REND: Prior Cycle (Old Version)

“Isn’t this wonderful?” Deen said, opening the windows and stepping onto the tiny balcony of our room. Outside was the endless sea. Blue and boring. With some other ships at the docks, because we still hadn’t left.

Ocean, actually. The Pacific Ocean, to be exact. Until now, I still didn’t know what the difference was between the ocean and the sea. I had researched it. But the explanations I found were very vague. It was like this was an ocean, and that was a sea because people long ago said so.

This might be the same case as which object in space was a planet and which wasn’t. Poor Pluto, getting demoted. I’d be very excited if, someday, one of the oceans gets demoted to being a sea because a group of scientists clarified the criteria for categorization.

I wrinkled my nose at the salty air. “What’s wonderful?”

“Everything! The sea—”

“Ocean.”

“This room.” Deen sprinted back to me and cupped my cheeks. “You.”

I raised a brow as she squished my face. “Me?”

“You’re beautiful.” She kissed the tip of my nose.

“Are you saying that truthfully or just because I’m your girlfriend?”

“Let’s break up. There. You’re beautiful. Okay, let’s get back together again.” She planted a kiss on my lips this time.

“Wow, that’s a roller coaster of a relationship.” I licked my lips, tasting Deen’s sweet lip gloss. Strawberry flavored. I bet she used this because I liked sweets. “You seem really excited for this trip.”

“Of course, I am!” Deen twirled like a ballerina. The skirt of her yellow sundress lifted and spread open like a flower blossoming upside down. She walked back to the balcony. The sun outside went through the thin fabric of her sundress, highlighting the voluptuous curves of her silhouette.

“Me? Not so much. We’re here on an annoying mission, remember?”

We were aboard Islas de Sangre, a luxury cruise ship that was supposed to head to Red Island. After some deliberation among the hero wannabes, Dario decided that we should get on board and see what’s what.

Though Islas de Sangre wasn’t a super exclusive cruise for the filthy wealthy, it was still an expensive experience. It wasn’t like the other hero wannabes had a few hundred bucks spare to book a room here. And so, Dario had to get funds from the Professor and buy the tickets himself.

Deen and I decided to get our own rooms. Well, to be accurate, Deen paid for the room. I didn’t ask how much this cost, but it should be way more than the windowless inner rooms for the peasants. Maybe a couple thousand dollars or so? Chump change for Deen.

“I’ve been thinking…” Deen said, leaning with her back on the railings.

The wind blew her golden locks to the side. She was absolutely beautiful. And I appreciated her beauty as her girlfriend, not just as an objective observation. Maybe a hint of lust there, too. It was a whole different feeling, with my heart beating faster and even my mouth salivating.

Had I been conditioned like a dog?

“Thinking about what?” I asked, walking over to her. Directly in front of my face, the milky valley of her breasts teased me over the neckline of her sundress. I adjusted her neckline to conceal more of her cleavage. I didn’t want people ogling my girlfriend.

“What if… we just enjoyed ourselves here?” Deen suggested. “We’re not sure if Dario will ever find the way to Red Island. He’ll assign us our tasks to investigate, for sure. We simply won’t do our jobs. We’ll explore the ship and have sex here and there.”

Here and there? That was a phrase I often used. I must’ve said it enough times that it rubbed off on Deen. We really had been talking a lot since we became a thing. Not a bad thing, not a good thing. I sort of missed my days being single. But I also had fan yapping. My noisy brain could let out its thoughts into words.

“Is that your goal here?” I touched Deen’s toned abdomen, feeling the subtle cuts of her muscle under the thin fabric of her dress.

She asked me to pick this out for her. I didn’t know much about fashion, but this looked very sexy when she tried it out. Of course, we had sex in the dressing room when we bought the dress. I didn’t want to, but Deen pulled me in. Just a quickie because the store attendant was there. Didn’t take long to make Deen come.

“Yes, Erind,” Deen said, rolling her eyes. “I joined this dangerous mission just to have sex with you. No, we joined this mission to find Red Island and put an end to the assholes that are your enemies.”

I giggled. “You said assholes.” I kept caressing Deen’s stomach. I could see in her eyes that she was getting turned on.

“Because they are assholes. Trying to kill my precious girlfriend. But… we can also ignore them.”

“Here you are again with your escape to India or China plan.”

“We don’t need to go that far.” Deen held the wrist of my hand that was touching her. She started to lower my hand. “The boat will pass through Ensenada.”

“Are you seriously thinking of losing ourselves in Mexico?” I pushed my hand into the gap of her legs, massaging her thighs through her dress. Kind of weird that we were having a sexy bit while talking about a serious matter, but that was our relationship. I had gotten used to this. “We haven’t even packed that many clothes. And what about money? We need cash. If we use our cards, we’ll get tracked.”

“It might not be that bad to go on an adventure, won’t you agree?” Deen rubbed her thighs together, sandwiching my hand in between. The balcony had partitions on both sides, and we were on the side of the ship facing away from the port, so no one could see our shenanigans.

“You? Go on an adventure? Really?”

“You don’t think I can do it?”

“Are you willing to give up your comforts in life?” I wiggled my fingers between Deen’s legs, feeling the supple bounce of her flesh. I started to salivate. Crazy that my body instantly reacted when with Deen. “We’ll probably need to disguise ourselves, too. Say goodbye to your beauty regimen. And beauty, in general, for that matter. You’d stand out anywhere in Mexico.”

“I can wear a mask when going outside,” Deen replied. She slowly pulled up her skirt. “I have to be beautiful only for you. I can even dye my hair and cut it short if that’s what it takes to hide. It’s no problem for me if that’s what it takes.”

“What if we lived in the forest?” I jokingly asked. I pulled away my hand from between her legs so that she could raise her dress properly. Then I returned my hand to its rightful place, cupping her warm mound that was starting to get sticky.

She wasn’t wearing any panties. I told her to remove them while we were in the car, driving to the port. It was just a joke. I bet that she’d be too embarrassed to do it, given what I knew of her. But I was very wrong. Deen was turned on by the idea that I was ordering her around and excitedly removed her panties after parking the car.

“Live in the forest and be nudists?” Deen asked. Her breathing started to become shallow. She caressed my left cheek and inserted her thumb into my mouth.

“You seem to have a hidden exhibitionist side,” I said, mumbling my words as Deen’s thumb rubbed my tongue.

“The sea breeze is very nice.”

“It’s the ocean,” I reminded her as I ran my fingers over her slick folds. It was incredibly warm between her legs. “Look at how wet you are.” On one hand, I was losing ground as Deen became less embarrassed about things like this. But on the other hand, I liked that she was following whatever I told her. Nobody on Earth had this kind of power.

“It’s your fault I’m like this. Erind… What about ordering me to get naked?”

“Here? On the balcony?”

“Yeah.”