CYOA: Fuck Yeah Space #9

 Author's Notes: Back from vacation (more info on that in the post below) and spent the day making up for it with a mega-huge chapter of the CYOA for everyone to enjoy! Sorry for the wait everyone, everything's getting back on track!

P.S. - D was the winner!

[story]

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“Well, I mean, I have a credfile. And I’m Nauelli. So I’m kinda perfect for the last one, right?” The sweet spot of “easy” and “minimally morally ambiguous” is too tempting to pass up, and you find yourself attracted to the last option after considering your possibilities for a few moments. Taking another bite of your food, you consider it a little more. “Like, if they just need my credentials, I won’t even be in too much danger I don’t think. And it’s not like I’ll ruin the good standing of my credfile since I’m a numberslave anyway.”

“Be careful with that attitude,” your hostess says, a little gravity seeping into her recently-softened voice. “There’s a reason I got out of underworld work and took a nice, cushy corp job. Some jobs are easy, some jobs only sound that way. While the q’orrine tend to be more trustworthy than high-up Shadow Corp execs or idina warlords, they’re a desperate people, and I’ve never met Aia personally. You’re in uncharted space with this one, Una.”

You nod slowly, taking a deep breath. A sense of excitement fills you, dread and apprehension blending with it on its way from your stomach to your throat. You’re in above your head no matter what you try to do, but you have to start somewhere. And you’re better off starting with something that’s actually... y’know. Decent.

“When should I start?” you finally murmur.

“Not so much a ‘start’ as a ‘do,’ this is gonna be a one-shot job as far as I know. The q’orrine are waiting at the Hall of the Emancipated -- the holoport outside will get you close, but first...” Siara pauses, pushing her plate away and eyeing you up and down. “As much as I like you naked, we’re gonna need to get you some clothes.”

“I still have the--”

“Clothes anyone on Au Prime would actually wear.”

“--Right.”

A moment later you find yourself back in Siara’s bedroom, sipping from a bowl of thin, warm liquid that is at once both savory and sweet, like a confusing mixture of tea and broth. Odd though it is, you find yourself getting used to it as you watch Siara sift through her closets looking for something that might fit you.

“Let’s see... you’re...” she glances back at you. “...Short, for one. So leggings are gonna be tricky to find. Bust is comparable, though... think I might be able to fit you into something like...” She pulls something off one of her racks, eyeing it, then glancing back at you and tossing it into your arms, almost making you spill your drink. “...This. Try that on.”

You drain the rest of your after-breakfast drink quickly and set the bowl down on the dresser, examining the garment tossed at you. It’s almost scandalously small, but Siara’s right -- it just might fit you, considering its total lack of legs. The garment is more or less a sleeveless, legless, pale gray unitard, free of any noticeable embellishments. It does, however, fit, and after a few moments of squirming and adjusting inside of it, you find that it actually fits rather well -- with the exception of your penis, which either needs to be tucked, or makes a noticeable if undistracting bump in the garment’s nether regions. “Not bad, but... kinda skimpy, right?” you mumble, looking back up to Siara.

“I think it’s cute,” the census woman says with a smirk, tossing a pair of self-fitting boots and a compression belt in your direction, then fishing back through her things. “Sexy without being too scandalous, I think it’ll work just find for an underworld entrepeneur-- sorry, adventurer.”

“You sure you aren’t just playing dress-up with me?” you allow yourself a small, playful grin, one that’s returned by Siara as she returns to you with a pair of elbow-length black gloves, matching the boots. It only takes a moment to seal the boots, gloves, and belt in place, the three of which bring your ensemble together fairly well and give you the impression that you could actually move, run, and (Outer forbid) fight.

“Just playing to your charms,” Siara purrs, straightening you out and leaning in to give your lips a soft, warm kiss, one hand surreptitiously easing behind you to give your ass a gentle squeeze. “Now let’s get you to the holoport. We don’t want to keep Aia waiting, I’ve heard she’s a... loose cannon, sometimes. The code to get back to my apartment is Ex-Na-No-Ren, for when you finish the job. Assuming you finish the job.”

That last sentence drops a pit of unease in your stomach, doing its part to quell the elation you’d felt at dressing up for your big adventure. “I’ll... I’ll make it back, right?” you murmur as you slide your credfile into one of the small slots in your belt, following Siara back through her apartment towards the holoport.

There’s a moment of silence as Siara opens the door and ushers you through, out into the bustling atmosphere of Au Prime’s residential district, no longer muffled behind the noise-cancelling walls of her apartment. Advertisements blare at you once again from ever angle, making you squint as each vies for your attention and eventually, of course, what little money you have. “I’m not going to lie to you and say I’m certain you will. You chose to come to Au Prime and try to make your fortune, and that’s a dangerous business. Just... roll your dice the right way, I guess. And don’t be shy. Having too much caution will get you killed just as much as not having enough.” She kisses your cheek again, opening the sliding door of the humanoid-sized tube that you took here last night, the holoport, a device you still don’t fully understand the logistics of.

You inhale deeply, and nod, moving inside of the machine while Siara punches in the code to get you to the Hall of the Emancipated. You don’t realize you’re holding your breath until she flips the switch to send you, and it all rushes from your lungs in once choking blast of suddenness. There’s light and darkness and color, brief nausea, and then the ride suddenly ends -- the doors slide back open, and you’re elsewhere, leaving Siara and her apartment who knows how far behind. You try to remember the code to return. Ex-No-Na-Ren.

Stepping out of the holoport, you find yourself immersed for the first time in Au Prime. An endless maze of lofts, bridges, stories, shops, and people, you are placed headlong into a place where money and status rules all. Everyone moves quickly, some dressed up to entertain, others simply making their way through the place on the way to their next score.  Tourists from other systems look around with wide eyes, and for a moment, you find yourself doing the same, stopping by a few of the small vending storefronts to look at novelty baubles or snacks you don’t recognize. It all might be a bit more enticing if you had more money to spend, but that is tragically not the case -- you’re here to work, not sight-see, and after a few moments of busily scanning from structure to structure, your gaze finds its way to your destination.

The Hall of the Emancipated, a large bluish spire that stands out against the horizon with its aquatic architecture and lack of blaring billboards and advertisements. Connected to it by a series of bridges is a smaller structure that seems to float in the atmosphere, a sort of hangar surrounded by ships, both of the spacefaring and inter-atmospheric varietoes You’ve heard of this place before -- a sort of embassy constructed by emancipated q’orrine that managed to break free of their idina shackles, finding their way to neutral space and carving themselves out a section of it. It isn’t much, all things considered, easy to miss in the hustle and bustle of the inner city of Au Prime. But it’s where you’re headed nonetheless.

Doing your best to move with the flow of people, you make your way out of the more densely-populated metro and towards the Hall, finally reaching the base of the spire that designates the base of the building. At the front are two guards, though you notice they seem... a bit less capable than the nauelli equivalents you’d seen at the front gates of Au Prime. These pink-skinned, tendril-haired women seem rather young, unsure of themselves and their scavenged weapons, their uniforms pieced together from different bits of scavenged armor and then spray-painted a uniform seafoam green. They nod at you as you approach, looking you up and down for a moment as you freeze in your tracks, suddenly realizing that you aren’t quite sure where to go from here.

“State your business,” one of the amphibious aliens says, leveling her (literally taped-together) plasma rifle in your direction. Her partner does the same, and you hold up your hands in submission.

“I’m here about the job. The... secret... job.”

“...The what?” the other guard says.

“The secret... underworld... thing,” you say, winking awkwardly at her. “I’m the hired help.”

Both guards blink, looking at each other, then back to you. “Okay, whatever,” the first guard says. “Look, the building’s public access so we really can’t stop you from going inside. Just do your... whatever you came here to do and stop being weird.”

“Perfect,” you answer quickly, cheeks darkening with a nervous blush as you make your way between them, heading through the huge revolving doors that lead to the inside of the Hall of the Emancipated. Who were you even looking for again?

Right, Aia. Need to find Aia. You glance around the inside the huge structure, its ceiling high and its rooms spacious, almost more like a cathedral than an embassy. The internal architecture is even more strange than that on the outside, and you find yourself surmising that it was designed this way for easier movement underwater. Maybe? You’re not really qualified to say. Just need to find Aia.

“Aia?” you say allowed, your voice echoing off of the massive, marble-walled rooms of the huge central hallway, q’orrine moving back and forth around you as they sort through paperwork or make their way to their offices. Guards are fairly few, and any kind of hosts or greeters are utterly non-existent. “Aaaaiiiiaaa? Ummm... Commander Aia? Are there commanders here?” you call out again, standing still in the center of the place, utterly lost. “...Aia?”

“There are no commanders among us, little nauelli,” comes a voice from behind you, spurring you to turn on a dime to see the speaker. She’s tall, taller than Siara -- a trait you’ve noticed among all of the q’orrine you’ve seen so far. Like the guards outside, her armor is mismatched, though this isn’t spray-painted. Hers is more like a series of trophies than a makeshift uniform: a Sha’taui Corp insignia decorates her right shoulder, while a Fleetstep Company wing decorates the side of one boot. Her belt buckle bears the logo of the Democratic Terran Empires, and her chestplate is emblazoned with the geometric matrix of shapes indicating an idina admiral. No, this isn’t an accident. This mismatched armor is by entirely by design. “Only those willing to fight for the Lost Home.”

“Is... that you? Are you Aia?”

“That depends on what that name means to you,” the woman says, bending down at the waist to examine me face-to-face, a little too close for comfort, glaring at me through her one eye. The other eye -- visibly scarred around the eyepatch that covers it -- does nothing to detract from her fierce beauty, or distract from the curvaceously athletic luster of her armored body.

“I’m, um...” you pause, steadying yourself. Her harsh stare sets you on your heels, intimidated by her mere gaze. You’re certain of only one thing -- this woman has killed. “My name is Una. I got your message looking for an underworlder with a nauelli credfile. I’m here to help.”

The woman straightens her back, looking down at you and extending a grim smile. “Then I am Aia. I’m glad you’re here -- most nauelli wouldn’t risk their reputation trying to help us. Though I’m afraid we will end up needing more than just your credfile for this task.” Her voice is husky and experienced, belying her hardening in the face of her smooth skin and youthful figure. Likewise, her accent is slightly distorted... elongated and mellifluous like the rest of the q’orrine, but slightly distorted, bastardized.

“What do you mean?” you stammer. “I thought you said you just needed the swipe and then you’d be in? I have to... do stuff?”

“You do indeed,” Aia says gravely. Placing one webbed hand on your shoulder, she starts leading you out of the main auditorium of the Hall of the Emancipated, leading you towards a spacious hallway on the eastern side. “I’ll need you to infiltrate the carrier ship. Don’t worry, my girls and I will keep you safe -- but you’ll have to get on board and release their cargo yourself. There’s no way a q’orrine, even with the proper credentials, will be able to move freely aboard an idina slave ship without getting stopped by a guard.”

Damn, that makes sense. Still, altering the terms of the deal isn’t exactly to your liking. “What do I get out of this again?”

She grins. “Besides the heartwarming joy of liberating the oppressed?”

“Besides that, yeah.”

“Ahh. A true mercenary, I see.”

“I prefer the term ‘adventurer,’ but....”

“I’ll see to it that a considerable sum of money is transferred to your credfile when the job is finished. In addition, I’ll help outfit you with equipment for the job. If all goes well, you can feel free to keep it.” The two of you are making your way out of the building now, onto the bridge leading to the floating hangar. It’s not as scary as you originally imagined it would be, the entire thing being encased with a transparent, semi-circular barrier.

“That sounds a little more my style,” you admit with a nod. “So how do you want me to do this?”

“That will be up to you,” Aia replies. “There are a few different possibilities open to you.”

A) “You could try diplomacy. The idina will be more likely to hear you out than a q’orrine, and they’ve been known to take paying passengers. I could supply you with the money to book passage, but you’d have to make up the reason on your own... and keep your cover intact.” +1 Ingenuity

B) “Stealth is a possibility. Get past customs and then stowaway onto the ship. Less risk to your reputation, but, well, if you get caught... you know.” +1 Cunning

C) “I could also equip you with some weaponry and we could heat things up. Get past customs so we can track your movements, air-drop some commandos to join you, and take the ship by force. Won’t be easy, but my girls are always eager to take down some idina.” +1 Aggression

D) “And... well, I normally wouldn’t recommend this, but considering your attire I’ll put it on the table. If you can find a way to seduce a slaver -- or better yet, a mistress or officer -- you might be able to get a long leash for yourself, maybe even some access keycards that could lead you to the slave pens.” +1 Sensuality

“It’s up to you, underworlder. However you decide to approach this, I’ll do my best to help you in your decision.”