Lydia's Run

"Where we went as children."

I glanced dome-ward to be sure no drones were hovering.

"You shouldn't go there." I said with a resignation.

"I know you meet the Disses there. I wish you wouldn't."

"They're not there now. It'd just be me and you."

I looked about. Other citizens were just happy with their allocated lives. Smiling and talking. Drinking, eating, and enjoying the company of their friends. I wondered if it was only us that felt the starvation of bodily pleasure. Perhaps Protector was right to refuse our breeding requests. Perhaps we were faulty.

"Are the pictures still there?" I asked.

"Yes."

I considered that for a moment, seeing the images of primitive men and women in my mind doing things I could only dream of.

"Ever think what we found down there is why we're the way we are?"

"What do you mean?" Amelie looked confused.

"Everyone else looks content. You and me...Well."

Amelie touched my arm comfortingly.

"How are you not content? Don't I please you?"

"Yes. Of course, you do."

My hand went up to hers and held it in place against my arm reassuringly.

"But we're not content with our lives. Or our pleasuring. Not like everyone else."

Too late I realized Amelie had led me into a trap.

"Perhaps you're right. Perhaps those old pictures revealed a truth about us they've never suspected existed in themselves. Perhaps they don't know what it is to..." She lowered her voice and leaned closer.

"To fuck for pleasure. To cum."

I looked at her.

"Neither do we. Not really. We never will."

"Come to the secret place." She said again.

I turned my attention back to the stage. The singers had been replaced with an illusionist. An XX that combined sensual movement of dance to utilize the full space while performing a variation of the linking rings trick. This version involved giant hoops artistically manipulated by stepping through or twirling them around the body, intermittently linking or unlinking the seeming solid rings.

Behind him, the curtain of fountains that made a backdrop to the stage danced rhythmically to the accompanying music.

"Wouldn't you like to look at the pictures one more time? They're still there."

Why did she have to say that? What she suggested was forbidden and I hadn't risked it in many cycles. I did however long to see the pictures again. The stirring inside my garment left me rubbing my thighs together in betrayal of my thoughts. Amelie was watching, smiling.

"You do. Don't you?" She pushed.

I cursed my arousal.

"Okay. I'll go." I said finally.

I hadn't been down there in a long while. Part of the old tunnels under the city. The old city that ours had been built over.

Red oblong blocks of what appeared to be stone made up the walls. It was dusty and the surface crumbled at the touch. Grey lines of what I likened to glue separated them into a uniform patchwork pattern.

Cutouts that were once the windows of primitive buildings and even old lighting posts still in place betrayed this as part of a settlement trapped in time.

The floor was more familiar, at least visually. As in the City, it was tiled. But these were rougher underfoot, and cold. Nor did they subtly deform to comfort bare feet at each step. They were just large slabs of flat stone.

Above were more decaying constructions, arches, and the underside of old bridges, through which lay glimpses of the substructure for where everyone lived today. Long composite girders that stretched the width of the city. Part of a monocoque frame with the domes and buildings I was familiar with. In places, great supporting pillars had been thrust vertically through the ruins with destructive power and sunk deep into the ground.

"Why are we down here?" I asked once I was certain we were away from the monitoring systems of Protector. This was where we'd played as children after accidentally knocking a panel away from the wall to discover the hidden entrance. At the time, to our young minds, it'd been a great revelation. A secret known only to us. As a Mature I knew it to be an entrance made and disguised by dissidents. The Disses.

"I told you. To look at the pictures again."

Amelie kept on going. I knew she was heading for our secret place. We'd crept away to it many times before our Maturing Ceremony. Then we'd become productive members of society and I'd forced myself to behave for fear of punishment. If that is, dancing could be considered productive.

"And I want to explore an idea with you."

"Is anyone else down here?" I asked suspiciously.

Even as a child, I'd quickly realized this place was also a secret to others. As a Mature I knew what those others were. People who rebelled against the Protector and the rules of the city. People who it was dangerous to associate with.

It frightened me that Amelie did meet with those people. I'd asked her not to so many times. She still had and I generally ignored it, hoping she would never get too deeply involved, or make a mistake that would be picked out by the ever-monitoring Protector. The price could be... I forced the thought away.

Dust fell on my skin. Gritty and uncomfortable. I was unaccustomed to dirt.

"Amelie." I said again more urgently.

"I'm going back if any of your Diss friends are here."

"We're the only ones." She assured me.

"They don't come down here in the day phase.

I carried on, treading carefully as we walked. In the city, floors that appeared to be marble and stone formed around each footstep. Always warm and soft. Down here stone was rough. Hard and cold. It scuffed the skin on my feet and there was always the risk of standing on debris, something sharp. I'd cut the underside of my foot more than once as a child and cried so much. I was careful, watching where I stepped. I remembered the pain more clearly than I wanted to.

We reached a doorway. One I'd seen so many times, if not for a long while. It wasn't the smooth metallic of a city door or even one of the ornate ones used to decorate places of entertainment. This one was fashioned from a tree with a flaking red coating. It was rotten and crumbling but still just about passed for its intended purpose.

Amelie pushed it open, stiff hinges creaking, and we went inside the old room. I turned the light stick I was carrying to full and set it down. The dingy space was bathed in brilliant white light and I saw dust floating down from above caught in the beams.

On the wall, a peeling poster held a strange design. Colored lines in a weird pattern that meant nothing to me. I'd once thought it might be a map of the tunnels but not that I could understand it.

Even the purpose of the tunnels themselves had escaped us until one of Amelie's friends, a Diss, had told her it was an ancient transport system. Boxes of people being carried from one place to another at speeds much faster than a person could run.

"Would you like to know what it's like to breed? To fuck?"

Amelie said brazenly as she turned to me.

"To have your pussy filled by a cock?"

She threw one of the magazines we'd once giggled over onto the table in front of me.

"To be mutually pleasured by a Cis-XY? A man?"

I looked down at the picture. A blonde XX, a female with a figure more curvy than I'd ever seen in the city. Her breasts were full like two balloons hanging beneath her bent-forward frame. I was boyish in comparison. We all were. We weren't primitives like our ancestors. Behind her was a man.

He was like no XY I'd ever seen either. Males, our males, were... not that different from women. Smooth hairless bodies only without breasts and with narrower hips. This one though... was hairy, with wide shoulders and defined muscles. Even his jawline seemed more prominent. He was a masculine figure. Almost an animal. A man. Not the androgynous examples I saw daily.

And of course, there was his cock. A solid shaft, swollen and pointing out of that thicket of dark hair towards the girl's pussy. I felt myself becoming wet around the intruding graphene tube and I squirmed to alleviate the growing ache.

"Oh god yes.

You know I do. But I was refused a license. I can't."

I stared at the picture again trying to imagine what it would be like to have that cock thrust into me. How it would be to bend over like the girl and be fucked from behind by someone so powerful. My button burned at just the thought of it.

"And even if I could. No one looks like that."

"I've been talking to some people."

I looked up. I'd known this was coming.

"What people?"

"Just... some people."

"Oh god, Amelie. Not the Dissidents. I've begged you not to. If you get found out..."

"I won't."

She turned the page over and presented me with another picture. This time two girls. Both were free of Chastity garments and I could see clearly what a pussy looked like without any intrusion. Any, except the other girl's tongue inching its way towards that divine tender flesh.

I pushed my groin against the edge of the table making the ancient wood groan in protest at having its old joints strained. I couldn't even begin to imagine what that would feel like. Just the picture was making me want relief.

"Or if we could just do this?"

"Amelie." I sighed not wanting to hear anymore.

"They say there's a place where we can live like this. Free of controls. Free of this torture, where we can fuck who we want and breed freely."

"Without a license?"

"Without a license."

"There's no such place." I said sadly.

A beautiful dream. But that was all it was.

"There is.

Outside the city."

I looked at her in horror.

"Don't be silly. No one can live outside. The air..."

"It's a lie. Everything we've been told is a lie."

I could see she believed it and it frightened me. I shook my head.

"No. The Disses are the liars. If that were true then those people would be there. Not here filling your head with nonsense."

Amelie sat down and I found myself looking at her pussy. Or at least the area of her body not covered away from my eyes. I wished I could see and touch where that graphene tube invaded her. That I could push my face there and lick her just like the girl in the picture. I almost groaned with my rising frustration.

"They help people. People like us. They can help us get out and escape the Enforcers."

I subconsciously fingered my collar. It wasn't called a choker for no reason.

"Even if it were true. They'd turn our breathing off."

"They say they can remove those too. That we'd never need pay credits to breathe."

It all sounded alluring. Too good to be true.

"What's the point of breathing if the air is toxic? And what about the heat? The sun burns everything. It'd burn us.

The radiation peels your skin off. Don't you remember the schooling?"

"Only if it's true. Only if the world really is dead. But what if it isn't? What if we really could live as our ancestors did?

That's what they are telling me it's really like. They've been there. They've seen it."

I looked back at the magazine. The people in those pictures were beautiful. A fantasy. But they were also primitive. Barbarians who'd polluted the world with their ignorance and left it a barren cinder. I remembered the history lessons. Animals who burned black rocks and liquids from the ground and made the air unbreathable. Monsters that fought with terrible weapons that could destroy whole cities. They weren't evolved like us.

"You're mad. It's impossible. Those people you're talking to will get you switched off. The Enforcers won't just restrict your credits. They'll turn your breathing off for just thinking this.

I want to go back now."

"Lydia. Do you want to live as we do? Or like the people in these pictures?"

"They were primitive. We've evolved. We can't live like they did. And what did it achieve anyway? They destroyed a world and killed everything."

"It achieved pleasure."

Again the magazine was pushed toward me. I flicked through the pages. More pictures of exaggerated people engaging in mutual pleasure. All that bare flesh. Sensual-looking faces lost to enjoyment I could only imagine.

It left me feeling aroused again. A torment it was near impossible to ease. And never to the depth I needed. A tear of frustration formed in my eye and I quickly wiped it away.

Amelie stood behind me, pushing her frame tightly against my body. It felt good when her hand came around and caressed my tit. Kneading the soft mound before gently squeezing and tugging my nipple.

"Aw. Fuck."

"Imagine I'm that man behind you." She whispered, pushing between my shoulder blades. I leaned forward, over the table until my face was against it. I could see the picture. A primitive with his big, hard cock. Hair and muscles like an animal.

"Uhh."

Amelie was caressing my inner thighs, her hand moving up to my pussy and then into the crack of my butt.

My knees went weak as her finger pressed at my free hole.

"Amelie." I gasped.

"What are you doing?"

This was forbidden. We'd never once attempted this in the city. Protector would have known.

"It's in the pictures." Her voice was soft as she flicked a page and I saw the primitives. This time a female on her back with her legs held high and wide. I saw her pussy. But the male's cock wasn't in there. It was behind it, forced into her...

"Uhhh."

My eyes went wide and I gasped with shock as Amelie pressed her finger through my barrier.

"Now imagine if my finger was bigger. Deeper. Imagine if it was a hard cock forcing your butt hole open. Stretching your ass until it hurt."

She slid that digit in and out of me ever so slowly and my legs collapsed so only the table held me.

"Oh."

"How does it feel?"

"I... don't know."

I was fearful. Scared that she would damage me. Terrified that Protector could see us and would be less forgiving of matures breaking the rules.

"Tell me the truth."

"Oh fuck. It's wonderful."

It was. I couldn't think that it would be as good as my pussy being penetrated, but I knew her finger was only a thin layer of flesh from that place and I could feel it so strongly.

"Uhhh."

Her legs forced my knees apart and I spread my feet. Her finger slid in and out more purposefully. Forcibly, with her fist smacking into my butt.

"I'm fucking you." She whispered.

"Truly fucking you."

She was. Not the access point I so desired. Nor the body part I wished was inside me. But there was no doubt. This was fucking of a kind.

"Do it faster." I begged.

My mind was in turmoil as my body responded with more force than I'd ever known.

"Fuck. Fuck. Fuck."

I cried out with that forbidden word. At that moment I didn't care if Protector could see us. Only that it waited until I experienced where this was leading. To feel it just once. Then Protector could take my oxygen and send me into the no-more.

"Fuuck."

For a moment I lost my mind. My body was gripped by a magical energy that raced through my limbs. Like a New-Cycle celebratory firecracker, my pussy exploded with what I could only describe as a release of pressure.

"Uhh."

I peed myself. Urine trickled down my leg and I let out a stifled giggle.

For a moment I gasped lungfuls of the dusty air while I tried to process what had happened.

"I think, I just had an orgasm. A real one." I gasped in shock.

Amelie was skipping. An excited bundle of energy that couldn't be contained.

"Do it to me.

Please. Do it to me."

Every part of me told me to run from this place and forget this madness. But I also couldn't deny my chosen Second the delight of what I'd just experienced.

"Turn around. Lean on the table." I said as my eyes dipped longingly to her butt.

Three

"I'm thinking of leaving Lydia. Of going to the place outside."

Amelie spoke softly but determinedly. I sat next to her in the dingy underworld of our city and continued looking at the crumbling pictures. I wish I could read the ancient writings better. To learn what other secrets of sexual delight they held.

"I want you to come with me."

She pressed, putting her hand on my arm.

I was trying to ignore her, instead silently mouthing 'blow-job' to myself. I knew what it was referring to. But blow? Lick or suck I understood. But blow? What would be the point of that?

Finally, I tore my eyes from the mesmerizing image of a primitive woman with her fingers inside her pussy and a look of sheer joy painted on her face as she moved to 'blow' her man.

I stared at Amelie and shook my head.

"Please don't. Don't be so foolish. Either you'll die outside or the Enforcers will find you and turn you off.

Please. Just... for me. Don't."

I was losing the fight against my tears. What she was saying hurt me so deeply.

"Come with me.

Or at least come and speak to the Disses. Hear what they have to say."

I shook my head again. Fearful to even hear the words. I closed the magazine and gave the cover a cursory glance. An XX wearing a strange black torso covering that hugged her body so tightly that it pushed her tits up until they seemed to be about to overflow the garment. Were those supposed to be animal ears on her head? And the puffy white thing on her butt cheeks? I hadn't made the connection before but I started to realize the girl was supposed to represent an animal of some kind. Perhaps that was the meaning of the word I could just about pronounce in my head. Bunny? Perhaps it was an animal?

The images were fun. Exciting. And we'd learned words that seemed to exude desire. But a lot of the old language and meanings were still a mystery.

Worse. These pictures were leading us astray. Leading Amelie to her death.

"I'm going back." I said firmly.

I couldn't help myself as I walked through the city. It wasn't normal to look at other people as objects of lust but it was what I found myself doing. And comparing.

All the females looked much like me and Amelie. Elfin, boyish childlike figures, small with soft features and small breasts. It didn't matter if they'd been born XX or XY. In maturity, they were shaped by processes I didn't understand to fit the chosen image. It was one of the few choices in Life-Period we got to make.

Most were blonde and for the first time, I wondered if hair color was by design. Was it Amelie's red hair and my own russet brown that had stopped us from receiving licenses?

The next girl I saw without her chastity garment was a blonde. Her child was also blonde. And the next girl. This one was carrying an obvious swelling of her stomach and I instantly felt jealousy.

Then there were the males. Not one carried the body hair of the ancestors in the pictures. And all of them lacked the muscular frame I'd so admired. No. Our men were effeminate. Soft imitations of our ancestors.

I knew from schooling that they didn't carry the large levels of testosterone that had made men of history so aggressive. But it had made them feminine. Imitations of my gender. Perhaps that was why so many identified as XX when born XY.

Even when a licensed XY passed me by, free of his garment, his cock looked disappointing to me. No hair and small. Almost as if evolution was shrinking the very thing I sought.

I glanced up at a gentle hum and saw one of the Enviro Enforcer drones monitoring me. I felt a tinge of guilt and looked away quickly. It would pick up the heat in my cheeks as I flushed if I didn't move. Then I'd be watched ever more closely in the future. I walked on, mixing into the crowds, trying not to hurry. The drone moved away. I cursed Amelie for taking me into the tunnels again.

I was frustrated when I got back to my rooms. The pictures and Amelie's fingering of my ass hole had awakened desires I wanted satisfying again even as I was so desperately trying to suppress the feelings. I needed Amelie even in my anger with her. But she wouldn't come around today. Not while she knew I would argue about her plan.