Harry Turtledove - A Different Flesh

Sol also kept using that same wooden cup to help him pee.

He sometimes thought the simple desire to piss upright would be what finally drove him to his feet. He was glad he had the sense to recognize that urge as a sign of returning health, and did not try to act on it too soon.

Another sign came not long afterward, on a day Where, by the fire, the wind held a chil y promise of the snow would come soon. As he had countless times before, he called Sol's name and asked for the cup. she finished fishing the seeds out of a couple of pinecones she had and brought it over to him. took him in hand, again as she had so often before.

What happened then, though, was new and strange, for he felt himself stiffening at the sims touch.

It was hard to say which of them was more surprised.

Quick had been lustful enough out on the trap line, there is nothing like a compound fracture of the leg and a bout of fever to make a man put aside such concerns. Had Sol ignored his rise, simply put his penis in the cup waited, the moment would have passed. The sim was about to do just that, then paused, looked down, quietly said, "Iloo!"

Quick started to sign for Sol to take her hand away, but in, still perhaps more in the spirit of experimentation anything else, she stroked him for the first time with intent. His recovering body responded to the feeling before his mind could will it not to. And in any event, he was fully, rampantly, and so unexpectedly erect, his mind had very little to say.

The sim swung astride him, lowered onto him. He decided entering Sol felt no different from having a woman. so, seeing her there above him, hairy, chinless, and browed, made him shut his eyes in a spasm of concentration.

the act went on, whether he watched or not. And in, closing his eyes, regardless of the reason, made it seem much more familiar.

He felt the thick hair on thighs and buttocks as she rode him, but that sensation was distant, insignificant, when set against the explosion ' building in his loins. Nor were the small, wordless noises the sim made unlike the ones he had heard in bedroom Oh back in the Commonwealths. Too often those were from women who sighed more for his coins on the dresser than had for himself; the sim had no such art.

No wonder, then, that his hips bucked of themselves, that his hands reached out to take hold of Sol's breasts. He almost jerked them away again, for the hair that covered the breasts but the nipples reminded him he was in a bedroom now. Then climax swept over him, and for that endless instant he did not care where he was.

Sol rolled away as soon as he was through. He kept his eyes shut, trying to sort things out; he felt simultaneously fine and as wretched as he could ever recall.

He opened his eyes. Sol was looking at him. He nodded not yet trusting either speech or hand-talk. The sim nodded back.

Good, Sol signed.

"Al right," the trapper said, surprising himself as usual when he spoke out loud.

His equanimity was coming back. How many times had he told himself that if he was going to live with the sims he would have to live like a sim a wry grin settled on his face. Eating grubs was al very well, but he had not expected to take things quite this far.

Again Sol asked, and no grin, no matter how wry, could survive that question. Once he could explain away to himself, as something beyond his control. Repeating the act, though, would be committing himself to what he along with almost everyone in the Commonwealths thought of as disgusting.

And yet the coupling had not been the sordid sort of masturbation he imagined mating with a mare or ewes might be. Sol had been a partner in the act, not a mere uncomprehending receptacle for his lust.

Indeed, that he was being asked whether he wanted to go again said a good deal. In the end, the question, more than anything else, was what decided him "All right," he repeated. The sim could not have understood his words, but got the meaning from his tone.

Sol took him literally, and at once set about rousing his manhood. He thought that would be futile so soon after the first round, but his body, long deprived, proved him wrong. The sim mounted him again. Normal y he preferred riding to being ridden, but his leg made that not worth thinking about.

This time the joining was slower, less fervent. Quick left his eyes open. The sims in the clearing were paying hardly attention to him and Sol than they would have to a couple of their own kind, and the difference, he judged, was prurience, only curiosity about how he performed.

they saw he functioned much like them, they went to whatever they had been doing.

He stil did not look much at Sol, concentrating instead what he was feeling. As before, that was like in its knee to having a woman, but now he noticed the peripheral differences more. The hairiness of the sims body distracted him once or twice. Only later did he wonder if his relatively smooth skin was as strange to her.

He did notice the sims strength when she, in the middle coupling, he could not think of Sol as it, grasped him as they mated. He had never bedded a woman at least as strong he was.

Chat thought diverted Quick's attention again. He wondered how the males would react to his joining the band in this, most intimate sense. Some had partners who mated more or less steadily with them, but the dominant males of the hunting party, Martin and two or three others, So coupled with the unattached females of the band. Now trapper was part of that hierarchy. He wondered where he fit. He could not hunt. He could not even walk. If he was Plain importance, it would have to come through his tools. Anyway, he thought as sensation built toward release, it was too late to worry now.

But afterward he worked away on the bow and arrows ih more concentration than he had shown for several days. Nor could he stifle a twinge of alarm when Martin loomed over him, hands on hips, to inspect what he was up to. But the sim, as usual, was businesslike. Sticks flip Martin asked.

Henry Quick shrugged. It was always a good questioa After endless effort, he had figured out how to chip reasonably smal , reasonably sharp arrowheads, they were better points than he got by simply whittling away at the tip of tt arrow, at any rate. Now he was having trouble making the miserable arrows go straight.

The first ones he'd tried just spun crazily, which was good for making the sims laugh but not much else. Then he vaguely remembered that proper arrows had feathers at the back to make them fly true.

Getting feathers was a problem. The sims threw rocks well enough to bring down a lot of birds. But getting the feathers to stay on the arrow was a whole different question. The sims knew nothing about glue, and Quick did not know how to make it either So far his best solution was cutting thin grooves in the shafts and sliding the feathers into them.

That was not nearly good enough.

Once in a while, one of his arrows would fly straight and thwack into a tree with enough force to stick, which made the sims hoot appreciatively.

More often, a feather would come out in flight, which made the arrow behave as if it were trying to dodge its target instead of hitting it.

Sol continued to help in his bow-building efforts, and to care for him as she had been doing. She never understood much English besides her name, but he passed a lot of time talking first to her, then with her, in hand-talk. They did best at the purely pragmatic level.

She understood why the people back in the Commonwealths wanted the furs he had come to trap. Furs warm, she signed, running a hand over his relatively naked skin. No hair, need warm. she stroked he own red-brown hair to emphasize the contrast. Her hair had grown thicker, almost furry, as the season changed.

When Quick tried to explain that people coveted furs for their beauty as well as their warmth, he ran into a snare Sims did have an aestnet Wited to things they made themselves. A fur was just a fur.