Chapter No.11

Ah, sad are they who know not love,
But, far from passion's tears and smiles,
Drift down a moonless sea, beyond
The silvery coasts of fairy isles.

And sadder they whose longing lips
Kiss empty air, and never touch
The dear warm mouth of those they love --
Waiting, wasting, suffering much.

But clear as amber, fine as musk,
Is life to those who, pilgrim-wise,
Move hand in hand from dawn to dusk,
Each morning nearer Paradise.

Ah, not for them shall angels pray!
They stand in everlasting light,
They walk in Allah's smile by day,
And slumber in his heart by night.

- Thomas Bailey Aldrich -

"We are in normal space, Angie."

"Take us down to 5000 kps, Delphi."

"Yes, Angie."

"There is a Cyborg fleet coming out of jump," Ninja said. "They are on course for the Drak planet."

"Take us on intercept, Delphi. Maximum safe speed."

"Yes, Angie."

"There is a Dragon fleet moving from the Drak planet," Ninja said.

"Raise COM to the X-4001, Delphi."

"COM is up, Angie."

"We have a battle about to take place," Angie said. "We should launch three fighters each. We will approach from behind the Cyborg ships."

"Yes, Admiral," Brian said.

Ninja got up and joined Marty. Andy, Tiana, Theodore, and Edward also joined them."

"We'll stay on the fringes of this battle," Marty said. "That way we can attack the enemy while they are occupied with the Dragon fleet."

As usual, Marty and Ninja launched in the X-501 first and waited until the X-502 with Andy and Tiana and the X-503 with Theodore and Edward had moved up in formation around the X-5001. Along with the X-4001 and three fighters, the armada moved into the battle, attacking the fringes of the Cyborg fleet. This action caused the Cyborg ships to break up and try to fight individual battles. That's when the human ships were able to destroy many enemy ships.

But, the Cyborgs fought like hellcats. Marty and Ninja came under multiple ship attack, but Marty flipped over and Ninja shot plasma pulses into three enemy craft at the same time. Delphi shot multiple energy beams at ships flying around like angry bees.

That's when Marty spotted a Dragon ship in trouble. It was being jumped on by at least a dozen enemy ships. He came up over the enemy ships, firing everything that he could. Enemy ships soon began to explode and crash, allowing the Dragon ship to escape the melee.

The melee began to turn against the Cyborgs, but the brunt of the casualties was Dragon. However, they were grateful for the human help.

"We thank you, Commander," a Dragon officer said. "One of your ships saved this vessel from destruction. We honor them."

"We will also honor them, Commander," Angie said. "We will now go to the Drak planet to repair our damages."

"We understand."

"COM dropped, Angie."

"Call our fighters back, Delphi."

"Yes, Angie."

***

Angie looked up at Marty when he and Ninja came back on the command deck. "You two have been honored by the Dragon commander for saving his ship."

"Saving ships is us," Marty quipped.

"What are our losses," Angie asked.

"Edward got injured and we took some damage to all three fighters, but the bots should be able to take care of it."

"Excellent," Angie said. "We going to take a break and stick around the Drak planet for a while. The Dragon fleet is going out as soon as they repair some of their ships, so we have to protect the planet until they come back."

"We need a break. It'll give you some time to take care of business."

"Yes," she said, smiling.

"I'm going to go and check up on Edward," Marty said.

"That's good," Angie said.

Marty went to Medical Station, but Edward was not there. He was greeted by Ferris.

"Where's Edward?" he said with worry showing in his eyes.

"Onuki is allowing Honey to work on him. He suffered a bad wound to his abdomen and was bleeding badly.

"May I see him?" Marty asked.

"Yes. Go in there and put on a mask and gown.

Marty nodded and did as she had directed. He entered the dissection room and saw that Honey had already cut his abdomen so that she could go in and find where the bleeding was coming from. His intestines were untangled and lying out of his body.

"How's it going?" he asked.

"Honey has found several tiny nicks in his intestines," Onuki said. "The bleeding has subsided."

"That's great."

"I am having a wild time of it, Martin. The small intestines of a typical human are seven meters long and there are many folds and wrinkles in them."

"You are wonderful, Honey," Marty said.

"I am in over my head," she said.

Marty smiled.

***

Angie came out of her quarters into the common area to find a repentant and concerened George.

"Good evening, Mr. Taylor. Come into my quarters, please."

George followed her in, but he stayed back by the entrance.

"Come over here," Angie said, pointing to a spot in front of her easy chair.

He did so reluctantly, standing with his hands folded.

"I'm sure that you know why you're here," she said.

"Yes, ma'am."

"I've been given a direct order to severely punish you, but I really don't want to do it. You're a scientist, not a member of the military, but I really can't ignore a direct order."

"I understand, ma'am."

"I thought about it a lot and I decided to punish you, Karl, and Jean-Michel individually. That way I can adjust the punishment to each of your individual physical conditions. I don't know if you know it, but three of the women pulled the same dumb stunt that you three did. I thought about doing the punishments in front of an audience, but I decided that it would be too extreme."

"I appreciate that, ma'am."

Angie heard the request signal. "Wait a second while I go let someone in."

George watched her walk over to the entrance to her quarters. He didn't like what was happening, but there was nothing he could do about it. He was in the black widow's den.

After a few minutes, she came back with Lucia."

"Okay, Mr. Taylor, we can get started. You can go in my bedroom to undress."

"Do you want me to remove everything?"

"Yes, please."

Angie and Lucia watched him enter Angie's bedroom.

"You can sit there," Angie told her. "I think that you realize why I'm permitting you to watch Mr. Taylor's discipline."

"Yes, signora, I do."

After several minutes, George came back into the main room, hiding his genitals with his hands. He stood in front of Angie and Lucia with an embarrassed look on his face.

"We'll start with something simple," Angie said. "Stretch your right arm up over your head."

He did, but he realized that he could not hide his male equipment as well with only one hand. It didn't help that Lucia was sitting there smiling at him.

"I want you to stand on your toes, and then turn around slowly." Angie ordered.

George did as she ordered but soon found it painful. "This hurts, ma'am."

"It's supposed to. You're being punished. Keep your arm stretched."

"This is really hurting me," George complained.

"Keep going," Angie said.

"I don't know if I can, ma'am."

"Okay, you can stop."

He relaxed with a relieve breath. "Thank you, ma'am."

She allowed him to rest for a few minutes. "Now I want you to raise your left arm and then run in place."

He lowered his right hand so that he could raise his left before he started pumping his legs up and down.

"I want to see those legs moving faster and bend your knees more."

Soon, his breathing rate increased, his skin glistened with sweat, his gluteal muscles alternately bounce up and down, his belly shook like jelly and his thighs shook and vibrated.

"Okay, I want you to keep switching hands while you run in place, but you have to wait until you raise your hand before you lower the other hand."

George soon realized that it was impossible to protect his modesty now. Worse yet, he saw Lucia was grinning at him. The one thing he was certain of: he was being punished.

***

Marty relaxed in his easy chair. It was the first really quiet time he could enjoy since coming back to Andromeda, but his peace was interrupted.

"Come in."

Angie entered. "Onuki just told me that Honey and her kids are going to dissect Harvey. Do you want to watch?"

"I sure do. That should be very interesting." He got up. "Honey and her kids have become experts on alien anatomy."

"Actually, she and her kids have received several requests to dissect crew members."

"Why?"

"Dissection has become the ultimate diagnostic tool," Angie said. "That's my fault. The crew figures that if I allowed myself to be dissected, it must be a good idea."

"You were lucky," Marty said.

"I think that you should allow her to dissect you," Angie said. "I'd really love to watch that."

"I don't know if I would like that. One of Honey's kids would probably cut into my sex organs just to see what was inside them."

"Now, that I would really enjoy."

"You're bad."

"I know it."

When Angie and Marty got to Medical station, they found that an audience had gathered to observe this dissection. Harvey was already in the metal pan that sat on top of the dissection table. She had her arms and legs spread and her head tilted into a separate pan. The implication was that Honey was going to thoroughly examine the alien's dual face system.

Honey attacked the alien's head first. She removed part of her skull so that she could examine her brain. Arby made cuts in the dual foreheads in order to pull the two faces of the alien down so that he could examine the facial bones and muscles as well as the eyes and mouth structures. He used special instruments to pull her eyes out of their sockets and he cut into her mouth so that he could examine her teeth.

"I have found that the left ear and the right ear are connected to the listening face," Arby said. "The mouth of the talking face is separate from that of the listening face."

Meanwhile, Wendy was busy cutting the alien's body so that she could get to its organs. After splitting its ribcage, Wendy was able to examine its two separate hearts.

***

Angie smiled at Marty. He was asleep on the couch in the common area.

"Hey, wake up."

He looked up at her and then sat up. "What's going on?"

"I'm going to punish Lucia. Do you want to watch?"

"I'll pass," Marty said. "I've had my fill of punishment."

"I'm not really going to hurt her," Angie said. "Although, I should. She and Anna committed a serious infraction."

"I still don't want to watch," Marty said. "Thanks anyway."

Angie gave him a smile before entering her quarters. Lucia and George were seated on her couch, but they stood up when she entered.

"Thanks for waiting," Angie said. "I had a last minute meeting."

"We understand, ma'am," Lucia said.

"You can undress in my bedroom," Angie told Lucia.

Lucia smiled at George before going off to Angie's bedroom.

Angie sat down in her easy chair and smiled at George. "It's your turn to watch."

"I don't know if I really want to do that," George said. "I respect Ms. Fibonacci. She's a topnotch astrophysics expert."

"I'm not really going to hurt her," Angie said. "I just want to make her realize the consequence of the mistake that she has made."

"I'm not criticizing you, ma'am, but why do you make those you punish strip?" George asked.

"That goes back to the first time I disciplined Commander Sinclair. I knew that it constituted a punishment by itself because it made him angry. When you think about it, why do you need to be dressed to be punished? Besides, I am not allowed to touch you, either directly or indirectly. What am I supposed to do to punish you? I only have a few options like confinement to quarters, but I can't afford to be without your services, or I could cut your rations, but that would make you sick. The only thing I can do is order you to do things that will cause you embarrassment and pain. You are literally punishing yourself."

"I never thought of it that way," George said. "However, I am making a request that you punish me in her place."

"I am amazed by your chivalry, George," Angie said. "I will honor your request."

Angie got up and went into her bedroom.

Lucia and Angie's emerged from the bedroom, and it was obvious that Lucia was very pleased with what George had done.

"Thank you, signore," she said to George, giving him a big smile. "I am grateful for your offer to suffer in my place."

"It's my pleasure, ma'am."

"Okay, Mr. Taylor, you can go to my bedroom and undress."

He got up. "Yes, ma'am."

"I will go now, signora, and leave you to Mr. Taylor."

"No, Lucia, I want you to watch him undergo your punishment."

Lucia stared at Angie for a few seconds before sitting down. "Yes, signora."

George came back with his hands over his male equipment.

"Okay, stretch your arms over your head and stand on your toes," Angie ordered him.

When he obeyed Angie's order, George smiled at Lucia, surprising her.

"Now I want you to spin around on your toes, keeping your arms stretched high."

After completing six slow circles, George's calf muscles knotted and his thighs jiggled violently from the strggle to remain on his toes. After six more  turns, George was in obvious pain.

"Plesse don't hurt him, signora," Lucia pleaded.

"You can relax."

"Thank you, ma'am," George said, He smiled at Lucia. "And you, ma'am."

"I really don't like hurting you," Angie said. "Actually, I hate doing this, but I was given a direct order to severely punish you."

"I understand, ma'am."

"Okay, now I want you to squat with your hands behind your head."

After George had squatted for a few minutes, he began to squirm around. "This is hard on the legs, ma'am."

"I can't help that."

"But, it hurts. Ow!"

"Okay, stand up."

"Thank you, ma'am."

"Now, I want you to squat again, but this time I want you to spread your legs."

George gave her a surprised look before he obeyed.

"Spread your legs wider, please."

Lucia could hardly avoid giggling. She was seeing things that she never thought she would see.