“Not yet. We still have the south side of Starport City, and I have the AI searching for any mention of Mikki Pelker on the web. So far, nothing.”Calan responded, pulling off his shirt over his head.
He paused to watch Ajha wriggle out of her pants and straighten in all her naked glory. She gave him a sexy smirk as she admired his erect penis. Then she turned to hang her clothing over the bar on the closet door by the bed.
“Most of those fighter fems have colorful names like Tammy the Tigress. They could have given Mikki some crazy name, too.”
“The AI search is set to pick up all images from the advertising for these fights. Even though they aren’t legal in Starport City, they are extremely popular and heavily attended by the city residents.”
“Tomorrow, I’ll call up the results on my tablet and see if any of them might be Mikki. It’ll be hard to tell with some of them because they wear makeup and masks with their costumes.”
Calan took her in his arms, and Ajha pressed her delightful body against his. They both let out a groan of pleasure as skin met skin.
“You must keep practicing recognizing people by their psionic signature. You know her, and it’s in your mind somewhere, but you don’t know it yet. Practicing will help you recognize it if we get near her.”
“I am doing it every day. I recognize Holly’s and of course yours, but I’ve known yours for a long time.”
“We’ll keep looking.”He cupped the side of her face with one hand and tilted her head gently up with a thumb under her chin.
“Do you think she is dead?”
“I don’t know, but I think you would feel it if she were dead. You would have felt when she died.”
“How? When I didn’t know I even had these abilities before.”
“It would feel like a dark cloud blocking the sun and the sinking feeling you get when you know something bad is going to happen, only worse. You might not know the cause immediately, but you would definitely feel it as close as you and Mikki are.”
“I believe that. Sometimes I almost feel like she is reaching out for me---worrying about me like I’m worrying about her. But I don’t see anything in my mind to give me a clue where she might be.”
Calan kissed her lips tenderly, letting her feel his love and compassion. He understood he worry because Mikki had been a sister, parent, and friend all rolled into one. She was the person Ajha cared about as much as she cared for him but differently. He would feel the same if one of his parents or siblings were missing.
His sympathy and understanding soothed her, and the feel of him in her arms drew her thoughts to the passion that was igniting between them. He deepened the kiss, and she readily opened to him.
He reveled in her pleasure as it enhanced his own. Touching, kissing, nibbling, sucking, he lost track of where his enjoyment ended, and hers began.
They fell into bed together entwined in each other, and he joined their bodies with a firm thrust that made Ajha coo her approval. Thrust met thrust, and the two were enraptured in their mutual ecstasy echoed back and forth between their minds. Their climax made them see stars in their minds as they panted and moaned in exquisite delight and love for each other.
“We’ll find her,”Calan vowed silently.“We won’t stop looking until we do.”
Her response was a wave of pure love and appreciation. Despite her worry about Mikki, she had come to adore Calan, and she knew without a doubt that those feelings were reciprocated. To be loved like that was better than any drug ever made. When their bodies joined together in passion, their endorphins went off the charts higher than when Normals copulated.
Anyone who ever experienced that kind of elation could only find forcing women to perform sex acts as virtual slaves an abomination. It was no better than rape.
If people willingly provided sexual favors for payment, it was their choice. But that was not the case in most of the brothels run by the overlords. The men and women who worked them were virtual slaves imprisoned there. Those were the people he and Ajha wanted to free.
In the weeks since opening the doors of the refuge, new people arrived on a daily basis. Calan and Ajha only went out to get them if they were advised their help was needed. Some mornings, there would be up to two hundred people sitting on the lawn waiting to be admitted. Others there would be only a few.
The population was expanding faster than the modules for the individual flats even though he had doubled the orders. Some of the men and women admitted to the refuge volunteered to learn how to set the modular units and hook them to power and plumbing.
Rax seemed an apt teacher and got along well with those volunteers, but he was still disappointed that the influx of people hadn’t brought him a mate. Calan sympathized with his friend’s loneliness. He had felt that way when he knew his psion mate was on Earth and he couldn’t be with her.
Some innate knowing, perhaps not unlike Calan’s psionic sensibilities, told Rax his own true mate was out there somewhere. Unlike Calan, he didn’t know where to even look for her.
Even Ajha had become sensitive to the cyborg’s yearnings. She had come to like Rax as Calan had, and she wished to help him as well. Sometimes, Rax went out at night on the scooter wandering the ruins, even the red-light district, hoping to catch her scent. It was frustrating and fruitless, but he was at least trying to do something to find her, whoever---wherever she might be.
Fortunately, Rax’s services as a security officer were rarely needed. Except for some minor squabbles, everyone was at least tolerant of the other residents. More were openly friendly and willing to help when others needed it. Almost two thousand people were living there at the refuge after two months---people looking for a better life arrived nearly every day.
Spring had faded into late summer. The vegetable crops were thriving, and they would substantially supplement the food budget for the Refuge. There was enough open land surrounding the complex to expand next year’s planting. In the back of the east wing Calan set up a protein lab where animal protein was grown from cells for the food processors.
Children and adults alike were getting an education from the AI through their tablets. The refuge council was learning how to govern the community as well. They understood the need for the community to become self-sufficient if it were to grow enough to include all those who needed to join it.
