{"sf1_id":848665,"sf2_id":null,"title":"The Dogs: Litany - Episode VI","author":"Aux Chiens","words":8011,"posted_at":"2015-04-17T08:46:00.000Z","tags":["Character Development","Cuddling","Cum","Fingering","Gay Relationships","Handjob","Hugging","Kissing","M/M","Male","Male Pregnancy","Plot Development","Pregnancy","Story Progression","Transformation","precum","semen"],"url":"https://fse.anthro.fr/stories/848665-the-dogs-litany-episode-vi","original_url":"https://sofurry.com/view/848665","image_url":"https://www.sofurryfiles.com/std/thumb?page=848665\u0026ext=.jpg","description":"","content":"            The Sun was glorious above them, Sol Invictus, the rays of the Solstice fresh and gorgeous down from\nthe Virginia sky - the air was alive with the smells of the summer, the damp\nearth from a passing shower, and the effervescence of a campfire, somewhere\nnearby. Around him he could hear the faint of buzz of bees, and the alighting\nbirdsong of the chickadees and the cardinal.\n            But what caught his sight first, were the mountains, nigh-blinding\nin perfect verdance, a green so resplendently rich and deep that they possessed\na sinister kind of beauty, as though they did not belong on this Earth. The\ntrees seemed altogether too thick from how Andrew remembered - he knew where he\nwas, he was near home, just outside of it, although he could not see the road\nand the sign, but he was close, he felt, even if the forest was too wild and\nwicked, as though not a day had passed from the first utterance of the name, in\nthe tongue of the Spaniards who had claimed it first: Apalachen.\n            He glanced down - and gasped.\n            Before him were no more than fifty men, on their hands and\nknees, prostrating themselves in a deep bow of grateful reverence - they were\ndressed in the finery of the Powhatan native he had seen in textbooks, beaded\nand breechclothed, painted fantastic stripes of brilliant red. \n            They did not speak, but one amongst them, in front,\ndifferentiated from his fellows by a magnificent cloak of turkey feathers, came\nforward, standing, a box woven from what looked like willow branches in his\nhands.\n            And he spoke.\n            What came out of the man's mouth was beautiful, mysterious,\nand hushed - a language that Andrew did not recognize - and as he finished\nAndrew's eyebrows furrowed in, his mind struggling to make sense of this strangeness\nso close to him.\n            He looked to his right, and there stood a great Black man,\nbroad-shouldered and powerful, with a handsome face, dressed in plain cotton\nclothes which Andrew, with a new clenching dread, recognized as the costume of\nthe Colonial slave. Next to him, dressed equally humbly, hair tied back, was a\nBlack woman, observing the scene serenely - from her proximity to the man she must\nhave been his wife, and at her breast, a baby, their child, was nursing.\n            He had never seen this man, or this woman, in his life, but\n- but he knew their names, and he spoke to the Black man as though he had known\nhim for years, and inquired of him in a nervous whisper: \n            \"Turner Jack, what be this manner of strangeness?\"\nHe lifted his hands to the native in his feathered finery, deeply puzzled.\n\"These Indians come to us as one who would do obeisance, yet - do we not--?\"\n            His voice was not his own - it was his, yes, but the accent\nwas very different, it seemed tempered and forged by an anvil that was not\nAmerican...or perhaps not yet American.\n            \"Massa Nicky - don't ya know?\" The man's words\nwere rich with the timbre of the Sénégal - it was English, but an English\ndipped in the mermaid-waters of West Africa. \"Dese man a'fom da tribe down\nby da watah - da creek dat run by ya farmland, Massa Nicky.\" There was a\ntinge of confusion in his voice, as though it should have been utterly obvious.\n\"Dey here ta tank ya, riddin dem of da scourge upon de land - Massa Nicky.\"\n\n            He smiled - it was a kind smile, patient and wise, and he\nstretched his arm up, and over, the gathered Indians.\n            Andrew's gaze trailed back to them, this mass of men whom\nhad not moved from their reverence to him, the white man who had encroached on\ntheir territory, but somehow held in esteem, still, for some errand he did not\nremember doing.\n             The one who seemed\nto be their chief, and who had uttered the peculiar supplications of\nthanksgiving in a language which Andrew now suspected he should have\nunderstood, dressed in that cloak of turkey feathers, now fell to his knees,\nthe woven box held up for Andrew to see.\n            He uttered a single word, choked with emotion:\n\"Tenagh.\"\n            A moment, awkward and stilted, passed before Andrew heard\nTurner Jack's voice, still gentle, still patient, in his ear: \"Dey mean ta\noffa dat as a gift - a trophy, wat ya helped dem git in da battle, dis night\nnow just passed.\"\n            \"Trophy...?\" \n            Andrew repeated, as he felt swimming in his heart a\nnameless fear, a revulsion he could not place - but he answered the chief, with\na respectful nod, from an instinct he struggled to understand even as it came\nnaturally to him:\n            \"Netah...\" \n            He took the box from the Indian chief's hands, and as the\nlatter went down to kowtow in imitation of his tribesmen, he nodded, again -\nand removed the lid.\n            Inside was the tip of a tail - it looked like a wolf's\ntail, or perhaps a dog's, a large dog's...it was black, as black as night, and it\nshimmered like jet in the summer Sun, beautifully tied at one end with wampum\nand a scarlet thread.\n            At once, he could not sense Turner Jack, or his wife, or\nthe Indians, or their chief, around him, any longer - he felt alone, hideously\nalone, alone with this box, and its contents, the eldritch evidence some great\ncrime had taken place which he, evidently, had masterminded, committed, in cold\ncolonist blood.\n            Andrew recognized it immediately - this was the tip of Bligh's tail, the same color, the same\nshape - it had to be, yes, there was no mistaking it. \n            He cried out, bitten into by stark, morbid horror - he\ndropped the box to the ground, and the little furry trinket began to twitch\nlike a panicked worm, sprawling upon the grass and moving about, wildly,\nserpentine, blindly searching, Andrew realized, for the body it was cut from.\n            He screamed - he screamed aloud - and sat bolt upright in\nbed.\n            Andrew was in his bedroom - Cody was snoozing, facing the\nwall, beside him, the boy's tail making the furtive motions of deep sleep\nagainst his leg.\n            He took several breaths - long, ragged, shuddering breaths,\nbefore he clapped his hands to his face - a dream, that's all it was, just a\ndream, a horribly fucked up dream...\n            Cody stirred beside him, rolling over to face Andrew.\n\"An...dy?\" he asked drowsily.\n            \"Go back to sleep, Cody,\" Andrew said letting his\nhands come down to stroke his boyfriend's hair, trying to regain his composure\nand expel the awful final image of the dream from his mind's eye. \"It's\nokay--\"\n            \"Are you okay?\"\n\n            \"Yes Baby, I'm fine.\" He was lying, but he would\nrather lie, in the moment, than have Cody worry about him. \"Just a - just\na weird dream, that's all.\"\n            Back to the wall rolled Cody. \"Mmm...love you...\"\n            \"Love you too, Baby - go get some sleep.\" He\npatted Cody's ear - the furry dog's ear that twitched and swiveled and\nfluttered, so sweet and so bashful, when Andrew and Bligh would dote on him.\n            Cody made a little sleepy moan of acknowledgement, and\nAndrew tried to chuckle at the cute sight - but the macabre image, the feeling\nof dread and the thick, saturated guilt, down through the ages...\n            ...what an odd thought. What ages? Who was he, in that dream?\nThe man had called him Nicky - was\nnot the first ancestor that came to Dog's Creek Nicholas Lightfoot, for whom he was given that middle name? Was he\ndreaming things that had happened to his ancestor, the man who, Stephen said,\nslaughtered the tribe that was there before the Indians ever came...?\n            He tried to make sense of the fragmentary details - he\ntried to make sense of feeling so sick from a dream, a dream about Bligh...but\nwas Bligh really in it? His tail was - was it symbolic?      Was something his ancestor did speaking\nto him about he had treated Bligh the day before, the residual regret from\nquestioning the three of them's relationship, the vulnerability opened up by\nletting Stephen in?\n            And then he realized:\n            \"Stephen...\" he whispered to himself.\n\"Stephen'd know...\"\n            Gingerly sliding out of bed as to not wake Cody again, he\nfound some jeans that had been tossed to the floor earlier that week - putting\nthem on, stuffing his tail down the right pant leg as part of a now-ingrained\nsubroutine, he made his way out of the bedroom, to the living room, to see if\nStephen was still awake.\n            Opening the door, he was greeted with something he\nhalf-expected but still surprised him: Stephen, slumped back on the couch,\nbreathing heavy in the throes of sleep. Bligh was next to him, taking up the\nother two-thirds of the cushions - his hat was still on, even in the slumber\nwhich the wheezing rise-and-fall of his chest made apparent. \n            Andrew stood there, in the open doorway, observing them,\nunawares in their dreams - he sighed, being able, for the first time since\nStephen had cannonballed into his life after a three year estrangement, to\nreflect...and to breathe.\n            His thoughts came to Bligh and Stephen's relationship,\nhidden from everyone, the seven months Bligh had latched on to the one person\nhe could turn to and count on with Andrew gone, probably for good. \n            How stupid he had been - how fragile he had been. One small\nupset and the whole thing was in chaos - was that he, Andrew, had always been? \n            The answer was an obvious no, because this was a perfectly reasonable neuroses to have\nacquired, being forced into this, by Bligh, with Cody's encouragement...\n            His eyes drifted to Bligh, asleep. Here he looked helpless\n- here he looked so vulnerable, as though, unlike the Bligh that moved about in\nthe waking world, he could be wounded, he could be defeated. But he could\nactually - only when it came to Cody, sometimes, but all the time, when it came\nto Andrew...\n            ...had Andrew really been forced into this, after all? \n            No.\n            The terror was no longer fresh and therefore no longer\nexquisite, the novelty of the separation from the world no longer a curse -\nbecause it was never a curse.\n            Bligh - twisted up into his own neural pathways, his\nechoing shadow from Tempest, his legacy of West Virginia skin, this obstinate,\nstubborn, forceful, patriarchal hayseed with the thick accent and the wolfish\nsmile and irritating laugh, this stupid dog - he would follow Bligh into the\nHell that Pappy had preached about it, and dwell with him in damnation and\ntorment for eternity, and all he had to do was ask. \n            Simply because...he was Andrew,\nand Bligh was Bligh, and that's how,\nin the reductionist way that he taught himself in things scientific - for was\nhe not, even now, a scientist? - that\nthings in this universe were. \n            And then Cody - Cody would follow him, because wherever Andrew went, Cody went too...this too, was a\nirrefutable facet of the universe. For the three of them could not be\nseparated, as hard as the world seemed to scheme and pressure.\n            He leaned in the doorframe to look upon his brother - mouth\nagape, a hilarious image, for someone who spent his existence trying to play\nthe role of the trickster.\n            He had forgiven Stephen for what he and Bligh and done, and\nthe memory of his outburst played out embarrassingly, a bit of melodrama he\nhoped that all three of them, Cody too, would forget soon enough. \n            He had forgiven him because - there was nothing to forgive.\nBligh had every right to fall in love for someone as close to what, he, Andrew,\nwas and represented...he had every right, with Andrew gone, to have someone who\nloved and respected him.\n            And Stephen did - Stephen probably did still, Andrew\nguessed. He had made the right decision, the uncharacteristically conscionable decision, to let Bligh go...\n            ...and when he did, Bligh, on a winding path, set off to find\nAndrew and Cody...\n            Andrew had told him that night, no\nterms uncertain, that Stephen was to stay the night, and Bligh was to look\nafter him. It was the first time he had maybe ever insisted on something that\nmajor over Bligh's objections - but what else could he do? Stephen was Andrew's own flesh, his\nfamily, whom he shared DNA and, now, a destiny with. \n            And Cody had spoken up too - he, forever believing the best\nin people, making sure Stephen, though a year younger than he was host to an\nutterly different life, was comfortable and secure on the couch to sleep off\nthe copious liquor and beer and marijuana...\n            He knew what level of drunk his brother was - the spins, that awful period of\ninebriation when the level of fun of getting has evaporated into a slow panic,\na danger, a danger that he knew well in his own life and needed to protect his\nbrother from. Cody sensed that - he must have - but Andrew guessed it was from\nhis own volition that he wanted to care for Stephen...Andrew's brother, but his brother-in-law.\n            In Cody's belly, growing, were puppies - so Cody said, so\nCody felt, and with that conviction Andrew could choose only to believe it\nalso. They would be his flesh and family too - and therefore Stephen's also.\n            Why couldn't Andrew do as Stephen did, and meet the phantasmal terror of the half-dog species with\ncosmic wonder? If they were his,\nand Cody said they were with a passion that made Andrew secretly proud that\nthey were - they were not holotypes or case studies...they were his. Now, though\nit felt as though some key component of his existence would be absent, Andrew\nknew - now was not the time to be a\nscientist.            At least Stephen, for one,\nwould doubtless see the\ngravity of having nephews - even if those nephews walked on four legs, covered\nwith fur, speaking an esoteric language of growls and howls and barks. \n            It made Andrew smile, warmed by the thought, the cosmic\ncertainty that stood in direct juxtaposition to how he felt - was it only a few\nhours ago? Earlier that day - by the sink, cutting chicken...it was still in the\nfridge, he would fix it tomorrow for Bligh and Cody, and invite Stephen, uncle\nto his puppies to at least eat with them...as a family. \n            Another sigh - a sigh of relief, the feeling of something\nold ending and something new beginning, even in this ineffable abstract. \n            He pushed himself out of the doorway, and crept back into\nthe bedroom - he gently closed the door behind him, leaving it open at the\ncustomary crack, and as he was disrobing the spare pair of pants he heard\nCody's drowsy voice from the bed:\n            \"Andy...?\"\n            Andrew looked up at the faint figure nesting in the covers.\n\"Hey Baby - you can go back to sleep, yanno.\"\n            \"Mmm...\" A clump of shaggy hair move in a\nheadshake. \"I don't think I can...I have uh--\" He coughed. \"It\nkinda hurts, like, right over my heart--\"\n            Andrew paced quickly, the pants tossed off by the closet\ndoor, embracing Cody tightly at the edge of the bed. \"Holy shit, Baby\nwhat's--\" But then he withdrew, his abrupt panic melting, back into his\nusual ordered scientific thinking. \"...oh. I bet I know what's wrong\"\n            \"What?\"\n            \"I bet you got heartburn.\"\n            \"Is that--\" Cody rubbed the patch of skin just\nunder his neck. \"Is that what that is? It's like a--\" He looked as\nthough he was gathering his words, trying to express a queer quale he had never\nfelt before. \"Like someone's pressing on it - and it's burning, but like,\na wet burning--\"\n            Andrew smiled, nodding. \"Yeah - that's heartburn. I've\nheard pregnant women get it, and - because you're pregnant...\" \n            He watched Cody's eyes, very faintly vitreous, light up.\n\"I - I'm getting it too...\"\n            Andrew nodded. \"Yep.\"\n            Cody giggled. \"That's - that's great, right? Even, um\n- though it hurts.\"\n            \"Yeah, I was about to say, that's--\" Andrew\nchuckled, leaving the sentence unfinished in the midst of feeling unsure to\nshare in Cody's triumph, or still be worried about his pain. He tilted his head\nsome: \"But you've - never had heartburn?\"\n            Cody shook his head again. \"No, not - well maybe I\nhave, I just, not like this and - not like how other people get it, after eating\nspicy stuff.\" He smiled, and Andrew could make out the outline of his\nsharpened fangs. \"You know I love spicy stuff!\"\n            Andrew kissed him with a small chuckle, his tail wagging\namidst the covers. \"Yeah - yeah I do...\" he whispered gamely - he\nleaned back just slightly, the smile morphing into a frown. \"I guess -\nit's possible not to have felt it before. I really dunno.\"\n            He saw Cody's ears lower slightly. \"Yeah - I am kinda\nweird.\"\n            \"Stop that...\" Andrew said gently, nuzzling Cody's\ncheek with his mouth.\n            \"Sorry...\"\n            \"It's okay,\" Andrew answered. \"But, uh -\nyeah, we don't have anything for heartburn in the house...\"\n            Cody shrugged. \"It's okay - I'll live.\"\n            \"Yeah I know that,\nbut--\" Andrew took fingers to massage where Cody had indicated he was\nailing. \"I don't want you to feel bad...\"\n            Cody gently pushed Andrew's hand away, coming close to\nplant a deep kiss on his cheek. \"Andy - I'm fine.\"\n            \"Alright...\" Andrew kissed him on the forehead.\n\"Alright.\"\n            \"But why - I'm kinda worried about you too. Did you\nhave another - weird dream?\"\n            The memory of the waking vision - the Indians, the\ncenturies-old summertime, the horror in the woven box - played back out in his\nmemory, and the rising flood of terror filled his skin once more.\n            \"Ah--\" he intoned, his ear twitching slightly. \"Y-yeah\n- yeah I did.\"\n            Cody's tail, which had been wagging lazily in a pleasant\ncadence because Andrew was nearby, stilled to a stop. \"Oh no -\nagain?\"\n            Andrew nodded, his ears drooping. \"Yeah - it--\" He\nstruggled with the words, unsure even himself what he had seen, what he had\nexperienced. \"It's kinda hard to, like...describe.\"\n            Cody thrust his arms in the space between one of Andrew's,\nand held him, putting his head up to rest on Andrew's shoulder.\n            \"Wanna talk about it?\"\n            Andrew hesitated. \"Y-yes - yeah I think I - I think I\nshould.\"\n            \"Well I'm here,\" Cody said with a small smile.\n\"I can listen.\"\n            Andrew glanced to the boy and caught his smile - up came\nhis free arm to ruffle his hair, to which he responded with a giggle, and a wag\nof his tail.\n            \"Okay - okay.\" \n            He took a deep breath, shutting his eyes, the images\nreappearing, fragmentary, but then coalescing, until he could near-see them\nagain in his mind's eye.\n            \"I'm - okay, maybe not I, that's the thing, I don't think it was me being me, but - one of - one of my ancestors\nfrom way back in the day--\"\n            \"Mmm,\" Cody said back. \"Which one?\"\n            It was an almost sarcastic answer - Andrew knew Cody well\nenough to know that it wasn't, that he was, out of a deep love, concerned with\nAndrew's mental health...but talking about his ancestors, his birth-status, the\naristocracy of the Lightfoot name and the ferocious way it made Andrew (not to\nsay Stephen too) neurotic and\nmaladaptive, was something of a tired subject, something Cody could never think\nto relate to.\n            Still, Andrew stifled a frown, and continued:\n            \"Nicholas - Nicholas Lightfoot, the first one that\nmade our na--the name Lightfoot all\nfamous.\"\n            \"So like...way back when?\"\n            \"Y-yeah - Seventeenth Century.\"\n            Cody nodded. \"Yeah, so way back when.\"\n            \"Right.\"\n            \"And you, like - you - saw what he was--\"\n            \"I was him.\"\n            Cody lifted his chin, tilting his head, one of his ears\nfalling just slightly. \"You...were your\n- ancestor?\"\n            \"I--\" Andrew's ears fell, and he hung his head,\nthe weight of some imagined crime that his far-off family from centuries before\nnear-literally pushing down on him. \"My - people - back then, remember\nwhat I said my brother told me?\"\n            \"Yeah, um - there was a tribe of Indians only they\nweren't Indians--?\"\n            \"The Moon-Eyed\nPeople,\" Andrew affirmed. \"It's a - that name and that tradition\nshows up in other places in the Appalachians - uh, where I'm from - down in, or\nI guess up in, whatever, uh,\nTennessee, Georgia--\"\n            \"South Carolina?\" Cody guessed with a hopeful wag\nof his tail.\n            Andrew smiled. \"Maybe, I'd have to research it--\"\n            \"Neat!\" Cody exclaimed.\n            \"Yeah, yeah - um, but there in that part of West\nVirginia, see, Stephen said they were this--\"\n            \"They were like us,\" Cody finished.\n            Andrew sighed. \"Right.\"\n            Cody fidgeted. \"He told you that when he was really\ndrunk...\"\n            \"But I believe him...\"\n            He lifted his head up to seek Cody out, and with a\ncompassion that came from nowhere and vanished into the same, grabbed his wrist,\npulling it tightly to him.\n            \"Cody--\" he said, an insistence. \"Cody my -\nmy family killed all those people - all those people who were like us.\"\n            Cody stared at him for a few passing seconds, his eyes\ndrifting down to the wrist that Andrew was still gripping - he nodded, very\nslowly, understanding at once how grave the notion truly was.\n            \"So you - you're upset - because that memory - was\npassed to you...\"\n            \"Yes - yes.\"\n            \"And that dream you had - was him - telling you - that you were him, that\nyour family...killed--\" His ears drooped, together with his voice, as he\nspoke the last word: \"--us.\"\n            \"I don't know,\" Andrew interjected. \"I don't--\"\nHe shook his head. \"That's really not how - how memory works, I mean, barring the existence of\na soul which science is - I've told\nyou, pretty clear on, there's theories out there about cellular memory, but--\"\n            \"Andy,\" Cody said softly, gently pushing away the\ngrip that Andrew had on his wrist. \"Andy what - what do you feel?\"\n            \"I - I--\"\n            It was a strange question, a complicated question, a\ndisarming question - Cody was good at these: a good mass of their relationship was\nCody being able to shoot through the armor of science - a scientist - and reason and logic that Andrew draped himself in.\n\"I...feel...\" Andrew spoke slowly, his voice ravaged by an ambient\nsadness he tried, and failed, to understand. \"I feel - guilty.\"\n\"But - why?\"\n\"Because I - we - we're what they hunted - they - they must have done it\nas a favor to the Indians who hated us too - my...family...\" He stopped.\n\"Us - we - I can't believe--\"\nBack went Cody's chin to his shoulder. \"That's right, though. We're\ndifferent.\" \n\"I...\" Andrew sighed again, longer this time. \"I guess - no, no,\nyou're right--\"\n\"And so you're really upset your family did all those terrible things to -\nus­--\" He tilted his head to\naccent the word before withdrawing from Andrew's shoulder. \"All the way\nback then? And maybe the dream was a message?\"\nAndrew frowned. \"I still don't think--\"\n            \"But maybe,\" Cody pressed, \"it was.\"\n            Now Andrew studied him, Cody, his boyfriend, his husband,\nhis mate - studied him in the darkness, trying to fathom the wisdom this\nnineteen-year old could have acquired that, in so many ways, eclipsed his own.\n            \"Fine...\" he muttered. \"Maybe it was. Maybe\nthey were trying to tell me - make me remember what had happened.\"\n            Cody thought a moment. \"But - Andy, what difference would\nit make if they did do bad things to us though?\"\n            Andrew raised an eyebrow. \"What - do you mean?\"\n            Cody leaned forward. \"I mean...\" He smiled, a\npuckish knowingness that dovetailed a little too fitting his young face.\n\"It wasn't you, right? It was -\nlike, people who you were - um, your ancestors, not you.\"\n            \"Yeah, but--\"\n            \"We've talked about this before, haven't we?\"\n            Andrew frowned - he glanced away to the slitted light\ncoming from the blinds. \"We - y-yeah, we have--\"\n            \"And I tell you the same thing.\" His arms came\naround Andrew's shoulders from behind - a tight hug. \"That it doesn't matter. Because you--\" He kissed his\near, gently, it twitched back in response, eliciting a skittish chuckle.\n\"You're your own person. Just like--\" He sighed. \"Just like with\nme, living - where I was, and stuff, before we met - that's who I was.\" He gave Andrew an encouraging\nsqueeze. \"Not me now...\"\n            Andrew smiled - a little sadly - as he looked over his\nshoulder at Cody's shadow.\n            \"Am I,\nthough? My - my own person?\"\n            He felt Cody nod. \"Yeah! Of course you are! And - and - maybe that ancestor - Nicholas,\nwas that his name?\"\n            \"Nicholas - um, yeah, Nicholas Lightfoot.\"\n            \"Well maybe Nicholas was telling you that he made a\nmistake - but you can correct it.\" Cody smiled. \"You - me - Bligh and\nStephen, we can - rebuild who we were, someplace safe...\"\n            Andrew smiled back at him, and chuckled, very softly, and\nvery well in spite of himself. \n            \"The - thought - is nice...\" He paused, cringing.\n\"But - w-well - I - sometimes--\" \n            He hesitated - he blushed in the dark and he was glad that\nCody could not see it, though he could probably tell how he felt with how flat\nhis ears had become. \n            But even so, he felt that the weight he had carried since\nthe first day - the very first, in fact - that Bligh had made him the half-dog\nhe would be forever, the weight of being's Bligh's bitch, his property, creep on him, heavy, too heavy, any longer, to\nhide from Cody, who, now especially, needed to know:\n            \"Sometimes I'm - actually all the time I'm not - my own\nperson...\"\n            He winced as he felt Cody pull away just slightly.\n            \"Well...whattya mean?\"\n            \"I'm...\" For a passing second the words were heavy\nin his mouth before he could actually say them: \"I'm - Bligh's\nbitch.\" He let out a rush of air. \"I - he owns me, like really owns me--\"\n            Cody parted from him and Andrew winced, harder.\n            \"I...could tell,\" came Cody's answer as he shifted from\nbehind Andrew to scoot next to him, now both sitting on the bed together.\n            Andrew jerked his head to Cody in frank surprise. \"You\n- really?!\"\n            \"It's not hard,\" said Cody, almost like he was teasing.\n\"You uh - well, should I really - spell it out?\"\n            Andrew stared at him blankly - he felt his tail thump, up\nand down, on the bed.\n            \"Tell me,\" he murmured. \"I wanna hear, uh -\nwhat you think.\"\n            Cody moved his head in a coy, shrewd way, and even in his\nnightvision Andrew could see he was trying to be clever. \"Just - the way\nyou act around each other, it's kinda different from how you and me are--\"\nHe paused. \"Well - it's a lot different. Bligh likes to tell you to do\nstuff and you--\"\n            \"I know,\" Andrew cut him off, feeling his penis\nstart to inexplicably harden. \"I know, I - it's weird for me, but...\"\nAndrew looked away, his breathing starting to quicken. \"I dunno, I\nshouldn't - I shouldn't like it,\nshould I?\"\n            \"Well why not?\"\n            \"Because I love you too!\" Andrew blurted, near\nthe same way as he done before. \"And that's not - fair, for one thing - if\none guy owns me, then...\"\n            He saw one of Cody's ears twitch, as though in thought, and\nhe answered slowly: \"I...have never really seen it that way, though?\"\n            Andrew raised an eyebrow. \"You haven't?\"\n            \"No, not at all, actually.\"\n            He gave Cody an askance look. \"How...?\"\n            \"See--\" Cody grazed Andrew's bare shoulder with\nhis fingertips - Andrew's tail went up and resuming its wagging at the touch.\n\"I always knew you two had a thing going on, something, um...something I\ncouldn't really understand.\" His hand dropped into his lap. \"Remember\nyou...told me that? When--\" His voice dipped at the imperfect, painful\nmemory. \"When - we started--\"\n            \"Yeah,\" Andrew cut him off, sensing the discomfort.\n\"Yeah, I - did, didn't I...\"\n            \"So yeah.\" Cody shrugged. \"I mean, Bligh\nloves me right?\"\n            \"Baby, yes, of course, why would you--\" \n            He stopped. The waves of guilt and doubt from earlier, made\nan unwelcome reappearance, flying up through Andrew's body - his face turned a\nbright red, and for the second time he was glad Cody could not see it.\n            \"Is this...about the work thing, and the fact\nthat--\"\n            He was silenced by Cody's headshake. \"I told you I'm\nfine with it.\"\n            \"You're sure?\"\n            \"Yes I am.\" He rubbed his belly, and the\nbedsheets quivered with his happy tail-wag. \"I wanna make sure these guys are\nhealthy and safe like you guys do,\ntoo...\" His hand came away and grasped Andrew's. \"Plus - Bligh did, um,\nhave, a point...maybe it would be dangerous. And you two can get the money we\nneed...I don't really need to help...\"\n            Andrew nodded quickly, his guilt again assuaged but not yet\ngone, and he suspected that it may never leave - a twitch of his ear gave it\naway. \"Okay - okay, if you say so.\"\n            \"Because - Andy I mean\nI know he loves me - I'm his husband\nand your husband too - and I--\" He giggled again, softly. \"I love that\n- all of that - I love you guys. But...\" He slowed. \"I just asked you that to ask you back, uh...basically...\"\nCody's fangs appeared, almost glinting in the light from the blinds, in a\nmischievous smile. \"Do you - like being\nhis bitch?\"\n            Andrew nodded, slowly at first, then picking up speed.\n\"I...I do. I really do.\" He sighed, feeling the weight of the truth at\nlast slide off of him. \"It feels - right\nfor me to - be his, like that.\"\n            \"And do you like what we have?\"\n            \"Well - that's the thing, what do we have?\"\n            It was Cody's turn for his ears to\ndroop. \"What do you\nmean?\"\n            \"What...\" Andrew's ear twitched again, and he\ngrabbed it irritably. \"I'm trying to say if - if I'm his bitch, his - property, then - what does\nthat make us?\"\n            He saw, faint, but unmistakable, Cody's ears return to\nwhere they were - and his warm smile with them. \"It makes us - us.\"\n            \"That doesn't--\"\n            Cody silenced him with a gentle kiss on the lips.\n\"We're just us, Andy - you're my\nhusband and you're gonna be a dad to my puppies...\" The smile grew. \"We\ndon't need a label.\"\n            Andrew glanced away - his tail thumped in the bed, his\nheart full and happy. He turned back to Cody and nodded at him. \n            \"Right - right. We'll always - always be together.\"\n            \"That's right!\" Cody affirmed, throwing his arms\naround him to give him a tight squeeze. \n            Before Andrew could reciprocate - Cody retreated, with a\ngiggle that had a strange tone behind it, something Andrew could not readily\nplace.\n            \"What...what are you--?\"\n            \"Oh, uh - it's...\"\n            Andrew chuckled. \"C'mon Baby, tell me.\"\n            \"O-okay. Like, um - well since you're - he owns you,\nlike you said does that mean - does that--\" His face broke into embarrassment. \"Oh - geez - but, um,\ndo you wanna get pregnant too?\"\n            Andrew opened his mouth to answer him, but closed it, his\nears fluttering until they settled, firmly flat, his embarrassed tail-wag\nstopping still. He remembered earlier that that day - he and Bligh in the\nkitchen, the heat and the pressure, the ecstatic release of precum because\nBligh had put his palm over his belly...something that had been lost in the\nexplosive chaos of the day.\n            Instinctively - in an instinct he did not understand, that\nsurprised him as it happened, he placed his own palm, as Bligh had, right over\nhis stomach...\n            \"Yes,\" he blurted. \"Yes, I - yes I do.\"\n            Cody laughed, a peal of delight. \"Oh wow that's - that's great!\"\n            \"It...is?\" Andrew chuckled back nervously.\n            Cody nodded vigorously - he pulled himself into Andrew's\nlap and kissed him. \"I would love to be pregnant together...\" \n            The remark took Andrew offguard. \"Are you serious\nabout that?\"\n            Cody nuzzled their mouths together. \"Yes, Andy...whether\nwith your puppies or his - me and you...\"\n            Andrew found himself lost in a sudden, acute void - of\ngratitude, of intangible feelings of love for this boy so intense that mere\nlanguage failed him as descriptors.\n            He pulled Cody to him, into him, he felt the skin of the\nboy's face against the skin of his own face, devoid of fur, devoid of the\nthings that made them different, and for that instant they were as they had\nbeen before - Cody was his alone to protect and preserve against a world that\nhad tried to kill him.\n            \"I love you...\" Cody murmured, kissing his lips -\nfirst, then moving, deeper, deeper into Andrew's ready mouth. \"I - I love\nyou s-so much--\" And again came his passionate kiss.\n            \"I...love you too...\"\n            Andrew was not prepared for it either time - it was such a\nsudden thing, out of almost nowhere, from a fine talk in bed, assuaging his\nfears about a nightmare he could only barely make sense of... \n            ...but he knew, he knew from an instinct that had to have\nbeen primal and that he relished must have been primal and base, he knew\nprecisely what this was. \n            He could sense what was happening - their mouths parted, a\nvery small trail of saliva drawn between them. \n            Against his better judgment - a judgment being voraciously\nswallowed by sexual desire he vocalized it: \n            \"You - pregnant - now\n- it's heightening your sexdrive...\"\n            Cody nodded, quickly - even in the dark Andrew could tell\nit was bashfully, as though even he did not want to admit it.\n\"I - I need you--\"\n            For\na moment, a fleeting and fatal moment, he felt what Bligh must have felt, the\nurge, irresistible, to orgasmically release, to mate with Cody, to be inside\nCody, to join with him as a single creature, gorgeous and new.\n            Cody's body was precious, it was perfect - and Andrew\ncraved it.\n            \"I need you too - more than anything right now...\"\n            His hand continued the slide down Cody's toned, flat\nstomach to the awaiting cock - erect, wet, it twitched at Andrew's fingers,\nready for him.\n            He would touch him, he would caress this beautiful Florida\ncreature whose hair was once crowned with a wreath of strawberry leaves by his\nadoring mother, he would impregnate him again, and in the abyssal twilight of\ntheir lives he would bring forth in the Tampa sunshine the perfected canine\nshape that arose in an antediluvian age from the Appalachian valleys - foreign,\nforeign utterly, to the gemtones of Florida, the pearl of beaches and the\nemerald canopy of the jungles and the peridot of the waters and the diamond of\nthe sunshine.\n            But he would replace these colors, this rainbow, with the\ncoastal pelican emblazoned upon it like flag of Saint Petersburg - he would\nmake Cody something new, as Bligh made them both new before.\n            Andrew felt his sheath stir, insistent, even angry, and his\nshaft met the air as it extended fully.\n            His mouth came to his first nipple, just a faint hint of\nbeing swollen, so delicately enlarged and waiting for its purpose that one\nwould never know unless, as Andrew did, as father to the mouths it would\nsuckle, one knew just where to look. It would not grow very much but would be a\nsmall symmetrical pillow, a low raised mound, easily hidden...but no, never, he\nwould crave to see it every day, the synthesis of the two human genders in the stark\nperfection of man-and-dogkind.\n            He pressed his mouth to it and suckled - Cody moaned, his\ntail twitched violently, out came Andrew's name from his youthful, perfect\nlips.\n            Andrew was overcome: his hand shot to Cody's penis, turgid,\nmoist, where his touch was met with a sudden swell - a spurt of precum. Up came\nhis mouth from the needy nipple - with his other hand he pressed against the\nnape of Cody's neck, bringing them close, achingly close, a breath apart, lips\nto lips.\n            \"Say it again,\" Andrew commanded, coldly - the\ngame they used to play, though to both their minds it had ceased long ago to be\na game at all, but instead a sacred ritual.\n            \"Andy - An - drew--\"\n            \"Who loves you?\" Andrew demanded.\n            \"You - you do - Andy does--\"\n            \"And who do you love?\"\n            \"You - too - I love you, Andy - Andrew--\"\n            \"Yes you do,\" Andrew affirmed in a satisfied\nhiss, his hand moving up and down Cody's shaft, longer and more ample than it\nhad been as a human. \"Yes - you do--\"\n            \"Oh - oh gosh, Andy--\"\n            Andrew's hand dropped from Cody's neck, down to the center\nof his chest, pushing him, guiding him, down to the bedsheets, feeling his own\npenis become hotly stiff as he felt Cody's legs instinctively rise...it made his\nwhole being burn to see that Cody was still an animal, a submissive animal that\ncraved him as Andrew him also in turn.\n            The movement of his hand on Cody's shaft slowed - slowed as\nhe took his free hand, with a ready middle finger, to tease around in the blind\ndark in the region of the cleft of his beloved's furry ass, knocking against\nhis tail that had moved back to better let Andrew finish his task.\n            The room was silent, tensely silent, except for the drone\nof the fan that seemed drowned in the collective sound of Andrew and Cody's\npassion.\n            He heard Cody moan, plaintively - another anticipatory\nspurt of precum.\n            \"You want this?\" Andrew whispered.\n            Cody leaned up some, trying to find his protector's eyes,\ntrying to show him how he felt - his tail wagged, just slightly.\n            \"Y-yes - yes, Andy, gosh y-yes--\"\n            Without another word, Andrew's middle finger found its\ntarget - Cody's anus, unusually stretchy, unusually receptive, more than a\nhuman's...the thought made Andrew grit his teeth, the fangs poking his lip, it\nwas too beautiful and too crystallized a notion, that Cody had transcended the\nmortal flesh he was born as and become what he had always wanted...\n            The finger slid in and he heard Cody squirm ecstatically,\nthe pleasure receptors he had developed there, what Andrew had also, and Bligh\ntoo, the few times he had let Andrew finger him this way - the invitation of\nenflamed nerve endings that made anal sex, in all its forms, so thrilling a\nsexual experience.\n            His finger slid out almost to the tip, but back it went in,\nharder, once, twice, thrice, like it was a dick, the dick Andrew had that was\nhard for Cody, only Cody, the moment so pure in the shared darkness it\nbelonged, in the universe, to them alone.\n            Cody moaned - then cried out, his penis, smaller than\nAndrew's and dwarfed by Bligh's, blindly spraying precum all over his body, the\nsmall swell, the mound in his belly that, at a stroke, rent the curtain of\nscientific proof, the universe he had built simply because he had dwelt in it,\nin tatters.\n            Andrew longed to do more - he longed, his whole body a\nskin-ridden flame, to take his inhuman penis and, with a skill he had only just\nlearned to master, knot him, tie to them together and hear his pitiful noises\nof love, mind-rending devotion, hear them echo in his ears, smell the arousal,\nthe milky-sweet musky of an animal in heat...\n            ...but he could not.\n            Even - even as he knelt down and licked Cody's lips, then\nhis cheek, then his face, in an abominably atavistic ritual he choose not to\nunderstand, even as his finger thrust, in and out, in and out, Cody clamping\nhis mouth shut to block out the immodesty of his pleasure that made him want to\nscream with sexual abandon - even, even,\nafter all that, Andrew still remembered not to use his penis, enlarged from its\nhuman shape, to penetrate too deeply, not to endanger his children, something\npreviously nebulous that, each lick, each thrust of his finger, each demand to\nbe told he was loved and each answer that was a near-shout of affirmative, was\nbecoming something new...something real.\n            He wanted to be father - no matter his children looked\nlike, whether a human, a naked little ape, or a puppy, furry and blind...no\nmatter what they were, how they were shaped, what would they end up as, he\nwanted to be a father - and he wanted Cody to be the mother. \n            Faster and faster his finger plunged, back and forth, forth\nand back, into Cody's ass the warm, slick, moist flesh of the boy's insides\nunchanged from the transition to half-canid - Cody moaned, cried, whimpered,\nhis ears never moving from a prone position of submission, his tail still, too\nstill, with arousal.\n            He did not last long - Andrew knew he wouldn't, he knew how\nCody's body was engineered, with or without the beautiful fur and the superior\ncaninity, he knew, still, what do...how to use a simple digit on his hand to make\nCody overload with pleasure, and all the rest incidental, but vital: the\nnewfound nerve endings inside his rectum, the psychological security of the\nman, the dog, who rescued him, defended him, protected him, so near to him, so\nenraptured in the waves of their mutual scents, milky-fertile, sweaty-sweet.\n            His thrusts were futile, they were always futile, because\nthere was no ass, no vagina, for him to put it in, he was always the receiver,\nthe vessel for someone else, for Bligh, for Andrew - but still Cody thrusted as\nhis humanoid evolution demanded and commanded, his lithe body taut, the spray\nsubstantial, the musky-smelling near-luminescent grey fluid that geysered all\nover him, on his chest, on his cheek, on the pillow...\n            The sight of him - prone, whispering the name, Andy, over and over - overrode any last\nsane thoughts Andrew himself may have had: he took his cock into hand, rigid\nwith the baculum, deliciously slick, and thrust into it, over Cody, over him\nand dominating him, looking into his face in his grainy nightvision to watch\nhim as his own thrusts continued apace...and then in a euphoric paroxysm, he\nreleased.\n            The ropes of semen - grey, musk-ridden, the same as Cody's\nif, perhaps, a little thinner - let loose from his pointed cockhead, painting\nCody's chest, up to his chin, for several seconds of erasing bliss. \n            At last the orgasm ebbed from him - his eyes, which had\nwatched Cody supplicate him silently for the semen, for the sloppy mess, refocused\nout of the primal urges of lust and reproduction...he could see movements below,\narms and mouth, and tell that Cody was feasting on the cum that Andrew had\ngiven him.\n            But the exertion was too much - much too much, and he was\ngripped with the lassitude of having awoken so suddenly with no respite since...and\nstumbled, near-fell, onto Cody, into the cesspool of their intermingled slime.\nCody near-caught him - they were soon wrapped in each other's arms, Andrew\nnuzzling the boy's cheek, chuckling breathlessly.\n            \"You like that?\" he murmured.\n            He felt Cody nod. \"Y-yeah - I love when you do that...\"\n            \"Good...\" Andrew kissed his nose. \"I'm glad.\"\n            \"Andy?\"\n            \"Yeah Baby?\"\n            \"What--\" Andrew felt Cody's breath on his face,\nhesitant, concerned, as if the words could not come correctly at first thought.\n\"What - what's gonna happen now? You - me - Steve - Bligh? Our - our family?\"\n            The question faded into Andrew's psyche, where transmuted\ninto a line of disjointed thought:\n            The moment that was so pure before - he and Cody alone -\ntunneled back into the real world, it opened, in Andrew's mind, he could see\nit, he could see the world receiving him again...he heard Cody's question and he\ncomprehended it, the chemicals firing in his brain that he was, day by day,\nless sure about it, the divine supernatural glow he had long flouted that, now,\nflesh, fur, grew in him every day.\n            He felt it - he felt it and he knew what Cody felt, the\ncertainty not falsifiable by any science anywhere.\n            He felt - he knew. He knew Stephen\nwas safe - and still loved him. Loved him enough to recklessly and with a\ndisquieting abandon change his life, his location, to be with him...him,  and Bligh, whom he imitated in many ways but,\nin that elegant throwaway of his old life, clearly taught him something more.\n            Bligh loved him - that deranged, damaged love that never\nmade sense, could never make sense...should never make sense.\n            Cody loved him...the gratitude that rendered words useless,\nthe safety that could be expressed only with arms wrapped around\n            ...he stroked Cody's face, gently, so gently, as if the\nslightest misstep from his fingers would shatter this, this moment, this\nperfection that slowed down time itself.\n            \"You didn't answer me...\" Cody whispered, his face\ncurving into a smile.\n            Andrew stopped the movements of his hand on his beloved's\nface. \"Which - which part?\"\n            \"About...what's gonna happen next.\"\n            \"Oh...\"\n            Andrew hesitated - within the silence he felt it, he felt\nthe line, drawn, down from West Virginia, he and Bligh and Stephen, wrapped\naround them all, wrapped around Cody like Andrew's own arms were. \n            And then he knew: he was always apart from the world,\ndifferent from it, walled off. First he and Stephen's status and birth, then he\nand Bligh's inscrutable relationship, then Florida and its wilderness, and then\nCody...he was always an outsider.\n            But not with them. \n            Not ever.\n            \"It doesn't matter what happens next...\" Andrew whispered,\ncoming down to kiss Cody on his smiling mouth. \"As long as we - the four\nof us - as long we're together.\""}