I wrote this short story very recently, for a contest whose theme was “Love and lust”. Sadly it didn’t get selected, I still hope you’ll find it entertaining. I’m happy to receive constructive feedback about my style or storytelling techniques.
Warning: as the theme might let you guess, this text contains scenes of a sexual nature. Please only click on “Continue reading” if you can handle it!
Mission Immersion
We first meet near an abandoned plane somewhere, I think it’s supposed to be in Northern Europe but I’m not too sure.
He looks so gorgeous that at first I wonder if he’s real. As we start talking, we both quickly forget about the spaceship parts we were supposed to scavenge.
“I’m so glad I’m here with you”, he says in a deep voice and, like a bloody teenager, I drop the metal cutter I was carrying.
He bends to retrieve the tool.
“Ha! It works!” he says with such a dazzling smile that for a moment I think my clothes dropped as well.
He’s trying to learn my name but I can’t tell him, obviously, so he laughs and invites me to team up for the mission. We talk some more and while our names, where we live or where we work are filtered out from the conversation, we do talk enough to understand we’ve got a lot of things in common.
That night, I have the most vivid fantasy, of meeting him again and kissing his full lips and feeling his hands undress me. The alarm clock wakes me up abruptly, leaving me disappointed in this quite literally anticlimactic dream. All I can think about is going back to the mission as soon as I can.
We’re now in a cabin in the woods, probably not too far from the abandoned plane but I used some credits to go there directly. He’s here as well, we’re glad we found this place. We didn’t have a lot of privacy in the main factory as there were two other people, crafting the spaceship or whatever, and I know I’m supposed to help find saboteurs but instead I found this cabin.
“I’ve been thinking about you”, he admits with a chuckle.
Maybe we’re bolder now because of the situation, but I know I will regret it if I don’t make it clear I’ve been thinking about him as well.
“You were in my dreams”, I say with an explicit twinkle in my eye.
“Gosh, I want to kiss you so badly”, he says, and we move towards each other.
He holds my hands and I can hear his ragged breath, our faces are drawn to each other like magnets and we pause very briefly, our lips nearly touching, our hands squeezing frantically.
With a whimper of despair we realise we can’t feel more than the hand squeeze.
I would love to feel our lips parting, touching, a flicker of his tongue on mine and us getting lost in a long French kiss but we are kept one millimeter away from each other. This might as well be a light year.
Since we can sort of feel with our hands, we start exploring each other. I can make out the shape of his mouth, his back, his neck, and it looks like he can feel my waist and my thighs but I can’t feel him touch me. It’s killing me.
It’s so dull compared to the real thing and yet, a fire has started within me. Even if I can’t feel his warmth, this is all so hot. I tease him by stroking his fingers and telling him I would lick them one by one if I could. He moans, then tells me in a very soft voice what he’d like to do to me, and this does create ripples of desire. I wish we could see each other naked, but it’s not possible. I’m still trying to feel the difference between the soft looking texture of his skin and the fabric of his jeans but I can only imagine it. We both imagine very hard, and oh, speaking of hard, I’m surprised I can actually see this rendered here.
I’m not going to report this even though I’m sure the creators will think it’s an issue. After all, that’s not what we’re meant to be doing. We have to build a space shuttle to go to Mars, using things loosely based on a future version of our world. Some people are saboteurs in disguise but I’m on the “good team”. I don’t know about “IorekB”, or whatever his real name is, but I don’t really care. Unless it is all a very convoluted plot to make me fail to help with the shuttle? His desire seems all too real in this fake world of ours. I can see a glitch in the moon outside the window, there’s a second flickering moon on top of it. But overall it’s really well made, for a beta. We’re testing this new multiplayer VR game called “Mission Immersion” (working title), with motion capture so our avatars look the same as us. It is a good game, I just wish it was even more realistic, at least in the places where it matters…
We decide to go to our virtual wardrobes to change clothes. Everything is so PG, I discover with a sigh. We both end up in swimwear. The scar on my left thigh and his back tattoo have disappeared, but we look hot, for 3D rendered avatars.
I have an idea and get closer to him when someone barges in our space and says “oh my! Sorry to, uh, intrude.” We both disconnect immediately, with the jolt of fear a teenager caught by a parent would feel.
I laugh, in the safe space of my living room, and think about some features I should ask for.
1: A forum to talk to the other players. Pretty please.
2: A way to bypass GDPR regulations in terms of conversation topics, if both players are willing to.
3: Better sensations, full body if possible, for a better, well, immersion… I’m not being very subtle am I… oh well.
4: Maybe a way to take in game screenshots because I so looove the views in this game. Nice resolution.
5: And maybe an actual changing room with locks where we could really be naked and try clothes on… It will be slightly trickier to make this one sound innocent, I think. I’ll wait until I’m a top player to ask.
Instead, I report the glitching moon, to justify my participation in the beta program and feel less guilty.
When we log in next, we decide to make an experiment. We go to our respective virtual changing rooms and try using the sensor gloves to stimulate… something other than our hands, but believe me, it is such a bad idea. Not very comfy and the interface doesn’t pick up on it so it is pointless. We’ll have to do something else.
We go to the middle of the woods. The game is an open world and we manage to walk so far away from the main area that we’re pretty sure no one will disturb us this time.
Our desire for each other is quite overwhelming while we walk hand in hand in the well designed autumn forest, leaves actually falling at random intervals on our heads.
Both of us are naked in the quiet of our homes, except for our VR gear, obviously.
In Mission Immersion, we still wear the frustrating swimsuits. It looks like it would be a bit cold outside but at least we can’t feel it, just the respective warmth of our homes.
We stop in a recess among some oaks and it’s still incredibly frustrating not to be able to kiss and to feel more, but my idea is quite simple. We’re going to touch ourselves in front of each other.
We stand as close to each other as we can, and I am thankful for how well rendered our faces are as we can both see quite clearly how much we crave each other.
In real life, one of his gloved hands is stroking the one body part I can’t see properly, hidden under the swimsuit. That still makes me gasp. The other hand is drawing the shape of me, trying to get a sense of the virtual me. I am amazed at how we are touching ourselves so openly in front of each other. I haven’t even met him in real life, I don’t know who he really is, just that I’d do anything to jump through this parallel world and feel him completely, with all my senses. In the meantime, my hand isn’t doing such a bad job and my pleasure is inexorably rising as I picture his hands on me instead of mine and wish he’d feel my hands exploring him while we would moan and he would…
“YOU ARE BANNED FROM THIS GAME”, a cold voice interrupts us like a cold rain couldn’t have. “YOU CAN READ THE TERMS AND CONDITIONS AND HAVE 15 DAYS TO FORMALLY CONTEST THIS DECISION. YOU WILL BE…”
We look urgently at each other and he tells me really quickly: “Saturday, 6pm, by the plane where we first…”
I’m suddenly back in my flat in London, in shock and in a panic and all I can think about is understanding what he meant.
I remember the abandoned plane, it was probably modeled on something real, I think there is one in Iceland. I search for it online and no, it’s not this one. I think it’s the one in Scotland. I hope it’s the right location because I’ll be there, hoping that this time, things will end up with a bang…
OuZePo 