by Chogan Swan
“We need to get you back to the embassy where we have an internet connection.”
“This machine will carry both of us then?”
“Easily,” Jonah said. “Just step this way. Would you like to sit up front?”
“Thank you. That would be grand. When we get where we are going, can you update me on the highlights of what happened with the niiaH. I'm assuming my branch-sister or sisters were victorious since we are public knowledge now.”
“I'd be glad to, but Tiana would have a much more complete history.”
“Well, I only really need the last ninety years, but I can wait. I wasn't expecting to wake up and have that nasty job out of the way. A long shower and a night of relaxing would be a nice change.”
Jonah took her bag for her and stowed it, but Una kept the BAR. The pilot, a tall, sun-browned ex-navy Rotary Wing specialist named Charles Barton, helped fit the headset over her ears and—with only a little encouragement—gave her a thorough explanation of the flight controls and the capabilities of the modified Bell OH-58, while his eyes flicked repeatedly to her breasts, tail and face. The drop of pheromone compound she'd rubbed on the skin between the thumb and forefinger of his right hand might have had something to do with that and his eagerness to talk. Especially when she asked him to elaborate on who the Red Wolves were and exactly what he had done when flying with them.
By the time they were back at the embassy, Barton had volunteered to help orient her to the information systems and fill her in on the organization.
She’d accepted the offer.
For some reason, she liked the way he smelled.
ShwydH had been familiar with the embassy, a converted walled, Spanish-style, luxury Bed and Breakfast. The ambassadorial offices had only moved in two weeks ago. When ShwydH had last been in Puerto Peñasco, they'd been in another luxury hotel. The security would be easier to handle in this new location, and the room on the second floor where Jonah took her was on the gaudy side of palatial with tons of white tile everywhere. She thanked him as she ducked into the bathroom.
Looking around at the mountains of towels and the mirrored walls that framed a huge shower and jet tub there was only one conclusion….
There's been a huge mistake … I'm in heaven.
The shower boasted a full-body jet spray, and—under its full-force application—seven days of dust and dirt sluiced off her body like a miniature mudslide. She soaped and rinsed three times, applying the loofa vigorously. The sound of bustling staff in the main room and the smells of food came through the crack in the door. Some of the smells were familiar and some not. Una turned off the water jets and slowly used her hands to strip the dripping water from her body.
Barton had promised to come by after he finished the post-flight checklist, but there was time for food before that….
She took one of the thick, slightly rough towels and rubbed her skin all over as she stepped back into the main room. Carafes of tea and trays of fruit and vegetable pate' covered the large table by the window. Two men carrying empty trays were just leaving the room, but they paused to bow when they saw Una's reflection in one of the mirrors.
“Muchissimus gracias,” she called, wrapping the towel over her body as they left.
A woman carrying hangers supporting a variety of clothes swept through the door. She smiled at Una and entered the walk-in closet. The sound of hangers moving on clothes poles drifted out.
Una went to the table and started sampling the food. Cactus salsas on tortillas, legumes ground into spicy hummus … everything was delicious. She could almost hear the calories ignite as the food hit her metabolism, which had shifted into high gear when she smelled the food.
As she ate, she noted the dishes had already been sorted onto color-coded trays: white for foods also edible for humans and red for foods that would disagree with them. Since Barton would be coming, she focused on the red trays.
He might be hungry.
He might stay awhile.
Una grinned….
He might need his strength.
She had almost emptied the bowl of green persimmons when Barton knocked on the door smelling of curiosity, excitement and a good measure of nervous hesitation.
“Come in, Charles,” she called. The door was still open while the woman continued transferring clothes from a rack in the hall to the closet.
Barton nodded to the woman as she came out of the closet. “Hi, Naomi. Would you like a hand with that?”
“Thanks, Charlie. I'm already done. Thanks though.”
“Thank you, Naomi,” Una said. “I'm looking forward to seeing what you've left me.” She turned back to Charles. “They left so much food here. “Both of you, please join me if you haven't eaten. Anything on the white trays is safe for you, and there's much more than I can eat by myself.”
“Thank you, ma'am,” Naomi said, “but I'm meeting someone for dinner soon. I'm sure Charlie can help you though. He's always hungry. It must be the exercise he gets running from all the women chasing him.”
Una laughed. “Well, who could blame them? Help yourself, Charles.”
Naomi grinned. “We're all finished now, ma'am …”
“Una, please. Just Una. I'm not an officer or a madam either.”
Naomi nodded. “Una, then. Enjoy your evening.” She turned to leave, closing the door behind her.
“What is all this food?” said Barton. “Not much looks familiar.”
“I've been sticking with the red-trays,” Una said. “I'm not sure about all the white trays. You'll have to tell me what you think.”
Una took a post-it note from the dresser top and wrote on it with the pen from the penholder. Taking it to the door, she opened the door and stuck it on the outside.
Please do not disturb / Por favor, no molestar.
She closed the door and detoured into the closet. “Just let me slip into something a little less comfortable,” she called.
The closet was full of choices, from eveningwear to swim suits, but held nothing in lingerie.
A bathrobe then.
The slit in the back was high enough not to restrict one’s tail at least. She belted it loosely and hung the damp towel on the hanger to dry.
“Find anything tasty?” she said as she rejoined him at the table.
“This dip is good.” Barton said, glancing over Una's shoulder at her tail. “Cheese, cauliflower and artichoke is my guess.” He seemed more than a little interested in her tail, or maybe it was what was under the tail.
Indulging his curiosity, Una leaned over the tray and inhaled. “Good guess,” she said.
On her way to Yuma, Una had taken advantage of a number of opportunities to interact sexually with the human males she’d encountered. ShwydH’s memories of Kate’s behavior toward him had been a treasure trove of sexual tactics for Una … quite effective tactics too, so far.
Una stood straight again, stepping closer to Barton. “Charles, how much do you know about the nutritional needs of nii females and how we satisfy them?”
Charles swallowed the artichoke dip with sudden difficulty. “Uh, well, I've heard rumors, but who knows what to believe? What can you tell me?”
Una sat down on the couch by the table and patted the space next to her. “We need animal proteins to live, but—by choice—we don't kill to feed,” she said as he sat next to her. “Our ways of satisfying the requirement can come from several methods. We can drink milk of any kind. We can painlessly subsume sub-cutaneous fats from living partners. You can think liposuction, but with no side effects. Female nii can couple with some males of partner species and subsume the ejaculatory fluids for a helpful supplement to our diet. Our male partners generally enjoy the experience, but the other health benefits can be substantial. We can also consume blood, usually we do this only with partners in small amounts. Taking blood from male partners also keeps iron from building up too high in their blood.”
Una waved at the table. “Other than a small amount of dairy produ
cts, there is nothing that fulfills those requirements on the trays. I don't want you to feel pressured, and I'm not desperate for any of that now by any means. I've never had trouble locating willing partners. But … if you’re interested….” She smiled, trying not to show too many sharp, pointy bits.
Barton was silent.
Una took a chip from the bowl and dunked it in the artichoke dip then popped it in her mouth. “You're right. That is tasty. You can think about it, and don't worry, I won't be offended if it's too uncomfortable for you.”
Barton took a deep breath. “So you can suck the extra fat off my abdomen without leaving any marks?”
Una smiled. “Piece of cake. You want a sample?”
“Yeah, sure, but it seems like cheating. I try to control it with diet, but stomach fat is a bitch.”
Una smiled again. The men she'd encountered over the last week had been lower on body fat than the calories available from their reproductive system. One would have felt guilty taking fat they might have needed to survive. “Take off your shirt and relax on the bed.”
Barton put his plate on the table and removed his shirt. The shadow of well-developed abdominal muscles showed through his skin. He didn't have much fat anywhere, but she could probably find half a liter with no trouble.
He lay down on the bed, shivering slightly. His body gave off a slight tang of nervous energy.
Una walked to the foot of the bed and crawled on top of him. She lay down on his legs, putting her elbows on either side of his waist. “If you don't want the sculpting to stop at your beltline, you'll have to loosen your belt and pull your pants down a bit.”
Barton nodded, unbuckled his belt and unsnapped his jeans then he pulled the waistline down an inch.
Una looked at him with one eyebrow raised.
Really?
He sighed and unzipped, lowering the pants to his pubic bone where a dusting of close-clipped pubic hair scattered across his loins.
“Oh, I can take away hair too,” she said, brushing a finger over the stubble. “…unless you like being scratchy.”
“Is that permanent?”
“Well, it could be. But in general, I consider hair a renewable resource.”
Barton chuckled, loosening up. “Go ahead, I suppose.”
With her finger filaments, Una took all the clipped hair from his shoulders to his pubic bone, and then shifted below the skin, drawing off the fat that clung to his abdominal muscle wall and around the hipbones, until the ridges of his muscles stood out clearly.
A bit more than a half liter. More than I thought.
As she'd worked, it had been impossible not to detect the blood flow below his belt, pushing back against the pressure of her chest.
She looked up to his face. “Best not to take more unless you want me to hit other areas to make it look even. There are big mirrors and bright lights in the bath if you want to check how it looks.” Una smiled. “The arousal you are plainly experiencing is a normal reaction. I'd be glad to help you with that too, but it's up to you.”
Barton sighed and shook his head. “Will you keep a secret for me?”
Una nodded. “Of course.”
“As much as I would enjoy that, I have a condition called genital herpes. I haven't had a breakout in years, but there is no cure, and there is a slight chance that it can be passed to someone else by cross-genital or oral-genital contact even when there is no breakout.”
Una put her hand on his chest, keeping her eyes on his. “I am immune to both strains of HSV, and I can cure yours.”
Amazing the difference between this guy and the last one to share that information with me.
Barton's face froze in shock. “You can cure it? You're positive you can't catch it?”
“Yes, and I can also give you immunity to it so you'll never contract it again.”
“Great! What do I do? How does this work?”
“Simple. I put some of the antibodies from my blood into your bloodstream. Two hours later, you get a mild fever that lasts about five hours. I give you a sedative so you can sleep through that. When you wake up you are clear. Do you want to go ahead with that? I've got nothing else on my schedule for tonight.”
“Sure. That's a no-brainer.”
“Alright then.” she crawled up his body to his neck. “Go like this,” she said, tilting her head to demonstrate the position she needed. When he tilted his head back, she licked the skin above his jugular, desensitizing it by adding a numbing compound to her saliva. She bit her own arm, pulling in the antibody-thick blood then bit his neck, forcing the compound gently into his system. She put two fingers inside the seal between her lips and his neck and stitched the bite closed with her filaments.
CHAPTER 9 – UNA
Explicit Content Warning - Skip to Chapter 10 if you wish to avoid.
Barton shifted on the bed. “Feels like a hickey,” he whispered. By the time Una was finished with his neck, His arousal had returned, a hard wedge pressing into her leg.
“That must be uncomfortable trapped that way,” Una said, brushing her tail along the zipper.
Barton gasped.
Una looked into his eyes. “Would you like me to do something about it?” she whispered.
He nodded—his breath coming short and fast.
Una raised her body from his and untied her robe, tossing it aside.
With gentle fingers, she unzipped his jeans all the way and pulled them down, stripping off his running shoes at the same time. When she looked back up, what she saw made her freeze for a moment. Her life orifice started to drip with lubricating fluid.
She reached for Barton's erection, tugging it toward her. Twenty-six centimeters long and sixteen centimeters in circumference, it pulled back, heavy in her hand, as the attaching muscles reacted.
Well here's our chance. This one will certainly reach the pleasure node.
Una moved closer, cradling him in both hands. She analyzed her reactions, her intense, hungry … aroused … reactions.
Until now, her interest in this encounter had only been about her quest for nourishment to grow her body stronger. Now it was something else.
This wasn't coming from the ShwydH personality, that much was certain.
She'd been slowly noticing over the last several days that there was more going on inside the awareness she'd first named One than she'd at first thought. It was more than just ShwydH's mind being added to by experience and the slow inclusion of Riniana Tiana's memories. There were multiple persons inside each set of memories.
When one had first encountered the childhood personality of Riniana Tiana, the new memories also provoked a long-suppressed, childhood ShwydH personality to the surface—an angry, wounded child needing attention and reassurance. If the Tiana memory’s child personality hadn’t reached out to the child ShwydH, healing might never have started.
Now, Una could tell some sort of healing had started, though still ongoing with no end in sight.
As the memories of Riniana Tiana had continued to unfold, each new phase of her life seemed to provoke resurrections of more personalities.
The post-pubescent personality of Riniana Tiana was preoccupied with the novelty of sex. The Tiana who was a tough forty-centians-old infantry scout had just come in from a long patrol and she wanted to go out and get laid, Dammit!
On top of that, the young female body itself seemed to have a personality, and judging by the body’s behavior now, that one was a … HORNY. LITTLE. TRAMP!
Think this through, Una.
There wasn't an eligible nii species male for parsecs other than ShwydH, and HumanaH might not be willing to share him. At least that’s what Una’s ShwydH personality wanted her to believe—though Una thought there was a good chance that was shear male ego.
Tiana, the branch-sister in charge of the association had defected to a relationship with a human male, and so had Ayleana.
Adult ShwydH, cold, logical, ruthless—a rank novice at ethics—wasn't prepared to be the v
oice of reason, caution and abstinence. Not only that—he would have been out voted.
Una bent over and ran her tongue around the swelling head.
Barton moaned.
None of us know what to do with a human male.
How hard could it be?
I'm going to find out!
Acta Vila
I say we put ShwydH in charge. He at least has a male perspective.
The ShwydH personality knew this was trouble. Something needed doing.
Stop!
