Starting Over: Nerites
Copyright© 2025 by Quantum Mechanic
Chapter 8: Ashes, ashes, all fall down
Science Fiction Sex Story: Chapter 8: Ashes, ashes, all fall down - Cheyenne is a plains world dedicated to production of livestock for sale to other human-occupied planets. Jean has a great job there, but he's offered a better job on a watery planet, and an opportunity to develop his own homestead. In order to take the new job, he has to uproot and transplant his young family. It's not easy going, and once there, the troubles have just begun.
Caution: This Science Fiction Sex Story contains strong sexual content, including Ma/Fa Romantic Heterosexual Fiction Science Fiction Cheating Massage Oral Sex Pregnancy Slow
Beth looked at the test strip in shock.
Jean had been gone well over a month. The original assignment was only supposed to take a couple of weeks, but equipment failures, construction delays, and labor problems had stretched things out.
The PDA had offered to fly her out for a “conjugal visit,” but with the girls in school, and no nearby family members to lend assistance, it just wasn’t practical. Besides, she and Hardy had enjoyed the extra time together.
Now, impossibly, her period was a full sixteen local days late. Mild worry quickly turned into full-fledged panic as the home test kit confirmed that she was pregnant.
This wasn’t supposed to happen! her mind screamed. I use the best fertility control methods available ... What the hell went wrong?
Unable to find any answers, she sat down and cried, and that’s exactly how Hardy found her.
Hardy had been very appreciative of Beth’s increased availability while Jean was stuck off in the wild wet yonder, but he still had a business to run. He had taken advantage of Beth’s preoccupation with getting the children off to school, so that he could conduct that business, and was now on his way back to the love of his life.
He thought it strange that she did not meet him at the dock as she usually did, and worried that she might be ill or injured. Although unaware at the time, he was very close to correct. He cut the engine, well away from the dock and walked up to the forward deck, waiting for the expected, mild collision, so that he could step over the gunwales and onto the dock. He tied off hurriedly, and went into the house, almost running.
What he saw there did not put his mind at ease. Beth was draped over the settee, bawling her eyes out. It took many minutes of cuddling and cajoling to get her to agree to sit up and talk about what was bothering her. When he succeeded, he wasn’t sure he’d done the right thing.
“I’m pregnant,” she said, with a tear-stained grimace, “and it’s your baby.” Hardy was dumbfounded.
“How can that be? You were protected!”
“That’s what I thought too,” she wailed, “but it failed! The test strip is over on the table. See for yourself if you want.”
“Are you sure it’s not Jean’s?” he asked, hopefully.
“Very sure,” she nodded, “He left a couple of days after my last period ended, and now I’m two weeks overdue for the next one. The chances of it being his baby are about as close to zero as they can get.”
They sat in silence for a long time, then Hardy asked, “Well, what do we do now?”
“I’m not sure, yet. My options are limited.”
“What do you mean?”
“Well, when I was in college, and something like this happened to one of my classmates, she was able to leave town for a while during a break in classes, and when she came back, she wasn’t pregnant anymore.”
Hardy had trouble keeping up with the flow of ideas she was generating. When he finally understood her, he was horrified.
Oblivious to his reaction, she continued, “The problem with that course of action is Jean. He called and said he’s coming home tomorrow night. I can’t just be unavailable when he gets here, or worse yet, still in a hospital. Even it were going to be weeks before he returned, I’d still have to arrange care for the girls.”
“You mean abortion?” Hardy cried.
“Yes, I mean abortion. What the hell other possibility do you see?” she snapped at him.
Speechless, Hardy simply looked down and shook his head. This was not something that he had ever anticipated. After a time he looked up at Beth and said, “Beth, will you marry me?”
It was Beth’s turn to be shocked now. “Hardy, you idiot, I’m already married! I can’t marry you.”
“Well, technically, on Nerites there is no legal problem with bigamy. The PDA recognizes any and all forms of domestic and sexual partnerships,” He observed, “But all of that aside, my question is still valid.
“You already know you can’t solve the problem with an abortion, and I won’t deny that that doesn’t make me unhappy. On the other hand, don’t you think Jean can count? Won’t he figure out that the baby isn’t his? Will he be willing to stay with you, and raise the child as his own anyway? If you can’t answer the last two questions in the affirmative, I think you should consider mine.
“I’m single and unencumbered. I love you, and I’ll love our baby. I’ve been a successful businessman for a long time, and I can easily afford to support you. Beth will you marry me?”
She blanched as the import of his words sank in, and then looked at him sadly. She touched him tenderly on the back of his head, and drew him into a kiss.
When they broke apart she gently said, “Listen to me Hardy. I never said an abortion was out of the question. I just observed that I can’t be in the middle of one when Jean returns home.”
Hardy was nonplussed. “But how can you be sure that he’ll leave again, soon enough for you to get a legal abortion?”
“I don’t have to wait for him to leave, Hardy,” she said, looking away. “I just have to make him think the baby is his. When he returns,” she continued, “I’m going to be the kind of lover he’s always wanted and deserved. We’re going to make such passionate love, so often, while he is home, that it won’t be a surprise to him when my fertility control fails and I turn up pregnant.
“I have to convince him that it should be aborted. Failing that...” she gazed at him steadily, “you both have blue eyes and your natural hair color is light brown. If I don’t give him reason to ask for a DNA test, he could easily accept the child as his own.”
Unhappy with the direction the discussion was going, Hardy asked, “So, this is going to be an early baby?”
“Only if it goes to delivery.”
“Isn’t that a little mercenary?”
“You could look at it that way,” she replied, tears falling in profusion, “You could also accept that what I’m doing is the only way I know of to protect myself and my family, as well as your friendship with Jean, from complete destruction.”
“Hardy,” she continued, “I have two other children that I don’t want to lose. I don’t want them to hate me either, when they grow up. And as much as I love you, I also love Jean, and he’s been a much better husband than I have been a wife. I need to make this work if I can. I’m compelled to protect the people I love most. That includes Jean, it includes my daughters, and it includes you.”
Her tears had dried, but the look of pain on Hardy’s face was almost more than she could bear. She stood and took him by the hand, then said, “Come on lover. I’m already pregnant, so you can’t do any more damage. Make love to me.” And so he did.
Hardy left the next morning, and when Jean returned home that evening Beth was ready for him. After she had retrieved the girls from the school boat, she had fed them an early supper, and bathed and prepared them for bed. The last of their regular broadcast shows was signing off just as Jean entered the house, so he spent some quality time with his daughters before Beth sent them off to an early bedtime.
She had prepared one of his favorite meals, and they ate by candlelight, with some soft music and conversation setting the mood. A chilled bottle of their favorite wine was waiting for them afterward. They sat in chairs on the dock and sipped the wine as they talked quietly for a while, waiting for the children to fall asleep.
Later, in bed, Beth was a wild woman, and she made him feel like the world’s greatest lover. Her behavior was so unlike what he had come to expect, that making love to her was like making love to a complete stranger.
They kissed, deeply. In contrast to her usual quick, closed mouth pecks, these kisses lit a fire in him that he hadn’t felt in a very long time. They seemed to have a similar effect on her. She couldn’t seem to get close enough to him. Her nipples were as hard as diamonds, and at his slightest touch, she opened her legs without hesitation. Her sex was awash with the lubricant of her passion, making their joining nearly effortless.
He didn’t last long the first time. More than a month of abstinence did little to enhance his staying power, and she was on a short fuse as well. As soon as he thrust into her willing body, she exploded in a series of rapid-fire climaxes, and it was this that drove him over the edge.
On the other hand, he wasn’t out of action, either. He still had skilled fingers and a tongue, and he used them to keep Beth happy and busy, until his “limp noodle” recovered. He had more stamina for the subsequent rounds.
It seemed he could do no wrong, and she denied him nothing, which was not to be expected, considering their sexual history. They led each other around their respective erogenous zones, teasing, titillating, and arousing each other to a state of mutual incoherence, at which point she opened herself as widely as she physically could, madly clutching and keeping him enveloped in her sex as she rolled and thrust with her hips. He just as mindlessly drove his rampant member into her tender body, and twice more they coupled with the same overwhelming passion, before they fell unconscious from the effort.
Jean was completely bowled over. It had been several years since Beth had shown him the slightest interest in sex or romance, and he had never seen this depth of passion from her before. He knew better than to question his good fortune, however, and the scene was repeated night after night, until he was sent out again.
He had been in the field for only a day and a half when the call came in. It worried him, because it was out of character for Beth to contact him while he was in the field. He would have called home by the next afternoon in any event, so whatever she had to say must be extremely important and time sensitive. He closed the door to his office and accepted the call.
“Hi babe,” he said, on seeing her face, “what’s up?” She looked tired and upset. “Are you and the girls okay?”
“Yes, we’re okay, but I have some bad news.”
“Is it your parents? Did something happen to them?”
“No, they’re fine! If you’ll just quit trying to guess, and give me a chance to get it out, you’ll know, please? Okay?”
“Okay, okay, I’m sorry. You’ve just got me worried.”
“It’s nothing all that bad, it’s just inconvenient and irksome,” she replied. “I’m pregnant.”
The pause in conversation, following that announcement, was pregnant as well.
“What ... How ... Why...” Jean stammered, as he tried to find his voice.
“Like I said, I’m pregnant,” she replied testily, then she smirked, “you know how. We did how pretty frequently last week! As to why, if you’d been listening to the news lately, you’d know that this little drama is being acted out all over the planet.
“Seems that one particular batch of fertility suppression implants was mislabeled. Although they were thought to be effective for three hundred sixty standard days, they were actually supposed to be labeled for one hundred twenty. The vendor has admitted fault, and accepted full financial responsibility.”
“What does that mean?” Jean queried, mystified.
“It means that they have offered to fully reimburse us for the medical and incidental costs we might incur from terminating the pregnancy,” she replied calmly.
His face fell, and he said, “I guess that’s what you want to do then.”
She nodded, and replied, “I think it’s best. We already have two children, and you know I didn’t want another.” She waited for the storm to hit. It had been too easy thus far.
Jean didn’t respond for quite some time. He was stewing in a mix of emotions that were too strong to allow coherent conversation. When he did speak, it was with bitterness.
“I guess it doesn’t matter how I feel about it,” he spat. “It doesn’t matter that the child you’re talking about is mine as much as yours. It has to die because you don’t want another child.” Grimly, he began to turn away from the comm. “I can’t talk anymore right now. I’ll call you later tonight,” he said as he broke the connection.
Beth’s demeanor became deflated as she shut down her end of the call. “It’s okay, you can come out now.” she called out.
Hardy walked out of the master stateroom looking troubled.
“Well,” she began, unhappily,” that didn’t go as well as I’d hoped.”
“Yeah, I heard. Sounds like he isn’t any more thrilled over a possible abortion than I am. So what’s next?” he asked, quizzically.
“I don’t know,” she shrugged. “We’ll have to wait until after he calls tonight, then figure it out. The news story about the implants was a terrific stroke of luck, though.”
“Yeah,” he agreed. “At least we don’t have to make up a reason for the pregnancy now. Even though the child isn’t actually his.”
“I wish you would stop calling it a child,” she snapped. “It’s a foetus! It doesn’t become a child until it’s born!”
“Hey, hey, hey,” he complained, raising his hands defensively, “I don’t know where that came from, but I sure didn’t mean to upset you! Legal interpretations aside, it’s the way I view the foetus. It’s part of me, who and what I am, and it sounds like Jean feels the same way.”
“I know,” she admitted bitterly. “It’s like men have a some kind of pro-pregnancy club. Too bad you don’t have to carry the baby and do the labor!” She rested her head in her hands, hiding the tears she was shedding.
“So biology isn’t fair,” he replied. “Is this a surprise? Yeah, it’s tough on women, but it’s tough on guys too, just in different ways. Being the one whose body is pre-empted doesn’t give you a monopoly on the emotional impact.” Seeing her silent sobs shaking her body, he felt like an ass.
“Look,” he offered, “I know this isn’t helping any. What say we talk about something else? Something that’ll make you happier?”
“At this point,” she responded weakly, “I’m not even convinced that there is anything that could make me happy.” Looking up at him, her face wet with her tears, she continued, “Jean will be calling back in a few hours. You can’t stay here tonight, and I can’t leave. Love me please? Then go away for awhile?”
Put that way, he couldn’t refuse her: not that he would have even thought about refusing to make love to her, anyway. Their lovemaking was uncharacteristically slow and gentle, followed by lots of cuddling and kissing. When she fell asleep, he got up and dressed. He still wasn’t comfortable with the idea of leaving her alone, but saw no way around it, so he left as she had requested.
By the time the comm announced Jean’s call, Beth had managed to compose herself. She had cleaned and straightened the house thoroughly, then showered and changed. She’d even managed to dry her hair and put it up in her usual style. She was the quintessential beautiful and well-organized homemaker. Jean would be pleased.
Before answering the call, she pasted a big welcoming smile on her face. That was a gambit, designed to prevent immediate deterioration of the discussions into an all-out battle. When she accepted the connection, it came as no surprise that Jean’s facial expression was clouded with barely-suppressed hostility.
“Hi babe,” she said sweetly.
“Hi,” he growled. “I don’t suppose you’ve had some kind of magical change of mind.”
“No,” she admitted, “nothing has changed. I’m just trying to be nice about it. We really just can’t keep this baby...”
“Why not?” he demanded. “We’re married, so there’s no stigma to it. For Pete’s sake, we already have two kids, where’s the social problem with having another? We know how to take care of babies, and it’s not like we can’t afford it. I make enough money to support another child. Tell me why we can’t have this baby!”
It was clear he wasn’t prepared to give any ground, and in her desperation she could only plead, “Jean, there’s only so much of me to share between our children! I can’t be as good a mother for three as I can for two. I’d also like a little energy left over to be a wife and lover!”
As Jean reflected on the facts, they did little to assuage his anger. Beth had been a fantastic lover ... for one week out of the last eight years. For that one week, he had been overjoyed with her responsiveness ... responsiveness that had resulted in the pregnancy that she wanted to end. What she wanted to do seemed to go beyond simply aborting an unwanted foetus. To him it appeared that she wanted to kill the passion that had happened between them. It was to his credit that he didn’t speak these thoughts, but his next words were not comforting to her.
“Beth, you know how I feel,” he said. “As far as I’m concerned, that life you carry in your belly is my child, and not just a lump of protoplasm. I know it’s your decision to make, but if you terminate this pregnancy, I not sure I can live with it.”
She swallowed hard, and said, “I see. But what does that mean for us?”
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