Remiel's Fall From Grace - Chapter 11 (Patreon)

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Happy New Year's Eve! ^_^

Remiel’s religious upbringing on a puritanical space colony has left him wholly unprepared for Captain Ramda Uweko’s stunning herm wolf hybrid beauty. On his journey to earth, Remiel struggles with his extreme attraction to her and all the things he thought he knew about himself. Enticed by Remiel’s shy lust, Ramda gives chase. And things only get hotter and heavier from there.

Remiel's Fall From Grace - Chapter 11
by Zmeydros
(edited by Tiliquain and Sheera Castellar)

"Hey, you've got to turn the gravity back on. This is going way too far," I said, looking at  Cuber while standing just outside Daniel's doorway.

His quarters were just like mine, with cabinets made of marbled grey composite with wavy purple streaks in it, and a storage space for his luggage above his bunk bed. With each passing second, that luggage was drifting further away from its storage space.

Cuber turned to look at me, and trilled while bouncing excitedly.

"Please, turn the gravity back on," I said. "I don't want either of us to get in trouble."

She let out a few beeps as she thought about what I said. Then she shook her cubical body, mimicking the way someone would shake their head.

I couldn't keep my desperation out of my voice as I said, "They're going to blame me for it, Cuber. And then they're going to send me back to Trinity and I'll never get a chance to see you again."

Cuber made a succession of worried beeps and then worked in conjunction with the other robots to lift the floor panel back up. I looked on with interest at the neatly routed cables and meter-wide, composite-encapsulated artificial gravity flywheel underneath. Next to the flywheel was a junction box with a bunch of breakers, all of which had been switched off.

Hearing two people conversing behind me, I turned to see Josiah and Daniel. Josiah's eyes were on the floating luggage behind me.

His nostrils flared with rage as he said, "REMIEL!"

Keeping myself outwardly calm despite feeling queasy with anxiety, I said, "I-I was telling them to turn the gravity back on."

"Was the gravity on when you left, Daniel?" Josiah asked.

"Yep," Daniel said, grinning wide as his eyes twinkled with delight over my predicament.

I felt cold and woozy.

"Clearly you weren't ordering these robots to turn the gravity on, then. Don't make me dig for the truth, Remiel," Josiah said.

My eyes wanted to cry, my legs wanted to run, and my chest wanted to cave in. I had no other story to tell him. "I was walking back to my room, I noticed Daniel's gravity was off, then I asked them to turn it back on. I'm not certain why it was off in the first place."

Josiah got frighteningly calm. He was even smiling, but it wasn't good. I'd seen him this angry once before, it made him giddy and that scared me. "I want to watch you try and get Ramda to believe that story."

"She's on her way?" I asked.

"Yep, and she'll see right through this." Josiah smiled broadly.

Ramda had to come to my rescue constantly. Why she liked me enough to do that just didn't make any sense. Everyone wanted to blame me for everything. Maybe it was because I was a fraud and this would be where everyone figured that out. My fists clenched as I held back a wave of frustration. Everything got so chaotic around me. I couldn't do anything right.

Josiah was waiting to make a retort and further flame me with his righteousness, but I never gave him the opportunity. Not by choice, I just had no idea what to say. He had dismissed every counter point I'd made since this trip began.

Cuber trilled as the artificial gravity flywheel wound up with a soft whirr. Something of Daniel's crashed to the floor so loudly that I winced.

Holding back tears, I said, "See? The gravity's just been reset."

"That proves nothing," Josiah said.

Daniel said, "Can't wait till you're sent back to Trinity."

Having no idea what to say, I just looked at the floor.

"And if Ramda lets you off the hook for this, she's gonna get in trouble. Maybe even lose her contract with us." Daniel grinned. "Then your abomination of a friend will get exactly what she deserv--"

"Shut up! You can't say that," Josiah said.

Daniel said, "But you--"

"You will not use that word while on this ship," Josiah said.

"What word? Abomination?" Ramda said, from far down the corridor to Josiah's right.

Josiah's face went pale. "Captain, I apologize for Daniel's outburst."

"With my abominably good ears, I've heard you and other MiraManna employees refer to me that way many times," Ramda said. "Did you know, in English translations of the Bible, the ancient Hebrew word tow'ebah is  rendered either as 'unclean' or 'abomination,' depending on context? If given a choice, I'd take 'abomination' over 'unclean' any day because I showers regularly, thank you."

Daniel's eyes went wide as his jaw dropped. Only Religious and government officials were allowed to study Hebrew. I was just as surprised as he was.

"Please accept my deepest apologies," Josiah said.

Ramda shrugged. "Don't sweat it. I find it hilarious to think I could achieve that status simply by combining traits found in the very natural world God created. But I guess I should expect such things: according to the Old Testament, anything that lives in water that doesn't have fins and scales is an abomination. Too bad shrimp tastes so good, eh?"

Josiah laughed, but his heart was not in it.

Daniel's eyebrows were deeply furrowed as he looked at Josiah, wondering why Josiah wasn't trying to contradict Ramda.

I laughed because I was so tense that I would've exploded otherwise.

After Josiah ended his fake laughter, Ramda asked, "So, why did you call me over?"

Josiah's wicked smile was back. "I'm terribly sorry to report that we caught Remiel using his crew clearance to tamper with Daniel's artificial gravity."

Ramda stared off into the distance. "He has issued no commands to the maintenance robots and he does not have clearance to issue commands to them in the first place. On top of that, this robot would never take orders from someone who kicked her. I believe I overheard you mentioning that the other day."

"Tell me this, then: if he wasn't ordering them to cut Daniel's artificial gravity, why was he here talking to them when we showed up?" Josiah asked.

Ramda looked at me, confused.

"I was asking them to stop," I said. "Maybe they recorded what I was saying on video?"

"Sorry, my contract with MiraManna clearly states that no personnel are to be recorded under any circumstance," Ramda said. "That said, Cuber can likely tell us what happened if we give her a chance to."

"Who's Cuber?" Josiah asked.

"The largest robot in Daniel's room." Ramda pointed at Cuber. "She's an Organizer and can direct other simpler units to help her with tasks."

"Is she capable of speech?" Josiah asked.

"Not exactly, but she can communicate." Ramda turned to Cuber, "Could you come with us to the starboard conference room, please?"

Cuber trilled softly in question.

"Let your friends go back to working on the ship and come with us, please," Ramda said.

Cuber walked up to me, putting me between her and Ramda. Looking down and back, I said, "Just follow me, okay?"

She made two pleasant beeps. Then we all walked down the corridor, the light from the overhead spotlights feeling ominous rather than epic.

When we got to a doorway not far from the Biome's starboard entrance, Ramda waved her hand in front of it. It opened to reveal a room with a large conference table and walls that were made out of high-resolution displays. The tabletop was also a display and was pretending to be beautiful striped mahogany. The only reason I knew it was a display was because my HUD now had an option to send media to the walls or the table.

Cuber was the last to enter and the moment the door closed behind her, she stayed right in front of it, impatient to leave. I could relate.

"Okay, Cuber," Ramda said. "Are you upset at Daniel?"

Daniel scoffed. "Oh come on, if it can't talk, what's the point in even asking it? We caught Remiel red-handed. What more do you need?"

"Cuber's meant to work near reactors and engines and not interact with people much, but I found that her model was capable of a lot more than what people typically use them for. Just because she's mute doesn't mean she can't give useful testimony," Ramda said.

Cuber  she backed into the door. I wanted to try and comfort her, but I had to stay back or it would look like I was interfering.

As calmly as I could, I asked her, "Are you upset at Daniel?"

She nodded and then opened the door.

"Cuber, you can't go yet," Ramda said.

"Please stay a bit longer," I said. "We'll try to get through this as fast as we can."

She stepped back in and closed the door.

"Huh, she seems to understand English rather well..." Josiah looked puzzled. "Why would she be mad at Daniel? Do your robots just pick someone they don't like? We once had a parrot that only liked my wife and would pick on everyone else."

"These robots are very intelligent and their perfectly natural desire for retribution is actually an asset because they get cross with anyone who abuses them or ship equipment. If they didn't do that, I'd have to record video because I'd never catch vandals," Ramda said. "I can offer you over two dozen jointly filed incident reports that show these robots only pick on someone when it's warranted."

"Fair enough, but I'm only going to entertain this for so long and I'll require proof that Remiel hasn't tampered with this robot." Josiah said. "You may continue questioning the witness."

"You can ask her yourself if you like, Josiah," Ramda said. "I know you want to get to the bottom of this as much as I do."

Josiah's face softened and he leaned down a bit, looking into Cuber's sensor cluster. "Why are you mad at Daniel?"

When Josiah tried to put on a nice face, it never quite looked believable and Cuber immediately scuttled over to me and hid behind my legs.

"Well, that's proof enough for me," Josiah said. "It's exactly as I suspected. Remiel's done something to your robots."

"Hah, what a waste of time," Daniel said.

"I don't think this is conclusive." Ramda looked at Cuber, frowning. "She seems overwhelmed."

"Overwhelmed or not, she doesn't seem willing to testify beyond signaling Remiel's involvement," Josiah said.

It was over, Cuber was too scared to testify and I didn't blame her. There was nothing I could do. My chest stabbed with anxiety. I was going back to Trinity with only myself to blame. And now I was overwhelmed too. I had no idea what to do, I couldn't even think with all of them here.

"If you'll excuse me, I've got paperwork to fill out," Josiah said.

"Hope you enjoy your one day on earth, Rem," Daniel said, walking toward the door.

My mind raced. What could I do? I had to do something. But Cuber was too terrified to-- "Wait," I said. "Cuber b-barely knows how human social stuff works. If we don't stare directly at her, s-she might show us what happened."

"Give it up, Remiel," Daniel said. "Know when you've lost."

"No, I think he's right," Ramda said. "This is the largest number of people Cuber's ever interacted with in her life."

"You two had your chance," Daniel said. "Josiah and I have better things to do than babysit a spiteful robot."

"Daniel, why are you calling Cuber spiteful?" Ramda asked. "I thought you said the gravity shut off was Remiel's doing. Did Cuber do something to you directly?"

"You said it was spiteful, I'm just going off of the way you described its model." Daniel smiled confidently to hide his worry.

"No, I didn't. I said they desire retribution." Ramda said. "Spiteful is what one would say about a bully."

Daniel winced. "Well, I, uh, used the wrong word. That's all."

Josiah thought for a moment and then grabbed the back of one of the chairs to lean on it. "You two have five minutes to get that robot to do something other than cower."

My blood was rushing in my ears as I looked down at Cuber, but I knew what to do. "Everyone, stop looking directly at her and watch her out of the corner of your eye instead."

Daniel glared right at her, his face turning red with frustration.

"Face the wall, Daniel," Josiah said.

Daniel directed some of his fury at me before turning to face the wall. For a moment, I thought he was trying to blow my head clean off my shoulders using only his thoughts.

Ramda faced mostly away from Cuber and so did Josiah.

I asked Cuber, "Why are you upset at Daniel?"

Cuber beeped softly and hid behind my leg. It felt like Cuber's nervousness was feeding off of mine and I was only getting more tense. Then I remembered when Ramda told me to breathe. Closing my eyes, I took a deep breath in, and then blew it out. I did this two more times, thinking about how alike Cuber and I were. If anyone could get through to her, I could.

For once in my life, I had to calm down and just trust that I could do this one thing.

Opening my eyes, I looked down at Cuber and said, "Come on, girl, where's your inner rebel? I know you have a sense of justice and want to see it served. Don't let them think you're just a spiteful robot who pulls pranks without reason."

Cuber backed away from my legs, looking me in the eye.

"Can you show us why you're upset at Daniel?" I asked.

Cuber tilted her head at me.

I knew she understood me, but something was confusing her. She'd gone after Daniel's gravity and him kicking her just didn't seem like enough to get her to do that. Maybe she  had multiple reasons she was mad at him and when we asked her a general question, she wasn't sure what we wanted her to show us.

To test my theory, I asked, "Why did you steal Daniel's food?"

"Wait, what?" Daniel said, trying to look behind himself without turning away from the wall.

Cuber walked over to Daniel and kicked him in the calf with one of her skinny legs.

"Ow! What the fuck!?" Daniel said, rubbing his calf.

"Wait, you kicked Cuber?" Josiah asked.

Daniel said, "No-OW!"

Cuber kicked his other calf, bleeping angrily.

"You stupid robot!" Daniel swung his heel toward Cuber and stopped at the last second when he realized he was being watched.

"Did you kick that robot?" Josiah's eyes narrowed at Daniel. "If you lie to me, I will make sure you regret it."

"Okay fine! But she was growling at me while I was just walking down the hallway. She's no better than a stray dog!" Daniel said, not sure which calf to rub.

"She warned you about going into her personal space and you didn't listen," I said.

Cuber made a trill of agreement.

Ramda and Josiah were looking at each other with wide eyes. Then they both turned to Cuber and asked the same question two different ways. The result was unintelligible.

"You go first," Ramda said to Josiah.

"Is that why you cut the gravity to Daniel's room?" Josiah asked.

Cuber shook her body.

"Then why did you do it?" Josiah was making an effort not to look directly at her. It was the most respect I'd seen him show anyone since this trip started.

Cuber walked over to me and tapped my left shoe before moving her three fingered hand toward herself.

"You want my shoe?" I asked.

Cuber nodded.

I took off my shoe and she grabbed it. Then she went over to Daniel and tapped his left shoe.

Daniel spun around, his face looking like he was about to snarl. "You want my fucking shoe? Go get it!" Pulling off his shoe, threw it across the room.

Ramda grabbed Daniel's shoe out of the air and then tossed it to Cuber who caught it with one of her three-fingered hands. Then Cuber trilled in thanks before taking both shoes to the wall next to the door. Then, in the view of me, Josiah, and Ramda, she used Daniel's shoe to pin mine against the wall. Her third arm moved from Daniel's shoe to the ankle of mine, strangling my shoe. Then, she followed our fight perfectly until Daniel's shoe had mine pinned against the floor.

Ramda, Josiah, and I gasped in awe while Daniel walked up to see what was going on.

When she slowly moved our shoes upwards to show the zero-g phase of our fight, Daniel said, "I kept t-telling Remiel we had to strap in."

Josiah stood up straight and set his jaw as he looked at Daniel. "You, in my quarters, now!"

"But Josiah, I--"

"The only thing I want to hear out of your mouth is an apology for your serpent's tongue," Josiah said.

"No, you're not listening, Rem--"

"You're the one who's not listening." Josiah grabbed the collar of Daniel's uniform shirt and dragged him out the door, saying, "That wasn't an apology and when I ordered you to my quarters, I wasn't making a request."

After they left and I got my shoe on, Cuber picked up Daniel's shoe. Then she handed it to me, trilling excitedly.

"I think she's handing you a trophy," Ramda said.

"This is the shoe that kicked you, isn't it?" I asked, grabbing Daniel's shoe.

Cuber nodded.

Setting the shoe down next to the door, I said, "I think he deserves to be without it for a while, then."

Cuber trilled.

Turning to Ramda, I asked, "How did Cuber know what happened during our fight?"

"She's assigned to your section and has a nook in the wall that she gets into when she's inactive or we're going to jump. I think it has a good view of that hallway," Ramda said.

I looked down at Cuber. "You've been keeping an eye on me?"

Cuber trilled and nodded.

"I keep forgetting how resourceful her model is," Ramda said.

I knelt down and offered Cuber a hug, feeling a bit giddy over how much I liked her.

She looked at me, tilting her central cube for a moment before reaching out with her three arms and grabbing my sides. I held her for a moment and then patted her on the back. She beeped and then patted me on the back the exact same way.

Ramda got on her knees next to us and joined the hug, saying, "I've never hugged a robot before."

Happy tears streamed down my cheeks. "This is awesome."

"Yeah," Ramda sniffled. "I'm gonna miss you a lot, Remiel."

I started crying. "M-Me too."

Cuber took her third arm and reached into a compartment, pulling out an absorbent pad. Then she blotted at my tears. She beeped when Ramda's tears dripped on her top and used another arm to grab a second pad. When she was drying both Ramda and my tears at the same time, seeming confused as to why her human friends were leaking, we started cracking up.

First Ramda laughed and then I did and then we kept laughing until we fell on our asses.

Cuber backed away from us. Then she made a trill that had the cadence of a question while tilting her cube portion so far that I thought she was going to fall over.

When I managed to stop laughing, I said, "Sorry, I don't know what just happened there, either."

"Cuber, do you want to hang out with Remiel this evening while I take care of some stuff?" Ramda asked.

Another question-like trill.

"We're getting full maintenance when we get to earth, so you can just spend time with Remiel until he has to go to sleep if you want, if he's okay with that, I mean," she said.

"Are you serious?" I asked.

"Yeah, Cuber's more interested in human interaction than other units with her model number and I think all this would've been a lot easier if I'd made an effort to socialize her earlier," Ramda said.

"Maybe I could show her how to play Go Fish or something," I said. Looking at Cuber, I asked, "You want to try playing a silly human card game?"

Cuber nodded, but still looked confused.

Ramda said to Cuber, "Hide Daniel's shoe in the maintenance locker just outside. I'll have Remiel come and join you in a couple minutes."

Cuber beeped an affirmative and then the door opened as she grabbed Daniel's shoe.

Once she was on the other side, I asked, "Are you going to give it back to him?"

"Sure, right before he disembarks," Ramda said.

I chuckled.

She hugged me. "I wish I could stick around tonight."

"It's okay, you've gotta run the whole ship, after all," I said, hugging back.

"Yeah, too many random things happened today. Feel free to bug me anytime from nine AM until noon tomorrow, though. No need to plan or anything. I just want to make sure I get to see you before you disembark."

"Sure, I'll message you after breakfast or something," I said, amazed she wanted to see me badly enough that she'd leave her whole morning open.

"I'll count on it, then." She kissed me.

I kissed back.

We both knew she had to go soon, so we made the most out of the moment we had. When we were done making each other shiver with our tongues and hands, our hearts were beating a bit fast and our pants were very tight.


END OF CHAPTER 11

I’d like to acknowledge my $20 patrons, Arkona Kothe, Navajo Demar, UBA, and Warialinth for helping make all this possible. Thank you! Thanks to all my other patrons as well. Every one of you rocks!

(Ebook) (All) (Ch. 1) (Ch. 2) (Ch. 3) (Ch. 4) (Ch. 5) (Ch. 6) (Ch. 7) (Ch. 8) (Ch. 9) (Ch.10) (------) (Ch.12) (Ch.13) (Ramda Dakimakura)