I'm Not Touching You

A short story by Sylvia Barry

This story contains: him and him, queer, non-human, Sci-fi, anal, BDSM/kink, sub/dom

Maply winced as the Com-Bot shattered into a thousand jingling photons. 

The hard-light form discorporated the moment Carmine Barilla rammed his fist through the core processor in its chest. Carmine gave his victory crow: “Feel the love!! D’you feel that? D’you feel the love?!” 

He bounced around like a psychotic puppy.

Maply shut his eyes against the glare of screens in the otherwise dark control cave. He let out a sigh that would be inaudible over the comm, and logged the heightened levels of testosterone and dopamine surging through Carmine’s system; he was certainly feeling good about himself, the bastard.

“Carmine,” Maply said, steadying his voice. He removed his glasses and clenched his hair with one hand. “What, may I ask, was the point of that? You’re supposed to be practicing the Cerberus Combo. It’s going to take me five minutes just to reset the bot.”

Carmine’s blow to the Hard Light Projector-Deflector Drone knocked it back to default settings, which meant Maply would have to download the plugin again, which meant a demerit on his official FightCorp record. Every time Carmine Barilla destroyed a Com-Bot, it made Maply Mosher look incompetent.

This was why no one wanted to work with Carmine. This was why, despite being one of the best fighters in the league, he got shunted onto an Assistant Coach’s assistant coach like Maply. FC coaches as young and inexperienced as him almost never got assigned their own fighter, and definitely not one like Carmine Barilla, who actually had a shot at the title. 

“What’s the point?” Carmine paused his hopping and bouncing and shadow boxing at the holographic walls of the training cube. He grinned into the camera. “The point is to win, Coach!” They’d been working together for nearly two months, but there was no chance on earth Carmine would learn Maply’s name. So much for breaking into the next level of industry. Carmine wasn’t a promotion, he was a cul-de-sac. “The point is to beat your ass! Every time!”

“But I’m not trying to fight you,” Maply explained again, his voice flat with ennui. “I’m trying to teach you this combo.” He could barely find the energy to argue about it anymore, so instead, he turned his attention to Carmine’s stats: endorphins and serotonin still going strong, heart rate and blood flow slowing despite his bouncing around. All the ingredients of a champion, and none of the discipline. On the closeup cams, Maply could see Carmine’s dilated pupils and a bead of sweat trickling down his neck. It left a gleaming trail from his jaw all the way to his collarbone. Carmine shivered, his sweat-soaked golden hair trembling and breath hitching even while mid-gloat.

That was a problem—Maply jotted down the observation alongside his recommendation that Carmine’s final battle-fit include a high neck; the area was clearly sensitive and a potential liability. 

The Com-Bot came back online, and Maply ignored the pop-up message from corporate noting his third download this week. He was so getting fired. He queued up the Cerberus Combo training module. Then hesitated.

“Are you ready to learn the combo?” he asked Carmine. 

The fighter was running in place to keep up his heart rate. He flipped the sweaty hair out of his eyes (Maply had already recommended a headband, or even better, a haircut—both ignored) and presented the wolfish grin that could be found on all his promotion posters. “I’m ready for anything, bitch.”

He was definitely planning to destroy another bot. 

Maply’s hands hovered over the controls as he considered pivoting the training stratagem. There were less than ten minutes left on the clock. He refused to come to corporate, hat in hand, admitting he’d allowed Carmine to destroy even more company property. 

The Com-Bot materialized in the corner of the training cube. It wasn’t the latest model, but it was good enough; all chrome and metallic reds, it was three times the size of Carmine and at least twice as fast. It crouched innocently in its starting position, wanting only to teach. 

Carmine was going to destroy it in cold blood. Again. Maply knew it.

Sure enough, with another cry of “Feel the love!” and a flying kick, Carmine aimed for the hard-light core processor.

Maply jerked the bot out of the way—it wasn’t pretty (this wasn’t what he was trained for), but he managed a basic defense combination and scrambled away. Carmine gave a happy shout and pursued. Great, now there was no way he was going to focus on learning anything.

Unless. Maply kept the basic defense stratagems running while plugging in a new move, so that the next time Carmine went flying past, the Com-Bot parried him with one arm and used the other to gently caress Carmine’s neck. From ear to collarbone. The lightest, most teasing touch possible for a 45-lb gauntlet of digitized metal and rubber.

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