7 comments/ 29437 views/ 51 favorites Starry Starry Ride By: themightyxloph The proximity alarm pinged, and Zena looked up at the bridge's main navigation display. "Ten seconds to reversal", a calm female voice announced. Zena sighed and strapped herself into the pilot's chair. "You can skip the countdown, Shan", she said curtly, as she waited for the ship to revert to realspace. Exactly ten seconds after the alarm, the ship shook and her stomach lurched as the artificial gravity generator struggled to compensate for the sudden change in the ship's mass and inertia. Then it was over, and she sighed. "Space travel..." she muttered. "Sign up and see the universe..." Yeah, right. "You did get to see a part of it", Shan replied. Zena snorted. "Yeah, some trip. There and back again. Fly through forty-seven systems, drop probes and hyperwave relays at opposite ends, and on to the next. Exciting job, huh? A robot ship could do it." "You know very well that in the initial program none of the robots succeeded, and that of the original sixteen only two were heard of after the second system they visited", Shan said primly. "Robots just aren't flexible enough." "Eight years", Zena went on, ignoring Shan's words. "Eight fucking years, five down and three to go, with nobody to talk to but a computer." "You knew that when we left", Shan reminded her. "I know I did, damn you! I just never thought it would be this bad, OK? And I didn't know that you would get up my nose so badly either! A heap of overprogrammed computer hardware with no personality is not much company, do you know that?" Shan said nothing. Zena punched for a standard long range scan and looked up to the main display. "OK. What've we got?" Shan brought up a flattened map of the system. Yellow dwarf star, late G2 type, maybe a little on the hot side. Eleven planets, two in the biosphere, the inner one with an oversized moon. The perfect configuration. In spite of herself she felt a trace of excitement as she studied the display. "Looks promising", she muttered. "Yes", Shan said. "That's why it was selected in the first place." "Look, I know you're a computer, but I'm not stupid, OK?" Zena growled. "You know as well as I do that there's no telling. Or have you forgotten our second drop?" "My memory banks are in perfect working order, thank you", said Shan with a very convincing imitation of sarcasm. "And you had as little way of knowing that that star was instable as I did." "Until your spectral readings turned out to be way off and it started to blow up in our faces, yes", Zena said. "So what does this one look like?" "Spectral scan and neutrino patterns all normal", Shan reported. "Ready to drop the first relay." "Go ahead", Zena said, and a low, almost subsonic echoed though the ship as the clamps released the hyperwave relay. She watched on the screen as the barrel-shaped capsule stabilized. Diagnostic data scrolled across the bridge's main display as the relay powered up. "All systems online and functioning normally", Shan reported."Relay orbit well within parameters. Ready to enter the gravity well." "Proceed", Zena said. After so many times it had become nothing but routine: drop a relay on the way in, drop the probe in-system, then drop another relay on the way out again. The relays would skim the edges of the system's gravity well in a circular orbit and forward the probe's data through hyperspace. The orbits of the relays were critical: too far out and cometary debris would slowly decay their orbits over the millennia; too far in and the star's gravity would distort space enough to block the hyperwave carrier. But Shan was designed for such a job, so for her it was nothing much. Zena keyed in the sequence that made the top half of the hull transparent. The ceiling seemed to vanish and the naked stars looked down on her. It was fairly dark out here, of course, but the ship's indirect interior lighting didn't interfere with the starlight. "What's the particle count out here?" she asked. "Low enough to turn sideways?" "Yes, but barely. I'd advice you to wait." "Do it anyway", Zena growled. "As you wish", Shan said primly. She would of course log the order for the usual periodic squirt transmission though the relay they'd just dropped. Well, fine. Fuck the psych guys at mission control. The ship began to turn slowly, and the system's yellow star slowly swam into view until it was almost overhead. "Far enough", Zena said. Shan stopped the ship's rotation. "Stable", she announced. "Zena, you make me do this each time we're insystem. Why?" Zena sighed. "Because I want to see the star", she said. Shan did not reply. Zena leaned back into the pilot's chair and wearily closed her eyes. She knew that Shan had no emotions, but she'd come to know her simulated personality all too well. "Go ahead", she said with resignation. "Tell me I'm not making any sense." "You must admit that that reason does not seem logical", Shan began. "You can observe the entire system on the nav display in excellent detail." Zena slowly shook her head. "No, Shan", she said patiently. "Not observe. See. With my own eyes." Again Shan said nothing. "Forget it. I can't explain it. If you were human, you would understand. I think." Zena unstrapped herself from he pilot's chair, got up and stretched. Nineteen hours before the first probe drop. She felt tired and depressed. "I think I'll get some sleep", she said. "You have been sleeping more than usual for the last two weeks", Shan replied. "How are you feeling?" "Tired", Zena said. "Tired of this flying shitcan, tired of this stupid routine, tired of you." "Biosensor readings show that you're physically healthy", Shan said. "Voice stress and semantics analysis however indicate that your mental state is deteriorating. I suggest a mild combination of relaxants and antidepressants." "Fuck you", Zena growled. "I'm just tired. Wake me in four hours." She left the control cabin and flopped down on her bed without bothering to undress. She closed her eyes. * * * Relax... relax... Zena felt tense all over; she just couldn't help it. Relax... She willed herself to think of the things that used to soothe her. She imagined herself lying on a white beach, under a great blue sky, bathing in warm, gentle sunshine. That usually did the trick, but now it only hurt, and a fresh wave of homesickness rushed through her. She felt tears burn behind her closed eyelids. Sleep wouldn't come. "Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck", she said with soft intensity, and she banged her fist against the wall. Her arm felt strangely heavy. She sighed again and opened her eyes. Tears ran across her face. She turned, and again she noticed that she felt strangely sluggish. Damn. "Shan", she said. "What are you doing?" "In spite of your denial, my diagnostics package indicated that you needed a relaxant", Shan said, her synth voice without a trace of guilt. "So you had the recycler release it into the air", Zena said. "Great. Can I still get up?" "Yes, you can, but sit up slowly", Shan said. "I shall reduce the dosage if you feel weak." "Yes, do that. And lower the gravity by twenty percent. What about that antidepressant?" "Why don't you have a drink of water?" Shan suggested. Zena sighed. No point in arguing with a computer that's in control of your life support system. A glass of water appeared at the outlet of the autokitchen. She sat up, moving carefully in the reduced gravity, her arms feeling rubbery and clumsy. Still she managed to get to the 'kitchen and drink without spilling a drop. No way to tell what Shan had put in it. "How long until this relaxant stuff wears off?" she asked Shan. "About fifteen minutes. I suggest you lie down again." "No. I want you to reduce the gravity slowly to zero over the next three minutes while I step into the shower." "As you wish", Shan replied. "And Zena...." "Yes?" "I think it's time for you to use the Chair again." Zena said nothing and stared at the wall. Then she shook her head. "No", she said curtly. She felt strangely lightheaded as the ship's gravity slowly dropped. She carefully made her way to the shower cabin and began to strip off her coverall. "I just want a shower, nothing more." She stepped out of the coverall and pushed it into the laundry chute. The movement was enough to lift her off the deck now. "Keep gravity at this level for three minutes, then reduce to zero", she said as the stepped into the shower cabin and sealed the watertight door behind her. "As you wish", Shan said. Zena keyed for her favorite shower program: starting with a soft, lukewarm spray from all sides, then gradually increasing with hotter needle sprays and a massage. The shower cabin started to fill with droplets. They were strangely sluggish and wobbly in the low gravity. She sighed as the hot water enveloped her. When she sensed another slow drop of gravity, she keyed for even hotter water and a low-intensity shower. The water clung to her body as she floated weightlessly in the shower cabin. A breathing mask popped out of the side wall and she put it across her mouth and nose before the water covered her face. Then she drifted, a huge blob of warm water with Zena floating weightlessly in the middle. "Interrupt shower program", she said into the mask. The shower cut off and she closed her eyes. This was one of the few good things about space travel. She felt strangely content. Probably the effect of the stuff that Shan had slipped her, she thought. Well, not much she could do about that. She felt her mind calm and her body relax. Her limbs felt almost fluid, her body dissolving into the warm water. God, it felt good. A warm pleasure infused her, flowing through her legs, her belly, her breasts, which were now unnaturally high upon her chest in zero gravity. She felt her nipples grow hard, and a tantalizing sensation began to build between her thighs. She didn't know for how long she'd been drifting like that when she became aware of a strange sensation at the tips of her breasts. She opened her eyes and saw two low intensity massage sprayers aimed at her nipples. As she watched, a third one extended from the wall and aimed itself between her thighs. A soft but insistent spray started to play across her groin. "Shan, damn you! What the hell are you doing, messing with my shower program?" "Don't you like it?" the computer replied. "No", Zena lied. A human would have sighed. "Zena, do you know how long it has been since you last used the Chair?" Zena said nothing. "Twenty-seven days. I think that has something to do with your present state of mind." "You're improving", Zena said sarcastically. "When we left Earth, you would have said twenty-seven days, four hours, thirty-one minutes, eighteen seconds, mark." "You're evading the issue. Will you use the Chair?" "I already said no." "I ask you to reconsider", Shan said. Zena grunted. Computers. "Stop hosing down my cunt and tits and I'll think about it", she said curtly. "As you wish." The shower heads cut off and retracted. "Do you want me to resume your shower program?" "Do it", Zena grunted. A hint of gravity returned, and the water that enclosed her slowly started to flow down along her skin. Zena took off the breathing mask, and a medium intensity spray came on to rinse her as the gravity slowly increased. "Keep gravity at fifty percent", she ordered as the water cut off and a blast of warm air hit her. "As you wish." The shower cabin quickly dried up as the water vapor was pumped out to be recycled. The transparent walls slowly cleared in the warm, dry air, and Zena looked thoughtfully at the curved plastic contraption outside that was the Chair. Molded to the exact shape and size of her body, the Chair was made to fit her like a glove. Designed to provide as intimate a contact as possible, the Chair had been made only after the tiniest folds and wrinkles of Zena's entire front and back had been scanned. The end result reminded her vaguely of a motorcycle. The Chair. It appeared somewhere on the budget as a 'sensory stimulation unit'. The med techs were more honest and called it an 'auto-erotic stimulator'. Pilots just called it the Chair. Her eyes followed the lines and curves of the white plastic. If you'd take a woman and press her firmly into a mound of soft clay, front first, you'd get an imprint just like that. The saddle, which formed the central part of the Chair, was an exact negative of the inside of her thighs, her pubic region, the cleft of her buttocks. Recesses at both sides of the Chair fit the insides of her spread thighs exactly, with supports for her knees and feet below so that she could sit on it with her legs spread wide and her knees drawn. The central part of the saddle curled up at the front to cup her groin. The center pad was covered in a soft pliable material, with slits that hid a variety of animated dildoes, plugs and vibrators. The front shield of the Chair was a similarly negative shape, molded to provide an exact fit to the front of her upper body, lacking only an imprint of her belly button. It had curved recesses to support her arms on either side, a chin rest with adjustable forehead support on top, and twin cups that fit her breasts exactly. Those cups were crammed with all kinds of interesting devices as well, and the whole conductive surface of the thing was of course full of sensors and nerve end stimulators. All in all, it was exactly what it looked like: one huge sex machine, designed to provide the best sexual stimulation possible. And after all these years Zena still had mixed feelings about it. There were times that she was glad to have it, even if she resented the cold efficiency of its designers a little. But there were also moments when she hated the fact that she needed it. And of course it was only a machine, emotionless and dead. The stimulation it provided was infinitely better than what she could do with her own hands, absolutely. But especially at the times that she needed it most, what she'd really want was a lover's tongue, his kiss, his arms around her, something that wasn't only warm, hard and throbbing (the machine could do that) but that was alive as well. The blowdry finished, she opened the door of the shower cabin and stepped outside. She ran a hand through her closely cropped hair (long hair could be dangerous in zero gravity) and walked past the Chair to sit down on the bed. "Well?" Shan asked. "I said I'd think about it", Zena said. She leaned back against the wall and closed her eyes. A soft humming sound from the Chair made her look up, and in spite of herself she couldn't help laughing. Shan had activated the Chair, and a slim, long dildo extended through the slit at the front of the saddle. It pointed upwards like an obscene finger, shiny in its coat of lubricant, and it hummed softly as it vibrated. "Oh my god! The Chair has a hardon!" Zena chuckled. "Poor thing..." She sighed in resignation. "OK, Shan, you win. I give in... But just don't push me, OK? Let me do this at my own pace for a change." "Of course, Zena", Shan said, skipping the usual 'As you wish' response just for once. The dildo retracted. "And put the Chair in the center of the cabin deck while you're at it. And I want the entire hull transparent, including the floor." Shan complied without saying anything. The Chair started to hum, then moved slowly forward on its air cushion, and the entire ship seemed to vanish as the hull and floor became transparent. Only the controls, the engines, the life support section and the furniture in the living quarters remained visible as isolated objects that appeared to float in a vast amount of nothingness. Stars blazed all around her, the system's own yellow star a tiny sun overhead. * * * Zena got up and walked over to the invisible wall that was the outer hull. The emptiness out there seemed to pull at her. She took a step back until the light from the overhead glow tube reflected against the transparent bulkhead at just the right angle, blotting out the void, and she could see herself reflected in the inner surface of the bulkhead. Even after all this time on the ship she still looked passable, she though. No, correction. She looked damn good. Two hours each day on the ship's exercise machines saw to that, as did the efforts of a nagging computer to balance her diet against the energy readings from the biosensors. She studied her reflection, dimly visible in the soft light. Her luscious breasts were full and firm, and even in full gravity they didn't sag. Now, with the ship's gravity at only fifty percent, they looked even fuller. Her nipples were soft pink buds, just visible in the dim light. Her waist was slender, her belly tight, her buttocks firm, her thighs supple and muscled. All in all she had a great figure... and nobody to admire it. "Turn off cabin lights. Zero gravity", she said softly.\ Shan complied without comment, and the lights dimmed until the cabin was only faintly lit by the stars outside. The tiny sun overhead had grown noticeably larger since they'd entered the system, and the amount of light it gave off at this distance was almost as bright as that of the full moon back on earth. As gravity slowly dropped to zero, she felt her breasts rise and her internal organs shift. Weightlessness always made her feel good; strangely carefree and content. The pressure on the soles of her feet eased until she lost contact with the floor. Ventilation slits in the floor and ceiling opened with a soft click, and a gentle stream of air at her exact body temperature came out. Zena smiled faintly. Of course. Shan exactly knew her routine by now, so she anticipated her need for a gentle air current to keep her right where she was, floating there in front of the transparent wall. She remembered the first time when she'd fallen asleep in zero gee and woken up at the other end of the ship. Without gravity the normal air currents and even her own breath were enough to move her around. She let the relaxation take her, a dreamy smile on her face. Alright... She might as well enjoy it. Slowly her hands rose to her breasts. She ran the tips of her fingers across the outer curve, then she cupped them in the palms of her hands. A delicious, almost electric tingle ran through her as her fingers found her nipples and slowly rubbed them. She felt how the pink buds swelled under her caress until they stood out clear and hard. She sighed, staring into the void. Then she closed her eyes and reached down between her legs. Her fingertips slowly ran across the slit of her hairless pussy. Hairs were a nuisance in space, and it would have been better if she'd depilated her scalp as well, but she hadn't been able to bring herself to do that. The tip of her index finger gently probed between her labia, felt the moist warmth inside. She moved down her other hand as well and started to caress herself there, until she felt herself start to get wet. She held apart the lips of her pussy with one hand and slowly slipped the fingers of the other between them. Then she moved up to the top of her folds and found her clit. She carefully pulled up the hood and spread a drop of her own juices over it. She began to rub gently along the shaft, pulling the sheath up and down in a slow rhythm. She felt the little button swell and grow hard. She knew that if she had a mirror she'd see the sheath slowly retract and the little head of her clit peek out from under it, hard and pink. She started to stroke herself more firmly now, running up and down across her wet pussy, only touching her clit in passing. With her other hand she moved back up to her breasts and pinched her nipples, first one, then the other. She sighed deeply. Starry Starry Ride She opened her eyes and looked into the distance. Shan had dimmed the cabin lights further, so instead of her own reflection she now saw stars, thousands of stars, millions of stars... They were looking down upon her with light that had traveled for thousands of millennia... Quite an audience. With the cabin gravity still at zero she seemed to float in nothingness, the cabin interior only present in her peripheral vision. A familiar tension started to build between her thighs, and she started to stroke herself there with two hands now, one working on her lips, holding them apart and caressing them, the other rubbing the shaft of her clitoris, up and down, up and down... Her breath came faster. Shan turned up the air currents from the ventilation grids to keep her in place, floating there in front of the cabin bulkhead, but Zena didn't notice. Her legs clasped firmly together as she hovered on the brink of orgasm. Then she pulled up the hood of her clit and touched the exposed tip of it very lightly, only brushing it, again, and again... The delicious tension started to peak and she gasped, "Oh... oh... oh... yes.... Ooohhh... OOOOHHHH!" Suddenly a wave of pleasure burst from the tip of her clit, expanding outward through her pussy and through the rest of her body in a soundless explosion as her fingertips brought along her first orgasm, and she shuddered as her spasms began. "Oh, oh, oh, oh....." she whimpered as the pleasure continued, then slowly ebbed. Then she just drifted, panting, and finally sighed deeply. She'd closed her eyes when she started to come, and when she looked up she smiled at the stars that looked down on her. "Did you like the show?" she whispered softly to them. "I did." She smiled, for the first time in many weeks. After half a minute or so she slowly pushed herself around against the bulkhead. So much for the warming up. Now she was ready for the real thing. "Shan, full cabin gravity... but slowly", she said. She drifted down to the floor as Shan complied, and over a period of perhaps thirty seconds she felt her weight return to normal. Then she walked over to the center of the cabin where the Chair stood. She looked down on the saddle. The soft material in the center was white, just like the rest of the Chair, but it felt strangely like living tissue, like skin almost. The twin slits in the front and rear section looked like vaginas more than anything else. She ran her fingers across the smooth plastic. About three degrees above body temperature, just the ways he liked it. She swung one leg over the saddle and sat down upon it. Her thighs found their places in the recesses on either side, her knees slipped into the supports and, after adjusting the ankle braces a little, she pulled up her feet. The Chair adjusted the supports until it had found the position she was most comfortable in. Her buttocks fit snugly into the hollows at the rear end of the saddle. This put her groin against the soft pad in the saddle's front section. She gripped the handles at either side of the front shield of the Chair. The plastic changed shape as soundless actuators beneath it followed her movements. The Chair gave a soft ping, and she reached down into the side compartment for the biofeedback sensor. She pressed the coin-sized device against her left temple, where it stuck. Now the Chair would be able to read her body's responses to everything it did, even when the contact of her skin against the plastic surface was less than perfect. There was a soft click somewhere inside the Chair, and the center of the saddle changed shape so that it pressed into her groin more firmly. A small oval pad slowly came up and molded itself to cup her clitoris. Slowly its temperature rose, until it felt warm against her clit. Something under the front slit pushed up the edges, so that the resulting ridge pressed against the entrance of her pussy. "Yeah.... that's it, baby", Zena muttered softly. "Go on..." The Chair responded, even though it wasn't designed to accept vocal commands. It must have read her sexual response, or maybe Shan had provided it with additional feedback. In any case, the clitoris cup in the front part of the saddle grew even warmer and started to move back and forth, slowly, softly, at an easy pace. In fact it mimicked the strokes of Zena's fingers a few minutes ago. Zena pushed herself down into the saddle. Her legs clasped the sides of the Chair, her hands gripped the handles. The center pad began to vibrate, softly at first but then stronger, and the pad changed shape again for an even more intimate contact with her groin. Zena felt her second orgasm build as the saddle rubbed her clit, slowly at first but faster and faster, and soon she was close, so close... and she came! She shuddered as pleasure exploded between her thighs, and the Chair modulated its vibrations to match the contractions of her pussy, off and on, off and on, in an effort to prolong her orgasm. Then the wave of pleasure ebbed, and so did the activity of the Chair, and the shape of the saddle slowly returned to normal. Zena panted, and she let herself sink down against the front section of the Chair. The front of her body found its fit in the molded shape, and her breasts fell into the cups. She rested her forehead against the pad, her chin into the support. She let go of the side grips and put her arms into the recesses on either side of the front shield. Her hands found another set of grips further down, and she gently held them. The Chair let her relax until it judged she'd come down far enough. Then the breast cups came alive. Inside there were soft pads, not unlike the center portion of the saddle. Each had a small opening in its center, and Zena felt how her nipples were gently sucked into those holes. The actuators in the nipple pads enabled the foamy material to move almost like living tissue. The cups started to work on the tips of her breasts, expanding here, contracting there, so that her nipples were first squeezed, then rubbed, then massaged. The sensation was incredibly like fingers caressing her breasts, and occasionally like a pair or lips around her nipples, or a gently sucking mouth with a slow, luxuriously licking tongue. Zena moaned softly, her eyes closed. Her fingers gripped the handles more firmly. The Chair sensed her arousal, and the center of the saddle started to move as well. No vibrations this time, instead the flexible center moved up and down, started to undulate, and soft bumps rose and fell. It was like a soft, warm hand stroking her pussy, and Zena moaned again, louder this time. Then she felt a bump come up under the front slit of the saddle. "Yes..." she whispered. The bump rose further. The slit opened, and the shiny round head of a lubricated dildo appeared. It slid between the waiting lips of her pussy without effort. Then it extended further, slowly but surely. Zena felt it slide into her, deeper and deeper, her inner walls parting before the slick round head as it penetrated her from below. It stopped when it touched the entrance of her womb, then retracted a little before the feeling became uncomfortable. Zena tried to move around it, relishing the sensation of the shaft that held her pinned there as she literally sat on it, immobilized around the center of the saddle. Slowly the dildo started to swell, as internal hydraulics inflated it. It became thicker, until it filled her completely and pressed against the inner walls of her pussy. The front pad of the saddle rose again to cup her clit, just as it had done before. Then the dildo slowly retracted, a fraction of an inch, then it extended again. "Yes..." Zena moaned. Again the dildo moved, out, and back in again, this time a little further. The clitoris cup had begun to vibrate softly, its vibrations modulated to keep in pace with he dildo's gentle pumping. "Yeah, that's it, baby, fuck me", Zena whispered. She felt the head rest become slick with her sweat. The saddle and the thigh supports absorbed moisture to a certain degree, but the forehead rest did not, which she considered a stupid design flaw. The dildo was pumping her slowly but seriously now, the nipple cups squeezing in sync with its rhythm, and she felt she was going to come again, and very soon. This time her orgasm approached her from far away, but came closer with each stroke. A delicious sensation started in her hard clit, rising, rising, until suddenly the pleasure hit her like freight train, and she cried out in her release. "Ooooohh... ohhhhhhhh.... OOOOOOOOHHHHH!!!!" Her hands squeezed the grips like they'd never let go, and her knees pressed into the supports. The storm raged through her, faster this time but more intense, as it always did after a few orgasms. She bucked her hips against the saddle, the dildo rigid inside her. When it was over, Zena sat motionless, not changing her position, as the Chair let her recover. "Shan?" she whispered. Her voice sounded hoarse. "Yes, Zena?" "How much control do you have over the Chair?" Shan seemed to pause. Odd. "I am not sure I understand the question, Zena. The Chair's systems are autonomous, as you know. I can activate or deactivate the Chair, I can run diagnostics and I supply additional biofeedback to it. But that's all." "But you could take full control of it, couldn't you?" "No, not really. As I said, its programs are largely autonomous. Although I can control its behavior to a certain degree through the biofeedback loop, as I did earlier when I activated one of the dildoes." Zena opened her eyes and took a deep breath. "Do that, then." "Do what, Zena? Please be more specific." "Just what I said, Shan. Take control of the Chair, as much as you can. You do the job for a change." This time she was almost sure that Shan hesitated. "Zena... exactly what kind of a..... job... do you want?" Zena gazed at the stars. "Once, years ago..." she said slowly, "before I enrolled with the program... I had sex with three guys. All at once, I mean. Don't ask me what got into me, I still don't know. It just happened. Three of them, and it was unlike anything I'd ever done before or since. It was so... different. Different than anything else. and it went on and on... They never seemed to tire as they took turns and changed places. I don't know how many times I came. I lost count... I just remember that at one point everything just... blurred. Nothing, just pleasure, coming, more pleasure, coming again..." She sighed. "The last thing I remember was having two of them suck my nipples while the third one fucked me and I came and I came..." She let her voice trail off. "That's what you want?" Shan asked. Zena nodded. "Yes... that's what I want. And the Chair can't do it all by itself." Shan seemed to consider that. "I'm not sure I can do that either", she said finally. "My control of the Chair may be too limited." "Try it", Zena said. "Shan...." Then she used a word she'd never spoken to ship's computer before. "Shan... please." "Well... I can't promise it will work", Shan said. "But I'll try." Zena smiled. "OK... Thank you", she said. "Oh, and I also want the straps." "You know I'll need your order for that", Shan said. "OK. I hereby order you to restrain me and keep me restrained until I command otherwise or until your diagnostics indicate that it's necessary to release me", Zena said formally, knowing that there was no way for Shan to get around her programming on that point. "As you wish", Shan replied. From slits in the side of the Chair broad straps sneaked out to loop around her thighs, her calves, her wrists, her upper arms, until she was comfortably but firmly restrained. No matter how hard she tried, she couldn't break her contact with the Chair. "I'll need to calibrate my biofeedback link with the Chair", Shan said. "There may be an odd sensation." The Chair shook lightly, then vibrated. In rapid sequence the breast cups grew hot, then cold against her skin. So did the center portion of the saddle. A small dildo rose, parted the entrance of her pussy, vibrated for a second, then retracted. Warm air hit her groin, then a small nozzle from behind blew cold air between her buttocks. The front shield of the Chair grew momentarily cold, and the nerve stimulators embedded in its surface gave off small, painless, barely perceptible electric pulses. Zena giggled. "Stop tickling me", she said. "No", Shan said. Zena looked up. "What?" "No", Shan repeated. Huh? Shan had never disobeyed a direct command from her. She couldn't. Unless... Zena thought for a second. Of course. The only way Shan could override her was when her medical condition was involved, and that ability was keyed to her biodiagnostics package. So... "Why not?" Shan paused, and Zena would have sworn that she could feel a smile hovering behind that silence. "Why do you want me to stop?" the computer said at last. "The sensors indicate that you enjoy it." The electronic jabs continued, and it felt like a thousand tiny fingers on her skin. Zena squirmed against the front of the Chair. "Hey, that's not fair!" she yelled. The tickling went on. "Shan... stop it! Aaahhhh! Hey, I mean it. Stop it!" Shan ignored her. "Shan..... Ahhhhhh! Hey! Shan... Stop it! Please!" This time the computer finally obeyed. "Interesting", Shan said. "I'm not sure I understand this. Your pleasure increased when I overrode your command. That's a very abnormal pattern." Zena smiled sadly. "Think about it, Shan. Until you understand it you'll never be a good lover." "Being a lover was not in my design parameters." "Too bad... you might have liked it." "Do you think so?" "Hmm.... If you were human, yes." "But I am not, Zena. You know that." Shan sounded strangely thoughtful. Funny... In all those years Zena had come to know the synthesized personality that enabled her to think of the computer as a person, and she knew Shan's speech patterns, her pauses, her inflection, everything that was built into her to make her sound more human. But now... something had changed. Something subtle. "I have little experience with your sexual response patterns", Shan said. "That's normal. It's your first time", Zena said drily. "Don't worry about it. You'll learn." "I'll try", Shan said. "It would be easier for me if you told me about the experience you're trying to recreate." "That gang bang thing, you mean? Shan, I'm not trying to recreate that. I know I can't. I only want something just as good." "Tell me about it", Shan insisted. "OK..." Zena said slowly. "If you want..." Her voice trailed off as she remembered. "I think I was twenty-two or so at the time. It happened at a party. Some of us were partying all the time then. I'm still amazed that most of us actually graduated... Anyway, there was this guy I'd been seeing, and he threw this huge party at his house. Biggest blast I'd ever seen, then. There were a lot of people there, I don't know how many... I didn't think he was rich, but he must have been. I mean, big house, big garden, pool, jacuzzi, everything. Loud music, booze, everything... I got a little drunk, and then more than a little. And I felt good." She closed her eyes and rested her head against the forehead pad. The Chair's front shield and the center of the saddle suddenly grew very warm, she noticed. "So we danced, and then we ended up in the garden to get away from the noise. Warm summer evening, clear sky, stars above... We danced in the garden, and the next thing I knew he was undressing me in a sheltered corner behind a tree." The breast cups gently sucked her nipples. "He was so sweet... he put me on my back and went down on me... Made me come within seconds. And then again." The saddle pad slowly rose and started to work on her clit. "We made love... But when I'd come again he still hadn't. He rolled me over on my stomach and he pushed me back onto the ground. He was very strong, but he was gentle. I don't think I could have resisted him, but then I didn't want to, so that was alright." The straps around her upper arms and thighs tightened slightly. "Then I felt him between my butt cheeks, and I got a little scared. I'd never taken a guy from behind. But he was careful, and I relaxed, and I enjoyed it." A small jet of warm air hit her from behind and played around the rim of her anus. "I don't know when I saw the other guy standing there. He smiled, and he had a huge bulge in his pants. And the funny thing was, I wasn't afraid. I held out my hand to him, and he took it. Before I knew it he was naked as well and he knelt down in front of me. And a little later there were three of them." The saddle pad pressed into her groin more firmly now, moving up and down like a gentle hand, caressing her there. "And that's how it started. I don't know how long it went on. I lost all sense of time. Sometimes they'd take turns, sometimes I'd have all three of them, one in my pussy, one in my ass, one in my mouth. They didn't seem to tire or whatever. I came, and the guy taking me from behind would bring me back to the brink again in no time at all, and then another guy would enter me and I'd come again... I dripped, I sweated, I panted, I had cum running down my legs and my face, and I loved it..." As her voice trailed off, he vibrations from the saddle grew stronger, and she responded by pushing herself down into it. "Yes, Shan, that's it..." she muttered. "Go on, go on..." The saddle had become slippery with her wetness, the absorbent pad not quite able to cope with her arousal. A bump rose in the middle of the saddle and she rubbed herself against it gratefully, a little more, a little more, the slippery surface vibrating smoothly against her clit... Yes, yes... And she came! With a gasp she started to convulse against the Chair, her thighs clasping the saddle as that wonderful pleasure rushed through her most intimate parts. As the wave ebbed, she felt how the breast cups' nipple pads gripped the tips of her breasts firmly. The Chair had never used such force before, but now she felt the actuators pinch her hard nipples, pull them, squeeze them... The breast cups grew hotter and enveloped her luscious flesh with a gentle warmth. "Yeah, that's it, baby, that's it, go on", Zena whispered. Shan didn't answer, but from the font slit in the saddle a thick dildo rose and pressed against her pussy lips. "Slowly..." Zena muttered, but she was so wet that the head slipped into her without effort. Then the tip of the slick shaft bent forward and started to move around in circles. As she felt the head slide further into her, delicious sensations ran through her as the head bent this way and that, until the biofeedback sensors knew that it had found the exact spot. Then it started to rub her there in slow, loving circles. She felt the wetness run down her thigh. Oh well... The Chair was designed to cope with that. The cups started to suck her nipples seriously now, and a gentle rhythmic vibration sent sparks of pleasure through her breasts. Her belly and buttocks suddenly tingled as the nerve stimulator electrodes came into play, and she gasped with delight. The dildo continued to rub her magic spot, and a small tube rose from the saddle to rest its head on her swollen clit. A thin jet of warm water came out of it, cleaning her and driving her mad with pleasure at the same time. Then the water stream started to pulsate, and suddenly the pleasure was too much for her to take. It peaked, radiated outward from her clit, and she let out a long, soft, quivering moan as the force of her massive orgasm shook the Chair. The dildo started to vibrate inside her, low, strong vibrations that ran through her pussy, her clit, her thighs. The orgasm went on and on, almost painfully intense, until at last it burned itself out and she hung limply in the Chair's arm and leg supports. Starry Starry Ride She just lay there, gasping, until she caught her breath. Then she felt how the rear section of the saddle began to warm. The dildo deflated and gently retracted from her pussy. A bump in the center pad rose and started to play around her tortured pussy lips. The twin hollows in the rear end of the saddle that cupped her buttocks slowly moved apart. From the rear slit a small tube extended, and she felt something warm and slick being sprayed between her spread cheeks. Then a thin probe rose, about as thick as her finger, liberally coated with lubricant. Its round tip carefully nosed its way forward until it came to rest against the entrance of her anus. She sighed, relaxed until the tip of the probe slipped into her, and soon she felt it advance. "Do you like that?" Shan asked suddenly. "You know I do", Zena said softly. "Go on..." The probe sneaked further into her rear hole, then retracted. After a second or so it moved back in again, and slowly it began to pump in and out of her. More lubricant was released from tiny pores in its surface, and Zena let out a soft "Ooohhhhhh... yeah..." as she relished the slick wet friction of the smooth, slippery surface against her insides. Another dildo came up, this one studded with bumps and ridges, and slowly it began to penetrate her. "No, not that one", Zena whispered. "Not yet." The dildo deflated, and she barely felt it slip out from between her pussy lips. Another one came peeking out of the saddle, smooth and much thinner this time. It entered her pussy like a torpedo sliding into its launch tube. Then it started to vibrate, and she felt herself grow hot again. The anal probe began to vibrate as well, and the strokes with which it was pumping her became longer as the Chair sensed her rising excitement through the biofeedback sensors. Not long now, not long now... A bump at the base of the dildo touched her clit with each stroke. "It's coming", she panted. "Yes, fuck me, fuck me, yes, a little more... harder, harder..." Her breath came fast. "Go on, go on, yes, yes... Oh, ohh... oh... oh.... oohhh, yeah, ooooohhh... ohhhhh.... hhhhooohhhh.... OOOOOOOOOOHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!" She bucked against the saddle, her sphincter gripping the anal probe as pleasure exploded inside her and she came, hard, and the vibrations somehow prolonged the orgasm and made it more intense, burning like a blue flame with the intensity of a supernova. She didn't know how long she sat like that, gasping, panting, sweat running down her face. The anal probe and the dildo had retracted, but the surface of the Chair was caressing her gently wherever it touched her skin. After a time she opened her eyes. Cool, dim, quiet starlight. So beautiful... so peaceful... She felt warm lubricant being sprayed onto her from both sides, front and back. A conical plug with a slender tip and a thicker bulge at the base extended from the rear opening of the saddle, and she pushed herself forward to receive it more easily. As she did so, at the front end of the saddle another thick dildo rose from below and slowly but irresistibly drilled its way into her waiting pussy. She closed her eyes and felt how she was being filled from both sides. A little more, a little more... The anal plug slid home and stayed there. The dildo kept on coming, moving further into her, and with it rose a second manipulator from the slit, which came to rest against her clit. With its rounded tips it gently pulled up the hood, then stopped. The breast cups came on, the nipple pads sucking and squeezing. The tips of her breasts, hard and sensitive, felt like they were being licked, nibbled, sucked both left and right. She realized tears were running down her face, so delicious were the gentle caresses. Other parts of the Chair's surface started to work on her skin as well, and it was as if she was being stroked by countless hands. Then the clit probe moved up and down a fraction of an inch, and more than anything else it felt like a smooth finger caressing her clit. She gasped. Slowly, the dildo began to move inside her as well, not pumping this time, but gently moving forward, sideways, bending and turning, and occasionally moving a fraction of an inch out of her and back in again. The plug retracted a little, and she felt the round bulge at its base pull at her sphincter, but not enough to make it slip out of her. Then it pushed itself in again, and it too started to rotate, slowly, carefully, first left, then right. She thought she'd go mad with pleasure. Anchored at both front and rear, there was nowhere she could turn to, nowhere she could go. The straps kept her in place on the Chair, and he had no other choice but to sit there and take it, until she felt herself begin to peak again. She felt how it came closer and closer, the familiar pleasure rising as the clit manipulator pushed her onward with gentle, expertly timed ministrations, further, further.... Then the moment arrived when she felt sparks shooting out of her clit, and she screamed as she started to come. A stream of stars seemed to gush from her cunt as the orgasm burst inside her with a blinding flash of white light, and the wave of pleasure from her pussy connected with her rear where the anal plug was still doing delicious things to her rectum. She convulsed with the intensity of her orgasm. Without the straps she would have lifted herself from the Chair. Shan let her recover for only a few seconds, then resumed to work on her with the plug and the dildo, which had begun to pump in and out of her pussy. She started out easily, but soon the stimulations became more insistent, and Zena felt another orgasm approach. "Shan...." she gasped. "When I come... don't stop. Just go on. Turn on everything. The works. I want it all. Hard." Shan didn't reply, but the dildo started to pump in and out of her, and the clitoral probe began to vibrate. Soon she hovered on the brink of another massive orgasm. When the Chair's biofeedback sensed that she was ready, a thin jet of water squirted from the clit probe's head in a sharp burst. It hit the tip of her supersensitive button at exactly the right spot at exactly the right moment and she exploded, screaming and convulsing in intense pleasure. And this time the Chair did not stop, nor did it give her time to recover. The dildo started to vibrate, the butt plug began pumping harder, the breast cups went mad. Her next orgasm arrived on the heels of the last one, and she felt the dildo inflate inside her as it continued to pump and vibrate. The butt plug was oozing lubricant continuously now, which leaked from between her buttocks to coat the saddle with a shiny, slippery layer. Harder and harder the Chair ravaged her. The butt plug deflated at the base, elongated and changed shape as hollow chambers inside if filled with hydraulic fluid, and gradually it turned into a ridged shaft that mostly resembled a series of tightly strung beads, each the size of a walnut. It started to pump in and out of her tight hole, the lubricated beads slipping through her sphincter one by one, stimulating her most sensitive spots. Its tip began to vibrate and sent waves of pleasure through her. Her fingers gripped the handholds so tightly that her fingers ached as another orgasm rapidly built. The whole center pad of the saddle started to bulge. It moved and vibrated as the Chair fought to keep up with her arousal. She howled as she came again, this time even more intensely. The front dildo retracted and immediately another one rose from the saddle to replace it. Her pussy, waiting there right above it, was sopping wet and the dildo's thick head slipped straight in, pushing on relentlessly until it was deep inside her. This time it was the thicker shaft with the bumps and ridges that she had rejected earlier. She welcomed it now, and when it began to pump in and out of her she felt its smooth thick head slide up and down in her love tunnel, the textured shaft massaging the entrance of her pussy as she sat on it. She moved with it as it pistoned in and out of her most intimate part, and the anal probe changed its rhythm to match her movements as she rode the Chair with short, hard strokes, the beads slipping through her sphincter and back again, providing her with their delicious, lubricated friction. Soon the Chair sensed that the golden moment was close again, and another spurt of warm water hit her clit. This time the burst of pleasure was sharp and intense as she came, but her contractions intensified the stimulation, and the orgasm soon took her on to the next one in a biofeedback enhanced chain reaction of pleasure. "Oh... oh... oh... oh..." Her breath came ragged, almost gasping, and she whimpered as she got near her next orgasm. The dildo now started to vibrate as well and pushed her over the edge. She let out a long, loud "Ooooohhhhhhhh!!!" as she came, powerless to stop it. The Chair held her captive in the straps. She rode the saddle, from one nova-hot explosion of pleasure to the next, taking everything the Chair did to her, and wanting more. And she got more, as the anal beads slowly inflated and continued to ooze more lubricant while pistoning in and out of her hole with slow, deep strokes, and the dildo, deep inside her pussy now, kept on pumping and vibrating stronger and stronger, one of its bumps hitting her clit with each stroke. Again she came in a burst of intense pleasure. It must have been about then that she lost it. Somehow, all conscious thought vanished. There was no time, there was no space, there was no awareness. She no longer existed as a person or as a consciousness... All she knew was pleasure, almost painfully intense. She came, came again, and kept on coming as each climax triggered the next one... * * * When she opened her eyes she dimly realized she must have fainted somewhere along the way. She felt completely exhausted, completely drained. Her vision was blurred, but she saw that the Chair had moved on its air cushion and was now standing directly beside her bed. The straps were gone. With what seemed a superhuman effort, she lifted herself off the saddle. If Shan hadn't reduced the ship's gravity she wouldn't have made it. She flopped down on the bed. A compartment in the wall popped open and the medsensor package fell out. She fumbled with it, managed to place its pad against her upper arm, felt its clamps move into place, and then she sank down into a bottomless void, like a stone into dark, still water. * * * Waking up was a slow, reluctant thing. She just lay there, eyes closed, mind quiet, body unmoving... A simple, animal bliss. Her arms and legs felt heavy. After a while she lifted her hand and felt between her legs. Not sore. Good. It was so nice just to lie there and just drift, drift... But eventually she opened her eyes to find the deck bathing in warm, yellow sunlight. "Shan, fifty percent gravity", she said. Her voice croaked. "Good morning, Zena", Shan said. "How do you feel?" The cabin gravity began to drop. A steaming glass of tea appeared at the autokitchen's delivery table. "Sleepy..." Zena yawned. "Sluggish... but otherwise pretty good. How long have I been out?" "Just under twenty hours", Shan replied. "The diagnostic sensors indicated that you needed more than just a night of natural sleep. Since no emergencies developed and this starsystem was unlikely to come up with any surprises, I decided to let the med package keep you asleep as it deemed necessary." "You dropped the probe?" "Yes, I did. Everything went according to schedule." "But then why..." Zena sat up, almost bouncing herself off the bed in the reduced cabin gravity. Sunlight! What had gone wrong? They should have been on their way out of the system already! "I hope you don't mind", Shan said. "As soon as the third and fourth planet came into scanner range, I saw that they both qualified, although the third is a bit hot. I first dropped a probe on the third on approach. The moon made it a little tricky, but there were no problems. Then I followed through a slingshot orbit around the third, so that we arrived at the fourth with a significant reduction in speed. I went into orbit around the fourth planet, and dropped the probe from orbit." Zena shook her head. "But... Shan... Why?" She stood, took the tea from the 'kitchen delivery table and sipped. It was sweet. Shan must have decided she needed a little extra sugar after last night. She ran her finger along the inside of her right arm and sure enough, the medpack had given her an IV while she slept. Water and glucose, probably. Shan hesitated before she answered, in a completely uncharacteristic way. Zena began to feel more than a little worried. If Shan started to malfunction, out here... "I... thought you might want to see this", the computer said finally. "I have a visual feed from the probe on the bridge screen." Zena slowly made her way to the front of the ship and looked down on the fourth planet. From this altitude was a fluffy ball of swirling white, blue and greenish brown. Then Shan activated the main display and she saw the landscape that the probe had chosen for its descent. Green, rolling meadows... Lush prairies and, in the distance, a majestic range of white-topped mountains against the horizon. Blue sky, white clouds... Suddenly here eyes were full of tears. "Oh Shan.... It's beautiful... It's perfect!" The computer was silent, as if it didn't know what to say. No, Zena told herself. Not "it". She. For some reason, she suddenly found herself unable to think of Shan as an artificial construct anymore. "I wonder..." she said very softly. "We never got such a good look at the other planets... but if they were as beautiful as this... Then the program is going to work... It just has to." For millennia mankind had looked up at the stars, and wondered. For centuries radio telescopes had scanned the heavens, listening for signs of intelligent life. With one exception, which had never repeated itself, nothing had ever been heard. Robot probes that left the solar system through realspace, and later through hyperspace, had carried messages to alien civilizations, in case they would ever encounter other life. Later yet, interstellar expeditions had always looked for traces of other intelligent life as part of their missions. And found none. Eventually someone realized that intelligent, earth-like life would be attracted to habitable, earth-like planets, and the probe seeding program was developed. When robot ships proved unsuccessful, manned ships were sent out on trajectories that took them along the right types of stars. If they found a planet that would sustain earth-like life well enough to qualify, their mission was to drop probes that, in the centuries to come, would detect the arrival of visitors, if any, and signal Earth. When the network of probes would finally span enough lightyears, it almost had to be successful. "You thought I might like it?" Zena said. "Yes... I did", Shan replied. Zena said nothing as she looked at the nav display, until she was sure she'd read it correctly "What's our position?" she asked. "We're clear to leave the system. We can use the third planet for another slingshot trajectory to regain almost all of the speed we shed when I approached the fourth." "No, I mean our position relative to the sun", Zena said. "We are in the ecliptic, currently eight lightminutes and forty-one lightseconds out from the primary." Eight lightminutes. About as far as earth was from its own sun, the sun that was so much like this one. Zena looked up, felt the warmth on her face, let the yellow sunlight filter through her closed eyelids. "Shan..." she said slowly. "Last night... when you were.. doing me, on the Chair... How often did I cum?" "You experienced a total of twenty-six orgasms, the last three of which you did not register consciously, but during which your body still responded to stimuli", Shan said clinically. "Did you learn anything from it?" Shan hesitated again, but now Zena believed she knew why. "Yes, I did", the computer finally said. "But I'm still analyzing it. I'm not sure what I have learned, but your responses to the different stimuli were not at all what I expected." "In what way?" "For example, there was your reaction when I tickled you. You enjoyed it when I overrode your command to stop. Then there was your sexual response pattern while you told me about your experience with group sex. Your arousal peaked at points in the narrative that had little to do with sexual stimulation, and in an unusual way. Your voice pattern and brain wave frequency spectrum indicated emotion and arousal much more than your physical feedback did. And I am sure that some of the stimuli I administered later on would have been uncomfortable at other times, but from your biofeedback I concluded that now they weren't." "So what made you decide to park the ship here in orbit?" Again Shan hesitated. "I'm not sure", she said. "Maybe I just wanted to learn your reaction." Maybe? A computer doing something for reasons of "maybe"? Yeah, right. Zena smiled. "Shan... Remember what I said to you yesterday, about you just being a piece of hardware with no personality? I'm sorry. I was wrong. Please forgive me. It's not true." "But I am indeed not human, Zena", Shan said. "No...", Zena said. "Not quite... Not yet. But you're learning, Shan. You're learning. Maybe you're not a full person yet... but you're getting there. And you're doing fine. Think about what you have learned. And ask me about anything that doesn't make sense. I'll do my best to explain. Once you understand this, you will be more fully human than you ever were, and maybe even more human that some humans I've known." Shan said nothing. Zena reached over to the nav console to punch for an exit course, and she watched the parameters scroll across the display. When Shan announced that all was ready, the engines began to whisper and slowly the planet drifted out of the scope. Zena gave it one last look as she left the bridge on her way to the shower. Beautiful as this system might be, they had many more left ahead of them. The sooner they got going, the sooner she'd be home.