Gingerbread Man: 2109; Chapter 11, The Morning After
This story is meant for those 18 years old and older.
11: The Morning After
Corporal Matthew Thorn enjoyed the feel of the morning sunshine that filtered down through the leaves of the alien yet familiar trees while he rested upon the upper abdomen of his Dorzeli-Ki lover Feih Desslat. His thoughts continued to revolve around the events of the previous evening when they had managed to express their feelings for one another even though she was over four times his size and a highly dangerous carnivore. A slight twinge of pain in his right arm was the only negative reminder of what he had gone through to please her, and even that caused him to smile.
He checked his internal chronometer -- it read 09:32 (relative), April 26, 2109 -- and realized that thirty minutes had passed since he had awakened and that he had spent almost the last two-thirds of his twenty-seven years waiting for an opportunity such as the one Feih had offered him. Just thinking about this made him want to show her how much he loved her and he tried to turn over in order to hug her, but her large, strong hands still had firm and loving hold of his nude body just beneath her generous breasts, the same position in which they had both fallen asleep. He was glad that she had not rolled over during the night.
He was thinking of a way to wake her up without startling her into accidentally crushing him when he heard and felt a muted growling sound from beneath him. This caused him to wonder if she was hungry.
He was confident that he, unlike their prisoner, Commander Lasteri Hatelo, would be safe from her appetite: he believed that he had barely managed to stop Feih from devouring her after she tried to kill him back at the Soriss outpost. There was something about that incident that was still bothering him. Feih had appeared to have missed her intended victim on purpose with each strike until she finally managed to trap and bite her; injecting just enough venom to knock her out.
A rustling sound to his right caused him to turn his head to see that Hatelo had managed to free herself from Feih's prehensile tails and was trying to crawl away. Her slow movements told him that she was still suffering from the effects from Feih's venom. He attempted to get up to stop their prisoner from escaping, but again found that he was nowhere near strong enough to remove his alien lover's sharp clawed hands.
A light tap on his left side from one of those claws caused him to look up and see that Feih had craned her neck to look down at him. She slowly moved her eyes in the direction of the escaping Soriss officer then back to him, smiled and removed her hands from his body.
He acknowledged her silent message, jumped off her sizable frame and moved to a safe distance, near his discarded backpack. Once he was clear she spun her body around and pounced on Hatelo. She screamed surprise then terror when Feih brought her face down onto her body.
He knew there was no way he could possibly stop her, so he turned away from what he thought would be a grisly scene. However, when the Soriss' continued screams took on a different and familiar tone, he forced himself to look back. His mouth dropped open in disbelief of what he saw and he asked, "Feih, what are you doing to her?" She lifted her face from Hatelo's body, turned slowly toward him and gave him a look of mild annoyance while she licked at the wetness on the front of her snout.
"Be patient Matt; your turn will come soon." She grinned and returned her attention to Hatelo's lower body. Matt turned away and thought of how little he still knew of her and her habits and was glad that she was not his brother.
He tried to keep busy over the ensuing minutes by gathering up and sorting through his possessions, anything to keep his mind off of how his body was reacting to what was happening behind him. Just when the smell of her arousal and the sounds they were had started to get to him when he heard an ear-piercing scream from their prisoner. He froze when, after a brief moment of silence, he heard Feih approach and sit behind him.
He felt he had no choice but to see if the Soriss was alive or dead and turned around. He was surprised when she deposited Hatelo's living and nude body at his feet. He looked up at her for an explanation.
She licked her snout clean then, in a pleasant tone of voice, said, "I share my possessions with those I care for."
He was surprised and somewhat touched by her offer, but felt that he had to decline it on more than just moral grounds; "No thanks Feih. You're more than enough for me and I'd get court-martialed if I did what you're suggesting."
His heartbeat raced when she frowned and moved down to all fours so that her face was only centimeters from his and growled, "But I insist."
Despite the possible consequences of refusing her a second time Matt held his resolve. "No Feih, I can't do this."
She smiled and gave him one long, very wet lick from his groin up to his face, evoking the same reactions they had when they had first touched each other. She pulled back and commented on his decision. "Your loyalties to me and to your beliefs are commendable, but I only wished to show you some of the more pleasurable aspects of my culture. And besides, I prefer males and you taste a lot better than she does, especially now." The stunned look on his face caused her to laugh.
He laughed with her but thought, "I don't know whether to feel complimented or frightened." He looked down at Hatelo he saw that she was awake and had a smile on her face, but he could tell that Feih had worn her out for the moment. "At least she won't be in any shape to put up a fight for awhile."
Fifteen minutes later, after they had dressed, he heard Feih call to him, "Matt?" He turned to her and saw that something had her worried. "You'll have to go on without me."
Puzzled by this sudden change in their original plan he put his helmet on and asked, "But I thought we were going their together?" He was shocked when his visor's display began to flash a T.A.L. of nine-point-five. He followed a hunch and looked in the direction Hatelo had been crawling. It jumped up to a ten-point-zero which, along with a hint of movement among the trees, confirmed his suspicions
He picked up the Soriss rifle he had acquired and asked, "How much time do I have?"
Her ears swung backward to focus on the forest to her rear. "Only a few of your minutes, maybe less" came her uneasy and whispered reply.
When he finished tying Hatelo's hands tied behind her back he returned to Feih and looked into her eyes.
"Feih I..."
She cut him off by returning to her earlier stance from which she gently rubbed the left side of her face with his. He reached up and hugged her. "I know," she whispered, "I feel the same way about you too, but we'll be seeing each other again if everything works out." Then, to his dismay, she reared up, bared all of her formidable teeth at him and snarled, "You must leave now!"
He could not believe that she was acting in this way toward him and thought that she might be joking with him, but decided not to take any chances and backed away from her while watching her eyes for any sign of an impending attack. When those same eyes moved quickly to the side where Hatelo had been crawling then refocused on him he knew where the actual threat lay. He offered her a causal salute and exited the clearing with Hatelo in tow.
Daihas Desslat emerged from his concealed position a few minutes later with a spare uniform for his sister and the carcass of a Driska. Upon arriving by her side he greeted her by rubbing the left side of his face with hers. He then handed the animal to her.
She accepted his offering and asked, "Is everyone ready?"
"Yes," answered her younger brother. "They'll be here shortly and they thank you for the leaving behind something to eat, most were very hungry after that swim, but I must warn you that some of them may not be too pleased with what you did with that human."
She looked directly at him with narrowed eyes. "Don't you mean you're not pleased by my letting Hatelo go with him?" He tried to look away, but she reached out and gently redirected his face toward hers. "Don't worry. He's an honorable being and she'll be back." She looked to the path the two humanoids had used to leave the clearing. "They'll both be back."
He sounded despondent when he asked. "You did it, didn't you?"
"Yes." She saw him frown. "I know how you feel about what I've done, but you'll have to make this sacrifice if our race is to survive. As to how the others feel about what I've done: they're just going to have to put aside their personal feelings if we're going to successfully push these invaders off this planet and regain our people's rightful place on the Kroon ruling council."
He smirked. "Are you talking about the Soriss or the Humans?" Instead of an answer she took a large bite out of her breakfast and gulped it down.
He sighed and stared at the path in front of them. He brightened a bit when she offered him the animal's rear half.