It’s easy for a writer to become obsessed about finding reviews–it can really kill your writing time to spend it hunting for mentions of your name or your book’s title, and it’s easy to get lost in the idea of the book you’ve written to the detriment of the book you’ve still got to write.  But when you receive a happy bit of news like this, it can be just the thing to kick start your day.  Hearty thanks to Night Owl for taking the time to read and review Jolly Rogered.  I know I’m one of a great many, and it means something that someone took the time to read and review.

Half an hour later, after stroking the Yank’s cheek and excusing himself to go clear the rest of his schedule, Nigel sauntered into the office, whistling the tune of a sea shanty about a good ship called the ‘Venus’, prompting a snort from Suisan as she passed back out to the front desk.

“Well?” Drew slid away from the terminal and the collection of ledgers which Nigel paid him a king’s ransom to care about.

Nigel flopped into the plush leather chair, put his hands behind his head, and regarded his former lover with a grin. “They’re so bloody cute when they come with little whimpers like that.” He emitted a self-satisfied sigh. “And when those big baby-blues look at you with wonder, it’s just enough to melt your heart and make you sick.”

Drew rolled his eyes. “I’m supposed to envy you the exotic new pet?”

“Not yet, my friend. He’s got no clue what he’s gotten himself into.”

“Yeah, about that. I’m not so sure he did the getting into. I checked his reservation and it was made from somewhere in the States, but through several bounces and out of a tunneling service located in Germany.”

“Poor bastards have to go through all that just to get a little vacation sex?” Nigel wanted to close his eyes and take a nap. Or better still, get back to the Yank and the lovely, pleasant feeling of low-grade, constant arousal the newcomer engendered in him.

“Do you think our new friend is really as innocent as he makes out?”

Nigel glanced at his longtime friend. “Judging by the way he makes out, yes.”

Drew slanted him a return look. “So what’s in it for you, then? I thought you kissed off your last Queen of Denial eight years ago.”

Nigel pouted. “I’m a fickle bitch, aren’t I?”

“Tell me something I don’t already know.”

“He’s a complete neophyte. I want to show him the whole resort just to see the look on his face. Am I too jaded, you think?” Bloody virgins and their bloody ingénue eyes.

Drew was not to be put off by the temptation of speculation. “All I’m saying is that getting involved with an American can lead to heartbreak of the International Incident kind.”

Nigel’s brow furrowed. In spite of being the master of all he surveyed, the stark fact was that he was master on a kind of sufferance. As long as the Isla paid its taxes and membership fees to the Caribbean Union, they enjoyed a moderate international protection via carefully-courted goodwill with the looming behemoth to the north. That didn’t stop the Americans from establishing “embassies”–otherwise known as bases of nosiness–on international properties–whether the inhabitants wanted them or not. Yet he somehow doubted the Union would spend its diplomatic capital on his behalf, should the US wish to open up shop on his island. All the same, a steady flow of palm-greasing gold only lubricated the wheels of diplomacy when one knew which palms needed the greasing.

He scrubbed a hand down his face. “Well then,” he said. “I guess I’ll just have to pump him for information, then, won’t I? Make sure he’s on the up-and-up and all. I should go get my spy outfit on.” Nigel rose out of the chair in mock eagerness.

Drew took the bait and flicked a stylus at him. “You’re an idiot.”

“Then I’m lucky to have you riding my back. Just pull my hair while you’re doing it.”

And because I can’t walk away without making a silly pirate pun…this excerpt is rated Arrrgh.

—

“Heads up.”

Roger spoke to the pitch-darkness surrounding him. At his command, the blank space lit up with a softly glowing yellow interface. A dial control and a series of checkboxes floated at shoulder height, waiting for the touch of his gloved hand or a spoken command. Without any of the sensory inputs activated, the skin-like suit of the virtual reality booth pressed against his skin and itched just a little. “Wrestling,” he said and the blank blackness resolved into a gymnasium space, lined with springy mats. The skin-suit’s sensory inputs activated and Roger looked down to see his body encased in a wrestling singlet. Even though his mind knew he still wore the VR suit, his vision and his sense of touch told him otherwise.

If there was one thing Roger knew, it was that fantasies were nice places to visit, but dangerous places to live. He would know, since he made them for a living. Yet it didn’t stop him from becoming attached to certain fantasies. If people like his boss could glut themselves on virtual golf rather than clogging up the travel permit offices with requests for real-time golf junkets, then the VR booth was the lesser evil. And if people like him had virtual outlets…

“Confirm. Select Fail-safes,” he said. Letters floated in front of him, next to checkboxes. A poke with one of his gloved fingers ticked off the boxes next to “Safety protocol: Mild impacts” and “Verbal commands: Activated.” All completely acceptable settings for an innocent VR experience.

Then he spoke again. “Activate Masking Mode Stonewall, authorization Zeta Gamma five-six-three.”

His field of vision shifted suddenly, and a tiny glow in the corner of his eye began flashing a slow, intermittent rhythm. “Deactivate Adult Content Blocks? Y/N.”

He nodded to accept the suggestion, and an opponent with an appropriately-similar body type appeared before him. He tried not to think of his opponent in terms of sex, but the lean strength in the opponent’s body made him remember being confused and thrilled and hyped up on adrenaline and the smell of sweat.

Roger’s heart began to pound and he bounced experimentally. The floor felt springy, like a high-density mat. Even the smell that reached his nostrils immersed him in the experience–that sweaty gymnasium smell that couldn’t be found anywhere else. The buzzer sounded and his opponent lunged in for a takedown.

He responded to the moves–dodging, grappling, using his body weight to interfere with the balance of his opponent. The takedown was Roger’s, and his opponent’s body beneath his felt one hundred percent real. The other man’s body even generated body heat, and Roger’s hands registered sweat-slicked skin. For someone used to working in wireframe–the stage of VR programming where everything was simply polygons in a three-D grid box–the sensory richness of the experience blew his mind.

Objectionable as it might be to polite society, at least VR kept him from risking his life and his freedom to pursue a real sexual relationship with another man.

His moment of surprise granted his opponent an advantage and he turned the match in his favor, flipping Roger onto his back and shifting his body to place Roger in a hold. Roger struggled against the grip and found himself flat on his back, the opponent’s body sprawled over his. The sound of the other man’s breathing, the warm puffs of air over his face, only discernable through the openings in the headgear, the pressure on his chest, his stomach, his hips–he tried to tell himself it wasn’t real but his body simply wouldn’t buy it. If anything–

Oh Jesus, no. He tried to turn over, to hide it. But the opponent had a legitimate hold and the upper hand, and Roger couldn’t see how he’d fail to notice the sudden, raging hard-on swelling his groin.

Just like in high school.

Any minute now, Diffenbarge would blow the whistle, he’d spring away, mortally embarrassed and unable to look at the other boy, and his dreams would torment him for weeks, leaving him sweaty and erect in the middle of the night, with only the guilty relief of his hand raising more doubts than it released.

In the instant his eyes met the blank eyes of the VR opponent, he both hoped and feared that the booth’s failsafe would kick in and boot him out of the scenario. Health lessons, religious studies, the law said it was wrong. But he didn’t know any other way to be, and he was slowly going insane. Megan’s advice to “just do it” reassured him. She didn’t think there was anything wrong with him, and deep down, neither did he. But it wasn’t the same as tolerated or accepted, so this would have to do.

His opponent’s eyes flickered, and Roger grew aware of a firmness against his thigh. The match took on a heavy, swollen air and his opponent’s hands went from competitive to consensual. He ground his hips against Roger’s.

Roger’s heart sped up in anticipation, his body warmed. Finally, some relief! If this worked, he could bear anything. Even marriage and breeding.

A powerful bolt of heat flooded him. Objectionable content! he thought, delighted. He relaxed his body, giving into the sensations of male muscled thighs rubbing against his and the harsh breathing of the man on top of him.

He reached down between their bodies to stroke at the other man’s cock, marveling at the reality of the firm flesh beneath his hand. Some enterprising programmer had put ridges in. Ridges!

His partner mimicked his action, and Roger felt his own dick being squeezed gently. He thrust up into the other man’s hand and moaned. He pushed downward on the other man’s shoulders, and his partner obeyed, sliding his body down Roger’s until his head was level with Roger’s crotch. Roger’s head drifted to the side as he felt his singlet unsnap at the crotch, freeing his erection into the other man’s waiting mouth.

A cue appeared in front of him. New downloadable content available from Pillaging Pirate Productions! Browse? Y/N

“Not now!” He shook his head, his eyes snapping open and searching the corner. The tiny, pulsing light that indicated the masking failsafe was gone. “Shit!”

Objectionable content! he thought, panicked.

But his body only cared about how good it felt to press against the sleekly muscled body on top of his. Sweat prickled along his ribcage as his hips thrust up into the VR partner’s mouth. Blood rushed to his head and before he could stop himself he groaned aloud as his balls tightened, then released a sticky flood of guilty release.

“No!” he cried, “Terminate program!”

He shoved the visor up onto his forehead and found himself lying on the floor of the booth. He still felt sweat, and the pressure of the virtual opponent on top of him, made all the more disconcerting by his un-helmeted vision showing nothing but dead air where the body would be. The front of his suit was soaked at his armpits … and his crotch. He jerked the power cell from the suit and the sensation went away. The booth was silent, except for his own panicked breathing and the thudding of his heart.

The sudden silence was split by an ear-piercing squeal of feedback that echoed through the booth. “Objectionable Content Detected. Authorities Dispatched. Await custody where you are, citizen. Leaving the scene of a Social Misdemeanor will result in felony charges. This is for your protection.” The cold female voice hadn’t finished before Roger fought his way out of the suit and crashed through the booth’s door.

He had maybe five minutes left to him before the twenty-second orgasm cost him his freedom.

Five minutes was a generous estimation, but an accurate one. As one of a few people who held an executive passcard to VR Solutions, Roger bought himself some time by placing the deserted office in lockdown mode as he dashed down the hall and away from the test bed, completely naked. If he were really lucky, the woods behind the office would afford him a few more minutes of freedom before the cops donned their infra-red visors.

He slammed through the building’s fire door with a small pang and a loud clang–it would be the last time he’d ever see it, now that his desperate need for release had pushed him this far. He dashed across the parking lot at a dead run, heedless of his state of undress, and hit the woods at full speed, the sirens already sounding from the front of the building.

The loose spot in the fence scraped against his bare ass as he scuttled through headfirst, the half-forgotten VR visor falling down around his neck. He came out the other side and followed a twisting path towards a deserted back road with pitted pavement. Headlights flickered on, pinning him in their glow as a car accelerated towards him. He froze.

“Get in! They’re already tracking through the woods!” Megan leaned over the seat and swept a PDA tablet to the floor.

Roger dove in, yanking the door shut behind him and his fiancé smiled down at him. “Looks like we won’t have to fake a marriage after all, huh, babe?”

He sprawled, light-headed, heart slamming against his ribcage, and had the insane urge to laugh. For better or worse, there would be no more faking.