[Veltzeh]: 39.The Heritage of Humankind.Tales from Kyerrion.7

Tegafel and Krezagon had barely gotten to know each other more closely, when a messenger came from an undisclosed location and the lieutenant and sergeants had some unusual meetings that took some time off their daily routines. However, the soldiers were not concerned at this point, so besides the overall curiosity, nothing really changed. The change came when it was informed that an extra squad would arrive and stay at the camp for a week or two, after which they and one resident squad would be sent to do a mission whose nature was not yet revealed.

There was no free barrack, so the incoming squad got split up into the existing barracks. As a result, the buildings were slightly crammed, but the people did fit. At that point, Tegafel was jokingly jealous of Krezagon and eir private tent. Ey did not think to ask if ey could share the tent, though. Tegafel's squad also got slightly rearranged to move out people who needed to stay in Ailanihi and move in people who did not.

However, what Tegafel really and truly noticed was one person in the visiting squad: the first and only other wacod ey had ever seen. Tegafel could not help but start stalking em, and did that for two days before ey got the chance to talk to em. The other wacod's name was Roinynin Voggelnet, and ey had joined the army for similar reasons as Tegafel. That had been just over five years ago, and Roinynin had renewed eir contract three years ago. Roinynin was also slightly over five years older than Tegafel. Nevertheless, they became friends in a few days, close friends in a week and started getting close to being waloners when it was time for them to leave for their still unrevealed mission.

The night before the day they were supposed to leave, Tegafel and Roinynin walked around the camp, mostly having fun and spending some time together.

Krezagon saw them from far away, but of course did not first know that one of them was Tegafel. Ey continued sitting around and watched as the two figures slowly came closer. Ey thought to hide when they got to a distance from where they would the able to properly see em, but that was when ey recognized Tegafel. Krezagon had not seen em in two weeks and stared at them for a moment, figuring out what had been going on. Ey then stood up and took a couple of steps toward the two figures.

Tegafel only spotted Krezagon right then when ey moved and was momentarily alerted, but then remembered the friend ey had neglected for two weeks. They stared at each other through the darkness, until Roinynin's voice broke the silence:

"Tegafel? What's goin' on?"

Tegafel stopped staring and instead looked at Roinynin. "Um... I'd like you to meet a friend of mine." Krezagon looked down, but lifted eir face back up when the two wacods came closer. "This is Roinynin... ey came with the squad two weeks ago."

Krezagon made a somewhat tart comment. "It has been two weeks since I saw you." After a bit of a pause, ey continued: "I am Krezagon."

Roinynin was noticeably a bit surprised to see an ancod, but more of it was because Tegafel introduced em as a friend. Roinynin just nodded at Krezagon.

"I hear your two squads will leave tomorrow..."

"...Yeah. I don't know the mission..."

A moment of staring ensued.

"Tegafel..." started Krezagon. "Would you come with me over there? I'd like to say something to you."

"Uh... sure. Could you wait here, Roinynin?"

"Yeah, I can."

Tegafel smiled back and walked over to the edge of the forest with Krezagon. Ey was uneasy. "I'm sorry... I didn't mean to... to forget you... It's been kinda hectic and... and I met Roinynin." Tegafel made a silly, enthusiastically innocent and hopeful smile one would see on a person who had fallen in love.

Krezagon had eir eyes turned down. Ey was sullen. "I was sure it would happen one day... but it happened so damn soon."

"I'm still your friend."

Krezagon lifted eir eyes again. "And you'll be gone tomorrow."

"I'll come back."

"You might not. That's the army life for you. I've traveled hundreds of kilometers from the place I was born. I don't even know where it was... I suppose it says on my contract, but I have never seen it."

Krezagon made a great job of making Tegafel feel guilty. A few tears fell down eir face and ey looked down. "I'm... sorry."

Krezagon twitched a bit; ey wanted to hold Tegafel for the last time, but it did not seem very appropriate since ey had a real partner now. A few tears fell down eir face as well. Eir time of some happiness was over and ey thought ey would never have more. "I... I'd want to give something of mine for you... to remind you of me. But I don't own anything."

They stared at each other for a moment, teary-eyed. Krezagon thought to hell with appropriateness and hugged Tegafel anyway, pressing eir face against the wacod's hair and letting out a few sobs.

"Do you think I really won't return?" asked Tegafel with a faltering voice.

"It's fairly likely," the ancod answered.

Now Tegafel also touched Krezagon's back slightly and nuzzled into eir nice, long and pale hair. Ey rubbed eir back a bit before saying: "You do have something you could give me..."

"What?"

"A strand of your hair."

Krezagon shook a bit and let quite reluctantly go of Tegafel. Ey was smiling, though, and then brought eir knife close to eir neck, cutting off a strand of hair about thirty centimeters long. Ey thought ey should tie it with something, and it took em three seconds to remember that ey did have one durable string with em: the string that held eir pants closed at the waist. Ey pulled it off and used it to tie the hair strand so that it would not fall. Ey then handed it to Tegafel.

"I'm glad I got to know you, Tegafel Darrelter. Farewell... sowa." Krezagon greeted Tegafel.

Tegafel almost wept. "I'm glad that you're my friend, Krezagon. Farewell, soan." Tegafel greeted the ancod as well, and after a few seconds of staring at each other, Tegafel turned and walked away.



During the journey to Adenelihe and the mission itself, Tegafel and Roinynin became even closer than they had been or could have imagined either of them could become. They slept together in the same tent, shared their experiences and had sex, though not in a way that either of them would become pregnant. Tegafel often thought how ironic it had been that ey had joined the army to be rid of all expectations to marry—and then found a partner in the army. Ey had imagined there was a chance it could happen some day, but the fact that it had happened so soon was mind-tickling.

From Adenelihe, the two squads of soldiers traveled further east. It took a very long time until the actual mission was revealed—they were close to being at the destination already and had run into a few femehan spies on the way. The sergeants had questioned the spies for information and then killed them. The mission was to investigate the advancement of a group of femehan rebels—femehans who actively resisted joining forces with jinhaliares. The rebels had reportedly been "converting" too many people to their side and ought to be stopped.

The squads were supposed to imprison or kill the rebels. The sergeants told their soldiers why the femehans had allied with jinhaliares: Everybody knew jinhaliares were going to go to war. They were unhappy with their territories and wanted more. Femehans had always been rather far-sighted and usually secured territory for themselves before the situation became too bad. Jinhaliares could not control their population as well, so they had to until going to war was a better option than just staying home. In war, jinhaliares could be devastatingly ruthless. If one was not on their side, one was against them, and no femehan wanted to lose countless of lives in a war against the jinhaliares. Thus the alliance was formed, and when the time for war would come, jinhaliares would be allowed to travel through femehan lands and given assistance. The femehans would also receive some of the new areas as well as information and services from the jinhaliares.

Eventually they came across the rebel settlement. The rebels were mostly unprofessional workers and ex-soldiers, but there were more of them. The two sides tried negotiating, but it turned into a battle in ten minutes.

Tegafel saw little action in the fight. Ey was at the rear when the battle started and ey, along with a few others, were ordered to run behind the camp and prevent anyone from fleeing. Four people tried to flee. Tegafel stabbed one in the stomach with eir sword.

The rebels lost inevitably. Among others, Tegafel was ordered to search the rudimentary buildings. They entered the biggest building with a far-walker who incapacitated a rebel far-walker and revealed the hiding place of the rebel leader. Ey was in the cellar that contained some tools and barrels where some goods had been kept. The far-walker, Tegafel and two other soldiers entered the fairly large cellar confidently and started threatening the poor rebel leader with mentions of torture and mind-raping. One of the soldiers stabbed the rebel leader's arm nearly useless.

Suddenly a dagger flew out of nowhere, struck the rebel leader in the eye and ey fell to the ground, dead. The far-walker started screaming about who in sharkeli had done it and whoever it had been was as good as a mind-dead prosht. Tegafel took a step forward when the far-walker flailed eir arms in eir direction, managed to step on a rake, making it swing upwards and hitting something that was not eir own body. A knife flashed before eir eyes and made a small cut on eir cheek. Ey screamed in terror while the other soldiers were quiet and temporarily paralyzed with surprise. Everybody soon prepared emself. With their swords drawn, Tegafel, the far-walker and two soldiers faced an unarmed ex-soldier rebel clad in perfectly dark armor, but the extraordinary thing was that the rebel was a gecod.

The far-walker seemed to be panicking. "Ey's not real! I can't read em! Ey has no spirit!" Ey drew eir sword to emself in a defending position and backed down. "Ey has no spirit! Eir eyes are cold as a dead tree in winter!"

Tegafel and eir friends took down the gecod in no time and tied em up. The gecod did not utter one word and ignored everything ey was told. Ey did not even yell in pain when one of the soldiers broke some of eir fingers.

Most of the important rebels had been mindwiped by the rebel far-walkers. They managed to catch alive one far-walker rebel and two important seeming people who had not been mindwiped. Also the quiet gecod aroused interest, because the two far-walkers who were with the soldiers could not read em much at all. With great effort, they were able to sense some of eir surface thoughts, which included just the usual disorganized feelings of pain, anger, failure, discomfort and basic needs. Since there were many wounded rebels still left, some soldiers stayed with them while the rest took the important people back to Aolkheine, a big city south of the camp and closer than Adenelihe.

More people were sent to the rebel settlement from Aolkheine to bring the rest to the city as well. The rebels insisted that the jinhaliares were nothing but evil-doers and would stab femehans in the back as soon as they saw a convenient chance—even a war against them was better than living in bad conditions and oppressed by them.



Tegafel did not think much of what they said. The captains said that soldiers did not need to think, they only needed to do, and Tegafel was quite content with that. Roinynin, however, drew em into a discussion about whether the alliance was a good thing after all. It was the night after the battle and they were lying in their tent, stroking each other.

"I know th' leaders don't want us thinkin' anything, but how can someone not think?" stated Roinynin.

"What, do you think that the alliance is a bad thing too?"

"Well, it's worse 'n if the jinhaliares weren't goin' to war. I don't really know if it's worse 'n havin' no alliance though. Prob'ly on some side it'd be better an' on some side wouldn't." Roinynin rubbed the middle of Tegafel's chest a bit and smiled. "I like thinkin'."

Tegafel smiled too, but ey was not as light-hearted about it. "But you have to be careful... if the sergeants find out, or if some far-walker scans you or something, they could, well."

"Could what? Far-walkers could make me stop thinkin' but this far they haven't. I'm not gonna betray our military or anythin'! I jus' like to think. An' who knows, if I come up wit' somethin' really genius, I'll jus' go share it an' see what they say an' hope they won't ignore me jus' 'cause I'm a wacod." Tegafel smiled. "Anyway, let's list th' pros of this alliance thing, okay? First is of course that they don't crush us on their way. Second, they share their info; third, they let us keep some of the lands they secure. An' fourthly, if someone attacks us too, they'll protect us. Though I don't think they did squat when we heard about those rumors about some galanfetzcans runnin' around killin' important people in the eastern nations. But who knows, it was probably the rebels foolin' them 'cause everybody knows galanfetzcans an' jinhaliares hate each other an' they wanted to give a bad impression of galanfetzcans, why, who the gzoozz knows, but I don't really care. Right?"

"Yeah... but what do we do with any more lands?"

"Gives people a reason to be productive an' aim for somethin'? I dunno."

"And if people attack us, it's most likely because of the alliance."

"Yah. See, I made ya defend my startin' position by tellin' th' pros first! Hee hee!"

Tegafel laughed shortly and grinned. "You little manipulative bastard, heh heh." Ey flicked Roinynin's nipple.

"Want to see me manipulatin' your cock, eh?"

Tegafel giggled. "But how about those cons, then?"

"Oh yeah, those. Well, besides what you said, th' jinhaliares aren't nice folks, they might start demandin' more of us an' oppressin' us... an' there's that backstabbin' thing. But who can really know how reliable they are? Maybe they'll do their part fine an' without issues if we don't do anythin' to piss 'em off."

"It would be nice to know what's for the best..."

"Best for who? That prob'ly means different things to different races an' people. Is it 'best' for us wacods to not be in th' army? I've been fine here once I got my squad in order! Took just a pair of fists an' a bit of convenient cryin' an' there I was!" Tegafel smiled sillily at the positive attitude that had caught eir attention when ey had first met Roinynin. Tegafel bent toward em and kissed em. "Would you like me to be manipulative?" Roinynin squeaked and stroked Tegafel's sides very lightly, barely toughing em, making em shiver.

Tegafel smiled, closed eir eyes and bent with the shivers. "Maybe I'll manipulate first." Ey lifted emself over Roinynin and sat on eir lower belly so that eir swelling goninjin pressed Roinynin's crotch. Roinynin, ever so gentle and considerate, took off Tegafel's shirt slowly and carefully and placed it behind eir head. Having done that, ey brushed eir fingers over Tegafel's chest and nipples. Tegafel, then again, just lightly groped Roinynin's breasts—ey had not learned to be very good at having sex yet.

"Tegafel, do it like this." Roinynin took Tegafel's hands lightly and moved them over eir chest and breasts. Tegafel smiled and continued doing it after Roinynin had moved eir own hands back to Tegafel's chest. They fingered each other's nipples for a while and then moved on to licking them while their genitals swelled under their trousers and were left unattended for the moment. They sucked on each other's nipples for a few moments longer before they figured that it was time to pay attention to the actual genitals as well.

Roinynin slid Tegafel's trousers down and poked eir swelled goninjin lightly, making Tegafel gasp. Roinynin lifted eir legs and Tegafel pulled off eir trousers, brushing eir thighs while at it.

"Did you ever try penetratin' yerself?" asked Roinynin suddenly.

Tegafel giggled a little. "Well, no."

"It feels funny."

Tegafel leaned on one arm and with eir other hand, took a hold of eir goninjin and started bending it toward eir gogenjin. Roinynin did the same. "It feels kind of uncomfortable."

"Yeah, but you should try it at least once." Ey then displayed eir crotch, with eir goninjin inside eir gogenjin. "Here ya go!"

Tegafel thought it looked funny and ey snickered. Ey then bent eir goninjin more and managed to bring it to the mouth of eir gogenjin. "Ooo-oh, oh. Uuh. Ah!" ey went as ey inserted it.

Roinynin grinned delightedly. "I've been wonderin' if we could have sex like this! We could jus' rub our crotches against each other, y'know?"

"This might be a little too uncomfortable for that..."

"Well, we could at least try."

Tegafel grinned a little. "Okay." Roinynin lay down and Tegafel came on top of em, positioning eir legs so that they could press their crotches against each other. They did so and rubbed their crotches for a while. "Uhmh, I don't think this'll work. It's too uncomfortable."

"Yeah." They stopped for a moment and Tegafel's goninjin slid out all on its own while Roinynin had to help eirs a little.

Tegafel grinned. "Have you done that before?"

"Heh, yeah. Jus' wanted to feel how it was like an' well, it was kinda good." As soon as ey had said that, ey grabbed Tegafel's goninjin and started manipulating it. Eventually they ended up sitting and facing each other, with one hand rubbing the other's genitals and the other hand on the other's chest. On top of all that, they were kissing.

When they started getting orgasmic, they noticed that they would not be able to do it while sitting, and it was possible that some of their gamete-containing fluids would get into right—or in this case, wrong—places. Therefore, as usual, they lay down and positioned themselves so that they could easily reach the other's genitals with their hands. They continued stimulating each other for as long as it took both of them to reach climax.

Afterwards, they cleaned up the little mess they had made, pulled on their trousers and continued with cuddling under their blankets.

"You know, I've really come a long way since I joined the army... and it wasn't even that long ago!"

Roinynin smiled and petted Tegafel's hair. "I'd be more amazed if you didn't."

"Even just considering, well, this stuff." Tegafel wiggled a bit against Roinynin. "I had no idea that having sex could feel so good. I never really thought why people would do it, other than to have kids."

"Didn't notice that nice chafin' even, when you were excited?"

"I hadn't been that excited! I was always discouraged when I felt like it because I was afraid of getting pregnant... Mhm... do you... do you remember Krezagon? That ancod who —"

"Yeah. Hard to forget, I'd never seen one before."

"I was just thinking... that ey was so safe. Ey was like the perfect friend for me at the time. I mean, I could go to em an' be with em without having to fear that ey'd try to rape me or even try to have sex! And, do you remember when I told about how Neret tried to have sex with me and then Fairani did that... An' I went to Krezagon an' ey let me cry and then held me an' let me kiss em."

Roinynin stroked Tegafel's back. "I could've used a friend like that when I was your age."

"Yeah." Tegafel smiled, remembering the few stories Roinynin had told about eir first months in the army. "I really admired em you know. Ey did eir job there well, even though ey didn't train with the others or spend time with them. Ey was so good with bows... and woodwork, you should've seen em do that. I didn't pity em then because I thought it would've been great to have my own tent and not bother with the others. But after I got to know you, I figured what ey's missing..."

"Well, ey's an ancod. I doubt ey even realizes what ey's missin'."

"Well, I know ey was missing a friend. Ey was so happy when I spent time with em. I wish I hadn't forgotten em when you came... Actually, ey might've been allowed to join with our squad, I wonder why ey didn't?"

"...Heh, see how long it took for you t' figure that! Prob'ly ey thought of it too late too."

"Ehheh. I hope we'll get to go back. I'm sure ey'd like to hear about you too." Roinynin smiled a bit uneasily. Tegafel did not notice any uneasiness. "I feel so sorry for em now... ey can't ever know how good it feels to have an orgasm. Or even just excitement. Can ey?"

"Heh, no. Ancods are sexless, they can't feel anythin' there. Yeah, poor thing... I wonder what keeps em goin'..."

Tegafel coughed. "Well um, even feeling excitement isn't all there is to life..."

Roinynin grinned. "Oh yeah. Oh-huh, a bit silly t' forget, I mean, I came to the army to get away from it in a way." Roinynin wriggled. "Ehehem. silly-y-y..."

Tegafel grinned back. "At least ey liked kissing. Ey was pretty good at it, too, I think."

"Better than me, eh?"

"Heh, I don't know. You're good too. But you're different, too."

"Y'know, I can't imagine not feelin' sexual excitement. How's it like?"

"How should I know?"

"Wonder if that Krezagon would mind if we asked em when we got back."

"Heh, I... I'm not sure really. But maybe ey'd just say that ey can't imagine feeling it so ey won't know how to explain it either."

"Right! Hee hee!"

They continued stroking each other until they fell asleep.