QT UK - Chapter 15 & 16 (Almost Final) (Patreon)

There's still the need for a little edit pass on some of this and the thumbs up from CP on a few details, but there's enough here to show you all now. While it's all a single update, it's a little too long to be a single chapter at my normal pace so the new stuff here is now labelled as Chapter 16. Use ctrl-F if you want to jump straight down the page to that.

*****

Chapter 15

28th October 2020

Tomorrow always comes after a happy ending.

The words drifted up from the back of Ethan’s mind as he stirred. It was something his first boss at BBC News had been fond of saying, a reminder to the crew that it didn’t matter how well a broadcast had gone, the cycle didn’t stop and they’d still be back the next day having to work just as hard. Evidently he’d taken the phrase to heart enough for it to have stuck.

He felt the pleasing weight of her body, half on top of his own, before registering anything else - felt it shift against him with shallow breaths perfectly in time with his own, warm air blown softly against his chest. One of his arms was around her and he drew it tighter, content to lie there barely aware for as long as he was going to be allowed, only waking further with the dim realisation that he didn’t know exactly how he’d got there.

The last he remembered, Aoife had been on top of him, her face bunched tight in the giddy moment before his climax had hit. His own eyes had closed, and something warm and wet had coated his thighs. Then nothing, just the familiar haze stretching out and only finally lifting now as he woke alongside her.

Someone had put a blanket over them both, which he discovered as he moved just enough to disturb it, leaving a cool draft to tease his side and rouse him enough to finally open his eyes. He peered past the splay of green hair that filled half of his vision, out into the grey of the room illuminated by a single splinter of daylight sneaking past the edge of one of the curtains. He realised that they were still in the cinema room, although not on the same sofa he was sure they’d been on before. Instead, they’d been moved further back, to a different pair of couches that had been turned to face each other and pushed together in the approximation of a bed. Whoever had done that had also taken the care to clean the mess from his crotch, as well as gathered up the clothes that he and Aoife had discarded, folding them into two neat piles nearby.  Ethan began to sit, but a soft exhalation from alongside him sounded enough like a sigh to make him stop.

There was just enough light for him to see Aoife, although her face was half veiled by her hair, and he gently brushed it aside to look at her properly. Enough time had obviously passed that she’d stopped saying imprinting, but she didn’t move - although he could convince himself that the corner of her mouth quirked at the touch. He’d never seen her look this content, catching her without any of the frustrated energy he was so used to her carrying, and as he watched he realised how relaxed the knots under his own skin suddenly felt. The cliche would have been for things to not feel real, but he wasn’t sure if anything had felt more real in his life than the sense of her body against his and, after a few moments, it was more than Ethan could manage not to lean in and ease a kiss on her forehead.

What sort of idiot would have risked losing this?

He rested there with her a while longer, until the sounds of activity outside the window began to creep across his awareness and joined the questions he had; about how he’d seemed to have lost several hours and just who had found and tended to them? Even then he had to fight his reluctance to move for several stretched out minutes before leaning in and mumbling an explanation to the Scottish girl, just in case she could hear it.

“I’m going to find out what happened. Try not to get into too much trouble while I’m gone this time, ok?”

Aoife didn’t move as he carefully lifted her off himself, but Ethan still did his best to slip from the blanket and scramble free of the pushed together sofas without disturbing her. As he did so, he felt a throbbing pain in his left forearm that he was sure hadn’t been there before he slept. More familiar was the aching stiffness in his knee, that he still got any time he slept in an odd position or over taxed his body, the consequence of an old ACL injury playing football at university. He frowned as he considered the implications there, but quickly became distracted, more focused on the woman sleeping in front of him than how it felt to put weight on his bad leg.

He had to stop himself from standing and watching her, heading instead for where his clothes were waited nearby, newly aware that whoever had been here had seen (and left) them both nude. Pulling on his sweatpants after his boxers, he felt the telltale shape of his phone sitting in one pocket, and instinctively reached to check it, only to immediately curse himself for doing so.

The clock said it was late afternoon, which meant he’d lost more than twelve hours since he’d paired with Aoife, and the volume of notifications and emails waiting for him was ample proof of just how little the world cared to slow down and notice. He swore to himself and rubbed a hand across his face as the constant background flicker of stress returned. Rhys had attended the meeting with the foreign broadcasters in his place, and a secure link to a server’s worth of footage from the Germans did its best to jump out at him; something that was now Ethan’s responsibility to start wading through, along with the rest of his back-logged schedule. At some point, he realised, he was going to actually need to focus on his job again. There were enough other questions lingering, however, that the first thing he did was to open his group chat, looking to follow the trail of messages left there in the direction of wherever the others had ended up.

Stepping back out into the corridor, the sun was low enough through the windows to leave him blinking, and he traced his way back through Taymont, feeling like the building itself was watching him with a sort of detached indifference as he surfaced. At some point, he pushed past the unmarked boundary between the quieter parts of the hotel no-one seemed to visit and the spaces used for production, emerging into the familiar background pattering of noise and occasional mask clad runners moving from office to studio. He made a brief stop at his room to grab a jacket and a pair of half-worn slacks from his laundry pile; however, he ultimately made his way to the side of the building, heading out through the exit reserved for transmission cables and onto the terrace beyond.

The smell of smoke from the grounds staff burning leaves lingered in the air as Ethan stepped outside, quickly noting that the Special Branch presence seemed to have dwindled to a single marked police car near the front of the building. It wasn’t hard to find at least three of his team members where their group chat had suggested they’d be. Days earlier, he had made a request to Pallisade’s site manager that they might be able to return some of the outdoor heaters and cushions that had been taken from the patio during the enhanced restrictions, looking for small things he could push through that would make a difference to the newly forming Teams. He hadn’t actually expected it to go anywhere, but then the sudden, uncommented appearance of several tall heaters that captured the near-new furnishings in a pocket of red-tinged warmth was particularly on brand for site management’s sense of priorities. Jess and Alex sat together on a two seat sofa, the sisters inclined familiarly towards each other, with the sense that the only thing stopping the pair from leaning against each other was the presence of Moxie having curled herself up in the small space between them. The dog’s head rested against Jess’s leg, half-regarding the screen of one of the laptops the two redheads were using, with work on the project seemingly already insistent enough to be a feature of their downtime.

Farah occupied an identical seat across from them, casually striking in a black leather jacket that Ethan was sure he’d previously seen Alex wearing, which might have begged more questions were it not for the fact that Sarah, the camerawoman from Team Kaminski, was there with her. The pair’s body language was similarly close, but with none of the familiarity of the McNamara sisters, instead replaced by a flirtatious intensity as Farah leaned forward towards the glasses-wearing brunette, propped up against the back of the seat with one arm that was practically wrapped around the other woman.

The four of them weren’t entirely alone, with a small group made up of researchers, editors and a make-up artist from both Teams Barclay and Kaminski having claimed the space beneath another heater a short distance away, giving the whole scene an odd sense of normality that hadn’t felt present for weeks. That alone was enough to briefly unbalance Ethan as he approached however, almost like he’d been stepped sideways as he slept, finding himself somewhere parallel where everything had been moved a couple of inches in different directions.

Moxie was the first to notice him, with a curious prick of the jack russell’s ears followed a second later by a short bark. Quickly, several sets of eyes were on him, though Ethan was grateful that the members of the other two teams did their best to keep things to an idle glance in his direction before returning to something a couple of them were watching on a phone. Sarah shifted away from Farah with a subtle embarrassment that went unnoticed by the other woman, with the presenter instead giving Ethan a broad smile. Meanwhile there was an unexpected, self-conscious fluster from Jess and the hint of a blush as the younger of the two sisters glanced away.

Something tugged at the back of Ethan’s mind in response to the gesture - a compulsive little note that stirred, semi-erect, through the constant background hum of his libido and caused his attention to catch on her. He watched her bite her lip, and felt the unusually strong urge to go and kiss her, enough that even briefly he felt his questions and thoughts about Aoife slip. She hadn’t been dosed by him in several days and logically, he knew the serum would be making her feel the need, but, for an instant, it felt as if there was something in his mind alongside him driving him to feel it too. Telling him how hot and sore that need was.

Pressing.

Urgent.

Insistent.

…but it only lasted for as long as it took Alex to be the one to speak.

“So, what time do you call this?”

The older McNamara’s words were filled with an increasingly familiar sarcasm, but he still had to blink the foreign sensation away before he could be sure who’s voice he’d heard. And it took him just a little too long to grasp at a response.

“Oh you know how it is. You hit snooze on your alarm a few times and suddenly it's the middle of the afternoon.”

Evidently the quip was still hesitant enough for Sarah to feel like she was in the way, and the camera woman awkwardly began mumbling her own excuses as she pulled herself from whatever was going on with Farah. She waved away the polite protests that she could stay if she wanted and made to leave, although not before Farah pulled her in close and whispered something in her ear. Whatever was said had earned Ethan’s partner a playful shove to the shoulder, leaving Farah grinning as the other woman edged away. Again, Ethan’s mind slipped as it tried to find solid ground, and again, it was Alex that pulled him back.

“Are you ok?” Her voice had a genuine concern this time, and he realised how carefully she was watching him.

Ethan took a second to find an answer, but a grin came with it as he did. “Yeah…I think I’m good. Just…”

A sound came from a short distance away, before he could finish the thought - a rising moan that spilled out of the phone which the group behind were clustered around. It was followed by several more, each more obviously pornographic than the last, although the women from the other Teams made no attempt to turn the volume down, or bothered to show any shame in whatever x-rated video they were watching. What was odder however was how Ethan’s own embarrassment didn’t surface. It wasn’t that it felt usual, but the emotions that should have told him it was unusual simply weren’t there. And even after a blonde-haired editor from Team Barclay slipped her hands down her jeans, while casually talking to the woman next to her, he still found himself able to turn back to his own team, and finish his thought.

“I just feel like there’s a few gaps and my head can’t quite catch up.”

He did, at least, manage to feel foolish for how understated that sounded.

There was a flicker of attention from the others in the direction of the sound too, although only Jess’ lingered for more of a moment,  causing her cheeks to colour further. Alex appeared to be too busy watching him, as if she’d not quite decided if his answer was enough to ease her concerns, while Farah just smirked.

“Did you miss Armstrong?” the Indian woman asked, with a relaxed stretch out into the space Sarah had left next to her. “She’s been checking on the pair of you a couple of times an hour since it became clear you weren’t going anywhere.”

“Must have done. I’ll admit to not being sure how we even ended up like that.”

“Evie was the one who found you both, after you weren’t answering any messages this morning.” Farah replied. “It was obvious that Aoife was in an imprinting sleep but you were even more of a dead weight than she was, so she came and got the rest of us to help. The pair of you had made a real mess of the sofa you were on but we couldn’t exactly move you back through the building like that either so the least we could do was to get you cleaned up and comfortable. I’m just jealous you didn’t make me squirt as hard as she obviously got to.”

“Seriously?” Alex quirked an eyebrow at Farah’s over-candidness, before seeming to catch how Ethan’s mind was still pulling at some of the implications of what had just been said. “Armstrong’s best guess is that you’ve had one of these regenerations that have been talked about.”

Outwardly, it seemed as reasonable a conclusion as any. Ethan had seen some of the before and after footage from Veraxiontic of people in the US who’d supposedly recovered from significant health conditions after receiving the vaccine, with beneficiaries entering an unconscious state following pairing, similar to an imprint, as something triggered their bodies to heal. That was something Project Upstart still hadn’t quite worked out how to present to the public, knowing how hard it was already going to be to accept that this wasn’t all a hoax without getting their heads around the impossibility of re-grown limbs and the blind being able to see.  Personally, he’d become desensitised enough to feeling like science was suddenly being written by a bad pulp author, but even so the regen was the first thing he’d considered after he’d woken up, and the longer he’d spent with the idea the more his gut protested against it.

“I’ve never had any health conditions to recover from and my old ACL repair is acting up as badly as ever from sleeping on that couch. I don’t feel any different.”

Or at least no different to the changes he’d been noticing anyway such as his appetite slowly increasing, or the way the extra inch he’d been carrying around his waist had toned up in the days since things had started. It was certainly possible that there was something undiagnosed he didn’t know about, but that felt unsatisfying as an explanation. Nor did it address the new feeling in the back of his mind, straining against his self-restraint as he looked again towards Jess.

He stretched his arm, reminding himself that the unusual throb he’s woken up with was also still there. “Plus I’ve got this weird pain along the bone here.”

“Not a doctor, Ethan. She just said it was obviously a response to the vaccine so we should try not to worry.” Her tone however, suggested that they had worried, and Ethan watched as she quickly tried to shift the conversation before he could dwell on that. “How’s Aoife doing?”

“She’s still sleeping off the imprint.”

“Riiiight, because that’s what I meant.”

He caught Alex’s eye, and for a second Ethan could see something strained there, barely buried under the outward humour. It wasn’t just him that she’d been concerned about. But then it wasn’t just Aoife who could say that she wasn’t part of the plan.

“She’s…finding some parts harder than others,” he settled on eventually. “I don’t know how easy it’s going to be for her to come to terms with a lot of what’s going on, or to find the answers she wants. But then maybe that’s not unreasonable of her. She can be stubborn, so I’m just glad she’s trusting me enough to help her through it.” Alex glanced down briefly, as he spoke, and he waited for her to look back and let him hold her gaze before continuing, his voice low but earnest. “I don’t think anyone should be made to feel like this is meant to be easy.”

Alex gave a weak smile and, for once, he couldn’t tell how sarcastic she was being. “Lucky her.”  

He’d have pressed a little further, if it wasn’t for another, particularly loud moan coming from the other group’s phone, slicing through the atmosphere enough to cause Mox to give a confused little yap. Jess only fidgeted and blushed further, prompting Ethan to turn back to Farah in search of an explanation.

She shrugged. “I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but I think most people are at least a little bit horny most of the time now. I think some people have just decided it’s not worth dancing around the fact that everyone around them knows it too.”

“There’s still a lot of people on site working on normal production who don’t know about the vaccine and Project Upstart though.”

“Actually, Delphi questionnaires went out to the rest of the staff this morning. Evie said something about management aiming to have the site fully vaccinated by the end of the week.”

Ethan paused, the news surprising enough to briefly distract himself from picking at the odd sense of disinhibition around him. He was pleased, thrilled even; but the thought of the rest of the colleagues he’d arrived at Taymont alongside getting vaccinated, quickly stumbled over the realisation that he wouldn’t be able to ignore the gaps others had left for much longer either. Instead, he fought back a sigh, and gave a practiced step around the thought.

“Was that what was up with you and Sarah,” he asked, settling on a return to the topic, and received a half-proud grin from Farah.

“What can I say; she likes flirting, I really like attention and neither of us see the point in pretending we aren’t having fun.” As soon as she said it, however, a note of hesitation seemed to finally catch up to her. “But there’s nothing more to it than that, promise.”

Ethan closed the gap to where she was seated, brushing a hand through the side of her hair reassuringly before replying. “The fuck are you promising me that for? I like you, Farah, but I don’t own you either. And you’d have far more reason to be upset at me than the other way around.”

He watched her relax. They’d never talked about exclusivity or commitment beyond the vaccine, but clearly there were enough guessed expectations that he made a note that they needed to. For a second, he wondered how much of an influence the serum might be having on how she was feeling and acting, whether she would have flirted quite so openly with Sarah before or if this was all new. But it was followed by the odd realisation that it almost didn’t matter. This was the only version of Farah he was ever going to know, and if this was out of character, he was never going to be able to understand what had changed. The same for Jess and Alex and for Nia.

But would he notice if Evie or Aoife were different?

Next to him, he realised that he was standing close enough to Jess for her breath to have hitched, the sound clear to him over the rest of the noise around them. He looked to her, felt the foreign feeling stir again, impressing on him how she was near enough to be able to reach out and touch, but she shook her head and he forced several steps back.

Ethan breathed, and Jess did with him. “Where is Evie anyway?”

“Some sort of crisis meeting, apparently,” Farah replied, prompting Ethan to pull out his phone with a frown as he tried to work out if he’d missed a message about it. It was only when he checked the project’s electronic diary that he was able to see Evie’s name, booked in alongside Laura Cooper and Rhys, on a secure call to Westminster for the rest of the day. Both of the site’s government liaisons and their head journalist.

“Any idea what it’s about?” Ethan asked.

Alex shook her head. “Nia wasn’t invited either, so it can’t be to do with Upstart.”

Ethan swore, more out of frustration for Evie than anything else, but not quite able to escape the feeling that something new was about to start looming unwelcome overhead, and an unpleasant thought that the police were suddenly absent because they were needed elsewhere.

“What about Nia then, where’s she?”

“Making some calls,” Alex said, her tone dripping with characteristic understatement. “She went for a walk to the top end of the site a little while ago, said that she didn’t want to be in the office and the reception was better there.”

Ethan noted a hint of exasperation too, as the redhead spoke. Alex barely knew Nia, but it was obvious that she’d already decided no-one was about to stop the other woman from trying to fix the world on her own. Or maybe Alex had tried? Either way, the fact that Nia had presumably barely stopped was probably the least surprising thing he’d learnt since waking up, but still came with a prickly guilt that he hadn’t been there to make her slow down.

He wasn’t sure if he swore out loud the second time, or if it was just in his head. Whichever it was though was enough to make Jess choose to speak for the first time since he’d arrived. She looked down as she did, her voice carrying a certain pressured heaviness, stumbling her way through her words. Just like with Farah however, it was hard for him to know how much was some effect of the serum, and how much was Jess being Jess. “We felt bad that we weren’t helping them, but didn’t really know what to do either, so we agreed we’d help by making sure our own work’s taken care of. And being there to support the two of them when they need us.”

“Four of them,” her sister corrected, leaving Ethan to take a second to realise Alex was including himself and Aoife as well.

Jess nodded, with a certain quiet enthusiasm showing through the strain.

For a short while longer, they made small talk, catching Ethan up a little further on what they’d heard about the rollout of the vaccine to the rest of the staff and the potential for more new people to be drafted in. Apparently, the members of Project Upstart who’d been around long enough had already started betting pools on which of the old crew would end up together, as well as speculating about what would happen to Jon, their weather man who was just camp enough to leave people guessing about his sexuality. There was also the slightly uncomfortable mention from Farah that she’d heard they may be recruiting some new engineers, leaving Ethan with the uneasy thought of how much pressure Aoife was quickly going to find herself back under. In truth, for most of the conversation, he was eager to leave, wanting to find Nia and to start handling whatever issues his team was now left facing, but at the same time he didn’t want to immediately walk away from the three women in front of him. As much as he believed they’d understand, they’d been given less of him than he wanted and the least they deserved were a few more snatched minutes of his time. And even then, his focus was still blunted by the creeping sense of arousal he couldn’t entirely shake, struggling to listen through every little blush and murmur Jess made; until he started to feel sure that the pressure from the serum that had to be affecting her was working on him too.

Somehow, Ethan managed to keep his cool, pushing intrusive thoughts of the redhead’s lips on his own to one side, despite being aware of how his heart rate was increasing the longer he stayed near her. It was something that wasn’t helped by the sight of two of the women from Team Kaminski beginning to kiss each other, just over Jess’ shoulder, taking the display as a cue to go and look for Nia. It was all a touch more than he could bear.

However, just before he managed to excuse himself, Alex decided to unintentionally make things worse.

“So, when are you going to show him your ‘thing?’” she asked, leaning towards her sister, teasing her with a joke that Ethan clearly wasn’t meant to understand yet.

“What? No! Alex!” Jess immediately flustered, suddenly sitting up straight enough that the laptop still resting on her knees almost fell to the floor and caused Moxie to hop down, the dog’s ears and tail both pricked upwards. “He’s probably got enough to worry about without…it’s not, he doesn’t need…I mean I will eventually, probably, definitely, I just need to…” With each blathered word Jess’s face progressively shifted to match the colour of her hair, only stopping when she finally caught up with herself and took a breath. Her forehead creased into a frown, and she gave a glare that somehow managed to only make her look cuter. “You are such a bitch sometimes.”

Alex smirked. The reaction seemed to be exactly the one she was hoping for, and she fixed Jess with her grin, playfully daring her sister to keep going until Mox barked at her. Alex rolled her eyes and turned to the animal, talking to her as if she could understand sarcasm. “Right, don’t you start. This totally isn’t what she wanted to happen.”

“No it’s not,” Jess protested, but doing so somehow only seemed to prove Alex’s assertion.

The odd sensation pulling at Ethan tightened. “Am I missing something here?”

“No.”

“Yes.”

Both women replied at once. Ethan managed a brief glance in Farah’s direction, finding her leaning forward in her own seat with an anticipation obvious enough to confirm that he was the only one without any idea of what they were talking about. Realising he was waiting for her help, she gave a small shrug. “Alex is being a little unfair, but on the other hand Jess was being a pretty massive dork when she was wondering how to tell you.”

It took effort for Ethan to suppress a frustrated sigh. His body already felt more tense than he knew what to do with and he was eager to try and find some distance to let it settle, but he didn’t want to force Jess one way or another either.

“I’ve time for you,” he said to her, carefully trying not to add to things, but he accidentally met Jess’ gaze as he did so and found himself held there, unable to look away. “But only if you actually want to tell me whatever it is now.”

The light from the heater caught Jess’ face as she shifted in her seat, the red glow and heavy shadows adding to the feeling of intensity that had been forced between the pair of them and left to hang there, warm and unnatural. She wavered, as if understanding that if she gave even a little of what she was holding back, neither of them might be able to stop, but not quite able to tell if she cared. Her fingers, looking to grip to whatever they could find, curled around the edges of her laptop, and Ethan realised that both of them were holding their breath.

Eventually, she managed to break the tension, glancing over her shoulder to confirm there were other people still around, and slowly shook her head.

“I do…but I don’t.”

“I can make some time for you properly after I’ve seen Nia,” he offered, realising how much it sounded like an open proposition. But then he supposed that’s exactly what it was.

Jess gave another small nod. “I think I’m going to really need that.”

***

The odd sensation that had wrapped itself around Ethan while he’d been near Jess loosened as he left, leaving him feeling oddly unmoored as a little of the heat disappeared with each step - until his body noticed that the thin jacket he’d collected from his room was barely enough for the chill. And the sight of Nia in a long dark coat didn’t help.

She was where he was told she would be, at the upper edge of the hall’s grounds, where the best view of the landscape, spilling out in green-smudged fells, could be found and where a small wooden gazebo had been placed, originally for weddings. The jasmine that had been coaxed up the faded white trelliswork looked like it was already longing for the sun more than he was, but was still just enough to frame his partner with what felt like artistic intent as she sat on a bench beneath it - failing to notice his approach until he was almost alongside her. Instead, Nia was too engrossed in the video call she was obviously making, talking towards her phone with uncharacteristically animated hand gestures. Ethan knew that the spot was where the best of Taymont’s notoriously patchy phone signal was to be found, but between the chill and noticing how unguarded Nia seemed, he didn’t manage to ask why she was out there rather than simply using Pallisade’s wifi.

He stopped a few paces away as a pair of dark eyes flickered towards him. Nia’s body language immediately closed, slightly, although the subtle smile that came with it was hard for him to miss now. And as she did, he felt that same disembodied sense of something in the back of his head reaching out towards her, as if it was now trying its best to anchor itself on her - and the thin thread of stress he somehow knew she was feeling.

She raised a finger, wordlessly asking for a moment longer and Ethan obliged, waiting silently for her, close enough to catch the voice of a woman with a thick scouse accent on the other end of the call.

“She’s coded as yellow on the audit software. The lads on the backend are arguing that, but fuck knows. Like, you’ve seen how rushed this whole thing’s been and the underlying code’s this jarg knockoff of the American’s so there could be any number of bugs in the Naive Bayes crap they’re using as their architecture.”

“She wasn’t yellow,” Nia replied, her voice firm.

“Dunno what to tell you Babe. I’ve asked for clearance to look at the code meself, but Delphi is technically its own project and I’m getting the same old shite with all the pushback.”

Nia must have seen the way Ethan’s eyebrows lifted at the voice’s term of endearment, something knowing playing across her face for a second before she interrupted the other woman, who seemed ready to keep talking for as long as she was allowed.

“I’m going to have to stop you for a second, Jordan. My partner finally decided to wake up.”

“What, like, as in, he’s there now?”

There was an eager sort of excitement to the voice’s response rather than any sort of concern, and Nia simply nodded, before undramatically turning her phone towards Ethan. A blonde woman’s face leaned intently towards the screen, as if doing so might allow her to get a better look at him.

She appeared to be roughly the same age as himself and Nia, but immediately Ethan was struck by the contrast to his teammate - the other woman’s sharp features notably expressive and unrestrained, with intelligent brown eyes that seemed to leave nothing hidden as she took him in. And while she was obviously in a lab, the care she’d evidently taken over her hair and makeup made her look like she’d be more at home in a swimsuit on instagram than somewhere made for research.

“Uuuh, hi there?” Ethan mumbled, raising a hand in greeting, suddenly aware of how underdressed he felt.

The woman smiled. “Remind me - how many weeks did you argue against lettin’ an algorithm pick anyone for you, Nia.”

The statement was casual and playfully approving, spoken as if it was something that Ethan would already know, and it took him a second to realise he hadn’t. His stomach gave a small jump and he looked to Nia, but she’d already turned the phone back towards herself, and if she’d noted the slip of new information, she was intentionally ignoring it.

“Given what we’re talking about, I don’t know if you can blame me for being cautious,” Nia said, flatly. She then looked back up at Ethan, shuffling along the bench to make space for him to join her beneath the overgrown trellis, and giving a small pat to the seat beside her. “This, Ethan, is Jordan Price. The current head of one of Averna’s research teams and one the people I worked with at…”

“She was the CTO at AexaSphere, I know,” he said, as he slipped alongside her and leant in to join her in the camera’s frame, able to see her surprise on the screen as he finished her sentence. “I did a deep dive on your LinkedIn.”

Normally Ethan would have blanched at the idea of poking through the profile of someone he was dating, no matter how public it was. However, he’d become so used to Nia’s attempts to be across every detail she could find, that he’d convinced himself she’d respect the effort to learn about her, something confirmed in the way her attention fell on him.

Not that they hadn’t already talked about their pasts enough for him to be broadly aware of AexaSphere anyway. It was a biotech company she’d joined as a start up, working to develop AI tools for use in healthcare and disease diagnosis several years ahead of anyone else until its eventual multi-million purchase by Veraxiontic in 2018. And from there it was simple enough to trace her path through the corporation’s executive structure to Averna and Project Upstart. What she’d quietly left out however, was just how much attention AexaSphere had received from the specialist press, with her and Jordan’s pictures even heading a fawning article in The Financial Times about the visionary, female CTO and COO poised to revolutionise Britain’s tech field.

“Jordan wasn’t just the CTO at AexaSphere,” Nia corrected, after a moment, “she was AexaSphere. The company was just there to support her work on AI models.”

“Ni, I swear we aren’t having this argument again.”

Between her accent and unashamedly casual manner, Jordan made for an unconventional sort of genius, but it was clear that just how much more heavily Nia weighed the other woman’s contributions than her own was an old scar on the familiarity between the two of them. Briefly, he felt that Nia did, in fact, want to have that argument again and it took her looking up at the grey horizon for a second to compose herself, and think better of it.

“I asked for her help,” she continued instead, “with trying to work out what happened with Alex.”

Ethan moved closer to Nia. “That’s what you were talking about? Something about a Code Yellow?”

Jordan nodded, blonde hair bobbing on the screen with an almost nerdy enthusiasm. “Yeah, we insisted to Averna from the start that the Delphi teams should have a system for auditing any errors with team assignments. We ended up with nine different categories for the sort of things that anyone could think of going wrong, but it was Nia’s suggestion to colour code them. Blue and Green cover end user human error and are something like 90% of the cases that have been logged. Orange is for someone physically forcing things, while most of the others are for technical fuck ups on the back end. Yellow’s what they’re using for coding errors and bugs in the Delphi system itself, glitching out and producing results it’s not meant to.”

The wind blew, bending the frame of the trellis. “You’re telling us that what happened to Alex was just a glitch?”

“I don’t know what else to tell you, like. Delphi’s system lead was already seein’ her arse when I reached out to her. Apparently they’ve had several hundred yellow cases since the start of the month and she and her team are insisting they’re being over reported. Says any time anything goes wrong it’s automatically been written off as her code without a proper assessment. She’s proper fumin’ that we’re not using the Grey code for unclassified cases where any doubt exists, rather than rushin’ to close em so quick, but it feels like Stevens and some of the other blerts on the board are pushing to get things nailed down. That said we’re talkin’ less than a percent of matches so it’s still in the system’s margin for error and without access to the current version I can’t tell who’s covering themselves.”

 “And your intuition actually believes that?” Nia asked, with an incredulity that was almost as visible to Ethan as the small clouds of steam coming off her breath in the cold. “What about Red? Or Black?”

It was only later that he would have the meaning of those two codes explained to him, with Black being used to designate an external hack able to pry it’s way through multiple layers of security software, and Red any sort of internal manipulation or corruption of Delphi’s processes by someone with the means and authority to do so. Strictly speaking the coding was intended for someone tampering with the algorithm or database, but Nia would confide in him that her passing the vaccine to Aoife, outside of the programme’s authorisation, would also be classed as Red if anyone chose to hold it against her.

For the first time, Jordan seemed to slow down in her response, rubbing at one temple with what Ethan thought was irritation before she spoke. “We’ve not had a confirmed case of either. Black would have caused all sorts of drama. And Red…trust me Babe, I’ve done the blue sky thinking on this already. There’s nothing to tell you there.”  

Ethan could almost convince himself he felt Nia’s reaction to something he’d missed before he saw it and he looked over to her to see her body coiling with a feline sort of tension. Three of her fingers drummed rhythmically against her thigh, as he waited for her to speak and only stepped in when she didn’t.

“You can’t just brush this off so easily,” he started, his voice rising as he found his own anger at how Jordan seemed to be dismissing what had happened to Alex out of hand. In his own mind there was simply too much sex and power to be traded to not presume the worst, and the redhead was owed so much more than the answer promised her. “Not when there’s…”

A dark hand stopped him, with a careful, cautionary press against his arm, quieting him as Nia’s voice came in low. “You’re certain?”

“Yeah. I mean, with you that far away, as certain as I can be.”

Jordan’s answer was somehow both vague yet also certain. Nia moved, with Ethan only realising how close the pair of them had ended up as she pulled her coat more tightly around herself and the space suddenly opened up again between them. The feeling in his head reached for her again, but whatever was there wasn’t as strong as with Jess, and it struggled to find purchase. Even so, it was enough to make him reach out and place a hand on her back reassuringly and the pressure immediately softened. Next to him his partner tilted her head away, unreadable as she picked out a spot on the clouds and chose to watch it rather than immediately replying. Whatever had just been said was enough that she was choosing not to push any further, and Ethan convinced himself to trust her enough to wait before asking why.

His attention rested on Nia and stayed, only realising he’d zoned out when Jordan started speaking to him.

“So, Ethan, Nia said you got a tiny bit of unexpected downtime after yer last pairing.”

The attempt to change the conversation was obvious, but he still took a second to catch up, admitting to himself how fuzzy his head had felt since he’d left Aoife. “Uh…yeah. If we’re calling it that? Honestly, I’m still trying to work out what happened.

“Well? How are you feelin?”

The question was friendly, but came with an over-eagerness that left it clear he was being scrutinised from the other end of the call. But, for whatever reason, he wasn’t quite ready to admit to the mental tugging sensation - the idea of it feeling foolish until he’d confirmed it wasn’t just some hallucination - and he kept his answer vague, hoping one of the two women would fill in some gaps for him first.

“I don’t know? Off? A little like my focus is all over the place and my brain hasn’t quite caught up yet.”

Jordan’s look quickly became more intent. “No physical changes? Healed scars? You sound like you were out for long enough that any regeneration would have been fairly significant.”

Ethan shook his head. “No. Nothing like the reports we’ve had anyway. And I definitely don’t feel better than I did before this anyway.”

There was a small flurry of questions from Jordan, with an academic intensity that appeared from beneath her accent as she probed about his heart rate, appetite and mental state. “If you’re willing, get your site’s medic to send me over a work up. Gemivax is like several kids in a trench coat pretending to be a real drug sometimes. We had to set the cycle rate to be higher than the US serums to get production to work over here, but not only is that causing the libido boost but it makes the model the smart proteins work on a little less stable. If it’s doing something weird, you might not see all the results dead quickly, but I’m happy to chip in where I can.”

The concept of ‘smart proteins’ was one Ethan was familiar enough with, not least from the mountain of documentation on immunology and organic chemistry that had been couriered to the project by a Dr Siobhan O’Sullivan, the bulk of which had immediately gone over his head. Luckily for him it was Armstrong’s job to parse the workings of the serum into something they could convey in a 5 minute section of their broadcast - and she’d managed to explain to him how the vaccine essentially worked by running algorithms on a near molecular scale, able to keep up with DuoHalo as they iterated over multiple generations and growing in complexity the more nodes they could add to their network.

“Do I need to be worried?” he asked, before realising that his concern was more for Aoife and the others than himself. “Or my teammates?”

“Definitely, probably not,” Jordan replied, leaning back in her chair, stretching arms that somehow managed to look naturally tanned despite being on lockdown. “Your model might be diverging a little, but if it is, you’re not going to know until any changes start to appear. And they’re always what the serum thinks is beneficial.”

If the answer was meant to reassure Ethan, it didn’t quite manage, but he only got halfway through a frown to himself before the sound of Nia’s fingers rapping on the wooden bench drew his attention sideways with a tense little tug. She hadn’t spoken since the conversation had changed, and while she was looking at the screen, the furrow of her own brow made it obvious that half her thoughts were elsewhere.

Jordan seemed to notice a second behind him.

“Need me to love you and leave you?” The blonde asked, softly.

Nia considered, then finally nodded. “I think I’ve a few things I need to discuss with him now, if that’s ok?”

The other woman laughed. “He’s your partner. You are allowed to tell me to piss off when I’m overstayin’ me welcome you know.” Nia responded with a flat look that felt like it must have been well practiced, but Jordan ignored it. “Was good to meet you Ethan. Make sure you call her out for me if she tries to keep things too close to her own chest, ok?”

Ethan smiled, about to tell Jordan that seemed easier said than done but, beaten to it by an over-exaggerated sigh from the woman beside him; he left them to play out whatever the dynamic between them was.

“I’ll talk to you later,” Nia replied, in a manner that managed to not quite be either a statement or a question.

“Yeah, sure.” The scouse woman leaned forward to turn off her end of the call and locked eyes with the camera as she did so, departing with one final smirk. “Love ya Sugarnips.”

Nia sighed.

Almost as soon as the call had ended however, she was reaching into the folds of her coat. With Jordan no longer watching, her shoulders bunched as she stashed her phone and replaced it with a lighter and a pack of cigarettes. Stress rolled off her in a heavy wave, and she flicked, impatiently at the lighter, frustrated as the first flame was quickly snuffed out by the wind.

“I told her I quit.”

Feeling his own heart rate rise, Ethan leaned forward. One hand reached for hers and lifted the cigarette from her grasp. The other eased around her and drew his partner towards him, kissing her deeply.

There was half a beat where Nia hesitated - and then her mouth pressed back. She drew on him instead of the smoke, bracing herself against his chest and stayed there until a small exhale whispered from her. And although the breath caused her to pull back, Ethan captured her lips again, feeling her relax with each extended piece of contact as the serum thrummed. He knew he had an effect on her, wanted to give her something other than the fleeting hit of nicotine to rely on, but there was something about the way he could practically feel her pulse slow beat by beat that was hard not to marvel at.

Eventually, her hand settled at his waist and she steadied herself as the last of the weight fell from her, their foreheads leaning together.

“So,” Ethan said, finally breaking the silence with a smile in his voice. “Sugarnips?”

Nia groaned, giving him an embarrassed little shove. “We dated. For a couple of months, before it started to get in the way of things. It was a couple of years ago now, but she still thinks she’s funny.” She met his gaze, turning stern but with a fraction of the genuine tension that had been there moments earlier. “I swear, if that nickname gets so much as breathed to the others…”

“My life won’t be worth living. Got it.”

The small smile she gave him was wry enough to suggest she didn’t entirely believe she wasn’t going to get teased. She sighed, her mind obviously wandering, and Ethan felt the stress beginning to settle back in. Quickly, Nia attempted to change the subject, doing her best to deflect things out and away from herself, but she still surprised Ethan by how genuine her next question sounded.

“How did things go with Aoife?”

Even if Nia was trying to wriggle away from her own anxiety, it was clear she cared; but Ethan saw what she was trying to do, and shook his head at her. “No. You first for a change.” Brown eyes wandered down towards the packet of cigarettes he was still holding, and he reached out to caress her face, reassuringly. “What’s up?”

Nia closed her eyes, leaning into his touch, and kept them closed as she started to reply. “The phrase she used, ‘blue sky thinking.’ It was a code I came up with at AexaSphere whenever we were meeting clients or investors, for if either of us ever wanted to signal to the other that we needed to talk outside the room.”

“...you’re sure that’s what she meant?”

“She wasn’t exactly being subtle.”

It took Ethan a second to find the thread of implications and to begin tugging - and he suddenly wished he’d paid as much attention to Jordan’s body language as he had been to Nia’s. “So, there’s something she wants to tell you that she couldn’t on a call like that? She thought there was a chance you were being listened to.”

The wind blew again, punctuating his thoughts with a rustle of the nearby plants, and the penny finally dropped as to why Nia was out in the cold rather than using Palisade’s wifi for the call. Jordan wasn’t the only one concerned about how easily someone else might have been listening, although Nia’s reaction suggested that her caution had only just become more concrete. This time, the flicker of anxiety he felt was definitely his own rather than Nia’s. Between the Red and Black codes and what had happened to Alex, there was something Jordan was only willing to discuss with Nia in person; and she was worried that someone in authority was not only involved, but that they also had their attention.

But who? The government? Averna? The thought of either manipulating Delphi left a nasty pit in his stomach.

“Is she safe?” Ethan asked, studying Nia for cracks.

“I know Jordan, she can handle herself - better than I can. And if she thought she was in immediate danger this isn’t how she’d be acting.” For once, it didn’t feel like she was deflecting. “But she’s obviously guarded enough about things that she wants to meet in person.”

“Where’s she based?”

“The Wellcome Institute on Euston Road. It’s where Averna’s been operating from since we were established. Close to the people making decisions and it’s letting us stay collaborative with the teams already based there.”

Central London. Ethan knew the building, vaguely, from his own trips to the capital. It belonged to one of the world’s foremost research organisations and the 10 storey glass facade was practically opposite Euston train station, leading him to pass it almost without thought each time he needed to travel to the BBC’s London HQ at Broadcasting House. There were plenty of good reasons to balk at the idea of going, from security and the virus to the job they still had to do, but Ethan looked at Nia and his mind skipped over all of them.

“How soon do you want us to leave?

Nia’s posture straightened, leaning back at first in surprise, only for the arch of her eyebrows to furrow as she retreated behind her professionalism.

“You know it’s not that simple,” she replied, her tone turning low and clipped; but he could tell that it was for her benefit rather than his, as if she was the one who needed convincing. He met her gaze, and she repeated herself. “It’s not that simple.”

Back, down the slope to the Hall, an engine rumbled as the remaining Special Branch police car rolled out towards the front gate and, as Ethan looked up, his attention lingered on the grey building and the production facilities tucked up tight alongside it.

“Even if I wasn’t determined to find out what happened to Alex, if the idea that it might be being covered up didn’t make me…” he started, but paused, realising that wasn’t a feeling he quite had the words for, and didn’t want to dwell on. Instead, he turned all of his attention back to Nia. “I would still be able to tell what this means to you. If what Jordan’s implying is right, then she’s basically saying that what we think we’re working towards is tainted from the start. And I know that if I leave you to it, you’re going to keep trying to take all of that on your own shoulders until you break. So yes, it really is that simple.”

Nia shifted, breaking eye contact first and fidgeting under what might have felt like half an accusation. For the first time, she didn’t immediately reach to try and fix the mask as it slipped, and the vulnerability as her shoulders dropped seemed to shrink her.

“But it’s not,” she protested, after a brief hesitation that made Ethan realise he’d never seen her look unsure of herself before. “Even if you set aside Special Branch riding our arses here, we can’t be in two places at once, as much as I’d like to be. And if there is something there that needs to be addressed, if the cost of doing that is Upstart not being ready then people lose either way.”

There was a pause, in which Ethan could see she was weighing up some other piece of information, and he waited for her to offer it.

“Cooper and I were contacted by Central Government this morning. The Americans are weighing up dates in the middle of next month for going public and cabinet are insistent that they have a version of our broadcast ready for review in advance. We’ve just been given until the sixth to have it prepared for them and it would need to be approved by Averna’s board ahead of that. I can’t see how there’s time for half of us to simply wander down to London in the middle of things.”

Ethan made a face. Nine days. They’d been working to a timetable that suggested they would have a week or two longer than that and while it would be enough time for a regular news broadcast, this was anything but. There was an awareness that every word and frame needed to be agonised over to get as much of the country on board. They could certainly have a script filmed fully and edited by then, but coming up with something much more considered than Farah standing in one of their studios between rushed segments was going to require as many man hours as their small workforce apparently had left, particularly if the executives were going to want their own revisions.

He did his best to push down the guilty little voice that was telling him his own drama had been time they couldn’t afford, and then the other that demanded he was still going to need to find more of it for Aoife. He also tried to ignore the uncomfortable thought that the people handling those revisions might be the same ones Jordan was suspicious of. Instead, his mind quickly started to grasp at the various pieces they’d already filmed, jumping from one consideration to another as he tried to work out a path that took them to London.

The sensation of Nia’s pulse, racing in his temples, drew him back to her. His partner’s gaze had wandered back to the horizon again and he could only guess which part of things she was thinking about. Instinctively, he moved to reassure her before he’d even managed to reassure himself.

“Leave it with me,” he said, reaching out to catch her attention with a soft brush of his hand through her hair. “The production schedule is part of my job. Let me actually do it. If we need to be in London and not here then I’ll make a way for us to be in London.”

A low, thoughtful hum rolled from Nia, as if she was having to catch a chuckle. “That’s just bluster and you know it.”

Ethan smirked. “Right, and how is that any different to you?”

He half-expected Nia to argue back, but she didn’t, quietly conceding the point. She regarded him, thoughtfully, instead, and lingered until something behind her eyes seemed to turn wistful. Ethan gazed back, taking a moment to appreciate her. The more he saw of her, the more he was beginning to understand her own bluster, and just how much she was pushing herself to try and hold things together through sheer force of will - even at her own expense.

“Have I told you how incredible you are?”

Ethan’s words pulled Nia out of her own head, with a warm kick of feeling that for once, left her speechless.

“And, I don’t deserve what you did for Aoife,” he continued, with a force of feeling that barely captured a fraction of what that had meant to him.

For a second, it looked as if she was about to try to turn and shy away from the candor, but he reached out to caress her, and she sighed against the touch. But even in being honest, she tried to underplay her own feelings.

“I told myself that if this was how things were, I’d do whatever it took to make things work for the people I was with.”

Ethan held her. “You know, even if you think you need to fight to prove yourself to other people, you don’t have to for me.”

Nia’s face shifted to one of consternation, and she looked at him as if he’d managed to not understand her at all.

She leaned forward, capturing his lips in a long soft press.

“I know. But I want to prove myself to you more than anyone.”

***

Chapter 16

Aoife floated.

The darkness around her had faded to a fuzzy grey, bundled up around her heavy and warm. She knew she’d dreamed, but she couldn’t remember what.

Lazily, she tried to stretch her senses, experimentally looking for the edge of her half-awareness, tried to find some shape to the slow creeping of the light, but the warmth told her not to. She wasn’t ready. Just a little longer. Just wait. She listened to it, and it hugged her closer, until the reassuring feeling slipped under her skin and filled her again.

She knew she was still dreaming.

Her mind tingled, wonderful and slow as something moved through it that hadn’t been there before she sank. It was part of her, but it wasn’t her, and as it shifted, she felt it leave a mark, a long bright trail that danced, flickered then faded like bubbles in a glass.

It had remade her. Past tense.

Aoife liked that.

Was going to keep remaking her…

Aoife liked that more.

Not all of her. Not even much of her, just the deep places she wasn’t using, the cold and lonely ones she’d done her best to close off; it was opening them again, and making room for something else. For itself.

For him.

She thought of Ethan and for a second she thought she could see him at the edge of the grey, nothing between them but a horizon she simply needed to cross. It was almost too close for her to bear and she stretched again, trying to move her limbs to pull herself closer. But she couldn’t move, and the feeling in her mind tightened.

Just a little longer. Not ready. But soon. Very soon. Promise.

Aoife thought she should object, it wasn’t like her not to, but the lights reached for that part of her.

Promise?

The lights danced, and although it wasn’t an answer, for once, Aoife didn’t actually feel like arguing. Dimly, she realised she wasn’t going to remember this anyway, and started to wonder if she’d done some of this before. Whether this was the first time, as she drifted slowly back towards the surface, or if she’d protested in spite of herself through all of this, impatient to get back to him?

But it didn’t matter, did it? She was almost there anyway. Just a little longer?

Good enough.

***

The door to Jess’ bedroom slammed shut harder than Ethan intended as he pushed it closed with his foot - but he barely noticed.

Her hands. Her breath. Her lips. All of them had been on him from the instant that Jess had opened the door. And, as she’d done so, the warm sensation from earlier had roared fully over him. His senses dizzied, the world blurred, and after a beat he was kissing her back, giving in to the currents in the back of his head as they dragged him under. Almost without thinking, his hands gripped her, half-lifting the redhead into his arms and they stumbled clumsily backwards until their legs hit the edge of her bed. He toppled forwards, and felt her need pushing him into her, until the mattress creaked.

Ethan had spent a while longer with Nia before leaving, talking through things with Aoife and Jordan and Averna, but when he had finished it had been Jess he’d gone to find first. In the front of his thoughts at least, he’d still been telling himself that he wanted to start planning how to get Nia to London while Aoife was still sleeping. He already had an idea of where the remaining bottlenecks with Upstart’s production were likely to be, and expecting Jess to finish the graphics and animations they wanted to include remained one of the largest. But as he tracked the artist down again it became harder to pretend there wasn’t an odd mixture of concern and curiosity about how he knew she felt driving him. It hadn’t taken long to learn she’d returned to her room, and the closer he got, the more the heat had returned.

There was a desperation to the way Jess leaned up, hungrily attempting to coax more of his tongue into her mouth. She moaned, and the sound hummed through him, turning his vision white until he bunched his eyes closed. When he opened them again, he was fully on top of her, having lost the seconds it had taken him to take her by either wrist and pin her assertively to the sheets.

Bright blue eyes looked up at him, expectantly. Half the buttons on her checked shirt were already undone, although by which of them he couldn’t quite say, and the slight curve of her chest heaved beneath the fabric. 

Ethan forced himself to breathe. Something strained as he did so, but there was just enough stillness in the moment that he was able to catch something approaching sense, and leaned himself unsteadily against it. Neither of them were in control, and he did his best to slow the pressure down for her.

“You said…there was something you wanted to talk about?”

The words snapped Jess out of her own head and she blushed, furiously.  “Oh…yeah. I uh…”

Ethan realised that the embarrassed fluster was what he’d hoped for. He didn’t mind that he was going to fuck her, what did bother him was the notion that the serum might be pushing Jess along faster and harder than she’d be comfortable with if her head was running cooler.

She struggled with herself for a moment longer, squeezing her eyes shut as she gave a small shake of her head as if trying to physically clear away the haze. Realising he was still holding her down, Ethan released her, shifting to sit next to her on the bed, but Jess remained where she was, staring up at the hotel room ceiling. Sheepishly, she laughed.

“Shit. Ethan…I. I got a little…I didn’t mean to…”

Normally, Jess blathered quickly, but even that seemed to be stuck tripping over herself. Ethan felt the urge to kiss, but knew that even trying to reassure her like that was only going to tip things one way. Instead he reached over and rested his hand on her shoulder.

“It’s fine. It must be the serum, right? For whatever reason I think I can feel how much it’s influencing you myself.”

Jess nodded, not fully seeming to catch that that was odd in itself.

“We can fuck,” he continued, watching her fidget as he said the f-word. “Or we can talk. I don’t mind. I just wanted it to be your choice, not the vaccine’s.”

Propping herself up on her shoulders, Jess turned her head and looked towards where her computer was sitting on the room’s desk. 

Ethan realised he’d barely taken in his surroundings. Jess had been given a repurposed room, in a newer part of the complex that had been fitted out by Palisade to increase the site’s capacity, with brand new furniture that had barely been used by its previous occupant. She was obviously still living out of her suitcase, with only a handful of small, personal touches such as photos and a couple of anime figurines perched near the window breaking up the clean interior. The exception to this however, was the sleek, computer set up alongside her macbook and drawing tablet on the desk - and the wall behind it, covered in a mood board of sheets of paper displaying different graphics and ideas she was working to, annotated in careful, colour-coded handwriting. His attention, however, was almost entirely grabbed by just what was being displayed on Jess’ monitor. 

Plastered, almost shamelessly across the screen, was a selfie of a very naked, dark skinned woman. Clearly holding her phone at arm’s length, the girl, who couldn’t have been much older than twenty, had just about managed to include her face in the shot, smirking flirtatiously with beautiful features in one corner of the frame. Meanwhile her second hand was dipped between her legs, spreading herself for the viewer. The majority of the picture however was dominated by the largest natural set of tits Ethan had ever seen, pushing the limits of what felt reasonable on an otherwise curvy but not large figure.  

A small, pink, vibrator sat next to Jess’ keyboard, and Ethan’s cock hardened further than it already had been as he realised what she’d been up to just before he arrived. 

The redhead flushed, awkwardly, as he looked, and he quickly tried to reassure her through the returning heat. “Hey, no judgement, you don’t want to see what my harddrive’s ended up looking like over the last few months.”

“No. I mean, you don’t understand,” Jess replied, inelegantly sitting up the rest of the way. Her voice quickened again. “That’s what I wanted to talk to you about, the picture, sort of. Not the picture itself but more, the person it’s of, is, she’s…I sort of know her and…”

“You know her?”

Jess nodded, slowly, keeping the rest of her body tight, as if she was scared something might boil over if she did much more. “So I told you when I’m not working I sometimes like to stream myself doing art, right? Well she’s one of the other people I sometimes do that with. Her name’s Paws, Purple Paw Princess or just Shannon. She’s from the States and, well, I never knew what she looked like but she’s always liked to flirt, but that’s just her with everyone, but I’ve always kind of had a crush on her. Or, well, a massive crush on her. On her voice. And, well, since having the vaccine I’ve not had a chance to stream but we’ve still talked on Discord and I’ve sort of not felt quite so embarrassed about flirting back. And then she was flirting more, and I flirted, and she flirted and I flirted and it all got a little…”

She keened, with a tiny, embarrassed little whine, as she finally caught up with the words running away from her. Normally, Ethan would have found it hard not to have been at least a little distracted by the picture of the other woman, but the serum dragged his attention entirely on Jess, and it was only as she finished that he glanced back towards where the monitor was looming at the edge of his eyeline. He should have been embarrassed too, but that particular emotion still felt buried and instead his first thought was about how much of Jess’ life he still didn’t know about. He knew she streamed. Hell, he knew she drew porn and that she was already sleeping with the other girls in the team; but the woman on the screen was like stumbling into a reminder that there were entire chunks of her life that were important to her that had been going on long before him. 

“I mean, fuck, it’s sort of hard to blame you,” he said, finally taking a second to appreciate that the girl in the picture was objectively stunning.

“I didn’t expect her to send me anything like this. And when she did I didn’t feel right doing anything about it until I’d spoken to you. But then you had everything with Aoife so I’ve been waiting. Only…”

“Only the serum’s kicking in and you’re more horny than you know what to do with it?”

Jess managed another, barely there nod. “It’s only been four days. I know the serum’s meant to hit harder at the start but this is still really tough. I’m sorry, Ethan, I’m trying.”

This time, he kissed her. He’d wanted to find something reassuring to say, but his head came up wanting and he risked breaking the fragile calm they’d found to show her instead. Jess was sweet and beautiful and he’d never asked for her to feel like her feelings had to be conditional on his approval. Her resolve wavered against him, open mouthed, and he took her hands in his, only just trusting himself to eventually pull them apart from each other when she began to sink a little too heavily into whatever the serum was doing to them.

“You don’t need to try,” he said, finally easing them apart. “You don’t owe me anything.” 

He looked back at the screen, almost to give himself something else to pay attention to rather than the urges he could feel radiating off Jess. “If you like her, you like her. I’m the last one to get any high ground about that right now.”

Jess followed his gaze, biting her lip as she looked at the picture, her thighs rubbing with urgency against each other.

“I like her, but not like I want to date her or anything, just…”

Her hand twitched, as she stared at the computer, taking visible effort not to disappear down her panties. The atmosphere was thick enough that Ethan could practically feel the hazy edge of her libido and he reached out to push at it.

“You like the way her attention makes you feel.”

It wasn’t a question.

“...Yes.”

Jess’ feelings burned, wonderfully, at the admission. Ethan felt his own control slip; and this time, he didn’t even try to stop it. Instead, gently, he reached out and guided her attention back to him. Blue eyes stared up at him, wildly, and he felt his cock harden. He pushed again.

“You want to do more with her.”

“Yes.”

“You want to show her how much of a slut the serum’s turning you into.”

“Yes.”

“You want her to see your perfect little tits. And how your tight, greedy little cunt is going to drool once we’re finished with it.”

“Oh fuck, yes.”

Suddenly, everything felt pressured. His hands were already on her belt, working hurriedly until he succeeded in yanking her jeans down in time with her final answer. Jess tried to help him, but Ethan could feel how much the urges coursing through her were demanding he be assertive - instead, he pushed her attempts away, pinning her beneath his frame as his own senses swam and they embraced, fiercely.

He rode the swell. There were currents in how she reacted, ill defined little contours that helped guide him through the moans and gasps towards what Jess wanted. She didn’t need him to be rough, but her feelings came in sharp peaks as he took control. Somehow, he drew out unpicking the final buttons of her shirt, letting her sit when he was done so that he could pull it firmly from her shoulders. But with that gone, her bra only lasted scant seconds longer before he was casting it to the floor, leaving her covered in nothing but her panties and the fox shaped splash of ink tattooed across one arm. Jess’ small, pink nipples already looked almost painfully hard. She pawed at one herself, unable to wait without touching herself as Ethan removed his own shirt. As soon as he had, however, he once again moved her hands away and pushed her back against the sheets. 

His mouth caught the first of the nubs, teasing it until his tongue left it slick and Jess swore. The redhead’s feelings kicked. The shaky connection between them demanded more; and Ethan obliged. He grazed with his teeth leaving little bites across her cleavage as he switched to her other breast, his hands wandering as he did so to make sure that the first wasn’t left abandoned. His fingers plucked, and he tormented the peak, hard and firmer, until he found her limit and the line between them turned taut. Each of Jess’ unsteady breaths came with a blathered little curse, halfway between a laugh and a moan, until eventually, Ethan pulled away. 

Rising again, slightly less steady, he fumbled with his own belt. The strain of his cock against his slacks had become unbearable, and he rushed, wanting to feel her spread around him. His partner mistook the movement however and by the time he’d lowered his boxers Jess had already slipped eagerly from the bed to her knees. Ethan barely had time to register what she was doing before her mouth was on him. It wasn’t quite the frenzied need that came with a woman priming, but it wasn’t far off - and it was his turn to groan as her lips slid across his shaft. Without thinking, his hand strayed out to steady himself, finding the top of Jess’ head. But the understanding he was feeling with her clearly only ran one way, and again she misunderstood. Interpreting the touch as him being about to pull her deeper, Jess attempted to do so herself, bobbing her head as deep and vigorously as she dared, looking up at him with watering eyes. 

Ethan gripped at her hair. For a moment, he wavered, not even sure himself whether he was about to slow her down or to simply press fully into her throat, mindlessly, the way she seemed to have expected. He still had enough composure however to realise that no matter how enthusiastic she was, Jess had never tried that before, and the idea felt rougher than she was ready. Instead, he settled for taking control in the way she wanted, guiding her with both hands into slow, shallow movements. Jess shut her eyes, dreamily, working her tongue as he moved her. His cock twitched, gratefully - but her libido wanted more, and he was going to indulge it.

“Bend over the desk.”

Even with the order, Jess was desperate enough that it took her a couple more sucks of his dick before she could bring herself to pull her mouth away. As she did, she made a greedy little whine in protest. Seemingly trying to work out if there was a way she could keep blowing him while they fucked, she hesitated, lingering on her knees until Ethan repeated himself, slightly softer.

“I can tell how much you want it, now bend over the desk.”

She obeyed, rising on shaky legs, turning her back to Ethan. However before bending forward, she still had enough presence of mind to reach down and lower her panties in a single hurried motion. Pressing herself flat against the desktop besides the monitor, the redhead thrust her arse back towards him, spreading her legs as she wordlessly offered up the hot flush of her pussy. The pale curve of her backside was flawless, and the angle was just enough for Ethan to be able to see the edge of the tuft of red hair that crowned her folds, a view made easier as she reached back to part her cheeks for him with both hands. 

Next to her, the screen continued to show the nude image of her American friend, mirroring Jess with her own spread legs, but Ethan’s attention was almost entirely on his partner. Moving behind her, it took more willpower than he thought he had to not simply take hold of her hips and start mindlessly fucking. Instead, he steadied himself and forced his body to slow down with a couple of long, firm strokes of his fingers across her waiting lips. Her pussy parted for him and with the final press his digits curled, just enough to push to the 2nd knuckle. Jess gasped, then swore, pulsing tight around his hand. However, she managed to remain in place, continuing to hold her cheeks apart and as Ethan removed his fingertips, it felt natural to draw the dampness up her cleft, running them in a slick circle around her exposed arse.

“Ethan…” Jess’ voice wavered, as everything about her tensed with an electric sort of uncertainty. Her excitement was palpable at being touched there and the urge to push, experimentally, inside was strong; at least as much hers as it was his. But there was a rush of other feelings too. Embarrassment. Apprehension. And even with the connection they were sharing he couldn’t tell if she knew how far she wanted him to go. Inwardly, Ethan knew the situation was far too heightened for the care that it would need, so he settled for giving a final, slow tease of her rear, before reaching for her hands instead. He moved them for her, setting her palms against the desk’s surface and linked his fingers through hers, leaning over her until his chest pressed intimately against her back. 

Briefly, Ethan let her feel his cock resting against her. He relished the anticipation as it peaked. And then he pushed forward. His body found the perfect angle, first time, without the help of his hands; and Jess’ pussy eagerly accepted him to the hilt.

With the feeling of her clenching about his shaft, Ethan’s reason seemed to float, finally removed from his body. His partner cried out, arching her petite frame towards him, but he leaned against her further and held her in place. The movement brought his face close to her neck and he stooped instinctively to kiss the spot where her neck met her shoulder, grazing it with his teeth. And as he did so, his hips moved on their own, rolling into her with a second, slow, hard thrust. The desk shook, rattling the monitor, and Jess’ feelings begged him to do it again. 

For several minutes, he fucked her at the same measured but assertive pace, as if there was a pattern in front of him, telling him where to touch, how deeply to drive, and all he had to do was follow it. His hands roamed, dragging over her ribs before twisting her slightly to the side to allow him to paw roughly at one of her tits, his fingers biting into her flesh as he angled her towards the screen with unconscious intent. It left Jess’ face inches from the device, and the knot of arousal clenching around her chest tightened even further as she realised she had nowhere to look but at the exposed form of her friend. When they’d first had sex, she’d blathered and sworn her way through the encounter, but was gentler then, and this time words were something barely intelligible that she snatched at between each gasp.

“Fuck…oh god…Shannon…she’s…oh fuck…”

Ethan found something about her reaction to the other woman hotter than he’d have imagined. He’d felt how she’d been before he came in, and pictured her buzzing her clit helplessly to the selfie, her head and cunt both equally full of heat. He thought of how eagerly she’d been fucked by Nia, and how those desires had been sitting just below the surface until now, until the serum had stripped her back and pushed her feelings shamelessly into the light. 

“Imagine what she’d think if she saw you like this,” he managed, feeling the words do almost as much for Jess as his movements, both in the back of his head and the flutter of her pussy.

“...oh fuck.” 

“Touching herself while looking at your body.”

“Please”

“Hearing you moan her name like a whore.”

“Fuuuuck!”

Both their peaks were close. They’d each been much too far along from the beginning for anything else and Ethan’s hand found her thigh, lifting it up slightly so that he could angle himself even deeper into her. But it wasn’t enough, and he took hold of her body, raising it off the desk as he stood straighter and drove up into her with a fierce, claiming thrust 

Jess reached out, palm against the table top both to steady herself and to push herself back against him. Her eyes half-lidded as he thrust, and she fought to keep them open, locked on the screen. Her frame shuddered against him, her shoulders rising and falling as she fought to hold her balance.

She clenched.

Ethan’s legs almost gave way. His head leaned over her shoulder, his own moans breaking low and ragged against her ear. For a few, brilliant seconds, he felt lost in appreciating how incredible she was as the feeling in the back of his head became a roar.

 It crashed through his body. Tensing every muscle.

And gave one final burst of anticipation…

***

Aoife’s eyes shot open.

She had almost surfaced, drifting somewhere almost as awake as asleep and dimly aware of the feel of the blanket on her skin; but the pulse had reached down and grabbed her, pulling the rest of the way with a gasp. 

The feeling wasn’t hers. She understood that instinctively as it washed over her in a wave, but that didn’t make it any less visceral; a feeling of pleasure from somewhere external that rolled through her like a bass note felt next to a speaker, strumming her core more intimately than any toy had ever managed. 

It only lasted for as long as it took her to be very awake before giving the impression of fading, confirming in half focus that she was still in the movie room and very much alone; but the second beat that came an instant later was even stronger than the first. She squeezed her legs together as her mind staggered through the sensation as it stretched out and gave way to a third pulse, and then a fourth.

Struggling with the blanket for a second, Aoife urgently slipped her fingers towards her own crotch. She wasn’t cumming herself, but the rhythm was easy enough to recognise, the same steady unfurling that she’d felt any time a guy had released inside her. The same urgency. The same sticky sense of uncomfortably gratifying arousal. She could almost convince herself that she was going to pull her hand back away and find someone’s seed there, smeared across her digits. 

And it was good enough that for a moment, her mind managed to accept it. It was only as the feeling eased and her heart rate slowed around her that she let the weirdness of the situation come closer than arm’s length. Slowly, she let herself sit up, holding a hand to her head as she looked around the grey-lit room and shook with what might have been panic. She had been warned that after the vaccine she might wake up horny, and that was definitely still the case but no-one had mentioned anything like this. Nothing that visceral. Nothing about the alien sensation of someone else’s feelings, pressed up so close to her that they crept up her spine almost as readily as her own. Even now, she could still feel some sort of pleasing afterglow lingering, and she wasn’t sure if it was the only thing stopping her speculation turning intrusive.

Aoife looked down at her hand, coated in nothing but her own wetness and mumbled to herself.

“What the actual fuck?”