Insurance - part 22

[miriam_e]

(2792 words)

total so far:

48,061 / 50,000
(96%)

OK. Here is the climax.
This was hard to write.

Just one more chapter to go!!

Let me know what you think.

Note that what follows contains adult concepts.
The love of two females for each other is central to this story so if you are offended by that stop reading now.

22 - high

Rachel stirred in the morning, wrapped in Sally's arms.

"Good morning sleepy head," Sally said.

Rachel snuggled in tighter, cosy. Bliss bloomed in her and overflowed through the cap into Sally, making Sally's eyes flutter closed in pleasure. They lay there together, drunk on their combined love. They lay for some time. It may have been minutes or it may have been hours. All they knew was that their minds were saturated with warm happiness.

Eventually the pressure in Rachel's bladder forced her to get up. She rose to hands and knees giving Sally kisses and apologised, running for the toilet. "Sorry honey. Be right back. Gotta service this design flaw."

Sally got out of bed too and sent, Not so much of a design flaw. Without it we might never get up.

She could feel the humor in Rachel's reply, You say it like that's a bad thing.

Sally sent, Seriously though, I wonder why Dina and Marc didn't warn us of this.

Rachel suggested, Maybe they don't see it as a drawback.

Sally thought, Maybe it's different between two humans.

Silence for a while. When Rachel came out of the toilet she had a smile of wonder on her face. She said in a soft voice, "Wow. It just hit me. We're the first. Never before have a flesh human and an android human shared like this. There aren't any guidelines. This is new territory." She walked forward and put her arms around Sally. Sally hugged her back and put her head on Rachel's shoulder. They were both acutely conscious of their bare bodies pressing against each other.

Sally asked Rachel, "Have you ever heard of those ghoulish experiments where people implanted electrodes in the pleasure centers of rats?"

Rachel shook her head slightly.

Sally continued, "The rats self-stimulated until they died, ignoring food and water."

Rachel led her lover over to the bed again. "You think there's a possibility of that happening to us, huh?" She grinned. "Ah, but what a way to go!"

Sally let herself be pulled down on top of Rachel. She stroked the hair away from Rachel's beautiful Asian eyes, and from the corner of her delicious lips. Sally whispered, "No. There is precisely zero chance of it happening with us. I wouldn't let it."

Rachel laughed and challenged, "And how would you stop it?" She immediately regretted the question. She already knew the answer.

Sally nodded, "Worst case, I'd shut myself down. I will never let harm come to you." She chuckled. "You could say I'm your insurance."

Rachel rolled Sally over and said, "This has suddenly got very macabre. We're on our honeymoon. It's supposed to be fun and lots of hot sex."

---

They didn't come out of the room until late afternoon.

Rachel felt like her legs were rubbery and trembling. It was as if she had a neon sign over her saying that she'd been having sex all day. Sally assured her that she looked and walked perfectly normal. She nevertheless leaned on Sally for support.

Rachel felt weirdly exhausted yet more alive than she'd felt in her life. She kept feeling like she needed to sit down to rest, yet when she did she couldn't sit still and had to stand again. "Maybe I'm coming down with something."

Sally laughed and said, "Yeah, a bad case of sex."

Rachel said, "I think I need to go back to bed and rest."

"Oh, and that's going to really help." Sally guided her toward the ramp up to the surface. "What you need is fresh air and something to distract you... other than me."

As usual, Sally was right.

They walked around the island. About halfway around there had been a light rain, and although it wasn't cold, Rachel scampered up off the exposed shore to stand in the comforting shadow under the sheltering trees. The sky and the sea became the one beautiful velvet grey and the hissing rain a soft shushing music. They embraced and kissed among the large drops falling from the leaves, their bare feet on the soft, warm leaf litter. Their love tinted everything.

The gentle rain didn't last long, but it seemed to clarify everything. The clouds swept away to leave the sky clearer and sharper than it had been for days. It was getting close to sunset, throwing this side of the island into deep shadow.

And then a wonderful thing: the moon began to rise -- a full, bright, orange moon, larger than they could have believed. They were struck by the heartstopping beauty of it. They stopped walking and sat on the beach together to watch the sea give birth to the moon. As it rose, it imperceptibly paled, draining of color, shining brighter.

The sky gradually darkened. The breeze dropped and the air stilled. The little waves lapped on the beach a few meters from where they sat. Behind them in the tree-covered hill the birds sang their hearts out. Above them the brightest stars shyly peeked through the deepening blue.

"What are the chances?" Sally breathed. "Of all the planets, life should develop on one partnered with such a giant moon. At times like this it's easy to see it as another world isn't it... plains, mountains... Amazing. It seems so, so close, but a vast, empty gulf separating."

They sat for a while, arms around each other, taking in the scene. Sally asked, "Whatcha thinking?"

Rachel said in a baby-voice, "Ooh! Pretty!"

Sally laughed.

The evening was warm and they took their time wandering back. Thanks to the full moon there was plenty of light.

When they got back to the resort they decided to try the restaurant. Neither of them had ever been to a restaurant before. This one was large and dim, with dark furniture that looked and felt like wood. Soft music played. An android waitress gave Sally and Rachel an electronic paper menu.

Except for sugar water, Sally didn't need to eat. Rachel felt like she should eat a bit more than the standard protein and starch mix from the replicator, because her algae hadn't been getting much sunlight lately, but she was mystified by the items on the menu. Even when she touched the eye icon beside each and saw a 3D image of the item she was no wiser. She could barely remember the meals her Mum used to cook for her when she was a child, back before the replicators. She leaned forward to Sally and asked, puzzled, "Why do people come to restaurants?"

Sally shrugged. "You're asking me?"

Rachel said, "I'll be back in a minute," stood, and walked over to the counter where the android waitress was chatting with a man. The waitress seemed embarrassed, cheeks flushed, and the man amused. His smile widened when the waitress asked "Can I help you, Ma'am?" and Rachel gently corrected her saying her name was Rachel. Rachel wasn't sure but she got the impression he was almost laughing at her, but he turned out to be quite polite when Rachel asked the waitress what the meals were. He suggested a couple of things that would not be likely to upset her digestion. She thanked him and walked back to Sally.

"What are you getting?" asked Sally.

"I have absolutely no idea."

When the meal was delivered Rachel thanked the waitress and ate the meal joylessly. It had some strange tastes that she simply was not accustomed to. At one point she tried some dark grey-green things which looked like large berries and almost vomited when she found that instead of being sweet they were oily and salty. She gave up on the meal then and vowed to stick to ordinary replicator fare.

Sally pointed out that this food was almost certainly created in a replicator.

Rachel took her plate to the counter where the waitress and the man were still talking. She thanked the waitress, nodded to the man, and left.

Rachel was relieved to get Sally alone with her in their room. She pulled off her own and Sally's bikini tops, embraced Sally, and nibbled up the side of her neck. They stood there for a little while, nuzzling each other. Rachel pushed their bikini bottoms off and led Sally to the bed. "Tonight's our last night here."

---

It was mid-morning. Wanda's pale-colored hatch slowly closed above them and made it's chk! locking sound.

Rachel said to the craft, "Back to your home please, Wanda."

Wanda replied, "Dot isn't here yet."

Rachel explained that Dot had already gone home by other means. "Just Sally and me today, Wanda."

The craft jarred very slightly as it detached from the docking pod. It slowly, silently turned, and began the journey back. For an hour the girls asked Wanda to take various detours to see more and more of the brilliantly colored corals. Their eyes hungrily devoured the impossibly vivid colors and the otherworldly shapes.

Finally they left the reef and were in the open, blue, featureless water.

The several hours' return journey was spent mostly on the bed cuddling and exploring the telepathy cap's ability to share feelings and thoughts. They were becoming adept at pinpointing particular experiences, perceptions, and memories. They were starting to understand what Dina and Marc had meant about telepathy bringing order to their thoughts. They were gradually learning each other's minds the way they had, over the years, learned each other's bodies.

They were enthralled at the idea of spending years learning like this. They had never realised just how complex their minds were. Vast territories were here to be uncovered -- whole regions that one person couldn't hope to explore alone. Your mind's eye was too rudderless. At the slightest resistance it would slip away in a different direction. Alone there was no traction. It needed another's perspective to give stable purchase; to really see the layers and multiple reflecting facets of your own mind.

If this much had changed in just a few days... how much more would unfold? How much more could there possibly be? Marc and Dina had said that after a couple of weeks they were still learning. Was the android-human coupling so unusual that they were racing through levels of this faster than people usually do? Or was this normal? And what did 'normal' mean in such a situation anyway?

---

When they returned Wanda at the boat hire shop the big guy passed on a message that Rachel was wanted at the offices of Insurers Consolidated. An airboat was waiting in the field a small distance beyond the shops.

The girls wandered down the path to the airboat. It was orange and yellow, decorated with intricate designs. Rachel didn't really want to go and she almost sent a message saying she'd come in tomorrow, but she decided that it must be important if they sent an airboat. They both walked onto the little ramp at the nose, which then folded up. They sat on the couch running around its edge, and watched the skirt of the little craft balloon as it lifted gently from the ground. The long, wide, twin tails of the craft started into waving motion and pushed the craft forward silently.

They looked out over the water. After a while they could see the resort island in the far distance, and beyond that, more islands dotting to the horizon.

Rachel cuddled up closer to Sally and sent, I should have worn something warmer. Quite chilly.

Sally suddenly realised just how high they were. She did a quick calculation using the distance to the islands and the curve of the Earth. They were much too high. She sent a command to the airboat to go lower. It didn't reply or respond. She tried again. Nothing. And they were still quickly gaining altitude. Sally sent out an emergency call giving their position and asking for help. There were no other aircars near, but some kilometers away one had dropped off its human passenger, had turned around and was on its way as quickly as possible.

Rachel was getting tired. Sally was starting to get scared and sent to her, Stay awake, honey. Don't go to sleep.

Sally tried to pull apart the panel which housed the controlling AI, but it was too strong. Without the proper tools there was no way to get access. And it was doubtful she could do much anyway. She couldn't just break things willy nilly or she'd risk the skirt deflating and the airboat falling out of the sky. But at this rate of climb Rachel could die from oxygen deprivation soon.

She seemed to remember that the vacuum balloons around the edge were compartmentalised. Perhaps she could break one and slow their ascent that way. They had nothing sharp so she used her fingers. The material was incredibly tough and stiff. She had to keep waking Rachel who was now shivering violently and couldn't keep her eyes open.

Sally shouted at her, "Stay awake, dammit! RACHEL!" while she tried in vain to tear through the balloon material.

She pushed her mind into Rachel's trying to flood her mind with alarm and kick her adrenalin system into action, but she found Rachel ebbing, fading.

In a faint, horribly feeble thought, Rachel sent I love you, Sally.

"Stay awake!" she shouted at her. "Wake up!" She shook her. Rachel continued to fade. "NO! NO! NO!" Sally raged inside Rachel's mind. "Hang on. WAIT! You only have to hang on a little while!"

Sally broadcast her desperate plea for help. The other aircar was ascending as quickly as it could, but it would take a while to catch up.

Sally tried mouth to mouth to force air into Rachel's lungs under pressure, but it didn't seem to help. Sally couldn't produce enough pressure and she felt the life flicker out in Rachel. Sally screamed into the void.

Eyes streaming man-made tears, she was furiously punching at the balloon with her hand, the silicone skin torn and hanging off the broken ends of her fingers. She was scratching and tearing at the undamaged fabric when the other airboat came up close under them. Wild, she grabbed up Rachel, a loose rag doll, jumped into the other boat, and ordered it down as fast as it could go.

It plummetted groundward, slowing only when it was getting dangerously close to the ground. All the way down Sally kept calling to Rachel to wake up. She tried thumping her chest to get her heart started. She tried mouth to mouth. She tried screaming and roaring in what should have been Rachel's mind... except there was no link there anymore. As they came down toward a hospital roof a doctor asked her how long it was since Rachel had breathed. Some automatic part of Sally gave the time. Incredibly it had been 18 minutes ago. When the airboat landed gently on the roof the doctor checked for body temperature and brain function.

Sally saw him through tear-blurred eyes as he shook his head.

---

Sally went with Rachel to the morgue. She wouldn't leave. She had nothing to do. She had nowhere to go. No reason to be. She stood in the dark in the morgue... no reason to move, hardly a thought in her numb mind... dark and empty like the room around her.

Zoe burst into the room. Sally heard her distant voice asking about Rachel. Sally absently looked at the drawer containing Rachel's vacant body. She shouted something at Sally. It might as well have been another language; Sally didn't know what she said. It didn't matter. Nothing mattered.

Zoe turned from Sally and struggled to put Rachel over her shoulder. She wasn't strong enough to lift her. Something seeped through to Sally that Zoe needed help, so she absently stepped forward and lifted Rachel, cradling her in her arms. Zoe was pushing her towards the door. All Sally could do was look down at Rachel's beautiful, peaceful face. Her lips were no longer red; they were blue. Some part of her mind noticed that Zoe was pushing her through corridors and into lifts. Zoe often looked angry and would frequently shout, but Sally couldn't really hear her in her numb silence. Somehow they came to be in a room where Rachel was frantically pulled from Sally's arms and laid on a table. Her head was put into some machine. Distantly Sally knew it was a scanner, but she knew it was no use. Rachel was gone.

Sally was alone.

It echoed hollowly in Sally's mind: alone.

Rachel was no more.

Alone...

------------

Comments

[sharpblonde.livejournal.com]

Ike... you's almost done and I haven't gotten to reading any of it yet! Maybe that's a good thing... Maybe it means I'll be able to go through and read an edited and therefor better version ;)

[seaofserpent.livejournal.com]

Very interesting climax. Congrats!

[miriam-e.livejournal.com]

:)
Yep, soon after I'm finished I'll be putting it online as a book for free download. I'll gradually go over it editing it and improving it. So, yep, you'll end up reading an improved version... though there is the chance I may end up discarding some bits too. :)

I'll see what happens. Worse comes to worst the original will always be available on LJ.

I've mentioned to a few people that I'd like to illustrate it too. I'll have a think about that. I'm going over to New Zealand to visit my ex- for Xmas. I'll have a rest and a think about it then.

It would be great to make it as a piece of machinima (VR fiction) but the technology isn't yet at the point where this would be easy. I'm currently looking further into that.

If/when you do read the story I'd be delighted to hear your reaction.

Of course what I hope doesn't happen is that I spend some time away from it, and with the perspective that distance brings, I decide that the story really, really sucks. [gulp]

[miriam-e.livejournal.com]

:) Thanks.
I'll get the final episode up as soon as I can (hopefully in the next several hours).
I'm sooo tempted to give some clues, but I won't.

[seaofserpent.livejournal.com]

I may resort to begging!

[gothxxangel.livejournal.com]

OMG, my heart stopped and I got tears! Sally's desperate fight to save Rachel has so much urgency and feeling in it, I totally got sucked into it. The rest of the story has been so idyllic, this part seemed all the more shocking.

I hope you can finish the next part soon!! I have to see what happens next!

[miriam-e.livejournal.com]

Yep, that's why I've been saying to people that there was a reason behind them being so totally happy together. It was to try to give this as much impact as I could.

I'll try to hammer the final chapter out tonight. :)
Being in Japan you are almost in the same time zone as us here in QLD. With any luck it might be there in the morning... I hope. I still have about 1,850 words to go. Cutting it pretty close because what remains to be said won't take much more than that to say, I think.

Crossing my fingers. I hope this gets written reasonably easily. The end is going to be difficult to write well.

[miriam-e.livejournal.com]

:)
I really, really want to say... but I shouldn't. :)
Nope... I just wrote a tiny hint but it gave it away so I erased it again.
It sorta doesn't matter though. There are only two possible endings at this point.
OK. Here is an oblique hint. Why is Patricia Highsmith famous in the lesbian community?

[miriam-e.livejournal.com]

By the way, did you notice the line, "screamed into the void"?
:)
(A very tiny tribute.)

[gothxxangel.livejournal.com]

That was for me? Wow, thanks!! (*^^*) blushing in happiness

Good luck with the final chapter, I agree about the ending being difficult to write well. I'm kind of procrastinating on mine, I've got some done on paper and have added a bit to the final chapter (so far) to pad out the word count a bit before I submitted it.

Only a bit more to go!! Good luck!!

next chapter

[jenna2.livejournal.com]

ARG !!!
your kill en me here!
great chapter
but why where they set up like that? and who really set them up? or was it a set up? was it really a malfunction...
jenna

Re: next chapter

[miriam-e.livejournal.com]

I'll post it soon. :)