There was a quiet click as Gideon shut his laptop. He leaned back in his chair, massaging the bridge of his nose as he took a moment to decompress and rest his eyes.

He’d been working pretty much non-stop since coming into work that morning. As far as he could figure, he probably had quite a few hours of work left if he wanted to get things wrapped up in time for the big expo.

When Gideon was a kid, he saw NASA as the one place where his talents truly could shine. He imagined that the halls of the illustrious institution would be filled with geniuses of his caliber—people who could keep pace with him and from whom he could actually learn things. Reality, as it so often did, turned out to be disappointing.

“Well, there’s a reason they say ‘never meet your heroes’ after all,” he muttered to no one in particular. He rubbed his eyes and sat up, turning his gaze to the exo-suit in the middle of the lab. It was suspended from a wire harness and was still hooked up to all the testing and calibration equipment.

The Hellion was Gideon’s brainchild. It was an environmental isolation and life support system just like the suits that astronauts wore for their EVAs but integrated with a mechanical exoskeleton so that astronauts would be able to conduct physical labor even in high-gravity environments.

The use case was limited, he had to admit. None of NASA’s current exploration targets had an environment that would necessitate the exoskeleton part of the Hellion but there was still utility on Earth for the technology—especially when it came to disaster relief scenarios.

The higher-ups had given Gideon an entire team to tackle this project but he felt like he was the only one making any meaningful contributions. No one else seemed to have any idea what they were doing. These guys were supposed to be the best in their fields but Gideon still had to put in more work than anyone else to fix their messes.

This was the burden of a genius, he supposed, his cross to bear. In the end, it was probably for the better that he was doing all this work anyway. He was destined for greater things and it was bound to be more fulfilling if he did it on his own merits. It just proved that he was capable of standing on his own—that he didn’t need anyone else’s help.

Gideon had already reached for his laptop, his thumb perched just under the lid ready to flip it back open when he heard an almost deafening crash from right outside the building. He heard the squeal of metal stressed far beyond its breaking point and then, shortly thereafter, felt a faint tremor through the ground.

At first, he was afraid that the building was going to come down on top of him. He looked around, half expecting the roof to cave in at any moment but nothing of the sort happened. That initial pang of fear was replaced with curiosity as he started to wonder what could cause such a gigantic racket without compromising the building’s structural integrity.

Gideon snatched his coat off the backrest of his chair and got up to leave. He thought of reporting the commotion but elected not to. He figured someone else would have it in hand. He just wanted to see what all the fuss was about.

---

Carix scowled as he wrested himself free from the thick blob of impact gel that had swallowed him moments before his ship struck the ground. This was yet another reason why his government didn’t scout the Galactic Council’s scouting records.

“Relatively safe my ass,” he muttered angrily under his breath. If he’d known there would be gigantic radiation belts around the planet, he would have approached from the poles. Instead, he flew straight into one of them while he was distracted.

The resulting electromagnetic shitfest didn’t just zap him while he was handling a high-voltage line that he needed to connect to one of the ship’s high-powered survey scanners, it fried a handful of his ship’s auxiliary systems. He was in the middle of trying to fix everything when his ship then fell through the inner radiation belt and a full half of the remaining systems got fried—including some major ones.

Carix cursed every god he knew under his breath as he clambered out of his chair. It was his favorite chair and he wasn’t going to be able to use it until the nanites managed to break down the impact gel in a couple of hours.

If there was one thing to be glad for, it was the fact that the inertial dampening system had remained more or less intact despite passing through the two radiation belts. The ride down would have been a lot bumpier if the dampeners had given up on him.

There was another thing the scouting report had neglected to mention about this planet: and that was the presence of civilization. The last few moments of his crash had been particularly enlightening in that regard. He’d never have approached the planet so close if he’d known.

It wouldn’t have been so bad if his ship’s cloaking system were intact but it wasn’t. The inner belt had taken it out. His craft had likely been exposed to the inhabitants of this little rock as he careened through their night sky so this was likely to turn into a whole thing if word ever got back to the Galactic Council.

Carix was lucky he’d crashed in a relatively isolated area. Even if there was a sizable facility nearby, it was in the middle of nowhere. With any luck, he’d be able to at least get the contragrav and cloaking systems online so he could be out of the way of the natives before anyone noticed.

People in the building coming out to investigate was a bit of a concern, but a minor one. There were lights everywhere, which suggested that the dominant species on the planet was diurnal. Since it was the middle of the night, it was unlikely there would be anyone inside since the facility looked more like a workplace than a residence.

Carix popped the hatch on the emergency exit and clambered out of his ship. He needed to get a better look at the damage so he could figure out what his priorities were as far as repairing his craft was concerned.

---

Gideon was trying to figure out what could have caused such a racket on the way out of the building. A meteorite was the first suspect that came to mind, but the metallic squeal he’d heard pretty much ruled that out. Unless, of course, it had collided with an antenna or part of the building, which he doubted.

If it were a plane that had crashed, he’d probably have heard the sound of the engines unless it had run out of fuel. A helicopter was just as likely a suspect. Mind still whirling with the possibilities, he burst out of the doors to the parking lot and then, promptly stopped in his tracks.

The sight that greeted him was so incomprehensible his brain short-circuited for a moment. An enormous alien vessel easily taller than the very building he worked at was buried, he assumed, nose-down in the middle of the parking lot.

Gideon was so taken aback by the presence of incontrovertible proof of intelligent alien life before his eyes that it didn’t even occur to him to wonder what had become of his precious hand-restored classic car. It could have been buried in a pile of rubble for all he cared.

This was the discovery that would get him in the history books. Not the fact that intelligent alien life was out there—that was pretty much already a given as far as he was concerned—but the wealth of technology he would be able to reverse-engineer from the crashed ship.

It didn’t matter that the materials science involved alone looked centuries, if not millennia ahead of the current frontiers of science. Gideon was a genius among geniuses. As long as he could get his hands on the ship, he was confident he would be able to crack the secrets it held.

Fame and wealth weren’t things that typically motivated him, but he could see the trajectory of his life from here. There would be book deals and guest speakerships, delivering speeches to enthralled and adoring crowds. His brilliance would be vindicated, his efforts would be recognized, and he would be remembered as the one who propelled mankind into the galactic stage.

Gideon was so preoccupied thinking about how he might go about reverse engineering the wealth of technology before him that he didn’t notice the figure standing near the ship. Maybe it was the pang of sudden anxiety he felt that spurred him to act, but he strode across the parking lot with purpose before he could even think about what he was doing.

He wasn’t pleased. There was a stranger between him and his future. They definitely didn’t work for his team or any of the other teams based in this facility because he would have noticed anyone that tall and thin.

“Hey!” Gideon called out, wildly gesticulating with an outstretched arm. “This is private property! You’re not supposed to be here!” He’d be damned if he let some upstart off the streets steal the greatest discovery in history from right under his nose.

“Holy fuck!” Gideon exclaimed, nearly stumbling over his own feet while rapidly backpedaling once the figure turned around to face him. The crash had taken out one of the lights in the parking lot, so it was dimmer than he was used to, but it wasn’t a human face that peered at him from underneath the hood of what he could now see was a sleek black flight suit.

The alien tilted its head, two of its eyes fixing Gideon with a level, curious look while the third—yes, the third—scanned him up and down. From the way that its fingers—four to hand instead of five—were hovering over the surface of what seemed to be a bracer of some sort, it seemed he’d interrupted it while it was in the middle of something.

Gideon wasn’t sure what to do. Part of him wanted to sprint back inside and call the higher-ups but he suspected they’d either try to cover things up or hog the credit for themselves and he could not permit either of those things.

He swallowed the lump in his throat and raised both arms with palms facing outward. He hoped the universal sign of surrender was truly universal but even if it weren’t, it was likely the alien would recognize that he was unarmed and, therefore, not a threat.

The alien said nothing and just kept watching Gideon. He’d expected as much. There was probably a major language barrier. But he had to make at least some overtures at communication. “H-hello!” he said. “Welcome to Earth!”

No response was forthcoming. The alien simply blinked. Then it made a few gestures on its bracer—likely a wrist-mounted personal computing unit of some sort.

Some sort of integrated circuitry began to glow on the alien’s flight suit. Blue line segments climbed its body, following the contours of its slender physique. Many of the lines converged at the alien’s throat, forming a narrow band around its neck. A few continued higher to just about where Gideon might have expected an ear, and they formed a shape reminiscent of an earpiece.

Now a bit less taken aback by probably the first real encounter between a human and a clearly intelligent alien species, Gideon took the chance to closely observe the visitor. At first glance, the layout of its anatomy seemed more or less human.

He’d already noted the alien’s three eyes and the fact it had four fingers to a hand instead of five. He couldn’t count toes since the flight suit included footwear that obscured that part of the alien’s body. It was also far too slender for the height that it was. It looked like a twig, and even that felt generous.

Besides those characteristics, the alien could have been easily mistaken for a human and nothing else seemed to suggest the presence of hidden limbs or anything of the sort. It wasn’t until the alien smiled at him that he saw anything else that would differentiate it.

Gideon felt a bit of a chill run down his spine. The corners of the alien’s mouth weren’t where he expected them to be, they were nearly all the way up by where the alien’s ears should have been. The alien didn’t grin broadly but it was still unsettling.

“An endlessly fascinating example of convergent evolution,” said the alien in perfect English, though its mouth moved out of sync with its words and contorted in ways that could not have produced English sounds.

Gideon’s heart skipped a beat. He wondered how much stock to give the tone and timbre of the translator’s chosen voice but it suggested to him that the alien before him was of the intellectual variety.

“Do you mean the similarity of our anatomy?” he said. Maybe the ship wasn’t the true prize. Maybe it was this alien. If the alien was an explorer, someone who had the same appreciation for knowledge and the search for truth as he did, then maybe he could build an even deeper connection and learn even more than he could have hoped just by reverse-engineering an alien ship.

The alien shook its head. “The fact that over 70% of known species capable of language have named their home planet some variation on the native word that means ‘dirt.’”

Gideon couldn’t help but grin. He’d found a kindred soul.

---

Carix wasn’t happy to have been caught by one of the natives. He’d been lax. Maybe it was the tumble from literally the top of the planet’s atmosphere but still, there was no excuse for letting his guard down just because this was a galactic backwater.

He sighed inwardly. This was turning into more and more of a major incident by the minute. Luckily, he could deal with a single native well enough. As long as they didn’t start showing up in force, he was going to be just fine.

Carix wasn’t the violent type so while vaporizing the native and solving the problem that way was an option, he was going to keep it as a last resort. Right now, he was going to take a more diplomatic tact. “Strictly speaking, protocol dictates that I should not have revealed myself to the native inhabitants of an uncharted world, much less conversed with one,” he said.

The native frowned. He didn’t seem happy to hear that. “I won’t tell anyone if you don’t.” said the native.

How pithy, Carix thought to himself. The phrase did have a certain pleasant ring to it and he wasn’t above appropriating phrasal constructs from primitive peoples.

“Maybe there’s some way we can both benefit from this,” said Gideon. “You know, I help you, you help me. Is there anything you might need to fix your ship? We’ve got a lot of equipment here that might be of some use. I just have a lot of questions. Maybe you can answer some of them in exchange.”

Self-serving behavior. This was going to be that kind of planet but Carix wasn’t annoyed. If anything, he was pleased. This kind of psychology was easy to exploit.

“I don’t believe your people even have the means to manufacture the materials necessary to repair my ship,” he said as he suppressed the smirk tugging on his lips. “But this place is an institution of learning, is it?”

The native nodded. “It’s a facility operated by our planet’s premier space program,” he said.

Carix nodded. “And this makes you a scholar?” he said.

“One of the best,” said the native. “I wouldn’t be here if I weren’t.”

Carix smiled but he could see the native didn’t seem much pleased. Perhaps it had something to do with the natives’ freakishly small mouths. “Then I imagine you must be burning with curiosity about my ship,” he said.

“Oh, yeah. I would give anything to be able to see inside,” said the native.

“Well, you needn’t go so far,” said Carix. This was perfect. It seemed he’d be able to get rid of the witness without much of a fuss. “It’s strictly against protocol to permit an uncontacted species onto a Galactic Council ship but if you can promise to be discreet…”

The native’s eyes lit up. “Oh, of course. I won’t tell a soul,” it said.

Carix could practically smell the blatant lie but he didn’t care. While he hadn’t said a single lie so far, he wasn’t strictly being truthful either. “I am likely to get in big trouble if you break your word. I am taking a chance by letting you inside. I hope you don’t disappoint.”

The native shook its head. “I swear it on my mother’s grave. Everything that happened here tonight, it’s going to stay between us. I promise.” It then extended one of its appendages toward Carix, its hand-like manipulator structure held out in some form of expectation. “My name’s Gideon, by the way. What’s yours?”

Carix stared at the native’s five-fingered hand. “Carix,” he said, omitting his title and the rest of his name on the assumption that this was an informal introduction as the native had provided only a single name.

“You’re supposed to put your hand in it, clasp it, and then shake it up and down a few times,” said Gideon.

What a peculiar greeting, Carix thought to himself. He had to crouch to reach Gideon’s hand comfortably. He shook it, though perhaps with more force than was expected given the look of discomfort that crossed Gideon’s face. “Shall we?” he said as he released Gideon’s hand.

“Yes, please!”

---

Gideon was in awe. Carix must have set in motion some sort of self-repair system since the damaged parts of the hull were already looking better by the time the alien led him to the entry hatch.

“Does your ship employ nanomachines for maintenance and repair?” said Gideon. There was a gash in the outer shell of the ship that was knitting itself shut. It was like watching a time-lapse of a flesh wound healing itself.

Carix seemed surprised that Gideon was even aware of the concept. Perhaps science fiction was uncommon in the wider galaxy. Maybe humans were unique in their ability to dream up technologies that might be far beyond their means.

“Correct,” said Carix as he stepped through the threshold, motioning for Gideon to follow him.

“Do you have a limited amount? How do you manage attrition?” Gideon hadn’t exaggerated when he said he had a lot of questions. They came quickly and he blurted them out almost as soon as they crossed his mind. He wasn’t holding back. Not when the opportunity of a lifetime was within his grasp. “Are they self-replicating? How can you make sure that they won’t propagate a grey goo scenario?”

“Your knowledge of this concept is surprisingly deep. I admit I was skeptical about your claims but clearly, you are a scholar of some merit,” said Carix.

“One of the best,” Gideon asserted.

Carix gave him a small smile. “To answer the question: only a small proportion of every batch is given the ability to indefinitely reproduce in a manner alike to stem cells. The others have simulated telomeres to restrict their ability to multiply and the swarm as a whole is programmed to attack and destroy individual members that possess damaged safety mechanisms.”

Gideon nodded. It was a simple solution. An elegant one. The fact it took inspiration from biology made a lot of sense.

He took in his surroundings with wonder as Carix showed him around the ship. He was right that it had been an exploratory vessel of some description. A survey ship, to be precise.

“What caused your crash?”

Carix scoffed. “The proximal cause is an electromagnetic storm in your planet’s radiation belts. The root cause, however, is bad scouting data.”

Gideon quirked an eyebrow. “Bad scouting data?”

Carix nodded. “Compiled from a survey probe that passed by this region roughly…” he trailed off as he tapped the device on his arm. “Fifty thousand years ago. It might not have been close enough to pick up on the belts but it certainly didn’t report signs of civilization.”

“…But there wouldn’t have been any if your scouting data was from that far back,” said Gideon.

“How could that possibly be the case?” Carix laughed, his tone definitely condescending. “Your civilization may be decidedly primitive compared to what is beyond your system but such a society couldn’t have sprung up in less than 50000 years.”

“But it did, though,” said Gideon. What an intriguing yarn Carix was spinning. If he was to believe the alien, galactic civilization developed at a snail’s pace compared to human civilization. He had to admit, it made him the tiniest bit proud to be human.

“That’s preposterous,” said Carix. “This topic must have been propagandized. No civilization develops so quickly.”

“As far as we know, the agricultural revolution happened around 12 thousand years ago. The first large-scale civilizations, around 6 thousand years ago. Widespread industrialization started around 300 years ago. And we first touched outer space less than 100 years ago,” said Gideon, a smug look on his face.

Carix narrowed his eyes. “If so, that would make you a quite remarkable species,” he said. “And if you are among the brightest of your kind, then you are even more noteworthy.”

Gideon grinned at Carix. “You bet I am.”

---

Carix found it difficult to believe Gideon’s assertion but he didn’t detect any dishonesty. It seemed the native truly believed that it was genuinely one of the most intelligent members of its species, as well.

He suppressed his laugh. If this was the best that the natives of this planet could offer, then there was good reason to doubt the timeline that Gideon had given. Regardless, it was worth investigating.

Carix had already decided what he was going to do about Gideon. Uncontacted species didn’t have as many protections as full members of the Galactic Council so he had a lot of latitude about how to resolve the situation.

Trying not to smile too widely to avoid putting the native on alert, Carix gently guided Gideon down one of the narrow corridors and said, “I would like to conduct an in-depth study of your anatomy, physiology, and psychology. Since you claim to be an exemplary member of your species, you may be the perfect subject to perform a scan on.”

Gideon’s expression brightened. “Of course!” he said. “If it means I can contribute to the development of galactic science, then I am more than happy to.”

“Perfect,” said Carix. A few moments later, he showed Gideon to his medical bay. He got Gideon on the scanner bed—the native had many questions about the technology that allowed it to hover—and conducted a thorough biomedical scan.

The results were… surprising. Less surprising was the near-instantaneous flag that Gideon was part of an uncontacted species. What Carix was interested in was more cerebral—literally—and he was pleased with what he saw.

Carix’s people had a little-known ability that made them particularly suited for exploratory missions and intelligence gathering and it was going to come in handy on this occasion as it had in many others before.

He went over the results of the scan one more time and tried his best not to smirk. Not only did Gideon’s species not have any way to objectively detect dishonesty, but Gideon as an individual had a weakness he was happily going to exploit. This was going to be easy.

“I must say. The results of this scan are remarkable…”

---

Something must have piqued Carix’s interest in Gideon’s scan because the alien’s voice dropped into a register that he could only describe as sultry. He wasn’t sure if that tone of voice meant the same thing for Carix’s species as it did for humans since he didn’t know how Carix’s translator worked, but it still sent a chill down his spine.

“Would you mind much if I… Confirmed the results myself?” said Carix.

The translator might have not been conveying the real meaning of Carix’s tone but there was no mistaking the look the alien was giving Gideon. Carix’s three eyes were smoldering.

Even the sway in Carix’s hips as he approached was downright seductive. Whether Carix had any ulterior motives, Carix’s intentions were as clear as day.

Gideon was an intellectual. Science was his life. He wasn’t so given to base instincts that he would fall for the obvious provocation. That was what he would have liked to think, at least. Instead, he was rooted to the spot. Carix’s tone was having what he assumed was the intended effect.

He sat up, placing his hands on his lap to cover up the fact that he was half-hard already. “O-oh. No… Not at all,” he said, eyes wide as Carix hopped up on the bed beside him and placed a hand on his arm.

Carix’s slender digits brushed over Gideon’s bicep. His other hand traced along his forearm before taking him by the wrist and lifting his arm, gently extending it. “Your muscle density is impressive and your tendons are markedly stronger than average, likely as a consequence of evolving in a higher gravity environment.”

Despite the clinical tack of Carix’s words, Gideon still found himself hopelessly turned on. This was the kind of treatment he might have expected had he been a jock but he’d always been a nerd. His physique was scrawny, at best, but he supposed that compared to Carix he must have looked positively jacked.

It was a new experience and one that Gideon didn’t dislike. His cock throbbed, the outline it made in his pants all the more prominent now that Carix had taken possession of one of his hands. His erection was pressed up against his thigh and he could feel the wetness of the pre-cum leaking from him already.

Carix released Gideon’s arm. Hands now free, he touched the side of Gideon’s face gently. His fingers were like feathers, delicate and light. The contact made Gideon’s skin tingle. “The neuronal complexity of your brain is also incredible. It will take our best neurologists decades to pick apart the finer structures.”

Gideon shivered as Carix leaned in, voice dropping even lower. “And your brain, in particular, appears to be a delectable specimen.” He swore he felt Carix’s tongue caress the side of his neck. “I can see why you call yourself one of the best…”

A nervous laugh bubbled up out of Gideon. “H-hah. I told you. You should have just believed me,” he said, involuntarily tilting his head back to give Gideon easier access to his neck. He felt the light, playful nip of sharp teeth and had to bite back a moan.

“I also saw that your species is sexually dimorphic… And that you are of the gamete-giving variety…” Carix’s voice was low and smooth. It flowed like oil dripping right into Gideon’s ear. “I am of that variety myself. And I am given to wonder if our two species might share certain… modes… of pleasure.”

Gideon swallowed dryly. “If you’re asking whether we get off on gay sex, then yes,” he said. He might have used sophisticated vocabulary but his brain was struggling enough to cope with the possibility that he was about to fuck an alien. “I-it wasn’t widely accepted in society until recently, but from a biological, historical, and anthropological perspective, homosexuality has been part of humanity for a very long time.”

Carix grinned. “That’s what I like to hear,” said the alien.

It was fully unsettling, seeing all those sharp teeth in that too-wide mouth but Gideon was too far gone to give much of a shit. His breath hitched in his throat as Carix slid off the edge of the bed and onto the floor.

Carix then knelt up, his height meaning that his head was pretty much just at crotch level when he did. Distilled arousal thundered through Gideon’s veins, which was a good thing because he was pretty sure the rest of the blood in his body had gone straight to his cock.

Gideon met Carix’s three-eyed gaze, his cheeks warming as his face suddenly felt like it was on the verge of catching fire. “What have you got in mind?” he said almost breathlessly.

“I was thinking…” Carix placed his hands on Gideon’s lap, fingers splaying as they slowly crept up along the inside of Gideon’s thighs, “…that we might engage in some… academic exploration of… anatomical… compatibility… If you would be so inclined.”

“Oh yeah,” Gideon blurted out as if he were afraid that Carix might change his mind at any moment. “I am very inclined.”

Carix licked his lips. “Good.” He reached up and fiddled for a moment with the fastenings on Gideon’s pants. He quickly understood the principles of the belt and undid the buckle. Then, he popped the button on Gideon’s waistband and pulled down the tab on Gideon’s zipper.

“So many layers,” said Carix, a hint of genuine amusement in his voice as his slender fingers caressed the outline that Gideon’s cock made in his underwear. “One would think your species particularly prudish.”

Gideon barked a laugh. “You wouldn’t be wrong,” he said. “Many of us are uncomfortable with nudity. Some are unsettled simply by showing more skin than necessary.”

Carix chuckled, his third eye remaining fixed on Gideon’s face while his other eyes turned to gaze hungrily at Gideon’s cock. “What a peculiar species indeed,” he said. “You’ll find such attitudes are the exception in the galactic community. Out there, among the stars, people are happy to wear as few external coverings as strictly necessary.”

Gideon wondered how humanity as a whole would take that little nugget of fact. He imagined the consternation it would cause to learn that the galaxy was one giant nudist colony, pretty much.

Whatever other thoughts Gideon might have had were derailed by the sensation of Carix’s tongue licking a stripe along the length of his dick. He couldn’t even stop the moan that spilled out of him then.

“Quite responsive,” said Carix with a little smile. “Your vocalizations, I assume, are to indicate pleasure.”

Gideon nodded. His throat was dry. Carix’s tongue—which turned out to be prehensile—curled around his cock and stroked his length. “Yes,” he managed to croak, unable to muster anything more than a single word.

“Fascinating,” said Carix. He wrapped his tongue around the head of Gideon’s cock, swirling around the sensitive glans while running the tip under the crown.

Gideon was losing his mind. His cock strained. His toes curled. Carix’s mouth was incredibly talented and he’d never felt this way before. He tossed his head back and moaned, clutching the edge of the bed as he spread his legs wider to give Carix easier access.

His cock twitched helplessly, leaking pre-cum from his slit when Carix pulled away. He swallowed thickly. “Fuck,” he said with a groan. “That was incredible.”

Carix flashed a grin at Gideon. “I hope you don’t think this is over,” he said. “I’m satisfied that your genitalia are similar enough in structure and erogenous sensitivity to my own people’s that you’ll enjoy my particular talents.”

Gideon’s breath hitched in his throat. It had been amazing enough to get his cock tongued by Carix. He couldn’t imagine how much better it could be. But he was a scientist. Of course, he was willing to find out. “I look forward to more,” he said breathlessly.

Carix gently tugged at the fabric of Gideon’s pants. “Be rid of these,” he said.

Gideon had no objections. If anything, he was eager to get his pants off. They were in the way. He hooked his thumbs into his waistband and pushed them down—underwear and all—shimmying them down his legs until he could kick them off.

Carix swept the crumpled heap off to the side and looked up at Gideon, a mischievous glint in his eyes. “And the rest?”

Gideon stripped off his coat and his shirt. His stomach tensed as Carix’s slender fingers splayed over his flat belly. He had some faint definition down there, but not because he worked out. He’d just lucked out in the genetic department and had a good enough metabolism to keep up with his awful diet.

Still, Carix seemed impressed. Those feather-light fingers explored the faint lines on his stomach, gently pressing down on the individual bunches of muscle.

Gideon sucked in a sharp breath as Carix’s other hand curled around his flank and slid up his torso. Two fingers found his nipple and gently rubbed, squeezed, and tugged on the sensitive nub, drawing a low groan to his lips.

“My people are of mammalian descent as well, to use your people’s term,” said Carix as he lightly toyed with Gideon’s nipples, the hand he’d been using to play with Gideon’s stomach moving up to join the other. “But in my species, only the gamete-receiving, child-bearing sex possesses these structures.”

“Y-you don’t have nipples?” Gideon gasped, the stimulation to his nipples making his stiff cock bounce between his legs. He wasn’t sure why that was the part that his brain had seized on but he did want an answer.

Carix shook his head. “But I personally know quite a few members of my species who do. And these are famously quite sensitive parts.” He leaned forward and licked the tip of Gideon’s cock. “It seems the same is true for your people.”

Gideon had never been too into nipple play but it was as good a time as any to start. “Yes,” he said with a groan. “It definitely is.”

Carix smirked. “Then you and I will enjoy this thoroughly,” he said. That was all the warning Gideon got before the alien opened wide and swallowed his cock to the root.

Gideon wasn’t freakishly huge by a long shot but he was still above average in the endowment department. Carix managed to take all eight of his inches in one fluid motion and without even a moment’s hesitation.

One moment, his cock was aching in the cold air and the next it was enveloped by the wet heat of Carix’s mouth. He couldn’t help but groan. Carix’s mouth and throat were incredible and it didn’t seem like the alien had a gag reflex to speak of.

Gideon couldn’t help himself. His hips moved of their own accord, rolling to buck his cock in and out of the heat of Carix’s mouth. Part of him had been anxious about those sharp teeth and that wide, unsettling maw but the pleasure was enough to make him forget.

He placed his hands on Carix’s head, fingers gripping the skin-tight fabric of the alien’s flight suit as he helplessly thrust his cock into the heat of Carix’s throat. It was embarrassing for someone supposedly as smart as him to lose control like this but he couldn’t have stopped even if he wanted to. It just felt too good.

Gideon had only ever gotten blown a few times and it had always felt good to have a mouth wrapped around his dick but this was on another level. This was—for lack of a better term—utterly otherworldly, which he supposed was only apt.

He might have expected that Carix would have trouble forming any suction with such a wide mouth but the alien was sucking him off just as hard as any of the guys he’d been with. He moaned, finding it futile to try and hold back his vocalizations anyway as Carix’s prehensile tongue curled around his cock and massaged his length while he bucked his hips.

Carix’s tongue wasn’t the only part of him that he could control. His throat gripped Gideon just tightly enough that there was delicious friction in every thrust, but not so tight that Gideon felt like there was any real resistance.

Gideon’s burst of energy didn’t last very long. After two or three minutes, he tired, his hips not accustomed to moving like they were for very long. He only had himself to blame for not having the stamina.

His cock was pulsing and throbbing right on Carix’s tongue. He hadn’t thought he’d be able to hold onto his load for very long, especially once he felt the wet heat of Carix’s maw envelop his cock.

Gideon had hit the edge a few times while face-fucking Carix. Somehow, Carix knew whenever he was approaching his climax. Every time, Carix’s throat would loosen and his tongue would go still. The stimulation would all but stop and only resume when he’d come back down from the edge.

On one hand, it was frustrating. His balls were churning. He could feel the fat load just aching to shoot out of his cock and he wanted it. On the other hand, there was a part of him that didn’t want this to end. It felt so good. And how often was he going to be able to get his dick sucked by an alien visitor, anyway? He wanted to savor every moment.

Carix pulled off of Gideon’s cock with a wet pop. His three eyes almost twinkled as he flashed that sharp-toothed, too-wide grin once again. “My turn,” he said.

Gideon tossed his head back and groaned as Carix’s hands grasped his thighs and held him down. Moments later, his cock was once again engulfed in the heat of Carix’s mouth.

Carix turned out to be surprisingly strong, but that was little more than an afterthought in Gideon’s head as Carix’s head bobbed up and down between his legs. The alien slurped and slobbered on his cock, prehensile tongue toying with his dick in ways that he never imagined were even possible.

“Oh, fuck. Oh, fuck, that feels so good!” he moaned unreservedly. It was all he could do not to lose his mind. Carix was an expert cock sucker and fuck if it didn’t feel like he’d just stuck his dick into the hose of a vacuum. He was being sucked off to within an inch of his life.

Gideon’s knuckles turned white as his grip on the edge of the bed grew tighter and tighter. His legs tensed. His toes curled. Tension coiled in the pit of his stomach.

“I’m so close, Carix,” he panted as sweat beaded on his brow. Despite the cold air in what he assumed was the medical bay of the ship, his body felt like it was burning up from the inside.

Sweat trickled down the side of Gideon’s face as he drew closer and closer to the edge. Then, all of a sudden, Carix sucked him down to the base. He couldn’t help but gasp, a moan spilling from his lips as he felt Carix’s throat stroking the length of his dick while Carix’s mouth sucked hard enough on his cock he felt like his soul was being sucked out.

Gideon’s dick started to tingle, starting from the head all the way to the base. The sensation didn’t stop there. It continued deeper, spreading along even the part of his cock that was buried inside his body.

He wasn’t sure what was going on but it felt so goddamn good he couldn’t help but moan. The tingling kept going, eventually reaching his tailbone before climbing up the curve of his spine.

Gideon gasped and moaned, writhing on top of the bed as suddenly it felt like every nerve ending in his body had come alight with mind-numbing pleasure. It was almost too much and yet the tingling continued to climb.

He shivered as the sensation reached the base of his neck. Some alarm bells started going off in his head as it climbed one vertebra to the next but he felt so good he barely paid attention. Then, the tingling met the base of his skull, and all hell broke loose.

Gideon’s whole body locked up. The moan froze in his throat. His eyes glazed over as what felt like a massive barge full of fireworks went off all at once in his head.

He’d never given much thought to the phrase “mind-blowing” before but his experience, this sensation, he was certain it was the very essence of “mind-blowing.” He saw stars. He saw lights. Colors that he was pretty sure weren’t supposed to exist danced before his eyes.

Gideon moaned. His thoughts slowed, almost as if they were wading through molasses or weighed down by a heavy blanket. The alarm bells ringing in the back of his mind were smothered as a haze of arousal and pleasure filled his skull.

The strangest sensation followed. He felt like his brain was being stroked. Squeezed. Sucked. Maybe he should have been more concerned but then he felt the tip of Carix’s tongue playing with his piss slit and the thought was lost to the ever-growing static between his ears.

Gideon couldn’t even think through the fog that had filled his skull. And with Carix holding his hips down against the bed all he could do was squirm and grind his crotch against the alien’s face but Carix’s throat was gripping his cock so tightly he couldn’t even move it.

The sensation of fingers stroking his brain, playing with it like it was made of putty, only intensified with every passing moment. Gideon’s tongue lolled out of his mouth, drool dripping onto his chest as his eyes glassed over.

Gideon’s brain was being squeezed and sucked and there was nothing he could do to stop it. It felt like Carix was working it over just as much as his cock and somehow, somehow it felt just as good—if not better.

The pleasure was so overwhelming he barely even noticed as knowledge and memories from the periphery of his mind began disappearing into the static. It started with things he barely even remembered, lessons he never used, but the deeper that he sank into the haze of utter bliss that Carix was giving him, the worse it got.

Incidental childhood memories and little bits of trivia disappeared like delicate soap bubbles. The more that was taken from him, the more adrift he felt. It was as if the mooring lines keeping his brain firmly seated in his skull were snapping one by one.

The edges of his mind were crumbling and all Gideon could think of was how good it felt to have Carix sucking his cock and his brain. He just moaned, oblivious to the danger.

The harder Carix sucked, the faster Gideon’s mind deteriorated. Darkness encroached from the corners, hidden by the pleasant haze and the mind-numbing static underneath.

Gideon had the vaguest inkling that something wasn’t quite right but he pushed it off. Later. He’d deal with it later. Right now, he had to enjoy Carix’s mouth.

Snap. A core childhood memory. Snap. How many stairs there were on the porch of his childhood home. Snap. The species of the beetle that had flown in through his bedroom window one summer when he was eight.

Gideon groaned. His cock throbbed and swelled and pulsed. His balls drew up against his crotch. Every nerve in his body sang. A long, low moan spilled from his lips as he reached the edge.

At the same time, the last tenuous link keeping his brain anchored began to fray. As the pleasure built, the tether thinned. He felt like a coiled spring, every muscle in his body tensing, his toes curling, his breath caught in his throat. By the time he reached the point of no return, his mind was holding on by no more than just a thread and then, in all its sudden and overpowering glory,release.

Pure, white-hot ecstasy flooded through Gideon as the load that had been churning in his balls the whole night started shooting out of his cock. It was the most intense orgasm he’d ever had in his life. It felt so powerful, so overwhelming. Hell, he felt like he was shooting his brain right out of his cock.

Spurt after spurt emptied his skull of whatever was left, the fireworks, the stars, the colors fading until all that was left was the haze of pleasure and an echoing silence where thoughts should have been.

---

Had Gideon been looking, he might have noticed the way that Carix’s throat bulged as he came. But the native was too absorbed with the pleasure that he never did.

Carix pulled off of Gideon’s external genitalia and licked his lips. He cupped his middle. His usually flat stomach was bulging, the fabric of his flight suit stretched taut over the bump.

He hadn’t lied when he complimented Gideon’s brain structure. There was an incredible density of neuronal tissue in the native’s brain. It made for a very satisfying meal.

While Carix couldn’t deny that Gideon was indeed a remarkably intelligent member of the native species—or used to be, now that he was done with him—Gideon’s brain only proved the conventional wisdom: density and complexity didn’t necessarily translate to efficiency.

The contents of Gideon’s brain were disorganized. The line between memory and knowledge was so thin as to be almost nonexistent. He’d glimpsed the suggestion of structure buried deep within the chaos but it would take him time to digest all the information.

This was what made Carix’s people so adept at gathering intelligence. Their mystical ability to extract information from their targets through sex was poorly understood despite how far their civilization had come. It was more magic than science if he was being honest.

He hadn’t had to suck Gideon’s brain out through Gideon’s genitals. He could have extracted the information he wanted over the course of many sessions. But this way was most expedient. He didn’t want to stay any longer and risk further exposure.

While Carix had been plying Gideon with his oral skills, the ship had finished its repairs. The diagnostics were just about done, too. It was time to leave this backwater behind. For now, at least.

Carix looked up at Gideon. The native was staring slack-jawed and glassy-eyed at the wall, drool trickling off the tip of his lolled-out tongue. He still had a few checklists to go through before he set off again but he would have to decide what to do about the poor fellow before long.

He considered just putting Gideon back where he’d found him. It would have been the easier option, certainly, leaving the mess for other natives to take care of, but it would have been a shame. And he supposed the natives would have been very curious how a man without a brain was managing to survive.

The sexual compatibility between Gideon’s species and Carix’s was quite high and his experience with Gideon had proven that handily. There wasn’t any point tossing a perfectly serviceable sex toy. And since Gideon belonged to an uncontacted species anyway, he doubted anyone would bat an eye as long as he paid the fees and did the paperwork. Besides, Gideon’s ejaculate had proven quite tasty.

Carix stood up and brushed himself down. It was settled. He was going to keep Gideon, though he’d probably have to give it some brain tissue so it wouldn’t be so thoroughly dependent.

Once he’d digested everything, he’d be able to figure out exactly what to give back and how much. He wanted Gideon to be able to move around, feed itself, and have some personality but he wanted to make sure Gideon was kept horny and dumb. He wanted a sex pet, not a passenger.

All of that, however, was for later. Carix eyed Gideon, a smirk tugging at his lips. A hole didn’t need to have a brain to be a good hole, and he had to admit that sucking Gideon off had worked him up.

His ship was off the ground. His cloaking system was fully operational. Since he was planetside at this point anyway, he could run the automatic survey routine while he blew off some steam.

Carix rubbed the outline his cock made in his flight suit. Oh, he was going to enjoy this.

---

“Is this information correct?”

Carix bowed his head. “It’s been verified and triple-checked, Your Eminence.” It had been a few Galactic Standard Cycles since his brief mishap at Earth. What had felt so catastrophic at the time had turned into an unexpected boon, in the end. Now, he was part of the High Hegemon’s Science Advisory Council.

“Incredible,” said the High Hegemon as he flicked through the pages of the report. “And you are confident that we will be able to bend these ‘humans’ to our ends?”

Carix grinned. “The likelihood is high, Your Eminence,” he said. “We were fortunate to have found them when we did.”

“That you found them,” said the High Hegemon with a wry smile of his own.

“As you say, Your Eminence. Given the pace of their development, every standard cycle that we leave them alone increases the chance that they will eventually emerge into the galactic stage as a dominant power,” said Carix.

“We can’t have that,” said the High Hegemon. “Not if we can bring them to heel.”

Carix nodded. “As you say, Your Eminence. In retrospect, it would have been optimal to subjugate humanity when I returned with my preliminary findings.”

“What is it that these humans say? ‘There is no use crying over spilled milk.’ That is the phrase, yes?”

“Yes, Your Eminence. As soon as possible is the second most optimal time to bring Earth into the fold,” said Carix.

“Then we had best begin making plans,” said the High Hegemon. “You have my thanks for your tireless efforts, Senior Science Adviser Carix.”

Carix ducked his head low and excused himself. The matter was in the hands of the war council now. His role would strictly be advisory from this point on. It was a huge load off his shoulders, which meant he could finally relax.

He knew just how to start. It had been some time since he was last able to properly enjoy his Gideon. He was sure his adorable drooling fuckpet would be more than eager to help him unwind.