So, I tried to tie it to the actual fires, and thought it'd be interesting to do differing perspectives throughout. Probably needs some editorial love - kill all the darlings, etc. Feel free to do so, or to do anything else needed to make it eligible.
A Bored Utopia
By Grumpy
(MF)
Hestia peered down through the gold-trimmed marble and ethereal clouds. She sighed loudly as she pointed to yet another earthly tree which instantly caught on fire. The orange flame and pitch-black clouds used to be beautiful to her, but even their beauty had faded. So many years had passed since the last time anything interesting happened in The Realm of Gods. Decades. Centuries. Millennia. Not a single human had ascended for six hundred years, and even then, that was just some tired old philosopher. Hestia pointed to another tree and giggled a little as the top of it crumbled and curled downward as the flames blasted it. She fell back on her chaise lounge and her long black hair followed to drape across her sharp face. She made no effort to remove it – what was the point, she thought. Instead she closed her eyes. Her mind conjured up images far more interesting than anything down below.
A man with a chiseled jaw and strong arms appeared behind her closed eyes. He was smiling at her and carrying a whole pig over his shoulders. Hestia bit her lip and let go of whatever little held her knees together to have them fall apart. The silk covering her up drifted apart with her knees and she slid her hand down her crotch. She consciously inhaled a long deep breath as she touched her clit with an expert finger. The man walked closer to her, but the smile had disappeared from his lips. He was saying something to her – his eyes distraught and desperate. Hestia paused her touching. This was her fantasy, why was it not doing what she wanted it to? She shook the thought and continued her touching, admiring the man. He was strong, his chest impervious to arrows, his arms of steel. He threw the pig off his shoulders and to the side. Hestia moaned, anticipating the man ravaging her right there. The man tackled her to the ground as a pillar of gold fell where she had just stood. She paid intimate attention to his lips as they moved, imagining their taste.
Luke downed the bottle of water and wiped his brow from the sweat. He picked up another bottle and splashed half of it on his face before taking yet another swig from it. He was panting. Now seven hundred meters away from the nearest fire, it was still close enough that there was nothing else to smell than burning, ashes, and smoke. He could feel the heat on his face. The thirty-minute break would be over fast, but without it, they’d all faint out there in the forest. It was his eighth hour on shift, and he would be on for at least another six before any sort of relief came. His arms were sore, his legs were burning, and his back was killing him. But it was necessary. The fire would consume everything without firefighters like him. It would destroy countless lives and livelihoods, and surely be the demise of any semblance of nature wherever it passed through.
“Luke,” his chief called out as he walked past and tossed him a sandwich. Luke caught it and ate it quick. He was hoping for a few minutes of sleep before being called back into action. He propped himself up against his folded jacket and drifted off to sleep.
“Worship me, Luke. I am your goddess!” A soft, yet demanding voice called out to him as his vision went black. He whipped his head around to see a being wrapped in light. A woman. A beautiful woman with long black hair and a youthful face. As his eyes adjusted to her light, he began to see through it. She was naked and- Oh, she was gorgeous! Perfect, even. He reached out to her, and as his hands touched her skin, he felt electricity beneath his fingertips. He cupped her breasts, and the woman moaned tilting her head back.
“Oh, Luke!” she said, “Be my lover, Luke.”
Luke traced her chest up to her neck and wrapped his hands around the back of her head. He tried to look into her eyes, but they were elusive, and he could not find them no matter how hard he searched. Her lips said his name again and he leaned in for a kiss. He met her lips with his own and-
“Get up! Come on, time’s a runnin’ Luke!” his chief shouted as he poked him in the chest with his boot. The older man with a white mustache leaned down to him while the other firefighters got up and ready. “Son, you might want to stuff that one away before you get up,” he said and nodded down to Luke’s pants. Luke looked down and saw the tent he had pitched.
“Fuck!” Luke said as he instinctively sat up and bent his legs to cover it up. His chief laughed and went on his way. That had been a weird dream. The weirdest he had experienced in a long time. Maybe ever. He thought of the woman in the dream. He could still see her, vividly, like he had seen it for real. He tried to shake the image and get rid of his boner and succeeded just as the trucks were about to leave again.
Hestia arched her back and released the breath she had been holding in. She was just about to orgasm as the man disappeared from her view. The warmth in her body died down, and no matter how she tried, her fingers couldn’t make her feel good anymore. She stopped trying and laid back down. It was always like this. She would see the man of her dreams, have intimate and passionate moments with him, then he would disappear and take her arousal with him.
Hestia screamed up at the skies in frustration. Why did they make her like this? Why was she the virgin? She didn’t want to be! When no answer came back from above – it never did – she rolled over to watch the earth down below again. The fire was bigger now. She sighed and pointed to a bush, which instantly caught on fire. A fire truck rolled up not far from it and the tiny people got out from it and got to work. Hestia rolled her eyes at them. Always trying to beat the gods at their own game and never succeeding. Fools. She paused to watch them work in vain. There was a farm building nearby that would burn if they didn’t get a move on – Hestia wondered if the men would get to it in time. It was like a game. She bet against the tiny people. There was a line of burning trees between them and the farmhouse that they’d have to get through first, and with the fire spreading as it did, there was no way they’d put it out fast enough.
She saw the men struggle with the same realizations as they tried to fight the flames toward the farmhouse. She saw them douse the ground and trees in water that evaporated in an instant. She saw them give up and she sighed. She won again. Then a man stopped in front of it. Hestia raised her brow – what would happen now? He looked up at the sky. Hestia nearly fell off her chaise. It was him! The man! From her fantasies! She saw him charge into the flames and she shouted for him to stop, but she could not be heard down there. Quickly she tried to move the fire out of his way as best she could as he leapt through trees and bushes. Don’t die!
Luke saw the farmhouse on the other side of the tree line. There was no way they’d make it in time. But they had to try. Everyone fought to push the fire back. To save the farmhouse. Everyone should be evacuated by now, but it is someone’s livelihood that will go up in smoke if they don’t save it. Sure enough, even with a dozen firefighters fighting the line, the progress was too slow. They had to change priorities.
Luke paused and contemplated why all this was happening. He looked up to the sky. It was filled with black smoke and orange embers. In the corner of his eye, he saw movement. Through the tree line he could see something move. Without thinking, he rushed forward, toward the fire. He leapt over the first burning log, and felt the insane heat penetrate his thick clothing as he kept going. The bushes and debris seemed to bend out of his way ever so slightly as he continued, and when he emerged on the other side, he knew he should’ve been severely burned. But he patted himself down and could feel no injuries.
He whipped his head to where he had seen movement before, and he ran toward the barn. He traced its wall until he came around the other side where two koalas sat idle, waiting for the inevitable. They looked at him as though they didn’t understand what he was. Luke approached the creatures, who didn’t doubt his sincerity – they had nothing left to lose, Luke thought. He lifted them up, one on each shoulder, and made his way back to the front of the barn. His mind was racing, trying to come up with ways to get back to his team, or otherwise get out. He couldn’t run through the flames with these two.
A sound made him pause. Soft, yet demanding. He looked up to see a woman in a white dress which was singed at the edges and covered in soot. She was standing at the brink of the fire, looking straight at him. She was smiling at him.
“Hey! Get away from there!” Luke yelled. He got closer. A crack to his left. A tree was breaking in two. It would crush her. “Hey! Move!” he yelled again and started running at her. Another crack and the whining of wood fibers tearing apart had him sprinting. He let the koalas down to the ground and tackled the woman away from where she was standing just as the burning inferno of a tree fell to the ground with a heavy thud. The koalas ran away, too far and too quickly for Luke to catch up to them.
“Are you crazy!? You could’ve died! What the hell are you still doing here?” Luke said as he got on his knees above the woman. She was still smiling, with long black hair covering her shoulders.
“Make love to me,” the woman said. Luke shook his head. She was insane. No wonder she hadn’t evacuated.
Hestia watched intently as the man made his way through the flames and to the barn. She knew he was the one from her dream. She had to have him. Her voice could not be heard on earth, but she could go there by proxy. That would have to do.
As her consciousness left her and entered the shape of a woman down on earth, everything seemed heavier than before. Her limbs, the sights, the smells. They all had a weight Hestia wasn’t used to. She took a step, then another. The dirt under her feet had texture. Not at all like up in the skies. It had been a long time since she had been down on earth. She stepped up to the fire she had created. It burned her leg, making her take a step back. Its beauty was even greater up close, but its prowess and fierceness had increased thousandfold. Hestia turned toward the barn and watched as the man came around, carrying a pig on his shoulders. Except, it wasn’t a pig – it was two smaller animals.
“Beautiful day is it not?” she said. The man paused and looked at her. He looked confused. Maybe he did not hear her. No, he responded. But the crackling of the fire drowned out what he said. He started running at her. Hestia could feel every sensation at once. He knew how she wanted her. He was coming to love her. As he laid her down to the ground, she could feel nothing but ecstasy. She waited for him to rip her dress open. When he didn’t, she thought he might need some encouragement.
“Make love to me,” she said. To her disappointment, the man grabbed her arm and pulled her up to her feet again. What was happening? Why wasn’t he exploring her body with his hands? Why wasn’t his tongue intertwined with hers? Hestia broke free from his hand.
“Are you out of your mind? In open defiance of me? I demand that you love me!” Hestia said and crossed her arms. The man looked at her as if she had said the most ridiculous thing ever. Did he not know that she could have him sent to her brother Hades in a snap of her fingers?
“Listen, lady, I’m sure you can get any man you want, but right now, I just want you to survive, alright?” The man responded.
“No fire can touch us, lover,” Hestia said confidently. The flames closest to them crept away at her request. She touched his cheek. It was warm. Hot as lava.
“If not us, then someone else, and I can’t have that on my conscience. Come on, up you come.” The man gripped her arm and pulled her up to her feet. He dragged her along with him as he explored the edge of the fire, looking for where to go. Was this man more concerned with people he had never met than with her? The idea confused Hestia. She was beautiful and pure, and godly beyond a doubt. This man had never seen a woman such as her before, yet he would choose to cast her away for someone he did not even know existed.
Luke had a few seconds to look the woman over. She was somehow familiar to him, even though he was sure he had never seen her before. In normal circumstances, a woman throwing herself at him like that, he would accept the offer. Especially if the woman in question looked like this one. He scoffed to himself – he had never seen anyone more beautiful than her. It was like she had no flaws at all. Except disregarding the evacuation order, that was.
Luke pulled the woman with him, desperately searching for a way out of the fire. He looked back toward his firetruck. It was getting further and further away as he searched for a safe passage. Just as he spotted a large patch of shrubs that were yet untouched by the flames and ran toward it, it caught on fire as if covered in gasoline. Another hole to his right. He pulled the woman toward that one, and it caught fire as well.
“No way out. Would you not lay with me now? I want you. I know you want me.“ The woman grabbed his hand and put it to her breast. Luke felt electricity flow from his fingertips. “There is nothing else you can do.”
Luke took a desperate look around. She was right, they were surrounded by flames. He was not getting out of there without a miracle, and she – without any protective gear – would not stand a chance. His eyes locked onto hers and the moment he saw the green in them, all sound disappeared. The periphery all faded into white, and he could see nothing but her. The dream! She was the woman from the dream! Luke leaned in and their lips came together.
Hestia’s lips were as soft as velvet, his adventurous, wanting to go further. She let him, and their tongues mixed, chasing each other around eagerly. Hestia felt the warmth come back to her, starting in her crotch and spreading all throughout her. She put a hand on his collarbone and his firefighter outfit fell from him into a void, together with all the soot and sweat. She traced his naked chest with her fingers and moaned into his mouth.
Luke didn’t notice they were both naked until he broke off the kiss and the electricity in his fingers had grown even stronger. He lightly squeezed her perfect tits. She tilted her head back and exhaled. It looked like she had anticipated it for all her life and wasn’t at all disappointed now that it came to pass, thought Luke. He moved himself lower and kissed her left nipple. He rolled the stiffening nipple between his front teeth and licked it greedily. Hestia moaned deeply and ran her fingers through his hair. Luke moved over to her right breast and gave it the same treatment, getting more aroused by the second.
Hestia explored his full, toned body with her hands, taking in every sensation she could. She reached down and wrapped her fingers around his cock. It grew rapidly in her hand as she massaged it back and forth. As if on cue, Luke came off her tits and she floated to her back, and Luke floated atop her. She spread her legs, and her wet pussy opened for him. She nodded to the perfect man on top of her, encouraging him to ravage her.
Luke slid down her body and aligned his cock to her pussy. He rubbed her slit up and down with the head of his cock. He moaned at the sheer pleasure. He couldn’t imagine anything better than what was happening. He had never experienced sex like that before. He aimed the head for her vagina and slowly inched forward. The warmth off her embrace was almost enough to make him cum right away, but he held it off. His eyes wandered up her perfect shape and again the green of her eyes made everything just make sense. He thrusted forward, deeply, burying himself inside her.
Hestia gripped his strong arms as he fucked her. She had never experienced anything like this. The amazing feeling that had always slipped through her fingers was there, and it wasn’t going away – it was stronger than ever before! Each thrust made her let out a high-pitched moan, and each thrust made it harder and harder to keep herself in control. Her legs were starting to shake. Her grip on his arms slipping.
Luke slipped his cock in and out of her welcoming pussy, his hips seemingly moving on their own, as if divined by a higher power. He could see her orgasm building just by the look on her face, and even more so, her body was desperately clawing herself onto him, her arms wrapping around his back, her hips thrusting back at him, her pussy clenching his cock. Just as he thought he could not hold on to his own orgasm anymore, he could feel her whole being starting to shake and spasm. She exploded, screamed into him, yet the sound was soothing and mesmerizing. Without a second to spare, Luke thrusted himself deep into Hestia in an orgasm of his own. His voice growled as rope after rope of semen was slung into her. His hips twitched in sync with hers as they both died in each other’s arms.
Luke broke the kiss and removed himself from the woman. He looked around to see a raging fire, a barn, and a farmhouse. It was like no time had passed since the woman claimed there was no way out. He took a step back, trying to process what had happened and what hadn’t. It had been real, what he just experienced, hadn’t it? It had to have been! It was- It was too real not to have been!
“Thank you, lover,” the woman said. “Come with me,” she continued and took steps toward the fire, intending to walk right into the inferno. Luke shook his head. He knew there was no way out. The fire was closing in on them. But he couldn’t go out like that.
“I can’t. I- I must try,” he replied.
Hestia paused. This mortal was a fool. He could not accept his fate. Besides, he would be living in paradise with her from now on. She sighed.
“What will you do even if you get out of here?” she asked, trying to persuade him to follow her, knowing that it will take a willing sacrifice to make him ascend. She saw his mind working overtime to find a way out.
“Make this fire pay for taking people away from their families and friends – for destroying lives,” Luke responded, picking up a log and trying to turn up dirt to create a path where he could walk. Hestia paused. He would still choose others over her? Was this fire all that? She was just trying to not be bored.
“Is that all you want? For the fire to stop?” She asked, hoping he would say that he wanted her. “If I could make it all go away, would you come with me? If I could make the fire burn out, would you?” Luke shook his head and scoffed and the preposterous statement.
“The only one with that power is the one who keeps it burning, and frankly, if that’s who you are then my answer would be an even bigger ‘no’.”
Hestia bowed her head down to the ground. She understood. He would not follow her no matter what she did. But if she made his wish come true, then maybe when he has outlived his mortal years, he may change his mind. She could wait a lifetime for him. To experience what she just had again, she’d wait a lot longer than a lifetime.
“Then so be it,” she said and the flames in front of Luke dissipated, carving out a road back to his firetruck.
“Hey, there’s a path here! Come on!” Luke shouted and turned back to grab the woman’s hand just to realize she was nowhere to be found. Not a trace of her. He had no time to lose, and took a step onto the path, then another. With each step, the flames around him dissipated a little more, until the entire tree line was as cold as winter. The black clouds slowly disappeared from the sky as the fires all started dying out. A minute later, rain came pouring down all around Luke and his firefighter team. They all celebrated, yet all Luke could think of was the woman. He looked back to where she had been, only to find the two koalas from before in her stead.
