Chameleon in Chrome Ch. 05

***Depending on how the last part crunches out, I think this is the second-last chapter. This one's a bit short again, but I needed the room in the upcoming one to bring in the final character.

I wrote this five years ago at least, but reading through it, I see that I'll need to add one more person for the ending.

This is still largely the recollections of Ryan as he worries about the two most important people in his life and it's a strange thing to him, which makes it worse.

He's lived his life - the latest part of it anyway, alone. Now he cares about Taela and Shorty and they're missing.

But that's for later.

The hot chocolate?

~grin~ I added it since that's what I was sipping a big mug of while I was checking this over.

0_o

*****

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A year of earth time had gone past. Taela and Ryan had grown their relationship into something that neither one could have ever expected to have. They had the odd disagreement now and then, and a few of those had even grown into minor fights, but they'd never lasted long.

Long before the winter set in, they were a true hunting pair, a couple so in love and in tune with each other in all respects, though they went about it a little differently.

Ryan taught Taela as much of the technology of Earth as he had on hand in the shuttle and they spent days out there inside it. It was during one of those times when Ryan had an idea.

He accessed the old beacon that Betty had set out from her probe ship ages before and, finding that it was still functional, he queried it for everything that it still had, and he learned a lot.

"What are you doing?" Taela asked him one day as she sat in the co-pilot's seat with Shorty. It hadn't taken Ryan long to see that the two of them had their own relationship in a very real sense. He guessed that it had come about from their time together when she was younger and had to look after the screecher when Betty was out hunting.

By the time that he'd figured it out, Ryan found that he didn't mind it very much. In fact, he liked it a lot. Seeing the two of them walking together was a nice thing, he decided, since they were close, a little like a girl with her younger brother, though it was a lot different from his own relationship with his younger sister had been when they were kids.

They'd hated each other as children and that had matured as they did themselves to the point where he hadn't seen his sister since he'd left home and had no desire to ever set eyes on her again. There just wasn't anything there, other than mutual avoidance. Of course, it was also a bit of a moot point, he realized, since by now, she was more than likely long dead.

But Shorty and Taela had something. One of Ryan's favorite sights was to see them walking without their knowledge that he was watching. They were different, but it was obvious that they fit together and the way that they looked together always gave him thoughts about ...

Left alone or in only Ryan's company, they were affectionate toward each other, though not sickeningly so, as though they'd discovered a piece to each one's completion as a person in the company of the other. He liked to see it, and he guessed that something about the two of them had changed the way that he saw Shorty as well.

The screecher still had his odd relationship with Betty, but as time went by, she seemed to be finally beginning to age to a degree and for a time, it had caused Shorty some difficulty, since he hadn't understood it at all and took it to be a little bit of rejection of him on her part.

It had been Ryan who had stepped up for Shorty then, seeking to give him more of his friendship as well as a bit of mentoring in a way.

He just hadn't interpreted Shorty's adoration of him in the correct way -- at first.

The sound of Taela's question to him put him in mind of the day that Betty had gotten angry with him when she'd walked in on them as Ryan was teaching Shorty about PDWs. She'd about lost her mind when she saw the little guy practicing with field-stripping the weapon on a table while sitting on Ryan's knee, since he liked to do that whenever Ryan allowed it.

And Ryan allowed it because he saw that Shorty learned things even faster when he had a teacher to be in physical contact with, as though part of what he learned flowed better for him that way.

"What I'm doing," he replied, "is getting Shorty over his fears. He's not a minor in age and he's not retarded, the way that you like to tell yourself that he is. I've found that he's got quite a sharp mind in his head. I'm just giving him a way to use it and I guess that I'm also empowering him here a little. I'm slowly learning how to talk to him so that he understands a lot more.

One of his biggest fears is that one night, his nutty relations outside will get in here with us. He's always felt helpless fear over it. You've got racks of Morgarod weaponry. I've got my stuff. He's had only his fears and his utter dependence on the rest of us. Even after I gave you and Taela a PDW each, there's still one for me and one left over.

I've given it to him and I'm training him how not to shoot himself or any of us. You know what I've found?"

Betty had been almost furious. "What? That he can now kill us without meaning to?"

Ryan had just shaken his head, "No, Betty. I've found that he can calculate how much to lead a flying target by almost innately. After only about three mags through his weapon, he already knows the trajectory that this ammunition flies at over any given distance -- and we both know that he's not exactly an idiot savant. He's got a lot of processor between his pointed ears.

I've learned that his difficulty in speaking is not due to the lack of mental horsepower. It's quite the opposite, to my mind. He's something which can only engage his vocal chords as a screech for the most part.

He's got a brain and it's hungry. I'm feeding it, and my reward is that he's finding that he CAN speak - he just only has the ability to whisper and hiss the words, that's all."

She'd turned on her heel then and stormed out.

Shorty had looked over at Ryan with an expression of concern then. "Don't worry about it, Shorty," Ryan had smiled, "I'm sure that you know just how to get on her good side again in a little while."

Shorty's face showed that he was thinking about it and then the screecher had grinned and nodded.

"Now," Ryan had said, "start from fresh and take this thing down and then put it back together with your eyes closed. It's really important that you can do this blindfolded and by only feel."

Shorty had nodded and then went to work with his eyes tightly closed. He had it apart, field-stripped right down and then back together in less than a minute -- and that included the strong and wickedly devious spring which was a bitch to get into place and hold while one screwed in the gas adjustment plug against its compressed force.

When Ryan told him that he'd done it faster than he'd ever seen anyone do it, Shorty had half-turned where he sat to hug Ryan tightly. It was the way that Ryan knew that the screecher expressed his happiness over something that he'd been either given or had learned and he'd smiled at his smaller friend.

But then Shorty had done something that Ryan knew had taken him months to get his courage up for and he didn't know what to do, not wanting Shorty to feel badly over it.

All the same, Shorty's soft kiss on his lips had come as a total shock.

Even more as Ryan found that he'd really liked it.

While he'd sat there wondering how to respond without causing a setback, Shorty had laid his head on Ryan's shoulder and sighed softly with his eyes closed. After a moment, he'd raised his head to look at Ryan very searchingly for a moment, and then -- as if what had happened hadn't been enough - he'd actually managed to form a very rare whispered question.

"Is it ok, Ryan?"

The veteran soldier had been struggling for a long time over Shorty anyway, out of the way that he liked him and felt for him. This -- while it had been a bit of a rude shock to him, didn't seem to be that far wrong somehow.

Ryan had what he might have called a 'what the hell' moment and then he'd just kissed Shorty back for a second or two, and the soft sigh that he heard felt so good to him.

Just then, Taela had walked in and she chuckled at them, "That's been a long time coming."

Shorty looked as though he'd have blushed -- if he'd had the ability to -- and he got down from Ryan's knee to pick up the PDW, taking it over to Taela and showing her what he'd learned a little proudly.

"What do you mean?" Ryan had asked Taela as Shorty worked.

"Just what I said," she replied, smiling, "Shorty loves you, Ryan. He loves us both quite a lot. I've been wondering just how long it would take you to see that." She watched as Shorty repeated what he could do with the firearm and she fussed over the screecher a little.

"I've loved him since we were kids, him and I, and now, well I know that he's dying to go a little farther and begin something more with us."

She asked Shorty to put the weapon down and then she put her arms around Shorty's waist and the response was almost instant.

Shorty groaned softly and put his arms around Taela's neck as he looked up at her. In turn, she began to kiss him and Shorty's wings unfurled to wrap around her a second later. When they broke the kiss, Taela turned her head to smile at Ryan.

"You don't mind, do you, Ryan? I'm really hoping that you're not going to start feeling jealous. I've seen the way that you like to look at us when we're together. We both love you, Ryan. That hasn't changed one bit. I really don't think that it ever could."

Ryan shook his head, feeling the way that his sudden erection throbbed against the restriction of his pants, "No. It's just something that I guessed that I preferred not to see coming, though now I really don't know why."

As the screecher hung in her embrace, Taela said very quietly, "I'm going to tell him that the next time that Mom sends him away, that I don't want to hear him sniffling as he looks for a place to sleep. I want him to come to bed with us, Ryan.

Because he needs it from us both, and I think that we need it from him too. We already do a lot of things together. When the time comes again, I want to take him hunting with us. I know that he's always wanted to come along -- and he knows what we do then. That's another thing that he wants from us."

Ryan looked up at them, "I've seen how you two are when you're together, Taela. I don't actually think that I mind it all that much, for some reason. I think that I'd love to see it. I just don't know if I can actually DO what he wants from me."

She led Shorty back around the table to Ryan who stood up then. "Show Ryan," Taela smiled, "Show him how you really feel, Shorty. It's alright. I think that he's ready to know now."

Shorty nodded up at Taela and then he looked very shy once again as he took the two steps to where Ryan stood. It suddenly hit Ryan after all of this time, just what the screecher's shy way really meant.

Shorty placed himself in front of Ryan and he raised his thin arms to place them around Ryan's neck. When Ryan reached to hold him, Shorty stretched up and kissed Ryan so softly for a long minute before he eased himself back down onto his feet.

"I love Ryan," Shorty hissed and then he laid his head against Ryan's chest and closed his eyes.

"You ought to see the little smile on his face," Taela said softly, "He's so happy whenever you hug him, and I know just how he feels.

You always make me feel so good every single time that you hold me."

Ryan lowered his head and he kissed the top of the screecher's ear, "I love you too, Shorty. I guess I just didn't really think about it enough to really know."

As Shorty let go of Ryan and backed away, he looked embarrassed again, but neither Ryan or Taela allowed it, both of them telling him that between them all, his erection wasn't a big deal, and Shorty's face showed his relief.

"I don't know about this, "Ryan said, "Could you please try to explain it to him for me? I know that he understands things from you instantly. Me? I usually need to tell him in about three ways before I'm sure that he gets it and believe me, I do love him. I just don't think that I'm ready to love him in quite the way that he'd like -- at the very least not yet, anyway."

Taela nodded, and she spoke quietly into Shorty's ear.

He came back to Ryan and hugged him again. Taela said, "He understands. He wants you to know that he loves you anyway.

I think that you ought to give a little thought to what you could have with both of us, that's all. It's what we both want.

We're not the same in a lot of ways, Ryan, but we're just the same in one way, and that's how we both love you."

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Ryan came back to Taela's question, "I'm looking for something. I've just realized that in order to have this degree of completion in her data, ... I've never asked her how long she had before her ship's sick engines began to give out on her, but from what's here, she didn't do the usual three Earth day thing and make a few passes. She must have been here for a while, since I know that there's always been an emphasis to look for worlds which are at least a little compatible to ours and then if at all possible to map them as completely as possible.

And here it is," he grinned.

"What?" Taela asked, looking over.

"She must have been here right about at the time of the big seasonal weather shift," Ryan smiled, "Let me just configure a drill-down of the faunal types and their activity at that time, ... It'll just take me a sec, ..."

He sat back with a wide grin as he pointed to one of the displays, "There, Taela. She probably didn't do this as a thought, other than when she set up her sensor arrays, but if I can just plot this, we'll know of at least the relative time -- datewise -- and the places for the herd migrations. With that, we know just where we need to be and when."

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The results took a couple of days of study, but Ryan showed it to Taela when he was done.

"We're really too far north for the best hunting, since we always go on foot and that limits us to how far we can go in a day, leaving enough time to hunt, kill what we're looking for, butcher it out roughly and then trek all the way back so that we're under cover by the time that the sun out there goes down.

Look here," he said; pointing to another display, "They all just go there to stand around munching the whole winter. And there, after dark, there are no screechers at all. The only predators that I've been able to see in that area are things something a little like the lions back on Earth, and there aren't many of those, if I query for their positions. After dark, there's only some other cat-things.

I might be wrong, but I don't think I am. We could fly there, up high to conserve fuel, land somewhere there and then hunt for a couple of days before we'd have to come back."

They showed Betty that afternoon and she was surprised, "I never thought of it," she said, "but then, I didn't have a shuttle to take advantage of it anyway."

"We want to go when it's time," Taela said, "and we want to take Shorty with us."

Betty considered it for a moment and then she smiled, "I assume that what that also means is that you three want to go there to do more than hunt together."

Ryan and Taela nodded and when Betty looked over at Shorty, he looked nervous for a second before he nodded very firmly as well.

Betty's response surprised them all.

"Oh thank God," she laughed, "I know that turning him down was hurting him, but I just, ... I guess I'm finally really getting to feel my age, but, ... well, I just can't keep up with him anymore."

She turned to look at Shorty and she reached out to take his hand, "Baby, I think that this is something that you need quite a lot. So from now on, if you want to sleep with Taela and Ryan, well you just go on ahead. It's got nothing to do with you, but these days, Momma just wants her sleep, alright?"

Shorty nodded and then he walked over to hug Betty for a moment.

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That night, after locking down, they walked to the hot stream and bathed together. Ryan found that, more and more, he was coming to like the thought of what it meant to them all. He was in bed, looking over the printed data for the upcoming trip when they walked in.

Even after thinking about it for most of the day, Ryan still found that his heart seemed to skip a beat when he looked up. The weather had begun to turn cooler in the evening, though the effect there in their home was minimal. Only Betty had really taken to wearing the flightsuit that she'd been given.

Ryan tended to wear only combat pants these days and Taela and Shorty were still fine walking around with nothing on at all. To see them coming to him like that was a rather large thrill, no matter what he told himself.

The sight of Taela like that always caused his heart rate to ramp up a little and he knew pretty much that it always would. And when she walked with Shorty, he just felt so, ...

He couldn't describe it, really. Shorty was a male, though like this, the way that the two of them came to him, ... well, it felt a little like Christmas, no matter how he looked at it.

"We found some hot chocolate powder in the survival kits," Taela grinned, "and we put it all together and there's enough for all of us twice over once we added the milk powder to it. Shorty and I want to celebrate a little tonight, since I'll have my males and he'll finally get to have his man and you'll get -- "

"Probably shagged out, I'm hoping," Ryan grinned. They all laughed as they got onto the bed and sat together sipping something that Ryan had quite forgotten about.

"When I was a kid, I used to love hot chocolate over the winter. We used to live in a state called Minnesota and one thing about it; as nice as it was to live there, it was always a cold place in the wintertime. My mom always kept some in the kitchen all winter, a big cardboard tub of it.

But the very best to me, anyway, was when Dad would take us all to a coffee place. They had the best hot chocolate there. Now that I think about it, that's about the only thing that I miss about the place, all of it."

After a time, they found that the drink caused Shorty to feel a little sleepy and Taele took his empty mug and set it down on the little table beside her bed. She patted the mattress in about the middle and Shorty moved there. Then she moved to lie beside him.

"Come on, Ryan," she smiled, "just lie on the other side of him and I'll teach you what he likes."

Shorty looked a little uncertain at first, but he relaxed soon after as they kissed him and they took turns caressing him. It was a very new thing for Ryan, though it wasn't as strange as he'd have thought.

"Just remember how you feel about him," Taela said very softly, "Just show him that you want to make him feel good and then he will, because that's how he is.

We all don't really know how to do this between us -- Shorty least of all, but I think that if we try to keep it quiet and slow, we should do alright."

What began with Shorty in between them slowly turned into something where he played a more active part. It took a little time, but Shorty came over Ryan's hand from the way that Ryan had been stroking him. After that, Shorty had moved and finding Ryan hard, he just began to suck while Taela caressed him all over his back end and she found that it wasn't too long a stretch to where she could kiss Ryan and Shorty was thrilled when Ryan came.

Ryan himself was astounded by it all and the ease with which they seemed to fit with each other.