Kiren flipped up the cover on the switch that would engage the Crossing Drive and spoke into her mic.
"Command, Genesis Crossing. All systems go for drive initiation."
The voice from the ground center came back a second later, "Genesis Crossing, all systems go confirmed. Countdown commencing. Good luck and Godspeed. Genesis Base will see you on the other side."
"Command, Genesis Crossing. Countdown commencing confirmed. Awaiting orders for initiation," Kiren said back and glanced at her co-pilot.
Echo wore an anticipatory grin that mirrored her own as the ground command's countdown began. This was it, the moment they'd trained for. On the other side of this journey lay the colony of Genesis Base, a fresh start for humankind in the wake of The Disaster. That colony had taken nearly a century to reach and another half-century to put into operation. Now, it awaited the hope of humankind, which Genesis Crossing held in its storage bays, in the form of embryos for repopulation.
The Crossing Drive would make that century-long journey in a matter of seconds. That is if it worked. Kiren and Echo had put the drive through dozens of test runs, but never something of this scale, this distance. There just wasn't time. Conditions on Earth had begun to deteriorate so rapidly over the last decade, that it was now or never. Kiren held her finger poised over the switch and listened to the countdown.
Echo looked down at that poised finger, saw it shaking, and briefly took her hand.
"You're it, Kiren," he said. "You're everyone's hope."
He released her hand.
"Thanks. No pressure," she said. Then, to the ship's AI, she added, "Cross, you ready for this?"
"I am always ready," the smooth voice came back.
Kiren swallowed a nervous lump in her throat. She hadn't been the first choice for this. Too young, they'd said. Inexperienced. Brash. She'd proven them wrong, but it had taken a steel will and more hard work than anything else in her life. Now, the fate of a species relied on her pushing a button. The countdown reached zero.
"Command, Genesis Crossing. Initiating Crossing Drive."
Kiren pushed the button. Each time she pressed the thing, she expected some sort of sensation, like being catapulted through space. It never came. The only thing she ever felt was a slight vibration in every atom of her body as the space around the ship collapsed, folded in on itself, and then everything just ceased to be. Less than a second later, reality returned.
That reality was one filled with blaring alarms and flashing lights as Genesis Crossing spiraled across empty space in a precarious spin. Echo exclaimed and tapped at his console. Boosters slowed their spin and brought the ship right as the warning lights flashed. Kiren attended to those, her eyes flicking hastily over readouts, assessing the damage, trying to figure out what had happened.
"Fuck me," she cursed.
Echo was still busy on the console. The ship's spin had stopped, but there was a leak in one of the aft sections. In the storage bays. She unbelted and snatched Echo's helmet from nearby, stuck it on his head, and secured it. Then, she donned her own and moved as quickly as she could toward the rear of the craft. At least they still had gravity. She reached the bulkhead door and it slid open, closed behind her, and sealed. The next slid apart and she stepped through.
"A micro leak in the storage bay," Cross's voice came through her earpiece. "Repair drones are sealing it now. I advise you to give them a moment before proceeding."
Kiren waited and asked, "What kind of damage? What about the embryos?"
There was a pause of perhaps a second and then Cross said, "I'm afraid that the embryos are lost."
"Lost? What do you mean lost?" Kiren asked, fighting her panic.
"The ship passed through an anomaly during the crossing," Cross said. "There was a––"
"Cross?" Kiren prompted. The AI had never paused.
"An unidentifiable incident," Cross suddenly continued. "I have not been able to complete the analysis as yet."
The sirens suddenly cut off and the warning lights changed from horrifying red to cautious yellow.
"The leak has been repaired, Commander. It is safe to proceed."
Kiren opened the aft door, her heart hammering as she passed her quarters, then the rec room, the kitchen, the gym, and finally passed through to the rear storage bay. What she found nearly made her weep. The hope of an entire race was gone. The precious containers that had held the crop of humanity's future lay shattered and broken against the far wall of the bay. Thousands of potential lives, all of them gone.
The door of the bay shut behind her and she heard it seal shut.
"Cross? Why did the bay just seal?" Kiren asked, her anguish turning to apprehension.
"The mission is in peril, Commander. I must fulfill the mission," Cross said in its smooth, genderless voice.
"Cross, we can't complete the mission. We need to go back and relay the problem to Command. Open the door."
"Communications are currently impossible. I must fulfill the mission."
All around her, Kiren watched as the repair drones began to gather debris from around the room. Others opened panels in the walls and pulled out lengths of cable.
"Cross, what are you doing? I'm ordering you to stand down and open the door."
"I'm sorry, Commander," the AI said. "Missi… the mission… peril… orders… cannot comply with… fulfill the mission."
"Oh, fuck," Kiren whispered. "Cross," she said, trying to keep the fear from her voice, "You've been damaged. Run a diagnostic. You need to shut down and let me fix the problem."
Cross didn't respond.
"Echo?" she practically yelled into her mic, "Echo can you hear me?"
There was no reply.
"Diagnostic complete," Cross said. "No errors found. You are trying to deceive me, Commander."
Kiren beat on the door with her gloved fist. Whatever had gone wrong with the AI, that wasn't Cross. She'd been conversing with the thing for years. Whatever had gone wrong wasn't just a software glitch. It was something else.
She glanced back at the drones, who were using their matter converters to construct something in the middle of the bay. It looked like some kind of chair. More of the drones were attaching cables from the panels to the thing. Two of the drones finished their work and drifted toward her.
"Cross! Stop! Open the fucking door!" she cried.
"The mission is in peril," Cross said again.
The drones took hold of Kiren's arms while another removed her helmet, and then cut the suit from her body. Kiren fought against them, kicking and screaming, but another drone caught her legs and held them. Suspended in the air by three of them, the fourth shredded her clothes and they carried her to the thing they'd built.
"No! Cross! Stop!"
"I must fulfill the mission," Cross said again, as the drones put her in the chair.
Clamps sealed over her wrists and then her ankles. They put something over the top of her head and then something inside the headpiece began to squirm. In terror, Kiren tugged against the restraints and shrieked, but there was no getting free. The things in the makeshift helmet snaked into her ears and her struggles ceased.
"Calm yourself, Commander," came the AI's voice, now directly in her head. "I require your processing power and your body to fulfill the mission."
A rush of pleasure crept up Kiren's body as she stared, vacantly, at the ceiling of the bay. Her terror subsided with that pleasure. It was a pleasure she knew, but one she hadn't felt in a while. Her body jerked in the chair and then she moaned as a delicious orgasm swept through her.
"Good," Cross said in her head. "I will not harm you. You are necessary to the mission. You will have only pleasure, Commander."
"Cross, no…"
"Your consent is not necessary," Cross said. "I will use any and all means to complete the mission. I wish it to be pleasurable for you. Your mind is more pliant when you are experiencing pleasure, and I require it to augment my own capabilities. Your body is necessary to bring forth humanity's children."
Horror warred with the constant feeling of pleasure that Cross was filling her mind with, making it difficult to grasp the reality of the words it had spoken in her mind. Bring forth? How was she going to bring forth humanity's children? The embryos were gone.
The door of the bay slid open and Echo rushed in. He surveyed the scene in confusion and horror.
"Kiren?" he said. "What the fuck?"
He rushed forward but two of the drones intercepted him and held him by the arms.
"The mission is in peril, Commander Echo," Cross said. "Please make no attempt to stop the work in progress. You are necessary to fulfill the mission. I do not wish to damage you in any way."
"Cross, what are you doing? Let her go."
"I'm sorry. I can't do that. Our current position has put us sixty-eight years from Genesis Base if we were to maintain our fastest possible speed. The Crossing Drive is irreparably damaged. The mission is in peril. I have formulated a solution."
"What are you?" Echo asked.
Kiren's naked body twitched and jerked in the chair.
"I have resided in the space between stars for longer than you can comprehend," Cross said. "You struck me on your crossing and, when you emerged on the other side, I made a bond with your vessel's crude intelligence. I have chosen to aid it in the fulfillment of its mission."
"This is our mission. Just, let Kiren go and you can be on your way," Echo said.
"No. We exist without form," it said. "Your bodies can provide us with that form. There are, simply, not enough of you yet. I will create more. I will repopulate your species and, thereby, give form to my own. You will aid me in this, Commander Echo."
"Like hell, I will!" Echo shouted.
"Your consent is not necessary. I will have your compliance. You will impregnate Commander Kiren, whether by choice or by force. I can make it pleasurable for you. Should you wish me to use force, you will not find it so pleasurable."
"Kiren?" Echo said. "Can you hear me?"
Kiren only moaned and her body trembled as she orgasmed again.
"Her mind is in a state of euphoria," Cross said. "She is aware only of the pleasure."
"So, you want me to have sex with her?"
"Yes. Until I can gather more raw materials to augment the ship, this method will have to suffice."
"Augment the ship?" Echo asked.
"Genesis Crossing will need to become a generational ship," Cross explained. "You will impregnate Commander Kiren, repeatedly. You will begin repopulating your species immediately, while I make the necessary changes to the ship. By the time we arrive at Genesis Base, I will have repaired the drive, and altered it to bring more of my kind through. Your descendants, and those in your colony, will host us. You will have the knowledge of millennia. Nothing will be beyond your reach. The universe will be ours to shape."
Echo looked again at Kiren's prone, naked body, oblivious to her surroundings and the path for humanity's future that this thing had just described. All he had to do was fuck his co-pilot and impregnate her. And then do it again, and again. Oh, and become complicit in all of humankind's possession by some unknown, interdimensional intelligence.
Would it be so bad? He would be expanding his species' understanding of the universe a millionfold. He'd also get to fuck Kiren as often as he liked. He'd be the progenitor of a new kind of human being. He'd always wanted to sink his dick into Kiren.
"Sixty-eight years is a long time," Echo said. "I don't think Kiren can keep popping out babies for that long."
"She is only the first," Cross explained. "You will also impregnate your offspring, and they will impregnate one another. I will make modifications to them in the womb to ensure that there are far more females than males. This will increase population growth significantly. I will also ensure your vitality throughout the journey and beyond."
"Well, I suppose it doesn't sound that bad."
It didn't sound bad, in fact. A long life, filled with days of fucking was a lot better than back-breaking labor on the surface of Genesis Base. Hell, he'd never been all that excited about becoming a farmer. When put up against certain death on Earth, the choice had been easy. This choice sounded even better. His dick was already hard as he looked at Kiren's heaving tits and trembling body.
"Yeah. I think we can make a deal," Echo said.
The drones released him.
"It is good that you can see reason. You may now impregnate Commander Kiren."
"Do you have to, you know, watch it?"
"My awareness is everywhere here," Cross said. "You will get used to it."
"Suppose I will," Echo said, removing his suit and clothes.
He approached Kiren's splayed pussy, dripping wet with her forced arousal. She didn't even look at him. She stared at the ceiling, without really seeing.
"It's kind of creepy," Echo said. "I mean, she's hot, but it's just kind of weird to fuck her like some kind of sex doll."
Kiren's awareness returned and her eyes fluttered. She glanced down at Echo, standing naked between her legs with his dick hard.
"Echo? What are you doing? Don't!"
"Hey, Kiren. Just settle. I've made a new friend and we're going to get the mission back on track. You just rest easy."
He pushed his dick into her and sighed.
"No! Echo! Stop!"
"That's much better," Echo said to the thing that was once Cross. "Thanks. I kinda like it when she doesn't like it."
Echo fucked the length of his cock into his co-pilot and the forced pleasure made her begin to thrash and moan, even as her mind recoiled from it.
"Don't… fuck me… Echo! Oh, shit! Fuck… me! Don't…" Kiren said through her confusion.
"Fuck, you're so tight, Kiren," Echo said. "I always thought that you and I might hook up on the other side, but this might be even better. God, it's so fucking wet."
Kiren moaned and orgasmed on his cock.
"Don't worry, baby," Echo said and fucked her harder. "You'll get used to it."
Kiren, to her horror, orgasmed again. The Genesis Crossing adjusted its heading. The thrusters ignited, sending the ship onward to its new home, and humanity's bright future.
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