by T. J. Quinn
“I am yours, and you are mine,” Chaytok told her. “Love will grow from this bond between us.”
“I think it already is,” Alexa murmured. She unclasped her legs from around him and put her feet on the bed with her legs bent and thighs spread wide with him cradled between them.
“So do I,” he kissed her at length. After a time he drew back and sighed, then pulled out of her. He laid on his side, and she turned to face him.
Six
Chaytok reached up and pushed her hair back from her face and stroked her cheek with the backs of his fingers. The sun had long set, but he noticed and orange light flickering in the bedroom window. “What's that light?” he asked.
Alexa looked up. “Oh, no! Fire!” She rolled out of bed and ran to the window naked. “It's the barn. I have to get Jetson out.”
She raced to the pile of clothes on the floor and pulled on her jeans and blouse sans underwear and boots without socks. Chaytok pulled on his clothes and weapons belt and followed her as she raced down the stairs. She flipped on the light switches by the door, unlocked it and yanked it opened. Before she could unlock the storm door, a shot rang out and shattered the window in the outer door. Chaytok grabbed her arm and pulled her inside, slamming the inner door shut. Alexa ducked low and flipped off the light. Then bobbed up to peek out the front window.
“It's not the barn,” she murmured to him. “Just a big bonfire in front of it.” She stayed low and moved through the darkened house to another window. From there she could see a car parked a little way down the road. “Looks like Lawrence's car. I figured he was lying.”
“Do you have that shotgun you threatened him with?” Chaytok asked.
“Yes, in the closet with a new box of shells,” she said. “I'm not much of a shot, but I'll get it.” Alexa moved through the darkened house with ease and got the gun out of a small closet under the stairs along with the box of shells. She loaded the five shot twenty gauge pump with shells by the flickering firelight from outside.
“He doesn't know I'm here, and I can see far better than a homo sapien in the dark,” Chaytok said. “Can you take the gun and open the inner door and shoot through the broken window?”
She nodded.
“And stay out of the line of fire... I will go out the back.” He trotted to the back door in the dark, unlocked the back door and drew his weapon. He opened the door and slipped out.
Meanwhile, Alexa went to the front entrance and opened the inner door standing to the side. She pushed the muzzle of the shotgun out the broken storm door window and fired it toward the bonfire, then crouched low on the floor. Momentarily, three shots in succession bored through the thin aluminum door and slammed into the living room sofa. Alexa waited a few seconds, pumped another shell into the chamber, and fired out the broken window again. The gun kicked back, and she almost dropped it as she ducked back behind the wall.
After a few seconds, she heard another weapon fire and saw a bright light flashing in the windows. It stopped for a minute or so then she saw some more flashes, then nothing but the flickering from the bonfire. She thought it must have come from Chaytok's weapon, but she didn't know. She pumped another round into the chamber and let the empty casing fall to the floor. She stayed squatting by the front door and waited, silently praying her lover was safe.
Two long minutes passed then she heard the back door open. She stood up and raised the butt of the gun to her shoulder with the muzzle aimed at the floor. Her whole body was trembling as she waited, hoping.
“Alexa,” Chaytok called. “It's me. He's gone---forever.”
“Oh, my God!” She shuddered in relief. She flicked on the safety and laid the shotgun on the floor. She jogged toward the kitchen and met him in the dining room and threw her arms around him. Chaytok hugged her close. She was horrified that it had come to this with Lawrence but also relieved that it was over.
“You did well, sweet one,” he murmured kissing her hair and nuzzling her neck. “He's gone, and so is his car---nothing left but a couple burn marks on the dirt.”
“He deserved it. He came back to kill me. He set that fire so I would think the barn was burning and come out to save Jetson.” she asserted. “Are you, all right?”
“I'm well,” he said. “I should have killed him the first time for what he did to you... But he is gone now.”
Several sharp bleeps emitted from a pouch on his belt. Chaytok released Alexa, pulled out his tablet and flipped it opened to read the text message. She looked at him expectantly.
“Good news! A freighter will deliver my part to Mars in about a month. They will send a drone with the part for my ship, then we can be on our way,” he said, happily.
“Wow, that's a lot sooner than you expected,” she said thoughtfully as the enormity of leaving planet Earth to start a new life on a colonial world began to set in. It meant she would have to leave Jetson behind. In the two years since she got him, she had become quite attached to him, Tears pricked her eyes at the thought of leaving him.
His face grew serious at her expression. “Do you still want to go?”
She grinned up at him. “Of course, I do!” she murmured fervently and rested her hand on his upper arm. “I just realized that I can’t bring Jetson with me on your ship.”
Chaytok frowned, “You are emotionally attached to the horse.”
“He’s my friend---like a pet or companion animal,” she said.
“I understand. Many people on my world are fond of horses as well. We have imported them for centuries,” Chaytok told her. “When the Alliance first came to your world, riding horses or in wagons pulled by animals was the primary means of transport. Many of our agents developed a fondness for the animals.”
Chaytok thought for a moment, then spoke to his tablet in his language then folded it up and put it back in his pocket. “We can put him in stasis for the journey. I can make room in the cargo bay for him. I will need to send a small tissue sample from him to make sure he carries no diseases to our base here to clear him for transport to Vesta Three.”
“Stasis---what will that do to him?”
“Slow his metabolism, so he will be inactive for the journey, requiring no food or water, nor have need to excrete waste,” he said.
“And that won’t hurt him?”
“It won’t. I ordered the equipment we need to set up a stasis field for him. Horses have been transported this way for centuries, they said,” he told her.
“Is it expensive?”
“Not if it makes you happy, meomee.” He smiled down at her, his eyes sparkling with affection.
She returned his smile and hugged him fervently. “Thank you Chaytok! You make me happy. I’m just sorry that you had to be involved in dealing with Lawrence but glad you were here.”
Seven
He put his arms around her and hugged her back. “Don’t let it trouble you, sweet one. I would defend you with my life---and I am well trained to do so.” As he looked down into her face, he couldn’t resist the invitation of her lips. That was all it took to light the fire of desire between them. “I need you again,” he whispered when their lips parted.
“Yes,” she replied. “I’ve never felt such an intense need for sex before---like I can’t get enough of you.”
“It’s our bonding time,” he explained. “The pheromones are pretty intense for the first 7-10 days. The only way to quell the desire is to mate frequently until the pheromones subside.”
“Sounds like we are in heat,” she said before he kissed her again, running his hands down her back and pressing her buttocks so that she could feel his erection against her belly. “Ooooh,” she cooed. “I think we should go back upstairs for some more bonding---unless you would rather have some food first.” She pressed closer squeezing her breasts against his hard chest.
“You know what I want, and I think it’s what you want as well.”
“Then it’s upstairs, food later.”
Chaytok took her hand and led the way upsta
irs to her bedroom where they helped each other strip off the hastily pulled on clothing. Both were trembling with desire as he moved in to frame her face with his hands. His tender gaze was as a caress as he studied her face. The only sound between them was the quickening of their breath in anticipation of the melding together of their bodies.
First, his lips softly molded to hers, warm and moist, parted inviting his tongue to enter and dance around hers. Then he pulled her tightly against him savoring the sensation of flesh against flesh at every point of contact. It was the balm he needed against the violence of the hour before. He had hoped he would never have to do it again, but he did and he would again to protect his meomee.
If that were the only thing he knew about her, he would love her. She already owned his heart and soul, and all he would ask in return was that she love him as he loved her. He believed she did. The pheromones drawing them together were that powerful. They didn’t just keep his cock hard and aching to be sheathed in her silken center, or make her ache to have him fill her. They also served to pull them together emotionally, so they began to form a real mutual attachment to each other as they mated.
Chaytok kissed her long and slow and deeply while caressing her smooth skin with his hands. He stroked her back and down over her buttocks, lifting her, so his erection pressed against her core, eliciting an ardent moan from Alexa. Holding her there with one arm he used his finger so stroke her breast and tweak her erect nipples alternating his hold on her.
Her pussy was moistly lubricated so that it took little effort for him to slide into her channel by lifting her up so she could wrap her legs around his hips. He just held her there and went on kissing her as he rolled them onto the bed.
He was home where he belonged in her and on her as she wrapped herself around him. War and violence receded from his thoughts as she became his universe---all he needed to make him feel alive and whole. For Chaytok she was love, the love of his life, love that he never truly believed would be his while fighting for his life on that backwater colony far from his home world. Enveloped in her arms, sheathed inside her, was easy to forget everything but the feel of her pleasuring him with her body and putting her heart and soul into it. In those moments, she was everything he ever dreamed and desired, but never believed he could have.
When he finally slowly thrust in and out of her, it augmented his pleasure that he could elicit breathless cries and moans of her sensual enjoyment of his internal caressing where they joined together. Each time he drove his shaft home she hugged him end arched to meet him. He took his time drawing them to the brink of ecstasy then pulling back before they could move over the edge. He wanted to drive away all the earlier horror from both their minds so they would only remember the incredible bliss over what was happening to them.
Alexa writhed in protest after several times of being drawn so close to climax and abruptly pulled back from the edge. Yet she knew as well as Chaytok that anticipation was half the pleasure. When he finally pushed just a little harder and longer, she shouted inarticulately as her whole body was wracked with orgasmic contractions.
“Chay, oh Chay,” she murmured when she could form words again.
They lay joined together, kissing and caressing for a long time after their mutual orgasm waned. Even when he pulled out of her they were reluctant to return to their lonely separateness. Chaytok rolled them to their sides and drew her against him, soothed by the warmth of her skin against his.
“You are so beautiful, meomee!” he murmured and drew the backs of his fingers down across her cheek. “I have never felt so alive---such elation as when our bodies join together. That I found you as I did is beyond my wildest most precious dreams.”
Alexa smiled at him and turned her face to kiss his hand. “You are my wildest dream.” She laughed softly “And here we are.”
This time it was Chaytok’s stomach that growled. It was hours since they shared a light lunch at his ship. It was almost midnight.
“I don’t have a food processor like yours, but I could probably find some eggs and cheese and make some scrambled eggs and toast for midnight breakfast,” she said.
“Anything palatable would be fine,” he said. “I am told that bonding takes a lot of energy.”
“Come keep me company while I cook.” She reluctantly withdrew from his arms and sat on the edge of the bed. She pulled a thin robe off the chair beside her nightstand and slipped it on, tying the belt at the waist.
Chaytok pulled on his shirt and pants again as they were the only clothes he’d brought. They went downstairs to the kitchen together, where Chaytok insisted on helping her. She showed him how to make the toast while she beat together half a dozen eggs.
Within minutes they were sitting together at the table eating. Chaytok complimented her on the palatability of the egg and cheese combination. “I have heard others talk about Earth food with fondness. This is the first I have had,” he added. “There are actually eating places---you would call them restaurants on Narova that specialized in preparing food as it is done here on Earth. You would be very surprised at how many Narovians have been to your world, not just Alliance agents.
“Felines come here often seeking their meomees.”
“How do they even know where to look? There are billions of people on this planet,” she asked.
“They go to places near Alliance bases. It used to be simpler before people on your world became so mobile. Even so, there is a fairly high concentration of sapiens with various levels of feline genes in and around this area.”
“But when the Alliance first began coming here there weren’t humans with feline genes, were there?”
“Honestly, I don’t really know. Felines can fall in love just like humans, and they mate with sapiens or other felines. But to find meomee is the ultimate relationship. It goes far beyond the sexual bonding in the beginning,” he explained. “With your media promoting DNA testing for ancestral origins, the odds improve that the matchmaking service will find meomees more frequently.”
“I’m surprised that the Alliance allowed agents to take mates from the native population,” Alexa said, “Don’t they have something like the “prime directive” policy of non-interference?”
“I’m not sure I understand. The Alliance doesn’t directly interfere in the governing of non-space faring worlds, but it doesn’t prevent its citizens from seeking and finding their fated mates on any lower tech world. Those who are stationed here have always been allowed to recreate off base,” he said. “These days, there are some people who prefer to live on your world rather than in pampered luxury on Narova.”
“Is that why you want to settle on a colonial world?”
“That’s part of it. After being a warrior for so many years, I need to build something for myself and for the family I wanted to make one day,” he said. “I want that even more now that I have found you.
Eight
In the weeks that followed, Chaytok and Alexa divided their time between her home and his ship. The intense sexual part of their bonding lasted the full ten days, though they continued mating almost daily.
Alexa finished up harvest season and listed her property with a realtor. Even before meeting Chaytok, she had transferred all her family photos and music to digital storage so it would be easy to take with her. She was both uncertain and excited about going into space and settling on a colony world in another star system. She was going to do something she never expected to see in her lifetime.
It wasn’t science fiction anymore. She was living it---starting a new life with an alien mate. Occasionally she wondered if the bonding pheromones were keeping her from having second and third thoughts about leaving Earth perhaps for the rest of her life. No, she reminded herself that she had seen his coming. She had only had those dreams a few times in her life, and the difference was always clear to her that none of them were simply wishful thinking.
Chaytok has lots of information and video of Vesta Three an Earthlike world that was at
an earlier stage of development than Earth. It had a Starport and several large towns but no true metropolitan areas. There were native flora and fauna but no sentient beings before it was opened for colonization. The soil and climate in many parts of the world were optimal for growing crops. Alexa thought it too bad that other people from Earth would not get an opportunity to settle on a new world with so much potential. At least she did---new world, new people, new friends and the love of her life.
In less than a month her whole life changed. With her business, it was not unusual to have people stopping by to buy plants and things. She was surprised when a large rental truck arrived. Chaytok was thrilled because the driver was his cousin and dear friend Jeck Fantis. He frowned at first when he saw the tall well-built man striding toward Alexa’s porch. Although he looked sapien, there was something familiar about the way he moved. As he came closer, Chaytok knew.
“Jeck Fantis, is that you?” Chaytok asked as he approached.
“Chaytok, it sure is. I couldn’t let you leave Earth without getting here to see you,” Jeck met him half way between the truck and the porch. The two warriors hugged then stepped back to survey each other. “When I heard you were stranded here, I volunteered to bring you the part for your star drive--- and the stasis field generator?”
“For my mate’s horse,” he explained. “He is important to her, so we will take him with us to Vesta Three. Stasis is the only way in a ship the size of mine.”
“You have a mate? Is that why you came to Earth?” Jeck asked.
“That was unintended. I went off course, and then the stardrive started to fail. I couldn’t make it to the moon or Mars, so I landed as close as I could to base, here. When did you get stationed here?”
“After we pulled out of Wissol, I decided to come to Earth to find meomee. Is your mate meomee?” Jeck asked.
