12/03/2026 00:56

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I answered without trying to make eye contact, as he kissed softly across the bare skin where neck met shoulders. He pressed me in the circle of his body, arms sliding around me, pinning me gently against him. Yet he could clearly detect the hiss of his scout’s blaster as it poured beam after beaminto the lead ship of the Kyben fleet. That was what I’d said, though I’d known that wasn’t the whole answer, perhaps not even the rightanswer.

Gregory's my leopard, I'm his Nimir-Ra. Maybe I'd spent too much time around the shape-shifters and their casual nudist policy. Benny’s head pulled back sharply, assomething gave all at once, and a bleeding raw-white dripping of flesh hung from his teeth. Back then, in that less cynically impoverished time, such testing had more to do withcontent and message than structure and approach—