“Mmm, too bad,” purred Arabel. “Can you just imagine mating with a diploid woman? I mean…wow.”
“Stop it.”
“Sorry, babe.” Arabel leaned over, shoulder to shoulder against Lina, and let her head drop until her cheek was resting against Lina’s skin. “You know I love you, right?”
Lina’s lips stretched into a genuine smile at Arabel’s comment. “I know,” she said, “and I love you too.”
“And, I promise I’d never snap your neck after I mated you. Even if you were a drone.”
Lina playfully pushed Arabel aside and stood to collect the now empty plates. “You should have quit while you were ahead.”
Arabel stuck her tongue out and Lina reached around to pull Arabel into her arms. Lina felt a low moaning from Arabel vibrating against her neck, where Arabel was currently engaging in explorations with her mouth and tongue. Lina used the last vestiges of her control to pull away before things got out of hand again.
“What are you wearing to the rave?” Lina asked.
“Oh, wait ‘til you see it.” Arabel puffed up her chest. “My best find of the day.” Arabel walked to where her satchel hung from a hook on the back of her front door. She pulled forth a half-used roll of wide, yellow and black-striped caution tape.
Lina cocked her head to the side, staring.
Arabel unrolled an arm’s length of the tape and wrapped it so that it covered her bare breasts. Her nipples were still protruding rather obviously, but she was covered.
“That’s it?”
“I’ll do a couple passes down below, too.” Arabel beamed. “What? It says caution, doesn’t it?”
Lina set the dinner plates in the sink, gave them a quick rinse, and made her way back to Arabel’s side of the breakfast bar. “It’s perfect.”
Arabel glanced up at Lina. “Disco nap?” she said.
Lina nodded and let Arabel guide her to the couch and pull a light throw blanket over them. Lina curled her body around Arabel and enjoyed the soft warm feeling of Arabel’s skin, a full belly, and the still-smoldering, tree flower-enhanced post-orgasmic bliss of their mating.
Chapter 2: The Rave
It came to pass that humankind had lived in the shadow of the Great Tree for so long, that its image became shrouded in mist, and its gifts but an echo in their minds. And as the tribes of men began to favor that which was created by their own hand over the gifts of the Great Tree, the world began to sicken and wither. Too long had humankind strayed from the path of righteousness. And so it was that the land would become barren, the water poison, and even the very air thick and choking.
—Selected passages from The Book of the Origin by Bella Aurelius Nobilis, Modern Language Translation
* * * *
The rumble of a distant explosion rattled Lina from her peaceful slumber. “Damn rebels,” she muttered, and rolled over again. In her hazy state, Lina patted the empty space that Arabel had occupied what she thought was only a short time ago. The blanket was still there, but Arabel was missing. Lina rubbed her tired eyes—she had not intended to sleep so hard.
Lina dragged herself upright. “Where are you, baby?”
“Ta-dah!” Arabel appeared, reaching for the ceiling, elbows locked, and her fingers spread wide. She was dressed in nothing but yellow caution tape—two passes around her chest in a lopsided sort of X shape that hid her breasts, but did little to conceal the outline of her protruding nipples. And then there were three passes low around her hips that barely did anything to cover her sex.
A deep blue, child’s teething toy hung from a gaily-colored, beaded string around her neck and flopped about as Arabel did a little half-twirl. She shifted her weight from one leg to the other, giving Lina an eyeful of her jiggling buttocks spilling out from below their scant covering, before facing front again.
“How long have you been awake?” Lina said, though she could see it had been some time, judging from the assortment of fresh bio-luminescent designs laid out all over the front of Arabel’s body.
“A while.” Arabel grinned, and then trotted over to pull Lina up from the couch. She did not succeed. “Don’t you want to get your hands on this, baby?”
Arabel stood in front of Lina, hands placed behind her head, gyrating and nearly knocking her over with the last pass of her hips, close enough to kick up a breeze in front of Lina’s face. She then grinned and handed Lina several tubes of the brightly-colored, bio-luminescent dye that she had reclaimed from the refuse piles earlier that day. “Do my back?”
“Sure.” Lina stifled a small yawn and scooted herself farther back into the couch cushions and spread her thighs to give Arabel a place to sit. Lina placed a hand gently on Arabel’s shoulder, pausing to enjoy the touch of skin, before pressing her lover’s body forward to make room to work.
“What did you have in mind?” Lina asked.
“Tribal, like I did on the front.”
“Okay.” Lina dipped a sharpened piece of bamboo, about the size of a chop stick, into a tube of dye and twirled it around. She pulled it out, dragging the bamboo against the lip of the tube to shed the excess dye, and began scratching it against Arabel’s skin. Lina clamped her jaw in concentration. It wasn’t a deep enough scratch to be permanent, but it would last for several days, and Lina wanted her lover to wear her markings with pride.
Arabel occasionally sucked a sharp, hissing breath between her teeth to which Lina would respond, ‘Sorry,’ but otherwise Arabel remained still while her skin was being adorned with ever-expanding, multicolored, glowing designs.
“Lean forward a little more, baby,” Lina said. “I want to put some on your butt cheeks. To match the rest of you.”
“Why, who’s going to see down there?”
Lina couldn’t see if Arabel was ginning or not. “Um, darling? Have you seen your costume? It doesn’t cover much.”
Arabel bent deeply, wiggling her ass and grinning over
