Cloverleaf Station: Chapter Thirty-One, Part Two: AKA THE END!

 Notes: HOLY HECK, we're finally at the end of this one! Over 80,000 words to tell a story I thought would take about half of that. Does that mean I've wrapped it up nice and neat in a bow for you? HAHAHAHAA, no, I'm sorry, I didn't. Many problems are solved, but many more new problems await. The next story, Chelen City, will be in Elanus's POV, and begin next Tuesday. I thought at first I'd be diverting to different subject matter for a while, but no. The lure is too strong.

Happy New Year!

Title: Cloverleaf Station: Chapter Thirty-One, Part Two

***

Chapter Thirty-One, Part Two

 

Kieron had to give Elanus credit for how unflappable he was. They’d spent months apart, coordinating a dramatic rescue operation that had resulted in bringing over a hundred refugees here to Gania while taking care of a pair of very intelligent and opinionated beings at the same time, and as soon as they were together again, Kieron had broken down. He’d never, ever broken down like that before. He thought he was better than that, needed to be better than that, and he wasn’t.

So maybe the only thing he could do right was sex, then. That was fine—he wanted that, he was good at that, they were good together. Except this time around…

Kieron, sweating and horny and frustrated, covered his face with his hands. “It’s not you.”

“I know,” Elanus said, sounding as even-keeled as ever. He was stroking Kieron’s cock, which was resolutely staying soft no matter what they did. Not even being fucked had brought Kieron off, even though it felt so good. “It’s fine.”

“It’s not!”

“I phrased that poorly,” Elanus acknowledged with a grimace. “What I mean is, I’m not taking any sort of offence here. What is there for me to be offended about? I get to touch you and kiss you and make love to you, all of that is fantastic for me. The fact that you’re not hard right now? Not necessarily unexpected.”

Pfft. “It’s never happened before.”

“Really?” Elanus raised his eyebrow. “Not even when you were extremely stressed?”

“I tend to have more erections then,” Kieron said.

“What about all those months when you were alone on Cloverleaf Station? How often did you get off then?”

“Um.” Actually… “Almost never. It just never occurred to me.” Kieron uncovered his face and looked at Elanus. “How weird does that make me?”

“It doesn’t.”

“Elanus, seriously, I—”

“I’m being fucking serious, so lay there and relax and listen to me for a while, all right?” There was enough emphasis in his voice that Kieron acquiesced, even though he wanted to keep arguing. If today had made one thing clear, it was that he was needed help in ways he didn’t understand.

“So you don’t feel the need for sex all the time. So what? You like it with me, or at least I assume you do from the things you’ve said and the number of times you’ve come down my throat or against my hand or inside of me,” Elanus said. He moved the slick fingertips of his free hand back down to Kieron’s hole, rubbing along the outside before finally penetrating him with a finger. Kieron gasped as Elanus immediately found his prostate and began to rub it. It felt so good, more intense with such specific stimulation.

“And your body reacts different ways depending on the circumstances. High pressure means a higher libido, maybe. Lower pressure, less need to blow off steam. Weird-as-fuck circumstances that you’ve never experienced before, after being run down to the point of exhaustion for weeks on end, means you get horny without getting hard. Not the worst thing in the universe, babe, not by far.” Elanus smirked. “No pressure here, by the way, but how much do you want to bet I can get you to come like this?” He slid another finger inside and moved both of them together, pressing and tapping.

“I never—never win bets against you—yuh—oh, fuck…” Kieron bit his lower lip as his balls drew up, pressure building, gathering, and finally releasing even though his cock never got more than half hard. It felt so good—strange, different, but good. He breathed through it, eyes falling closed as he reached up for Elanus. His lover gentled his touch and finally pulled out before settling in against Kieron’s body and kissing him with surprising sweetness.

“It’s still great sex,” Elanus pointed out once Kieron had caught his breath. “Just different. Different happens, and that’s all right.”

“Is there any problem you don’t have an answer for?” Kieron asked languidly. He was surprised when Elanus didn’t answer immediately. He opened his eyes again and looked at Elanus, whose face had gone stoic.

“More than I’d like,” he said with a sigh. “Being back on Gania has been excellent in some ways and terrible in others, even apart from the awfulness of missing you and Lizzie. A lot of it is business, some is politics, some is metaphysical…”

Kieron chuckled. “Metaphysical how?” When Elanus didn’t immediately answer, or join in the laughter, he got suspicious. “Is…is this about the girls?”

Elanus pressed his head against Kieron’s chest and blew out an aggrieved sigh. “So godsdamn much is about the girls.”

“Mm.” Kieron tilted his head up to kiss him. “Tell me about it.”

“Are you sure you want the know? It’s guaranteed to make your blood pressure rise.”

Honestly, a little more stress might do Kieron some good at this point. “I’m your partner. I want to know.”

That got a smile. “Well then, strap in, because this is going to take some time. And some food. And some booze…actually, let’s clean up, get something to eat, let me actually show you the place you’re living now instead of carrying you off to have my wicked way with you like some barbarian—which I want to do all the time, by the way, don’t make me stop, I’m begging you—and then I’ll tell you about the circle of lies, acts of sabotage, and attempted assassinations I’ve been dealing with here.”

Holy shit. “You’d better! What are you talking about, attempted assassinations?”

“They were very bad assassins,” Elanus said as though that made it any fucking better. “But I’ll tell you all about it. Promise. Let’s just make ourselves presentable first, huh?”

Kieron sighed. “Sure.” What the hell. Why not?

Maybe Gania would be less of a break from his normal after all.

Cloverleaf Station: Chapter Thirty-One, Part One

 Notes: Here we go! The penultimate chapter! Enjoy the emotional turmoil, friends!

Title: Cloverleaf Station: Chapter Thirty-One, Part One

***

Chapter Thirty-One, Part One

 

“Shouldn’t I—”

“Nope.” Elanus’s hand was firm on Kieron’s shoulder as he turned him in the direction of a doorway not far from the landing platform.

Kieron briefly tried to resist. “But I have to take care of the—”

“It’s all taken care of.”

He huffed with exasperation. “You don’t even know what I was going to say.”

“You were going to say you needed take care of something for Pol, or for Xilinn, or for the other refugees, or you needed to make sure Lizzie is all right or reach out to Catie or pack up your stuff.” The door opened automatically as Elanus got close, and he shepherded Kieron in briskly, never letting go of him. “Right?”

Actually… “Yes,” Kieron said, a little sullen about being so transparent. Elanus smirked at him, clearly seeing it. Stars, if he was this easily readable then he had to be exhausted.

“It’s all taken care of. Hand to heart, it is.” The strange, cylindrical room they were standing in suddenly began to move down a see-through hallway. Kieron glanced down and his eyes widened. They were…very, very far off the ground.

“Don’t worry, it’s safe,” Elanus added, and Kieron didn’t even have the energy to be properly annoyed at him this time around. He was just happy for the reassurance. “And Pol and Xilinn have to get a whole raft of medical checks before they’re allowed anywhere, not to mention Ganian IDs in their implants. Same for the rest of the refugees. Lizzie has instructions to fly back to my private hangar as soon as she can, and Catie is waiting for her there—she’s gotten into opera recently, so get ready for some truly incoherent music over the next few weeks. She has plans to drag Lizzie into it as well, so while they both love you and are happy you’re here, they’re set. It’s all right for you to take care of yourself for a while instead of putting everyone else first.”

“My things,” Kieron began, admittedly weakly but it was all he had.

“As soon as Lizzie lands, they’ll be taken to your room. Which, coincidentally, is also my room, isn’t that convenient?” The platform shifted directions, moving toward an immense, slightly familiar-looking skyscraper in the distance. “So everything really is taken care of. Everything except for you, and that’s where I come in.” When Elanus tugged Kieron into his arms this time, it was easy to go—easier yet because it gave him a good excuse not to glance over the side of the platform. Kieron had never been acrophobic before, but maybe spending all that time on Cloverleaf Station had changed that. After all, it was hard to be afraid of heights when there were none, whereas here it seemed like that was all there was.

A wave of vertigo almost knocked him over, and Kieron leaned harder into Elanus, who held on even tighter. “What’s wrong?”

“I don’t know.” Except he did. It was hitting him all at once, now that he was in a place where he could let go of responsibility and just exist without having to be on it, be competent, be alert.

Everything had changed. Everything had changed. The life Kieron had spent the last five years living on Cloverleaf Station, a life that had become laser-focused ever since losing Zakari three years ago, was over now. Everything he’d become accustomed to, the rhythms and rituals of his day that he hadn’t recognized the importance of until now—it was all over.

The adventure he’d had with Lizzie rescuing Pol and Xilinn had staved off this harsh realization, giving him a new crisis to focus on. Now he was here, with the man he loved, in a beautiful city on a beautiful world, and he was suddenly falling apart. Kieron tried to slow his breathing, but his lungs seemed intent on disobeying him, fluttering fast and hard in his chest until he could barely get any air in at all. His heart raced and tiny, swirling stars glimmered in front of his eyes no matter how hard he squeezed them shut.

“Okay. Shit, okay.” Elanus held him up with one arm around his waist while the other rubbed circles between his shoulder blades. The lift stopped, and Kieron was suddenly swept off his feet, but he couldn’t even bring himself to care that someone might see it, might think him undignified, might wonder what was going on. He buried his head against Elanus’s chest and let himself be carried away, laid down on a soft bed in a quiet room, let his jacket and shoes be taken off without a fuss.

When he finally managed to open his eyes, all he could make out was Elanus beside him. It was almost—almost—like being back in Cloverleaf Station. Kieron’s heart began to slow, and his breathing finally calmed.

“What the fuck,” he croaked out once he could make his throat work again. Elanus grimaced and held a bottle of water up to his mouth. He drank, and it made his throat feel better but sloshed uncomfortably in his stomach.

“I think you had a panic attack.”

“I don’t get those.”

“Oh, sweetheart.” Elanus’s eyes were a little sad—not pitying, but filled with a melancholy compassion. “I think if anything, you’re overdue for them. That’s not a criticism,” he added quickly, “I’m not saying anything bad about you and you’re very tough and smart and everything admirable and you know you can believe me because I would never leave you in charge of one of the girls if you didn’t have your shit completely together. The thing is, you’ve lived almost your entire life under immense stress—life or death, do or die stress. Obviously you’re going to do in that situation, because you don’t want to die. You’ve managed yourself and everyone around you like a fucking pro for years, and now…you’re here. With me.”

“Why should that make me panic?” Kieron didn’t understand. “I’m happy to be here with you, I swear I am.”

“I know! I know you are, you think I don’t know that? I’m fully convinced of just how amazing I am, you don’t even have to tell me because I know it.” That look on his face said he well and truly did, and Kieron relaxed a little bit further. “But for the first time in years, you don’t have any major responsibilities. There’s no one to save, there’s no station to keep running, no concrete goal to pursue. You spent five years living on a fucking death trap in one of the deadliest corners of space humanity has ever been stupid enough to attempt to colonize, you think that didn’t leave some marks in your psyche? It did.”

Elanus tapped the side of Kieron’s head with two fingers. “And that’s fine. It just means you’ve got a few bumps in the road ahead of you when it comes to learning to live without constantly looking out for ways you could die.”

It made sense. Kieron hated that it made sense. “Bullshit,” he muttered.

“Aw, listen to you and your quaint, old-fashioned swear words. Do you even know what bull looks like? Also, why were ancient humans so concerned with different kinds of shit—it’s so redundant. They could have been far more creative with their cursing, as far as I’m concerned. Then again, I’m not a historian, so for all I know there are plenty of ancient cultures with a lot more imagination than that, but I don’t know the examples personally and clearly neither do you—”

“Please shut up.”

“Tell me you get it first.”

Kieron sighed. “I get it.”

“Will you see a psychologist for it?”

“I…” Kieron hated, hated, hated psychologists. He’d been forced to see them at several critical junctures in his life, and had always felt that they were looking for reasons to tell him he was broken. Who the hell wasn’t broken in some way? But the glimmer of concern in Elanus’s eyes was enough to sway him. “Fine. But I refuse to be locked up.”

“Why the fuck would you be locked up?”

Kieron laughed. “Are you kidding me? I’ve been the primary subject of several scientific papers. I was in a psychiatric hold on Trakta when I first arrived for three months, they were so excited to investigate my psyche.”

Elanus’s lips thinned. “That won’t be happening here.”

“Swear it.”

“I swear. I will ruin entire GDPs if anyone tries to do that to you.”

Kieron laughed again, and this time it felt easier. “You’re so dramatic.”

“Only when it comes to the people I love.” When Elanus reached for him, Kieron went, letting himself be pulled until he was lying half on top of Elanus. He traced the lines of the man’s immaculate facial hair, the swirls and curves, the plane of his jaw and down his neck.

Elanus inhaled sharply. “Sooo,” he drawled, “are we starting something here? Because it’s fine if we’re not, I just want to know so I don’t make the wrong move, which I know seems impossible but lo and behold it does happen sometimes, and—”

Kieron leaned in and captured his mouth in a fierce kiss. “Yeah,” he breathed when he finally pulled back. “We’re starting something.”

Notes on stories and what to expect next!

 Hi darlins!

Just a quick update to let you know that I'm alive (Christmas is a blur of presents and food, oy) and will be posting the next-to-last chapter of Cloverleaf Station tomorrow. Yes, we're almost to the end! Very exciting :) And as for what comes next...

Well, I had a lot of ideas and was reminded of a whole lot more I could write about, but then I wrote tomorrow's chapter. And tomorrow's chapter kind of opens a whole can of worms that I want to dig into, so the next story--probably novella-length--is going to be a continuation of this one, from the perspective of Elanus. We're going to have him dealing with the refugees, handling the repercussions of killing his former business partner, trying to hide sentient tweenage ships that really don't want to be hidden, keeping his business running, and quite importantly, keeping his lover from falling apart.

Why would Kieron be falling apart? Read tomorrow and find out!

So yes, that's what the blog holds next. For fans of Cloverleaf, this is surely good news. For those who aren't fans...I'm sorry! I've got more content coming on Radish (M/M urban fantasy this time, I post as Cari Z there), a continuing exclusive Patreon story, and a newsletter story I have yet to decide on but apparently it's going to be about dragons, so possibly set in the Luckless world. This is in addition to all the other books I'm writing, because I'm a little bit mad, so! Links below if you're interested, otherwise you get two more chapters of Cloverleaf Station and then--Chelen City.

Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/Cari_Z

Radish: https://radishfiction.com/ (it's an app)

Newsletter: https://landing.mailerlite.com/webforms/landing/x1x1m4

Happy Holidays and best wishes!

 Hi Darlins!

Soooo...it's been a weird few days. My parents were part of an evacuation due to a wildfire near their home. It was lifted this morning, but it's put everything on delay, including all my writing. Plus it's my week to look after my kidlet while my man works (we're switching next week), and we're getting ready to have temperatures plunge to a thirty-year low in another day, and I just...haven't written. Anything.

But! We all need a break sometime, and I hope you get one as well. I'll finish up Cloverleaf Station (for now) over the next few weeks, and then we'll start on a new adventure. I wish you a very happy holiday season, and I hope you're safe and healthy and happy. I appreciate you all so much. Thanks for hanging in there with me on this blog <3

Cari

Cloverleaf Station: Chapter Thirty, Part Two

 Notes: We're winding this arc down! Probably two or three more posts and then we'll be...gosh, not done, HA, not with all the loose ends I left dangling, but done for now. Then we can figure out what the heck I should write on the blog next. The next part of this? Something completely different?

Title: Cloverleaf Station: Chapter Thirty, Part Two

***

Chapter Thirty, Part Two

 

After that, Kieron worked harder to keep up with Lizzie and Catie’s technical arrangements and manipulations, which were somehow getting them all to Gania two days ahead of schedule. He also made sure to schedule time for Pol and Xilinn to talk every standard day, sometimes twice. Xilinn’s implant had been shut down, like everyone who’d been on the refugee ship, and the mercy fleet didn’t have the technology to reinstate them, but they made private communications possible for the mother and son. No one else over there needed them, after all—it would be far too dangerous to communicate with someone back on Trakta via implant, and all ship-based comms were being intercepted by the government.

Making time for himself was harder. There was just too much to do. Lizzie should have never felt like she had to take such a leading role for this mission—she was just a child herself. That she and Catie would go behind his back to do so wasn’t surprising. They were both compassionate people, and Catie at least had Elanus’s sense of mischief. But he was…he was the parent, damn it. He wasn’t going to be like his own mother, throwing a child into the wilderness and telling it to survive, or else. He was going to take care of Lizzie, and Pol, and everyone else he damn well could until he didn’t have to anymore.

Pulling that off meant consuming more coffee than was good for him, having short daily Regen sessions to replenish his reserves, and putting a good face on their still-precarious position. Everyone involved in this, from Xilinn to Pol to Captain Hu to Elanus himself, was relying on one person to make sure it all stuck together: Kieron. He wasn’t going to let them down by being too tired or too fuzzy-headed to handle whatever came their way.

Apart from some sickness on board the mercy fleet vessels thanks to ill refugees and an engine malfunction that had them all paused while Lizzie in her “Kieron” guise figured out what to do for it, though, it went as well as he could hope. They made it to Gania in good time, and although everyone was restless by the time they got there, no one was actively having a mental or emotional breakdown, which…had been a problem early on. Thank goodness the mercy fleet had a large staff of medical professionals in addition to Regen treatments, because they’d caught three near-suicides and were treating a host of anxiety disorders in the refugees.

Elanus had coordinated with Captain Hu to provide informational sessions on Gania and what to expect when they got there for everyone, but Kieron mostly ignored those. He had to, if he was going to have time for everything else. That’s why he thought it was excusable when they finally had Gania in their sights and all he could do was stare at it for the longest time. It was so…shiny. The oceans were shiny, the land was shiny, the city was shiny…

“There is a great deal of mica in the natural environment,” Lizzie supplied quietly.

Kieron sighed. “How did you know what I was thinking, hmm?”

“You haven’t blinked in nearly a minute, Kee. I assumed it was a reaction to the planet, and that the mostly likely cause was the unexpected appearance of it.”

“Good assumption.” He rubbed his eyes, which were rather dry now. “You’ve got the landing coordinates, I take it?”

“I do.”

“I’ll let you handle taking us in, then.” He glanced at Pol, who was also rapt at the striking image of Gania. “Ready to see your mother?”

“Yes,” Pol whispered, reaching out and taking Kieron’s hand. Kieron gave him a gentle squeeze as they neared the planet, finally descending through the atmosphere and heading toward Chelen, Elanus’s home city. The mercy fleet followed suit, and soon they were all landing at a large, well-appointed space dock at the edge of the metropolis, held up on elevated platforms.

The city itself was an amazing sight, with buildings so tall that they seemed to create their own ecosystem of light and dark, heat and cold. Kieron was sure he saw clouds drifting off one of the larger ones—perhaps created by releasing water into the sky? Why bother, though? He’d have to ask Elanus…whenever he saw him, which likely wouldn’t be for hours yet.

City officials came in a delegation to meet them, along with immigrations experts and several lawmen. After reviewing documentation with both Kieron and Captain Hu, they allowed the passengers to be released from the ships. The first person off a mercy fleet vessel was Xilinn, and the second Pol saw her he dropped Kieron’s hand and ran with all his speed toward his mother. She cried out and opened her arms to him, and then…

It felt too personal to watch. That had to be the reason that Kieron’s eyes were tearing up. Or perhaps he was just too tired to do this right now, too tired for more lines and more questions and more demands. He’d done so much already, more emotional lifting than he’d ever done before in his life. The physical was something he could handle, but this? And now it was almost over, and he was more exhausted than ever, and all he wanted was…

A warm hand on his shoulder made Kieron spin around, but his body knew who it was even as his mind briefly panicked. He immediately leaned into Elanus’s tall frame, burying his face against the other man’s chest. Elanus smelled like lightning and fresh rain and machine oil, like he’d been in his workshop right before flying here like some sort of angel. He held Kieron up with ease, which made it that much easier for Kieron to allow himself to sag, just a little bit.

“Hey.”

“Hey.”

Elanus laughed. “I never thought I’d be reduced to monosyllables like this, but I suppose you’re always surprising to me.”

“Mm.” Kieron’s hands tightened across the back of Elanus’s shirt.

“Mm indeed.” Miraculously, Elanus shut up and just let Kieron hold onto him after that. This, this was what he needed, what he’d been missing. Someone who wasn’t a dependent, or a beloved child, or a fellow professional he needed to keep at a distance. He’d been missing his partner, the understanding and support that only that person could give him. He had a partner. Not just someone he loved, but someone who made him feel like everything was going to be all right, because they were together again.

“I’ve got you,” Elanus said at last with the faintest tremor in his voice. “I’ve got you.”

Good.