The Twin Moons of Tansa

Chapter 1Taar sprinted into the alleyway, sirens screaming into the night behind him. His lungs burned; the back of his throat was on fire. Terrified, he searched for a place to hide if only for some small respite from the chase. Immense skyscrapers of concrete and metal towered over him, surrounding him, spearing into the night and disappearing beyond a veil of dirty, grey cloud. Ahead there was only darkness where anything could be waiting for him—the oversized rats that infested the slums of New Melbourne, vicious gangs, or even the very authorities he was desperate to evade. Every muscle screamed for relief from the tortuous pace he had been maintaining for the past thirty minutes, but he had to ignore the demands of his body and push himself ever forwards into the night. He could hear the sounds of footsteps, many footsteps, echoing down the alleyway after him, gaining on him. He could hear the officers shouting to each other, laughing as they ran, whooping and growling to intimidate him. Bastards. But he would not let them win. Getting caught was not an option. It just wasn’t. “Pssssst. Ay, buddy!” At first, the voice didn’t register. “Oi, buddy!” The voice was a little louder this time. “Over ‘ere. Quick!” Taar brought himself to a halt and was immediately pulled into the dense shadows of an abandoned service entrance. “Ssssshhhhh,” said the husky voice. “If we’re lucky, they’ll run right by.” The hand gripping his arm led him further into the darkness, through the shattered remnants of a door and into the derelict ground floor of an apartment building. There was an aroma of decay about the place, of rot and rodent, which he took deep into his lungs with each gulping breath. Outside, the scurrying footsteps were getting dangerously close. Faint traces of flashlight beams found their way into the space just inside the door, moving like ghosts across the detritus. “He didn’t get this far.” “Where else would he have gone, ya dickhead?” “Must be around here somewhere.” Taar took a step back. He hadn’t quite caught his breath, though somehow he managed to hold whatever breath he did have. Bang. Bang. Bang. His heartbeat was like a series of explosions going off inside his heaving chest. He pressed his hand against it, but the action did little to muffle the sound he was certain would give him away. Suddenly, he felt the stranger’s hand on his arm again, untended fingernails digging into him like talons. “‘E’s in ‘ere! Yo! E’s ‘ere!” Taar gasped. His eyes widened as the mysterious saviour-turned-traitor dragged him towards the voices, the flashlights, and certain capture. He dug in his heels but he was weak from the chase and the stranger, though wiry, was deceptively strong. “What are you doing? I thought you were supposed to be helping me.” The stranger’s laughter taunted him. “‘Elping meself, more like.” Then, the full beam of a police flashlight hit him in the face. “We got him!” shouted one of the officers. The semi-darkness came alive with movement as police officers poured into the small space. “Is that him?” asked one of the officers. “You sure it’s him?” Taar looked at the man who held him fast in his withered claw of a hand. The gaunt, haggard face offended him, and when he spoke, he spat, small globs of white spit splashing the officer and a good deal of it landing on Taar’s arm. “Is there a reward?” asked the man. “Yes, there is,” said the officer, pulling Taar free of the claw. “But you ain’t getting it.” The man’s expression turned from one of desperate hopefulness to one of stunned dismay as the sound of laughter erupted from the assembled officers. “Ya can’t do that,” he complained, grabbing at Taar. “Ya offered rewards and I got ‘im. I got ‘im and kept ‘im for ya.” The officer shoved the man in the chest, sending him staggering backwards into the shadows. Somewhere in the darkness, he hit the dirt with a muffled thud. “We would have got him anyway,” explained the officer. “Thank your lucky stars we aren’t taking you in, as well.” Then the officer turned his attention to Taar. “Come on, handsome. You’re off to Processing.” Taar shuddered. He felt his heart become a stone and sink to the pit of his stomach. His blood turned to ice, chilling him to the marrow. Silence cloaked him as he was escorted by the officers down the alleyway to the lamp-lit street, where a squad of police cars waited. A door was opened and a hand pushed him into the back of one of the vehicles. On either side of him, an officer, uniform in both appearance and expression, though he hardly noticed them. His eyes stared straight ahead, barely noticing the homeless man staggering out from the shadows of the alleyway to watch his meal ticket being driven away. * * * * “Taar 5-2, you have been charged with man-love. How do you plead?” Taar hung his head. There was little point in lying. He had been caught with another man’s c**k in his mouth in a public park. His anonymous partner had been faster, had escaped, leaving Taar at the mercy of the police. He knew what the penalties were. Even in an overpopulated world, same-s*x love was illegal. Many before him had argued the fact that if the government was so concerned about overpopulation that it would limit each family to one child—and that was after the couple had applied for a licence that wasn’t always granted—then surely same-s*x love was a solution they should be happy to tolerate. Every protestor and rights activist had failed. Same-s*x love was seen as a threat to what shreds of “family” still remained, and a threat to the moral fibre of a crumbling society. It was a law clutching at straws. “Guilty,” said Taar, his voice monotone. The stern face of the computer-generated judge paused for a moment. The screen flickered. Someone coughed, and for some reason, this produced a frown on Taar’s face. What was taking so long? “You will be taken to holding cell BB12 where you will be kept until your exile to Tansa. You will remain on said planet for the rest of your days with others of your kind. If you make any attempt to return to this world, or any other civilised world, you will be recaptured and executed. Is that perfectly clear?” Taar nodded into his chest, his eyes momentarily cast down. “Very well,” said the judge, his dark expression unchanged. “Take him to the cells.” An officer of the court, dressed from neck to foot in artificially produced black leather, rose from his position beside the dock and escorted Taar from the courtroom. “Tansa, hey?” said the guard as they walked down a long, brightly lit corridor. “Nothing but wilderness there. Wilderness and about a hundred other arse-invaders.” He looked at Taar, his top lip curled into a snarl. “Not much of a punishment, though, is it? It’s more like a fuckin’ paradise to you arse-licking, c**k-suckers. You can bugger each other till the cows come home.” He shook his head. “Fuckin’ great punishment.” Taar let the guard’s taunts wash over him. They couldn’t touch him, not at that moment. His only thoughts were of his elderly mother. What would she think when her only son didn’t turn up for dinner on Sunday? His lover, Terek, would notice him missing even sooner, yet what could he do? Perhaps his young, green-eyed boyfriend would visit some of the places where man-lovers could meet in secret, ask around to see if anyone knew anything, but where would that get him? Absolutely nowhere. Taar’s eyes watered. “Awww, don’t take it personally,” said the guard, no doubt having noticed his prisoner’s eyes well with tears. “I find all your kind repulsive.” The guard’s voice had become an annoying drone in Taar’s ears. It was a mosquito whose buzz barely registered, only breaking into his thoughts on a subconscious level. They soon came to a small room containing no more than a table with a large brown box and an electronic, handheld scanner on it. “Get undressed,” said the guard. “What?” asked Taar, his thoughts interrupted by the realisation they had stopped moving. “You heard. Get your gear off. Now!” Taar nodded and proceeded to remove his boots and socks, his pants, then his coat and shirt. Within the minute, he was standing amid a pile of clothing, naked and exposed. “Pick them up and put everything into that box,” said the guard, nodding towards the table. Taar moved as though he were being operated by someone at a set of controls. He felt numb, separate from the world, like he was a figure in someone else’s dream. Bending down, he scooped up the pile of clothing. As he walked to the table, he only half realised what he was doing, that he was even naked. He dropped the clothing onto the table, removed the lid from the box, then put the clothing inside, resting his shoes neatly on top. He replaced the lid and turned to face the guard. “Step away from the table!” Taar did as he was asked, and the guard walked to the table, picked up the box containing the clothing, and took it to a small door in the wall that Taar hadn’t noticed before. He opened the door and placed the box inside. “What’s going to happen to them?” asked Taar. “Incinerator,” said the guard, squinting, studying Taar’s face. Taar detected the ghost of a smile lurking on the guard’s lips, ready to bloom into a full grin should he find whatever it was he was hoping to find. But Taar wasn’t going to give his tormentor any satisfaction. Not if he could help it. A slight frown materialised on the guard’s brow. He walked back to the table and snatched up the scanner. “Arms out,” he barked. He scanned every inch of Taar’s body, holding the devise only centimetres away from his flesh, lifting Taar’s c**k between the tips of his thumb and forefinger as though it were something he’d found in the gutter. When he had finished, he looked at the screen, pressed some keys, and read the results. “Did I pass?” asked Taar. It was a small attempt at humour that was met with a fierce glare. “Bend over!” Taar swallowed. The man pulled out a pair of latex gloves from an inside pocket in his jacket. “I wouldn’t look so worried,” he said coldly. “I thought you’d actually be looking forward to this bit.” Taar bent over the table and waited for the internal examination. He braced himself. He knew the guard would be rough. It was how the bastard got his jollies. He felt his arse cheeks being pulled apart and the sting of an unlubricated finger being thrust past his anal sphincter and into the cavity beyond. He grimaced, his arse muscles clamping down around the digit. “I imagine it’d be easier if you relaxed. And gave me my fuckin’ finger back!” Taar closed his eyes and clenched his teeth as the guard probed his arsehole, checking for whatever it was he was taking his time checking for. “Is that turning you on?” asked Taar, knowing he had nothing to lose. “Getting hard?” The guard yanked out his finger with a force that made Taar cry out, producing a smile on the sadistic state employee’s face. Taar scowled at him and gave his stinging arsehole a couple of rubs. In any other circumstances, he would have hit the bastard, knocked him for a six, but the little maggot would only report him and that could mean anything from a prison sentence to the death penalty. Life was cheap on this planet, and so being sent to Tansa was preferable to any of the other punishments on offer. The guard pushed him out of the room and into the corridor. “Down there,” he barked, sticking him with the butt of his phaser gun. Taar stumbled. “Aren’t I supposed to get a video call?” The guard snorted. “Your type isn’t entitled to anything.” “s**t, man. No one’ll know where the hell I am. I have to let someone know what’s going on.” “They’ll read it on the nightly bulletin,” snapped the guard. “Now keep walking. And shut up!’ With everything else going on, with all the other thoughts crowding his head, Taar had forgotten about the bulletins, transmitted into everyone’s homes at precisely six o’clock every evening, irrespective of the channel. Each and every citizen was expected to watch these nightly invasions of privacy because they contained information such as new laws, changes to existing laws, and community service rosters. Ignorance was no excuse for not knowing the latest updates. Each bulletin was concluded with a roll call of the latest citizens wanted by the police, man-lovers included, and a list of criminals that had been captured, their offences and their sentences. He felt his cheeks burn red when he realised not only would his mother and lover know what had happened, but so would anyone who had ever known him—his boss, his colleagues at the bureau, his sister and her family. The sense of shame was almost too overwhelming. He had tarnished the family name. Perhaps it was a good thing he would be transported to Tansa and left there to rot. He was led to a holding cell crammed with other man-lovers who had likewise been stripped and, no doubt, inspected and assessed just as he had been. Only the strong and healthy could make the two-year voyage to Tansa, and rumour had it that those who were deemed unfit were simply executed and ground up to make fertiliser for government-run market gardens and parks. The guard opened the gate and pushed Taar inside. “There ya go, cocksucker. Home away from home.” Taar stumbled forward, but stopped himself from hitting the ground by grabbing hold of one of the other prisoners. “Sorry, fella,” he said, steadying himself. “No problem,” said the handsome stranger. “You alright?” “Yeah,” replied Taar. “Apart from wanting to beat the s**t out of that guard.” “You’ll get used to it. They treat us all like animals in here, but it’ll be over soon. Once we get to Tansa, we can start over, a whole new life.” Taar shook his head. “But I already have a life here. A family, friends, a partner.” He sighed and teared up. “It’s just difficult to think…I won’t be seeing any of them again.” The stranger put his arm around Taar’s shoulders. “I guess it’s easier for me. I don’t have anyone. For me it’ll be a fresh start. Think…the entire planet to ourselves.” He sucked his teeth. “Stupid bastards. Could’ve taken it for themselves and left all us undesirables behind. But we got it instead.” “A whole planet?” Taar found the idea inconceivable. “For us?” “I had an acquaintance whose wife works in the Bureau of Corrections. She reckons eventually the other worlds will send their man-lovers there, too, so it won’t be just for us. But we’ll be the first.” “Yeah. The first to find out if there’s anything that’ll welcome a new addition to the menu.” Taar and his new friend turned to face the owner of the comment. “The initial surveys found the planet was uninhabited by anything larger than a kangaroo,” said Taar’s friend. “I hope you’re right,” said the stranger. “As long as it’s not a kangaroo with fangs. I’m Tolen, by the way. Sorry to eavesdrop. A bit hard not to.” Taar introduced himself as did his new friend, Bror. He was somewhat relieved to have met two people with whom he could share the journey, even if his thoughts did keep slipping back to his mother and Terek. Though he was quick to decide that some comfort was better than none, and already he was feeling all the better for having it. Tolen was tall and lean and blond. He obviously came from the Snowlands. His accent was peculiar, but understandable—after Taar had got used to it. Bror was a bit shorter, thick-set and hairy. His body was toned and strong, traits that would come in handy when they were on Tansa. There was something rugged about Bror that appealed to Taar. Even as they were introducing themselves, he felt his c**k stirring. Taar was somewhere in between—in height, body size, and c**k size. While Bror was half an inch shorter than Taar, he had the largest c**k. Even flaccid, it must have been six inches, and thick. But thoughts of Bror’s c**k were not helping Taar keep his own organ under control. Far from it. “What happens now?” asked Taar, distracting himself from thoughts of Bror. “We wait,” said Tolen. “I guess we wait ‘til they have a full load, then they herd us aboard the space shuttle like cattle and off we go.” “And then?” Tolen and Bror looked at each other. “Don’t know,” said Bror. “No one has ever been there before, have they? And they”—he nodded towards the two guards at the gate—”don’t tell us anything.” “We just stay cooped up in here, then?” asked Taar. “Looks like it,” said Tolen. “Nothing else has happened so far since I’ve been here.” As the light from outside the three small windows of the holding cell dwindled, the eighty or so men inside began to settle down for the night. Space was at a premium, with many of the prisoners having to use parts of their neighbour as pillows. In a corner, two men f****d, their low moans creating a sea of erections around them. Taar lay on his side, Tolen in front of him, and Bror behind. As he tried to block out the sounds of passion, he became aware that Bror was also erect, and was rubbing his c**k gently against his arse. His own prick was rigid, yet it had been a long day and an even longer night. He was too tired for s*x, though there was something comforting about the way Bror gently rocked his hips against him. Smiling, Taar closed his eyes and began drifting towards oblivion, but not before he felt the splash of warm c*m on his lightly-haired arse cheeks.