First Contact
Willow was floating with her legs folded all lotus-like and her eyes closed, looking very inner peace-y, even if Xander knew she was giving her brain a workout, learning about the Eliezera. Xander had made a few walls melt to give him more room, and was having fun flying around like he had superpowers.
"Oh, wow," Willow said sometime later.
Xander looped around and floated up behind her, wrapping his arms around her waist. "Well don't leave me in suspense. What's up?"
Willow opened her eyes to the sight of Xander's manhood sticking up in front of her from between her legs. She felt her face heat, but didn't stop herself from taking it in her hands and caressing it. Xander tensed up at her back, but he didn't pull his hips away.
"Zach was more right than he knew when he said the Eliezera was in a coma," Willow said. "The Giaa is missing. I can order the ship to do anything it already knows how to do, assuming I can find the command, but its intelligence, its awareness, its ability to make decisions and act on its own initiative, that's all gone."
"So, the ship's braindead, but you can be a surrogate mind for it?" Xander surmised distractedly as Willow's fingers played lightly around his glans.
The head of Xander's shaft, the membranous tissue, began to secrete lubricant as Xander became aroused, making his hardness slippery under Willow's hands. For Fae, getting wet wasn't just for women. Both sexes contributed to the lubrication.
"Well, not yet," Willow said, slowly tightening her grip. "But once I learn how, yes."
Xander gave her middle a squeeze. "That's my Willow."
Willow really wanted to turn around and kiss him, but she couldn't quite bring herself to. That seemed odd, since she already had her hands around his erection, but she supposed it was because that was further out of the context of what she had been used to - playing with his cock like she was doing was more of an Eelesia thing, but wanting to kiss Xander was just normal Willow.
Her fingers tightened around Xander's length, stroking up and down more firmly. Of course, Willow had fantasized about making love to Xander since she first learned about sex, but it had been a distant future dream, then. With Eelesia's experience in her head, and his glistening erection in her hand, fucking Xander's brains out right now didn't seem impossibly out of reach anymore.
"Aah," Xander breathed into her neck. "Willow, I'm gonna... uuuah!"
Willow watched in delight as Xander's erection pulsed in her hands and spurted his white cum through the air in a series of gooey streams. The fluid sailed across the room and splattered on the wall, where it was immediately absorbed, and Xander's Utility Cloud pulled moisture from the air to replace the loss.
"Uh, Wills?" Xander said hesitantly. "You just gave me a handjob. Is there a reason you just gave me a handjob?"
"Do I need one?" Willow mumbled.
Xander pulled back and turned her around by her shoulders. "Uh, don't you think we should slow down here? What if you're just being... swept up in Eelesia's memories?"
Willow lifted her legs and squeezed Xander's hips with her knees. "So what if I am? Xander, I've wanted you for as long as I've been able to want anyone in that way, the sexy way. Maybe I like that Eelesia makes me not afraid of my feelings anymore."
Xander dropped his head back and sighed. "My Zach memories are telling me that I'm making a big deal out of nothing. I guess it helps that he started out human, so he already went through this once." Xander shook his head and gave her a smile. "We've always loved each other, haven't we?"
"Always loved," Willow agreed softly.
"The Fae don't see a difference between friendship love and romantic love, do they," Xander mused distantly. "Take a romantic love, and subtract everything that makes up a friendship love, and what you're left with doesn't have any love in it at all. That's what Eelesia said to Zach, back when he was still adjusting."
Willow nodded seriously.
"We'll always be Xander and Willow, right?" Xander asked, gently taking her face in his hands.
"Oh yes," Willow sighed happily, "but we're Fae now, and I think we should act like it... is it okay if I sleep with Buffy?"
Xander went to a happy visual place, and Willow giggled.
"I'll take that as a yes," Willow said.
"Yeah, but, since when are you into girls?" Xander wondered, sliding his hands down to her waist.
Willow ducked her head. "I'm, um, not really with the sureness on that. I might have been doing the repressing thing, but it doesn't matter now. Fae are pansexual by design."
Xander winced at a couple of Zach memories that surfaced, but decided to put off dealing with the idea that he'd be attracted to guys now, for later. "Yeah that. Even so, you think Buffy will go for it?"
"I think I can persuade her," Willow mused. "She's a Fae now too, and we're already friends."
"Friends," Xander intoned. "Now with Benefits included in the standard model."
Willow giggled, and Xander pulled her close, trapping his erection between their bellies. He leaned in and kissed her, his lips warm and gentle, his tongue firm and probing. Willow melted into a figurative puddle of euphoria.
Xander slid his hands up her back onto her shoulders. He angled her slightly and lined up himself up, aiming his cock with his pelvic-floor muscles, which in Fae were more sophisticated that the human equivalent. Xander yanked Willow down by her shoulders, spearing her to the hilt.
It was a move that would have seriously hurt a human girl who hadn't been worked up to it with ages of foreplay, but for Willow there was nothing but a crashing burst of pleasure that rocked her body into orgasm.
"Eaaah! Uaaah. Ooooh!" Willow gasped.
Once her spasms stopped, Xander's hands gripped her butt and she moaned against his lips. Two thrusts and she felt him cum inside her, felt his body tremble in her embrace, but he barely slowed down. Willow curled her hips to meet his firm thrusts. Their pace was easy and steady, bringing orgasms every two minutes or so.
It took them each about a dozen orgasms before they got the hang of timing it so they climaxed together almost every time. At some point they flew back to the bed platforms in the center of the cavernous room.
Xander grunted and Willow gasped as they climaxed yet again. Willow kissed him and pushed him off of her. She turned over an lay flat on her front with her legs together.
"Do the thing," Willow breathed, referring to a shared Eelesia and Zach memory.
Xander straddled her butt and sank his length back into her. Willow's butt jerked up against his hips as she moaned happily. Xander laid himself down flat on top of her, taking her hands in his and pinning them down. Then he increased the pull of his skeletal magnetics until he was pressing down on her with something like five times his Earth weight and she was having trouble breathing.
Willow shuddered in orgasm, and he hadn't even started moving yet.
Xander shifted his hips and started pounding into her hard, letting his simulated weight do most of the work on the downstroke. He climaxed quickly and often, but Willow was cumming hard almost continuously. A human would have passed out from overstimulation in minutes, but Willow was just riding a high of ecstasy and exultation.
Xander, Willow, a message came over their Dreamlinks, from Buffy. We have a situation. You're not going to believe this.
Xander stopped fucking Willow upon his next orgasm, and they both went limp while the fog of orgasmic pleasure faded from their heads. Xander moved to get off his adorkable best friend, releasing his five-times simulated weight, and with a fleshy wibble, the bed launched them up like a slingshot. They bounced between the two beds a few times while Xander fumbled in surprise.
"Oops," he said with a goofy grin.
Willow snickered and looked at the image Buffy sent with her message. "Holy moley."
Buffy was baffled. There was a ship like something out of Star Wars parked right on the Eliezera's hull, with big English letters proclaiming USAF, and a group of people in space suits. It was such an unexpected sight that she flung her Utility Cloud at their helmets and demanded, "Since when does the Air Force have spaceships?" before she could think twice.
She could only see the vaguest impression of faces through their visors, but the four space suits seemed to be staring at her in open-mouthed shock.
Buffy was suddenly very aware of the fact that she was completely naked. It took every scrap of willpower she had not to flinch and try to cover herself. Doing so wouldn't have even occurred to Lyn, and while Buffy would have preferred to confront these soldier-astronaut-whatevers clothed, it was too late for that now. The least embarrassing option was for her to pretend she didn't know any better, like the Fae she now was, and she was wary of showing weakness to unknown military people in any case.
"Ah," one of the spacesuits said, sounding like a woman's voice.
"Are you guys seein' this?" a man's voice said inside another helmet.
"Indeed," a deep male voice said inside a third helmet.
"Ah, it could be a telepathic projection or some other psionic effect," the woman's voice said uncertainly. "I can't imagine how else we'd be able to hear her, or how else she could even be out here. Unless she's a robot - no, the radio logs in my suit don't show a transmission."
"You military guys believe in psychic stuff?" Buffy asked curiously.
The woman's suit jerked, like she'd startled. "Uh, psionic, and yes, we've seen several cases of - "
"Carter!" the man's voice barked.
"I'm not a projection, by the way," Buffy said. "This here's the real me."
"But we're in hard vacuum!" the woman, Carter, exclaimed. "How are you surviving? And how are we hearing you?"
"I'd rather not say just yet," Buffy said. "No offence or anything, but I don't know if you'll use that knowledge against us, yet."
No way, came Xander's reply over her Dreamlink. Hang tight. We are so on our way.
You guys haven't found clothes, have you? Buffy sent back.
No, why? Willow sent.
Because I'm still naked out here, and I'd rather not have you guys show up clothed and make me look weird, Buffy replied.
A third suit stepped forward. "Um, hello. My name is Daniel Jackson, of SG-1. You can hear and understand us?"
"Duh," Buffy said. "So, Daniel. Nice to meet you. I'm Buffy. What can I do for you?"
Buffy put on her best irreverent act and sauntered over to the big spindly laser thingy, breezing passed the bulky spacesuits as Daniel floundered.. "This thing looks all gizmo-y. What's it for?"
"Oh for cryin' out loud!" the first man's voice grumbled. "Please tell me this isn't your ship."
"Yep," Buffy said, popping the 'p'.
The spacesuit identified as Daniel Jackson stepped forward again. "Well, in that case, um, Buffy, on behalf of SG-1, the United States of America, and the planet Earth, we'd like to know more about you, and your ship, and establish peaceful relations if possible."
"Ahem."
"And," Daniel added quickly, "politely request that you move your ship somewhere less visible from the surface of the Earth."
Buffy blanched and created a message in her Dreamlink, Willow? Can you figure out how to make the Eliezera move yet? Before someone planetside decides we're an alien invasion?
Crap, why didn't I think of that? Um, maybe? Give me a few minutes, Willow replied.
"We're working on it," Buffy said. "The Eliezera - that's our ship - is damaged."
"Great," the man's voice groaned.
"How big is your crew?" the woman asked.
"I guess it's just the three of us," Buffy said.
"You can run a ship this size with only three crew?" the woman gasped.
"Actually, it's designed to run without any crew," Buffy said blithely. "But like I said, it's damaged."
"Well folks," the man's voice cut in before Carter could have a geek-fit, "this is going well, wouldn't you say? How's about we take this somewhere we can talk face to face, Miss Buffy? Can we convince you to come aboard the Prometheus for a chat?"
Buffy thought that over. These SG-1 people seemed nice enough, and she was curious about where their spaceship came from. There was no way to know for sure, but they really didn't look like they had even basic nanotech. That wouldn't have meant anything before Halloween, but to Lyn, being pre-nanotech was like not having discovered electricity yet, only worse. If that was the case, there was absolutely nothing they could do to harm her, and probably no way for them to hold a Fae against their will.
"Alright," Buffy said. "As soon as my fr-fellows get here, we'll come in and talk."
"Carter, see to setting up a meeting room in the cargo bay. Full hazmat protocols," the man ordered.
"Yessir." Carter turned and tromped back up the cargo ramp.
"So, " Jack said, rocking back on his heels. "Howcome you know what the Air Force is?"
Buffy winced. "Ah, well, um..."
"We come from an alternate Earth, actually," a softer feminine voice said from behind him.
"Gah!" Jack yelped, stumbling as he spun around in his bulky spacesuit.
Standing off to the side, Jack saw two new naked people, a red-haired girl and a brunette boy, both with physiques like a freakin' centerfold. The boy, of all things, had a hardon that would make even Jack feel a little insecure. He sighed. Why did SG-1 always get the weird ones?
Jack radioed Carter. "Carter, our guests are here."
"The protocols are in place, Sir," Carter replied. "Go ahead and show them in."
Jack had Teal'c take the nude aliens into the sealed room, while he and Daniel went and changed out of their suits. Fifteen minutes later, SG-1 was cleared to go in. Buffy and her two fellows were sitting on one side of the table they'd had set up. Buffy and the well-endowed boy were looking around curiously, while the red-head was sitting still with her eyes closed.
"Sorry for the wait," Daniel began. "Before we start, may we offer you clothing?"
Buffy and the boy shared a look.
"Sure," the boy said. "When in Rome, and all that."
Jack sent an airman for a few sets of BDUs.
"That's right," Daniel said. "You're from an alternate earth?"
"Well, technically only Xander and Willow are from Sol," Buffy said. "I was actually born in Procyon."
"You mean the star?" Carter asked. "The white binary system eleven light-years from Earth?"
"That's the one," Buffy confirmed.
"We haven't had an Air Force in millennia," the red-head said without opening her eyes. "But we know what it is, and we know you shouldn't have spaceships in the twentieth century."
"What year is it, in your universe?" Carter asked.
"5189, by your calendar," the red-head said, eyes still closed.
"Your Earth never encountered the Goa'uld?" Daniel asked.
Buffy's face scrunched up. "Goa'what?"
That was when the airman arrived with extra BDUs for their guests. The red-head finally came out of her trance or whatever, revealing startlingly green eyes. Buffy held her BDUs up at arms length in obvious distaste, before shrugging and pulling them on.
Once they were dressed, the boy clapped his hands together. "So, first things first. How about some introductions?"
"Of course," Daniel agreed. "I am Doctor Daniel Jackson, archaeologist and linguist. This is Colonel Jack O'Neill, the leader of our team. Major Samantha Carter, astrophysicist. And that is Teal'c, jaffa warrior and freedom fighter. Together, we're SG-1, and this is the Prometheus."
"Cool," the boy said. "I'm Xander Reon. I'm not much with the titles."
"I'm Buffy Reaval. My specialty is ass-kicking," Buffy said cheerily.
"My name is Willow Rin," the red-head said. "I was a researcher, and a teacher. I guess now I'll be a starship brain. Our race is called the Fae, and right now you're parked on the hull of the generation ship, Eliezera."
Jack raised an eyebrow at Buffy's so-called specialty. She didn't look like she could take Cassie Fraiser in a fight. and barely looked older than her, too. He hadn't noticed before, because her body was very obviously developed, not to mention the surrealness of her being out in space like that, but in the oversized BDUs she looked like barely more than a child. They all did.
"Aren't you all a little young to have your own big honkin' spaceship?" Jack found himself asking.
Willow smiled mysteriously. "I'm six-hundred seventy-four, Colonel O'Neill."
Xander put up a hand. "Two-hundred thirteen."
"Forty-seven," Buffy said sheepishly.
"You're kidding me," Jack said.
"We know it's possible for sufficiently advanced medical technology to rejuvenate aged human tissue, Sir," Carter said. "Maybe they have something like a sarcophagus, only they've solved the side effects."
But Willow shook her head. "We're not dependent on anything so crude as an external treatment, Major Carter. Fae simply do not age. Nor do we starve, or thirst, or as you've seen, suffocate."
"I find it interesting that you call yourselves 'fae'," Daniel commented. "Where did that name come from? Is it your nation?"
"It is our species," Willow told them. "The name was really a bit of whimsy, in the beginning. We are the race Forever After Earth. F-A-E. Fae. Humanity needed a new name, after we threw out the grossly inefficient and dangerously flawed biology that evolution created and started from scratch, building bodies worthy of the conscious minds they housed."
"Of course!" Carter blurted in realization. "It's bio-engineering. It's all bio-engineering, but at a level we've never even imagined."
"Molecular engineering, actually," Willow corrected. "Ooh! Ooh! I got it!"
"Got what?" Jack asked suspiciously.
"I just figured out how the Eliezera's navigation systems works," Willow said excitedly. "Give me a sec to reconfigure the thrust envelope, so's I don't rip your ship apart when I turn on the stardrive, and I'll park us at the Lunar L2."
"We appreciate that," Jack said dryly as Willow closed her eyes and went still.
"You're in mental contact with your ship?" Carter asked the other two.
"Sort of," Xander said. "It's more like having a high-bandwidth internet connection in our heads, but the interface is seamless and instinctual, just like the rest of our biology. We call it the Dreamlink."
"I thought you said you couldn't move your ship because it was damaged," Jack reminded them.
"It is," Buffy said flatly. "Our ship's supposed to be controlled by a Giaa, but the Eliezera's was destroyed when we came here."
"Imagine our ship was a person in a vegetative state," Willow said distantly. "What I'm doing would be like trying to make that person perform a complicated task by puppeteering them but only being able to make them move one or two muscles at a time."
"A Giaa is an AI?" Carter asked.
"After a fashion," Willow said distractedly.
"Ah, are you sure you've got a handle on this?" Daniel asked nervously.
"If it was anyone but Willow, I'd be worried," Xander said with smug pride.
Jack smiled inwardly. "Relax Danny-boy. I'm sure Cauldwell will start hollering if Willow hits a mailbox."
Buffy snorted. "So what's the deal with these Gaga-Olds you were talking about?"
Daniel winced. "Goa'uld. And they're a race of evil parasitic body-snatchers, who rule like warlords over a large percentage of the galaxy. They call themselves gods..."
One long explanation later, and Xander only had one question. "Hyperdrive actually works in this universe? Awesome!"
Seeing an opening, Carter pounced. "Clearly, we both have technology the other is interested in. Would you be interesting in making a few trades?"
"Ah, we're not going to say no," Xander hedged, "but we don't really know what we can offer you yet, or what we can and can't do with anything you give us. We're effectively crippled without our Giaa, and we're going to need time to learn to function without one. And as amazing as Willow is, she can't ever really replace a Giaa."
"I see," Carter said, disappointed.
"Is there anything we could offer you that you're in need of right now, in exchange for a promise that the Eliezera will aid Earth in the event of hostile alien action?" Daniel asked.
"Of course we'll protect the Earth!" Buffy blurted. "Right guys?"
Xander and Willow nodded.
"We're stranded here," Xander said. "If I understand how we got here, this isn't even our multiverse, let alone our universe, and there's no way to go back. So, your Earth is it, for us."
Daniel nodded. "Thank you. I'm sure a lot of our people will be glad to hear that."
"If that's true, how did you come to be here?" Carter asked curiously.
Willow opened her eyes an let out a little, "Whew."
"Welcome back, Wills," Xander said with a smirk. "We parked?"
"Yup!" she chirped. "To answer your question, Major Carter, we aren't sure of the exact chain of events, but as near as we can tell, we were magically summoned."
Cater blinked. "What do you mean by 'magically'?"
"I mean, something caused the magic of this universe to reach out, find us in our universe, and edit us into being in this universe," Willow said.
"You seriously think it was magic?" Carter asked doubtfully.
Willow expression turned incredulous. "Didn't you say you'd already studied genuine psionic phenomena? You have spaceships that violate conservation of momentum and temporal causality. How can you doubt the existence of magic?"
Carter sighed. "These things all function due to replicable scientific principles. Some of your technology would undoubtedly seem like magic even to some modern humans, but just because we don't understand something doesn't make it magic."
Willow rolled her eyes. "Well, d'oy. What makes it magic is that those principles you mention cannot be reduced to the quantum math. They are special-case rules imposed on this multiverse externally. You don't have a forcefield generator in your brain, so if you move something with telekinesis, it's because the universe is editing kinetic energy into existence in exception to the natural progression of the quantum math."
"That's a limited view," Carter insisted. "There is more than one fundamental physical equation, each a component of the panspacial whole, interacting through measurable rules."
"You just described irreducible physical laws bound by bridging laws," Willow rejoined. "That is a fallacy unless you're explicitly postulating magic. My old universe has the same fundamental physics that yours does, and yet in my universe hyperspace doesn't exist. It was... tacked on, to your universe. That makes it magic."
"But we can travel hyperspace through well-understood, completely physical means," Carter shot back.
"Sufficiently analyzed magic is still magic, Major Carter," Willow said sagely. "Mistaking magic for technology is no less a scientific sin than mistaking technology for magic."
"Is anyone else getting a headache?" Buffy cut in. Willow pouted at her.
"Oh yeah," Jack sighed. "They might as well be arguing about whether a tree makes a sound if it falls in an empty forest. Carter, you can argue semantics later."
"Yes Sir," Carter grumbled.
"Okay, so I can't actually get headaches," Buffy was saying. "It's a saying with words thing."
"Can we go back to you folks using your ship to defend the Earth?" Jack asked, sitting forward. "I wanna hear about your weapons. You wouldn't happen to have some big honkin' space guns?"
"Technically, our ship doesn't have any weapons," Xander said.
"No weapons?" Jack repeated.
Xander grinned. "No, but why would we need them? The Eliezera's stardrive can cut a planet in half if the thrust vectors are configured for it. A fully populated generation ship can accelerate at half a G, if it needs to. Do you think Gould shields can stand up to that kind of force?"
"Holy Hanna," Carter whispered.
"And, if the Goa'uld mostly use energy weapons, they can fire on the Eliezera all they want. All they'd be doing is giving us a power boost," Willow said.
Jack whistled. He'd pay good money to see that Fae ship slicing up a fleet of ha'taks. Especially if he got to gloat.
"Well, that went pretty well," Daniel commented, as SG-1 watched the three Fae walk out onto the Eliezera in nothing but their new BDUs, carrying an SGC subspace radio.
Buffy, Xander, and Willow walked a short ways, and then simply sank through the pearly hull like it was the surface of a particularly vicious pond.
"Well, I guess that answers how they get in and out of their ship," Carter said, wide-eyed.
"Alright, kids," Jack said, rocking back on his heels. "Time to report in."
"That went pretty well, right?" Buffy asked as they flew down a miles-long corridor the size of an eight-lane freeway, her hideous green jumpsuit flapping in the wind.
"I think they bought it," Xander said. "I'm still stuck on the part where there've been alien invasions and nobody noticed. I mean, people are used to ignoring vampires and stuff, 'cause they've always been around, but evil alien spaceships?"
"I should be able to set up a program to operate the radio they gave us," Willow changed the subject. "I'll need to write some code from scratch, but we'll be able to call them or answer their calls as long as the radio is on the Eliezera, no matter where we are."
"Good. 'Cause my mom has got to be freaking that I never came home last night," Buffy said.
"We could always land the shuttle in your backyard and tell your mom you were abducted by aliens," Xander suggested with a grin.
Buffy rolled her eyes. "Oh, yeah, I was abducted by aliens, and my best friends are pod people."
"Well, technically..." Willow started
"Nyah!" Buffy held up a hand. "I don't want to think about that."
They swooped into a turn and eventually arrived at the room they'd woken in. It was as good a place as any. Willow flew to one wall and made an anchor stand for the radio. Setting it securely in place, she sat in the air and closed her eyes.
Buffy fidgeted in her BDUs. As at odds with her normal way of thinking as it was, she still couldn't help feeling like she'd just rather be naked than wear the thing. But Willow hadn't found the synthesization algorithms yet, so it was all she had to wear home
Xander turned to her with a goofy grin. "So! Wanna have sex while we're waiting on Willow?"
Buffy stared. Buffy blinked. "Xander!"
"What?" Xander asked innocently.
"We are not having sex!" Buffy exclaimed.
"And why not?" Xander questioned, folding his arms.
Buffy sputtered. "Because!"
"Because why?" Xander repeated.
Buffy's mouth worked soundlessly until she finally slumped and said, "Because I don't know if it's me or Lyn, that wants to. It feels like half my thoughts are hers, now. I'm afraid of what I might let myself do."
Xander floated towards her and pulled her into a hug. Buffy accepted it, trying hard to ignore how awkward and wrong it felt to have clothes between them.
"We really are Fae now," Xander murmured. "We've got to accept that, or we'll just drive ourselves crazy. I know you remember, just like I do. You don't need to be afraid. You can let go."
Buffy pushed him away. "I can't. I'm not even sure what's me and what's not, right now. I need to process."
Xander looked at her sadly. "What is so terrible about turning to your friends for comfort and release?"
"I don't want to talk about this anymore, Xander," Buffy said firmly. "I'm going to go wait with the shuttle."
Buffy backflipped and flew off into the ship. Xander watched her go and sighed.
"Don't worry, Xander," Willow said softly. "I'll work on her. She'll come around."
A phone rang, and was picked up. "Yes?"
"What have you found out?" came the voice of Vice President Kinsey.
"SG-1 claims to have made peaceful contact with the alien ship. They brought three aliens on board the Prometheus, talked for time, and then released the aliens."
"Of course they did," Kinsey snarled. "Acquisitions?"
"None, sir. Only a promise to combat any hostile Goa'uld ships that enter our space."
"Well, I suppose that's something," Kinsey grumbled.
"There's more. Our asset tracked a small object leaving the alien ship. It made landfall in California thirty minutes ago. The SGC do not seem to be aware of this."
Kinsey swore colorfully.
"Shall I mobilize a squad?"
"ASAP," Kinsey ordered. "The SGC's let a foothold situation slip through their fingers. These aliens have landed potential infiltrators on American soil. This is our chance to show the SGC for the fools they are."
"I'll see it gets done."