Destiny's Choice (The Wandering Engineer) (41 page)

“For
some fancy pants strategist you seem off your game,” she teased, laughing and
he hugged her.

“In
matters of the heart it's best to let the lady lead. She knows what she's
doing,” he said with a smile.

“That
I do,” she said smugly getting to her feet. She pulled on his arm. “Up. Play
later. I still planning on kicking your ass.”

“Oh
really?” he said getting to his feet. “Who's going to tend to it later?” he
asked. She blushed as the shot went home.

“Cute,”
she growled dropping into a horse stance again. Her eyes flashed. She made a
come on motion with her extended hand. “Let's find out shall we? Best two out
of three.”

They
walked arm in arm to her quarters sometime later. She didn't say anything, just
stepped in and then turned. “Come here,” she said, grabbing the front of his
coverall and pulling him in. As the hatch closed behind him she traced a heart
on his chest with her fingertips and then pulled his head down for a long
lingering kiss.

When
the kiss broke she smiled up at him, eyes twinkling. “Do we have to do this
with an audience?” she asked.

“Sprite
take a walk,” he immediately said. Sprite gave him a wink on his HUD and then
blinked out. “There, better?” he asked. He didn't mention Proteus or Defender.

She
grinned and started kissing him, tearing at his clothes. He laughed, and soon
concentrated thought was forgotten in the heat of the moment.

  They
made love all night long, she was surprised by his stamina. “I told you I can
do this for weeks,” he teased, getting ready for round three.

“You're
pretty spry for an old guy you know that?” she asked. Her respiration had
finally dropped from a hard pant to something more regular. But apparently his
wandering hands were affecting her once more.

He
grinned. “Oh goddess of space you're serious! Oh goddess, what have I gotten
myself into?” she asked in mock despair. He didn't believe it for a minute, she
had a lazy half smile on her face as she wrapped her arms around his head to
pull him closer for a rather thorough kiss. When the kiss broke that smile
reappeared. She had her eyes half lidded, perspiration cooling all over her
body. Time to warm it up once more.

“Oh?
I thought it was the major selling point,” he teased, playing with a nipple,
her respiration picking up as he tenderly stroked it.

“Oh,
it was,” she said with a throaty purr. “It was.”

“I'm
going to have an interesting set of bruises later,” she said, getting off him
sometime later. He chuckled softly as she stroked his bare chest. Her fingers
played with his chest hair, occasionally running across his rock hard abs. He
knew what she was doing, she was testing him, playing with him like a cat with
a mouse. There was no way he was going to... he flinched a little as a
fingernail touched a sensitive flank. Damn her... She grinned a little. Shit.
Now she knew he was ticklish. Great.

“Worth
every one,” she purred, lying down beside him. Her arms and legs tangled with
his, he kissed her and she relaxed. “Now, if you don't mind, we mere mortals
need our rest.”

“Sure,”
he said. “I'll just wait until you're ready.” His arms folded under his head.
He whistled, looking up at the ceiling innocently. “Are you ready yet?”

“Oh
you!” she slapped him with a pillow laughing. He laughed as well, tickling and
playing with her. After a few minutes the play fight wound down and she rested
in his arms. “I give up, too tired.”

“Ah....”

“Later.
I mean it.”

“Yes
dear.”

“And
don't you forget it,” she breathed, voice softening. He smiled, stroking her
hair. It felt incredibly soft, even with his enhanced tactile senses.  She was
one in a million. He wasn't sure where their relationship was going, if it even
was a relationship. Best to think about such things in the morning he yawned
and then let Morpheus take him.

He
woke after his customary six hours. She was still out, snoring in a cute soft
way. He stroked her arm gently. She had one of his under her. He snorted,
flexing it a little. It felt good, the natural feel of having someone else to
comfort over your own needs.

“You
like her don't you?” Sprite asked on his HUD.

“Of
course I do,” he said softly, lying on his back, right hand cradling his head.
“What makes you ask that?”

“Admiral
did you feel like you were being used? That she did it to get close to you?”

“Not
in the slightest. I thought about it briefly, but her bioscans were normal
across the board, no signs of subterfuge.”

“Which
matches my take on it as well. However you realize this can't be a serious
relationship correct?”

“Sprite?”

“Seriously
Admiral. Sex is sex for you organics. A form of bonding, stress relief, and
procreation. You definitely needed the relief.”

“Sprite?”

“I
don't think she felt used, not after that performance.”

“Sprite?”
his voice dropped into a warning tone.

“Sorry
Admiral, you were saying?”

“My
personal relationships are off limits remember?”

“Sorry,
It's well...”

“We're
tied together, I know. And we're friends. Just don't stick your virtual nose in
too far.”

“Noted.”

“Hmmmm.”
He looked over to April who was stirring a little. He smiled and turned over
again, free hand stroking her hair gently. It trailed down her arm, caressing
it. Blindly she reached out and grabbed his hand and pulled it over her. She
held on as he tried to pull back. After a moment he chuckled at her ploy and
relaxed. Some things could wait. For now, the entire ship, hell the entire
universe could wait.

“So,
where do we go from here?” Irons asked as they showered together. She rested
her hands on his chest, fingers twining into his chest hair. He'd found out
some interesting things about her, including just how far down those freckles
really went.

When
he'd tried to play connect the dots she'd done her level best to beat him into
submission. It hadn't worked of course but the frisky horse play had been fun
and invigorating for both.

“You
want that discussion now?” she asked, sounding a little dismayed and amused.
She hated getting her hair all wet. It made her feel vulnerable and self
conscious. Though his wandering hands were something of a bonus. They did
wonders scrubbing her back and soothing all sorts of aches and pains... and
tending to the glowing embers of desire in her. Damn he was good.

“Just
trying to figure out the ground rules. Boundaries and such, you know,” he
kissed the nape of her neck making her close her eyes and sigh softly in
contentment. Her own hands wrapped around his waist, holding him close to her.

“Ummmm...”
she said thoughtfully and then stood on her tip toes to kiss him. He smiled
down at her. His eyes twinkled as she stroked his cheek. “You're sweet you know
that?”

“And
you're stalling,” he said, smile growing. His hands however were stroking and
caressing. Hers were twined behind his neck.

“Ummmm.”
She really didn't want to think about this now. Why did he have to choose now
to have this conversation?

“I
think we covered that part,” he said, hands getting naughty. She gasped at the
pain and intrusion. “Oh, sore, sorry.” he said, rumbling a chuckle.

She
smacked his chest with one arm and then looked up into his eyes. He looked down
with laughing eyes until her own mock annoyance turned her frown upside down.
His mischievous smile was infectious. He leaned down and then kissed her
forehead. “We'll go with it. I get it. Don't over analyze or anything.”

“Bingo,”
she murmured huskily, drawing his lips down to hers once more.

“So
what's on your agenda for the day?” she asked, smiling coyly as he looked up.
She was fully dressed, but brushing her hair. He felt a glow at the after image
her supple body burned into his retina. She had the zipper down again. He'd
found out what lay behind all those zippers. Just covering it up did
tantalizing things, they begged to be opened once more.

He
felt relief as Sprite put the ship's sitrep up on his HUD. “Um, oh ah, school
mostly. We've done what we can to the sensors. The captain wants to test and
calibrate them before we jump so they are working on that now. I'm on call in
case of a problem actually.”

“Ah.”
She nodded, then frowned prettily. “He's delaying the jump? I thought we were
going to jump?”

“Just
for a shift. Eight hours to make sure the sensors are tuned and ready to go. We
don't want to go blundering in hyperspace believe me. Flying around with a
myopic view is one thing, but going in with sensors that are messed up is
suicide.”

Calibrating
the sensors was going to be a pain. He had an idea, set up tripods on the hull
along with markers launched into space. Possibly even using the shuttles. They
knew the dimensions of the shuttles of course. With those four ideas they could
get a rough field calibration in place. It wouldn't be the best, but it would improve
the ship's eyes a great deal.

Unfortunately
all that would take a bit more than one shift to accomplish. He'd sent a memo
off to Bailey and the sensor watch several days ago. Bailey had been waiting on
approval for it. He'd seen the approval for the project in his inbox while he
ate breakfast with April this morning. From the testy response Bailey had used
as a follow up, he was eager to get started.

She
blinked at him then her lips twisted in a wry smile. “Okay, I understand that.”

“Besides,
it gives the crew time to check everything over one more time. And time to
process the material's we've got in our holds. The fuel I mean.”

“Oh.”

“We
can wait on processing the raw materials until we're in hyper.”

“Why?”

“Why
not?” he asked amused. She looked at him in confusion. He grimaced in
embarrassment. “Sorry, I thought you knew. When you're in hyper you can draw
energy from hyperspace. The higher the band the higher the amount of
compression and higher amount of energy. That is why when we get to Beta we can
drop the fusion core to forty percent or even standby mode if we've got a
particularly dense energy cloud.”

“Energy...”
Her pretty brow wrinkled in thought. For a spacer she wasn't well versed in
hyperspace or space travel. Of course she'd been on Anvil her entire life...

“Electrons
and gravitons. It's complicated.”

“I
gathered that,” she said dryly. He chuckled.

After
a moment he caught her raised eyebrow and cleared his throat. “See when we get
to hyper and get to the right octave the fusion reactors or in this case
reactor since Destiny only has one primary...” he grimaced at that and then
shook himself mentally.

“Anyway,
the drive is running on it's own so we can skim off power to power other
things. Like say, the replicators.”

“And
since we're getting power for free it powers the systems? So we can make more
things?”

“Right.
I'm planning an entire package of things this round. A general purpose package
to help bootstrap colonies up a level. Everything from simple things like
simple tools and texts, to generators and satellites.”

“Like
we gave Agnosta?”

“Well,
yeah, but that, well...”

“Was
your doing. I know.” she came over and hugged him. They kissed for a moment. “I
ever thank you for being a generous and forgiving spirit?”

“Generous?”
he asked amused. “Forgiving?”

“Yes.”

When
he started to protest she tickled him. His arms dropped to his sides to try to
defend his vulnerable flanks but she dug in with a will, taking full advantage
of having the upper hand.

Their
legs tangled and he went down with a whoop. She looked down at him with a self
satisfied, smug expression. After a moment she climbed on top of him and began
to kiss him again, this time a lot more serious.

“We'll
never get anything done this way,” he protested between kisses.

“Works
for me,” she said huskily.

“Nanites
are evil,” a student said, jutting her chin out. The Admiral sighed, trying to
think of a way to respond that wasn't the same as before. He crossed his arms
as he thought and the class debated.

The
class was in the small class room. He'd almost gotten bumped to the
multipurpose room by a scheduling conflict. But the Yoga class had decided to
try the Dojo one more time since Ed had called for an all hands sweep of deck
three, freeing up the time in the Dojo apparently.

That
was good. He didn't see why the yoga club needed to meet here in the class
room. It was silly. They liked to stack all the chairs and equipment against
the walls or out in the companionway and then leave it after they left. That
meant a class coming in had to put it all back before getting settled. It was
causing a bit of bickering with the senior staff.