Author's note:
I have always been fascinated by the movie Aliens and the lifecycle of the alien, variations of it, and the implied breeding of humans by other sci fi species.
For whatever reason my thoughts have drifted to another variation on this parasitic behaviour with a different kind of creature and setting to my first in this series, I hope someone may find it interesting.
For consistency, I have described the creature as a he, though it lays self fertilized eggs. I've left many issues specifically unclear because a writer doesn't need to explain every little detail, and some things I drop clues and let the reader piece things together themselves, if they are observant enough.
For the uninitiated reader, here is the general definition of ovipositor from Wiki - An ovipositor is a tube-like organ used by some animals, especially insects, for the laying of eggs.... For most insects, the organ is used merely to attach the egg to some surface, but for many parasitic species (primarily in wasps and other Hymenoptera), it is a piercing organ as well.
It's fiction and sci fi, don't get hung up on precision.
This story comes in 3 parts, each roughly the same length. Due to work commitments, part 2 may take a month or two to get tidy up and post. Part 3 is already complete and ready for posting.
Chapter 1
José stood at the bottom of the loading ramp and looked out into the surrounding open fields. For every new world visited, the panorama was the same, but different. Different forms of life, different horizons, different taste to the air, but always its own sense of freedom and adventure. He could be stuck on one of the home planets with all the other dregs of humanity packed into small, toxic spaces where the soul and body were quickly crushed until death crept along to end the misery. Luckily for him he had the opportunity to escape.
The major corporations had learned early on that exploring new planets with possible life and breathable atmospheres was fraught with danger - too much danger for experienced biologists, archaeologists, geologists and technical experts to get killed on first visits, or to develop long term complications. On the other hand, the automated robot explorers were prone to missing the obvious, and being terribly expensive to retrieve when they inevitably didn't work due to conditions.
So then they made the bold, or some say cold, decision to take the unemployed and disaffected who would jump at the chance to take the risk exploring in outer space rather than be trapped where they were. There was little money in it, little recognition, poor long term prospects, and the ever present dangers of instant or lingering death due to whatever they encountered. But there were more than enough willing to give it a go and make a life of it.
With nothing more than basic work and survival training they were dispatched to planets worthy of closer inspection. They lived on the smaller orbiting exploration vessels for months to get to their destinations, with a crew less than a hundred at a time who could pilot the ship, keep it self sustaining in space for the duration, and who could then undertake some basic analysis of the planet to determine ideal places to begin exploring and collecting samples.
Once there, a shuttle would relay work crews planetside to collect the samples and investigate, and then bring it all back to the exploration vessel for the long journey back to the nearest hub station, where significant research was conducted by trained experts who were shielded from all the risk. On the way back they would be doing routine and basic studies and analysis of any life forms, geology, chemical compositions, and so on of the things they had found, at least with the skills and equipment they had been given for the task.
While they had only limited training, over long periods of time they learnt skills on their own to better do their preliminary observations, and in rare cases make significant discoveries, all of which would be claimed by the corporation and figurehead researchers at the other end.
Those on the exploration vessels lived mostly alone, died mostly alone, and were largely unwritten in the history of mankind. But for them, it was better than being lost in the anonymity of the sea of people trapped planetside.
José had signed up young, and while he wasn't very smart or observant, he had done more than enough trips to experience many of the problems encountered, and ways to overcome them. This enabled him to slowly work his way up to being nominally in charge of this particular expedition. Most people did what they always knew to do, and he didn't need to boss or direct them. The whole vessel had to function as a working team just to survive, and then in the small spaces of time they had to themselves, they mostly all maintained their own private space apart from each other. He didn't need to interfere in any of that. His main tasks were strategic goals, and making sure any technical bugs were ironed out, and any personality issues that developed were smoothed over. In all there was a lot of implied power, but not much really, and being captain didn't attract any extra respect or kudos from anybody. Neither from his co-workers, nor the corporation.
Why was he doing the top role then? He wasn't sure himself, it was just something different to be doing, and they asked him to do it.
Now he stood there watching the bio samples team bringing in their jars and containers full of whatever it was they found. The planet seemed to have an abundance of low level life forms: flowering plants; insects; small carnivores that could be reptilian or mammalian, though they had yet to see anything larger than a common cat. The atmosphere generated abundant surface moisture and precipitation of some kind, and the soil seemed well suited to providing ideal nutrients for the thick plant life, which should indicate plenty of micro bugs for study.
Generally the plants were tall grasses with willowy, wispy trees dotted distantly throughout. It reminded him of pictures of wheat fields from history long ago before fields of crops became fields of concrete and tiles, and food was generated in chemical vats. Clustered around the trees were slightly taller grasses that flowered with very long, tubular flowers in an off white colour that gave off strong, sweet smells that seemed to change a little in odour throughout the day.
They had been planetside for several days, and this had allowed them to experience the flow of life through the days and nights, and helped select places to set up wildlife traps and observe which flowers were closing overnight, and which plants were tracking the sun. All of the kinds of things that static pictures couldn't detect, and a well trained, experienced eye would start to note very easily.
Not that he had that kind of eye. His eye? That was tuned for other things. And one of those things was walking her way up the ramp with an armful of samples. Obviously space travel didn't offer much chance for high fashion, or anything that was particularly sexy. And so what he thought might be a very fine ass was walking away from him in bulky, baggy trousers that almost hid the fact they were being worn by a woman. Her no nonsense work shirt was equally unadventurous and hid her other feminine charms.
Her name was Brooke, and this was the first exploration they had been on together. She focused on aquatic life and liquids, seemed to know her stuff, did her work, managed herself, and generally had no call for him to professionally take any interest in her activities. The silver wedding rings also made it clear there was no call for him to take any romantic interest in her either, though her husband was not on this expedition.
Not that these expeditions really had any place for budding romance either, nor were they set up for the aftermath of illicit liaisons. Condoms didn't work with the recycling systems, weren't available anyway if you didn't bring them yourself, romantic situations in space rarely went unnoticed, and generated more crew issues than they solved. Added to that, sexual encounters were generally frowned on by the corporations, and actively discouraged in all training and psych evaluations.
To top that off, it was generally accepted in the medical fraternity that pregnancy in space was fraught with high risk for any developing embryo, and thus was usually grounds for the mother to be instantly transferred planetside at the first opportunity, along with the biological father who was there to ensure that the child grew up with stable parenting, essentially ending careers and prospects.
Sex in space therefore became a rare thing even though there was much joking about it going on, and heightened female promiscuity due to the isolation and lack of gravitational influence on the body. Or so the myths went.
He watched her disappear up into the shuttle, habitually rubbing his upper lip with finger and thumb as if he still had his wispy moustache, which he had shaved off recently in a fit of boredom. Tall and thin, the Hispanic lineage in parts of his bloodline emerged to dictate his physical form, though most humans were a blended mix of many races from the original earth days, with a throwback highlighting one aspect over the others.
Brooke on the other hand was short and blonde, and like the old fashioned wheat crops he had been thinking of, she reminded him of some old school, pioneering, wheatfield farmer's wife with rounded hips, thick thighs and small tits. And the fact he liked her made him realise he had been far too long in space by himself. He was a breast man, he liked them round and firm and in handfuls. And Brooke's were like loose, flat pancakes hanging low, which she kept in the most basic sports bra, or budget comfort bra which let them sag low. Several times he had seen her with buttons loose and saw how saggy the little things were, and once she had worn a white sheer bra under a white top and he had picked out her small nipples making a shadow underneath, until she had noticed and covered them up.
They were definitely not his kind of thing, and her whole low key demeanour and style did everything possible to broadcast how plain she was. At least she had long hair, that was something he liked. He stopped watching her walk, the baggy pants barely even gave a view of an ass cheek crease, so he accepted it was pointless looking regardless.
Around him the grass was rustling from light tides of breeze that rolled across the open land. This one brought a subtle hint of the flowers, which set him off thinking about good memories and old times when he had been around more people and enjoyed their company, and having fun together, laughing, smiling, being human.
