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Pitch Dream was considered something of a myth.

Some mused that it was just paranoia of the League, the demented imagination of an emperor driven mad by the notion that upon the fringes of his kingdom lay a forgotten outpost that had become home to the scourges of the galaxies. Never had it ever been officially acknowledged as real however; certainly there were reports drummed up by the bravest of individuals who presented leaked information of searches throughout every solar system possible where on some cold, desolate moon they might find a haven of crooks, pirates, and all manners else just hiding away. Others believed it more to be propagandist nonsense, a whisper spread about ports and colonies to instil some fear into the people, that the League was their only protection against a place brimming with such evil and malice, intent only on corrupting and destroying the livelihoods of the peasant folk. Many did not care though. Pitch Dream was just some urban legend that would surface now and again before it dwindled back into obscurity, resigned to the realms of conspiracy theories and crackpots.

But out beyond the stars, further and few between when the abyss of space grew wider still the further out you ventured, lay a wasted corner of the galaxy long since abandoned. Filled with remnants of older empires and fallen cultures flew a singular red giant, an aged star already past its prime, spiralling and twirling on the edge. It was not a densely populated system, not anymore, not since the star went nova, and many of the planets which orbited it had since lost the last signs of life save for a sparse few now in the optimal range. Once upon a time there had been a bountiful society of interplanetary people, but as the star had begun the inevitable process of its decay, the centrepiece of the system had be scorched from existence leaving behind its satellites to fend for themselves before they succumbed to extinction themselves. Or so the history was believed to have been undertaken, nobody could be sure, but the archives suggested as much happened. Whether it was fact or fiction was left to be decided by the individual. Of course, history mattered little to the underworld.

So beyond the churning storm of the red giant spun a few planets still clinging to their master, dense gas spheres that marbled with tempests of their own, each a beauteous neon shade and pocked with markings along their immeasurable surface. Naturally nothing could live upon these titans, but indeed twirling round them in ever faster speeds were the moons. Inhospitable environments that one would think could not possibly support life, unique only in the sublime horror of their beauty. But the remnants of a bygone age had left enough. And, like vagrants, all forms of delinquents had crept their way across space to climb into the shells of former homes to stake claim as their own.

Upon one such rock, perhaps the biggest of them all, was the moon known infamously as Pitch Dream. For all its reputation and mythical standing, it was truly was a spectacular sight to behold. Dark black, its surface was covered in a crust of obsidian rock, making it near impossible to pick out from the backdrop of space. It was a blot upon the fabric, a stain only noticed by the keen of eye, and inky spec on the distant horizon seen only by a few, yet flocked to by plenty who seek it out. The rumours that surrounded it varied from the tamest of suggestions to the wildest, darkest possibilities, but in reality all and anything was true in the outpost. Pitch Dream was home to all manner of phantasmagoria anyone could possibly imagine. A haven to any individual who could survive its harsh community, either by claw or by cash, the moon had become a breeding ground for the ideas and thoughts otherwise rejected and quashed in a civilised society. Shady medical practices, rogue arms dealing, enslavement of the grossest sort, the moon full well deserved the title of a feared enigma that many gave it.

Closer inspection of the moon's surface, provided one could indeed get close enough and endure against the oppressive presence of bounty hunter ships, the armadas no one dared no cross, and defence systems still active from the system's predecessors, would reveal the surprisingly bustling cities that had grown up and sprouted from the ruins of the old. Decrepit buildings restored to liveable conditions, infrastructure repaired, a tightly knit community that embraced newcomers with open arms and safeties off had sprung up to make Pitch Dream the freakish haven to everything criminal and seedy that could ever have existed.

Across its horizon however stood out the hollowed vessel of a long-ago downed Tertian cruiser. Inside the emptied bowels of the once great ship was the central hub of this community, the marketplace and residency to plenty. It had no official name, certainly nothing ever went on record to the credit of those who frequented it, but it had been dubbed by many as the Black Bazaar. Upon the outside all one could see was the carcass of a ship belonging to a once proud and conquering race who had skated across the stars and laid claim to planet after planet. Its hull, mottled down from gleaming silver to a grubby smoke after years exposed to lunar winds and dust storms, remained enough intact against the landscape that it stuck out as a prominent landmark, striding up into the dark sky with its nose buried deep into the moon's crust. Nobody cared to recall when the cruiser had since crashed, though many rumour it was several millennia ago, some point between perhaps when the last system's empire fell or when war had struck its solar shores, but it now served as sanctuary to the most inscrutable and wretched of the cosmos. Any who were feared, wanted, hunted or worse usually found themselves destined for the Black Bazaar sooner or later. Services would be rendered, merchandise exchanged, passage given; the bazaar had it all, and served as the crown jewel for Pitch Dream.

It was then with bitter and morose irritation then that Bovan mused as to why the hell business had been so slow within recent weeks.

The porossian had spent the last few days musing over the small but undeniable victory for his most recent assignment, which had been to accompany some human to an exchange of Vorpis ore for ten million units. It shouldn't have been so high stakes, but it turned out the client had been right to hire a security detail, as the buyers had tried to swindle him out of his cash and make off with the ore as well. Bovan hadn't been at all surprised. Sergals were a sly race and nine times out of ten in his experiences with them they had always done their best to scam their way through any situation. Even during his day job working behind the bar, it was rare to find an honest sergal who would exchange a few meagre units for a flask of trigonian ale rather than insist on opening up a tab and then conveniently misplacing their transponder so that they didn't have to pay up. It was difficult to make a living, forcing him to have to take up security assignments as and when he could to make up the rest of his rent – which was way he wasn't entirely happy with the lack of custom on both ends.

Bovan owned a small little tavern in a cosy part of the bazaar. Central enough that it was probably passed by most visitors mulling about and frequented by enough patrons that it could remain open and look in reasonably good shape. But the books hadn't been too healthy lately. Bovan was living from week to week on what little he had, and it was pushing him into a position where he was beginning to take on more and more security assignments that kept him away from his bar. He wouldn't have minded so much, but the jobs were becoming a lot harder than usual, with bounty hunters upping their pressure on blackmails and dragging in more and more bounties than what professional courtesy usually allowed. It had always been the convention that, so long as you weren't worth more than a couple hundred units, you'd be left alone if you were good, but times were changing, even Bovan could sense that. The values of Pitch Dream, as warped as they might be, were never enough to maintain a status quo if the League was pushing harsher taxes down the throats of its citizens. Even crooks had to eat, after all.

He sighed wiping a grubby rag across the bar's counter top to soak up errant spills. Maybe he was just old. A typical porossian in good health could live up to two hundred years and he was already into the third decade of his second century. He liked to think he still looked good though, despite the fact he'd put on weight since coming to the moon back when he was in his prime aged just forty, wanted for a series of assault charges amongst other petty felonies, mostly just drugs and handling stolen goods. He had always been a bit of a brawler; more brute than class, despite the fact that porossian's were meant to be a placid species of herbivores who avoided conflict at all costs. It had left him with a boxer's build, squared up and heavy set, with thick limbs and even thicker torso. The average of his species was usually slimmer than he was, but they varied amongst castes and Bovan belonged to the lowest of them all, so he had learnt that genetic inferiority was to be expected.

But if he were truly frank with himself, he reckoned on a good day he probably looked no older than eighty, perhaps shy of ninety if the lighting wasn't flattering rather than beyond his first century. He would always joke about his good looks and flash some charm to butter up the paws of his customers to get them whipping out their transponders to tip, but he had the self-confidence to know he was a fetching man. His coat, shaggy as it might have been, was rich velvet purple, with his underfur an even crisper white than what ought to be possible for someone working in his field. It flushed from a sea of mauve around his head, making up his voluptuous mane, just as it smothered his chest and underarms, trailing down his portly stomach and covering in equal volume his crotch and ass. Some had begun to sprout from his forelimbs, he'd noticed, but not enough really to warrant any concern. If anything he reckoned it just made him look more mature. He was used to all the comments now from drunken idiots wanting to touch his fur, shocked at how soft it was, or to crop a feel of his horns that curled out from his scalp or the two sabre fangs that jutted from his top jaw. He was a unique novelty amongst the sea of usual types, like sergals or trigons, the sorts already associated with the criminal underworld. Porossians were not known for a criminal class, yet there Bovan was, a testament to the contrary – the curious comments and quipped remarks was all part of the job.

Still, it gave him an edge when he had to moonlight; nobody ever suspected that a porossian could take down five men at once without even breaking a sweat.

“Bovvy, can you's fill me up mate?"

It was Gallus, perhaps Bovan's most reliable customer. He was a good friend, at least when he wasn't inebriated, and he didn't really mind the trigons company whenever days were slow. Of course he usually became a small nuisance on busier hours, but no such times seemed to be coming any time soon, so he was a welcome patron for the meantime. Bovan often joked to himself that the tavern was kept open by Gallus' pocket alone, as it'd be the only place he could get drunk and not get thrown out every night.

“Sure, what'll you have?"

“Usual." He was gruff, but Bovan knew underneath it all was a loyal man, so long as you overlooked the spat of heists he was suspected of. Everyone always said they were innocent, but if you were at Pitch Dream then only god knew when it came down to it. Bovan took a pitcher filled with a dark, cloudy and disturbingly thick liquid, a mystifying colour of blues and yellows, and filled the man's flagon full to overflowing, froth bubbling over its lip and back onto the counter. Bovan again wiped down the surface, as if it were something to do to be productive and pass the time.

The tavern was dead. Bovan didn't really like to admit it, but even his staff, as much as he was remiss to call her that, was meandering about rather aimlessly, more so than he was. His only employee, Mina, puttered about the other tables wiping them down herself whistling a Rancornian shanty one of her siblings must have taught her in the nest, all the while gathering up empty glasses that might have graced them. But save for the odd couple of bounty hunters who had come in to quench their thirst, the bar was quiet. It would be yet another measly night of poor sales. He'd already had to let go of one barmaid because she had been getting tetchy on wages. Mina understood the difficulty, and she knew Bovan well enough to not kick up a fuss. The last girl though had been trouble from the moment he'd hired her, but supply for menial staff was always so short. Pitch Dream was not a place known for excellent recruitment services of a timid nature.

He watched her from the bar gather a few glasses in two hands whilst the second pair polished down the worn steel of the table tops. Even he felt bored just standing in his own bar.

But that was when he walked in.

Normally Bovan did not pay much attention to newcomers. Within the first few minutes they might just find a seat, get their bearings, relax a little once they realised nobody was drawing a weapon at them, and then they'd order something. But this human looked around Bovan's tavern with a curious attitude, nerves frayed underneath it all, like he was some feral animal sniffing the air for any signs of danger. He was doing his utmost best to play himself off as cool and collected, but Bovan could clearly see the paranoia that festered behind his eyes. The feline carried out the same assessment he did regardless of anyone who set foot in his bar, summing up the human's character and motives from years of experience. This was somebody that was a wanted man, who by and what for, he couldn't have said, but there was a definite chime of skittishness that at the first sign of trouble he would have bolted and not stopped running until something broke.

Bovan looked him up and down; the man was not all too imposing. He was never any good with human ages, especially when they got so touchy whenever you got it wrong – which seemed to be all the time, considering the numbers that Bovan had interacted with in his time. But he had to say this human looked younger than most. At a push he might have said late twenties, given the distinct lack of wrinkles their species seemed to suffer, but the male carried himself with a rather weary, weathered disposition, like he had seen too much. His clothes certainly indicated as much that he was a traveller, as many always were when they first arrived on Pitch Dream, so Bovan could only surmise that this man, whoever he was, had only just recently landed.

Much of his face was obscure however. Although Bovan could make out the sharp blue of his eyes and the tight corners of his lips, he could not see much of the human's head. He kept it hidden under a hood which was pulled up tight and drawn across him, as far as it could go. Etiquette in Pitch Dream usually encouraged people to leave their faces visible as a gesture of good faith to everyone else. Naturally many wished to hide their identities, and so to avoid nasty incidents of snitching or back-stabbing, everyone was open about who they were and nobody tried anything. Etiquette however was not obligatory, there were no rules or laws, but the human was only drawing attention to himself as he moved towards the bar after taking a scan of the room. Bovan noted that the man didn't seem all too pleased with the two hunters who sat in a booth on the far side of the tavern, too engrossed in their talk to have seen the human enter, but frightened eyes kept flitting back to where they sat whenever one guffawed too loudly or a clatter erupted with a flask thrown down too hard.

Whatever; business was business and Bovan figured this guy was just some harmless runt on the run for something stupid. Selling him a few drinks wouldn't hurt.

“What's your poison, mate?"

The cloaked human clambered atop one of the bar stools furthest from the hunters, further from Gallus still as he too was eyed up with indecision by the man. He leaned across the bar and gestured for Bovan to lean in close, wanting to whisper something discreetly. Already the porossian's heckles were being raised, but he humoured the tiny man. What harm could a petty human do to a guy like him anyway?

“Is this 'The Dreamer's Drop'?" He muttered in a hushed tone, leaning as close as I allowed him to dare. Bovan watched him indifferently, not quite sure what to make of the strange male. Usually he could peg them down to a type, deciding who they were and what sort of attitude they were skulking in with. It helped business to read people, to turn on the charm to grease people's pockets and get them splashing around their transponders, but this human came in with the stinking air of a scam. Hidden face, distract the mark, target some low key establishment during a quiet hour… Something wasn't right.

“That it is. Name's out front, after all." The human quailed a little at the affront, but he wasn't deterred. If anything, he seemed relieved to Bovan that this was indeed the tavern he believed it to be.

“I need to speak to 'The Boss' then."

Bovan should have thrown him out there and then. The feline stiffened where he stood, fingers tightening around the rag until claws were digging into the worn fabric. His lip twitched in the beginnings of a snarl before he smothered the expression, keeping up the composure of a cold barkeep nonplussed by the human's antics. Nobody dared to even speak of such a name in public, a code of honour amongst mercenaries, especially those who kept discretion as a high priority for their clients.

“I was told I could find him here. I need to see him." There was a look somewhere between confusion and irk on the human's face, as if Bovan didn't understand what he had meant. Gallus had already now cast a sidelong glance across the bar at the human, and Bovan knew it wouldn't be long before others got suspicious of his presence too. Nobody came into a bar, neglected to order a drink, only to then demand for someone off the bartender. It reeked of a novice clearly in too deep and way over their heads.

“I don't know what you're talking about," Bovan said as levelled as he could, “Perhaps you should check your sources, ask 'em how you ought to get in touch with whoever it is you're looking for."

He left the human on those words and hoped the guy would just take the hint and leave. Bovan was not the sort to get involved with cons of any kind. There was a pride to be had when it came to this sort of thing. You could usually be duped once or twice rather harmlessly by cheap artists looking to make a quick few units, but if you kept up the habit of constantly succumbing to scams then you were ostracised and mocked by fellow dreamers. Bovan wasn't in the mood to get duped today, regardless of who saw. Word would travel fast.

“Please, I'm desperate!" The human seemed to want to lunge across the bar counter, his hands wringing themselves with fraught nerves. It didn't ring of a con anymore that was for sure. Typically by now any decent self-serving crook would have accepted that they weren't going to get far with this establishment and would promptly move on to the next. There was no point in trying to flog a dead beast for more out of it. It certainly could have been a ploy, the man could be running the classic victim routine where he was some poor unfortunate soul being harassed by thugs and needed a place to hide, maybe a backroom, to which a gullible bar owner might allow them to hop in the back, where the supposed victim would then signal for his friends to come in and cause a ruckus whilst they ransacked the place for valuables and spiked all the transponders for all the units. It could still very well be a scam, but something inside Bovan wavered, a part of him he wished he could just smother down and snuff out like a light.

He looked across to Mina, his eyes feeling like pinpricks as they gauged the situation, the bar maid watching the human from the corner of her gaze as he meandered around the tavern. She too was sceptical, but Bovan couldn't help but feel there was something afoot that he just couldn't put his finger on. Regardless though, he neither could have the human pestering him over and over about 'The Boss'. People might talk. Bovan could do without the attention.

Swearing colourful in his native tongue under his breath, he stomped towards the door leading to the back, hiking up the counter top to allow the human passage through,

“Get in the fucking back already and shut up." The human acted immediately. Like a scurrying beetle he zipped through and darted into the open doorway that Bovan held for him. The feline looked across to his staff, nodding his head towards the bar, “Take over for me, will ya?"

“Sure thing, Bov."

It wasn't an ideal situation. In fact, it was exceedingly suspicious. But with the human causing a scene, he was going to get himself killed either way. A loud, naïve voice hollering around Pitch Dream was like a bleed, a deep cut into one's flesh; it exposed so much, things that really should best be kept secret and hidden away, so people would always act fast to either exploit or tend to the damage. How the human had so far managed to evade both of those was phenomenal in and of itself, but now the bleed was in Bovan's paws. He could control it, stem the flow, and allow it to clot, potentially save himself and the delusional kid. But if worse comes to worst, then his paw might be forced to deal with the wound in more drastic measures. If a bleed refused to stop, then he might have to cauterise in order to save the limb… It was morbid to think about, but Bovan was used to the 'messiness' his job entailed, both on and off the clock.

He ushered the human into the back rooms, passed through the near-derelict kitchen and into his office. He didn't give the kid a chance to get his bearings, he couldn't afford to let him get cosy, so with a swift and decisive shove, he pushed the man into the room and slammed the door shut behind him.

“Perry, seal the doors," the feline said aloud, a chime in response followed by a smooth, emotionless female voice,

“Affirmative."

A soft click locked the door behind him, a feature Bovan had installed in the early days when back room dealings had a tendency for going south tremendously quickly with far too common occurrence. What better means of defence by only allowing those to exit when the cat deemed that they may? Killing Bovan would leave whoever had decided to cross him trapped in a rather spacious, impenetrable steel coffin that could be jettisoned into space on a moment's notice.

“You have a composite?!" the human proclaimed, seemingly aghast that the cat had such software, “But they're illegal!"

“Goodness, yes," he responded, voice dry and etched with sarcasm, “Whatever was I thinking, owning something that's contraband across the galaxy on a moon full of criminals? How reckless of me." The sour look he got from the human in kind was worth the effort of teasing him, but Bovan was well aware of the risks he carried allowing a composite to run his systems practically unchecked, especially an older generation composite, a relic from the times when such devices were seldom monitored, constrained, or limited in their capacities. But Perry so far had served him well, acting as personal manager for his business affairs as much as she helped keep his other side of living under wraps. He had bought her from some merchant that was passing by the system some time ago, a fractured crystal lattice that needed a touch-up repair job, but it had been worth the units. She was stored on his server kept in the office, ran the tavern when he needed an extra pair of eyes and a brain far more capable than his own.

The room itself however served as Bovan's 'office'. It housed the tavern's server which stored all the security footage from the drones, as well as keeping stock of what was in store and what wasn't, including pending orders and deliveries. Page-screens and log-books were scattered across the desk, not particularly kept in any meaningful order; Bovan detested the digital necessity of the upkeep on his bar, he much preferred to remember himself and keep whatever else jotted down on old fashioned paper, but Mina had since convinced him when she was first hired to ease up the process so that it was less stress for the feline. The office by this point then had become just a dumping ground to all the junk and irrelevant stuff Bovan had no need for. Battered chairs no longer suitable for the tavern, boxes full of goodness knows what, permits and files kept stored away somewhere. It was a relatively bland room, thank goodness, giving the feline the chance to utilise it for his security side job. A desk was thrust into one corner, buried beneath a mountain of all sorts, a monitor was projected onto the wall just above it, displaying the security feeds to the tavern's main floor and the odd one or two to the kitchen space. The only exit in or out was the now sealed door. Every other wall was too thick to even imagine breaking down.

“Don't even think about calling for help, I've got an Anti-Locutor active in this room."

“A fucking what now?" Holy fuck, this kid really was sheltered? What fucking corner of the galaxy had he crawled out of?

“It jams signals and communications. Ain't nothing getting out of this room without my say so." Bovan had begun to ditch the friendly bartender guise and was slipping back into his authority. He had to admit, he did have a knack for the act, but his real self had become very much the cynic the older he got. Pitch Dream had done that to him. It was going to do a lot worse too, over time. Nobody stayed pure forever, not when every act you undertook on the frontier sullied your very soul like an ink stain.

“I just want to see The Boss, just let me speak to him."

“You're speaking to him right now, kid," Bovan said as he pulled himself up his chair. The metal had been reinforced with alloys derived from dwarf star grade particles, a rarity to come by but if you knew the right guy and made the right price, there was very little you couldn't get at Pitch Dream. Bovan had made sure once business was booming for him that he indulged himself with luxuries now and then. After all, the next job could always be the last, why bother scrimping and saving when sooner or later somebody's going to cross your path in some wrong way. Bovan wished it wasn't this human who was going to try and be the next.

“You're the Boss?!" He sounded almost incredulous, but really it wasn't hard to figure out. Bovan had a reputation so whilst a small fraction knew his moonlighting identity, it wasn't a giant leap to work out for oneself. He nodded at the boy,

“Now you better speak fast and tell me what the hell you want, or you ain't leaving this room alive."

The human visibly stiffened, Bovan picking up on the small gulp he made as the gravity of the situation crushed his bravado in an instant. A slight stench of fear emanated from him, enough so that it perhaps was masked by all the other smells of sweat, grime, body odour and plenty of males Bovan didn't even care to try and identify, but undeniably the male was afraid. Something in his instincts though told him that his terror did not originate with the alien cat that sat before him, or even the threat of death. It lay somewhere deeper than that, something so primal in his mind that Bovan couldn't even fathom what it might have been.

“My name is Kazim Bashara and I seek protection." Pulling his hood down, Bovan finally got a decent look at the human standing before him.

His appearance was particularly striking, perplexing almost if he were quite honest. His hair had been allowed to grow, though cut to the skin upon one side of his scalp, so cleanly shaven that it looked smooth and unblemished. Bovan suspected the follicles had been chemically treated to never grow there again, leaving the boy with only the hair he had left, which had been dyed the most unnatural vibrant red, a crimson shade that seemed almost the illuminate even in the darkest of shadows. But it was unkempt, left to straggle and matt from days of being unwashed so that strands had begun to clump together stick to the skin. The portion which had been kept bald, though why he couldn't discern, was the more intriguing part of his face; a bold, black tattoo had been inked across the scalp, dyed in azure with lettering that Bovan had never seen before. It was an unusual design, and so prominent upon his visage that he had to wonder why he would go to lengths to make himself look so identifiable if he was wandering a place like Pitch Dream. Then again, why else would he shroud himself in cloak and hood?

The rest of his face was more to what Bovan expected of a human. Typically those he had come across would typically always be scarred or pockmarked, age etched across their expressions like words across a book, telling of the person who bore the look. But Kazim had the purest face Bovan had ever seen of his kind. The skin was nearly perfect, like polished stone or fresh metal, so creamy and delicate. It looked near enough like the softest hue of caramel, his dark tone unlike that of many the feline had seen before. Most of the humans he came across were white, black, or some other variant of the colour, but Kazim was the first to be something of a blend between. He didn't really understand the genetics behind it, but he supposed it was something akin to his own species discrepancies in fur colours and markings. A simple flux of an allele here or there, what little difference it made. But Bovan had to admit, regardless of all that, Kazim was… remarkable. It was a polite way for putting it, considering the man was still deciding whether or not to snap the boy's neck if he proved too dangerous to let walk around Pitch Dream.

His eyes were a bedazzled blue, something that was almost too intense to break contact with. There were well set within his face, an outstanding testament to his genetics, Bovan had to admit. He liked to think that were he amongst his own kind, Kazim would have been considered a handsome individual. But then he was clueless to such notions. Alien cultures were never his specialty. He simply learnt the customs of the dos and do nots, and he left it there. But Kazim was exquisite. Impossibly so; it left an uncomfortable knot in the pit of Bovan's stomach that he just couldn't explain as he leant back in his chair, masking his uncertainty. There was something about this human that just didn't sit right with him, but he was growing less paranoid about him and more curious. He wanted to know more, even if it was against his better judgement.

“Who from?"

“That's none of your concern; I simply need the best sanctuary you can offer." Bovan chuffed, snorting in Kazim's direction,

“How am I meant to protect you if I don't even know who's after you?" He crossed one leg over the other, arms folded across his bulged gut.

“I cannot tell you… it would risk exposure." Kazim's expression faltered, the mask of indifference he held, the façade of control and composure slipped, revealing the frightened boy underneath. But he straightened himself out in a heartbeat, too slow though for the likes of the professional sitting opposite him, “It is inconsequential anyway. All I need is sanctuary, the best you can offer." He glanced about around him, scanning the room before his attention fixed upon something, “May I sit? Please." The human gestured to a chair tipped over, something old and rickety Bovan had been meaning to throw out. With a curt jut of his head, he gave him the go-ahead and waited whilst the man set himself down on the chair once it was righted, pulling the cloak free from his body and folding it rather neatly in his lap.

The clothes he wore were unnervingly distinctive. They didn't suggest power or status, but an emblem was sewn over the breast of the overalls Kazim wore. An emblem Bovan recognised. It was the hallmark of the Emperor's estate, which meant where the human had come from, it had not been a place he ought to have been able to escape. He wore workmen's clothes, janitorial type garments issued to all workers for the high society, wherever and whoever. Kazim happened to be wearing the most prestigious of them all, right from the Emperor's innermost sanctum. Very few ever got the chance to step inside, and so to be sat across from someone who had frequented the most secure, the most secretive and the most elusive halls ever in the entire galaxy, was an astonishing fact.

But Bovan kept that card to himself. The more he learnt, the better he made up his mind.

“How long we talking here, supposing I decide to take your money?"

“Indefinitely."

Bovan almost laughed out loud, but he held himself back, if only for the courtesy of hearing the human out,

“You're shitting me."

“At the very least I'm looking at long term asylum. At most a few months, easily up to a year depending on my… pursuers."

“They must sure as hell be eager to catch you, if you're looking for that long to hide away," Bovan stated matter-of-factly, if only to gauge the human's response. But still Kazim kept a neutral face, the mask remained stuck this time, “And if you want the absolute best for that long, then it's gonna be pricey. Real pricey."

“Money is no object. Leave that worry to me."

“No don't take this the wrong way, but I barely know you, Mister…?"

“Bashara. Just call me Kazim though."

“With all due respect, Mister Bashara, I like to keep my business strictly professional, and I make it my business to ensure I ain't being had by some human who thinks he can strut into my bar and make all sorts of demands." Bovan shifted forwards in his chair, suddenly filling out to an impossible size that towered over the human. The effect he had was instantaneous upon the human's face: regret, regret and panic, if only fleeting behind those dazzling blue eyes, “Now let me make this clear. We are not friends, and if you're wanting to be my client, then you're sure as hell going to give me some reason to trust you. Because right now, you're giving off a real stink that makes me think you're toxic. And I don't like poisoning my well, if you catch my drift."

Kazim paled a little. If anything, Bovan was just pushing him through the fire that he needed to walk into in order to survive in Pitch Dream. Even if he walked away from the feline, if he went elsewhere for somebody else's services, if Bovan turned him down or whatever the outcome, he was just doing him a favour. In order to make it here, one needed to let go of their sentimentality and to embrace the cynic in themselves. To understand that just about anybody, from a common street thug to the crime lord sitting behind a desk, could destroy your world and worse, was of paramount importance. Kazim had approached Bovan with the naivety that he could just get what he wanted by flashing some cash around and putting on an act of courage, but it was weak and easily crushed. He needed to know that the underworld worked how it wanted to, and no matter how hard you tried to bend it to your will you would always lose somehow. Kazim had to accept he was utterly out of his depth if he was to rise and learn.

“Very well…" He said, eventually, in a levelled, quiet tone, “What can I do to assure your trust in me?"

That was an interesting question, one Bovan hadn't really considered. Suppose he does decide to put some trust in the man, that he listens to his proposition and takes him up on it, then how does he ensure that Kazim wouldn't backstab him somewhere along the line? For all he knew, it was indeed just some elaborate ruse, one of Bovan's many enemies, forgotten or otherwise, come back to seek revenge for one thing or another. Though that was seldom the creed of Pitch Dream to hold a grudge, naturally not everyone agreed by that sentiment alone; courtesy could only go so far.

“You list exactly what you need," Bovan bluntly stated, returning back to inclining in the chair, “And you pay five hundred, up front."

“Only five hundred? Surely your prices aren't that-"

“Thousand, you idiot. Five hundred thousand, don't take me for a mock." Kazim shuffled uncomfortably in his seat, a sign of realisation that perhaps he couldn't afford Bovan's employment? “Or is that suddenly too expensive for you?" Though he didn't look any more relaxed, he stiffened where he sat and folded his arms, cloak clutched to his chest,

“No, that's perfectly acceptable. I have more than enough." Clearing his throat, he continued, “What I'll need is a safehouse. Somewhere I might stay in hiding, comfortable enough to live. I'm not looking for luxury, just adequate necessities. I'll also want someone guarding me constantly, I don't care if it invades my personal space, I need somebody to insure that I'm protected at all times. And nobody must know of where I am. You speak of this to no one, not even those you believe you can trust. I'm to be a ghost in your closet, a name you don't know, a man you never met. It's imperative that I am well-hidden and well-protected. The absolute best you can offer. I've been told you're an exceptional figure in the business of security."

That was an ambitious itinerary. Even some of the best Bovan knew would struggle to keep any job an absolute secret. Whispers were hard to stop when they whistled through cracks in the walls. Any trace could be followed, perhaps some security footage here or there, one mercenary's drunken ramblings listened to by overly curious ears, a bleed in a cell, and that was all it took to leak information to the wrong sorts. What Kazim was asking for was the perfect escape, to literally lift himself from existence for the next proposed year and to never be found whatsoever.

Fortunately for Kazim, by sheer luck, he had perhaps just come to the perfect guy.

“I can provide all that for you," Bovan said, keeping his voice low and measured, “But it will require you to keep an open mind, and it will not come cheap at all." He stared at the human, watching his reaction, but Kazim barely had to stifle a sniff, his composure keeping for now. Maybe he was growing accustomed to doing business in Pitch Dream, or maybe he was simply learning to perfect his, as the human kind called it, 'poker face'.

“I don't care what measures you have to take to give me what I want, I'm prepared to endure anything. And as I said, money is not a problem. Shall I pay up front now?"

“You sure you don't want to know what it is I'll be offering, see if it's something you want for yourself?" Kazim shook his head, hand dipping into his pocket to draw out his transponder,

“I trust my recommendation that you're one of the best in the business. I'm sure whatever it is you have in mind is more than adequate."

Bovan shrugged. If that was how the human wanted to do deals, then fair enough. Typically any ordinary client would check out the parameters for what they needed, ensure every man or woman involved was up to scratch and that nothing was out of place, that it was all watertight for their needs. But Kazim seemed almost frantic. He had already declared that he was desperate, but it seemed greater than that. It wasn't Bovan's place as security to know exactly what he was helping protect Kazim from, but certainly if it had the human rattled so much it must have been of staggering proportion. Bovan just hoped he wasn't putting himself into a bad position to taking the job.

Lumbering his weight out of the chair, he got to his footpaws and padded across the room, snatching up the scanning unit in one grasp. He held the receiver out for Kazim to swipe the transponder against, the small light upon its side flickering from red to green as it accepted the unification. Bovan thumbed in the price, five hundred thousand units, settled the fee as a deposit, and sent the transaction through. There was a light chime from the device, green light turning to amber that blinked on and off for a few seconds, before it flashed back to green. Bovan was now just that little bit richer, tossing the scanner back onto the tabletop where it clattered into the stacks of disk drives and page-screens.

“So," Kazim declared with inflection to his voice, clearly set on moving beyond the tension, “When do we leave for the safehouse?"

“It's right here," Bovan turned around to face the human as he too rose to stand. There was a look of disappointment on his face,

“Really…?" Eyes wandered round the dishevelled room, “This is the safehouse? I wouldn't think it's particularly secure…"

“Not here, stupid. Here." With that, Bovan pointed with one finger to his belly. He prodded his swollen gut with the digit as he kept his eyes trained on Kazim's face. The reaction melted between confusion, revulsion, and morbid curiosity. The feline knew damn well he was being cryptic and vague, but he enjoyed this part the most, toying with his client's a little.

“Your… your stomach? I don't understand. What the hell is wrong with you? Whatever happened to professionalism?"

Bovan flashed the human a toothy smile, saber-fangs glimmering in the darkened light,

“Let's just say it's my party piece, something no other security guard can do for you. And I assure you it's the safest, most secret place you could ever be in."

“I don't follow…"

“Of course you don't."

Bovan had to explain. He always did, and after years on the job, he had refined it down to a fine art, a speech cut of its spiel and its poor analogies so that it could get down to the essential information. He had Kazim take his seat once again, and much to the human's shock, Bovan began to strip off in front of him.

The porossians were a peaceful race. That was why they were seldom seen on Pitch Dream, making Bovan a spectacle, a diamond amongst rocks. They were not a war-mongering species, nor were they a species renowned for any such criminal intent. Originating from the planet Poros in the Valen system, the wildlife had been a unique blend of creatures and plants that had resulted in an ecosystem with relied upon coexistence. Bovan had been forced to endure all the science lessons when he was growing up, still only in his first decade of life, and he knew well enough the history of his people and their evolution. Though there was the natural order of prey and predator, the 'prey' had become the dominant species for thriving in the lush forests and jungles, for growing strong by ingesting minerals and chemical compounds found in the plant-life that developed their anatomy to such a degree where they soon ascended the evolutionary ladder to intelligence. Bovan didn't really remember the specifics of it all, but he knew well enough about all the perks that he was afforded thanks to his ancestry.

A porossian was, by design, a herbivore. But their digestive systems had grown over time to perfectly use up nearly one hundred percent of their food intake. Any waste products were typically secreted in sweat or urine, reliant more upon the latter, resulting in Bovan having to get used to the fact that whilst most species just pissed a clear, easy stream, he had to find endure the lengthy few minutes of relieving himself of the paste that collected in his equivalent of a bladder. It wasn't pretty, but Bovan liked to say that at least he didn't have to deal with shit whatsoever. That always shut anyone up trying to laugh at him for the unusual bathroom routines. The result though did mean that although porossians had developed an interesting internal physiology. Even some scientists still struggled to understand why, though many theories ranged from lucky genetics and mating to organ functions still as of yet unknown. Either way, whatever the explanation, Bovan was part of a species that had plenty of unique traits, some of which benefitted his job immensely – even beyond the greater muscle density from living in hardy conditions on his planet or the defence attributes such as horns or fangs.

The reproductive system of a porossian was not too dissimilar to that of plenty of other species. Male fucks female, female gives birth, but it branched off when it came to rearing. Bovan had learnt in his time that it was best to just compare his species to the equivalent animal that the client could relate to. In this instance, the feline brought up the analogy of the seahorse, a bizarre creature if he'd ever heard one, but it made his point far more succinct and understandable. The male of the species, after the female has given birth, takes on the role of raising the offspring. In harsh conditions, the male's greater size provided better odds of allowing the young to survive, especially if the female was still recovering from birth. Male members of the porossian species had therefore over time developed an internal nursing sack, an empty vacuous organ that was positioned somewhere roughly where the womb of a female might be located, perhaps a little further up under where a colon might be on any other species. It served as a chamber for the young to climb in to when the weather became rough, if predators were nearby, or whatever the case might have been in those feral days of his ancestors. As time had gone by, the necessity of the male to be the nursing parent had waned, but by that point biology had settled upon the path, and so Bovan was gifted with these traits. His 'womb', an organ he knew to be called a vestile, was arguably the most secure place for the human to be. It was a bold suggestion, one he typically never offered to people, but the human was promising to pay good money, and something deep down in Bovan told him that this was something he needed to do. He might be incredibly suspicious still, though it wasn't for him to say, but the human was afraid. It was a difficult decision, but he argued with himself that it was the right decision to make.

Even if he ignored the small voice of altruism that sang in his head, the bar was suffering financially with a draught of custom, and he needed all the extra units he could get. His last payment had been sunk into repairing so many different things, both at his living quarters as much as at the tavern, and he was already behind on Mina's wages. If the human was true to his word, he could be earning some very decent and very easy cash.

By the time Bovan was finished with the brunt of his explanation, he stood before the human stark naked. Kazim seemed to be visibly uncomfortable at the sight of the male stood before him, but for Bovan he was at ease with his body. His species were famous for their naturalistic views, and though Bovan went against many of them, some seemed so ingrained into his instincts that they were hard to deny; he enjoyed the feeling of being free of his clothes, the cycled air brushing through his pelt, not clamped down by garments that restricted his form. That and he liked the way the human squirmed as he did his best to ignore the porossian's endowment that hung between his legs, sat snugly below his paunch. Sniffing the air just right revealed the faint arousal that emanated from the human. Whether he was gay, straight, or whatever else in between, Bovan knew that he couldn't deny the fascination with the alien's body.

Kazim cleared his throat, electing to try and do his best to keep eye contact with the feline, though they occasionally flitted and wandered where they ought not to go,

“You… so let me get this straight, you want me to get inside you, into this… 'vestile'?"

“Correct." His expression was unreadable, something that felt blank but hid away amazement as much as shock.

“This vestile, it's for porossian children?"

“Well they're cubs, but sure."

“So it's basically just like a kangaroo then. Weird…"

“What?"

“A kangaroo, they're marsupials on my planet, Earth. The females still look after the joey, but they have like a pouch for them, over their stomach, which the joey can hide in."

“What's a joey?"

“Word for their offspring, just like porossians and cubs."

“Huh…" You learn something new every day, as they say. Bovan would have to remember that one for next time. “So do we have a deal?"

“But won't I show up in scans, that there's a lifeform inside you. I mean, you can't exactly pull the pregnancy card…" The alien shook his head, patting his fattened stomach with one meaty paw,

“Beautiful thing about our diets; our food sources are rich with minerals that allows us to create fat layers infused with compounds that deflect all sorts of shit. Poros has varying levels of radiation in places and in order to keep the cubs as best protected as possible, males evolved to have the vestile lined with the fat-like substance. No metal can cut it, no scans can penetrate it. Only way in and out is the rectum."

Kazim suddenly spluttered, eyes growing wide with astonishment,

“You mean to say to enter the vestile, I have to go through your ass?!" A smile slipped across Bovan's lips, a wry smirk as he'd heard that startling revelation thousands of times before and it still never failed to be humorous to watch,

“Technically, it's not an ass. It's just an opening, like a mouth or a urethra. It's called the rectum because that's what it is."

The astonished disgust waned slightly on Kazim's face, but he still seemed unconvinced.

“Does it not hurt?"

“I'm a feline, we're incredibly flexible. I've taken bigger things than you in there." He added a wink, just to toy with the human a little more. The vestile was not traditionally an orifice one used for sexual pleasure, but for Bovan, he was part of a small fraction of his people which, for one reason or another, took something enjoyable away from the sensation of having something enter him and sit inside the empty space. Much like a masochist likes pain, it was an inexplicable feeling he had, but he didn't let Kazim know that. It might have simply made things more problematic for him.

“I'm not sure… This seems incredibly… extreme…" The way he paused, the way he backed into his chair, the way his eyes looked across Bovan's form, it was clearly a conflicting scenario for him. But it was the best option Bovan had for him. All he had to do was convince the human of that.

“You can take it or leave it," Bovan called his bluff, hoping the human wouldn't rise to the occasion, “But you won't find anything better elsewhere. Certainly nobody will be as accommodating for what you want. At least this way you get round the clock protection, no matter where you are."

There was a terse moment of silence, where Bovan could see that Kazim was seriously considering his options. Wherever the human had come from and whoever he was running from, it was obvious that this was a tantalising offer. He just had to get past the hang-ups he had about the parameters involved. The seconds ticked by, Bovan folded his arms and stared the human down. The decision was flashing behind those dangerous blue eyes.

They glanced up, finally meeting the feline's gaze,

“Will I be staying inside you permanently? I assume you have preparations for nutrition and exercise." It seemed they had a deal on their hands – or paws, in Bovan's case.

“No, only when we're outside my place. When we're at home, I'll release you and you can walk about freely and do whatever you like on your own."

“But I'll essentially be shackled to you, right?" Bovan shrugged,

“You said you didn't care about personal space. It doesn't get any more invaded than being inside the other."

There was a heavy sigh from the human, his head dropping down as it seemed the weight of his options were finally bearing down on him, then he looked up again, setting a sterner look on the porossian as he lifted himself up off the wrought chair,

“Then I'll 'rent' out your vestile and pay for your protection at a rate of two million units per month, food and whatever else I will pay for as and when necessary." He extended out his hand, thrust into the open space between them; it was a human custom, a non-verbal statement that an agreement had been struck. It was hardly binding, but to the humans it was apparently of grave importance to their dealings. Bovan was no stranger to it, though it was still just a curiosity. Obliging Kazim, he took the human's hand and wrapped it in his own paw, the size easily dwarfing the petite male, and he shook with vigour.

“Make that four million, this ain't your ordinary job detail." A pout tentatively puckered on Kazim's lips – he looked so childish to Bovan when he was upset – but it sank away almost immediately, a curt nod of his head settling on the terms.

Their shake fell away and allowed the silence to return between them, the husk of the conversation now gone as all that hung between them was the obvious and somewhat awkward question of how best to proceed next. Bovan had done this dozens of times before, he was accustomed to the unease that settled in once somebody agreed to rent out what was essentially your womb, so he politely smiled, throwing in just a hint of an apology into the expression, as he waited for Kazim to ask the inevitable. He seemed to shift from foot to foot uncomfortably as he staved off speaking up, perhaps hoping Bovan would make the process easier for him, but alas, the feline was not one to push. He preferred his clients to be proactive. After all, it was their wishes that were his duty, not the other way around. Kazim for all he knew might wish to leave, to venture round the bazaar for a little while before returning, or he might want to set all his accounts straight before performing what he had come here to do, though he had not known what it is that he would be doing until just that very second.

Slowly, a grimaced realisation dawned across those captivating eyes,

“So, uh… how do you want to do this?"

“Do what?" Bovan was gruff, but much like with sex, he required consent. And consent required specifics and clarity. He needed Kazim to acknowledge and understand what it was he was about to do.

“How am I to… 'enter' you?" He said the words like they were rotten upon his tongue, visibly cringing as he uttered the syllables. It was an unpalatable notion, Bovan admitted. To anyone outside his species, this was the equivalent of a fetish known as 'vore', and whilst certain races had the potential to devour their subjects via whichever orifice, the porossians were the only race Bovan was aware of which one could safely perform the act with no damage to victim or host. Though if the cat was honest with himself, he likened the act more to 'unbirthing', another bizarre fetish he had learnt in his time upon the moon. But he was neither a mother nor was a vestile a fertile womb. It was simply an internal sac, a sanctuary to whoever required it.

“Well, you'll need to strip down first. That is, if you want to do this right here right now?" Kazim nodded, already putting his cloak aside and moving to unzip the overalls from his body, “And just follow my instructions. It's not difficult, but it's sure as hell gonna feel pretty weird."

“Right," he peeled the overalls from his shoulders and for the first time, Bovan got to see the human as he stripped nude, “Is this so that you know I'm not carrying any weapons, you know, assuage your paranoia that I'm not some scam artist or an assassin sent to kill you." There was a smile upon his face, a flash of some innocent part of him that the feline was also seeing for the first time. It was almost sweet, to see beyond the bravado and the swagger, and even further than the fear and trepidation. Kazim was just Kazim, a normal person, not some jaded, bitter client who wanted nothing else from Bovan but security.

“An assassin wouldn't be as stupid as you," he joked back, chuffing, “But you can try all you like to damage the insides; like I said, not even a scalpel can cut through the lining. It's grown to be essentially impervious. Too much fat and muscles, it's meant to keep cubs safe, and if you haven't noticed we're a species with horns and fangs. You try and shove a knife into me in there, best you're gonna do is tickle me something silly."

Kazim seemed amused at the prospect, shaking his head with an airless laugh, before shucking his garments off. Bovan didn't think it would be such a fascinating spectacle. To bear witness to the male naked, but underneath his clothes Kazim wore nothing at all, not even under-armour that had become so commonplace amongst the residents of Pitch Dream. He must have been so fresh on the moon that he must have come straight from wherever he docked and headed right for Bovan's bar. The human had been on a mission to ensure his future. That spoke volumes.

“Besides, the clothes usually just irritate the insides, so best to do it the best way possi-…" The feline's voice trailed off as he Kazim bore more and more of his nudity, shucking off his overalls with only the hint of modesty left within him.

But it was the male's body that intrigued him most. When Bovan had said he was flexible, he had meant that in the loosest possible sense as it applied to much of his attitudes. Coming from a race of non-aggressive, peace-keeping creatures, a species that prided itself on an equal parenting paradigm, Bovan had grown to not care where he put his dick. He liked women as much as he liked men, and considering he was the only porossian around for miles he wasn't on the lookout for a mate to reproduce with. Which meant he had made do with whoever he could find, and though he took pleasure in having his vestile filled, he was what many liked to label as a 'top', or at least plenty of his male bedmates did. Kazim was something akin to the feline's type. Small, durable looking, slender in the right ways, so really Bovan should have been at the very least pleasantly entertained by the boy's naked form, but it was much more mesmerising than that.

Much like with his head, more tattoos geometric in design than the characters upon his scalp, descended across the expanse of his body. They trailed along his limbs and entwined down his torso in what appeared to be almost like a map to the various elements of his being, accentuating certain muscles, particular areas like his chest, navel, or crotch, and even his buttocks and back. It was a rather unusual pattern to have, one which must have been one hell of a custom job Bovan figured, which just added more to the mystery of who exactly this human was, to be so wealthy and indulgent in such luxuries. Beyond the cyan ink that marked his body, his skin was so perfectly smooth that Bovan was amazed. Not even a wrinkle or crease where scarring might have occurred or fat could have formed. It was so pristine it seemed almost brand new, impossibly so, to the point that the feline was beginning to think that perhaps Kazim even had the money for high end cosmetics, the sort that many did not offer, dare he say even the sort that legally weren't permitted. Bovan wasn't in the business for such practices, he had had no need of them himself and he'd never dabbled in that side of things even just out of curiosity, so he couldn't say for sure, but he had heard rumours of various practices and procedures involving cellular rejuvenation and genetic scalping. Those found in your common clinic were not exceptionally good, and pricey for what they offered, but there were doctors and scientists prepared to venture further into such fields at higher costs – all for the sake of beauty. Though then that begged the question just where did the human have such procedures performed, if at all, and that was a realm of thinking Bovan had assured himself never to tread. Though it was professional discretion not to get involved with a client's background, it was more a safeguard to protect himself with indemnity. The less he knew or was aware of, the better he would be if the storm blew his way.

Pushing the critical side of his brain away, Bovan just tried to enjoy the sight of the naked male as he disrobed. Between the tattoos, his skin, though smooth, looked supple and soft, the same honey colour throughout without a single blemish. It was almost mouth-watering to the feline, who wondered just how it would feel to rasp his tongue along the human's skin, to taste the delicate notes of sweat and warmth as he lapped against the soft, perfect surface. It was free of hair too, not a single strand, suggesting perhaps the human had had work done in the past. Even down to his forelimbs, chest, and crotch where Bovan knew hair ought to be on human males. It was polished, like the skin had been dipped in cream until it slathered every inch of him. It was almost cute to look at, so sweet and tender to see the male standing there, hands covering his genitals, as he clung to the last vestige of his modesty.

“What now?"

“Now, you need to give me a second…"

Bovan propped one footpaw up on the chair, tail flicking behind him as he lifted up his paws and between thumb and forefinger he tweaked at his nipples. He rolled the fat nubs between his digits, biting his lip to stifle the gasp that rose up in his throat as the sensitive flesh was toyed with. Though he had barely gotten far before he heard the shrill indignant cry of Kazim piping up mere moments in,

“What the fuck are you doing?!"

“Relax, I'm not some pervert," Bovan said, in his head smiling coyly from the blunt lie, “I need to trick my body into thinking I'm nursing." He went on to explain the further logistics of his anatomy. This was another tricky part when it came to the vestile: in ordinary circumstances, when a male needs to place the cubs under his protection, he enters a phase known to porossians as 'nursing'. For them, as far as Bovan understood it, was a state of mind and body that simply meant the male was rearing his cubs. Breasts would lactate a milky liquid needed for nutrition were there actual offspring to suckle upon his nipples, but having gone so long Bovan knew his ducts had since dried up and shrivelled under the natural progression of his body's aging. However, a curious trick he had learnt is that when the nipples were stimulated to emulate a cub suckling, it activated the gland in his vestile that secreted a slimy, lube-like substance. What it was made of and what benefits it had had always eluded him, and its only purpose that he knew of was similar to how a female would get 'wet' when aroused, to make entry easier. In the same fashion, this slime was to allow the entry of cubs into the vestile easier, though in reality cubs were barely the size of two fists. A human was an altogether different matter for size, but Bovan had stretched himself out, a guilty pleasure of his that he kept as a dark secret. Typically a sexually active porossian male could easily enter the nursing phase as and when needed, controlled by impulses and instincts, but Bovan was over a hundred years old, his body needed the extra encouragement.

That and secretly he just liked to tease and work himself up. One of the many perks of the job.

“That's…" Kazim looked conflicted, just as before, but it was a darker confliction, one he seemed to be denying himself. There was a pregnant pause between his words, but eventually he found his voice again, “That's gross."

“So's shitting out feces, let's not judge things we don't understand."

“Fair enough…"

Bovan returned his attention back to his nipples, now that Kazim was informed. He tilted his head back and just allowed himself to feel the lull in the back of his head. It was such a hard feeling to describe, because many people he'd explained this to had simply attributed 'nursing' to sexual arousal, or something similar, or that it was merely an extension of paternal instincts that many men had when raising kids, but Bovan had to disagree. It was something so much more than that. For him, the nursing phase was a deeply intricate feeling that was something he could sense and anticipate. It was similar to any other emotion, like rising panic that seized your chest or the feeling of giddiness that would bubble in your heart. In the same sense, nursing was a feeling of service, a state of mind where you were no longer the independent individual, you became a warden, a protector, a figure of authority and nurture. It resonated deep down to your core where suddenly the things that were important to you shifted, your body responding to the needs it was now being asked to perform. That was when the heat would begin to trickle in, whether it was adrenaline or endorphins slipping through the body or if it was merely a reaction of thinking, Bovan couldn't be sure. But what he did know was that it felt amazing. Every time he pushed himself into his nursing phase, it was like a rolling wave of pleasure and contentment. He often abused his little trick when it came to sex, because the physical sensation was always amplified by his body's own natural response to stimuli. He pinched his nipples hard between his fingers, and a rock of warmth spread through his extremities, like a tidal surge. It made him shudder right to the bone, just that feeling of need. Not overtly sexual, but that something so undeniably good about the sensation that he just couldn't fathom what it was. Much like kissing does not derive immediate pleasure, but it generates intimacy and desire, in the same way did nursing induce a state of urges to fill the vestile, to embrace the physical closeness and be whole.

Bovan felt hot, wet goo run down the inside of this thigh, soaking his ball sack and matting his fur. He could feel the slime oozing from his hole, his body pulsing and throbbing in that dulled sensation of need. His instincts were telling him he needed to be filled, to be entered and to have something alive settle within him, to protect and nurture. It took all his rational thinking not to descend too deep into the unfathomable pit of his own psychosis.

Casting his eyes over to where the human stood, now shivering in the deathly cold of the office, his attention slid down to Kazim's groin. With an arched eyebrow, he grinned mischievously at the huamn's growing erection,

“Enjoying the show, are we?"

“Don't be absurd. I'm not gay." Well, Bovan wouldn't lie and say he wasn't disappointed, but he hadn't expected anything in such regard from a client. But the human, on the other side of things, was a terrible liar, or so his body believed.

“Really? I suppose then you get hard at any big, brutish male tweaking his nipples and swinging his dick all over the place, knowing you're gonna be inside him."

“I'm not gay!" Kazim spat, with so much venom and ferocity that it even startled Bovan. He had touched upon a very frayed and fiery nerve, it seemed. Best to leave well enough alone if he was to keep the peace with his client of an interminable time,

“It's alright," he placated, assuming the tone of reassurance, “It's not you. Everyone has a reaction akin to arousal; it's your body's way of trying to interpret the pheromones that get pumped out when I go into nursing." It wasn't untrue. The glands that produced the lube also produced various musks that induced similar parenting states within adult porossians in the nearby vicinity. It was meant to generate communal responsibility and connection, the cloud-instinct to remain as a group and work collaboratively together. Bovan had always seemed aloof to that; sometimes his instincts worked, sometimes they didn't. He just seemed to be the black sheep of his kind, as the human phrase goes. “Relax… it's natural, nothing to be ashamed about, just try not to focus on it and pretend things are normal, it'll fool your body into thinking everything's fine. Just try and be casual and breathe slowly, counting backwards from a hundred in your head."

Kazim followed Bovan's suggestions, rather fixedly adhering the cat's commands as if they were gospel. With his hands clasped behind his back, he couldn't help but notice that Kazim adjusted his stance too, though he couldn't deduce why it bothered him so much. Regardless the human turned his gaze upwards, looking at the plain steel of the ceiling, seemingly focused upon the light tubing, as he began to mutter numbers under his breath. Whether it worked or not, Bovan wouldn't know, it was just nonsense he made up to put his client's at ease for the process ahead, but an added bonus was that he finally got a decent look at the male's genitals whilst he was otherwise distracted.

The human was painfully hard. It was such a delight to see, because in all his time Bovan had only ever bedded three humans, two of which had been women. So his experience was limited with the species on the most intimate level, so all he had to compare Kazim to was a human mercenary he had met whilst on detail for a smuggling run. The guy's name had been Bob, no given surname, and he was well into his fifties, scarred from a lifetime of service as a soldier for hire, one or two various prosthetics for body parts he had lost during his assignments. Bovan remembered him well, as despite being a very vanilla man, Bob had certainly proven to the feline that age mattered little when it came to the bedroom, anybody could be a rough fucker. But that was also where Bovan derived much of his knowledge of human age and appearance. It was how he knew Kazim ought to have by now at least begun to develop and show the signs of his years. Maybe though Bovan was just expecting the wrong image, perhaps Kazim was just a testament of youth, whilst Bob had been far older. It was certainly tantalising to see the human's cock and balls, so much smoother and supple than those he'd seen before. It was perhaps average length, something that Bovan reckoned would easily fit in his paw, and it strained with such eagerness that it twitched as it jutted out free from Kazim's body. His balls had drawn up close to his body from the chill, the sack shrivelled a little, but Bovan could tell he sported a rather nice set of nuts, ones he'd love to just roll around in his paw to get the boy squirming. Perhaps he could even dare a cheeky lick of his head, take a sample of the boy's pre which dripped so earnestly from his tip, but then that would be crossing personal boundaries he had yet to wear down.

Provided his hunch about Kazim's defiant heterosexuality was well founded, of course.

For now, he did actually have work to do, and as much as he would like to take in the sights of an aroused human male standing before him, Bovan was always made sure to put business before pleasure, especially when the price was so high. Keeping one paw to his nipples to spur along his nursing, Bovan reached the other down and slid his fingers between his buttocks, hiking his tail for better access. As he pushed his paw into the crevice between, he could immediately feel the hot, slick wetness accompanied with an almost satisfyingly loud squelch to the air as he dipped inside. His fingers probed around for the entrance to his vestile, and high off his hormones that raced wildly through his body and induced this near transient mentality in him, three slipped in all too easily. His tongue lolled out from his muzzle with a happy sigh as he felt himself stretch to accommodate his own paw, working those digits around, wiggling and spreading them to loosen himself up. For Bovan, nursing made every sensation in or near his vestile and its entrance feel electrifying, so deeply satisfying to have something toying with him, opening him, ready to fill him at a moment's notice. He didn't care if it was some perversion of his paternal instincts, it felt good and that was all he needed to know. It was his body and nobody else's. He had already left his people far behind.

“You sick fuck," Kazim once more chimed in, as if by now his opinion was going to wholly worthwhile for the process of getting him inside Bovan, “You're getting off on this!" The feline had already dealt with every client expressing their reservations and their horror of the act, ultimately concluding with the last panic of their first time. Kazim was nothing special, not in that regard, so in his clouded mind the cat paid him little attention,

“Shurrup…" He slurred, words addled by the fog of pheromones. The room was sealed tight, and though the air ventilated it didn't account for the heavier musk of the big feline. Bovan breathed in his own scent, his body reacting accordingly in a vicious cycle, pumping more into the air and sucking more back in, until his stench was all that fuelled him in the hazed stupor. Only the job at hand kept him focused enough not to lose himself to the excitement, his priority was to get Kazim acquainted with the act so they could move forwards. After that, Bovan wouldn't need to be as anxious with the human's comforts as he would hope the boy would be adjusted enough to the process by then. It was unusual, terrifying on its first instance, but could be relatively quick and painless when performed correctly and by those who understood what they needed to do.

He was working in four fingers with graceful ease now, the lewd noises of farting, sucking wetness erupting with each movement Bovan made. But it was worth it though, he could feel himself relaxing and opening up. The vestile's entrance was already an incredibly flexible and durable muscle, one which most porossians had great control over to flex and clench at will, or likewise to loosen as well. Bovan was no stranger to having large objects in there, both for personal pleasure as much as business, and Kazim was somewhere between the smallest and largest he'd ever taken. He had no worries about himself; it was the human he had more concern for. The experience, as far as he knew from what people had told him, was how they imagined birth to be like. The closest, most reliable rendition of the feeling Bovan had ever been able to correlate is the sensation of fingering someone else, only then it graduates to fisting, and then it escalates from there. The enveloping sensation, whilst at first oddly pleasant, swiftly turns petrifying as the warmth and moisture continues to build, and the muscles constrict and pulsate around the body drawing you deeper and deeper, until finally your head plunges under and the light begins to fade, replaced by a faint, blackened hue of red. From there Bovan couldn't find a firm answer for what happened next. A common occurrence was that client's learnt to sleep whilst others would find themselves spaced out in the sensory deprivation, giving them a chance to collect their thoughts. Some however felt the experience was more traumatic, a feeling of hypnotic imprisonment as they knew they wished to leave but couldn't, until their brain settled and fell unconscious.

After a while Bovan had stopped asking. He tried not to think about it too much, it honestly freaked him out sometimes when he thought too long about it, trying to wrap his head around the ramifications of the sensation, what that must do to a person. It was better to just enjoy and find that pleasure within everything else.

With one sinking motion, Bovan slid his whole paw into his opening, feeling the muscle glide so effortlessly over the bulge of his knuckles before sucking him in to his wrist. It was going to be as good as it got when it came to stretching out before he introduced Kazim to the entrance, as Bovan didn't have the gear or space to take it any further. Really he would have liked to have gotten both paws in there, really pull at the rim a little, but he could make do. After all, he was meant to be a professional.

“M'ready…" He announced, yanking his paw free from his hole, grunting as he felt his body suck and slop around the hollow he left in its wake. It dripped with slime, his paw coated in the stuff, which was promising at the least, though it seemed to quail the human somewhat at the sight of the thick, milky ooze that slathered Bovan's forearm. With no towels he was forced to wipe himself clean on his own pelt, using the shaggy fur of his chest to dry off. The slime always absorbed back into the body anyway – the waste not, want not methodology of evolution. But it earned him another disparaging look from the human, though he had learnt at the very least to keep his mouth shut. The feline could forgive him for his nerves, though if this turned into a recurring reaction he would tell the boy where he can shove his transponder.

“You sure?" Kazim was sceptical, but he was stalling. Every client always did. This was the part where push came to shove and suddenly they got cold feet. Nobody liked the plan when it became a reality.

“Positive." The bulky cat pulled one leg off the chair and clambered to the floor, groaning and huffing all the way until his weight finally slumped upon the ground.

“What are you doing?"

Bovan lifted his legs up, assuming the missionary position with his 'ass' exposed to the human. In any other situation and he was sure Kazim might have freaked out or become aroused even more, but the peculiarity of the encounter was diminishing the uncanny somewhat. His paws grabbed at the back of his knees to give himself some leverage, his backside fully upturned to the naked male.

“Now it's up to you, you need to get in."

“This is so fucking weird…"

“Tell me about it, just do it one foot at a time."

“Won't it hurt?"

“You're a tiny human and I'm a big boy; relax, I've done this hundreds of times, you ain't gonna break me, boy." Bovan snorted. The position was not all too comfortable for him, “Now hurry it up, we ain't got all day and I've got a bar to run." Though many seconds seemed to pass, rather hesitantly Kazim moved beyond his reluctance and edged towards the alien feline like he was a feral ready to snap at any moment. There was little else he could do other than to allow the human to approach him however best put him at ease. Any more barking at him would only rile the fear in him even more. It was such an unusual proposition that Bovan sometimes just had to take a step back and accept that he was asking for a lot, even if it wasn't he who was asking for the help at all. Kazim had come to him for security and the best way he could provide that was not the way the human must have intended. He must have had visions of a secret bunker somewhere, with a squadron of mercenaries patrolling the perimeter whilst he lived a life of hidden luxury for however long he needed. He certainly would never have expected climbing into another man's body.

Faltering just as he made that last step towards where Bovan lay, the human looked down over the feline with a mixed expression of uncertainty and revulsion. With one tentative foot, he seemed to hover over the cat, undecided about what to do next,

“Do I just…?" He made the indication to press down with his foot, toes pointed just to Bovan's opening, his cheeks glistening and slick with slime. The feline's body constricted from his abdomen down in reaction, feeling so close and boiling with anticipation as Kazim almost entered him. Just the mere thought of having something inside him sent Bovan's nursing-addled state into frenzy. He had to keep himself calm, keep breathing slow,

“Just do it."

Slowly, either with great care not to harm Bovan or with near insurmountable reluctance, Kazim pushed his foot into the feline's hole. The opening swallowed the toes and half the foot all too easily, muscles immediately drawing it in and pulling it down into Bovan's body. The human seemed a little frightened but Bovan hushed him, one paw darting out and grabbing his thigh to prevent him from pulling away too much. The vestile was not an organ design to be fucked. If Bovan had learnt anything about his anatomy in his time is that he was no a guy to receive anal. The construction of the internal tubing, the way the muscles and lining operates, as a cub would typically enter the vestile it would seldom resist, as much as the male goes into nursing, the offspring likewise would become pliant and sedated. It protected both parent and child and committed the father to taking the cub inside him. If Kazim pulled out now, even just slowly, it would be near excruciating for Bovan. Like swallowing a piece of string only to keep hold of one end and pull it back up.

“It's okay," he whispered, doing his best to keep the flash of panic out of his tone, “It's alright, just let it happen. Accept it. Breathe…"

Though it seemed for a moment that the human wasn't listening, his eyes glued to Bovan's hole just stretching and settling around his foot, the feline could see that he was doing his best to slow down the hyperventilation that built in his chest. The fear was natural, as was the knee-jerk panic, but Bovan had to remain in control of the situation.

“Just ease it in, breath deep and let yourself go."

The breathing wasn't to calm his nerves, though it was an added bonus. The pheromones were pulsing from his system now and just drowning the air. It might not have had the direct effect on Kazim that he wanted; Bovan knew that the human's physiology reacting to the chemicals would lull him at least into a state of want if not complacency, regardless of what that desire was. Any means necessary would be taken to ensure this went as smoothly as possible. The better it went the quicker they could get on with everything else.

Kazim did seem to calm, though he was still somewhat agitated. Bovan couldn't stop the experience from being unusual to him, it was on the human to get over his own apprehension, there was nothing he could do to help. But he no longer was pulling his foot out. Instead he eased himself a touch deeper, the sound of fluids squelching around his limb as he began to push with a little more force. The added weight sunk the foot deeper, until Bovan felt his hole wrap around the ankle and suck it in, grunting as now the whole foot sat inside him. The human let out a giggle, not from amusement but just a pure, intense burst of sound to alleviate the pressure, an overwhelming, indescribable feeling that had to be vented somehow, and it came out in childishness. But it was good to see that that Kazim was soothed in some fashion, bemused perhaps by the prospect of having his foot inside someone else. Bovan just concentrated on his own breathing for the time being. Nursing took one hell of a toll out on him and he wasn't exactly in the prime of his years anymore. He could certainly stretch, much better than others he'd known back in the day, but it had grown to become more difficult the longer he left between entries and the older he got. It didn't perturb him though; it was just a matter of pushing past the mental blocks.

Pushing deeper still now, Kazim let the beginnings of his calf begin to slide into Bovan. The hole greedily gobbled down the limb, opening and slurping around his leg as it disappeared deeper and deeper into his rump. He could only bite his lip and hold back a rumble of satisfaction as Kazim entered into him, the leg pushing to the stage now where even if Kazim tried to pull out, the feline's internal muscles would have only drawn him in more no matter how much he struggled.

“Feels… squishy… and warm…" The human was getting just as breathless as the cat was as his knee was swallowed by the hole, leaving Kazim with half a limb trapped inside Bovan now. Thank goodness the door was locked, Bovan thought with mirth, otherwise this would have been one hell of a sight to walk in on, the feline upturned whilst a human stranger climbed into his guts.

“Yeah…" was all Bovan could mutter in response, eyes trained upon the human and watching his every move. There was hesitance again, an uncertainty once more about how to proceed, “Now the other one… th'other leg…"

“Right…"

Kazim seemed to find it a little tricky, almost afraid to put any pressure on the feline's innards, but as he gently eased his weight across he found the cat to be resilient, as if he was as light as a feather and gave him no concern. There was perhaps just a moment where the human's worries peaked just a touch more before he steadied himself against the chair with one outstretched arm, relying upon his leg currently sinking deeper, frighteningly similar to quicksand, into Bovan for support. The other leg was raised, foot pointed with toes curled, as Kazim moved his limb down alongside the other until it came into contact with that stretching rim, gasping softly as Bovan expanded to accommodate. The hole widened, it yawned as the human pushed his second leg inside, and all too quickly he sunk down to the knee as gravity was beginning to take hold.

“Holy shit…"

Now unable to control his descent, Kazim's body moved much faster down. Bovan's hole crept up his thighs and gulped his limbs inside, undulating muscles moving along the human's body internally. There was no fighting the situation now as he was swallowed up to his hips, crotch just jutting free of being taken entirely.

Kazim was hard. So painfully hard, it seemed, as his dick twitched with every needy heartbeat, pre dribbling from his head with no means of stopping himself. He gave out a slow, shuddering groan as Bovan's rump began to slide over his groin, balls first before gliding across the length of Kazim's shaft. His abdomen was descending into the feline's warm depths and soon his cock and sack disappeared altogether. But Bovan could still feel them. His member prodded into the sides of his innards and dragged along all the way down it went, sending shivers of intense sensation racketing through his body. There was nothing to be done about it though, he had riled him up after all and made him breathe the musk that sent him horny. It wouldn't be right to complain, though somewhere in the back of his brain he had a perverted feeling of elation that the human was aroused at what was happening. He would never have said though, never to a client – professionalism and whatnot.

“Oh fuck…" Kazim groaned, his body trembling as his stomach was sucked down into the feline's body. It was at that point that Bovan realised that the human had actually just orgasmed, as soon Kazim was bucking his hips as best he could inside the alien's body, a warmth spreading down into Bovan that was not created by his own doing, something pulsing deep within. It was so hot but he had to keep himself calm, though his otherwise dormant member now throbbed into life as it grew hard. He couldn't resist the temptation as it burned inside him, even as Kazim now filled him up, his legs beginning to curl inside as he enter the main portion of his vestile. It felt so good to feel whole again, whole and full. “Fuck, fuck, fuck!"

Further down he went, his stomach now swallowed by Bovan's hole, and now his chest began to slide down into his body, up until it came to the armpits. The arms would be the trickiest to get inside, as typically at this stage…

“Wait…" Kazim panted, the reality suddenly clawing its way into his mind as his climax abated, the pleasure now relieved to make way for clarity, “Wait!" But there was no stopping now. Even if Kazim changed his mind, even if he didn't cooperate, Bovan's body had a hold of him and even if he wanted to help the human get out, the muscles were already working on instinct to draw the human in, constricting and tightening to bring him deeper down. “What if I can't breathe? How am I meant to breathe in there? I want out, I want out!"

“It's alright," Bovan soothed, as Kazim's arms bent upwards from the strain on his body, the posture forcing him to allow his arms to curve up as the feline's hole drew in the human's shoulders. “Just relax…" With one heavy paw, Bovan clamped a grip onto Kazim's head and gave him the helping push he needed. A trial by fire scenario: the only way the human was going to learn that things would be okay was by doing. Which meant speeding up the process a little, and so with strength pushed behind one great bicep, Bovan eased down Kazim's head as carefully as he could. He struggled all the way, his arms flailing as best they could despite losing the battle, and the human's neck, jaw, and then face was slowly swallowed by the feline's hole. His last words were mumbled, garbled into the slime that now oozed across his head, as Bovan watched those piercing blue eyes stare at him with wild fear before slipping out of view. All that was left were the two limbs that dangled rather uselessly from his ass, very quickly sucking into his body as now the majority of Kazim was inside him.

Bovan's gut swelled with the bloat of another being inside him. He grunted as he felt Kazim's form twist and writhe until it finally settled within his vestile, the arms disappearing amidst of squelch of fluids and frothy foam. Inside the human would naturally assume the foetal position once he gave in to the situation, once he accepted that everything was alright and nothing was wrong. The fluids inside the vestile were oxygenated, thankfully the same gas humans breathed, which made the process less daunting for Bovan's end. Kazim would have to get used to having the liquid invade his lungs, hence the last fleeting struggle from a body believing itself to be drowning, before all went quiet and calm.

Letting his legs down, Bovan lay upon the floor heaving out staggered breaths. He hadn't realised it until then but he'd been holding his breath until Kazim had fully entered him, and now relief was sweeping his body that all had gone well. A paw stroked over his now noticeably fatter stomach, feeling the heavy round of fat pushing up against his flesh much tighter than before, a sign that something was inside him. He could feel Kazim in the space within, perhaps not his actual form, but the presence. The heartbeat that thumped in his chest, the slide of his limbs against the walls, the soft rise and fall of his breathing through the fluids. He was bound up into a ball, as any baby would inside its mother's womb, and Bovan felt an intense wave of pleasure just scoring through him. It was just too much, too real, that finally it was happening again and he was full.

He grabbed his cock, erect and leaking, pushing up against his gut, and furiously he worked his paw over his shaft, grinding the head with his palm. With nursing pheromones still potent and dripping in the air, he sucked hard and deep and he stroked himself off, feeling the heat rising in his loins until he was biting back an orgasm.

“Fuck!" Bovan snapped, propping himself up on one elbow as the other arm jerked himself off. His hips struggled and bucked beneath the added weight of the human inside, but it didn't stop the onslaught of his climax. With a few short thrusts into his own grip, his cock twitched and spewed heavy streams of cum that went arcing up into the air. It was impossibly thick, creamy and viscous, as they jetted upwards until they came down naturally and splattered across the floor. The sound was rich and wet to the ears, sticky as every shot landed with a satisfying slap. He didn't stop stroking himself though until every last drop had been milked from his cock, until he was growling and snarling from the overstimulation. Only then, when he was positive he was empty, did he stop, and drew his paw away from his crotch. It was covered in his seed, emanating a stench of the same musk he had drowned Kazim in before, and without even thinking he licked himself clean. His rasping tongue danced around his fingers suckling every drop of cum he could find until his paw, though moist, was clean of his fluids.

He was now alone, in a manner of speaking, inside his office, and with his sexual frustration now equally vented, and his nursing state calming with his afterglow, he looked about for his clothes. For as much as he would like to sit and bask in the glorious sensation of having the human inside him, there was work to be done.

With a huffed sigh of resignation, Bovan rolled onto his side, and using the chair he lifted himself up with a stagger to his steps. Getting used to the new weight was always a problem, and though he was getting on in his years he could still carry something the size of the human easily without it feeling like a chore. If anything it was just a dulled workout, constantly wearing down on him. He could deal with it though, it was coming to the end of the evening anyway and once the night shift was over he would close for the day and head home. Perhaps he might get Mina to cover for him tomorrow, so he can ease the human into a routine of what was expected of him, or he could just shut up the bar entirely for one night, it wasn't like sales were booming.

He needed this cash. A paw idly stroked over his gut where the human lay, an eye cast over to the man's clothes. If he was telling the truth, if money was no object, then he sure as hell had better be worth his weight in gold. Otherwise Bovan would be pissed.

Another sigh. What's done was done, he could only take Kazim at his word for the time being. Stooping to swipe up his clothes, Bovan began to get dressed, realising he might need to dip into the larger end of his wardrobe when he got back to his quarters as he struggled to clasp his top together. His belly now protruded out the bottom like a beer gut, not that it wasn't too far from reality, but it made Bovan feel sheepish as he gathered together the human's belongings and stuffed them into a draw for him to take home later. Hopefully Gallus wouldn't pick up on the size change, though Mina certainly would. The last thing he wanted was to attract attention to himself…

Though maybe he'd give himself five minutes and maybe a blast of hi-perfume. He positively stank of his own sex.

But on a side note, with Kazim indisposed of for the meantime, he was overly curious to figure out just exactly who this human was and what he was getting himself in to. As much as Bovan upheld his discretion as an ultimate priority with all clients, there was just something that bugged him about the boy. Something incredibly strange and unusual, enough to warrant him considering breaking his own rules, even just a touch. The less he knew, the better, but he had to know something…

“Perry?" Bovan spoke aloud again, though careful to keep his voice low so as to not rouse Kazim inside him, “I need you to run a scan for the name 'Kazim Bashara', check all intergalactic frequencies and see what you can find. But keep it quiet… I don't want to attract the League's attention."

“Affirmative," the effeminate, disembodied voice responded, “I take it you will wish to receive this information in private when I have gathered sufficient data?"

“Yes, just don't let the human catch wind of it."

“Affirmative."

Bovan didn't feel good going behind the human's back. Even if it was a professional disgrace, it felt more than that for some bizarre reason. Like he was betraying the man's trust, stapling himself to be this figure of authority and security and behind it all he was duping the human over to learn a little more than he should. He growled at himself; what difference does it make? What the human doesn't know can't hurt him, and surely Perry will only come back with the most insignificant charges held against him. Maybe the human had killed a few people accidentally, pissed off the wrong guard, or scammed someone he shouldn't have done out of lot of units… In fact, that last thought made sense. Bovan decided it. That was probably why he was running. He'd committed some heinous act of fraud or ripped off the wrong galactic cartel and now they wanted his head on a platter. It would explain why he had so much cash to spend. Bovan wasn't a stranger to taking dirty money. Once it was in his paws on Pitch Dream, it became anyone's cash. Nobody could stake a claim to it after that. He rubbed his paws over his gut again, tutting to himself. He just needed to tone down the paranoia that was all. Though he still couldn't shake it, just there in the back of his head…

Inside him the human twitched, a jab to the side of his belly, and Bovan's cock throbbed again with an ooze of cum. His whole body shuddered in response, the stimulus working over already sensitive nerves. With a sniff of the air again, it seemed his musk was only getting stronger, his cock pulsing back to life trapped under the swell of his belly. Maybe he'd give it a few more minutes, maybe ten or twenty, depending on how quick he could rub another out.

~ ~ ~

The Horan Estate was located not too far from the Black Bazaar. If anything, it was the only feasible domicile in the vicinity, unless one preferred to brave Pitch Dream's alleys, back passages, portholes or stowaways for somewhere to sleep. The construct itself was near enough as vast as the Tertian cruiser, but unlike the bazaar, the estate was built into a crater, and rather than jut straight up from the moon's surface, it burrowed deep into its guts, having ransacked the shell of what might have been a former mining operation, or perhaps it was the remains of some forgotten colony that had tried to escape the radiation that scorched the lunar plains.

Naturally, like most others Bovan knew, the feline lived within the estate, keeping to himself. Rent was affordable most days, crime was kept to a minimum on the upper levels nearer the surface, but the further down one went, the grimier, more questionable it got. There was such little choice else, not unless one had the units to splurge on some better off class of living. For Bovan though, it suited him just fine. Nobody dared to cross him and so far his luck of neighbours had been incredibly fortunate, limited to some of the tamer sorts. As he stood in the elevator waiting for his floor, he watched the numbers flicker by until it reached the first of its double digit: level ten. The place he called home. The elevator trundled to a grinding halt, bare cave walls exposed through thin grids that made up the walls of the cage he stood in, just as they drew level with the floor Bovan was to exit out on. The gate hissed open, screeching with a pneumatic shriek, and a dull claxon-chime sounded signalling to the feline that he was to leave. He stepped out compliantly and into whistling winds of the tunnels. Cold draughts could breeze from any direction, but hot flushes of exhaust and incinerators blasted through the crust and warmed the estate just enough, leaving the place feel like a tomb, clawing at its last vestige of life but otherwise having lost the fight in the end.

Scanning the various crowds that mingled around, Bovan lumbered his way through the winding path to his quarters with two duffel bags lugged in each paw. People made room for him as he cut through, whether it was the steely grave look upon his face or the fact he was larger than large, especially considering the bulk Karim's body now offered him he wouldn't know without asking, but he didn't want to waste time in getting home where walls would be thick and exposure impossible. Who knows who could have been following the human? The boy, whilst no novice, was not proficient at the art of evasion. Bovan had felt an uncomfortable sensation ever since he'd left the bar, the feeling of eyes watching and following him, but in the clustered bazaar and the disorderly estate there was no way of knowing who might have been scoping him out without drawing attention to himself. The sooner he was behind closed doors, the better. It didn't matter if they knew where he lived, Kazim would always be under his protection in the most intimate sense possible. It was whether or not they knew he had Kazim that bothered him.

He slunk down gangways and passages until he came to his door. Part of him always dreaded the next part. Beyond the initial entry, what Bovan always neglected to mention was the rather gruesome exit one had to take leaving the vestile. Something in him might have acquainted it to birth, but the process was much easier than that, if anything he rationalised it was more like defecating for any other species, though he'd never know the true feeling that heralded. It was the aftermath however that was more troubling. He wondered how Kazim would cope, not that he had much choice; there was no other way. Bovan just crossed his fingers, as humans would say, and prayed he'd take it in his stride.

Paw hovering down across to where the handle ought to be, Bovan's meaty fingers lingered across the smooth black panel that blinked into life with his presence. Holographic figures appeared in a grid, sometimes alternating their shape and form, freezing every few seconds before resuming. Jabbing in his keycode to the lock and swiping the genetic reticule below, Bovan was rewarded with the sound of his deadbolts demagnetising and sliding free. With a muffled swish, the door glided across and he stepped through the threshold, double checking the seal the entrance behind him. Again came the clunk of bolts slamming shut, and he dumped the bags upon the floor where he stood. Priorities came first.

His living quarters, whilst apt for a man his size, were not what he would have called expansive. The majority of it consisted of one conjoined room, between partitions for the kitchen, a lounge, and an eating space. Furnished enough for the porossian's needs, Bovan had never poured too much time and attention, and nay, even money, into decorating his place. It felt like a redundant waste of his time, a touch too much of sentimentality that could get a man like him killed in his business. Pitch Dream was not a place to call 'home', it was the last port for many. Bovan couldn't see himself leaving any time soon. Perhaps in his final years he might try to make himself more comfortable, but for now the salvaged furniture and standard-issue grade décor would suffice.

He made for the washroom, one of the only two other rooms that were physically divided from the main area, stripping himself of his clothes as he went. His trousers hit the floor and came off between strides, he almost tore his tunic from his torso before he could unbutton it, and he shucked away the vest he wore to be 'smart' when working the tavern. By the time he got to the bathroom he was right back to being nude, though really it wasn't too far removed from his domestic routine once he walked through the door. Only Kazim presented him with a predicament, one he couldn't simply put off.

He stepped into the rather confined room and shuffled into the cleansing pod, the large fixture built into the very walls that just about accommodated Bovan's larger size with a little room to spare, the floor beneath his footpaws warming to his presence as the room activated upon its sensors. He wasn't here to get clean though, he squatted down upon his haunches, one paw steadying himself against the wall, whilst the other squeezed his cock and balls. The situation was no different to earlier, he had to induce nursing. Only he needed an added kick to reverse things.

With a strained grunt, Bovan began to stroke himself, fingers wrapping around the already thickening shaft and working his heavy member. His thumb rubbed his head, making him wobble upon the pads of his footpaws as arousal glimmered somewhere deep within his body. A growl rumbled in his chest as he moved his paw down to his sack, cupping his large balls and squeezing them in his paw. Though he was reclusive about it, Bovan was a rough lover, even with himself. When it came down to it and all he had available was his own paw, Bovan would always wind up putting himself through the grinder so long as he got a satisfying orgasm out of it. That wouldn't be what he would get now, but he needed his body to expel Kazim, and the best method he had found was an impulse of an automatic eject. Some wilful control of his internal muscles could push and pump the human's body out of his own, though it was almost a rather laborious task the first time around. New textures, shapes, sizes, all of it was confusing the system. Bovan just had to rise above it and get used to the feeling.

Still, he was getting hard and he couldn't deny that rubbing a quick one out whilst Kazim was exiting him was a tantalising thought, but he thought better of it. No need to freak the human out any more than what he was about to go through already.

Bovan could feel his backside getting sticky again as glands worked to produce his lubricant. He could feel his breath getting heavy once more with the pheromones that had begun to trickle into the air. His cock throbbed under his gut, he snarled with a sense of salacious pride, and that's when things began to move inside. There was a flex of movement, not by Bovan but by Kazim, who seemed to be responding to the change in state, and it was shortly followed by the feline's gut gurgling before he clamped down upon his diaphragm. With a heave against his stomach, the cat felt things shift, as his vestile slimed up and push out the occupant inside. He felt his rim bloom open, dark purple guts widening followed by a torrent of slick, white fluids. Bovan supposed, perhaps just like birth, these were his waters, but it was a terrible analogy. The liquid was more akin to perfluorocarbon and synovial fluid than anything else, a cocktail of oxygenated particles, nutrients suspended into a loose protein jelly, and goodness knows what else that made it so slippery. He sloshed about his footpaws to form a large pool, the contents of his vestile ejecting what was easiest to get rid of first and pasting the way for Kazim to follow. Bovan moved a paw to his bloated gut to feel how the human was moving inside him, and he felt his body retreating downwards, heading for the opening. With his nursing instinct swimming in the back of his brain, Bovan groaned aloud as he felt the canal open around the human, his hole flexing until finally the feline could feel the human's feet poke out of his rim.

He pushed down harder, his groans turning to horrific garbled moans of pleasure and intensity, as more of the human came free. Feet became legs, legs bore way to his hips and then torso, finally followed up by arms clasped to his chest and then, with one lewd squelch as everything was released, the human's head. His body slumped to the floor in a lazy curled position, neither really conscious nor unconscious, but in fugue state somewhere between as Kazim's body resumed its own autonomy. He was covered in a thick film of the fluid, coating him from head to toe, plastering every inch of him and leaving him looking as if he had been dipped in paint. Bovan turned around, still crouching down, and began to wipe away the slime from the human's face, making sure to clear the eyes, nose, mouth and ears so that he wouldn't wake up so disorientated and suffocated. It was somewhat part of his instinct, though his species had since evolved beyond the point of licking cubs clean once they'd been expelled from the vestile. The fluid that soaked the floor would drain, he wasn't concerned with that, nor was he bothered by the stench having grown far too used to it that he barely noticed it anymore. His concerned was placed with the human he was beginning to rouse from his comatose state.

Kazim gurgled, trying to form words as he came too, but he found his airways to be blocked. Bovan winced as the realisation dawn for the human that his lungs were filled with liquid, and immediately the panic set in and he began to choke. Suddenly his body began to convulse, spasming upon he floor where he lay, thrashing about with his hands scrambling for his neck. It was a hideous, grotesque sight, one that never got any easier to watch as Bovan clasped at the human's shoulders to try and keep him still,

“It's okay!" he shouted aloud, though whether Kazim heard him or not, or if he was even listening amidst his convulsions, didn't show, “Just relax and breathe, like you normally would." There was no response from the human, he was still gagging and his movements were becoming beleaguered, he believed he was choking to death, drowning essentially, and though he could breathe perfectly fine his brain was informing the rest of him that he was dying. Thus he couldn't breathe, the reaction simply wasn't there. It had been severed. Naturally Kazim would just pass out eventually from the lack of oxygen, he would resume breathing once more, only to rouse and repeat all over again. It wasn't fair to put the human through such torture. It was far to sickening to witness, let alone experience. Bovan took action.

One paw grabbed the human's head, forefinger and thumbing just at the joint of his jaw to force him to open, pushing the cheeks apart. Kazim fought back, trying to break free in his struggle, but the feline was far stronger, and with his other paw he took his fingers and pushed them between the parted lips. Two fat fingers dug through his mouth, spilling goo all down the human's face and Bovan's forearm as finally he prodded Kazim's uvula. Rushing to tear free his fingers, his paw was followed by the human's vomiting. His body's reflexes took over he collapsed to the floor, held up weakly by his hands in the puddle of white fluid, and he hurled the contents of his lungs and some of his stomach across the cleansing pod. It was no prettier a sight than before, but at the very least it was more 'humane' as the humans would have called it. It spared Kazim the suffering, but Bovan knew that sooner or later he would have to get used to breathing the liquid and ridding himself of it in cleaner, safer ways. Porossian cubs could digest and absorb the fluid thanks to their biology, but other species were not built the same, especially those which relied on the need for gaseous respiration.

Bovan stood up, leaning heavily on his unspoilt arm as he shook the other free of the goo. He would dry naturally, he wasn't worried about himself, but with a light pant he watched the heaving human from above, waiting until Kazim was finished with the ghastly sounds of him retching. Only when he had spat out the last of slop, sucking in deep breaths, did the feline speak up once more, softening his tone as best he could,

“Are you okay?" There was quiet, filled only with Kazim's haggard wheezing, still gargling up some spit to hack across the floor. His head turned slowly up to Bovan, eyes positively glowering with bloody murder, rage etched across his face that cut up any sense of relief or gratitude. With a low, cold voice, he spoke quite plainly though his words dripped with venom,

“Do I fucking look okay?"

“You would have been fine." Bovan stiffened at his words. He always expected anger, most clients would have a moment, something similar to a tantrum really, but never were they just cold like that. It really resonated with something dark in the porossian. Something really didn't sit well about the human and it irked him to not understand why.

“Oh good," words were hot with sarcasm, his tone still equally acidic, “Nice of you to tell me whilst I choked to death."

“You paid for my services. These are my services. You don't like it, go fucking elsewhere." He really wasn't prepared to take undeserved flack off a client. Sure it wasn't ideal, but there was no danger to his life, Bovan knew what he was doing. Kazim had bought his protection and now he was throwing it back in his face.

“Then why the hell didn't you tell me!" He snapped, staggering to his feet and almost squaring up to the feline, “You could have said something!"

“You would have freaked out then as you have done before. Think of it as a trial by fire." Bovan rose up to his full height, casting a shadow over the human who seemed almost to quail beneath him, “You could have breathed, you know. It's breathable liquid. You weren't in any danger."

“Nice to know that now…" Kazim tried to slough off some of the gloop that clung to his body, strands slopping free of him and splattering on the floor. His modesty had returned somewhat, as he tried to keep his crotch as best covered from the feline's view, though in such close quarters it was near impossible.

“Well you know that now." Bovan stared him down, Kazim stared back. Those eyes really were haunting. Their standoff persisted, if only for a few seconds though it might well as have been an age, before the human broke first, glancing away. The porossian was clueless really what to say next, given that part of him now bristled with untoward frustration at being pushed around by a human who knew no better, but the best way to dispel the situation was to give Kazim the chance to move forward.

However neither of them spoke first. The dulcet tones of Perry's voice rang out overhead,

“Sir, I have retrieved the information you requested, how shall I proceed?" Bovan eye's flashed up to the ceiling, more out of habit from the days when the composite would only talk over the installed sound system he had in his quarters, rather than using the universal intercom wired throughout since the refurbishment.

“I'll speak to you privately in a minute, Perry." He looked down at Kazim, whose rage seemed to have died down to a sulk if anything, the energy behind it gone and dissipating rapidly, “Are we good?"

“Whatever…" Kazim pouted, huffing at the feline, “Just… Help get this shit off me."

Bovan thumped his paw against the inner wall of the pod, and pipes clanged into life and somewhere behind the panelling a machine whirred. It was an older model, but it got the job done. A shower of hot water began to rain from above, immediately soaking the human who stood inside, the slime peeling away as the torrent washed over him. Guttered strips along the pod's floor began to drain the mess, giving Kazim a chance to feel clean once more,

“Once you're done, just hit that panel," Bovan pointed just over the human's shoulder, “to dry off. I took the liberty of picking you up some new threads, I ain't letting a client go another day dressed in clothes that might as well scream runaway." Kazim's face softened, the gesture touching him in a way the feline hadn't anticipated,

“That's… awfully kind of you. Thank you." He was a little dumbstruck. There was sincere gratitude in his voice, actual genuine appreciation for his act. It made him feel weird, weird in a way he didn't know how to interpret,

“Sure…" he drawled, “I'll just, uh… add it to your bill…" Uneasy, he edged for the door, not able to meet the human's eyes as he retreated, “I'll leave your clothes outside for you."

Bovan couldn't have gotten out of there fast enough. With a near scurry to his step, he exited without another word to Kazim, letting the door glide shut behind him. He let out a heavy huff of air he hadn't realised he'd been holding, wiping a clean paw across his face and rubbing especially upon the eyes. What was he doing? The human was a client, nothing more. He couldn't allow himself to let something slip into the chasm between them. But there was an unknown amount of time between now and the moment when Kazim could finally leave in the sure knowledge he was safer than he had arrived. When would that be? The sooner he was gone, the better. But the longer he was around, the more Bovan could milk him for units. It was a catch twenty-two, if he was using the human phrase correctly.

He pushed the thoughts aside. They weren't prevalent right now, Kazim was washing up and could be done at any minute. Whilst he had a moment alone before he had to orientate the human to the way things ran in his household, he had better see what Perry had dug up on him. Walking through the quarters, he spoke aloud with just a whisper to his voice,

“Perry, you there?"

“Where else would I be?"

Fucking composites, too much awareness over themselves. Some turned insane, others tyrannical, and a few just turned precocious.

“Just… Tell me. Tell me what you know about Kazim Bashara." He began to pick up his clothes again, tidying his place as he went. Part of him considered dressing again for the human's benefit, but if they were to be living together in a warped sense as roommates, Kazm would just have to adjust to the porossian's way of living. Which meant absolute nudity from the cat as soon as he entered through the door.

“Kazim Bashara, personal accounts prior to his disappearance register him as a twenty-six year old male, originating from his home planet Earth, the state of Egypt, capitol city of Cairo. Height logged at five foot and six inches, weight logged at one hundred and thirty-two pounds, emergency medical information lists that Kazim is allergic to penicillin and cannot digest lactose. General appearance taken from his verified identification card indicates that Kazim has lighter skin than relatives, dark brown hair, green iris and scarring over his upper forehead. Education has either been scrubbed or left blank, religious affiliation has been noted as practicing Islam, and his occupation was last listed as-"

“Hold on," Bovan interrupted, brow furrowed as he paused mid-step, “What colour eyes did you just say he had?"

“Kazim Bashara has green irises."

Now that was impossible. If Bovan had noticed anything about the human then it was his unsettling eyes. They were cold blue, like zaph crystals, scintillatingly blue, a hue of the purest azure that just resonated into the soul. Bovan couldn't bear to look at them sometimes, feeling himself weak under their gaze like they had some kind of overwhelming effect on him. It had to be just his own foolish paranoia feverishly working under his logic, but now either the information Perry had phished for was wrong or, on a slightly more disconcerting note, he had had cosmetic work done. Which might mean the human was implanted with augments. Worse yet he might not even know he had been modified.

“Alright…" Bovan said steadily, calmly, trying to keep his anxiousness low and working through the situation as it unfolded, “that's all the trivial stuff, what do you know about Kazim's life, where he's been, who he's met, what he's been doing."

“Kazim's first logged appearance was on the manifesto of the human vessel 'The Ark' when it boarded with outpost epsilon-one-five in the Abel sector." Perry paused just to let the information sink in. The Ark's arrival had been the first mass appearance of human to have ever been witnessed before. Many had been aware of the species, but seldom had few met one. Bovan had heard the stories about when that ship had emerged from the nullified zone of the galaxy, where none had yet dared to fly, surprising everyone. Typically humans were abductees or victims of a transmat-relay gone wrong, never had any appeared in such huge numbers. Refugees they were, according to all the official logs, seeking asylum and a planet for their own to call home. Apparently they had refused to answer questions the League had for them, about where they'd come from and why, but under some archaic treaty they'd been allowed to slip by on their way unharmed, something about a new species who had yet to provoke or give cause to the League to conquer them, whatever the legal nonsense was. But Bovan had heard that the humans had been armed to the teeth, bristling with technology nobody had ever seen before – not that they were more advanced, just… different. Beyond all that however was one key issue that troubled the feline more.

All that had happened over three hundred years ago, long before Bovan had even been born.

“What are you saying?" he scoffed at the unseen entity that he spoke with, “That Kazim is several centuries old? He barely looks a day over twenty."

“That's why I dug some more. According to logs, not every human onboard left the outpost. Some remained behind, declared citizenship under the League, and so forth. But others were simply declared missing. Upon boarding the next outpost half a parsec away they registered slightly fewer passengers. Kazim Bashara was amongst those to be expunged from the manifesto. I'm sorry sir, but after that, there is no mention of Kazim Bashara for the next two hundred years."

“So he left the Ark at outpost e-fifteen and just… vanished? How the hell did he just slip off the radar then for over two hundred years? I mean, if he is even that old, and with the whole physical perfection, he must have sought after some pretty dark water surgical practices to stay looking young. But it doesn't really explain anything, what did he do in those years?" Frowning, Bovan's face grew dark, “Unless he's told me a false name. He might have read up on the Ark, picked out a name of somebody who disappeared and assumed their identity, somebody of similar ethnicity. But then why does he look so similar? Surely if you're trying to become some dead man from centuries ago, you put in the effort, you don't miss out silly details like the eyes, the hair, or the scarring."

“I really couldn't say, not without interrogating him or fusing with his mind," Perry quipped. Bovan could just about hear the smile in her voice, “However, within the last decade Kazim Bashara emerged: tuning into a delta-wave pirated intergalactic frequency and routing through the capitol's world-ring database revealed a personal log from a man employed at one of the League's highest facilities – one of the more secluded off-world estates belonging to the Emperor himself – which made mention of Kazim's name."

Bovan's curiosity, as mortified as it was to be confirmed of the human's involvement with the League and the actual Emperor, was piqued. Stifling the nervous swallow in his throat, he cleared his voice,

“Read me the log."

“Personal Log of Dramer Vantis: I was cleaning out the black room again, not that I liked it. Way too nasty in there, not my colour. But jobs need a-doing. Only his majesty had left one of… well, he'd left one of them in there. Now I knows it's my job to just clean, tidy, and mend anything, but I couldn't help but look at him. I mean, what sort of life is that? He looked so pitiful so I took the gag out of his mouth and gave him some of my water, just a touch mind, I's got to drink too and he's only the Emperor's 'consort'. Said his name was Kazim, thanked me for the kindness and then started to try and beg. So back in went the gag, and I just left. Got my ass served to me for slacking on cleaning, but it ain't natural what they do in there. It just ain't! Fuckin' hell… what do I do? I can't even look at him anymore without feeling guilty. I'll try and talk to him next month, let things simmer down. Yeah, next month. End of log."

Bovan felt his blood run cold. Kazim – if that even was his real name – was involved, on some level and in some way, with the Emperor? Had he belonged to some inner circle? Was he an aide or a liaison of some sort for the Emperor? The porossian wasn't that well versed with the politics beyond the Emperor's estate, having no idea what Dramer's comments about the 'black room' and gags was about, but there must have been some logic or reason to it. It must have been something similar to the prosecuting traditions of having the accused cleansed thoroughly and given special white garments so that may appear before the judge clean in body so testament can be given to the filth of the mind.

“Perry… why did Kazim have access to the Emperor's estate? Who is he?"

He knew the High Courts were corrupt and that the governing entities were so tightly pressed beneath the League's thumb that they never dared step out of line, but only so many were allowed into the sanctums of the Emperor's chambers and estates: the odd senator perhaps, an ambassador from a trading alien race, or maybe the chief of the League's armada. Secluded and exclusive, they were the most well protected parts of the League's empire that very few had even heard about, let alone seen. There were so many rumours and whispers surrounding it all that a good many had concluded that the estates were nothing more than rebellious superstitions fed by jealousy and bitterness towards a ruling empire. But Bovan knew better than that. They existed, and it seemed like Kazim was one of the fortunate rare few to have been within the territories to see for himself.

The question then that plagued Bovan's mind was why was 'Kazim' running?

“I'm sorry, I believe we have company."

A voice, quiet and cutting, spoke up behind the feline,

“How dare you…"

Bovan froze, fur bristling on the back of his neck, as he slowly turned around to find the human standing just a few feet away. Pulling on the last of his new clothes, Kazim stood, blue eyes glaring at him with murderous intentions broiling behind his pupils. If before he had merely been showing trivial anger towards the porossian for not being forthcoming on the act of vore, then this must have been Kazim's most feral, brutal rage Bovan had not yet seen. The human was just still. He wasn't energetic, there was no passion behind him, just a dark, empty void that seemed to leave the cat feeling hollow and timid just looking at him. He was a big man himself, and in comparison Kazim was tiny, weak, and almost pathetic. But he chilled the porossian with such unbridled vehemence that Bovan was genuinely shocked.

“How fucking dare you."

The best defence was a good offense. Or something to that effect; Bovan wasn't entirely certain what the best line of attack was, but he was being lied to. He could feel it, since the moment he'd laid eyes on the human. Something was wrong.

“Who are you?"

“I didn't pay to ask questions," Kazim spat, “I didn't pay you to snoop around. So much for fucking discretion!"

“I do not like my clients lying to me."

“Well tough shit! You don't get to decide whether or not you have a right to hear the truth! I'm paying for your fucking protection, not for you to dig up shit on me!"

“Considering I'm letting you get incredibly intimate with me, I think I've got the right to know just what the hell I'm getting in to," Bovan was already feeling the confidence rush back like the dam had been burst and his credence for being a ruthless mercenary forming, “You're not who you say you are, you're making fuckin' ridiculous demands, and you're flashing around a hell of a lot of cash for someone who's just looking to hide. Now what the hell have you got to do with the Emperor? Because I tell you this, if you've crossed the League in some way and they're out for blood, I am sure as hell not heading down that dark path again. The League leaves Pitch Dream well alone, and Dreamers don't provoke the beast that's breathing down our necks."

Kazim seemed not to flinch beneath the porossian's shadow, but there was fear in his eyes that couldn't be masked. He said nothing, mouth nearly working to form silent words that he judged to be wrong for the confrontation. Bovan could feel his hearth thundering in his chest, a flicker of shame and guilt riling in his gut, but he ignored it as best he could.

If he wanted answers, he wasn't going to get them by playing nice.

“You have no idea what is going on," Kazim said in a very quiet, dark tone, “And it's better if we both keep it that way."

“I'd beg to differ," he snarled in quick return, Bovan slamming a fist against a wall, almost crumpling beneath the force, “I swear, if you're playing me, I will rip your spine out through your throat and tear your guts out." Paling beneath him, the human's face drained of colour, but his expression remained steadfast,

“I believe you, but know this: whatever you do to me will be a mercy compared to what I've endured. So don't even think you can intimidate me." The human actually even stepped up to Bovan, defiant to his face and chin jutted out almost as an attack, “I've seen Shaytan in the eyes of monsters, but he is not in yours. I am not afraid of you."

“Then that's a terrible mistake on your part," Bovan coldly replied, “Because I've killed men for much less than just lying to me. So I want answers."

“Or else what? You'll kill me? Then you get nothing. And I'm dead, and those who are after me will have been triumphant. Neither you nor me gets what they want." Kazim folded his arms, sensing a hold on upper ground, “You don't get paid, and I die. Lose, lose. Answers or not, you have to protect me if you want payment."

“I don't have to do anything, I can refund the units and kick you the fuck out of my life. I don't like scams and I don't like jobs involving the League." With a jab of one paw, finger pointed to the door, Bovan growled, “Either you tell me what's going on or you can get out and find someone else to protect you."

“Fine!" The human bellowed into Bovan's face, spittle landing across his muzzle as finally the rage flashed across Kazim's mask. He let it slip for a second, the coldness revealing the fierce heat that bubbled beneath, but it was gone in the instant. It was quite unsettling to the see the human act this way; most clients Bovan had come across who had wound up trying to sell him out, to scam him, or some other ploy had always flourished with flaming anger that was always all just for show. It was a tactic they used to try and overplay their confidence, to show their hand and try to be 'the good guy' in the scenario, but Bovan had a will of steel and could see right through them. But as he watched the human storm out the door, gone from his life, he couldn't help but feel that maybe he was wrong, perhaps just this once.

But the facts just didn't add up. Humans don't live for two hundred years, not without some extensive, deeply invasive gene therapy and modification on some perverse level that nullified the laws of nature. If Kazim was indeed the same man who'd left the Ark all those years ago, why then would he undergo such treatment? Why avoid answering questions? Or better yet, how did this all connect to the Emperor? That was what upset Bovan the most. He had spent so much of his life separating himself from the League's power and influence, and Pitch Dream had become a sanctuary he knew he could never leave. Many Dreamers just avoided meddling with the League in any way, not unless there was a sure-fire way to get away with it. But most chose not to risk it, it would needlessly cause an uprising, potentially a war. For as much as those of the outpost liked to believe they were so much better and stronger than the League, they knew they would easily be wiped clean should they antagonise things. The only reason they were allowed to exist excluded from the rest of the galaxy was that it confined the worst crimes and criminals without the need for involvement. No responsibility, no backlash, no repercussions, all the things the League could want.

Kazim though promised to disrupt all that. He was a threat to the peace. Bovan was even beginning to consider whether he, for the benefit of the rest of the outpost, should have killed the human himself, spare him all this trouble. But deep down inside him there sat a heavy weight of guilt that burnt his core like acid. Why did he feel so bad over someone so inconsequential to his life? Why did he pity this male? Why did he…

He scowled to himself, shaking his head and thumping the wall again. It didn't matter. Let the human perish to the darkness of Pitch Dream. Someone else would slit his throat sooner or later. He was no longer the cat's problem.

Yet still Bovan felt awful for letting Kazim walk away.

“Perry, get me a fuckin' beer."

~ ~ ~

When, after endless hours of sitting in the dark just waiting, Bovan heard the soft ping of somebody at his door, he had already drank himself through three crates of cheap ale.

Sprawled naked across his worn couch, Bovan was left in a dazed mood with a sombre gloom shadowed across his face. Empty metal canisters littered the living space amongst the various other emptied packets of rehydrated candara grass and kelp solutions. There was a stench of sweat and musk to the air, the stewing aromas of a man clearly unwashed. It hung in the haze that seemed to swelter in the quarters, a lack of decent ventilation and the already stagnant atmosphere added to only by Bovan's presence. Idle paws rubbed over his gut, some longing for fullness churning within him, and another fondled his cock simply out of a need for physicality. On any other day this would have felt like the dream, as any other day and his routine wouldn't be any different. He would be doing exactly what he was now, ruminating in the dark and drinking himself to sleep. That was the ideal way he could spend his nights, little else pleased him other than perhaps the bed company seldom few offered him or the pay packet of a late night job that required his expertise. Tonight then should have been a decent night in with nothing else to do but enjoy his own body and relax. But he couldn't It was all the human's fault.

Bovan was alone, he knew that much and most of him was assured that he was fine with how things were, but something was still missing. Something was always missing, and he filled that however he could with whatever he could. He would always tell himself that he was fine with the status quo, that being on his own did not mean that he was incomplete, but in the darker moments of those nights he couldn't help but feel the pervading sense of loneliness that crept up. Pitch Dream was not a placed meant for those needing of friends or love. Those were sentiments that often got you killed for being chummy with the wrong people or leaving yourself vulnerable and open to weakness. Having someone close, someone you cared about, left a gaping opening in the guard you held against all the other vermin of the moon. The only way to ensure that one could look after oneself was by isolation. As for Bovan, he had simply followed suit and done much the same. There had been the odd individual, someone who'd caught his attention, but sooner or later he had found reasons or excuses to pull himself free and cut them away. Much to his own regret, of course; there were many nights he spent wondering just what might have happened if he'd persevered, both with good and bad outcomes. But that didn't stop the lonesomeness. That would always strike with a grim, cold vengeance and refused to ever let go until the void of sleep claimed him.

Why then did he feel more alone then tonight than he had ever felt before? Was it because of Kazim? Why? He barely even knew the human. The guy was a liability, a rogue element. Bovan had known him for all of a day and yet his heart ached for the human to return. He was normally so in control of himself and in check with his emotions. How had Kazim managed to make him feel like the worst person in the galaxy?

His actions had been grossly out of line, even he had to accept that. Kazim had, to be perfectly blunt with himself, requested the utmost discretion and professionalism money could buy. Bovan had broken the most sacred trust of bodyguard and client. It was not his place to question who was sending the shots or who was delivering the blows, it was merely his prerogative to stand in the way and serve as Kazim's shield and sword. But he had needed to know, and that was what bothered Bovan. Of all the jobs he'd taken, Kazim had been the one where his wandering curiosity coupled to a gut instanced had finally gotten the better of him. He needed to know what it was exactly the human was hiding. The century old human who didn't look a day past his twenties on the run after partaking in the Emperor's chambers with the man himself… it was certainly the type of person you wouldn't expect to find on Pitch Dream, let alone anywhere, and yet of all the bars in all of the moon, he'd strode into his. Was it a setup or was Kazim just as desperate as he claimed?

Another ping came from the front door, proceeded rather immediately by a serious a loud thumps to the heavy metal from the other side. Muffled shouts could be heard, but remained unintelligible. Bovan didn't care, they'd get bored eventually and leave. He didn't fancy any company tonight.

“If I might intrude on… whatever this is, but it seems you have a visitor outside your door," Perry announced, lifting the lights up to a more acceptable level.

“I don't give a shit, Perry," Bovan spat back, scratching through his pubic fur and grunting softly at the feeling of relief just under his gut, “Tell them to fuck off and turn the fucking lights off."

“I digress, I really do recommend you rouse yourself and see to them. They are in awful distress."

“Perry, for the love of a junalla's backside, I don't give a shit!"

“Shall I tell Kazim then he is no longer welcome and that he is to," the composite paused, though it was just speech patterned programming dictating how it spoke. Bovan should have known that for a composite as cheap as Perry that there were going to be drawbacks. Like the intelligence's sarcasm and all too innocent bluntness, “how did you phrase it? 'Fuck off'?"

Kazim… Kazim was back. Bovan could think of easily a dozen different reasons why, but they were all merely necessity. The human was back because he had nowhere else to go, because he'd already spent units hiring the porossian, because he couldn't risk exposing himself further to anyone else. There was no other choice but to return. It was of little comfort to Bovan, but he supposed it had drawn the man back. Sitting up where he lay strewn amongst his own debris of empty canisters and reconstituted food sachets, his eyes peered through the half-light for the door.

Should he answer it? He had made it quite clear that he didn't want the human around, not without getting the truth out of him, but the guilt still riddled him. Some small part of him, deep down, was beginning to feel pity for the man. There was something unequivocally not right about him, something traumatic and wrong, but Bovan, in the deepest recess of his heart, believed that perhaps it wasn't the humans fault. They might even be able to salvage their deal, reinstate the hire and carry on – business as usual. Bovan did miss the feeling of having someone inside him again. His paw stroked over the curve of his vacuous gut, the hollowness resonating inside him the more he lingered on the thought. He wanted Kazim back. He wanted the male's perfectly caramel skin and the feel of his smooth, pristine body pressed close to his own… fuck, it was like being in heat! Bovan was better than this!

He would let Kazim in. At the very least, he could get paid. A job was a job, and Bovan did need the money, as much as he would have been prideful and declared that he didn't.

“Perry, open the door."

“Very good, sir."

With a dulled hiss, the entryway opened up. Light spilled in from the corridors outside and Bovan blinked blearily as he adjusted. A silhouette stepped in, rather reluctantly, edging closer until the feline could make out the formed features of the human's face.

“Fucking hell, are you always like or is this some special occasion?" Kazim recoiled as he saw the sight of the fattened male strewn amidst his rubbish, “It smells worse than Truvialite mud in here…"

Bovan got to his footpaws, rising with a precarious stagger as his weight tilted and tipped. Canisters clunked against one another as he brushed them away, sweeping them with a careless brush of his footpaw. Brushing down his torso, he realised he was still very much naked, though he knew he shouldn't be embarrassed before the human, yet somehow a small part of him urged him to get some clothes on. Why he was considering Kazim's personal comfort now, above all else, baffled him, but the human was here.

“Why are you back?" he asked, voice more deadpan than anything else. He wanted to recall his anger from before, to relight the fire that had made him drive the human out, but the inferno had since abated to a sputter, to embers, and then to ashes. But he couldn't muster sympathy. He knew something was wrong. It stuck in his mind and refused to go away, so for the meantime he stole himself for the cold shoulder.

“You were right."

“About?"

“Nowhere else would take me…" Kazim folded his arms across his chest and refused to look Bovan in the eyes. Instead he chose to scrutinise the lapse in the porossian's living standards, warily standing just beyond the threshold as the door slid shut behind him, “Either they outright refused my terms or they creeped me out… Plenty sussed I had a bounty on my head, I reckon many of them considered turning me over for the easy option."

It didn't strike Bovan as odd. Nobody wanted to go against the League, and it really hadn't taken much to unearth all the details on Kazim, enough to know that he was going to be a highly valuable prize to someone. Though it had been of no interest to the big cat to undercut his client – much to his own personal code of ethics as it was to uphold his reputation as a credible and trustworthy mercenary – it would have been the first thought to even occur to some thugs out there. As gullible as the human seemed, he was smart to have turned them down and hightailed out of there before they'd already snagged him. But that made him even more of a target now. Blood had been tasted, hunters were aware of their prey dwindling in the dark, and soon they would come skulking for his carcass. Bovan was, by no means an admission of his ego, his only hope of seeking absolute protection, both from the League as well as those who wandered Pitch Dream.

Why that fact made Bovan so happy bothered him when it should have made him anxious was a mystery to the feline.

“Go figure." The feline lumbered to his footpaws, thumping through his own apartment to the kitchen, all too angrily swiping at the fridge door and snatching himself another beer. A single claw snapped the cap off its neck, fresh froth spilling from the crystal which he pressed to his lips and slurped greedily.

“How many of those have you had?" Kazim asked, curiously looking at the bottle with roguish glances.

“Not enough." The human winced, immediately Bovan felt guilty for snipping. He was drunk, or at the very least close to getting there. Was that why he was feeling so fuzzy with the human back in his company, “Do you want one?"

Kazim eyed the disturbingly thick, almost syrup like booze that smeared Bovan's lips a dark green. He knew that humans were a terribly squeamish breed when it came to intergalactic cuisine, but the feline was offered a gruff shrug as he accepted, fetching yet another bottle from his refrigerator cell. He made a mental note to stock up, he was running low again, no thanks to his little binge, no doubt. Watching as Kazim opened and glugged with starved thirst at the marsh slime, Bovan realised that the human was far less naïve than he had judged him to be. Whilst he might have been fresh to Pitch Dream, he was no stranger to life among the stars. It only sought to plague his apprehensions further.

With his 'guest' attended to, Bovan returned to the main living quarters, throwing himself right back down amidst his nest, tail flicking behind him in a daring display of vitriol. Though he had reason to be angry at the human for acting shady in their dealings, the cat found his bitterness to be rapidly diminished. Time had whiled away the edge to the blade of his rage and left it dull. He would argue he might now simply be apathetic, but that denied the warmth that had surged in his chest at hearing Kazim's voice again and seeing him stood before him. Something was wrong, not with the human now but with Bovan. He couldn't allow this.

“Well?" He snorted, taking a swig of his ale, “What do you want from me then?"

“You haven't yet refunded my units."

“You want them back?"

“No…" Kazim still couldn't meet his gaze, blue looking anywhere else but at the lounging fat cat, bearing all except decency, “I assume our deal is still in place?" Bovan laughed, an ugly sound that was brief and cutting,

“Fuck no. Your refund'll come. Just wait."

“I'll double my offer!"

“Piss off, I ain't getting in bed with a crook."

“Then what do you want?" There was just a twinge of desperation and defeat in the human's voice. Enough for him to seem pitiful, enough for Bovan to take notice. As much as he knew a reputation preceded him as a discerning, irrefutable grunt in his field of muscle for hire, the cat had some soft spots, ones he kept so closely guarded he forgot they were there at all. But the human was pricking upon each one of them in ways the feline didn't like. He didn't feel comfortable getting so emotionally involved, but there was still something out of place that had him second guessing himself.

“You tell me," he said, measured syllables in every word, paw clutching his bottle jutting out an accusing digit, “You tell me what the hell kind of backstory you've got as to why the League wants you and what your ties are with the Emperor. Everything. You lie, and I genuinely mean it, I will kill you myself and hand over your cold, dead corpse to them in person."

Kazim shifted uncomfortably, but it was clear in his eyes he was considering it. All his options, there and then, were so marginally slim it would mean either being caught by some other bounty hunter and returned to the League, death, or the possibility of continued survival. Nervous though he might have been, Kazim had struck Bovan as the sort of man who would want very much to stay alive, no matter what the cost. Why he was that way however remained a mystery, unless the human decided to indulge the porossian with his sob story. Gravely he took several swallows of his beer, very nearly finishing the bottle with a gruesome belch, before clearing his lips of errant juices with the back of one hand. He seemed no less at ease, but he took a long, quivering breath,

“I was one of the Emperor's slaves." Bovan felt his heart drop. But he had to be sure,

“He has plenty of slaves, which one were you?"

“One of the private ones. One of the ones he uses and whores around for his and others' enjoyment. One of his harem's number." Kazim bit his lips, weighing his words carefully as he tried to keep himself composed, “I was a particular favourite of his. On his estate in the Gullrich system, I was kept alongside others he'd amassed over the years and subjected to his whims and fancies. I escaped, now I'm here."

Bovan had so many questions. His mind was reeling at the thought of them all, of the answers he might receive, and his guts turned sickly. As infamous and secretive as Pitch Dream was, the Emperor's harems were all-but-confirmed rumours. Many knew such places existed, plenty of evidence and suspicions could point anybody in the direction of where to look, but so few dared to rise to the challenge of proving they were real and what went on inside them. More often than not they were closely guarded private facilities privy only to a chosen few, seemingly all those in the High Court who were chummy with the Emperor himself, though Bovan was aware ambassadorial diplomats and visiting officials were often invited there as a means of bribery. What went on behind those closed proverbial doors though, that was always up for the imagination. Never had there been a confirmed account, nor did Bovan ever think there would be. Escapees were above all else killed unless otherwise captured, which made Kazim remarkable in that if what he was saying was true he would be the first in an eternity to have survived to tell the tale. Though nothing was ever corroborated, there were always whispers in seedy dens and backwater bars across the galaxy of the kind of things slaves were forced to endure. Such unspeakable, horrible things that made even the most grizzled thug's blood run cold.

“I… I'm gonna need more than that," Bovan didn't want to hear, but he had to. He owed it to the human to at least bear witness to his trauma, if only as a mark of what his species would term 'humanity', the moral virtue of kindness from one to another. “How? What? Why?"

Kazim took another sigh and finished his drink,

“As you already know, I was originally a passenger aboard 'The Ark', a refuge ship that left Earth after we were thrown off the planet. We had only been living in America for just over three years when the uprising happened and the war broke out. In the end, I didn't have a choice in the matter, I was taken with my family when I was just a teenager and we are all packed into the Ark. When we arrived in the Abel sector and boarded the outpost, I was nearly twenty, and the alien world I stepped out on was like paradise. I had been cooped up on a ship for years, struggling by on rations and in cramped conditions, fearing the next day might very well be the last – hell, even the next hour. So as soon as I got the chance, I left. I signed right up for citizenship under the League, didn't care how I was gonna survive, I just knew I wanted off that fucking ship." Kazim spat the words, if only to himself, as Bovan listened dolefully, more enamoured with his story than with anything else, “But I had to find a way to earn a living… It was hard grafting, but I eventually caved; humans are an exotic delicacy to some… I faced reality and basically whored myself out, I let things use me, as much as I hated it, but it paid well. I got by for a few weeks but pimps at the port got suspicious. They figured pretty quickly that I didn't have anyone owning me, so they fought over me like feral strays over meat, until one won. I didn't get a say in it, she just claimed me by jabbing me with some kind of chip that controlled the pain receptors in my body, that if I didn't do what she wanted and said, I was subjected to untold agony. Enough pain that I actually wanted to kill myself, a feeling so indescribably primal that it was just this searing white… So I did what she said, became her prized bitch, loaned out at will. What I earned became how generous she felt and what mood she was in, and my life became hell. I didn't think it could get any worse, but boy was I wrong…"

“One day I found myself in one of the backrooms she owned at her tavern with this weird looking guy. I'd never seen his kind before so I wasn't quite sure how to proceed, but Mistress had told me that I was to let him do whatever the hell he wanted and if I did a good job my cut would be incredibly handsome. She had seemed so earnest and genuinely afraid, so when I saw that thing come into my room… I felt scared. It was hideous and I had no idea what to do, so I stood there at ease, ready to serve and waiting for it to tell me what it wanted. I…" Kazim choked, snorting back some retch that had risen in his throat, “It was grotesque. It hurt me and it used me in ways I didn't even think were possible. I felt it slide something down my throat, all the way into my stomach, actually moving around as he… I guess as he fucked my mouth? And I don't know what the fuck he did, but he actually pierced my skin and slid into my flesh, cutting these deep holes into me that just burnt… only when he pulled out I was healed, albeit with puckered scars in my flesh. I don't know how long he had me, but it went on for what felt like days, until I was sure I was just dead and this was my torture. When he finally left, I was ragged, bleeding, broken and exhausted. I thought that would have been the end of it, that I could just return to the new normal beneath my Mistress and relish the fact I would never have to deal with that thing again, but only after did I realise I had just become intimately acquainted with the Emperor himself…"

“I'll cut it short: he bought me. It turns out the Emperor has a thing for humans, more so than you might realise. They were a rarity of course, I figured that out fairly quickly as soon as I turned up on outpost epsilon-one-five, so I think he was rather smitten with me. He had a fetish for my fleshliness, for my skin and the way I looked, how demure I was. So I was sold off into his service and shipped off. Like cattle, like a slave, which I guess is obvious…" The human fidgeted with his hands, no longer even able to look Bovan in the eyes, “During the transport, whilst in storage, I was… modified. As you know, The Ark arrived in the Abel sector nearly two centuries ago, so you won't believe me when I tell you that I was on-board. I should be dead. But don't mistake me, I am. Inside, at least, but have you ever heard of a process called 'Lazarian Refinement'?" Bovan had. It was an extremely illegal and gruesome medical treatment initially theorised and practiced by some of the League's highest physicians in the desperate pursuit of prolonging life. It was exquisitely painful, from what Bovan had heard in his bar from those who'd dared undergo the procedure. From what he could gather, the process smelted down all the cells in a person's body, like a cross-section being sliced apart and reassembled simultaneously. It repaired and rejuvenated decayed genetic material, replenished each nucleus of every cell until it was impossible to tell what part of the original was and what was brand new. It had been derived from the technical formulation of teleportation, the theory developed when teleporting still compromised of obliterating a person in one place and creating them in another and transferring the mental conscience across. However cellular structure could only be copied, never improved, until of course scientists began to dabble on the quantum level. Bovan had seen the procedure only once in his lifetime when hired as security for an elderly – now young – drug tycoon who had paid to undergo treatment. In a dingy laboratory elsewhere on the moon, a bunker long since forgotten, Bovan watched a man turned demon birth itself for long, slow agonising seconds until an imposter walked free wearing the old man's skin. It still haunted him to this day. He nodded at the human; indeed he had heard of the 'refinement'. “Well that explains my age… I'm two hundred years old and have been kept at the age of twenty-three for his desire. Everything else was likewise modified as and when he wanted it. My irises were transplanted for another slave's, some poor boy whose name I never got. He resented me for the months he survived, blind thanks to the operation, but I had no control over it… My skin was made perfectly smooth, all my pores dusted away by microfiling, which is gonna cause all sorts of problems later down the line for me… He edited by pleasure receptors to be dulled, he permanently tightened the muscles in my anus for that 'forever virgin' feel, he replaced my teeth with harmless cargonite substitutes, I was granted an accelerated healing factor, my dietary requirements reduced to the barest of essentials so that I produce next to no waste, I even had the Emperor's personal seal imprinted on my head so I can't even go in public without being recognised… He took everything from me and shaped me into his personal sex toy, a thing to be used and abused however he pleased. The things I've seen, the things I've endured, you can't even begin to fathom." Visibly the human shuddered, the sensation seeming so intense to Kazim that he recoiled at his own thoughts with his breathing rapidly inclining until Bovan thought he might just about have a panic attack, “Forget whatever you think your worst nightmare is, it won't even come close to a fraction of the horrors I endured in those chambers… The black room was the worst. That was where slaves went to die. To die and be brought back only to die all over again. Once you stepped inside the black room, that person who went in is gone. The thing that comes out is dead and hollow. They're a walking corpse with nothing to lose. So believe me, when you threaten me with death, when I tell you that I couldn't care less, know that I am telling you the absolute truth."

Bovan was bluntly stunned. Every word said had been sincere and harrowing to hear. Kazim was telling the truth, and he was telling it as raw as he could. Clearly he was withholding details, things probably even he didn't want to relive even in memory, and yet what he had told Bovan had him chilled to his core. The regeneration, the snuff, the torture, and the indecency of it all… it was enough to make even a hardened man like himself feel sick. He sat there almost unsure as to what to do, but he had to proceed, he needed to know everything, including up until the most recent developments of Kazim's escape,

“How did you get out?"

“One of the cleaning staff, he was on duty in the black room at the same time I was given the reprieve of a few minutes rest whilst he mopped up my blood and cum from the chamber floor and wiped down the tools for the next session. Normally they ignore you, they blot you out and do their job as if you don't even exist to them and that really they're just working in some abattoir cleaning up after matured meat. But this guy, he caught my eye, he couldn't entirely drown out my sobs and screams for his attention, and that's all it takes. Just a look and he caved. No cameras or anything in the black room, kinda like your office, nobody gets in or out without permission, nothing can be carried beyond the doorway, so I could only ever speak to him when he and I were there together, which was rare… So in order to heighten my chances of seeing him again, I pushed to be placed in the black room more often… The Emperor made me his personal 'consort' because he thought I was getting into all the torture, so I had to make it look believable, that I loved him and the way he hurt me. Over the course of two years, I managed to wear the janitor down into helping me escape. His name was Dramer. We got me a spare set of clothes to sneak me out in, he helped cause a distraction, and I stole with me some of the Emperor's private wealth to ensure I wouldn't have to resort to reducing myself to the level of a prostitute or worse ever again." Kazim breathed a deep sigh, “Now I'm running because naturally they want me dead or alive, preferably the former. Whilst it wouldn't really do much to damage the Emperor's or the League's reputation if word got out about his harems, I was impossibly close and intimate with him and many other high ranking officials. Overheard conversations, whispers not meant for my ears, discussions about matters inside the black room that should never leave it… They want me dead because I know too much, I could destroy the whole empire in a few choice transmissions if I so dreamed it." Finally, after what seemed like a painful age, Kazim could look Bovan in the eyes again, though behind that stolen gaze was dark, broiling emptiness, the likes of which Bovan had seldom seen except in the men who had lived their worst nightmares in the flesh. It chilled him to see it in the eyes of someone so physically young, yet knowing they were as ancient as him if not older, “I came to Pitch Dream for asylum. There is nowhere else in the galaxy for me anymore except here. Not for a long while, possibly indefinitely… They may give up the search eventually but I can't ever know. I struggle to even sleep at night since obtaining my freedom because I'm convinced they will come for m and drag me kicking and screaming back to that infernal place… death would be too much of a mercy for them to grant me the privilege."

“That…" Bovan started, his voice failing him as he tried to contemplate what to say, “That is a lot to process…"

“I don't wish to destroy the empire, I don't care what happens to them. I just want to live my life in peace… It's all I've ever wanted ever since I stepped off that stupid refugee ship." The wrong blue eyes steeled themselves, set with both determination and resolve, “I don't want your pity, I don't need your companionship. I will pay you for your services and in kind you will treat me as ever your client. Are we in accord?"

Bovan dumbly nodded. It was a rare occurrence for him to be genuinely stunned and at a loss for words. But every word seemed to ring true to him, it was far too grand a tale for one human to have made up, and if indeed it did transpire to be a scam, it wouldn't be the first time someone had attempted to take him for a ride. If it came to that, he would just kill Kazim anyway, if not, then he was sure he had a near-permanent client for the rest of his days, provided the human stuck around and continued to supply the units.

“Good. Now I need another fucking drink," As if treating the quarters as his own personal space, the human straightened himself up and wiped his face, moving for the kitchen without so much as asking for the porossian's permission. From where he sat upon the dilapidated couch, Bovan called out to the human,

“I'll add it to your bill…"

Kazim didn't respond, but all he acknowledged was Bovan's bit, huffing back some derisive laugh that he immediately drowned with yet another bottle of ale. The feline watched impressed as the human didn't even have to swallow as he finished the beer without so much as a single breath and a satisfyingly quivered burp of stale air afterwards. Catching the cat's fascinated yet shocked stare, the human could only offer a shrug of his shoulders,

“No gag reflex, they desensitised the nerves, and my airways and breathing have been rerouted and enhanced." The human strode back across the room, picking where he placed his feet between the strewn garbage, until he threw himself down beside Bovan, “The Emperor wanted to see one day how much of his… let's say 'excrement' he could force into me… So out come the physicians and, Bob's your uncle."

“Who is Bob?" Bovan asked with a curious face. Why would the man reference satellite family members? Was that a human thing? Kazim, though as much as he tried to shoot the feline a withering, almost doggedly frustrated look, couldn't help but break out into a chuckle. A soft sigh followed by laughter that built from just a smirk into the human smearing his greasy palm across his face as he wiped away loose tears. Bovan failed to see what was so funny, but the human seemed to be sincerely amused,

“Sometimes I forget I'm surrounded by aliens." He chucked his bottle to add to the already vast pile of Bovan's own conquests, “It's nothing, just a phrase." It was probably best to leave it be. Humans were a species, he had found, to be incredibly fickle when it came to their language and customs. Never had he known a race to be so wrapped up within the complexities of language, substituting one phrase for another and replacing the meaning of words in lieu of something entirely different. Bovan picked up what he could, using it whenever he could to earn him a little extra tip, but even then his grasp of it all was loose as best. They were notoriously difficult creatures when it came to dealing with them. As much as Bovan understood that many of the men and women or anything in between he had business with were always criminals or something similar, he knew they were all predictable beings at the end of the day. Even if they were backstabbers or devious, he could pin the honest from the liars with startlingly accurate results. But humans, for their scarcity, had always remained an elusive species. They guarded themselves all too well, something they had dubbed a 'poker face' – a customary game amongst their kind for gambling, similar to arlon-r'agh, he supposed. But Kazim, he was somewhat different. Sure Bovan had trouble getting a clear reading on him, but the more he spoke and associated with the human, the more familiar he became. The more familiar he was, the greater his feelings grew. He smothered them as best he could, but glancing across in the baking light of his quarters, he found himself drawn to reflect upon the features of the male's face. Skin so soft he wanted to brush his paw against it, lips looking so succulent he wanted to bite into the tender flesh ever so gingerly to taunt the boy, and those stolen eyes of his just captivating. So too had he seen beneath the clothing, the well-stroked canvas of his body covered in tattoos that Bovan wanted to explore along every inch into every crevice, hairless and supple being so foreign to him that it was almost a treat to have had – and hopefully to have again – the human inside him. He wanted more, and it scared him. “You don't seem horrified?"

“I'm sorry?" Kazim had spoken, Bovan breaking free from spacing out in his own thoughts. He was on the receiving end of the human's discerning expression,

“Most people I even hint at what's happened to me and they don't want to know. It's too much to even contemplate the stuff I've seen, but you…" Kazim worked to find the words, “You just accepted it."

“I'm still disgusted with what you've endured… But you learn to adapt, adjust… When you become a Dreamer, all sense of right and wrong, natural and unnatural, it no longer matters. Bad shit happens and you deal with it." Bovan rolled his shoulders though, a grimace coming to his face as his mind flashed with the potential images of what Kazim might have suffered, the kind of things that had been done to him. Even the human's body was no longer his own, sustained far beyond its years and modified to another's purpose. It wasn't uncommon for slave owners to go and buy some Blanks from black markets not unlike Pitch Dream, slaves grown and engineered to be almost mindless, ideal creatures with next to no willpower or independent thought save for that which their creator's bestowed upon them. But Kazim was a Refurb, a genuine, free-thinking and acting person who was captured and broken down for somebody else's designs. If Blanks were revolting to Bovan, Refurbs were even worse…

“You must think I'm a monster."

It was if Kazim was reading his thoughts, cold blue eyes watching the porossian's twisting face as he went through all the nightmarish scenes of what the human has sustained under the Emperor's service, all the invisible scars that could never be seen but almost certainly felt. But as Bovan stared back at the man, he could feel his heart changing. Kazim was just a victim, an unwilling subject who'd been dragged down a path he'd never chosen, forced to abandon his home planet, trek across the void of space, until thrown into a hellhole that had been his life as a prostitute turned slave. The amount of men he must have pleasured, the many more who must have tortured him, and the thousands after that who all turned a blind eye to him beyond that had turned him into a husk of a person by now. Much like Bovan, his past had shadowed him to the point where he was as dripping in blackness as the rest of Pitch Dream. Just like the feline, Kazim was only trying to get away and find sanctuary from it all.

Something was sparking in the feline now. Something that had pricked and reared its ugly head long before, but it was beginning to corrupt and take hold. Bovan knew well enough what the feeling was, and he loathed it as he felt it tighten around his chest. Nursing was kicking in. But unlike before, unlike the simulated process or tricking his body into its natural impulses, this was all by instinct. By authentic, sincere emotion, he was entering his species' mating rituals. As crude as it was to describe it as such, Bovan couldn't help but look back at the human who looked so broken and alone in the galaxy, thrown into the porossian's care, and feel his heart reach out to help him. The cat wanted to keep the human safe as he could have done for any cub he might have had, but he also wanted to claim the male as his own. Pheromones were slowly seeding the room, gradually drifting through the air until one out of the two of them would react, realising something was happening. Bovan didn't have a lot of time, but there was no fighting his urges. He must either speak candidly or he would have to remove himself from the situation.

In no way could he do the latter, not anymore. Not after how it left him.

“I think you're beautiful."

“What?" Kazim seemed to almost come about with a start. He recoiled, but didn't move from the feline's side. His expression changed though, from pitiful whimpering to almost disgusted shock.

“I think you're beautiful," Bovan repeated, his voice low and soft as if tending to a startled creature about to bolt, “You're scarred and broken in so many ways. I'm sorry for having not trusted you, but I understand you now on a level I hadn't before. We're so alike, Kazim, you and I. We're both very tired of living and we just want peace. I can give you that. I can give you peace."

“I'm not gay." There was venom in Kazim's tone. Acidic, insidious venom that didn't just ooze from every word, it exploded from them. Each syllable was coated in it, the human doing his absolute best to extinguish the moment, but his eyes betrayed him. The eyes that weren't his own didn't obey him and they showed fear and need. He had run such a long way, his whole world betrayed and tormented that he, like anyone, had come to Pitch Dream as his last hope.

“I think you're confused."

“I'm not a fucking fag!" His teeth were clenched. Kazim was tensing up. But Bovan wasn't expecting a fight. If anything, the human's resolve was bleeding away as the feline kept pressing,

“Then why did you serve male clients? Why become an escort? I've been to every outpost in the galaxy, there's always some kind of work that needs doing and there's always someone willing to pay for it. You didn't have to have sex with anyone, but you did." He reached out and stroked through the human's straggles of hair, Kazim jerking his head away in bitterness, but Bovan refused to stop. He wa bigger, stronger, and in control. As with any animal scared and panicked, one must always keep a steady paw, “Now that's not wrong. You did what you had to do and you did what you were good at. Just because you had to whore yourself out, there's no shame in that. Clearly you were very good at it, to have roused even the interests of the Emperor." Kazim winced, a sore point, one Bovan quickly moved away from, “But that doesn't matter. People love who they love, they fuck who they fuck; what difference does it make how they do it and why?"

“I'm not gay…" Even if the words lacked their bite, something behind them still growled with derision. Humans were so peculiar when it came to mating, so fussy in their idea of love. Bodies were just vessels of flesh in which to negotiate the world, and who you shared that with was as equally inconsequential as you. A physical state of their being ought not to get in the way of the spiritual. Then again, Bovan hadn't really bought into the whole religiosity his people had ascribed to sex. There was always procreation and recreation for them, one sacred the other trivial. Whilst he separated the two, his nursing had always imbued a sense of want in him that could seldom be satiated by just any ordinary thing. It had to be deeper, it had to mean something. Kazim, to him, now meant something.

“Okay, so you're not gay. But so what?" Bovan's paw cupped the human's cheek gingerly, as if he were made of glass, and he could feel his heart thumping in his chest. He was crossing a line here, he knew that much, but he couldn't stop himself. His own musk was addling his mind and he wanted this so badly, for it to just be real for once, “You can't fight a feeling. You came here to Pitch Dream for safety… So let me make you feel safe."

Only acting now, he leant forward. Suddenly and feverishly, he reached out and pulled the human towards him, drawing their heads together and pushing his mouth to the smaller male's own. Human flesh felt strange to him, but it was a peculiar pleasure, so soft and ripe like so few things in the universe. Kazim fought him at first, a flash of some protest, but it dissipated as the porossian's warm tongue slid into his mouth, pushing between the lips so tenderly that it must have taken him by surprise. Bovan cusped that head and kept them steady, kissing the human into submission, his long tongue gliding deeper into that warm mouth until he filled it almost entirely. Another tongue writhed against his, but it was weaker, smaller, just how he liked them as he suckled upon the sweetest taste of the male upon his buds. His sabre-fangs did little to help, but the clumsiness seemed only to melt away as Kazim eased himself into the moment. His eyes fluttered shut, his body relaxed, and he was soon lost to the feline's dominance.

As quick as he had come, he relinquished his hold on Kazim, prepared to pull himself back and face whatever consequences might happen. But the human lingered, the two of them still kissing even without Bovan pushing himself onto the boy, all for just a moment, until he almost realised he was free. He withdrew, just an inch or two, his breathing rapid and Bovan staring deep into his confused blue eyes,

“I…" he began, “You. That was… how dare you."

Bovan shrugged, his heavy shoulders dragging themselves as if sluggish. His body was becoming a traitor to him, just like Kazim's eyes stole the truth from his half-spoken words. The smell was in the air, but it lingered unnoticed by all but Bovan, who drew each breath in the knowledge that the further along he went, the more he could not turn back,

“You want this."

“How do you know what I want?"

“Because you came back."

“Because there was no one else."

“Exactly," Bovan said, with almost a saddened smile, “No one else."

Kazim stiffened, almost imperceptibly, as it maybe dawned on him that this was where the end of the road was. Bovan was now the only man in the galaxy who could defend him, the only man who hadn't considered on the instant of learning who he was, of handing him over to the authorities. Sure, he was getting paid out of this arrangement, but he would have been happy with even just the smallest fraction of what Kazim was offering. It would have been more than enough. More could have been gained from claiming the bounty upon his head, less trouble to be had in the long run, yet still Bovan sat opposite him as if the thought hadn't even crossed his mind. For naturally it hadn't. Bovan was, even if so declared to himself, still a decent person beneath his blackness, just as he believed Kazim was.

“So you want to fuck me?" He scoffed, some acid returning to his voice, “Is that it? You just wanna fuck me because you found out I'm some slut?"

“No. I want you to want me. I'll let you make whatever move you want." Bovan rose up, lumbering to his footpaws, his cock dangling free between his legs. Though he had been soft before, he was undeniably hardening now. Only nursing at half his proper length, it was too obvious to try and hide. But Bovan didn't want to hide. He was tired of trying to keep a mask up for the human to fail to read. Instead he returned a warm smile, the warmest he could muster, as he sauntered away to his bedroom. There was no part of him that wanted to force this between him and the boy, he wanted Kazim to come to terms with himself and the person he had now become, but that was on his own volition. Bovan couldn't make that happen, nobody could. But he so badly wanted to try, to make the human follow him into the bedroom, to prove there was something between them. It was all out of his control at that point, however. He left Kazim without a single glance back, tail flicking nervously as if he were a cub again, confessing some crush to some other girl or boy who had taken his fancy.

He left the main living quarters and resigned to his bedroom. Arguably in worse state than the rest of his accommodation, the room was too sparsely furnished for it to feel unclean. A bed occupied the centre of the room, bedside units accompanying ether side, with plain white sheets and little else. A closet ran along one side of the wall, half the doors open to the lockers, with various clothes spilling out and breaching the floor, but it was all irrelevant to the feline. He had no reason to keep tidy, even with Kazim in the other room, he didn't want to pretend he was some other man to him. He was ugly, he was fat, he was getting into his older years, he was no different to any other criminal or conman in all of Pitch Dream, all he had to his name was reputation and a smudge of common decency. He hoped Kazim could at least see that.

Climbing atop his bed, Bovan turned around as if settling, awaiting a visitor. His eyes preyed upon the doorway whilst he reclined against the pillows, back to the headboard, his gut protruding before him. He always felt too large in this bed, but he had never been bothered enough to replace it. Typically he had always slept in his own filth after drunken nights, but he wanted to make an exception for the human. But still the doorway remained shut, no sound of anyone moving beyond it either, and Bovan felt his heart sink. Pheromones and promises of sanctuary and love could only go so far, he realised. They had only met in a day, after all, but part of him wished the human would come. Seldom would he feel so strongly about someone, and rarer still would his body react by presence alone to another person, triggering his nursing instincts. Kazim had to mean something, even if it was something as shallow as a physical connection, Bovan just had to hope he could get something and not feel so achingly hollow inside.

Long minutes passed without any action. For a moment, one elongated, sadly bitter moment Bovan felt his heart just drop right through his gut. He felt a void inside him just churn and broil inside him as he forced himself to the conclusion that maybe he had pushed too far with Kazim, that he had misread some sign or feeling and was just pushing his desperate loneliness. The room felt so deathly silent were it not for his slow, heavy breathing, his chest feeling like lead upon his lungs as he struggled to find the energy.

But the door opened, a soft hiss as it breached the way into the living quarters with the silhouette of the human standing there, imposing in the light with nothing but shadow casted over Bovan's reclining form. Drawn out seconds went by as neither of them said anything, the porossian's heartbeat stalled in that singular moment, caught between wanting to be elated but also mortified he was faced with whatever stark reality would tumble from the male's tendered lips. He couldn't make out the human's face, Kazim unreadable as he simply stood there in the dark. Part of him felt almost compelled to say something, to break the ice or ease the tension, but he couldn't bring himself to. His voice was stunned into cowering, his authority lapsing for just a moment; he had to let Kazim decide for himself though what he wanted.

However the human broke the interminable silence, almost too quiet for Bovan to hear, whispered as if afraid of the very words he uttered,

“I'm not gay."

Bovan smirked in a half-breath, his cock swelling as the human admitted some dark truth to his own being, contrary to the words he pushed from that sweet mouth.

“If it helps, neither am I."

He picked himself up from the bed and stood upon his knees, a well-worn mattress depressed as his weight sunk down, reaching out with one paw for the human's hold. It was a single offer, a paw outstretched for the human to make that last sign of consent, to defeat whatever demon still plagued that fevered brain of his and took the plunge. Again hesitance still tinged the male's face cast beneath a still glooming shadow, but it was flickering away like the dying echo of a bulb, burning out as it was consumed by something so overwhelming and powerful it couldn't be fought.

Fingers returned the reach, a hand clutched a paw, and Kazim allowed himself to be pulled onto the bed and into Bovan's embrace.

The feline made it as easy as he could for the human, one arm sliding around that supple waist whilst the other placed a paw against the male's chest and softly rubbed the clothes that constrained the flesh beneath. Their lips met again, only this time Kazim seemed more prepared, for at least he returned the touch, his tongue pushing to meet Bovan's as they slid into each other's mouths. He could feel the very dainty laps and mewling whimpers that went by near silently as the human allowed himself to let go, to abandon whatever had been holding him back and to just give in. Bovan felt himself getting bold however, feeling he was gaining rapid ground against the human much to his secret delight, and fingers sought for the zips that held the male's clothes to his body. Without a care for subtlety or seduction, he yanked the fly down and unravelled the overalls which clung to Kazim, letting the ragged fabric fall away to expose the caramel skin beneath. It was awkward positioning, the human bending his arms back to shuck off his sleeves, the overalls eventually catching at his waist where his lower half remained dressed, but his torso was all Bovan needed for now.

Breaking away from the kiss, his muzzle dropped lower against the human's nape. Kazim sighed an almost restrained whine, his head tilting back as he felt ivory teeth graze against his sweetened flesh, the feline suckling upon the sticky skin wherever his tongue rasped. Bovan nibbled and gnawed so gently upon the flesh whenever he could, mesmerised by its softness and physicality beneath his own senses. His fingers dug against pliant muscle, squeezed at chubbier mounds, groping every inch he could reach as he pinned the male to his stomach, lifting Kazim up into his arms. Instinct seemed to take over for the human as time had served to indoctrinate him well, legs wrapped around the cat's waist as best they could, barely even encircling the hefty gut. Bovan's paws quickly sought the human's buttocks however, led on my driving lust, as he molested those bubbled cheeks beneath his grasp and clawed at the overalls until they were sliding down the male's legs. In seconds he was disrobed, entirely naked with his crotch pressed into the apex of the cat's stomach, his body's heat melting into Bovan's own, and he simply held them both there. Knelt upon the bed with the human in his arms, chewing against Kazim's skin and sucking his neck with unbashful pockmarks of love-bites where the flesh turned from caramel to hardened toffee until it burnt a darker red. Haughty moans came fast and quick from the human's throat as Bovan nurtured it, arms wrapping around his chest and keeping them pressed close.

But he didn't just want to cuddle and play nice with the human all night. His stench had accompanied him through to the bedroom, his musk still heavy on his brain and tripping all sorts of sordid desires. He wanted more, and he was going to take it.

Turning them both around, the allowed them both to topple over onto the covers. Bovan caught himself before he crushed the human, but undeniably his mass kept the boy pinned under his gut, his strength holding the male there squirming as he sunk into the bed. Kazim looked up almost innocently, were it not for the darkest glints of smut searing in his eyes, and a sultry lick of his lips as arousal seemed to take over. Their crotches were, for once, aligned, and Bovan's hardness was sliding under his stomach and pressing at the human's own. Unlike their anatomy, so smooth and streamlined, Bovan's cock was textured and rough. Akin only to the humankind's leather, it was heavy to the touch, lined along the shaft with ridges stopping only at the flared head that was blunt and intimidating. That very tip pressed against the human's smaller, softer balls, grinding into the sack has he leaked a liberal gush of pre over him. Lust was thick in the air, rank and invasive, and every breath they both took was one that rushed ever further into need. The tightness between them both, the stagnant air sucked away and replaced only with every pant they expelled, left the temperature rising and the atmosphere seeded with each other's mark. Bovan stayed there, hanging over the human, as he writhed their bodies together with the semblance of thrusting his hips, sliding himself into the male's own, and their cocks errantly gliding along one another with smeared pre from the feline. He licked his fangs, feeling something predatory in him rising, quenched beneath a need for this to go right. As much as he could ravage the human and make him his bitch, he wanted Kazim to enjoy the suffering, to find pleasure in torment where he had never found it before,

“I'm going to breed you, do you understand?" he spoke, frank and unwavering, his tone low and a growl rumbling in his chest. Beneath him Kazim quailed. “I'm going to destroy you and you're going to be screaming my name. Are we clear?"

Kazim nodded. The cat snorted,

“Say it. Tell me you want it."

“Please," he simpered, “I want you to destroy me, Boss."

“That's a good boy."

Sidling back his weight, Bovan lifted himself off the male, but by no means allowed him to get up. Instead he returned almost immediately, lowered back down to the human's chest as he licked his neck once more, easing further until his tongue had traced a line of saliva to Kazim's nipples. Tight, round buds of sensitive flesh that had him yowling and writhing as Bovan sunk his teeth down into the skin. He tweaked the tough nub in his mouth, tongue flicking at the tip whilst the pricks of his teeth gently pried down upon the edges. Kazim's hands flailed to push the male away, but Bovan was quicker, more agile it seemed for a man given his size, and his strength was irrefutable. His paws clasped at the human's wrists and pinned them to either side of his head, his gut pressing down against Kazim's hips, rendering him immobile once more beneath the feline's mass. His cock was trapped within the hard curve of his gut, every minute movement causing the human to break out into all new groans and grunts. His legs thrashed as best they could, but there was no fighting the porossian, who salaciously snaked his tongue against one nipple before drawing himself to the next, taking his sweet time as he tortured the sensitive buds until Kazim was panting breathlessly and mewling all the more.

His fingertips sought out the neglected nipple his teeth weren't chewing and pinched it with a heavy paw, twisting one way and then the other before pulling back, marvelling at the stretch of the human's body so pliant under his ministrations. Kazim writhed in desperate anguish whilst Bovan had his fun, crying out shrewd moans and throwing his head back against the pillows. His eyes were clenched shut, denying the feline the view of those bright blue eyes consumed with confused need, but it was all the same a good sign as he rasped his tongue soothingly against the reddened, now tendered skin.

He wanted more though. Much more. So he took the liberty of moving yet further down the human's body, finally lifting away his stomach and releasing the human's wrists. But there wasn't a moment left as Bovan dragged his tongue across the slippery sweet skin and suckled on Kazim's sweat, letting the taste just smear on his senses and find some solace in the mark. His paws moved down the male's body, cupping and molesting every single inch that he could, until he came to the human's crotch. So curious was the species' anatomy to him, that Bovan found himself just idly toying and manipulating the male under his grasp. Their members were overtly different, that much he was already aware of, and their testicles too were similar to many other kinds throughout the stars, by no means an uncommon characteristic, but the smoothness of the skin, how it wrapped every part of their body and even guised the glans, was bizarre to him. Acquainted mostly with aliens who had all in some way boasted sheaths and slits or had exposed genitalia, it was the humans who bore such sleek, silken cocks. The females were less impressive, he had to admit. As much as Bovan liked the other sex, one female was oft seldom different to any other except for the internal plumbing. For women, it boiled down to experience, but for men there was something so physically pleasing and enjoyable about fondling something uncanny in one's own paw.

Taste however and experience, now they were far more interesting.

It was easy work to simply lift the male's hips and push him back, pressing by the backs of his thighs to move his legs so that he was almost bent over double. Kazim, once realising Bovan's intent, helped to work himself into a comfortable position, ass and cock exposed under the porossian's paw with his cheeks spread to leave his hole on show. A blush must have come to his face as Kazim opened his eyes, seeing the cat leering over him like meat, but Bovan was no longer paying much attention to his face. His eyes flicked down across the soft skin and velvet flesh that was bared before him and leaned down. Once more that tongue rasped against the succulence, lapping against the male's sack before slithering up his shaft, much to the delight of Kazim. His body shuddered with a drawling roll as pleasure skirted through his spine. Bovan would have thought that any sensation now would have been banal for a former prostitute turned slave, but then again he was oblivious to all the things Kazim might have been through in his time, or what might have been done to him beyond the naked eye. Nerve amplification was not uncommon among slave owners, whilst likewise nullification, genital desensitisation and physiological modification both organic or not was equally widespread. But at the very least it was not a display of pain, Bovan would hate to cause Kazim genuine discomfort. Blurring the line between vexing torment and euphoria was the ideal, but anything that teetered too much to the former was never his intention.

Bovan allowed his mouth to linger on the human's head for a moment, tongue circling his tip before those lips engulfed and sealed around his cock. The flavour of a human's seed was sour compared to others, its texture so runny and almost too easily thin upon the palate that it went by unnoticed, so heavily influenced by their diet that rarely would any two taste the same. Kazim had a more delicate note than what the feline had had before, but there was little really to contrast it against in Bovan's experience. He had to say though, he tasted exactly how he imagined the sumptuous human to taste, fine and elegant but with a brutish aftertaste that hid underneath and thumped against the mouth once it hit the back of the throat.

Whilst he sucked upon the human's cock, slowly easing that member in and out of his maw by just the first few inches, allowing himself to explore the bizarre fleshliness of the human's foreskin, marvelled at the soft sag and teasing the stretching folds that slid over his head, he slipped a paw further down to Kazim's backside. He didn't try to hide the movement, he wasn't ashamed at all in his bluntness, and he knew the male was watching him as his mouth wrapped around his cock. His fingers prised between his cheeks and slid against that puckered ass, encircling the rim with just a fingertip before he dared to push a little further. Tightened permanently, he had said, to retain some sense of virginity Bovan supposed, not that he really had a preference between loose bottoms or never before fucked. Taking someone's innocence was good, ravaging a slutty veteran was a dream, but trying to pick which he found more enjoyable was trying to compare men to women; they just weren't the same, yet both offered their own unique experiences. However his intrigue was piqued when, as his finger dug against the tight bud, he felt slickness to the entrance. Now most species he knew well enough were not like porossians, waste was often excreted via the rectum, through the anus, as feces. It was an ugly process, one he tried not to think about, but it meant anal always required thorough cleaning, and he knew that unlike females, they couldn't produce their own lubricant. He always kept some in his nightstand for whenever he fancied taking a deeper passage or if his bedfellow was male, but he hadn't applied any yet. Curious, he pushed further still and found that whilst taut, his finger slid easily into the human's hole. Wetness paved the way for Bovan to sink his finger right in to the knuckle deepest down inside the boy, feeling that muscle clench down around his digit, the steady, rampant thrum of Kazim's heartbeat rhymed within his pulse. His eyes caught the panting male's own, brow arched questioningly, unable to speak for the cock between his lips. Kazim shrugged,

“Gland implants. He wasn't a fan of riding rough, as much as he liked to hurt me."

Another modification then, but Bovan could feel it. There was a definite slickness he had never felt in any male before, save for when he finally did apply lube, and pushing his finger back and forth soon became quick work as whatever secretion slimed the way coated his digit. The rim shone in the shadow of his body, his cock throbbing hard as he staved off the thoughts of thrusting himself deep into the human's hole. As much as he wanted to just slam himself in right then and there, he had to loosen Kazim up first. There was no use in being brutal when all he had known was brutality at its most gruesome. A second finger was swiftly added, though it took some persuasion to push past the ring of tight muscle, feeling very much like a vice against Bovan's paw. Kazim took them well, though his grunts were becoming gradually more pronounced, thick from his chest as his hole opened up. But then Bovan was also gulping down more of the human's shaft until his chin scratched at the human's dainty balls, fangs pressing upon either side of his crotch and framing his cock and balls between his muzzle. That tongue worked against the hardened meat, feline dexterity licking and twining its way in manners few other species could match. Kazim, propped up on his elbows to watch the cat's efforts, made a whimpered grimace as his body became suspect to the pleasure Bovan gave. Fingers found his prostate and made that whimper ever higher, rewarding the porossian with a spurt of the male's pre upon his tongue. Such cute, supple creatures, Bovan could only think to himself, as he began to dare a third digit into Kazim's entrance. It was impossibly tight, but with some more persistence and a great strength carefully placed in his arm, Kazim yielded, but not with a defiant cry of pained lust. He wanted this, but it was demanding. Pleasure was but a meagre distraction as his cock was sucked, his hole split open by three fingers which gently pried apart his rim.

“Fuck!" He cried, head once more slammed into the pillows and his back arched, his hands reaching out to claw at the bedding in some futile move to find purchase. His toes were curling, his body tremdling with some feverish shiver, and thin beads of sweat matting his forehead and turning the straggle of his hair even mussier than it already was in the throes of his anguished bliss. Bovan chuffed at the thought of pleasing the human so much that he was overstimulating the poor boy, a twinge of sadism in him flourishing more than he ought to have enjoyed it. But it was there, and he relished the feeling, allowing it to at least puncture his actions and colour the mood. They were there to fuck as much as he wanted to claim the human.

Pulling off the human's cock, lewd slurp accompanying his withdrew, allowing his tongue to just linger leisurely upon his shaft, drawn all the way to the tip until with a little embellish he allowed the member to drop free and slap to Kazim's abdomen. He fixed the bent over male with a glare that spoke volumes, of power and of lust, as much as he conveyed at the very least something of the porossian's restraint and compassion,

“You're going to be very tight." It was a statement of fact, as Bovan wiggled those three fingers inside of the human, his hole clamped so tight around him it was a wonder why they hadn't lost circulation already, “Not that I'm bragging, but I'm very large." Another statement, the two correlated. Implicitly he was voicing his concerns.

“I can manage."

“Are you sure?" Bovan, least of all, wanted to truly hurt the human. Absolute pain was never on his agenda, never his prerogative.

“I've had plenty worse, Boss."

“I'm going to hurt you."

“And I'm going to like it."

“I really don't thin-“

“Boss," he was abrupt, cutting Bovan off with a loud snap, “Shut up and fuck me."

The boy was bossy, but Bovan couldn't complain. Kazim would know his body better than the cat, so if he was giving the all clear, he could only go by the human's word. He gave one last lick to the human's cock before pulling his fingers free from that clenching hole, the moment he began to retreat feeling the muscles clamp and expel him as if eager to have him leave. Even as his paw pulled out, that ring tightened right back up, firm as ever when Bovan had first laid eyes on it. Pushing a single fingertip to the strained bud confirmed his suspicions. Virgin tight; his efforts were for naught. Had he known that, truly understand the fact that the modifications were far more severe than just his assumptions, he wouldn't have bothered and move straight to the main event. After all, it's what he was craving most.

He eased himself up to his knees and stood before the human, lifting the bulk of his hips up until his swollen cock rode between Kazim's cheeks. Brutally he outmatched the human. It had always been in the back of his mind, but Bovan felt it quite distinctly in that moment. His cock looked monstrous contrasted to the human's perked buttocks and unsullied hole, for a moment feeling just a twinge of guilt that he was going to put Kazim through so much agony. But the hungry look in the human's eyes, the grind of his cheeks against the underside of Bovan's shaft, it was all enough to waive away the doubts with a single instant. He pulled back, aligned the head, blunt cock tip pressed to pure darkened toffee flesh, and pressure he placed upon that rim. It was difficult, first of all no ground gained for the dulled head couldn't penetrate past the too tight ring, but Bovan was strong, and he was skilled, as much as the human claimed to be, and with a snarl, bared fangs and grinding his jaw, he lowered his weight forward to apply greater force. It was a savage entry, but he would never deny the sheer pleasure he got when suddenly Kazim's body opened up to accept him.

Invited or not, it was beyond the point as Kazim howled aloud, loud enough to shake the walls, as fat, immense inches impaled him in the fraction of a second it took for his hole to yield. Bovan could only imagine the sensation from the human's end, that abrupt, painful, shocking feeling of being speared, of being all too quickly full, too stretched, especially from an impossible tightness, the burn of no lubrication save for pre and whatever the human's body had produced on its own, it must have been agonising. For Bovan however it was pure delight, the human's insides smooth and soft, so pliant and encasing upon his member. Truly now he could feel the extent of the male's body modifications, the Emperor having really performed some truly horrendous things upon his slave. As much as Bovan wished he could deplore what had happened to Kazim, he couldn't lie; it was the best ass he had ever fucked. It was no exaggeration, not for the porossian, as those velvet innards, warm and plush, sucked and swallowed him deeper as he allowed his weight to sink himself forwards, gravity bringing him into the human. The tightness felt incredible, his preference suddenly freezing like a broken metronome to one side of the spectrum. He could feel Kazim's heartbeat as if it were in his palm itself, the thundering organ just palpitating away to its own steady thrum, an erratic rhythm as he desperately tried to climb down from his pained distress.

He pushed forwards though. There would be not changing the human's situation if he simply kept still. Adjusting was not an option, so all Bovan could do was ride the boy's hole until he yielded. Motion was their best friend in that it would keep both Kazim's mind occupied on the thrusting length of the porossian's fattening cock whilst Bovan could sit back and enjoy the gulps of those plump insides. He drove a few inches forward, slipping past the halfway point, and ground deep. Surprisingly he felt the human's prostate, a seemingly universal feature of all males, only Kazim's felt swollen, pressing down upon his cock as he fucked the human's ass. A mild whimper of pleasure broke through the male's fractured mewls, a drawn out strangled sound that grated higher the deeper Bovan touched. Their size difference was not lost on him. If the human could fit inside him without so much as even giving the porossian a change in his appearance, then Bovan inside of the human was a different story altogether. That slender frame left nothing to the imagination as the feline slid himself balls deep, letting the lip of his sheath mash against a taut rim, his balls tapping the human's underside of his buttocks; obscenely the outline of Bovan's dick swelled within Kazim's gut. Though not prominent, in the right light he could make out the bulge and bloat of innards stretched around his cock, riding up into the human's abdomen and touching just into the stomach. It felt so dirty to see himself impaling another, to visibly watch his own manhood twitch, withdrew, push in, all beyond the human's flesh. So few species could stretch and accommodate others, the smaller you got the less you dabbled with the larger men, but humans, even without any extra meddling, were a pliant, fleshy kind. Far and few between if Bovan could bed one he refused to waste the opportunity. To find a treasure like Kazim however was something unheard of, even one Bovan could feel himself falling for.

He sniffed the air. There they were, laden with his musk, enough pheromones to set him going. His nursing state was in action again, his arousal mounting. Whether it was all down to the chemical science or if he had some instinct about the human that wanted to keep him close, Bovan didn't care. Kazim looked gorgeous in his shadow, bent over double with his cock shoved deep into that tight, warm hole, sweat filming his body to leave it in a caramel shine.

Pulling back, the human let out a shrill, haughty groan as Bovan eased back his length. The sensation of the following vacuum that chased his cock was phenomenal, he had never felt anything quite like it, and though he had expected Kazim's hole to behave much like any virgin's, there was no push or pressure. No insistence that Bovan leave his guts. The boy had remarkable control of his ass, perhaps a testament to his experience or just some other leftover treat the Emperor had done to him. Regardless of which, Bovan pulled back until just his head remained. The rim clenched down upon his cock almost as if the human's body didn't want the feline to leave, his pulse still quick but steady, drumming out his lust with his hammering heart. Bovan was happy to oblige, waiting for just a moment with his length extruding lewdly from the boy's ass with just his blunt head inside, before slamming himself back in. Gone was the need to be gentle, the thought abandoned in an instant when he heard Kazim's cry of agonised bliss as he ground against his prostate for another time and hilted once more in that tight hole. He set himself a brutal speed, slow enough so that the human could feel every inch draw out then plunge back in with languid seconds, but hard, like the slam of a piston, just careening into those silken guts with shuddering force. The bed shook with Bovan's thrusts, his hips driving the human back up into the wall, pillows tussled up and all but cast aside as the sheets rode with them, the porossian's knees mussing the bedding all the while Kazim clung as if for dear life. Bovan fucked the human's guts with all the vigour he had, rolling his heavy weight back and forth, his stomach grinding down upon the human's own cock, its hardness pressing against his swell and dripping pre through the soft underfur. Moans rang out from the pair of them, Kazim's distinctly higher than the cat who purred and snarled with a flick of his lips, chest rumbling with guttural lust. The male's insides were so warm, the nicest he'd ever felt in a long time, and Bovan found himself drooling, his intense arousal just burning within him as he savoured the heat of Kazim's ass. It was so wonderfully tight, the phrase fitting like a glove never more accurate than how the cat felt now, his spined cock rubbing against that rim, milking the human's prostate, until the male beneath his leering gaze was nothing but a quivering mess of some spent load. Bovan could see, even feel, the slick juices pooling between them both, collecting along the boy's navel, smearing into the feline's stomach fluff. The stench was incredible, combined with the porossian's musk which heightened every sense, it was like breathing in liquid sex, the scent so overwhelming that Bovan sucked deep breaths to keep himself calm. His maleness was rigid inside Kazim, oozing pre as if it had sprung a leak, and he fought off the idea of cumming too soon for want of relishing that hole for a little longer.

Instead he lowered himself down. With Kazim's legs bent back, there was nowhere else for them to go except to embrace the porossian's hips, wrapping round the male as he were any other female for the taking. It gave Bovan the leverage to drive deep, to angle himself so that he could tap even further into the male's innards and start stretching out the beginnings of his colon – or at least, where his colon ought to be. He couldn't feel, not in the truest sense. Kazim's guts just to seem to continue onward, clearly yet more reworking on the League's behalf to make him the perfect bottom, to accept any man of any size. It worked in Bovan's favour though, balls deep in his boy with ample more room to go. His gut pressed down upon the human's own, near suffocating him and restricting his breathing so that Kazim broke through with bursting gasps and heady pants. The cat's weight bore down on him and left him rasping for musk-laden air, and Bovan seized his chance. Rolling his hips in a leisurely fuck, he pressed his muzzle back to the human's mouth. Airless, he kissed the human until Kazim struggled to breathe, feeling the writhing body struggle beneath him as Bovan pushed his tongue down the male's throat. He was beginning to see the difference of their size as even more of an advantage as the boy quelled in pathetic groans whilst the cat used him, until finally letting go of Kazim's lips so that he could suck in some desperate lungful of sweaty air. One, two, maybe three breaths was all he got before Bovan let his weight crush back down and his mouth returned to Kazim's, tongue sliding into his maw and slipping deep, just as he thrust his meat into the clenching hole.

As Kazim squirmed and fought for fresh air, pinned under the feline's bulk, Bovan could feel his ass clenching. Arhythmical and hard, it was unlike the usual milking sensation of the human in form. The male's hips buck up to meet the cat's thrusts, his body shuddering with some unspoken delight and his blue eyes shut to the world. Only when the feline felt heat jet and gush under his stomach did he realise that the human was cumming, from his manhood alone slamming deep into his guts. He rolled with the feeling, riding out the human's orgasm for as long as he could, stroking his cock over those sensitive inches where he could get Kazim twitching and panting most. There was begging somewhere in the human's errant breaths, but they were lost under Bovan's tongue as he kissed his boy again, claiming his muzzle as much as he intended to claim the human's ass.

The massaging, tightening rim of Kazim's hole however was just too much. Even if Bovan had the stamina of the greatest of men, which he liked to think he did, there was no fighting the glorious insides of the human's rump. An impossibly tight hole that stretched just enough to give room to breathe but always clamping down where needed, combined with the soft velvet cavern that went on into unfathomable depths, it was enough for Bovan to lose his mind. He could feel his lust sparking as it burned a hole in his abdomen, a fiery heat that pleaded to be released. There was only one destination for it though, and Bovan rammed deep, as far as he could go, his head thrown back and tossing the gnarly tussles of his mane, roaring to the roof as he pushed his weight down on top of the human. Kazim howled in chorus with Bovan's bellow, his voice lost to the din of the porossian, but he was screaming for the hot flood that surged into his guts. Bovan came hard, harder than he'd ever done for a long time, as he painted the human's bowels a slick cream. His cock shot into those guts like a loose cannon, flesh throbbing and bouncing inside Kazim as he came. His whole body thundered with the orgasm, bones rattling and muscles clenching all as they responded in kind to the scorching pleasure of his climax. He gave a few, final thrusts, one inch retreated then slammed back in, all as his load poured into the human's ass. Teeth snapped at the air, gritted together and jaw locked whilst he went rigid, the last of his seed dribbling free until he was convinced, finally, he was entirely spent.

Bovan slid free, slowly, drawing out his gradually softening length still pulsing angrily with his swamped heartbeat, drooling loose strings of his thick cum across the human's backside. He popped free with a lewd squelch, his cum following his cock as it oozed out of the human's stretched hole. But he watched in mild amazement as true to Kazim's word, his rim tightened right back up within seconds, clamping back down until it looked as virgin perfect as it had done before. It looked as if nothing had happened whatsoever, were it not for the slimy smears of Bovan's cum dribbling down his cheeks, marking his crack with his seed, the air pervaded with the stench of the porossian's maleness. As Bovan leant back, he could see the human's abdomen tenderly swollen with the load still trapped inside, the soft skin blushing a rosy hue as it wobbled almost too cutely with seed sloshing inside. He allowed Kazim to relax, dropping his legs back onto the bed so that the boy could just recuperate, Bovan sitting back to watch the bathing afterglow of sex first hand. Their eyes met, both panting as Bovan sat back on his haunches to just breathe, admiring his handiwork as Kazim recovered his strength – and his lungs,

“That was incredible," he began, paw wiping away the sweaty straggles of his mane from his face, “Best ass I've had in years…"

Kazim didn't respond, he just flushed scarlet on his cheeks, clearly unused to such kind compliments. Bovan supposed that had he come from a harem of slaves, his sole purpose a toy for torturing, such kindness was seldom shown, if at all. He made the mental note to make sure he rebuilt the human's confidence in such areas, as he doubted with an ass like that that this would be their last liaison by no means.

“We're not done though…"

“We aren't?" Bovan shook his head, a small smile playing at his lips as he rose back up to his knees. In one paw he held his receding cock, still hard enough to have its size but soft, limping in his grasp. It was smothered in a coat of cum and Kazim's ass fluids, his fingers alone smeared through the slickness, and his intentions were quite clear as he shuffled up the human's body straddling his torso. The cock was lifted to Kazim's lips, just within reach, close enough so that all he would have to do was lean forward and take it.

“Clean me off, boy."

For a moment Kazim looked between Bovan and the member dangling before him, before need took over and he bent up, lips pursed to kiss the male's head, before they widened, graciously fed several inches of the sullied meat. His eyes were closed but his cheeks still burnt a bright red, enjoying his meal as Bovan let him take his cock at his own pace, savouring the feeling of a hot mouth working over his nursing length. There was no urgency behind the act, no need to get off, this was merely a bonding moment between him and his new mate, allowing his boy to suckle his manhood and recognise his taste. He grunted as Kazim took him deeper, an expertly skilled throat opening up to swallow the whole of what was left, so that his face pressed into Bovan's damp crotch, head trapped beneath that fat gut. It was just too much for the male, who reached up with his free paws to tweak at his nipples, grunting as Kazim worked on his shaft.

His musk was still ripe in the air, maybe that was why Bovan still felt too wound up to relax. Kazim was already drifting into the fatigue of a good fuck, but the porossian was tightly sprung, unable to settle. It wasn't arousal though, there was no urge to cum again, no need to turn the human back over and rut his ass until another orgasm. It must have been the pheromones, Bovan thought, they were sending him into nursing again. There was really only one solution for that.

Pulling free of the human's mouth, Bovan tilted Kazim's head back far enough so that they could meet eye to eye, the feline cupping his boy's cheek,

“Time to go back inside, boy," he spoke softly, thumb wiping away some escaping smudge of sticky cum, “You ready?"

There was a hint of trepidation in Kazim's gaze, but it steeled over, and Bovan was given a quiet nod. It was all the feline needed to stand up upon the bed, hobbling himself over the human, and spread his cheeks wide. He could feel the heat radiating off his own pucker, grunting as he felt himself brace for entry, before he squatted down. The flourish of straggled hair on the human's head tickled his hole before Bovan felt the weight of Kazim press against him. To give credit where credit was due, as much as the process might have been unnerving to him, the human kept his body firm, allowing Bovan to let his weight and gravity ease him down. His hole opened up, his vestile relaxing for the oncoming human that would soon occupy it once more, and he grunted when he felt his rim slide open over Kazim's skull. The unusual feeling of spreading around such an unusual shape had him panting, his cock throbbing hard once more, before he sat back down further. Suction pulled in Kazim's head once he reached the midway point, the sudden movement making the human muffle a cry, but it was lost the moment he was inside Bovan. Next was the precarious stretch of the human's shoulders. As the cat lowered himself down, weight pressing the male's body into his own, he grunted as his opening strained wide, working itself loose as the human slipped inside. He roared when he felt those shoulders pop inside him, and all too quickly he slid down, sucking the human inside of him. Half of Kazim's chest was buried in his behind before he knew what had happened, and from there it was easy work to just lay down on his back and feed the boy's body into his own slowly, paws helping to manipulate Kazim into his rump. Huffing into the air, Bovan felt the slick wetness of the human's cum as it slipped past his hole, before the cock and balls pushed past too. All that was left was a loud slurp as Kazim's legs entered him, and his hole clenched up behind the male's body. Within him he felt the human curl up, returning to the safest place Bovan had for him, and only then could he feel at ease. Breathing a heavy sigh, Bovan collapsed where he lay, eyes feeling like lead, paws rubbing over his stomach as he felt the human inside, another heartbeat contained within his flesh, and he felt happy. Happier in the longest time he'd ever had the feeling, far longer than any orgasm or hook up he'd ever had. It was the deepest sense of the word, some innate feeling of completeness.

Bovan never wanted to let it go. Not ever.

~ ~ ~

Trouble had to come knocking sooner or later.

Bovan had returned to work. Kazim had adjusted to the porossian's schedule rather well, though there was little he could really do. It was agreed that at least for the time being he would remain under Bovan's constant guard, always inside him whenever in public or elsewhere, only released when back at their living quarters. It was a necessity until Bovan could be sure the heat had cooled off just enough on Kazim's bounty that he could be allowed to perhaps stay in the quarters whilst Bovan worked, or he could set the human up with a job in the back somewhere, meaning he was never too far behind. The kitchen could always use a clean-up, and the human had volunteered his services if it was at all possible. But the porossian figured that was maybe a sly jab at the fact that Kazim had become his bed mate and not an offer to be his cook, where nearly every night ended the same way with at least several loads getting put somewhere inside the human's body, and then the human would be inside the cat's stomach until they were both lulled to sleep.

If Bovan was honest, he would have said he liked the arrangement. Kazim had ample enough money to help the pair of them get by, and the porossian was able to finally pay Mina her overdue wages as well as employ a few other bar staff to help ease off the weight of running a tavern. Business was still slow, but it was picking up a bit, much to Bovan's delight. He couldn't help but feel there was a catch to it all. It was only when they had come snooping had he realised what that catch was…

“Can I help you, gentlemen?" He cleared his throat, wiping a sodden rag across the bar top to mop up whatever ale had graced it this evening. Tonight was a relatively active night, several of the booths were full and a rabble of some star ship crew had set themselves up on a table playing arlon-r'agh, means drinks flowed fast and spirits were somewhat merry. Kazim was tucked safely inside the porossian, his body nestled within the many layers of fat and wall lining within the cat, under no threat from the outside world as far as Bovan had a say in it. Instinctively though a paw betrayed the feline, rubbing over his noticeably larger gut that was barely contained behind the buttons of his clothes, feeling the heavy mass that sat within him. His eyes were trained on the two figures who had just walked in, strutting with a self-appointed swagger that already screamed trouble to the porossian.

They were sentinels, some of the League's highest officers; clad in pristine golden armour with trimmings of iridescent turquoise, they were ranked as juggernauts, brutal soldiers who knew no mercy and took no prisoners. They mere presence alone, forgetting even the fact that they were brazenly sauntering around Pitch Dream, was already a bad omen. Bovan could feel his whole body clench, and the atmosphere of the tavern grew colder the moment they set foot through the door. One was shorter of the two, denser it appeared, and had his rifle holstered, whilst the other had his slung across one shoulder, armed already and seemingly expecting a fight. It was no wonder; every pair of eyes in the bar were immediately trained on them as soon as they were inside, tension so thick that even the sharpest knife couldn't have cut it.

Bovan suspected how they had found where Kazim was. Like he had known from the very beginning, the human was an obvious anomaly in the realm of Pitch Dream. Spending so much time exposed to its elements would have naturally made any hunter suspicious. All it would have taken was a single tipster looking for an easy buck to make to send a transmission to the League, and they would have come running, determined to retrieve their leaking asset to protect the disgusting things their Emperor and subordinates were getting up to. It made him sick.

“Are you the owner of this establishment?" The shorter one spoke, a female's voice, though filtered through the impassive, blank visor drawn across her face. Sentinels didn't have identities. They were just meat shields and cannon fodder, if nothing else, there to serve, born to die, always underneath someone else's orders. Bovan could see his reflection warped within the blank silver of the glass, his stature stiff and his death grip on the bar enough to splinter the wood,

“That I am."

“We have reason to believe a suspected fugitive of the League recently visited these premises. We're going to search them, and we will access your surveillance footage."

Bovan snorted. How typically arrogant of sentinels.

“We're all fugitives of the League, mate," he laughed, “And you ain't having shit. You have no jurisdiction here. You can't do anything."

“Do you wish for me to collect on your debt?" The female spoke, the filtered tone doing nothing to hide the ferocity of her voice, “We allow Pitch Dream to exist because it is convenient; however I can make an exception for you, criminal."

Bovan's eyes scanned the bar. Everyone was prepared for a fight, it was all too clear. Blood was in the air and everyone had had a taste. At the slightest provocation, Bovan could start a brawl, at least buy himself some time to escape with Kazim, but preferably he'd like to avoid that. Dreamer's Drop might not be much, but it was his sanctuary, as much as Kazim was his to protect. Paid or not, he would have laid down his life for the human.

“I suggest you leave," he said, cold and predatory, “Before I slice your throat and torture your friend over there." The lanky one, who had yet to speak, was prowling around the bar as if he owned the place, not quite paying attention to the conversation between the female officer and Bovan.

“I'd like to see you tr-“

Before she could even finish her sentence, Bovan had leapt across the bar with startling agility. His weight ploughed into the sentinel before she even had a chance to react, barrelling into her and sending her to the ground. There was a scrabble, desperation as she went for her gun, but Bovan was already upon her with his paws clutching at her head. Though their armour was advanced, the neck was always a weak point. Dexterity and manoeuvrability was a trade off with protection, and since the former was always favoured, Bovan needed only a little strength to puncture through the metal plating and drive a claw deep into her neck, ripping at a jugular and sending a fresh arc of crimson into the air. Hot blood splashed across his face and chest, marked in her death as the life faded swiftly, body flailing in the throes of panic before succumbing to the inevitable. Her friend, however, had tried his best to come to her aid, all too slow unfortunately as his bravado had been his downfall. Thugs were already upon him the moment Bovan had sprung into action, Mina joining the fray and snatching away his rifle with a fist socked to his jaw. A nasty crack had splintered across the panel, revealing just a little of the ugly visage that lay beneath, the League a species not known for natural beauty. Bovan rose up from the corpse pooling in blood, red streaked across his face with a deathly, unyielding look in his eyes, as he stalked across the room to where the male sentinel was being restrained, peering down into the blank visor.

“What you gonna do?!" He spat, kicking out as Bovan neared, “Kill me? They'll just send more!"

“Oh I know," the porossian replied, squatting down so that he was level with the soldier, “That's why you're gonna deliver a message."

“I ain't saying shit to them. You're harbouring a fugitive of high value. We'll burn all of Pitch Dream down if you don't comply!"

“That's where you're wrong…" Bovan smirked, paw lifting up to wreck what was left of the visor, tearing it away with a ruthless yank. It revealed the male's face beneath, gnarled and black, straggled in veins and hideous growths, the League were a sickening species. He smiled pleasantly as he leaned in close, whispering so that only the sentinel could hear, “I don't need you to say anything to deliver a message. Your broken half-dead corpse will be enough." Fear bled into the male's eyes, Bovan catching the abject terror as he pulled back, wondering just how he'll torture him as they tortured his Kazim, “Burn Pitch Dream into dust for all I care, there'll be somewhere else sooner or later, but mark my words: nobody will ever touch me or my boy again."