(Rewritten) Ch. 92 – Surprise

"What do you call a pirate with two peg legs?

Stumped!"

– Road Rash, sitting down and holding up both his legs by half an ankle each after blowing up his other foot, April 2056

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Leah stumbled and stared at me, her mouth falling open. I thought she might've been too incredulous to blush.

"Seriously? You orgasmed in that explosion?" she asked incredulously. Then she blushed and snapped her mouth shut.

Yup. My guess was spot-on.

"Yes?" I asked innocently, tilting my head at her, making big innocent eyes and holding back laughter. I kept walking.

She sputtered. "You…" She waved her hands at me. I couldn't help it anymore and laughed. Leah blushed harder and hmphed at me, before catching up again. Then she flicked me on the forehead and raised an eyebrow. With a rather more serious voice, she asked, "Well? How's that work? Why?"

I smiled at her easily, dropping the childishness. "It's a reflex, and there's nothing sexual about it. And it's not uncommon, actually. Lots of people experience it. But they don't talk about it, 'cause everyone else don't get how that works and then start acting all weird."

"And you?" Leah asked, looking at me.

"Mmm." I turned forward and thought a bit. "I think it started as a coping mechanism. Or maybe, survival mechanism? Did I tell you about my childhood?"

"A bit. You told me that you grew up in an old religious cult, the kind that prays to a god, and that they pretty much vilified you. Fanatically. You had no mother? And, that's pretty much it. Well, you explained how you wanted to become a woman, but I don't think that's relevant?"

I shook my head. "Not relevant, no. That cult wasn't just fanatical. They were mercenaries, too. Still are, I suspect. I don't imagine they went under. And they weren't shy about fielding children."

Leah's face blanched, and then she got angry. It was a horrified anger that twisted my stomach, and hers too. Leah's eyes went hollow as uncomprehending disbelief drew her face, mixed with unbelieving rejection against the evil I spoke of. My hands shook a little and I drew her in for a hug.

"I'm okay, Leah." I slowly gentled her hair, over and over. "It's okay. I got out long ago. I survived, and I've become…human, since then. I'm okay, now."

She hugged me tighter and started crying. That's when I connected the dots. She cared a lot about children. More than a lot.

They were kind of her reason to exist.

I shifted on my feet and gnawed my lip. Drew in a heavy breath. I'd brought it up, but…should I not have?

No… That wasn't really an option, either. It was a pretty important part of my, uh, origin story. It wasn't something to be secretive about, at least not around somebody who may or may not be more than a friend.

My arms tightened around Leah, and I kept stroking the back of her head and down her spine. Maybe I should've waited until we were at her home and she had her friends around? Would that have made a difference?

I…didn't know. I couldn't know. It wouldn't have made a difference to me, but I was…different. In the end, I'd have to see where Leah would take it. She was a caretaker, too, no stranger to horrible circumstances.

Ah, well. I kept petting and soothing her.

It didn't take long for Leah to catch herself. She straightened up and looked me in the eyes, while slowly stroking along my cheeks. I froze.

Uh…

She leaned in and kissed me on the lips. Softly. She wasn't looking for anything. She wasn't even testing me. She was just…talking. She was saying yes.

My heart beat so fast I got a little dizzy. I shivered, my antennae shivered, my tail was completely stiff with tension. My endless ruminations just…shut up and evacuated, for once. I was so present I saw even the slightest shivers of her lids.

Leah knew I wanted her, and she was saying yes. To me. I closed my eyes and pressed my closed lips into hers. Just a little, just barely allowing myself to bask in the intimate touch.

My arms had dropped to her waist somewhen.

Happiness filled my heart and spilled from my tear ducts. I shook a little with the power of it, felt my hands respond to the nervous joy and vibrate, too.

Then I gently broke contact. I leaned back, watching Leah's eyes flutter open. There was that gorgeous green that clashed and melded with the red of her hair, and the dangerous, scary, fuck-off white, black, and gold of her alien eye. Her smile softened when she saw tears tracking down my cheeks, and she gently drew a thumb across my happy, almost drunken smile, making me shiver again, and my hands tighten on her waist.

My lips fell open under her finger, and I quietly asked, "Leah?" And she understood.

"Well," she said in the softest voice I'd ever heard anywhere, "I figure my worries about you around the children were misplaced, considering that you are who you are despite your childhood, hmm?

"So, I'm gonna take you," Leah murmured as she stared me in the eyes and her intensity made me clench my abs. Her hand wandered around to cup the back of my head, before she continued, "and make you mine."

Her other arm tightened around my waist and pulled me fully into her. The full-body contact seared me, forced a half-moan half-whine through my throat, and I shivered through another "Leah," as my knees went weak and my tail wrapped itself around her shoulders for comfort and for stability.

"Yes, Tinea?" she asked, smiling smugly.

Air moved through my vocal cords, but my lips were swollen and sensitive and numb at the same time, so I only managed a "Whuaah", and I couldn't really form a coherent thought, but there was stuff niggling at the back of my mind. Even as I scrambled to get a hold of something that felt important, Leah moved her hand from my hips and lifted me up by my bum, just like I'd done for her earlier.

But she had to lift me higher, and I wasn't used to this and my tail curled around us more, and then my face was level with hers and I saw her satisfied smile at my wide-eyed expression. I was being treated like the woman I wanted to be, and that sensation touched me in ways I wasn't used to either, and I was completely out of my element, and thrilled to helplessness.

So Leah leaned in and nibbled on my lips, while I just breathed and whined and opened them for her so she could keep going.

And she did, and slowly I got used to it. I got used to it, and recovered bit-by-bit, until I moved away to lay my head on her shoulder instead, where she tucked me close and squeezed me tight, as she began to walk again, carrying me, even though I wasn't that light with my battle skirt.

I smiled and exhaled a long breath. Part of me had relaxed all the way to the core, and part of me was slowly starting to think again, consider things from different perspectives. And I did have a lot of things to sort out.

I let my eyes fall closed again as I rubbed my cheek against the side of Leah's neck. My tail was still wrapped around us and did most of the holding. One of my antennae was totally focused on Leah, patting all over her back. Her scent drifted up my nose, and if my brain wasn't so busy plucking recent events apart, I thought I'd be drifting off to sleep.

But, nope. There was stuff to talk about, after all.

So I opened my mouth. "Leah?"

"Hmm?" Her hum vibrated through my chest a little and I snuggled even closer.

"I'm worried that there might be dependencies between us. That they might've had something to do with, you know. You wanting me."

It hadn't escaped my notice that she'd specifically said "she'd make me hers," which, even though it was so very thrilling and made me blush furiously, didn't contain the word love.

Which hurt and made all kinds of things pull tight inside of me. But Leah patted my head and kneaded my shoulder until I relaxed again.

"I know. And maybe the worry isn't entirely unfounded… But I'm not the people I depend on, Tinea. Whatever I may or may not have latched onto, I do see you. There's much to respect. Much to learn from. Much to spend time with. You're worth loving, with or without any other factors involved."

I broke, and I cried. Relief slammed through me and washed away all the worry and anxiety in a big great flood of easing tensions and disappearing pain. I squeezed tight enough to make Leah ooph, and she returned the favor and made me laugh wetly.

It took me a while to stop crying, but when I did, I wasn't tired. I was full of a nervous, hyperactive energy, like somebody had spiked my blood with raw hope.

Leah pulled away, took my chin in her fingers, and kissed me full-on, open lips and tongue teasing mine. I squeaked and giggled, and returned the favor. I nibbled on her bottom lip and enjoyed her pillowyness, tickled the underside of her tongue when she dragged it along my upper lip, and moaned when she made me open my jaws and devoured me until I couldn't breathe anymore.

My knees were tight around her waist and I'd subconsciously risen up during the whole thing, until my hands were resting on her shoulders and her face was turned up to look at me, with a wicked, wicked smile on her.

I learned then, that if I felt strongly enough, my tail—usually not an indicator of my mood or focus—would still express my emotions. It was swishing through the air behind me like a cat's, agitated and full of the vibrating energy that shook my entire body just a little.

I was on an entirely different kind of high, and I loved it. I loved Leah, and I told her so, and with a brilliant smile she said, "I love you too, Tinea." And I was gone, up in the clouds, well beyond the reach of any earthly concerns.

I started crying again, happy and overwhelmed tears, and dropped down to hug her with arms, legs, and tail, like a monkey.

Leah resumed walking, idly stroking up and down my back as I emptied all the gas tanks on my emotions. She was humming quietly, some kind of lullaby I thought, which was very sweet, but also a little weird. But I decided to let the vibe carry me into that spent state of deep relaxation.

I breathed easily, calm and centered, letting the night and its noises flow through me.

Finally, I climbed off of Leah and walked next to her, giving her a happy smile, and took her hand as we kept moving.

She giggled out of nowhere. "So, wanna tell me more about your orgasms?" Leah said with a laugh.

"Sure!" I replied blithely with a grin. "They're actually really intense, and I can't quite keep quiet during them!" And laughed when Leah flushed and showed playful chagrin. Yup, walked right into that one!

A little more soberly, I picked up the explanation from earlier again. "You'd think that fighting as a kid was a horrible thing—and maybe it was. But it was also when I didn't have to listen to my…elders. There was just me and my rifle, and a few of the other kids, and the place we were supposed to go to, complete the objectives, and fight.

"And I was very, very good at that. It didn't matter how far away I was, if I could see them, I could hit them. It didn't matter how close I was, if I could move, I could hurt them. And the few times that the masks broke and I saw the…people beneath, I distracted myself with the things I was feeling. The battle fever. It…didn't stay a fever. By the time I was eleven, I'd learned to orgasm against the pain and go go go, so it wouldn't stop me from fixing myself. Of course, I didn't know what orgasms were, at the time."

Leah's hands shook in mine, so I stopped for a few minutes and just squeezed hers.

"When I ran away at fifteen…I was very deadly. Some others had done well too, but I was the best of them. They'd been accepted into the cult years before. But I never was. 'Cause I was the Devil's Child, according to my father. So…I remained different, until eventually, I ran away."

Leah was crying quietly, wiping away her tears with her free hand continuously. But she didn't look fragile. I didn't get the sense that she was just trying to look strong either. I just squeezed her hand, and continued talking.

"I'd already figured out that the things I'd felt during battle were supposed to be sexual. The lust, the other things. But," and I smiled a little there, "when I was nineteen, long after I'd crossed the ocean to Canada, I met a kind girl who had sex with me. That's when I learned the difference."

I threw Leah a glance. She was quite absorbed in my words, not really crying anymore. Her natural eye was pretty red, but the tears had mostly stopped flowing.

"The battle madness might be a form of lust, yes. Yet even the orgasms paled before the real thing." I laughed a little as tears formed. "You can't imagine how relieved I was to have that happen. It, like, cleansed everything. It wasn't the same, and the fake stuff was nothing like it."

I squeezed Leah's hand again and drew in a big breath before letting it out slowly.

"That was where it all changed for me, Leah. That's when I started becoming human."

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