Work Text:
Up was down, left was right, xenon was a solid, and it was Rocky crowded under the covers in the Hail Mary’s crew cabin and Grace who was tinkering away on a project behind a partition. Rocky could see Grace nonetheless, of course, sitting with his knees bent inside a metal wall cavity at the far side of the bedroom. The hygiene cabinet in the dormitory was suffering an obnoxious and no longer just intermittent short; and Grace, finally fed up with the flickering mirror light, had been unable to repair the issue from the counter’s exterior.
Rocky knew that Grace could not see him from where he was working, even without the protection of the quilt. But, the Eridian found the fabric drape comforting as he clasped and unclasped his agitated hands, tapping and rapping his individual claws one against another as he fretted.
In the few days since their improvised human wedding ceremony in front of the ship’s command computer, there had been a whirlwind of glorious physical exploration, Rocky’s hands crawling ravenously over every soft-firm-soft inch of Grace’s body.
His focus had been joyfully and almost exclusively on his new mate. He had crouched, purring and playfully predatory over Grace, committing to memory the precise map of caresses that caused Grace’s hips to buck tremblingly underneath Rocky; had perfected the exact pressure of grip around Grace’s cock to set the human to teary convulsions of arousal, and gloriously vibrato half-words; and had delighted as saliva and sweat and semen dripped down the close-fitting xenonite that covered his carapace.
Each time that Grace had sunk back, utterly spent, onto the mattress - the floor, the lab table - slick with the pleasure Rocky had provided, he had panted, “What about you?” Each time that Grace had inquired, Rocky had deflected. Since falling in love with Grace, he had become accustomed to grappling with feelings he had either very seldom or never experienced. But, the jittery self-consciousness he felt at the prospect of sex with this beautiful, alien lover he had crossed the universe to meet still confounded him.
It was not that he was not aroused every time he and Grace had fallen into bed (or sundry corners of the Hail Mary) over the past several days. In fact, he had never been more stirred up in his long life. Sparks of hungry electricity danced across his every auricle whenever Grace panted, whispered, screamed as Rocky’s skilled claws explored him. Rocky felt the warm and tingling of the protective scutes on his underside, just forward of his mouth, beginning to soften and part whenever Grace’s long, beautiful fingers clutched in ecstasy at the flexing xenonite over his limbs. He had been driven wild again and again by the aching throb of the mound of nerves beneath the plates, swollen and eager, each time Grace wrapped his arms around him in the throes of climax, rapid heartbeat pounding through his chest and into Rocky’s every cell.
But, even with Grace writhing so perfectly and pleasurably in his grasp, Rocky was stubbornly preoccupied with how strange his aroused body might seem to his human mate and with how odd the few requests he could make to cross the threshold of orgasm might strike Grace when spoken aloud. Particularly when they were delivered by the stilted computerized translation program that Grace still relied upon.
Rocky could have easily worked himself off with a free hand as they romped. But, some principle, one that Rocky readily admitted to himself was arbitrary, required his first orgasm with Grace as his mate to be driven primarily by Grace’s touch. So, he crouched irritable and sore with desire on his marital bed - a pent-up prisoner of his own making.
“Hey, Rock?” Grace’s voice echoed metallically from inside the Hail Mary’s wall. “Could you bring me the multimeter? My hands are full in here.”
Rocky blew a pitiful sigh through his vents and chirped flatly, “Fine.” Dragging his feet, he emerged from hiding and plucked the tool from where Grace had forgotten it on the dormitory’s breakfast table. He dawdled mopily to the panel where Grace was working, stepping carefully past Grace’s laptop, and waved the device toward him inside the cramped wire-lined plenum.
Grace did not turn his head, focused as he was on the several wires he clutched in both hands. “Thanks, pal. Could you squeeze in here and give me some hands? You’ll probably figure this out way quicker than me anyway.”
“Grace do fine alone,” the computer translated Rocky’s self-pitying reply as he climbed into the recessed space, straddling Grace’s left leg, and began to trace the paths of the wiring. He lingered over the simple task, stealing time to take in the alluring portrait of his new mate as he worked. The sleeves of Grace’s coveralls were tied around his waist, his t-shirt inadvertently rolled up to expose several inches of abdomen. His glasses, for once, were resting practically on the bridge of his nose as he chewed absently at his lower lip. Sweat and habitual finger combing had slicked Grace’s hair into scattered blonde starbursts across his scalp. It had also soaked the shirt fabric under his arms and over his sternum and left droplets of perspiration clinging to his throat.
Every nerve of Rocky’s carapace was buzzing, in awe of Grace's every other-worldly feature. Still, Rocky strove to maintain some focus, and leaned forward to touch the probes of the multimeter to the wires in Grace’s hands, turning the tool’s screen - unreadable without his texture camera - toward Grace.
Grace grunted thoughtfully at the number and reached for the selector switch before Rocky could advise otherwise. The shifting of Grace’s fingers was enough to accidentally bring two wire heads together and send a flurry of sparks ejecting into the enclosed cavity. Grace yanked the leads apart with a yelp, and as his whole frame jolted in surprise his knee flexed sharply upward against Rocky’s underbody, rubbing against the sensitive scutes there, already ripening in close proximity to Grace and his sweaty, clueless allure. As Grace shifted his weight to recover his balance, the pressure of his knee flexed more forcefully against Rocky’s suit and the Eridian felt himself fully and wetly exposed against the transparent xenonite.
“Oh, Rocky, I’m sorry—”
Grace had hardly started speaking before an involuntary, velvety trill of pure pleasure had passed Rocky’s vents. A totally unknown sound to the translation software just outside.
But, not to Grace, much to Rocky’s frustrated chagrin.
“Wait, you’re…” Grace adjusted his glasses and looked his mate up and down.
The Eridian squirmed, minutely because he was flustered, but primarily so that he could rock more deeply against the hard joint of Grace’s leg. Rocky sensed, somewhat hazily through arousal, Grace raising his eyebrows, doubtless fascinated by the throbbing domed organ rubbing longingly against the fabric of his jumpsuit. To Rocky’s mingled embarrassment and delight, Grace smiled tenderly, salaciously, making a soft sound between pressed lips. Bracing his foot against the wall behind Rocky and his back against the opposite one, Grace anchored himself steadily in place and gave a small, encouraging nod.
Rocky was wholly unaccustomed to being the more yearning and vulnerable between himself and Grace, but had been depriving himself so thoroughly that he could only submit to his own urges, eking out a tremulous, “Grace!”
“Hold onto me here,” Grace instructed sweetly, guiding Rocky’s forward claws to clutch the firm muscle of his shoulders.
The leverage was immediate bliss, and Rocky pushed himself in slow deliberate arcs against Grace’s leg and the pleasurably bunched fabric that covered it.
“There you go,” Grace murmured, flexing his steadying hands against Rocky’s side, encouraging the juddering roll of Rocky’s body against his knee. “That’s it.”
“Grace— not— hurting?” Rocky hitched the question as he sought a perfect rhythm, the fabric of Grace’s shirt twisting in his hands as he searched.
“Not at all,” Grace assured him breathily as one hand dropped from Rocky’s carapace.
Rocky could sense his mate’s blood pumping faster as Grace’s free hand worked under the sleeves knotted at his hips, wriggling desperately toward his cock as Rocky moved atop him.
“You’re just fine. This is —” The words caught thickly in his throat as the hand beneath his waistband worked, “—so hot!” The motion of Grace’s hand squeezing and stroking himself against the restriction of his jumpsuit rocked his leg more forcefully against Rocky’s underside, and they traded a chorus of pleasured sounds between each other.
“Want to– want to see you,” Rocky whimpered, slowing his enthusiastic riding to paw at the waist of the troublesome work clothes.
Grace hurried to untie the sleeves at his waist and haltingly shimmied the obscuring garment lower, until his erection bobbed up from the parted zipper and against his stomach. “Better?”
Rocky could only manage a strangled chirp of affirmation. He resumed grinding against Grace, slow and fluidly at first, stretching the sensation of each push until the indulgence overwhelmed him. Then faster, harder, and more erratic, a silvery-purple condensation collecting along Rocky’s parted plates, dripping languidly into the interior of his suit.
Grace ‘s left hand rested just above one of Rocky’s shoulders as he luxuriated in the vision of the Eridian bobbing and lurching so eagerly astride him, a gorgeous shuddering mess of musical sounds and scrabbling claws. The other, now unencumbered by the restriction of his coveralls, slid lazily up and down his shaft, the motion a lesser consideration to that of cataloguing Rocky’s every pleasured movement.
With the escalating thrusts of his carapace, Rocky sang out new and faster declarations of rapture, “Grace Grace Grace– I have opened for you! My brilliant sun! My whole life’s star! My love!” The laptop translated deficiently, “Grace Grace Grace — love!” But, Rocky was too carried away and near to climax to care how poorly it had rendered his words.
Rocky saw Grace’s eyes were trained keenly on the burgeoning pool of mercury at the base of his thorax, and as the human licked his lips Rocky felt the warm orgasmic tremor of the earthquake he had been chasing for days pulsing in his core. “Grace, I am— I am—” A few further gyrations against Grace and Rocky at long last reached the throbbing crescendo ecstasy of climax, words obliterated by the tingling shockwaves radiating through the whole of him.
With the arm that was not busy stroking his cock, Grace pulled Rocky toward him once his trembling had ceased, hugging him tightly against his chest.
The Eridian wove a claw into the hair at the nape of Grace’s neck, relishing the percussion of Grace’s racing pulse as his arm worked faster and faster, moving both of their bodies with the jerking enthusiasm of the motion. Rocky half-growled half-sang a fervent, “I love you,” tugging at the sweat-damp locks with expertly calibrated force.
Grace came near-instantly, shuddering against Rocky with a broken, “oh, fuuu—” and decorating the iridescent pool in the bottom of Rocky’s xenonite suit with several spurts of his own fluids across its exterior. He clung to Rocky for a lingering minute or two, heaving deep gulps of air until his clenched muscles began to uncoil. As he relaxed, he let his chin fall forward against Rocky, folding his arms loosely around him. “Thank you.”
“For, question…?” Rocky let the inquiry trail lazily off, tucking his limbs beneath him so he could recline more comfortably against Grace.
Grace’s voice quivered slightly as he answered, “For finally letting me do that for you.” He kissed Rocky twice, a peck followed by a longer and more lingering second, blinking a single escaped teardrop down onto the xenonite just over Rocky’s vents.
There was a lengthy treatise on his love for Grace written between the very building blocks of Rocky’s being, but he held it back, so extremely content in Grace’s arms, and unwilling for the moment to feed his contemplated poetry through the clumsy translation software. He chose instead to nuzzle still closer into Grace’s, humming his affection against Grace’s ribs.
“‘My life’s star,’” Grace whispered reverently after a quiet while, his cheek resting against the crown of Rocky’s body. “No one’s ever called me something that beautiful.”
Rocky chirped a small laugh, feeling sheepish and pleased, “I was wondering how much your Eridian had improved.” Grace’s laptop played its crude translation just beside them, “Rocky wonder how Grace Eridian improving.”
“I catch more than you think. You won’t be getting much of anything past me before long.” Grace yawned dozily, “I’ll finish this up later, let’s go have a nap.”
“No! You’re absolutely filthy,” Rocky protested, straightening up as best he could in the space between Grace’s knees. “Go take a shower while I repair this.” The computer echoed, “Grace is disgust. Shower and Rocky will fix.”
Grace leaned outside the panel to flip the interrupting laptop closed. “Jeez, you’re bossy,” he reclined against the metal partition behind him, beckoning, “Let’s just stay here for a bit, then.”
Rocky settled again in the hollow of their cramped and unconventional little love nest, all too happy to fold himself against Grace, tucked between his legs and draped in his soft-strong arms, “As long as you want, brilliant sun of my universe.”