Star Force: Cascade (SF73) Read Online Free Page B

and stepped behind
where he couldn’t see. “Don’t use your Pefbar. A blind reaction should be
better.”
    “Ok,” he said a moment before he felt her run her
finger down his spine slowly.
    The next thing Synthia knew the air in front of her
face suddenly blossomed and kicked her hair back. “Worked?”
    “Guess I am ticklish,” Paul admitted.
    “Being naked is probably part of it. I’m guessing
here, but as far as I know most Archons might get naked without flinching, but
we are hardly ever touched when we are.”
    “Good point,” Paul admitted.
    “And since we don’t usually get laid, you should be
really ticklish right now,” she said, running her finger across the left side
of his waist and seeing/feeling another distortion manifest from his skin.
    “Am I to take this to mean you’re wanting to help with
my training?”
    “Whatever keeps me here and you naked. ”
    Paul reached out telekinetically and hit the door
controls, lowering a very wide door down and closing off the hallway from view.
    “Alright then, I’ll indulge you in the name of more
goosebumps. I figure I’ll numb up to your touch eventually, but do what you can
now and hopefully I’ll hop the learning curve before that happens.”
    “Why’d you shut the door?”
    “Just in case someone else walks by.”
    “Think they’d get the wrong idea?”
    “No, but your touch is having a secondary effect and
I’m a little bit shy regarding volume increases in public.”
    Synthia couldn’t help but laugh, not at him but the
idea that she could do that to him with just a finger brush on his back. “But
you’re ok with me seeing it?”
    “You’re standing behind me.”
    “I have Pefbar,” she reminded him.
    “Just shut up and poke,” he said, trying to keep from
peeking himself to know when and where she was going to tickle him, for that
would definitely lessen the effect. “But don’t mention this to your master.”
    “Embarrassed?”
    “Just don’t want to make him jealous.”
    “I will admit…he’s not as hot as you,” she said,
stroking his neck with two fingertips this time and giving Paul easy access to
another wave of goosebumps.
    “That’s working fine,” he said, trying to focus the
slippery energy inside his body and redirect it even a nudge before it
automatically released. “You don’t have to add innuendo.”
    “Waste not, want not,” she said, touching his waist
and running her finger laterally across the small of his back.

 
 
    3

 
 
    Paul was waiting outside the training chamber in the
sanctum when Rio walked out, drenched in sweat but not looking overly fatigued.
The trailblazer pointed in the direction of the equipment room and Paul walked
with him, getting the feeling that there was something he wanted to discuss in
private. There weren’t many other Archons in the sanctum, but he sensed
something was up so he went along quietly until they got into the equipment
room and Rio still wouldn’t say anything.
    What? he asked telepathically, almost shouting it as the other
titan began to pull a set of fresh clothes from a rack on the wall.
    Rio didn’t say anything, but he did stop picking out
clothes and turned around to look at him.
    Paul crossed his arms over his chest and stared back,
wondering what the hell he was up to and deciding to wait him out. After a few
minutes he got a battlemeld prompt from Rio and accepted it, then a series of
images/thoughts flashed into his mind.
    Rio immediately pointed a finger at him when he felt a
twitch in his fellow Archon. “So you do recognize them?”
    “I don’t know…what are you showing me?”
    “You tell me.”
    “I just said I…”
    Rio raised his eyebrows, waiting for a response.
    “Those aren’t sensory. Where did you get them?”
    “A dream. A repetitive dream that is very illusive.
You’ve had it too, otherwise you wouldn’t have reacted that way.”
    “What way?”
    “That flinch of recognition.”
    “Dude, I really don’t