpants without a top. In case of him leaving the ship, he switches to certain sets of civilian clothing, most combinations contain of simple or printed T-Shirts in white, grey or black, black jeans from casual to tight fit, often combined with a studded belt; black shoes with white soles and air conditioning; multiple leather jackets in black. According to his crew members, he sometimes walked around merely dressed in swimming trunks when either moving or returning to Curacao. Given that the planet is currently under siege of Battlegroup Carcassonne, this has yet to be confirmed.
MEDICAL STATUS
Dr. Adrianna Carr's report of his latest full body scan from November First, 825, reports no concerning anomalies. Aforementioned weakness of his heart has not been significant since the beginning of my observation. Vertiga is not known for taking any medicaments recently. Generally, he seems to perform extremely well, leads the morning workout group almost every day when he is on the Apahanta and appears to be of high stamina, according to a few female crew members. The ship's inventory registry indicates that Vertiga seems to consume reasonable amounts of wine, mostly imports from Gallia. Red wine, rather sweet and fruity in taste.
According to Dr. Carr, Vertiga is visiting her rather frequently for body scans. According to her, mostly after he had sexual intercourse with women not belonging to the crew. Also according to her, he performs the scanning and diagnosis himself. Apparently she grew tired of facing his genitals more often than actual issues that should require her attention.
BEHAVIOR
Captain Vertiga is in his current state classified as ENFJ-A PROTAGONIST personality type. He is extroverted and appears to be gaining energy from social interaction. On the Apahanta, this shows very much by him not being distant to the crew at all. Since the start of the observation, he was observed in close proximity to most crew members both during duty and free time. He is frequently seen assisting his inferiors in their work while having clear priorities set for himself. During social interaction he is rarely seen without a smirk on his lips. Even while fully being capable of performing as entertainer, which is often shown during his morning workouts, he also remains frequently rather observant. He appears to be a good listener while being a comfortable conversationist.
Vertiga seems to think before acting or talking whenever the situation makes it necessary. This applies to his actions as Captain of a battleship as well, as he prefers to keep the Apahanta remain cloaked while observing dangerous situations from the distance. Vertiga does not lead the Apahanta into battles as long as the intervention is not necessary to change the fate of a fight in a significant way. This means both when friendly entity is about to get destroyed by a hostile force or on the other hand when a friendly entity is beating a minor hostile force.
Notable examples
- Battle of Carthage
The Apahanta was deployed as protective asset of Freeport 11 and Port Carthage during a siege of the combined forces of Corsairs and Order. In this scenario the ideal of assisting an ally, the Zoners, together with the Core and other volunteers against a common enemy made the risk worth enough to actually join a combat. The Apahanta was heavily damaged as a result of that and there had been crew casualties, however the Zoner Community and the Core as well as many other groups have taken notice of the selfless act. After this event, Ezrael became more careful about the consideration of battles as he had to face the first deaths within the crew since the desertion from the Core.
- Bretonia and Apahanta vs Order
The Apahanta spied on a group of Order ships in the New London system and later was hired by the Bretonian Armed Forces to assist against the law-violating and disrespecting Order forces. Accompanied by a significant amount of escorts and later a carrier-type capital ship, the Apahanta managed to ensure a successful operation against the Order intruders. The odds seemed promising enough for Captain Vertiga to deploy the ship without taking much damage.
- Vagrant Assault on the Apahanta
The latest combat situation the Apahanta was forced to deal with was in Sigma-13 after an attempted hostile takeover of the ship. The Apahanta was faced with an giant alien warship three times the size of the Apahanta. While Mako-class warships are manouverable and swift enough to have good chances against heavy warships, Vertiga did not risk the ship to fight the alien and instead ordered to retreat, which was successful as the alien force was unable to prevent cruising and jumping out.
Vertiga appears to be ambivalent when it comes to making decisions. The lower the risk or significance, the less planned out his actions are. For example, he plans out the flight routes of the Apahanta in detail, is however spontaneous and intuitive when it comes to social interaction, which hints an admirable balance. Nevertheless, he is an assertive person with a stable emotional fassade.
The Captain takes great care of everything he values. Beginning with his perfectly shaped and attraction-aimed body, over his own crew members leading to his ship in general. He tries to ensure the best possible comfort to his crew both by providing what they demand as well as ensuring a healthy daily routine on the ship, consisting of physical activity in workout sessions, social interaction during breakfast, lunch and dinner, providing of areas that invite to social interaction like the hydroponics, the observation deck, the canteen, the gym and the media room as well as opening up one water shower for the public use as the crew quarters on any other deck than the bridge deck use sonic showers, which are fine but often considered insufficient. The Apahanta uses Kishiro Service Robots to prepare meals and once per week the ship receives a load of fresh food and resupplies from the logistics pilot. His altruistic behavior is most notable when it comes to Engineer Trainee Noel Bäker, which is a rather recent addition to the crew. As a result of multiple horrible events, Noel lost his family, his home and all his belongings and Vertiga took care of him, first offering him a room on the bridge deck until he invited the boy to live with him in his own quarters. According to Bäker, he sees Vertiga as his new family. Other crew members share this admiration and call him a hero.
Whenever he leaves the Apahanta, it either involves a diplomatic or business meeting, or he leaves to meet with either his girlfriend, a woman called Maren von Westefeld, or other women. Vertiga said himself he lives with von Westefeld in an open relationship, which explains why he is also having sexual interaction with multiple female crew members as well as other women. Generally, Vertiga seems to be known for his polygamic hedonistic life-style, and according to Logistics Pilot Hookier, he has a three digit count of women he slept with so far. Background research confirmed that Vertiga engaged in sexual action not only in a few professionally directed scenes but also caused, or more precisely, was involved in a scandal on Corinth Research Station's public area where he performed in rather rough action with the controversial maltese politician and former Core Guildmistress Enma Loyola. The crew is also rumoring about his suspiciously long meeting with Liberty Separatist leader Admiral Victoria Knight.
These many significant and influental sexual successes resulted in a certain reputation and a matching behavior. While Vertiga does not seem to be, pardon the pun, penetrant about his success in these aspects, he generally seems to be invest much time in everything related to it. It explains his extremely well preserved body and almost obsessive healthcare, his notable abstinence from chocolate and junk food, his daily workouts and frequent body scans at the medical bay, his general appearance and the way he treats women. As in, he doesn't appear needy at all and rather appears to be extremely sovereign at his subtle seductive and charming moves. For example, his constant smirk, direct eye-contact, the application of fruity scents via shampoo, deodorant and perfume combined with physical contact during social interaction, close but not intrusive proximity, open and sovereign body stances, politeness, etiquette, adequate voice modulation and a general feeling for conversation topics. He is excellent at both reading body language and deducing from context, which seem to give him much confidence as sexual predator. He appears overwhelming while not being aggressive. In fact, especially in a situation where he is alone with a woman, he seems to use his opportunities to flirt. As mentioned in the notes, I was not able to backdoor a psychological interview with him without his attempts of changing the conversation to a more instinctive topic. I assume he designed the Apahanta suit intentionally the reveiling way they are to provoke in a similar way as he does during the morning workouts when he shows off the traits of his attractive upper body.
While Vertiga seems to be all about sexual predatory and hedonism, he seems to have a clear behavorial codex. He doesn't treat women as sex objects if they don't signal to be enjoy said treatment. According to the crew, the contract payment for each crew member is independent from gender (or origin). He treats everyone as equal, regardless of the job they perform. He despises unhealthy food and drugs except alcohol in the form of gallic red fruit wine or curacaoan wine. According to Chief Engineer Leon Isley, Engineer Trainee Noel Bäker and Logistics Pilot Sombra Hookier, he does buy alcoholic drinks during parties or night club adventures, however he himself never drinks more than he can stomach. According to his medical history, his liver was damaged a few years ago from excessive alcoholic intoxication. His liver regenerated, however.
The same three crew members and more have voiced that Vertiga seems to lack a feeling for physical shame. For example, aforementioned three crew members said he was sexually performing infront of other people, which is confirmed by the fact that he was acting in certain clips available on the neural net. His room mate Noel Bäker also said they don't have a feeling for shame infront of each other, which apparently was something Vertiga taught him. According to him, Vertiga describes shame as a cultural trait he doesn't want to adapt to, with the reason that the human body is perfect the way it is if people take care of it. It might also just be another subtle hint of his obsession of his own body and his sexual predatory.
Apparently, Vertiga seems to be into extreme sports. I myself was hoverbiking with him on Gran Canaria at high speeds. This preference matches with his founding of Hot Gear, a company entirely about motorsports and related fashion. Concluding from his almost satyriatic behavior and his joy for motorsports, surfing and diving, I assume he enjoys adrenaline rushes.
RELATIONSHIPS
Captain Vertiga does not have any biological family members left. He was the only child of his parents, which died a few years ago during an alien attack on the Cortez system. There are no grandparents left either.
Vertiga claims to be in an open relationship with a Miss Maren von Westefeld, a woman with roots in Rheinland, that he met in the first half of 823 during his time with the Core. According to the crew, he used to be frequently away to spend his time with her on Curacao or on his home ship, which changed when his home ship was stolen and Curacao put under siege by Gallia. Since the beginning of my observation of the subject, Vertiga left the Apahanta frequently however never for longer than one or two days, meaning his time spent with Miss von Westefeld has been drastically reduced. In this time, Miss von Westefeld was not seen a single time on the Apahanta, which leads me to the conclusion that Vertiga does not want her to be around here, which could be for multiple reasons. For example, the fact that he sleeps with a few of his crew members; the fact that a battleship is not a suitable home for a family or the fact that Miss von Westefeld seems to have spent time with other men, too, according to Logistics Pilot Hookier. Or the fact that Miss von Westefeld adopted a child without his agreement, which is currently living with von Westefeld on Baden Baden.
Vertiga also seems to spend much time with Logistics Pilot Hookier. They share a common past on Curacao as she was his student during the few years he worked as teacher at her college. Hookier appears to be questionably fanatic about Vertiga, not only praising him for his sexual skills but about pretty much everything remotely related to him. This seems to be the case for an even longer time than Vertiga is in a relationship with Miss Maren von Westefeld. According to Hookier, Vertiga is not interested in long-term relationships and prefers to be friends with benefits. Apparently both Hookier and von Westefeld have proposed to him without success. Judging by what Miss Hookier said, she probably became the Apahanta's supplier because of her obsession with Vertiga.
It is rumored that Vertiga also frequently beds with Commander Sherry Aguilar, the executive officer of the Apahanta. While she is a person of authority and respect that rarely engages in social interaction with the crew beyond common duty, some say he and her sometimes lock themselves up in a room and leave it after a certain time. It was also mentioned that he remained in her quarters for a few nights. It is very likely that Commander Aguilar only allows the Captain to get close to her to receive some social and emotional attention. I would like to investigate this further with future interviews with Commander Aguilar.
After returning from a journey beyond the borders of explored space in May 825, facing critical crew casualties, Captain Vertiga hired a bulk of people from Hot Gear to work on the Apahanta. A notable amount of these people are female and it is rumored that some of them have been engaging in sexual interaction with him rather quickly. Engineer Trainee Noel Bäker also mentioned a weekend off with Vertiga and Isley on Planet Gran Canaria in Las Palmas, where they apparently visited a night club and met women they spent the night with.
Due to the nature of his life-style, I suspect Vertiga to be prone to a phobia of commitment. This is hinted by multiple factors and matches with what some crew members told me about him.
- He lives in an open relationship with Miss von Westefeld.
- He refused her marriage proposal.
- He refused the marriage proposal of Miss Hookier.
- He was said to be extremely upset about Miss von Westefeld adopting a child without his consent, despite him and her having tried to procreate for two years.
- He generally spends more time on the Apahanta than with Miss von Westefeld.
- He was said to have been extremely upset about Miss von Westefeld having had sexual intercourse with four different people in only one week shortly after she believed him to be dead during the accidental jump of the Apahanta into uncharted territory.
- He appears to generally be more interested in conquering the hearts and nethers of new women instead of sticking to the ones he already conquered.
This also hints to a strong disliking about making compromises. Miss von Westefeld appears to be a constant source of forced compromises to Vertiga's life. Engineer Trainee Bäker mentioned he was frequently talking negatively about her. Isley and Hookier hinted similarly. On the Apahanta, everything happens based on his commands and his structures, and everything works fine like that. Miss von Westefeld appears to be something he can't control like that. According to what I saw on the archive, Miss von Westefeld is also not of comparable physical attractivity for a man who can have - and has - any woman he wants to be with. This either means he is in love with her and simply doesn't want to give up on her, or he can't. The latter would imply her having some sort of leverage against him, which is something I need to investigate.
Apart from his sexual relationships with women, he also has defining bonds to his male contacts. The most notable is his friendship with Engineer Trainee Noel Bäker. As of right now, they live together in Vertiga's quarters. Bäker made clear the relationship they have is platonic and not sexual, while Vertiga apparently enjoys claiming the opposite out of jest to annoy Bäker. After losing his family, home and belongings, Bäker was stranded on Livadia and about to get attacked by two unlawful inhabitants of the station. Vertiga appeared right in time and knocked out both attackers to rescue the boy, to take him to the Apahanta where he was taken care of. Since that day Bäker grew more and more attached to Vertiga and they became friends. The young man began his training as engineer of the ship under the lead of Chief Engineer Leon Isley and Chief Technician Jeff Powell while Vertiga made sure Bäker would eat healthy and build up some physical fitness as he seemed to starve on Livadia, having lost much weight there. Under the constant protection of his patron, Bäker turned healthy again, started a relationship with a female crew member, but when it turned out that there was an alien inside his body that left to take over the body of his girlfriend, which resulted in a hostile take-over of the Apahanta for a day until the crisis was solved, resulting in the death of the alien and the body it had taken over. Vertiga took even more care of Bäker from that moment and after some time he took Bäker with him to some adventurous nights on Gran Canaria, to meet other women.
Vertiga also has a similar relationship with Chief Engineer Leon Isley, wich used to be a student of his, just like Logistics Pilot Sombra Hookier. Back on Curacao already they enjoyed women together, went to parties and clubs, enjoyed surfing, diving and other activities together until Vertiga left Curacao to join the Core, to fight the Nomads. Isley remained on Curacao, finishing successfully his OSC Engineering training and when Vertiga deserted from the Core and took the Apahanta with him, he invited Isley to join his crew, first only on his home ship to take care of former Reaver Nancy Sweetwater, later to become the Chief Engineer of the Apahanta. Despite the much troubles they went through together, mostly because of Isley's relationship with former Reaver Nancy Sweetwater, they consider each other still best friends and do these night club weekends still together, just now with Bäker as well.
Looking at his relationships, it is obvious that Vertiga makes a difference between male and female contacts in his inner social environment. He generally likes to treat women as friends, with benefits, while keeping his male friends close, trusting on their loyalty to keep the Apahanta running.
SUMMARY
Ezrael Vertiga, despite heavily impacting burdens, hostile environments, dealdy threats and the to many people rather imprisoning life on a battleship, appears to be mentally stable. He is an opportunistic hedonistic sexual predator, altruistic and admired leader, possibly unable or simply uninterested in the commitment to a monogamistic relationship. A rare but welcome trait is the fact that he doesn't appear to be power-hungry for a man who already has billions on his accounts and weapons of mass destruction in his inventory. Despite the Apahanta being a warship, he prefers to use it as sanctuary for his people and himself to stay away from the dangers of Sirius. Nevertheless he will stand up and be strong if the situations demands it. If people can bear the fact that he is strongly sexed-up, they will find a very interesting persona to meet in him.
RECOMMENDATIONS
At this point, there is no worrisome behavior visible. There are only few hints pointing at unbalances in his acting and thinking, but these aspects are not dominant yet. Observation will be continued, investigation on mentioned points will be executed.
QUOTES
"[...] Shame, so he said, is something unnecessary. He said he saw me naked before already, like when I was beaten into unconsciousness by those guys at Livadia and he rescued me and on the medical bay, he removed my clothes and cleaned me while Doctor Carr treated my wounds. I still felt incredibly awkward when he helped me prepare for my date with Lorena, though. He later added that half of Sirius probably saw him naked at some point on the neural net - slightly overestimated I think - but it helped me feeling more comfortable when being naked infront of other people. He also told me that he once had to enter the bridge during an emergency situation completely naked as they got attacked and he was needed there. He explained to me that there is no room for the feeling of shame on the Apahanta. We needed to be professionals all the time. And putting on clothes costs seconds you don't always have. Of course he added later that it would always make up for a good story when he could tell other people that he fought the Order completely naked. "
- Engineer Trainee Noel Bäker on Vertiga's opinion on shame
"I'm fully aware some people think I'm obsessed with him. I probably am. He is the perfect man. He looks good. He smells good. His is good at everything he does. He has good intentions. He is funny. He is strong and rich and eloquent and I gain energy from being with him. He turned me into the woman that I am now, and I am a happy woman. Of course I would like to be married with him, I would even have loved to have children with him. But he doesn't like children. So I made sure I wouldn't be able to become pregnant. He never said anything positive about what I did there, but I know he appreciates it silently. It was just something against his ethics."
- Logistics Pilot Sombra Hookier on her sterilisation
"Every single time we meet a new group or individual out there, and they ask me to explain to them what we are doing, I have literally no idea what to tell them. I bought the Apahanta to fight Nomads under the flag of the Core. Turned out the Core doesn't want to fight them the way I would have liked them to, so we left, with the Apahanta. And that mostly because the ship was a billion-heavy investment. First I wanted to sell it for the full price. Now I don't want to anymore. I want to keep it. Right now, the Apahanta is my home, and the home of my crew,
who are my family. Try to explain to other people that the Apahanta is not a warship but a research ship. It's like trying to convince people that these Zoner Juggernaughts are colony ships and not warships."
- Ezrael Vertiga on the Apahanta and her mission
"I don't hate the Captain. Not at all, actually. He cares well for us, he pays well, he gives us a nice home. It also never gets boring. Except for me. I either have nothing to do here because nobody gets sick or loses an arm, or I see a bunch of corpses lying around that I can't patch back together because some heavy bullshit laser pierced the hull or a heavy mortar exploded their bodies. The only change is when the Captain returns from a date with some crazy maltese bitch and asks me to check for possible infections. I don't know what is worse, really. You'd think he would get STDs at some point, but it's not even that. I get paid better than any other doctor out there and have literally nothing to do."
- Dr. Adrianna Carr on her relationship with Vertiga and her work on the Apahanta
November 04th, 825 - Battleship Apahanta, Omicron Theta Outskirts
So, Captain Vertiga bought a data cache of the Cult of Technology from some shady Core captain called Cassius Richard. He and Commander Aguilar used the Apahanta's AI to try and make sense of it, and apparently they had enough cross references to make some sense out of it. There were coordinates about possible storage and testing areas. So we went to the first location yesterday, hoping for some nice treasure just waiting for us. Turns out the coordinates were correct. Turns also out we were too late. We found the remains of an installation hidden inside a cluster of drifting Omicron Theta planetary fragments. Small enough to allow the Apahanta to fly close to it and take a look. Everything down there was abandoned, damaged and whoever was there must have taken everything of value. Due to the unstable nature of the fragments, a restoration of the depot down there wouldn't be a good idea either. Chances are it would be ripped apart in the next five or ten years.
I sat next to Vertiga when the drone scout team explored the area, to find nothing. Not even a database. One would think Vertiga was disappointed about it, but he didn't seem to be at all. If anything, there were sparks of joy in his eyes. "A credit for your thoughts, Captain?" I asked him with an expectant glance at him. He just stared at the main screen, smirking, before placing his gloved hand on mine on my armrest.
"You know, sometimes I like to imagine situations like these. This is literally what a so called adventurer would do. Hunting for treasures. For fortune. I like to imagine that asteroid having a giant red cross on the surface to mark the spot where we dig. I'd like to put on an EVA-suit, grab a laser digger and resurface a wooden lootcrate. And then we try to open it but we can't without the key. So we go on another adventure to pilfer the key from some religious cult that sacrifices female virgins to a stream of lava on some volcanic world, but then the Apahanta comes in with a planetfall - yes, in that story it would be possible - and pew pew pew fires our Dual-Gatling-Lasers at the fanatics and I save the girls and they are all like 'You saved me, I love you, Starlord Vertiga!' and then the credits start rolling while all these hot babes with their oiled 90-60-90 bodies go down on me."
"Yeah, that sounds great," I sounded while imagining his very graphically described scenario, for a moment drifting away in thoughts.
"There are more of these coordinates in the cache. I want to check out all of them. Doesn't really matter whether we find something. Of course it would be great, you know, but with the sales of the Gale Cannons we made enough money to cover the maintenance, repair and supply for years. Things are currently looking good for us and we can allow ourselves this little adventure." He smirked at me. His damn charming smirk. I was about to say something while he lifted his tea cup to his lips as the ship beeped. Ezrael turned to the main screen, reading the notification. A transmission, high priority.
"Uh... uhm, Apahanta, please play the transmission. Mainscreen overlay."
receiving transmission identifying encryption applying available decryption keys processing transmission format: text checking transmission for hazardous content status: trusted tracing neural net ID trusted neural net ID recognized loading neural net avatar playing transmission
Neural Net ID SOMBRAHOOKIER
I just saw the news. I'm so sorry, Ez. I'll be at Livadia today if you want me to be around.
The voice of the woman didn't sound well at all. She sounded sad. Very sad. I looked at the Captain, and irritation was written in his face. His mouth was open as his head turned to Commander Aguilar first, then to me, then back at the mainscreen.
"Apahanta, please open the attachment."
And the picture of the main screen changed to the LSF broadcast. A report about the death of Nancy "Sangria" Sweetwater and Maren von Westefeld. It was the kind of moment I needed to focus on him entirely. I faced him, trying to read as much as possible of his body language. He watched the broadcast, first in disbelieve, followed by a smirk, then an awkward smile. Then he lowered his head to look at the ground. "Sherry, you have the conn. Apahanta, close the broadcast and the transmission, please."
Then he stood up and headed for the exit. I stood up as well, intending to follow him. "Stay," he said with an untypical commanding voice. Doing as he said, I sat down again and watched him leave. Then I turned towards Commander Aguilar, who remaind cold and controlled as usual.
November 5th, 825 - Battleship Apahanta, Omicron Theta
For the rest of the day, nobody got to see Vertiga again. He also didn't show up for the breakfast or the morning workout of the next day. The Apahanta was remaining where it was, hovering above the hole in the clustered rock far outside of Omicron Theta. It felt like nobody knew what to do without the Captain saying anything. There was an awkward feeling within the crew during breakfast and morning workout. His absence was impacting. They were worried.
I was certain that it was time for me now to act as his counselor. Since he wasn't at the breakfast, I went to the canteen and asked a KSR to fill tray with a bit of everything that was known for him to like. Ten minutes later, I was surprised to see that the tray was filled with various fruits cut into slices and prepared with a bit of citrus to prevent it from oxidation, as well as a glass of red wine and a filet of chiwi meat. It looked incredibly good and smelled just like that. However, I should have worded my order a bit more carefully. The glass of wine looked weirdly out of place, and after taking a sip from it, I left it at the counter. I didn't want to bring him alcohol.
Carrying the tray up to the bridge deck and to his room, I knocked at his door. He didn't open. I put the tray down on the floor and leaned against the door. I wanted to comfort him. Convince him of my best intentions. "Captain, it is me. Your Counselor. I have some food for you, and I really would like to talk to you if you don't mind. Or just see you, so I know you are fine. Just a minute, at least. Could you let me in?"
But he didn't open. "Look, I won't go away until you let me talk to you. I'm really concerned about you. Just give me a life sign. Say anything. You can yell at me, if you want. Yeah, do that! Yell at me! Give me your best shot! And then hit me! Beat me! Just open the door, please, okay?"
Sighing in a bit of resignation, I turned around and saw Commander Aguilar standing a few meters away from me in the direction of the bridge. I could have sworn she was slightly smirking and watching me but her expression quickly changed to her usual cold one. "Did you just smirk at me?"
"I did not," she said, her eyes scanning me from head to toes. Then the tray. "Counselor, these doors are heavy. If you want people to hear you, you shouldn't knock but use the door panel to talk." That was explaining much! How often did I talkt to doors without them complying to my demands! "Aside from that, the Captain is not in his quarters. You can find him at the observation deck."
My mouth formed the shape of a perfect o before I nodded at her and picked up the tray again. Observation deck, here I come! I made my first steps, then turned around in an elegant manner with the tray in my hands, glancing at the Commander. "Where is the observation deck?"
Around five minutes later I arrived at the dark multi-level room that was the observation deck. There were multiple platforms up there for people to stand or sit and look out of the wide windows at the cheeks of the ship. It was a bit intimidating, to be honest, to see Ezrael sitting down there on the floor level on a bench, all alone. I moved a bit closer to him, with very small steps as walking in the dark was challenging with the tray in my hands. "Captain?" But he didn't react. I stepped closer, standing next to the bench. "Captain? I brought some breakfast for you." No response. As I wasn't there at all. I placed the tray on the bench and moved over to him. His eyes were closed. There was music playing very silently? He was wearing in-ear headphones! Curious, I leaned in closer as I wanted to know what he was listening to. I was expecting it to be something melancholy, but it wasn't. He was listening to some rock music. His eyes opened and he found my face close to his. I quickly pulled myself back and he smirked at me.
"Hello Abigail," he sounded, afterwards taking the headphones out of his ears. He probably must have thought I wanted to kiss him like that. How embarrassing. Thankfully it was a dark room, so he couldn't have seen me blushing. In fact, I was standing in the light right now, Omicron Theta shining into the room right behind me. There was an awkward moment of silence before I caught myself to say something.
"I brought some food for you. The crew is worried about you," I told him and moved over to the tray of food, pulling it towards him.
"What a nice gesture of you!" He smiled at me and placed the tray on his lap, then patted the place right next to him. I took the invitation, sitting down right next to him. It appeared like he was quite positively surprised by the food.
"How are you?" I asked him, folding my hands in my lap while glancing at his food. Back then I never had tasted chiwi meat so far, so I was actually wondering why he liked specifically that kind of meat. It looked very inviting.
"I'm fine," he sounded and grabbed his banana. The banana, I mean. An actual banana. He began to peel it while talking. "It's not how it looks like, really. The LSF broadcast is a fake and Maren is alive. Admittedly I forgot about the deal when I saw the news, and shortly afterwards I received a wall of transmissions from people. I had to manage some things." I really wished I had eaten something for breakfast. I only had a coffee and an apple from our tree. I found myself staring at his banana. It was quite a big one. He uncovered it teasingly slow while talking. "I have a problem, now, though."
My belly was creating a suspicious sound and he looked at me with his typical smirk. "You know, I can't eat all that on my own. So take whatever you want." And then he offered me his half-peeled banana. I took it and gave him a flat look. My belly was agreeing with his offer, though, so I took the banana into my mouth. He smiled widely at me and didn't look away during his next lines. "... Commodore Kaze Dagon of the Bretonian Armed Forces contacted me. Do you know her?"
Yes. Not my department, of course, but she was known for certain activities within the Armed Forces and other groups. Never had business with her, though, despite her influence on a certain other branch of the service. Of course I couldn't tell him about that. "No. Should I?" I paid more attention to his banana again.
"Not really. I've been in an ambivalent working relationship with her. Nothing outright negative so far, but, you know, she is the kind of person you don't want to have as your enemy. Less trust, more control. She sent me a comm, asking me whether I can confirm or deny the death of Maren and the other woman." And that was a very clever move of her. "She never said it directly, but I know she prefers to use my contact with the latter woman as a leverage to keep me under control. Which now puts me in a very difficult situation. If I confirm that they are not dead, she has the leverage to inform anyone who is now supposed to believe the two women are dead about the opposite. It sort of would confirm that these women are involved in suspicious activities - which they, matter of factly, are not. People however believed them to be."
Until this point, he himself never had mentioned the Reaver bitch at all infront of me. I knew about her, of course, from my talks with the crew. I knew he still had contact with her. In this moment, he didn't smile anymore, though, despite me eating his banana. "If lie and say they are dead, or pretend that I don't know myself, it will just raise further suspicion. Dagon knows I want to protect Nancy and Maren, out of love, which is an incredibly irrational reason to risk all I have. And I think that is exactly why she is so keen about it. Women have always been my weakness. A reason to act irrationally. So if I told Dagon that I don't know or that they are dead, it would be a lie, a break of trust. A fauxpas. A flaw in my reputation. I am allied with Bretonia, you know. The Apahanta can roam around freely in Her Majesties realm. I would like to keep it that way. If I lie to her, it means I need to ensure that Maren and Nancy keep a low profile. However, I can't control either of them. They both are stubborn, dumb and unpredictable. Relying on them doing the right thing is like asking a guy with epilepsy to not spazz out for a year while living on New Tokyo."
"Then tell her about it?" I proposed, as that at least wouldn't risk his own reputation but only increase the leverage on him. In thought I suckled on the banana.
"I'd like to do that, yes. Giving her the benefit of the doubt, as so far, nothing bad happened because of her. Well, apart from the bounty on my head from the Order, but that is something that I chose to risk. However, I noticed something. Usually, Commodore Dagon sends transmissions from her office on one of the Bretonian Battlegroup Flagships. This particular transmission does not use a bretonian signature. It's a libertonian one. I do have a suspicion, based on her interest in both Nancy and apparently Maren, too. That suspicion is that she is in touch with the LSF, with Agency 404, who used to use Nancy as an asset to spy on me. I know from the LSF agent I am working with that 404 and the main branch of the security forces are not working hand in hand. Two completely different departments. So 404 now is not sure whether they are dead for good, I suspect. This is all based on deduction, though. There are only so many facts supporting this construct. I have no way of finding out the truth with my limited resources. This limits my choices to trusting professionals that act beyond the laws to not fuck me and my protegés over, or trust my protegés to keep a low profile for the rest of their lifes, which by extension means that they probably need to stay away from me. As I will be watched, just to prove them right."
I have to admit, my dear diary, I was impressed by the farsight. Vertiga was not dumb. He was good at deduction, profiling and analysis and calculation of possible outcomes of his choices. It was something I liked about him. Not that there was not much to like about him. But it was a quality I valued about him. One of many. I put the banana on the tray and glanced into his eyes. "What if it was not you who would lie to them?" I asked him.
He picked up a piece of the pan-fried chiwi meat with his index finger and thumb, supported by his middle finger, and held it up. "What do you mean?" He dipped the chiwi meat in the white cream in of the bowls there, then held it up again.
"If you don't want to outright tell them either truth or lie, then you need to act like someone who just lost his girlfriend. You pretend it to be the truth, but not to trick Commodore Dagon, but those who are supposed to buy the story. Tricking the Commodore would just be a by-product. A result that was achieved out of the necessity to keep the act up. So, you will need to behave like you just lost two very valuable friends. Any normal person would be suffering from the shock, being emotionally compromised." I took his arm and moved it towards myself, to have his hand holding the piece of chiwi meat be close to my face. "You are the Captain of a warship. If you are incapable of doing anything because of your emotionally compromised state, someone else needs to take over. Of course you don't need to give away your command now, since you and I know the truth. However, they don't. So my proposal is that you allow someone with a degree in psychology to answer your comms until you are able to do it yourself again." I smirked at him. "Let me take care of it for you, for now."
I then pulled his hand closer and took in his meat. A bit of the white cream remained on my lips, but god, it was tasty as hell. I don't know the name of the cream out of my head, but the combination of the fried chicken-ish meat with honey flavor combined with his cream was just incredible. His index and middle finger moved over my lips to wipe the cream off, however aimed for my mouth again after I swallowed so I sucked on his two fingers to clean them off the cream. What an aroma! My tongue slid over his fingers, taking in the taste and I moaned. What an incredible experience. I opened my eyes as he left my mouth and I looked at him, suddenly returning to the here and now and realizing that I just sucked on his gloved fingers like a slut. He smirked widely. "I can put the tray somewhere else, if you like."
I have no idea how it must have looked to him, but I was pretty certain my cheeks were glowing in red in that moment. Why was I always forgetting myself in his proximity? The chiwi meat was sort of spicy, too. Maybe that was why the cream was supposed to be eaten with it. I grabbed the glass of milk from the tray and lead it to my mouth to prevent the hot spice from getting worse. I did that too fast, though, and milk ran down my chin, dripping on my chest and running down between my legs. Taking the glass off my lips, I had to breathe for a moment before I placed the glass back on the tray on his lap. "So, do you want me to answer Dagon for you?"
His eyes were aiming at his fingers, then they scanned me and my body. There were clearly white drips on my chest, my belly and between my legs. They were well visible on the black, waterproof suit. "Do you want a cigarette before that?"