If you have been brutally broken, but still have the courage to be gentle to others then you deserve a love deeper than the ocean itself. – Nikita Gill
Inamorata – A woman with whom one is in love or has intimate relations; a female lover (Italian)
Nángùn – (南棍) literally, a 'southern staff', polished, two-meter long white wax wooden staff
NDA – Non-Disclosure Agreement, signed by Yuán and Traynor at termination of the Ø7 program
SDU – Standard Duty Uniform
VI – Virtual Intelligence
XO – Executive Officer
• CRUISER SSV TOKYO · 2 KILOMETERS FROM ARCTURUS STATION •
Staff Lieutenant Yuán Xiùlán had somehow managed to get back to the Tokyo after attempting to speak with her Inamorata at her residence within the Arcturus shipyard. Yuán actually didn't remember the shuttle ride back to the ship, and since she was supposed to be on leave, she managed to walk—seemingly in a daze—to her quarters, without speaking to anyone. Once in her suite, she went straight to her bunk; after pulling her boots off, she curled into a fetal position on top of the blankets and coverlet, her back to the open area of the compartment, and stayed in that position until Olivia McKenzie disturbed her nearly ninety minutes later.
After reluctantly—and tearfully—telling her friend and roommate what had transpired at the shipyard, she had retaken her position facing the bulkhead as she embraced her lower legs with her knees under her chin. Despite the aching hurt to her insides, Xiùlán finally managed to drift into a sleep, troubled by dreams of a Samantha Traynor she had never known.
Xiùlán awakened slowly, grudgingly; she didn't want to move from her position, but it became increasingly obvious she needed to empty her bladder. Reluctantly straightening her long legs, she discovered she was covered by a blanket. Kenzie, came the thought. Had to be her. Swinging her legs over the edge to place her feet on the deck, she sat for a few moments, getting her bearings in the darkened compartment. As she was getting ready to stand, her omnitool lit up, its eerie purple glow—most omnitools glowed in shades of orange—casting strange shadows in the room.
She rubbed her eyes for a moment, then walked to the hatch; from there, it was a short trip down the passageway to the woman's head. Once inside, she utilized the red lighting of the middle watch to find her way to the toilet; when she was done, she washed her hands before heading back to her bunk.
As quiet as she had been, she had disturbed Olivia, who rose slightly to lean on one elbow and ask, "Everything okay, Yuán?"
Smiling at Olivia's concern, she sat in the middle of her mattress, where she folded and crossed her legs beneath her and replied in a quiet voice, "No, but I think I can survive."
McKenzie was quickly out of her own bunk and came over to stand in front of her despondent friend. "I'm so sorry for your pain, Xiùlán. I wish there was something more I could do for you." She instantly regretted her choice of words as Xiùlán asked in a voice tinged with suspicion, "Why, what have you done already?"
McKenzie turned and sat on the foot of the bed beside Xiùlán. "You should probably check your messages, Lieutenant. I think your omnitool coming to life as you left to go to the head is what woke me up."
Xiùlán was instantly apologetic. "Oh, Kenzie … I am so sorry. I was trying to be quiet."
"Don't worry about it. Just … check your messages so we can get back to sleep." Thinking, I am not going to tell you what I already did unless it becomes necessary, she drew one foot up to place alongside her other leg while she looked expectantly at her roommate.
"Oh, I don't know, Olivia … it's probably just a class schedule change. It'll certainly keep for the rest of the night."
Thinking, Dammit! Stop being so stubborn, McKenzie said in a quiet voice, "I'd prefer that you open that message now, Lieutenant. That purple glow every 15 minutes is hard to disregard."
Xiùlán could see there was no hope of ignoring Olivia, as much as she wanted to just crawl back into her shell of misery. Activating her omnitool, she looked at the sender information and gasped. "Sammy?" Opening the message, she read it in silence, the doubts and unhappiness in her expression at, "Xiùlán: I have acted like a bloody fool …" rapidly giving way to cheerful hope as she finished with, "I'll wait to hear back from you. 沒有你的愛我的生活是不完整的! You have my heart, my love." She reread the message twice more, savoring each word as it were a precious, life-saving elixir. She looked at Olivia, still sitting beside her on her bed, watching patiently and waiting expectantly.
"She wants to talk to me, Kenzie," Yuán cried in an excited voice. "She apologized to me, told me she still loves me!" Xiùlán started to weep, her shoulders shuddering as she gasped, "My God, Kenzie!" In a voice now hitching as she sobbed with happiness, she said, "I have to call her right now!"
Xiùlán started to get off the bed, only to have a pair of arms reach around her, gentle hands grasping the side of her ribcage. "Whoa there, Lieutenant. Stop right there!" Olivia knew Xiùlán was more than strong enough to overpower her, immobilize her in any number of ways, but she didn't believe she had anything to fear from this woman. "Hear me out, Xiùlán, before you run to that comms unit or reply to that text … Please?"
After glancing down at Olivia's arm across her chest, Yuán looked at her roommate with a mixture of incredulity and upset, marveling at her boldness. "Okay, Lieutenant … you have my attention. What do you need me to know?"
McKenzie released her grip on Xiùlán's side and withdrew her arms, embarrassed to realize her right arm had been hard against Xiùlán's breasts. With a suddenly sheepish look on her face, she admitted quietly, "Okay … it's said confession is good for the soul, and I have something to confess to you. I was going to tell you in the morning, but … here we are now, and you've seen Traynor's message." Olivia reached for and took Xiùlán's right hand as she continued in a rueful voice, "After you told me how Traynor had acted when you went to see her, I was so pissed off for you I could hardly see straight. So I called her, Xiùlán … on the comms unit. I called her … and I read her the riot act."
Xiùlán's mouth fell. "Kenzie, my God, what did you say to her?" She looked at her omnitool, a hint of distrust now in her eyes.
McKenzie saw the look and said, "That message came within an hour of my hollering at her … I didn't see what it said, but I believe you should take it at face value. I think I probably scared the living hell out of her, Xiùlán, and whatever she wrote to you, whatever she said in that text? It's the truth, of that I have no doubt."
Xiùlán stared at her roommate for several seconds before she found her voice again. "Okay, you think I should wait to call her?"
"Absolutely. Call her at 0630, when you normally get up. Tell her the truth … you cried yourself to sleep. After the tongue-lashing I gave her, she'll be convinced I was acting without your knowledge … which I was, but if you call her right now, she may think you persuaded me to call her and chew her out. You're my friend, Xiùlán … I consider you my sister, and sisters don't allow other people to be mean to their own."
Olivia watched and waited to see what Yuán would do next. Surprisingly, she had calmed down completely. Using the hand she was holding, Xiùlán pulled them together slightly, reached in and kissed her forehead. "Thank you, Kenzie … for standing up for me. I had totally given up … didn't have a clue how I was going to live without Sà mi in my life. Thank you." Looking at the chrono on the desk, she said, "Better get back to bed, see if we can get some sleep."
Olivia got to her feet and crawled back into her own bed. "Good night, Lieutenant."
"It will be now, Kenzie, thanks to you."
• ARCTURUS STATION AND SHIPYARD · AT LARGE •
Samantha Traynor had delayed leaving her quarters until she had barely enough time to reach the yard and begin her shift, and still there was no word from Xiùlán. Sammy wasn't too concerned—yet. She was aware that unplanned schedule changes affected all shipboard personnel at times, with the least senior officers most likely to be affected.
She left her personal comms terminal in receive/record mode, so that any call sent there would be picked up with an automated invitation to leave a message. Traynor hated having to do that, but she had been called in to work a weekend shift; apparently, one of the contractors had accidentally severed a bundle of fiber communications cables, and Traynor was the only comms specialist available to make the repair. Her supervisor promised her some additional time off to make up for the missed weekend, a promise Traynor assured him she would hold him to. She knew the Tokyo would only be in system for a limited time, but still hoped Xiùlán would contact her – she simply had to apologize for being so insufferable, before the cruiser went out on its next assignment.
As she toiled over a large bundle of hair-thin cables, laboriously tracing the cut ends to their terminals, then testing each one for continuity after making the repair, she thought about her time in the Terminus, when working with Xiùlán meant she had someone constantly watching her back. Thinking about the woman's total selflessness brought additional moisture to Sammy's eyes, something that really interfered with her ability to discern differences in fiber optics strands of similar diameter. Putting thoughts of the raven-haired beauty out of her mind, she swiped at her eyes and refocused on the task at hand. It wouldn't do anyone any good to have even one pair of these minute cables crossed during the repair.
Taking a quick look at her chrono, she was surprised to learn it was barely 0945 … Looks like it's gonna be a long day, came the unhappy thought.
• SSV TOKYO · 2 KILOMETERS FROM ARCTURUS STATION •
As she was technically still on leave, Xiùlán had slept in for an additional half-hour; upon waking and looking at her chrono, she thought that Sammy might still be in her quarters, as it was supposed to be her day off. After rereading the message Sammy had sent to her omnitool, Xiùlán moved to the day room, where she sat in front of the comms unit; activating the device, she entered Traynor's comms address and waited for the unit to connect. After several moments, the device in Sammy's quarters replied with an automated response that was obviously intended for Xiùlán, apologizing for not being available, explaining that the specialist had been called in for an extra shift, would return at her normal time and to please leave a message.
Xiùlán's message couldn't include everything she wished to say—not in the brief amount of time allowed by the comms unit—so she simply expressed her profound regret at not being more supportive of Sà mi during her original call, and finished by saying she still loved her … deeply, and hoped they could get together later in the day.
A bit frustrated at not being able to speak with her Inamorata, she went back to her sleeping quarters, there to make up her rack, after which she pulled on her exercise clothes, grabbed her nángùn and headed for the smaller of the two martial arts areas adjacent to the large gym.
Once inside, she accessed the environmental controls—as Sà mi had taught her—in order to change the artificial gravity on the exercise floor from .95 G to 1.25 G. Working out at a higher gravity than Earth-normal insured that her body would be subjected to a more intense workout than would ordinarily be possible. Before beginning the intense exercises, she cleared her mind of all thought, including her troubles with Sammy, and went through her daily exercise routine, a form of Tai Chi called Neigong.
Upon completing the quiet, contemplative moves—which served to stretch and limber up all the muscles in her body—she energetically powered through the routine movements of Wushu Nángùn three times, with a five minute break between each set, followed by a cooldown repetition of her Neigong routine.
She had been on the exercise mat for an hour and was soaked in sweat, with loose strands of hair plastered to her face. Upon returning to her compartment, she sat at the comms unit and placed another call to Sammy's apartment, even though she knew the specialist would still be at work, she was still disappointed to have it answered with the message saying she had been called in to work. Xiùlán left another message, again conveying regret at not being able to speak to her and finishing with a promise to try again in the evening. After closing the connection, she opened her omnitool and sent a text message in response to the one Traynor had sent the previous evening, expressing how happy Sà mi's message had made her and saying that she still had a bit of time off if Sammy wanted her to visit.
She gathered up her toiletries, slipped on a pair of shower sandals and took the short walk to the woman's head, there to take a nice, soothing shower. Returning to her compartment afterwards, she dressed in casual, off-duty clothes, finished drying and combing her long hair, then walked to the junior officer's mess hall for a late breakfast. She looked around the compartment for McKenzie; Xiùlán hadn't really expected to see her, guessing her friend was already at work on one of the lower decks.
She finished her second mug of tea after downing a plate full of pancakes with eggs; the dish was similar to what she might have had in her native Shanghai, with a fried egg on top of a thin, quickly-cooked pancake, which was then wrapped around a deep-fried crispy dough slice. She had added some finely chopped onions with grated cheddar cheese on top of the egg, making it even more like a dish from her distant home.
As it was late mid-morning when she left the officer's mess, Xiùlán decided to use her free time to study for the upcoming astro-navigation exam; she would attempt to call Sammy later—perhaps catch her during her lunchtime. She still hoped to see her tonight in her residence.
Xiùlán had spent the rest of the morning and a bit of the early afternoon studying; she had tried calling Sammy again at 1245 without success, so had left another message. It was frustrating to be so close to her lover and still be separated by their career choices. She had entered into her relationship with Traynor with her eyes wide open, realizing from the very first time she'd declared her love for the specialist that they would most likely be apart more than together; still, she had expected that she'd be able to take her few days off in the Arcturus system so they could have some alone time.
Returning from the mess hall after a light mid-afternoon lunch, Xiùlán was taken completely off guard by the chimes sounding general quarters; as she was still effectively on leave so didn't have to be at a duty station, she continued on to her quarters as people ran by her in both directions.
Upon entering her shared 'dayroom', she heard the tail end of a general information announcement—something about an immediate deployment. Activating her comms terminal, she played the entire message. The Tokyo and its accompanying frigates were being sent to the Iera system in response to yet another pirate attack on the colony world of Horizon. When she heard the words '… all leaves are hereby canceled,' she quickly went back to her quarters and began changing out of her casual clothing. As she was pulling on the pants of her SDU, McKenzie burst into the compartment at a dead run, drawing up in surprise upon seeing Xiùlán still on board the ship.
"My God, Xiùlán! I thought you'd be ashore! Captain's recalled everyone—cancelled all leaves! We'll hit the relay just as soon as everyone's aboard."
"So I heard! I have to get a message to Sammy, let her know I won't …"
"Comms blackout's in effect, Yuán … not even any texts. Captain seems worried any comms leaving the ship might be intercepted. I'm sorry!" Olivia placed a hand on her roommate's upper arm. "Traynor will have to learn of this from her co-workers. She'll understand, Xiùlán."
Xiùlán's expression revealed the doubt she was feeling. "I called her on comms, Kenzie. Had to leave a message—three of them, in fact. She's not in her quarters … got called in to work an extra shift. Damn! I hope she realizes I'm a victim of those pirates as much as the colonists on Horizon."
"It's all going to work out, Xiùlán … we'll go to Iera, kick some batarian ass and get back in time for dinner."
A wane smile was all Yuán could manage. "Hope you're right, Kenzie. I was really looking forward to some cuddle time with Sà mi tonight." Shaking her head as she looked down at the deck, she muttered, "Qīcan dì haidào húndàn! [淒慘的海盜混蛋！– Miserable pirate bastard(s)!]
• ARCTURUS SHIPYARD · SPECIALIST TRAYNOR'S RESIDENCE •
It was nearly 1900 when Traynor finally managed to drag her tired body back to her quarters. The first thing she inspected upon entering and closing the hatch was her comms terminal. Three messages from Xiùlán, she noted. Her stomach instantly began to hurt and her heart seemed ready to burst through her ribs. What if she doesn't love me anymore? came the nervous thought. How am I going to live with what I've done to her? She anxiously played the first message, only relaxing slightly when she heard Xiùlán's voice telling her how glad she had been to learn that Sammy still loved her; the second one, coming in after her breakfast, expressed regret at not being able to speak with Sam before finishing with a passionate expression of her love for the specialist. Xiùlán's third message spoke of looking forward to possibly seeing her in her quarters tonight. Damn, she thought. Tired as I am right now, the only thing I'll be doing tonight is sleeping. Sammy quickly composed a reply to the last message. After making sure it had a delivery request embedded in the header, she pressed SEND.
Moving into the small kitchen, she pulled a frozen dinner from the freezer and placed it in the reheater. While her meal was being thawed and heated, she heard a chime from the comms unit indicating an incoming message. The instant happiness she enjoyed at the sound was all too brief; the reply was from the comms system itself, advising that the Tokyo was currently out of range, and the message would remain in the queue for delivery at the next available opportunity.
What the bloody 'ell? The ship was literally right outside my window! She pulled her dinner from the small oven and gingerly uncovered the reconstituted meat and potatoes as she thought about the Tokyo. Damned ship must have been ordered to another system … no time for any notifications … or … she had gone silent before hittin' the relay.
Deciding to send a text from her omnitool, she drafted a short message — Looking forward to seeing you when your return. — placed a receipt confirmation request in the header and pressed send. Within half-a-minute, she received the same denial of delivery message as had been sent to her comms unit. Thinking, Why in 'ell didn't she send a note? Rapid deployments aren't usually that much of a secret … unless a colony is being attacked. Shit! I need to find someone that can tell me what happened. With this thought in mind, she finished her dinner, cleaned up the kitchen, then went to the bathroom, there to strip out of her clothes in order to take a relaxing shower. Feeling better once she was cleaned up and dressed, she decided to call her supervisor in order to ask about the Tokyo. She knew ship deployments were generally not discussed by dock workers, but she really needed to know what had happened to cause the small battle group to so abruptly, and quietly, leave the cluster.
• SSV TOKYO BATTLE GROUP · SHADOW SEA CLUSTER •
The SSV Tokyo, accompanied by four Alliance frigates, dropped out of FTL beside the massive relay; before their crews could secure from running FTL, all five ships were set upon by a massive bombardment from a large group of Thar'Van assault frigates that had taken up ideal positions to control the space around the relay. The Alliance frigates, being more maneuverable than the cruiser, made radical course changes in a vain attempt to avoid the weapons fire and multiple interceptors sent to attack them.
Two of the four frigates were quickly crippled, their main engines either critically damaged or destroyed in the lightning fast attack. While they could no longer jump to FTL, they used their maneuvering thrusters to good advantage, continuously repositioning themselves in order to bring their spinal mass accelerators to bear on the batarian assault frigates. As the remaining two Alliance frigates flew close to the Tokyo in an effort to eliminate some of the annoying interceptors harassing the larger ship, they themselves fell victim to the 150m auxiliary mass accelerators from two of the batarian vessels.
In less than a minute, the batarians had seriously damaged or crippled all four of the Tokyo's accompanying frigates, and had inflicted moderate damage to the cruiser as well. Despite several hull breaches in engineering and damage to one of her four main engines, the Tokyo managed to briefly jump to FTL, thus leaving the vicinity of the relay and the Iera system; as she left the system for the dark space between, her crew knew that any hope of immediate rescue from the Alliance was slim—the batarians had entered in force, and the only thing that would keep them from totally dominating the system was the lack of an orbital refueling station. The small Alliance battle group had been crippled; with the system's comms buoys destroyed, the batarians believed their victim's calls for help would go nowhere. If they were going to have any chance at surviving the encounter, the officers and crew of the Tokyo would have to somehow repair the damaged engines and get back into the system.
The batarians mistakenly believed destroying the comm buoys would keep the Alliance ships from calling for help, not realizing the Tokyo had been retrofitted with a QEC terminal; its counterpart inside Alliance Command on Arcturus Station had all the information regarding the batarians attack within minutes of the cruiser's escape from the Iera System, and had relayed the Tokyo's plight to the rest of the Fifth Fleet. The SSV Shenyang and the Perugia—along with their accompanying frigates—were being deployed from the Exodus Cluster and Local Cluster, respectively.
Captain Anderson warned Fleet headquarters to have all the ships arrive through the Iera Relay with their shields at maximum and their weapons hot, to which Fleet responded that one of the damaged frigates was still close enough to observe the batarian ships; they had withdrawn all but one of their assault frigates from the space around the relay, no doubt to continue their attack on the virtually defenseless colonies of Horizon.
Anderson reported he would reenter the system in a different quadrant and attempt to harass the batarians from long range while waiting for reinforcements; he would also provide assistance to the crews of the damaged frigates. Before signing off, he stated, "I intend to make the batarians pay for this—they need to learn that attacking our colonies is not something they can do with impunity."
Lieutenant Yuán had been assigned to lead Damage Control Team Charlie-two; their task was to extinguish the equipment fires in the engineering decks, along with disconnecting the various pieces of severely damaged apparatus from the power grid— a task made more difficult by the pitch-black conditions beyond the limited range of their enviro-suit mounted lamps and the light provided by their omnitools—within a number of equipment compartments in which they had to operate.
Yuán had been cautiously feeling her way along as she attempted to keep herself and her team-members safe; even with the lights inoperable, some of the machinery was still receiving power from the grid, making the danger of inadvertent electrocution by coming into physical contact with the wrong side of a high-voltage cable run quite real. As her team moved through the areas with the most damage, individuals entered the confined spaces of each equipment compartment on a rotating basis in order to keep everyone's fatigue level to a minimum. Considering the proximity of hot and even live parts, the relief she felt at reaching the end of their assigned area was evident in her voice as she reported to Commander Nolen. "DC team Charlie-two: 8-12-6-E12 through E27 is safe. Fires have been extinguished, emergency ventilation established, combustibles removed, damaged equipment disconnected and logged for repair or replacement. Moving down to 9-12-6-E – we should be meeting with DC team Charlie-three shortly."
"Belay that move, Charlie-two," came the reply. "I need your team on the starboard side, 8-12-5—the VI reports damaged equipment in several of the main and auxiliary machinery rooms and emergency generator rooms. Nothing on fire, but exercise caution on opening hatches over there—internal temps are high, so use suppressant as you open and enter."
"Acknowledged, Sir. Moving to 8-12-5." Yuán looked at her team members and said, "You heard the commander … we have some more compartments to inspect." She grabbed the straps of her back-mounted breathing apparatus, pulling them away from her shoulders as she bounced her torso up to resettle the pack, then began moving towards the starboard side of the deck. It was going to be a long night.
• ARCTURUS SHIPYARD · SPECIALIST TRAYNOR'S RESIDENCE •
Sammy had contacted a couple of members of her team to inquire about the Tokyo; before the night was over she had learned the ship had been deployed to deal with batarian slavers in the Iera system. What had been a real surprise was the news that reinforcements had been called up. Although she couldn't learn the names of the warships involved or from where they were coming, she could make an educated guess that the Navy would send a cruiser each from Exodus and Sol – these were the closest systems from which any meaningful backup could be deployed, and it was a straight run from Sol to Shadow Sea. A jump from Exodus would involve two additional relays, slowing the response from that system considerably. Still, two additional battle groups should be able to take care of whatever threat was posed by the batarians.
It worried her somewhat that the Tokyo had run into trouble severe enough to require backup. Traynor suspected Yuán's ship had been attacked and sustained damage as it exited the space-time corridor beside the Iera relay – she could only hope that whatever damages had been inflicted on the ship hadn't resulted in any major injuries or loss of life, whether on the cruiser or her accompanying frigates.
• ALLIANCE CRUISER SSV TOKYO · DOCKED, ARCTURUS SHIPYARD •
— TWENTY-EIGHT DAYS POST-DEPLOYMENT —
Lieutenant Yuán, along with a large number of crewmen from the Tokyo, left the numerous shuttles being employed to transport the ship's personnel to Arcturus Station for what was expected to be a two-week long liberty after enduring several damaging encounters with batarian slavers in and around the Iera relay and the colony world of Horizon.
She had been looking forward to spending her time off with Sammy—at least during the evenings when the specialist would be off work. As the comm buoys in Iera—destroyed by the batarians at the beginning of their all-out assaults on the colonies on Horizon— were still being replaced and tested, each of Traynor's daily messages to Xiùlán, having been held in a queue, had been delivered all at once within a few minutes of the Tokyo's arrival at the Arcturus relay.
Yuán had read them, one after the other, while lying in her bunk aboard the ship. Each one tore at her heart with lengthy apologies before lifting her spirits with declarations of renewed feelings of love and devotion. As the days had slowly drifted past, Sammy's apologies grew less heart-rending; she had managed to learn that none of the crew on the cruiser had been seriously injured or killed, so accepted that Xiùlán would receive her messages when the ship cleared the relay to return to Arcturus.
Once on the station, Xiùlán had gone to a public comms terminal in order to place a call to her Inamorata; she found it nearly impossible to keep her emotions in check when Traynor answered the call. "Sà mi! I have missed you terribly. Will it be alright … I mean, can I come over for a bit? I'm on leave while the ship is being repaired. I need …" Xiùlán's voice quit working as the tears, held in check ever since that awful night so long ago, began streaming down her cheeks. Embarrassed with her seeming lack of control, she dipped her head to look down while she struggled to rein in her emotions.
"Xiùlán? Of course you can come over. We need to have dinner together, just the two of us. I'll make a call … find a shuttle to bring you over. You can stay with me while you're off the ship." As Yuán looked up again, Sammy smiled and added, "Without your love my life is not complete, Xiùlán."
"Ni de ài shi wo de shēnghuó wánzhěngle, Sà mi!" [你的愛使我的生活完整了, 薩米 – Your love makes my life complete, Sami!] came the happy reply. "I can't wait to hug and kiss you," she finished in a shaky voice.
• ARCTURUS SHIPYARD · AT LARGE •
Xiùlán stepped out of the shuttle and looked around for a moment before spotting the only person in the galaxy that made her life complete. She trotted over to stand in front of Sammy; dropping her bags on the metal deck and grabbing the specialist around the waist in one fluid motion, she hoisted her up and swung her around in a circle before easing Sammy back to her feet in order to apply her mouth to a pair of eagerly waiting lips while reveling in the feel of a willing body molding itself to hers.
Breaking the kiss to breathe, Traynor whispered huskily, "Come on, Luv. Let's get back to my place so I can peel those clothes off of you."
• ARCTURUS SHIPYARD · SPECIALIST TRAYNOR'S RESIDENCE •
Samantha raised her head from the bare shoulder next to Xiùlán's neck; moving her left arm into an angled position of support, she placed her hand on the side of her head as she used a pair of fingers on her right to idly trace invisible patterns on and around the intensely aroused nipples on Xiùlán's breasts.
"Hhhmmm … feels good, Sà mi. I don't want you to stop."
"Don't intend to stop, Luv. I still feel awful about the way I treated you the last time you were here … and I know you said I was forgiven, but I …"
Xiùlán reached up to place a pair of fingers vertically across Traynor's lips. "We're good, Sà mi. You've mended my broken heart; I love you with every fiber of my being … always will, but … that being said, please … don't ever treat me that way again, okay? I couldn't bear to live through that misery a second time."
Sammy's eyes became glassy as she looked into the sable brown eyes regarding her. "I promise you, I will never break your heart again, my love. I'd sooner die than have to witness that level of hurt in your eyes." She leaned over slowly as the fingers across her lips slid slowly down her chin and throat to begin sketching patterns of their own on a pair of sweetly curved mounds; pausing with her mouth hovering above Xiùlán's, Sammy slowly dipped her tongue between the seam of Xiùlán's lips, following with her own lips as Xiùlán's parted slightly in acceptance of a soft kiss. Sammy enveloped her Inamorata's lower lip with both of hers and teasingly sucked on the luscious morsel for a moment before releasing it with a moist pop.
Xiùlán smiled as Sam slid her face down to pause between a magnificent pair of honey-soft breasts. Lifting her head slightly, she recited in halting Mandarin the words tattooed between Xiùlán's boobs. "My love for you will never end." Placing a kiss on her breastbone, Sammy added, "It works both ways, darlin'."
Xiùlán whispered in response, "Actually, I had Master Jiang modify your original phrase before he applied the ink there."
Traynor placed several kisses across the Hànzì characters inked into Xiùlán's light olive-colored skin before asking, "So, what does this actually say, Luv?"
"It says 'My love for you is as enduring as the sky and the earth'," came the somber reply. "Literally … it means 'I love you forever' … It was the way I felt when we visited my parents; it is the way I feel about you now, this minute … and every day … since the very first time I held you close. Do you remember that night, Sà mǐ?"
Traynor spent several moments thinking back to their time together at the Alliance base on Earth's moon. "Seems to me I was feeling depressed about the way others were treating me—especially that miserable little bastard Joesiar—you held me tight, assured me I was special … that you didn't want to associate with someone that felt they were worthless. I absolutely loved you for that, Xiùlán … you gave me a really precious gift that night."
Yuán's smile widened as she thought back as well. "I also told you I wasn't interested in a one-night stand, darling. I'm so glad we've been able to get past our … disagreement. I believe you will always have a bad attitude concerning Alliance brass …" Xiùlán could see the protest forming on Traynor's luscious lips, so hurried on with, "and that's totally okay … really. Just … please, Sà mi? For me? Don't let that attitude cost you your career … It would devastate me after all we've been through together."
Sammy's tousled hair fell past her eyes as she continued to kiss her way down the center of Xiùlán's chest and tummy; just shy of her ultimate goal, she raised and tilted her head to gaze at Xiùlán's face while saying, "Looks like someone's name might be partially hidden by all this curly hair." To emphasize her point, she used the tip of a finger to lightly trace the three exquisitely delicate Hànzì characters tattooed across Xiùlán's pubic mound— 薩 · 曼 · 莎 —it was the final word for the phrase on her chest, meant to tell anyone and everyone that Xiùlán's love was only for Sà màn shā.
Sammy lingered on the middle character, knowing that the very bottom of the 曼 was less than a millimeter from the entry to an enticing valley of pleasure; Xiùlán's entire body stiffened, and she shuddered in anticipation of what Sammy would be doing with her talented fingers … and mouth. Bringing her left knee up and laying that leg down, she placed the sole of her foot against her right knee. Traynor, never one to ignore such an invitation, used two fingers to tug a damp sheath upwards so she could torture a stiffening pink bud with the tip of her tongue; Xiùlán squirmed in appreciative ecstasy, grabbing the edges of the mattress while thrusting her hips up and spreading her legs as wide as she could to accommodate a pair of fingers sliding into her moist, throbbing core.
The combination of fingers and tongue quickly proved to be Xiùlán's undoing; after such a long time without Sammy's loving attention to her physical needs, she discovered she was nearly always only a hair's breadth from a full-blown climax anytime Sammy had her nude body alongside her own. She stifled a squeal of pleasure as her entire world contracted to the hot flesh that responded to her lover's fingers and tongue by soaking Sammy's face and the sheet underneath her ass; Sammy rewarded Xiùlán by quickly bringing her head back up to apply a wet, hungry kiss to a willing mouth.
Xiùlán was still out of breath when she stiffened and arched her back as she was once again blasted over the edge by Sammy's fingers—two inside her wet center and a thumb massaging her needy little pearl. Ending the kiss so she could take a breath, she said, "Damn! I don't think I've ever climaxed twice in such a short time." After a few more deep breaths, she added, "Making love with you has got to be the best experience I've ever had, Sà mi."
"Making you crazy … feeling your body squirm around and shudder underneath me? Fun for me as well, Luv." Sammy palmed Xiùlán's sweet warmth, moving her hand in tiny circles to massage the flesh she was holding while using her curled fingers to stimulate moist, warm folds, causing her lover to bring her legs back together in order to clamp down and immobilize Sammy's hand.
Traynor giggled as she kissed a sensuous mouth once again. "I love you, Yuán Xiùlán."
A/N: My sincere thanks to a fan living in China … Fanfic author Gary2000 praised my use of written Chinese in my stories (he's following Transformation, Part III: New Beginnings), and has generously offered to assist me anytime I need some longer phrases translated into Chinese. The English translation for the tattoo on Xiùlán's chest, explained by Xiùlán to Sammy, means so much more than the simple translation I had previously used.