by Calista Skye
And the idea of getting naked here and now is pretty attractive. Xark’on has done nothing but protect me and give me food and shelter. I have no reason to not trust him, and letting him see his first naked woman is an idea that turns me on. And he did see most of the merchandise when I was hanging upside down in that damn trap of his. I suppose he should be allowed to see it the right way up, too.
I slip my dress over my head before I get a chance to think the thought to death and change my mind.
I tiptoe across the pebbles, noticing that Xark’on isn’t splashing around anymore.
He’s probably looking at me, but that’s part of the point. Just a little reward for his protection before I go home.
I tiptoe into the water and keep going until it’s up to my hips, and then I swim a few strokes, enjoying the cool water. I haven’t swum for I don’t even know how long. Long before I came to Xren, certainly.
It took me forever to learn to swim when I was a kid because everything would scare me, especially getting water in my nose and drowning. So, I was nine when I finally learned. And then my mother could hardly get me out of the water. Any pool or beach nearby, and I would spend all day in the water until my face was blue.
I turn over on my back and calmly do the backstroke to the other shore, feeling Xark’on’s eyes on me. Then I do a quick crawl back again, enjoying mastering something. It’s been a good while since I had that feeling. But I’m actually pretty good at swimming.
I find the bottom with my feet and stroke my hair back with both hands.
Xark’on is staring at me. Hey, I expected that he’d look, but this is a little intense.
“See something you like?” As the words leave my lips, I want to kick myself. Gods, what a slutty thing to say!
“Yes,” Xark’on replies. “How do you make your way through the water like that?”
“The swimming?” I don’t think it can be that. The other cavemen can swim okay, I’ve been told.
“Svimn?”
“Swimming. When you make your way through the water fast. Like a fish. Like I did. It’s called swimming.” I’m using the cavemanese word, but I guess his tribe doesn’t use it.
He comes closer, walking under the water. “How did you know how to do it?”
“I learned it. When I was a kid. Lots of people can do that where I come from. You can’t?”
“I can’t,” he says with an honesty I’d not have expected from a guy like him on Earth. “Is it possible for me to learn?”
He’s pretty close now, and through the clear water, I can see the wobbly outline of something very large at his crotch. The breath catches in my throat from having him so close and so naked.
“Yes,” I croak and clear my voice. “Yes. Anyone can learn that.”
“Now?”
He’s so serious, and his boyish eagerness makes me want to smile. But how do I do this, exactly? It’s not like I can help him up if he drowns. Of course, the pond isn’t all that deep.
I’m acutely aware of my nakedness. And his. But he’s never asked me for anything. This is the least I can do for him.
“If you want.”
He looks at me expectantly, towering over me like a mountain of muscles.
I guess I’ll teach him to swim.
“Okay,” I say as confidently as I can. I’ve never done this before. “So, first you want to realize that you actually do float in water. You won’t sink. So lie back like this.”
I put my head back and let my legs float up so I’m floating with my arms out. “See?”
He’s getting a decent look at my chest, but that’s okay. If it helps him pay attention, it’s all good.
He puts his head back and kicks both feet into the air. Immediately, his upper body sinks to the bottom so just the legs are sticking straight up.
And then he just stays like that.
“No, no!” I say and grab hold of his huge hand under the water, trying to pull it up while also pushing his legs back down. “Come up, now!”
He kicks his legs uselessly in the water, splashing me down, and then his head emerges from the depths, coughing and spluttering. “Like that?”
“Um. Something like that,” I say, trying to not look at his crotch. “It was a good first try. Now lie back slowly and let your feet just float up all by themselves. Don’t kick, just gently help them. Keep your arms out to the sides.”
He does and goes as rigid as a board, then floats on the surface for a second, during which I get a fantastic and totally unashamed look at his manhood, which is every bit as sensational as the girls have assured me. Then, he slowly sinks down to the bottom like a green-striped Titanic with a gigantic hard-on for a funnel.
I grab his hand again and pull him up.
“There should be some movement, maybe,” I suggest. “Let’s try the other way. Try to keep your head above the water.”
I calmly push myself forward into a breaststroke, keeping my legs still, just using my arms. “See? You use your arms like this.” I demonstrate. “And keep your head above the water at all times.”
He gives it a shot.
I scratch my head. “Okay. Good! Now, the legs shouldn’t really be scraping along the bottom. Try to make them float up behind you. And the head really should be above the water. So that you can breathe. Did you see what I did with my arms? Like this. Notice that my hands are not fists.”
He tries again and once more comes up gasping for air. If this pond had been two feet deeper, he would be long dead by now.
“Yes!” I say to encourage him. “That’s much better. Now, attempt to keep your hands under the water. They should stay under at pretty much all times. And straighten out your legs. Just let them float behind you, don’t curl them over your head. Also, the head… Are you able to angle it a little back? Show me. Just tilt your head back, looking at the sky… Yes, so you can do it. Try to do that while swimming so that your head is over the surface.”
Another attempt.
“Good! Nice. You don’t actually have to look up at the sky all the time. See, you just want to look forwards. You can use your arms a little slower, too. Much slower, actually. While keeping your face over the water. Over it.”
It takes us a good half hour before he gets the main points. He’s not afraid of the water. He just needs to learn and coordinate the movements. When I decide that we’re done, he’s panting hard and his cock isn’t stiff anymore. But I’m as horny as I’ve ever been. Seeing such a strong and well-equipped man really using his body and throwing himself into learning something new is a much nicer experience than I would have expected. He’s stiffening again, and it’s all I can do not to reach out to feel his hardness in my hand. How would that alien cock feel in my mouth?
Or my pussy? Gods, I haven’t had anything there for a long fucking time. Nothing here on Xren, of course. And before that, the antidepressants kind of removed my urges. I decide not to calculate how long it’s been. Or who it was. That would just make me sad.
I finally have Xark’on swim a circuit of the pond, and he manages it with tolerable skill. I wonder how many young men on Earth would have been able to learn something physical from a slightly younger woman without going through all kinds of ego-saving bullshit along the way. Xark’on just tried his best, made a fool of himself like we all do when we learn something new, got over that, and then mastered something important for the first time.
I give him a very heartfelt grin. I’m proud of him. “Okay. Now you can swim. Well done!”
“Thank you,” he pants, out of breath. “I think it can be useful. Especially for traversing a volume of water.”
“Yes,” I agree. “For traversing water. I think that’s pretty much what it’s for?”
“Ah.” Then his face brightens into a wide smile with teeth and fangs so white, the breath catches in my throat again. “And it’s fun.”
I grin, too. “Isn’t it, though?”
The relief at seeing him finally smile makes me follow a
sudden impulse, and out of nowhere I splash him right in the face.
Aghast, I immediately regret it. “Oh, I’m so sor—”
He splashes me right back with such force that some water goes up my nose, and the spray pushes me backwards.
Then he stands there with his hands on his hips and a smirk on his face. “More lessons? But I already knew this one.”
“Yes,” I splutter and cough, wiping the water and hair out of my face, relieved that he’s not offended. “So I see. Maybe you can teach me? See, I only know this...” I splash him again, weakly. “Whereas you did something like this.” I use both hands and head as much water as possible into his face.
“Yes, very good,” he coughs, water running down his face and his cock standing at attention again. “But try to do more like this.”
Nown he uses both hands and sends me a floodwave that knocks me off my feet and sends me floating backwards. I find the bottom with my feet, coil up, and then shoot towards him under the water and push his chest with both hands before I stand up and see him slowly fall backwards like a tree falling in the woods, not even trying to stop his fall, making a face as if he’s shocked.
It makes me laugh. And that feels so good that I laugh for a good while, splashing Xark’on and letting him splash me. I feel pretty safe with him, even naked.
I walk ashore ahead of him, wanting to reward him with a good look at my naked butt. He’s been the perfect gentleman to me, kind and protective. He went along with my horseplay, showing another side of him that I really liked seeing. And the persistent image of his cock in my mouth is hard to get out of my mind.
I put my dress back on while Xark’on fights to pull his pants on with his rock-hard manhood at full mast.
“A little problem there, warrior?”
“It will subside,” he growls. “It’s usually not like this. Something about you makes that happen.”
“Is it because I splashed you?” I’m still in a silly mood.
“No.”
“Maybe if you look in the other direction, it will forget me.”
“Very hard to forget,” he says with a short glance that makes me feel seriously attractive for the first time in ages.
But he turns around, and I sit down while we wait for his erection to go down.
This side of him is very nice, too. Extremely nice. He has an insanely broad back that’s all muscle and stripes and a number of scars, and it tapers down to his muscular butt in the most enticing way. Then his thighs widen out to tree trunks further down.
Sure, I made his cock hard by just existing. But he’s having quite an effect on me, too. His dark hair shines in the sun, and his hands are on his hips, his stance as calm as if he were a farmer surveying his fields.
I had an image of what he would be like when I was spying on him. And he’s turned out to be quite different but at the same time very similar. His personality is just as strong as I thought, but in a different way. And I had no idea he would be an artist, too. A tremendously gifted one. It must have taken him years to develop that kind of eye for his surroundings.
It must have been the same way he just learned to swim. Clumsily and totally wrong in the beginning, then quickly much better when he grasped the basics. There’s a humility and patience in this guy that I don’t think I’ve encountered before. He cares less about how something happens, just the outcome. That first part of his swimming lesson must have been a little humiliating for him, at least. But he powered through it. And in the end, he could swim.
I could learn to like a man like that. A lot.
I’m not attracted to cavemen, but now I think I just might be attracted to this one. He’s not really a caveman in any way. He doesn’t even live in a cave. He’s like a modern man who’s taught himself all kinds of cool stuff.
It takes him a good ten minutes before he’s able to pull his pants on and close the drawstring in the straining leather. I’m strangely proud that I have that effect on him. His effect on me is less obvious, but probably just as strong. I’m dripping, and it’s not just the water from the pond.
11
- Xark’on -
I’m finally able to pull my trousers on. Holy Ancestors, how embarrassing! But I have no control over it.
What is it about this woman that turns both my mind and body into turmoil? The longer she’s close, the more she attracts my eyes and my thoughts.
She makes me do undignified things, like a child. I haven’t played with water since I was a boy, and only in the shallow water in the creek at the village. But this time, it was even more enjoyable than back then.
Possibly that’s because Caroline was entirely bare. While her body is alluring enough with her garments on, it becomes ridiculously so when they fall. That chest has those twin protrusions, just like the shaman’s doll years ago. But that doll was made of wood and could not convey the gentle, perfect curves and the roundness and the obvious softness. Not to mention those large nipples—
No, I have to stop thinking about this. My trousers threaten to split at the front. And Caroline keeps sending anxious glances at it as we walk towards the jungle side by side.
I have a sudden insight. “There are no men on your planet?”
“Um. There are many men.”
“Oh. Many big villages.”
“Yes. Except we call them ‘cities’. And ‘countries’.” Her soft, bright voice is like the chirrups of a dreigi pup, except richer and more mature. And endlessly more resonant in my soul.
“Yet they could not protect you from the Plood.”
“That’s right. Just like your tribe could not prevent the Plood from stealing your women.”
It’s a good answer, turning my own disdain back on my tribe. She has an inner strength.
We enter the jungle, and now talking can only harm us, and she obviously realizes that.
I still feel as if in a dream. This part of the jungle is very familiar to me. I’ve hunted and walked here many times through the years. But now it seems entirely new to me. The smells and the plants and the trees—it’s as if I’m here for the first time. Because I’m here with a woman. A real one. Breathing and moving and talking.
It’s only just sunk in. Yesterday was so eventful that I had no time to think about it. I was in a daze all day and all night. Now, the wonder is starting to dawn on me. And it’s even more wonderful than I’d ever thought.
I thought she was helpless and just a burden. Now, I’m not so sure. That swimming thing she taught me could be useful. There are no large volumes of water near our village, but I’ve sometimes walked far in the jungle and come across very wide creeks that have stopped my progress unless I could somehow use a rope to swing across it. And once, I saw a very large surface of water that stretched as far as the eye could see.
In my minds’ eye, I can see images of Caroline on the grass, spreading her legs and opening that mysterious slit for me. So that I can slide my manhood in there—
The front of my trousers creaks like a tree about to break in a storm, a sound that travels far in the jungle. But these flashes of a naked Caroline in various positions are hard to keep away.
What am I going to do with her?
She wants to leave and go to her tribe. That seems to be less than ideal if she is to be the bait in my trap. Because surely that’s why she’s here. The Ancestors have given her to me for that purpose.
But now I wish they could have chosen something else. Anything else, almost. Being the bait in my trap will kill her, of course. And now I want her alive. Very much so. So much so that it aches in my whole chest when I think of her not being here and not breathing and not snoring softly in her sleep.
I want her to go to her tribe so that I can’t use her for bait. At the same time, I want her to stay so that she’ll be near me.
And I want the trap to be a success. Because the consequences of that will be a great triumph for me and for the tribe. A new future, so very bright, the future promised to us by the Ancestors.
Not just for me, but for my whole tribe. For Garx’on and Ever’an and Yru'zan. And all the others.
I will let the Ancestors decide. If she stays with me, then she’s indeed intended as bait. If she leaves, then she is not, and I have to find some other way to lure the mighty prey into my trap.
I glance behind me. She meets my gaze with a smile that’s less restrained than before. I can’t help but return it. Her teeth are blindingly white, and her hair shines like the sunrise. The skin of her face is smooth and round and perfect. It makes my heart jump in my chest to see her. I don’t think I could bear harming her.
But why would the Ancestors send her my way if not for me to use for the most important purpose there has ever been?
12
- Caroline -
Gods, he has a nice smile. So strong and manly and confident, with just a hint of boyish shyness. And I don’t blame him for that at all. I’m the first woman he’s ever seen, and he’s still finding his way around me.
That playtime we had at the pond was good for both of us. It brought us closer, and now his smile is a little wider and less tight than before.
I think mine probably is, too. It feels that way. I like smiling at him. And I haven’t smiled that much these past few months on this nightmare of a planet. So it feels good.
It also feels good to rest my eyes on his broad back and muscled legs.
He still walks in front and scouts for danger at all times. So do I, but only so I can alert him if something happens. I don’t have anything to defend us with. Those throwing stars are more dangerous to me than to any other creature. When we get back to his construction site, I’ll pick up my spear for the walk back to the cave.
The thought of leaving him and returning to my old life and the girls makes me sigh internally. Our situation is pretty grim. Our only hope is that Bune will somehow provide us with a way home. It’s not much of a hope.
Around Xark’on, I don’t have to think about that. Shit, his treehouse is amazing. When I was up there, the ordinary problems didn’t concern me.