Waking up from cryo is a similar experience to waking up from anaesthesia. It’s difficult to say how long you’ve been awake, and even more difficult to form a coherent thought. The eyes swim with shapeless blobs and incoherent colours. Random understandable objects may pop out into space, but their location is mostly indiscernible.

This sort of feeling was currently plaguing Martin, in addition to an absolutely maddening sense of thirst. His limbs refused to budge, after what he remembered to have been a very, very long trip. The muscles were responding, just very slowly. The feeling was akin to sitting on your hand for too long, and having the blood and feeling rush back into it after getting up, but over the entire body. He blinked a few times, his eyes intensely dry. He began to wonder if something went wrong. He hadn’t experienced cryosleep in a very long time, and couldn’t quite remember the experience, but this couldn’t be right. His vision clearing, he looked off to his pod mate beside him, but she was already gone, leaving no sign of her but a dangling intravenous cable, a loose vital reader, and a Tenebris-shaped impression in the foam that was previously against her back.

IVs. He looked to his arm. In it, an IV was imbedded into the skin, but it was evidently long done putting liquid into his body. Carefully, he removed it, feeling a pinching prickle of pain as it came out, accompanied by a pearl of blood forming in the wound. At least his heart was working. Reaching out an aching arm, he pushed open the glass separator, and kicked out his legs, gliding out into the chamber. He tried to call out, but his dry throat would not comply, and a squealing exhale was all that came out. 

As he continued to move, his memory began to return to him. His parchment was a normal side-effect of cryo, and he would simply need to find some of the electrolyte solution for himself and he would soon feel much better. He gently made contact with a wall, sliding his fingers into the grooves and details to give himself a hold on it. Eventually, he found the ladder, and pulled himself up the side rung to the control room, being the ‘upper’-most level. 

Peeking his head into the room, he was greeted by the sight of Tenebris, sitting in the acceleration couch, fiddling with the console. Unable to speak, he used his knuckles to rap on a looser bit of metal plating in an attempt to get her attention. Martin watched her turn around the corner, her untied black hair following, floating gently in the air. She was holding a balloon-like object to her mouth with one of her hands. With a pop, she took the balloon out her mouth, a few beads of coloured liquid floating outward from it. “Look who’s finally awake!” She chimed, “Cryo is a real bitch, ain’t she? You’re probably thirsty, come over here and I’ll give you some of my stuff.”

He braced his legs against the top rung of the ladder and pushed, careening through the air. However, he quickly noticed his launch was a little off-centre, and he would likely miss the mark. Before he could embarrassingly hit the back wall, he felt Tenebris pinch his leg and gently pull him back down to her. With her opposite arm, she guided the electrolyte bulb toward the Parvian. It was about his height, but it was a sphere with a small fabric handle on one side that would slide your hand beneath so you wouldn’t have to grip the bulb as carefully. Wrapping his lips around it the small nub at the end, cool liquid began entering his mouth. It tasted awful, but he could practically feel how rehydrating it was. It was a very welcome feeling, and he only was able to realize how absurdly dry his mouth was after he finally recognized the feeling of not being absolutely parched. He greedily gulped down the liquid, but the bulb was so large he wouldn’t necessarily be taking much. Still, he filled himself with it. After a short while, he removed the nub and distanced himself from the bulb a little. Tenebris returned it to her own lips, and with a firm squeeze, emptied the entire thing into her mouth, another reminder to Martin of just how large the world around him was. Once she was done, the woman let the empty bulb float off to the side to be dealt with at another time, and went to the console. 

“This is so weird.” Tenebris muttered, more to herself, at the console. She was staring at the flight’s recorded telemetry, and at some point it had made a radical readjustment to get back in line with its proper route. “There are hundreds of light hours worth of telemetry just… missing! The internal clock syncs perfectly, like nothing even happened…” her voice trailed off. She stared at the console, endlessly confused. With a sigh, she swiped the telemetry off screen. They were at where they were supposed to be, and at the right time, so what did it matter? 

Martin grabbed the cloth on her forearm to prevent himself from floating too far away and was reminded of a question he had wanted to ask. He cleared his throat, and feeling that he was sufficiently hydrated to speak, he let loose his question. “What’s with the clothes? Seems a bit too military-ish for you to have it, no?” 

“These?” She gestured to her garments, “they’re some old Martian army garb. Wearing it just makes me feel more ‘in touch’ with my history, I guess. Bought them a good while back from some scrapyard that set up shop after a fight, ships must’ve had ‘em.” 

“Never heard of Martians.”

“I’ve heard they the first group of people to survive on another planet, but when everyone left Sol for new systems, they were left behind, and ended up getting screwed. Long story short, Martians ended up being poor and with a genetic defect that made us incapable of producing Melanin.” 

“Yikes.” 

“Yep.”

“So that’s why you’re so pale, right?” He paused in thought. “How come you have dark hair then?”

“Artificial.” Tenebris answered matter-of-factly. 

“Don’t you kind of need melanin though? Cosmic rays and whatnot?”

“Don’t really need to worry about cosmic rays when most of your species’ generations are spent cooped up in a carved up rock. So, yeah, that’s the short history of the ‘homino-martinids’. At least we ended up with a semi-decent name.” She shrugged. 

“Heh, my name’s in there.” Martin chimed. 

Tenebris paused for a moment. “Hm, I guess it is.” 

“So, um…” Martin puffed out his chest and furrowed his brow, and with his best military voice, asked “what is our status, captain?”

Tenebris chortled a bit, and then assumed a similar posture. In her own robotic military voice, she replied, “closing in on the station, private. Should be there in an hour or two, I’ve already sent a message and got us a dock.” 

“Aw, man, a private? I was hoping I could at least be a corporal or something.” Martin joked, relaxing into a normal posture. 

“Keep complaining,” she teased, “and you’ll end up in my privates, private.” 

Martin’s stomach rumbled. Ignoring her remark, he made a request. “You think we could find something to eat? I’m pretty starved.” 

“I suppose I could eat, it’s only been a hundred thousand hours since I’ve had a good meal.” She grabbed the Parvian off her forearm, and together, they left the control room and began their hunt for whatever preservable goods were packed on the ship. While on their search, Martin ended up explaining to Tenebris the way Parvians could adjust their metabolism, which eventually came to the topic of the spiritual monks who lived on Mick’s Planet (being the Parvian’s home planet), who had honed their ability to alter their metabolism consciously that they could forcibly overheat or freeze solely through willpower. Tenebris found the idea intensely disturbing, while Martin found the display of incredible self-control beautiful. The discussion made Martin yearn to return to his home planet someday, however far in the future that might be. Eventually, they came upon some sort of meal ration. It was good for protein, but it was nothing remarkable outside of tasting strangely like mussels. While they were searching, they came up with some other goodies, such as a vacuum suit, some spray sealant, along with a few other miscellaneous items, which Tenebris threw in a backpack, which she slung over her shoulder. Before they knew it, the hour wait was over, and their ship approached the station. Martin took a look outside the closest window to get a view of it. 

Guyen station rotated into view, and the first thing to take in was its immense size. It was at least a dozen times larger than the ring station, and it took the form of a massive cylinder. The megastructure must’ve had a diameter of about six entire kilometres, and it extended at least a dozen kilometres outward. Most of the volume within the drum appeared to be pure vacuum, with metal caging running across it. Looking past the metal bars, storage containers and a plethora of docks could be seen, with most taken up by larger ships probably running cargo. As they grew closer, more details could be seen. The station was covered in insanely large graffiti, but it seemed less the work of vandal and more akin to proper artwork. Portraits of visages, shrouded with floral patterns and sprawling colours, their faces serene. Huge, coloured fabrics flowed about, attached to the ring, in a constant state of peaceful free fall. The cloths shone from the warm orange sun behind it.  It exuded a pleasant feeling, feeling much more expressive and warm than the oppressive grey metal and cold blue light Martin had spent so much time with. 

The ship approached the entrance, which sat in the opening at the middle of the station. Red lights flickered to guide their passage and signal the limits of the opening. Passing through, they continued onward towards their dock. All around them were slide docks, a configuration where one would park on a dock, and then their ship  would slide down to make room for another docking ship to go above them in a sort of column of ships. Ships that were leaving would slide off to a second sliding rig, and ascend so that they could leave. Individuals  would use an elevator at the top to travel from their ships to and from the station’s main floors, so that people on the ships would leave the ship after docking was completed, and the ship would go to it’s ordained spot while it’s passengers could leave. 

Docking went smoothly. The pair found their reserved column, and gently made contact with the mag locks. A tube extended from the elevator’s airlock to the ship. On the end of the tube was a collection of soft, suctioning plastics, which would contort to the shape of the ship so that pressure could be maintained, even without any standardized docking mechanism such as a shape or lock. Standardization was incredibly difficult to maintain in the space age, since any sort of message or PSA would be incredibly expensive to broadcast, due to the necessity of using gravitational waves as the medium - radio waves have far too little range. Furthermore, they could take as long thirteen million hours to arrive, long enough for any civilization to simply create more rugged and versatile designs, rather than wait for some galactic standard that wouldn’t last long anyway. 

“It just seems a little infantilizing, is all” Martin complained, raising his arms so that Tenebris could tie a thread around his waist. 

“There are plenty of good reasons I should have you tied to me,” she argued, finishing the knot. “For one,” she pulled the thread tight, causing Martin to gasp in surprise from the sudden tightness, “it’ll be pretty fun.” She attached the opposite end to one of the belt loops of her shorts. She picked him up off the large box of terraforming goodies they were using as a platform, and they proceeded down to the air lock. The rotgrav at this point was a bit strange, since it wasn’t powerful enough at this point to be entirely comfortable, but it also wasn’t low enough to be ignored. Instead, it hovered in a slightly annoying middle ground. Air lock procedures went well, with similar enough atmospheric compositions and pressure differentials easily within tolerance. The outer door opened with a mechanical whirring, leading into the catwalk, which extended to the elevator. The catwalk was entirely see-through, allowing one to get a wonderful view of the hundreds of ships, with every one being unique. Some seemed old and rounded, others sharp and new. There were massive cargo ships, and tiny cruisers, all in the same area. It was an unfathomable sight to Martin, since his major exposure to ships came in the form of the cargo ships that dropped off food and other goods at his ring station that came from elsewhere in the system. If he looked far enough, he could see the storage - innumerable crates of varying colour, but consistent size. It was difficult to imagine something that they couldn’t fit there.

Eventually, after some gawking, some oo-ing, and finally, some aw-ing from Martin, they eventually arrived at the other airlock. However, since the area was pressurized, it was already open, and they immediately proceeded to the waiting elevator. It was a bit larger than one might expect, likely to fit a large crew or large objects. Obviously, it felt uncomfortably large to Martin, but he wondered if Tenebris felt the same way. The walls were covered in luminescent art. On the far wall, ‘Welcome All!’ was written in glowing blue cursive. Looking closer, Martin noted that something else was written. ‘Parvians welcome here’ was in the ‘A’ hole. As in, the enclosed space inside the tip of the letter ‘A.’ “I don’t like the look of that.” Martin muttered. 

Tenebris squinted at the tiny text. “Cmon, that’s clever! Don’t be a downer, Mart.” Around the welcoming message were various other doodles; neon outlines of women, contact information, and the like covered the black walls. Steel bars ran across the ceiling, for reasons unknown to Martin. Beside him, the Martian reached and pressed one of the buttons, causing the doors to slide shut. 

She was quite enjoying the feel of this place. For a simple trader outpost, it was incredibly warm and friendly. They even had a welcome package that auto-delivered to people docking. It came with a digital map, listed with interesting spots, and an encryption key to let people listen in on the station’s music channel. She enjoyed the channel, the instrumentation was fun and had an interesting abnormal quality, and it played well on her neural chip. As usual with space elevators, she reached up and gripped the steel bars on the ceiling, bracing herself for acceleration. The familiar gut feeling of going down overcame her body, and she could feel her shorts and backpack pull up a bit. In the corner of her vision, a Parvian-shaped blur shot upward, leaving only a taught thread in his wake. 

She  glanced up at Martin. He was dangling at the end of the thread from the acceleration of the elevator, catching his breath and recoiling from the surprise. Removing one hand from the steel, Tenebris began wrapping her finger around the thread and drawing the Parvian closer, until she could grasp him out of the air. “Maybe,” he panted, “the rope was a good idea.”

One of the interesting things about an elevator in a ring station, is the matter of moving it. In a normal elevator, it’ll put in energy to go down, or put in energy to pull it up. However, since the artificial gravity grows more powerful the further you get from the centre, the mechanism actually has to switch from pulling the elevator down, to pulling it up, since the rotational force ‘takes over’ and you the mechanism then has to manage the car’s speed. The result, is that the people in the car feel like they are moving up, and gradually it shifts until they feel they are falling down. 

Martin watched Tenebris’ hair cascade down from above, and settle at her shoulders, and he could feel the normal sensation of gravity in his stomach. Tenebris took her hand off the ceiling, since the risk of an unpleasant head injury was abated. 

The Parvian uncurled the massive woman’s hand from around him, and stood in her palm. “Hey, umm, you know where we’re going?”

Tenebris was tapping at the air again. “Yep.”

“… And, where might that be?” He asked timidly, noticing that she was clearly distracted. 

“Oh, right!” She exclaimed, “well, first we’ve gotta trade out the hunk of crap we left at the dock, I don’t trust that thing to take us to Edo. I’ve already sent the guys the specs and pictures so that shouldn’t take long. My map also has this thing labeled as a ‘Parvian Cafe’ if that’s something you want to check out. After that, we’ll try to arrange some way to get to Edo, and see if I can grab some clothes somewhere and a good nap.”

“Sounds like you’ve got it all figured out, then.” 

“Somewhat.” She returned her attention to her interface. By the looks of it, she was typing something with her opposite hand. He shrugged, and tried to make his way up to her shoulder. It got pretty difficult when he reached her elbow, due to the incline, but he made it work. Sitting atop her shoulder, he gazed down at the top around his waist, and how it stretched all the way down to Tenebris’ own waist. He took a small bit of confidence in the fact that if he fell, he at least wouldn’t have to suffer hitting the ground. The heat of her body was soaking into him even here, though her suit. He found it slightly soothing.  

The elevator began its deceleration. Glancing at the elevator controls, Martin noticed that Tenebris had selected the highest of the three main floors. The standard elevator feeling of the stomach pushing down went through his body. Yellow light bathed the room, accompanied by an affirmative pinging noise. Martin grabbed some of the hair next to him for safety. The doors whirred open. 

Outside, was a bustling city. A wide road, completely filled with people. Patterned fabrics were draped across the ceiling, which was low, only about seven metres high. Dangling strings of lights and fluorescent ropes tied around advertisements and directional signs. To either side, the street extended so far that the curvature of the ring made the end unseeable. Across the streets were innumerable stores, with neon signs and widely varying fonts. Each storefront’s title seemed to always include the name of the owner, and the purpose of the store. For example, a fabric store would be titled ‘Phil’s Fabrics.’ Every inch of wall that wasn’t already covered in fabrics or signs was drenched in portraits, patterns, and artistic renditions of the landscapes on far away planets. The ceiling arched above them, covered in a screen displaying a recording of a purple sky. If one looked far enough down the street, they could see the purple sky transition into an orange evening, and an empty night filled with uncountable stars. 

The people occupying the streets were fascinating. Some stood incredibly tall, gangly and skinny, with long arms. Others shorter and stockier, with odd hues of skin. A few noteworthy individuals seemed to have pupils so large they covered the entire eye in black, with skin that was tinged ever so slightly blue. These individuals wore thick shades, likely to protect their eyes from damage. There were people in skintight garbs, flowing robes, and a few even wore suits. 

While Martin was busy gawking, a woman with darker skin approached Tenebris. She was in a more casual outfit, one that hung loosely around the body, but she still wore a brilliantly patterned orange sash around her chest. He didn’t catch much of their conversation, but he did notice that the woman pulled out a hand terminal and sent Tenebris something, before they gave one another a shallow, formal bow. During this, Martin had to hold tightly to her hair so as not to go tumbling off. The woman turned and headed back the way she came, vanishing into the crowd. Martin assumed this was the sale of the ship that Tenebris had been talking about earlier. Tenebris started making her way in the opposite direction, but judging by her lack of speed and her side to side glances, she didn’t have a particular destination. 

Martin allowed himself to return to soaking in the place. He was endlessly astonished by just how vastly different this place was from everything he had ever experienced. Something else he noticed, was the visible range of wealth. People who appeared to be poorer, had numerous cybernetic mods, while the wealthy seemed to have none. His eyes wandered back to the artistry of the place, but one piece of art stuck out to him. It was a pitch black background, which seemed to sprawl out like roots from the centre of the image. In the centre was an outline of a person, painted in stark white, which contrasted strongly with the black around it. Below the outline of the person, were the words ‘Enjoy this year’s Scramble!’ Martin pointed this out to Tenebris, who simply shrugged. He found it endlessly strange, and decided he would ask someone about it if he had the opportunity. 

Tenebris turned towards a storefront. Above the entrance, ‘Cassinova’s Classical Cloths’ was written in cursive. Peering through the window, the place was completely full of very ancient stylings of clothes. The building wasn’t large, but it still held a larger variety than one could shake a stick at. Upon entering the store, they were quickly approached by a short old woman, her back slightly hunched. She had friendly eyes and was a welcoming grin rested on her face. The name tag that sat just about her heart informed Martin that this was the titled Cassinova herself. She stuck out her foot in front of Tenebris, and Martin noticed her shoe had a piece of artificial leather on the top of it, and it seemed dirty. 

To Martin’s surprise, Tenebris lifted her foot and gingerly tapped Cassinova’s leather spot on her shoe. The woman smiled a bit more brightly, and clasped her hands together. “What can I help you with, dearie?” Her voice had the sort of elder’s compassion, that made one feel at ease. 

“Oh, I just noticed your store, and it’s absolutely gorgeous!” Tenebris marvelled, “the selection here looks absolutely lovely, but I’m not familiar with the styles. Would you mind showing my around?”

The old woman was beaming now, “it would be my pleasure, dearie! Well, we just got some new imports recently, and they’re absolutely beautiful. Would you like to take a look?” 

Tenebris’ nodded, causing Martin to bounce a bit. Cassinova gestured to follow her, and began making her way through the store. She approached the far wall, and pulled a lever. The display wall began to rotate, switching between numerous different selections of clothing, all labelled with different purposes and levels of professionalism. Eventually, it stopped at a section labelled ‘personal fitness.’

“My seller told me that these were regarded by some as the pinnacle of clothing, since it served as incredibly comfortable and breathable, without sparing a single bit of its alluring quality.” She was gesturing toward a pair of black pants, which appeared smooth. Tenebris reached out and felt the fabric between her thumb and forefinger. Seeing this, Cassinova continued. “The material is a lovely mix of polyester, nylon, and spandex, which makes it hug the figure beautifully while still being very light and comfortable.”

Tenebris nodded along. “And what are these called?”

“My seller tells me these were often called ‘yoga pants,’ or ‘leggings.’”

“Mmm.” Tenebris drifted over to what looked to be a bra, but held a more firm, solid shape. 

Noticing her attention shift, the older woman followed. “This is a similar design. I’ve heard it’s very useful for more well-endowed women. Keeps you comfortable during physical activity, without all the... bouncing.”

Tenebris and Martin both glanced down at Tenebris’ bust, simultaneously coming to the conclusion that she fit that category. Tenebris lifted her head back up and continued looking at the display. Aside from the bra and leggings, there was a package of authentic cotton panties, a pair of sneakers, and a loose shirt that was listed with the option to have anything you chose printed on it. Tenebris put her thumb and forefinger to her chin in thought. “I’d like to have… actually, would you be able to grab me the whole set? And on the shirt, would you please put the Martian insignia on it?” 

Cassinova smiled and nodded again. She grabbed a metal object off her waist, which flashed green, and a text box on it read ‘measurements acquired.’ She took a quick glance at it, and put it back on her waist. She turned to Martin. “Is the little fellow getting anything?” 

“Oh! Um, sure.” Tenebris looked at the Parvian on her shoulder. 

The woman made her way to the corner, and came back holding a box full of Parvian clothes, all in similar styles to the rest of the store. “I just got these delivered recently to prepare for the Parvian shipment.” 

Martin made his way to the box, and began looking through it for something that he would like to wear. Above him, the two continued talking.

“Parvian shipment?”

“Oh yes, dear. Guyen station received their order for fifty thousand Parvians a little while ago. It’s been absolutely terrible for anyone trying to make a few tchokas off the Parvian trade, but the people have been very happy with it.”

Martin finally poked his head out the box. In his hands, were a pair of grey dress pants and a blue polo shirt. 

“Excellent choice.” Cassinova chimed, seeing Martin’s selection. He stepped out the box, back into Tenebris’ palm. “Dressing rooms are just over there,” she pointed to a hallway in the far corner, “I’ll bring your clothes to you while you’re there. Will the little guy be needing his own changing room?”

Tenebris glanced down at the Parvian in her palm. “No, I don’t think he will.” 

Cassinova turned and disappeared into a door in the other corner, with an ‘employees only’ label on the surface. 

Martin gripped tightly to Tenebris’ thumb as she spun on her heel and made her way toward the corridor Cassinova had pointer at. “Why’d you step on that lady’s foot?” 

Tenebris rounded the corner and was greeted by the hall of changing rooms, all of them having solid doors. “Hm? Oh, that. It’s a sign of respect in some cultures, it would be very disrespectful of me to reject the gesture.” She stepped into one and shut the door behind her. The room was a big enough that Tenebris could stretch out her arms and not touch the beige walls. On the wall opposite the door was a large mirror, and on the left was a sort of chain mechanism that fed into the wall. On the opposite side, a bench, which she dropped Martin onto with his clothes. She crossed her arms and looked down at the Parvian. 

Martin looked up at her. “What?”

“Go on, change.”

“No, you go first. It’s awkward.”

Tenebris raised an eyebrow. “My clothes aren’t here yet. Now go ahead.” 

“Could you at least turn around?” Martin timidly asked. 

Tenebris sighed, and turned the other way. 

Finally, Martin could begin changing. He removed his belt, which was practically falling apart, and then unzipped his shipsuit. It clung tightly to his skin after he had been wearing it so long. Peeling it away, he kicked it off to the side. 

“Nice figure.” Tenebris commented. 

Martin looked to his side and did a double take at the mirror. Tenebris had been looking at him the entire time through it. “Perv!” He shouted, instinctively covering his crotch with his hands. 

Tenebris rolled her eyes. “Just finish up already.” 

Not wanting to aggravate the woman, he tugged the new pants up and put his old belt back on. He threw on the new shirt, and buttoned it to his neck. Hearing the rattling of a chain, he turned back around. The mechanism he had noticed before was rotating, bringing in Tenebris’ clothing selection, hung on clothes racks that had a special hook for the chain. He saw the shirt make its way in, and he noticed the Martian insignia, a red sphere, with two smaller dots above and below it, representing its two moons. Following it along the track, it was obscured by Tenebris’ figure, which he quickly realized was facing directly towards him. 

“Come on!” Martin shouted, “Can I not get the smallest bit of privacy?” 

“Apparently not.” Tenebris drew a cross across her chest with her middle finger, with one line reaching from shoulder to shoulder, and the other from the top of her shorts to her neck. The garment opened in the pattern she drew, and easily slid off her back and into one of her hands. Her pale skin was practically glowing in the light. Martin shielded his eyes from the light with his hands. Tenebris’ breasts fell out freely, her slightly blue tinged areolas bouncing lightly. She noticed Martin’s behaviour. “What are you covering your face for? You embarrassed?”

“Um, no. I’m just trying not to go blind from your whiteness.”

“Oh, shut up.” She tossed her top at him, but it missed, and landed next to him on the bench. She kicked off her mag-lock boots while she turned around. Afterward, she untied her shorts. Hooking her thumbs into the waistband, she shimmied them down, spitefully sticking her ass out at Martin.

 Her glutes appeared surprisingly strong, with very little fat content. Below her stark white rear, plump labia poked out, and from where Martin was standing, he could see the stubble of a small patch of pubic hair. Her movement caused her hips to sway hypnotically from side to side. A small voice in Martin’s head told him it looked very warm, and that he should approach it, but he quickly pushed it out of his mind and addressed it was a trick of Parvian evolutionary psychology. Tenebris stood back up straight, and put on the bra and shirt. The shirt hung loose around her top half, which was a novel concept to Martin. Her lower half remained entirely nude, fair legs and shapely hips unconcealed. She fiddled with the box of panties, trying to carefully open it in case she needed to have them put back. “See something you like?”

Martin shot back up to attention out of his ogling, muttering embarrassed denials. Tenebris scoffed, and popped open the box. After putting them on and the so-called ‘leggings’, she inspected herself in the mirror. The outline of the underwear was visible under the pants, and they hugged her figure phenomenally. “I like it,” she turned back to her Parvian companion, “what do you think?”

“It looks tight.”

“Doesn’t it?” She bubbled, “but it’s really comfortable.” She posed in the mirror, inspecting herself. She tucked the package of underwear into her backpack, along with Martin’s old shipsuit, and slung it over her shoulder. Martin climbed into her open palm, and they returned to the main area of the store, where Cassinova was waiting, her hands clasped together. 

 “Anything you’d like to have put back?” 

“Nope, everything was perfect. 

Cassinova grinned. “That’ll be two-hundred and thirty-seven tchokas.”

Tenebris had sold the ship for around twenty-four thousand tchokas to the woman earlier, so she was equipped to cough up the payment. Cassinova handed Tenebris a small pad, which she brought behind her neck. The machine beeped, indicating that her neural chip had successfully made the payment. She returned it to Cassinova. Sliding the object into her pocket, Cassinova stuck out her foot again, and Tenebris performed the same gingerly tap she had before. 

“What a strange gesture.” Martin muttered after they exited the store and returned to the open street. 

“What? No, it’s lovely!” Tenebris hand waved the notion away. They continued walking for a good while, before coming upon a set of descending stairs, which Tenebris climbed down. Martin caught sight of a sign behind him before that read ‘commercial level’ and another sign once they reached the bottom, which read ‘residential level’.

Past the staircase was a screen, displaying a flattened map of the area, with street numbers and housing numbers. They currently sat in roughly the centre, at least according to the ‘you are here’ red dot. Curiously, as Martin looked from one end of the station to the other, the number of addresses per housing complex seemed to become smaller, and less dense, until entire blocks were taken up by single addresses at the very far end. On the map, housing complexes were marked as blue, and the few sporadic motels were marked purple. The closest one was a short walk away, about a kilometre, and according to the map, held the humble title of ‘WORST MOTEL EVER 0/5 CELESTIAL BODIES’. Evidently, it had been hacked by a disappointed customer. Nonetheless, Tenebris began entering in directions to the place on her neural chip. 

From her palm, Martin watched Tenebris interface with her chip. It was almost humorous to look at, as if she were popping invisible bubbles rather than exchanging electrical signals with a machine jammed into her brain stem. 

When they began walking, Martin resumed his previous occupation of absorbing his surroundings. This area didn’t have the same energy as the floor above. The area was dark, and the only illumination came in the form of the dim orange lights illuminating the ground and street signs. The clothes and patterning were absent here, exchanged for a consistent orange evening sky, interspersed with thin clouds covering the entire ceiling. The whole area suggested its sole purpose was sleep, rather than leisure. Few people walked the streets, and most that did were in work uniform, likely heading for the upper floor to clock in. The routine was familiar to Martin, as his previous ring station did not lend well to idle activity – a productive side effect of having literally nothing to do.

The housing was uniform, with every block being a massive collection of connected houses. The street seemed to be elevated, as there were two levels of houses, where one floor was halfway into the ground, with a staircase leading down, and the second level placed atop, with another staircase leading up to it. 

After a series of twists and turns, all showing the same, uniform streets, they arrived at the motel. It was, at the very least, a small break from the consistency. Above the entrance, a large sign written in fanciful lettering, bearing the title ‘Wurst Motel’. Martin snorted. Tenebris descended the steps into the building. 

The interior was a vast expanse of white, with purple carpeting and violet tubes which climbed across the walls, giving them a pleasing splash of colour. Across from where they were standing was another staircase which led back outside. Between the exits was a square entry area, with a large round terminal in the centre. To the sides were two long corridors, which extended to either side a good fifty metres. The walls of these corridors were covered with three levels of what appeared to Martin as very large lockers, with ladders beside them to allow people to access the higher ones. These lockers were roughly two thirds the height of Tenebris, and seemed rather wide. 

The area was completely empty, but it was by no means dirty or even of poor quality. Tenebris approached the centre terminal. She went up to one of the many screens on it, and tapped in some things that Martin didn’t quite see. A screen was brought up, asking for the user to input a 6 digit pin, however, Tenebris curled her fingers, causing Martin to not see the code. When the machine spat out a pad attached to a wire, the Martian brought it behind her neck just as she had before, which the machine responded to with an affirmative beep. 

“I-16A” Tenebris muttered, turning to her right, and making her way down the wing. Martin watched her eyes zip past the lockers, until locking onto one in particular. She tapped her code into a small terminal on it, and it cracked open. Martin peered inside.

The interior was nothing but a white mattress, which covered the entire floor and two of the walls, and a large storage box in the far corner. It was larger than a normal bed, but such a privilege was lost when one noticed the pitifully low ceiling, which Tenebris would be completely incapable of standing up in. The room was bathed in cool pink lighting. As it turned out, these were not lockers, but motel rooms. Seemingly unfazed, Tenebris dumped Martin out of her hand onto the floor/mattress, and crawled in, pulling the door shut behind her. Automatic locking mechanisms squealed and clicked shut, and a terminal next to the door beeped. It displayed a number indicating the remaining hours they had the ‘room’ rented for, and an area to input the code to unlock the door. 

Seeing Martin’s reaction to their room, Tenebris finally spoke. “Crazy small, right? Well, it’s not small for you, I guess.” 

“Yeah, I expected something else”

“I’m sorry to burst your bubble then. This is pretty standard stuff. Now,” Tenebris brought a fingernail to the corner of her mouth, “where ever is our little Parvian going to sleep?”

“Cmon,” Martin moaned, “I’m not gonna escape! I don’t even know the door code! And even if I did, I can’t even reach the damn thing.”

Tenebris reclined on the mattress, stretching herself across. “Sure, but I do remember you telling me Parvians just love warmth. Can’t even sleep without a warm spot, or else they can just roll over and freeze to death from running out of calories.” 

As if Martin’s nerves had an impeccable sense of ironic timing, the cold air in the room brushed against his skin. His metabolism picked up, heart pumping and muscles getting warmer, but he knew his body’s energy stores wouldn’t hold him long enough, and he’d run out. 

“There’s no shame in it,” Tenebris’ hand rested on her crotch. “You do what you have to do.” She breathed. 

Martin, being a smart Parvian, knew when to cut his losses. He walked toward his captor, passing her feet and making his way toward the centre of her spread legs. Passing her calf, he noticed how she simply exuded heat, her thighs even more so. Seeing the place he was about to spend the next few hours in, he stripped himself of his new clothes to keep them clean. In front of him lie Tenebris’ open palm. Stepping in, she raised him to her toned stomach, where her shirt was pulled up. He stood and watched Tenebris hook her thumb into the waistband of her new pants, and lift up. A wave of heat washed over Martin’s body, humid air oozing with pheromones. This was it. He crawled in, and felt the elastic material grow increasingly tight as Tenebris slowly released the waistband. 

The Parvian entered what was effectively a different world. Powerful heat and humidity surrounded him. Tenebris’ labia caressed his body, as he lay in her slit. The warmth infiltrated Martin’s body, his heart slowing and his muscles relaxing, yielding to the external source of energy. Unlike last time he was here, Martin got as close as possible. He let Tenebris’ folds wrap around him and hold him, hot secreted juices further warming him.

Tenebris patted Martin’s back through her clothes. “Good boy.” She muttered to the man between her legs. She propped her backpack under her neck as a pillow, and was lulled into sleep, to further continue her journey when she awoke.