Chapter 13

Liddy sighed in relief as Leira lead her smiling client back to the lounge to rest. Hannah had been approaching her and noticed.

“He looks much happier than her first one.” Hannah grinned.

Liddy sighed again as she noticed Hannah. “No kidding. Thankfully he was too spent to kick up much fuss.”

“To be fair, I’ve often told men ‘You can go now.’ after sex, but not since I started working here.”

“Well, it was my fault for not making sure someone told her how to handle that. I’m just glad Catherine had been walking by and overheard it. If she hadn’t jumped in and ‘translated’, it could have been a mess.”

“Still, considering her personality, I expected a lot more issues than just that. Close to fifty clients since, and she’s been a star.” Hannah nodded at Liddy’s observation, impressed.

“Busy week for all of us. Not sure why I ever expected to go any amount of time without seeing clients personally.” Liddy wondered

“I think if we didn’t have the girls in uniform that might have been more the case, but they do their jobs well. At the door or in the beds. Less stress for the rest of us as well.”

“Who’s doing what right now? I just got finished with two brothers. They stood the whole time and didn’t let me touch the floor. Fun, but I’m a tad dizzy.” Liddy smiled with satisfaction

“Well, Mari and Easy are in with a client having a bath. Ving is getting nailed on the bridge again. Emma is under that table over there.” Hannah pointed to where the elf was on her knees getting bills dropped on her. “I guess that guy is paying by the second. Catherine must be in a room with someone, and I think the guards are all taking turns putting on the new uniforms.”

“Oh, they arrived? Excellent. Did you see who Catherine was with? I had my eye on someone but I think she may have taken him.”

Catherine was pushed up against the door as soon as she closed it. Face pressed against the wood, she felt a hand exploring under her dress while a foot kicked hers to spread her legs wider. It wasn’t the first time someone had not wanted her to look at them as they took what they wanted from her. Often the men who had watched her grow into a woman couldn’t deal with her eyes while they satisfied themselves with her body. It always disappointed her because she loved watching someone over her and the faces they made as they worked hard to bring her pleasure. Of course, it was never really her pleasure they were concerned about, but it happened all the same. Slowly the man fumbled with himself and her with one hand while he pinned her to the door with the other. Eventually, he got himself free and Catherine felt him pressing up against her while he struggled to penetrate. Knowing full well that the type of man trying to push inside her would be angered by any assistance, she simply struggled slightly and moaned sharply when he finally found his way.

His hot breath was on her neck as he pushed his whole body against hers now that his hands were out of the way. He stared lustfully down at her breasts that spilt from her dress as they were pressed against the wall. Catherine knew what he wanted and pulled one of the silk sheets from the wall that had been decorating it and wrapped it around her head. Under the illusion that she couldn’t see through the thin material, he pulled her away from the door and pushed her to the bed, where he climbed on top and had to decide if he wanted his hands on her breasts or guiding himself back inside. He settled on using his mouth and one hand on her breasts while the other hand went to work. He acted as though he couldn’t take a break from her body long enough to position himself comfortably.

Catherine moaned to hide a sigh, wishing he would just take his time. She certainly wasn’t going anywhere and would have preferred to have been completely undressed.

Finally thrusting inside her again, he gripped her breasts firmly and unimaginatively worked to a steady rhythm. Had the thrusts lacked the force they fortunately had, then Catherine would have been quite disappointed. Instead, she moaned in simple satisfaction that at least it felt good and he liked to shift his grips on her breasts rather than clamp on them without moving. Suddenly his speed picked up as he finally let go of his load inside Catherine, mixing with what was left of the seven other men who had done the same that night. She sighed as though satisfied, and figured that at least it would be easier getting dressed.

Juno admired the new uniform on Tara. The stained, deep wooden-brown of the corset and skirt covered in elegant brass cogwheels of varying size. Long black sleeves that looked like corsets themselves, protecting the arms and hands, terminated at what looked like a cast-iron bra. The underbust corset wasn’t attached to the bra Tara removed and replaced, getting used to the clasp between her breasts. Juno appreciated the sight of her revealing her breasts repeatedly. Without the bra, there was still fishnet covering just under her neck, but keeping the breasts and upper back bare. As Tara put her bra back on again, Juno appreciated the long black boots as she pushed Tara’s legs apart, and made use of the knee guards as she rested on hers. Pushing her head under the belt of bullets running around the edge of the skirt, Juno began to kiss the bare flesh, since the uniform neglected to include any underwear. Hands holding the fishnet covered thighs wide open.

Tara stopped fiddling with her bra, letting it hang open as she put her hands on her skirt where Juno’s head happened to be. Laurel gave her head a shake as she smiled, trying to get her boots on. Inky was helping Foxy with her custom outfit, since her tail needed to be in the perfect spot to avoid unnecessary rubbing. She gave a curious look as Tara began to gasp more loudly, and wondered if she should have kept Juno with her to keep her out of trouble. They should have been on deck to relieve the other girls who needed to come down and get their new uniforms on, but most of the girls were still dressing so it could wait.

Juno reached under herself between her own legs to start sliding a pair of fingers between the folds of her flesh. Her own breasts moving with the sway of her body’s response to imagined thrusts. The familiar scent of Tara getting wet with the attention pleased Juno, who always loved how easy it was for her to bring Tara to climax. Instead, however much she wanted to continue, she stopped.

“No, no, no, not this again.” Tara gasped, trying to keep Junos head where it was.

Juno about to explain whose turn it was, suddenly found herself pushed back firmly between Tara’s legs. A hand joined her own between her legs and began pushing a finger inside her. Without being able to see, Juno could only guess. Of course, being so intimately familiar with the touch of every woman in the squad except for Inky, Juno could tell Astra was working her magic inside her. Tara let out a howl and Juno felt the spasms as she kept Tara stimulated while she orgasmed. Juno felt Astra slide another finger in along with the rest and rapidly worked them to elicit her own muffled scream. Falling back on her bum, Juno looked at Tara, her breasts glistening and heaving with deep breaths. Astra kissed her on the neck before leaving.

“Now, can you two go upstairs and relieve someone else?” Inky asked in a not quite playful tone.

“Yes, Ma’am,” Juno and Tara snapped.

Juno wobbled a bit getting up, but eventually stood and fixed her bra as Tara did the same. They both left and got back on deck.

Liddy was impressed to see them emerge into the lounge with their sidearms fixed smartly at their lovely hips and rifles slung on their backs. Not that Liddy needed to notice their flushed cheeks to know what the noise below decks was, but she honestly couldn’t begrudge them the delay. She wanted to bed them both instantly as she saw them. Getting to their posts to relieve the other girls, they pulled out and donned berets that made Liddy twitch with desire. On them was a metal icon that Liddy didn’t recognise so she got closer.

“What is that?” Liddy said pointing to the cap pin.

“Oh, well with the ship being called ‘The Lucky Harlot’ we got cap pins.” Juno showed Liddy the pin as well as the metal knee covers. “Horseshoes are supposed to be a symbol of luck, so we took two and inverted one to make an H. I hope it’s ok. I probably should have checked with you first.”

“Yes, you should have, but it’s lovely. It will give me something to paint on the side of the ship or onto a flag. This ship needs its own colours.”

“I’m relieved you like it.” Juno sighed, relaxing.

“The bra come off as easy as we wanted?”

“Yes, very easily,” Juno replied with a smirk.

Liddy stared at Juno with a smirk of her own. Juno quickly picking up the hint revealed her breasts to the captain. Liddy admired the beautiful, supple flesh for a moment before nodding at Juno to cover them back up.

“It’s late, or early. No more clients tonight. Once the last few have left, you can lock the door.”

Juno saluted and joined Tara outside the door, while Liddy turned to see Hannah guiding a client towards the door, giving a disapproving shake of her head. Liddy stuck out her tongue and smiled, getting Hannah to smile in return.

Eventually, all the clients were gone, and all the soldiers within the lounge showing off their new uniforms.

“Alright, everyone,” Liddy began. “Today was our last day in the city. Taking to the sky tomorrow and finding new clients in...” She checked her map she picked up off her table. “Farmtown Seventeen? Seriously?” Liddy groaned, in frustration before leaving the room in a huff.

Everyone sat around and waited silently for a few moments before Liddy returned with her purse. She fished out a wad of bills.

“Okay, this goes to anyone who can satisfy me...”

“Dibs! Me! I can! Anytime!” shouted several of the women present.

Liddy glared at those who interrupted her. “ ... with an answer as to why all the cities in the world have such idiotic names.”

The volunteers slumped a little at their false presumption, though Hannah smiled wryly at the fact that most of the soldier girls could probably still get her in bed with their uniforms. Astra raised her hand.

“Astra? Please.”

“Well, since crater peak was founded and thus named more recently, it’s an exception though still rather unimaginative. The rest are because of the old empire. When the Sorcerer-Emperor came through and conquered everything, he was as full of himself as you could imagine. So every time he took a city, he gave it the same name as him. Eventually, everything had his name or some minor variation. Of course, the people and politicians found it annoying, but they were the ones being oppressed, so they couldn’t really object to anything. His own military, on the other hand, found it impossible to give orders without knowing what locations they really referred to.

So they told their Emperor they needed ‘code names’. So either because they didn’t want to come up with names too fancy to anger their Emperor, or because soldiers aren’t exactly the most creative people, they all got named something obvious and simple. After the fall of the empire, everyone figured some other war would come along and give everything ‘his’ name, so they kept the code names. Now we know nobody else bothered making a new empire, everyone just became their own city states and kept the names. At that point, we had been using them so long, nobody bothered to change them again.”

Liddy extended her arm towards Astra who walked up to her and took the bills with a smile.

“Alright then. Despite the name, this place has a decent population and a ruling class who won’t smell like barn animals. So I was informed at any rate. Get some sleep. We will take off tomorrow morning.”

A heavy fog hung over the ship as it lifted away from the docks on the ground. Ving was secure in the knowledge that her compass still worked and that there was nothing tall enough to trouble her after a certain altitude. Moving through the thick grey clouds, she fed more power to the engines to push them forward before turning to their course. Turning an airship at a standstill was always annoying and slow, with a shudder that shook the whole ship. Suddenly Ving felt a tightness in her chest and she gasped, letting the wheel slip from her hands.

“Focus,” Hannah whispered in her ear hugging her tightly, arms wrapped around Ving just under her breasts.

Ving smiled, getting back to task and slowly moved the wheel to turn the ship while enjoying the tight embrace of the woman kissing her neck. For Ving, it wasn’t just the physical touch of a beautiful woman that made her smile. It was having someone who cared for her and enjoyed seeing her smile. She turned to speak with Hannah, only to receive a good long kiss once they were face to face.

“I’m flying through fog. Not the best time to distract me, no matter how pleasant.”

“Distracting you is fun. How else should I spend my time?”

“Bent over the railing with Easy’s tongue deep in you. When you hear your moans bounce back, point out where they came from, and I will know not to fly in that direction.”

Hannah placed another quick kiss on Ving’s lips and slapped her ass as she left the bridge. A few minutes later, Ving saw her outside the bridge on deck, holding Easy by the hand. She shook her head with a laugh as Hannah poked through the door.

“Such good advice, I think I will take it,” Hannah stated in a haughty tone.

“Hah, jokes on you. Fog is clearing now that we are climbing above it.”

“Hey, Hannah, do you hear something?” Easy asked, looking off into the fog.

Hannah listened and could hear some noise that she couldn’t quite place. “Go get Foxy. She...”

Easy was already heading back inside when they both paused to look, now that the fog was suddenly clear. Small craft with two sets of wings mounted on a thin tube flew in the air before them. The strange noise coming from them as Hannah saw muzzle flares were a rapid series of shots that stitched across their arc of fire. Every few pops had a bright line of light fire out of the gun mounted on the rear of the small craft.

Hannah felt the ship turning sharply as Ving turned the ship around, and as the side of the ship lifted, so did Hannah’s gaze, until she saw something to blot out the rising sun. It was a massive tube that could swallow their little ship many times. Many big propeller engines mounted on its side pushed it through the air, and it was slowly moving over the tiny airship. Hannah held on as the shuddering vessel turned sharply when she heard a high-pitched whistle from above, followed by more as the first craft drew closer. She looked up to see smaller metal tubes falling from the behemoth airship. Holding onto the railing with the ship almost on its side, Hannah could see the object fall just a mere meter from her face. It slammed into the service doors below decks, knocking them open and Hannah was relieved the damage was minimal. She looked back at the bridge to see Ving, who had turned at the noise of the impact and smiled.

The explosion tore the decking below her to shreds, and Hannah was surprised to find herself moving farther away from Ving, despite still holding on to the railing. She stared blankly at the sight of the ship missing a section as time seemed to crawl along. Then the ship started to rise and she lost sight of Ving. Time suddenly started rushing forward as she realised she was falling away from the ship. Losing her grip on the railing, Hannah let loose a terrified scream as the realisation of her situation set in.

Below her, she could see lines in the ground, in patterns she recognised as trenchworks. Small flashes all along the leading edges where soldiers fired their weapons, plumes of dirt being thrown into the air where artillery and mortar shells landed. A line of explosions stitched across the line where the rest of the bombs had fallen from the massive airship. The sounds of the battle muted by the rushing air, Hannah almost didn’t hear the noise close to her until a moment before she saw.

One of the smaller craft was racing under her in a dive to reach the ground and get under her. Two men sat inside. The first right behind an engine and what Hannah could see now as a rapidly spinning propeller. The second towards the tail where the rapid gun was mounted -- but instead of holding it, his arms were reaching out towards her. Bundled up in goggles and a scarf, his gloved hands got closer and closer until Hannah felt his firm grip around her wrist. Pulled hard, she was brought in close and tucked in the tiny space with him. He thumped the side of the craft, and suddenly Hannah felt so very heavy as her momentum shifted. Desperately trying to climb out of the dive, the pilot was yelling in exertion. Almost level, the stress started to ease when suddenly the craft spun into a sideways tumble with the tearing of thick cloth. The man clutching Hannah tightly shoved her lower into the cramped insides -- when he suddenly flew out entirely. She braced as best as she could when a sudden slam knocked her into blackness.

Ving stood at the helm, tightly gripping the wheel, rapidly looking at each of the soldiers on deck who would signal her if they saw anything else in the air. She tried not to look to her right, where the windows were broken. Nobody stood there anyways. There was no deck to stand on. It was getting hard to see at all with the water in her eyes, but she couldn’t bring herself to wipe her tears away if it meant taking her hands off the wheel. All that mattered was that she get the ship back down to the docks they only left a few hours earlier. The fog had lifted and her path was clear enough.

Inky surveyed the damage from below with an icy glare. The laundry room was gutted and gone, with the corner of one of the barrack rooms gone. Crates and supplies of food had been lost, placed there to keep the ship balanced against the weapons and ammunition stacked on the other side. Of course, now they had been emptied. Knowing she needed her girls busy, she ordered the new guns that had been in the truck they took, mounted onto the sides of the ship. Now, while keeping an eye out, they did so down the barrel of a machine gun. She had only seen them used on the range a few times, but knew how devastating they would be. It was a superficial gesture, but it gave them something to do.

Easy wept in the arms of Emma. Her throat sore and dry from her lamentations and cursing of her inability to fly out and save Hannah. Emma had long since stopped trying to say anything to comfort her. It wasn’t going to help until Easy was ready to hear it. She also knew the only other person who could reach her was back with Liddy in her room, in many times a worse state.

Liddy, as devastated as she was, was mildly impressed at the insults hurled at her from Mari. She had gone from open tears to unbridled hostility either against herself or Liddy. As a result, she accepted whatever role she had to play in order for Mari to expel her emotions. A villain for offering the job in the first place, a friend to keep her from self-blame, an idiot for plotting a course into a war zone, a lover to indulge her typical solutions to problems. Liddy matched her mood to whatever was needed and never let Mari feel alone.

Hannah awoke to gunshots around her. The first sight after opening her eyes was of a man being riddled with holes as he fell into the mud. Other shots rang out nearby as another man worked the bolt action to send bullets back at someone else. A third worked his arms under her shoulders to slowly pull her out.

“Wonderful,” she groaned loudly. “I died and hell looks just like the military. If I had known that, I wouldn’t have spent so much time in it beforehand.”

The man pulling her paused in surprise before laughing and continuing his efforts.

“She’s alive,” he called out with a smile to someone she couldn’t see.

“Good, get ... wait, ‘she’?” The other voice sounded surprised. “Nevermind. Wait for my call, then rush back to the trench.”

Hannah was pulled free, but found standing difficult with wobbly legs and her rescuer shoving her head down. Suddenly a torrent of gunshots sounded, and she was pulled forward on the arm of the man as he dashed towards the gunfire. Her vision cleared as she wiped her eyes in time to see the jump down into the trench, but her legs didn’t do much to soften the landing. She laid awkwardly in the arms of the man who should have been catching his breath but was still and unmoving. Pulling away, she saw the top half of his head missing. She was pulled around to look at someone else.