“What on earth are you talking about, Will?” said Jason. He was straining his neck away from the blade. It had already nicked him in a few uncomfortable places, and he could feel blood trickling down his bare chest. “I do not have nanites in my come. Don’t you think that’s the kind of thing a guy would notice?” he hissed.

Will looked at Jason for a moment, head tilted in curiosity. The neural link on Will’s left temple briefly glowed cyan, in tandem with Jason’s. He sighed, the anger dissolving from his frame. He patted Nico on the shoulder and placed a hand, gently, on Nico’s wrist. “He’s not lying.”

With a huff, Nico removed his hand from Jason’s chest. A heartbeat later, reluctantly, Nico withdrew the knife. He tucked the knife back in its hidden sheath on his belt. “Come on,” said Will. The doctor grabbed Jason by the elbow. “Let’s take this somewhere else.”

The way to Cerberus was relatively uneventful. “Cerberus,” said Nico, as they stepped into the ship. The A.I., one of the few with a non-humanoid manifestation, barked. “Human speech, please, Cerberus,” said Nico. “Protocol silenzio.”

Jason didn’t know archaic Italian too well, but he understood it well enough. Silence protocol. One of the few things multilateral agreements between the majority of companies, spacefaring organizations, and the planetary government, the Silence protocol demanded that all ship Artificial Intelligences be programmed to suspend surveillance capabilities on docked ships broadcasting the protocol signal. He was well aware that whatever they said would remain on Cerberus unless they decided to share it with Scipio.

“What were you talking about when you said there were addictive compounds in my come?” said Jason. Nico and Will had taken him to their living quarters and had given him a seat. “Nanites, I doubt,” said Jason, “but addictive compounds? I could be convinced of nanites, don’t get me wrong, but frankly, I can’t think of anywhere those addictive compounds would be coming from.”

Will glanced at Nico, their neural links blinking and flashing under their skin. “Better you see for yourself,” said Will, with a heavy sigh. Will picked up a hand-held screen projector. The four quarters of the silvery cube flew apart, projecting a holographic screen in the rectangle between them.

“See this?” said Will, pointing at a document that Jason could only assume was the collated data the doctor had managed to gather from his semen. “That’s an addictive compound. One of the most dangerous. It’s been outlawed on C-Vita Lyrae since planetary government was established and borrowed the earth charter of laws.”

Jason could barely even read the name of the compound, but he faintly remembered having seen the name in a document somewhere. He just couldn’t remember which document it was, exactly. “It gets worse than that,” said Nico, begrudgingly. Jason looked at Nico and saw that the tension that had been in the other man’s shoulders had melted away. It seemed that Nico was finally convinced of Jason’s innocence.

Will pointed at another name, slightly familiar to Jason, but for reasons he couldn’t properly recall. “This compound,” said Will, after pointing to four others, “and these, are known components of a classified military-grade drug used to not only induce receptiveness to instructions, but also dependence on the person that is perceived to have administered it.”

“Do you have any idea why the military classified this drug?” said Will, “Because there was an unprecedented consensus between the Collective government on Earth, as well as the Lunar, Venusian, and Martian planetary governments that the drug was too dangerous to use even in military operations.”

“I hope you’re not taking any offense to me right now, Jason,” said Will. “But you have to understand. Your come is potent. That thing you thought Octavian was doing to tide him over when you weren’t around? That was because he was going to experience withdrawal without your come.”

“The boy’s life is fucking ruined, Jason,” said Will. “Kahale won’t be happy when he learns about this, no matter how enthusiastically he endorsed the whole agreement between you and Octavian while Octavian was working for you.”

“And now you’ve done it to Percy,” said Nico. There wasn’t a hint of sympathy on the son of Hades’ voice. There was something cold and mildly threatening about the words, too. The Neural link revealed the words that had been left unsaid. “You better fucking hope you don’t ruin his life, too.”

“What can I do about it? What can we do about it?” said Jason. There was a tremor in his voice that he was so unaccustomed to hearing. What had just been revealed certainly explained the desperate phone calls from his intermittent sexual partners that he had never had the time to properly answer.

What Will’s findings didn’t explain was why the calls just stopped coming. Will looked at Nico, again, twiddling his thumbs nervously. “Well, the thing is, I can get rid of the nanites but at best that will only reduce the amount of both substances that you produce, and the rate at which you produce it.” Will stood up and patted Jason on the shoulder. “Have you ever noticed that you could eat much more than other people and not really gain any weight?”

“Well, yeah,” said Jason. He looked over at Nico, who offered little more in support than a nonchalant shrug. “I always thought it was just genetics. Zeus never seemed to have trouble burning off fat. I know he eats like a king and loves it, but he never gets any bigger.”

“Well,” said Will, with a nervous chuckle. “The thing is, it probably is genetics. Only, it’s likely not the kind of genetics you’re going to want to have in your body.” Will squeezed Jason’s shoulder. “How long has it been since your last biometric scan?” said the doctor.

“Well,” said Jason. “I’m a conscientious objector, like Percy,” he said. Will smacked his forehead with the palm of his hand. “The last biometric scan I had was a superficial one, only to confirm my identity with surface features, while my neural link was being installed.” Jason bit his lower lip. “The last full biometric scan I had to endure was back when I still lived with Zeus at Hellene HQ.”

Nico and Will shared another nervous look, as they had been wont to do over the last few minutes. “Well, you better get your ass to Cerberus’ medbay,” said Will. “We have to do one right now.”

Percy genuinely felt conflicted when the weight on the bed behind him left. He missed the hands that had been rubbing his shoulders, and, frankly, some small part of him also missed the cock that had been rubbing up and down the cleft of his ass. Still, that did not change the way that Percy felt torn between disgust and happiness.

Percy was nauseous. He couldn’t believe what had just happened to him. What he had just let happen. How much of it had he actually wanted, and how much of it had he done to stay in Jason’s good graces? He didn’t know, and the fact that he didn’t made him sick to his stomach.

Percy still tasted Jason’s come on his tongue, the salty-sweet flavour of it mingled with the taste of his own. Only, the sweetness had long since disappeared, leaving behind a bitter note that Percy felt was only too apt to describe his current state of mind.

Percy traced his fingers down his side, shivering as they followed the path that Jason’s had tread so many times during their ‘session.’ He traced the curve of his ass, remembering the way that Jason caressed it. “Fuck,” he whispered to himself in the darkness. His fingers dipped into the cleft of his ass and massaged his hole. “What am I doing?” he said, with a bitter laugh.

Percy felt both loved all over and violated. He couldn’t explain the feeling, nor could he even fully wrap his head around it. It was strange. It was alien. It made him afraid.

Percy whimpered. Even alone, thoughts of Jason tormented him. He imagined the older man fingering him, pressing a single finger in, and then two. Percy gasped as he breached himself with a third finger, his cock rising between his legs.

Percy licked his lips. His mind’s eye was captured by the thought of Jason’s thick cock in his mouth. He was salivating. He stretched his hole, moving his three fingers apart. He hissed and then whimpered at the burning, but satisfying, pain.

“Gods,” Percy thought to himself, lips parting in a moan. In his mind’s eye, he was licking Jason’s cock, he was sucking the pre-come right out of it. “I want it in me,” he thought to himself. Percy whimpered, the fingers in his ass shaking as his mind’s eye changed the scene.

Percy imagined himself on his back, his legs in the air, ass exposed to the heavy thick cock that was rubbing against his. “Daddy,” he panted, to the empty room. “Fuck me,” he said, “please.”

In Percy’s fantasy, Jason plunged into him. As in his daydream as in real life, Percy’s cock started to spew come onto his chest. He whimpered and shuddered, toes curling in pleasure as his spontaneous orgasm washed over him without so much as a stroke of his hard cock.

When it was all over, Percy gasped for breath, tears stinging at his eyes. “What is happening to me?” he said, to no one in particular, biting back the sobs that threatened to spill from him.

Jason swung his legs over the side of the medical cot that Will had commanded him, in no uncertain terms, to lie naked in. Granted, Jason wasn’t about to complain about the appreciative looks that Will shot his way, mirrored, albeit begrudgingly, by Nico.

Jason liked knowing that he was at least attractive enough to draw the attention of the very tightly—or loosely, depending on who was asked—committed couple. Anyway, whatever levity had been in the room at the beginning of the scan had practically been leached out of the air. Will had started frowning as soon as the preliminary results had come in, and the frown had only deepened since.

Nico was pacing back and forth, neural link surprisingly devoid of the tell-tale blinking of a person responding to messages. Jason looked with concern and worry at Will. He was well aware that the doctor and Nico were rarely apart, mentally, if not physically. “It’s much worse than I thought,” said Will. There was a weariness in his shoulders as he turned around to face Jason and Nico.

Nico frowned and walked over to Will’s side. Jason watched, anxious, as Nico wrapped his arms around Will’s waist. “I thought that maybe you were producing the necessary elements and the nanites were in charge of assembling the compounds, but I was wrong.”

Will splayed his fingers over the holographic clipboard he held in his hands. He drew his fingers together as though he was clutching a ball. The projection turned into a spherical bundle of light which Will subsequently threw on the wall nearest to Jason. “Your prostate and seminal vesicles have been hijacked, basically. You yourself are producing the compounds, and the nanites are, as far as I can tell, only there to fix malformed compounds and boost production by excreting hormones.”

“I can help you get the nanites out real quick with a localised EMP,” said Will, “but like I said the problem is genetic.”

Will motioned with his hand, and the holographic screen shifted to show an image of Jason’s body. Will flicked his wrist, and suddenly, Jason was looking at a very red image of himself. “What does this mean, Will?” said Jason. He felt the bed sink beside him as Nico took a seat, Will in his lap.

“Hate to break it to you, buddy,” said Will. A heartbeat later, Jason felt a hand squeezing his shoulder. “Red shows every cell that currently carries the genetic instruction to produce the compounds. Blue is supposed to show the cells that have your original genetic code—or at least what’s in the registry,” said the doctor.

“Literally every cell in your body had its genetic code replaced at one point, and now, what’s in the registry, which still matches except for the parts that we didn’t know about until now, isn’t stored anywhere on your body.”

“Wait, wait,” said Jason. “That makes no sense. How could someone change my entire genetic code without me noticing?” Jason pursed his lips and looked at the floor. The hand on his shoulder was both comforting and aggravating. “We didn’t even have the technology to add instructions to DNA without damaging the prior structure until it was invented on C-Vita Lyrae.”

“Well,” said Will. He looked at Nico, as though asking for permission. Nico just grunted and waved him on. “That’s where you’re wrong, Jason. Remember when you hired me as the medical contractor for Pantheon Industries and the New Rome fleet?”

Jason frowned, not sure what Will’s employment contract had to do with his present condition. “Reyna told me that as, technically, the highest ranking medical officer of a branch of the company directly subsidized by the government that I had security clearance to classified military-grade medical information.”

“So,” said Will, twiddling his thumbs nervously again, “I took her word for it and accessed Collective government files. We had the technology long before we arrived at C-Vita Lyrae. It was the Hellene group that introduced the commercial version of it, and they were only able to because they were directly affiliated with earth military.”

“You say it makes no sense that someone was able to modify your entire genetic code without you noticing,” said Will. “I’ll give you that. You’re right. It makes no sense unless…”

Jason frowned. Then, he felt like puking as the horror of what Will had just shared dawned on him. “ARKIII,” he whispered. “That fucker did it to me on the way here.”