Quaranteam-Northwest: Part 25

Harri wakes up in the hospital. Again.

Based on a post by Break The Bar. Listen to the ► Podcast at Explicit Novels.

 

Once Kara had come down, panting as her cheek pressed against my abdomen, she turned and looked up at me. "That's it, right? No going back now for either of us."

"That's true," I said. "Not that I'd want to consider an alternative even if there as one."

Kara sat up and leaned over, kissing me. "That means nothing can get in between us again," she said, looking at me with a fervent desire. "Nothing ever should have, but now I have you and I'm not letting go."

"Ahem," Tanaya said, sticking up for herself.

"Sorry," Kara said, turning to her. "I'm just; So maybe I might be dealing with some stuff too."

"It's fine," Tanaya said. "Um... fuck, suddenly I'm way hornier than I was before. This vaccine thing is wild."

"I'm feeling it too," Kara nodded. "Look, do you want to just finish getting him hard, and then; well, how do you want to do it?"

Tanaya ran the tip of her tongue across her thin bottom lip and then reached out and took my cock in hand. She had slightly rough hands from her years of riding and taking care of the animals, but her small fingers still felt good as she stroked me twice from top to bottom. She glanced back to meet my eyes. "Mind if I'm on top?" she asked. "I think I'd feel better that way, this time and maybe a couple more."

"Sounds great," I said and leaned in to kiss her again.

"Tee, do you think maybe..." Kara started, then bit her lower lip, looking from my cock to my face and back. "Do you think if you're busy there, I could maybe get some of his mouth?"

Tanaya already had her mouth on my cock and I had to assume it was the post-Priming vaccine that had her simply grunt and give Kara a thumbs up. We shifted a little so I could lay on my back and as Tanaya continued to suck the top third of my cock and stroke the bottom two-thirds with her hand, Kara swung her leg over and straddled my chest. Looking up at her naked body, I groaned and raised my hands to grab her tits, finding I was right that they were just a bit more than a handful for me.

"Definitely bigger," I said. "And fantastic."

She snorted softly, her pelvis humping just slightly with her horniness as I thumbed her puffy areolas and nipples. "Not as big as Gerty's though," she said. "Were they fun to take for a spin?"

"All boobs are good boobs," I said sincerely. "And I can't wait to get my mouth on these ones, and yours Tanaya."

The other woman mumbled something around my cock and flashed another thumbs up from around Kara.

"Then here," Kara said, leaning down and bringing her tits to within reach. "Get a taste, baby. Because they're all yours."

I got my lips into her cleavage and, for a long moment, hoped I'd never need to leave that spot again. There was the unfortunate fact that her skin tasted a little of the chemical decontamination showers, but otherwise, she was warm against my lips and I could feel her skin starting to goose pimple a little as I kissed and licked and nuzzled and loved on her tits. When my lips finally found one of her nipples and ran my tongue around her areola the way I remembered she liked, Kara moaned gently, getting a hand behind my head and pulling me tighter to her bosom.

Being lost in her tits, however, didn't distract me from when Tanaya's mouth left my cock and she shifted on the bed, and then I was feeling her grinding her slick twat against the underside of my cock.

"Fuckin' hell," she groaned. "Fucking hell."

Kara pulled her tits from my face so she could look me in the eyes as she grinned. "Is she riding you?"

I shook my head. "Still feels great though."

Kara raised an eyebrow and then sat up more, looking over her shoulder to see Tanaya writhing her hips as she teased my cock. "Really?" she asked. "I can't believe he's not already inside you. I know I want that cock in me."

"I'm just,” Tanaya grunted. "I'm just making sure I'm not gonna fucking be too tight or something."

"If you're as turned on and wet as I am, there's no way in hell he wouldn't slip in," Kara laughed. "But you do you." She turned back to me and shuffled a little higher on her knees, biting her lip in a little grin as she raised both eyebrows at me questioningly.

"Get that twat up here," I said, patting her hips before sliding my arms between her legs instead of outside. "It's been too damn long."

"Fuck, yes," Kara moaned softly, shuffling forward a bit more and bringing her twat right over my face.

I hadn't been a complete idiot as a teenager, or some asshole. I'd become intimately familiar with this sight before and it seemed to be one thing that hadn't changed much about Kara. She had a pretty twat with thin outer labia and a neat little inner pair of lips along with a slightly prominent clit hood that was a shade darker than the rest of her warmly tanned skin. Her inner twat was a soft, pastel pink beyond those lips. Now it looked slick with her natural lubrication and gave off a slight musk and warmth with how turned on she was.

There wasn't any hesitation on my part. I slid my arms up to hook around her thighs and pulled her down to my face, driving my tongue into her and tasting Kara. At almost the same time Tanaya was shifting and I felt my cock pushing into her, the thinner woman's twat tight but not uncomfortably so as she drove herself back and down onto me.

I moaned. Kara gasped and wove the fingers of her hands into my hair. Tanaya groaned and reversed course, pulling all the way off of me and then right back on, driving my cock deep before she started to gyrate her hips like she was riding a bucking bronco.

Heaven couldn't be much better, I decided. The only thing that would turn that cheap motel room into true heaven would be the rest of my girls cuddled up around us. Even the weird saran-wrapped pillows and floors could stick around.

"Fuck, Harri," Kara moaned, her hips working as her body tried to roll towards an orgasm. "God, fuck, what a stupid fucking girl I was."

"Jesus," Tanaya groaned. She had me deep in her now and the smooth, circular motions of her rolling hips was a tantalizing urge I had to meet with my own thrusts up to meet her.

It wasn't fair, really; I knew Kara was making a bit of a mistake. From what I understood about the whole Priming-Imprinting sequence, she wasn't going to be able to reach a climax without the Imprinting. Getting oral from me definitely felt good based on how much of her nectar she was dripping onto my tongue, but she wasn't going to find satisfaction that way.

I was having fun trying to get her there, though. And God did she look good, looking up at her as she braced one hand on the wall and her tits wobbled with her grinding motions. Her head was hanging low, her eyes closed in intense focus as she absorbed my cunnilingus with soft little groans and gasps. I wondered how long she would let me keep working on her, building her need without being able to reach it, and how she'd react.

" Umm-fuck," Tanaya suddenly moaned and I felt her change her stance, leaning forward a bit and I saw her hands grab Kara's shoulders from behind for support. "I feel like I'm fucking a goddamn donkey, Kara. God. You said he was a good size, not that he was the perfect size." She moaned, low and long, for almost a minute straight before she sat back down heavily, driving me deep into her, then rocking forward again. "Fuck. God. Harri, you better not be pulling the wool over my eyes here cause I'm gonna be really fucking pissed if you turn out to be an asshole with this cock. I can't handle another shitty relationship even if I'm addicted to your cock. Fuck. Ugh! God, I feel like my twat was made for this cock. It's all fucking yours, Harri."

"Gonna come on his cock, Tanaya?" Kara gasped, grabbing her friend's hands and pulling them a little farther over her shoulder so she could kiss one and then the other. "Gonna become Harri's Indian Cowgirl? Fuck, Harri, that's good. God, you know how to treat my clit right. Best I've ever had, and still so damn fucking good. Why can't I fucking come though!?"

"I'm gonna come, Kara," Tanaya panted. "I can feel it real deep in me. Fuck, it feels like I'm riding a horse full tilt. It's a vibration in me, rolling through me."

I could feel myself getting closer as well. I wanted to give Tanaya what she was craving, I wanted to finish the job and make her mine. Her pretty, stern little face, her tight little body. She was mine now. And then I wanted to cram my cock into Kara and fuck her until we were both puddles on the bed. I wanted to prove that I was the fucking king and she wouldn't ever think of leaving me again. I had lionesses around me, and not one was going to go wandering from the king of the jungle's pride.

My hips were thrusting up, driving my cock into Tanaya fast as she worked her hips. My orgasm was building, and my balls felt heavy and tight.

"Hmm," Tanaya moaned through a clamped-shut jaw. "Make me come, Harri," she mumbled, her voice suddenly sounding completely normal like she wasn't getting fucked at all. "Make me come, please. I need you. I need you so bad. I need; Everything; Ugh!"

I came, my tongue wedged into Kara's twat as far as it could get while I thrust my cock up into Tanaya and felt like my soul was gushing out of it and into her. In the midst of the extreme high I reached all I saw was white, but I had a moment of wonder as I tried to figure out how the hell I was dumping what felt like a month's worth of cum into her tight little body when only an hour before I'd felt that same way as I'd imprinted Gerty.

Where the hell was it all coming from?

"Yes! Breed me, you fucking stud," Tanaya cried out, shaking me out of the white noise and making me blink rapidly as another jet of my cum rocketed out of me and deep into her. I didn't have time to think though, because Kara was dismounting from me and Tanaya fell forward onto my chest. I immediately wrapped my arms around her, crushing her to me as I humped up into her again and again as we both gasped with each thrust until I was done and her body had stopped shaking.

I felt her hands go loose from where they had grabbed my shoulders, and her body went limp despite still being impaled on my cock.

My eyes felt heavy.

"Holy fuck," Kara said from beside me. "That was amazing. God, now I,” I missed what she said.

"Imprinting," Tanaya mumbled, her voice husky and her cheek pressed against my chest. "Imprinting."

I was being shaken.

"Harri!?" Kara sounded urgent.

I wanted to respond but everything felt heavy.

"Help!"

Kara sounded further away and she sounded panicked. I fought, snarling in my own head, trying to get to her. Wherever she was.

But then I wasn't thinking at all.

I was moving before I was really awake, my head throbbing with panic and aggression because I'd been helpless. Something was wrong. I needed to do something. Someone needed me. My heart was pummeling the inside of my chest and adrenaline was shooting through me. I opened my eyes and was assaulted by white light and hands were on me, pushing me back. I struggled, batting them away.

Kara was panicking. Her voice, calling my name. She needed me. I needed to do something.

"Harri, stop!"

My vision was still swirling but Kyla swam into focus, and I wasn't sure if it was because I would always have eyes for her, or if it was because she'd reached in and grabbed me by my face as she glared in a stern panic over a heavy-duty rebreather mask strapped over her mouth and nose. I almost couldn't recognize her except for her eyes.

I was holding someone, my arm around their neck. I was sitting up and had another person by the front of their shirt.

"Mr. Black, you're in a hospital," grunted the woman I had by the collar.

I sucked in a massive breath, blinking as my vision cleared some more, and let go of the Doc and then the nurse; a male nurse, thank God. He stumbled away coughing, but the Doc just straightened out her white jacket.

"There he is," Kyla said, letting go of my face and running her fingers through my hair. Her voice was muffled by the filtered mask, which looked like the kind of filtered mask that construction workers wore when dealing with heavy dust or chemicals.

"That wasn't the usual wake-up," the Doc said clinically. "We'll need to update our procedures."

"What happened?" I asked, my heart still beating hard in my chest as I looked around. Kyla was there, so I wasn't in danger, but then why was my fucking fight/flight reaction off the Goddamn charts? The last thing I remembered was... "Where's Kara?"

"Mr. Black, everyone is unharmed," the Doc said, her tone commanding my attention. Something in me wanted to ignore her though, to leap out of bed and push past her and go. "Following your imprinting of Tanaya Airington, you happened to undergo a process known as 'regeneration'; it is what it sounds like. You've been unconscious for about twenty hours."

"Is Tanaya alright?" I asked, my eyes bouncing from the Doc to Kyla. "Where's Kara?"

"Tanaya is fine, she's already awake," Kyla said, putting her hands on my chest. I was dressed in a hospital gown. The room around us looked familiar; we were in the medical ward of Miriam's skyrise facility in Portland. Where I'd been taken when I was shot. "Harri, you need to focus. For Kara."

"Your partner is correct," the Doc said. "Miss Swiftwater is currently under an immense amount of stress due to the timing of your regeneration. I need you to listen to me for one minute, and then I'll bring you to her."

I sucked in another deep breath and nodded. What the fuck was she waiting for?

"Miss Swiftwater has gone longer than anyone should after the priming until the imprinting. Only one test subject thus far has gone longer than her by choice, and we are unaware of anyone else who has gone this long. She requires your semen now, Harrison, but you need to be cautious. Be careful not to hurt her, her body likely feels like it's on fire at the moment."

"Okay," I said, taking another breath. "Alright. Take me to her." The Doc signaled to the orderly, who grimaced as he went to open the quarantine containment door for the room. Kyla hovered while I swung my legs over the side of the bed and stood up.

"No dizziness?" she asked. "Do you need water?"

"I'm fine," I said, then adjusted my tone because it was harsher than I meant it to be. "Sorry. I'm fine, but if Kara is in pain because of this thing then I need to get this done ASAP."

Kyla nodded, still eyeing me critically, her brow knotted together in concern. "Okay," she said, then looked to the Doc. "Let's go."

I really was only in a hospital gown and I could feel the cool air on my ass as we walked quickly out of the room and into the medical clinic hallway with all its sci-fi-looking state-of-the-art observation bays and equipment. I didn't give a flying fuck if my ass was hanging out the back of the gown, though. Everything in my body was on edge, the panic in Kara's voice that last moment before I went unconscious ringing in my ears.

The orderly started to open the next containment-sealed door and Kyla turned and put a hand on my chest again as she looked up at me. "Gerty and Tanaya are in there with her. Let me get them out and then you do your thing, Okay?"

I swallowed, resisting the urge to growl at the orderly as he took so fucking long to open the door, and nodded to Kyla. She nodded back firmly.

The door opened, and Kyla slipped in first as she quickly called for Tanaya and Gerty to follow her. The Doc went in next, and before I could push past the orderly and into the room Kyla was coming out, followed by Tanaya and then Gerty. They were all dressed in sweat suits, I realized, baggy and in Air Force grey. The sweatpants hung a little low on Tanaya's thin hips, and Gerty's curvy physique wasn't done any favors as the bagginess hid her charms. Both of the women looked stressed out and relieved at the same time, and I opened my arms and pulled them both to me in a crushing hug.

Gerty was saying something, but the ringing in my ears was back, hanging over the thundering of my blood pressure in my ears. They felt so fucking good in my arms, and I wanted to tell them everything would be Okay, and I was there for them, and I still considered myself lucky as all fuck to have them in my family, for them to be mine.

But they smelled of sweat and stale sex. It was clinging to them.

The hospital room was leaking the stink into the hallway.

"I can't talk," I said, hoping that I wasn't hurting Gerty by not responding to her.

"Go," Gerty urged me, pulling from my hug. Tanaya followed quickly. I caught her by the arm, leaning in and planting a quick kiss on her forehead, then pivoting and doing the same to Gerty. Kyla tried to usher me into the room but I kissed her forehead as well before entering through the wall of hot smell that was hovering in the doorway.

There wasn't any other way to describe it than sweat and stale sex. And as soon as I entered I could see why.

Kara was on the hospital bed, completely naked. Her body was shimmering, her hair damp and clinging to her forehead, cheeks and shoulders with sweat. Her wrists and ankles were strapped with cushioned cuffs to the bed railings and she was tensed and pulling against the restraints. Her knees were twisting as she practically vibrated, her teeth clenched like she was going to crack her molars from the tension coiled inside of her and her pretty face scrunched in a grimace.

"Harri!" she exhaled, her voice breaking as her eyes snapped wide as soon as I was in the room. "Thank fuck, I'm fucking dying without your fucking cock. I need you to fucking fuck me right fucking now. I can't fucking come but I need to fucking get some fucking relief god fucking damn!" She thrust her knees apart as best she could, shifting her butt down the bed to let her legs spread even wider. No shame, even with the Doc standing next to her bed and Kyla hanging in the doorway behind me.

"You should,” the Doc started, but I was already pulling off my hospital gown. "-do so," she continued, her eyes hesitating for a moment on my nude body. "And the sooner you complete the process the better. Try not to be too loud, please."

I didn't know if it was the knowledge that Kara needed me, or that it was Kara generally, or just the adrenaline still beating through my veins, but I was hard by the time I was at her bed. The Doc disappeared, and as I was climbing onto the bed Kyla followed me in and hovered near the bed.

"In me, in me, in me," Kara was grunting, thrusting her hips up towards me. "Please, God, Harri. In me!"

"I've got the restraints," Kyla said, starting to work on one of Kara's feet.

I was between her legs, leaning down over her, and positioned my cock at her entrance. It was inflamed and literally dripping with her excretions, flowered open like it had already been fucked so hard it couldn't close up again. Even her interior muscles were flexing. Her eyes were pleading and bloodshot from being awake and wracked by the strain that had been put on her.

Then I was inside her, pinning her to the bed with my cock, piercing into her with one hard, swift thrust. Kara let out a sobbing moan of relief and need and desperation. Kyla got the restraint for her foot undone and Kara snapped it up and around, hooking it over my hip and digging her heel into my ass like she was worried I was going to pull away.

"Fuck me, Harri," she gasped. "I need your cum. I need it, it's the only thing that will; Fuck, that will stop this. It's like my insides are trying to become my fucking outsides, Harri. It needs your fucking cum. I need it in me. I need you to fuck me like a fucking whore and fucking come in my twat and make it all stop. I need it so I can be yours. I need it to live. I need you to live. I need you."

I was hammering into her as she babbled. Kyla got her other foot free and Kara wrapped both legs around my hips tightly, yanking me down into her after every out thrust.

"I'm here," I growled. "I'm here, Kara. You're all mine, forever."

"I'm yours," she sobbed, still somewhere between relief and desperation. "I'm yours, I'm yours, I'm yours."

This wasn't how I'd wanted it to be. I wanted to make love to her. Even if it was an imprinting, I wanted our first time together again to feel like it meant something, a symbol of the new us. I'd imagined something slow, something emotional. Instead, this was animalistic. It was pure instinct, pure mechanics. My hips were a piston driving my cock in and out of her in a forceful beating, and as Kyla got one of Kara's hands free she wrapped it around my shoulder, trying to pull me ever closer.

"Please, Harri," Kara sobbed. "Please. I love you. I want to always love you. I want to be yours. Please let me be yours."

I kissed her, little more than our lips mashing together, and I growled, "Mine," into them.

I came, my hips not stopping as I emptied myself into Kara's sloshy, messy cunt. I fucked her like she wasn't even human, just a thing. I was a thing, just a fucking machine of instinct and hormone, mindless in my pursuit of the primal urge inside me. To fill her. Claim her like property. No one would ever consider her anything but mine again. Over my dead fucking body.

All of them were mine.

"Imprinting. Imprinting. Imprinting," Kara was saying in my ear.

"Come on, Harri," Kyla said. She was shaking me gently.

I was cradling my body over Kara's protectively, breathing like a bellows. My right ear had a ringing in it, different from the thundering pressure that had been in me when I first woke up. This was the ring after someone had been screaming and howling in my ear at the top of their lungs. I also had an ache in my shoulder and across my back, which I would later piece together was because Kara had bit my shoulder hard enough to leave teeth marks without breaking the skin, and then clawed up my back as she'd rolled through a trio of massive orgasms in a row as I'd rutted my cum into her. I'd completely blanked through all of it.

Sitting up slowly, I looked down at my newest, and oldest, partner. Kara looked like hell. I hadn't noticed before that her skin looked reddish and inflamed, or that she had fresh bruises on her arms and legs like she'd been thrashing around, now layered over the scrapes and bruises she'd gotten from her ordeal with the militia. But even with all that, and the sweat, and the smell of her confined chemically-induced lust, she was still a fucking gorgeous sight.

And I was still hard inside of her.

There was a temptation to just keep fucking her. She was mine and she would allow it if I wanted it.

But that wasn’t me. I grunted, shaking my head and taking a breath. Carefully pulling out of her, I groaned in my throat as my cock bobbed back up at attention while I backed down the bed. I was still breathing heavily, though the adrenaline hammering in my chest seemed to be calming down. Once I was on my feet I grunted again, bracing a hand on the end of the bed and blinking a couple of times.

"Are you Okay now?" Kyla asked me.

I looked at her. The outfit might have been unflattering, and she didn't have any makeup on, but my partner and the mother-to-be of my future child still looked gorgeous even with that filter mask on. And she'd been just as at risk of infection as me, and it had been twenty more hours for the virus to settle into her while I'd been unconscious. Going through whatever had happened to me.

"I am," I said lowly, coming around the bed towards her. "But you're not." I closed the distance and picked her up, reaching around her and lifting her with both hands on her ass. She didn't fight it, instead wrapping her legs up around my sides and leaning towards me, pulling my face into the plain grey cloth over her chest. I backed her up to the wall and she pressed her back to it, bracing her hands on my shoulders so she was looking me in the eye.

"You need to fuck me," she said. Not a question, not a demand. Just a fact.

"Over and over," I said, my hands finding the waistband of her sweatpants and scooping them down under her ass along with her underwear.

She shoved the mask up over her face and it clattered to the ground, and then she used her athleticism and limberness from her years of dance to shift first one and then both legs up onto my shoulders. This dropped her hips and ass lower until my cock was nudging against her butt cheek. Her sweatpants didn't even come down past her knees as she tried to fish a hand under us to get me in position. "Fuck me healthy, Hatti," she groaned.

I lifted her a little, my hand back on her ass, and she got me positioned and I thrust into her.

Again, what my brain said I wanted was love-making. We'd been through a couple of traumatic experiences, we needed to cool off and find ourselves and feel that special connection between us. We needed to reset our balance.

We fucked. Her back pressed to the wall of the hospital room. My hips slapped against her ass. She had her hands clasped behind my neck, staring intensely into my eyes as we both panted from the exertion.

"I love you," she gasped.

"I love you too," I growled.

"I did my best," she said, her eyes softening a little.

"I know," I said, driving deep into her and practically folding her in half as I pressed as close as I could to her, our lips meeting in a feverish kiss. "I know you would."

"Erica is pissed," Kyla murmured. I was rotating my hips, stirring my cock in her. "Ivy had to stop her from driving up here."

"It's fine," I groaned. "It'll be fine. There was nothing else you could do. You took care of all of us."

"I tried," she whispered. "I couldn't stay with all of you at once. I had to let Miriam take care of you so I could take care of the others. Dani helped until we got here, and then she had to get back home so she could be with Leo."

"You did the right thing," I said, kissing her again. "You did the right thing."

She sobbed, the weight of everything leaking out of her. She carried so much stress, so much baggage, and it was so easy to forget that she wasn’t just my gorgeous girlfriend-lover-partner, or my badass Deputy. She had a childhood of exacting expectations and training, and the demands of a father and nation that had wanted to use her any way that they could for their own gains. Kyla still carried the effects of that, and I hadn't realized how much she had been turning those expectations on herself; to keep me safe, and to keep the family safe.

"You're safe," I told her. "You're safe. I've got you now."

We ended up on the cold tile floor. I didn't give a fuck. Kyla was on top of me, her pants still clinging to one ankle and her shirt pulled up and over her head, hooked behind her shoulders and neck, so that she could press her bare chest to mine. She was riding my cock using just her hips, her chin tucked into the crook of my neck as I held her tightly with my arms.

"I'm yours," she sniffed. "Just as much as she is. Right?"

"Oh, Kyla," I said, my voice cracking. "You're all mine, forever. No one will ever take you away from me."

She bit my shoulder lightly and came, still humping her hips at me. A completely non-vaccine related orgasm, and my favorite kind for my partners to have even if they weren't the mind-blowing ones that came from my cum hitting their system.

The next one was a vaccine orgasm, but that was Okay. Her moans echoed through my ears as she milked my orgasm out of me and my fingers dug into her sides and back as I continued to hold her tightly.

Kyla's hips stilled, and our synced breathing started to slow, and we looked into each other's eyes.

I was about to tell her I loved her again but was interrupted by a knock on the hospital room door. Then an intercom turned on.

"While I applaud your diligence in taking care of your vaccine-boosting activities," the Doc said. "I would like to check up on Miss Swiftwater."

"Fuck," Kyla chuckled, sitting up and fixing her sweater to get her head back in the proper hole and let it drop down to cover her torso.

"We just did," I smirked back at her, then hooked a finger in the collar of the sweater and pulled her back down into a kiss. "And we will again, and again, because I love you and I'll never get enough of you."

"Good," she whispered, already starting to pull off my cock, which had managed to stay semi-hard and not quite slip out of her. "Because I'll never get enough of you either."

"Alright, I've only got fifteen minutes here," Miriam said as she sat down in the chair at the head of the conference room table. "Today is absolutely fucked in terms of everything that needs doing."

We were a couple of floors up from the medical wing, and I was dressed in the same Air Force unbranded grey sweats that my partners were. Apparently, our clothes had been sent for a thorough decontamination protocol. Free balling it in the sweatpants felt weird as I sat in what, in my previous career, would have been a highly professional location.

"The handoff is happening?" I asked her with a grimace.

Miriam nodded, then glanced at the others around the table. "General Prewitt is assuming command of this facility and the State rollout," she explained. "She's... not awful, from what I've been able to put together through some calling around. I just need to wrap up everything I need to accomplish here before she and her staff take official command. She's given me until 4:55pm, so even fifteen minutes here is cutting it close."

"We don't need to take up your time," Gerty said. "If there are more important things you need to do."

Miriam paused, putting both her hands flat on the table. Kyla, who was back to wearing the filter mask, Gerty, Tanaya and the Doc were all sitting around it with us. "Nothing, realistically, is going to be more important than getting our family sorted out," Miriam said carefully. Then she turned to the Doc. "Doctor Sheridan, can you give us a quick update on everyone?"

The Doc cleared her throat and nodded. "Miss Kara Swiftwater is currently safely settled into her Imprinting process and her vitals are now within normal ranges. We'll know more when she wakes up, but I'm not seeing any signs of lasting impacts due to the inadvertently extended bonding process. Miss Gertrude Swiftwater and Miss Tanaya Airington have both been cleared of Duo Halo infection following their successful imprinting process, suggesting that we can expect Miss Kara Swiftwater to enjoy the same effect; in other words, we're not dealing with a variant with an odd reaction."

"I'm sorry," Kyla cut in. "An 'odd variant?'"

The Doc glanced at Miriam, who hesitated and then nodded for her to explain when she decided it wouldn't be a problem. "Duo Halo is a virus," the Doc explained. "And, as viruses spread, they naturally begin to mutate. It occurs for a variety of reasons, and is the core roadblock to simply abolishing the Common Cold. During the lifespan of most viruses, their mutations often end up toning down their effects because they are survival mechanisms; a virus doesn't want to kill its host, as much as it can 'want' anything at all. It functions with the same basic core functions of all other life; live, and multiply. If Duo Halo functioned as a normal virus we would expect mutated strains to generally, over time, become less deadly but more easily spread. The reverse can also happen though, where a particular strain becomes stronger. Duo Halo doesn't follow this pattern; all of its mutations that I am currently aware of remain as deadly as the original strain that we've been studying but can have strange side effects, or occasionally cause strange reactions when it interacts with the Vaccine. None have beaten the vaccine, or come close as far as I'm aware, but we've been getting reports of some odd interactions."

"Is that what happened to Harri, then?" Kyla asked, glancing at me with a worried look across the table. After our sex, and quickly cleaning ourselves up, we hadn't really had much of a chance to talk but I knew she was probably bubbling over with things she needed to ask and share.

"To finish my report," the Doc said, sidestepping Kyla's question, "Our most recent blood test confirms that Miss Kyla Bautista is still currently infected, but after a vaccination uptick event she is no longer contagious and will be fully cleared within the next day. Earlier, if another event occurs. Of the other victims rescued from the raid, we've had to organize quarantining for all twenty-eight of the children as they were universally infected, though in no personal danger due to the nature of the virus. Several were also infected with Covid, however, and are being treated separately from the others. Out of the other forty-nine adult females, seven of the other nine who were initially identified as most at risk have come through their imprinting process successfully. The other two underwent regenerations and are expected to wake up within the next few hours. Fifteen of the other adult females have already been matched via Oracle, are vaccinated and en route to their new partners; another ten of them are mothers of some of the children so we are waiting to vaccinate once the children have had time to acclimatize to their temporary quarantine care. A dozen of the adult women are currently participating in intensive group and individual therapy to help them process their recent experience so that they can safely be matched and imprinted, and three of the women are currently refusing the vaccine altogether."

"Who?" Gerty asked, raising her eyebrows in alarm. "Who's refusing?"

Again the Doc glanced at Miriam, and Miriam fielded that question. "I'll get you the names if you're willing to talk with them," she said. "They are infected, so we've had to keep them in enforced quarantine."

"I will," Gerty said, practically growling as she shook her head. "I'll set them straight."

There was something about the way Gerty seemed ready to knock some heads together that flared a coal of heat in my belly. She was looking so much healthier than in the motel, even if she wasn't completely back to her previous self, and for all that the imprinting had been fun, I wanted her properly.

"I'll arrange it," the Doc said. "Lastly, of course, we have Mr. Harrison Black. How much do you remember from when you woke up, Harrison?"

I blew out a soft breath. "I think I might owe that nurse an apology for trying to get him into a chokehold. And you, Doc. Sorry for grabbing you."

"Apology accepted," the Doc said, waving dismissively. "And Oscar got the rest of the afternoon off, he'll be fine. The key information is that you have undergone a Regeneration process. Every time you, or a woman, goes through an imprinting there is a chance that either of you can be subject to one; obviously, this means you are more likely to undergo one or more than any individual woman is. If it hadn't happened now, it would have likely happened during your next few imprintings. Based on your physical health, I'm sure you've noticed that the minor abrasions you suffered during your recent... 'excursion' have healed and that the previous firearm wound in your leg has healed over without a trace."

"Oh," I nodded slowly, frowning a little. "I guess so, I hadn't really thought about it." I'd noticed that the bullet wound in my leg that had been bothering me for a few weeks now had faded away, but the Doc had told me that I had 'regenerated' so I'd assumed that was what that meant and brushed it off. Now, thinking about that consistent ache that I'd been dealing with, I thought it was weird that I'd barely acknowledged it.

"You'll likely also notice other similar changes; scars that have disappeared, same with any odd discolorations that come with age. Old aches gone. If your hair happened to be thinning, it would likely start to grow back as thick as when you were a youth."

"Sounds like a miracle drug," Gerty said with a raised eyebrow. "Does it make you lose weight, too?"

The Doc raised an eyebrow as she smirked just a little. "I've red a few reports of the morbidly obese beginning to lose weight after a regeneration, yes. Our best guess at the moment is that a regeneration adjusts various hormone producers and internal organ deficiencies, causing their metabolism to kick start up to a level to manage their weight. We're still waiting to find out if that will normalize when the subjects reach a healthy body weight, or if we'll need to find a way to counteract the effect."

"So what does this all mean?" I asked. Now I was wondering if I was dealing with 'your tongue is too big in your mouth' syndrome where I couldn't tell if I was missing something that had been there, or if I was manifesting memories of aches that hadn't actually ever been there.

"It means you're likely more healthy than you have been since you were twenty," Miriam said. "Not that you weren't a tall, dark and handsome mountain of a man to begin with."

"The concern is that you did have a variant reaction," the Doc said. "We don't have any records of someone going through a Regeneration and coming out of it... well, for lack of a better term, aggressively. The larger the regeneration, the more resources the body eats up, so most people come out with a need for water first, then food. Oftentimes they also have a need to expel 'crud' that the regeneration has been clearing from their system; tar from their lungs if they were a smoker, for example."

"Never been a smoker," I said. "Well, except for a little pot in high school."

"It was just an example, Harri," Miriam said with a little smirk.

The Doc shot Miriam a bemused look, and I got the sense that she was enjoying the whole 'Watch your boss try to not flirt with the man she was clearly crushing on' aspect of the meeting. I felt like I was highly attuned to what Miriam was saying and the way she said it now that we'd kissed and I knew where we were at. How had I missed such clear signs that she was attracted to me? "My concern, or maybe 'interest' would be a better way to put it, is that you came out of your regeneration not only 'healed,' but physically energized," the Doc continued, turning back to me. "You didn't require the usual refill on basic resources such as water or food, and you were clearly in an agitated state."

"He lost some body weight," Kyla added. "But I think it was all body fat."

"He got more fit?" Tanaya asked, the first thing she said in the meeting.

I shrugged. My mind had been elsewhere, even when I'd noticed the missing bullet wound. I'd been thinking about Kara, and Kyla, and the girls back home. About the mission, and what we'd done. What I'd done. How I felt, physically, wasn't on my mind at all. Now I pulled up the front of my shirt and looked down at my stomach. Before, I hadn't exactly had visible abs, but if I was feeling complimentary towards myself I would say I was only a few weeks of heavy workouts and dieting away from a decent hint of them in good lighting; which had sort of been the goal with the workouts at the Falls. Now I did have abs, and while I wasn't shredded like a competition bodybuilder or the fabled 'Brad Pitt Fight Club' dream body, they were there. Not only that, but my pecs were a lot more defined than just a couple of days before, and my obliques were tighter, revealing more muscle on my sides.

"Huh," I said, a little shocked. Then I looked up and saw that all five women were staring at me.

The Doc was the first one to blink and look away, a light color rising to her face. It reminded me that I'd noticed her take a long glance at my body right before I'd fucked Kara. She was a little older than me and my family, maybe in her early forties, but attractive with her pale Irish skin and copper-red hair. She gave me a bit of 'TV medical drama' vibes and I could see her as the will-they/won't-they female lead. And she didn't have a ring on her finger, so she wasn't married.

I swallowed, struck again by that fucking weird feeling that had been sneaking up on me recently. That 'She should be mine' possessive feeling. I knew almost nothing about the Doc other than her last name was Sheridan and she had a bit of a wry sense of humor.

"Jesus, we're married to a goddamn Men's Fitness model," Gerty murmured.

That got a snort and smirk out of Kyla that I could see in her eyes, and chuckles from the others. I dropped my shirt, surprised that I wasn't feeling embarrassed at all; their attention just felt good.

"It seems like the Regeneration ate up your body fat reserves," the Doc said. "Which isn't unheard of, but usually it only occurs to this level during a major regeneration. I'm more interested, and concerned, with the aggression coming out of the regeneration sleep though. I would have usually set that sort of reaction down to someone suffering from PTSD symptoms, but as far as your partners have reported you don't seem to suffer from post-traumatic stress."

"Well, I may have been... a little reactive, considering how I'd gone out," I said. I got an 'explain' look from the Doc, so I cleared my throat and continued. "When I, ah, finished with Tanaya, I felt myself get sluggish but I didn't go fully out immediately. I was in and out a couple of times I think, and I could hear Kara panicking. That's what I woke up feeling, and it was like her panic was ringing in my ears."

"Hm," the Doc said, frowning a little and grabbing a pen from the little cup in the middle of the table and starting to scribble a note in the margin of the pages in front of her.

"That's not really that surprising, actually," Kyla said through the mask. "Harri has a tendency to leap to help, and the more dangerous the situation the more forceful his response." She looked from the Doc to me, her eyes saying that it was something she liked rather than a criticism.

"Oh, you noticed that too, huh?" Miriam murmured with a sly smirk, shaking her head at me.

"That could potentially explain the response," the Doc nodded slowly, scribbling down another note. "Still, I'd like to take some fresh blood samples and do a broader spectrum panel, Harrison. So far most of the blood tests we've done with you have been solely tracking vaccine levels and for the presence of Duo Halo. Considering the report I red about your third partner's imprinting situation, I'd like to dig deeper into this."

"What happened with that?" Gerty asked.

"That's a story that Vanessa can decide if she wants to tell you herself," I said, definitely not wanting to open that can of worms quite yet with my two new partners.

The Doc, Miriam and Kyla all traded quick and knowing glances.

"Is that everything medical-related, Doctor Sheridan?" Miriam asked.

"Unless anyone has any further questions for me right now?" the Doc asked the table, and we all shook our heads. "Then it is, and I have other patients to take care of. Harrison, I'll have a nurse come by to take more blood before you leave, and again before Miss Swiftwater is awake and can be discharged tomorrow. For now, you should boost Miss Bautista's vaccine level again soon, and if you can manage it, it wouldn't hurt to do the same with Miss Swiftwater and Miss Airington as well."

"Got it," I said, finally feeling a bit of heat in my cheeks again. Just a casual 'have sex three more times today, doctor's orders' moment.

The Doc gathered her notes and stood, tossing the pen back into the little cup in the middle of the table before heading to the door.

"Alright, I've got; five more minutes," Miriam said, glancing at her watch. She turned to Gerty and Tanaya. "I'm sorry I haven't had the time to talk with either of you more, but just to recap for you; I'm Miriam, I've known Harri for several years now though we weren't in contact for a while. He once punched an Air Force General in the face on my behalf and got drummed out of the military for it even though the fucker deserved the hell out of the punch. We reconnected when I got assigned this facility, and it's a good thing we did because I can't imagine how much more shit he'd have gotten into if I hadn't been able to help him."

"Only, like, three feet more," I said. "Down. In a pit."

She rolled her eyes at me. "At least." She turned back to the others. "I've asked that Harri be my partner. Honestly, if we hadn't reconnected, I likely would have been reaching out to him for this anyway; he's the best man I've ever met, and it's tough to meet people when you've got all of that in your mind." She gestured at me with a tilt of her head, and all three of the others glanced at me with little smiles. "So I just want to say that I'm sorry I couldn't do more for you and your people before the last in a line of disasters hit," Miriam continued. "And that we're going to be sharing him, so I hope we can find a way to get along."

Gerty and Tanaya glanced at each other, and then back to Miriam. "You seem like you've got your head on straight," Gerty said. "And Kyla filled us in a bit, and she almost bit Kara's head off when she didn't look happy about the news you'd be partnering with Harri as well. You're fine in my books."

"Mine too," Tanaya said, glancing at me briefly. "Though I'll be honest, it seems like half of the people Harri's partnered with have a lot of history with him."

"Just... well, three out of what will be eight," I said.

"So not quite half," Kyla chuckled from behind her mask. "Don't worry, Tanaya. Harri has a massive heart. I've never felt less than Erica."

"I'll make sure to prioritize trying to bury the hatchet with Kara," Miriam said sincerely, then let out a breath. "Okay, I've got less than two minutes. Here's the business; I've managed to 'acquire' another trio of RVs that are being delivered down to Black County. One will be for our family, and the other will be for the LaCosta family. The last will be serving as the anchor of my mobile command until we get a proper building erected. They won't be quite as nice as what you already have, but it's more living space until the houses are built. I've also set up shipments of more equipment through the quartermasters. Most of it is to equip the tiny garrison that I'll be working with, but some of it will be for you as the chief security officer of the County. Timeline-wise you four will have rooms made available to you for tonight, and I'll assign someone to work with you, Gertrude, so you can talk to those other women. Tomorrow you four and Kara will be able to head back to the construction site, and Laura and I will likely follow that evening."

"Wait, who's Laura?" Gerty asked. "And you can call me Gerty, by the way."

"Laura's my right-hand woman," Miriam said. "Captain Bloomberg, I should say."

"She's joining us as well?" Tanaya asked, and I thought she was doing the mental math of how many people she'd gotten into this weird relationship with.

"No, but she'll be joining Leo LaCosta's team, who lives on-site as well," Miriam said.

"Leo is Erica's brother," I said, then realized I might need to clarify more. "He was my roommate,”

"Do the backstory stuff later, I really need to go," Miriam said, standing up. "Sorry, but I do. I'll come by later to check in on things, but I'll likely be fucking slammed with shit through the evening with all the handover stuff even after I'm not officially in command anymore. I'll get someone to bring you up to your rooms, and to find your clothes or new clothes."

"Miriam," I said, standing up. She stopped heading for the door, turned to me, and let me pull her into my arms as she hugged me back. "Thank you for all of your help. Today, yesterday, and before that."

"Had to keep you alive, you big fuck," she murmured, squeezing me.

I shifted a little, and she looked up at me, and I leaned in to kiss her. It was firm, no tongue, but passionate all the same. Just restrained passion. When we separated she straightened her uniform and I snapped to attention, sans salute, and she smirked and rolled her eyes. "Harri, you're a fuckhead but somehow I love you all the s; Ignore that I said that. I didn't say that." She headed for the door and if it had been locked I was sure she would have gone through it like the Kool-Aid man.

Kyla snorted hard. "She's probably shitting bricks right now. No way she planned on dropping the L-bomb like that."

I sighed, going back to the table and sitting in the seat that Miriam had vacated at the head of the table so I could look at all three of them equally. "And she didn't even give me a chance to say it back," I grimaced.

"Do you?" Tanaya asked, and at my raised eyebrow she said, "Love her, I mean. You're engaged to... Erica, right?"

I nodded, but Kyla answered before me. "He's in love with me, Erica, Ivy and Vanessa. And Kara," she said. "But like I said, he has a big heart. He loves pretty easily. He loves Leo, his best friend. He loves Dani, Leo's partner. And he's lovable, too. I'll give you girls the rundown on the Valkyrie Falls ladies."

"Kyla," I groaned.

"Shush, they need to be caught up on what's going on," my girlfriend said. "Anyways, there's no expectation that you need to try and fall in love with him. Erica has this whole speech planned out for you, so act appropriately when she gives it, but the fact of it is that you're gonna get loved on by Harri unless you decide to act like a bitch. If it happens, we'll be happy for you. If it doesn't, you will still be a part of our family."

"Sounds good to me," Gerty said, giving me a considering look. "And the fantastic sex doesn't hurt I bet."

"No, it doesn't," Kyla grinned.

"I do love Miriam," I finally answered Tanaya. "I'm not in love with her yet, per se, but she's a kindred spirit and I've cared for her for a long time. But even if I'm 'in love' with every single person I'm partnered with except one, I'll still try my fucking hardest to love that one so they never feel less-than."

"Okay," Tanaya nodded.

"So, what now?" Gerty asked. "Because for some reason I think Miriam might forget to send someone to get us after that."

"We figure out how to get our phones back," I said. "So that we can call home and make sure everyone is Okay there."

"That and find out about those rooms," Kyla said, giving me a look. Then she turned to Gerty and Tanaya. "Are either of you bisexual, or shy? We've developed something of a group understanding; Erica, Ivy and Vanessa are all bisexual and willing to be sexual with each other, and in front of each other, often. I'm very much straight and prefer privacy except under special circumstances."

"I've... dabbled," Gerty said.

"Mostly straight," Tanaya mumbled, blushing a little. Her imprinting had been a threesome, but she and Kara hadn't really interacted sexually.

"Good, think about what sort of boundaries you want to set for yourselves," Kyla nodded. And then she grunted softly and turned back to me, and I could see that smirk in her eyes again even if her pretty lips were covered by the filter mask. "And, by the way, I told you so."

I opened my mouth, then snapped it shut and sighed as I nodded. "You did, dear. You told me so."

The knock on the door was soft but insistent. I groaned a little but sat up, immediately awake. Kyla's arm slipped down from my chest to my stomach before she woke up with a little grunt of her own.

We'd been stashed in a tiny barracks room, barely big enough for a cot, a stub of a desk and a squat dresser; exactly what I'd been expecting. Really, I was surprised there wasn't a mirrored set so they could cram two soldiers into the space one would occupy healthily. I'd ended up hooking up with Kyla once we had the privacy of our rooms, and unlike the previous sex, we made the most of being able to touch and feel each other, slowly making love. There was a lot left unsaid between us still about what I'd done, and what we'd put on our consciences, but for now, that could wait.

Then, once Kyla was fully 'updated' or whatever they were calling it in the medical facility, I'd sat down with Gerty and Tanaya in the small common room area while Kyla had a nap; I hadn't been surprised to learn that she'd stayed up all twenty hours that I'd been out. I would have probably done the same if I could. The common room had been empty at that time of day, and I'd gotten to sit in between them on a couch as we tried to share things in little shotgun blasts of information. Some of it had been about their lives before the pandemic. Some of it had been what they'd been put through in the last few days.

Tanaya wasn't fully comfortable yet, though she held my hand and traced her fingers across the back of it most of the time as we talked. The few flashes of her eyes when she looked up to meet mine had helped me know that she was Okay. Gerty, on the other hand, had been happy to snuggle up to me on my other side, pulling my arm around her shoulder.

A soldier had interrupted us a little while on, and Gerty had been escorted away to go find out which of the rescued Tribe women were refusing the vaccine and why. That left me with Tanaya, and after a silent pause, she'd climbed into my lap and started kissing me. We'd ended up in their room, an exact duplicate of the one I was sharing with Kyla, and we'd explored each other a little. There was a feverish energy to it, not like the imprinting but still eager and needy. We both needed to feel each other. I'd found out that the skinny woman liked my fingers clawing into her back, and my breath on her neck.

Kyla ended up interrupting the peaceful quiet after we'd finished. I'd been massaging Tanaya's feet as she tried not to laugh and pull away because she was ticklish. It was funny hearing the woman with such a stern, husky voice try to suppress little giggles. Kyla had gotten our phones back though, and we made calls home to reinforce that I was Okay; they'd already been told by Kyla, and then Dani, about what had been going on with me but they were reassured. Then Erica had asked after Julia, and I felt like utter shit because I hadn't gotten any information about anyone on my team, and Kyla didn't have any more answers than I did.

Gerty had come back from her 'diplomacy mission,' partially successful with one and hopeful the last two holdouts would come to their senses if they started to show symptoms. She'd also checked in on the kids and had sighed heavily when thinking of how many of them were orphans now. Then she'd decided that she needed a pick-me-up, and I'd ended up right back in her and Tanaya's room as we had a fast, fun quickie that didn't even make it to the bed as she bent over the tiny desk and she slammed her ass back at me as we fucked standing up. That's when I found out Gerty liked a tongue teasing her ear, and being told she was a 'good girl' who deserved every dirty thing that was happening to her.

I'd spent the rest of the evening with all three of them, including dinner, as we waited to hear from Miriam but were left in the dark. Finally, we called it a night, and I had a feeling all three of them wanted to be in bed with me but I ended up with Kyla purely out of the fact that the single beds wouldn't fit more than two people.

"Who the fuck?" Kyla grumbled.

"I don't know," I said, slipping out of the bed and pulling up the sweatpants from the floor, hoping they were mine and not the smaller ones Kyla had been wearing. I stood up and they reached from my waist to my ankles, so I'd guessed right. Kyla had gotten out of bed as well and had pulled one of the sweaters over her head, but stayed back near the bed as I went to the door. The light that came in the crack made me pull my face away for a moment as I winced, and then I opened the door some more and stuck my head out.

"Got a minute to chat, kid?" Agent Grierson asked. The old bastard was dressed in a suit that looked like he might have been wearing it for three days straight, and exhaustion had settled on his face like it was trying to build a permanent home along the rings under his eyes.

"Grierson," I grunted softly. "Yeah." I looked back into the room. "It's Grierson, you can go back to bed." I knew, and I knew Kyla knew that I knew, that she wouldn't go back to bed. I stepped out of the room and let the door close behind me, barefoot and without a shirt. "You alright?" I asked, looking him up and down.

"Long week," he said. "But then, you've had one of those too. I just haven't had a chance to put it behind me yet." He cleared his throat and then shook his head, sighing. "You kicked a hornet's nest, Harrison."

"Okay," I said. "In what way, and who's the queen?"

He smirked a little. "Good question, and usually the right one. Let me rephrase; a hornet nest has been good and kicked, and the nest feels like it was your boot that did it even if someone else may have been wearing it at the time."

"What the fuck does that mean?" I groaned, scratching at my beard. It was getting a little shaggy again and needed a trim.

"It means that you need to keep your head on a swivel," Grierson said. "Especially now that there's been a leadership shuffle."

"Is this about this General taking over from Miriam, or is this about Venroy Quinn?" I didn't give the man the honor of his rank.

"Well, at least you've been paying attention to your surroundings," Grierson said. "Both, though mostly General Quinn. The man seems to have become aware that Colonel Abarbanel was in charge down here, and sent out some feelers and discovered your connection to everything. He's flagged your clearance status and has already put in a call to Prewitt about you. Your clearance is technically coming from me, so he can't do shit about that, but if he gets Prewitt on-side then you and Abarbanel will have problems."

I let out a little grunt and sucked in a breath before looking at the ceiling and letting it out slowly. "I guess it's not an option to go find him, take him to a boat and drop him somewhere in the Pacific?"

"I doubt he'd let you within a hundred yards of him," Grierson said. "He really does hate your guts."

"Then I guess it's too much to hope that someone has gotten the fact that he was charged with multiple accusations of sexual coercion and assault into his Oracle profile, even if he was never prosecuted," I said.

"Son, if I could do that, I would," Grierson said. "I can be damn fucking magical at times, but even I have my limits. He's already got three partners, and the only reason he hasn't got more is because he's not exactly an easy person to match with, apparently."

"Fuck," I sighed. "I guess that means I can't drop him somewhere in the ocean." I sighed again, a bit closer to a growl, and shook my head. "You can't just be here to tell me this, though."

"I'm here to pick up Captain Luckey," Grierson said. "And I take my silver linings where I can get them. How did she do on your little outing yesterday?"

"Why do I feel like you already got her report about me?" I countered.

"Because I have, smart ass. I still want to know what you think of her."

"Maggie's capable. She didn't flinch as far as I know, and did her part. If you want more detail than that you should probably talk to Dylan, he was working with her more than I was during the operation."

Grierson chuckled and shook his head. "Dylan might spontaneously combust if he found out I was in the same building as him. We've crossed paths before when he was with the Agency." I knew he meant the CIA; Dylan had been open about the fact that he'd worked for them for a bit after his military career. What I wasn't entirely sure of is if Grierson was also technically in the CIA or not.

"From what I know so far, Dylan having a bad impression of you has more to say about you than it does of him," I said.

"We've all got skeletons in our closet, son," Grierson grimaced.

I shrugged a little. "So what happens now, then? She goes back to training or recruitment or whatever?"

"No, now I have a frank conversation with her directly," Grierson said. "It starts with 'how would you like to save the world on a monthly basis' and ends with 'by the way, the pay is kind of shit but the travel perks are pretty nice.'"

I snorted and smirked. "Government work."

"Government work indeed," he chuckled. "Alright, Harrison. I've got three more stops to make on this little national tour before I can rest my weary bones for a day or so. Just keep in mind that you owe me a few favors at this point."

"I'm pretty sure it's just two," I said. "But who's keeping count between friends?"

"Who are you?" Miriam asked sternly; she'd just rounded the corner down the otherwise deserted hallway, her stare firmly locked onto Grierson in an intense concern as she stalked towards us.

"Ah, Colonel Abarbanel," Grierson said, turning on his heel and putting on a magnanimous grin. "Nice to finally meet you. I'll let Harri give you the details, suffice it to say I'm a... concerned friendly citizen and your future neighbor."

"Yeah, no, that's not how that works," Miriam said as she came right up to us. She held out her hand demandingly. "Security pass."

"Actually, Colonel, that's not how this works. You technically can't demand that of me in this facility anymore," Grierson said. The look on Miriam's face could have turned him to stone. Grierson looked back at me with a sly smile. "Harrison, you'll hear from me sometime. Try not to get shot in the next few days, I don't need a wet towel thrown over my days off." He raised his voice a little. "Miss Bautista."

The door to the little bedroom opened behind me and Kyla leaned out, still only dressed in my sweater so it came partway down her thighs. "Agent Grierson," she said, glancing between the older man and Miriam.

That seemed to dampen Miriam's quickly growing fury.

"Leave it to the foreign asset to ruin my fun," Grierson chuckled and sighed. That distracted Miriam long enough for him to shake my hand as he looked me in the eye, and then the old fucker winked and headed off down the hallway with his hands in his pockets and I swear he started whistling.

"What the fuck does that mean?" Miriam asked, staring intently at Kyla.

I sighed. "Maybe we should sit down and talk."

"Maybe we should," Miriam said, turning her ire in my direction.

"I'll put on some pants," Kyla sighed, shutting the door.

"Foreign asset?" Miriam hissed. "I'm a Colonel in the US Air Force. She's been on my base for almost two months and she's a foreign asset!?"

I blew out a long breath. This was going to take a while.

"Fancy meeting you here," Julia said as she slipped into the seat across from me and Kyla at the cafeteria table. Our ability to eat in public was helped by the fact that Kyla had gotten another blood test that morning, confirming she was cleared of Duo Halo. Still, breakfast, it seemed, trumped security clearance and we'd been allowed to join the various doctors, nurses, scientists and soldiers that were filtering in and out of what felt a lot like a mid-level hotel 'restaurant.' The food itself wasn't bad, though it wasn't a nice brunch either, and I'd noticed that there were some civilians mixed in with the folks in uniform; all women, and some of whom were eating and openly touchy with their obvious male partners.

I really hoped the military was giving teams larger than two some bigger accommodations than we'd gotten.

"Morning," I said. "Good to see you."

"Good morning," Kyla smiled at the other woman.

Julia looked refreshed. She was dressed in the same grey sweatshirt and pants as us and didn't have any makeup on, but she'd clearly showered and was feeling good. Considering I'd only really seen her after she'd been flying her helicopter for a few hours and geared up for a paramilitary mission, it was good to see her relaxed.

"Any idea when you guys are heading out?" she asked. "I'll need a ride back if there's room."

"We're waiting on Kara to wake up, and to get any tests done that need to happen," Kyla said.

"And she'll probably want to talk to her people before she leaves," I added. "God, she's going to be heartbroken once it all settles in."

Julia frowned in commiseration, nodding slowly. "I can't imagine."

"What's next for you?" Kyla asked. "Actually, are you imprinted now?"

"Nope," Julia shook her head. "When we got here they gave me the option, but when I tested clear for the virus they didn't pressure it."

"How the hell did you manage not to get infected?" I asked.

Julia shrugged. "I guess I didn't inhale while we were blowing chunks of people all over the walls of that shithole? Seriously, though, I have no idea. For a second the doctor who was testing me thought I might be naturally immune and got all excited because that would be a big deal, but nope. They did some blood tests and I'm not immune, just lucky."

"Well, I'm glad you came out untouched," I said. "What's next?"

"I figure out my life, and if I want to trust their Oracle thing or not," she shrugged. "Before I got the call from Colonel Abarbanel I'd been stuck on my ass for a few months now; when I got out of the Air Force a couple of years ago I started flying for a helicopter tour company and doing the occasional traffic watch when news stations wanted to do the 'eye in the sky' bit instead of using traffic cams. The National Guard tried recruiting me a couple of times and I told them to fuck off, now I'm starting to think the military is the only way I'm going to have a good reason to burn some fuel ever again. I guess that depends on what I end up deciding about the vaccine, and who and where my eventual partner is."

I almost stepped on Kyla's foot, knowing what she was thinking, but we both managed to control ourselves. There was that other part of me though, as she talked about not having a partner, that rose up like a lion from his slumber on the savannah. That little urge in my head that said it was supposed to be me.

"So you're coming back to the site with us," Kyla said. "And then back home?"

"Unless you guys have room for a guest for a few days," Julia said. "It would be nice to spend some time with Erica, maybe get her to do a bit of work for me since she's got some free time."

"We can figure something out," I said before I really thought about it. "Home is going to be a little, uh, chaotic for a few days though. Lots of changes."

"That's right," Julia smirked a little. "You had four partners before, and now you've added three including your ex-high school sweetheart, and the Colonel is planning to hook up with you too; nice job on that, by the way. Miriam is fuckin' hot."

I grinned a little and shook my head. "Not why I said yes," I said. "We have a platonic history."

"I mean, I assumed as much," Julia shrugged, gesturing with her fork as she speared another breakfast sausage.

"How are the rest of the team?" I asked, pivoting the conversation away from my love life. "Miriam could only give me basics."

"Dylan and Jed both imprinted one of the rescued hostages," Julia said. "The 'needs to be done now' crowd. Jed says he's going to go through the Oracle for anything more, but he's hoping he can relocate back to Pennsylvania to try and give an out for Amish women who want a safe place to land. I think he's got someone in mind from back before he left. Dylan imprinted Jeanine yesterday, so he's up to two already, and once she's awake I'm sure Jeanine will be vetting every new member carefully; that or taking in any lost puppy they find. And Mags got whisked away in the night, I guess, but she wasn't given the option of doing Oracle with the rest of us since she's active in whatever secret shit she's active in. Hell, maybe she was already partnered and didn't tell us."

"She's with someone good, I think," I said.

"And getting to do what she wanted," Kyla nodded. Our conversation with Miriam the night before had covered both Grierson and Kyla's secrets, and we'd come to the conclusion that Grierson seemed on the up-and-up, at least concerning everything with us.

"So, my turn for a question," Julia said. "The whole 'regeneration' thing that knocked you on your ass for a bit. Real shit, or bullshit?"

I shrugged, but Kyla jumped in. "Real, absolutely," she said. "Look, he used to have some pitted scarring on his side here and now it's gone." She had me raise my arm so she could lift the side of my sweater and show the smooth, unblemished skin on my side.

"Grenade," I said, trying not to sound like I was bragging. "I was on the far fringe of the blast area so it wasn't a big deal."

Julia nodded, pursing her lips as she eyed my side, and then she smirked at Kyla. "Don't stop there, keep raising the curtains. I want the whole show."

Kyla chuckled and started to try and lift my shirt up more, but I lowered my arm and caught her hands with mine. "Maybe not in the middle of breakfast?" I suggested.

"Oh, he wants to give you a private show," Kyla grinned at Julia.

"Not what I meant," I said.

"Hey, you want to give me a Champagne Room experience, I'm down for it," Julia laughed, and I snorted and had to chuckle as well while Kyla bit the tip of her tongue and her nose scrunched as she playfully tickled my side.

Our conversation, and meal, were cut short by a soldier approaching our table. "Harrison Black?" he asked.

"That's me," I nodded.

"I've been asked to relay that Miss Swiftwater is waking up," he said.

I glanced at the others and Kyla and I both stood.

"Go," Julia waved us off. "See the damsel in distress we rescued. Just don't forget me when you leave, I need that ride."

"We won't," I promised, and we started following the soldier.

"She wants that ride," Kyla said quietly, a teasing grin on her lips as we left the cafeteria.

I sighed. "You've been talking with Erica, haven't you?"

"No comment," she said. "But just remember,”

"Yeah, I know," I said, taking her hand in mine and squeezing it. "You told me so."

"I did," Kyla grinned.

Based on a post by Break The Bar for Literotica

If you have enjoyed the series so far, definitely make sure to check out Corrupting Power’s main series and other spinoffs.