We lay quietly for a while. Lop was still in bliss, flying on his gutful of SkhtuS, when I asked him to let me go so I could get up.

"Sure, red", he said, dreamily. He sighed deeply, but other than that he didn’t move. Then he pulled his head back and looked at me with his intense eyes, but they were softer now. And his whiskers were twitching in amusement. "Not that I’m complaining", he said very softly, with another lick, before he put his head down again, "but I reckon you still do owe me a fuck. You hear me, stud?"

I said I heard him, and mumbled something about two–I couldn’t quite force myself to say "fucks"–two like that hardly coming up to one link from him. I felt him relax. Let me loose. Slowly. He seemed reluctant.

I didn’t know what to think. Mostly I was ashamed to have felt so much beauty. Before, during, and after snapping into his ass. I’ve never just linked to a strange man’s tail-hole. Wlkatar are totally different. I’d never just gone off with some guy and plugged his gut. Plus, this was weird. "Fuck?" Fuck a man? Had I actually done that? It seemed perverted even to think of it that way. But if it was perverted, why was it that I couldn’t stop thinking about my–our–black up to the nuts under one another’s tails?

All these thoughts were pinging around inside my head while we got ourselves cleaned up. Then we got the kids up. (They slept through the whole thing, it seemed. To my relief.) We discussed what to do. We never actually talked about whether we should join up. We skipped that part. I guess it was just obvious. As we talked, the man was cuddling Mickey in his lap. Practically hid him behind his big arms. He had a natural way with the kits. In any case they took to him right away. I–well, it gave me an odd feeling just watching. Watching the tawny, silky-furred youngster nestle against that hulking brute beast.

Between his legs. Where I’d been, well, nestling myself, not many minutes ago. Mickey looked contented and happy. He was holding the rupellid’s thumbs like handles.

I started to think that I doubted he was as happy between those thighs as I’d been, when I caught myself and shuddered. The intense beauty of snapping nuts up a tailhole doesn’t for a moment justify linking with a stranger. Linking repeatedly. I didn’t even know his name. And I was as guilty of crude lewdness as he was. I tried to tell myself he forced me to link with him. He was brutal. I had no choice. I was afraid of him. He made me do it.

Except for one little thing: this voice in my head that kept reminding me of something inconvenient. This–this utterly crude ruffian had stirred up as much beauty and bliss in me as I’d ever felt. Ever. And I kept catching myself staring at him, whenever I didn’t think he was watching. Marveling at his shoulders, feasting my eyes on his buttocks. They were sort of blocky. Craggy. I caught myself trying to think about what that butt looked like with a monux cock under his tail. Odd thing to wonder about. Gawping at those black slashes on his arms. Big arms, too. Strong. Big chest. I’d never seen anyone so male. And now the toddler between his thighs only made his complete masculinity stand out even more strongly. I caught myself thinking weird thoughts, like how that penis-sheath of his (now out of sight behind the kit) didn’t seem at all out of the ordinary, unlike what came out of it (as my asshole reminded me from time to time).

We agreed that it made sense to keep on heading north, and to stay away from big water. For now. On the other hand, we had enough monux meat right there to keep us feasting for several more days, and the grove of trees was pleasant and safe, and we couldn’t think of any reason to lug the carcass around with us.

We snoozed after eating, of course.

My crude friend was such a sex-maniac. At least, I think it was his doing. After we woke up, he volunteered to go fetch some water from a little stream at the foot of the hills, while I watched the kits. (There was water in the shishemu grove, as I’d suspected, but it was more of a swampy ooze than a spring.) He’d no sooner come back with the water than he was standing over me where I lay. Hkshihh was trickling down his sheath and glistening in the fur on his balls. I swear, his nuts were already beginning to turn tan.

The smell of him made my own hkshihh start.

"OK, cunt-swab", he said. His manner and voice were pleasant, even if his words were crude for three or four reasons. "You still owe me a fuck." (Cruder and cruder!) "We agreed. Well, you owe me a fuck-and-a-half, by my way of thinking. That wasn’t much of a hosing this morning."

"Fuck", again. You fuck a cunt. Hose a cunt. This guy–!

He dropped on his knees, straddling my body, and took my balls in his hand. My brother never did that. I don’t think any wlkon at a wlkatar did.

"You’re black", he said, matter-of-factly, with a squeeze. "That was quick."

"You’re black, yourself", I said. He’d shot his black while he was standing there looking at me. Big, black bone against his white belly. Gleaming black, streaming with hkshihh.

I guess it was my first really clear view of his black. I’d never seen a peg like his. Large. It was large. No wonder I’d felt like I was being opened again when he linked. In a sense I was: cold for months, and then getting a gutful of–

"–And pushing SkhtuS. You’ve got me acting like a rupellid, now–I mean–I–wouldn’t mind a bit if you wanted to plant that wad in me–"

I was so hot so fast. He was sort of pressing me between the legs. Every touch felt beautiful.

"No", he said. "Your black, there–your black belongs to me. Man, you vulcids are nancy-boys! C’mon, sport. Give me what’s mine. I can’t just take it–you’ve got to give it."

I guess I was too hot to pay much attention to what he’d said, never mind object to it. Wlkwim talk about their husband’s cock and balls as "theirs". A wife, even a wlkwy at a wlkatar, might say "Give me my black" to a wlko, leading him on, just as they start to fuck. But I’d never heard a man say that to his co-mate.

With that, he lay down on top of me, and was sort of squirming around in our mingled hkshihh. The SkhtuS coming out of his dick made our bellies really slick. Well, it was coming out of mine, too. He was purring and licking my cheeks and my neck. It felt good, I wasn’t really paying attention to anything except my increasingly beautiful feelings. In addition to liking the feel of Lop’s strong body on mine. His arms–

It was hard to stay in the groove. I kept forgetting what I was supposed to do. That boy on my chest, I was in such a mood to feel something slip into my aching ass. I guess it was silly, in a way: at first, I mean when my own black started to go into his tail-hole, I actually didn’t even realize it. I’d never linked from below. I’d fucked that way. Ranee in particular sometimes got a sort of kick out of "taking" my SkhtuS, as she said. Instead of just "getting" it. It was fun, too. She’d play the whole part, lick between my legs, curl around and chew on my tits and growl, just like she was a wlko fucking a wlkwy. Me, I just lay there with my arms over my head, purring and enjoying the ride. She’d wriggle down and get her cunt to take my black. It was different, all right. Drushka didn’t take to it, or Kanyaa, but I didn’t mind a bit, and it was like something special between Ranee and me.

That kind of thing wasn’t exactly practical, linking with a male, though, the moves being so different any everything, and just about the time I realized what was happening, Lop growled, "Hey–so fuck, red. Start fucking."

I curled and pulled and struggled to work my cock in his ass. Lop helped out. But mostly he was licking me. And hugging. Anyway, it was maybe a little awkward and my balls were in no rush to snap, this time. It felt so good. So beautiful. The whole time.

I was slow to juice, this time, and when my nuts finally snapped I jerked so hard I nearly threw the thug off me. And I slipped almost as soon as I juiced. Not like Lop. That boy has never juiced twice in the same link, I know, but I honestly think he could if I begged him to. I can’t count the times I’ve watched him slip black after leaving my link-hole. Me, and Drushka too, we’d slip black almost as soon as we snapped. Linking and slotting, either way. It was something I was used to–feeling Drushka slide out of me when he was still pressed hard against my asshole. Panting. When we pulled our bodies apart, there was nothing but sopping-wet sheaths to see.

Not Lop.

After a long time he raised himself from me and without saying anything started grooming my sheath and nuts and around my thighs and belly. I jumped when he got to the tits in my groin.

"Like that?"

"I guess it’s a little sensitive right now", I said. I was kind of squirming. "No one’s ever cleaned me up after linking. I mean, I do it myself."

He went back to his work with a little grunt. When he was finished with me he sat next to me while he groomed his own front and between his legs, and cleaned his asshole. I must have noticed the low moans he made, but mostly I was just too busy watching him, a little enviously. Right at the moment I didn’t feel like licking up his (and my) hkshihh and whatnot, but I realized that, somehow, I wanted to. I was fascinated by his asshole, and the big, pink tongue sweeping around and across it. A few minutes before, my nuts had emptied themselves into that, pouring into him through my beautiful cock. I looked down at the white pelt between my own thighs. You’d never guess those white-furred balls had just snapped, everything was so immaculate, like the breast of a longbill. He’d even licked or sucked every last drop of hkshihh out of my sheath.

Except–I couldn’t believe it!–maybe that was what had made me look between my legs in the first hkshihh was welling up at the mouth of it! What was this all about?

Lop saw it, or scented it, when it started to trickle out of my sheath. "Hey, stud! Hey-hey! Ready again? There’s more to life than fucking, you know."

I was embarrassed. My feelings were a little hurt by that "nancy-boy" remark, and I almost said something smart about how he was turning me into a rupellid, which would have embarrassed me even more.

As flustered as I was, it did register that when he straightened up there was something awkward about his movements. Not to mention the groan and a grimace. It didn’t go with his muscular build. Or for that matter with what I took to be a preoccupation with that cock of his, a preoccupation that flattened everything in its path, I thought resentfully.

"You know", I said, "I don’t even know your name. Well, we don’t really need names, maybe, there’s just the two of us. Still–"

And so I told him my wlko name.

To my surprise, he didn’t make fun of it. He just sat there, looking at me.

"That’s a nice name", he said. Offhandedly. "I had the big-time, custard-squirting hots for a cousin of mine with a name like that. You’re cuter. Much. And nicer. Also much. He was a bully."

"Well, the young–"

"He was a bully. Trust me. He got a kick out of making me unhappy."

Everything about this guy was a puzzle. Even linking with him. He was a thug and he was tender. He was a sex-maniac rapist who made you want to have his black in you. No matter how much it hurt. He talked weirdly about "fucking" guys, and being in love with a wlko cousin. Whom he resented as a bully. He stopped me from "girl stuff" like licking his face while he drilled my ass. But he just about licked my face and neck raw while I drilled his.

"Er–", I said, feeling awkward at having to ask, "and–what is your name?"

He looked at me for a long time. Like he was thinking. (Who has to think about his name, anyway?)

"Ktshelh-lsuhp", he said.

"What?!"

"Don’t go and lose your whiskers", he growled.

Green eyes!

It was unthinkable. Nobody could be–no male could be named–

"It’s a nickname", he said. "They mostly just call me lsuhp for short." ("Green". That’s what I’m calling "Lop" here. It’s close enough. And there’s another reason too. I’ll tell you later.)

"What’s your real name?"

"I’m not going to tell you. It’s stupid. Besides, stud: I want you to call me Ktshelh-Hhlsuhp."

"In front of the kits?"

"It won’t hurt them."

Well, I found out his real name. Years and years later. It was one of those old-fashioned things that were so long out of fashion in vulcid families that I knew only of remote ancestors with names like "Whose-hkshihh-Flows-Like-a-River" and "Whose-Co-mates-are-Always-Red". Some were sort of cute, like women named "Whose-Eyes-Draw-Men-at-the-Wlkatar", or "Whose-Creel-is-Full-of-Shrimp", and even "Whose-Children-are-Numberless-and-Well-Behaved". (Things were different in those days.) But the names were just as likely to be pretty startling, like "Whose-Cunt-Opens-as-Easily-for-Giving-Birth-as-it-does-for-Fucking".

It seems they were still current among rupellids. Lop’s co-mate Jess was actually named "Whose-Co-Mate’s-Penis-Will-Never-Need-Monux-SkhtuS", and the other co-mate Carl’s real name was a fantastically long-winded thing about his bulging nuts and his cock and the copiousness of his SkhtuS. His family just called him "Cock-and-Balls" for short. (I was shocked. Not at the words. Wlko aren’t shy about sex. Proper sex. There was nothing odd about one of our wives inviting one of us to fuck her by saying, "You’ve got my cock and I’ve got your cunt", say. But it would be shocking for her to say that to one of our kits, or to a total stranger. And a nickname like "Cunt-Fuck"–one of Lop’s kits–was unthinkable!)

Well, I found that Lop’s real name was "His-Always-Hard-Penis-Opens-the-Womb". A fertility thing. And it had a really oldfashioned word for "cock" I’m sure I’d ever heard only once or twice before. Funny as it sounded to my ears, it sounded apt. Especially once Lop explained that "opens" is meant literally–some such idea that his fucking is the supposed to be opposite of giving birth. His black actually getting inside the wlkwy’s womb, I mean. Like I say, he was well-named. But who knows what a typical rupellid cock is like. Or whether wlkwim have real deep cunts. I’ve only known one rupellid in my life. And as for him, well, I became used to his black, and soon enough. I had plenty of opportunity to. But it never stopped making an impression on me. A deep impression, too. And definitely an "open" one.

In any case, with those names–you could hardly finish a sentence in one breath if it had a name like that in it–small wonder they went in for nicknames. Much more than we do. That was part of the reason he didn’t mind being known as "Green". Lop. That’s the "lsuhp" part of his name. Instead of the whole "Green-Eyed" thing, I mean.

But to get back to that mild late morning in the little grove of shishemu trees, I didn’t really know what to say when this tough fellow twenty or thirty years younger than me said that he wanted to be called Green-Eyes. A thug. Muscular, tough, scarred, limping. Gruff. Wicked wedges on his arms and the longest mane I’d ever seen–I’d swear the thing grew all the way down to the root of his tail. Whose hkshihh did indeed flow like a river. And whose black made me think my belly was about to burst. Green-eyes?!

"You don’t think you’re a female, do you?"

"No. Of course not."

"Do you–wish you had a cunt?"

"Sometimes. But only if I could have a cock as well." He showed his teeth. "I have nothing against cock. No, sir. I like cock. My own. Yours. Look, I did my married duty. Who knows which of the kits were the fruit of my personal juice. I had two co-mates, but I left enough of my stuff in the girls’ cunts to make half of them. Wlkatar were something else. I never fucked."

"What?"

"Never. Well, hardly ever. No slotting for this boy. Squirming around in some mushy pussy-hole. I got all I wanted of that at home. Men. I wanted a man’s hand. Handsome men. Handsome boys would do, but I prefer studs. Like you."

He looked at me with that look. "I couldn’t believe it when you walked into the clearing yesterday, white as alkali. Handsome, and totally–totally–male."

His look made me uncomfortable. But mainly I was stunned. It had never occurred to me–I mean, so far as I knew, all us wlkon felt nothing but beauty from juicing into both males and females. I never had any reason to think that the beautiful feelings of something black in my ass was anything different from the other boys’. Well, look at adolescent wlkon. All my sons, they’d link during meals if we let them. When we were at that age, Drushka and I had sore cocks half the time. Literally. It was almost a relief to get married and do some eeling. Something a little more soothing and less muscular. Cunt sort of coaxes the SkhtuS out of your black, rather than hammering your balls into a froth while you feel your black being pulled out by the roots.

I’d never heard of a zizi wlko, I mean an actual guy who cared only for guys. Or even particularly for guys.

But I had now.

And it was confusing. The sicko in question was about the most masculine animal I’d ever–. Maybe it was just because he was a rupellid. But I doubt it. That couldn’t be the whole story anyway. He was just plain male. Man-male. Male-male. And not because he made hkshihh as copiously as most wlkon made water, or had black that looked like it couldn’t possibly fit into its sheath. (Or into a tail-hole. I’ll never forget the first time I got a clear look at it, hard and ready and tipped with SkhtuS.) I’d just stare at him, lying quietly on his elbows, with his legs out to one side, not paying any particular attention to me. Snoozing, even, chin on his wrists. But even all soft and loose, relaxed and supple, muzzle on his paws and eyes closed, he was so male.

And whether I’m like him that way, as I met his gaze that day, I knew I had funny feelings about him. Well, I wanted him. I didn’t care who drilled who, I just wanted him. I tried to tell myself I was just lonely. But I didn’t believe it. If it was loneliness, why did I feel so lewd? Dirty and sick. But most of all, I wanted him. I wanted our bodies to melt together in endless, nut-snapping bliss.

But where on earth did I fit into this farce? I knew what rupellids thought of us vulcids. If they didn’t call us zizi to our faces it was mostly likely because they were too contemptuous to do so. They giggle (I’d heard–and Lop admitted it was true) that at vulcid wlkatar, the women content themselves with cunt-swabs because their husbands are too busy slotting one another. Yeah, "slotting". So, here was this hunk of a rupellid, whose third hand could honestly rip my black out of my crotch, or that’s sure what it felt like, and he’s going on about what a stud I am and what a gift to cunt my black wood was.

His cunt, of all the outlandish things.

And me? I do know that since I was opened, I’d never felt the almost continuous longing for any wlko, male or female, that I felt toward Green-Eyes. Sexual longing. Well, before we got married, Drushka and I couldn’t get enough of it, and this was sort of like that. But it was different. Get this: I actually found myself daydreaming about what "our" kits would look like: would the males be as sexy as Lop, and what kind of girls we’d have. "We’d" have. Two wlkon. I guess that tells you a lot.

I didn’t tell any of this to Lop. He didn’t want me to be like him. That was clear. He wanted me to be a man. He did all manner of effeminate things, or things he thought were feminine, but he wouldn’t let me. Like licking him. He never allowed it. He’d lick me wringing wet while I was struggling with the grip of that hand of his, but I wasn’t allowed to lick him. During sex, I mean. It was hard on me, too, because I wanted to. I was used to it, and Lop’s was a face I wanted to lick.