Season Content notes: (explicit) sex
It had been a long day of welcoming the students, getting them settled on board, helping Skullfire and Ezra load and store the supplies… when Moira fell into bed with Zdenko she expected to sleep quickly and deeply. Not to still be lying awake an hour later while Zdenko snored beside her. Of course, it didn’t help that the bastard hadn’t touched her since he came back from his surgery. Not even in his sleep.
Susie had warned her that removing the parasite would change him, and she’d expected to see his libido drop… but she hadn’t thought it would disappear entirely. Or that he would be actively avoiding her.
Frustrated, Moira dragged herself out of bed. She grabbed her tablet and slipped out into the common area, hoping that if she got some work done, her brain would quiet down enough for her to get some sleep.
Ezra was in the common room already, sitting at the table and sipping from a steaming mug. With a quiet sigh, Moira went to join him. “Hello Ezra.”
“Moira,” Ezra rumbled. The short, stocky man had a deep voice that Moira had always found soothing, even during the worst of her first months on the Meadowsweet. “You’re up late.”
“Mm.” Moira slid into the chair next to him and stole his drink. The first sip surprised her — dense, creamy chocolate. It was closer to drinking a candy bar than any hot chocolate she’d had before. “Oh, this is good. Why did I not know you could make this?”
“I couldn’t,” Ezra smiled and stole the mug back. “I picked up this recipe on Thetis III last year, after you’d, ah, left us.”
Moira snorted. “‘Left’. Zdenko all but pushed me out the airlock. I wonder what he’d have done if I refused to tell him where ‘home’ was?”
“Best we didn’t need to find out. The captain’s a good sort, but he does have his notions.” Ezra took a long drink and the mug ‘clinked’ when he set it back on the table.
“I suppose that’s one way to put it.” Moira poked at the empty mug. “I don’t suppose you’d be willing to whip up another batch?”
“For my favorite eavesdropper? Always.”
Moira shoved him and laughed, “It’s not eavesdropping if you all knew I was doing it!”
Moira had first come on the Meadowsweet as a sex slave, bought by Zdenko to help him manage his parasite problem. He’d offered her a portion of the ship’s profits as ‘payment’ and promised to send her home when she’d earned enough to pay back what he’d spent on her. Since it was the best offer likely to come her way — and unlike anyone else on the infamous ‘3Ps’ he’d actually given her a choice — Moira agreed.
Only to find that in a misguided effort to ‘protect her,’ Zdenko had ordered all the crew to avoid her and avoid talking or interacting with her as much as possible.
To keep the isolation from driving her crazy, Moira had hacked the ship’s security system and spied on the crew. It had also gotten her the first of several scientific papers on the function of a free trader in space.
While Moira had been reminiscing, Ezra pulled out milk and chocolate and a handful of other things and started whisking them together in a pan on the stove. Moira, who could microwave on a good day, didn’t even try to keep track of what he was doing.
“I missed you,” she said, surprising herself.
Ezra turned away from the stove to smile at her. “And I missed you, beautiful.”
Moira flushed and smiled back. She and Ezra had never been more than friends last time she was on Meadowsweet, Ezra had been too aware of her position on the ship, and not comfortable taking advantage. But maybe this time…
Before she could follow that thought, the door to crew quarters slammed open and a knot of young adults came out, talking loudly. Moira recognized Grover and yawning Stephanie, and she thought the third was Mackenzie. All of them should have been asleep, but Moira wasn’t exactly one to talk.
Mackenzie suddenly squeaked, pointing at Moira and Ezra. The trio got a lot quieter.
“Sorry, Prof,” Stephanie said around another yawn. “Didn’t expect anyone to be up.”
“That’s a reason to be quiet, not a reason to go tramping around like a monkey with cymbals.”
The three giggled but promised to keep it down. They settled down on the opposite side of the room and turned on the view screen before quietly arguing about which game to set up.
With a sigh, Moira turned back to Ezra, half expecting their time together to be over for the night. Instead, he was watching her with a quiet intensity. “My room?”
Moira smiled again, wide enough that her cheeks actually hurt a bit, but she didn’t care. “Yes, please.”
Moira had never been in Ezra’s room, so she was surprised that he actually had a half dozen fish tanks built into the walls. They were small — one foot tall by two feet wide, and they couldn’t have been very deep. Each was filled with a different underwater… landscape?… made up of plants, rocks, and brightly colored fish or fish-like creatures.
“These are beautiful,” she said, looking back and forth between them all.
“Yup,” Ezra said, coming up behind her, “Beautiful.” He leaned forward and nuzzled her neck. “I can tell you all about them… someday.”
Moira turned to him with a smile. “Not today?” He wasn’t quite as tall as she was, putting him at the perfect height for her to look down and kiss him.
“Moira,” he returned the kiss with interest, “we’ve been flirting for nearly three years and I finally have you in my bedroom. If you think I can think about fish right now, you are going to be very disappointed.”
“Oh.” She smiled again. “Good.”
Sometime later, sweaty and sated, Moira rested her head on Ezra’s shoulder. It had been a long wait. And absolutely worth it.
The next several days passed… challengingly. Getting her students settled into shipboard life was more difficult than Moira expected, and she was grateful that Efe and Ildar had stepped up to run an introductory course on safety and social customs on small ships.
It left Moira time to get her paperwork sorted out and spend a few hours with each student individually, getting to know their strengths and weaknesses. Grover was her biggest concern, he didn’t want to be there and had no real interest in the coursework — he just didn’t want to be where he came from more. Carina was a close runner-up. Dedicated, yes. One of the most dedicated students Moira had ever had. Dedicated enough that Moira knew she was headed for early burnout if someone didn’t convince her to slow down.
But those were problems that would be sorted out — or not — over the semester, not in a couple of days.
After a couple of weeks back on ship, with the students as settled as they were getting, Moira was past frustrated and into annoyed with Zdenko and the distance he had put between them. But she was trying to be patient. Ten years with the parasite, it had to be almost a different for him without it, right?
Still, Moira wasn’t going to sit around waiting for him to sort himself out. She decided it was time to pin down Skullfire. The female was always closed off and distant, but outside of work, Moira had barely seen her at all.
And Moira had several fond memories of time spent with Skullfire, she didn’t want to lose that connection if she could avoid it.
One morning, she made herself climb out of bed at least an hour earlier than usual. As usual, Skullfire was in the quartermaster’s office, getting an early start on paperwork. Moira knocked on the open door and was relieved when Skullfire turned and smiled to see her.
“Moira. How are you doing?”
“I’m good, Skullfire. Still enjoying being back.”
“Good.” Skullfire turned back and fiddled with her paperwork. “Was there something I could help you with?”
“No. Not really,” Moira sighed. This wasn’t going to be as easy as she’d hoped. “I wanted you to know that I enjoyed spending time with you, in the past. I’m hoping you might let me join you again.”
Skullfire dropped her pencil and turned, face blank.
The only real time the two had spent alone together was the first time Skullfire had gone into heat while Moira was on board. Skullfire had asked Moira to help her through the heat as an excuse to get Moira alone and explain to her (finally) why everyone was avoiding her. She had told Moira she didn’t need help with the heat, but Moira had been desperate for any kind of social connection and too long without spending time with another woman. She insisted on spending the full heat with Skullfire.
Skullfire had never repeated the invitation.
“You do not need to do that,” Skullfire said now.
“I know I don’t,” Moira smiled. “But I did enjoy it, and I’d… well, I’d like a chance when you aren’t feeling guilty or like you are taking advantage of me. I want to see what we can have together.”
“You are with Zdenko, and Ezra.”
Moira looked away, shrugged, “I’ve never been into monogamy. Ezra understands that. As for Zdenko… Don’t get me wrong, I like the man. But he never again gets to tell me what to do with my body.”
Skullfire chuckled. “Well. I can’t argue with that.”
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