To Walk the Constellations Pt. 01

"Okay, that's enough of that," she said. "I'm going to sedate you and you can enjoy waking up a new woman."

"Oka-oowww!" I rubbed my jaw as the ache in my teeth and jaw got stabbing sharp. Then I wobbled. Then-

GREEN

My eyes opened. I was laying on something amazingly soft and brilliantly green. A green I'd never seen before. My fingers brushed slowly along the soft and I felt that it was actually many tiny threads -- each one flat and tipped like a tiny sword. But they pressed to my back and my butt and my legs. I was naked and a thin breeze blew along my lithe body -- but I didn't feel shame. I just felt pleasure at the warmth shining on my body. My nipples became puffy and hard and I drew in a slow, languid gasp. The air tasted divine.

I had never known that air could taste so good.

My back arched a bit and I closed my eyes, focusing only on the sleek, softness I was laying on, on the taste of the air in my nose, the warmth on my naked skin. My arms finished stretching and I sprawled. My hands ghosted along my body, pausing on my pathetically small breasts. That soured my mood a bit. I opened my eyes, focusing on where I was: I was sprawled on the green, surrounded by strange brown pillars, each one...splitting into dozens upon dozens of small, reaching arms, each one bedecked in tiny, arrow shaped green things. The things rustled together as the wind blew through this place and...

I liked it.

Then my ears perked. I heard a sound -- a splashing, dribbling sound, like water falling off a cliff and into more water. I stood up, walking naked away from the green softness. But the rest of t he ground was covered with more green. There were thick bunches of green that grew up to waist high, though they were a lit more prickly and sharp than the softnenss I walked over, so I made sure to skirt them as I came closer and closer to the sound of water. And then the splash came with a gasp. A masculine gasp. A male. Gasp. A man.

I stood, pressed up against the rough, textured surfaces of one of the brown pillars and looked at the pool of water. It looked more pure and clean and cool than any water I'd ever seen before, and water flowed into it from a collection of gray not-plastic that looked rounded and smoothed by the water. There was a flowing river of water, which looked like it was flowing from the distance. But I had no time to figure out where the water was coming from because...

Oh.

Oh.

A male stood under the spilling water, which cascaded along his back and some slipped along his chest, drawing the lines of his muscles. They were as well defined as if they were drawn by rulers. But. Like. I could count all six of his belly muscles. He wasn't bulky, though. He was lithe and slender and so tall I could imagine crawling all over him. His skin wasn't quite perfect. It was pale, yeah. But god. He had so many scars. They crisscrossed on his forearms, ringed around his wrists. There was a puckered scar on one bony hip. There was a trio of lines along his chest, like a claw had raked him. Each scar begged for my lips to trace them, for my tongue to lick them. He was nearly hairless, save for a tiny tuft on his chest and a tiny tuft above his groin, just barely visible above the edge of the water, leaving what was below the water a total mystery. And then, as his hands slid away from his hair and he stepped away from the water, I saw that his sleek, silky, midnight black hair had a pair of triangular ears sticking out of them.

And, behind him...a tail. A narrow, furred, black tail, dripping with water. His eyes were purple -- and slitted.

And they widened as they saw me. He froze, his jaw hanging open as he looked at me.

"H...Hey," I said, my voice husky, my entire body glowing red. There was nowhere that wasn't blushing and I ducked against the pillar, hiding the faint swell of my breasts. The touch of my nipples against the rough texture almost made me moan -- in pleasure and pain both. I bit my lip, hard.

"Hey," he said back. He jerked his hands down, clapping them over his groin -- not that I could see anything. "H-How did you get here?"

"I don't know," I said, then ducked back. I turned and pressed my back against the pillar. Silence hung in the air. "What's your name?" I asked.

There was a long pause. I could picture him in my mind and my sex ached. I wondered how his lips would feel, doing those things that Techne had told me when I had managed to work up the guts to ask her about her day job. My cheeks heated more and more and I swore, my heart was going fast enough that I was pretty sure it'd crawl up my throat and flee. Then, at last, the boy spoke.

"Thale," he said. "You?"

"V...Venn," I said.

"Venn," he said back. "I like it."

"T-Thale is nice too." I peeked around the tree. He hadn't moved, but when he saw me, he smiled a little. Then his head jerked to the side, as if he was hearing something. "I-I have to go."

"Wait, Thale, I-" I started -- but then my eyes opened and I was sprawled in the hospital bed, the corset still chugging away on me. My throat itched and I wanted to cough, but it was like my ability to cough had been taken from me. I sprawled in bed, and felt my nipples ache and my sex drip with the memory of Thale. I looked at the ceiling.

What the hell had that been?

And...when would it happen again?

I looked at the window -- at the stars. That was what they were. I could feel the floor shuddering and I had a sense that the Tiamat was falling towards the sun. We were heading on. I was beginning to head up the Chain.

My eyes closed.

One planet down. Nine hundred and ninety eight to go.

TO BE CONTINUED