- Ava -

Ava kept quiet. Xark'ion looked away, to the treeline beyond the idyllic little village. “It's clear to me now why he wanted me to stay back. He had realized before I did that the situation was hopeless. He commanded his group to make their way back, but if everyone had gone, they would have been overrun from behind. As soon as his group had turned their backs and were fighting their way towards us, Groti'ax ran at the enemy with a mighty roar, swinging his sword. The machine enemies were distracted, and they let the rest of his group through to us, while they all ...”

His voice trailed off with the painful memory.

Ava reached over and took his large hand, not saying anything. For a few minutes the only sound was the crackling of the fire and the murmur of daily life in the other tents in the village.

Finally Xark'ion took a deep breath again. “Well, he was overwhelmed. The machines were small, but they were hard to kill. Many of them jumped on him and forced him to the ground. He fought them, of course, and destroyed some. Finally he was pinned to the ground in a heap of them over his arms and legs.”

He went quiet again, and Ava squeezed his hand. She got the feeling this was the first time he had told anyone the details of his friend's death.

“And then,” he continued, “the alien who owned the machines came over. There was only one of them. It was also dressed like machines, covered in gleaming metal. It was tall and thin. Almost as tall as Groti'ax. It was very alien. Groti'ax was held down by the machines, though the struggled to get loose. The alien had a device that was like a scissor. Two long, gleaming blades hinged together. The alien placed the blades-”

He drew in his breath sharply and let it out, in a trembling sight. Ava grabbed onto his hand with both of hers.

“It placed the blades on either side of his neck. Plainly intending to cut his head off. And then Groti'ax laughed. Loudly, in the way only he could. It was a free, defiant laugh. Happy, even. That was Groti'ax. That was the way he was. He laughed as death came to him. He was going to die, but he had saved his half of the squad. He was fulfilled as a warrior. The bravest ... no, 'brave' isn't the word. He was the best man our village had ever produced. The best man of our world. Coldly executed by a cowardly alien that needed machines to fight its battles.”

Xark'ion's hand wiped across his face, and Ava squeezed his hand again.

“Well, the scissors closed. His laugh died at that moment. Something died in me, as well. What happened then, I don't know. I only remember short, confused glimpses. Apparently I went into a frenzy and fought my way alone through the enemy ranks, over to where he lay dead on the ground. I don't remember all of that. I just know that we somehow retrieved his body. Then I was on the shuttle going away from the surface of that planet, with Groti'ax's body inside a sack on the deck. I hope it didn't happen like that. Because if it did, then why couldn't I have fought like that before he was dead?”

Ava sniffled and wiped some moisture off her cheek. Just like back at the funeral, Xark'ion's emotions were so strong and pure that she felt them deep inside her. “Seems to me like you did everything you could. Nobody blames you for that at all. I've seen your record. The only one who blames Xark'ion is Xark'ion.”

The warrior didn't reply, just took both of Ava's hands in his giant one.

Ava took a deep breath. He had told her something important. Now it was her turn. Something she had never told anyone else. “I did the same thing. On Gideo Station. When it was just us four girls there. First I left Harper alone outside the base. Against regulations. Nobody's supposed to be outside alone. That's when she was first abducted. Then I took the two other girls with me to the Fire Planet to find Harper. Also against regulations. And it pretty much killed us all. If it hadn't been for Vrax'ton and some dumb luck, we would all have died.”

She remembered the Fire closing in and Charlotte and Lily looking at her with despair in their eyes, still trusting their leader to find a way out. Their leader who had done nothing but screw up.

“The fact that we made it from the Fire Planet alive was just ... well, I couldn't have gotten closer to killing us if I had tried. Totally irresponsible. Stars, it got so close by the end. We were all sure we'd burn. And then the abductors came back and we were captured and tied up and placed in irons ... like ...”

A hard sob racked her body, and Xark'ion laid one impossibly large and heavy arm around her, helping her release the emotions that she had pent up for far too long.

“This is why you have spent all your time since making space safe for Earth and Acerex,” he calmly observed while she wept against his warm chest. “Despite everything turning out fine, you feel guilty. And it seems to me that if you'd stayed outside your base with Queen Harper, you would both have been abducted. With consequences that we can now only speculate about. Then you went in blindly to get your friend from a deadly place. Breaking regulations in order to maximize the chances of success. I would not say it was irresponsible. I would say it was accepting responsibility. I would say it was leadership.”

And as simple as that, he had turned the whole thing on its head. Yes, she had done the best thing she could think of at the time. The only thing she could think of. Maybe. But still. He was not humoring her. He was not the type. That was his actual opinion. 

Ava suddenly felt much better. She sniffled again. “Just like you. You showed both heart and leadership. But you don't see it.”

“I see it a little more now,” Xark'ion said quietly. “When I first saw you, I knew something had happened that was important. There was something about you that stood out. But it was Groti'ax's funeral and my mind was in turmoil. If only I had known.”

Ava wiped the last of the tears and angled her neck to look up at the warrior, noticing that now she was no longer sitting beside him, but on his lap. He must have lifted her over without her really noticing.

His eyes had a tinge of red around them, and there was a trace of tears on his cheeks.

She reached up and dried it from his skin, and he let her.

She craned her neck more to kiss him on the lips. Fuck, what a man this is.

Her body immediately responded to the thought, and it happened with an urgency that she had never experienced ever before. She needed him inside her. Now.

She adjusted her position on his lap and placed her hand on his bulge. After a couple of heartbeats, there was definitely a swelling going on there, and a sudden twitch and a groan that escaped his lips sent hard sparks of joy to her pussy.

“Let's go to your tent,” she whispered, looking around. The village was quiet, but there were people inside almost all the little huts around them, and Ava didn't want to make a spectacle of herself and Xark'ion.

He got to his feet, lifting her with him in a display of incredible strength, and then carried her the few steps into his tent.

Inside, an oil lamp was sending a warm light over the skins and furs on the floor and the sparse collection of objects along the walls and hanging from the wooden supports. Despite the increasing chill outside, inside there was a pleasant heat.

Xark'ion placed Ava on a thick fur on the floor, then closed the tent flap and secured it.

Her need was great, and she stripped off her jeans and sweater before discarding her bra. Then she laid back on the fur, enjoying the luxurious feel of it on her naked skin.

Xark'ion just stared at her for a moment, then untied his pants and stepped out of them, while his large cock pointed straight up.

In the warm, flickering light, in these surroundings, he was more than ever a warrior from the distant past, and Ava loved the primitive feelings that set off in her. She spread her legs, wanting him to remove her panties and uncover her. Fast.

He knelt down beside her and peeled the sheer fabric down to her hips. She lifted her butt, and he pulled them all the way down.

She instinctively closed her thighs, but he wasn't having it and pushed her knees far apart, opening her body for him.

“Yeahhh ...” Ava groaned when he surveyed her sex. Even his green gaze on her female flesh was enough for delighted little tingles to spread all around her pussy.

He spread her more, and the wet sounds from her slit betrayed her arousal.

She involuntarily arched her back, anticipating the feeling of him sliding into her. “Come on, fuck me.”

His tip was as her nether lips, spreading them and sliding up the wetness between them. He was teasing her, demonstrating that he was in control and she wasn't. That was fine with her. She wanted him to take his pleasure from her, this honorable warrior who was feeling guilty for not being perfect.

She arched her back and groaned again, trying to impale herself on him. The squelching sounds of her wetness should probably make her feel embarrassed, but she didn't care. She wanted this. More than she'd ever wanted anything.

Then he took possession of her, pushing into her in one long, steady thrust that filled both her body and her mind.

“Yeeeeesssssss!” she gulped, forgetting to breathe as he invaded her with his hot manhood and stretched her sex to the limit.

He didn't pause inside her this time, just withdrew almost all the way to leave an empty sensation in her center, before he calmly plunged back into her with a confidence that astounded her and sent a hot wave of pleasure through her pelvis. He fucked her slowly and steadily, his sensational, ridged rod finding every tiny little spot inside her that could give pleasure and forcing. She had never known sex could be like this, that her body had such a wealth of secret little folds, just waiting for the right man to find them and release their little rays of joy.

And Xark'ion was the right man. In every way. How could she ever have doubted it? How hadn't she seen it from the first time she laid eyes on him?

But of course she had. She had known it. All her little excitement whenever he was near. How he would always scan every room she entered to see if he was maybe inside, the little sting of disappointment if he was not. The little mental gasp if he was, the butterflies.

He was still fucking her, building up the joy in her, filling her up with a large pool of heat that could explode at any moment if this went on...

She knew she was whimpering, squealing and screaming, and that the tent was not far from other tents. But the Acerex tribe could take hearing a woman in love. Despite their focus on war and death, they appreciated life more than anyone else. And, Ava knew as his cock hit a new spot in her and released another shower of little sparks, she wanted them to hear it. She wanted everyone to know that Xark'ion was taking what was his.

And he was taking her now. Hard, fast, unstoppable. So fiercely and so well that she had no choice but to give in to the sensations. His deep grunts in her ear, the scandalous squelching noises from her pussy, the soft fur supporting her and warming her from beneath, the prehistoric surroundings, her own uncontrolled moans and squeals and whimpers. Stars, the previous times had been great, unbelievable. But not like this.

An impossible thought entered her mind: he had been holding back before. Only now was he fucking her like he wanted to.

Her eyes flew open at the realization, her gaze locking with his intense green. “I love you,” she gasped as the first of many orgasmic waves rolled over her and through her and she bucked wildly. “I love yooouuu!”

She distantly felt his cock swell inside her, heard his roar and grinned in uncontrolled bliss when she felt him spray her insides down with his boiling hot juices.

This was love. She had to travel light years. But finally she'd found it.