Archive of Our Own

Maybe it was inevitable. I grew up a Star Trek nerd, I got my PhD in What If Star Trek Aliens Were Real, I went to space, I made an alien best friend, and then through a quirk of whatever—feels silly to say fate, but, well—I ended up on an interstellar roadtrip with my new alien best friend, just the two of us, confined to an extremely small metal tube for three and a half years with only an enormous library of human entertainment to keep us from losing our minds and killing each other.

And of course I'd felt something, initially, when I realized which star system Rocky was from. A little twinge of an old, wistful, childhood feeling. Quickly dismissed, because at the time I was kind of busy making humanity's first contact with an actual alien race, but the thought lingered at the back of my mind. 40 Eridani A, and I'm no astronomer, but I got a telescope for my tenth birthday, the year DS9 was starting to get good, the year Voyager first came on the air, and you bet I made a pet project of looking for all the stars the Star Trek aliens were from.

It doesn't come up for a long time, because Rocky and I have plenty of other fish to fry, like making sure our spaceship doesn't explode and our fuel doesn't get eaten by taumoeba and I don't die of malnutrition in space (turns out it's all about rationing Ilyukhina's supply of weird Russian gummy fruit candy. You don't need that much vitamin C to prevent scurvy). But about six months into the journey to Erid, when I'm lying down to sleep and Rocky is settling in above to watch me, I find myself thinking about it again.

"Hey Rock?" I say, and he crawls forward on his bunk so that I can see more of him. When he first started doing this, it was so weird; I thought I'd never get used to having an alien stare at me (or the echolocation equivalent) while I fell asleep. And I sure never thought I'd miss it, when it was gone. I think if I'd continued on to Earth, I might've put myself back into the coma-sleep eventually, risk or no risk. I just don't think I could've faced four years' worth of nights alone without Rocky.

Now I never have to face that possibility again. At least, not until we get to Erid. But even then . . . I don't know, lately I keep feeling this weird certainty, deep inside me, this strange absence of anxiety about Rocky. About what we are to each other. It's nothing I've ever felt in any relationship before, not even with my mom, certainly not with any of my exes. Like the thing we have together is real. Solid. Unshakeable.

I know I never want to leave him. And he sure acts like he feels the same way. Every story he tells me about Erid is in the future tense, and is always about both of us: what we'll do, what we'll see, who we'll meet. Never Rocky, never I: only RockyGrace, only us.

Rocky clicks down at me. "Yes?"

I've turned off the translator for the day, which I'm trying to do as much as possible. Rocky still slows and simplifies his speech for me, more so when he knows the translator's off, but he's hinted darkly about teaching me more linguistic registers soon, so I figure I'd better start practicing my hearing skills. His yes is a sweet, high chirp, and he accompanies it with a gentle tap-tap of one limb against the bed, question, inviting me to speak more. It's hard to put my finger on it, but there's a soft, indulgent nature to both the word and the question-particle, like he's matching my sleepy bunk-bed tone.

"We're going to Erid."

"Affirmative," he says, his yes but with a lower tone played underneath; he's making fun of me. Indeed, you don't say.

"I never told you this. But there's a famous human story about your planet. Or, your star system, anyway."

This gets his interest; he sits up, and spins to show me a different facet of his body. It's the one without any reflective surfaces, the craggy, plain one; it's more sound absorbent than his other facets. He told me once that showing your most absorbent side was a polite way of showing attention, like a human making eye contact with the person they're speaking to. His listening face.

"Human story about Erid?" This time the tap-tap question particle is louder, more insistent. I can't help but grin.

"The writers didn't call it Erid, they came up with a different name. But there's a human story called Star Trek, that imagines the distant future, when humans have met many alien species to be friends with. And one of the aliens is from your star system."

"Name of Erid in human story?"

"It's called Vulcan."

"Tell tell tell." He spins to his more reflective facet, then back to his listening face again, and pounds once with a rear leg. Emphasis!

I chuckle and hold up a finger, just give me a minute, trying to figure out how to phrase it. "Okay, well, Star Trek is . . . it's a very big story, a series of stories, really. An epic. It takes years to tell."

He hums with happy surprise. "Yes, Eridians have this kind of story too. Many singers, over many generations. Say word again."

"Epic," I repeat. He sings me back his word for it; it's a long one, too hard to memorize on the first try. "We'll have to put that one in the computer tomorrow."

"Yes yes. Continue." His impatience is wildly, overwhelmingly cute. Not for the first time, I wish we could cuddle up together, under one blanket, have our bunk bed conversations that way. But my bed isn't reinforced for his weight, and his new xenonite suit only gives him about four hours outside of his environment—not enough to watch me sleep through the night.

We do hug sometimes, though. It's hot, scratchy, and the best feeling in the entire universe.

"Okay, so, the very first Star Trek story has an alien who is . . . who has a human parent and a Vulcan parent. His name is Spock."

"Human and Eridian lay eggs together?" This, an octave above his normal pitch. Whuh oh. I kind of forgot that I'd have to explain interspecies mating as part of the lore. Welp. I forge bravely on.

"Um, I guess, in the story, the Vulcans are much more like humans than real Eridians are. So it would be easier for them to—ah. Mate."

His voice resumes its normal pitch. "Oh, understand."

"They can, uh. Breathe the same atmosphere. And stuff."

"Not like us," Rocky says. He turns two of his hands over each other in little circles. One of the first of his gestures I learned.

"Yeah," I agree, and make the gesture back at him. Us, us, us. It's us who can't share an atmosphere. Rocky's done some amazing engineering to accommodate that, but we still can't touch directly.

Or, we can, but. I run a finger over the scar on my arm, and Rocky pays attention to the movement, cocks his carapace a little, and I feel odd, sort of hot and strange, as we both think about the one time he touched my skin. I remember the heat of him, the pain, searing, branding.

I swallow, and continue.

"But, you know, the story actually got some things right. Vulcans are very strong, because their planet has more gravity than Earth, just like Erid. And they can tolerate a lot more heat, because their planet is hot—not as hot as Erid, but still, hotter than Earth."

"Humans make story where Eridians scary?" This question tapped with some trepidation. That's my fault, I'm the one who picked Alien for movie night a couple weeks ago. Rocky had a lot of questions afterwards about how humans would react to him, when they saw him on the video logs, if they would think he was a monster. I felt bad, but I told him the truth: yeah, some humans will probably think you're scary, bud. Until they get to know you and start designing cuddly merch or something. It was a long conversation, and we added a lot of new words to the translation software.

At least in this case, I can reassure him.

"No, that's what's cool. Spock is a hero. A good guy. One of the best characters. Everyone who sees the story loves Spock."

A little trill of happiness. I smile back, helplessly.

"Tell little more of Eridian from human story. Then bedtime."

I huff out a breath, half laughing, half annoyed. He's gotten really particular about my sleep patterns, which should feel intrusive, but honestly just makes me feel cared for. By Earth standards, Rocky and I are probably pretty codependent, but also, Earth is over thirteen lightyears away and shrinking rapidly in the rearview mirror. It seems ridiculous to apply Earth labels to us. Or Erid labels, for that matter. Rocky likes to monitor my needs and look after me. And it turns out I really like being looked after, or at least, I do when it's Rocky. It seems to work out okay. We are what we are.

"All right, deal," I reply. He settles in a little more, loafing on top of his neatly folded legs. "Let's see. Spock is very logical. Very good at math and science. He's the science officer on the spaceship, and best friends with the captain. He doesn't express emotions like humans, so sometimes humans find him difficult to understand. Causes conflict sometimes."

"Good at math, like Eridian. Thinks humans weird, like Eridian."

"Yeah." I grin. Eridians aren't not Vulcan. I've had the same thought.

"Beautiful like Eridian? Genius like Eridian? Sexy like Eridian?"

"Hey, who told you Eridians are sexy?" I protest, laughing. We came up with "sexy" as the translation for that low-pitched Eridian word, which Rocky told me meant "beautiful-sounding body" and "desirable mate" when we had our initial conversation about comparative reproductive biology and mating practices. Now that he knows I've learned it, he uses it persistently to describe himself. I can always pick it out in his song because it sounds, hand to God, a little bit like a wolf-whistle.

"Is fact."

"Well, he's played by a human actor, so don't get your hopes up. But you know what else?"

"No, what else?"

"He's also very stubborn like Eridians, and arrogant like Eridians, and mean and bossy like—"

I'm cut off by Rocky's howl of unfair unfair unfair, accompanied by angry stomping from above. I think if we were really in bunk beds, rather than rigorously separated climate-controlled individual environments, he'd have thrown a pillow at me. I'm glad he's not in his suit so he can't come down here and poke me, like he sometimes does these days when he wants my attention. I laugh at his outrage, delighted, and a second later he gives up the pretense and laughs with me.

"Tomorrow you demonstrate story of Eridian-human. Movie night. Sleep now."

"Sleep now," I agree, softly, and feel my heart so ridiculously full of fondness for the being above me, for the delicate faultlines in his facet as he perceives down at me, for his elegantly curved claws counting out the seconds of my rest time, for his absolute and consistent lack of any chill whatsoever. I feel so much, all in a warm rush, that I think it's going to spill up from my chest and out of my mouth like another of my disgusting human fluids. But I keep a lid on it, and the moment passes, and eventually the metronome-click of Rocky's fingers soothes me to sleep, just like every other night.

*

So I show my alien friend Star Trek. Who wouldn't?

Rocky is disappointed, at first, by the fact that Spock looks essentially exactly like a human.

"Bigger ears!" I protest. "Different brow shape! Slightly darker eyeshadow!"

"Humans say want to imagine aliens, but can only imagine beings exactly the same as them with bigger ears. Ridiculous."

"I think it was mostly budget issues," I tell him. I wonder if showing him The Animated Series would help; I remember that the aliens on that show were more interesting. But he just huffs dramatically to indicate how long-suffering he is, then asks me to pause on Spock so he can more carefully perceive his ears, and then we keep watching.

As with any Earth culture I show Rocky, there's a lot of stuff to explain, tons of hidden sociological landmines that trip us up. Among other things, there is a lot more sexual assault and human trafficking in TOS than I remembered. We have to pause "Conscience of the King" so I can show him Hamlet (and then The Lion King when it turns out that Elizabethan English is too far outside his linguistic comfort zone), and then we have to pause "Shore Leave" so I can show him Alice in Wonderland (and then we talk about drugs for approximately three days. Turns out Eridians have a kind of tuning fork that gets them high). He tries to make me explain human criminal law and the court system during "Court Martial," and I have to draw the line (IANAL, as they say) and tell him to read it on Wikipedia.

The best part, by far, is how much Rocky clearly loves Spock. He takes Spock's side in every argument, becomes extremely suspicious of McCoy, and critiques any writing choice that portrays Spock as inflexible or uncaring. He has a field day with "The Galileo Seven," huffing and steaming the whole time, which, fair enough, Spock got done dirty in that episode. And anytime Spock fixes something on the Enterprise, repairs something, Rocky will move his hands along with Spock, humming happily, mirroring him. It's really funny and sweet to watch Rocky exhibit something I can only call hometown pride whenever Leonard Nimoy is onscreen.

I mean, I get it. I identified with Spock the first time I watched it too, and I wasn't a literal alien who didn't understand human customs, even if I sometimes felt like one.

"Spock beautiful? To humans?" Rocky asks, at one point, and it comes out of nowhere and surprises me.

"Uh—I guess? A lot of people thought he was sexy." I whistle the Eridian word instead of saying it in English, since it's one of the ones that's within my vocal abilities, and since it kind of works in English, too. A lot of people did think Spock was wolf-whistle.

"Grace think that?"

I blink. Rocky's never asked me for my opinions on which humans are sexually attractive before. It's not the kind of thing I generally have that many opinions on, to tell the truth. But Star Trek has always been different.

Out of sheer habit, I tell him the truth. "I . . . I always thought Kirk was sexy. As a kid."

I really shouldn't be sweating about having said that in front of an alien who has no concept of gender or homophobia, but there it is, the back of my neck is damp and my hands are shaking and my breath is coming a little fast. It's not something I've ever said before, to anyone, the way I feel (felt?) about guys sometimes. It's not something I've ever acted on, ever even let myself think about too much. And while Rocky has no context for this kind of confession, it still feels like it matters, somehow.

Earth remains a lot of lightyears behind us in the rearview mirror, I remind myself. Who cares if you used to fantasize that the Captain of the Enterprise would hold you and kiss you and tell you everything was gonna be okay. There's no one here but Rocky.

"But, um, yeah, I think Spock is sexy, too," I add, using the English word this time. I take a deep breath, then let it out, letting the fireworks go off invisibly and silently inside my chest. Well, that's something off the bucket list, I guess. In the weirdest circumstances possible.

"Understand," is all Rocky says in return. What an anti-climax. Whatever, I guess any theoretical bisexuality of mine is kind of academic anyway, at this point.

"What about you?" I ask. "Do you think Spock is sexy?"

There's a fair amount of clicking and humming in response. "Screen insufficient for make decision," he says, eventually. "Cannot think someone is sexy when cannot perceive any of their minerals."

"What," I laugh. "The actor is human, bud, all his minerals are on the inside."

Casually, as if it's something we do all the time, Rocky lifts one arm, extends one claw towards my open, laughing mouth, and taps, just once, against my left front tooth. Even muffled by the xenonite, I feel a sharp tap. It's so shockingly sensual that I can't move for a moment, letting his claw rest on my lower lip. It's heavier than I thought it would be.

"Make human happy, make human laugh, they show their minerals. It is ——." A new word, a high chord with a grumbling hum behind it.

I pull back just a little, out of the range of his claw, and lick my lips. "It is what?"

He repeats the word, then turns his more reflective facet towards me, as if he doesn't care what I think about it. His nonchalant face. "Like sexy, but softer. Like song to lure in mate."

"Alluring," I say, distantly, but all I'm thinking about is that tap on my tooth.

He trills yes, acknowledging the word, and I add it to the database, mind reeling. Rocky thinks my teeth are alluring?

"Spock good mate, even if cannot see minerals on human screen," Rocky adds, quietly, like a concession to my position.

"Yeah. He's, uh. A good guy. Very smart. A real catch."

Rocky does yes-with-undertone, yes yes, agreed, let's move on, and pokes my wrist with the same claw he used to touch my mouth, until I catch on and restart the episode ("This Side of Paradise") that prompted the question.

*

In my defense, I hadn't seen "Amok Time" since I was a kid. And I definitely forgot that it was the season two premiere. Look, I was really more of a Sisko guy.

Watching it with Rocky, I feel like a kid again—very specifically, I feel the way I always used to feel when I watched a movie with my mom that had any kind of kissing or love scene in it. Acutely, grotesquely, sexually uncomfortable. I'm very aware of my body, and how close it is to his body, sitting less than a foot away in his xenonite suit while Kirk and Spock have a tense, drawn-out conversation about the biology of Vulcans. And I know for a fact that Rocky is still just translating Vulcans to Eridians in his head.

To my relief, Rocky doesn't ask to pause for clarification, but that also means that I'm stuck wondering what he's thinking, how he's interpreting this. As the galaxy's latest greatest Spock fan, it seems like he must have an opinion on the character's newly revealed mating cycle, but if he does, he's not sharing it.

So we watch silently as T'Pring tells Spock that they are parted and never parted, never and always touching and touched. Good god. I should probably just be cool about it. Right? It's just a silly scifi show, imagining that people from Rocky's planet become sex fiends once every seven years. We'll probably laugh about it later.

I don't feel like laughing, though. It's just—the idea that Spock, so strong, so self-sufficient, might need something. That he might have the same physical impulses as the rest of us. That he could be reached, through that need.

Rocky dances back and forth a little as the Vulcan ceremony commences; he really digs the huge, aggressive TOS music stings in general, and this one with the foil-wrapped Vulcan bellringers seems to be a particular hit. I have hope for a few seconds that we can talk about Eridian music or something when the episode is over. The next part is just a fight scene, right? We're almost at the end.

And that's when I realize that I remembered this episode really, really wrong.

I tell myself that the . . . grappling . . . Kirk and Spock are doing onscreen might look like sex to me—and, wow, they are really grinding up and in between each other's thighs, aren't they?—but it probably doesn't look like sex to Rocky. It probably does not at all look like a human and a Vulcan (Eridian) having gay sex, to Rocky. Rocky is probably just vibing to the music and not even paying that much attention to the physical . . . configurations.

I tell myself that. But Rocky seems rapt, one hand up and claws tapping together to better perceive his textured screen. The fight reaches its, no other way to say it really, climax. Then there's a sweet scene where Spock is ready to give up everything he cares about out of grief for Kirk, but then Kirk shows up alive, and Spock smiles, the way he never does on the show, eyes crinkling. Showing teeth.

Rocky makes a noise halfway between laughing and yes, yes! that sounds like pure delight. He's not wrong. Nimoy is pretty when you can see his minerals.

And then the episode finishes, and Rocky turns his listening face deliberately towards me, and yeah, you're not getting out of this one, Ryland Grace.

"So, uh, I'm guessing that wasn't . . . biologically accurate," I say, trying for a joke. "Too bad they didn't know that Spock should lay eggs."

"This is human sexual fantasy of aliens?" he asks, and I can absolutely hear him laughing underneath the computer voice translation and his oh-so-polite little tap-tap question particle.

"Uh, I think it's more like, because of the worldbuilding, right, they're imagining a biological imperative that would force Vulcans to—" I start, not at all sure where I'm going but pretty sure I should be going somewhere. Anywhere. Away from here. Rocky ruthlessly cuts me off.

"No no, I understand. Humans want to imagine strong, powerful, hungry alien mate. Force you to submit. Like animal. Too big and strong to resist, humans too weak, Eridian alien strong strong strong and sexy sexy—"

"Oh my god," I mutter, burying my face in my hands as the translator gives up and I'm left with just the sound of Rocky's tinkling laughter. I don't think that was the polite version of hungry, either.

"Grace say this is epic story, is a trick, this is sexual fantasy entertainment."

"Star Trek is not a porno," I shout, from behind my hands. "That was combat."

"Sexy sexy combat," Rocky laughs. "Humans think, what if we fought alien and it was sexy scary beautiful, alien body against human body, tight, close—"

I drop my hands, laughing, blushing, and interrupt his weird dirty talk. "You have got to stop."

"Most humans think aliens sexy?" Rocky asks sweetly. "Grace think aliens sexy?"

"You know what, you are not asking that question in the honest spirit of cultural exchange, so, I—I am choosing not to answer," I huff, drawing my knees up to my chin and sulking. Rocky, of course, just laughs again, getting up and walking closer to me.

"Grace think Eridian Spock so sexy when he has mating-need," he teases, poking at me with one balled-up hand. I bat him away.

"Mating-need?" I have to glance over at the computer and squint. It's a compound word, and the computer dutifully vocalized both parts, but the way Rocky sang it, it didn't sound like one of his made-up compound words for weird human stuff, like light-perceiving-organ or bad-good-taste-candy. It sounded like a natural word in Eridian. "Wait. Wait. Oh wow. Oh my gosh. Did we get it right? Do Eridians go into heat? You have pon farr?"

He stops poking me and goes still. "Not what it's called," he demurs, and now I'm the one laughing. I poke him back, as hard as he poked me, because I know it annoys him even though he doesn't feel it the same way. Poke poke poke and he dances away, pushing at my hands.

"You totally have pon farr!" I laugh, and our mutual poking gets faster and sloppier, until I'm basically having a slapfight with a four hundred pound alien rock. To his credit, he holds back, refrains from actually pushing me, up until I noogie him right on the vents and he has to shake himself like a wet cat, shocked and irritated. Then he lunges for me, pinning me down to the metal grate we're sitting on, and it's not like he makes me take his full weight, but two of his hands spread so he can hold down my upper arms, pressing into my biceps just above the elbow, and then a third arm pins my left thigh while he balances on the other two limbs.

"Why you ask?" he says, and the translation computer is across the room by now, so I primarily hear it in his own voice, an octave below where it would usually be. He taps the question-particle with one claw, bop bop, into the flesh of my arm. "Want big strong sexy Eridian to hold you down?" Tap tap, again, and I can almost feel the point of that claw through the xenonite. I think it feels sharp.

"Yeah, yeah, humans are weird gross sex freaks, I know," I say, and my breath is coming fast and I'm not at all sure what's going on. Are we still joking? Is this . . . horseplay? To him? Because it's kind of crossing a line for me, but. "We've been over this." I struggle up against him, but he doesn't let me go.

"Gross gross gross," he agrees, laughter behind it.

"Come on. Let me up," I say, and I feel his claw clench on my thigh, just for a second, before he does. It makes my heart stutter, and all of a sudden I don't care what he thinks about it, horseplay or foreplay, I just want more of it. More of him.

I tackle him the second I'm free, which isn't particularly effective, but at least it has the element of surprise? I wrap my hands around two of his wrists and hold him long enough to lean in and bite him, right on his prettiest green shoulder-joint, digging my teeth into the hot, flexible xenonite enough for him to feel it against his carapace. He startles away from the bite, steaming, squealing, then flips me again, pins me again, in almost the same configuration, except this time his lower leg is on the floor between my thighs.

"Gross gross gross! Mouth open and biting like eating! Disgust! Rocky try to be nice, try to be soft, kind—"

"You're a big liar, you said you like my mouth," I say, then widen my eyes, because that has to be incredibly perverted to Eridians. He freezes for a full three seconds before replying. I feel a little triumph at having shut him up, and I feel another thing, too, the thing I've been trying not to think about this whole time we've been . . . wrestling. Doing combat. Like Kirk and Spock. I feel it thrashing hot and tight inside my chest while Rocky effortlessly pins me once more.

"Rocky keep you down this time," he says, and, yup, that's about it for me.

His leg is perfectly placed to feel my dick getting hard against him. He doesn't say anything, doesn't do anything, and the heat I felt a moment ago starts to transmute into humiliation.

I swallow and try to figure out where to go from here. "Um, that's—sorry, that's rude, I'll just, uh, go—"

But Rocky's claws clench on my arms, on my thigh.

"Grace want to go?" he asks, and holy smokes, I can feel that double-tap question-particle ring along my entire clavicle.

I look up at him, at his accepting, sound-absorbing facet. I breathe and I breathe and I breathe and Rocky waits for me while I work up the courage.

"No," I answer, eventually. "Grace want to stay."

"Want to stay and have sex with big, strong, sexy Eridian mate," he hums, and I cannot believe he's still making fun of me while he leans his leg against my dick and grinds.

"Yeah, I kind of, kind of do?" I say, blinking at the hot, embarrassing tears that are pooling in the corners of my eyes, squirming uselessly under his hold.

"Good," he says, and I watch him, fascinated, surprised. He's still rocking against me, mostly nudging up at my balls and the underside of my dick. Not the sexiest way I've ever been touched and it doesn't do a lot for me physically, but the intention behind it is everything. I groan without meaning to.

"Good sound. Submit," he says, one back-foot tap between my legs for emphasis, and I shake my head up at him, disbelieving. My glasses are askew and fogged up and my dick is trapped at a weird angle in my pants and I have never been so turned on in my life.

"I, I submit," I say, my mouth dry, my dick throbbing. Then I lick my lips and blink my eyes and try to grasp at least one normal braincell before this goes too far off the tracks. "If—if you—that is, uh, does Rocky want—"

"Rocky Eridian alien in mating-need," he interrupts, because apparently Rocky and I are going to fool around while doing Star Trek themed roleplay. Why not, I think, hysterically. Who's gonna stop us. "Rocky want." Then he tilts his carapace forward, rubbing the flat planes of his listening face up and down my chest, scraping over my belly and nipples, and I can't help but think that he's listening to my body, my internal organs, my tissues and lymph and muscles and bone. The blood filling my cock. "Rocky want want want. Bite again."

"Oh," I say, lost in the combined surge of emotion and arousal. Leaning up as far as I can, I bite at the closest arm, right over the elbow-joint, and he shudders. His little nudges against my dick get harder and faster, and I appreciate the sentiment, but ow. I angle my hips away.

"Woah, woah. Gentle. Long movements, from the, the bottom to the top," I suggest, and Rocky pauses, then digs two xenonite-covered claws under the hem of my pants and boxers and shoves them both down to my knees in one swift movement. Then he's on me again, holding me down with two claws while the third grips my erection and starts sliding up and down in slightly more human-appropriate movements. The xenonite's far too dry, though, and I wince again.

"Let me—let me have an arm back."

He sits up a little and releases one claw, watching me carefully. I feel so, so perverted as I spit into my hand a few times. Rocky watches, still, absorbing it all. Once I have enough, I slide that hand down to my dick and get myself wet. The back of my hand bumps up against Rocky's hand. He trails his claws against my knuckles.

"Gross, sexy, leaky human," he says, harmonics low and dangerous. "Need to be wet."

"Yeah," I pant. "Wet for Eridian alien in mating-need," because what the heck, if you're gonna do it, you might as well do it. The dirty talk seems to work, because Rocky hums and buzzes and rubs his full carapace against me again, like he can't help but touch me, listen to me. I bite at him again, since he seems to like it, even though it makes me feel like a tiny baby animal gnawing ineffectually on a human finger.

"Need to be still," Rocky says, authoritatively, but there's a gentle, secret question tapped against my thigh.

"Yes. Please," I say, turned on and desperate. He replaces his claw on my arm, immobilizing me, and starts working my dick again, up and down, gently, like I told him. It's still a little rough, but the hot, stony, three-fingered grip couldn't be anything but alien, anything but Rocky's, and that's enough to get me going.

"Human want to feel strong, mean, bossy mate. Take controls." He's using the word we use for the ship controls, and god, that's exactly right. Like I'm the Hail Mary and he's piloting me.

"Yeah," I agree, because, like Spock, he's annoying, but he's rarely wrong. "I want that. You take controls. F-fuck. Rocky. I need you," and it's the most embarrassing thing I've ever said during sex, easily, easily, and it's the most turned on I've ever been in my life, and I don't even know what this is, between us, and I don't care because it's so freaking good.

"Need need need," he trills back to me, and yeah, his claws on my dick aren't getting any less pointy, but he's figuring out what I need, finding the spots that make me twitch and gasp. Always so quick, so smart, listening to my whole body, seeing all of me at once. His rough, sure palm on my dick makes me want to scream.

"What—what Rocky need," I huff out, because even if it turns out I really like being held down and jacked off by an alien (if?), I can still be a considerate lover. Wouldn't want to give Earth a space reputation for being selfish in bed.

"Soft Grace. Need need need. No think. Take. Take take take and be good."

"I—oh—okay," I pant, and this time when he shoves his carapace against my chest he starts humming, not a word but just one low tone, and it's really unfair that Vulcans turned out to be so freakishly sexy, is my last thought while that tone vibrates through my entire body and Rocky's hand squeezes my dick and I come like an explosion, like a killing, like a death.

Just like Kirk, though, I come back to life a little bit later. I find Rocky still pressing his carapace to my torso, but his hands are no longer holding me down; he's bracing his full weight on the floor instead. I glance at my upper arms, and I am one hundred percent sure I'm gonna get hot and bothered by the bruises that are already forming from Rocky's hands, just as soon as my dick comes online again.

I sit up on my elbows, which means pushing my chest into a whole bunch of warm, humming alien.

"Okay, okay, seriously, what can I do for you? Can I make you feel good like that?"

"Already make Rocky feel good," he protests. "Good good to feel Grace's body. Want to do again again again, listen again."

I blush, because, okay, if my best friend, roommate, and—life partner?—wants to keep holding me down and getting me off, I'm gonna find it pretty hard to say no.

"Really? Um, I can't do it again, for a while. Need rest."

"Yes, expel lots of fluids," Rocky agrees, wiping his hand on my t-shirt, leaving a smear of my spunk behind. But he doesn't say gross, and he seems fascinated by the little trail of sticky fluid that drips from his finger, and it makes me wonder.

"Yeah. Do you like that?" He hesitates for a long time, maybe thinking about how far away Erid is, about how we're just the two of us here on this spaceship and no one can stop us.

"Yes. Rocky like."

He's still humming gently against me, vibrating my chest, and I'm not actually sure how much rest I'm gonna need before I can go again, with him on top of me like this, telling me he likes my fluids.

"Can I get you off?" I ask, then frown at my own word choice. "Uh. Do you have orgasms?" Man, we are gonna have to do a very awkward vocabulary lesson sometime soon. "Can I make you feel sexual climax? Peak?"

"Not . . . now," Rocky says, evasively. I blink, then grin.

"But during your pon farr . . . "

"Not what it's called!"

"Oh, pardon me. So when do you go into mating-need?"

He clicks his fingers together, either because he's nervous or because he's converting from base six. Or both. "One hundred and six days."

Oh ho. "Will we need to do some science to prepare?"

"Maybe," Rocky replies, so quiet that he sounds shy, and I'm helpless, I'm a goner, I lean forward and kiss him right on the carapace.

"Gross," he says, but it's half-hearted.

"You like my mouth," I say, smugly, because I'm sure of it now. I bite him gently for emphasis.

"Calcium very pretty mineral," he concedes. "Rare. Teeth sound very sexy. Can't help it."

"I know, I drive you wild," I say, feeling weirdly flattered. "Never had anyone compliment my teeth minerals before."

"Too bad you keep them in wet soft disgusting human mouth," he adds, just to be a jerk. Just to be a jerk back, I lick the xenonite over his vents, and he squeals, rolling away and off of me.

A little self-conscious, I pull up my pants and boxers again. "So, uh. When you have your pon farr,"

"Mating-need." One very loud stomp for emphasis.

"Okay, okay. When you have your mating-need . . . do you want me to help? Are we—do we help each other with this? Now?"

It's not my best ever foray into a relationship talk, but, y'know, it's not my worst, either. At least I asked.

"Sex with Grace very fun. Want to do again."

I blush all up and down. "Yeah. Um. Okay. Me too."

"Maybe should explain more. Mating-need can be fun fun fun, but not just fun. Very . . . special and private between people, make people close."

"Intimate," I say, and he whistle-hums the word back at me; I try to remember it. "I understand." I've never been great at intimacy, but with Rocky, maybe it's possible. I know I want to make everything of the opportunity, when it comes. I know I want to be closer to him, as close as possible through the xenonite.

"And it take many days."

Whoops. What. "Uh. How many days?"

His fingers tap tap again, and this time I don't think it's because he's doing arithmetic. "Twenty-seven point three," he says. "Intimate intimate."

"Wow," I say, for lack of anything better. "And that whole time, you're . . . " I try to gesture, and he cocks his carapace at me, and I give up. "Uh. Mating? Having sex?"

"Most of time."

"Wow."

"Eridians too scary for humans now?"

"Scared is not my dominant emotion, Rocky, no." I try to figure out what my dominant emotion actually is. I think it's somewhere between sexual euphoria and a panic attack. "I'll really have to hydrate, I guess."

He lets out a soft, happy trill at that, then shuffles closer and plops down next to me, one of his legs draped over mine, just above the knee. So apparently we're doing casual touching now. I run my hand over his leg, rubbing, touching him back.

"Kirk Spock become mates, after this episode?" Tap-tap on my inner thigh.

"Uh, no," I say. "It was combat, remember?"

"Sound exactly like human sex," he says, with a low, amused note of disagreement.

"Oh, you're an expert now, huh."

"Yes. Exactly. Rocky expert on human mating. First try, already expert. Next time even better."

I shiver, just a little, at the thought of what my genius alien engineer friend might get up to with three years to kill, a large supply of xenonite, and my body as a playground. I might die of orgasms. Oh well.

"And you, with your expertise, think Kirk and Spock become mates after this episode."

"Yes yes yes. Kirk want strong alien mate who can hold him down. But also gentle mate who loves him," Rocky says. "Kirk can be vulnerable. Soft. Trust. Good."

"Yeah," I agree, choking up a little as a tear slips down my face. Stupid leaky space blob. "It's good."