Winter, Vic - Space Station Explorer.doc

Space Station Explorer
By Vic Winter

Rand floated, free and naked, Vivaldi playing softly over the speakers. He liked being naked in zero G, and the Vivaldi, well it just seemed to fit. It was the Stones and overalls for fixing engines, but floating naked needed Vivaldi.

He curled around his knees, momentum keeping him rolling in slowly, easy somersaults. It was his last day alone on the Explorer for several weeks and he knew he needed to enjoy it while he could. Instazi, the company he worked for, insisted that every six months he take at least two weeks leave planetside. It was pretty much always preceded by nearly a week teaching whatever idiot they’d sent to replace him how to take care of the great lady.

The rolling started to get to his stomach and Rand reached out, grabbing a pipe. It was exactly where he’d expected it to be. The Explorer was as good to him as he was to the station, a constant, and mostly quiet companion.

“Thanks, baby,” he murmured. “Was getting a little queasy there.”

Rand’s job was maintenance of a station that acted as a receiver for various spaceships out on missions. The Explorer picked up their signals and beamed them back to the Milky Way. He liked it. He liked the solitude and the silent, cold companionship of the station.

Yeah, life was good. Except for the two or three weeks twice a year when he had to pretend he remembered how to interact with human beings.

***

Dressed, music turned down and guest quarters freshened up, Rand watched as the small ship maneuvered its way to the Explorer’s right airlock. He grumbled when the ship landed against Explorer with a thump and a bump.

“S’okay, baby,” he murmured, fingers sliding on metal and reinforced glass as he made his way down to the airlock. “He didn’t mean any harm.”

He waited until the light went blue, indicating equalized pressure, and then spun the wheel, opening the airlock.

“Rand Prance, station engineer,” he said, giving a quick salute, standing at attention. He wasn’t army, but most of the replacements were, or had been, and he’d found things got off on a better foot if he made like he gave a shit about their rules, regulations and traditions. He wanted the training period over as quickly as possible so he could do his two weeks planetside and then get back home to his baby.

Blue eyes twinkled at him from beneath a mop of blond hair. If this guy was army, Rand was a three-dicked Lojan. The guy held out his hand. “Joe Agnas. I’m here to relieve you.”

Rand nodded. “Yeah, I know why you’re here. You have a good trip up?”

Joe nodded and rolled his neck, the bones cracking audibly. “Yeah, but cramped quarters for eight hours have left me pretty stiff.”

“Not that much more room on the Explorer but you can stand straight. I’ll show you your room and you can get some shut-eye while I get back to what I was doing.”

“You want a hand?”

“No. You don’t officially start until midnight.” He wasn’t going to share the Explorer for a moment longer than he had to.

One eyebrow climbed up, disappearing under the thatch of hair over Joe’s forehead. “Whatever, man.”

Rand grabbed Joe’s pack and closed the airlock back up, heading across the way to the three small rooms that served as crew’s quarters. “Mine’s the one on the right. You’ve got the one on the left. Middle’s the galley.”

“Thanks. Where’s the head?”

Rand nodded toward the front of the station. “Up near the controls. See you at midnight.” Before the guy could say anything else, like offer to help again, Rand took off back toward the engines. He had work to do.

***

Rand was talking to the life support engine. He explained how he needed this engine, more than any other, to work.

“I can live without lights. I can live without propulsion. Hell, baby, I can live without gravity, but I have more than a passing fondness for breathing.” He gently tapped the last bolt into place and then made sure the nut was good and tight. “You wouldn’t want my head to explode from lack of oxygen, would you? It’s messy. All that blood. And who would clean you up, baby? Not me, I’d be dead.”

“Are you quite sure you’ve got that right?”

Rand must have jumped a foot at that. He’d been alone up here for six months, was it any wonder he’d forgotten that Joe was on board? Okay, so he knew, but he’d thought that Joe was back in his quarters sleeping and when he got involved with the station’s engines, Rand tended to forget anything else existed. Besides, it couldn’t possibly be midnight yet. He glanced at his watch. Nope, not even close.

He pushed himself out from under the engine and wiped his hands on his overalls. Damn, Joe was close. Of course there wasn’t exactly a lot of room on the old girl. “Well, as I’m a mechanic and not a scientist, I don’t know if that’s how it happens or not. But I’ve seen plenty of movies and they all seem to agree.”

“Fair enough. You always talk to yourself?”

Rand gave Joe a slow once-over. The overalls they wore weren’t flattering or form-fitting, but the blond curls on top of Joe’s head were cute enough, those blue eyes twinkled like they had before as they laughed at him. Joe was saved from being pretty by the scar on his cheek that looked like a small chunk of skin had been dug away.  Rand hadn’t noticed that before. “I wasn’t talking to myself.”

Joe made a production of looking around the small space. “He must be invisible then.”

“She,” Rand corrected, refusing to feel like he was crazy. This was his station. Joe was only his replacement.

“Oh? You have a sweetheart stowed away up here?”

“I sure do.” Rand let his hand slide fondly over metal. The Explorer was the only friend he had, the closest thing to a long-term relationship he’d ever known. She was the only one he could talk to. Not to mention he was a mechanic because he loved the job, so by extension he loved her. And then there was the whole keeping him alive thing. A man became real fond of the gal that made sure he had good, clean air to breathe.

“She’s real special, too, Joe. And I’m going to make sure that you know how to take real good care of her while I’m gone.”

Joe chuckled. “Mecali warned me you space boys were a little loopy. Said you took the cake, too.”

“Let’s just wait and see how loopy you’re feeling when I get back.”

“Oh, I think I can manage.”

Yeah, only two weeks on his own; that was a cakewalk. Rand snorted. “I’ll just bet you can.”

Joe tilted his head. “Hey, Rand. Man. I’m here to give you a break. Let you get off this bucket of bolts and go get your rocks off or drink yourself stupid or whatever it is you like doing that you can’t do up here. I’m not here for your job. So lighten up, okay?”

Rand shrugged. “Sorry,” he muttered. He let his hand slide along one of Explorer’s bulkheads; it wasn’t nearly as smooth as it looked and he knew that, knew each nook and cranny and scratch that made her up. “Did you need anything? ‘Cause I’ve got to get back to this if we want to keep breathing.”

“Yeah, whatever. I’ll meet you in the galley at midnight.” Joe turned and walked off, back stiff.

Rand felt a little bit bad, but only a little bit. Joe would be here for two or three weeks, depending how long it took to train the man and then he’d be gone again.

Not him. Rand knew where he belonged and he knew who it was who gave a damn about him, too.

He turned the music up, Mick Jagger looking for Satisfaction, and slid his hands along Explorer as he began testing, making sure his fix was going to hold.

***

In the end, it had only taken two days to bring Joe up to speed. It looked like the bosses were finally sending in replacements who could actually do the job. Rand figured it was likely a good thing, but it made him nervous. He liked being the only one who really knew how to keep Explorer up to snuff. Job security and all that.

Sure there was more to it than that, but job security was all anyone really needed to hear about.

He spent two miserable weeks on Togo. He sat on the beach and got burnt. He sat at the bar and got hit on by men who weren’t his type and women, who as a gender weren’t his type. He didn’t get laid, and he didn’t really get drunk because he was paranoid about getting shanghaied. He didn’t swim because he didn’t know how – thought it was unnatural, to tell the truth.

So his two weeks were spent pining for Explorer, wishing for even five minutes in zero G, and cursing whoever’s idea it was that employees should spend any of their time planetside when there was a perfectly good space station in orbit.

He was ready to go home, long before he was scheduled to. As it was, he headed back several days early. The planet might be all sun and sand and pretty people, but Rand didn’t belong there. Hell, he’d known that the moment he’d walked of the ship and heard the damned tinned calypso music playing.

Everything sounded fine over the radio as he back and forthed with Joe, getting the little ship into place and attaching it to the airlock, but when the door opened and Joe let him in, the man was wide-eyed, curls messy.

“What’s wrong?” he asked immediately, mouth snapping shut before he could accuse Joe of hurting his baby.

“When you talked to the station...” Joe stopped and swallowed and Rand felt the tension stretch inside him like a rubber band.

“What? What?” He had to know what was wrong.

“Did she ever talk back?”

Rand felt his heart jolt and his stomach kind of lurch. The station had talked to Joe? Why Joe? The man hadn’t even been here two weeks and his baby was talking to him when she’d never... His eyes narrowed. “Explorer spoke to you?”

Joe cracked up. “No. No, but you should have seen your face. Man, there were a few minutes there that you believed it.”

Rand glared and pushed past Joe. “I’m back. Thanks for looking after her. You can go now.”

“Ah, man, come on. I was just teasing you. You know, joking, fooling around. Jesus, Rand, you don’t look like you’ve had a vacation at all. And you’re back early. Everything go okay planetside? You get into trouble?”

“Everything went fine. It just isn’t my scene.” And that was more than Joe deserved to hear. Pretending that Explorer had spoken. That was just mean.

“Okay, Rand. You coming back early means I get a few extra days planetside myself. But I don’t want to find out you bitched about your time getting cut short.”

“I won’t.”

He went to his room and slammed the door closed pointedly. It didn’t take more than moment to find a cd and throw it into the sound system and he had to grin as the opening bars of Paint It Black filled his room.

***

Things got back to normal pretty quickly after Joe finally left. Rand was actually pleasantly surprised to find that the man did know what he was doing and not only had scheduled maintenance and emergencies been dealt with, but Joe’d put a bit of extra work in, and everything was clean and tidy, shining like the man cared.

Rand admitted grudgingly that Joe wasn’t all bad. Of course that didn’t mean he wasn’t happy Joe was gone and the company would send someone new next time, just like always.

And just like always, the six months he had to himself with Explorer passed by quickly and before he knew it, Rand was waiting at the door for the airlock to pressurize, his two week replacement three days early.

He turned the wheel as soon as the light went blue, jaw dropping open as Joe grinned at him from beneath the fringe of curls. “Hey, Rand. Surprise!”

“What are you doing here?”

“Well hi to you, too. I’m your replacement, you goof. Or have you finally gone right round the
bend and forgotten you get one twice a year, needed or not.”

“They've just never...”
“Send the same guy twice? I guess they’re finally smartening up. And I’m early. To make up for
the days you lost last time.” Joe grinned and headed across to the living quarters, bag over his
shoulder.

“Oh, I don’t need them made up.” Rand followed, unhappy. He wasn’t ready to go yet. He wasn’t
ready to share the Explorer yet. He wanted Joe to go away, dammit, he had three more days with
his baby before he had to leave and sit, miserable and grumpy, in the sand.

“Then stick around, I don’t care.” Joe shrugged and Rand glared toward the man.
He sighed and let his fingers caress Explorer’s bulkhead. “Sorry, baby,” he whispered.
Joe stopped suddenly and Rand barrelled right into the man, breath knocked right out of him. “Hey!

Watch where you’re going.”
Joe turned, hands reaching for his arms and steadying him. “You’re the one who ran into me.”
Rand glowered up at Joe, who didn’t look in the least perturbed. In fact Joe looked like he was

trying not to laugh. “I can make sure you’re not assigned to the Explorer ever again,” he informed
Joe belligerently.
“You know what your problem is?”

“Yeah, I do. You.”
Joe did laugh at that, the sound echoing around the quiet space and Rand cursed himself for turning
Mick and the boys down when the radio’d first gone off, letting him know there was a ship coming.
“No, I do believe I’m the solution to your problem.”

Rand snorted and tried to get Joe to let go of his arms, but Joe's warm hands just tightened on him.

“Let go of me!”
“I don’t think so, Rand.” In fact Joe not only didn’t let go of him, but pushed him up against the
cool wall near the door to his room. “Your problem is you need to get laid.”

“Fuck off.”
“Yes. Exactly.” Joe leaned in, still laughing softly.

Then that laughing mouth covered his own, lips warm and solid against his mouth. As Rand started to sputter, Joe’s tongue slipped right in between his lips, hot, wet, teasing his skin. Rand gasped, eyes going wide.

The kiss went on until he was breathless and Joe pulled his head back, the rest of his body coming forward, leaning against Rand.

“What. You.” Rand was back to spluttering, shocked and hard, angry and more turned on than he’d been in a long time.

“Yeah. Me. Kissing you. Has it really been so long that you don’t remember what this is?” Joe’s hips circled, rubbing them together. One solid thigh pushed between his legs, his cock rubbing against it as Joe’s cock poked his belly, hard and hot even through two layers of overalls.

“Not that long. I.” He shook his head. It had been a long, long time.

Joe didn’t say anything, just looked down at him, moving with those slow circles. The tension built as they stared at each other, Rand having trouble breathing. Explorer was solid behind him, the bulkhead absorbing his heat, leaving his back almost chilled, while his front was on fire.

That was his Explorer, silent and solid, cool, always there no matter what. No matter what. So she wouldn’t mind if he just this once...

Groaning, he leaned up and pressed their lips together, hips beginning to move. He humped hard against Joe and the hands that held his arms slid, moved up to cup his face as Joe took control of the kiss, tongue invading his mouth and stealing his breath all over again.

Rand reached, grabbing for Joe’s hips and pulling them harder against him. He could feel the need now, the heaviness in his belly, in his balls, making his cock so hard he ached. He could feel the pre-come dripping from the tip, burning against his foreskin.

Whimpering, he rubbed harder, trying to get more, needing more.

“What do you want?” Joe asked, teeth nipping at his lips, making Rand jerk.

Rand looked up at Joe like the man was crazy. “What the fuck do you think I want?” Wasn’t he right here with Joe, kissing back and rubbing like he was trying to put out a fire? He moaned and rubbed harder, the material of his overalls starting to rub almost painfully against the tip of his cock as his foreskin started to draw back.

He wasn’t going to fucking beg though.

He whimpered, hands tightening, hips speeding.

Okay, he wasn’t going to beg with words.

Then Joe laughed at him. Again.

Growling, Rand tried to shove Joe off him – he could whack off in his bunk just like he always did.
Hell, when Joe left he could whack off in zero G. Asshole.
Joe grabbed his arms again, hands big, strong, and held him back against the wall. “I meant how,

Rand. How do you want to do it?”
“I want to do it without you laughing at me.”
“Sorry, man. I didn’t mean to upset you.”
“I’m not upset!” The denial was sharp, immediate.
“No?”
“No. I’m pissed off.” And if Joe laughed or pointed out they were essentially the same thing, he

was going to throw the man out the airlock.

“And horny.” Joe rubbed that thigh against his cock, reminding him it was there, that he was
desperately hard.
“Yeah,” he admitted grudgingly. “And horny.”
“So let’s just do it. No laughing, I promise.” Joe looked serious enough, that twinkle gone, no smile

quirking the red and slightly swollen lips. That was from their kisses.

Groaning, Rand nodded and got a hand around Joe’s neck, pulling him back down for more of those hard, needy kisses. He was gonna make those lips get redder and more swollen. Joe got a hand behind his ass, guiding his movements and Rand just went with it, humping for all

he was worth, that rubbing against the tip of his prick both painful and the best damned thing he’d felt in what seemed like forever.

“Oh, shit. Not gonna last,” he warned.
“Go for it,” muttered Joe, pushing harder against him, teeth sliding along his jaw to nip at his
earlobe.

“Fuck!” He grabbed hold of Joe and lost it, come spraying up over his belly and falling around his

cock and balls, wetting his overalls, making a total mess.
And for about sixty seconds, he couldn’t care less. He collapsed back against the wall with a groan,
trying to catch his breath as Joe’s teeth nibbled at his neck, breath hot on his skin.

The bulkhead seemed colder than ever now, especially with Joe’s hand still on his ass, hot as a
brand where it touched him, almost as hot as the cock that rubbed against his belly.
“Messy. Gross,” he managed between breaths.

Joe grinned, but didn’t laugh this time. “My bunk or yours, Rand?”
“Mine. Yours isn’t ready yet. You weren’t supposed to be here for three more days.” He tried to
say it so it didn’t sound like an accusation.

“Yeah, but then you’d have had to wait three more days to come like a comet shooting through

space.”
Rand rolled his eyes, pushed Joe off him and headed for his bunk. Each step was torture, his
overalls wet and cold and almost made him wish he was in the habit of wearing underwear.

Joe followed him in. “This is okay, right?”
Rand glanced back, pulling his zipper down shrugging out of his overalls. “I won’t leave you

hanging.” Truth was, now that he’d come, now that he’d touched another human being, a man, a good-looking man who wanted him, he was ready to dive in and make up for the last six years. He grabbed a cloth and wiped at his crotch. “Strip,” he ordered as he sat down on his bunk, eyes on

Joe, wanting to know what the overalls hid.
He wasn’t disappointed either. Joe was tall and lean, but not skinny. There were nice muscles there

and a beautiful cock in a nest of blond curls. It was hard, curving up toward Joe’s more than pretty
belly, the tip red, shining with pre-come.
Rand licked his lips, his own cock throbbing and whooshing back to life. “Get over here.”
“That’s the plan.”
Joe grinned and strode over, coming to stand between his legs. Rand nodded. Yeah, that was just

where he wanted the man. He didn’t warn Joe, didn’t play, just leaned in to lick at the leaking slit
and then wrapped his lips around the head and took Joe all the way in.
He gagged a little until old instincts kicked in and then he swallowed, his head beginning to bob.
“Fuck. Oh, fuck. Rand.”

If he hadn’t had a mouthful, he would have grinned. Who was laughing now? Certainly not Joe. Rand got one hand on Joe’s ass, encouraging Joe to move his hips – this wasn’t the first time he’d done this and he wouldn’t break if Joe got a little enthusiastic taking what he wanted. His other hand he wrapped around his own prick, tugging and squeezing, balls going nice and tight as Joe

gave in and those hips started driving the fat prick in his mouth deeper. Heat and flavor slid on his tongue, making Rand moan, which made Joe shout and move faster. Joe’s long-fingered hands slid into his hair, holding his head as Joe started losing control, started to fuck his mouth hard.

Rand timed each squeeze of his hand around the head of his own cock to match the bump of Joe’s cock against the back of his throat and it was like a circle of pleasure, him and Joe, giving and taking. He could feel it building, feel the heat between them. There wasn’t anything else like it. Not planetside, not spaceside. Not even the Explorer had anything that could match to this.

“Now, Rand! Shit, now!” Joe’s warning came a split second before Joe did, wet heat splashing the back of Rand’s throat and pouring down into his belly, warming him from the inside out.

He started swallowing, his own prick jerking, shooting spunk over his hand, onto Joe’s legs. They finished up around the same time and he pulled off slowly, trying not to feel smug, like the cat that got the cream. Except that he was. He lay back against the rumpled sheets of his bunk, grinning up at Joe as he licked his lips.

Joe snorted and threw himself down next to Rand. “See?”
“See what?”
“You’re in a better mood – you needed to get laid.”
He popped Joe in the arm. “Asshole.”
Joe just nodded. “Yeah, you can do it next. I’ve wanted it ever since I first heard you talking to the

station.”
It was his turn to snort. “And they say I’m loopy.”
“Nah, just lonely.” Reaching over, Joe touched his face, fingers tracing his lips, one sliding in to

fuck his mouth. “But I’m here now.”
Rand rolled his eyes. “Is this where I’m supposed to say Halleluiah or something?”
Joe nodded, damned eyes twinkling again. “Or something.”
Rand bit down on Joe’s finger and then started to suck it, his tongue working the pad, thinking

maybe it was time to get some Mozart cds.
Hallelujah.