Reptile Dysfunction

Posted on Mon Apr 6th, 2020 @ 4:52am by The Narrator & Lieutenant Commander Shadi Zatra

1,448 words; about a 7 minute read

Mission: S0:1: What Is Past, Is Prologue
Location: Deck 6 Rear Tractor Emitter Control Room
Timeline: MD26 18.00

It was a tasty day for Shadi. Not only had her theory on a subspace ordnance to get around the Myriad's super shields panned out well, but she had been able to clear the rest of her schedule. The first time she had met with Mazarian seemed like ages ago. Her cloaca quivered at the memory of the last time she had been in the rear tractor emitter control room and tightened with anticipation at finally mating with him again. All of the dreaming, the flirting, the ritualistic dance where they had to keep themselves controlled around other people had led to this moment.

Shadi dimmed the lights, raised the environmental controls to a sweltering 50° C, and started the syncopated drumming that throbbed nearly as hard as she did.

"Clee'san," she said, propping herself atop the control cluster panel with naught but a leathery thong over her scaly nethers. "Perform a site-to-site transssport and beam Mazarian to this room."

There was a pause, a moment of thought, but then the static taste of ozone filled the air and a shaft of light-filled in with the elongated body of Mazarian. He was stood facing the wrong way, addressing a wall it seemed with an arm gesture that ended within seconds of him finding himself where he should not be.

He turned, coiling about on himself as his diamond-cut eyes narrowed on Shadi.

"Why, Shadi, a delight as always," he said in sibilant syllables.

"I've been waiting for you," Shadi said as she traced a talon down her scaly torso. "Come hither, my dragon king. Crown me with your coilsss like you did before!"

"Yes I..."

He reached up with one of his small working limbs and took her hand, enclosing her talons in his dexterous fingers.

"...had been meaning to discuss that with you. But with the planning, and the Battle...there never seemed to be a good time to find you, and speak as one should about these things."

Shadi grinned ear to ear like a death's head. "Yesss! Tell me how I will be your queen! How I will lay clutches of regal ssspawn from your noble ssseed! Of how we will rend the flesssh of our enemies and feast on the heart and soul of one another until death's bell tolls for us!"

"Yeeees....about that."

The atmosphere in the emitter control room seemed to drop a few degrees.

"Shadi, I might not have been as honest with you as I should really have been. Not about my people, nor our designs to free Messier 4 from the yolk of Myriad oppression. But, and for this surely you must understand, my voyage into the stars was a far-flung hope compared to the then reality of our lives. The Myriad controlled our system, dominated the spaceways with their Whisper Gates, with their iron grip on all sentient life under their control. The odds by which myself, or any of the others who might still be travelling with the Myriad, might actually succeed..." Mazarian gripped her hand. "My people choose by lottery those who volunteer for service with the Myriad. And whilst I am of noble birth, it is not a duty I shied from. When I was chosen, I had the same luck as high or low born. But the odds, the sheer reckless chance of it..."

He squeezed her talon.

"...I thought, we thought, we would have our lives together when we shared our oaths. For you see, I am promised to another."

The words did not immediately register in Shadi's ear holes. She blinked her large eyes three times in slow succession. "You... are what?" Her breathing turned to rapid hisses. The dilation of her eyes threatened to overtake her entire ocular cavities. "What does it mean you're promised to another? On my world it means betrothal. It would mean that you fucked me in the eight positionsss of the Warrior Code of the Ragolar Brood in dishonor of everything it stands for. It would mean I am a thief, you were an oath-breaker, and both of us liars. Is that what you're telling me, heart of my hearts?!"

"I would not put it as pointedly or, and pardon me for saying this, so overly dramatic as that. We are both adults..." Mazarian thought about this point for a second and concluded that Captain Remas would not hire on officers in command positions who were children. "In a moment of battle, the heat of the moment and the threat of death-"

He was cut off.

"Who is the bitch?" Shadi barked. "Is she a milk-drinker? Most princesses are. I bet she has luscious mammaries ripe for you to suckle! Is that what you want, Mazarian?!" The narrow slits for nostrils on Shadi's face began to flare. "Is it not good enough that I am a distinguished daughter-spawn of the Ragolar brood, first of my clan, and last-standing champion of my generation's Ravaging? DO YOU WISH I HAD TEATS TOO?!" She thrust out her flat, scaly chest and challenged Mazarian to speak.

"She is is of The Second Ring, and is 18th in line to the station of Arch-Duchess. And really you are blowing this all of out any reasonable proportion," Mazarian said, his general good nature and tone straining at Shadi's emotional outburst. "Her name is Eacles, a viscountess. She's a member of the Royal Guard, a ship captain, I think you'd' like her-"

"I'd like to rip out her innardsss and wear them around my neck!" Shadi screamed. "Your people, they have some sort of trial by combat? You must. I want to do that! I will face her in battle, triumph, and rid us of this Eacles and her starving demands, and then we can be together forever!"

"We have a means by which legal disputes can be handled in a civilised manner, yes. Though I don't think it's what you think it is," Mazarian said as gently as he could. "Now really, you must calm down. These hysterics will do you no good, and soon we will be at Casstaul. The Arch Duchess will be impressed by your spirit, of that, I have no doubt."

Shadi let out a feral shriek. "But what about ussss?! What about the poems I've written about our enduring love? Have I been a fool?"

Short answer: Yes.
Long answer:

"No, of course not," Mazarian said, patting her hand. "But we are both not so naive as to forget that we have larger roles to play than the part we play to each other. Your ship, your people. My home, my people. They count on us to be the example that leads them forward to a promised land of possibilities."

"Huh?" Shadi's face twisted in confusion. "What possibilities?"

"Why to be free of the Myriad, what more important possibility could there be?! Your entire ship, your entire people, will be sung of as heroes to the entire Cluster," Mazarian said, layering it on with the plastering trowel of a desperate man.

The Song of Shadi Zatra sung far and wide across the stars did sound appealing, but the Saurian also desired it to be sung into her loins as well. "O Blood Goddess, thou art harsh in thine judgmentsss!" Shadi fell to her knees and implored the ceiling for forgiveness. "I have been insolent! Weak! Impertinent! Do not make me choossse between love and glory!" But as any Ragolar adherent to the Warrior Code was taught since hatching, the Blood Goddess set Her honor on only one of those two things. Shadi took a deep, wheezing breath to ready herself for what must be done. "But the Code demands no less."

And, with that, Shadi's burning fire went out.

"Very well, Masszarian," she hissed with deep, abiding sorrow. "I release you from your pledge to me... that you might fulfill a greater one. But..." Part of her felt too ashamed to even ask it, yet after displaying so much courage to let him go, Shadi could not deny her desire. Her fire did not go out completely. In fact, it seemed to have rekindled with the kind of vengeance of a suicide mission with nothing to lose "... we have not reached your world yet. Perhapsss our responsibilitieees can wait for one more night."

Her scales began to flex, as did other parts on the lower part of her body, in a non-mammalian lordosis reflex, or what is known in the Animal Kingdom as "presenting." To her mind, it was enough to set cold blood to boiling.

"Perhaps...one last night."

 

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