Humanity, 2.0
Year 6, Day 115
“This is the most exciting vacation I’ve ever been on, I’ll tell you that.”
Bethany glared at me over her shoulder, then rolled her eyes as she turned back toward the shelf and continued to read the label on whatever it was. I had to admit – still do – that she looks pretty cute all bundled up. Her big puffy white jacket hid half of her body, including her big, perky tits, but her legs and ass were hugged tightly by the jeans and the long underwear I knew she had on beneath. She didn’t care if I was staring at her ass, I knew – she loved the constant reminders of how sexy she was – but some reflex forced me to only do it as she was looking away.
I was leaning bodily on the edge of the shopping cart, trailing behind her a few feet in the cramped mountain grocery store. The long fluorescent lights were the only illumination – it was well after dark, and Bethany had dragged me out to haul groceries for her as we went food shopping for the whole trip. It was the first night of our ski vacation in Tahoe, the fifth of its kind; we made a lot more, actually, but we went to Tahoe once a year. There was a house we rented up that way every time, and we typically stayed for a few weeks. Of course, it being a ski vacation, it was the dead of winter, and it had just snowed pretty heavily the night before; the whole place was quite chilly and covered in a thick layer of pristine snow. I was already anxious to get out on the slopes – the only thing holding me back was how anxious I was to enjoy another little tradition; to start things off, on the first night, all of us would strip naked, get in the hot tub, and let things proceed from there.
I probably looked pretty silly. It would at least a decade before I was truly comfortable in my own shoes in a hominus male body. I wasn’t even physically mature yet; I was about six and a half feet tall at that point in time – go convert it to metric yourself, I’m done with that – and about two hundred pounds. I towered over Bethany’s five feet and two inches, and she looked several years younger than me – but she was the one closely inspecting everything, reading the label in detail, and either putting it back or dropping it into the increasingly heavy shopping cart. The store was fairly crowded – high season had just started – with people from all over the place, but mostly white and Asian folks. Bethany, whose ancestry was primarily Hispanic, and myself, well, you know about the mongrel I am, and in a place like Tahoe, for reasons which I don’t really want to get into the long version of – we both kind of stood out in that day and age.
Bethany had appointed herself Chief Nutritionist of our little family ever since our trip back from the Vault. She’d spent basically the whole time there studying 15226’s notes, and she was convinced that she could unlock some kind of special, dormant abilities that the Experimenter had imbued us with, if only she could find the right amino acids or something. She picked everything, I bought it, and I usually ended up cooking it too.
About an hour and a half of staring at her gorgeous ass later, I pushed the full-up cart up to the register and paid for the whole thing. I wheeled it all out while Bethany pulled around our big SUV we’d rented – I could never fit comfortably in anything else anymore. I got back in to drive, and she hopped herself up into the shotgun seat and off we went. I had to be careful, of course – the roads were icy and it was really dark out – but I was fairly good at it by that point. Bethany took off her jacket, revealing the dark red turtleneck sweater she had on beneath, which hugged her tits as nicely as the jeans swept around her ass. She noticed me checking her out, and smiled. One finger stretched out, and ran up and down my arm.
“Mmmmmm…. What do you want to eat first tonight? The steak? The salmon?” She bit her lip, wiggling an eyebrow.
“I’m not really starving yet… what do you think Em and Nina are up to?”
“I think there’s something they’re eating already.” Bethany licked her lips.
“Oh good, we’ll have to join them then, and sample whatever dish that is.” I smiled.
She fidgeted in her seat. “Don’t get me too hot, it’s probably not good for me to distract you too much by masturbating in the passenger seat and all.”
I snorted. We made some small talk the rest of the way back. We found the driveway easily enough even in the dark. Our place was a two-story ski lodge, in its own sizable chunk of land in the high forest. The tall, dark trees towered above the house, but in the dark they were just looming vertical shadows in all directions. The thick snow formed a ghostly layer surrounding the house, though tinted slightly orange by the lights coming out of the house windows inside – by the way it was flickering, I was guessing Emily or Nina had started up the fireplace. What we liked most about the place was that it was private; that didn’t come cheap in a place like Tahoe, but it was worth it; there was no need for the neighbors to get a good view of all the group sex going on nextdoor. The house had a porte-cochere off to one side, with a few other cars under it – probably Nina’s and Emily’s rentals, I figured. I pulled up under it as well, cutting off the engine and getting out, then opening the trunk.
Despite the girls being physically stronger than me up until about a year before that point, it seemed to be assumed that I would do all physical labor. Bethany got out and went inside, and I heard some squealing as the three girls were reunited. We’d been separated for a couple weeks – Emily had been up in New York again for some case, Nina had been in Venezuela, and Bethany and I had remained at home. We’d agreed to meet up here. I put a few things in the freezer chest outside, then slung half the remaining load under one arm and walked up the creaking steps to the side door and barged in.
“Ben!” It was Nina, separating herself from the three-way hug that the others had going. Bethany and my sister then shared a deep kiss. “Put that stuff down, get it later. I’ve missed you…” Nina, her blonde hair swinging freely behind her, her clear blue eyes fixed on me, was wearing a long brown skirt and a heavy cream-colored cashmere pullover, with no shoes over her wildly painted toenails. Suddenly, she hopped up, hugging me bodily and suspending herself as she wrapped her legs tight around my torso – her head suddenly leveled with mine. I staggered, and dropped a bag of groceries as I struggled to find my balance, then Nina’s lips were on mine and I found myself instantly returning her affection.
I let the other bag down and let my arms wrap around her, sliding one under her ass and keeping this wonderful creature so tight to my body. The kiss was passionate, but quick, as Nina’s often were; she pulled back, then turned to the other girls.
“All right, Ben’s here, turn the heater off and let’s all just squeeze up against him until it’s time to go.”
Emily snorted. Bethany let her go and she walked up to my side, and I bent my knees to kiss her – which Nina awkwardly joined in on. My sister had on a black pantsuit with a smart little jacket above, and a frilly-necked red blouse beneath that gave what little hint of cleavage those perfect small tits of hers could show. She’d let her shoulder-length chestnut-brown hair down and apparently had tossed her shoes off sometime earlier.
“Hmm… so glad you could join us…” She kissed us both again. “What took you so long?”
“Flight delay.” Bethany said it before I could. “We would have been here last night to welcome you two, but our connection in Salt Lake got stuck there for a day when the whole place froze over. We holed up in this nice hotel room and basically just fucked the whole time until they could get the runway clear. My hips still hurt.” One hand went to her waist, cupping her ass-cheek as she sighed. “It’ll be at least a day before I can think about taking a dick again, so he’s all yours, you two.”
Emily made a tired sigh; despite our lifestyle, she had never really adopted Bethany and Nina’s casual, almost crude approach to sex. She might easily get as into it as the rest of us, but when we weren’t naked, she was as refined and elegant as always. I finally managed to get Nina off me long enough to get the rest of the groceries inside. Once that was done, of course, the first thing to be unpacked was the booze. Nina always did the mixing, and knew everyone’s favorites intimately.
Ten minutes later, I was sipping a Jack and Coke, and we all fell down together onto the couches, Emily spooning against me as I stroked her hair. I looked around; the house was as nice as always, the wood paneling on the walls had a heavy and aging appeal to it. There were some skiing-themed decorations, and the furniture was all that two-tone wooden mountain-themed stuff; it looked heavy enough to make me break a sweat if I tried to move anything. The couches were massive, thickly padded things, with throw blankets strewn all around. The girls had already gotten the fireplace going earlier. I looked over at Nina, who was splayed out wide . “When did you two get in?”
“Only about ten minutes apart. I got here first, and had barely gotten in the door when Emily showed up right behind me. God, it feels like it’s been forever!” She took a swig of her Sweetwater.
“It was only three weeks for me, but…” Emily sighed, shrugged, and turned her head to look back at me. “Yeah, it did seem like longer. It’s funny, I think you were right about that proximity thing, Beth. When none of the others are around, I’m not as much of a sex fiend, but I just have this distant mopey feeling all the time. It’s tolerable, but it’s never far away from what you’re thinking of at any given time.”
“Yeah.” Nina immediately sounded agreement. “We really don’t know shit about ourselves, do we? I mean, it’s been what, five years—“
I cleared my throat. “Six and a quarter.” Nina had raised an eyebrow. “Six years and one hundred and fifteen days, all right? Yes, I keep track.” I shrugged.
“It’s been six years and a hundred fifteen days, thank you Ben. It’s like – well, here. The whole time I’m down in Caracas, I have my cell phone. While it was on the plane, I turned it off, then I turned it back on, right? I get some calls during the trip. I answer them, everything is normal. Blah blah. Only, the day before I’m going to fly home – I notice that I’d had both ringer and vibrate off. But I answered it, without having to look at the screen. I somehow just knew it was ringing, even when I had it in my purse. Isn’t that weird?”
“That happens to me too…” Emily sounded concerned. “I can tell whenever somebody turns a machine on or off. I can tell how hard their computer is working, even if I’m not looking at it. I only have to be nearby, like in the same room. And I can even tell when someone else’s phone is about to ring.”
“Yeah…” Nina agreed. The three girls trailed off into silence for a time. Nina finished her drink. We all just laid there for a time, pondering things; Bethany went and got her laptop and began typing furiously, probably taking notes about what Emily and Nina had said just then.
Nina suddenly hopped up, stretching. “Well! How about our little tradition?”
“That sounds good…” I nodded, snaking my arm a little tighter around my sister, my hand inching beneath her jacket to cup a small breast.
“Oh, all right.” Emily shook her head and sat up. Nina and she held out both hands and pulled me up off the couch, and I suddenly grabbed both girls and pulled them close to me. They kissed each other for a while, and then roaming hands found seams and buttons, pieces of clothing being tossed away. Bethany kept tapping away at her keyboard, oblivious to the two girls stripping each other only a few feet away, as I went out to get the hot tub ready. I pulled off the cover and turned the jets on, and then tested the water; it was already hot enough. As I stepped back inside, both girls were in only their panties, Nina’s bigger, paler boobs pressing upon my sister’s small dark ones. They were kissing again, open-mouthed, and Nina’s hair was sweeping around Emily’s shoulders as well as the two turned about.
I guided the two loving girls outside, and they squealed and shivered as the freezing mountain air hit them. They rushed and dunked their nude bodies in the hot tub, letting their heads pop back up out of the water as I closed the door. Their hot breath was visible in the air as the two shared another kiss, then looked at me.
Nina rose out of the tub, and placed one knee on the side of it as she reached out to strip me. I wasn’t dressed half as heavily as the girls had been, just in a long-sleeved shirt and slacks, and I felt my belt and pants fall to the decking with a clank as Emily’s sneaking hand undid the buckle. Nina pulled my shirt over my head, and kissed her way around my broad chest until she and Nina both had a hand on the hem of my underwear.
“You ready?” Nina looked at Emily. They both knew, and now loved, the effect my cock had on them – once a woman saw it, it was virtually impossible for her not to touch, lick, and suck it, then open herself to it.
“I’ve been ready.” They both tugged, and my boxers fell down under me, revealing my stiff eleven inches of meat. The rest of my skin had goosebumps in the cold, and my balls were tight up against my body, but with my mass, the cold didn’t otherwise bother me much. The girls each held out one hand and guided me inside, even as their other hands reached for my prick. There wouldn’t be any fighting or competition; they lovingly shared me, as always, each of us wanting one or both of the others to come even more than we ourselves did. The bond of love between the four of us was well cemented even then; I could never have picked out which of the three I loved more than the others. These days, nobody can; only someone from that age would think of something like that.
I sat on the edge of the tub, my legs in the hot water, as both girls – submerged up to their shoulders – pulled my cock down and began to play with it. Emily dunked her head even lower, coming up from beneath to lick the underside of my cock, while Nina took my tip into her mouth and cupped my balls with a free hand. I felt her shudder a little as my sister’s wandering hand under the water found Nina’s clit. I gasped at the long-awaited sensation of Nina’s loving mouth on my pole, where we both thought it belonged. She had never learned to deep-throat me as Bethany had, it only made her gag, but that never stopped her from always doing her best to give me a slow, sensuous blowjob. My hands naturally found her head and guided her deeper, until I knew I was at her limit – maybe a third of the way down my pole. Her eyes met mine, willing me to what we both knew was next, and I began to slowly fuck her mouth, bobbing her head back and forth on my cock.
The frigid air on my skin combined with the heat of her lips and tongue on my sensitive cock, and the hot, steaming water below made every little sensation feel incredibly strong. I began to honestly worry if the sweat already covering my upper body would freeze in place, but I didn’t want to move. Emily slid out from under Nina and myself and came up out of the water to kiss me, but it was seconds before I could feel her shivering. Her teeth chattered as we kissed. I bent forward, and quickly slid all three of us underwater, making both the girls squeal and laugh. There was a little splashing around, then both Nina and Emily seemed satisfied to dunk all but their heads underwater, to hide from the cold.
As I settled into one of the corners, stretching my arms out on either side, the both of them came up on either side of me. I was treated to a brief girl make-out session on my lap as their two tongues dueled – then we were all interrupted as we heard the door opening. Bethany stepped out, wrapped in only a towel, with a smile on her face. She padded quickly over toward the tub, and with a quick motion, tossed the towel over the railing and slid into the tub with us. She moved into the outstretched arms of Nina and my sister, and sat herself on my lap, making my whole corner of the tub quite crowded. She was up a bit higher out of the water, enough for her generous, shining-wet tits to be on display; I bent forward to suck on her nipples briefly before both Nina and Emily did the same.
Emily seemed to focus on Bethany more, making Dr. Lazar gasp as she wrapped her arms around Bethany’s waist and pushed her into the far corner. Moving up slightly, and pulling Bethany downward, she finally had Bethany’s back to the opposite wall and pressed their bodies together as the two made out. I once again reminded myself how glad I was that Bethany and my sister had so completely gotten over their bad first meeting; right now, I only saw two beauties, full of love and energy, doing their best to make each other come. Nina, for her part, was straddling me, blocking my view of the other two. She seemed to belatedly notice, and shifted us both so that I could watch my sister and Bethany make love as she rubbed herself against my cock underwater. Having sex in the water was always a little more difficult, but more things were possible for us than for normal humans.
Nina hugged herself bodily to me, putting her head up next to mine and whispering something as she guided me into her. I groaned, savoring that lovely sensation of my cockhead meeting her pussy and stretching her wide as she was invaded.
“I missed you so fucking much…” I felt her arms come around behind my back, and her grip tighten – almost enough for her nails to draw blood. She remained right there, just holding me, with my cock still hard inside her. She made a low purring sound for a time.
“I know… but not like I missed you.” She came back up briefly, giving me a brief peck before hugging herself tight again. Still there after a while, she suddenly whispered again as I watched Bethany turn the tables on my sister, spinning her around to suckle at her tits. “Hey… have you thought about what I said?”
“I did.” I sighed, steeling myself, hoping this wouldn’t ruin the moment.
“And?” She bounced her hips a little, taunting me.
“I’m sorry, Nina… I’m not ready for more girls yet.” She came up, her face unreadable for a few moments, which naturally made some part of me panic – though not like I would have before. I scrambled to justify myself. “Nina – every time I think of that, I think of how fucking lucky I am. I have you, I have Bethany, I have Emily… I couldn’t have picked three better girls!” I ran my hands up and down her sides. “But I didn’t really do the picking, when I think about it. Bethany was basically an accident, you just kind of fell into my lap, and Emily’s my sis. If even one thing had gone differently—“
Nina shook her head, sighing and interrupting me. “—you think you’ll make another Nadine, and she’ll run off and get us all in trouble or something.” Nina sighed. “I don’t think that would happen, and I think you’re a lot sharper about that now.”
I remained silent, just feeling her body under my hands. She smiled down at me, with a hint of sadness, then took my hands under hers and guided them up to her tits, biting her lip. “Sorry… bad timing. Sex time now.”
“I can do that.” My hands fixed on her waist, bouncing her up and down. We began to make small waves as the fucking motion took over, so natural by now that it took virtually no effort. 15226’s memories had merged themselves into my mind fairly well by then, and I’d also had so much experience with all three girls by that point that sex between us all was a subtle and sensuous thing, doing exactly what each other wanted but always trying to find some new, small, secret way to mix things up.
Once we were both going fairly strong, the splashing was getting a little out of hand; Nina pulled herself up off me and bent over the side of the tub, shivering at first, then gasping as I came up behind her and guided my rod back inside her tight pussy. I bent over her body, knowing she was freezing cold and using myself to help keep her warm. My own hand came down next to one of hers on the lip of the tub, bracing me in place as I held her just under the breasts with the other. I grunted as my hips took on an animalistic motion almost of their own accord, adjusting my pace to the soft moans and gasps she made. I could hear the noise of Emily and Bethany’s lovemaking behind us getting louder as well, the two’s hands playing across clits quickly as their tongues never left one another’s mouth.
I sensed Nina’s closeness not long after she did, and my hand found her clit, rubbing hard and around in circles just how she liked. Her mouth opened wide and she made a long, low, moaning sound as I forced her past the point of orgasm. Her body quivered underneath me as she came. I kept pumping away, and I glanced back behind me to see Bethany and Emily trying some kind of underwater scissoring thing with each of them braced against perpendicular walls. I don’t know how good it felt for them, but it was new, and the sight was enough to push me over. I grunted, and pumped my hips a few more times while I felt the shocks of pleasure in my dick. Come spurted into Nina’s pussy once again, resuming a near-daily occurrence after three weeks of not seeing her.
When I let myself slide out of her, Nina lowered herself down again into the hot water, a contented look on her face as she went down to her neck, reveling in post-coital bliss and the heat of the water together. I stood up straight, stretched, and smiled as I heard Emily making a series of short yelps, Bethany bringing her to orgasm – and Dr. Lazar following behind not long afterward. I held that position for a time, letting the girls rest, and just breathing the frigid air. We couldn’t stay in the pool all night, of course; even hominus have safe limits. I got out first, toweled off briefly, then grabbed three fresh towels from inside, still warm, and opened one wide.
Taking Emily’s hand, I pulled her up and wrapped her quickly, then did the same for the other two. I shut off the tub as they went inside, drying one another’s bodies casually and talking about something. I picked up my discarded clothes, and went in to join them. Bethany and Nina were retiring to one of the bedrooms, and Emily took my hand and began to lead me up the stairs to the master bedroom.
Tempting as it was to bend her over the bed and fuck her brains out, I was tired after a long day, and more than satisfied after the fucking I’d given Nina. Emily seemed even more sated, and fished through her open bag to pull out an oversized nightshirt, which she donned then tossed herself under the thick comforter. For myself, I pulled on a pair of jeans, forgetting about underwear, and propped my back up against the headboard with my e-reader. I might have been a multimillionaire with three sexy girlfriends and a permanent-vacation lifestyle, but I didn’t want to just completely abandon the idea of bettering myself; the little handheld thing was loaded with nonfiction and educational texts.
I was currently slogging my way through an astrophysics book; the subject had especially began to grip me in the past few years as the magnitude of the Experimenter’s existence began to hit me. A cosmic being, flying throughout the galaxy for eons, having witnessed the end of thousands of civilizations – what a life, what an existence; she’d downloaded into my mind the knowledge of sex in her life as a human female, but the ‘real her’ was something else entirely, of which I had experienced only a fragment of a fragment. The things I wish I’d asked her in that time. But I hadn’t – I was what, nineteen at the time; even then, at twenty-five, that encounter still left me feeling like a stupid kid.
I lost track of time as I tried to commit to memory everything I read; Kepler’s elliptical studies, the main sequence of stars, Doppler shifting. Nina had finished her graduate degree not too long ago, in world history, and had finally accepted my money when I offered to pay for her second PhD program. She’d been saying something about not being my hooker for years, which always made me roll my eyes, but I guess my argument that the Experimenter’s money belonged to all of us finally won her over. She had taught me a few things along the way, mainly tricks about studying and memorization, which had helped me a lot. I took a few notes on a pad next to the bed; they were incomprehensible scribbles to anyone else, probably.
I must have been reading for two or three hours. Emily was sound asleep next to me. The only sound was her near-silent breath and the din of the house’s old heater, firing full blast just to keep the place halfway to warm in the below-zero temperatures of Tahoe at night during that time of year. I thumbed to the next page.
Emily moaned next to me, sleepily. “Bennnn… that you?”
I glanced over, perplexed, then looked back at my book. “I didn’t say anything, Em. Go back to sleep.”
Emily turned over, bleary-eyed, looking up at me. My eyes met hers, and she looked confused for a while, then her eyes narrowed. “What’s that sound?”
“What?” I shrugged. I couldn’t hear anything. Emily suddenly sat upright, now looking very concerned. Her eyes darted around the room, and one hand shot out to my forearm, holding me still as I bent toward her, worried. My throat caught. “Em, what’s wrong?”
Her voice was so quiet I could barely hear it. “Someone is in the house, Ben.” She slid out of bed, quick and with almost no noise. I had never seen her move like that. I was still staring at her confused.
“Do you think maybe Bethany or Nina got—“
She shot an angry glare at me as she crept toward the door. “Shut up!”
It was that moment, as I was staring at her, feeling dumb and hurt, that the soldier in snow-camo colors and a white balaclava came through the door, gun pointed out and sweeping the room. I was startled, and for a few moments my mind went blank. What the hell is this guy doing here?
Dumb possibilities were still floating through my head as Emily acted immediately. In a flash, she threw herself at the nameless gunman, knocking him against the wall with a thud and a groan, and her arm shot out behind her as she punched him in the gut, full force. There was this sickening cracking noise as I knew she broke at least part of his ribcage. A second guy, right behind him, rushed in, his gun down in one hand as a flashing steel knife shot forward toward her.
Something clicked in my head, an instant too late. Someone with a knife was coming at Emily; my beloved sister, one of my first chosen. I hadn’t even gotten my feet on the floor yet when Emily caught the second soldier’s wrist, twisting it, making him groan, but he countered with a shift of his weight and the two of them twisted around as the first guy slumped to the floor. It turned into almost a wrestling match, the second fighter trying to push her back against the wall, Emily too off-balance to push back harder. I had hit the floor, lost my own balance for half a second and felt something twist in my ankle as I landed poorly. I still wasn’t used to being as tall as I was. I cursed myself a hundred times in that instant for being such a clumsy ass.
There was an enormous crash as the world filled with flying glass. Behind me, the big window which covered the wall out to the second floor patio exploded, two men swinging in, dressed just like the two who had come through the door. One was on either side of me. On reflex, I reached out toward the one on the right, grabbing him by the vest he wore, though he shifted out of my grasp with a roll to his right.
I heard the sound and, for a second, I thought I’d been shot. They didn’t have silencers or anything on their guns; it was as loud as a cannon in the silence there had been before. Two shots, in quick succession; like a professional, or so I’m told. I saw the blood spattering on the door as I turned to see what had happened. Two blossoms had formed on Emily’s side, right around the lower ribs on her right. Her eyes were wide, and she spat up a little blood, which was bright and easily visible even in the dark of my reading light on the soldier’s snow-camo-colored outfit. Our eyes met for an instant.
Emily.
Up until that day, I had never really tested my full strength. I went to the gym, and did my cardio, the resistance machines, lifted weights– all to the impressed oohs and aahs of the people there. I was always careful to hold back because I didn’t want to get any attention by breaking Olympic records casually in some random gym. It also seemed really disrespectful to the actual Olympic athletes who busted their ass to bring themselves to the peak of human perfection – after all, I wasn’t actually human anymore. Even when I tested my strength alone, I was doing it on machines designed and built for humans, performing to the limits of human power and endurance. No methods or machines existed yet then which could really test a hominus male.
I had never before, or since, felt fury as I did in that moment. My arm lashed out again at the man on the right, grabbing him savagely by the neck, my big hand clamping down on it as hard as I could. I felt a pop, then a snap, but I wasn’t paying much attention to it. The man who’d shot Emily needed to go down. I flung the man in my right hand as hard as I could, pivoting on one foot as I shifted my weight to bring him up and over, smashing him down atop the shooter. I heard shouting, the sound of disciplined men all trying to order each other at once; I didn’t care. The two who had come through the window smashed together, leaving a big dent in the hardwood flooring with a massive smash. They bounced back up briefly, like ragdolls, before bumping against the armoire and lying still.
The one who had been fighting Emily was backing away from her, leveling his gun at me as she slid down the wall, leaving a trail of bright red blood on it. Panic threatened to take control, but in the moment before it did, the other took over again. With a tight, controlled kick, I felt a sharp pain against the bridge of my right foot as I kicked the whole bed up and toward him. It was king-sized, and reached almost to the ceiling on its side; the thing suddenly filled the guy’s whole field of view. There were more gunshots, but they went wide, blowing holes in the mattress as I charged toward the opening left at the base of the mattress. As expected, I saw him coming around the corner to try to line up a shot at me – but I got there sooner than he (and I, for that matter) expected.
I batted the rifle out of his hands, bruising my palm in the process. I heard an odd noise from it as I did, and wondered in some corner of my mind if it was broken. I was turning back toward him, but for an instant he wasn’t there. I sensed a shift of weight lower down, and saw he had ducked low, and was gripping the knife tightly, blade down in a closed fist. In a single flashing motion, he swung it diagonally, starting on my lower side; I stepped backward on some reflex. It was probably the only thing that saved my life. It didn’t hurt for the first second; there was this cold metallic sensation zipping across my chest, then I felt hot sticky stuff creeping down my chest. It confused me long enough for him to draw it back toward him, and suddenly launch his arm forward from the elbow with the glinting steel at its edge.
I could see a look of intense anger and concentration in his eyes and mouth – all that was visible through the balaclava – and I tried to stop him with one arm, but I was too late. The knife sank into my chest, in between two of my lower ribs on the front. Instantly, I felt an enormous, horrific pain in my chest. He tried with all his weight to twist the knife; I suppose I should thank 15226 for those polymers she managed to apparently steal from certain dinosaurs and engineer into our bones. The imperviousness of my ribs made him lose his grip, and he staggered backward, still with this massive, maniacal grin – like he’d felled the giant, all by himself.
I suppose that was his final thought. My kick caught him in the gut, as hard as I could, and he sailed backward as I felt bones shatter and organs rupture against my foot before he flew away and smashed limply against the far wall. He spouted out a messy goop of blood, coughed a few times as he laid out flat, and then went still.
The pain was quickly becoming unbearable. The blade – a big, ugly military combat knife – was still sticking out of my chest, blood was all over me, and it only seemed to be getting worse. I inched closer to Emily. I noticed she had one hand over her gunshot wounds, and was looking over at me. Happiness ran rampant through my head for a few brief moments as I realized that she was, at least, alive. I didn’t want to go after she did. I reached out toward her, brushing my fingers across her face. She was more pale than I ever had seen her. Dread filled every part of me. It couldn’t end like this; not here, not before I’d done anything. Not together with one of the girls, the both of us still young. I forced my flagging consciousness back into place with a surge of anger, but I still felt myself going in and out. My vision was getting progressively darker.
I heard the girls’ voices from below. They were calling out to us, saying something. I was dimly aware of a tallish blonde coming through the door, wearing a heather-grey sweatshirt, and there was this awful screech of horror as Nina saw us both. Blood was everywhere, four strange men’s bodies were strewn about the room, shattered glass was everywhere. The freezing night air was filling the room, which didn’t help because I was already feeling my body get kind of cold. I figured it was probably because hot blood was pooling around my knees. I mentally patted myself on the back for such a sound deduction; clearly, it made thermodynamic sense. Bethany was shouting my name, and Emily’s, and then she was shouting at Nina too. For some reason the world turned sideways and I felt something hard against the side of my head as I hit the floor.
I don’t have a clear recollection of the following hours; this next part is taken from what I was later told by Bethany and Nina. Had Bethany not been an ER doctor for years, neither of us would have survived – hominus or not. I’d lost a massive amount of blood, and Emily had two through-and-through bullet wounds that had come dangerously close to her major arteries. Bethany, apparently working bare-ass naked in the freezing cold, without any medical supplies, saved both of our lives. You’d have to ask her for the medical specifics of how it was done; I know she apparently left the knife in me for a few hours after she sealed my wound with foam insulation spray, of all things. She turned her attention to Emily, quickly doing everything she could stop her bleeding.
It occurred to me later how strange it was that no police ever showed up. One would assume that the neighbors would have called 911. I can only guess that whoever those men were, that they’d taken some kind of precautions to ensure their attack happened without incident or any chance of being caught; they must have done something to keep the neighbors from calling. Nina suggested that they probably rented every unit near ours, but that meant that they would have been planning this thing for a long time.
I was in and out of consciousness for a long time after that; my world was a dark place of labored breathing and throbbing pain. Remaining motionless did barely anything; it was like my body was tearing itself apart. It was far worse than the pain I’d felt when I was initially exposed to 15226’s retrovirus. I remember Nina’s face, and Bethany’s. I recall, as my stints in the waking world became longer, even Emily’s face over me. All of them had these smiles that looked as fragile as glass, like they were trying to cheer me up and be supportive, but there was some crushing worry on their mind the whole time.
I woke an interminable time later, in a familiar place. I recognized the ceiling as Bethany’s; I knew that funny brass ceiling fan above her bed. I was lying on my back, and the pain in my chest and stomach was still a horrible, churning monster eating me, but it wasn’t enough to wipe out all thought. I grunted something, and cleared my throat. I was parched. I shifted an arm, trying to support my weight. It caused a horrible burning pain in my chest, but I could do it. I grunted loudly as I tried it a second time.
“Ben?” I was distracted for an instant by the clear, high voice, familiar to me. I fell back down and looked over. Bethany was curled up in a small chair next to the bed, wearing an oversized knit sweater and sweatpants. She hopped up out of it and to my side. “Ben, don’t move.”
“Be—guhcchhhhh-beth-huchhh…” I rasped. She moved a bit, and suddenly a glass of water was on my mouth. I drank, messily, but it was the best drink I ever had. I felt the bed shift slightly as Bethany’s weight came up on it, and she knelt next to me.
“Don’t move for a second. I’m going to take a look at the wound.” She sounded professional and calm again, the ER doctor. Her small hands found the thick, red-stained gauze bandages wrapped around my chest, and she fiddled with some clasp. I felt a sharp pain as something lifted and ripped away from my skin. She winced, and replaced it. Her hand brushed through my hair. “I know it’s bad, but trust me, you got off easy. Had you been human, you’d have been dead inside five minutes. As it is, you’re only alive because your body is built like a tank. If he’d managed to twist that knife and break your ribs, that probably would have been all it took to push you over.” She was talking almost more to herself than me.
“Ema…” I cleared my throat. “Emily?”
“She’s all right, Ben.” She nodded at me, this time without the impending worry I’d seen in their faces as I was in and out. She continued as she looked at my injuries. “Emily’s wounds were through and through, and missed her major arteries. She got off a lot easier than you, really. Anyway, she’s resting with Nina right now, but she’s been awake and moving around on her own for the last three days.”
“How… long… me?”
“You’ve been out for five days. We drove back here as soon as I had you both stabilized. Nina ditched the rental car in some seedy part of town, unlocked with the keys in the driver’s seat, where it’ll probably get stolen by tonight if not already.” She turned her head to the side, calling out loudly. “Girls! Ben’s up.”
I rested for a time as Bethany tended to my bandages as Nina came in through the door, Emily’s arm slung over her shoulder and shuffling inside with Nina’s help. Emily was pale, but standing… barely. I released a breath I must have been holding for five days. Emily was safe. The wounds really hadn’t been that bad.
“Ben! We knew you’d be fine.” Nina sounded upbeat, but all three looked disheveled, tired, and had bags under their eyes. I’d never seen them looking more drained, but they were all three still beautiful.
I croaked out another brief sentence. “Who were they?”
The girls looked between one another, then Bethany turned back to me and shrugged. “We don’t know. There was nothing in the news about it, and nobody ever came asking us questions about it. It’s really weird. People blocks away had to be able to hear those gunshots.”
I tried to think about it, but felt waves of tiredness creeping back in. I mumbled something, and drifted off to sleep again.
I woke another three days later, and it took me a while to even remember that I’d been injured; I just lazed in bed, drifting in and out of consciousness like it was a weekend morning. The pain was weak enough to no longer distract me from sleeping. I suddenly recalled what had happened, and my eyes shot open. I realized once again that I was in Bethany’s house, in her bed. My chest still throbbed, but I could move. I sat up. Nobody was in the room now. After a few experimental motions, I felt confident enough to get out of bed. My body creaked and felt stiff from days of being motionless, and I almost fell over just from that and not from any pain. I steadied myself against a bedpost and took a step. After a minute, I felt good enough to walk unsupported. I stepped into the bathroom, flicking on the light.
I was shirtless, wearing only a pair of boxers that I guess one of the girls had put on me. The bandages were wrapped around my chest, but they weren’t stained with blood as they’d been last time I was awake. I unclipped the little clamp, and began to unwrap it, waiting for the sharp pain as the wound was exposed. It didn’t happen. As I pulled the last of the bandages off, the scar was revealed. It was a ragged, mess, running crosswise from my lower left side, straight up almost to my neck, running across my sternum. I hadn’t noticed, but he must have also swiped the knife across the lower part of my face in the same swing – I had a visible scar going from the side of my chin up to my lip, ending just under my nose. It wasn’t hideous, exactly, but it was very… distinctive.
“Kind of sexy, I guess... I could learn to like it.”
I hadn’t heard Emily approach. She was leaning against the doorframe, wearing a tube top and a knee-length skirt. I spun around, feeling relieved to see her fully recovered.
“Well, you know… anything to impress you.” It was all I could think of on short notice.
She padded up to my chest, then came up on her tiptoes. I bent down, meeting her kiss. She ran a finger up and down the wound, which caused me to wince. Her eyes met mine again, then she wrapped her arms around me and just stayed there, her head against my chest for a while.
“You almost died, you know. Twice.”
“I only remember the one time.” I started for a moment; had the bastards come a second time while I was out? Was anyone else hurt?
Emily shook her head as she saw me suddenly looking around. “Once, from shock and blood loss early on, Bethany said, and another from something the knife did in your lungs. You were out the whole time the second thing happened. She said if you’d gotten an infection, that would have been it. Somehow you didn’t, and you’re still here with us.”
I didn’t reply, instead wrapping my own arms around her and just rocking back and forth for a while. Bethany’s head poked out from around the corner, and she greeted us, seeming glad that I was awake. I thanked her for saving my life, but she looked at me like I’d said something stupid. She pulled something out of the fridge and set it out; I realized immediately that I was starving. Before I was done, I’d seemingly eaten half the fridge.
Bethany nodded afterward. “I’d say he’s good now.”
“Yup!” Nina, who had appeared from some side room, kissed my cheek and sat down next to us.
I stood up and stretched. “That was great… come here, you all.” I opened my arms, and all three seemed to reluctantly fall in. I held them to me, cherishing them. I’d almost lost Emily, and had I died, I’d have left them alone, just the three of them, nobody else ever to join them or be like them, no children, no existence save centuries of loneliness.
I guided them together onto the couch with me, letting all three warm female bodies gather up against mine. It wasn’t sexual, at least at the time. I just didn’t want to let any of them go. We spent the day all together, goofing off mainly; telling jokes, acting like it had been old times. Oddly enough, we didn’t have any sex – it was probably the longest stretch of time the four of us had spent together in one room without any fucking. We joked a lot about it, though. Booze came out, and we started drinking as the sun went down.
A while in, a sort of mental itch began to get the better of me. The girls seemed… off, somehow. Still, I’d been bedridden for days, and my body was aching for a go at them. I’d been awake and relieved that they were alive long enough for my baser instincts to start to assert themselves. My eyes were drifting down to Nina’s ass, Bethany’s tits, under my sister’s skirt as they played some dumb game or another.
All three noticed, of course. My erections are difficult to hide, and even under my clothes, it always had some effect on them. Bethany and Nina were soon cuddled up on either side of, kissing me up and down, pulling my shirt back off and then my pants. I helped Bethany out of her clothes first, then pulled her over me so I could bury my face between those tits. Nina and Emily took turns on my cock again, then they let Bethany at it. Dr. Lazar performed her specialty – deep-throat. The girls cheered her on as my pole stretched her throat wide, as I gasped as I was taken down to the base of my cock into Bethany’s mouth.
Nina and Emily stripped each other, and Emily came up above me, balancing neatly on the edge of the couch as she spread her legs wide over my face. She slowly lowered herself down further, and my tongue extended. Her taste hit my tongue and I savored it, then licked at her clit and probed a finger inside her pussy while my other hand came to rest on her sculpted ass. I felt Bethany’s weight atop me, shifting around, as my cock popped out of her mouth, then Nina helping position me. Bethany’s pussy sank down around my pole, surrounding me with hot silken wetness; I moaned into Emily’s pussy. It reverberated into her clit and she moaned herself.
Nina was the only one left out, but I felt her shifting weight, and then her tongue on my balls where my cock was sliding in and out of Bethany. She licked at my pole in the moments it was exposed, and laved my balls gently.
Something was wrong with the whole picture; it kept finding its way into my mind, though I kept fighting it down. The whole scene was too hot. I felt a rush and clutching pleasure in my balls. I groaned loudly into Emily’s pussy, nibbling at her clit, which set her off; she made a low keening sound, steadying herself. My balls pumped, and I felt blasts of pleasure as my cock unloaded a massive amount of semen into Bethany – eight days’ worth.
Finally, as Bethany was sliding off of me, I put together what it was. The whole time, the girls had been totally focused on me, not each other. Every time we’d had any kind of group scene before, the girls were just as much into each other as me, but this time, it was like they’d done some kind of choreographed show just for my benefit. Bethany tightened herself against me, and as I looked down at her face, I could see her eyes were squinted shut. She was holding onto me for dear life. It was like…
“What was this just now?” I said it out loud, even though I’d half meant it as a question to myself.
“Uh – what?” Emily suddenly came up from where she’d plopped down on her side, and had been creeping into my open arms.
“This. We’re never like this. You all can’t have enjoyed that as much as normal.”
“Of course we did!” Emily said it with just enough conviction for me to almost believe it. “Ben, we’re just glad you’re okay, and you saved my life, so we just wanted to thank you!” Her smile beamed, in that same fragile way as when I’d been bedridden.
“Like hell I did, I sat there frozen like an idiot. You’re the one who saved us both. That’s not what this was about.”
“Ben, just stop it and relax.” She slid over atop my waist, straddling me. “Maybe you just need another fuck.”
I glowered at her. Fun as it sounded, it wasn’t the time.
“Em… don’t. He deserves more than that.” Nina sighed from my left, and came up; she looked downcast. She fished around for her panties, then pulled on the rest of her clothes. She continued as she pulled her top on. “Let’s not wait until tomorrow, okay?”
“For what?” I peered at Nina.
Emily looked at Nina, then back at me, then back at Nina – almost frantically, then she bit her lip, with sadness in her eyes.
“What the hell is wrong!” I raised both my arms up.
“Tomorrow morning, Ben…“ I heard Bethany’s small voice from my side. She looked up at me. “… we’ve decided we’ll abandon the house, and split up. Nina will be the only one with you for a while, and we won’t tell each other where we’re going, just in case—“
“No.” I said it flatly. I already knew where it was going. I had to stop this before it started.
“Yes, Ben.” Nina was looking at me like I was a petulant child. “Last week was our wake-up call, but this whole possibility has been stewing in my head for years now. Hell, probably in everyone’s head but yours.” She sighed. “We’re superhuman. Even we don’t really know what we’re capable of… to anyone but us, that has to be terrifying. Splitting up is the best way for us to ensure the king survives.”
“NO!” I’d meant to only raise my voice a little, but it came out as a roar, which startled Emily so much she fell right off my waist and onto the floor below. I stood up, too angry with Nina to focus on anything else. “Not now! We’re stronger together, and now isn’t the time for us to have a fight and break up!”
“Break up?” Emily looked up at me. “Ben, none of us are breaking up. We all love you. You know that. This is about…” She looked at the other two, steeling herself. “Ben, only you can make more of us. At the end of the day, the three of us—“
“NO!” I roared it even louder. “We are NOT doing this! This is NOT how I want this to happen!”
“Oh, please. Do you think that matters anymore?” Nina glared at me. “Ben, I love you, but you can’t ever think straight when it matters. If they get us, it’s bad, but if they get you, it’s over. We don’t know who they are, but we’ll have ways to keep in touch with each other, and all of us will keep our ears to the ground and be very careful. We’ll rotate you between us, one year at a time, and nobody will tell each other where they are except to meet up once a year. This way, they can only get one of us at a time, and if they do, the others can follow up and learn as much as we can. Maybe we can even fight back.”
I searched frantically for a while. “We don’t even know if there is a ‘they’! For all we know those four guys in Tahoe were the only ones who knew about us! Let’s at least make this decision after we know more—“
“And if not, Ben?” She sighed. “They could bust in through the walls any minute, you know, and this time they’d come with a hell of a lot more than four guys. Can you punch out a helicopter, Ben? Can you dodge bullets if they have a sniper? We’ve already risked enough by even coming back to this house. We rented the Tahoe place in your name, but they could easily track you back to Bethany with the link between the two of you with the whole hospital thing six years ago. If they track down your records, they also find Emily’s. We can’t keep all the eggs in one basket, Ben. We split up. Everyone’s already agreed.”
“Everyone except ME agrees!” I snatched my boxers up off the floor. “This isn’t some movie bullshit! None of us know anything about this stuff! None of us know how to do the Jason Bourne disappearing thing or whatever, so let’s just stick together and hole up somewhere safe, trawl the internet for leads...” I put a hand to my forehead, scrambling for anything. “I can’t do this. I can’t lose any of you. I already lost one.”
Emily, dressed again, came to my side. “Her again? Now?” She sighed. “Ben, I know you don’t think you’re ready for this. None of us are. It doesn’t matter, though. We have to do it. They get one of us or they get all of us. Or we get lucky and they get none… but then, the worst case scenario is you have to settle for fucking only one hottie at a time for a few years.” She shrugged, smiling up at me weakly. “We’ll keep in touch. If things look safe, then we do it your way, and all get back together again. Until then, we lie low and split up. You’ll thank us later.”
Nobody who’s ever said that has been telling the truth.
I fumed, looking between the three of them. Bethany was fumbling for her clothes, but all three had that steely gaze. They’d clearly discussed this at length while I was out. I knew I wasn’t going to win them over, but I felt compelled to try. Every instinct said this was the wrong move, even if I agreed with the fundamental logic Nina was using. Still, even I knew that logic is only as good as the data being fed into it, and there was this niggling worry in my mind that said I was failing to consider something really important. I had to keep my girls with me. There had been this big, unresolved question in my mind for years by then about what happened to Nadine that occupied my thoughts all the time; I knew that if anything happened to any of the three of them while we were apart, it would drive me nuts. I couldn’t go without knowing they were safe.
Nina waited for a while as I stared at some point well beyond the sky, as if the Experimenter was going to pop out of the sky and offer some great solution that meant I’d be able to keep the girls around and not get shot. No celestial intervention was forthcoming. As always, I had to make the whole thing up as I went along.
My blonde lover looked at the other two, then at me. She nodded toward a duffel bag over in the corner. “Our stuff’s already packed, and so is yours. We all leave in the morning.”