THE GENTLEMEN'S CLUB
Roderick

Written by Lady Poetess
egiggles at moose-mail.com
http://www.asstr.org/~bbp

Please do not reproduce on any website without permission. This
story has no resemblance to anyone dead or alive.

ONE

As the unofficial sheriff and peacemaker of this lakeside town of
Little Bigby, it was Eric Ouellette's duty to know the presence of
every newcomer in town, tourist or paranormal enthusiasts. Even if
he weren't aware of any newcomers, he would be when he visited the
local diner for his breakfast at eight every morning.

He had no problems with newcomers as long as they stayed out of
trouble. The legend of the Bigby monster attracted those too cheap
to visit Loch Ness, and Little Bigby also had a booming tourist
trade because of its clear warm waters that were perfect for
fishing. The lake wasn't big, but it was deep had many nooks and
crannies that a dinosaur could easily hide in. Once a kid drowned
just a few feet away from his parents because the parents couldn't
see the kid - reeds, bushes, and thick mud banks all made Lake
Bigby a dangerous place for swimming. Eric spent most of his days
on his boat patrolling the waters.

He didn't believe in the monster, because he hadn't seen one in
the ten years he had lived here. He knew the waters here better
than anyone, because ten years of navigating every nook and cranny
could do that to you. All he knew was that he didn't mind the
industry the tourist brought in, as long as they followed the
rules.

Hence he was in a foul mood as he steered his boat, looking for
the newcomer Roderick Mancuso who just arrived this morning and
against the advice of the Bornforst who ran the local rental boat
business, took a boat to explore Hemlock Creek. Hemlock Creek was
the nutcase magnet here - rumors of the Bigby monster being
sighted there lured the nutcases there like a lemming stampede,
but unfortunately the sharp rocks and turbulent waters also led
the nutcases more often than not into trouble.

Damn, his new pair of swim trunks itched, and that was another
reason for his bad mood. His recent laundry accident - the washing
machine caught on fire and along with most of his clothes - had
him spending almost all of his meager pay on a new wardrobe, and
upon some temporary moment on insanity, he decided to invest on
those fancy tiny swim trunks. The ones he ordered were too small,
like the one he was wearing, and they made him itch around the
balls. Hell, he could barely keep his balls and dick from popping
out, and the trunks were riding dangerously low already as they
were.

There was the boat. He recognized it at once from the name
Bornforst gave him - the Santa Bigby (Bornforst always did have
crazy delusions of grandeur, for fuck's sake it was just a stupid
motorboat). It was empty, a bad sign. Eric stopped his boat beside
it and looked around. There was no one he could see, even on.
Fucking hell - this was bad. Eric cursed when he saw ripples on
the surface of the water. He pulled his shirt off and dived into
the dark depths in a smooth plunge.




TWO

Roddy Mancuso climbed onto the boat, and reached for the towel to
dry himself. In his hand was what he came to look for - a small,
undistinguished metallic prism shard he had dug from the depths of
the lake. The journal that the bumbling explorer Toby Stephens
found in the Inca ruin in Tikka Iklutz, Mexico was accurate after
all, he thought, pleased.

He gave a soft start when someone burst from the calm water. Roddy
then noticed the boat beside his - shit. The last thing he needed
was a rival fortune hunter. He reached for the dagger he wore in a
sheath on the belt around the waist of his swim trunks, only to
realize his mistake the moment he placed the blade against the
jugular of the man making to climb on board his boat.

"You must be Sheriff Ouellette," he said, sheathing his dagger and
pulling the man on board.

The man only gave a growl and pounced on Roddy. They fell down
hard, Roddy pinned under the man's weight, the sheriff's hands
pinning down his and the sheriff's knees pressing down Roddy's
legs. The prism fell across the boat. Both their eyes followed it.
Ouellette moved first, reaching for it, in the process his knees
easing slightly on their painful pressure on Roddy's own knees.
Roddy took this opportunity to push hard, throwing the sheriff off
him. But the sheriff's hand was already halfway there to reaching
the prism. In desperation, Roddy made a grab - and his hand pulled
hard on the other man's shocking brief trunks. There was a soft
tearing sound as they were pulled down the man's buttocks, and
Ouellette fell on his stomach hard.

He turned just as Roddy threw himself over him.

Shocked silence descended as they found themselves face to face.
Roddy shook slightly as he found himself looking at the weathered
but shockingly attractive face of the sheriff. Never more was he
aware of the hard-muscled body beneath him, a sculpted body of
perfect musculature that could put a Greek god to shame, and Roddy
was keenly aware of his hands pressing down on the most perfect
pectorals he seemed to have ever touched, right down to the two
hard nipples that burned into his palm like the streak of desire
fast taking over his every senses.

And from the way their breathings began to take on a rapid, harsh
rhythm, Roddy was aware that Eric's dark brown eyes had deepened
into pools of hunger. Eric's cock trapped between Roddy's thighs
was already fast filling into its impressive length and thickness,
and Roddy was intensely aware of his own near nudity, the
tumescence in his shorts, and the vulnerable need in his now
aching ass to be filled.

Roddy lifted his lower body, and Eric, instead of pushing him off,
pushed his fingers into the waistband of Roddy's shorts and pulled
them down. Roddy urgently reached down and touched the hot,
burning erection and cried out in need as the engorged crown
pressed urgently against the tight pucker of Roddy's ass. Already
the cock was fast moistening with lusty fuck juices, and Roddy
pushed down even as Eric thrust upwards with a violent lift of his
groin, his buttocks lifting off the floor.

Both of them cried out in pleasure even as Eric's cock plunged
home to the hilt. The shock of the sudden penetration shook them
both so much that Eric just lay there, his hands urgently
squeezing and massaging Roddy's pectorals as they both tried to
adjust to the feeling of the incredibly tight ass trying to
accommodate the cock that was way too large for its usual
capacity. Roddy tried desperately to relax his nether muscles,
experimentally riding up and down that cock. Soon, Eric urged him
with the thrusts of his own hips, until Roddy's ass adjusted to
the painful invasion of potent male flesh.

Eric, sensing the other man beginning to relax, began to increase
the rhythm of his pumping. Roddy threw his head back, his eyes
closed, and his mouth wide opened as he breathed loudly, often
moaning and crying out as he began to lose control, his speed and
rhythm becoming more and more bruising and urgent as he began to
climax noisily. Eric smoothly reversed their positions, and Roddy
screamed as he convulsed into a powerful climax, his cock spurting
his hot juices hard that a large amount actually splattered across
Eric's face. More semen splattered on Eric's chin, neck, chest,
and lower and Eric balanced himself on his hands and knees. As
Roddy lifted his thighs to clasp them high around Eric's torso,
right under the man's armpits, Eric began fucking the man in
earnest. His cock ravaged Roddy's steaming ass, in deep and hard
thrusts, his cock actually becoming thicker and harder with each
rapid inward plunge as blood rushed through every thick vein along
his shaft and his own come began filling his seminal tubes and
urethra - so much that they felt as hard as stone - and then he
felt the familiar sensation of come rushing hot and searing along
his cock, the tightening of his powerful balls, and the engorged
sensation of his cock crown, right before his slit separated
forcefully and in a burning sensation, his fiery semen ejaculating
in a powerful scorching series of spurts into Roddy's convulsing
ass.

Roddy arched his back, still caught up in a powerful climax that
hadn't stopped since his initial climax, and the carnal glory of
being filled with this man's drenching male spunk only heightened
his orgasm. He screamed until he was hoarse, and Eric held him
tight, even bruising him, as the sheriff gave a loud guttural roar
in his own powerful climax.

They remained joined that way, breathing hard to the point of
hyperventilating, as their orgasms slowly ebbed down. Sweat
drenched them both, cooling their overheated bodies, and Eric
looked down at the man below him.

"My name's Eric," he said in between heavy pants.

"You have a nice way of welcoming strangers to town, Eric," Roddy
managed to say shakily.

Eric laughed, and Roddy joined him.




THREE

"This is the crystal they say is part of a key used to unlock an
ancient spacecraft that was said to have crashed in the bottom of
the lake," Roddy said as he passed the prism to Eric. "There are
three more components I must find, and they are all hidden around
here."

"Alien spacecraft? This is not Roswell, Roddy," Eric said,
studying the prism he held in one hand as he steered the motorboat
with the other.

"I don't really believe it, but I found this, didn't I?" Roddy
said. "Whatever it is, it must be something that can bring about
such incredible tales of space aliens, so I intend to find the
other components as well as the space craft."

Eric shook his head. In the two days since they had met, he
learned that Roddy was what they would call a relic hunter. He
traveled around the world looking for legends and treasures. Rich
spoiled city kids, Eric thought privately, but he didn't mention
it aloud to Roddy. Every night he fucked Roddy, and each night was
a repeat or a more powerful encore of the first powerful mating
that Eric felt weak in the knees just thinking about it. He didn't
understand it - surely the novelty would wane the second time they
fucked, right? But if anything, fucking Roddy seemed to become
more earth shattering each time.

His cock peeked out through his trunks, and Roddy noticed. Eric
had taken to wearing shorts over them, because it was
embarrassing. His cock was having a hard time already keeping
within the confines of those trunks, but when Roddy was around, he
became as hard as a rock. Roddy got on his knees, and Eric's hand
tightened around the steering wheel even as he urged Roddy with
his other hand, letting the prism drop onto the floor. Roddy began
sucking him, and Eric moaned.

It was a good thing nobody was drowning, because Eric wouldn't
have noticed, lost as he was in Roddy's expert skill in fellatio.



Sunset wasn't bad, Eric decided, it was all red and orange, but it
was much nicer when watched from a hammock at the porch of his
lakeside house, enjoying the breeze, his man lazing beside him
with one hand down Eric's swim trunks. Eric lay back and let Roddy
play with his dick, enjoying the pleasure.

Roddy complained playfully that he was sore, and Eric, mindful of
the possibility of hurting Roddy too much, vowed to be nice and
stay clear of any actually penetration tonight. He just kissed
Roddy's forehead as he rubbed the man's hair and laughed softly as
Roddy murmured something obscene under his breath.

Trying to slow Roddy down, he reluctantly pulled the man's hand
out of his trunk and held it to his chest. "I like it when you
join me on my trips."

"You just want some fun on those long, boring trips round the
lake, big guy," Roddy remarked. He tried to free his hand, but
Eric was strong. "After the way you behave around, I'm sure the
whole town knows that you and I are fucking."

"Good. If those guys sniff around you once more, I will personally
beat their heads in," Eric growled, remembering darkly the way
Roddy seemed to invite flirtations. He could easily imagine having
to fend off Roddy's admirers all the time in the future.

Roddy, Eric had learned within a day of knowing the man, was the
unusual kind of guy who was a mix of nerd and jock. The man knew
what seemed like everything there was to know about nature. Roddy
told him that he had never attended a school before, his parents
home-schooling him until he was seventeen, upon which he applied
for college and actually got into Boston.

Roddy shifted slightly, nesting his head on comfortable warmth of
Eric's chest. "You should be happy that I don't get jealous over
them all drooling over that cock of yours." He made his point by
cupping his hand over the body part in question with his free
hand.

Eric laughed as Roddy squeezed playfully, his laugh slowly fading
into a groan as Roddy began massaging his aching tumescence.
"Okay, a few of them may have seen my dick up close..."

"How many?" Roddy demanded to know.

Eric pretended to count, only to laugh again when Roddy straddled
him and began tickling him with earnest. "How many, damn you?"
Roddy cried out in mock outrage. "How many?"

"It doesn't matter anymore. It's you and me now, right, for now?"
Eric managed to say.

Roddy gracefully conceded to that. "You're not my usual type,
Eric, but you're okay," he said.

"You may be book smart, mister, but don't you think I'm some
backward hick," Eric teased him. "I lived in LA once."

"What did you do there?" Roddy asked.

"Well, I was born here, and I got bored soon enough. I packed up
and moved to LA, bounced a few bars, even became a fireman for
three years, but then I came back here in the end. LA seems much
more exciting - it is - but in the end, I like it here better."

"I can see why," Roddy concurred. "The scenery is beautiful, and
the peace of it all. Sometimes I think I'd like to stay here for
as long as I could."

"Why don't you?" Eric asked quickly, maybe too quickly.

"So you're the unofficial leader of this town," Roddy just said
instead.

Eric let Roddy change the subject. If he was honest, he wasn't
sure that he wanted to face his feelings for the other man. "I
always wanted to modernize this place a little," he told Roddy,
"give it a more organized economy, or something. But no one here
seems to know what to do." He wondered if he should say what he
was thinking. Oh, why not? "Except maybe you."

"Yeah, I have connections with the city folks, I have money, and I
have the brains." Roddy stretched and lazily stepped down the
hammock. "Actually, I'm planning to write after I find this
spacecraft. I will not travel for a long, long time." He turned
and winked at Eric as he stood at the pier facing the lake. "Be
nice to me, Eric, and you may just get your wish and I will want
to stay here a lot longer."

Eric lifted his upper body and watched in bemused delight as Roddy
gracefully slipped off his shorts, not caring if anyone could see
his nudity, and dived into the water. "You'll actually consider
staying with me a lot longer?" he called out as he ran down the
pier.

He went down on one knee at the edge of the pier. No Roddy in
sight. "Roddy?" he called. "Where are you?"

With a laugh that caused Eric to jump a little, Roddy surfaced.
One hand reached out and pulled at Eric's trunks, the skimpy
material easily allowing the man's cock to spring free. Roddy
lifted his body up so that his mouth could close over Roddy's
cock, and then he fell back in the water. Roddy, not wanting that
delicious suction of his cock to end so soon, laughed and dived in
after the man.

Roddy began swimming away. "Yeah, I'll stay with you a lot
longer," he called back at Eric. "If you can catch me and make
me."

Eric began to give chase in earnest.




FOUR

Eric didn't stir when Roddy whispered his name. Perfect. Roddy
quietly pulled on his pants and threw his shirt over as he walked
towards the door. He paused to pick up shut the door behind him
when a knife was pressed against his neck, right under his Adam's
apple.

"Ah, Lea," Roddy said pleasantly. "You're improving. A year ago I
would have heard you sneaking up to me."

"I want the journal back," Nicholas Lea said.

"Okay. Can I reach it into my bag and take it out first?" Roddy
said.

"Ha, you think I'm born yesterday. Hand me the bag." Lea took the
bag roughly without much ado.

Roddy watched as the man walked away, still facing Roddy warily.
Lea bent down and rummaged into the bag, and grinned triumphantly
as he pulled out the familiar musty old tome wrapped in protective
plastic. And Roddy watched, cursing silently to himself, as Lea
ran off into the night with the journal.

Still, he knew where Lea would go - back to his lover Toby
Stephens, to whom he was doggedly loyal to like the most tenacious
bulldog. An almost inhuman smile of anticipation playing at his
lips, Roddy began to run.



Eric awoke when he realized that the bed was empty apart from him.
"Roddy?" he called. Receiving no answer, he squinted at the clock
beside him, the glowing digits indicating that the time was four
twelve am. "Roddy, damn it, where are you?" he called again. "Come
back to bed."

Cursing softly, he got on his feet and sauntered nude around his
house. "Roddy?" No Roddy. For a moment, Eric actually panicked,
afraid that Roddy had packed up and gone. Later, he would wonder
why he cared so much, but now he could only grab for his pair of
jeans and T-shirt before he dashed out of his house.

Later, he would also wonder how he knew where to go. At that
moment, he just ran with an urgency he didn't understand, not
knowing where, just feeling this frantic fear that he might be too
late if he didn't hurry. And sure enough, he dashed through a door
he dimly recalled as a room in Madeline's inn, just as a shot rang
out.

He watched, stunned into silence, as Roddy collapsed, his face
frozen in an expression of disbelief, as a pool of blood began to
spread across his chest. He fell off another man, whom Roddy had
been attacking. Eric gaped at the sight of the man Roddy had been
attacking - deep red lacerations tore through the man's shirt and
flesh, lacerations that could only be caused by sharp claws -
perhaps those razor sharp claws now slowly retracting, morphing
into the appearance of more humanoid nails as Roddy slowly slipped
into unconsciousness.

The man who fired his gun held it shakily at Eric. "Who the fuck
are you?"



"What is he?" Eric whispered as he watched Toby bandaged Lea's
chest.

Toby Stephens didn't pretend to misunderstand the question. He
just nodded at Roddy, who was still unconscious but now tied
securely on the bed in the room. "After seeing him attack Lea,
I'll hazard a guess that he's not exactly human," he said. "I
don't know what to think. Perhaps the space craft really does
exist, and Roddy needs to use it to go home."

"He's an alien?" Eric said. He couldn't believe it. He couldn't
accept it. "But it's not possible."

"Yeah, and I'm actually imagining this. Shit, Toby, be gentle,"
Lea hissed.

"Sorry, Nic." Toby apologetically loosened the bandage a little.

"Should he be at the hospital?" Eric asked. This he could handle -
an injured man. "I can call - "

"Nah. This is nothing," Lea told him. "I had worse, like when the
Sunn'iahs tortured me in El Turasia - now that was a bad one."

"Nonetheless, we have to check and see if there will be any side
effects from the injuries," Toby told him.

"Oh please," came Roddy's weak voice, "What do you think I am, the
predator monster?"

But Roddy's cocky voice faltered when he saw the man with Toby and
Lea. "Shit," he just whispered. "Oh fuck."

"What are you?" Eric asked, forgetting Lea and Toby and walking
towards Roddy despite his best judgment. "Your hands, they turn
into claws."

"Don't ask, Eric," Roddy just said, looking away. He closed his
eyes wearily. "Just forget what you saw."

"I can't forget, damn you," Eric said in a low, hard voice. "What
did you do to me, Roddy?"

"Nothing. It's biological. Among my people, we come into heat the
moment we meet our mates. We mate only once, and it's a sad,
twisted fate, Eric. When one dies, the other will follow within a
heartbeat. Somehow in the bonding, we become one in every way that
counts. And we can't fight it. I can't. I am compelled to give in
to the mating call - with you. A human. Who would've thought?"
Roddy studied Eric, his face inscrutable. But Eric somehow knew
that the man was hurting, just as he knew how to find Roddy,
because Roddy was in danger. "I have never heard of my people
mating with anyone outside our species, humanoid or no. That's how
you know where to find me, by the way. You just know. Because our
minds no longer have any boundaries when it comes to each other's
emotions and we just know where to find each other."

"Damn," Toby whispered from the background. Eric ignored him.

"I need the journal," Roddy continued. "My parents and I crashed
here twenty years ago, and I just want to go home. Please, Toby,
let me find the ship. If you want to see a fucking spacecraft, go
dig up the old useless craft that I came here with in the Andes
range. I just want to go home," he whispered.

"You shouldn't have attacked Lea," Toby pointed out furiously.
"You shouldn't have stolen the journal from me. You could have
fucking ask me and I will help you."

"I don't trust you," Roddy said simply. "And I should tell you -
my strength is returning. In five minutes, I'll break free of
these ropes and you'll have to choose. Give me the journal or I'll
kill you both. This time you won't catch me unawares."

"Shut up, Roddy," Eric said, moving to stand between Roddy and the
other two. "I won't let you lay a finger on them."

Roddy only scowled and defiantly pulled one hand up, snapping the
ropes holding it to the bedpost. Behind Eric, someone loaded a gun
- "Stand aside and let me blow a hole through his fucking brain,"
Lea said.

"Shut up, all of you," Toby snapped. He seemed startled when all
three pairs of eyes focused on him. "Roddy, I'll give you back the
journal. Hell, just take it and get out of this planet, I don't
care if I ever see you again. Here!" He flung the journal to
Roddy, who caught it with his free hand. "Next year I'll stick to
chasing the Holy Grail," he snapped. "And here is the second part
of your key," he said, pulling out a circular prism shard from his
pocket. "Take it."

Roddy caught it and closed his fingers tightly around it. "I...
but why?" he finally asked.

"I'm Toby Stephens, a respected paranormal researcher, I don't
pillage and plunder paranormal evidences, instead I study them or
debunk them!" Toby said hotly. "Your attitude is a mockery to my
work."

"He's British," Lea told Eric.

Eric nodded stupidly.

"Just tell me, will Nic be okay? Those wounds won't fester?" Toby
asked.

"No, they won't." Roddy broke free the last of his restrains, but
he just lay back on the bed. "Look, can I be left alone with
Eric?"

"This is our room," Lea pointed out.

"Oh come on, Nic," Toby told him. "I'll get you to the clinic."

"Tell Dr Jackson that I sent you. He won't dare to turn you away
if you say my name," Eric told them absently, his eyes on Roddy.

Toby shut the door behind them, and Eric was left alone with
Roddy.



Eric didn't turn away. Roddy was confused when Eric just sat on
the bed beside him and actually touched his cheek, checking to see
if there were any bruises or wounds. "So, do you have three eyes,
green skin?" Eric asked conversationally.

"I'm what you see. The claws are our natural defense mechanism. I
can't make any other of my body part longer or bigger if that's
what you're thinking."

Eric chuckled. "Even now you can crack a joke."

"I don't want to cry or rage, may as well I laugh."

"But you're not laughing, are you?" Eric asked simply.

"No." Roddy wished Eric would stop touching him. It wasn't making
this easy. Even now, desire was slowly fanning with each touch and
each rub of their body against each other. "You are my mate," he
finally said.

"And you'll be leaving me," Eric said. "You won't even ask me if I
want to come with you?"

"You can't survive on my planet. I can breathe your atmosphere
just fine, because it has sulfur, and I breathe in sulfur. But my
planet - which we call Xerona, the fifth planet from the star
called Ceresion (similar to your sun, only around ten times larger
in size) in the Alpha Centauri galaxy. Which is a stupid name you
humans give our galaxy. We call it Jurecon Xontellis. And what
kind of stupid name is the Milky Way anyway?"

Eric placed his finger on Roddy's lips, silencing his babbling. "I
will always know where you are, like you said. You leave me here,
and I will personally lead NASA to your old spacecraft and beg
them to restore it. If they can't, I will wait until they either
discover a way to travel to your place or die trying to find you."

"You won't find me."

"But I will try. Because apparently we are mates, and that means
we are in a committed relationship, right? I will honor that vow.
What is it in your people? To love, cherish, and honor, till death
do we part? That's my way, and I will do that, I swear I will."

"Then help me find the ship, Eric. Please. I miss my home. I want
to go home."

Eric looked away. "Okay," he said lifelessly. "If that's what you
want."





FIVE

"It sure looks like something out of TV," Eric said, trying to be
jovial as he stepped into what looked like a white room.

Roddy didn't laugh. Neither did Eric. They watched as Roddy
flipped open a panel and placed his hand over some glowing light -
just like in TV - and the ship seemed to come to life. Lights,
screens with blinking lights - Eric couldn't absorb it. All he
knew was this man whom he was irrevocably bonded to by chemicals,
hormones, and other complicated substances - and emotions - he
couldn't comprehend would be away in literally another world,
another world that couldn't divide them, as he would be keenly
aware of the distance between them every living heartbeat of a
second.

How could he bear it? How could Roddy bear it?

Roddy just stood there with his back to Eric, frozen, a beautiful
figure in only short swim trunks that revealed every glorious
detail of his sculpted body like an untouchable god. Eric wanted
to turn away, but he couldn't. Roddy lowered his head, and his
shoulders heave - once - before he hooked his thumb into his
trunks and pushed them down. When he turned to look at Eric, it
was with eyes red and moist with tears.

Eric pushed his own trunks down, letting his throbbing cock free.
One step, then another, and then he was feeding his erection into
the willing tight heat at the junction between Roddy's thighs.
Roddy placed his palms, fingers splayed wide, at the wall and his
forehead against, a man who seemed defeated and dead inside, and
as Eric took him, he let his palm cover Roddy's, each of his
fingers between Roddy's, until Roddy tightened his fingers into a
fist, holding Eric tight, hand to hand, cock to anus, as they both
came in a hard climax that wrung the last of their breath.

"I can't leave you," Roddy whispered harshly. "Eric, oh Eric, I
can't bear to leave you," he repeated, and he would have fallen
onto his knees if Eric hadn't held him. "I can't bear the very
idea of not being with you. I hate this, fuck it, I hate this
fucking bond between us!" He yelled the last sentence, before
laughing brokenly. "No, I don't," he amended. "I could still see
the beautiful red mountains of my home, and I want to stay here
with you, I..."

"No, Roddy, you should go home," Eric whispered. There, he said
it. "You spent all your life searching for this way home, and you
won't be happy here, even with me. Please go, Roddy. It's probably
for the best."

Roddy nodded, and buried his head in Eric's shoulder. His tears
mingled with the sweat and water on Eric's flesh, but it didn't
matter. Eric inhaled the man's scent, trying to savor it one last
time, even as he pushed his cock deeper into Roddy's body, his
body recoiling at the idea of leaving this man. "Just remember me,
okay?" he managed to say through the constriction in his throat
and heart. "I love you, you stupid alien."

"I hate that word," Roddy said feebly. "But yeah, I'll remember,
Eric. I swear it."

Eric didn't know how, but he managed to walk away from Roddy. He
saw Roddy staring back at him at the doorway of the fucking ship,
and he pulled on his trunks, waved shortly, before diving back
into the waters, before he lost his nerve and break down and cry.



"I'm sorry about Roddy," Toby said. Behind him, Nicholas Lea
loaded the last of their bags into the cab that would take them to
the airport, where they would fly off to another place that had
some paranormal or unexplained phenomena that fascinated Toby.
Unlike Lea, who thought Roddy's departure a good riddance indeed
(the man's stoic nature amazed Eric, but then again, Lea had
probably seen enough strange things in his adventures with Toby),
Toby genuinely seemed to feel sorry for Eric.

"No, don't be," Eric told him. "For a week, it was pure magic."

"He said that you will never mate again," Toby remarked
thoughtfully. "You think you will ever...?"

"We'll see," Eric said. Not that he believed it, as his interest
in living, not just in sex, seemed to have evaporated with Roddy's
departure. He went through days by motion, smiling emptily at
people, but inside he felt dead and drained. "We always get hot
hunks coming here every year," he told Toby just to humor the man.
"Maybe I'll find someone soon."

What he was aware of was Roddy. He looked into the sky every
night, and he stared at the stars, so hard until his eyes ached,
at the very spot that he knew Roddy was, too far away for him to
reach. So Roddy wasn't human, and Eric was probably under-reacting
to the insane adventure he was caught up in this week, but how
could he behave otherwise? Roddy seemed so right, so perfect, and
now he was gone.

Fuck Roddy. Damn him to hell for leaving him like this!

As he watched the cab leave, he realized that now he was truly
alone. Toby and Lea, whom he could at least share his misery with,
were now gone as well. In Little Bigby, surrounded by people he
couldn't really relate to anymore, he was finally, utterly alone.

He looked up at the sky, trying to ignore the sun's blinding
light, until his eyes watered and he had to look away.




SIX

That night, Eric dreamed that Roddy came home - to him. He dashed
through the night, stopping only to pull on a pair of jeans, and
by the pier, there Roddy stood, smiling nervously, hands in
pockets of his jeans, waiting for Eric.

"I couldn't do it. I have to turn back, and come back to you,"
Roddy said.

This was a nice dream, Eric decided.

"My home? It has nice mountains and other amazing things you can't
imagine. But you are here, Eric, my life and my soul, excuse the
corniness, and that makes this my home now," Roddy said. "We'll be
good together, Eric. Did I mention that I'm pretty rich? Amazing
analytical skills and permutation calculative abilities make me a
super killer at the stock markets. I'll live here with you, and
you can do your sheriff thing while I sell the Bigby monster
trinkets to gullible tourists. How about it, Eric? Please?"

Eric had seen the dashing heroes like Fred Astaire do this to the
heroines they love in old movies. He tried to emulate them, to
gracefully sweep Roddy in his arms and kissed the man while the
audience applause wildly like they should. But when he first
touched Roddy - shattering this lovely dream to drive him to
realize that this was sweet, sweet reality - he became Eric
Ouellette again. "Sure," he said, and laughed in relief as he
kissed the man. He wanted to be tender, but as the dark voids in
their souls now lighten with the reinforced proximity between
them, their hunger flared anew, and they were fast tearing at each
other clothes.

On the pier, Roddy closed his eyes and cried out in relief and
bliss as Eric's cock once more filled him to completion. Eric
kissed his chin and neck, and as they began moving together, he
knew this was the right decision he had made.

Their climax was almost unbearable, Roddy's body singing with
pleasure that he thought he would explode, and when Eric released
his climax into his body, Roddy's body hummed with life - this was
right, this was the perfect, most correct thing he had ever done.

And, "Welcome home, love," Eric whispered.
