Chapter 18: All’s Fair

They hurried back to their quarters, finding that what members of their team were still there were sleeping. Quietly, his hands trembling due to nerves and excitement, Evan opened his locker and pulled out his sleeping bag. He pulled the pillows from his and Jade’s bunks, tossing them to her, his companion catching them in her four arms.

The pair made their way through the carrier’s winding hallways like they were on their way to commit a crime, giddily checking around corners to make sure that no officers were patrolling the corridors so late. They weren’t doing anything that was against regulations as far as they knew, but they didn’t want to have to explain why they were sneaking around the ship with handfuls of bedding in the middle of the night shift.

Evan knew exactly where he was going, leading Jade back to the secluded room. Once again, the door slid open with a touch of the panel, the two slipping inside before closing it behind them.

“Can you lock it?” Jade asked as Evan fiddled with the display, his sleeping bag tucked under one arm.

“Nah, looks like that would require an access code.”

“Oh well,” she chimed. “I guess we’ll just have to keep quiet, then, won’t we?”

He turned around to see her standing there, framed by the light that was bleeding in through the narrow window behind her. For the first time, he allowed himself to admire her unreservedly, to drink in the contours of her alien body without fear of how she or others might react. Maybe it was the fact that he was only now allowing himself to see her in this light, or maybe it was something to do with the pheromones, but her feminine features leapt out at him more than ever.

From the moment that he had seen her walking over from her dropship on Kerguela’s surface, he had noted her oddly human traits. Now that he knew more about her heritage, about her purpose, she seemed almost to have been sculpted specifically to please the male eye. There was nothing coincidental about the way that her thorax armor pinched her narrow waist like a corset, nothing accidental about the way that her hips flared out into a fertile hourglass. Her thighs were thick and inviting, tapering into willowy, digitigrade legs. Her two-toed feet were like the dainty hooves of a deer, Jade balancing on them with all the grace of a ballerina. There was nothing clumsy about her, nothing unnecessary, her form somehow honed into a thing of both beauty and efficiency by her Queen’s unfathomable intelligence. Once again, he marveled at how her tank top made it look like she was nude from the waist down. Even though her skirt was protecting her modesty, her inner thighs could still be glimpsed between its hanging plates, left conspicuously exposed. The skin there was waxy, shiny, catching the light like a buffed car. Her body was still a mystery to him – he had no idea where her armor ended and her natural figure began, but he was only moments away from figuring that out for himself.

“I guess my worries about being too alien for your tastes were unfounded,” she said, cocking her hips in a way that only exaggerated her curves. “This isn’t a museum, y’know. You can look with your hands if you want to...”

He didn’t need to be persuaded, a surge of desire propelling him across the tiny room. She dropped her pillows, and he tossed his sleeping roll aside, Evan sweeping her up in his arms. She was a head shorter than he was, if one didn’t take her branching horn into account, Jade having to stand on her toes and lift her chin to meet his kiss. Their lips joined, Evan taking the initiative this time, resting her head in his hand as he leaned into her. This embrace was more passionate than their last, Evan reveling in the texture of her lips as she matched his greedy pace with equal vigor. They were so plump, as soft as marshmallows, full enough that he didn’t even come into contact with the firm plates that surrounded them. All pretension of modesty was abandoned, the veil of propriety lifted, that flowery perfume filling his lungs with each staggered breath. They were alone in this sanctum, with nobody to judge them and no idea of where their desire might take them. As Hernandez had said – they would have to find out together.

Becoming more brazen, Evan parted her lips with his tongue, pushing deeper. She tasted familiar, just like a woman should, and he found himself wondering if her scent was muddling reality and memory. Something greeted him, coiling around his tongue like a fleshy rope, Evan quickly realizing that it was her proboscis. It was far thinner than his own organ – maybe the width of his finger, but it was muscular, prehensile. Where he expected the slow, deft strokes of a practiced lover, he instead found darting exploration. She was mapping his foreign organ, glancing across its surface, tickling him. His body was as alien to her as hers was to him.

He tried to lead by example, slowing his pace, entwining his tongue with her own. She quickly got the picture, matching his movements in a sordid dance. Her proboscis was slippery with her saliva, its surface as smooth as silk, winding across the flat of his tongue now like a snake crawling across a dune. It was a strange, novel sensation, but one that he welcomed. Her four hands clawed at his uniform all the while, clinging to him, Jade taking handfuls of the fabric for purchase.

As their heated kiss dragged on, he felt her antennae brush against his face, the sensation akin to someone dragging a feather lightly across his skin. She was tasting him, or maybe smelling him, sampling the pheromones that exuded from his pores with all the gentleness of a lover’s caress. It was like a drug to her. He could feel her shiver in his arms with each stroke of her antennae, her embrace growing ever more unreserved as it dragged on. That probing organ slid into his mouth now, repaying his curiosity in kind, drawing shapes on his palate with its twisting motions. It was long enough to reach the back of his throat, Jade drawing back when she felt him tense.

Finally, they parted with a wet pop, Evan leaning back to see Jade gazing up at him with longing in her eyes. She was breathing just as heavily as he was, her thorax expanding rhythmically in spite of her lack of lungs.

“Did I do that right?” she asked, her voice wavering. “That felt like I did it right.”

“Yeah,” he chuckled. “You did good.”

Now that he had crossed the threshold, a newfound confidence was swelling in his chest, and Jade seemed to be just as uncertain as he was. He released her onto unsteady legs, Jade reaching up to fiddle with one of her antennae nervously as he spread out the sleeping bag on the deck.

As he stood up again, he felt Jade pounce on him from behind. She seemed to have regained some of her prior assertiveness. Her four arms wrapped around his core, feeling for the buttons on his uniform.

“Let me undress you,” she insisted, turning him around to face her. “I want to unwrap you like a birthday present.”

He glanced down as her deft fingers began to peel open his shirt, exposing his bare chest. The environment on the carrier was kept at a constant temperature and humidity, so he rarely felt the need to wear underclothes while off-duty. As she spread the garment open with her upper hands, the lower began to explore him, her fingers tracing the contours of his muscular core. They were soft, fleshy, devoid of carapace when her protective gloves were off. Her skin was smoother than that of a human, devoid of any imperfections, and she had no fingernails. There wasn’t a hair or a goosebump on her, making it feel like she was wearing latex gloves, but the warmth of her touch quickly dispelled that notion.

She pressed her fingers into his belly, testing the firmness of his muscles, the sensation making him tense up reflexively. As a Marine, the high physical requirements of his lifestyle kept him in good shape without him really having to work at it, and she seemed pleased by what she found. Did she even have any concept of what a man should look like? Maybe she was attracted to his human traits just as he was attracted to hers.

“Not so squishy after all,” she muttered, roaming up towards his chest. “I’ve never, uh ... seen a human so close before. Not like this...”

“You must have been curious about human anatomy at some point,” he prompted, all four of her hands roaming across his exposed torso now. It was such a strange feeling, his senses insisting that he was being groped by two women at once. “Didn’t you ever search for it on the colony’s intranet?”

“Not ... often,” she admitted. If she could blush, her face would have been as red as a beet. She changed direction, slowly moving down towards his waist, the tips of her delicate fingers brushing the waistband of his shorts where his coveralls were open. He shrugged off the top portion of the garment, letting it fall around his waist, then began to slide it down over his thighs.

As he let it fall to the deck, Jade paused, her eyes lingering on the conspicuous bulge in his underwear. After their heated kiss, he was already at half-mast, her curious explorations only arousing him further.

She hooked her fingers around the elastic waistband, dragging it down until his erection bounced free, her emerald eyes lingering on its unfamiliar shape. Her antennae tickled his chest as she brought her hands to his member, hesitating for a moment as though afraid to touch him. She quickly overcame her doubt, her questing fingers roaming up and down his shaft with a feather-light touch. One of her smooth digits ran from its base to its tip, tracing a throbbing vein, her long lashes batting as it twitched at her touch.

“They look a lot bigger in person,” she said with a nervous chuckle. “Listen, you’re hotboxing the room with pheromones, and it’s driving me crazy. Hurry up and undress me before I do it for you.”

“Where should I start?” he asked, looking her up and down.

“How about the shirt?” she suggested, her tone sly. “You’re curious about what’s underneath it, right? I’ve caught you looking before.”

Evan reached down to grip the hem of the tank top, slowly lifting it, his member pulsing along with the quickening beat of his heart. The V-shaped plate that covered her groin rose high on her hips, where it connected to the carapace that protected her torso. As he lifted it further, he saw more exposed, pink flesh. Running from her groin to her sternum was a vaguely diamond-shaped window in her shell, exposing her soft, unarmored midriff like a piece of lingerie or a provocative swimsuit. The plates interlocked, flexible and segmented so as not to limit her range of motion. Like a corset, the shell pinched her waist, giving her an irresistible hourglass figure. Evan couldn’t help but slide one of his hands from her hip to where her ribs would have been, following the sweeping curve.

The texture of her shell was different from what he had imagined. Far from being hard and rigid, it was remarkably yielding, like soft plastic that had some give to it when he applied any pressure. Just like her waxy skin, it was glass-smooth, making it oddly pleasing to touch. Even here, there wasn’t so much as a chip of paint that might reveal her original green hue, everything covered over with jungle camouflage in shades of autumn. They hadn’t missed a spot. Jade shivered contentedly as he stroked her, Evan realizing that her carapace must be full of nerve endings.

She slipped her lower arms through the holes that had been cut in the garment as he continued to lift it, Evan reaching her chest, his heart skipping a beat as he caught a glimpse of more rosy flesh. Jade had breasts. They were firm and shapely, just large enough to fill a cupped hand, her shining skin reflecting the light to make them look like they’d been oiled. The same armor that protected her torso rose to the fluffy ruff of iridescent fur around her neck, her bust spilling through a pair of strategically placed openings. This must all be part of her anatomy, while the chest piece that she was constantly replacing was just synthetic armor.

No man could have beheld such a perfect pair of breasts and kept his hands to himself. Evan reached out to cup one of them, feeling butter-soft flesh yield before his fingers, filling his palm when he gave it a gentle squeeze. God, she was so impossibly soft, her velvet fat pouring between his digits with the consistency of melting wax. It had been some years since Evan had been with anyone, but he didn’t remember it feeling like this. Coupled with the inhuman smoothness of her polished skin, the sensation was irresistible. Through his haze of arousal, he noted that she had no nipples. These were not functional organs – not as far as he could tell. Even if they were just for show, Jade reacted strongly, becoming weak at the knees as he groped her. She began to lift her tank top the rest of the way over her head, then got it stuck on her horn, writhing and struggling as Evan took the opportunity to take his fill of her inviting chest.

“G-f-stop that!” she moaned as he teased her, Evan delighting in the way that she danced with each squeeze. For a creature enclosed in so many layers of armor, she was wonderfully reactive. Even her carapace was no less tender than a woman’s skin. He relented, helping her pull off her top, careful not to damage her delicate antennae. He lifted the two longer sensory organs that flowed down her back like braids, ensuring that they didn’t get caught, feeling her tense at his merest touch. They were so soft and feathery, Evan running his fingers through the comb-like whiskers. Jade suddenly went quiet and still, save for the rapid rise and fall of her chest, her expression hidden by the fabric.

As he tossed the garment aside, Jade was on him again, her four arms reaching for him. Two of them cupped his cheeks as she drew him in for a needy kiss, the lower pair gripping his waist, Jade pulling herself closer. Her supple breasts squashed against his torso, and his rigid member pressed against the window of soft flesh on her belly, her warmth radiating into him as they embraced. More sure of herself now, that agile tongue coiled around his own, each stroke and lick imbued with her excitement. She didn’t need to tell him how she was feeling – he could feel it in her desperate pace, in the way that her pheromones tugged and plucked at his senses like the strings of a harp. Each breath that he took brought with it surging desire and half-remembered memories, lurid flashes of lovemaking, the taste of sweat on fever-hot skin.

When they broke off, he leaned down to plunge his face into the nape of her neck, burying it in her ruff of silky fur. It shimmered as it moved, like strands of fiber optic cable, but it was as soft as anything that he’d ever felt. His head began to spin again as he inhaled deeply, the flowery scent joined by a deeper, more primal aroma that lit a fresh fire in him.

“You’re not done yet,” Jade whispered in his ear. “I can be more naked.”

She took one of his hands in hers, guiding it down to the small of her back, where her armored skirt connected to her waist. Its segmented plates hung free, almost like empty wing casings. As she encouraged him to lift one of them, he realized that it was lined with a layer of soft fur, perhaps designed to stop it from chafing. They were attached to a belt-like structure that popped off with a little effort, Jade tossing it to the floor. The garment had been protecting her butt, and now that it was off, Evan felt more flush skin beneath his fingers. He took a generous handful of her cheek, leaning forward to look over her shoulder, seeing the inverted heart shape of her rear as she arched her back. It was befitting of her wide hips, spilling through his fingers, Evan feeling firm tissue rise to greet his probing digits as he pushed deeper into the layer of doughy fat. She was tight, toned, muscle as springy as rubber lurking just beneath the surface. However their Queen manipulated their DNA, she did it with the skill of a sculptor’s chisel, and she must have a deep appreciation of the female form.

He guided her over to the sleeping bag that he had laid out for them, lowering her down onto the padding. As he knelt beside her, she pulled him on top of her, trapping him in another ravenous kiss. She was deceptively strong for her size, easily able to wrestle him onto his back with her four arms. She pinned his wrists above his head, straddling him between her stout thighs, the soft meat of their unarmored inner surface sandwiching his hips. With her two lower hands, she stroked his exposed stomach again, enjoying the way that his muscles flexed when she slipped a fingertip into his navel. His member pulsed against her belly, a bead of his pre welling at its tip.

He flinched as she brought a hand down to his cock, pressing it tight against her abdomen, Evan feeling the warmth of her body permeate him. She glanced down at it, sizing him up, her antennae twitching.

“I hope it fits, or this is going to get really awkward,” she giggled.

“I should probably take a look at what we’re working with,” he replied, Jade narrowing her eyes in mock suspicion.

“That sounds like an excuse if I ever heard one.”

She released his hands, and he took her by the hips, rolling her over onto her back. Lying her head in the pillows at the base of the wall behind them, Jade shuffled a little higher so that he could kneel between her legs, Evan parting her armored knees. He lifted one of her slender legs, bringing her calf to his lips.

“Can you feel this?” he asked, planting a kiss on her shell.

“Y-yeah,” she mumbled, wriggling as he roamed a little higher.

“How about this?” he added, dragging his tongue across the chitin that encased her thigh.

“Mhmm,” she cooed, twirling the end of her antenna around her finger as she watched.

He reached the cutout in her armor where her inner thighs were exposed, planting a sucking kiss on her pink skin. Even beneath the flat of his tongue, he couldn’t feel a single imperfection. Jade let slip a stifled yelp, her skin apparently more sensitive than her shell. Encouraged, he roamed higher, crawling his lips up to the V-shaped piece of chitin that ran down between her legs.

“Please tell me this comes off,” he panted, drawing a little closer so that he could press his lips against her belly.

“Yeah,” she murmured, reaching down to slide her thumb beneath it. “It just pops off.”

She applied a little force, and it disconnected from her body like a fender from a car, extending the diamond-shaped tummy-window all the way down to her mound. As the band of firm chitin pulled away, it remained linked to her by a strand of colorless fluid, Evan’s pulse throbbing in his ears as he looked down at her loins. Between her soft thighs, exactly where they should have been, was a pair of plump lips. They were formed from the same pink flesh and waxy skin that surrounded them, puffy and swollen with desire, a glistening sheen of her excitement making them shine. He wasn’t sure if it was the sight of her so wet and ready, or the fresh surge of pheromones, but he was suddenly as hard as a diamond.

“Is that about what you expected?” she asked hesitantly.

“Better,” he replied, his voice a low growl of barely-restrained lust. Her sweet perfume drew him in, his mouth watering, his burning cheeks sliding against the burnished skin of her inner thighs as he brought his lips towards hers. He parted them with two fingers, finding them just as soft and as yielding as the rest of her, her rosy flesh stretchy and pliable. Between them was a very familiar vulva, its color the same shade of pink, its delicate folds and creases like pleated silk. He could see her twitching opening, a bead of her anticipation leaking from it, her swollen clitoris peeking out from beneath its hood of protective skin. She was inhumanly neat, inhumanly smooth, but there was nothing here that gave him pause.

She responded strongly to his touch, those pillowy thighs squeezing around his head reflexively, her toned butt rising off the sleeping bag. He held her open for a few moments longer, admiring the way that her anatomy glistened, droplets of fluid clinging to it like dew to the petals of a rose. Unable to hold back any longer, he dragged his tongue between her puffy labia, her vulva small enough that he could encompass it entirely. He placed his mouth over her smooth mound, lapping and sucking gently, mapping the details of her burning loins.

Her taste jumped out at him, an unexpected sweetness surprising him. It wasn’t merely a pleasant flavor, it was good, encouraging him to keep up his doting licking. It tasted like she had smeared her womanhood in honey, not quite as strong a flavor, but still very apparent. He had tasted this before, he realized, in the Jarry Juice that the aliens supplied to the UNN. If her entire diet was comprised solely of that nutrient paste, then perhaps it was the source of her inviting taste.

The last thing he’d wanted to do when going into this was to compare her to a human woman. Making her feel like she was being judged to some predefined standard wouldn’t do anything other than make her nervous, and his only goal here was to make her happy. He wouldn’t have cared if her loins had been equipped with teeth – he would still have done his best to please her. Still, he couldn’t help but make a comment as he paused to take a breath.

“Fuck, you taste amazing.”

“Was I not supposed to?” she asked, Evan noting that her thighs were rising and falling subtly along with her chest as she panted. Nothing more than a little exploratory oral had her splayed out on the deck like she had just run a marathon. She really hadn’t ever been touched in this way before.

“I was expecting something neutral, but you taste like honey,” he replied with an enamored sigh. He resumed his licking, Jade writhing as he danced the tip of his tongue across her womanhood, painting every inch of her quivering anatomy. He circled her opening, feeling her muscles attempt to grip his tongue reflexively, but they were both too slick to gain any purchase. As he roamed upwards, he felt her tense up again, Evan glancing up to see her peering back at him with those green eyes. She looked drunk, her antennae waving as though caught in a breeze that only she could feel, her heaving chest making her pert breasts wobble enticingly.

“You okay?” he asked.

She reached down with one of her lower hands, wiping away a strand of her fluid that was clinging to his chin.

“Is that a trick question? Keep going...”

That same hand delved into his hair as he resumed his ardent lapping, Jade running her fingers through it, seeming to enjoy its texture.

“Right there!” she gasped, squeezing his face between her thighs again as he neared her clitoris. He teased her a little, feeling her squirm and moan as he skirted around it, delivering doting licks and kisses everywhere except where she most wanted them. When he finally gave it the attention that she craved, he found it swollen with desire, pulsing against the flat of his tongue. He pursed his lips around the organ, drawing it out from beneath its hood, the gentle suction enough to make her spine arch off the deck.

“Oh, fuck,” she mumbled as she covered her face with her upper hands. “Is ... is it supposed to feel like this?”

“I figured you’d know better than I do,” he replied, Jade slowly sagging back to the sleeping bag like a deflating pool toy as he relented. “It doesn’t hurt, right?”

“N-no,” she stammered, her antennae waving as she shook her head adamantly. “It feels like I’m floating on a cloud. I’ve ... I’ve used my fingers before. I was curious,” she added with a nervous chuckle, as though she felt the need to justify it. “I just wasn’t expecting this to be so much more intense...”

She had been so confident leading up to this, seducing him like a pro, but it seemed that he had more experience than she did when it came to lovemaking. Communication was something that she had practiced every day of her life, after all, but this was completely new to her. She might not even know what her body was capable of yet. How many Jarilans had slept with a human and could inform her?

“This is just foreplay,” he chuckled, taking a moment to revel in turning the tables on her.

“I know that!” she protested, giving him a mock tap on the head with her fist. “There are videos on the colony’s intranet. There, I admit it. Female Drones outnumber males by a huge margin, and I’ve never met a human who I wanted to approach before. Not until you.”

“I’d be surprised if you weren’t curious,” he added. “If I look like I know what I’m doing, it’s only because you’re a little more familiar than I expected.”

“Maybe I can still surprise you,” she cooed, pushing his head back down between her legs.

He began to circle her firm bud with the tip of his tongue, alternating between quick flurries and slow, doting strokes to keep her guessing. Her winking opening drew his attention, and he raised a finger to it, a ring of stretchy muscle closing around the tip. Jade flinched, a tremor rolling through her body, the Jarilan propping herself up on her lower elbows to get a look at what he was doing.

“Tell me if I’m going too fast,” he said, Jade nodding her head as she watched his finger with half-lidded eyes. Slowly, he pushed it deeper, his heart quickening as new sensations assailed him. He was met with an impossibly tight, undulating tunnel of flesh, rolling muscle contractions stroking his finger in powerful flurries that felt like shivers. It wasn’t strong enough to be uncomfortable, but it still gave him pause, wet flesh with the texture of satin pressing down on him like it was trying to make a mold of his digit. Her honeyed nectar coated his skin in a slippery sheen, warm and viscous, making her clenching muscles glide as they eased him deeper.

After the first inch or two of rippling flesh, he felt something unexpected brush against the tip of his finger. His eyes widened as what felt like tiny nodules of delicate tissue closed around him in a muscular spasm, combing across his skin. They were just firm enough that he could feel them, but not quite so much that they provided any real resistance, like a forest of tiny papillae.

“What is it?” she asked, noting his expression. “Is something wrong?”

Now, it was Evan’s turn to stammer his reply.

“I ... uh, guess you surprised me after all. A good surprise,” he added, meeting her gaze. He began to move his finger now, pulling it back, feeling a wonderful suction grip him. As he found a steady rhythm, he brought his lips back to her loins, pouring his passion into each kiss and lick. She was so sensitive, dancing like a puppet on the end of its strings, her upper hands rising to knead her breasts as the lower pair clawed desperately at the bedding beneath her. When he felt like she was getting too close, those wonderful contractions coming thick and fast, he relented a little to pay some attention to her thighs. Her fat was so cushiony and inviting – if it was indeed fat – rubbery muscle rising to the surface to dimple it when his lingering kisses made her flex.

The openings in her armor guided him, almost as though the most sensual parts of her body had been left purposefully exposed in a deliberate attempt to entice him. No, that was the truth of it. Jade hadn’t been honed by millions of years of evolution, but by an unfathomably intelligent consciousness – an alien mind with a singular purpose. How a creature that likely didn’t even experience love or attraction could glean such profound insights into what turned humans on was a mystery that he would probably never solve.

Jade was rocking her wide hips into him now, matching his pace, hilting his digit as though she was trying to reach an itch deep inside her. He admired the way that her flat tummy flexed and shifted, the subtle outlines of what might be abdominal muscles rising up from beneath the taut skin. It was hard to tell if the rosy hue came from the skin itself or if it was transparent, letting the color bleed through.

He redoubled his efforts, lashing her clitoris with his tongue, trapping it between his lips to make her writhe and gasp. She had dug herself deeper into the pillows that they had stolen from the bunks, one of them draped over her face, but she was too lost in her pleasure to pay it any mind. The pheromones that she was putting out now were incredible, like a hallucinogenic drug, each breath filling his lungs with her sordid perfume. It was as if pure lust was evaporating from her skin. Between the sweet taste that filled his mouth and the lurid flashes of half-remembered nights of passion that filled his head, he could hardly think about anything other than the needy ache in his throbbing erection.

With a low, drawn-out moan, Jade climaxed. Her insides sealed around his finger, tightening like a noose, those teasing papillae raking across its tip as the firm muscles beyond their bounds spasmed. He couldn’t take his mind off how it might feel to have those things encompass his glans, to feel the nodules of wet flesh stroking him in shuddering waves. He kept his lips locked to her loins for as long as he could before she bucked him off, her hands kneading her boobs like balls of dough as she rode out her orgasm, each spark of pleasure sending a wonderful tremor coursing through her body.