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Well, this was fucking stupid.
As if to emphasize the thought, another stalactite appears seemingly from nowhere, at just the right height to smack Natalie Mills in the forehead. At least she manages to duck at the last second, unlike the first three times this damn cave tried to kill her.
And okay, that might be a slight exaggeration. She's moving slow enough that the worst she's done is annoy herself with a scrape across the forehead, to go with a bruised knee from an earlier fall when the beam of her flashlight didn't pick up a small drop in the cave floor. If she hadn't had the flashlight, it could have been a lot worse.
It also could have been a lot better. Say, if the tour guide hadn't somehow managed to leave her behind. Who does that? Aren't they supposed to keep count or something? Natalie had looked away for only a second, her attention caught by the light reflecting in water trickling over stone, and when she'd looked up, the cave was empty.
She shivers again, still unnerved by that. Her phone told her twenty minutes had passed, but that couldn't be right. The water wasn't that interesting, and besides, someone should have nudged her when it was time to keep going. Instead, the tour group had moved on, leaving her behind to try to follow them.
Three hours later, she still hasn't caught up. When she'd first started, more irritated than anything, she'd been confident she was going in the right direction. That certainty faded the more time passed with no sound except the scuff of her own feet, mixed with an occasional muttered "fuck!" as she stumbled or banged her head yet again. Now she's completely lost, without the faintest idea which way to go.
She should stop, not get herself more lost, and yet, every time she does, she's suddenly certain of the way again. Then she'll go a little further, and her certainty will drift into uncertainty, and she'll stop again, and her certainty will come back. Over and over and over again, but each time it happens, she falls for it again. It's a compulsion, and nearly as unnerving as losing twenty minutes, so she tries not to think about either one. She just needs to keep walking.
The walls of this most recent tunnel have been pressing closer, but that weird certainty is back. It's this way, she knows it's this way, and when the walls suddenly drop away, she feels an unwarranted surge of triumph. Here!
Except not. Ten feet ahead of her, the ground disappears under a pool of water, a pool so wide her flashlight can't find the other side. When she points looks up, she discovers the ceiling is at least as far away.
At least she won't be hitting her head again for a while.
Natalie turns around to retrace her steps (this can't be the right way, she would definitely remember if she'd swum across any lakes), only to stare in confusion and rising panic. The tunnel she came from isn't there anymore. It wasn't wide, but it wasn't that narrow, and she should be able to pick it out no matter how uneven the rock wall in front of her.
For a second, she thinks she spots it, but when she blinks and looks again, she can't make her eyes focus. It's not just the wall, either: everything is blurring.
It should scare her, but for some reason, her racing heart is slowing. She's just tired, and why wouldn't she be? Hours of squinting in the dark would do that to anyone. A little break to rest her eyes. That's what she needs. A break, and some water.
As soon as she's thought that, she realizes how dry her mouth is, and how sweaty the rest of her is. When they'd first come down into the caves, she'd pulled her jacket tighter against the damp chill, but now she feels like she's burning up. The water looks so cool, so inviting, and it's not as if anyone's going to stumble by and see her. If they did, the relief of being found will be more than enough to compensate for the embarrassment of being caught naked by a stranger.
She clicks the flashlight off without thinking. The darkness doesn't so much close in as collapse on her, so thick and heavy Natalie takes a startled step away from the water. What the fuck is she thinking? There could be anything in that water, from bacteria to...to...
To what? Does she really think anything big enough to hurt her could live down here? The worst things in the water are probably fish. Small fish. Small, harmless fish.
The words feel alien and strange, more like someone whispering in her ear than her own thought, but she shakes off her unease. It's just the darkness making her nervous, that's all. Which is stupid. She still has her flashlight, and so long as she's careful not to slip, she'll be fine.
She's tugging at the laces of her shoes before she's even finished the thought, and she strips to her skin so fast she almost falls over. Instead of scaring her, it just makes her impatient with herself. Her body feels somehow wrong and unfamiliar, her fingers fumbling at buttons and zippers like she hasn't been dressing herself for thirty fucking years.
In her eagerness to get in the water, Natalie almost takes the flashlight with her. It's surprisingly hard to force herself to walk back to her clothes and set the flashlight down carefully, rather than keeping it with her or just tossing it aside to land wherever. What difference does it make if the flashlight gets broken?
The thought of stumbling through these caves in the dark pushes back the compulsion just long enough for her to reach her clothes and leave the flashlight somewhere safe. As soon as she has, though, it comes rushing back, dragging her toward the water like a dog on a leash. Her skin is so hot, and her mouth is so dry, and the water is so close, and the relief when she finally steps into it is nearly orgasmic. She's never wanted anything the way she wants to drink the water and let it cool this unnatural heat.
Unnatural.
The word breaks the surface of her hazy thoughts, a splash of metaphorical cold water that's a lot less pleasant than the literal cold water now lapping around her knees. Something isn't right about any of this: not those lost twenty minutes, not the certainty that led her here, not the heat that's about to drive her crazy.
Her fear disappears as fast as it arrived. It's fine. She's hot from walking all that way, she's only a little lost, she'll find her way back as soon as she's rested, and she lost twenty minutes because the water was just so interesting. Water is fascinating, after all. The sound, the taste, the feel of it-
The sight, whispers a part of her, a part that's separate from the rest.
She ignores that whisper (sight doesn't matter, there's nothing to see in the dark) and steps forward, deeper into the water. One step becomes two, and then she's running as best she can, desperate to reach the deeper water she somehow knows is there. The second the water is deep enough, she throws herself forward and begins to swim. She's only ever been a mediocre swimmer, but now she moves easily, strong steady strokes carrying her farther from shore as fast as possible.
And then the impulse, the need to move passes, leaving her treading water in the dark, with absolutely no sense of direction. She can barely tell up from down, despite the water. Forget any idea of which way she'd have to swim to get back to shore.
It doesn't frighten her. She's where she needs to be. All she has to do now is wait.
The grip on her ankle doesn't frighten her, either. It's slightly cooler than the water, and it slides over her skin every bit as smoothly, climbing her leg without pulling her down. If anything, it's supporting her weight, giving her something to push against with her foot so she's half standing, half treading water.
Something just as cool and sinuous begins to twine up her other leg, and another curls around her torso. They move her unresisting body, pulling and pushing as if she were a doll, until she's reclining in a nest of those soft, slippery limbs. A nest of tentacles.
There's no other word for it: they're tentacles. She's surrounded by tentacles, and she should be screaming in terror, but she's not. They feel so good, and they're holding her so gently. Why would she be afraid of them? All they want...all it wants is to touch her, to explore, to learn. Not to hurt her. Never to hurt her. She's a rare gift, too precious to damage, too perfect to risk. It will care for her, let her rest and recover from her walk and her fear, give her anything she needs and everything she wants. In return, it asks only one favor. A small thing, really. Nothing that would hurt her, oh no, or even inconvenience her. She'll hardly remember, later. All she has to do is lie here and let it care for her.
The creature brushes a tentacle across her lips, a gentle request. Gentle or not, part of her is screaming, terrified and disgusted, but that part of her doesn't have any control. The rest of her is hot, mouth parched, lips cracking from thirst. Whatever little favor the creature wants in exchange, it will be worth it for the relief that tentacle promises.
Natalie opens her mouth, and the tentacle slides in, cool and dripping and everything she needs. The liquid that pours off it is minerally, a little thicker than water, and it's the best thing she's ever tasted. She swallows quickly, greedily, and is delighted to find she can get more just by sucking on the tentacle that's still in her mouth. When she isn't sucking on it, it strokes her tongue and the insides of her cheeks, smearing more liquid across her lips with every lazy movement, liquid that eases the pain where they'd cracked from thirst.
As she drinks, a welcome chill begins to spread out from her chest, growing with every swallow, and the small screaming voice in the back of her head gets lost in a cool darkness full of curious tentacles. Some of them are slippery like the first few, like the one in her mouth, but many of them cling to her instead, exploring with delicate suckers she can see the same way she can see her fingers: not with her eyes but with a clear sense of where her body is. She could grab any of the tentacles as easily as she could touch her own nose.
There's no reason she would want to grab them, though. Her awareness of the creature's body must go in reverse, too, because it touches her the same way she would if she were checking herself for injuries. It prods and pokes and moves her limbs around, checking the limits of her range of motion without attempting to push past them. The exam is more clinical than sexual, but the liquid in her mouth is doing more than cooling her off. It's relaxing her, forcing tense muscles to unwind, and as she relaxes, the constant touches all over her body start to feel more like caresses.
Warmth gathers between her legs, but she's too relaxed to be embarrassed. The creature has to know, it's aware of her body the way she's aware of its, and if it minded her reaction, it would stop. It definitely wouldn't keep touching her in exactly the ways that are turning her on. No, of course it wouldn't. It wants her to be content and comfortable. It wants her to feel good. It wants to give her whatever she wants, so she'll give it what it wants. That little favor. That small thing. Such a small thing. Not worth wondering or worrying about. It won't hurt at all, if she'll just let the creature give her what she wants. Just let it get her ready to give it that favor. Let it get her ready to take what it will give her.
Her thoughts tangle and blur, so that she's not sure if the creature wants her to give it something or accept something from it. If she'd doing it a favor, shouldn't she be giving, not getting? What could she take that would be doing it a favor?
A small thing. The words drift through Natalie's head, alien and not her own, the way the creature's tentacles aren't hers but are still part of her. Nothing to be alarmed about. The creature promised it would only be a small favor. Really, it's so small it hardly counts as a favor at all. The creature will protect her, please her, even lead her safely out of the saves when she's ready, and all she has to do is accept a parting gift to take with her when she leaves. Is it so hard to accept a gift?
The word gift echoes oddly in her head, her brain stumbling over it like it's a word in a language she barely knows. Like she's trying to translate it, only there are too many possibilities, and she's trying to hear all of them at once: gift, friend, favor, child, offering, guide, rider, parasite, secret.
Gift. Emphatic. Final. It's a gift, and all she has to do is carry it. Which will be easy, if she lets the creature get her ready.
What happens if I'm not? she asks it, but she doesn't really care. The strange echoes, the other words hiding under the word gift, none of it matters. She licks the tentacle in her mouth, much more interested in the way it's beginning to feel more like a cock.
One of the creature's tentacles curls around her breasts, suckers pulling at the nipples as the creature answers her in impressions rather than words, too many and too fast for her to follow. Distracted by the tentacle in her mouth and the one playing with her breasts, she struggles half-heartedly to understand the answer. If she's not ready...what? It will hurt?
Yes. The word feels like a casual aside, as if her potential pain isn't the important part of the answer, but for a second, Natalie drowns in memories, an entire cascade of people screaming and thrashing in pain as the creature tries to give them its gift.
Before Natalie has time to process the memories, her attention is dragged away from them, like someone has a hand on her chin and is turning her face in a different direction. Those memories aren't important, because the creature has learned from them. It's learned who can and can't accept its gift and that even the ones who can still have to be ready. If she's not ready, it will hurt, and...and...oh. If she isn't ready, her body will reject the gift. No matter how willing she is to do the creature's small favor (and of course she's willing, why wouldn't she, it costs her nothing and gains her so much), she won't be able to do it if her body isn't ready to accept the gift.
The thought of the creature going to so much effort to give her something, only for her to reject it, makes her eyes burn in shared grief. Now she understands why the creature ignored the possibility of anything as minor as a little physical pain, compared to such a terrible tragedy. She'd rather have the pain than give the creature nothing in return for everything it's done for her.
What has it done for you? asks a voice in the back of her head, one that's not a whisper and more than a little sarcastic. Other than get you lost and drug you so it can feel you up.
No, no, that's not right. The creature showed her this place, cool and dark and beautiful, and showed itself to her. It's going to give her another gift, too, as soon as she's ready for it, and in the meantime, it's going to make her feel good. Better than she's ever felt before. So good she'll hardly even notice when it gives her its gift. In fact, it will probably have to tell her when it's finished, that's how minor a favor this is.
It's a weaselly answer, and Natalie tries to focus, to pin it down, but it's impossible to think with a tentacle in her mouth and another kneading her breasts. Her thighs are pressed tightly together, and she rubs them thoughtlessly in search of even a tiny bit of friction, her attention shifting from an unimportant conversation to the much more essential task of finding something to rub her clit against. Her fingers aren't really an option: her hands are wrapped in tentacles, and she's not sure she could move them even if they were free.
The tentacle in her mouth stiffens, feeling more like a cock than ever. If she sucks it enough, will it come in her mouth? She hopes so. She likes the thought of it coming inside her, whether that's her mouth, or (better yet), her cunt.
She presses her thighs together more tightly, wanting to feel the creature inside her but also needing more pressure on her clit. The muscles in her ass and thighs are clenching, trying to rock her hips even though it's a struggle to move any part of her body and there's nothing to rock against. It's pointless, but she can't help herself.
The tip of a tentacle trails down her belly, and Natalie thrusts her hips up, trying to encourage it. Maybe it needed the encouragement, or maybe it would have gotten there on its own, but either way, it continues down until the creature can explore her clit with the same care it's shown exploring every other part of her.
Its exploration is more than physical. Natalie can feel the creature inside her head, sifting through her memories and learning her body by studying what she does when she's getting herself off. It can feel everything she feels, and while it doesn't understand pleasure the way she does, it understands and remembers what she likes. It learns fast, its suckers massaging her clit and pulling at her labia, the tip of the tentacle teasing just inside her, refining its movements based on her memories and its shared awareness of her body, until she comes with a groan, spasming in the creature's grip.
Afterward, she slumps back, her muscles even more like Jell-O than they were before. At the same time, she feels vaguely unsatisfied. She wants to be fucked, to have something inside her when she comes, something thick enough she can clench around it and know it's there. And she still wants the creature to come inside her, in whatever form that takes for a creature without a dick. Or maybe it does have a dick?
It has enough of one, or at least, that's the impression Natalie gets from the emotions it shares with her. Amusement, anticipation, reassurance. It has what it needs in order to give her its gift, when she's ready.
I'm ready now, she thinks at it, because she wants everything it will give her. She wants its tentacles on and inside her, and she wants the gift it keeps promising her. She feels like she should be able to figure out what that gift is, or will be, but her thoughts won't line up and she doesn't actually care. It doesn't matter what the gift is. She wants to have it, and she wants as many as the creature will give her.
It calls her greedy, its amusement strong enough to wash away her own emotions, leaving her empty of anything except the creature's thoughts and feelings. In that brief moment of connection, the creature shows her an image of herself, standing naked on the shore, about to step into the water. Natalie knows, without understanding how, that the image is a future version of her, here to visit the creature and get another gift, or get the same gift again. She has to wait a few months, but she can come back as many times as she wants, and the creature will always be happy to give her its gift.
Only one? she asks. She doesn't care if it's greedy to ask for gifts. It doesn't matter that she doesn't even know what she's asking for. She knows, with the same certainty that guided her here, that whatever it is, she wants it.
This time, the creature's answer is nearly in words. One each time.
Only one? she repeats. It's obvious the creature wants to give her its gift as much as she wants to get it, so why only one? Why not more?
Dangerous. It sounds like the creature speaks from experience.
Natalie has a sudden urge to be better than all those other people who've gotten the creature's gift. Maybe they couldn't do it, but she can. She can be better than anyone else, so the creature will want her as much as she wants it.
Its amusement rolls over her again, tinged with skepticism. She has the impression it's saying maybe, but the sort of maybe that really means no.
What would make it not dangerous? she asks.
The creature's tentacles go still, like the creature is thinking. Then the tentacle in Natalie's mouth contracts, almost like it's a real dick and it just came, filling her mouth with liquid.
Drink, the creature says.
Natalie doesn't know if it's answering her question or trying to distract her, but she drinks. She swallows everything it's already given her, and when it floods her mouth again, she swallows that, too. She swallows as fast as it comes, only pausing occasionally to gasp for breath, hoping that if she drinks enough, the creature will give her its gift twice. And if this time it lets her have two, maybe next time it will let her have three, or even four.
There it is again, that impression from the creature of a maybe strongly shaded with no, but the no isn't quite as strong as before. Natalie smiles to herself and sucks harder on the tentacle in her mouth. Her body feels heavier with every swallow, weighting her down until she can't move. All she can do is drink and lie in the net of tentacles the creature made for her.
When her mind and her body are both impossibly heavy and slow, the tentacle in her mouth stops contracting. It continues to give off a bit of liquid, enough for her to swallow after every couple breaths, but nothing like it was before. Natalie is too weighted down to feel disappointed. The creature wants her to be content, so she is.
Until it begins to play with her clit again.
Content isn't what it wants her to be, not anymore, and the change is as sudden as turning on a light. The heaviness that's spread through her turns electric, her skin prickling, though she still can't move. She doesn't know what she would do if she could move: the creature's suckers are on her breasts, her nipples, her clit, her labia, everywhere she might possibly want to touch. As soon as she thinks of something she wants, the creature gives it to her, dozens of small, sucking mouths that drag her to orgasm so fast she doesn't have time to miss being fucked.
The creature gives her a few minutes to recover, the tentacle in her mouth giving her more to drink. The more she drinks, the closer she feels to the creature, like the liquid is changing her into something a little more like it. Their minds are overlapping all the time now, the creature's thoughts and desires more real than Natalie's own. She feels like an extension of the creature than a separate being, and its delight at that fills her, too.
The tentacles around her legs tighten, pulling them apart and bending her knees. Anticipation fills Natalie, but the feeling is only hers, not the creature's, and that confuses her. Why doesn't it want this as much as she does?
Its mind absorbs hers again, and she understands. Not yet. Her body isn't ready yet. There are things the creature still needs to do, and she needs to drink more of the liquid the tentacle gives off. She feels it again, that surge of protectiveness, or maybe possessiveness, the creature showed her earlier. She's too rare and precious to risk. She's doing well, but it wants to be absolutely sure it doesn't hurt her.
The creature strokes her face with a tentacle, and rubs the one in her mouth against her tongue. She revels in the affection, all the more determined to be the creature's favorite. It even pleases her when it chuckles in her head, calling her both greedy and arrogant. Maybe, but that doesn't mean she'll stop.
A tentacle squeezes her breast, one sucker directly over the nipple to pull at it, and she moans. The tentacle squeezes with the perfect amount of pressure and pulls with exactly the right amount of force, and in her head, she can feel the creature encouraging her to enjoy this. It will take care of her until she has to leave. She doesn't need to think about anything.
The suckers along her labia tug gently. It feels good, but more than that, it winds her anticipation higher for what she knows will happen next.
When the tentacle slides into her, it's disappointingly thin at first, but the creature adjusts to her thoughts as quickly as it has all along. It thickens the tentacle and withdraws it, just so she can feel it enter her again. It twists inside her, thickening further, filling her cunt for one brilliant moment. Then it withdraws, leaving her empty and whimpering until it pushes back in. Slowly this time: she may be so turned on she'd be dripping if she weren't in water, but the tentacle is thicker now, thick enough to hurt if it goes too fast.
It doesn't go too fast. It fucks her teasingly slow, pulsing gently as it fills her, all while other tentacles play with her clit and her breasts. It's so much, it's too much in the best possible way, and she comes with a groan that would have been a scream under any other circumstances.
The creature pulls its tentacle from her cunt and relaxes the rest. It's still holding her, and the tentacle in her mouth continues to twine around her tongue, but nothing teases her, or even touches her more than to hold her. Which is good, because her clit is so sensitive even the water moving over it is borderline too much.
She floats in the creature's embrace, content if not yet satisfied, anticipating more but not quite ready for it. She doesn't even have to say when she is, because the creature knows it the same way she does. As soon as she forms the thought, the tentacles are back, careful not pull too roughly on places that have started to get sore. They find new places to touch and suck, new things to do to her as the thicker tentacle fucks her, its tip curving forward to press against the spot inside her that feels like it has a direct line to her clit.
She comes, and afterward, the creature holds her, gives her as much to drink as she wants until she's recovered enough for it to fuck her again and they start all over. Each time, the creature fucks her with a slightly larger tentacle, or maybe the same tentacle swollen a little more, and she knows it's stretching her, preparing her. She asks the creature sometimes, when the tentacle pushing into her cunt feels bigger than anything she could take, if this is the one it's been preparing her for. Every time, she feels its amusement and gets the same answer.
You'll know.
It wasn't lying. When it's fucked her into a quivering ball of nerves and need, the next time she asks for more, something different presses against her cunt. It's not soft and smooth like the tentacle that's been fucking her, or even soft and bumpy like one of the tentacles with suckers. Whatever it is, it's hard as literal rock and covered in shallow ridges she can feel as the thing works itself into her. More than feel: she can practically count them, her cunt is stretched so tight around it.
But it doesn't hurt. It hits the line once or twice without ever crossing it, and she can feel the creature's smug satisfaction. She reflects the feeling back, pleased she could make it happy, hoping its satisfaction means she's done better than the others it's used before.
The creature strokes her cheek, her thighs, her belly, and she whimpers. It was teasing her clit before it started to fuck her with this thing, getting her slick enough to take it, and now that she's filled with it, she wants to come so badly. All she needs is a little more, just a couple strokes from the tip of a tentacle.
A couple strokes she's not getting, it seems, or at least, not yet. The creature sends her a confusing series of emotions and images, all of it too complicated for her current state of mind, but she understands the important part. The creature intends to keep her on the edge while it finishes something.
Gift, it whispers. My gift. Your gift. My/your gift.
Our gift, she thinks.
Yes. It feels very pleased with itself and her. Our gift.
For a split second, her mind merges fully with the creature's, and she realizes this is the first time it's truly allowed her to do that. This isn't a connection to superficial thoughts and the tentacles touching her. This is a connection to everything it is, a connection to something huge, and ancient, and through it, to dozens of other, distant creatures, all of whom are as aware of her as she is of them.
My gifts, the creature tells her. Gifts to others. Before you.
There are also other, more tenuous connections leading away from the creature. She follows one and is surprised to find a human at the end. A woman who's as startled by Natalie's presence as Natalie is by hers.
The creature's mind fills Natalie's, and through her, the other woman's. Reassurance pours out, wordless but clear: everything is fine, this is a dream, forget, forget, forget.
Natalie is wide awake for the first time in hours, and she wants to scream in horror and fear. Her body is limp and unresponsive, though. It just keeps lying there, wrapped in tentacles, speared on the cock of some monster straight out of nightmare, passively waiting for what happens next. Natalie knows what that will be. She knows what "gift" the creature is going to give her, and she wants to kick and scream and flail her way free.
Her body, on the other hand, wants to lie there and let it happen, so long as it gets to come.
The creature's full attention turns toward her, it's mind full of a dry, academic curiosity. Images flash, overwhelming her attempts to fend them off, and she understands that humans aren't usually able to see or reach through the creature's connections. Not to its young and certainly not to its other victims.
It protests the word victim, mildly and wordlessly. Quibbling over terminology, not really offended.
Livestock, then! she flings at it. Pets! Incubators! Hosts!
She's trying to insult it, but it just considers her words, turning each one over before accepting the last. Hosts. Yes.
That shocks her to stillness, and while she's reeling, its mind closes around hers as much as its tentacles have closed around her body. She feels it gathering itself for something, but then it pauses. Studies her. Asks without words whether this is really so bad as all that. She hasn't been harmed--the opposite, in fact--and its young won't hurt her, either. She'll hardly know anything is there, and in a few weeks, the new, young creature will be gone.
And what then? she demands. You summon me back the way you summoned me here today? Do this all over again?
She gets the impression of a shrug, that it doesn't intend to at the moment but if it goes too long without being able to lure anyone to its pool, it will reach down those connections to find the closest victim and call that person here, to be used again. And if one of those victims (memories of the creature so blurred the person can convince themselves it's not real) comes back to these caves on their own? Well, the creature would be stupid to pass up the opportunity to make use of someone it already knows can carry its young. Most people can't.
The creature regards Natalie again, then tells her she shouldn't worry. If she can connect to its mind so completely, she'll be a perfect host.
Lucky me, Natalie thinks.
Yes, the creature agrees, without a hint of sarcasm.
She would laugh hysterically, if her body wasn't drugged into stupidity.
Then the creature's mind closes over hers completely, and she doesn't want to laugh anymore. What was funny about it? She is lucky. She's glad to be able to do this. Glad to be one of the few who can do this for the creature.
The whole experience is already receding behind fog, but she grasps at one particular piece and hangs on. Not everyone can do the creature this favor, and of the ones who can, most of them can't connect to its mind as completely as she can. That means she's special, more like the creature than most people, and if that's true...
The creature's amusement fills her mind. She senses another maybe, but it's an optimistic maybe this time. The kind of maybe that sounds like, If you do well with the first one.
She has no time to gloat about that. The tentacle in her mouth is giving off so much liquid it's running down her chin, and she has to swallow hastily. She's barely finished before another tentacle strokes across her clit, making her sigh with pleasure.
The creature shudders, every tentacle trembling, and its mind retreats from hers. She has a vague, distant impression of its pleasure, and she realizes the creature is coming. Its pleasure is different from hers, more satisfaction at a job well done than the mind-melting orgasms it's given her, but that seems to be normal. When it's mind touches hers again, she doesn't get a sense of disappointment. If anything, it's smug.
She doesn't feel any different, other than desperate to come, and maybe a little uncomfortable with its cock still stretching her cunt.
Its mind touches hers, the sense of an indulgent smile and someone telling her to be patient.
The tentacle on her clit returns to playing with it, coaxing her tired body to the edge of orgasm again, only to leave her there. Which is when she remembers what the creature had told her earlier, that it would keep her on the edge while it finished. But isn't it done?
It lets her merge with its thoughts, enough for her to understand. Unlike a human, the creature doesn't come all at once. It will come a little at a time, until something takes. Until she's pregnant with a creature that's half hers, and half the creature's.
The thought sends a pleasant shiver through her whole body. She can picture herself with her belly swollen, their child growing inside her-
The creature cuts her imaginings short and replaces them with one of her looking only a little bigger than she does now. Its young don't need as much time as a human: a month at most before they're ready to be born and disappear into new waters, far from the place they were conceived. It will be decades before they're old enough to have young of their own, but out in the world, they'll have room to grow and an easier time finding hosts.
Another shiver runs through the creature, and this time, she can feel something cool inside her. She clenches involuntarily around the creature's cock, so turned on she thinks she might come even without anything playing with her clit. The idea is almost too much: the creature's come spilling into her, its young growing inside her, their young--their child--swelling her stomach. Doing this again, as soon as their child is born.
The idea seems to amuse the creature, but it doesn't explain why and she doesn't ask. That jolt of amusement was enough to pull her back from the edge of orgasm, and she doesn't know if she's grateful or annoyed.
Whichever it is, the emotion passes quickly, leaving her nothing but turned on, without an anchor for her thoughts. Time blurs until she doesn't know whether the creature has come three times or thirty. All she knows is that it keeps her constantly on the edge, slick around its cock but never allowed to come. Her attempts to come without its help, clenching around its cock and concentrating on the feel of it coming inside her, never get her anywhere. The one time she gets close, the creature's mind brushes against hers and breaks the moment apart.
It's a shock when the creature's cock finally pulls out, enough of one that she gasps, then gasps again as a soft tentacle fills her instead. The slick, smooth sides of the tentacle ease the vague ache from being stretched around something so hard for so long, but it's still thick enough she doesn't feel empty. She clenches around it, thinking about nothing except whether she'll finally be allowed to come, until her drifting thoughts are abruptly pulled up short by a realization: if the creature is done, then...
Yes. It guides her hands to her belly before she can ask, but she can't feel any difference. Which, of course not, but she's disappointed anyway.
How long before I can feel it? she asks.
They. An impression of a smirk and a shrug, combined with the memory of her own thoughts, wishing the creature would give her more than one gift. More than one of its young.
She forgets her original question, lost in the creature's satisfaction and her own pleasure. Two. Her body was able to take two. She was able to take two.
A tentacle strokes her clit at the same time the one in her cunt pulses, and she comes. Her whole body convulses with the intensity of it, her hands pressed tight to her belly and her mouth open on a soundless scream. She's never come so hard in her life, or so long, and when it's finally over, there are tears streaming down her cheeks.
She sleeps a while after that, and only half wakes when the creature touches her mind to tell her it's time for her to go. She doesn't want to go anywhere, but disobedience is impossible. Still half asleep, she stumbles out of the water to stand blinking in the darkness, too dazed to know what to do next. Whatever the creature gave her to drink, it hasn't all worn off yet, and her body feels heavy and uncoordinated.
The creature reaches out to her again and takes over, directing her to wipe as much water off herself as she can, then walk carefully up and down the shore to let her skin dry. Physical contact would make it easier, but at least for a month or so, she'll have the next best thing with her wherever she goes. It's easy for the creature to reach its young, and from there it can reach her. After they're born, the link will be more tenuous, but, well, after they're born she's coming right back here anyway.
Good, the creature whispers. It wants her to come back as often as she can: she's even more rare and precious than it thought when it first trapped her mind and separated her from the tour group. If it didn't need her to carry its young out into the world, it would never let her leave at all.
By the time she's dressed, the creature doesn't have to control her anymore. It hovers at the edge of her thoughts, ready to guide her out of the caves, but she ties her shoes on her own and stands up, almost completely steady. Through her connection to the creature, she knows it gave her more to drink than it usually gives someone: it was the only way to force her body to accept two of its young.
That makes her smile, smug. Now she knows the reason for it, the fumbling feels more like a badge of honor, proof she was able to do more than most people could.
Sleep, the creature whispers to that smug part of her, the part that's delighted by the young she's carrying and eager to have more. And it sleeps, taking with it the memories of everything that's happened over the last few hours, and the knowledge of what's growing inside her. She doesn't need to remember, not right now. When the time comes, the creature can wake that part of her up and call her to it.
It intends to do so frequently.