Futanari Freighter 4
Carla had
partly
gotten used to her new sleeping arrangements. She was still looking forward to the day her original quarters were fixed, but she'd stopped mindlessly wandering to them only to discover them taped off, and thus reminded of her current situation. She'd been able to sleep a little better as well, and thankfully avoided any stints of weariness.
But Tana's frosty demeanour towards her, and general secretive behaviour, had made it difficult to really settle in. They'd not gotten any more receptive of Carla, and seemed to still resent her presence in their quarters.
Carla had opted to be as neutrally cordial as possible; polite and professional, saying hi and asking them simple requests, but avoiding small talk or making more friendly offers.
Tana had to come around on their own, as Carla had surmised early on, but... the time they were taking, with seemingly little change, was taking its toll on Carla. It was frustrating and grating, and Carla was starting to suspect Tana's contempt for the situation was self-feeding and not entirely logical.
With little she could do on that front, she spent much of her time with the other crew when not working, and finding quiet places away from her and Tana's cabin to do her study, to avoid the distraction of a frosty atmosphere.
It was far more pleasant and kept her stress quite manageable... especially when her crewmates stole her away for some 'quiet moments'.
She deigned not to overindulge, and it was working out for her. Still, she kept things reasonable in her eyes... she hadn't actually had sex with any of them, just kept things to outercourse and oral.
Truth be told, though she could suck on their dicks easily enough, something about them... intimidated her, when she thought about taking them inside.
Thankfully, the Zamaar seemed to
adore
outercourse and oral sex. Carla didn't feel like she was missing out or disappointing any of them, because the way they did things was as fun as actual sex, if not more so.
For Carla, that was one step at a time... even if she was already having casual non-intercourse sex on a semi-frequent basis.
One day, she was sat down in the cafeteria, and an old friend joined her.
"Utan, how are you?" she greeted. They smiled, leaning in to peck Carla on the lips in greetings of their own, Carla smiling herself; she'd gotten used to their greeting kisses.
"I've been just fine. Kinda bored, actually. Doesn't seem like there's much work to do. I even tried to offer my assistance getting your room back in order, but apparently all the people necessary were on it already."
"Bored, huh?"
"Yeah. Fooling around is fun, and Shadow knows I've fooled around a lot, but dammit, I want to
do
things too. I wanna feel like I'm actually helping out and doing something useful. And if not useful, I would
love
to be able to run. Can't keep a body like this looking so nice with just weights and stuff."
"Aren't their omnitreadmills in the gym?"
Utan gave Carla a sheepish look.
"I mean, yeah, but... that's not the same, you know? Even in VR. You can't run and jump and feel so free on something like that."
Carla did not take Utan for a parkour freak... but it made sense all the same.
"Yeah, I get you. I think I'll stick to the basics, personally. I don't feel I need to be so chiselled," Carla admitted.
"Hey, a bit of softness never hurt anyone~" Utan teased, making Carla blush slightly.
"I'm flattered," Carla answered with a coy smirk.
Utan laughed, and then sighed, reclining in their seat. They took a bite of the ration bar they had, and sipped on a drink in a bottle, before looking back to Carla.
"So how's things with Tana?" they asked. Carla's expression immediately dulled, and Utan cocked their head. "That bad, huh? Still?"
"They're not
as
testy as they have been, but I know they're still pissed over the whole thing. Even after they've been told to get over it. But, I don't think they're going to, not any time soon. They're stewing in their own frustrations, I'm sure of it."
"Sheesh, and I thought K'dai was broody," Utan casually remarked, Carla not terribly familiar with K'dai.
"Well, once I get my room back, I'll be able to get some space. And maybe then Tana will ease up once they get their
own
space back."
"Here's hoping. Don't need bad moods like that getting morale down, not on a ship like this. Speaking of which..." Utan trailed off, leaning close and smirking knowingly at Carla. "... how about we do some good for our own 'morale'~?"
Their suggestion was obvious, and Carla was sorely tempted, even after their little rant about wanting to do more than just 'fool around'.
But with impeccable timing, her tablet buzzed, and she pulled it out to find that she had a job lined up for her.
"I guess we'll have to put a rain check on that," Carla said, before glancing at Utan and smirking. "Unless you wanna help me out and find some time during a 'break'~"
"Something to do
and
alone time with my favourite human? Say no more~"
They both giggled, and rose from their seats, heading off to work.
---
Carla wiped her brow of sweat, grunting as she pulled on the hammer wrench to unscrew a failsafe bolt on a piece of machinery in one of the engineering bays.
It was part of the system that ran the plumbing and supplied everyone's hot water. It was also responsible for keeping its pressure up, and it was in need of inspection and testing.
The failsafe bolt was part of a redundancy system meant to keep pressure from catastrophically building and bursting somewhere else. Of course, even failsafes needed to be tested and inspected. But that didn't mean they were always
simple
or
cooperative
.
The bolt needed to withstand exceptional strain, but burst at just the right amount of excess pressure - it'd cause a mess in the immediate area, but at least things wouldn't burst or shake apart elsewhere, places where people actually were - so removing it, even when the pressure in the piece of machinery they were inspecting was at zero from being disabled for the duration of maintenance, was a pain in the ass.
Utan couldn't help because they were busy with their own bolt, the two of them groaning until, eventually, Utan had some give. Carla managed to loosen her bolt moments after, and eventually, they had the bolts removed. Now they were able to check the piping of both the pump and the emergency pressure release system.
"That is not the exercise I had in mind," Utan muttered, flicking on a head lamp to peer into the pipe, a scanning device in their left hand projecting a pale flat beam that swept across the interior, meant to highlight abnormalities or structural defects and weaknesses.
"See anything?" Carla asked.
Utan furrowed their alien brow, not answering immediately as they looked both directions.
"Mmmm, nothing out of the ordinary. Not much residue build up either. System hasn't been needed in a while. So, things should hopefully be good?"
"We'll need to run a test after all this," Carla said. They took turns checking the pipe, making sure they didn't miss anything. Once they and the scanner were satisfied, they returned the heavy duty cover to its position, and began the arduous task of affixing new failsafe bolts; the old ones were, well, old, and nearing their recommended lifespan, by a margin of a few months. So they figured they'd replace the bolts now.
It was only marginally easier putting the new bolts in place compared to removing the old ones, so Carla still worked up a fresh sweat. So did Utan, and Carla had flashbacks to that time in the vents... the first time she ever did something intimate with one of the Zamaar.
Unfortunately, Utan hadn't stripped out of their clothes this time, so Carla couldn't appreciate their curves glistening from perspiration.
The bolts were eventually in place, and Utan wiped their brow.
"Phew..." they breathed out, then muttered something in their own language. "That's all done. We should check the electrical system."
"On it," Carla answered, heading over to a nearby wall, a panel on its face covering the local circuits for the pressure system. She opened it up, and first gave a cursory glance over the wires neatly contained in brackets beneath their corresponding switches and status monitors. Everything
seemed
to be fine, but it paid to be careful.
"Alright, putting it to maintenance mode," she announced, flipping a switch that sent all the blinking green lights amber, indicating that power had been diverted, save for only a small flow to help detect faults.
Carla brought the scanner over and used it to check for any faults that weren't so noticeable to the naked eye or the integrated sensors. When she found none, she flipped the board to test mode. One by one the amber lights blinked blue, before going back to amber, each receiving a normal flow of power for a brief moment. Once all had cycled, they cycled again, the blue lights blinking three times rapidly to indicate they were now receiving 150% normal power.
They all cycled normally, no faults were detected, or abnormal fluctuations... nor did anything spark or pop, which was also a good indicator.
All that was left was to do the surge test; all of the cables would receive power at normal and 150% levels. If any of them burst... well, she'd be fine. She was wearing some protective glasses, so at worst, he face might get stung from some sparks.
