Draxl: Apocalyptic Himbos, page 12
I still feel like I'm only aware of a tiny fraction of the whole story, and based on what Draxl's not telling me, I'd say humans are nowhere near out of the woods. Machines are on the verge of taking over, simple pleasures like food have been eliminated, and who knows whether the human race will even survive beyond the current generation since they can't repopulate.
Kinda puts my own situation into perspective.
I feel guilty that all I've been focused on is the safety of my boys, and hoping that the six of us get rescued so we can get out of here and safely return back to our time and go about our lives as if nothing happened.
Except…how can I do that now?
Somehow, in the space of a few short weeks, I've been pulled into this weird future-world where almost nothing makes sense, where life seems to be as dangerous and horrible as it is bleak, and yet…I'm invested.
Like, really invested.
How will I be able to go on with life as normal when I know that humanity is on the brink of extinction and Draxl is here, trapped in a future-world without hope? Without meaning. Without simple pleasures.
Without sex.
"Can I ask you something?" I say during a late-evening conversation.
His lips twitch. "Go ahead."
"Is it too late?"
"Is what too late?"
"You and me." I huff in a breath. "If we did stuff, sex stuff, would that be enough to reignite the life force and save humanity?"
He stares at me for a long moment, his eyes intense. "Two years ago, yes. Now I'm not so sure. I’d have to check with Klune. I can't give you a direct answer, I'm afraid."
"But is it still possible? Even theoretically," I press, not willing to let this go. "If you manage to reignite the life force, could that be used to defeat the machines?"
"I suppose so. In theory, at least." He looks straight at me and blinks a couple of times. "What are you saying?"
God, this seven-foot, scaly-armed future-man is seriously missing every signal I'm throwing his way. "What I'm saying, Draxl, is should you and I have sex to save the world?"
DRAXL
I blink a few more times, unable to speak. My throat turns to sandpaper, my heat vitals spike, and my cock stiffens, hard as steel in my trou.
Burleigh's words bounce around in my head, my brain seemingly unable to latch onto their meaning.
"You want to have sex with me?" I mutter dumbly. It's only after I speak that I realize how silly that question is since it's pretty clear that's what he's implying.
What can I say? Arousal makes a guy stupid. I can almost understand why the life force was taken from us.
Burleigh looks at me with those big blue-green eyes and a smile breaks across his smooth, beautiful face.
"Of course I do," he says, tilting his forehead down slightly, color rising in his cheeks.
I draw in a deep breath, release it, and repeat the process a few times, my eyes locked on his. I feel like I'm floating even though my ass is firmly planted on a chair. My cock, heavy with need, pulses in my trou.
Ever since I sent Burleigh the watch he's contacted me on the hour every hour from the moment he wakes up until he goes to sleep at night. Hours became days, which turned into weeks, and now…now I can't imagine a life without him in it.
The sense of protection that Burleigh's kindled within me from the moment we met has only intensified the more we've talked.
From what he's told me about his life and his childhood, I've cobbled together a picture of a person who doesn't trust easily.
Nor does he like to depend on others. He's been hurt, betrayed, and overlooked for reasons I cannot comprehend. How can anyone walk past him and not be completely mesmerized? Past-human guys must all be morons, I've decided.
In life, everyone faces challenges. The measure of a person, what separates the strong from the weak, is how we respond to them. Do we stay and fight for what we believe in, for what's right, or do we cower and run?
Burleigh's armed with an internal strength far more impressive than any brute force I can exert with my muscles. He's gone through a lot, he's resilient and capable, and ferkuck me, it only makes me want to be with him even more.
Here he is, trapped in a situation where he's all alone and in grave danger, with me being the only person he can rely on for support. It must be killing him, the feeling of helplessness. But even in this darkest of hours, without knowing what fate has in store for him or his friends, Burleigh's strength and determination not to give in shines through.
During the course of these conversations, I've come to realize that my need to look after Burleigh doesn't come from a place where I think he's weak. Because I know he's not. Sure, he may be shorter than me and his skin is smooth and scaleless, but he's hardly some damsel in distress. He's powerful and determined, and that's a truth I know not because of what he says, but because of what he's overcome in his life.
My desire to protect him, to keep him safe and make him happy, is born from a place where it would be an honor, a privilege to do it. If he ever bestows that gift to me, I'll be the luckiest man in all of human history.
I push out a breath. "Are you certain you want to have sex with me?"
"Yes." He responds instantly. "And this time I'll last longer. I swear."
The pink on his cheeks turns crimson. I keep telling him we'll need to implant more scales to help regulate his internal body temperature, but I'm having second thoughts about that. He looks too damn cute like this.
"Besides," he continues. "Who knows how long I'll be here? We may not get many chances before I go home. Right?" There's a raspy hunger in his tone, but it's accompanied by a trace of something that sounds like sadness.
My brain's still a little slow on the uptake, so it takes me a few seconds to process the implications of what he said, but when I do, it hits me like a kick to the balls.
Here I am, imagining the time we've spent getting to know each other as a prelude to a lifetime together, of me doting on him, caressing his soft skin, capturing those lips in sweet kisses, while he's planning to return back to his world, his time, his life.
After he has sex with me.
After we're bonded, joined forever in the most sacred, most intimate way two people can connect with each other.
How could he get up and leave after that?
Why would he want to…?
I scratch the back of my neck, baffled by the inner workings of the past-human mind. I do my best to not let my conflicting emotions show on my face.
"Unless you don't want to have sex with me?" Burleigh questions, possibly mistaking my dazed silence as uncertainty.
"What? No. Of course I do. There's not a single day that went by in the 748 days we were apart that I didn't think about you, what it would be like to hold you in my arms, kiss you…make love to you."
He slides a hand over his mouth. "You counted the days?"
"Of course I did."
From the moment I got pulled away, my soul's been missing a you-shaped piece, I want to say but don't. But by gods I want to.
My chest bursts with so many unspoken words, but this isn't the right time or the right way, not through a holo-viz. He deserves better than that.
I had planned on telling Burleigh everything I feel for him once I rescue him and he's safe and in my arms.
Who knows how long I'll be here?
That's thrown a spanner in the works, making me question whether it's even worth bringing my feelings up if he's planning on leaving anyway.
Dammit. Are all relationships this much of a clusterferkuck?
And somehow, despite the torrent of seesawing emotions and conflicting thoughts thrumming through me, when I look down, I'm in disbelief at what greets me. I mutter to myself.
"Didn't catch that," Burleigh says, his face getting larger as he leans in toward the holo-viz screen.
I look up and clear my throat. After a few beats, I finally say, "How do you past-humans walk around with erections?" I palm my cock through the straining fabric of my trou. "This thing is throbbing." How can I be hard when my mind is awash with so many emotions?
Burleigh's serious demeanor vanishes, and his whole face lights up. "Ooh, let me see, let me see."
"You saw it two years ago. It hasn't grown any in that time."
"Thank fuck."
"What do you mean by that?"
"I mean you already have a massive cock, and despite many repeated sessions with my supersized vibrator, I think I'm still going to struggle to accommodate you."
I get light-headed, a pleasurable ache bubbling in my chest as I scramble to process what I just heard.
Repeated sessions.
Supersized vibrator.
Struggle to accommodate me.
"Shit," Burleigh hisses, instantly snapping me out of my reverie.
I really need to ask him to refrain from using that word. And while I'm at it, I can throw in asshole, crap, piss, and, possibly the worst offender of all, holy shit. I'm afraid to ask if past-humans thought shit actually was holy. I realize the twenty and twenty-first centuries were barbaric times, but surely not.
"What is it?"
"Someone's coming," he whispers urgently.
I growl, hating the presence of danger anywhere near him. "Let's end comms."
"Okay." He nods, then a small smile forms on his lips. "Hey, Draxl."
I lean in closer. "Yeah?"
"I like you."
The words settle over me like a warm blanket on a cold winter's night.
Everything about this feels so right.
I have no doubt he's the person I am destined to be with.
Burleigh is my soulmate.
I just need to come up with a way to bridge the three-hundred-year time gap between us.
For the moment, though, I smile back at him. "I like you, too."
"Can I ask you something?"
I grin widely at the familiar refrain. Along with our I like you farewells, it's something I've fast become accustomed to.
Burleigh's got a lot of questions which is completely understandable. If I got shot through time and space and landed three hundred years into the future, I'm sure I'd have a few of my own, too. He's trying to wrap his brain around some pretty far-out concepts like time travel and the brink of annihilation humanity finds itself perched on.
"Go ahead. You can ask me anything."
As far as I'm concerned, no topic is off-limits, even if I do moderate how much I tell him. I hate keeping information from him, but I remind myself it's only a temporary measure to protect him. Some of it, like The Change of 2100 is too intense, too heartbreaking, to tell him in any way other than in person. I'll reveal everything to Burleigh once we're together.
At least about historic world events.
I still haven't made up my mind whether I should tell him how I feel.
"Well," he begins, biting into his lip. "It's personal, and possibly a painful topic for you, but I was wondering…what happened to your parents?"
I take a sharp inhale.
With anyone else, this topic would be strictly off-limits. But Burleigh isn't just anyone. He's the most important person in my life.
Sensing my hesitancy, he smiles apologetically. "Forget it. I don't want you to feel bad. I shouldn't have brought it up. I'm sorry."
"No. It's okay. You've told me things about your past that are painful, I want to do the same with you. I just…need a moment."
"Of course. Take all the time you need."
I steady my breathing as I prepare to talk about the most painful experience of my life. I think about Burleigh, about how strong he was when he told me about his childhood. How his parents relinquished their responsibility. How he grew up, shuttled from one foster home to another. When he intimated some of the people who were meant to protect him fell short, I dug my nails so deeply into my fisted palms, I drew blood.
He's also told me more about his close relationship with Ulysses. What I witnessed between them, their strong bond, is actually a brotherhood. A connection forged from shared childhood trauma that they endured, and survived, together. From what I can make out, kid Ulysses protected kid Burleigh as much as he could, and for that, adult Ulysses has earned my eternal gratitude. I will repay him one day, this I swear.
And since Burleigh's been strong enough to open up and share some of the painful events of his past, I need to be brave enough to reopen one of the most agonizing chapters of my life and do the same in return.
"There's not a lot to say, really," I begin, my voice tight. "The parenthood journey in the 2300s is probably different to how people became parents in your time."
"How so?"
"Well, for starters, my parents had to apply for a child-rearing permit."
He inclines his head. "Who do they apply to?"
"The Council of Unknowns. They control everything."
Burleigh frowns. His eyes have gone darker, narrowing in thought. "Wait. This Council controls the entire world. How are they able to process every single child-rearing application?" He pulls a face when he says those three words, like they taste funny on his tongue. "Wouldn't they be inundated with millions of applications?"
"Uh… No."
Silence.
Then, "Draxl, what are you not telling me?"
I wring my hands. "587,322."
He frowns.
"That's the number of humans left on earth."
A sob breaks from his chest. "No."
"Numbers have been dwindling since 2100," I tell him. "First, we had The Change. Then, when reproduction was taken over by machines for our supposed good, The Council of Unknowns severely restricted permits. To top it all off, The Elite have been making people who they deem to be dissenters disappear."
"Is that…" Burleigh's voice splinters, possibly from the shock of what I just told him. "Is that what happened to your parents?"
"It was," I say, trying to stay strong by reminding myself that what I experienced was a mere fraction of the horror humans living in 2100 endured. No one's gotten off lightly. We've all been battered. Sometimes, it makes me wonder why I even bother fighting. Humanity's plight is so desperate. Are we past saving?
"My parents were…are…scientists. Despite all the incremental genetic modifications humans have been subjected to, they have something of what I believe is a classic love story."
"How so?"
I smile as the memory of the way my dad's eyes would light up with affection every time he regaled me with this story of how he met Mom rises from my memory bank and into my stream of consciousness. "They were both at university. He spotted her from across a crowded cafeteria. They were both with their friends, but he left his group, inexplicably drawn to her…"
It's only as I start telling Burleigh the story of my parents' meeting that I recognize the similarities between it and the way he and I met. He cuts his eyes to me, and as we look at one another, I wonder if he's picking up on the parallels, too.
"She played hard to get, apparently," I continue. "Dad had to ask her out twenty-four times before she said yes. Mom would say she only agreed on his twenty-fourth attempt because twenty-five would have made him look desperate. As I grew up, I realized how much they loved sharing this story, because every time they got to that part, he'd gaze lovingly toward her and deliver this line: 'I'd happily be the most desperate man in the world for you, my darling.'"
"Awww," Burleigh coos, clutching his chest. "That's so romantic. Now I see where you get it from."
Genetically, I can't cry, but by gods, hearing Burleigh compare me to the man I worshiped my whole life brings me right to the very edge.
I clear my throat and continue with the story. "They fell madly in love. But, here's the thing. Love in the twenty-fourth century is a bit…iffy."
"Iffy?"
"Well, with the life force removed from us, humans tend to struggle making real, meaningful connections with others. We have a plethora of tech and enhancements to keep us distracted, but anything real, even something as small as a conversation with another human, it's…not very common."
"Oh. That sounds…"
"What?" I prompt when he trails off. "You can say it."
"Kinda horrible. Sorry."
"Don't be. It is horrible. My parents, somehow, despite being products of their time, were still majority-human. After graduating, they decided to put their scientific minds to use to explore the human body and understand these so-called enhancements we were receiving. They started digging, and it wasn't long before they dug too deep for the Council's liking."
"Uh-oh."
"Yeah. Big time uh-oh. Once you're on the Council's radar you have to tread lighter. The thing about my parents? They don't cower from a fight. As they kept discovering more shady stuff that directly contradicted the Council's 'we're doing this all for humanity's good,' they started getting detained more and more frequently."
I pause and swallow. I'm getting to the really hard part now.
"One afternoon, Mom asked me about school and I was so excited because I'd made it onto the football team. I was midway through telling her about the training schedule when she screamed. I'll never forget the sound…"
A heaviness hits my limbs as I close my eyes, the shrill pitch of terror ringing clearly in my ears.
"A squad of Elite soldiers broke in, freezing my parents before my father could even get to his feet. They were frog-marched out of our house, and that was the last time I ever saw them."
"What about you?"
I shrug. "They left me there. It wasn't me they were after."
"And your parents, are they…"
"Dead?"
"Yeah."
"I don't know."
Burleigh looks like he's been frozen by one of The Elites' laser guns himself, but I know he's just trying to process what I've shared with him. He's in shock. "I'm so sorry. There's nothing I can even say…"
He stops talking and we sit there in a sad silence. I hate talking about what happened that night, hate the feelings it stirs up. Rage, fear, confusion. I was a ferkucking child and I had my whole world snatched away from me. I couldn't do anything to save my parents, I could only watch as they were taken from me.
