Unable to properly process what exactly was happening in front of him, Swabbie stared in disbelief for a few seconds at the nude female in front of him. Blinking a few more times, he noticed that Tesla’s smile was slowly fading as she pulled back a little bit, confused by the Swabbie’s reaction as he looked down at her. The once confident red-head was now looking up at him like a pitiful puppy, then down as the male slowly reached forward and put his hand onto her shoulder. Twisting around, she noticed that the Swabbie was looking down at her, the bill of his flat cap resting just against her forehead for a moment. Tesla blinked once again before she found her face being closed in by Swabbie’s hands. She could feel them shaking lightly, most likely still some feed-back from the shock, but she couldn’t tell.
Glancing up at him, she met his eyes, the odd mixture of hazel and green making her think of one of the forests on her home-world. She could have gotten lost in those eyes if he had let her stare long enough, but she was brought back to reality by his voice. A slow, reassuring tone escaped the Swabbie’s lips as he stroked the side of her face to calm her down. “Tesla, you didn’t do anything wrong by expressing that desire; it is just that…we’re hardly in a situation where I can…perform.” The swabbie was struggling for words at this point, he had never been much of a lady’s man back home, nor had he ever had more than a ‘passing’ interest with women. Most of the time he would be focusing on his work and trying to make a living rather than bothering with women; his life was one that required long hours and little appreciation, he doubted any girl would have wanted a farmer’s son when there were the rich boys flying around in their fancy cars.
Contemplating what to do with Tesla, he found her still looking into his eyes. The same pitiful look of regret and apology in them; his heart strings were tugged for a moment, but then a light bulb went off over his head. “Tesla, I’m not sure what…your society does with sex or the implications behind it; however, let’s just leave the process down to I’ll tell you when I’m healthy enough for it and whenever you want to, I’ll do what I can for you.” Tesla bit her lip lightly as she rubbed her legs together in response; she was almost shivering as she gingerly wrapped her finger tips against Swabbie’s thighs and kissed him. Her plump lips were just as sweet as before, only this time it was not a kiss that invaded his very being, it was instead something very gentle. Taking it as a nod from Tesla that she understood what he was saying, he smiled a little bit, though the pain still throbbing through his chest made him cringe at the sudden movement.
Tesla leaned backward glancing over him for a moment as, a soft sigh left her lips, the air tickling the Swabbie’s chest as he listened to her speak. “I understand what you’re saying, I was just left in that box for so long on my own; I lost track of time and I couldn’t even touch myself. I’m so pent up right now and well…I don’t much like Garrus and you did save me.” Tesla swayed side to side for a moment, shaking her head back and forth before biting her lip glancing back up at the Swabbie and putting a half a meter of distance between them. “Captain, Garrus didn’t tell you everything when he said that Yor’zvinians serve those who save them. We…our culture depends on the rules of dominance and submission; we fight those that try to break us and if we ever get captured, we will continue to fight until we can’t anymore. It is a sign of weakness to have someone save us, but it also forces us to submit to that person.”
Tesla shook a little bit, her fists clenching together for a moment while Swabbie stood there looking at her for a moment. Already, he could tell that the female was cursing her own weakness and her traditions, but she would not break them. Looking back up, she met Swabbie’s eyes before speaking once more. “My people are warriors, everyone is a warrior and relationships are founded not on the qualities of love, but rather who can claim the strongest mate as their own. Men hunt out powerful women and women hunt out powerful men, when a Yor’zvinian is brought into combat…the loser must yield all rights to the victor and enter into a situation of servitude or be let go. Being let go is one of the worst shames to my people, it means in the eyes of the opponent that you are worthless, less than scum…that you wouldn’t even be a good slave, let alone a mate.” Rubbing herself softly now, Tesla scowled and let her head land on one of Swabbie’s shoulders as she turned around.
“My father, back before I was kidnapped…knew I was a strong woman but also knew that there were many people…men and women that were stronger; who would simply beat me and make me a slave to their sexual desires. He trained me, hired men to train me and even assigned bodyguards to make sure this happened, I was royalty and therefore doubly bound by my people’s traditions, but it didn’t mean we couldn’t protect ourselves from them.” She sighed, looking back up at the Swabbie as she run her hand against his face gently. “Yet, our people already gave into those desires…battle is one of the most powerful aphrodisiacs to my race; people would go out and battle until they could scarcely move, return covered in blood and sometimes even missing appendages. Even in this battle-weary and weakened state, they would clean and they would seek pleasure, they would return to their mates, their whores or whoever and enter into adrenaline filled orgies. These could rage for days, parties could join in and the lust would spread like wildfire.”
Another soft sigh left Tesla’s lips coaxing Swabbie to shiver once more, the air brushing against the nape of his neck almost seductively. Yet, the irritation and sadness on her voice was clear; it was clear she was home sick and wondering the differences between his race and hers. “When…I saw you, I thought maybe your race was much like mine; you have most of the same anatomy, though your eyes are different. I thought that maybe the fight you had just left, had left you aroused, needing and ready to punish my body with whatever carnal desires you had in mind.”
Swabbie could only blink for a few seconds as he listened to everything that Tesla had just told him, all of it mashing together in his mind. The last two minutes just seemed to blend together, the pain that he was feeling not only making it hard to focus, but even harder to listen to catch every little detail. It was as if someone had ignited a flame just beneath his chest. As the pain intensified with his gasp, breathing itself was now painful, let alone a deep one. Trying to return to normal breaths between a few sputtering coughs, each sending new waves of pain through his body, he found himself wondering just how much of the outside world Tesla new about. It wasn’t exactly surprising she didn’t know what a human looked like or couldn’t identify them by appearance, though that she wouldn’t have been informed of their culture was surprising.
“Captain,” Tesla broke in between Swabbie’s thoughts, causing him to stop for a moment and look back at her. During his thought, she had broken away from him, standing about two meters away in the water with her arms crossed over her breasts. Her wide hips no longer set into a manner that spoke confidence; the beautiful Yor’zvin merely bit her lip for a moment as she started to shake her head once more. “If I can be frank, I’ve been pursuing my own sexual needs over anything else so that I could be of better use to you. Right now…it is so hard to focus; back when…that thing attacked us, I was so focused on well…you know that I completely lost myself. It wasn’t until you went running past that I woke up. Still, I owe you my life, you had a strength that I didn’t have and you ended up rescuing me from some coward.”
It was Swabbie’s turn to look away, his face turning red as he looked up at Tesla wondering if she realized all he had done was open a box. Shaking his head again, he put his hands into his pockets and let out one steady sigh. “I’m not a warrior, I’m not some courageous man that fought tooth and nail to free you from that box. I’m just a….nobody really. I opened that box because I heard noises in it, I didn’t know you were in there. I ran from a battle I knew I couldn’t win and well…the rest is how we got here; I’m not a strong man, you don’t owe me anything Tesla.”
The Yor’zvin merely smiled before putting her finger onto the Swabbie’s nose and shaking her head in response. “That’s where your wrong Captain, you’ve got a strength that most people on my planet can’t ascribe to. You’ve got a strength of character, you’re honest and brave. You threw yourself into harm’s way to protect me when I was proving to be useless to you. On my planet most people would have just left me for dead, you on the other hand, you would have sacrificed yourself to make sure I would stay alive. So I owe you twice, once for getting me out of that box and again for giving me the time to think when I was utterly lost in my own mind. Captain, I’m your slave now, use me as you see fit because I always repay my debts and I already owe you more than I could ever repay. Now go rest dear Captain, don’t think I didn’t see you cringing in pain while we were talking.” Giggling and feeling better about herself, Tesla turned the Swabbie around and gave him a loving tap on the ass pushing him away back onto the shore. Swabbie barely had enough time to chuckle himself before the female was already diving head first into the water and disappearing beneath the surface.
“Well…that was…interesting.” Swabbie muttered to himself, not wanting to risk the chance that there might be something in the water that could infect the wounds. Regardless, there was clean water back at the ship and it recycled anything they used, so he could get a hot one back there. Finally feeling the soreness of his arms and the implausible amount of stress he had put on them; he let himself breathe out slowly pondering what to do next. It wasn’t exactly good to interrupt Tesla’s bath and he figured she might be caring care of some ‘other problems’ while she was in there. Sighing, he crept along sluggishly finding himself tracing around the shore line of the spring before coming face to face with the beast from earlier. Its head tilted towards him in curiosity before slowly rising a paw up. Once it had leveled itself with Swabbie’s head, it lifted it a little higher placing it on top of the would-be captain’s skull and forcing him to sit. Blinking for a few moments as he found himself now sitting next to the creature, he let his hands rest over his knees.
The serenity of the place struck him now that he wasn’t talking or really thinking about anything aside from: “Why the hell did that creature just make me sit down for?” The swaying of the breeze through his hair, a few flakes of snow brushing through into the little oasis and falling down into the bluish-green grass. The trees around them, jutting upward and reminding him of the great oak trees he used to see around, existed at intervals. Each of them presenting shade in various places while their branches ignited into brown and red leaves, making him think of the autumn season on Earth. It was eerily similar aside from some of the colors, making him feel homesick, just as Tesla had before. Turning his head slowly to the creature beside him; he noticed that it had laid down beside him, head resting on top of its forepaws.
It seemed as if it was going to listen to him, as if it was saying: “Go ahead and talk to me. I have all the time in the world and I’ll listen to every word you say. I may not be able to reply in any way you understand, but I will at least hear you out.” Swabbie smiled a little bit, recalling the collie that his parents used to herd the cattle, it would often lay its head in Swabbie’s lap and just listen to him talk. Sometimes they’d spend hours at night, just looking up at the stars, he’d talk about what it was like and that collie would sit there, enjoying the petting and the time with the farm boy.
Unable to repress the urge, Swabbie’s hand stretched out slowly, finding its way onto the beast’s head. It looked at him for a moment, quizzical of what he was doing before Swabbie’s fingers scratched lightly at the scalp and began to run down to the beast’s neck. Still looking up at him, four of the beast’s eyes drooped downward, indicating that it was enjoying the petting and not going to bite his face off at the moment. Chuckling for a moment, he turned his eyes back towards the beast and stopped scratching, simply stroking through its fur as he started to talk for a moment.
“You know, back home, I would always do something like this with a border collie. It was much smaller than you…and a hell of a lot less wild.” Swabbie laughed as the creature gave a small snort retorting to the statement causing the male to raise an eyebrow in confusion, but let it go. “She would always put her head in my lap and still there for hours, just listening to me talk while I pet her. It was really something, she was a good dog and always knew how to make me feel better after a long day on the farm.” Swabbie was looking down for a moment, his fingers scrunching together casually on the top of the beast’s head, which was responded to by the creature slowly lifting its head and planting it down onto the Swabbie’s lap. “I’m….gonna assume that you can understand what I’m saying…to an extent.”
Immediately, the creature snorted lightly, the three eyes on the side nearest to him looking up as the creature turned over. It was slightly awkward and a little bit painful because of the size difference; however, Swabbie was just thankful that the creature wasn’t pressing into his wounds. At that, Swabbie looked back up at the darkened sky, lit only by the lights from the false planet overhead and the so far away they were nothing more than little blips of light. Sighing as he stroked along the beast’s side and around its shoulders, he started to speak again. “Back home, there was always some source of light somewhere or another, people would either start a fire or just flip a switch and bam there was light. Now, all I got is a flash light and whatever light I can gleam from that planet up there; however, those are all so dim that they might as well not be there. I miss being able to walk through a green field, smell the sweet flowers and put out an honest day of work. Back on Earth, my home planet, I never felt like my jobs were thankless or punishments. I would toil in the field and could always see the rewards that the land would return to me.”
Swabbie paused for a moment, letting the beast shift its head lower down towards his knees. It was obviously aware of the wounds on his chest and doing its best to avoid them, despite being extremely comfortable as it was being petted. Swabbie could only shake his head slowly and let a small chuckle pass through his lips before continuing to speak. “I would always look forward to the changing of seasons, when I would watch the orchids and plants that we had planted and tended to beginning to bloom up. When the our crops burst out from the ground and supplied us with food; I took joy in mucking the pigs and milking the cows. Everything there seemed so much purer, seemed like everyone was always happy to meet the guy that made sure everything they ate was of quality. When I came up here, my name suddenly became mud, no one wanted anything to do with me and I was just the worthless kid that cleaned up after other people’s messes.”
Swabbie laughed for a moment, his chest exploding into pain once more as he began to cough. “You really did a number on me…you know that?” He asked, breaking away from his original subject matter as the pain became the only thing he could focus on. The beast looked back up in response, licking its lips before twisting its head around and licking at his fingers and hand, coating the phalanges in thick saliva. Shaking his head, Swabbie buried his hand into the creature’s fur and shook his head. “Don’t think you get off easy because you can do something cute.” The beast only snorted casuing the Swabbie to chuckle and resume speaking.
“Well, not like you could understand the life or my problems anyway. You’re driven by instinct, you simply go out and kill a few things, eat and fuck that’s all you’ve got to worry about. Your fur protects from the cold for the most part and your body is so huge, you must become like a god damn furnace when your metabolism starts to pick up.” Shaking his head slowly, the Swabbie stopped petting the beast to pat it a few times, before returning to stroking its fur. “Honestly, I kinda wish I had your life. Never having to worry about anything but food, shelter and mating….that would be the life. Instead, I’ve gotta worry about things like money, prejudice and all sorts of other crap that just isn’t…I guess I shouldn’t call it fair. I’ve seen recordings about how my own species treated each other in the past. Not like what’s going on here is any different than what happened in the past.” Letting out a weak laugh, he only sighed.
“I’ve got no idea what I’m going to do. I’ve got some crazy ass tiger…thing…chasing me down and he makes you look like a cat from my world. Not in size mind you, but viciousness.” He hastily added the last bit when the creature lifted its head to look at him, then laid it back down, seemingly satisfied with the response. “I have to take care of three people, a alien princess whose culture I know nothing about, a girl who just lost her father and a self-absorbed pilot. Not a hell of a lot to work with any case. On top of that, I’m broke, our ship is busted and we’ve got no food aside from what we can gather. Just seems like life decided to deal me a raw hand on the sudden. I guess there were some good things that came out of, but over all, it just seems like someone upstairs decided it was time to piss on me.” Shaking his head slowly, he watched as the beast closed its eyes and slowly began rise up. It lumbered slowly away from the Swabbie moving over to one of the nearby trees.
“What are you going to do?” Swabbie asked, not really understanding why he had bothered to do so when the creature couldn’t actually reply to him. Looking over the massive tree with multiple twisting branches, obscured with a plethora of brown and red leaves, it turned around swinging its tail in a wide arc before smacking the base of the tree. The responding crack was deafening as bark and bits of wood came hurtling out of the impact zone as the branches began shaking wildly overhead, that’s when Swabbie looked up finding his eyes following the descent of two creatures. One, the raccoon looking creature he had seen earlier and the other, what looked to be like some cross between a centipede and a squirrel, were hurtling to the ground.
Each of the beasts twisted in the air, spinning out of control as they squealed in horror. Swabbie could see their faces vividly, the raccoon sized creatures, eyes, the pair of insect-like ocular glands were widening up, nearly covering its entire head. The sharp weasel-like nose breathing in furiously, the quad-nostrils flaring in box pattern while its prehensile tail swung back and forth. Black fur spewed upward, silver colored claws attempted to grab hold of anything as its brown underside and mask became visible. Twisting once more, its head slammed into the ground, leaving it twitching on the ground for a few seconds blood seeping into the grass before it finally stopped moving. Each third of a meter long arm now laid completely still, as its brain had likely been smashed in by the impact.
The squirrel like creature hadn’t been so lucky. It flew like a rock through the air, its two elongated trying to seek purchase in the nearby tree. It continually aimed back for the main body, but to no avail. It’s body little over a third of a meter long was split between its tail and torso. Looking like a rat with a bushy tail, it swung around wildly, its bright red fur making it stand out now. It managed to get lucky, twisting as its small paws hit the raccoon like creature’s body, bouncing and while disoriented, it was at least alive. At least until the beast leap onto it, stomping one powerful paw down onto the unsuspecting creature’s body, flattened and dead upon impact.
At this point, the beast turned and looked at Swabbie, walking over and licking his face before ushering out a warning growl then turning and marching out of the woods. Staring down at the meal that the beast had just left for him, the Swabbie pondered just how intelligent of a creature that it had to have been to have devised such a method for hunting. Scratching his head only for a few seconds, he found that Tesla was already behind him, burying her fingers into his hair with a small, frightened smile on her face. “I suggest that we heed the warning that the beast gave us and get out of here, it left us some meat and we can pick up some of those tubers I found on the way here. Maybe Lily will be able to turn that into some stew?” Swabbie only nodded in response, letting her help him to his feet, sucking at his teeth in pain before sighing at his weakness.
“I honestly can’t wait to heal from these wounds. Oh man…Lily is going to freak out when she sees the mess I’m in.” Sighing softly, Swabbie picked up the raccoon like creature’s corpse before Tesla took it from him and handed him the flattened squirrel.
“You carry the lighter one, you’re not exactly in the proper condition to be trying to strain yourself. As for what Lily might think, let me deal with her; it is my fault you’re in this condition in the first place.” Swabbie nodded in return to Tesla, letting her do the brunt of the work as they walked back in the direction they had come through the forest. It was an uneventful journey. Neither of the two felt like talking after the events that had transpired; both pondering just how intelligent the beast was that had given them food and had responded to them as if it understood every word they said. Slipping back through the woods and noticing a few more signs of wildlife, though nothing as big or dangerous as the beast, they managed to find where Tesla had left behind the tubers from earlier.
Collecting the spuds and walking back to the ship, the pair crept through the field of blazing flowers, as Swabbie leaned against the door of the escape pod elated to be back as he began to punch in the code. Yet, his mind turned to other things, like what to do first when getting inside of the ship.
A. Immediately get Lily to clean up the wounds, taking the fall for the events that occurred in the woods. Have Garrus tell about the ship’s condition afterwards, then proceed to sleep off the recent events after eating whatever is prepared by Lily, Tesla and Garrus.
B. Immediately get Garrus’s status report before entering the shower and cleaning the wounds yourself. Have Tesla talk to Lily, letting her take the fall for the events that occurred in the woods. Eat whatever meal Lily, Tesla and Garrus manage to prepare then proceed to bed.
C. Immediately get Lily to clean up the wounds, blaming Tesla for the events that occurred in the woods. Speak to Garrus about the problems with the ship afterwards and enjoy a meal with the crew before proceeding to bed.
D. Immediately get Garrus’s status report before entering the shower and cleaning the wounds yourself. Talk to Lily and take the fall for the events that occurred in the woods. Eat whatever meal is prepared then proceed to sleep.
