Celeste
⌛Chapter Twelve⌛

Celeste was awake at four in the morning.

She had to be at work in two hours. She wasn’t particularly tired, and as much as she loves to sleep, she’s been known to be up for days on end with naps in between.

She was fine sitting on the floor, her tablet in her hands. Zinnia was sitting on the couch, and Celeste was between her legs. Zinnia was braiding Celeste’s hair in a neat style. Apparently, Celeste had a meeting later in the day and she wanted to look presentable and like she wasn’t going to have a long day.

This was mostly why she takes a lot of days off. The thought of working twelve hour shifts and then going to meetings right after made her tired.

She was upset that someone was messing with one of her newer engines. It was a project that she had done flawlessly- like usual- and now she’s getting word that someone from the Department of Defense has more interest in the parts than they’re supposed to. She doesn’t like when people mess with her things.

“You’re quiet.” Zinnia said as she parted Celeste’s silver hair.

“I’m trying to decide if I want to yell during this meeting or be pleasant.” she said.

She had all day to decide, but maybe she wouldn’t be stressed out if she knew how to handle it. Yelling was the easier option. But maybe she shouldn’t use that as the first option.

“What happened?” Zinnia was curious. After all, she was woken up a little earlier than she would like.

“I don’t know which sector it was, but they high jacked one of the domestic planes to reverse engineer the engines. Now they’re mad at me because they can’t get it to work.” she definitely was upset about that. “I don’t know who authorized that sort of stupid shit, but I would hope they’re smart enough to understand that commercial use engines aren’t going to be as useful for whatever they need it for.” she ranted. “And another thing, I don’t understand why it had to be my-”

Zinnia put her hand on Celeste’s shoulder. “You’re going to give yourself high blood pressure.” she said calmly.

Celeste sighed. “Lately I feel like people are just yanking me into that department. If I wanted to work for them, I would’ve done it already.”

Zinnia brushed Celeste’s hair gently, hoping that would calm her down. Celeste was grumpy, which wasn’t uncommon in the morning, but she had a reason. Zinnia thought she needed to talk about something else, something that makes her happy.

“You never told me how it was with Dri when you went up to space.” she said calmly, a smile on her face. “You only told me about the blue prints and being out in the void, but he was there with you, wasn’t he?” she had to have details.

Celeste turned abruptly and looked up at Zinnia. Did Celeste forget to tell her the details? She swore that she talked about what happened with Zinnia. It’s not like she was keeping it a secret. She definitely didn’t want to keep it a secret. Zinnia wasn’t sure why Celeste looked so shocked.

“I didn’t tell you he fucked me?” she asked.

Zinnia’s mouth dropped. “No!”

“Yes!” Celeste smiled widely.

“Well! How was it?” Zinnia needed details.

“The first time hurt like hell.” Celeste turned back around so Zinnia could continue braiding her hair. “The other times got much better after that.” she emphasized, because it definitely was much better than the first, but Celeste wasn’t going to say she didn’t enjoy herself.

“Did you have to teach him?” Zinnia wouldn’t be surprised if that’s what happened.

Celeste turned again and gave her a sly look. “I’ll just say that he has a lot to brag about.” she smiled again when Zinnia’s eyebrows raised with surprise. “I was so happy, Zinnia, you should’ve seen me.”

“Yeah, I bet.” that didn’t surprise her. “You’ve been talking about getting in his pants for a while now. I’m glad it finally happened.” she said as she pulled Celeste’s hair back gently. “You deserve better though, he took so long.”

“Trust me, I got what I deserved.” Celeste didn’t need anymore than that.

“You need to stop being horny all the time.”

“Do you think he’s busy? I wonder if he’ll come over.” Celeste wanted to call him. She never really took Dri seriously when he said he wasn’t going to be available for some time.

He always picks up when it’s her, even if it’s inconvenient.

It was early in the morning, but he did say he would have a few hours off before he had to leave again. Celeste caught him at a good time because he just got back.

“Can I help you ladies?” he asked them both.

Zinnia smiled slyly because she knew the truth and she wasn’t going to hide it. She moved down lower to get a better image of Dri on Celeste’s tablet. “Heard you fucked my girlfriend.” She said bluntly.

“Multiple times.” Dri replied with a straight face.

“I’m in love.” Celeste smiled widely as she swooned. She was so in love with them.

“You said you were tired, Celeste.” Dri was sure she was complaining before. He thought she would have taken the day off.

“She came back a mess, Dri. Was that your doing?” Zinnia asked.

Celeste turned back to her. “He had me in a choke hold earlier. Best experience of my life.” she smiled dearly, her eyes sparkling with excitement.

“Celeste.” Dri got her attention again. “I like you, I really do, but you’re not going to tell Zinnia about all of our encounters, are you?” he asked, and he didn’t think that question needed to be private but he rethought that immediately.

He saw Zinnia smile just as widely as she did. It wasn’t that much of a problem, but he didn’t think he needed his performance judged.

“Encounters is a clean way to put it.” Zinnia said. “Are you a prude, Dri?”

He almost gasped at the question. He wasn’t sure what type of person he was, but he was sure he wasn’t a prude. He did prove himself, didn’t he? Celeste could definitely answer that question for him, but he spoke up instead. “Someone has to put Celeste to sleep when she’s saying all that garbage.”

Celeste had stars in her eyes.

“Come over.” Celeste said.

“No threesome.” Zinnia warned her.

Dri choked on air. They really did have conversations like that. He was surprised. Maybe he was a prude in comparison to them. As much as he knew they could be blunt, he didn't believe they would casually talk about everything. Celeste and Zinnia were both laughing at him because of his shocked expression. He wasn’t flustered but he didn’t exactly brush it off either.

“Yeah, I’ll come over.” he said, though he didn’t sound too happy about it.

It didn’t take much longer than half an hour for Dri to show himself. Celeste’s hair was almost done. It was the fanciest she’s ever done it, well Zinnia did it for her. Celeste wasn’t much for dressing herself up. Her wardrobe consistent of mostly black and white, and she always kept her hair down, always straightened. If she ever had to present herself in a different light, Zinnia took care of that for her, found her something to wear, helped her with her hair. Celeste definitely needed it. Dri was surprised to see her hair so neatly done, braided back in intricate twists, but it wasn’t done yet, and Zinnia wouldn’t let either of them touch her hair until it was.

Dri was still in uniform. He only had a few hours before he had to go back in again. He thought about going to sleep, but he was with Celeste, and she knows how to keep people occupied. She takes up all of people’s time. Sometimes on purpose, sometimes not.

She was easy to talk to. She was blunt. But that also made people scared. Could they handle what she thought about them? Or the truth? She told calls it like she sees it, and she won’t hold back.

“Which sector messed up my engine?” she asked him.

“Four.” Dri answered without thinking about it. Should he have said anything? Celeste was going to find out sooner or later. “Have you met Prism yet?” Dri asked. When Celeste shook her head, he sighed. “She can be...she’s nice and all, but she doesn’t do things right. She wanted to get the whole ‘let’s send fighter jets to Britain and fuck them up’ plan, but as you can see she went about it the wrong way.” he explained.

“The department literally has engineers for that.”

“She found out you’re the daughter of the Head of Defense. She basically just wants to get you out there for her.” he shrugged.

Celeste sighed miserably and covered her face with her hands. Her torture will never end. She knew it was a bad idea to work there for that specific reason.

“If she wants to contract me privately, I’m all for it.” Celeste wasn’t against the idea entirely. “But guess who’s going to have to approve that?” she already knew and so did Dri.

“You can’t exactly turn down a job.” Zinnia said. “The System is about to put you as dependent, and you can’t be dependent on me. You like to live high and mighty.”

“How are you this irresponsible?” Dri asked her.

Celeste shrugged and looked away. She doesn’t like working anymore, and lately it’s been hard since she’s trying to decide what to do. She hasn’t told either of them what she’s considering, more so because she wants to make the decision herself.

“So, there’s a war going on?” Zinnia was interested to change the subject to the possible state of the world.

“The tension is bad.” Dri said. “Europe is testing our patience.” he seemed frustrated with it. “If we make one wrong move, I’m sure it will be full on war.”

“Hm.” Zinnia mashed her lips together.

There was something on her mind, but she didn’t say what it was. Though, the look on her face said that she had a few things to say. Dri was looking at her, and he wasn’t curious. He was cautious. She always did ask questions like that.

He remembered that she made a comment once. She believed that it wasn’t all of Europe that was part of the tension.

He didn’t know how she knew that, but she knew, and that was a problem. Celeste wouldn’t be the one to tell her that because Celeste doesn’t care. Even right now, she was staring at her tablet, their words going right into her ears but she wasn’t understanding any of it. She didn’t care.

“As much as I would love to continue this conversation,” Celeste really didn’t, “I need to see you later tonight to upgrade your implant.” she said to Dri. “I’m working on a test upgrade with Clover and I need to see if it works-”

“Test?”

“Yeah, like a trial.” Celeste said plainly though he was a little surprised. “If it doesn’t work on you, I won’t try it on Zinnia-”

“Okay, I know I said I’d be a test subject-”

“Dri, you have no idea how quickly I can fix a mistake with you. You literally have two systems in you, I can catch a malfunction in seconds.” Celeste wasn’t that concerned for him. “Zinnia doesn’t have that luxury.”

“You’re going to be a robot soon.” Zinnia told Dri as she put her hands on Celeste’s shoulders. “I’m done.” When Celeste lifted her hand to touch her hair, Zinnia gently put her hand back down. “Please, don’t. You’ll pull the knots out.” she said.

Celeste didn’t think she was that much for all the different hairstyles, and she wasn’t. She most often hated them. She dealt with it when she needed to, like right now. Zinnia had put bright clips in Celeste’s hair, and they shined even under the low lighting. For once, her hair wasn't draped over her shoulders, it was up and braided neatly into a popular style.

“I can’t wait to take this out.” Celeste had to fight the urge to not touch her hair.

“You look beautiful,” Dri said kindly to her, and he meant it.

“Flirting with our girlfriend?” Zinnia wasn’t really impressed. “She knows she’s hot, Dri. Do better.”

Celeste was warned to be pleasant. She was warned to be polite. She was warned to not yell because she would be surrounded by people holding weapons.

She was warned.

She never listens.

A large group of people moved aside as she walked towards the plane they crowded around. It wasn’t a hot day, there was a chill in the winter air, but the sun was out, and the heat was enough to keep everyone warm enough. Celeste had diamonds in her hair and they shined bright under the sunlight. When people heard Celeste was here, the word definitely traveled up to the sector four leader in training.

She wanted to show Celeste what she wanted. But for some reason, she thought Celeste would just do it. sᴇaʀᴄh thᴇ ꜰindNʘvel.ɴet website on Gøøglᴇ to access chapters of novels early and in the highest quality.

Prism was not warned about Celeste. She was not warned that Celeste always gets her way. She was not warned that Celeste will say no if she does not want to do something.

Celeste doesn’t get bossed around. She doesn’t do things for people just because they want her to do it.

If it’s work, she needs something in return.

“Boys.” Celeste walked by the group. They were watching her, some of them stunned. Others gawked at her.

Celeste seemed to have that power over a lot of people. She flaunted it, too. That kind of confidence made people want her. A few of them had seen her around. The men made comments, whispering to their friends about wanting a chance to talk to her to make their move.

“Ladies.” she saw a few women in the mix and smiled at them. She had a tendency to turn on her charm more for women. She couldn't help it.

She liked them, too.

Once she got far enough in the center of the group of people she stopped and looked around. “Who messed up my engine?” she asked loudly.

One woman raised her hand at the question without hesitation. Was that the sector leader Dri told her about this morning? Prism was a tall woman, just as tall as Celeste was. She was wearing her uniform, like she was just leaving for a mission. There were weapons strapped on her, though that didn’t scare Celeste when she saw her. Her hair was pitch black and tied back neatly, her eyes a fierce grey.

She smiled at Celeste, and she wanted to make her intentions clear and polite as possible.

Celeste only looked nice because she thought this would be done inside, but Prism was expecting a last minute fix.

“You’re in charge?” Celeste asked, gesturing to Prism. “Where’s your sector leader-”

That caught Prism off guard. “I’m-”

“Who do you run things by?” Celeste was sure that none of the trainees were calling the shots yet. Prism was about to answer, but it wasn’t going to be the answer Celeste wanted. “Look, I don’t think this was a good bait trick.”

“I just want to ask for your services, Celeste.” Prism said calmly.

“Do you know who you have to go through to get that approved?” Celeste asked. Prism did know the answer to that. “Great. You also know that Sirus is my father as well and not only will he tell you no, he’ll light your entire sector on fire.” Celeste didn’t want it to be a threat.

“I didn’t ask other engineers because I like your work. You’re telling me that you don’t want to do anything for this department?” Prism tried to reason with her.

“I’m telling you that I can’t.” Celeste said. She didn’t waver, she didn’t try to make it seem like she could bargain for anything. She didn’t want to talk about it.

Someone had walked up behind Celeste. The woman was much older, and had a gold badge on her chest. She was the sector leader of the group. She wasn’t sure who was standing in front of her because the hair wasn’t a give away, but she heard Celeste’s voice. It’s hard to miss when she’s upset.

“Celeste?” she asked anyway just to be sure. When Celeste turned, the woman smiled. “Wow, it’s been so long since I’ve seen you.” she walked up to them. “Where’d you run off to?” she asked.

“I got my own place, Alya.” Celeste said.

“You’ve been on your own that long?” she was surprised. “Wow, I must be getting old.”

“Definitely with those grey streaks in your hair.” Celeste pointed out.

"Anyway," Alya chose to let that comment go. “What can I do for you? I heard you were causing a commotion.” she said and put her hands on her hips. “You’re definitely your daddy’s daughter with that temper.”

“I am not mad.” Celeste tried to say calmly as she glanced at Prism. “I just want to make it clear that I do not work here, I am not in this department, and I don’t do work under the system.” she made that clear. “I cannot help with making fighter jet engines unless approved by the department head.”

Alya snorted at the comment. “Yeah, that’s not going to happen.” she already knew that. “It was a nice try though, Prism. Just wish you wouldn’t have been so abrupt about it.” Alya shrugged.

Celeste took a deep breath, more so to calm herself down though it wasn't working that well. She was getting anxious and her heart was racing. She thought this would’ve gone more smoothly, but she just found out that Alya was okay with what just happened.

“Where’s Dri?” Celeste asked abruptly. Alya was about to make a comment but Celeste talked first. “I just need to do an upgrade on his arm before sector one leaves.” She didn’t want Alya to get too excited.

Alya pointed Celeste in the right direction to find Dri. Lucky for her, he wasn’t with the entire group so it was easy to pull him away. She took down her hair and pulled the clips out with it. Her hair brushed over her shoulders and back in wavy curls that she didn’t have time to fix. Now that she could actually run her hand through her hair, she felt better. Dri didn’t say anything as Celeste led them somewhere quiet.

It was warmer inside. Celeste’s hair covered her ears. She was seconds away from pushing the front strands behind them.

They sat down together and Dri extended his arm out for Celeste to look at.

“Get your way with Prism?” Dri asked her.

“I don’t know what the deal is but everyone is pissing me off lately.” Celeste said, more angry with herself because she was letting her temper get the best of her. “I don’t work here. I don’t want to work here. There’s not a possibility for me to work here.”

She was saying that to herself mostly, reminding herself why she didn’t work here in the first place. As long as she understood that, then she could handle anyone that got in her way.

“I believe you.” Dri said.

“Good.”

At least that was the end of that.

“I’m going to put a modified system on your arm, but hopefully it works through your tablet.” She said. “The goal is to broaden the range of the implant’s system and allow for..." she thought of the best way to explain it, "...flexibility.”

“Whatever that means.” Dri didn’t care about all that nonsense. He just let Celeste do her work.

“With this, I’ll immediately see a change.”

“You don’t have to monitor me so hard.” Dri laughed quietly.

“I do when I know shit like this is testy.” Celeste had to cover everything and be sure she can catch a malfunction. “I need to make sure I don’t kill you or Zinnia.”

“You’re not going to kill us.” Dri believed that wasn’t Celeste’s intention and it wasn’t.

Celeste created something good.

“It’s pretty neat.” Dri said to her. “Do you know what it’s like to see every exact detail like it was the first time? It’s great.” He liked it.

A lot.

He used it everyday because he could. It helped with work sometimes. Clearly a lot of information is being thrown at him at once, but now he has a quick way to remember everything he saw.

And of course he would spend his free time remembering moments he’s had with Celeste.

He definitely liked feeling his heart flutter with her around, not it was happening more often because he tries to see her more.

“I’m glad you like it.” Celeste looked up to him. “Don’t overuse it.”

Dri laughed to himself. He’ll use it as much as he wants to and she can’t stop him. Celeste didn’t say anything but she figured Dri was going to use it as much as he could. That wasn’t surprising.

“Where’s your next mission?” She asked.

“We’re going to Spain.” Dri said. “Apparently they’ve been trying to get on our side for a while now, but you know how Europe is.”

Celeste didn’t. She chose not to get involved.

“You should take me sometime.” Celeste said. “My Spanish is spot on...well,” she looked away for a second, “I’ve been told that my dialect is aggressive and obnoxious, but I didn’t learn it in school so there’s that.” She laughed to herself.

“I’ll take you up on that.” Dri was interested.

He’d take her anywhere.

Celeste shrunk the hologram when she was done. The system began glowing pink once complete and she restored his normal settings.

She could monitor him while he was away.

She figured he’d be gone for at least two weeks this time, so it’s a good way to watch him without nagging him every second of the day.

“Before you leave...” Celeste was going to suggest something provocative and Dri knew by the expression on her face.

She had a sultry look in her maroon eyes and smiled at him, flirting. If Dri was going to go away for some time, she might as well give him something to remember.

She came closer to him, just about straddling his lap because she wanted to.

“I have twenty minutes, Celeste.” It didn’t sound like he believed he could actually do something with her in twenty minutes.

She didn’t think the same way, especially with how she sat on him. “Think I can’t ride you for twenty minutes?”

That was the question.

Dri swallowed thickly as he looked up at her. The thought was definitely there. She hadn’t even done anything yet and he was already hard. His hand was resting on her thigh, but if he wanted to, he could just move it inward more to brush up against her.

What was he going to do with her?

What was he going to do to her?

“Don’t cum, okay?” She smiled and winked at him as she slowly moved her hips.

Twenty minutes wouldn't be that long. Two weeks wouldn't be that long either. At least, to Celeste. To Dri, not so much. He might be the one to replay his memories but it's not going to be like the real thing. Two weeks might be too long, so he was going to enjoy these twenty minutes.

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