Du'kar Compound
Nuvia City, Risa
2400 hours
It was one heck of a good time they were having. That idea Travis had of crashing the party and showing their client how amazing they would be in social situations…how sophisticated and refined and culturally adaptable…that had been the best idea ever!
The invitation got them all in the door and Boskin had been surprised, even delighted to find them there.
A little irritable for a while once he figured out they'd used someone else's invitation to get in the door…but that passed once Trip and Travis turned on the charm a bit. That was really their job, after all.
Malcolm and Loya mostly shot people. Hoshi interpreted and provided cultural insights. T'Pol…was T'Pol.
Travis flew the ship and he kept it running, but both of them usually worked together to keep people comfortable until business was successfully concluded.
Or Malcolm and Loya shot them. Whichever.
By the time they were done, Boskin had even introduced them to a few people and T'Pol had taken the opportunity to catch a few names. People she could make a professional pass at later. New contacts and potential clients, that sort of thing.
They got to see an actual Orion wedding reception, too. Even if it was kind of a weird amalgam of Orion, native Risian and even a little Human. A sort of cultural mishmash going on here. The Orions were pretty culturally adaptable too, it turns out. And it made sense from a business perspective, since they were on based here on Risa. Orions were all about the business, after all.
Loya found a nice wedding ring somewhere and Trip had been concerned at first, since she might have somehow got that off the bride or the groom…it was a wedding reception here, of course. Turns out not, but he didn't get the chance to find out where she got it from...
Because he had the most amazing idea ever! He'd teach Loya all about Human customs when it came to that kinda thing. Human marriage and weddings and things like that. Maybe she'd like the idea and pick up on it…maybe even marry Malcolm!
That'd be great! What a great idea he was having! He could play matchmaker here…or kinda…they were sort of already matched but…if they got married, because of him? That'd be great!
It took a bit of work to get a few concepts across. And she balked at the idea of only having one man…ever…that she couldn't even trade in for another, better one later on.
She didn't like that part so much, not one little bit.
But the other half of that…how she wouldn't have to worry about Malcolm wandering off. She'd liked that part a lot. Worse case scenario being that he might fool around a little here and there maybe, and even then she could just kill whoever he screwed around on her with.
So, yeah. She really liked the idea. Wanted to talk about that some more later, when they had the time. So he held on to the ring for her when she asked him to, in case she needed that later.
They stayed around, chatting everyone up. Made a few new friends, experienced some new culture, learned what an Orion 'love song' was.
That's when the matriarch decided somebody needed to be made an example of. So she seduced him, got him in the sack, screwed his brains out and pheromoned him to bits. Got him so tanked up on that stuff that killing himself in some insanely dramatic, extremely painful and very, very messy manner seemed like just the perfect, most impossibly romantic way to profess his immortal love for you.
That had happened to Okrish's friend, Tomec, a couple of weeks ago. The guy had stood right over there, where that stain on the floor was. Skinned himself alive with a dull knife until he passed out and bleed to death, just because Boskin's wife decided he might be skimming off the top.
Trip had to admit, that was probably a pretty effective deterrent. He'd heard the Yakuza back on Earth would have you cut off a finger if you screwed up, so he mentioned that. The Orions thought that was just hilarious.
He drank a lot of wine, though. Not so much that he got drunk or anything, since he was technically in charge of schmoozing people around here. But enough to be sociable and enough, more to the point, that he had to go find a bathroom.
He couldn't find one at first, so he figured that might be one of those cultural things. Maybe Orion bathrooms didn't look like bathrooms, so he hadn't recognized it wandering around looking for it.
T'Pol must have picked up on his distress or something, because she popped up all of a sudden, abandoning all the fun she was having making new contacts to come help him.
It was a big house. They got a little lost. But they managed to find the main bedroom of the place, so of course it had its own little bathroom attached. Pretty standard stuff in there. It even flushed about the way you'd expect it to.
Everything in there was made of gold or colored marble, though. Lots of mirrors too, on just about every surface that would support one…which was a little weird.
T'Pol waited in the bedroom outside for him to get finished, to go and rejoin the party with him.
And when he did and he came back out again…
She was just staring at the chair there by the door. Which was weird, too. So he figured he'd better remind her…
"Okay, let's go have some fun!" He said brightly. Because that'd snap her out of it and…well, then they'd go have some fun!
She didn't seem to snap out of it, though. She just looked over at him, with a curious eyebrow…
"What?" He asked.
"I have had a very intriguing idea." T'Pol said, evenly. "I think I will do it."
That gave him cause to pause. They'd all been having ideas all day, every one of them. Really great ideas that caused a whole lot of trouble and were fun and exciting…
So, great! That sounded just great!
"Okay!" He said, brightly. "What?"
"Sit there." She said, pointing at the chair.
So he went right on over and did that. Smiling up at her where she stood over him. Waiting for the great idea they were having here to present itself.
She considered him for a moment, looking down at him.
"There are rules." She said.
"Okay." Trip grinned.
"You must keep your hands on the armrests of the chair." She said. "You are not allowed to raise them from there. If you do…"
She paused.
"Raise one hand, so that I may demonstrate."
He raised a hand up eagerly, completely onboard with whatever she was…
She smacked the living hell out of his hand. Really hard, without even hauling back to do it. Just reaching out and swatting at it like probably only a Vulcan could do…
"Ow!" He said, unhappily. "What was that for?"
"To demonstrate." She explained. "That is what will happen…"
"Okay, jeez! That hurt!"
"Then do not raise your hands from the armrests."
"Okay, I won't." He groused, frowning.
"Additionally, you are not allowed to speak." She continued. "If you do…"
She paused again.
"Speak now, so that I may demonstrate."
Trip frowned. Because no, he wasn't going to do that. He'd learned his lesson already.
"No way." He said, firmly.
She smacked him on top of the head. Just a rough little pat on the head…but she was Vulcan. So it hurt.
"Ow! Damn, T'Pol…!"
She smacked him again, giving him the eyebrow now.
"I just…!"
Smack. The eyebrow a little higher.
"Okay!"
Smack. Again.
He grit his teeth and shut up. And snatched the hand that had wandered away from the armrest in protest right back down there before she noticed it.
She eyed him narrowly for a moment, ready to detect any further deviation from the established rules.
Then nodded.
"Continue in this manner until I release you." She said.
And she turned around, putting her back to him like she forgot he was there already. Reaching up to shrug her jacket off her shoulders…and suddenly stopping there. With her jacket just off her shoulders, resting on her arms still, with her back to him.
Shoulders exposed and the sleeveless shirt she wore underneath just putting them right out there…
Which…okay, so?
She looked back over one of those shoulders at him then. Looking him right in the eye. Kind of…well, he'd call it sultry but…T'Pol wasn't exactly the sultry sort…
She let that Vulcan Guard jacket…the very symbol of the extremely rigid, perfectly precise Vulcan ex-military officer that was T'Pol…slide slowly down her arms, until it fell in a puddle on the floor at her feet.
And that was the sexiest damned thing he'd ever seen in his whole entire life.
He actually breathed out audibly, taking the first steps in verbally communicating that fact. But then he remembered the rules here. So he just let himself huff appreciatively and left it at that.
Then she kind of glided into a turn, until she was sideways to him, looking down at him over one of those very nice shoulders he suddenly had a lot more appreciation for. Using every inch of her body to emphasize every single aspect of that turn.
All the way on around, taking his breath away more and more…until she was finally facing him again.
And, yeah. Breathless here. Panting just a bit.
Because, damn. Where was all this coming from?
And where could he buy tickets to go visit that place? Sound like a great place to vacation. To hell with Risa.
She held her hands out to touch his face…and he suddenly remembered the neuropressure exercises during all those really great mating rituals they'd done for all those months.
He really missed those, actually. They hadn't done anything like that since the bond happened. In fact…they hadn't really done much of anything since the bond.
He'd started kinda wondering what was the point of the thing if all the fun stuff was just what led up to it. Hardly felt like there were dating anymore since then…which…well, probably because they were technically married now…
So, yeah. He was real eager to do that neuropressure thing again. That was a great idea!
What a great idea T'Pol had here!
It's just…she didn't touch his face. Or any of the nodes on his neck or shoulders. Or any of the other place her hands were hovering around, just shy of actually touching.
She was looking him right in the eye, though. And that…was…
God, she was beautiful. He could stare at her for hours…except her hands were really getting distracting.
Because she wasn't actually touching him. Just…a hair from touching him. And every nerve in his body was starting to really get on board with the idea of doing that touching thing. Linking up with her nervous system, using the bond to mix things up a bit.
That was incredibly intimate. Indescribably intimate. And he really missed it.
Her hands flowed gracefully…and very, very slowly…along his neck and shoulders, back around again up to his face…really slowly…and his whole body was starting to thrum from all that…
He could feel her almost touching him. Hyper-aware now…his nervous system and his own mind reaching out desperately, beyond their mere physical reach…
And…wow.
He was really starting to get a little desperately turned on here, to be perfectly honest.
She kept just barely brushing a hair here and there. On his arms, when she let her hands flow around up and down the length of them. Just a bare, almost undetectable brush at the jaw or catching a stray hair on his chest…
Never any actual connection that their minds could bridge the gap across, though. Almost but not quite ever actually connecting.
It was maddening.
And amazing.
He could feel…whatever that was that linked their minds together when they touched…almost feel it extending out into the air, trying desperately to connect…
And…it did a little. He could sense things, in a vague kind of way. Or maybe he was just imagining, as it had grown just that desperate.
He got smacked a couple of times, when one hand or the other floated up of its own accord. And even that he didn't mind. Because there was the very brief moment of almost connecting when she smacked his hand…
Something nudged him. And he looked up again, right into her eyes…
Her eyes were on fire.
He knew right then. Before she even touched him, he knew. And when she finally did, letting her hands brush against his hair on the way down…sliding perfectly into place against the contact points on his face…
Oh, yeah. He knew.
And his hands were already up, sliding right into place themselves.
Completely against the rules, of course. But she broke that rule first, because that game was already over.
She was there, he could feel her perfectly. She was stoked, ready to be lit. That one touch, that one brief connection being all that was required to set them both ablaze.
There was a bed right there, not a step and a half behind her. And she'd been putting this off for a while now, he knew then, worried about what it would do to their bond. Worried that he wouldn't be ready for that. That he might withdraw and pull against the bond that would bind them all the more tightly to one another then...
But she'd had an amazing idea tonight. An idea how to make her Human mate a little more comfortable with things, by illustrating one particular benefit that bond offered.
Best. Idea. Ever.
After about thirty minutes or so, they were laying there panting. Completely buck naked, every nerve in their bodies having just exploded all over the place…and a few other explosions having gone on no less dramatic than that…
Took a minute before he could speak, though.
"Vulcan…lap dance, huh?" He panted, grinning.
"Yes." She breathed, heavily. Her face at his neck, body just collapsed all over him. "That was…very intense."
He chuckled.
Yeah. Understatement.
"My turn…next time." He panted.
"That would be…agreeable." She said. Agreeably.
The sounds happening outside the door, though…and the sounds happening in the doorway…
They had to pay attention to that after a minute. Because, yeah, they had gotten pretty loud there at the end a few times.
Boskin Du'kar was very understanding, of course. Finding them laid out, buck naked in his bed that way…having mussed the sheets and all.
Very understanding. He hadn't had them set on fire in the middle of the dining hall or anything, like he otherwise would have.
Had to kick them all out, though. Get them dressed, get them out of there and kicked them the hell off his property. Before his wife found out what happened, because people would be singing Orion love songs all night around here and no one would get any sleep and there'd be such a mess to clean up…
He was a pretty understanding guy, that Boskin. Trip decided he kinda liked him and hoped he never had to get set on fire by him.
He had to grab T'Pol and kinda drag her out of there, though. Because she'd been so sexed out of her mind that she got dressed in the wrong order. Had her shirt inside out and forgot to put her underwear back on. And she wanted to argue with Boskin about being given another minute to put all that right before stepping back out of the room again. Because that'd be inappropriate.
He barely managed to convince her to just switch her shirt inside out in the hallway real quick. And just shove her underwear in her jacket pocket for now.
Because singing Orion love songs and being set on fire…that didn't seem like any kind of fun.