FSE

Furry search engine

formerly SoFurry search engine

"Well, that was a short journey." Grishnag scowled at the huge vehicle as it sat tilted at an angle, its forward end resting on the floor and its front wheels cocked inward. Cora had gotten the engine running and the thing had moved less than two meters before its front axle snapped in half.

"We've got to find another." Cora darted past one vehicle after another. "If we don't leave now, we'll have to wait another day before it'll be safe to go outside."

"I don't suppose there's any way to find out which ones won't break like cheap glass if they move a few inches?" Dylan caught up with her and glanced around at the alien ground vehicles surrounding them.

Cora swept her optics back and forth over each one she passed. "I'm scanning them, trying to find the one that's in the best condition--one that hasn't been sitting here as long as the others."

A distant sloshing, gurgling sound from behind Grishnag made her pulse jump. She whirled and faced the door at the far end of the chamber.

"Grish? What's wrong?" Dylan hurried back to her.

"I heard something."

"So did I." Syala took a few steps backward and wrung her hands. Her hooves clopping on the metal floor echoed across the vast chamber and she froze with a gasp. "It's the same sound we heard when the blob things attacked us."

"And_that_ would be why we can't stay here another day." Dylan backed away and flicked his eyes around. "If those things get hold of us, we'll be put back into the simulation--and we might not find our way out again."

Grishnag stared into the faintly-lit distance and finally caught a motion in the shaft of light coming through the crack in the door. Something low to the ground, slithering and undulating. Light from the corridor outside rippled across its fluid surface.

It slid into the darkness outside the pool of light, and another squeezed through the gap behind it.

Followed by a third.

"Oh, hell," she whispered as she glanced over her shoulder. The only exit was the outer door, beyond which none of them could breathe unless they were inside one of the hermetically sealed vehicles. She turned back in time to glimpse two more blobs oozing through the inner door. "Those things have us cornered. We've got to get into one of these transports now!"

Syala stared at the indistinct shapes, clamped her hands over her mouth, and sobbed.

"I can't go back," Zilaka moaned. "I can't go back into that horrible place!"

"What I wouldn't give for a big-ass gun," Dylan muttered.

"Here!" Cora pointed at something off to the right. "This one has a lot less dust covering it." She scanned it and broke into a relieved smile. "It's definitely newer than the others. I'm not picking up any structural defects or other obvious damage. Looks like this is our best shot."

Grishnag dashed over to her and found her staring at something that looked like a cross between a bus and a train engine--all chrome, sharp angles, wide base, slanted sides, and a narrow, flat roof.

"No wheels," she muttered. "Some sort of hovercraft?"

"I fucking hope so!" Cora found a handle and twisted it to the right.

A door slid aside with a sharp hiss and lights inside the craft flickered on. Cora poked her head inside for two seconds, stepped out of the way, and waved her arm frantically.

"It's empty! Go! Go! Go!"

Grishnag grabbed Zilaka and Syala and gave them a push toward the "bus." She glanced to the far end of the garage, hoping to catch a glimpse of the gelatinous blobs, but couldn't find them.

They could be anywhere. Wonderful.

Dylan waited for the other females to board and then faced Grishnag.

"Come on," he said as Ayastal squeezed through the doorway. He took Grish's hand and tugged.

"Hurry." Cora waved her hand and swept her optics slowly around the chamber. She paused and glanced toward Dylan before focusing on something in the distance. "I see them. They're heading straight for us."

Grish gave Dylan a push and followed him into the vehicle. She whirled around in time to see Cora leap into the compartment and slap a control on the wall.

The door closed and sealed with another sharp, gunshot-like hiss.

Everyone slumped against the wall and let out a long sigh, except Cora. She lunged into the front compartment and tapped the control panel. It lit up and an array of holographic controls and readouts appeared in the air above the panel.

"Oh! Hard-light controls." Cora grinned. "We just might keep this baby."

Something skittered across the outside of the door, and everyone bolted to the opposite wall.

A throbbing hum filled the air and the floor lurched upward. Grishnag's heart twitched again, Dylan let out a startled grunt, and Syala whimpered.

"Yep, it's a hovercraft." Cora flicked her optics over the glowing controls, placed her hand on one, and pushed it forward. "The power cells are still good, so it must not have been here more than a few months. Should have enough juice to get us to the hangar."

"If we can get the door open." Grishnag pointed at the front of the garage, just a few meters beyond the windows.

"I'm still linked with the central computer. Should be able to find the right command pathway."

Something slopped over the front end of the hoverbus and everyone jerked back from the windows. Grishnag's heart pounded as the gel-automaton oozed across the surface. Now that she had a clear view of it, she spotted some sort of green glitter inside, and wondered if it was the thing's power source. Or, perhaps, an effect generated by it.

Or maybe it was part of the mechanism that stunned its victims and kept them immobilized.

The garage doors parted slowly. Dust fell from the surface and was blown outside, followed by a larger puff of dust from the floor, walls, and other vehicles. The air vented over the next twenty seconds.

"Well, we've hit the point of no return," Cora said. "Any section of this facility that wasn't still sealed off is now exposed to vacuum."

The garage doors ground to a halt, still only partially open.

Everyone stared at them. Grishnag snarled.

"Oh,fuck me!"

Dylan's face turned pale as he stared at the doors. "Is the gap wide enough to--"

The glob outside sloshed forward abruptly, and Dylan flinched. The mass of gel slid around the edges of the window as if probing for a crack to slip through.

Cora cocked her head. "It might be. Get ready, I'm gonna attempt a maneuver."

"Uh-oh." Dylan gripped the back of Cora's chair.

Cora shoved one of the hard-light levers forward and the hoverbus surged toward the doors.

Grishnag tried to brace herself against the wall as Cora turned the bus toward a smaller vehicle on the left, almost directly in her path.

Grishnag stared at the smaller, four-wheeled mechanism, and gasped. It's got a sloping front end. Is Cora going to do what I think she's--

Cora twitched the bus back to the right as it reached the car. "Hang on to your titties!"

Yes, she is. Grishnag clenched her teeth and tried not to squeeze her eyes shut.

The left side of the bus ramped up the front of the car and the larger vehicle tilted sideways.

Everyone grabbed for a handhold. Dylan sucked in a deep breath.

"Shiiiiiiiiiit!"

"Come on," Cora growled. "Come on, come on."

The bus scraped across the floor on its right edge, tilted almost perpendicular. The blob on the front slid off, extended tendrils, and tried to grasp at something to hold it in place. The hoverbus slammed through the gap in the doors, the jolt just enough to shake the blob loose, and tipped back onto its base. It hit the ground outside and the impact knocked everyone to the floor except Cora. She whipped her hands over the controls and the bus lifted off. She rotated it slowly and stared out the window.

"Okay...there." She pointed off to the left. "Thy sky's getting brighter over there, already. We need to haul ass." She turned the bus again and accelerated. "I'm pointing us toward the hangar. Just need to calculate the right speed to keep us ahead of the sunrise without hitting still-molten rock. This thing might be able to float over that kind of terrain, but I don't want to risk it."

Everyone remained silent as they picked themselves up, letting her crunch the numbers without distraction. Syala leaned against the wall, slid to the floor, pulled her knees up to her chest, and wept. Grish and Dylan sat beside her and put their arms around her, while the others sat in front of her and reached out to hold her hands or pat her shoulders.

"Okay, think I got it." Cora tapped a sequence into the holographic controls, smiled, and then kept both hands on the steering levers. "We're on our way. Shouldn't be too much longer."

---

"Drop-off coming! Everybody grab something!" Cora swept her optics over the unexpected ledge, hoping to find the shortest distance to the ground beyond, and nudged the controls to the right. As the hoverbus sailed over the edge, she caught a glimpse of something metal protruding from the ground. Part of a spacecraft or another ground vehicle that had plunged into molten rock, she guessed, its occupants asphyxiated or burned alive. She made a split-second decision not to mention it to the others.

The bus slammed down onto the ground below and scraped across the rock for a few meters before its repulsors could lift it back up. She glanced over her shoulder with a wince.

"Everyone okay?"

Grishnag, in the seat beside her, pushed herself upright and nodded.

The others either nodded or gave her a quick thumbs-up, except Dylan and Zilaka. The two of them had decided not to wait any longer, despite being covered in dried goop from their stasis pods, and had started making love right there on the floor--and they appeared determined not to let anything interrupt them. Cora couldn't fault them for the decision, given their current situation. If her calculations were off, or any variables changed, and the bus couldn't outrun the red giant coming up over the horizon behind them, the rock beneath the hoverbus would melt and it would likely plunge into a pool of lava.

At which point it would be all over, if everyone in the bus hadn't already been baked alive. The only way to escape an agonizing death would be for her to kill them all quickly, mercifully, by snapping their necks, and then deactivating herself permanently and letting the molten rock claim their bodies. They had finished discussing this a few minutes ago and had all come to an agreement to do just that if the worst happened, but Cora didn't know if she could bring herself to do it.

Please._She glanced at the readouts indicating the distance to the hangar, the temperature outside, and other factors. She patted the edge of the console gently, as if to encourage the bus to give its best effort. _Please work. Please get us to safety. I love these people. Don't put me in a position where I'll have to murder them to spare them an even worse death.

In the meantime, Zilaka had stretched out on the floor and tugged on Dylan's hand. "I know we wanted to clean this stuff off first, but we may never have another chance."

He had simply nodded, positioned himself on top of her, kissed her, and then both of them had begun moving together. The others had gathered around them and helped her along with a kiss here, a caress there.

Then the unexpected cliff had appeared. Luckily, the impact hadn't damaged anything, and the bus continued toward the hangar.

Cora glanced at the displays again. "Forty more minutes," she whispered to Grishnag.

"Almost there." Grish smiled and reached over to stroke Cora's cheek. "I knew you'd get us home."

Cora smiled, patted her hand, glanced over her shoulder, and chuckled. Ayastal had slid her huge body on top of Dylan's back in an attempt to prevent any farther bumps in the road from jolting them off the floor. Zilaka grinned, leaned around Dylan to kiss her, and then focused her attention on Dylan. Syala stroked Zee's hair, kissed her, and slid her other hand between Zee and Dylan to find Zee's sweet spot.

Zilaka gasped and her face contorted. She squeezed her eyes shut, beamed, and her breathing turned into deep gasps and moans.

Cora faced forward again and laughed softly. "That's not distracting at all," she whispered, but nevertheless it was a _welcome_distraction. Anything that gave her a chuckle at this point was exactly what she needed, considering the thoughts crossing her mind a few minutes ago.

Grish nodded, grinned, and wiggled her thick eyebrows. "Not to pile on any more distractions, but after watching them for a while, there's something I need to take care of." She leaned back in her chair, closed her eyes, and placed her hand between her legs.

Cora laughed again. "You go, girl!"

She focused on the path ahead for a few more minutes before taking another quick look over her shoulder.

Dylan closed his eyes and opened his mouth in a way that indicated he was seconds away from finishing. He gave Zilaka a long, passionate kiss--and then he groaned and shuddered slightly. Syala grinned and moved her hand faster, and a few seconds later Zee cried out, hunched forward, and clamped her arms and legs around him. Syala didn't let up until both of them collapsed in each other's arms. Syala tugged on her hand and then chuckled.

"Uh-oh, I'm stuck."

Gasping for breath, Dylan raised himself up enough for her to slide her hand out, and then he flopped onto Zilaka again.

"Damn, I'm good," Syala said with a giggle, and Zilaka nodded.

"Amazing," she whispered, and then sighed.

Cora faced forward and scanned for more breaks in the terrain ahead before glancing back at them again.

Ayastal laughed softly, lifted herself off them, and cupped her giant hand over Dylan's ass. He grinned, rolled over on his back, and sighed. Zilaka gave him one more kiss, scooted away, and leaned back against the wall.

Nishara slid over to Dylan, stroked his chest with her upper-right hand, kissed him, and grasped his shaft with her lower-right hand. "Need to get you ready for Ayastal." She aimed a wicked grin down at him.

Cora grinned and kept her optics on the road for the next ten minutes. After Dylan and Ayastal settled into soft, rhythmic gasping and moaning, she glanced at the readouts again.

Soon._She peered through the window, zoomed in on the horizon, and hoped to catch a glimpse of the structure in the distance. She couldn't find it, but hoped that would change soon. _It should come into sight sometime in the next half-hour.

And then all they'd have to do was find a way in, hope they could find a functional ship, and get away from this rock.

Grishnag came suddenly and clamped her hand over her mouth until it subsided. She released the breath she'd been holding, slumped back in her chair, and gasped several times. Finally, she took one more deep breath and glanced at Cora.

"Figured this would be distracting enough, so I didn't want to startle you by screaming abruptly." She laughed.

"Much appreciated." Cora winked and reached over to hold Grish's hand. "Shouldn't be much longer. The hangar should be in visual range any time now."

"That's welcome news." Grish gave Cora's hand a gentle squeeze.

Cora smiled back and took another quick glance over her shoulder.

Ayastal kept her eyes closed as she rode Dylan with increasing vigor. The other females kissed, nuzzled, and caressed both of them. Finally, Ayastal shuddered and twitched and let out a series of soft grunts before slumping over and bracing her arms on the floor. She let out a long breath and giggled.

Beneath her, Dylan continued thrusting for a few more seconds until--

"Haaaaaaahhhhhhh!"

Ayastal laughed again, waited for him to finish, and then lifted herself off him and propped herself up on her right arm. She rested her hand on his chest and he let out a long, relieved sigh, and put his hand on hers.

"Nothing left undone." Ayastal leaned forward to flick her forked tongue over his lips.

"Yeah," he whispered, and stroked her muzzle. "Just in case."

Great. Remind me of what'll happen if we fail._Cora kept her smile in place as she watched the waypoint on the console creep ever closer. _Screw that. No matter what happens, I'll find a way to get us to safety. I won't let any of you down.

---

"And here we are." Cora grinned and pointed at something out the front window.

Everyone crowded around her and Grishnag, and peered out across the smooth landscape. Syala finally spotted a rectangular opening in the side of a sloping mound of rock, as if a door built into the ground itself had been left open. She grinned, let out a relieved sigh, stepped over behind Dylan, put her arms around him and rested her chin on his shoulder.

He kissed her cheek and reached back to put his hands on her hips.

"Wonder why it's still open?" Grish frowned at the door and rubbed a finger over her lower lip. "Same reason the other doors wouldn't open, I suppose."

Cora nodded. "I suspect repeated overheating and cooling took a toll. Looks like it was able to open one last time, then the mechanism seized up or a part inside snapped. Glad it didn't go haywire after closing. I was afraid we'd have to ram the door to get in." She cocked her head. "I can see spacecraft inside. I want to scout the area and see if there's an opening big enough to fit one of them through."

She piloted the bus up the slope to the top and turned it to the right when a large gap in the terrain appeared directly ahead. Syala leaned closer and could make out a circular opening with faint lights far below, and a few dozen metallic objects arranged in an even pattern across the bottom.

Cora smiled and slumped back in her chair. "That is an _enormous_relief. I was afraid the hangar doors would be closed and we wouldn't be able to open them. Or we'd have to hope we could find weapons or explosives that could blow the doors off without damaging any of the ships inside. But it looks like these were able to open one last time, probably for the most recent abductee."

Her eyes opened wider and their glow brightened.

"Oh, that could mean my ship is still here! Since we were trapped in the simulation for only a few minutes, the _Mae Jemison_could still be here, and might even be in working condition." She grabbed the controls and maneuvered the bus back to the opening in the side.

Grishnag flicked her gaze all over the interior as Cora eased the bus through the door. "Be ready to grab onto something, just in case any security systems are still active."

Everyone braced themselves, but nothing happened over the next few seconds. Cora glanced at something on the panel in front of her.

"I'm detecting minimal power output. Looks like just enough to keep some of the lights on. The equipment here seems to be suffering from the same overheating damage that caused the simulation and other systems to break down in the holding facility."

"Good," Grish muttered. "Means we might not get shot down when we try to lift off."

Cora nodded and moved the vehicle ahead slowly. Her eyes flicked over each ship they passed by, until she finally gasped and pointed at one over on the left.

"There it is! That's my baby!" Cora grinned, laughed, and jabbed her finger toward a vessel identical to the one Syala and the others had stood atop during the final battle in the simulation. Cora glanced at her controls, tapped several of the glowing squares and circles, and beamed at the lines of text that appeared in the air above the panel. "Everything appears to be functioning. There isn't even any dust gathered on the hull. Hold on, I'm attempting to link up with the onboard systems."

Barely a second passed, and she grinned again.

"I have access. Running diagnostics. All onboard systems are online. Chronometer indicates only a few hours have passed. Looks like whatever captured my ship, was either unable to shut it down, or just didn't bother." She piloted the bus around toward the rear of her ship. "Let's see if I can open the cargo ramp."

A large hatch opened in the hull and descended, forming a ramp leading inside. Cora laughed.

"Yes! We're almost home." She maneuvered the bus slowly up the ramp. "I'm running a scan of the entire ship. Want to be sure there are no more of those blob things or any other nasty surprises waiting for us." She found a spot to park, nudged a few more controls, and the bus settled to the floor with a slight jolt. "Looks like it's clean."

Everyone sighed with relief and hugged each other. The ramp lifted up and the hatch closed as Cora stood and leaned over to give Grishnag a hug and passionate kiss. She joined the rest and shared a loving embrace and thorough kiss with each of them.

"Okay. I've pressurized the cargo hold." She opened the door and hopped out, her metal feet hitting the deck with a clank.

Everyone else followed her out, took a slow look around, and then took a few moments to share more hugs and kisses.

Wearing a brilliant smile, Cora walked over to the nearest wall, placed her palm on it, and closed her eyes.

"It's good to be home."

---

The first thing Cora did once they left the cargo hold was to lead them to the nearest airlock.

"The decontamination process will clean that dried goo off you, and also dispose of it completely, instead of having it run down the shower drain. That way, we won't have to worry about it reactivating and coming after us again." She waited as Dylan nodded and led the females into the airlock. She closed it and initiated the decontamination cycle.

Once it finished, she led them in a rush to the cockpit. As she was still linked with the onboard systems, she was able to start the pre-launch sequence on the way. The ship was ready to lift off by the time she took the pilot's seat and everyone else either grabbed another seat or found something to hang on to.

"Here we go," she said softly as she tapped the thruster control. I hope.

Outside the front viewports, the hangar floor dropped away and the walls slid past. The Jemison rose above the open doorway and Cora gaped at the alien sunrise.

Seeing it in person is quite different from watching it on a monitor.

The red giant had barely risen above the horizon, yet it already dominated the sky.

A shrill beep came from the console. Cora glanced at the display and tapped a button to silence the alarm.

"What's that?" Zilaka gripped the edge of the console in front of her and trembled. Nishara reached over to hold her hand.

"Radiation from the sun. Luckily, we're not sticking around long enough for it to cause any harm." She rotated the ship away from the sun and accelerated. She glanced at another sensor display and smiled as the ship gained altitude at an increasing rate. "We'll be in orbit in a few minutes. After that, we can put a safe distance between us and the sun, and figure out what to do from there."

The ground dipped beneath the viewports, leaving only the black, airless sky.

The minutes ticked away. Everyone stared at the viewports except Cora, who kept her optics on her console. Finally, she smiled again.

"We're in orbit." She nudged the controls. "And breaking away. Continuing acceleration. We'll be in deep space shortly." She glanced around at everyone. "I'll see if I can find the jumpgate network, assuming it still exists. Assuming we're still in a part of the universe that ever had one."

The minutes continued dragging by. Cora aimed a sensor array at the local sun and took a battery of scans. While waiting for the results, she watched another display for any pings from a gate network.

Several minutes later, there was no response. Cora shook her head.

"Can't detect any nearby jumpgates. This ship has its own jump drive, but a gate network would make it a lot easier to find our way back to civilization. There's a chance we'll be able to pick up a signal from the nearest gate once we're in hyperspace, but I have to be honest with you. It's possible the jumpgates no longer exist this far in the future, or we've been pulled so far across the universe that the nearest gate simply isn't in range."

Everyone exchanged a glance. Even those who didn't know what a jumpgate was could probably figure out the gist of it. Cora turned back to her console and started a scan of local space. Maybe there was something useful in the vicinity.

The sensors detected an anomaly moments later. Cora stared at the info on the screens and shook her head as several more, similar anomalies were detected.

"Huh. We've just picked up several bizarre energy fields. It's like space has been ripped open in several spots." She glanced around at everyone. "Could be some of the space-time rifts that were used to bring us here. If we can figure out where each one goes, we can return home."

The others looked around slowly as the implication sank in.

"Going home would mean leaving the rest of you," Syala muttered. "I was never very happy there." She took a moment to look each of them in the eye. "I'm happy here, with you."

"As am I," Ayastal said softly. "Perhaps we can visit our homes, but I would prefer to stay with all of you, no matter where we are."

The others nodded. Grishnag sighed.

"There's really not much more left for me back home than an empty house and memories of those I've lost. Until I met all of you, that was enough." She managed a shaky smile. "But now that I've met you, I feel renewed. Maybe it's time to finally resume my life. I'd like to do that with you all at my side."

Cora smiled. "I'd like that, too. If no one has any objections, maybe we can pick one of the rifts and find out where it leads. If they're stable on both ends, we might even be able to come back here and enter the other rifts, and map out where they all lead. If it works, you could visit your families and friends whenever you want, but we can stay together."

"Sounds good to me." Dylan smiled. "I'll miss my parents and friends if we can't find our way back, but it won't be bad at all if we're still able to see each other once in a while, if only to let them know we're okay." He grinned. "Actually, I'd love to introduce all of you to my family, just to see the looks on their faces."

"Sounds fun." Cora laughed softly. "Alright. I'll send probes through the anomalies to find out if they really are what I think they are, assuming we're able to receive data from the probes once they're on the other side. I want to be certain before we go diving into one of them." She leaned over to program and launch a swarm of probes. She watched them disperse and head for the anomalies she'd found.

An urgent alert came from the sensor array aimed at the sun.

Now what? Cora read the text coming up on the screen. What the hell?

"What is it?" Nishara glanced back and forth from the console to Cora. "What's wrong?"

Cora shook her head slowly. "The star has already reached the end of its life. I thought it'd be a few more years, at least."

"It's going supernova?" Dylan gripped the back of her chair and shivered. "How long?"

"From the readings I'm getting, a day or two at most. Possibly a few hours." She turned slowly to look around at the others. "That's not enough time to evacuate the captives, even if we had help."

Syala drew in a quick breath and covered her mouth with her hands. "All those people."

"I know. I wish there was something we could do, but--"

"Even if we tried saving a small handful of them," Grishnag said softly, "we'd risk being recaptured and trapped there when the sun blows."

"There's that, too, yes." Cora closed her optics and rubbed a hand over her face. No. Damn it, no.

"I don't want to sound cowardly," Zilaka whispered as she crossed her arms tightly over her chest, "but I can't go back into that thing."

Dylan nodded and put an arm around her shoulders. "We wouldn't be able to help anyone, anyway, if we got stuck back into the simulation."

"So." Cora turned slowly again, holding each of their gazes for a moment before moving on. "If no one has any objections, I guess all we can do is either go through one of the rifts or jump to hyperspace and try to find a jumpgate beacon. But if the star goes supernova before we can return, it might destroy the rifts, or destabilize them." She turned back to the console, stared at the data from the sensor array, and shook her head again. "It shouldn't be happening this fast."

"What could cause it?"

She shrugged. "One theory I've heard is that if someone opens a jump vortex inside a star and leaves it open, it'll gradually siphon out material from the core, destabilize the star, and cause it to blow up. I suppose it's possible that, this far into the future, there could be a species with technology advanced enough to do that."

"Huh." Grishnag arched an eyebrow and managed a grim smile. "Maybe someone discovered what these people were doing and decided to get even."

"Well, that would certainly put a definite stop to it, and destroying the entire system would prevent any other species from using their technology to continue the abductions." Cora glanced over her shoulder at everyone. "Once the star blows, we'll have _very_little time to escape, and if we go through one of the rifts, we could be trapped on the other side. If we end up in an even worse place, we'll very likely be stuck there."

"Oh, shit," Dylan said with a sigh. "After escaping the simulation and surviving everything so far, I'd hate for us to end up in an even deadlier place."

"I think we can all agree on that." Cora faced the console again. "I'll aim all the sensor arrays at the sun just to be sure we don't miss anything. We'll be notified the instant anything changes, and if the star's about to go, we'll haul ass, either through one of the rifts or into hyperspace. Until then, all we an do is wait for data from the probes."

"And if we don't hear back from them, or they're not able to find a safe place?" Grishnag arched a brow. "Or if we stay in this time, and don't find a gate network?"

"Then I guess we just start investigating planets and hope we can find a technologically advanced civilization, or at least planets that can sustain life so we can gather food and supplies." She waved a hand at the doorway. "Speaking of food, I always keep some on hand in case I pick up passengers. There's enough for a month or so. And I also have a limited wardrobe, if any of you want something to wear." Cora glanced at Ayastal and chuckled. "Well, those of you who can fit into them, at least."

Dylan glanced around and grinned. "I'm perfectly fine with everyone staying naked, but if we do make contact with anyone else, I suppose we should put something on before our first meeting."

Grish chuckled and gave his ass a quick squeeze. "Works for me." She couldn't keep the smile on for more than a few seconds, her thoughts probably circling back to the thousands of captives who were waiting to die.

"As for food," Nishara said, "I haven't given it any thought until now, but it has been a while since I've had anything to eat."

"In that case, the first thing we should do is run by the med-bay and check everyone to be sure you can eat food from Earth. All of you appear to be based on the same amino-acid proteins--if you weren't, kissing each other would've produced a reaction. But there could be other factors."

Dylan flicked a wide-eyed glance around at the females and turned to the door. "In that case, the sooner we find out, the better."

Cora nodded, took the lead, and hoped her sudden worry didn't show on her face.

Shit, I hope all of them can eat the food here.