2 Moons Ago...
He arrived back on Earth three sun cycles ago. He landed in the same location, just not the exact spot as last time. His ship remains cloaked whether he’s in it or not, because of course every little helps in keeping it concealed.
He chooses here, of course, because this is the place he saw her last. He remembers where her village was ten years ago, but as expected, when he goes back, he sees they’ve long since moved on. Yet, it doesn’t take him long to find her people again. Doesn’t take him long to scour the lands and pick up her unforgettable scent.
Those three cycles ago, he’d made sure the first thing he did when his ship had touched down was to make sure she was still alive.
...And there she was, knelt down in the dirt again, only this time, she was accompanied by three little oomans who looked very much like her.
He’d watched, from afar, taking in her thriving village before taking her in. She’d barely aged a day and he’d marvelled a little at how her beauty had stayed so strong (he could see how time hadn’t been as kind to some of the older oomans of her site.)
He’d felt a stirring in his chest as he’d watched her smile and listened to her laugh with her spawnlings. And he’d almost, very nearly almost walked back to his ship to leave her be. Only to have his possessiveness over her suck him so suddenly back in when he saw the young male ooman sauntering up to her with an obvious flirty grin.
It still makes him sick how some ooman males choose to present themselves. This ooman male was no different. Slightly younger than his little dhi’ke-de, who was clearly just humouring him with her returned smiles of affection.
He felt something else stir inside of him. Something less pleasant and way more ugly.
Jealousy.
Something he’s only ever felt once when he’d requested his first ever off-world hunt and The Elders had still deemed him too young and reckless before passing his wish over to another.
Since that day, he’s worked hard to curb any feelings that resemble envy, or even admiration.
Yet, here he is right now, growling quietly to himself while hiding in the shadows.
He’d blame his little dhi’ke-de, if he wasn’t already thinking about all the quickest ways to end this male ooman’s existence.
He walks away anyway, forcing himself to retreat to his ship, if anything, just to calm himself. Hunting is not why he is here. He reminds himself sternly of that as he shucks himself of all armour and clothing before he flops down on his bed of furs.
He lets the memory of her dark eyes of fury and that sweet battle cry of hers carry him off into his fantasies as he closes his eyes and reaches down to grab his already stiff cock.
And then now, three days later, after he’s roamed around to hunt and collect food for himself, giving himself time to breathe before he reveals himself to her—he’s back hiding in the shadows. And while it’s the middle of the night, the only light he has to worry about avoiding is the main fire where half of the people in the village are still celebrating their feast around while drinking merrily.
(It’s honestly not that different from his own villages and people. Most of his kind have moved forward, whereas his clans choose to stick to more traditional living.)
The darkness is his cover, but he keeps cloaked just in case. He moves slow and steady, keeping his heavy footfalls silent as he moves through the site of tents. (He knows the huge beasts the oomans ride are easily spooked, so, he makes sure to enter through the back way.) He’s scanning each tent and coming up with a few families already slumbering, many empty tents of course with the party still going on, and a few tents with oomans copulating inside.
He laughs quietly at that, but he soon sucks the sharp sound back down his throat when he finds the tent his little dhi’ke-de is in.
And it isn’t her own...
He moves slowly and silently closer, eyes locked on her and even in his outrage, he just can’t seem to look away as he watches her move over the younger male ooman. Both of them are panting heavily, and he stops when he finds himself looming over their darkened tent.
“Fuck, so good, Naru! SO fucking good!” The male ooman squeals like a little dying frog.
“Yeah?” His little dhi’ke-de breathes heavily, bouncing on top and keeping her palms flat against his chest for support.
She’s obviously beautiful in all things she does, he thinks as he watches her with a wide and intense glare.
“F-Fuck, y-yes! You’re beautiful...”
The male ooman is already getting on his last nerve, and thankfully, his little dhi’ke-de seems to think so, too, because she slaps a hand over his mouth and scolds him softly with, “Shut up. Just fuck me.”
He almost chuckles as the male ooman stares up at her wide eyed with shock for a moment before stumbling through his words like an infant, “I... O-OK...”
He grits his teeth in pure outrage again, almost letting a loudly possessive snarl loose as the male ooman suddenly grabs her roughly at the hips and shoves her onto her stomach before pounding his tiny cock back into her.
“Yes!” She hisses desperately, “Fuck, yes, right there, hurry up! Yessss...”
No.
No, he won’t let this go.
But he will let his poor little dhi’ke-de take her pleasure first...
(Before he shows her what real pleasure is...)
He blinks the thought away, backing slowly away and retreating back into the shadows.
For now...
He waits, patiently, because he’s focused on something other than the way his little dhi’ke-de sets his insides alight at just the thought of her.
He must be going crazy, surely.
He doesn’t ever remember any other hish-qu-ten he’s ever known to be quite so enthralled with their mate.
Mates are important to his people.
But code and honour is politics and religion to them. If it weren’t, his already unruly kind would surely be the destruction of the universe itself.
It’s not long (predictably) before he spots his little dhi’ke-de huffing her way out of the tent with a less than pleased look on her face. He would feel happier about that if he wasn’t so annoyed himself for her obvious disappointment.
Though, he doesn’t hold back the quiet snarl he gives to the darkness as the male ooman suddenly comes out of his tent with an overly proud grin sprawled across his stupid little face.
He watches the male ooman walk through the camp site before swiftly following him into the woods. He’s stalking after him, only pausing when the ooman does. Then, finally, while the ooman is turning towards a nearby tree to take a piss, he marches straight up to the ooman without warning.
He stops, and before the ooman even has time to hear his heavy footfalls, he lifts his arm and plunges the twin blades on his wrist right into the back of the ooman’s neck. He listens to the muted gurgles, twisting the blades and lodging them against the top of his spine before yanking his head and entire spine free.
He may be jealous of this stupid ooman, but he was only a stupid ooman. Not even a ooman warrior of any kind. So, not worth the kill in the first place. He only kills him clean and quick because he almost feels sorry for the little zabin.
Almost...
He stares down at the torn apart corpse of the ooman and can’t help chuckling when he sees his tiny cock is stiff again.
Killing in general always makes his own cock twitch to life, so, he muses at sharing sentiments with the pile of bloody human flesh and bones as he stalks back to his ship with the male ooman’s head in his hand, the tiny spine smearing blood as it trails behind him.
Now...
Naru sighs, already feeling disappointed as she notes, “I have to get back to my children. And my people. They will come looking for me.”
He turns away from polishing the beast’s skull, tilts his head as he stares at her for a moment. He then, lifts the beast’s skull into his palm and points a finger with his free hand at it in emphasis.
Naru nods in understanding. “I know. The other one is still out there.” She doesn’t know if he’s warning her because he cares about her in his own other worldly (literally) way, but she’s smiling anyway as she tells him, “I’ll be careful.”
He huffs in protest, but otherwise, simply places the skull back down and slowly stalks over to her. Before he does, though, she watches him turn back to his workbench to grab a small metal spear. She blinks when he holds it out to her, chuckling lightly upon realising the weapon is just small in his large hands. She takes the spear from him, and feels him watching her as she tests it weight out in her own small hands.
It’s incredibly light, but feels harder than any metal she’s ever held in her hands. She smiles up at him, arching a brow while asking, “This is for me?” She grins when he nods, and takes a few steps back from him to test out the balance as she swipes it through the air several times.
He tilts his head to the opposite side, just watching her.
She huffs her hair out of her face when she’s done, pausing to take in the finely carved and very intricate patterns of the weapon. She runs her fingertips along the carvings–most of them of tribal looking markings and symbols, of course of which she’s never seen before, she guesses they belong to his people. Both ends are perfectly narrowed to a fine and razor sharp point, she’s never seen such fine craftsmanship. Not even from the pale faces.
She blinks, a smile tugging at her lips as a thought suddenly occurs to her. She leans the staff against her shoulder, one hand clutching to support it as she says, “Thank you.” She’s guessing this weapon can cut through all sorts, including his own kind. But that’s not what’s on her mind right now. She’s truly grateful for such a thoughtful and clearly stunning gift, but right now, she just really wants to ask him: “What is your name?”
She blinks when he lets out a long and low click before hissing sharply. She sees his eyes narrow with some amusement as hers widen.
Naru asks, “Is there a...human way...to say your name?”
He huffs softly, but doesn’t seem irritated. She watches him walk out of the chamber through one of the smaller darker archways. And while she’s wondering if he wants her to follow him, he’s already returning and walking over to her. She sees he’s now wearing a bone mask over his head, almost identical to the last he wore, only this one is a little longer and narrower at the jaw, like a pointed blade for a chin.
She sucks in a sharp breath, taking an instinctual step back from him upon seeing him wear the mask again. Her hands automatically grip at the metal spear he gave her, but she instantly relaxes the moment he freezes in his tracks and stares at her. It’s unnerving through the mask to look at him.
It makes him less...human.
She almost wants to laugh at the thought.
Instead, she’s taking an automatic step towards him when he slowly raises one hand out to her and beckons her over to him. She reaches him in four more steps and by the time she takes a small breath to prepare herself for what’s next, she’s already standing in front of him with his giant stature looming over her.
She looks up at him, eyes widening curiously and with some surprise when he slowly reaches up to take the mask off of his head. She gasps softly when he reaches out and places the large skull over her head instead. She keeps still, letting him do whatever it is that he’s doing, but she can’t help herself from asking him, “What are you doing, mupitz?”
She can’t see him through the mask of course, but she can both hear and feel his rumbling reply of; “Hhhheh-eeeearrr...”
Ear...hear??
“Hear wha–whoa...” Naru’s eyes widen as the darkness surrendering her disappears and the inside of his mask suddenly glows a faint white light. She laughs gleefully, feeling like her head is literally in the cloud. “Wow, this is...wow...”
He chortles sharply beside her, and before she can think about her actions, she’s already reached out with a scoff to give him a playful little slap. She gasps short and sharp, pulls her hand back to her chest and mumbles out an apology before she freezes and waits for his reaction.
There’s a very brief pause, and she imagines him just staring down at her while deciding if he wants to hurt her or not.
However, she relaxes again when she feels him place one hand on her, the sheer size of his leathery palm engulfing her entire shoulder. She relaxes even further under the warmth that seeps out of him and into her.
She startles very slightly in her distraction of his touch when she hears him lightly tap once against the his mask. And this time when he speaks, she feels the vibrations even more through his hand still on her when he says, “Loo-Keh.” The word comes out short and choppy, almost like he spat it out, and she tries not to feel totally endeared like she already fricking does.
(Seriously, what has she become?)
(She’d like to think it was her father’s death who started her off on such a secretly dark path, but really, she sometimes thinks she’s been the same since the day of her very first breath in life.)
“OK, I’m looking...” Naru doesn’t have to wait long as she stares into the glowing blankness of his mask.
A couple of seconds pass, and then, a bunch of symbols she recognises to be similar to the ones on her new gift from mupitz appear from out of nowhere and stare right back at her. She’s about to ask him what they mean when they suddenly morph into symbols she very much recognises.
Letters.
Bo’thuiarll.
She doesn’t recognise the word, but she smiles brightly when she realises he’s showing her his name.
She’s still smiling when he carefully pulls his mask from her. She chuckles, grins and follows him over to his workbench. She watches him place his mask on top before asking him, “Can I call you ‘Bo’?”
He pauses for a second, then, turns to stare at her for a few seconds more.
Naru mirrors him when he tilts his head little. She smirks, shrugs casually and says, “Or not. I can keep calling you ‘mupitz’ if you prefer.”
Knowing him, he probably does.
She should be disturbed by that. But then again, she should be disturbed by him in general.
Instead, she’s chuckling when he copies her shrug.
He swiftly turns back to begin cleaning up his workbench.
For a few minutes, she watches him do so. She leans her spear against her front, pressing one cheek against the smooth metal and perches her hip at the edge of the workbench.
She watches him for a few more moments before finally, with soft curiosity in her tone, she asks him, “What does your name mean, Bo’thuiarll?”
At this, he stops his cleaning and snaps his to the side to stare at her. She sees his eyes are a little wide and he looks rather surprised and shocked. She blushes heavily as he lets out a low rumbling growl that’s clearly appreciative.
She doesn’t know whether he’s pleased over her pronouncing his name correctly, or if he’s just pleased in general over her using his name, but honestly, with the way she has to subtly squeeze her thighs together under that heavy yellow gaze of his right now–it’s making her unable to focus or even care about much else.
He stares at her for a few more moments before reaching out to grab one of her hands in his. She would think it not easy for him, but he is very delicate as he reaches out with his other hand to ball her fingers up into a fist. Save for one finger. He leaves her index finger free and tugs it down to press lightly over his workbench.
Naru is about to ask him what he’s doing again, but clamps her mouth shut when he begins to run her fingertip along the surface. It takes her a second or two, but her eyes brighten with realisation and she leans in to pay closer attention.
“B?”
She grins proudly to herself when he nods once.
She stares back at their hands again, both watching where he moves her and taking in the (surprisingly rather pretty) patterns of his skin.
OK, so...
“B...E...L...L...O...W...I...N...G...”
He pauses, raises a finger on his other hand in a waiting motion at her. She blinks once before realising he’s telling her the word has stopped.
She nods, then, he continues, moving her hand again...
“S...W...O...R...D...”
Naru blinks again when he suddenly lets her hand slip and backs out of her space.
She shoves away the disappointment of the loss of his touch, instead, chuckling and rolling her eyes as she teases him with, “Bellowing Sword, hm? Very appropriate, mupitz.”
...
Taunting him so playfully and causally now, hm?
She’s starting to feel more and more at ease with him, and he sometimes still feels like a complete romantic loser over how proud this makes him feel.
How he counts every second of her not fleeing from him as a victory.
She’s almost ready for him to reveal why he’s here for her himself.
She’s definitely more than ready for the Warrior’s Mark.
He feels gleeful and slightly nervous as he turns to face her while reaching into one of his belt pouches. He pulls the beads free and holds them out to her, and shows her his best smile, mandibles tightening up and tusks clicking as he softly grits his teeth, letting her see how sharp they all are while he’s at it (it never hurts to show what’s on offer.)
She gives him an odd smile, but he’s pleased that she isn’t disgusted with his face. In fact, she looks rather fondly upon him when she chuckles and thanks him again. She takes the beads from him and he huffs quietly in victory, puffing his chest out instinctively as he watches her take a closer look at her gift.
This one, he saved for the presentation of her Warrior’s Mark.
He means it as a representation–that no one will ever lay a mark on her without succumbing to the true death. (And that one will never leave her unsatisfied for any reason...)
Now that he’s given it to her, he will finally blood her with his own blood and give her her very well earned Warrior’s Mark.
Softly chirring, he takes a step closer to her, but is instantly halting when she takes one sharp and large step back from him. He frowns, confusion filling him when he sees her now staring hard down at the gift.
He takes a step closer again, and again, she backs away from him.
He huffs loudly, softly hisses unhappily at her, but for the moment, he stays put for her.
...
Naru’s head snaps up to him, her eyes slightly narrowed when she slowly asks, “Where did you get these from?”
She doesn’t know why she’s even bothering to ask when she already knows the answer, but her brain is refusing to let her connect the obvious dotted pattern.
And just when she (insanely, now that she realises) thought they could be...friends...
She takes a deep breath when the only reply he gives is to point at her and then to the beads in her hands before hissing rather sharply. “You...” She takes another breath, gripping both the beads and the metal spear tightly. “You killed him, didn’t you?”
He simply stares at her, and by his unwavering look, not even a blink, she knows the answer for certain.
She nods, taking another couple of deep breaths. “I have to go.”
He lets out a frustrated little snarl, but he doesn’t try to follow her when she...when she tries to leave because she has no idea of how to leave this place...
Her eyes widen in panic for a split second before she slowly turns and calmly asks him, “Will you please let me out of here?”
He still doesn’t move a muscle. Only blinks and stares back at her.
She sighs, but nods once and tells him, “I promise I will come to see you tomorrow night.”
His shoulders twitch a little, but she just about hears the low breath of relief he lets out.
She turns her back on him and hates herself for the smile trying to tug at her lips as he leads her out.