FSE

Furry search engine

formerly SoFurry search engine

It had been five years since the first two of the planned thirty-six ring environments were installed on the Barnard hub station. In those five short years, the station had grown to six ring environments, supporting the full-time needs of twenty-five human astronauts alongside nineteen dragons. It was by far the largest structure put in space by either species. Corymb replayed the pod's rear video feed again, squinting at the blurry dots on the screen.

“My guess is something went wrong in fusion containment," he said, pointing to one side of the blob that was thicker than the rest. The motion set him rotating the opposite direction, weightless in the microgravity.

“I'm pretty sure that jolt we felt didn't come from the dinky ion thruster," said Oryza, tumbling in a lazy spiral above him. “Something exploded. Or jetted. Not that you can tell from the image, though. It's a little blobby." With a flip of her wings, she drifted languidly to the console in the middle of the room.

They each wore blue jumpsuits, emblazoned with the logo of the Arche-Earth Joint Space Program. Corymb wore the thicker, human variant. At the wrists, neck, and ankles, elastic fabric pulled tight to keep any stray skin cells trapped inside, along with body heat. Oryza wore the lightweight dragon variant, which billowed loosely along her legs, tail, and wings to maximize airflow. Lost scales were less likely to clog the air filters than skin cells, and far easier to clean up.

The escape pod itself was the size of a modest bedroom, covered in modular panels giving access to ship internals, food supplies, toilets, and the like. Its exterior was a perfect sphere, save for the radiator that had unfurled from below the ship after ejection. Unlike traditional designs, these disposable units trawled behind the accelerating pod, attached by a flexible heat pipe. The transparent surface started as a package the size of a fist, but when stretched out was nearly the size of a football field. At maximum capacity, it would glow from the waste heat of the reactor.

In the middle of the pod was a large metal cylinder, about a meter in diameter. It stretched from floor to ceiling—insofar as the pod had the notion of up or down—and would have seemed structural if not for the dozens of needle-like spokes that radiated outwards from its center. Each one terminated in a thick cable that ran down into the floor. Oryza floated impatiently in front of the screen affixed to it.

“I would guess everyone made it out okay, though. There was plenty of time."

“Yeah. I worry for anyone who was in the hub, but everyone in the rings surely got out."

The lights dimmed for a moment as the faint hum of the reactor jumped in intensity. Each spike of the middle column lit up a green LED and began to whine.

“Looks like we have a course from the computer, finally," said Oryza. “Sixty-seven days, fifty-seven standard. So for you that's… fifty or so?"

Corymb nodded. The computer had a near-infrared sensor that differentiated humans and dragons by body heat and automatically used the correct units for each species. He could get the exact time later.

“We'll have several days here waiting on the geodesic drive, another fifty—of my days, that is—trying to hit the sun, and then another jump to put us on a trajectory to Arche."

“Nothing faster?"

Oryza shrugged. “Your technology. You tell me."

“Well, I guess it's better than anything we could come up with. Though it would be shorter if we remotely close to Arche to begin with."

“Don't blame politics. Neither of us were anywhere near that decision anyways."

It had come from the Ensemble itself; the station was to be nowhere near Arche, ever. The official reason was that decommissioning the station would pose “undue risk" to Arche given its large size. Anyone who saw the specifications of the hub station would know that this was a lie. The station had more than enough power to escape Arche's orbit, given several years of burn. There was no need to destroy it in Arche's atmosphere.

The true reason had to do with the directional antennae that communicated back to Earth. For any extrasolar project, such communication was a necessity. There were the dedicated radio arrays at both stars, but Earth would not accept an Archean repeater as a middleman. It was bad enough that the repeaters could hear every transmission from Earth to the station. At that distance, there was so much spread that the broadcast would cover the entire star system. Even so, Arche could not stop such transmissions in this direction. Were the station to use the Archean repeaters to reply, Arche would have full discretion over which messages would be sent. The directional antenna circumvented this issue, ensuring that human messages could flow back to Earth without restriction.

In a vacuum, even this was not an issue. It only became one when compounded with the multitude of telescopes aboard the Barnard station, of which several could be guaranteed to be pointed at Arche at all times. For the sake of research, of course—it was a research station, after all.

Out of respect for the privacy of both parties, the decision was made to keep the station antipodal to Arche, such that the sun would always be between them. Encrypted dragon transmissions would go through an Archean repeater, so the sun would not block dragon communications.

Sadly, this meant that the pod's velocity was identical to Arche's in magnitude, but pointed in the worst possible direction. Thus the fifty-seven days.

The console made a rude beep. Oryza glanced at the screen, reading the large font hungrily.

“Well, Arche knows the station doesn't exist anymore. They have our flight plan, too. They know you're on board, so they should send up something you can breathe in when we get there." She gave a toothless smile.

“Are we meeting up with everyone from the station then?" He cocked his head, rotating slightly under the motion. “Is there even a dragon ship big enough to hold everyone?"

“Not that I know of… certainly not anything that's public."

Corymb sighed, closing his eyes and frowning.

“It's easier for me, though," said Oryza. “Arche already knows where I am. I could even be on the surface in a couple of moons. But it'll be six years before Earth even hears about this."

Earth wouldn't be sending rescue ships. It would be six years for Earth to receive any message about the station, and then another six for a rescue ship to arrive. Instead, the monthly trade ships planned for extra capacity, in the event that any humans needed to be evacuated from Arche back to Earth. New ring units, too, would keep coming for the next six years. They would be sent right back, the crew losing twelve years for nothing.

“To be fair, the six years only counts if I stay here," said Corymb. “The trade ships can only take two people at a time. If I'm lucky enough to be picked first, I'd only be seventy days behind the news about the station. Same as you, really."

“But there are twenty-four other humans ahead –" Oryza trailed off. Perhaps there weren't.

“You're right." He looked up at her. “I'll gladly be thirteenth." He grabbed a handle and swung over to the terminal. Oryza flapped deftly to the side, moving out of the way. “They didn't send anything about who made it out?"

“Repeater 3 acknowledged, but it was the automated response. Ground is probably reading over ours and everyone else's right now. Give it an hour or so. I doubt they'd send us something prematurely."

It was two hours of anxious waiting before the message came. In different circumstances, Oryza knew, Corymb would make some joke about how the text was visible to Earth with the naked eye. He would rumble it out in his best approximation of Perphian, practicing the language. Oryza would laugh, not from the joke, but because of how funny he sounded. It was a good thing, too; font size was a dangerous topic to joke about in Perphia. But this was not a time for humor.

A sigh of relief came over the pair as they read the message: all people were accounted for, twenty-five humans and nineteen dragons. There were extra instructions giving the details for jump staggering; it was unlikely two pods would collide from a jump, given the intrinsic inaccuracy of geodesic drives, but they wanted everyone to have a unique time window upon which to begin orbiting Arche. The computer updated their course automatically.

“So now we just need to avoid going stir-crazy, being stuck here for this long," said Corymb.

“Indeed. I think that begins with lunch," she responded, drifting over to a panel labeled “FOOD". Holding her wings out to brace against the air, she tugged sharply at the panel. It snapped open, retained by a hinge on one side.

“Careful! Watch your wings, you take up half of this place with them stretched out all the way like that."

“Sorry. Hungry?" she asked, holding what appeared to be a small juice pouch.

“What even is that?" he said, catching the bottle as she pushed it to him. “It says 'Not for human consumption'… wait a second, this is just alcohol."

“I thought you guys could digest alcohol?"

“Not like you can—it's not exactly benign, to us. Besides, this says 98% pure. I'd definitely throw up—if I could even convince myself to swallow the thing. And I don't really feel like cleaning up floating balls of vomit." He pushed the bottle back. “Plus, I value my liver."

“Suit yourself," she said, unscrewing the cap and draining the contents of the pouch in a matter of seconds. The alcohol was beyond warm; everything in the ship was. There was a very thin slice of temperatures the two could agree on; humans required warm temperatures, and dragons cold ones. Thus, the air was perpetually kept at a balmy thirteen degrees Celsius. Oryza considered ten to be comfortably warm.

“And after the computer worked so hard on these meal plans for us," he scolded, shaking his head. “It says you should have the alcohol tomorrow, and alternate every other day." He gave her a sly glance, grinning. “You've already messed it up." They both laughed.

“Come on," said Oryza. “The pod is rationed for four humans, or four dragons! And you guys are voracious. There's plenty of dragon-specific stuff in here, too. We don't really need to worry about rationing, do we?" She continued rummaging through the compartment. “Aha! Cookies!" said Oryza, holding the reflective package up triumphantly.

Corymb grunted a syllable that sounded like a Perphian slur. “I'd rather have the alcohol. They're just… chewy is the wrong word. Gummy?" He made the syllable again. “They took crumb reduction too far!"

“You're being too picky," she said with her mouth full. “They are rations, after all. Even if we aren't rationing."

“Well, I don't want malnutrition, so I'm going to at least keep a log."

“Fair enough."

The rest of the day passed surprisingly quickly. They explored the contents of each compartment. They read the pod manual. They covered safety procedures. For fires. For loss of atmosphere. For loss of climate. For hull ruptures. They went over medical emergencies, and where the equipment for treatment was. They covered spare parts. Their purpose. Where they went.

Then the lights finally took pity on them and dimmed, indicating that it was now nighttime. The hub station, and consequently the escape pod, operated on an artificial 21-hour day, splitting the difference between an Earth day and the shorter Arche day. It took adjusting to, but made it possible for both species to maintain the same circadian rhythm.

The escape pod had four sleeping compartments, each hidden behind a latching, hinged panel indistinguishable from the storage containers. They were the size of a one-person tent, with a little extra space for the slightly larger bulk of dragons. Minus tail and wings, adults of both species were about the same size. Oryza and Corymb climbed into their respective units and snapped the door shut behind them.

Then it was the next day.

Oryza's eyes were slightly less orange than usual. The red tones had begun to fade, yellow sclera poking through the haze. It was going to have to be addressed eventually, given the fifty-seven-day trip, but she had hoped for more time. She had a couple of days, if that.

Corymb grumbled awake, climbing out of his sleeping compartment.

“Welcome to day one of having absolutely nothing to do," he said.

Oryza turned from the mirror. “You're not being creative enough. Look out the window, or something. I have a feeling the real boredom hasn't even begun yet."

He pulled himself over to the window. It was a small thing, the size of a dinner plate. A chunk of layered, metallic glass the thickness of his thumb was all that separated the pod's interior from nothingness. Outside, the stars stood still. Corymb knew that they were orbiting the red dwarf at many kilometers per second: basically, not moving. But these were the same stars he grew up with on Earth, more or less. The constellations were mostly intact.

“I don't remember seeing a low-tech telescope in any of the things we went through," he said.

“Unless you want to use the shitty navigation one," said Oryza. “Though it barely even has color."

“There's got to be something else interesting to do."

“Sleep?"

“I know! Languages!" he exclaimed.

“What?"

“We can practice each other's language! Your English is definitely better than my Perphian, but I could still give you a few pointers on pronunciation."

“You'll learn all of my bad habits…"

“And you, mine! It's a great idea."

“I don't know if it's sixty-days-worth of a great idea, but sure."

And thus began the first of the many ritualistic language sessions the two would have. They were slow, at first, neither one quite comfortable with the structure or rigor these sessions would have, but gradually became more relaxed. It was true that Oryza's English skills far exceeded Corymb's Perphian, but modern Perphian was half English these days, so she had less to learn overall. Even so, Corymb was on the short list of people actually fluent in the dragon language, and was by no means a slouch. The challenges for both of them at this point were all either pronunciation-related or vocabulary-related.

Perphian had a mix of polyphonic rumblings to it, interspersed with phonemes Corymb could handle quite well. The rumblings were structural; one would indicate a question, another an imperative, and so forth. He could approximate the rumblings, but this approximation meant his voice lost all emotion. Oryza spent hours going over the sounds, judging his jaw position and tongue placement. It was fun, at times. But sometimes he would give her the most frustrating questions.

“At least teach me scent theory," he said. “I've heard that scent is like an art form to dragons, but the language ambassador didn't teach it to us. We've seen it written and asked what it meant, but she downright refused to talk about it, saying it wouldn't translate."

“That's because it doesn't translate!" she responded, for the third time. “Every time a human tries to describe a scent, you use some metaphor. 'Oh, it smells like lavender!' But lavender isn't a smell—it's a flower!

“Here—let me try an analogy," she continued. “Imagine you didn't know colors, for a moment. You would see the color red and proclaim, 'It is like a rose I have seen!'—which is technically true. But then I could show you several other shades of red, and you might say, 'Clearly, they cannot be red, because that rose colored one is red! Red is already taken; they must be a different color.'

“Scents are about the abstract relations between a specific smell. The smell of cinnamon is not a word in Perphian; we would describe it as a combination of other, abstract scents. Green isn't defined as the color of foliage; it's the median of all green things. That's what scent is about. And human noses simply aren't good enough to do that."

And afterwards, they swapped positions. Corymb covered idioms, and helped her pronounce those pesky R- sounds, which she was convinced was a task rendered impossible by the geometry of dragon mouths.

“Don't make me reach in there and shove your tongue further back!"

“If ar fah ez I carn go!"

They taught and talked until their voices were sore, and then stopped for a food break.

Corymb perused the selection, eventually settling on a pouch of pureed squash and bag of jerky. Oryza picked a bag of some leaves that he didn't recognize, along with a small tray of ivory cubes labeled as “Marrow Paste".

“I really hope that's the vegetable, and not what I'm thinking of," he said.

“Says the guy eating old, shriveled up meat. I'll have you know, marrow paste is extremely nutritious." She popped a cube of it into her mouth. “Besides, we were in charge of the food. It's all grown in a beaker—well, a lot of beakers, at scale. Even that jerky, there. Completely sterile—no risk of food poisoning. There's not even bacteria in it to make it rot. Until you open it, obviously."

“That explains why it tastes so bland."

The language session continued afterwards. There was a growing comfort in acknowledging each other's mistakes, far from the initial reticence from fear of saying the wrong thing or being interpreted incorrectly. They talked the hours away, patiently walking each other through the subtlest of intonations, carefully explaining and repeated the obtuse reasoning behind idioms. But eventually, it began to wind down.

Oryza then spoke in Perphian: “You know Corymb, you would make an alright mate."

“What's a primary?" he asked, mishearing her. “I've heard a few of the other dragons use the term, and I thought they meant mate, but apparently it's something different?"

She blinked. In Perphian, the words “mate" and “primary" were quite similar. A minor difference in a vowel sound—it was not an uncommon mistake, even among dragons.

“They are orthogonal," she said, finally. “A mate, in Perphia, is someone you have sex with. It's about mutual admiration, lust. But a primary… they're a best friend? Maybe beyond that, even. A person you talk to a lot, and simply love to be around. You genuinely enjoy their company, and that is enough. In Perphian, the two words don't connote each other. You might be someone's primary and mate, or primary, or just mate.

“And I didn't… say primary," she added.

“Are you… coming on to me?" he asked in English.

“Hey! Idiom. But… yes? If I understood the question."

Corymb looked at her and frowned. “Is it just me, or are your eyes are a different color than they were yesterday?"

“No? Don't try to change the subject. I know humans can be a little convoluted when it comes to courtship. Especially compared to us—sorry if I'm being too direct. But you don't know much about dragon courtship, either. Right? What I'm trying to say is that… being direct is sort of all we have?" She gave a sheepish smile.

He scoffed. “Oryza, that's still not direct. Just so there's no confusion: you want to mate with me?"

“…Yes?"

He softened. “All right. Let me think about. It's not like we're in a rush."

You may not be, she thought. Her vision was far too sharp, definitely more so than it was this morning. She knew her eyes were closer to amber now.

“Don't take too long," she said. “If you wait to decide until halfway through—assuming you accept—think of all the wasted time we could have had."

“It's nearly bedtime, anyways," he said.

“Yeah, alright," she whispered.

They each drifted over to their sleeping compartments and climbed in.

Corymb had a raging erection, and it made it impossible to think straight, let alone sleep. His thoughts drifted to Oryza—she wanted to mate with him. She would mate with him, if he wanted. He could go over and ask right now. He just had to say yes. But he couldn't. Not yet. He had to process this first. And this boner was getting in the way of thinking clearly.

His hands drifted to the zipper on his jumpsuit and pulled in down in a smooth, habituated motion. He slipped out of it, wadded it up, and shoved it beneath the netting beside his head to keep it from floating around.

He pulled off his underwear, and his cock sprung up in response. He could feel each heartbeat—no, he could hear it, above even the hums of the fusion reactor. I haven't been this hard in a while, he thought.

What would he say to her? They'd be here for nearly another sixty days. His penis wanted to say yes. But from his experience, it would say yes to anything remotely concave. His brain was still undecided.

She was a dragon, and he was a human. There wasn't precedent for any of this. Plus, they had been explicit during training: no sex in space. The reasons were twofold: to avoid pregnancy, for which the effects of microgravity were still unknown, due to ethical concerns—and to avoid the mess, the contamination. It wouldn't due to have foreign gametes in a biological sample, or for the air filter to clog with dried bodily fluids.

He didn't have to worry about pregnancy, here, though the similarities between humans and dragons were frankly astonishing. It had become a core tenant of xenobiology: convergent evolution, even across planets. At the same time, even! No intelligent life for millions of years, and yet there was this tiny slice of time upon which both species existed? It was certainly not random. The theory was that some external factor—a dust cloud which both Earth and Arche passed through, perhaps—had held the key for intelligent life to evolve. Something that massively favored its selection. But even that theory had its holes.

But no, pregnancy wasn't a concern. And as for making a mess… he absentmindedly stroked his cock. There were ways to make it cleaner. Fun ways. He shivered.

They certainly didn't have to worry about contamination, for the escape pod was no research vessel. And for the air filters, they could simply give it a fastidious cleaning. It wasn't like they had anything else to do—they could clean it daily, instead of the recommended weekly, just to be safe.

He began stroking faster. Oryza was about the same size as he was, minus her tail. The geometry would work.

Plus, there were no internal cameras. The dragons, ever adamant about their privacy, had ensured that. They were thousands of kilometers from any other living thing, at least. Neither of them had to worry about the possible stigma. This was their closed system; no one would ever have to know.

Meanwhile, in the other sleeping compartment, Oryza had shoved her tail several inches inside herself and was thrusting it in and out with reckless abandon. Humans had been on her list of fantasies for some time now—but always just a fantasy. On the hub station, she had been nothing if not professional. But now it was just her and Corymb. As much as she hated to admit it, she was going to take advantage of this situation. Her tail plunged deeper, and a jolt of pleasure went up her spine. She lost control of her tail and it flopped out of her pussy weakly.

Groaning, she grasped at the slick tip of her tail with a hind claw and shoved it back inside. She was intimately familiar with her tail. It was great for a quick bit of pleasure, but it alone wasn't enough to bring her to orgasm. She limited to only going in and out, and while the pressure wasn't wrong, it could certainly be put to better use in different places. Someone else's tail was always better. What she wouldn't give for a tail that could twist, too! Or at least move side to side, even when wrapped around so acutely, like she had done to get this angle.

What did human penises look like, anyways? she thought. If she were on Perphia, she could have looked up an anatomical drawing with ease. But she hadn't bothered to while there, despite her fantasies. Some feeling told her that it would destroy the mystique—her erotic daydreams would be crushed under harsh reality.

She went deep with her tail again, curling the tip as much as she could. High-pressure electricity, this time, from the base of her tail to her navel. She exhaled, stopping herself when it came out as a moan. She didn't moan, usually.

I wonder if they're prehensile. She wished her tail was. Or maybe a knot big enough to actually hold. Dragon knots were comfortably large, but the dragon species had evolved so that a coupled pair could easily separate if threatened. It was a copulatory tie made of wet paper.

Her jumpsuit floated uselessly onto her face. She inhaled, pretending it was Corymb's jumpsuit, having since been discarded in order to better service her. I bet they cum by the bucketload. With the amount of water and food he puts in himself, he had better.

She imagined the lovely aftermath. His semen would be leaking out of her, the surface tension and lack of gravity making it cling and spread ever so tightly to her scales. It would seep into the cracks of those midnight scales, contrasting ever so wonderfully against the darker color. Every motion and stretch she made would have it pool outwards or settle back into the gaps. Capillary action would pull it through those interstitial spaces, until his cum coated her entire vulva in a web-like mess. Then she imagined him licking it up, reaching into those very same cracks, pulling it out and cleaning her with his tongue. She writhed in pleasure, a foreclaw hitting the side of her sleeping chamber.

After he had finished with cleaning her legs, he would move on to her labial scales. He would grab her haunches firmly, stabilizing himself in the microgravity. Then she would use her tail, guide his face into her crotch. Though he wouldn't need much invitation. She imagined thick, heavy slurps from that tongue. She didn't know what human penises looked like, but oh, did she know about that tongue. Their language session had made sure of that.

It wasn't about the length—dragons had them beat on that count. It was about the width, the texture, the strength behind it. That lick along her labial scales wouldn't just stroke, it would drag, pulling her scales along with it. He would move on to her clit, licking in circles, dragging the nub around whichever way he pleased. Her body shivered, and she thrust her tail into herself again. The damn angle is always wrong!

He wouldn't put his tongue into her, though. He was already done there. More than done. No, instead, she imagined, he would slide up her body. In the zero gravity, he would use her legs as handles, then switch to her sides. Those hands! She made a mental note to fantasize about them some more, later. He would pull himself close to her, dragging his now-flaccid cock across her underbelly and leaving gossamer streaks of their combined lovemaking across it. He would nuzzle his head into the crook of her neck.

She inhaled sharply. Would he do it?

She didn't see his tongue, but felt it drag along her neck slowly, below the chin, the surface area the size of a claw print.

She came stronger than she could remember ever having done in a long time. She twisted back and forth, striking the sides of the sleeping unit with stray limbs. Her scales cried out in ecstasy as she felt her powerful vaginal muscles grip with a force that was almost painful. They loosened.

She thought about that lick again.

Her walls slammed together again, even harder than before. She cried out in a deafening roar, warbling in the subsequent waves of pleasure.

She hit her head on the side of the sleeping unit. It didn't matter. She roared again.

That lick. Her heart skipped a beat. The orgasm was settling down, but her blood was hot and pulsed quickly.

She let her body relax—she'd had every muscle tensed. Then she exhaled. When had she last inhaled? She couldn't remember.

There was a wet sensation coming from the stem of her tail. She grabbed her jumpsuit from the air and mopped up the wet area. There was more than she expected. She repeated the motion on the tip of her tail, and then flicked on the lights to look at her jumpsuit.

The vibrant blue was discolored into mottled navy splotches all over, reflecting patches of light off the damp surface. It was her only jumpsuit, too. Hopefully it wouldn't smell in the morning. At least not strong enough for Corymb to tell. She put it near the air vent to dry, tying the net around it to keep it steady.

Did she roar? She remembered roaring. The sleeping chambers were soundproof, but that might have been pushing it. Her head hurt, too. And she needed to pee. Badly.

She clicked the panel open. Only now, in that refreshing blast of cool, sterile air, did she realize how much her chambers smelled. Corymb wouldn't just be able to smell it. He'd be able to taste it, if he were there now. The thought made her shiver.

But he wasn't there. He was still sound asleep in his compartment. She flew over to the bathroom panel and went inside.

Corymb heard the click of the bathroom door. He was stroking faster now. It felt like his cock would burst if he were any harder. He imagined Oryza climbing into his sleeping chambers with him. There wouldn't be enough space for the both of them. They would make it work, though. He would get his cock inside her, outside the compartment. Then they could slide in, and then there would be just enough room. He wouldn't be able to pull out, though. Not enough space.

Am I fantasizing about her? He was horny. But there was probably no harm in it. Besides, the sleeping chambers were private to a fault—she never had to know. Maybe it would even help him unpack how he felt.

Another click. I wonder what dragon pussy looks like, he thought guiltily. Maybe they don't have one. Maybe it's a cloaca. His cock throbbed. He could ask her. She would show him. Hell, she would show him everything he wanted to see. Another throb. He thought about her scales—those dark, smooth scales. He had brushed against her before, during the language session. She wasn't warm, or cold. Her body temperature was around room temperature. What did the medical guide say? Twenty-two degrees?

There was another click. He imagined slipping into her slit, hilting in an instant as she eagerly pulled him into her. It wouldn't be hot. Room temperature. But that was fine—it meant there wasn't any heat obscuring the sensation. He would feel the wetness as wetness, the smoothness as smoothness, and with absolutely no distractions.

Oryza noticed a smell she had never smelled before. She knew how to describe it, of course. She didn't need to know what it was to describe it. Her nose was better than that.

She was about to go to her sleeping chambers when she noticed Corymb's panel was slightly ajar. She heard him breathing fast.

“Corymb? Are you okay?" she asked, pulling the panel aside. “Your door was–"

Floating in his sleeping chambers, Corymb had a hand wrapped around his cock, another hand stabilizing his body on a nearby handle. He stared at her. His face changed colors.

“Sorry!" she chirped, quickly shutting the panel on him.

The panel opened up again, this time from the inside. A rush of hot air flowed from the compartment. Corymb climbed out and shivered.

Oryza suddenly realized she was still naked. This was not uncommon for dragons, but Corymb had not seen her naked before. And she had never seen Corymb naked before, either. Or any human, for that matter. Tonight was a night of firsts, apparently.

“My face is up here, Oryza."

“Sorry!" She kept looking at his erect and quite pent-up cock. “It's just… not what I expected."

There was no knot. Not even a little one. If it was prehensile, he certainly wasn't interested in showing off. The testicles looked about like she had expected, though, so at least she wasn't entirely wrong.

“Thinking about someone back on Earth?" she asked.

“Twelve-year round trip. Nobody's waiting for me. You know exactly whose fault this is," he said, pointing at his penis.

“Just remember, I gave you an easy out." She watched as his cock twitched. “And it's not my fault. You're the one with the boner. Which, you know—I could help with, if you want. Not like anyone would know."

“No, Oryza. I need to make this decision when I'm not horny as fuck."

Oryza adopted a professional posture. The air moved, cooling on the dampness of her vulva. It wasn't a chilly sensation; it tempered the incessant heat from the pod's climate, and reminded her how much she wanted the human inside her.

“So you go back to your bed and take care of that. What are you going to do with the semen? Let it float all over the place, clog up the air filters?" She rubbed her hind legs together. They flowed smoothly and without friction against each other.

“Oryza, that's not even subtle. And I'm not talking about the legs. Don't pretend like you want to fuck for the sake of the air filters."

“I need it, Corymb." She wasn't pleading; her gaze was intense, her tone serious. “It doesn't have to be a full-on mating. Let me suck your cock, or something."

There was something in her eyes. Not the color, this time, although Corymb knew it had definitely been getting brighter. It was a glint of something, hidden beneath the surface. Not lust.

Fear?

Oryza, like all dragons, grew up on Arche. Arche had 1.5 times the gravity of Earth. She had four sets of claws. Her practiced wings in zero gravity gave her more agility than he could ever hope to match. She wasn't afraid of him. Not physically, at least.

“I need it now! Or tomorrow morning. Definitely no later than noon tomorrow." The glint was still there, although a calm had returned to her voice.

“Why the deadline? We've still got months in here, and it's nighttime. Can't we just do this in the morning?" His cock gave a reminding throb.

“I want to tell you why! I'll tell you about it in great detail! But not until you answer me."

“It'll affect my decision?"

“Yes!" She frowned. “No. It… destroys your ability to make a decision."

“So I'll be obligated to choose one of the sides. That makes it sound like important information. Information I'll need to make a decision."

“You'll feel obligated. It doesn't change the problem. Listen, I'm going to go crazy if we wait any longer, and you'll get a priapism or something. Let's fuck, or not. But decide now."

Corymb was silent for a moment. I fantasized about her, he thought. And I liked it. But this is just weird.

“No strings attached?" he prodded.

“I'll never bring it up again. You can, if you want, though."

“And it's safe? Your saliva won't start digesting my foreskin?"

“We had a study done." She was quieter now. “We received human bodily fluid, tissue biopsies. The ones relevant to us… there won't be any issues like that."

He thought for a long moment.

“Alright," he said finally. “But just oral." He put a hand on her snout. “And you need to explain first."

“It's about ardeo," she responded.

Ardeo. The meiosis drug. He had heard rumors, mostly. Dragon bodies made no eggs, no sperm, until ardeo directed it to do so. Dragons didn't like talking about it with humans, apparently. Even the ambassadors had avoided detail beyond that. On the station, he would sometimes stumble into a room, overhearing a few dragons talking about it. Their conversation would pause for a moment, before resuming on a completely different topic. Corymb knew nothing beyond that.

“I need to have it soon," she continued. “It would be bad if we didn't figure out… this, before then. I'll tell you more later—we need to finish this first," she said, pouncing on him with a leathery flap of her wings. He backed up instinctively, but she was faster. Her mouth was around him in an instant.

It felt like his cock had entered a glass of lukewarm water, except the water really wanted him to cum. Her tongue danced around it with a turbulence and ferocity that surprised both of them. It had such a smooth texture, with a wetness that stuck to his cock. Her saliva spread along the entire length, driven by surface tension to spread and adhere. Without gravity to make it drip, it wasn't limited to a film—it was thicker than it ought to be, and her tongue sloshed around in it, adding more.

Corymb's cock was so hot—Oryza was reminded of eating freshly cooked food. It was about the right temperature for it. Her mouth salivated some more. She fought the instinctual urge to bite down.

Oral sex had been taboo in Perphia for some time—on males, at least. It had become less taboo since the ardeo shortage had been resolved, but semen was still considered valuable from a cultural standpoint. Still, Oryza had dreamed of having her mouth bred, imagining what the taste would be like. It wasn't for reproduction—it was for passion. She hadn't had the opportunity until now.

Corymb groaned, bucking into her, stabilized by his hands on either side of her forehead. “Oryza," he panted.

She closed her mouth around him, conscious of her teeth, and redoubled her efforts with her tongue.

“Now," he squeezed in between his breaths.

A spurt of burning liquid shot into her soft palate. Another joined it. She wanted all of it. She wanted it to fill her mouth, so full that she couldn't even begin hold it all. She wanted it to dribble out, make a mess of her face. She wanted it to take an entire minute to finish hunting down all of his cum and swallowing it. Oryza covered his urethra with her tongue. The next two spurts landed directly on it. There was too much heat for her to taste anything.

That was it?

“That was… really good," he said. But Oryza looked confused. “Something wrong?" he added.

“It just… wasn't what I was expecting."

“I mean, I'm not a dragon. It was bound to be a little bit different."

“Yes. It was certainly… hotter. But also… less than I was expecting. In volume."

“Oh." He hadn't been holding back. It was a good orgasm. It had been a time since his last, too. “Dragons have… more, then?"

“Quite a bit," she said. “Don't worry. I had fun, too." She nuzzled against his head. “Of course," she whispered into his ear, “if you're in the mood for more, we are right here. I'm ready if you are."

Corymb shook his head and pulled away from her. “You said no strings attached. And I'm getting cold."

“Then get yourself somewhere warmer," she mewled.

He smiled sheepishly. “I haven't forgotten about your rather poor explanation. But that's for the morning. Goodnight, Oryza." He slipped back into his sleeping unit, closing it properly this time.