Battle of the Folium Nebula - Cover

Battle of the Folium Nebula

Copyright© 2023 by SCBM

Chapter 3

Science Fiction Sex Story: Chapter 3 - When a ship goes missing within the Folium Nebula, the Hub, pioneers of the revolution against the United Earth Confederacy, sends a detachment to investigate, only to be caught in the middle of an intergalactic war between the Confederacy, and an alien civilisation never encountered before. Alone, the aliens and the Hub could not hope to stand against the UEC, but together, they may be able to turn the tide, or will this mutual Alliance live and die inside the Nebula?

Caution: This Science Fiction Sex Story contains strong sexual content, including Ma/Fa   Consensual   Heterosexual   Military   War   Science Fiction   Aliens   Space   Cream Pie   Massage   Oral Sex   Petting   Size   Politics   Slow  

The hangar was visible from the corridor, the airlock doors wide open. If the whole area was pressurised, maybe the aliens, or the Balokarids, weren’t planning on launching ships anytime soon, which was hard for Lambert to swallow. All stations should be battle ready after the skirmish, maybe they were forcing him and Carl to stay?

His boots locked and unlocked with each step he took, feeling the many eyes of the aliens falling over him as he stepped into the hangar. Most of the aliens had gone back to their duties, pushing oversized bits of machinery toward the dials, performing maintenance on the ships, but a good many still turned their heads as the humans passed, Mezul and Shaliyya and a few other aliens keeping close.

“Check it out,” Carl said, nudging Lambert. “Looks like Shaliyya’s brought some insurance.”

At Shaliyya’s side, one of the unnamed aliens stood by their flank, an opaque visor fixed on the two humans. This one carried some kind of artifact in its hands, its design long and blocky, the alien holding it one-handed by its side. More orange bands of light ran along its short barrel, the alien’s finger resting near a suspiciously looking trigger guard, the stock as thick as a car battery. It had to be a gun, but whether it fired conventional bullets or laser beams, he wasn’t sure.

“Personal bodyguard, looks like,” Lambert said. “Shaliyya might be important. Maybe it’s the leader of this fleet?”

“You reckon?” Carl asked. “Guess it’s the only one that- aw

hell.”

Lambert followed his gaze, seeing he was looking at their corvette. The spaceship was surrounded by a pack of aliens, their beaks turned up as they examined its sloped hull. As they watched one of the more adventurous aliens rapped a fist against the cargo ramp, the resulting thuds echoing across the hangar. One had even floated up to poke at one of the point-defence canons.

“I would appreciate some assistance here, humans,” Alice said. “Get your claws off of her,” Carl snapped, his boots whirring as he jogged across the deck. Whether he was talking about Alice or the ship wasn’t very clear.

“Calm down,” Lambert said, catching up and stopping his crewmate with a quick tug on the shoulder. “We can’t antagonize these guys. What do you think yelling at them is gonna solve? They’re two feet taller than us.”

“Who do they think they are? We’re not pokin’ round their ships, how’s that fair?”

“Shouting won’t solve anything. The Hub doesn’t need more enemies right now, we can’t risk pissing them off.”

Lambert hoped mentioning their home would get through to Carl. They were both cut from the same revolutionary cloth, after all. After a moment his friend huffed impatiently, removing Lambert’s hand from his arm.

“I ain’t no ambassador, man,” Carl relented. “Like it or not, we are now,” Lambert replied.

Noticing their distress, Shaliyya floated ahead of the humans, chirping loudly at the group of aliens gathered around the corvette. They turned as one, lowering their heads as if afraid of meeting their gaze, pushing off the nearby deck to float away from the human craft.

With the pack dispersed, Shaliyya turned, bowing to the humans in a way that said you are welcome.

“See?” Lambert said. “let the alien sort them out.”

Carl reached up and gave it a pat on the arm. “This one’s alright,” he said. “Thanks for that, Shaliyya.”

The alien looked at the place Carl had touched it, tilting its head as the humans passed it by.

With the ramp cleared, Alice remotely lowered the hydraulic couplings, the rear of the corvette opening like a mouth and exposing the bay inside.

As Carl moved inside, Lambert noticed Mezul sticking close by, the man watching as the alien flipped over in the zero-g environment. From his perspective, its legs hung above it as it positioned its head near the floor, Lambert watching with a bewildered expression as its beak inched towards his feet.

The eye on this side of its face looked up at him, the alien gesturing towards his boots, then the floor. It used the deck as leverage to flip itself upright again, giving one of its legs a flex before looking to him for a response.

“You’re wondering how I’m walking around?” he asked, the alien cocking its head at him.

“You reckon?” it said, its throat bobbing with each syllable.

Lambert tried not to look too shocked, realising it probably didn’t really know what it was saying. It was still a little uncanny, however.

“These are magnetic boots,” he explained, lifting a foot and making a show of gesturing at the electronics wrapping over the base. “I’d be floating around like you if not for these. Look.”

He clicked the button on the side of one boot, then the other, making sure Mezul saw what he was doing. Once the boots were turned off, he floated there alongside the alien, the Balokarids eyes lighting up as it ogled him and his strange equipment.

“Your new friend probably thinks you’re Einstein,” Carl said, watching from the top of the ramp.

“We’ve got plenty of other stuff inside,” Lambert said, flicking his boots back on and landing on the deck with a thunk. “Want to come have a look, Mezul?”

“You wanna give it a run of the ship?” Carl asked. “Or uh, a float of the ship? That really a good idea?”

“Maybe it’ll let us take a look at their gear after,” Lambert suggested.

“Hmm. I guess that would be a good trade...”

Lambert moved up the ramp, turning around and gesturing for Mezul to follow. The alien hung there, unsure of itself as it glanced between him and Shaliyya, the two exchanging a few chirped words.

“It’s alright,” Lambert said, trying to sound as reassuring as he could, even if it all felt a bit strange, this big alien nervous about approaching his ship. “Come on, I’ll show you around.”

Mezul appeared to make up its mind, pushing off the deck with its long legs, Lambert blinking when it floated over and seized his hand for leverage. He had to bring his other arm out to halt its momentum, grabbing at its wide hips to steady it.

The alien turned its gaze down on him, the hundreds of azure feathers making up its headdress roiling as its eyes darted between his own.

“Sorry,” he said, taking it by the hand as he turned around, its large, clawed grip tightening over his digits as he moved up the ramp and to the stairs, where an amused Carl stood watching from the top.

“He seems keen on you, Cap,” Carl said, reaching out to catch the tossed helmet Lambert sent his way.

“Go reload the guns while I show it around.”

“Better you than me to babysit,” he replied, moving out of the way as Lambert led the alien up to the main deck. “I’m gettin’ a snack.”

“This is our corvette,” Lambert said, waving at everything with a wide spread of his arms. “Corvette. Can you say that?”

“Corvette,” Mezul said, adding a little whistle right after the word. “Lambert corvette.”

“You got it,” he said with a nod. It almost felt like he was teaching a parrot to speak, but he had to remind himself this was a sentient creature, like him, its eyes wide with curiosity as it drifted into the doorway where Carl had gone.

Lambert followed after, the room before them filled in with countertops and cabinets, sealed with electronic locks so as to prevent their contents from spilling out. A bolted down table and a few pairs of chairs sat between the sink and the door, giving off the appearance that someone had just plucked out a section of a living room and set it down between all the storage units.

“This is our living quarters, slash kitchen,” Lambert said.

“Sometimes when we’re out on a long mission we need a place to sit back, watch some old movies or something.”

Mezul took an immediate interest to the television mounted next to the table, tapping at the glass with a claw, pressing the little buttons built into the side.

“You know he ain’t gonna understand a word you’re saying,” Carl noted. He was by the refrigerator, his hands delving into one of the cold drawers.

“I know,” Lambert replied. “But it’s pretty good at mimicking, and it knows how to associate words with objects, so why not? I wonder if it has implants like us, helping it understand, or if it’s just using pure brainpower.”

“Einstein kitchen!” Mezul chirped, drifting over to the table. “I’m goin’ with implants,” Carl chuckled. “Here, wanna protein bar? We got apple, chocolate, caramel.”

“Chocolate,” Lambert said, catching the wrapper Carl threw at him. He chewed away as he watched Mezul explore, the big alien looking and touching anything it found interesting. It flipped at the toaster levers, flicked the outlet switches on and off, occasionally talking in its own language as it marveled. Soon it caught his attention with a wave.

“What is it?” he asked. Mezul motioned at the four seats present, then pointed at the pair of humans, swapping its attention back and forth as the gears in Lambert’s head turned.

“I think it’s wonderin’ where the rest of the crew are,” Carl said. “Four seats, two dudes.”

“We’re a bit understaffed,” Lambert explained, the alien watching him. “The Hub hasn’t got that many ships, and even less people to fly them right now, so they have to send out half-crewed teams, like us.”

Mezul’s expression let him know most of that went right over its head, Lambert sighing as he tried to think of a way to explain, but just couldn’t.

“Don’t forget me,” Alice said through his suit speaker.

“I doubt I’ll be able to explain what you are to it,” Lambert said, the alien looking around to see who he was talking to. “Let’s just show you around some more, Mezul.”

“Be back in a bit,” Carl said when the three of them moved out into the main hall. Carl went back down to the cargo bay, while Lambert led Mezul toward the cockpit, the hatchway opening when they got close.

“This is where I sit,” he said, gesturing at the pilot seat, the equipment lit up by the hanger lights outside. “The cockpit.”

“Cockpit,” Mezul copied. “Corvette cockpit.”

“You got it,” he said. “Hey, what are you doing?”

Mezul eased itself down into the seat, Lambert seeing that the tail-like, metal sheathes sprouting from its rump were getting in the way, the alien chirping in annoyance at the undersized chair. It opted to rest on the very edge of the seat, suspiciously aware to keep its long arms away from the flightsticks, its knees tucked up towards its chest so its long legs didn’t kick at the dashboard.

Even sitting, its head still reached Lambert’s chest, the man standing beside it as he chuckled at the odd sight. He gestured to the glass canopy, and the alien escort ship just visible off to one side of the glass. “I fly the corvette from here. Remember when your ship came right up to ours?”

“Ghosha,” Mezul said, giving the stick on the right a gentle prod. The ship’s drives were offline, but the whir of mechanics imbedded in the walls still sounded off.

“Ghosha?” he asked. “What’s that mean?”

Mezul pointed at him. “Ghosha Lambert. Corvette cockpit, ghosha.” It motioned at the seat, then him. “Lambert ghosha!”

“I’m ghosha?” he asked as he pointed at himself, the alien nodding in a way that made it seem like they were almost talking. “Ghosha, and cockpit ... Does ghosha mean ... pilot? Hey, I think I learned my first Balokarid word.”

“You got it,” Mezul said. “Lambert ghosha, Mezul ghosha.”

“You’re a pilot too?” he asked. “So you were flying that ship around?”

He placed a hand on the control sensor on the armrest, and navigated to the recording feed. All external sensors were permanently on record for debriefing purposes, and after a minute he navigated to the timeline of the prior battle.

One of the screens displayed the recording, and he fast- forwarded to the first moments they spotted the alien ship, Lambert hearing his and Carl’s voices in the background. Mezul’s face lit up as it gestured to the alien ship that had lurked within the asteroids from earlier, then at itself. “Mezul,” it said, nodding vigorously and pointing. “Mezul!”

“That was you we were following?” he asked. “Maybe you do recognise me. Heh, never thought I might have something in common with an alien.”

“Lambert,” Mezul said, the man quirking an eyebrow at it. It was staring at him again, its big eyes dilating the longer they looked at each other. For some reason he felt a little self-conscious, like the alien was sizing him up or something.

“If you’re a pilot, then maybe you’ll like what some of this stuff does.” Lambert knelt down and tapped at the terminal on the far left. A few pairs of feeds opened up on the screens, showing the surrounding hangar from several different angles from the ship, Lambert showing Mezul how to manipulate each camera, the alien cooing as it swivelled the starboard camera around with the keypad.

The feed moved until they saw Carl outside the ship, his boots turned off so he could float up to the top point-defence cannon. He had opened up one of the belt feeders on the side of the giant turret, an ammo box he’d gotten from the cargo bay floating beside him as he removed the spent canisters. Carl had collected quite the audience, the human surrounded by at least ten aliens ogling at him from a short distance away around him.

“From here I can get a good look at pretty much everything around the ship,” he said, pressing the zooming feature. Carl turned towards the camera right as the lenses dialled up to maximum, the whole screen filling up with Carl’s wide, blue eye. The image amused Mezul, the alien clapping its hands together as it gestured to let it try. It manipulated the camera like it had been using human tech its whole life, zooming in on its alien counterparts as they worked on the other ships.

He took a moment to look his guest over, noticing that while

Mezul’s spacesuit was a dull grey, the ones who worked the machines wore suits in the shades of greens. Perhaps the colours indicated what type of role the alien served? Shaliyya was the only alien to have red on its suit so far – maybe that meant officer, and grey meant combatant, green for engineers. If only there was some way to ask.

There was something almost endearing about how the alien wondered at the cockpit devices. Lambert never really had the time nor the friends to demonstrate his profession, and seeing someone explore and map out every little part of his ship, and doubling up as a fellow pilot as well, brought a sense of companionship that he found refreshing.

A thought occurred that he was using the Hub’s first chance at alien contact to make a friend. His mother would be proud.

“Sir,” Alice began, its voice coming through the speaker on his collar. “I’ve been running some scans on our hosts since we’ve landed, but perhaps it would be best if we documented these

‘Balokarids’ in more detail.”

“What do you have in mind?” he asked, grinning when Mezul darted its head about in search of the other speaker. “We’re not doing any dissecting if that’s what you’re getting at.”

“Not at all, I am surprised you think so little of me.”

I’m not. So what’s your plan?”

“Lead your partner to the medical bay, and use the scanner there. I am nintey-nine percent certain a map of their biology will tell us more about them, as well as provide a template for our report once we get back to the fleet.”

“Still need to find a way to do that with no fuel,” Lambert said. “Come on, Mezul, follow me.”

The alien floated up behind him, keeping close as he exited the cockpit, his boots clunking against the floor as he walked.

“Are you planning on bringing these aliens to the rendezvous point?” Alice asked.

“We can’t just let them get picked off by the UEC,” Lambert replied. “Who knows how many Confederate ships are out here? When the Hub went independent, we promised we’d be different from the Confederacy and the core worlds. The way I see it, it’s our duty to help these people.”

“They may have valuable intelligence on UEC movements in the nebula as well,” Alice noted.

They walked (and floated) down to one of the doorways they hadn’t explored, the two entering a whitewashed space about the size of a bathroom. Basic medical equipment lay scattered about, secured to the deck by harnesses, a single examining table in the middle of the room.

Mezul must have recognised the room as being medical in nature, floating over to the table and peering at all the equipment.

Lambert didn’t even need to ask it to sit down, the alien curling its big digitigrade legs up against the edge of the table.

After a bit of looking, Lambert produced a device that looked very similar to a glowstick with a metal grip. The blue rod was packed with sensory equipment, Lambert flicking the tool on with a push of a button.

“Alright Mezul,” he said, getting the aliens attention. “I’m going to scan you now. With this thingy.”

The alien peered at the scanner, its feathery headdress rolling until the plumes flattened. Did that indicate nervousness, perhaps? Like how the fur of a cat would fold back when it was threatened?

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