Six Billion Credit Rent Boy - 2. Chapter 2

Anson Davistoff upended the bag of letter and number tiles and without a word watched as experiment HFS962 automatically sorted them into two distinct piles, one of numbers and one of letters.

“Wow.”

The creature Anson was failing not the think of as a kid put his head on one side, mewled briefly, and then mimicked him.

“Wow.”

“An expression of surprise.” Anson smiled at the kid. “And pleasure.”

“Yes.” The boy nodded firmly. His fingers on the tiles were incredibly fast, and he made shapes out of letters and wiped them away quicker than Anson’s eyes could follow. His blue eyes flashed across the table, flickering back and forth, and the brain-wave function sensor Anson had left stuck to his temple showed readouts that nearly left the extended chart they had drawn up. On a human it would have been an extreme seizure, but HFS962 seemed completely fine. More than fine, he was spelling words.

Wow.

Pleasure.

This room is very boring. Anson is interesting.

Anson blinked.

“You think I’m interesting?”

“Yes.” The boy smiled, showing his tiny white fangs. “Want food…” Anson could see his brain searching for the right words. “Please, I’m hungry.”

“OK.” Anson stood and checked his watch. It was time for the boy to have another proper meal rather than just a snack, and quick experimentation had discovered that like his feline features suggested, he was a meat eater. “I’ll go down to the kitchen.”

“No!” HFS962 flung his arms around Anson’s hips, tail grabbing at his ankles. “Don’t go.”

“I have to if you want food, buddy.” Anson tried to pet his hair so that he could move away, but he was stilled by a sudden warm sensation in his groin. The kid was nuzzling at his crotch, purring happily. Anson blushed crimson as his felt his penis respond to the physical sensation. “NO!” He pushed the kid back away from him. “You mustn’t do that!”

The boy whimpered, but Anson backed away from him and got out of the room as fast as possible. From the other side of the door, he heard the wail, and it followed him from the lab. The boy didn’t understand what he’d done, or why it was wrong, but that didn’t stop Anson from having a rather predictable reaction to an unbelievably cute boy nuzzling up to his crotch. When he returned with the food, neither of them mentioned it, and Anson wondered how long the discussion could be avoided.

*

“ANSON!” The boy’s wail was full of fear and Anson dropped the tray he had carried into the room and dashed over to the kid. HFS962 had made fantastic progress in those first few days, and along with breakfast the scientist had been bringing him a reading tablet with access to the United Federation library, as the boy had already burned through all the books which Anson had installed on his own personal reader.

“What’s the matter?” The boy looked petrified, sitting up his bed with his ears pushed flat back into his hair and his tail thrashing and quivering. “What’s wrong?”

“Something’s broken.” His delicate hands were pushing the duvet down over his crotch. “It feels strange.”

Anson had an equally disturbing and excited thought as to where this was going.

“Let me see.”

HFS962 blushed as he drew back his hands, and Anson decided that the kid really did need a name. Sure enough, poking out of the waistband of his underwear, this pair in red, was the blush pink tip of the boy’s hard cock. Anson drew the fabric up to cover it and the boy whimpered gently.

“It’s natural. It happens in the mornings.”

“But… I feel…” Anson blinked, and looked up to find the bold blue eyes inches from his own. “I don’t know what to do.”

“It’ll go away.” Anson tried to smile. “We should get you dressed.”

“I’m not cold.”

“That’s not the only reason to wear clothes.”

“Clothes, from the Middle English clathas; garments for the body, articles of dress, to provide covering and warmth.” The boy intoned as if reading from a page. “Like I said, I’m not cold.”

“We also use clothes to cover ourselves. It is not seen as polite to go out without being properly dressed.”

“We’re going out?” The boy’s eyes lit up. “Really?”

“Not today, but tomorrow we will. It’s practice.”

“OK.” The boy took the shirt Anson offered him and pulled it on. The scientist had the feeling that all clothes would always look perfect on his skinny, beautifully conditioned body. “Anson?”

“Yes?”

“What’s my name?” HFS962 put his head on one side, his ears tilting in the manner Anson recognised as questioning.

“Well, you don’t really have one. You’re HFS962.”

“Does that mean I can pick a name?” The boy pulled on the trousers, yelped, then removed them and ripped the fabric with his sharp little fangs. When he put them on again, his tail pushed neatly through the hole and curled by his ankles.

“I don’t see why not.” Anson replied, but inside his head, every scientist he has ever worked with was screaming at him. The boy was an experiment; of course he shouldn’t have a name. They were going to be spending years in the lab synthesising compounds and proteins from his blood, trying to engineer drugs which would make existing human soldiers smarter, stronger, and swifter. The fact the United Federation high command wanted to put the boy into basic training was in itself a huge mistake. He was a laboratory creature, and that’s where Anson should have been making him stay. And yet now, here was this boy, who without his cat ears and his amazing prehensile tail looked like any other cute nineteen year old, innocently asking if he could pick his own name.

“Hani.” He nodded. “I found it in your library.” He gestured to the tablet next to the bed. “It means happiness.” He bit his lip and pricked his ears momentarily. “It reminds me of you.”

“Umm…” Anson could feel himself blushing. “Thanks.” He allowed himself to sink onto the edge of the bed, because he could feel his knees quaking slightly. The newly named Hani purred and stepped up to him. Anson took the time to remind himself that the boy had no idea how sweetly seductive he was.

“Are you alright Anson?” He leant closer, resting his weight on the fingers of one hand on the mattress. Anson couldn’t help but lean back as the boy came within inches of his skin. He had no concept at all of personal space. “You smell warm.” Hani inhaled him, his delicate nostrils flaring briefly. His blue eyes flicked down to the concealed heat and hardness of Anson’s growing erection. “Why does that happen?”

Anson could barely believe what his eyes were telling him as Hani settled his weight on the bed, his long strong fingers skimming over the front of his white coat as he headed south. His dick throbbed in the confines of his underwear and he gulped audibly. Hani had no idea what he was doing, or how the lines of his body conspired to be absolutely perfect, his tail protruding from the round mounds of his perfectly sculpted arse.

“I-I-It means that I like you.” It was an awful half-truth, and Anson felt incredibly guilty the moment he said it.

“I like you too.” The boy’s lips were millimetres away from his own, damp and parted. The clothes Anson had provided fitted well enough to show that the feline was turned on, even if he had no idea why.

Hani would be leaving in the morning, Anson rationalised his actions in a micro second. He would leave and in all likelihood Anson would never see him again. He would become a solider and go off to war. It would be a terrible waste. All this happened in the breath that it took Anson to close the gap between them and press his lips against those of the hybrid creature he had created.

Hani purred a rumble in his narrow chest that still sounded like a housecat inside a bass drum. The noise made him vibrate, the only motion other than his breathing, for he had frozen when Anson’s lips had touched his. He had nothing to compare the experience with, and no idea how to describe the way it made him feel. Just that he was equally tense and also felt like his stomach was full of sploshing water. They parted with the wet sound of flesh on flesh. Anson smiled thinly.

“Thank you.”

“Davistoff?” His superior stood in the doorway. “I think it’s about time HFS962 had some time alone don’t you?”

“Sir…” Anson extracted himself out from under the boy. “Good luck Hani.”

The kid whimpered and mewled as he got to the door, and Anson was sure, from the look on his supervisors face, that he was never going to see the boy again. He sighed heavily, because the science should have been more important, but the fact that he would never know such sweet lips again made Anson Davistoff infinitely sad.

*

Hani was fascinated by the room in which he waited. Not because it was especially interesting, but because it was only the second place he had ever been. That morning the senior scientist had woke him, fed him and asked him to get dressed. When Hani had asked where Anson was, there was no answer, and the feline realised what he had been doing with Anson had been wrong, even though it had felt nice. No one really spoke to him, and after about an hour the supervisor had come and taken him from the room where he had woken a week ago.

Hani took in every sight and sound, and could’ve replicated the exact pitch of the scientist’s shoes on the white floor and drawn a precise scale map of everywhere they had walked, including knowing exactly how many bolts held the ceiling panels in place. But no one asked him, so he didn’t bother saying anything.

Now they waited in the biggest room Hani had ever seen, which wasn’t saying much, and it was also the only one that wasn’t white. The painted sign on the wall told him he was in the docking bay, and ahead of him was a set of doors which looked rather more important than any others he had passed through. The other side of them were more doors, and those looked foreign in a way Hani wasn’t sure he could actually describe.

“What’s out there?”

“Outside.” It wasn’t the scientist that answered, but the first man who had come to see him, the one who had stood on the other side of the glass and looked serious. He looked equally serious now, and Hani wondered if he ever smiled, and if he did, how the gesture would transform his face. “Those are airlock doors. They open at the wrong time and we all die.”

“Space is a vacuum.” Hani compiled all the things he had learnt from reading. “It is a void that exists between celestial bodies. Its borders are believed to be infinite, and it is not possible to survive in space for more than two minutes. In space no one can hear you scream. Space is big, vastly, hugely, mind-bogglingly big. Without oxygen you would lose consciousness in space in less than fifteen seconds. Much of the wider universe is empty space, and it has been called the final frontier in the belief that there is nothing beyond the edge of space-”

“Wow…” The man whose lapel tag and kit bag both read Sgt. Mjr. Phelps, laid a hand on his shoulder. Not counting the blood that had been drawn or the measurements they had taken, it was only the third time he had ever been touched. Through the cloth of his shirt, Hani absorbed and memorized the texture of the man’s hand. “Slow down there. You don’t have to recite the history of space travel or anything, kid.”

“Ah, Sergeant Major.” The lead scientist smiled tightly. “Would you like to sign for him officially?”

“Sure.” Phelps read over the small tablet with which he was presented. “Experiment HFS962, known as Hani?”

“Yes?” Hani flicked his ears forwards at the mention of his name, his tail whipping gently from side to side. He had learnt to control it rather better now, but it was best when there weren’t things behind him to accidentally hit.

“Right then.” Phelps pressed his thumb to the pad. “I’ll take him to Triden-A. Shouldn’t take long, Captain Reynolds is going to burn the engine hot for us.

“Goodbye then sir, HFS962...” Hani waited, thinking there might be more, but the scientist turned, and walked away.

“Come on boy. Time for us to be off.”

“Where are we going?”

“A planet not far from here. They’re going to train you up and make a man outta you.”

Hani wondered how anyone could manage that, when it was clear even to him, he was already much more than just a man.

*

“Is that him?” Hani turned an ear to better funnel the speech of the man who he had heard people refer to as the captain.

“Indeed it is. Not quite what we were expecting.” Phelps replied. “We should be arriving on Triden-A tomorrow?”

“Indeed, it’s an eighteen hour trip.” The captain was watching him again. Hani turned to look at him. The first time he had seen the man he had been wrapped up in the strong arms of a big burly guy, and their lips had been fused together. No one had shouted or complained or told them off, and Hani wondered what the difference was between that gesture, one which he now recognised as a kiss, and what Anson had done to him. “Will he be er… staying with you?”

“I think it’s best.”

“See you both for dinner in the mess hall?” The captain nodded. “I have to get back.” The captain departed and Phelps returned, picked up his bag and gestured for Hani to follow him.

Things were different on the ship, most noticeably that nothing was the same kind of glossy sterile white it had been on the space station, and the gravity of the place seemed much more balanced. Hani followed Phelps from the docking bay around a long curved corridor before they stood together in a tube like elevator.

Hani examined the Sergeant Major carefully. He was… Hani didn’t really have a word to describe the way Phelps looked. The shape of his body and his face made him feel warm in the same way Anson’s kiss had done. The feeling obviously wasn’t appropriate, and Hani hoped the stern looking man couldn’t tell that his penis was hardening under two layers of fabric. Hani could feel his blood flowing, pulsing in the thickening length of his member, and he pushed his hand down over the sensation as carefully as he could, trying not to whimper at the shocking and pleasurable sensation of his own touch.

Phelps didn’t speak as they passed through another corridor, but gestured him towards a door which whooshed open at the man’s touch on the palm scanner.

“You’ll be staying with me while we’re on the Kerouac. These are my rooms.” Hani had no way to judge the place in which he now found himself, because he had so little to compare it to. He was strangely glad to be in a place which was neither white nor grey. “Dinner will be in the mess hall this evening, feel free to amuse yourself until then.”

“Where are you going?”

“I have duties aboard the ship.”

“Can I come?” Hani didn’t want to be alone again. He’d spent so much time by himself since Anson had vanished. “Please?”

“No.” Phelps swiped the door closed and shrugged out of his jacket as he came further into the room. “I’ll stay here. It can wait.”

Hani giggled and licked his pink tongue over his teeth in excitement. He flicked his tail, and a cup went flying across the room. He whimpered.

“Sorry.”

“Don’t worry about it.” As Phelps spoke a little flap opened in the far wall and a small round machine started to hum its way across the floor in a slightly wobbly line. Where it passed over water droplets and dust, it hoovered them up, leaving the floor clean and dry.

Hani watched it for a moment, and then pounced. He had no idea what made him do it, other than the little movements of the machine fascinated him, and he just had to have it. He looked up from his curled position on the floor with the sweeper in his lap, to find Phelps laughing.

“You really are like a cat.” He placed his hand over Hani’s head and ears and ruffled him gently. The movement sent spikey waves of pleasure running down Hani’s spine. “Leave the sweeper and I’ll give you the tour. Just try and keep that tail of yours under control eh?”

That night Hani lay on the long couch in Phelps’s main room. The man had made up a bed for him and Hani rubbed the texture of the cloth between his fingers. Everything felt new and different, right down to the texture of the air, and for the first time Hani could hear someone else breathing as he tried to fall asleep. He couldn’t block out the soft boom-boom, boom-boom, of Phelps’s heartbeat. It made him feel… he searched for the word…lonely. He’d never felt lonely before.

Dinner had been the most interesting event in his life so far, the number of people and the range of foods. Hani had stared at everything wide eyed until Phelps had laughed, clapped him on the shoulder and told him ‘yes, you can try everything you fancy’. Despite being fascinated by the textures of the food and the smells and sounds of the mess hall, the most interesting thing had been Phelps.

No one had ever treated him like he was normal, even Anson had always been equally aloof and fascinated by him. Phelps treated him the same way as he’d treated anyone else around their table.

Now Hani listened to the man breathing in the next room, and felt utterly alone. He’d never slept in the presence of someone else, but somehow now that he was out of the lab and away from everything he’d ever known, he felt cold and isolated. Hani got up and abandoned the sofa, stepping softly and silently to Phelps’s bedroom door. Inside the man slept on his side in a bed twice as wide as the one Hani had first used, and the boy stood at the edge of the bed and watched him breathing. Phelps emanated heat and the slow double thud of his pulse, and the sound hooked at something in Hani’s head, and pulled him close. With a soft mewl, he slipped under the covers and curled up in the space where Phelps wasn’t, tucking his knees up under his chin and curling his tail around his feet. He was as close to the other man as possible without actually touching him.

It was nice to relax into the mattress, to shut his eyes and just feel the warmth of another person there. It was oddly comforting, though Hani had no idea why it was he should feel more relaxed in the presence of another. He was just falling asleep when Phelps shifted, and touched his back.

“Hngh?” He grunted gently. And Hani felt his heartbeat change as he rose towards consciousness. “Uh-huh.” Phelps yawed without fully waking, and settled back towards sleep.

Deciding it was all the permission he was going to get, Hani fell asleep. In the morning he was going to be placed somewhere new, and he had no doubt that Phelps would be gone again, but just for tonight, it was nice to have someone there with him. At least for now, he wasn’t alone.