This file is a part of Elf Sternberg's Collected Works on ASSTR.  The
complete archive of Elf's work can be found on his website at:

http://www.drizzle.com/~elf

The author can be contacted at:

mailto:elf@drizzle.com

  ----------------------------------------------------------------------

                            A Dearth of Irony

Journal Entry 028 / 00124

Noren, Nenim 03, 00124

After spending far too long drying out my fur from a shower, I sat down
with a cup of decaffeinated hot chocolate and began reviewing my email.
The Embassy mailing lists were unsurprisingly quiet. Despite the usual
upheavals in the world the introduction of the Feed the Stars program had
put a serious dent in the most common cause of inter-tribal warfare in
both Africa and Asia. When Humans have enough food they tend to be lazy.
The industrious by nature put their energy into entertaining their
neighbors rather than finding new ways of murdering them. I noticed
a new fusion-powered water desalinization plant was being protested by
"environmentalists" who decried the slight increase in local salt density,
claiming it would kill fish.

People who hate their own species that much shouldn't be allowed to
reproduce. It's a negative meme.

I moved on to the personal lists and found little of value there as well.
The only thing I did see was a hint of an orgy on another list, so I
traversed the links and found that it would be an all-male event of an
extreme nature, the kind of thing that intrigued me like no other. I'd
done a lot of kinky things since coming to Earth; regarded by the Terrans
as a low-level "bureaucrat," whatever that was, I was permitted my
peccadilloes. Fortunately, Terran intelligence agencies no longer thought
that my having peccadilloes would give them any leverage. The truth was
that Athena appreciated my diversions as part of the historical record
as they let her look in on corners that rarely received documentation
from the higher historians.

And, on the message board I spotted the name of someone I knew. I dashed
off an email to him from my personal account, avoiding any hint that
I wanted to discuss this particular matter with him. It was just an
invitation to lunch tomorrow.

Tuesday, I found an email from him agreeing to meet for lunch. It was
a friendly email, the "Hi, haven't heard from you in a long time" type.

The cafe we chose was the little French place two blocks up from the
Embassy, built into a sharp, triangular spot. Inside was painted a bright
mustard color, the chairs and table supports black wrought iron, the
tabletops glass. I supposed the colors would have been more appropriate
in the summer when the sunlight would brighten everything but right now
it looked dingy and tired. Much like the population of Washington in
late January.

Josh was there, sitting an a table, yawning. "Good morning," I said.

He nodded. "Is it morning, T'Oma?" he said, glancing at his watch. "Three
minutes left, I suppose." He stood up and offered his hand. I shook it.
"It's good to see you again."

"And how is my favorite legal eagle?" I asked.

"Being a clerk for the City of Washington is no picnic," he said. "Do you
have any idea how many completely ridiculous suits are filed every day? I
get to see the pettiest of personal details from these people. Divorced
couples who want to limit what the other parent lets the child watch on
TV. I've even got one mother who's filed a protest against the father
because he lets the child eat ice cream."

"What's wrong with that?" I asked.

"She's a vegan. She doesn't have a leg to stand on. The courts don't
allow one parent to dictate the parenting style of the other. But
he counter-sued on the grounds that her constant messages about the
dangers of milk have made the child paranoid and destroyed the father-son
relationship." He sighed. "I should stop talking about work. It depresses
me."

"You should. Just repeat to yourself that this'll all be over in a
millennium or two."

He grinned. "Do you really think so?"

Yeah, I really think so. I thought it would take much less time than that.
But I didn't say so. Instead, I said, "Who knows? Do you really think
we'll keep being as petty as we are now?"

"Dunno." Our lunches came, just sandwiches, nothing special. "So, what
made you think of me?" he asked.

"I saw you on Red Right."

He nearly choked on his sandwich. "You what? No, don't say that again. I
got it the first time." He downed his entire glass of water, rose and
walked to the elegant little tray where a pitcher with ice waited,
came back. "You read that?"

"I'm not just your ordinary alien homosexual, you know," I said. "I keep
track of these things. Especially since you all air them so publicly."

Josh stroked his chin. "I might have to find a new hobby."

"Oh, come on. Ever since Andrew Sullivan we've known privacy is
dead. Only the Pentagon keeps acting like its personal nasty habits
can be successfully kept under wraps. There are cameras everywhere,
Josh. The only question is, who's in charge of them?"

"Oma, you scare me."

"On Pendor, there is no privacy of the kind you imagine. The AIs know
absolutely everything, but they have a value standard that includes
gossip only when they think it furthers their purpose."

"And what is their purpose?" Josh asked.

"Ask Shardik. He might know."

"He MIGHT know?" Josh asked. "Do you have any idea how ominous that
sounds?"

I nodded. Pendorians lived with it. It was remarkable how rarely the AIs
intervened even in moments of personal violence. What they guaranteed,
though, was that the aggressor in any such moment was portrayed in the
worst possible light, and somehow the notion of notoriety, of power,
never came through. I never ceased to be amazed at how differently these
things happened on Earth. The idea that someone would give in to weakness
and descend into personal violence, and that this could be portrayed
positively, was about the only thing about Earth I thought could not
be fixed with a sufficient application of bread and circuses. Mostly
because that's what they wanted from their circus!

"So, what were you doing looking at RR?" he asked.

"I wanted to know if I could go to the party on Friday."

"You want to go to the party?" he asked. "I- I suppose. I don't see
why not."

"Can you tell me about it? What goes on there?"

"Well, you won't be asked to do anything you don't want to do, of course,
and there's really no pressure. The place is called Open Arms, it's a
little bed and breakfast down in Virgina, about an hour's drive. It's
actually quite nice. They have a hot tub and, well, the basement is well
appointed. Naturally, you have to bring your own party favors."

"'Party favors?'" I asked. "You mean, like drugs?"

"Well, no. I mean like Crisco. And it's nice to bring something the host
can use-- gloves, paper towels. And yeah, there's sometimes some drugs
there. Pot, beer, poppers. We don't allow tweakers."

"I'm going to sound like a parrot again. 'Tweakers'?"

"People on methamphetamine."

"Is it common that people show up like that?"

Josh nodded. "It used to be. Before the cure, it happened a lot with the
more self-destructive types. On meth, people think they're indestructible.
With AIDS, they thought they could afford to fuck themselves up because
they didn't have much time left anyway. They can take and do anything." He
changed his voice. "'But Bob, that's both hands up to the elbow!'
'Goddammit, gimme more!'"

I laughed. Josh's ability to do different voices should have gotten him
a job doing commercials, or cartoons, but he wanted to go into law. I
suppose I couldn't fault him for his decision. A man's gotta do what a
man's gotta do. And a Pendorian? We have our own needs.

"So, who do I call to get in?" I asked.

"I'll call the guy who runs the place. His name's Bill. I'm sure he'd
let you in. If nothing else, the novelty of having a Felinzi in the
place will certainly get the party moving."

I grinned. "Who's gonna try and suck my dick?"

He smiled back. "All of 'em."

  ----------------------------------------------------------------------

I did indeed get an email with the time, address, and some introductory
material. The actual act wasn't that foreign to me; I'd tried with a lover
some years back. Maybe it was him, maybe I wasn't equipped for it, but we
never did get anywhere and it left me feeling sore and unsatisfied. I was
amused to see that my presence was announced on the Red Right mailing
list, with a flurry of followups signaling that they'd all treat me
"right."

I checked out an unmarked car for the night from the motor pool and made
my way out to the freeway, headed south. I hit traffic, some accident on
the interchange, and ended up getting to the place a half-hour late. Part
of that was my miscalculating the length of the trip in the first place.

The address led me to a lovely three-story house with wood fronting
painted a calming blue. The front yard was tiny but as lovingly manicured
as a stereotype would allow. A sign on the front door said, "Entrance
in rear." The double entendre' brought my first smile of the evening.

I walked around to the back. A raised platform held a small but
comfortable-looking hexagonal hot tub bubbling away noisily, and through
sliding glass doors I could see shapes moving about in the dim light. I
walked in to find four men sitting in what looked like a small living
room. There were two couches along the walls, and opposite them was a
wide television screen on which some rather aggressive pornography was
playing to the rapt attention of a few.

The image was crystal clear; the release in 2006 of do-it-yourself smart
video restoration software, not to mention the cure for HIV, had led
to a major resurgence of interest in 1970-era pornography, especially
since you could insert yourself over any actor of approximately the same
build. The video on-screen had the look of some mid-90's work, but I
could see that the restorer had identified the condoms as unwanted and
edited them away.  The super-buff performers wore leather harnesses of
the kind popular with the kinkier crowd.

Not like the actual group here. The mix was very appealing, the buff
mixing with the out-of-shape freely. Four men was a small sample to go
on, but if they were representative the middle age was somewhere in the
late 30's to early 40's. And they were all still wearing some clothes.

That was when one noticed me. "Oh, my god." He looked me up and down and
I could see the calculations going on behind his eyes. I've gotten that
with every Terran lover so far. "You must be Oma. Hi, I'm Bill." A tall,
thin man in his mid-40's with a pot belly and eyes the color of moonlit
sky held out his hand.

I shook it warmly, and said, "Yeah, that's me. Josh here, yet?"

"Nope. He'll show up. He's on the list."

The other four men were also eying me warily now, not sure of what to make
of me. I let it slide. Nobody expects a black-furred alien in their midsts
here on Earth. We're still something of a rarity. I reached for my wallet.
"Twenty bucks to cover costs, right?"

"Yep." He took the money, put it in a small lockbox. "Ed, record Oma as
attending." The little laptop computer on the table blinked softly and
recorded the transaction. "Don't worry. It'll get wiped tomorrow. It's
just the guest list." I nodded. "Here, let me show you around. Now,
the rest of the place is off limits. It's just this room, the outside,
and the downstairs. Let me show you downstairs."

He led me through a narrow doorway and down a flight of creaky wooden
stairs. We reached a carpeted room, almost square except for what looked
like a closet built into one corner. "Through there is the bathroom. The
shower has two hoses, one for the head, one for the shot."

"'Shot?'" I asked. "Sorry, I'm a bit slow on some of the terminology."

"New guy, eh? I assume you did clean out, though?"

I nodded. Rather than find some way of asking the staff doc for help,
I had decided to go ahead and do it the old-fashioned way, with an enema
bottle. The process had been unpleasant and uncomfortable in a very
personal way, but I had managed to get through it. I understand that some
people enjoy the process. Some of the sensations had been interesting,
but certainly nothing I would have referred to as 'erotic.'

"Good." He pushed open a sliding door and showed me the shower. He held
up what looked like skinny dildo on the end of a hose hanging from a
diverter. "Showershot. Instant enema gear."

"Isn't it dangerous using wall-pressure?"

"You don't go deep with it," he said. "It's just for cleaning out the
bottom part." He laughed at his own joke. "If you're going to go deep,
you need to do other things. But you're new. If you're clean, I'm sure
you'll do fine. If you do use it, it's polite to fill the holder there
from that bottle and put it back for the next person." He gestured toward
a bottle labeled 'bleach.'

"Now, the rest of the room is where the real play happens." There were
four stations, three slings and what looked like an examination table,
all set in a row. At the end of the row, the nook created by the jut
of the bathroom was filled with a small bed. "You're one of the first
ones here.  Usually things don't pick up until about ten."

"I was afraid I was going to be late."

"Not running on gay time, are you?" I held my tongue. There are some
stereotypes I don't like. That's one of them.

I heard footsteps upstairs and the sound of the sliding glass door was
unmistakable. "I have more guests," Bill said. "Take a look around." There
were speakers hung in the corners and the music playing sounded like
trance as done by an orchestra. The floor was covered in cheap, flat
carpeting that looked like it could be pulled up without much effort.

There was one oddity to the room that caught my eye. Not in a way that
really interested me, but it was worth noting. I walked back upstairs
and dug into my duffel, pulling out a beer from the softpack sports
cooler I had borrowed from someone at the embassy. "Hey, Bill," I said,
"What's with all the straight porn?"

"More than half our business is straight," he said. "There are a lot
more of them than there are of us. They like this sort of thing, too,
you know." A small percentage of a large group and a larger percentage
of a small group. I shrugged. It made sense.

I had to deal with a number of shocked looks from people who were
finally beginning to show up. Josh finally did, and I hugged him as
he came through the door. We made small talk but it wasn't long before
loud and manly groans began wafting up from the basement. "Shall we go
look?" he asked.

Downstairs, the middle sling was in use. The sling was made of leather
straps sewn together with cross-straps, suspended from the rafters by
steel chains, forming a platform off the ground at just the right height
to fuck someone lying in it. A heavyset man in his early 40's lay in
the sling, his legs high in the air, knees hooked over the chains. His
partner, a thinner guy and even older, was working four fingers into his
butt. The volume of Crisco in use was amazing. I noticed that each sling
had a small table for the top to keep his Crisco and spare gloves, a stool
for him to sit on, and a roll of paper towels overhead, suspended from the
ceiling with a stretch cord like the kind used for securing cargo to the
roof of an automobile. A smaller, higher table lay near the bottom's head,
where he kept only a small brown bottle of amyl nitrite, a popular drug
that relaxed the smooth muscles of the body, making penetration easier.

At events like this, there are two kinds of voyeurs; those who gawk and
those who contribute. The former make you uncomfortable, as if you were
some kind of freak and they couldn't believe they were watching you do
these strange things; the latter turn you on, appreciating you for what
you're showing them. I hoped I was the latter; I felt like the latter.
Despite the obsession with hard bodies that came through in pornography,
watching these two gentle men do their thing gave me a hard-on.

Josh pressed up behind me, reached down and fondled my cock. "You're
liking this."

"Yeah," I said slowly, surprised at how much I was liking this. I wanted
to contribute. I wanted to participate.

Heavy footsteps on the stairs told me that more were coming down, and
soon the basement was filling with men. I made my way over to the bed
in the nook to watch.

I was joined by an incredibly cute young man no older than thirty,
barrel-chested and belly to match, body covered in fine, blond hair,
mustache, hair trimmed to less than inch all-over. Without saying a word
he began fondling my cock. "Never had a Pendorian here before."

"I'm just like you. With fur, mind you."

"And a tail."

"It's a hot tail tonight," I joked.

"Can I suck you?"

"If you like," I said, smiling. Josh was right. And, oh Fah! was his mouth
soft. I couldn't believe how good he was at giving head. He dropped down
onto my dick and I could feel the soft burr of his mustache prickling
the fell of my hide right above my cock. He was deep throating me and
instantly I felt close to coming. I knew it wasn't a real rise, just
the intensity of such powerful sucking so fast.

I luxuriated in the feel of his lips and tongue on my cock, but eventually
I had to tell him to stop. "I'm gonna come, and it's early yet." His
face dropped, but he smiled and nodded at me. We leaned against the back
wall to watch as the room filled up. For the first time I looked down
the length of the room. All three slings and the examination table were
in use. "Look," my recent partner said as his hands caressed the fur of
my chest. "It's like a kindergarten."

I knew what the word meant and, looking down the row, I realized just
how right he was. Everything was in order and everyone was following the
rules. It was organized just like a kindergarten. It even had cubbyholes
along the wall for shed clothing. The only difference was that this was
the kinkiest kindergarten I had ever seen.

I grinned. A perfect analogy.

I rose and went back upstairs. More people had shown up; I was a center
of polite attention. I liked it that way. They were quietly interested
in me, but I wondered if my difference would keep them away from me.

I needn't have worried. A handsome man walked by me, his hand brushing
my cock. He paused for a second. "I hope you don't mind," he said as he
casually fondled me.

"Oh, of course. I come here for this kind of harassment." I grinned to
let him know I was joking. He said, "Would you like to play downstairs?"

"I would," I agreed. "But... I'm new at this."

"I figured you would be," he said.

"Don't figure on that," I said. "Let me grab my stuff."

He nodded. I joined him down stairs with my bag over my shoulder. He
indicated an empty sling. As I was getting into it, the man in the
sling next to mine started shouting, "Oh, god, Oh god!" I looked to
see his partner with half an arm buried in his ass. The top, a tall,
thin guy with a gnarled nose and an angelic smile, said, "That's it,
man, you're in the house of the Lord now."

That got a few chuckles. I undressed, folded my clothes and placed them
on top of my duffel. I took out the few "party favors" I had brought for
myself and hopped into the sling. The tinkling of the chains overhead
was more amusing than threatening. My cute partner with the busy hands
slipped newspaper onto the floor under our play area, and then a towel
under my butt. I looked up and realized that the scene was complete;
above me, overhead, was a mirror, pushed down so that I could see exactly
what was going on between my legs.

"Hmm," my partner said. "What's your name?"

"Oma."

"I'm Greg. I know how much of a pain it is to get Crisco out of towels.
What's it like with fur?"

"I'm going to find out." He chuckled as I threw my legs out over the
chains. My ass was completely exposed, up in the air, easy for him to see.
My tail draped down onto the floor. I felt oddly small, compressed into
that tiny space, the sling only slightly more than a meter long and not
even a meter wide. I had been turned into a fuck object, my legs lifted
out of the way.

Greg started by kissing my balls. In the mirror, his head obscured my
vision but I could feel exactly what was going on. He coaxed my cock
out of its short sheath and licked the tip playfully before sliding back
down over my testicles. His tongue tickled playfully along that little
stretch of skin between balls and ass, and I waited, anticipating the
touch of his tongue on my hole. When it came, I knew I was in the right
place. Up until now I had been a bit hesitant about this whole event,
but now my asshole was telling me that I had brought it to the place
where it would get what it wanted. What I wanted.

"Oh, fuck," I groaned. "Good."

"It'll get better," he said, his voice muffled by my furred asscheeks.
"This will be fun. I get to give the alien the anal probe this time."

I had heard similar jokes several times in the past years, but this time
it had an effect, and I laughed hard along with him.

He stood up and started to pull a glove over his hand, then stopped. "I
forgot to ask. Glove or no glove? Got any allergies? Anything to tell me?"

My head was reeling from the attention already, but I managed to pull
myself together. "No allergies. You decide on the gloves. The only
thing you need to know is that I'm a bit of a neurotic about mess;
I'll probably try to get up and help you clean the second we're done."

"No, you won't," he said. "I won't let you."

"Just letting you know."

He grinned and finished pulling the glove on. I watched in the mirror as
he took a small glob of Crisco from the can and pressed it to my asshole.
The feel of cool grease made me feel more relaxed, which I thought was
weird, but I accepted it. He took more grease onto his gloved hand and
slid one finger easily into my butt. I lay back and let his invasion
happen, let myself be opened by this hot-looking man.

Two fingers were easy, and then he began with three. Things began to
get interesting. Three fingers was a lot, as far as I was concerned,
and watching him turn his hand and pry my hole with that greasy paw of
his was turning me on, but in peculiar ways. I wasn't getting hard from
it, but I was really enjoying the things he was doing to my asshole.

He was incredibly patient. I was already hungry for more, but he rocked
his hand back and forth slowly, sloshing grease around in my ass,
letting my hole open up more. Then, when I wasn't looking, there were
four fingers. "You haven't taken a hit," he said, gesturing at the small,
brown bottle of amyl at my head.

"I'm saving it until I need it," I said.

He nodded. "You've got a great asshole," he said, pushing in gently with
all four fingers. Deep inside my butthole I felt his finger curl up.

"Ow," I said softly.

"Not a prostate player, huh?" he asked.

"No," I agreed. "I guess not."

"I'll be careful, then." He kept up with the rocking motion deeper into
my ass; his hand was in all the way to the thumb, which he kept pointed
up and away from my hole. I leaned back in the sling and let the feel
of his hand on my asshole go through me. I couldn't believe we'd gotten
this far.  How long had I been here? How much could I take?

He was using both hands now, spreading my asshole open with three
fingers of each hand. But that was nothing compared to getting over the
hump of his thumb, the widest part of the hand. He showed me the tower
configuration of six fingers and then his fist and I realized that I
was a long way from taking it all.

Or maybe not. His hands were incredibly gentle, wonderfully talented,
as he opened me up further and further. I watched with amazement as
he folded his thumb along the length of his left hand in a straight,
goose-neck style, and then pressed inwards. "Take a hit," he said,
gesturing with his other hand toward the amyl.

I did as he suggested, the rough, ugly smell of the amyl filling my
sinuses and a second later the effect hitting me hard. I got dizzy and
my body felt light. In the mirror I watched a miracle happen as his hand
slipped into my asshole. Greg's hand was buried deep in my guts now.
Amazingly, I felt no pain, and I knew that wasn't because of the amyl
because it doesn't cover up pain, which is another reason why it's
popular. It also wears off in about thirty seconds.

"You've got an asshole just like mine. Tight on the outside, but a lot
of room once you get in," my buddy said as he slowly turned his fist
inside my guts.

"Oh, fuck!" I cried out. I felt so good! But I was also starting to feel
sore at the opening. "Maybe that's enough."

"Okay. I wouldn't ask much more from a virgin anyway." He slowly took
his hand out, so slowly I ached, but I wasn't sure if I wanted him to
stay or go. Past the thumb his hand slipped out easily and my body shook
with a strange ecstasy. I lay there, tears in my eyes, and looked up in
the mirror again. He was just touching my hole with his fingers. "What
do you want?"

"I... I don't know," I said. I was still trying to figure out what had
just happened. "I..."

"I'll just stay here," Greg said, "and touch you until you figure out
what you want." His fingertips danced at my hole, one or two fingers
sliding in now and then, teasing me. My butthole hungrily announced that
it wanted more, and I conveyed its request. "More."

"More?" he asked.

"More," I said. He slipped three fingers in, then four. He went only
slightly quicker than the first time, and when the time came for his
thumb I took another hit of the amyl, and in he slipped. "What do you
want?" he said.

I began stroking my cock. It grew to full hardness as he began rocking
me back and forth in the sling, using my asshole's grip on his wrist to
pull me to him before letting go. It felt so fucking good. In the mirror,
I could see us both attached by butt and wrist. "That's it, little kitty,
tell me what you want."

"I want... I want to bust a nut with your hand inside me!" I said, letting
the words out that I had wanted to say all night. A second later my wants
became needs, and then truth as I screamed out loud, coming so hard I
felt semen hit me on the muzzle. "Oh, fuck! Fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck!"

"I'm hearing some happy sounds!" said the man with the voice of an
evangelist. "Let me hear it some more! Hallelujah!"

But I had no more. I was drained. "Out," I begged. "Enough."

"I'm gonna go slow," Greg said. "Can't rush this."

I nodded, reluctant to take a hit of the amyl to get him out. Peristaltic
pressure in my gut was already pushing Greg's hand away; the sex
was over and I could no longer ignore the things I had done to my
anatomy. I pushed, and Greg's hand slipped out easily. He examined the
glove carefully, and then smiled. "See? Nothing wrong with you at all. No
mess, no blood"

"Oh, good," I sighed, sagging back into the sling. "Fuck. But I am
a mess."

"Only the kind of mess we like around here. All kinds of white stuff. You
stay right where you are," my hot buddy said. "Just stay right there." I
remembered my promise to him and nodded. I would stay right here while
he cleaned up. He pulled down a huge wad of paper towels and cleaned off
as much Crisco as he could, folded the towel protecting the sling over
my groin, and gathered up the newspapers. He offered me a paper towel
to wipe up the come on my chest and belly. "I need a shower."

"That's what it's there for," Greg said. He offered me his arms and I
allowed him to pull me up into a sitting position, then stood up into
his embrace. His body was so comforting; the whole thing had been,
really, and his hug just made me feel so happy. He tried kissing me,
and we managed something around my muzzle.

"Now, this is a story to tell my kids," he said. "I had sex with an
alien."

"You have kids?" I said.

"Yeah, and they know I'm gay. I don't think they'd want to know all the
details. I'll just tell them we met at a party and I spent a lot of time
with you exchanging... pleasantries."

I laughed. "You're sweet," I said, kissing him again. "I need to go wash."

"Then go shower," he said.

I grabbed soap from my duffel, went into the shower, and mistakenly
turned the power on high. The "showershot" thing was on, and it began
snaking around the bathroom out of control, giving me a noseful of water
before I managed to turn it off. "Damn," I swore.

"You okay in there, Oma?"

"Fine!" I sang. I found the valve to turn the shower proper on and was
soon washing myself down with a soap made in Hungary. It was one of the
few soaps that the Embassy people said was appropriate for grease on
Pendorian fur that wasn't a "pet soap," which was usually too harsh and
smelled awful. Even so, it wasn't enough to actually get all of the grease
out, and I had the impression that I'd feel slippery back there for days.

I dried off as well as I could with towels and walked back up the stairs,
taking a seat on the empty couch. The porn was still going, still with
the same theme, but over on the couch two guys were sucking each other
off, each with his head in the other's crotch. I watched for a while,
enjoying the sight, completely ignoring the fact that neither of these
men were the buff gods on film but they were real and they were enjoying
themselves.  One of them paused to light a hand-rolled cigarette and I
learned what marijuana smelled like. At least, I assume that's what it
was, if they were going by the party rules.

Eventually, though, after another beer I wandered back down to watch
some more. I admit it, I was hooked. I didn't think I had enough in me
to do this again this night, and I wanted someone to be by my side if
I was asked to top, but I wanted to bottom again, soon. I wanted to get
my ass plowed. And I wanted to fuck somebody. Anybody.

There was a handsome guy with muscles clearly earned from hours in
the gym lying face-down on the bed, looking away from the rest of the
party. There was a large mirror on the back wall of the nook and he was
watching all of us in it. I looked down on his proffered, hard-bodied ass
and wondered if I could have it. It was a surprising moment of avarice. I
had already come and yet I wanted more of something, anything, some way
of getting into another man before the night was over. I crawled onto
the bed, crawled over him.

"What... ?" he said, surprised, then looked up. "You're..."

"Molesting you," I said with a smile, kissing his shoulder. He relaxed.
"May I?"

"I would love it if you would," he said. "Something to remember."

"Mmm," I agreed, my cock getting hard between the cheeks of his ass. "I
admit I was attracted to your hot-looking ass."

"That's why I put it there, for the world to see," he said.

I pressed my cock against his asshole. "We're going to need some grease."

"Right there," he gestured. I followed where he pointed with my eyes and
used the indicated bottle. I squirted some of the clear liquid between
his cheeks and pressed my cock into him. "Yeahhh," was all he said as
I slipped into his hot butt.

I lay on top of this complete stranger, my cock buried deep in his
ass, and kissed his shoulders and neck as we fucked. In the mirror,
I could see him looking up at me, a face full of disbelief, pleasure,
and surprise as I slowly made use of his warm, willing hole. I smiled
at him. "How are you taking it?" I asked.

"I didn't expect to get fucked by an alien while here," he said. "But
I'll take it."

"Good," I whispered into his ear. "Because I've already come once. This
could take a while."

He put his head down in crossed arms and closed his eyes. He wasn't
completely passive, but I didn't mind either way. It didn't matter to
me at this point. If he was willing, I was horny. The groans of men and
the smell of sweat and poppers filled the air as my cock found a home
in his asshole.

It actually didn't take long. I was delighted by the rush of pleasure
as I came inside him, a soft gasp in his ear, a whispered "thank you,"
a roll in the bed, a hug. He relaxed and released me, heading for the
shower as I wiped my cock off with yet another paper towel.

I sat on the bed and let the dizziness subside for a minute or two,
watching as more men shouted out their pleasures in the slings and tables.

I glanced up. "Is that really the time?" I asked an older, heavyset guy as
he joined me on the bed. More hands groping for more cocks, more asses;
his was short, but amazingly fat, and he appreciated my strokes. It
seemed that I was the flavor of the night and as many men as possible
were trying to get their hands on me. I didn't mind, but I was tired.

"That's really the time," he said. It was already two hours past midnight
and unlike most Terrans I don't have much interest in weekends. I like
what I do. I even do it on Saturday. But maybe not tomorrow.

But there was no denying that this fuzzy bear of a man wanted one more
climax. I began stroking his cock with my hand as he stroked my back
and butt. I gently pried his hand free of my ass; he was probing me
with rough fingers and I was more than a little tender back there right
now. He didn't resist as I took him over the edge, sending lines of thick,
ropy come onto his belly.

He lay on the bed, gasping, and I kissed his cheek. He said, "Thank you."

"You're welcome," I whispered, kissing him gently.

I rose and recovered my clothing, then walked upstairs, duffel over one
shoulder. I dressed quietly. "You leaving already?" Josh asked.

Josh! "I didn't see you downstairs at all tonight," I said.

"Ah, I've been upstairs." He placed a hand on his stomach. "My system
isn't going to let me play tonight."

"I'm sorry to hear that," I said. "But you could have come down and
topped. I was looking forward to seeing you in action."

He shrugged, a pretty smile on his pretty face. "Sorry. I came down once,
but you were attached to someone else." I wondered what that meant,
but let it pass. "Anyway, talk to you later?"

"I'm free all next week. Drop me a line when you have the time."

"I'll do that," he agreed. I thanked the host, made my way out to my
car and drove back to D.C.

  ----------------------------------------------------------------------

Josh did invite me to lunch later that week. We met at a pizza place
closer to his office this time, a by-the-slice place that had wonderful
hand-made pies. He watched with amazement as I put down three slices
and a tall lemonade while he ate only a salad.

"Are you watching your weight?" I asked.

All the time," he said with a sigh. "It's relentless, the gay pursuit."

"It can't be that bad. I really appreciated Friday night. All those
guys of different bodies and ages, and there didn't seem to be that
much competition."

"It's a different space, I'll agree to that. What did you think of
the play?"

"It was okay. Great. I'll go back. I have to admit that I was really
amazed by one thing." Josh looked at me expectantly. "One of the
participants said that it was like a kindergarten. Ever heard of the
kindergarten organization principle?" Josh shook his head. "It's a
way of laying out office space. It says that you're not going to use a
file cabinet you don't like looking at, and you're not going to use a
closet you have to work to get into. So you organize your space like a
kindergarten, with containers close to the spaces where their contents
are used, and make them attractive so people will use them.

"That place was laid out perfectly like that. I am really impressed
with the skill of the host. Everything was in easy reach for any act,
and everyone had enough room to do his thing.

"But more than that, it was like a kindergarten in another way. Everyone
there was earnest. Everyone there was interested in having fun. There
was no holding back, no irony, no attempt to think deeply and consider
all the alternatives. I don't think I heard a word of real sarcasm or
discouragement in the whole place. If you couldn't do it, nobody cared,
and you just moved on to the next fun thing." I shook my head. "Places
like that don't exist in my world, usually. Even the religious people
I know have a post-modern take on it, looking at their own belief with
irony, knowing that belief itself is a dead end with no resolution. The
only people I know who live in wide-eyed wonder are astronomers--
and handballers." I laughed. "Now there's a pair of peoples who would
probably prefer to not be associated."

I looked at him and realized that my speech had not gone over well.
"Something wrong with what I said?"

He shook his head. "Not about what you said. I just think that the
wide-eyed wonder itself is going to disappear."

"What? Why?"

"Think about it," he said. "Part of the reason for that earnestness
is the danger we're playing with. Everyone is open and honest because
the alternative is, well, better not to think about. One out of every
two thousand fistfucks results in a trip to the hospital, usually with
inexperienced players. This Friday your life was in the hands of another.

"Except, for you, it really wasn't, was it?" He pointed at me. "What
would it take to kill you, T'Oma? I don't think it could be done from
your asshole, could it?"

I took a drink of water. I thought about it. "No," I agreed. "Probably
not."

"What happens if you take that risk, of death or lifelong disablement,
away from the fisters? Even the stupidest tweaker thinks that he's going
to survive this time, he's not that self-destructive. Death is always a
long way away. That's why they do it. That's why humans behave the way
they do. They don't really believe that death is going to come for them,
at least not today. But handballers, they know they're playing with
really dangerous shit.

"But you're going to take all that away from them. The risk will be
minimized. 'Cuisinart your intestine? No problem. Lie in this bed and
tomorrow you'll have a new one.'" He sighed.

I understood what he was saying, and it did hurt, in a way, to know
that this community that I had been introduce to was already on its last
legs, already heading toward oblivion. All the human truths were heading
that way. I knew that I would live to see a day when the universe was
completely subjective, completely arbitrary, completely without any
truth whatsoever.

"On the way back from the party," I began, "I was thinking. What
happened there was that I found a way to dump large amounts of certain
neurotransmitters into my brain, ones associated with acts both good
for me and bad for me, and my brain, swamped with these chemicals,
reported to the conscious me something equivalent to ecstasy. And I
realized that I could have that sensation any time I wanted to, with
Pendorian technology.  I could record it on a Brace-Reynolds headset
and play it back, completely, as if I had been there the first time. I
could look at it with the proprioception monitors turned off, look at
it with dispassion, see what it would do to me, or I could relive the
event in full and complete fidelity.

"And I wondered what it would mean if I could give that to a stranger.
What would they think of it? What would I think of it if you had given
a tape to me."

"And what did you come up with?" he asked.

I shrugged. "Nothing. I don't think there's a term for it. I don't think
you and I can talk about it without actually doing it, and even then,
we'd have to make stuff up. We'd be something other than the people we are
now." I could see on his face that he was having a hard time making sense
of that. "I mean, think about it. Speech itself must be an evolutionary
advantage of some kind, but its purpose is to convey survival-oriented
data. Sure, we've managed to get past that, but not by much. Think about
how hard poetry is to write-- and even harder to read! But what if we
could get all the way past that? Would we still be the kind of people we
are now? Would you and I, here, be able to understand people like that?"

Josh thought for a moment. "You mean, what will it be like for me when
I can turn on a switch and think... whatever I want?"

"Something like that. Josh, think about it. What have you got after a
handballing event? You've got a memory of how special it was and a desire
to do it again, right?" I didn't look to see if he agreed. "So, what
if you could have the memory, have the conviction that it was special,
and make that desire go away when it was inconvenient, like, at work,
or while making love in your own bedroom. Think, Josh, of what kind of
world it will be when you can fiddle with the knobs of your own sexual
desire, even your orientation, directly."

"You want that?" he asked, amazed. "Think about the potential for abuse,
the government ordering gay people to..."

"Screw governments," I growled. "They've come to understand that harming
innocent gay men and women is non-optimal, to use the terminology of
my department. Governments see people in one of three roles: economic,
defensive, and reproductive. Defense is winding down thanks to automation,
reproduction is winding down thanks to a combination of affluence
and overpopulation anyway, and being gay doesn't interfere with one's
economic role'. Only tradition gets in the way of governments choosing
optimal paths, and we know what happens to those whose choose tradition
in the face of those who choose optimization. Optimize or die."

I took a drink of water. "It's not a matter of me wanting it, Josh. It's
going to happen. The brain is an electrochemical thing; it can be
influenced. Right now you humans do it by soaking your brains in big
doses of chemicals such as alcohol and Prozac and the like. But very
soon you'll be able to both read out, and write back, the reported
and subjective meaning of fiddling with every neuron, every dendrite,
every connection.  The question will be, then, what happens to those
with that, and those without. On Pendor, that will be in the hands of
every private citizen. We have traditions, too, and I don't see this
catching on, even if fully mature, for another millennium. We move too
slowly. But Humanity will be making its own choices in the meantime."

We fell silent. Neither of us could think of what to say next. Lunch
moved on in silence. When facing the next big question, quiet always
feels like the right way to digest the answer.

I leaned back in my chair, letting the power of what we had been
discussing fade into the background. It does that, with us evolutionary
products. If we can't actually do anything about a given situation,
we adjust to our reality to make it feel tolerable. Anthropologists
call that accommodation. The things that would stress us under other
conditions become minor, maybe even familiar, after a while. That's what
Josh and I were both doing with the notion that our favored cultures
were doomed to extinction; since we couldn't do anything about it,
we were accommodating that thought, taking its power away from it.

An evolutionary gift. A survival trait. "Hey," Josh said. "Since I
didn't get to see much of you Friday night, you wanna go see a movie? The
Versailles Theater is doing 'coming out movies, 1978-2008.'"

"And afterward? Make use of our passions while we still have them?"

"That would be nice, too," he agreed.

  ----------------------------------------------------------------------


Original document is available from:
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The Journal Entries of Kennet R'yal Shardik, et. al., and Related Tales
are Copyright (c) 1989-2000 Elf Mathieu Sternberg. Distribution limited
to electronic media not-for-profit use only. All other rights are reserved
to the author.
