Chapter 637

The Prison Planet

Morales and his wives had just finished breakfast when the wolves alerted and hurried to the door. Lobo positioned himself and shoved the heavy door open as Lila rushed past him. Morales looked at his wives and grinned. The wolves’ manner had been hurried, but it was obvious the animals weren’t expecting trouble, and that could only mean they had visitors.

The wolves charged out of the entranceway, happy to greet their friends as Ship deposited Jeff, Diana, Kayla, Tosha, Selina and Adrienné nearby.

Adrienné, even though she had been warned and shown pictures of the wolves, let out an involuntary squeak as they hurried over to check out this new visitor. Intelligent, and knowing their appearance would startle a person not accustomed to them, they plopped down on their rears to smile at this new and very unusual human who smelled and looked different from the others they knew.

“Adrienné,” Jeff said, “meet Lila.” The big wolf came to her feet, moved closer to again sit and look at the alien, but this time, knowing that her rows of teeth made humans uncomfortable, she didn’t smile.

“She is trying to put you at ease,” Jeff assured Adrienné, who had been coached by the Matthews. The young alien female extended her hand to Lila, who, instead of putting her paw out to shake as a trained dog would have, nuzzled the offered hand and whined.

“And this is Lobo,” Jeff said, motioning.

Lobo repeated Lila’s movements and soon nuzzled Adrienné’s hand as well. Jeff stepped closer and said, “They didn’t put a paw out to shake because they aren’t trained dogs, but this world’s version of very intelligent beings that Morales decided to call wolves, because he couldn’t think of anything else to call them.”

Before Adrienné could say anything more, Morales and his wives came out of the cave. After introductions, Morales commented, “Lobo and Lila are far more intelligent than Earth animals and seem to possess a form of telepathy — at least between each other, and to some extent, with Jasmine and me as well. We think of them more as close friends rather than mere animals.”

“I think that I understand,” Adrienné said as she sucked up her courage and leaned forward so her face was nearer to the wolves to speak quietly to them.

“We’ve heard a lot about you,” Jasmine said a moment later. “Come on inside. We’ll have a cup of coffee and get to know each other better. You do drink coffee, don’t you?”

“I am learning to, and my friends are learning to drink stim.”

“And stim is...”

“I suppose you could refer to it as a mostly social drink similar to your coffee, and I am told that stim also has a mild stimulant quite like your caffeine.”

Morales glanced over at Jeff. “We would love to try it, should our friends bring us a sample,” he said, pointedly looking at Jeff and the big bag he carried.

“Way ahead of you, My Friend,” the Prime said as he handed Morales the bag of stim. “I think it has even more of a bitter taste than strong black coffee, but it tends to grow on you.”

“Thanks,” Jasmine said as she reached to relieve Morales of the bag. “Now, how do you make it?” she asked as she turned to Adrienné.

“I am told that the same method used to make coffee works with stim. Ship provides our stim, so I have not made any for myself yet.”

Diana offered, “It’s a little stronger, so we use about two-thirds the amount it would take with coffee.”

“Well, we have a second percolator, not to mention an electric coffee maker now that we have electricity, so we can give it a try right away. Thanks, you guys,” Jasmine said with a smile.

Selina put a big box on the counter. “We brought fresh home-baked doughnuts,” Selina inserted with a smirk, “and they are not bitter.”

Christine opened the box and leaned in to smell them. “Oh, they smell wonderful. We’ve just finished breakfast, but with the enhancement, we can always eat a little more and not worry about gaining weight,” she finished with a grin.

A few minutes later, they were sitting around drinking stim and eating doughnuts. “Oh, my; these are delicious,” Adrienné remarked as she was offered another doughnut. Motioning around her, “This is called a...”

“Cave,” Ashley filled in for her.

“But what led you into living here? I understand that most earthlings live in houses or other similar dwellings.”

Morales chuckled. “Long story, and it needs some background to go with it, but basically, this is a prison planet. I was sent here to serve out a life sentence...”

“But things have changed,” Jeff said. “He no longer has to live here...”

“But we want to now,” Jasmine inserted. “It’s our home, and we wouldn’t think of living anywhere else.”

“It is dangerous here, however,” Jeff inserted.

As Adrienné glanced around at the walls of the cave, Jeff continued, “No. I’m not referring to the cave but rather the whole area. It is teeming with animals, many of which are capable and quite willing to kill any of us.”

“But ... it is beautiful here, and we love it,” Ashley inserted.

“We would not want to live anywhere else,” Christine added.

Not knowing how to respond, the pretty alien timidly observed, “The ... trees here are quite large.”

Jeff chuckled. “I agree. The trees near the Retreat are big, but the trees here are in a different class altogether.”

Morales chuckled and said, “Unfortunately, the animals here are also unique in that they are huge, indeed, compared to Earth’s animals — not to mention aggressive.”

“And that might even be an understatement,” Jasmine said. Then focusing on Adrienné, Jasmine continued, “Please do not go outside unless you have an armed escort.”

Jeff chuckled when Adrienné’s eyes opened wide. “Morales, don’t you have a video of some of the animals here?”

“Several,” he replied, but Christine was already on her feet.

Moments later, Jasmine turned the lights down as Morales started the video on their new TV. “Obviously, I was zoomed in when I took these,” he said as the video began with a giant male saber tooth facing the camera while yawning.

There was no doubt Adrienné was focused on the animals because she sucked in a breath. “That animal roams free here?” she asked.

“That one and many more like him. The females are only slightly smaller, and if anything, they are even more aggressive.”

“The things are huge and faster than you would ever believe,” Jasmine said grimly. “So are those snow leopards, and there was a time when all he had to stop any of them from charging us was a crossbow with a compound bow as a backup.” Turning, she pointed to the bows hanging on a wall. “Those there, as a matter of fact.”

“Jasmine was limited to a crossbow and a compound bow when she first came here, just as I was,” Morales said. “And before she tries to deny it, she was and still is very good with them ... and a lot faster than I am.”

“Maybe to start with, but the last time we had to fire quickly, we shot at almost the same instant. All told, we did okay both when we were attacked and when we went hunting together,” Jasmine said as she came to sit in his lap, grabbed the remote and continued the video that he had paused while they talked.

“What are those?” Adrienné asked a couple of minutes later when the video shifted to a small herd of what seemed to be gigantic cows.

“Aurochs. On Earth, they are extinct, but they’re far from it here,” Morales said. “One of these days, with Jeff’s permission, we’ll give you a ride to the plains on our crawler. It has a cage so the animals can’t get to us, and we’ll be able to view them up close. Before the crawler, I avoided the aurochs, and they never made an effort to get close to me. To tell the truth, I was thankful. At that time, as we mentioned, all I had was a crossbow and a compound bow. Even if I managed to kill one — and that isn’t a given — there is always the rest of the herd. From what little I’ve observed of them, as with other types of animals here, they aren’t prone to run away from predators, so I doubt they would run when I killed one of them — unless it was to run toward me to stomp or gore me to death,” he finished with a grimace. “The females are gigantic. The males are even bigger, and many have an attitude.”

“That is a beautiful animal,” Adrienné said as she motioned to the screen where a snow leopard bounded across an open area scattering snow as he went.

“They are unbelievably fast,” Jasmine said in an almost-whisper.

“Amen to that,” Jeff said with a chuckle. “Had it not been for Morales, I would have had a very bad day, indeed.”

“Oh, bullshit,” Morales disagreed. “I just saw him a second before you did...”

“And killed his ass.”

“Debatable who did the deed, maybe, but together we did plant him,” Morales said with a grin.

Diana looked at her man and smiled. Knowing how fast you are, Husband, and despite what you said, you might well have waited to make Morales look good, but then again, maybe not. And ... from what we’ve seen on the videos, Morales is far from being a slouch. Then with an inner chuckle, he has even impressed the General, and there are three women here that he has definitely impressed, she thought as she noticed the love on their faces when Morales’ women looked toward their man.

“It’s only seven thirty, and we have nothing pressing to do this morning, since we picked our vegetables and canned them yesterday. There is no reason we can’t show Adrienné around — if it’s okay with you guys,” Jasmine finished as she caught Diana’s eye.

With a glance at Jeff, who shrugged almost imperceptibly, the Clan Queen turned to Jasmine. “If you’re certain it isn’t an imposition...”

Jasmine poo-pooed that before turning to Adrienné. “Want to go for a ride on our crawler and see some of the animal population up close?”

“Me? You would do that for me? Oh, my. I ... do not know what to say,” the beautiful alien responded as her smile spread across her face.

“Yes, is a good start,” Kayla said as she chuckled at Adrienné’s enthusiasm.

“Oh, my. Yes. I would love to go.”

“We need to fix a picnic lunch,” Ashley and Christine said at practically the same instant before looking at each other and giggling.

“They’re doing that more and more,” Morales said with a sigh.

“Amazing. I’ve never heard of anything like that,” Jeff said while almost keeping a straight face.

“He’s teasing, as you well know, because we’ve done it many times,” Diana broke in to say. “His younger wives do it until he gets frustrated. Sometimes we deliberately do it, then there are other times when we can’t seem to stop doing it.”

“And I will too — one day,” Selina said, obviously a bit down because it seldom happened to her, at least not with the frequency it did with Jeff’s wives.

“You will one day,” Diana quietly told her. “He loves you, and you won’t have to force him when you’re old enough. Just wait and see.”

“I cannot grow up any faster, so I do not have a choice,” Selina quietly grumbled, not wanting to spoil Adrienné’s good time.

“Okay,” Jasmine said with enthusiasm as she came to her feet. “Would you men get the crawler and the weapons ready while the women get the lunch started?”

“Adrienné hasn’t been in the sun much, so she is going to need some sunblock. I have some on Ship...” Diana began.

“We have plenty, thanks to you,” Jasmine interrupted to say. Turning to Ashley, “Will you get it, Sweetheart?”

Ashley was gone in a flash and was soon helping Adrienné apply it to her exposed skin.

Twenty minutes later, the group was aboard the crawler with Jasmine driving and Adrienné in the seat beside her. Jeff and Morales were seated on the outside of the second row with the rest in the middle of the same row or in the bigger seats behind them. The wolves had been cautioned that the group was going to be around some of the animals on the plains and seemed to be enthusiastic about the trip. Without having to be instructed, they lay down all the way in the back.

“Don’t put your hand on the bars,” Diana, worried, told Selina. “If one of the animals should attack, you don’t want any body parts exposed.”

Selina just agreed and refrained from commenting, although she really wanted to. I am not a child, went unsaid for anyone who happened to be looking at Selina’s face.

“Sorry. Habit.” Diana said as she reached over and touched Selina’s shoulder.

The seven-year-old grinned back at her but didn’t say anything.

Darnit, I can’t help it. She looks like a child. Heck, she is a child, but that mind is so far beyond me or any of us except Helen and maybe Jeff. Still, I hurt her feelings just now. Crap. When will I quit treating her as a kid?

Jasmine, having driven the crawler many times now, sometimes over rough terrain, had opened the big engine up on what had become a near road that they had been down many times. Oh, it had some major bumps and holes occasionally, all of which she knew, but the crawler didn’t steer as smoothly as a wheeled vehicle, even with the advanced transmission the new crawler possessed. As she moved the joystick a touch to the right or left, one track received less power than the other to correct their direction, and with Adrienné having never ridden in anything other than a spaceship or two and a very short trip in an Escalade, the ride for her, particularly with the roar of the big engine, was something very different and disconcerting.

When Jasmine noticed Adrienné’s death grip on the armrests, she reached a hand over to gently squeeze the young alien’s shoulder. “We aren’t going fast at all; it just seems that way because there aren’t any springs to smooth out the ride. I’ll let you drive back, and you will learn to love the crawler.”

“Drive? I know nothing about driving anything.”

Jasmine chuckled. “I was hesitant, too, and my sister-wives were even more so, still, we all took to it like ducks to water.”

At Adrienné’s questioning look, Jasmine chuckled. “There are several small lakes on the plains, and sometimes there are ducks, geese or other waterfowl swimming around. They aren’t precisely the same as you might find on Earth, but you can get the idea, anyway.”

“Until we came to Earth, I knew nothing about living outside the rooms we were kept in, so all this,” she said while motioning around them, “is entirely new to me. I ... know the language because it was mapped into my brain, but so much of it is just words without my having any concept of what those words represent. For instance, Jeff tells me that anyone in the country we live in would know what a horse or cow was, even people who had never actually seen a live animal, but until I saw a picture that contained farm animals — I think that is what Jeff called them — I had no conception whatsoever. Do you realize how dumb that makes me feel? All I ever did was service the males that came to me. Even then, I had never had an orgasm. I did not even know what one was.”