Sexy Space Babes - Mechs, Maidens and Macaroons: Chapter Twenty Nine

The past month had felt like an eternity -  and yet no time at all.

And now it’s over, Mark thought as he perched on a battered crate, looking out over the cavernous warehouse – and the massive mech occupying the center of it.

And it was a mech now. A proper warmachine, instead of the mass of disparate parts, limbs and armor plates it had been just a few weeks ago.

“Saria really did pull off a miracle,” he muttered as he took in the brand new blue and red paint scheme that covered the once bare metal.

A feat that had only been accomplished about an hour ago. And while that might normally have warranted some kind of loud, raucous celebration – the fact of the matter was that Saria had all but collapsed the moment she was done. Even now he could hear her snoring absently in the corner alcove she’d carved out for herself. He was content to let her rest. She’d more than earned it.

Alas, the busty paint-stained engineer was just about the only one who could sleep.

He knew he was certainly feeling a little too wired to settle down for the night, knowing that the match that would decide… well, everything, would be happening in less than twelve hours.

He glanced around the warehouse that had been their home for the last month.

He’d definitely learned much about the others while living here. Their good traits and not-so-good ones. For one thing, he’d found out that despite her outward maturity, Kalia was a total mess when it came to… just about anything domestic.

And he didn’t mean that she was bad at household chores. Rather that she didn’t even seem to realize they were things that needed to be done.

She dropped things. Wrappers. Fruit peels. Packaging. Once she extracted what she needed from something, it hit the ground. And then she’d step over whatever she’d just discarded without a single backward glance. Because she expected someone else to clean it up.

What was worse, he couldn’t even say it was laziness on her part - just ignorance. The kind of blind spot one developed from living a life where messes did actually vanish without a thought when you left them lying around.

She’d… been trying to adapt since he’d brought it up – and explained that he was here as a chef, not a live-in butler – but it was… slow going.

Still, at least Kalia was trying to change.

Tenir?

Tenir had the opposite problem.

Everything had a place and heaven help anyone – but Kalia! – who failed to return anything they used to that place. Now, Mark liked to think he wasn’t a slob or anything, but there were limits. He was a grown ass man, he didn’t need his day scheduled down to the minute.

Now, if it was just him she was trying to micromanage, there wouldn’t be too much of a problem. Unfortunately, where Kalia was exempt from said attempts, the same was not true for Jelara and Saria.

He’d quickly learned why Saria’s living space and place of work had a security door and was kept separate from the mansion. It was for both of their safety and sanity. Unfortunately, the warehouse didn’t allow for that kind of distance – and Tenir just couldn’t help herself when other people’s foibles were right in front of her.

…Or rather didn’t want to. She didn’t see why it was a problem.

Even after Jelara threatened to shank her in her sleep. Which led into something he’d kind of suspected about her but hadn’t been able to confirm personally.

That being that Jelara could get downright vicious when she felt slighted, annoyed, sleepy, hungry or a myriad of other emotions.

To be totally honest, he was reasonably certain that if she didn’t need the other three and he hadn’t been doing his level best to run interference – she’d have quite literally shanked one of the other girls by now over them moving or using one of her tools without explicit permission.

The less said about her incredibly specific and pointed insults the better. Both Kalia and Tenir had fled in tears at least once. The jelly woman knew how to get at a person's most sensitive spots for sure. He was spared because he had a penis – and knew to tread gently. Saria had also been on the receiving end of said insults more than once, but Saria was… Saria.

Which was both a positive and a negative trait. Insults rolled off her back just as easily as complaints and polite requests.

Mark hung his head as he reluctantly recalled the ‘three-day underwear’ incident. The hangar already had poor ventilation to begin with!

Yet, despite those flaws - or perhaps because of them - Mark had never felt closer to any other group of people.

The power of shared suffering, he mused.

…Still, despite that, he didn’t want to see any of them again for at least a week the moment he got out of here! Perhaps he might have felt differently if they’d been able to leave occasionally, but fear of being discovered by roaming Vorn goons meant it wasn’t worth the risk.

Only Jelara got to leave on a semi-regular basis. Which theoretically meant she should have been calmer than the rest of them with the ability to escape the metaphorical pressure cooker from time to time…

…Theoretically, he thought forlornly.

Again, the last month had been rather illuminating regarding people’s less than positive traits…

Chuckling wryly, he glanced over to where Tenir was still on a call. A call she’d started a good two hours ago.

“Kalia will be there for the fight tomorrow,” she said firmly. “So if you want to explain to a few hundred thousand fans why the event of the season has been canceled after she shows up, you’re more than welcome to do so. No, I don’t care what the Vorn Corporation has to say, and neither should you? They were her sponsors. Now they are not. Anything else is irrelevant.”

The Nighkru’s steps echoed across the concrete as she paced back and forth, her hair swaying with each turn. Honestly, she looked and sounded every inch the hard-as-nails business manager she was.

Which was doubly impressive given she wasn’t actually wearing any pants. Underwear, certainly, but otherwise she was quite bare from the bottom down.

Mark shook his head at the sight.

When they’d first started hiding out at the warehouse, he’d assumed he and Tenir would have the least to do in the month leading up to the finals.

He’d been half-right.

As the month wore on, more and more of Tenir’s waking hours had been spent combating the Vorn corporation’s influence. Efforts that basically amounted to reassuring the many people with a stake in the upcoming match that Kalia would, in fact, have a mech and be ready to fight when the time came.

Something more easily said than done when the pilot in question couldn’t physically attend any of the myriad interviews, sponsor segments, and meetings that would normally occur in the lead up to a match like this.

Oh, she’d done a few video interviews, but that was it.

“Oh, come off it. Don’t act like you haven’t been playing up the rift to drive sales. We both know that threatening to disqualify her is a toothless threat and you’re just trying to eke out concessions. Well, I’ve no more time for it. Kalia will be at the agreed hangar at the agreed upon time and that’s the end of it. Goodnight.”

The Nighkru ended the call and practically sagged in place.

“Right, that’s it. I’m heading to bed,” she called to him as she turned without preamble and tramped up the steps.

Mark waved at her as she left while thinking he should probably be doing the same. Though admittedly he had no real need to present tomorrow beyond moral support. Honestly, he didn’t even know why he was nervous.

And for the third time that night, Mark’s omni-pad buzzed in his pocket.

“Nope, no reason at all,” he muttered as he silenced the device.

He already knew who’d been calling. Vorn Senior’s people. And by ignoring them he was almost certainly in breach of some part of his contract. He’d definitely be kissing goodbye to the rest of his contract’s payout. Hell, he was likely in some degree of debt for failing to uphold his end of the deal.

Still, he couldn’t bring himself to regret what he was doing.

Glancing up, he wasn’t too surprised to see Kalia emerge from the office above, steps heavy as she descended the rickety gantry, the metal creaking under even her fairly tiny weight. In no time at all she was next to him, and he scooted to the side to give her space on his impromptu chair.

He also resisted the urge to help her as the fairly diminutive alien struggled to clamber up and claim a spot. He’d done the opposite once before.

The resulting tirade had been enough to convince him never to do so again.

Again, the past month had been a learning experience.

Eventually though, the crimson skinned Vrekian had situated herself next to him. She sat there for a minute, idly glancing between him and the massive mech looming over them both.

The silence stretched.

“Nervous?” Mark asked eventually, his voice soft.

“Terrified,” Kalia replied instantly, before chuckling.

“Oh?” He’d expected some nerves, of course, but she’d been a gladiator pilot for a long time. Terrified seemed like a bit much.

She turned to him, her gaze intense, her voice low with a confession. “You know, I’m pretty sure Jelara hates me. At least in principle.”

A little confused by the conversational shift, Mark shook his head all the same. “Pretty sure that’s not true. Mostly. She respects you. Hell, don’t tell her I said so, but I found some of your merch in the back office – before she hid it.”

Kalia laughed, a soft, bitter sound that echoed faintly in the hangar, her shoulders relaxing slightly. “S’why I said in principle. Obviously, we’ve done a lot of talking over the past month.” She shook her head. “Listening to her talk about scraping her mech together… well, I get why she’s got a bit of a chip on her shoulder.”

Her fingers fidgeted with the edge of her tunic. “And that ties into why I’m terrified.”

Mark didn’t say anything, instead just waiting for her to speak.

“You know, I’ve never had anything to lose before? Not really. Mother could just pay the repair fees if I lost a match and I’d be out there again in a week or two. Sure, things got a little riskier towards the end, with her trying to pressure me into quitting, but even in my last match I didn’t think she’d just refuse to repair my mech if I lost. I thought she wanted me to end my career on a high point. Make the transition to CEO more of a victorious transition. Skies, I was relying on it.”

Mark nodded. He knew the whole team had been surprised when Kalia’s mother chose to pull the rug out from under them right on the eve of her biggest match. Not least of all because the move would cause her company a lot of backlash.

Krenheim lived and breathed mech fighting. It was as ingrained in the culture as soccer was in a lot of South American countries.

And what Vorn Senior had done was the equivalent of pulling the national team out right before they were about to attend the world cup.

It just… wasn’t done.

Even now they were facing backlash – even with the ‘confusion’ on whether or not Kalia was attending.

She continued. “It’s just… meeting Jelara, hearing her talk about putting her mech together over the course of… years. It’s made the stakes real in ways that make my own worries seem so unimportant. That’s why I’m terrified. If I lose, it’s not just me who’ll suffer. And I won’t be the one suffering the most.”

Mark shook his head. “Well, I can’t argue that Jelara’s putting a lot more on the line right now. The consequences for if this goes south are far more deep reaching than they’d be for you.”

Kalia nodded somewhat limply.

“With that said,” he continued. “That doesn’t mean your own worries and hopes have no meaning. Everything’s important to someone.”

He reached over, smiling at the way the heiress stiffened – but didn’t pull away – as he pulled her in for a hug. Slowly, she leaned into him, her voice slightly muffled.

“Thanks, Mark.”

He resisted the urge to chuckle. “With that said, even if it’s because you’re too noble for your own good, I was a little surprised to hear you talking about having performance anxiety after piloting for years.”

Clearly, he hadn’t done too good a job hiding his amusement as she slapped him on the knee, flushing an even darker shade of crimson. “You don’t have to put it so crassly!”

He shook his head. “I’d have thought you’d be inured to crassness after spending so much time with Jelara.”

Kalia sniffed. “Perhaps. Though I’d argue she’s not that much worse than Saria.”

Mark nodded, conceding the point.

The Vrekian continued. “Still, as nice as your words are, I didn’t come out here to have you comfort me. I originally came down here to let you know not to worry too much about tomorrow.”

Mark cocked his head. “What do you mean?”

The Vrekian hopped off the crate, brushing down her pants with a certain lightness that was absent before. “What I mean is that I won’t let Jelara suffer the consequences of trying to shield me from my own.” She took a breath. “Regardless of what happens tomorrow, I’ll make sure that her mech isn’t damaged too badly. Even if that means bowing out early.”

She gazed up at the machine, completely ignorant of Mark’s open mouthed shock. “I figure that between the upgrades Saria has installed and the notoriety she’ll get from the match, she’ll have a pretty ideal springboard to launch her own career so long as her mech isn’t too badly damaged.”

Mark opened his mouth, totally unsure what to say to that – even if he had a few choice words he wanted to say. Unfortunately, it wasn’t his place.

“You idiot!”

He smiled – because, fortunately, it seemed the person whose place it was had no issue speaking up.

“Wha-” Kalia gasped, looking up towards the gantry. “Jelara!?”

“Yes, Jelara,” the Ulnus hissed from her suit as she leaned over the railing to stare down at them. “And stay right there, because this one has some choice words for you!”

Both Mark and Kalia glanced at each other as Jelara stamped down the steps – though not so loudly so as to wake Saria. Which didn’t necessarily mean quietly. The Persin was just… a very deep sleeper.

“Do you think this one is your servant?” Jelara said without preamble as she strode up to Kalia.

“What!? No! I…” Kalia flushed. “I actually respect you a lot.”

Mark definitely noticed the flush of pleased yellow that shot through Jelara’s core at those words – though she tried her best to hide it. Again, he was pretty sure Kalia was one of the woman’s idols.

“Then why do you assume that this one helped you without thinking of what’s best for her? Huh?”

“Best for you?” Kalia was flummoxed. “I… I assumed Mark was the one who convinced you to, you know, throw your lot in with me.”

Jelara snorted dismissively. “Ha! No, this one might like Mark, but she’s not about to throw her best chance at becoming a pilot for him just because he waves his seed-core at her.”

Mark deliberately held his tongue. Both about comments involving seed-cores and the fact that Jelara had been just desperate enough to go along with this plan entirely because she’d chosen to sabotage her career in order to help him. Getting all-but shadow-banned from the amateur leagues in doing so.

Like an idiot, he thought.

Honestly in that regard, both she and Kalia had a lot in common. Both were morons who were willing to sacrifice what they wanted most in life to help people they barely knew.

Who did that?

As he had the thought, he once more had to reach down to silence his vibrating data-pad. Vorn senior’s people really didn’t know when to give up.

“This one is not going to let you fuck this up for her by getting cold feet,” Jelara continued. “Because when this one agreed to this insane plan, it was because she saw it as an opportunity. An opportunity to be the first person ever to win the Krenheim Cup on her debut match!”

Kalia stared in open mouthed awe at the audacity of that statement – though it wasn’t news to Mark.

“A mech? A mere forty years of hard labor?” The Ulnus scoffed. “Compared to an opportunity like that, this one considers them small prices to pay. So, no, you’re not pulling out the first time our mech takes a little scrape. This one is not about to lose out on this chance because you wanted to act all noble. If we lose tomorrow it’s not going to be because one of us was afraid to put her tits on the line! You hear me.”

Kalia continued to stare, clearly at a loss for words. Then she smiled. Beamed, actually. A wide grin that split her cheeks painfully as she giggled.

“Of course. Of course,” she cackled. “Please forgive me for being such an idiot. You’re right. It was selfish of me to try and keep you from a chance at glory because of my own hangups.”

Jelara sniffed – or rather did an equivalent gurgle. “Damn right. And the only way I’ll forgive you for even thinking about doing so is if we win tomorrow.”

Kalia wiped a stray tear from her eye as she stared up at her partner.

“Done.”

And Mark just sat there, happy for both of them – with no real desire to interrupt the moment.

“…With that said, I’m so hyped up now that I don’t know if I’ll be able to sleep,” Kalia eventually admitted sheepishly.

Jelara too seemed to take that as a cue to relax a little. “It’s funny, this one came down here because she had the same problem. Fortunately, the solution to that problem is close at hand. You just need to get laid.”

For just a moment, Mark thought he’d misheard. A sentiment Kalia apparently shared. “What?”

“Yes, Jelara,” Mark deadpanned, recovering slightly better than the still flustered Vrekian. “What.”

The Ulnus just waved a hand dismissively at him as she kept her attention on Kalia.

“It’s the best thing to knock a person out before a big fight. A good orgasm and you’re out in seconds.”

Kalia flinched, turning to glance between him and Jelara.

“But, he’s… yours,” she whispered. “And I have a fiancée.”

“Do you?” Jelara asked. “Because from what you told me, I’m not too sure about that anymore. As for Mark? Well, he’s already fucked the other two here. And he isn’t complaining now.”

Well, he wasn’t. After a month without doing anything, he was down. And he liked Kalia. “Not untrue, even if I’m not much of a fan of my girlfriend using me as a meat dildo.”

The Ulnus just chuckled ‘winking’ at him, before she continued talking to Kalia. “And besides, this one is sharing her mech with you. By contrast, a penis hardly compares.”

“Again, pretty sure I should be offended by that,” he drawled in amusement. “Both the penis bit and that I’m apparently a step below your mech on the importance scale.”

“Only just,” Jelara pointed out. “If anything, this one thinks that’s high praise given the mech was here first and she hasn’t known you that long.”

Mark conceded the point with a nod of the head, before the two turned back to a very flushed heiress. An heiress, who looked torn between staring at both of them and staring at literally anything else.

“Saria and Tenir are sleeping…” she eventually whispered, as if ashamed of even considering this.

“Then it’s a good thing this one knows of somewhere that’s sound-proof,” Jelara said while glancing towards a nearby location.

Specifically, the cockpit of their so recently finished mech. Which while hardly the most romantic spot in existence, he could admit was now designed to seat two and was most assuredly soundproof.

It might have been a tight fit with three people under normal circumstances, but when one of them was made of jelly and the other barely reached five feet.

Well, it might work.

“We have a match tomorrow,” Kalia stressed – though it sounded like she was fighting with herself.

“That’s why you should join in,” Jelara insisted. “Because I’m not getting to sleep anytime soon without a good orgasm. But if I take on this beast of a man alone, I’ll be left too tired to fight. You don’t want that do you?”

“Beast?” He questioned.

Both women ignored him.

Kalia hesitated, then glanced at him. Finally she spoke. “Well, if he’s fine with it…”

The look she gave him was so vulnerable, as if she was expecting him to reject her. And he had to wonder how much of that was borne of her rather tumultuous time with her fiancée.

Well, as a man, there was only one response he could give to that.

“Eep!” Kalia squeaked as he scooped her up into a princess carry and started jogging towards the mech.

Behind him, Jelara let out a small chortle, before she followed after him. “See what this one means? A beast.”