The Lamb and the Shepherdess

As it extends the Mantis's penis darkens to a bright purple green and its head gleams with excitement. I guess it to be about nine inches in length and two and a half inches in circumference at its widest and I am suddenly very intimidated, but, I smile because I believe we can make this work. So I say:

"He's such a big happy boy!"

The Mantodean just stares at me. I stare back at him for a bit, and then I ask:

"What's your name?"

He tells me in his native tongue, but I don't understand him. I shrug and I look confused. He glances at the Mac, and then the Mac says the same thing. I laugh then and ask:

"How about I call you Mr. Right?"

The Mantodean nods. I kiss him deeply. He returns the kiss with a similar controlled vigor. Feeling the hard smoothness of them, I think of his teeth and I fear for my tongue. It must feel to him like one of the big squirmy maggots he likes to eat back home. I remember that it is my dream, so I know he won't bite me.

"Fine then Mr. Right." I say as I glance down at his Mr. Happy, "Let me demonstrate for you an actual earthly sexual practice and you can tell me if the rest of the universe rejects it too."

With that, I slide down to my knees and his long snake dick swivels to face me. It smiles, I mean really smiles or at least the mouth his Mr. Right's urethra and it is horizontal. Still, the head of his dick seems to stare at me. I decide to lean in one direction and then another and the thing follows me. I want to look up into Mr. Right's face, but I'm not sure I want to take my eyes off his serpentine cock either.

Slowly, I reach my hands up, caress Mr. Right's smoothly cased testicles, run my fingers along the base of his snake's shaft, and then grip his cock, letting my fist rise higher and higher up the chubby snake until I have him around the neck. I take a lick, like I'm a snake too and my mantis man jumps with surprise. I look up at him. He's staring at me. His chest is heaving, and his knuckles are a slightly lighter olive black as he digs his fingers into the ends of the arm rests.

"Sorry." I tell him, "I'll be gentler."

So I take him into my mouth with the greatest of care. He's still quivering, but as I give him the blow job of his life, learning that he really likes it when I run the tip of my tongue back and forth along his smile, I can hear my Mr. Right uttering something in his native language, which is sounding to me more like melodiously bass toned digital dolphin like moans and sighs of pleasure. Presently, I can feel that I'm bringing my big bad mantis to the brink, so I stop giving him head, and then I climb back onto his lap.

"How was that?" I ask him as I kiss my way up the side of his neck.

"That," says Surry, pausing, "was extremely comforting. It made me realize that it is truly unfortunate that our species does not have tongues."

"Oh my," I say between deep kisses, "that is too bad. I wonder Mr. Right, would you like to let your, genital member now feel the inside of my pussy?"

The Mantodean pulls back a little and says:

"But what if you become-"

"Pregnant?" I laugh, "Oh hell no baby! You're so silly. We're entirely different species! That ain't ever gonna' happen. Give me that cock big boy."

I was so damn juicy by then, and our thighs were so drenched with my girl lube, I almost slipped off my man, but he caught me by the ass and held on tight while I guided his big snake into myself, which sent Mr. Right into a new wave of shivers. So then I put my arms around him, I filled his mouth with my tongue, and I rode my off-world stud like there was no tomorrow. I felt fucking awesome. His mantis dick was so up inside me, coiling, dancing, squiggling around, I was feeling friction where I'd never felt it before. I began to shiver, and I had to stop kissing him because I was very much on the verge of coming that I couldn't help my head going back. My eyes were way up into the back of my head and Mr. Right was convulsing like he had epilepsy. Still, his cock stayed right where I put it and it wiggled and squiggled until I too came to convulse and writhe and scream and shudder and whimper and clench my noonchie around that mother fucker until I felt his mantis jizz shoot like a steaming geyser and then spill out of me in great spurts, once, twice, thrice and then three times more, each shot with less and less intensity, until we were both spent.

"Oh my god! Oh my god! Right baby! You fuck like an animal!"

I'm panting. Sweat is pouring down my body. I look at Right. His head is back, way back. I give him a minute.

"Right baby? You okay honey?"

Slowly, the mantis raises his head again and faces me.

"I am well."

"Good." I say, and then kiss him again and again on his mouth.

"Now," I say, meeting his gaze and still trying to catch my breath, "you wanna stick that huge snakey cock in my ass?"

2

"Hmm, and then what happened?" asked Dr. Savage.

I was still off in la la land, so I didn't really hear her question at first. But then, my alter Molly, the easiest going and able to cross the brain mirror substrate divide repeated it to me.

"Huh, oh, uh, well, Mr. Right refused me."

"He refused you." Said Savage, tilting her head slightly so that she was looking over her glasses at me.

"Yes. He declined my proposition. Like he said, the only carbon-based entities that dig doing it in the butt are the one third of individuals on this planet that, you know, are into taking it in the ass."

Savage eyes me, thinking, thinking for more than a few seconds, looks away slightly to the right, and then writes something down on her pad. It's true. I have a fetish for alien species, but that's not why I get AC therapy on occasions during my awake life. Aliens making me hot is still one of my secrets. Anyway, it used to be called xenophilia, but now it's known as exophilia and you can find it on the web like you can find everything else on the web, so as far as I'm concerned, it's quite okay to be an exophilic.

"Well," resumes Savage after she clears her throat, "you describe the Mantodean as your therapist. Can you explain the significance of that?"

I squint a little at her. Then I look off in the genuine, I'm not lieing, for real, direction, which they say is the right, and then I shrug, face her again and say:

"Nope. I have no idea. But, that's why I thought I should tell you about the dream."

Savage stares at me. It's weird. I mean, she's not staring really hard, but she's staring like my face is supposed to be telling her something about me or the dream that my words didn't. So then I look at her like she's weird and she changes topic.

"Let's go back to our conversation about what you want to achieve from therapy."

I look off to the right for a second and I think about how I'd like to achieve another orgasm so I can continue to help keep the Earth in its orbit, but that's what I told her during my last session and it hadn't gone over very well.

"Uh, I don't know." I say to Savage, and then I look down at my hands on my lap and watch myself start to do my knuckle tapping counting ritual, 1 2 3 4, 4 3 2 1, 1 2 3 4, 4 3 2 1.

"Then let's try to organize priorities so that we can form your approach toward managing what you want to achieve." Said Savage, her tone calm and her words measured.

Honestly, I don't know why Mr. Right was a therapist in my dream. I suppose Aurelia Savage thinks I'm attracted to her or to other women. However, not to be rude, but the good doctor is on the homelier side of old. She is a frump in her long skirt and frilly blouse. Her complexion and gravity's effects on her face I thought put her at about seventy-five. She has these big bags under her eyes and her hair is snowy white. No, not pretty.

Still, that is not to say that she is an unremarkable person, because she is very much the opposite . Savage was recommended by my son's pediatrician, Monica, who is also great because she treats Sean the way he should be treated, like a human being and not like a collective of multiple disabilities. Yes, I have a son and he is the love of my life. He'll be coming up in the conversation later.

Anyway so, Savage exudes confidence and selflessness. I say she exudes these qualities, but really, you can see them. Her eyes are this open sea blue that hold wisdom, like her intelligence is a huge iceberg inside her brain and her eyes are like these two bright blue blow torch flames that can melt the ice into practical kernels of advice. And then there's her posture. Instead of that old lady slump and crook neck, Savage's back is straight, like there's a much younger frame inside of her supporting the atrophying muscles, crinkled tissue papering skin and loose jowls . She makes me feel like she can help me, if only I'd cooperate and open up a little more.

"We established that you are experiencing a series of obsessive compulsions, dissociative identity, haphaphobia and anxiety over your extreme vasocongestion. In a review of your case files, I was able to glean that you have undergone a few sessions of hypnosis, during which you were able to provide your therapist at that time with descriptions of your alters and what personality traits they exemplify or serve as proxy for because you are unable or unwilling to demonstrate those personality traits in social contexts.

She goes silent. I listen. I tap and count my knuckles. 1 2 3 4, 4 3 2 1 I tapped, and then stopped because it was a good time to stop because I would have switched hands, which also meant that it was a good time to return my attention to my new therapist.

"You have shown in the past that you care about getting better." Says Savage.

"Yes." I said, nodding.

"Okay. So then Charlotte, can you arrange these problems from most to least severe."

I looked at Savage. The waiting in her eyes is so huge, like she could do it for hours and hours if she needed to. I looked away. I thought about tapping my fingers again. I thought of excusing myself to go to the bathroom so that I could rub off another good one because it would be really hot to polish my noonchie in the ladies room, but there likely wouldn't be enough paper towels and toilet paper to sop up my gallons of vaginal sweat. I could find the custodian and ask for a mop. Oh god no. Finally, I thought about thinking an alter to the surface, maybe a mild one like Molly or Roberta, but what I quite suddenly decided to say was:

"It was boys that aroused my enthusiasm when I was in my early teens and trying to have lots of sex with boys, unfortunately, were the reasons why my extreme vasocongestion became something to be depressed about. Then I had Sean, and everything changed. That was when my OCD chaining behaviors started, which then led to my haphophobia, so I started to be afraid of being touched by anybody for any reason, which worsened my OCD and basically allowed for the flood gates of my identity disorder because I think I made my brain need a bunch of alters to help me manage my life with Sean and all of my chaining behaviors."

With that out, I met Savage's gaze. Nothing. I swear to goodness, I bet I could wiggle my fingers right up into those eyes and she wouldn't flinch. I looked away again and let her process what I said. Then I was at it again, my knuckle tap and count chain, 1 2 3 4, 4 3 2 1, 1 2 3 4, 4 3 2 1. Before a minute passed, I could hear Savage writing on her pad.

"Charlotte," which of your day to day responsibilities, whether they are for yourself or Sean or for your obsessive compulsion, would you say exhausts you the most?"

I brought my knuckle tap and count to a good stopping point again, and then I thought about it. I thought about what I want to say and what I think Savage wants to hear. Then I checked my phone. I didn't have to be anywhere but here. Then I got a tickle in my noonchie and I tried to ignore it, but it wouldn't go away. I looked up. There was Savage, staring, hands folded on her pad, her pen resting in the crotch of her right thumb and fore finger. I clenched my thighs tight around my noonchie. I had to tell her something, but how do you tell somebody something when you're afraid to talk, afraid to say something you'll regret?

"Tell me about Sean, your son?"

"Uh, okay."

"How old were you when you had him?"

"I was, fifteen."

"Did you have enough support at the time, parents, boyfriend, friends?"

"Sean's father was there, for a while."

"And?"

"And, he left, just took, off."

I don't look at her when I say this.

"And your parents?"

I close my eyes and take a deep breath and I want to leave to go pick up Sean from school and help him play games on his tablet.

"My dad died when I was six. My mother was helpful for a short while, and then she left, too. I mean, she didn't die. She just left."

"You have no contact with her still?"

My eyes still closed, I slowly wag my head and I can hear Savage jot another note.

"Tell me," she asks, "about your relationship with Sean. He is now, what, you are twenty-two, he is then eight?"

I open my eyes and I meet Savage's gaze, which suddenly seems a little different, a little less serious and concerned.

"Sean, is amazing!" I say, "He's my hero. Sean's grown up to be such a champ. I mean, it was really scary for me at first, his respiratory distress syndrome, bronchopulmonary Dysplasia, breathing apnea, patent ductus arteriosus, hydrocephalus, necrotizing enterocolitis, cerebral palsy, missing three of his fingers and the inability to eat without a tube or to be toilet trained. But, there's not anything to be afraid of anymore, you know? Sean's happy and, well, healthy. I, I just love my Sean to pieces. He's my angel, my big boy, my little man."

I finish and that's when I realize why Savage's expression changed. I was smiling. Well of course I was. I was telling her about my baby Seany Sean.

"So Sean's joining you in the world was difficult because you were afraid for him."

"Well yeah, of course! I mean, it's only been like two years now since I've been sleeping in my own room. Up until then, I'd been sleeping in Sean's room, on the floor next to his formula racer bed. Still though, I keep the video monitor right there next to me, so if I hear something I can open my eyes right away and he'll be the first thing I see."

"So, you're still afraid."

I frown and just briefly glance away, and then say:

Sure, I worry about him still. But, I'm a mom, you know? That's what I'm supposed to do. I love him more than anything. He's my baby. Kids like Sean are very very fragile, and they, well, they die. No matter how advanced medical care has become, they can die, just like that. It makes a mom, afraid. I mean, it happens all the time. It's a very terrible and sad thing. Doctors and medical technology, they do great things to make precious sick little babies survive their first month in the world, but they can enter the world still significantly messed up and, well..."

I look at my therapist. I take measured breaths, and then avert my gaze from the woman because I know it. She sees what I'm thinking and, being caught, pegged by a person that seems to really give a shit, keeps me right where I am. There is silence for a while. I expect Savage will break the silence with "and well what," but she doesn't. Now my knuckles itch and I want to scratch them. So I do, and then I want to tap and count them again, but Savage gets my attention by saying:

"Charlotte, I want you to ask yourself why you can't forgive yourself for not having any control over the unknown."

A fresh silence ensues, and it is longer, much longer.

"Because, it's extremely obvious to me that you want to forgive yourself. In fact, you seem to admire the unknown. I mean, you even go so far as to fantasize about it, and I wouldn't be surprised if you were masturbating about it all the time."

"Wait. What?"

"How often do you masturbate?"

"Uh, once in the morning, once after lunch, and then once at night before bed."

"Which might be normal for a great many people, for a while, though it's ultimately, not socially or psychologically sustainable. Because, for you Charlotte, if you didn't have your other chaining behaviors, I would venture to say that you would be masturbating so much more often than you do."

"But, it's only three times a day."

"Uh-huh, and you never do it once a day or twice a day or you never skip a day, yes?"

What's wrong with me? No, what's wrong with her?

"But, I only do it three times a day. How else can I keep the planet safe?"

"Charlotte, the whole of Earth is not your obligation to protect. Do you say that to anyone else in your life?"

I avert my gaze and I feel too angry to tap and count.

"And may I ask," Savage continued, "are you aware of whether any of you alters masturbate when they assume your consciousness?"

I turn red and I think of Dirty Little Slut. She's bad. She's very bad. I feel like I'm in trouble. I feel like I've made a big big mistake and I have to fix it. I have to get right home and chain everything I do when I get back home. I grab my purse and stand up.

"Charlotte, you have twelve minutes left. Won't you stay and use them? Wouldn't you risk the world getting out of sync if you leave now?"

I stop and turn to face Savage and I hope she can see that I feel like I hate her, even though I don't really hate her because she's so smart and caring, but she can probably see the whole little dilemma playing out on my face. God, she's good. Bitch.

"I don't need you to be patronizing, you know." I tell her.

"I do know. You're right. I'm sorry."

I stand there. Eventually, I pull my phone back out of my perse and I read that my twelve minutes has become eleven minutes. That means I have nineteen minutes before I have to be at the apartment to get Sean off his school bus. I check my home surveillance app and I see that all of the plants in the living room are breathing just fine without me being there. I tuck the phone back into my purse and I notice the note I brought along, the one I wrote right after I'd woken up from having the dream. I finally sit back down, take out the note and unfold it. I read it again and I think about what Savage said about my alters having fun without me, at my expense. But the thing is, it was my dream. I drew from my memory, and then I wrote these words down.

"Is something wrong?" asks Savage.

I shrug, glance at Savage, and then look back down at the note.

"It's just, I came out of the dream and wrote this."

"Would you like to read it to me?"

Again, I met her sensitive, assessing gaze. If she was my Mantodean therapist, I would be able to see my sadness and consternation reflected in his big beautiful black eyes. Again I shrugged, and then proceeded to read.

"The complexity of chaos is sensitive dependence on initial conditions, Bifurcations that are as subtle as they are catastrophic . Disequilibrium is the source of life. Matter is born of chaos. Order is born of void. chemical composition results. Spontaneous production of chaining protein enzymes is inevitable. All sexually reproducing eukaryotic organisms derive from a common ancestor cell. All living cells possess a cell wall, the ability to maintain and expand the cell wall, the ability to draw in and process externally free-floating molecules of nutriment in order to create energy and the ability to split itself to reproduce."

After I finish, I glance at Savage. Her fingers are steepled under her chin, the pen is poking out from the right and her all-knowing eyes seem to be saying "well well well." Presently, the silence breaks with Savage taking a breath, though it sounds like a little laugh.

"Whoever wrote that," she says, " must enjoy philosophy, evolutionist theory and molecular biology. Are you interested in those things?"