Chapter 3:

Jesse found herself coming down from her high; but the two male alien's weren't. One came from behind, and touched her sides, almost cautiously, like she was a small, frail animal who needed medical attention for a wounded leg. Maybe they were being cautious because they were scared of iher/i.

i"Wouldn't that be the day,"/i she thought, squirming away from the touch, but only to be touched from the other side as well. Rippling muscles beneath her made her body ache; not in the good way. She was scared of these beasts, whatever they were. They made her want them, but were scared to know what they were really like, under the masks and the weapons and the armor.

"Wait," she said, quietly, into the scaly flesh that was his neck beneath her face; something had hissed earler, and she hadn't the confidence to open her eyes and see what had been sounded. She didn't particularly want to know. The touches continued, along her sides and down to her hips, back up again only to make another round.

Slowly, one of the hands from her sides traveled to her front and glided down her body to her thigh, and then resumed on her side. Obviously the alien wasn't comfortable with touching her there. Maybe trying to force a noise from her.

Clicks and growls were all she heard, but there were distinct repeats that she started to catch; "Nihkou'te," and "Akan'de."They didn't sound like any names she knew of, but the way they used the words in sentences sounded like it. The one behind her kept on saying the word "Akan'de," over and over to the other. Maybe that was his name.

"Akan'de," she said, a bit too loudly. The word didn't roll of her tongue as well as she would have liked, "W-wait."

The movements stopped, but continued after what felt like a nod. They didn't understand. They couldn't understand – how terrible dumb of her. They were aliens who only copied what she said, how icould/i they know English? She mentally smacked herself, and groaned when sharp nails dug into her sides, and more ripples of muscle came glancing across her front.

Apparently, they understood sounds. They stoped abruptly, almost jumping, at the sound of her discomfort. Things started to click in her mind.

Jess had to open her eyes, no matter how scary, nor gruesome, nor terrifying. She wasn't going to die. She wasn't going to be hurt. She would get her way out of this with wits.

She was smarter than them.

"Akan'de..."easier push of the tongue that time; "Put me down!" she said commandingly, pushing at his shoulders. The monster dropped her, stepping back a few steps, as if she were to lash out and rip their throats out.

With her eyes still closed, Jess could not see the red snow on the ground, or the footprints. She saw black, with small spectrums of color dancing behind her eyelids, as if coaxing her to keep her eyes closed, to stay with the safe, warm, pitch-black sactuary of behind her eyelids. Instead of complying, she opened them to a squint. Her eyes glanced up to see shit-your-pants terrifying faces. A large, elongated head with sunk-in eyes and pronounced eyebrow-bones with no real eyebrows, she stared into sickly yellow eyes. There was no nose, instead, a flat surface with no nostrils or holes. Beneath that were two sets of mandibles attached to large, square chunks of flesh, twitching in almost an expression – and expression that reminded her of fear.

This was Akan'de. He had the lion fish colored skin, and was standing only a few steps away from her, muscles still rippling behind a fishnet type fabric.

Looking to the other one, he looked about the same, but was grey, and looked more angry than anything. With a white-cream spot on his stomach, and dusting his features on his enlarged forehead, eyebrows, jawline (or at least what she saw of it) and the rest of his body, he looked read to pounce. His eyes shone gold, instead of Akan'de's yellow. That must have been Nihkou'te.

She opened her mouth, only to see Nihkou'te take a step forward, open his mandibles wide and let loose a roar that made the woman's eardrums stress. Jess' eyes widened, hands balling into fists.

She wasn't going to cry. Not at some stupid little... ibig/i alien that doesn't like her. Not the big scary teeth, or the big scary crab-face, or the the loud, ear-shattering roar coming her way from his mouth – that weird, lipless mouth.

With a shiver, Jesse found herself pinned; the ferocious beast with the fearsome face on top of her, hissing and growling like a rabid dog. His breath smelled like... male – the only way she describe it. Musky, like the afterstench of sweat, but having more of a nice twist on it. Spicy. She almost wanted to draw closer, but her fluttering eyes caused the male – Nihkou'te, she reminded herself again – to roar again, right in her face. Jess shut her eyes tight, feeling the muscled chest right above her diaphrigham. She was scared, but stubborn.

"G-get off," she murmured, pulling her hands off of the cold, icy ground and putting them on the male beast's shoulders, pushing lightly. "Off."

"... Off," he growled back, tilting his head.

"Y-yes, off. You're on me right now. I want you to get off."

"You're on me," he repeated back, the odd mandibles moving right above her face, almost threatening to drool on her. She didn't have the inkling right then to taste, or feel, what alien drool felt like. She didn't particularly want to know... ever.

Confused for a second, she just shook her head. "No... No, iyou're/i on ime/i."

"You're on me."

"No! iYou/i are on ime/i." Jesse's hands fell onto her stomach, feeling as the hands around her head clutched the snow. The male above her was getting frustrated, but so was she.

"No! You are on me!"

"You're on me!" the male repeated back. Hearing some low, rythmic thunder, the other male – Akan'de – was apparently having a nice time watching both of them get angry.

"Fucking Hell! You're on me!"

"Fucking Hell! You're on me!"

"iFUCK!/i Shut up!/i"

"No, you!"

"No, y... you?"

Confused for a minute at the sudden words, she tilted her head, only to get a head-tilt back. Jesse blinked. Was he learning from her getting angry like this?

With another move of his mandibles, and a growl in his throat, she saw that one of the mandibles were lopsided. It looked painful, a gash near the tusk that looked like it wasn't going to heal up any time soon. Though, instead of the red blood inside her, or the caribou, it had lime green blood oozing out slowly.

"What did you just say?" she asked, quietly.

Akan'de, a few feet away, was having a fit of laughter. He couldn't stop – when she looked over, he looked like he was about to piss himself... if this race could piss. She didn't know yet.

The male beast on top of her reminded her that he was there with a curt drop of his weight on her stomach. She gasped as he came down on her. His eyes still glowed that deep golden color that reminded her of wheat, and they said something to her that his words could never: yearning. Like a dog would, for a treat, or wanting to stay outside longer. She didn't understand this sudden look.

"What?" she asked, "What do you want?"

He understood that. His knees came up to behind her legs, pulling them up around his waist with skill she never could have thought; the large waist under her lower frame was... more than large. Massive. He tilted his head the other direction and moved his body towards hers, chest puffing up, as if trying to impress – though, his chest couldn't go far with all that armor on it. She knew what he was getting at.

Akan'de stopped laughing.

Jess' collar was grabbed, yanked, and her body imoved./i She soon found herself on the ground, a few (okay, more than a few) feet away, looking at too aliens – one on the ground, and one standing above him, scolding him in their own language. Was it disrespectful to treat a woman like that in their... land?

i"Land. Ha. What a word, Jess,"/i she thought as she watched Akan'de – the one standing – roar at the other for trying to talk back. She could imagine what they wer e saying.

i"How dare you, young man!"

"I didn't mean it, I swear! It's the hormones!"

"HOREMONES MY ASS!"

"But I –!"

"NO BUTS! GET TO YOUR ROOM!"/i

... Though, this wasn't a family-welcome TV show on Nick-at-Nite. This was two brutes disputing over the use of her body. Her face, at that realization, flushed. She became red, traveling to her ears and down her neck to her chest. She hated it when she blushed. It looked gross and blotchy. However, they were fighting over the use of her body. The thought alone would get a lot of girls off – one of which, Jesse.

She looked up at the aliens, to find that Akan'de was pulling the other one up by his hair, making Nihkou'te howl. He did inot/i like that. Nihkou'te grabbed the other by the neck andd threw him next to Jesse, the massive – to re-use the word – landed next to her with a sickeningly loud crack on the icy-snow ground. His body was unphased though, as the lion fish colored beast got up, straightened himself out, puffed up his chest, and glared at the other.

They were in a fight, and she knew it could only go down from there. She wouldn't have been surprised if they started to bite, and inflict damage with those powerful mandibles on their face. But they kept it strictly hand-to-hand combat with no cheap shots, as if there had already been pre-set rules. When one's guard went down – usually Nihkou'te, Jesse soon realized – the other one went for the face with a strong, rigid hand. That mandible on the poor grey alien wasn't getting better. The bright green blood finally started to drip down his face, onto his bronze-looking armor, the tusk almost scraping against his sharp teeth and flesh.

"H-hey, guys, stop," she said, standing up slowly. It had been the first time she stood since before her ex – whatever happened to him – Trent pinned her down.

Nihkou'te let down his guard again, gaining him another sharp tap to the face. Though, Jess could hardly call it a "tap" when it came around swinging. She could hear the bone crack in that one. He bounced back, angry as ever, only to let her see another break in the same mandible.

"Hey! Come on, this isn't fair!" she growled, getting angry. Obviously, Akan'de had to be more experienced. Somehow, he just had to be naturally better. Didn't that count as an unfair advantage? She didn't know, she was never in sports. "Guys! iGuys!/i"

Another sharp smack to the side of the grey alien's head, and he was down on the ground, holding his face with a large hand, glaring up at the other in a matter of moments.

"Pa'uk-de," he growled. She instantly connected it to the swear word "Fucker" be it intuition or just similar concinents and vowels.

"Yeah! Yeah, you tell him!" she snapped, stomping forward. Akan'de looked back at her, scowling with his entire face. Jess stopped, taking a step back when she saw the scornful look in his yellowed eyes. His entire body told her to stay away from the other alien, or just them in general.

She didn't know if it was to protect her, or protect them.

Slowly, he started to help his comrade up under her watchful eye. Confused as ever, Jess didn't say a word, though she wanted to. She knew he would just pretend he didn't understand – which, he might not have, but she didn't know that – and walk away.

There was always time though.

"You're disgusting, I hope you know that," Akan'de growled at Nihkou'te, glaring at him. They realized that the ooman was not hurt, and she didn't want to go into the "meat-bucket," as she said it, so they were letting her walk, trailing close behind them. Sometimes, she caught up to stand up beside them, or she trailed back, looking at the kainde amedha skull or sitting on the sled they were trailing behind them.

"I am not, Akan'de. You just have to get over being so... so... xenophobic," Nihkou'te growled, massaging his mandible gently, sometimes pulling some snow off of the ground to put on it. His mask sat neatly on the top of his head. They were now following Akan'de's mask, which seemed like they were heading in the correct direction. "Oomans are interesting creatures."

"You've only just met the species," Akan'de looked over, his mask drowning out some of his important facial features, but his eyes said it all: "You're a fool."

"I've known about them all my life!" the gray-and-cream-colored alien sounded insulted.

"As have I... As everyone else back on the clanship, but you don't see me trying to go up to some unknowing, unhonorable ooman female and try to... try to ipa'uk/i her in the middle of broad daylight!" he gestured back to the ooman now riding on the edge of the sled, looking intrigued with them. He gently scoffed at her, making her glare back at him. "Not to mention disrespectful."

"You think I was doing that? You think I was trying to pa'uk the ooman?"

"It might have been as well! It looked as if you were full-on mating the little beast!" Akan'de hissed.

"I was... I was showing her my interest, was all," Nihkou'te looked back to the front, to the invisible road they were following.

"With your ka'mak pressed up against her gentailia?"

"B'heru, calm yourself!" Nihkou'te growled, pushing Akan'de gently with the palm of his hand, only to gain an insulted hiss in return, "She didn't seem to mind – almost interested!... Maybe that is what the men of this planet do for trying to court their women!"

"It is inot/i your job, nor your place, to figure it out! That ooman is with child, and if you dare even try to disturb that, I'll know, you musky little rat!"

Akan'de and Nihkou'te hadn't realized they had stopped until the ooman waved her hand at them, yelling almost directly in their ears, only a few feet away. "Why have we stopped?"

Both of them puffed their chests out, frustration filling up inside of them, and then turning. They hurried on, faster than before, still throwing insults back and forth every now and then.