[magicmerlon]

“Space… the final frontier. These are the voyages of the… oh, why did dad make watch all that stuff…”

Tarsha DeLacruz was bored. Specifically, she was bored at this moment because her vessel, The ISS (that’s, Independent Star Ship) Wayfarer was currently in a very boring, empty part of the Torat Sector. But she’d been bored for a while.

There’d been no lack of excitement, that’s for sure. She’d been taking on jobs for a couple years now, everything from simple cargo runs to dangerous and thrilling space battles. She’d fought with and been hit on by every species with two-legs in the sector, and a few with more (or less). And as Tarsha’s experience grew, so too did the Wayfarer, and now the once simple cargo vessel rather resembled a small military cruiser, with all the armaments and long-term deployment capabilities of a ship three times her size. Tarsha herself wore a pair of dark blue denim pants, a sleeveless blue jacket zipped up tight, and a bandana around her black hair.

But Tarsha… well, was bored. The pilot leaned back in her command chair in the diminutive three-chaired bridge, and once again stared at the distant stars. She brushed her chin length black hair out her eyes and folded her pale, freckled hands behind her head. The comely captain’s white irised eyes sparkled in the reflection of the cosmos. Behind her, a dozen of Captain Mercury’s True Tales to Amaze were stacked and filled with dog ears.

“Maybe after this mission I’ll leave the sector…” Tarsha mumbled to herself as she kicked her feet up onto the dashboard. “Aurovo’s right next to the Fury Sector, maybe they’ll be some better adventure waiting there…” Her daydreaming came to an abrupt end when she heard the door to the bridge swish open. Oh right, my current mission.

“I say, how long until we reach our destination?” asked the Wayfarer’s only other passenger. Tarsha spun around to face her.

The Translnid woman in front of her wore a white lab coat over tight black bodysuit. The shiny material of the suit left little to the imagination, showing off her striking hourglass figure and sweeping curves delectably. The zipper was only pulled up to about half past her generous breasts, showing off a grand canyon of grey-skinned cleavage. She also wore a necklace with a skull pendant on it and thick leather boots.

Tarsha held back a blush of envy. The starship pilot was definitely busty, and compared to most human or Thriskoid women she’d be above average. But compared to the four-eyed bat-wolf woman in front of her, she was feeling self-conscious.

“Don’t worry doctor, we’ve slowed to sub-light and are approaching the planet now. Give it half an hour, tops.”

The doctor didn’t notice or didn’t care that Tarsha was glancing between her chest and face with every syllable. “Ah, well, yes and good and such.” She took three long strides and crossed the room suddenly, all four red eyes squinting like a predator at Tarsha.

“Uh, remember that talk we had about personal-”

The doctor suddenly reached forward and poked Tarsha’s cheek, then the other. Then, her small claws digging slightly into her freckles, she pinched both cheeks gently and deepened her squint.

“Um, doc…” Tarsha’s blush deepened.

“You are doing that again, the pulmonary reaction. Why does it increase in intensity the more I touch you?”

“The what?! Do you mean the blushing?!” Tarsha tried to sink into her seat.

“Oh yes! That is what you call it yes?” The doctor leaned forward, her generous chest now pressing into Tarsha’s. She seemed oblivious to the erotic nature of her pose.

“Y-yea, a blush, we do it for a lot of reasons-”

“Why are you doing it right now? Right this instance, what is the reason?” The doctor held Tarsha’s cheeks tighter and leaned her face in an inch from the other woman. As she spoke, Tarsha couldn’t help but stare at the fangs so close to her and the predatory eyes bearing down on her.

“R-right now-?”

“Yes right now, now-now.” The doctor nodded fervently.

“W-well you’re a little, um, close. And uh, you’re um, touching-”

“Really?” The doctor seemed very excited. “Then are face-cheeks erogenous zones for humans? Or Thriskoids? Or is it unique to Thriskoid/Human hybrids such as yourself?”

“Erogenous… n-no no not my, uh, cheeks, its uh-”

“Yes?” The Translnid leaned in further, practically squishing the pilot with her pillowy chest.

“Your… its your…” Tarsha wheezed out.

“Yes?!”

“Boobs,” the pilot managed to say with the last of her breath.

“Oh? Oh!” The doctor leapt off of her and smoothed out her lab coat. “Ahem… I see.”

Tarsha took in deep breaths, finally freed from the mammary prison. “What is wrong with you?”

“There is nothing wrong with the pursuit of knowledge! I will unravel your mysteries, piece by piece. I lay bare every aspect of you, become intimate with every detail, and shine light on every crack and crevice!” The doctor struck a pose, hand on one hip and the other pointing at a mortified Tarsha.

“Was… that innuendo?” she finally squeaked out as a response.

“What is this, innuendo, you say?”

“It’s nothing! Nevermind! Um, please return to your quarters while I uh, lay in our final approach course.”

“...Fine! Tell me when we arrive.” The doctor sashayed her lab coat behind her like a cape, for a moment showing off the voluptuous curve of her tush, and left the bridge.

“And stay out of my underwear drawer!” Tarsha yelled after her. She slumped back into her chair and once again pulled up the transport contract her terrifying passenger had signed:

“I, a certain Tarsha DeLacruz, captain of The Wayfarer and registered star pilot, hereby agree to transport a certain Paz Platelet to Aurovo at best speed for the agreed upon sum listed below,” Tarsha read aloud to herself.

This Paz had been a nuisance from the moment she stepped aboard. Twice now she’d found the doctor rummaging through her bras, trying to deduce their function, despite the fact that she herself seemed to wear one. Apparently the Translnid had modified her appearance to be less terrifying, with softer features and nubbier fangs and claws. Tarsha supposed it was more difficult to modify ones obsessions though…

On screen, the temperate planet of Aurovo, homeworld of the Conicoids, grew larger. “At least I’ll be rid of her,” thought Tarsha, and she began preparations for their approach.

Meanwhile, on the planet in question...

“Professor! Professor! I have the readings you asked for!”

The Conicoid lab assistant, Polly, sprinted through a maze of bookshelves, prototype equipment, and stacked papers. Her swishing cat-like tail trailed behind her as she turned a corner and burst into the main laboratory.

The room was huge, with a glass skylight for a ceiling. It had once been a greenhouse for Tardarian saplings, which grow to twenty feet high before you can replant them. The professor, Anna Albrechtsberger, had refurbished it into her personal workshop. There were benches shoved against every corner, and every inch of wallspace was taken up by taped up diagrams, screens, and hung up tools. The centerpiece of the room was a large complex of scaffoldings cradling a complex piece of machinery: A Flotation Device, of Albrechtsberger’s own design, now mostly built. The cylinder of circuits and metal casing pulsed with half-powered, ethereal life. A dozen Conicoids worked in the workshop, testing various things and maintaining equipment.

The professor herself stood hunched over a diagram that was so dense with computations and scribbled notes that no one but herself could really decipher it. Polly came to a screeching halt behind the Nettik woman.

“Professor?” Polly asked. The taller woman didn’t respond, the Conicoid nervously dodging the professor’s tail in anticipation.

“Professor?” she tried again, even quieter.

“Hmm?” Anna suddenly spun around to face the Conicoid. She had a coffee mug in her hand, bags under her eyes, and the skinny body type of someone who doesn’t exercise and is too busy to indulge in food or rest very often. Her grey tank top clung to her body, leaving no imagination that she wore a white bra and that her breasts filled the C cups nicely. Her cargo pants were filled with an assortment of tools, rolled up papers, and a piece of licorice. She pushed up her glasses to pinch her nose, and twitched her cat-like ears, the left one with a deep clip in it from some forgotten accident.

“Yes, Polly?” she finally answered properly, adding another coffee ring to her diagram as she set her mug down.

“Here you are ma’am, those readings from the high orbit probe came back.” Polly dutifully answered, handing the datapad over.

The professor eagerly took it, and her slitted eyes poured over it quickly, dilating more and more as she got excited.

“As you can see, it’s good news and bad news. These readings strongly suggest the invisible Deep Space Wormhole really is there, but…”

“But it only opens every few years…” the professor somberly finished the thought, setting down the pad.

The nervous Conicoid nodded, twiddling her thumbs anxiously. “I already took the liberty of contacting local stations for a ship to hire, but… well… the ones that weren’t busy…”

Anna crouched down to be face to face with Polly. “It’s okay,” she said gently, “be honest, what happened?”

The Conicoid, aiming to please, felt reassured and delivered the bad news plainly. “Most of them either hung up on me or said that it was a stupid crackpot waste of time that was too likely to destroy their ship, ma’am.” Polly smiled.

The Nettik’s face froze in her motherly smile. It stayed that way for a little too long.

“...ma’am?”

“Gah!” Anna suddenly screamed, throwing her arms wide. Polly shrieked in fear and hopped backwards as the professor slumped to the ground. She rolled back onto her tight tush and held onto her own tail like it was a teddy bear. Her ears flattened against her head and she mewled like a kitten.

“So many years of work! So many credits sunk into all this!” she whined. “The university will revoke my title! My funding! We’re almost out of money as is and if I can’t get results…” she rambled into incohersion. Polly worked up the nerve to approach the crying cat.

“Um, it’s ok, ma’am.” She tried to console her, tapping her three-fingered hand on the woman’s furry shoulder.

Anna sniffled. “I was the youngest to earn a doctorate at Arcana University, you know? The first Nettik to earn funding for a research team. But when I started looking into Deep Space Wormholes, everyone said I was crazy, that I was throwing my career. And now I have my best shot to prove my Flotation Device works, and I can’t.” She curled up into a tighter ball.

Behind them, on the scaffolding, a Conicoid lab tech was powering up a minor component of the experimental Flotation Device. The panel flared with plasma suddenly, and with a yelp the little adorable alien was sent sailing over the railing. Her lab coat got caught and stopped her, leaving her dangling in the air. She exhaled in relief a little too soon however, as the damaged garment tore and she went falling yet again. She yelped again, and grunted as her fall was cut short abruptly yet again as her waistband caught on the next railing to the floor.

Everyone in the room was scrambling to try to help her or get into position to catch her. Two more Conicoids raced up the railing to try to get pull her back onto the walkway, but the panicked alien’s flailing flipped her upside down, and the sudden change in gravity made her fall right out of her pants! The next railing down had more lab assistants ready to try to catch her. Grasping hands all tried to get a grip on her, but despite their best efforts to hold onto her arms, her legs, her ass, none could get strong hold. None, save for the one Conicoid who was left embarrassingly hold onto her shirt as she fell the last few meters to the floor.

Disoriented, she got to her feet. A gentle breeze and the wide eyed, blushing stares of her peers tipped her off to her state of undress. Her blue short-furred skin was completely exposed, save for her modest chest encased in a naughtily seductive lacy black bra, and an equally work-inappropriate lacy pair of black panties.

“Why’d she wear that to work?”

“Never knew Trix had such nice boobs…”

“Look at those hips!”

She screamed but otherwise froze, covering herself with her hands but too panicked to run anywhere. “Stop don’t look!”

The Conicoid coworkers dutifully averted their gaze.

Anna, who watched the whole thing, suddenly started laughing through her tears. “Hahaha… well,” she gulped in air, “you lovelies always break me out of my moods. I’m sure we’ll find a ship before the wormhole closes, and prove my theory!”

“That’s the spirit, professor!” Polly cheered, hugging the taller alien’s leg in an overly affectionate display.

Anna patted her head and watched the other Conicoids get clothes for the unfortunate one that was stripped. “Today is a big day, I can feel it…”