Author’s Note: This is an unedited, ongoing serial that will eventually be published in novel form. Plot/characters/elements are subject to change as it is being written. It’s currently in 1st person/present tense, but I may change it to past tense, excluding the first chapter which will act as an intro. Read at your own discretion and take note of story tags below.
Genre: Post-Apocalyptic sci-fi Tags: prostitution, graphic sex, large age gap, violence, theft, drug/alcohol abuse, depression, rape, gang rape, cannibalism, murder, incest, child/infant death and abuse, general abuse, (more to be added as the story goes)
The second his dick pushes into me, I realize this is a serious fucking mistake. Panic hits me like a punch in the gut and I scrabble forwards on my hands and knees, desperate to escape. My vision’s blurry and not just from the sweat pouring into my eyes—I feel like I’m having a stroke. My client, probably wondering what the fuck is going on, doesn’t move for a few seconds. The guy then comes over and puts his arms around me, patting my back gently as he goes tut tut in my ear. I lean right into his embrace and sob on his shoulder for a while, just bawling like a fucking baby.
When the tears have run their course, I pull back, face warm with embarrassment but he’s just staring at me with sympathy in his brown eyes. He’s average looking, maybe even on the ugly side, but there’s something about those eyes that makes me wonder why he has to pay for sex—surely someone else can see he’s a decent guy. That’s scarcer than water around here.
I think about trying again—I mean, he only just got the tip in… maybe after a few thrusts I’d be fine. I need the money. We need the money.
But just the thought of giving it another go has me trembling again.
“Give me your pad,” he says.
I frown. “Why?”
“So, I can pay you.”
“But—”
“Buddy, you look like you need it.”
After some arguing back and forth, he agrees on a blowjob in exchange for the credits. Down on my knees, I go all in and give him some of the best head I’ve ever given… but all the while, I’m wondering what it’ll take to open my hole for business again. What if my whoring days are through? I certainly won’t miss it, but what else is there? I think about Pytre’s suggestion: bodyguard. I did all right with that blaster at Turk’s, didn’t I?
I try not to gag as my throat is suddenly flooded with cum, swallowing down the guy’s load like I enjoy it, then give his cock a quick tongue bath to clean him up.
Satisfied, he thumbs my pad and pays me the original price we’d agreed on for a full fuck not just a blowjob, but he won’t back down.
I watch him walk away as I rub my mouth. Nice guy. Again I wonder what’s he doing on a shithole like Chornoboh-7.
+++
I can’t work the door code with my arms full, so I lean my forehead on the glowing button, waiting for Apple to let me in. After a moment, the door opens a crack.
“Oh, it’s you,” Apple says with a relieved sigh, letting me in. He’s wrapped a towel around his head, half covering his face. As soon as the door closes, he pulls the towel off and tosses it on the bed.
“You don’t look half as bad as you think you do,” I say, shaking my head. “Don’t be so vain.”
Apple’s single blue eye glares at me—the green one was lost to Turk’s violence and the wreckage hides beneath a silver eye patch that he never takes off, even to sleep. Despite the doctor’s nimble fingers and fine stitch work, the right side of his mouth is permanently twisted up, puckering in the corner where it meets the shiny pink scar zigzagging up his cheek.
I could mourn the loss of Apple’s prettiness, but there’s something weirdly appealing about his new battle-hardened face.
“I’m not vain. I’m ugly,” he says, staring down at the packages I dumped on the bed.
“If you were so ugly, would I do this?” I cup the back of his head and plant a kiss on his soft lips while giving his backside a good firm squeeze. I frown, measuring his ass cheek with my hand. He was still losing weight. “Apple, you have to eat.”
“What’s the point?” he says, heaving another sigh, but I can see the way he’s eyeing the package of cookies.
“Go on. I got them for you.”
He grins, pecks another kiss on my lips, and sits down to tear into the cookies. I touch my mouth, shaking my head. Funny how kissing is so… normal now.
“Where’d you get the credits?” Apple asks, his mouth full. He brushes a few crumbs from his bare chest and goes in for another cookie. “You worked?”
“Yeah.” I sit down on the corner of the bed and take a cookie for myself. It’s not very good—it tastes old and slightly rancid, but that’s all I can afford.
“And?”
“And it didn’t go well.”
“Oh.” He stops stuffing his face to take my hand.
Yesterday, when I was starting to mentally prepare myself to go back out on the streets, he shared a few stories about being brutalized by clients at the brothel—an attempt to commiserate over our unfortunate experiences. All it did was make me feel weak. If he’s able to function with all the shit he’s been through, why am unable to? It was one time.
“I panicked,” I say, looking down at his hand holding mine.
“It’s ok,” he says gently.
“It’s not ok,” I growl, taking my hand back and standing. “We’re going to starve to death because I can’t get my head out of my ass.” I pick up the other packages of food, all of them cheap and recently expired, and stack them on the storage unit near the foot of the bed.
“I can—” Apple starts, but I shoot him a warning look. He lets his shoulders fall and stares up at the ceiling. “I don’t know why you don’t want me whoring no more. I been doing it so long I can’t remember not doing it.”
“Because I don’t want you to.” I run both hands over my shorn grey hair, closing my eyes with a sigh. “I’m going to try again tomorrow.”
“Ok.”
“I just… don’t understand why it’s happening. It’s not like they hurt me that much…” I feel Apple’s arms come around me from behind and I hang my head, forcing myself to think about Turk’s men. I feel sweat prickling my armpits.
“It’s ok.” Apple rests his chin on my shoulder. “Tell me what happened today?”
I think about the sheer ball-squeezing, gut churning panic. “I just couldn’t go through with it.”
“Fucking or getting fucked?”
“Getting.”
“What about fucking? You ok with that?”
I honestly don’t know so I shrug.
“Do you want to give it a try?” Apple’s hand slides down my chest and he slips it into my pants, cupping my soft cock and balls. I shrug again, but I know I’m not going to be limp for long.
“C’mon.” Apple leads me back to the bed and has my lie down on my back while he undoes my zipper. “Up.”
I obediently lift my hips so he can strip my bottom half bare and then he straddles me. I’m getting flashbacks to the last time we made lo—
I close my eyes and shake my head. The last time we fucked.
It takes a few minutes before Apple can get me hard enough to penetrate him, but when he settles down on my dick, he tilts his head back with a moan, feeling me swell and get harder inside him. “Oh that’s nice.”
“Mm,” I grunt in reply, holding onto his skinny hips.
“Feel good?”
“Mm.”
“No ill-effects?” He starts to slide up and down my cock slowly like a human piston and my dick gives a happy twitch.
This time I smirk and shake my head.
“Want me to go faster?”
“Yes, please,” I reply.
“Like this?”
“Yeah…”
The door clicks and Apple’s head whips around, his body freezing in place with my dick buried deep.
“I’m sorry I, uh, didn’t realize you were…” Pytre stammers. “I’ll go.” He’s been cleaning rooms for Drenner to pay for our room, sometimes ten hours a day. I figure he’s probably exhausted and wants to lie down, so I start to lift Apple off me, but he puts a hand on my chest.
“I think you should stay,” Apple says to the ex-Rimer. “And join in.”
“What?” I think Pytre and I blurt it out at the same time.
Apple’s laugh jiggles my dick and he turns back to look down at me, his blue eye twinkling with mischief.
“Watching you two dance around each other is frankly exhausting,” he says, jouncing up and down a few times, injecting a little life back into my flagging boner. “You both want it but can’t figure out how to actually get around to doing it.” Apple grins, wiggling his hips.
“Apple, I don’t think—”
“I know what happened at Turk’s is what is fucking you up… but you’ve been acting extra weird since you found out Pytre’s a eunuch,” he says then glances over his shoulder to where I’m guessing Pytre is still standing. “And you’re confused because you thought he wanted you but suddenly he’s backed off and been treating you with kitten gloves and you have no fucking idea how to tell him you want him. I’m just saying you could fix that now.”
I don’t think it’s possible for me to feel any more mortified than I’m feeling right at this moment and I just want to sink into the bed. I don’t think I’ll ever be able to look Pytre in the eye again.
“Kid gloves,” I mutter, rubbing my face. “Pytre… I don’t know what—”
“Yes.”
My eyes pop open and my lungs stall and I’m not sure if I imagined Pytre’s answer but his next words remove all doubt.
“Yes… I’d like to join in.” He comes into my line of vision and I see his cheeks and ears are bright pink. His hazel eyes lock with mine. “But I don’t know how.”
Apple tosses his head back, the scar on his cheek becoming a deep crevice as his smile goes wide. “Thank fucking holy Rime,” he says.
“I don’t think Rime would approve,” Pytre says. For a second I think he’s being serious, but then a slow grin creeps across his face and I laugh.
Author’s Note: This is an unedited, ongoing serial that will eventually be published in novel form. Plot/characters/elements are subject to change as it is being written. It’s currently in 1st person/present tense, but I may change it to past tense, excluding the first chapter which will act as an intro. Read at your own discretion and take note of story tags below.
Genre: Post-Apocalyptic sci-fi Tags: prostitution, graphic sex, large age gap, violence, theft, drug/alcohol abuse, depression, rape, gang rape, cannibalism, murder, incest, child/infant death and abuse, general abuse, (more to be added as the story goes)
There’s no getting around the security cameras, so I don’t have much element of surprise to work with, but I’ve got a blaster shoved down the back of my pants that I’m hoping Turk can’t see on the old body-scanner pointed at me.
“Open up!” I pound on the thick metal door. Turk’s place is an ugly, squat building right next to the shuttle terminal. Windowless, it’s nearly a fortress—there’s a king’s ransom in real steel covering the walls, pitted in a few places but mostly scrubbed shiny from the sand and dust storms.
“Turk, you fucker… Open the goddamn door!” I shout, staring into the lens of one of the cameras. I’m probably going to die today, but I can’t let him get away with what he did—the image of Apple’s poor, torn up face is burned into my retinas.
There’s a loud clang on the other side of the door and I step back as it ratchets slowly open, my hand on the blaster’s grip. It’s Turk himself and he’s wearing a faded pink bathrobe.
Jesus, he’s hard to look at. He’s had work done on his eyes—built-in night vision and extra range… he loves to brag about it—but he went to a cut-rate surgeon and wound up with scarring that makes it look like he stared into the flames of Hell. His cheeks are cut open and fitted with flexible, transparent inserts, exposing his teeth on both sides, but the weirdest part of his face, by far, is his perfectly pert nose, upturned and dainty like it belongs on some doll, not sitting in the middle of his self-inflicted wreckage. I can’t believe Apple could stomach fucking him.
“Where’s my property?”
His words jolt me out of my daze. My reflexes are stupid-slow. I should have pulled the gun the second I laid eyes on him, but the whiskey is still going strong in my bloodstream and I’m sluggish from exhaustion.
“He’s mine,” I growl, leveling the blaster at him. He is—Apple’s mine in every way that there is, and if there is even the slightest possibility that I survive this suicide mission, I’m going to dedicate my life to keeping him safe and happy. No one will ever hurt him again.
I see movement in my peripheral and my instincts and training kick in—I swing the gun to my six, popping off two shots at Turk’s goon. The guy falls back hard, a smoking hole in the middle of his chest, and I turn around just in time to blast another hole straight through the head of the guy about to attack me. Even though he’s now missing most of his face—I can see the wall straight through his head—he doesn’t fall right away, just wobbles on his feet as he feels the edges of the wound. There’s no blood, the wound is cauterized, and the air is redolent of burnt flesh, piss, and shit… My heart starts to race and I’m getting tunnel vision. Helluva fucking time to have a panic attack.
Before I can react, a third guy tackles me to the ground. I feel my nose break as I hit the floor with my face, and the wind is knocked out of me. I blink through the pain, trying to draw breath, and focus on the slippered feet that stop in my line of vision. Finally, I cough, wheezing and struggling in the goon’s grasp as Turk squats down to stare at me. His robe’s wide open and his big, hideous dick is just dangling there in front of my face. It’s deformed and covered in broken veins and old surgery scars, the head of it bulbous and flared, a real nightmare.
What a last sight.
I laugh, spitting out a chip of tooth.
“Go on. Kill me,” I rasp. The boys would be safe at the hostel—Drenner assured me he’d hide them when he sold me the blaster—and tomorrow they’ll be long gone. Pytre will take care of Apple and in turn Apple will take care of Pytre… teach him how to survive with his wits.
“Kill you? No. You’re not going to die for a long while, my friend,” Turk says, patting my shoulder. He stands up, murmuring to someone I can’t see. I feel the pinch of a needle in my neck and everything fades to grey.
+++
I’m only half awake when I realize that someone is balls-deep inside me while I’m tied down to something. Wait, not tied… I’m paralyzed. I can’t even open my eyes, but I can feel everything. I’m on my stomach on something soft, a bed probably, with something shoved under my hips to elevate my ass—my legs are hanging off the side of the bed and the toes of my boots are scraping the floor in time to the pounding I’m getting. Boots? I’m still wearing my pants it seems. I’m guessing they ripped a hole in the seat to get access.
Damn, I liked these pants.
The guy slams into me hard with a grunt, finishing off, then pulls out. Almost immediately, someone else takes his place, and I let out a muffled moan. My ass is sore—how long has this been going on? I try to lift my eyelids again but nothing happens. I think of the relief girl at the bar—at least she gets to sleep through the rough stuff. This guy’s going way too deep, but there’s fuck all I can do about it except ride out the pain and hope he cums soon.
The asshole finally does and I breathe out a sigh of relief, but my respite is short-lived—a third guy sticks his dick in me, thankfully smaller than the last two, and starts speed-fucking me. With all the squelching and splattering I hear—god knows how many fuckers pumped and dumped—it’s gotta be like churning butter back there.
So, this is what Turk has planned for me? Fuck my ass raw? Rape me to death?
Finally, I get my eyes a bit open and I see that Turk’s sitting on the bed, just watching his fellas run a train on me and jerking off slowly. His dick looks only half hard but it’s still bigger than anything that's ever stretched my hole… I’m sure he’s going to take his turn eventually and I will admit that the idea scares the living shit out of me. What if I can piss him off enough that he’ll just put me out of my misery instead?
“Listen, you fucking freak—” I try, but it comes out as a mess of hissing and garbled vowels. However, it gets his attention.
“Ah, you’re awake. Good. Enjoying yourself?” He smiles and the inserts in his cheeks sort of buckle, making him even more grotesque.
“Fuck you,” I reply. Of course, it sounds nothing like that, but Turk can probably figure out what I said by my tone.
He laughs and shakes his head. My dance partner changes again and this time I let out a strangled yell. Either the guy’s dick is covered in studs or he’s wearing some kind of sheath—either way, my ass is getting scooped out so hard I’ve got tears in my eyes.
“Fuck you,” I mumble again, my tongue only half obeying me. My nose is throbbing in time to my heartbeat and I can’t breathe through it—I’d almost forgotten it was broken—but the pain is nothing compared to what’s happening to my poor backside.
Turk smiles wide, then licks his finger and thumb before pinching one of his nipples. I just close my eyes.
What a way to go...
Suddenly, I hear something that makes my heart beat faster: a Petrov Ten shuttle taking off. The whole place is shaking with the force of it. Shit, how long was I unconscious? It's morning already? But, it really doesn’t matter. I’m just happy that Pytre and Apple are safe. I might not look like I’m smiling but I am.
Safe travels.
Turk speaks up after the roar of the shuttle fades. “See, if you hadn’t killed Stern and Bruce, we mighta reached some sort of agreement, like,” Turk says. “I was willing to let you buy the boy back, you know. Give you a good price for him.”
I let out a shuddering breath when the guy with the studded dick pulls out, but then I feel fingers enter my wrecked ass, pushing in, and I whimper.
“But no... you come into my house and kill my guys? That don’t sit well with me.”
I’m barely listening because the fucker behind me is twisting his hand, back and forth, trying to get it to fit and it feels like something’s going to tear.
“Messing up the kid’s face... now, I didn’t like doing it, pretty boy like that deserves better. But it’s your fault, you know.”
My fault?
The thought barely registers because a few things happen almost simultaneously, taking up all my attention.
The first, is my ass finally accepts the guy’s fist and instead of pain, I spontaneously start cumming so hard—I mean, full-body, toe-curling hard—that the wail coming from between my clenched teeth sounds like a steam whistle. That’s never happened before... I mean, my dick’s not even hard.
The guy fisting me is so surprised he yanks his hand out of me—or so I thought that’s what happened... but then I hear yelling and a loud bang, and the unmistakable whirring sound of a minigun powering up.
I still can’t turn or lift my head, so I can only guess at what’s happening around me, but I hear Turk begging for his life and damn does that make me happy.
When a tinny lifeless voice demands that Turk’s men put down their guns, I recognize it. An Enforcer? Back when ‘Boh-7 was a slightly more lawful place, the Enforcer droids made up the bulk of the police force. Days before the coup that turned the moon into its current anarchic state, someone managed to hack their systems, turning them into guns for hire for anyone who could afford them... which isn’t many, these days.
I hear the clattering of dropped weapons and a second later, a gentle hand on my shoulder.
“Are you all right?” Pytre asks. Why isn’t he on the shuttle? Not that I’m not happy to see him...
“Can’t move,” I mutter through sluggish lips. I feel like I just shat out a bowling ball—I’m afraid to ask for the damage report. Also, I’m still tingling from head to toe from climaxing, and I don’t know how to process what happened. I’m just glad it’s over.
I grunt with surprise as I’m turned over, then lifted off the bed by two thick metal arms that hold me against the droid’s cold grey body. Pytre quickly pulls a blanket off the bed and drapes it over me. It’s not like I really care that my bare ass is hanging down for all the world to ogle but I appreciate the gesture.
“Wait,” I say as we start off. Turk and his goons are just standing around us. Why are they still breathing?
Pytre looks up. “What is it?”
“Tuhk...” I gurgle. “No... kill?”
“No.”
“Why?”
“Why? Because, according to Drenner, he owes a lot of credits to a lot of scary people... and who do you think will come after us when they find out Turk’s no longer capable of paying them back?”
He’s right. That’s why I didn’t tell Drenner who the blaster was intended for—I knew he’d try to stop me. Damn it. I should have told Pytre to keep his mouth shut. While I don’t really care about my own hide, the thought of putting Pytre, and by extension Apple, in harm’s way makes me nauseous.
We can’t kill them. Even if we have the Enforcer shoot Turk's head off his shoulders and kill every last one of his henchmen, chances are the droid belongs to one of those scary people Pytre mentioned, and between its body cam and Turk’s security system, there would be no hiding who did it.
Something dawns on me.
“Sold... tick’ts?” It's the only explanation for how he can afford to hire out an Enforcer droid.
Pytre nods, leading us out of what I’m guessing is Turk’s bedroom. “For the Enforcer and for the doctor. I also gave Drenner most of the credits left over from the chartreuse for a month’s worth of rent.”
Shit. So we’re broke again. And neither Apple nor I will be making money the usual way any time soon.
“I want that boy back!” Turk shouts, following us.
Pytre surprises me by turning around, his expression one of sheer fury. “Enforcer, shoot him in the knee.”
“What? Fuck!” Turk sounds like he’s running away. The droid swivels 180 degrees, me still cradled in its arms like a baby, and blasts off a shot from one of its shoulder guns. It goes right over my head, so close I smell burning ozone, and Turk goes down like a sack of wet garbage with a neat hole through the back of his knee. Pytre stands above the wailing merc, his face serene. His measured words are icy cold: “If you ever go near Apple again, I’m going to cut your cock off and feed it to you a piece at a time.”
Jesus.
+++
Pytre winds through the streets, the Enforcer following behind at a steady pace. I’m half asleep by the time we get to the hostel, lulled into dozing by the vibrations coming up from the droid’s treads... and possibly, probably shock. My brain just wants to shut down.
At the hostel, we go all the way to the top floor to a room I’ve never seen before. It’s much bigger than where we’ve been staying and it has two large beds—a bit wider than doubles. This must be what Drenner calls the “Honeymoon Suite”. Like all the other rooms in the discount hostel there are no wall decorations and just the bare minimum of furnishings, but I notice with some hazy amusement that there’s a little blue vase with a fake yellow flower in it on the table. Classy.
A slender blonde woman with thick-framed glasses is leaning over Apple on the bed, nodding at whatever he’s saying. I’m assuming the woman is the doctor Pytre mentioned.
“Enforcer, put him down here,” Pytre says, pointing to the other bed. Gently, the droid settles me down on the bed. “Enforcer, you can go.” The droid beeps twice and swivels around, leaving us to go back to its master, whoever that is.
I look over at Apple. Most of his face is swathed in clean white bandages, so he can’t see me, but I say, “I’m here.” My voice still sounds weird and for a sec I wonder if he even knows it’s me, but then he nods.
“He was given some kind paralytic. Or tranquilizers. Maybe both,” Pytre explains to the woman as she stands to come take a look at me. Without a word, she grabs my nose and—crack—jerks it straight. I yell, my eyes streaming, and almost hyperventilate as I lay there twisting in agony. I’ve broken my nose half a dozen times and it hurts the same every goddamn time. On the plus side, the adrenaline seems to have given me some of my mobility back.
When I’ve gotten a hold of myself the woman leans over me again. I wonder what her story is. Doctors here generally fall into two categories. The first are doctors who never actually got a license or even studied medicine. Most of them are pure butchers and the only doctors most people can afford.
The second class of doctors are the ones who had licenses but lost them. I’m pegging this lady for the latter—maybe she lost her license because she made a bad call, but from the way her grey eyes stare at me without a shred of life or compassion in them, I’m going to assume she lost it because she likes cutting up orphans in her spare time.
“Where else?” she says, her accent marking her as a newcomer to this moon.
“He was... uh...” Pytre goes bright pink as he gestures to my pelvis. Gone is the tough guy who threatened a dangerous man with castration just ten minutes ago. He looks like he’s going to cry and it hurts me because I know why that is. Well, I guess we have something new in common now, don’t we? “He-he was—”
“Raped,” I say, sparing him the words. "A whole bunch." The doctor nods, looking almost bored.
Pytre swallows and looks away. “I’m going to get some food for us. I’ll be back.” He almost runs for the door.
Once he’s gone, the woman asks me if I can turn over on my stomach so she can take a look, and I manage to with a little help.
After some not-so-gentle prodding, she stands up. “You’ll be fine. There are some abrasions but nothing that won’t heal in a few days. You’ll probably want to stick a freeze pack on there.” I hear her pull her gloves off with a snap and I slowly roll to my side. “The little one said you’re a sex worker?” She lifts an eyebrow at me.
I nod. I guess I have to come out of retirement as soon as my ass is healed up, don’t I? Fucking hell. Maybe Pytre can get more liquor to sell?
“A little old for that kind of work, aren’t you?”
I just frown at her.
“I assume you’re up to date on your immunizations?”
“Yes.” Both Apple and I get regular shots of black market Termezine and Declorazam to keep our dicks from falling off and our assholes free of disease.
“Good. Bring this one to me in ten days to get the stitches out,” the doctor says, pointing to Apple. “And keep the dressings clean.”
“Ok.”
The doctor picks up her bag and leaves without another word or a backwards glance. I’m guessing Pytre already squared up with her.
“Asher?” Apple’s voice is muffled by the bandages.
“Hang on,” I say and struggle to a sitting position. My legs are like wet noodles so I hang onto the mattress as I lower myself to the floor to crawl the space between the beds. It takes a few minutes, but I manage to pull myself up so I’m lying next to Apple. I take his unbandaged hand.
“I’m here.”
“You ok, old man?”
I think about it for a minute. “I will be,” I answer. “You?”
“I will be.” I see the corner of his mouth curl up a tiny bit, but then I’m startled when he lets out a shuddering whimper. “I’m going to lose my eye.”
“That’s fine,” I say, squeezing his hand. “You’ve got a spare.”
This time he laughs, then groans in pain. The doctor’s taped up his chest, so I’m guessing he’s got some broken ribs, not to mention the tear in his cheek. I shake my head. “I’m sorry.”
“S’ok.” He squeezes my hand back. “How’s it look?”
I can’t see anything because of the bandages, but I reach over and lift up the corner of the gauze covering his cheek. The stitches are very neat and tidy—there’s probably about twenty of them repairing Apple’s torn face—but his flesh is so bruised it hurts to look at. I place the bandage back, my stomach in knots.
“It looks fine,” I lie.
“Bullturds.” The side of his lip turns up again in a small smile.
I lay there quietly, just watching him breathe. “My nose got broken too.”
“Oh yeah? Hurts like a bastard.”
“Yeah.”
I can’t tell if it’s because I’m exhausted, in pain, or actively trying not to think about what I just went through, but I feel just plain wrong. Mostly in my head. I feel like crying for a bit but I don’t want to worry Apple.
“Did he tell you why he did this to me?” Apple whispers.
I frown. “No. He didn’t say.” I’m sure I’d remember it if he did.
“It’s because I told him I was going to go back to you.”
It’s your fault. So that’s what he meant.
“Oh.”
“You were right about him. All of it. I was just... I thought... Maybe you didn’t need me anymore. With the priest around. You know?”
Ok, so I am crying now, but doing it as quietly as I can.
“Oh yeah?” I say, my voice hoarse. “That’s bullturds.”
Apple lets out a shaky sigh and I realize that behind the bandages he’s also crying. What a pair we are.
I clear my throat trying to think of something cheerful to say.
“You should have seen Pytre. He threatened to cut Turk’s cock off and make him eat it.”
Apple lets out a raspy chuckle, then a moan of pain, but his ribs and face don’t stop him from laughing again. “That’s fitting, coming from him.”
My forehead wrinkles up. “Is it?” I’d found it weirdly out of character, though I'd chalked it up to the shit he's been through.
“Yeah. He’s a Rimer.”
“So?”
“So, he’s a eunuch.”
I’m silent for a few seconds, digesting this information.
“Asher?”
“Uh. Yeah?”
“Oh...” Apple says softly. “You didn’t know, did you?”
I just grunt in reply. Then I sigh. Well, it explains a few things, I suppose.
I look at Apple's hand in mine.
"Can you make a fist?"
He closes his hand in a tight fist. "Yeah, why?"
"Just wanted to see how big it is."
I can tell Apple's confused, but I just bring his hand to my lips and give it a little kiss.
Author’s Note: This is an unedited, ongoing serial that will eventually be published in novel form. Plot/characters/elements are subject to change as it is being written. It’s currently in 1st person/present tense, but I may change it to past tense, excluding the first chapter which will act as an intro. Read at your own discretion and take note of story tags below.
Genre: Post-Apocalyptic sci-fi Tags: prostitution, graphic sex, large age gap, violence, theft, drug/alcohol abuse, depression, rape, gang rape, cannibalism, murder, incest, child/infant death and abuse, general abuse, (more to be added as the story goes)
Finally. I look
over at Pytre. He’s lying on his cot, staring at the ceiling like I’ve been
doing for the past hour. “Remember the Gulchtown boy-whore?” I ask.
Slowly, Pytre turns to face me, his hazel eyes wide. “How is
he alive?”
I figure he means the withdrawal and rapid aging. I think about all the cock-sucking and decide to keep my mouth shut. “I don’t know.”
“He should be dead.”
“Yeah.”
A few seconds click by and I try not to squirm under Pytre’s
shrewd gaze.
“What is he to you?”
Well, technically
Apple’s my property, seeing as how I bought him and all, but I’m not sure
that’s what Pytre wants to hear. “We travel together,” I say gruffly. “And what
about you? How are you still alive?” I think about the cannibals and add,
“because of the drug, I mean. Isn’t it the same as Apple’s?”
“His name is Apple?” Pytre’s somber expression finally cracks for the first time in days and he lets out a little laugh.
I smile at him. “Yeah. Stupid name.”
“Poor kid.” Pytre shakes his head with another soft chuckle.
He shrugs. “I’m not on any drugs.”
I frown, confused. “You’re... not?”
“No.”
“You said you were.”
“I did not. As I recall, I stated that the Disciples of Rime and the whores of Gulchtown take something similar. I never said I did.”
I wipe my hand over my mouth, staring at him. I’d been
assuming all along that he could possibly be as old as thirty… But then Ghest had
been forty and looked like a wizened, crusty old man-child. Pytre is still a
fresh-faced teen. I feel uncomfortable and look away.
“Sorry, I just figured...”
“I’m nineteen.”
Alright so he is older than he looks, but not by much. “Ok.”
“At least I think I am. I came wandering into the compound
when I was just barely walking age, they said,” Pytre murmurs. I look over
again and see he’s got his eyes closed. “A one-year-old, alone in the
wastelands. They searched for a week for my parents and found no trace. I was a
miracle... given to them by Rime himself, they said. Maybe Rime reborn.” He
laughed. “What a crock of shit.”
My frown deepens. I’m no believer, and it is a crock of shit, but it bothers me hearing Pytre talk this way.
“They raised you.” Would account for what I had perceived
was a long life of worship. Hard not to absorb some of that serenity when
you’re fed it from age one. I wish Pytre could find a little of that serenity
now. I have no idea what to say to take the hurt away.
“They did, yes.”
Again, we lapse into uncomfortable silence. We’re saved by the door banging open and Apple trudging in, his jaws parted in a cavernous yawn. He sees me lying on the second cot and sighs dramatically. “No, no, don’t get up. Really. It’s not like I’m the only one working these days.” He leans over and yanks the pillow out from under my head. He throws it down, kicking dirty clothes out of the way, and stretches out on his back on the hard floor. He’s wearing a bright-green sleeveless jumpsuit, open to just above his groin. A patch of crinkly blond hair is visible above the zipper. Sighing, he folds his hands behind his head and closes his eyes. “Actually, I’ve been bent over backwards for the better part of an hour. This feels nice.”
“Turk again?”
His eyes snap open and he shoots me a look that’s either
defensive or nervous. “Yeah, why?”
“Aren’t worried your ass is going to fall out?”
“My ass is just fine.” He frowns and looks away.
I’ve been assuming the way he’s been acting the past few
days is because of Pytre, but maybe it’s something else. I look over at Pytre
and he’s gone back to staring at the ceiling.
“Did you pay the water bill?” I ask Apple. We’re down to one
jug of potable water.
“No.” Apple’s forehead wrinkles up and he lifts himself up
on his elbows, staring hard at me. “Turnbull said to say he knows who you are,
and we can get our water elsewhere. But he didn’t say it so nice as that.”
“Fuck.” I rub my face.
“What the hell does he mean?”
“It’s nothing,” I say, shaking my head. Maybe Pytre’ll be
well enough to secure a new source of water tomorrow. He’s got an honest face
and I have to stop showing mine if we want to stay alive. “Never mind.”
“I wanna know.”
“Go the fuck to sleep,” I growl.
“Asher hasn’t told you who he is?” Pytre asks.
“Who’s Asher?” Apple asks, turning to the Rimer.
The look on Pytre’s face is almost comically confused. “He
is,” he says, gesturing to me.
Apple’s mismatched eyes find me again. I can’t help but
laugh. It never occurred to me to tell him my name.
“Cael Asher,” I say.
Apple studies me for a few seconds and turns back to Pytre.
“Why’d he tell you his name?” His
tone is peevish.
“He didn’t have to. He’s well known.” Pytre smiles at me.
“He’s the man who saved the human race.”
I scoff and turn over in the cot, facing away. I have half a
mind to leave, but if Pytre’s going to give Apple a history lesson, I should
stay here and make sure he gets the facts straight.
“Then, why do they spit in his food?” Apple asks.
“Because he couldn’t save all of them,” Pytre says quietly.
“What do you know of the last days of Earth?”
“Only a little bit. My people weren’t from Earth.”
“Of course, your people were from Earth. You’re human,
stupid…” I mumble, eyes closed.
“Bertchel says I weren’t born there and neither was the
whore that whelped me,” Apple replies, sounding annoyed, but a few seconds
later he adds, “So, what happened to Earth?”
“About forty years ago, something called a ‘catastrophic climate event’ happened on Earth. No one knows exactly what triggered it, but there was no stopping it. The world was ending,” Pytre tells him. “No one could decide what to do and no one could agree when Doomsday was. The world was in chaos.”
My eyes are shut tight now and I’m trying to keep the memories from getting their hooks into me. Half the planet was in flames by the time the World Government collapsed. Sometimes, when I’m overtired, the smell of a campfire makes my hands shake and my bladder feel real weak. I see burning bodies in my dreams.
“Corporal Asher and a dozen soldiers seized control of a buildyard
where there were finished colony ships just sitting there empty. He got them fueled
up and sent out a message: We are leaving
the world.”
I swallow and cross my arms, gritting my teeth. I’d been only
a year older than Pytre when I stood before that swelling crowd of hopefuls. Somehow
in all the mayhem I’d found clarity and purpose. We couldn’t wait for a failed government
to save us. We had to save ourselves.
“People started arriving. Little by little at first, then by the busload,” I say quietly, taking over the story. I don’t bother turning to face them. I don't want them to see the pain I know is plastered all over my face. “There were tents as far as the eye could see… too many people for twenty-nine ships. We barred the gates to the buildyard, but they kept coming, right over the razor wire.” I frown, thinking about the disorder and confusion of those last days. “People were killing each other over food and space. A platoon arrived, Marines… they tried to retake the ships, but the people just tore them limb from limb. Half the Leaders of the World Government were telling us to wait, the other half wanted me in front of a firing squad. Some of the colonies were vowing to keep us from ever reaching their orbits.
“Then... the earthquakes got worse. Six ships were lost when the ground collapsed beneath them... lost about a thousand people too, maybe more. We couldn't wait any longer… so we had a lottery.” I shake my head slowly. That had wasted so much goddamn time. “I took forty thousand with me. I left the rest to burn.”
The silence is dense in our small hostel room, then I hear
the other cot creak and feel Pytre’s hand land softly on my shoulder.
“The human race owes you a debt.”
“What if I left too soon? What if I could have taken more?”
“What do you mean?” asks Apple. “Sounds like you got out of
there, nicky-time-like.”
“There’s no way to tell if the world did end, or if I pulled the trigger too soon.” I open my eyes and turn onto my back. I never burden anyone with the shit in my head—why the fuck am I doing it now? “Too many ships passing through the wormhole collapsed it. There’s no way back. What if I was wrong? What if Earth was around for another month? Another half-year? We could have built more ships. Could have saved more.” The loadmaster had said the same thing, over and over, until he let himself out the airlock one night.
Pytre’s mouth twitches to the side and he shakes his head,
his expression sympathetic. “Like you said, there’s no way to know. You know
you did the right thing… besides, could the colonies have supported more than
what you brought with you?”
I curl my lip at him. “That’s bullcrap and you know it.”
“Sorry… I don’t know what to say and I’m afraid if I quote
Rime you’re going to punch me.”
I blink. I’d as soon cut off my balls than lay a hand on Pytre, but Apple decides then to put in his two credits.
“The past is dead… why’re you still fucking a corpse?”
Eyebrows raised, I look over at Apple. He’s sitting cross-legged next to Pytre on the other cot, his chin on his fists and his blond curls shadowing his eyes. Blocking out the past is probably the only thing that gets him up in the mornings—I can’t imagine his life has been anything short of a nightmare.
“You saved the humans. Yippee…” he says in a flat voice, then gives me a little grin. “Did you get a shiny medal?”
I shake my head, but Pytre does the honours for me. “When
they arrived, the colonial council stripped him of his rank, citizenship, and
sentenced him to two hundred years hard labour in the asteroid mines.”
Apple whistles low. “Ouch. But… I thought you saved the
human race?”
“In light of that feat, they reduced the sentence. I did thirty years.” Thirty years digging tungsten out of a crater in the dark, alone except for the stars and the hiss of oxygen in my ears. Feels like a dream now.
“That’s not fair,” Apple says, his expression subdued.
“It’s not,” I agree. “They should have put a bullet between
my eyes.”
Pytre and Apple share a glance and I sigh, sitting up. I scratch
the back of my head and shrug. “Now you know why they spit in my food.” I roll
my shoulders, feeling stiff. “Best you two get some shuteye. I’ll go deal with the
water situation.”
+++
An hour later, I’m back at the hostel having secured enough water rations for a week. I don’t like dealing with off-market water merchants—who knows if we'll get sick drinking the crap they sell—but it’s not like we have a lot of choice at this point.
I key in the code and push open the door to see that both Pytre and Apple are fast asleep on their respective cots, leaving me the floor. With a sigh, I pull off my dusty jacket then unlace my boots, stretching out on the cold grey laminate. I’m exhausted, but not tired, so I lie there trying to clear my thoughts.
After a while, I feel like I’m being watched—I look over and
see that Apple is awake. He stares at me for a few seconds, his face devoid of
expression, then quietly gets out of bed. I frown as he undoes the rest of the
zipper on the green jumpsuit and lets it fall to the floor. Naked, he stands
over me and I’m surprised to see that his dick is hard.
I glance over at Pytre as Apple straddles my thighs. The
Rimer is dead asleep but Apple reaches over my head and taps the light, dimming
it further.
“What are you doing?” I mouth. Of their own accord, my hands find Apple’s pert backside. He sighs softly and arches back as I squeeze his warm flesh. He feels good. Just as I’m about to open my mouth to ask Apple again what he’s up to, he leans forward and presses his lips to mine. For a moment I don’t do anything, but he moves his mouth insistently, his hands around the back of my neck, and I can’t help but let him in. I close my eyes, tentatively moving my own tongue against his as he settles his weight on me. I don’t remember the last time I kissed like this. I let him breathe for me for a bit and my tongue gets bolder. Apple tastes like lemon for some reason. It's sort of nice.
My dick is waking up, but it’s as confused as I am. This isn’t fucking… this feels like that other thing that people do. That word that I won’t use because I have no business saying it.
Apple pulls back to look down at me, his eyes sparkling in the dark. He’s breathing as hard as I am. I move my hands, stroking them up his back, his skin so smooth against my hands. I like the feel of his nakedness on me. Experimentally, I scratch his back lightly and I’m rewarded with a hushed groan—I remember I’ve done this to someone before, long ago. My hands take over, rusty muscle memory at best, and slide down his back, cup his buttocks, squeeze, then rake his thighs gently with my nails again. He sits up straighter, rocking his pelvis, so I shift my hands to his waist, thumbs stroking his taut belly, then slide my palms up his chest. His nipples are hard between my fingers and when I give them a good pinch, he gasps quietly. I want to kiss him again, take my time with it, but his hands are at my belt and in a matter of seconds, he’s freed my cock.
Panting, I’m running my hands up and down his thighs—distracted, involuntary movements because my entire focus is on Apple spitting on his fingers and reaching back, his eyes half lidded. He’s up on his knees, one hand around the base of my cock to guide it, and pauses with a smile… then he sinks down, his ass swallowing my dick down to the balls in one smooth motion. Fucking hell, that’s sweet. I close my eyes, stifling a moan, and breathe out slowly, savouring the feeling of my cock buried deep. When I look up, he’s staring down at me, his expression somber, unreadable. He slips his hands beneath the hem of my shirt and strokes them up my belly, his fingers raking through the thick, greying hair there and up onto my pecs… then he starts to move. My hands find his waist again and I can feel the rhythmic rolling of his hips and pelvis as he rises and falls, fucking me at an unhurried pace.
My heart is beating so fast I’m breathless—he rises up to
pause with just the tip of my dick threatening to slip out, and I groan, pulling
him down so I can bury myself back to the hilt inside his slick hole. My chest
starts to hurt, and for a second I’m worried that I’m having a heart attack.
Hey, it’s not a bad way to go, blowing my last load into a good-looking
kid like Apple—but the pain passes and I chalk it up to how hard I’m tensing…
the pace is so slow it’s a tease, and I need more. I grab the back of his neck and
pull him down, eagerly kissing him again as he opens his lips to meet mine, and
I take over the pace, thrusting up into him hard until he’s gasping the air
right out of my lungs and the slap of skin-on-skin is loud enough that I worry
it will wake Pytre.
At the last second, I turn my head, breaking away from Apple’s hungry mouth, and clench my teeth as I empty my balls inside him, biting back a deep groan of pleasure. Shit, when was the last time I felt this good? Maybe never. The aftershocks jerk my legs out straight and I’m twitching and shuddering beneath Apple, trying to catch my breath as he smiles down at me.
His dick is still hard, but he hasn’t cum yet. Can’t have
that.
I sit up, arms looping through his to coax him backwards
onto the floor and I lay beside him, kissing him for a bit. My hand strokes his
shaft and up over the head to catch the dribble of precum, using it to swipe my
thumb back and forth over his banjo string, before returning to a firm grip to
start all over again. I know I’m pretty good at this.
“You’re driving me crazy, old man,” I hear him whisper. Grinning, I keep playing with his dick a while, teasing him until he’s trembling and covered in a sheen of sweat. I kiss him again, breathing in those raspy breaths for a moment, then move down his body, kissing and nibbling—first his neck, then a nipple between my teeth and I bite harder. Apple makes a sharp noise and I can’t tell if he’s objecting or enjoying it, but I don’t linger to find out. My mouth finds the head of his dick and I lap up the salty drop at its tip before rubbing my lips over the smooth skin.
Apple’s hips twist and his pelvis jerks up, his desire making
him greedy, so I slide my finger into his ass at the same time as I suck down
his cock—he lets out a quiet whimper, bucking his hips again as my finger slips
further into his cum-slick hole to tickle his prostate. I feel the head of his
cock swell in my mouth and he’s shaking so hard it’s almost like he’s
vibrating, so I push a second finger inside him and press on his gland, my tongue
and lips working him faster now.
It doesn't take long. Apple gasps and my mouth fills with his seed, salty and bitter, and I swallow it down as his ass clenches down over my knuckles. Drawing back when his body goes limp, I swallow again and pull my fingers out of him. His eyes are closed and he’s smiling from ear to ear. After a minute or so, he cracks an eyelid, finding me in the dim light. His smile slips.
“Thank you,” he whispers.
There’s something funny about the way he says it, like he’s
thanking me for more than taking care of his dick. “Don’t mention it.”
“I mean it,” Apple says. Then he sits up and kisses me
again, but this time it’s a quiet kiss, and for some reason that worries me.
“Ok,” I say awkwardly when he pulls away.
His forehead wrinkles up as he stares at me with those striking
eyes, then his expression shifts into its usual combination of sass and good
humour. “But, you know, a good blow-job doesn’t mean you get the bed,” Apple says
with a wink. He climbs on to the cot, still naked and collapses on his stomach.
“Right.” I sigh and stretch out again on the floor, tucking
my dick back into my pants. Pytre is still fast asleep, his breathing deep and
measured, and I’m glad he missed… whatever that was.
Bemused, I close my eyes—I can’t tell whether I’d like a repeat or if I’d like to forget it ever happened.
Author’s Note: This is an unedited, ongoing serial that will eventually be published in novel form. Plot/characters/elements are subject to change as it is being written. It’s currently in 1st person/present tense, but I may change it to past tense, excluding the first chapter which will act as an intro. Read at your own discretion and take note of story tags below.
Genre: Post-Apocalyptic sci-fi Tags: prostitution, graphic sex, large age gap, violence, theft, drug/alcohol abuse, depression, rape, gang rape, cannibalism, murder, incest, child/infant death and abuse, general abuse, (more to be added as the story goes)
In more ways than one—lost in time, lost to myself—but right now I'm literally lost in the centre of the badlands at the ass-end of the galaxy. I'm on Chornoboh-7, the last human colony before the empty disappointment of space... cannibals and rapists all but forgotten on their shitty, desolate moon. It took most of my credits to convince the scrappers to dump me here.
The dust is thick. It coats my tongue and makes it even harder to see in the weird piss-yellow light, but soon enough I spot a squat dark shape in the distance, too regular to be natural, and I trudge towards it.
Inside it's dark and crowded with the scum of humanity, reeking of sweat and desperation. It's a bar and I'm glad for it. I need a drink so bad I'm starting to shake.
The grain alcohol goes down like water and I ask the hunchback behind the bar for another. He looks at me right in the eye as he pours and I'm made to understand that he's the man around here who can get me anything I want.
What do I want? I want nothing. I want oblivion.
Lights go up next to the bar and I see a glossy white platform on the other side of a metal railing. I step closer as the platform begins to glow—it’s cleanest thing in the place. The crowd jostles and chatters around me, but I'm a rock, no one can move me.
Two men step out into the light, naked and completely shaved and powdered in white. The bigger one starts stroking his cock, expressionless as the other man goes down on his knees and reaches back to jab something at his asshole. It's a knife. The second time it goes in there's a spray of blood and the glowing white platform is clean no longer. I'm intrigued. Repulsed.
The wounded man doesn't even let out a sound, not when he cuts himself again, not when the other man kneels and thrusts himself into the wreckage. The gore pools beneath them, thick and dark and clotted. My hands tighten on the railing. I hear the words “necro blood fuckers.”
Finally the man being fucked seems to shake out of his stupor as his life runs out of him and he begins to struggle. There's a red handprint on the back of the other man’s bald white head.
I can see that the dying man’s pissed himself—urine cuts a clear streak in the blood. An estuary of body fluids. Semen is the next to mingle when the man pulls out and sprays the collapsed man’s back. A third man steps onto the platform, powdered white and naked, and I watch him and the other wrestle for dominance in the human soup for a moment before I turn away. I figure I know how it's going to go. I'm already jaded to it..
It’s just a performance, nothing else. It's not real. No one’s died. I know what that much blood smells like—that's something I can never forget. I carry it in my soul. I need another drink.
At the bar a dwarf grabs my dick through my pants and offers me a blowjob, but his price is too steep so I turn him down.
I've got enough credits for four more drinks. Not enough to get me to oblivion, but it'll take the edge off.
Maybe the bartender can see how hollow I am inside, or maybe he just wants a break from my carcass haunting his bar, but he sends a boy over to me with a wave of his hand. It's on the house—I’m never one to turn down charity.
In a cramped back room, the boy bounces up and down on my cock. His hole is so loose and sloppy that I could easily put both my nuts into him. But it doesn't matter, I'm getting close anyway and when he bounces a few more times, I cream his insides with a grunt. When he stands, some cum splats down on my belly and I wonder how much of it is mine. I watch him walk away and all I feel empty.
I've got to get going again. I'm almost out of credits and I’ll need a place to sleep out of the dust when I can't keep my eyes open any longer. So many years I've been floating, hounded by my ghosts, always on the move, sucking dick for credits when it's bad, getting my dick sucked when it's good. I don’t know how long I can keep this up, but so far my will to live is still placing bets and cashing in on my luck. What I do know is I'll keep wandering until something makes sense again. Until I'm no longer lost.
I'm back at the bar, my last credit burning down my throat to swim in my bloodstream and keep the ghosts at bay.
There's a man mopping the platform. You know, maybe it was real blood after all. It feels like I'm trapped in someone else’s dream.
The stink of the crowd is too much and there's nothing for me here. I turn to leave but the hunchback grabs my arm. The paper he places in my hand is creased and fuzzy with age, the ink faded. The picture of me is thirty years old. Now I understand the charity.
I shake my head. I'm not that man anymore—he shared the same fate as the people he didn't save.
No, heroes don't get lost. They don't chase oblivion. That’s just for the damned.
But I don't argue when I puts a few credits back in my account, credits in a dead man’s name. I nod in thanks but leave the old news article on the bar. I can't bear to look at it.
Without a backwards glance, I step out into the swirling dust to lose myself again.
