“Clever deception.” His voice comes from below my tree.
“You left the materials.” My voice cracks on every word.
“The female understood their purpose.”
He climbs the vine ladder. No struggle, no slipping. His four arms work in concert, making the ascent look effortless. When he enters the hollow, his presence fills it completely. The scent intensifies until I can taste it. Copper and green and male.
“Day five,” he says. Those alien eyes track over my naked body, taking in every detail of my deterioration. “Damage visible now.”
I don't deny it. The inflammation is obvious. Tissues swollen and red. My body destroying itself with need.
“Decision time approaches.” He settles against the far wall, but even that distance isn't enough. His scent fills my lungs with every breath. “The body breaks or accepts assistance.”
“What kind of assistance?”
“Relief. Not claiming. Temporary reprieve from the worst.”
Another wave builds. I brace for it but this one is different. Stronger. My back arches completely off the floor. My pussy clenches so hard I taste blood from biting through my lip. The empty spasms make my whole belly convulse.
When it finally passes, I'm sobbing. Not from pain but from exhaustion that goes deeper than muscle and bone.
“Please.” The word escapes without permission.
“Tomorrow,” he says. His tail moves slightly, the tip swaying. “When the fungi makes skin hypersensitive. When prey thinks she has advantage.”
I look at the pouches tied to my thigh. He knows. Has known all along what I planned.
“Not angry?” I manage.
“Why? Female thinks tactically despite torture. This shows quality.” He shifts, and I see the bulges under his scales where his cocks press against their protective covering. He's aroused too. Has been for days probably, watching me writhe and leak and beg the air for relief. “Tomorrow, use your weapon. I permit it. Then learn why prey remains prey regardless of cleverness.”
He stands to leave, pauses at the entrance. “Rest if possible. Tomorrow the body receives what it requires.”
Then he's gone. His scent lingers, making my pussy clench harder than ever. My body knows relief is coming. Knows that tomorrow ends this torture one way or another.
I curl in my shelter, riding out waves that barely separate anymore. My pussy has become my entire existence. The empty, clenching, desperate center of a universe that's shrunk to just need.
Tomorrow. The word repeats with every clench. Tomorrow he'll fill me. Tomorrow this ends.
I should be planning resistance. Should be thinking of escape.
Instead, I'm counting the hours.
ZIA
Day Six. Dawn breaking.
My body drives me from shelter before true light touches the canopy. The need has progressed beyond waves into constant seizure. My pussy clenches without pause now, muscles locked in perpetual spasm around emptiness that hurts worse than any wound I've taken in combat. Each contraction pulls from my core, making my abdomen cramp, my thighs shake, my spine arch seeking pressure that doesn't exist.
I've marked a trail without meaning to. The arousal drips steadily now, leaving dark patches on moss, glistening streaks on bark where I've braced myself through the worst spasms. Any predator could track me by scent alone. The thought should terrify me. Instead, it makes my pussy flood with fresh need.
The decoy camp waits ahead. I set it yesterday when my mind still functioned between waves, when I could still think tactics instead of just need. Now I can barely remember why I bothered. The plan seems distant, unimportant compared to the burning between my legs.
But my feet carry me there anyway. Soldier's discipline operating beneath the chemical storm.
The clearing spreads before me, exactly as I left it. My bedroll spread invitingly in the center, still damp with my scent from when I rubbed myself against it for hours yesterday, trying desperately for relief that wouldn't come. Empty water containers arranged around it. Torn pieces of my tactical suit hanging from branches, each one saturated with sweat and arousal. The space reeks of me, of desperation, of female ready to breed.
A trap so obvious it circles back to clever.
