A Tentacle Romance Novella

Nomy hesitated before beginning to speak, with a halting cadence she'd never heard from him speaking his own native language. Maybe he was nervous too? She wondered who the woman might be to him, and fought down the urge to interrupt and ask what was going on. Even as she contemplated it, the woman cut Nomy off herself, launching into another flurry of rapid speech. Although she had no way of telling what conversation was about, she didn't get the impression this was an encounter Nomy had been looking forward to. She ran her hand along his tentacle in an attempt to comfort him... and the woman responded by jabbing a tentacle in her direction again, and raising her voice even further.

Nomy shifted his body, angling himself so that Melina was barely in the woman's view, but the conversation, or argument, whatever it was, carried on. Gradually, more people started to arrive, attracted by the noise. Not a crowd, as Nomy had said, but a scattering of watchers gathered around them. This obviously wasn't just an ordinary conversation, it was drawing in far more attention than Melina had on her own. She wanted to ask what was wrong, but there was no space to interject herself into the incomprehensible argument.

Eventually, after a drawn out pause which Melina thought was the other woman finally giving Nomy a chance to speak, he withdrew, apparently leaving her the last word. He raised his unoccupied tentacles, a gesture she'd never seen from him before, and turned so that Melina couldn't see the woman behind him as he left. It wasn't until they were out of view of all the onlookers that Melina finally felt free to speak.

"What was that?" she asked.

Nomy paused, longer than he had in response to a question since he'd first told her about the nature of his work.

"She was asking about you." he said.

"Well, I figured that much, everyone asked about me! Why was that a whole argument?"

"She thought you might be dangerous at first." he said. "It didn't take long to change her mind, but then she just thought that I was showing off bringing you into town. Because I finally had something to show for my research. She thought I was treating you like..." he trailed off.

"Like what?" she asked.

"She was very insulting." Nomy waved a tentacle. "She's always thought my work was pointless and dangerous. I thought since you showed up from another world, she might admit it wasn't so pointless after all, but instead she was more insulting than ever. Probably because she was afraid she'd look like she was wrong all along, she wanted even more for me to feel bad about myself."

Melina mulled over this.

"Did you maybe want her to see me when you came, so you could prove her wrong?"

No!" Nomy responded emphatically. "No, I didn't want to see her at all. I did want to prove her wrong, but I'd rather she'd heard from someone else without my ever talking to her."

He paused again. Melina thought he might have sighed, if Nomy ever sighed.

"I hate her." he said.

"You were right thought." Melina said. "Your work definitely wasn't pointless. If she was so convinced it was that she'd start an argument about it, that's her fault."

"It is." he agreed. "But still, it hurts because she wasn't completely wrong. I was showing off a bit. I wanted people to see you. Just not her."

"I think you deserve to show off a bit. If I had a major breakthrough in my work, I'd definitely want to be recognized for it."

"You think so?" he said. "It's not like I summoned you here. You did that yourself."

"That was a screw up." Melina said. "Your receiver worked properly though. You can feel good about that."

Nomy pondered that in silence for a while. He still seemed tense, so Melina reached out to stroke his trunk and comfort him. Eventually, he reached a tentacle around and patted her back.

"Yeah," he said. "I guess I do."

~~~

"Alright, try rolling it out, let me know if it's difficult."

Melina tugged on the cord connected to the roll of fabric Nomy had fastened to the top of the ceiling frame, pulling down a sheet with only modest resistance. Tying it down to a peg set into the floor, she finished walling off the makeshift "room" he'd set up for her.

Most of the goods they'd picked up in their trip into town had been basic supplies like food and fuel, but Nomy had made a point of picking up materials for some new accommodations around the house. Although he claimed not to be particularly expert at handicrafts, his designs and workmanship were all highly functional. His biggest obstacle was intuiting what sort of designs would best suit the needs of human anatomy; he'd been surprised to discover that Melina wasn't capable of climbing a rope to reach the tops of his furniture. At her suggestion, he'd designed a set of step ladders for her to reach the places she needed to, although there was a part of her which missed the loss of the excuse for him to pick her up.

The most significant addition though had been a partition to give her her own "room" inside his house. Even though Nomy was always prepared to give her space and privacy when she needed it, it made a huge difference emotionally to have an actual space to herself. And even if it was tiny relative to the actual scale of Nomy's house, the basic minimum accommodations he'd considered acceptable were still spacious compared to the suite she'd had back at the University. Apart from its cloth "door," a human-scale door with hinges being beyond Nomy's engineering means, it felt from the inside like a solid, permanent room, laid out with suitable approximations of human furniture.

"It looks perfect, thanks." Melina said.

"Alright. Let me know if you think of anything else at the last minute though. There's still about an hour before the sealing resin sets, so if I'm going to move anything around, it's easier to do it while I can still pop one of the walls off."

"I think it's got everything I need. Better than my old room back home, even."

"If you say so." Nomy said. She thought she picked up a bit of bashfulness in his response, although his emotions could still be hard to read sometimes.

Nomy left her to ease into her new accommodations, probably needing some space to unwind himself after the work he'd put in, so she took some time to simply relax. In some ways, the room actually was better than the one she'd had at home; it was better lit for one, equipped with a crystal which shone nearly like daylight, which she could turn on and off without the use of her own magic. The University would never have sprung for that sort of expense, even for high-ranking faculty.

On the other hand, she really could use a kitchen, or at least something capable of producing meals other than nutrient slurry. Nomy was probably making something for himself right now after his bout of manual labor, and he still seemed awkward with the knowledge that he was the only person in the house getting decent-tasting food.

It could be worse though. She took a look at one of her other new acquisitions, a full-length mirror, the first proper reflective surface she'd had since she came to this world. Apparently simple glass mirrors weren't unheard of among Nomy's people, but they lacked features essential to their vision, and weren't considered a household necessity, whereas she was getting tired of making do with the churning surface of Nomy's bath. Despite several weeks with nothing but Nomy's body wash in place of her usual suite of cosmetics, she thought she looked surprisingly good. It wouldn't hurt to have a proper comb, but she'd been doing her best detangling her hair by hand in the bath, and it looked like her efforts were holding up. More than that, she looked visibly healthy. Her skin had never really been bad, but years of staying inside most of the time, sleeping irregular hours and eating a diet which had honestly been more convenient than healthy hadn't exactly been the best for it either. Right now, it was probably the smoothest and clearest it had ever been. Enviable, even.

Wearing the same outfit day after day, and putting it through the wash so often, wasn't doing it any favors though. Her laboratory robes were thick and durable, but the rest of her clothes were starting to get a little threadbare. Not that anyone in Nomy's world was likely to have an opinion on her clothes one way or another. She took them off. Taking a better look at her figure, she could see that as she'd suspected, she'd lost some weight. As far as she knew, the only scale in Nomy's house was the one for measuring ingredients in his alchemy lab, and while it was big enough to accommodate her, she had no idea how to convert units on it. But considering that was where all her food was coming from, it was no wonder she'd slimmed down a bit since her arrival It looked like she'd finally gotten back the sort of figure she'd had years ago, before she started living at the University.

Looking at her own reflection, with no one next to her to show how tall she was, she could feel good about her own appearance. Plenty of people had definitely thought she was pretty at least, even if a lot of them found her stature intimidating. But of course, the last thing Nomy would ever think of her as was "tall."

Could he find her at all attractive? The most likely answer there was "no." For all that humans might have a universal appreciation for the human form, that probably didn't apply to a life form whose body scheme was closer to a tree. But then, even if he didn't look anything like what she would have envisioned as "handsome" before she came here, there was still an aesthetic quality to his body which she could appreciate. Maybe more the way she'd appreciate a scenic landscape than a good-looking human, but he was definitely appealing to look at. Or maybe rather than a landscape, it was more like looking at a beautiful animal like a tiger. At least he shared the qualities of being strong, graceful, and having pretty colors. But it seemed unfair to compare someone as intelligent as Nomy to an animal. And his big, soulful eyes were expressive even compared to a human's.

Maybe she might seem like a pretty animal to him then, like a housecat or a bird. He obviously saw her as a person, rather than a pet, but that might be the sort of appearance she'd have to him.

Would she want him to feel differently though?

Maybe. It was no wonder that she'd lost it for the first few weeks in a new and unfamiliar world, but now that she felt secure enough in her place here, and probably healthier than she'd been in years besides, she was starting to recognize the stirrings of desire. Not just for companionship and connection, but in a rawer, more physical way. She'd catch hints of it when she saw Nomy building things, with those dexterous, impossibly strong limbs of his. More than hints, really, when he'd hoist her so effortlessly into the air. It probably wasn't honest then to think that she was only feeling desire in the abstract, targetless sense of having an awakened libido.

But there was no reason to think that Nomy could feel the same way. There might be a part of her which was drawn to tall, strong men, to that feeling of being protected and cared for, which Nomy certainly appealed to despite his inhuman shape. But what could she be to him in return? A tremendous inconvenience, for one thing. She'd done practically nothing but make work for him since she'd arrived. No, even "practically nothing" was an understatement. He had to build accommodations into his home simply for her to navigate his house unaided.

Besides, there was no getting past the other fundamental disparity in their relationship. She was stranded in a world without a single other member of her species. He wasn't. It felt unfair to ascribe "last man in the world" appeal to Nomy, but even so, it was one thing she certainly didn't have going for her.

As attuned as he was to her feelings, Nomy could already have noticed those flickers of attraction. But with all the times he'd picked her up or held her, he'd given no sign of acknowledging them. Far from reciprocating, he probably didn't even recognize or comprehend them.

But then, if she was being realistic, that was probably for the better. Feeling wistful, and more than a little ashamed, Melina dressed again, sat down at her new desk, and began to work.

~~~

"Alright, I'm bringing it back now." Nomy cut the flow of mana to the circle and let the failsafe activate. With an unceremonious popping noise, the probe, a small, transparent orb, reappeared in the center of the circle.

"Looks good." Melina said. "Fully intact and unexploded."

"If you've got any doubts about whether you might get blown up, definitely let me know before you step in the circle yourself."

"Well, I managed to get myself here in one piece," Melina said. "I trust you to be able to manage it."

"Let's not get ahead of ourselves before we analyze the data from the probe though. Even if it's definitely your own world, we can't be sure you'll end up at the same place you left. I want to make sure we can rule out your ending up somewhere so unsafe that you wouldn't be able to come back if necessary."

For all the novel work it had taken, Melina was astonished they'd managed to get to this point so quickly. Since the information of her original summoning spell had been stored in Nomy's beacon when she first arrived, they'd been able to avoid the trouble of recreating her work from scratch, but more importantly, it had also given them a basis to work from to translate a known summoning function into a system Nomy was familiar with. With his help not only with the actual construction of the spell, but the necessary theoretical work for a reversed summon which would locate a specific world based on the magical signature of an inhabitant, they'd come up with a working spell in a fraction of the time she'd expected.

Practically speaking, she could step into the circle right now and very probably end up safely in the middle of whatever the University had made of her old lab space, but after the way her last summoning attempt had gone, she wasn't taking any chances. And after months in Nomy's world, she wasn't sure she'd actually be able to use magic again immediately in her own world without time to readjust to the native flow. Better to take every possible precaution before actually making the leap.

"I should be able to go over it all by tonight." Nomy said. "I'll want you to look over it in the morning to check all the results and make sure it points to a safe destination for you. But if everything checks out, then any time after that, you should be able to, you know..."

"Are you sure you don't want me to go over it with you?" Melina asked.

"Thanks, but it'll go faster if I do it all in one shot instead of translating it piece by piece. I don't want either of us to not get any sleep before tomorrow." he said.

"Well, if you're sure."

Having Nomy do this step by himself at the last moment felt a bit lonely, but he wouldn't just put her off for no reason. Besides, they'd have plenty of time to talk tomorrow. It wasn't as if she was in a rush to leave as soon as possible. Maybe he had preparations he wanted to make on his own. She left him to his work and took some time to relax by herself for a while before deciding to turn in early.

Despite her best efforts, it was impossible to sleep. Her mind churning with thoughts of home, and of her time here coming to an end, she was too agitated even to stay in bed. Tomorrow, she was finally going to leave this world behind. She'd return to her own world, where... would her position at the University still be open? Would she be famous for her unexpected breakthrough? For returning alive from another world? Although that had nothing to do with her own resourcefulness and everything to do with the fact that Nomy had been there to help her.

Or maybe something unexpected would go wrong again, and instead of making it home, she'd simply die somehow.

No, that couldn't happen, could it? She and Nomy were checking each other's work, and they weren't on a deadline this time. Their precautions were much more extensive than they'd been when she sent herself here, and Nomy wouldn't tell her to go if he thought it wouldn't be safe.

But, either way, tomorrow would probably be the last time she'd see him. Whatever she said to him then would be her last words to him, ever. What could she possibly say? Even now, with nothing but time to think, the right words wouldn't come to her. It didn't feel like she could possibly say enough.

She picked up a handheld light crystal, pulled up the cloth doorway to her room, and began the long walk in the dark to Nomy's lab.

As usual, he'd left the door open for her; he'd long ago stopped closing doors in his house for her benefit. But inside, he was nowhere to be seen. She called his name. No response. She picked up her pace to a jog, heading for Nomy's room. The months she'd spent wandering this huge space had left her in much better shape than when she'd first arrived, but it still took a while for her to reach it. She expected to find him sleeping, his tentacles twisted together above him like an unblossomed flower, but when she scanned the room with her light, she couldn't see any sign of him. She called for him again, without answer.

Where was he? His house was quiet, if he was at work somewhere, she should probably have heard him while she was wandering. It would take a long time for her to cover the whole house on foot, but he should still be able to hear her if she raised her voice. She did, calling out his name in the hallway.

Still, no response.

He'd never ignored her calling for him before. Maybe if he was asleep... but he wouldn't just fall asleep somewhere outside his own room. So he was probably somewhere he couldn't hear her. Which meant he was outside.

Melina jogged down the hallway to the entrance to Nomy's house. The door was open, just a crack, too heavy for her to move but just wide enough to squeeze through. She slipped outside. If Nomy hadn't shut the door behind him, he wouldn't have gone far.

When she stepped out into the night air, a haunting sound reached her ears. A deep crooning sound, almost at the limits of her hearing. Not quiet, but too deep to tell what direction it was coming from.

She called out for him again. Still no answer, but the crooning noise continued.

She held up her light and scanned her surroundings. She caught sight of a silhouette, maybe his size and shape, but it was impossible to be sure in the distance. She set out running towards it.

"Nomy!?"

She thought she saw the figure move, but still, no answer. She kept running towards it. As she approached the dark shape, the crooning sound became louder. Her heart already pounding, her thoughts suddenly flashed back to the creature she'd encountered on her first day in this world, the one Nomy had saved her from. There was no guarantee she was safe out here. Still, the closer she came to the figure, the more it looked like Nomy's shape. She kept running.

"Nomy!?" She reached the base of the figure, the light in her hand clearly illuminating Nomy's body. But for the first time as she approached him, she couldn't see his eyes looking back at her. The crooning sound was coming from him. As she placed her hand against his trunk, along with the familiar warmth of his body, she felt the deep rumbling reverberating against her palm. She rested her weight against him as she caught her breath.

"Nomy, what are you doing out here?"

The sound continued, and he didn't answer, but he reached a tentacle down, brushing it against her shoulder, acknowledging her presence.

"Nomy?"

She still couldn't see his eyes, so she circled around his body, but they were shut on all sides. She put her hand on him again.