And for Butch, or he'll do something nasty to my hard drive...
One nano-second Butch had been sprawled on his fleshie's shoulder - in a virtual sense - watching her working on a particularly tasty variety of the type of story she called a lemon, the next…
He shook his head to try to clear the flashing lights from behind his eyes. Which didn't work, but since they were all around him that wasn't so surprising.
"What…"
"Butch?"
Big golden eyes blinked, then narrowed.
"Taipo?"
The steel-blue gremlin's flanged tail twitched as he inclined his head. Butch frowned.
"Where are we?"
Taipo shook his head. Around the pair machinery beeped and whirred and flashed. Butch took a closer look then eyed his acquaintance warily.
"This isn't your fleshie's computer."
"Um, no."
"This isn't any sort of computer I've ever seen."
"No."
"So what happened?"
The memory-grabbing gremlin seated himself on a pile of cabling, shoulders slumping miserably.
"It's my fleshie. Something… happened…"
Butch sat cross-legged in front of him, tufted tail stroking a strong thigh in unconscious sympathy.
"Tell me."
Taipo was quite clearly at a loss for words.
"I think… it's like… her processor overheated and short-circuited."
Butch's eyes widened in alarm. Yes, every gremlin knew that fleshies were subject to a whole host of ailments and diseases, enough to take up a substantial amount of memory, but this was serious. Potentially deadly. He gripped Taipo's wrist, claws digging into the cool flesh.
"And?"
"Well, they brought her here…" He gestured around himself, to the devices that surrounded the pair of them. "And… did something…"
He faltered to a halt, and Butch's eyes widened. Tears like liquid silver shone on Taipo's face.
"But you're still here… so she's alright - isn't she?"
As he said it, it occurred to him that none of them knew what would happen if - when, he realised, feeling suddenly cold - their fleshie actually died. It had never happened yet. Would they cease to exist also? Become just a memory, a couple of bytes buried somewhere in the hard drive, gradually becoming corrupted until beyond all hope of resurrection? A gremlin attached itself to its fleshie, after all, not to its fleshie's machine…
"She's still online, yes."
"So…"
Taipo closed fiery eyes.
"I was scared, Butch. Scared for her, scared for me… I didn't know what to do. I found my way here through the network, so I could keep an eye on her…"
The horned gremlin knelt up, pulling Taipo into his arms.
"And called me?"
"I'm sorry," Taipo gasped between sobs, gripping Butch as though he was some kind of anchor. "Couldn't help it…"
Butch stroked his stiff mane.
"It's OK. I don't mind. But I don't know what I can do to help."
"Just being here helps..."
They held each other in the humming, buzzing silence for a while, until Taipo calmed down.
Well, sort of calmed down.
Butch blinked; something was pressing into his abdomen. He reached a hand between their bodies - to find something large, smooth and prehensile in his grasp. Taipo whimpered and pressed his head to the horned gremlin's shoulder.
"Taipo…?"
"I'm sorry."
Butch blinked and moved back a little to see what he'd caught. His eyes widened.
"Um, Taipo…?"
Fiery eyes looked rebelliously into golden.
"I can't help it. You're… beautiful."
Butch's mouth dropped open. Taipo found him attractive?
Well, yes, he knew the antipodean gremlin found him attractive. Nearly everyone found him attractive, especially his fleshie - he'd designed himself to be this way. But to discover Taipo found him desirable as well…
His eyes sparked wickedly.
"So are you."
Taipo froze, then his eyes moved to Butch's groin. And widened. And returned to the horned gremlin's face.
"You… like me too? Like that?"
Butch glanced briefly at his pale blue erection then grinned.
"That's what that normally means. According to my fleshie, and everything else I've read."
Taipo reached to take the elegant organ into his hand - and it was then that Butch noticed the strange cables, on the ends of locks of his mane, sprouting from his wrists… He frowned.
"What are these?"
"Firewire."
Butch blinked.
"Where did you get them?"
"They… appeared. When I arrived here."
"… what do they do…?"
Taipo eyed the slender cords, each tipped with a little plug.
"I don't know. I haven't tried using them yet."
Butch concentrated, then formed a port on the inside of his wrist and extended his hand to Taipo.
"Try plugging it in."
"Are you sure?"
Butch tugged gently on the cable, pulling Taipo's arm closer, and slotted the plug into his flesh.
A bright jolt of pleasure sheared through him from wrist to brain and straight to his groin, sizzling along the electrical conduits that took the place of his nerves. He shivered, gasping loudly, and eyed Taipo, pupils huge.
"That's…"
He halted at the look on the other's face: Taipo was staring at him, expression awed.
Butch took a deep breath, recovering himself, then studied exactly where the antipodean gremlin's firewire were positioned, creating more ports in his own skin to match them, on his chest, his forehead, temple, under his jaw, down his throat and at the back of his neck. Watching Taipo licking his lips as he watched, the cables snaking against his body and obviously eager to make contact, Butch wondered about becoming female for the duration… But no. Not this time. It was this form that Taipo desired - had to be, he'd never seen female Butch. (Nor hermaphrodite Butch for that matter.)
And anyway, going by what he'd read, they'd both enjoy this…
Taipo was trembling slightly, with anticipation, the flames in his eyes a vivid leaping red as he twined his tail around Butch's. The horned gremlin lay back, smiling as Taipo eased on top of him - then yelping as the firewire found their ports.
*OK?*
Butch shivered, gazing up at him with huge eyes, unable to look away, unable to move very far, held immobile by the physical and electronic bonds between himself and Taipo.
*Spread your legs.*
Shaking as packets of pleasure sparked along the firewire and deep into his body, Butch eased his thighs apart, angling his hips upwards, relaxing as the thick cable of Taipo's organ pressed against the port hidden between his legs… crying out as it slid into him and one last firewire snaked out from Taipo's groin to plug into the slit in the head of Butch's (virtual) penis…
It was, he thought, much later, very pretty, mindscapes and schema in swathes of radiation across the spectrum from gamma to radar, swirling and sparkling and dancing along his virtual synapses. At the time he was inundated, drowning in electrical resonances that translated into several different states of pleasure and pain and something else entirely. He wrapped his legs around Taipo's waist as the steel-blue gremlin began to move his hips, each thrust sparking more intense sensations, delving deeper and coming in a spray of electrical pulses that illuminated Butch from within.
Taipo whimpered and rested his forehead against Butch's, eyelids fluttering as he tried to regain equilibrium.
*… ohhhhh… You OK…?*
Butch was shaking, unsatisfied, but the surge of power that had accompanied Taipo's release left him speechless. He shook his head, shifting the firewire slightly and gasping as tiny explosions skipped across his mind. Taipo grinned as he suddenly realised the uniqueness of his position - master over Butch, for the first time ever.
It would be the last time, too, unless he made this good for the horned gremlin. And he didn't want it to be the last time. He liked this, very much indeed.
He pulled back slightly, retracting his organ and unplugging from Butch's groin - then slid forward, positioning his own port over the blue gremlin's rigid penis and impaling himself forcefully, grinning as Butch jerked upwards with a strangled cry, claws jamming into his partner's hips. Crouched over Butch's slender body, rocking hard, Taipo sighed blissfully as he felt the smaller gremlin climax in a surge of power that had them both gasping…
Taipo recovered first, and slid the firewire from sated pale blue flesh as Butch slumped back with a contented sigh, eyes half-closed and glowing.
"Mmm. Interesting. Genuine 'plug and play'…"
Taipo grinned.
"I wonder how many different states we could attain?"
Butch blinked, then smiled.
"It would certainly be fascinating to find out."
The antipodean gremlin settled himself beside his… now-lover?... and laid a hand over the pale blue groin.
"I'm up for it."
Butch chuckled and wriggled, Taipo's hand arousing him again.
"So I noticed. Do you feel better?"
It took a moment for Taipo to understand what he meant - and then he felt guilty. What was he thinking of, playing human while his fleshie was so ill? Butch ran a claw lightly down his chest.
"Somehow, I don't think she'll mind."
Taipo was doubtful.
"You think?"
Butch nodded.
"I'm positive she'd be pleased."
Taipo was unconvinced: Butch rolled on top of him and twined their tails together.
"View it this way. It hasn't done her any harm, has it?"
Taipo quickly jacked in to the medical equipment around them, then shook his head.
"Well, no…"
"It's made you feel happier. It's certainly made me feel… different. Are you going to give her so many problems in future?"
Taipos' eyes widened.
"Oh I couldn't!" He frowned. "Well, maybe not quite so many. I'm a gremlin, after all."
Butch smirked and brushed a kiss over the steel-blue gremlin's lips - something he'd never tried before, but thought he rather liked, so did it again.
"So we're all happy."
Taipo inclined his head, considering the strange but rather pleasant sensation of lips on his, then frowned.
"Even your fleshie?"
Butch nodded resignedly.
"She'll turn it into a story."
"She will?"
"Of course."
Taipo grinned.
"Heh. Do you have any idea how jealous everyone's going to be? Of me, I mean? You're not going to get any peace again, ever."
Butch paled.
"… what…?"
Taipo nuzzled his neck.
"Well, now we've proved it's possible… What do you bet Murphy comes calling at the very first opportunity…?"
Butch's horrified wail echoed through the 'net, raising evil grins as gremlins everywhere trace-routed through to his IP address…
Thanks Valkyrie!
