An explanation

Rye gazed at her hands for a moment before raising her eyes to Dustin and Meli, both of whom were looking at her expectantly. Neither of them was sure what exactly the issue was with the bunny girl, but it was clearly important to her - which as they wanted to gel as a crew made it important to them. “I’m not entirely sure how to begin, so I guess I’ll start with the obvious. You spotted that I’m not exactly as forward about - well, you know - as most of my species, captain. It’s not that I don’t find the idea interesting or appealing, you know? It’s just… Ok, lets start at the beginning ‘cos neither of you are Rabyth so you probably don’t know half the things you’d need to for this to make sense.” She began, her words a rambling mess as she tugged absent-mindedly at one long ear.

“I’ve always been… different, I guess you could say. Most Rabyth have at least a passing interest in machines and building stuff - it’s ingrained in our species, the ones that didn’t have it baked in died when we overpopulated our home world the first coupla times. That’s the problem with breeding like Rabyth - it’s not like we have large numbers of pups at a time, but when you’re having them every cycle it really messes with the ecosystem balance. So the ones that lasted were those with an interest in the tech needed to either keep alive when the ecosystem collapses or make more room to stay alive in generally. Run an extinction-level collapse like that on your own species a few dozen times and you’d breed in **** tech interest and a drive to make more places habitable too. Well, we did that and it saved our species - oh, and figuring out a really good contraceptive shot, but by the time we’d gotten the shot developed we were already spreading out into space and needed the bodies to make up for those lost to the hazards of early spaceflight.” Her potted history of her species had the other two nodding along, before she returned to the topic at hand.

“So, all my people are interested in tech. But me? I’m super interested in tech. Most of my friends growing up had other hobbies that naturally trended into dating as they got older, but I was always happier stripping down a grav-thruster or hacking together some code to make things work better than they had before. Friends dragged me out to events of course - but unlike them I wasn’t going to go approaching people when I could sit in a corner and tinker with whatever tech I’d managed to shove in my pockets before they pulled me away from my current project.” She sighed, shaking her head “I appreciated the gesture - cog knows I’d probably have become a non-verbal shut-in otherwise, but it isn’t fun looking back and realizing you’ve spent most of your twenty-two years as a wallflower while your friends date, fuck and generally fool about all around you.”

Dustin raised a hand at this point, though Rye seemed to know what he was going to say. “Don’t start paying me compliments Captain, please. You can tell me how your species views me later on - though judging by your taste in Velca, I can guess. For the record, I’m not exactly ugly as far as Rabyth go; would you give him a rundown while I figure out how to explain this next bit please, science officer?” Meli’s ears twitched as Rye addressed her and she nodded before turning to Dustin. “Rabyth generally look for a few things in a mate. Musculature is important, especially in their lower half; beyond that however they largely look to ear length as far as physical attractiveness goes. Emotionally, their eyes are probably the most important feature - a strong, commanding stare in the males as you experienced with Flass, and a sparkling joy in females as Rye has exhibited.”

That comment caused the Rabyth girl to blush, but Meli wasn’t finished. “Overall from what I can see - given Rye’s jumpsuit is concealing or compacting some aspects of her physical attributes - her body would be considered moderate to highly attractive to both Rabyth and Humans. Her ears are of a reasonable length, attractive enough to my limited understanding.” At this point the blushing woman waved a hand. “That’s enough! I only wanted the basics not you undressing me with your words.” Before Meli could utter an apology Rye continued on “anyway, I think I can explain it. Look at this” and here she waved a hand up the soft fur of her arm. Dustin looked, not sure what he was supposed to be seeing. “I don’t follow?” he said, which prompted an exasperated noise from the woman.

“My fur is golden. Just golden - no markings, nothing, just this stupid plain straw colour over my entire body. Even my favourite kid sister managed to get a patch of dark brown on her back, but I just got plain gold. And because you two only have fur on your heads, you probably don’t even understand.” Meli looked about to correct the Rabyth, but Dustin hastily shushed her - he wasn’t entirely sure Rye would survive a discussion of where else both Humans and Velca had hair at this point. Rye continued without noticing, thankfully. “Rabyth look for all those things the science office said, sure. But when you’re at a party or whatever, how you stand out is the patterns on your fur. The more intricate or colourful, the more attention you’ll get from people looking for a casual time together. So if you’re just monochrome like me…”

It suddenly made sense to Dustin. “Oh.” He said, causing Meli to look at him quizzically and ask “have you identified the issue for our engineer, captain?” Dustin nodded, answering “yea. She’s attractive but in human terms basically plain - there’s nothing to cause people to approach her when there’s other people around. Which if she also doesn’t do the approaching…” at this his voice trailed off and his eyes grew very wide. He turned back to Rye “wait, you’re twenty-two and you’ve not approached anyone… does that mean you’ve never…?” He let the question hang in the air for a moment before the Rabyth nodded shyly. Dustin pinched the bridge of his nose and scrunched up his eyes for a moment before looking up at Rye again. “And you were willing to trade that just to get a job on my ship? For fucks sake, Rye. You don’t just…” Meli cut in, while Rye looked at him with a confused expression. “She’s Rabyth, Dustin, not Human. You’re assigning values from your culture to things that her species doesn’t put the same weight on.”

It took him a minute or two to collect himself before he nodded. “You’re right Meli. Sorry Rye, I apologize for any offense. It’s just on my world there’s a whole cultural thing about your first time, even if most people’s first time is clumsy and doesn’t match up to either their personal or cultural expectations.” Rye waved the comment off idly. “No offense even thought of captain. For the record, I don’t dislike the idea - folk always seem to be having a good time in the holovids I’ve… watched, but I can’t be bothered to go looking for it, not when there’s engineering to do.” Meli made a note on her tablet at that point. “I will ensure that your wishes are noted once we retrieve a Feliaxian comms officer. I believe their tendency to assume everyone on a ship is part of a pride could cause some awkward moments otherwise.”

Rye grinned at that point, some of her earlier bravado coming back. “Thanks, Velca. Y’kno, for a research nerd, you’re alright.” Meli’s ears flickered into amusement at that and she replied “Thanks, bunny. Do try not to start humping the engines though.” As Rye burst into laughter, Meli turned to Dustin and tilted her head to one side. “How was my tone? I was aiming for light humour and mild sarcasm?” Dustin stifled his own laugh and nodded. “You’re getting much better at human intonation. One of these days you’ll have to tell me why more of your kind don’t try it with how quickly you seem to learn.” Rye sat up at this, wiping a tear from her eye and began to say “that’s because they only bother when they…” before Meli shot her a fierce look and she finished lamely “…are really nerding out about a species.”

Dustin filed that under highly-suspicious, however as neither of the women seemed about to say more he sighed and straightened up. “Well, thank you for your honesty Rye. For what it’s worth, Meli was right about you being highly attractive by human standards - although I suspect your kind wouldn’t view things the same if the roles were reversed. Our hair - fur - is usually monochrome unless we add dye to it. Now that everything is taken care of in that regard, I suggest we all return to our quarters and get some sleep - we’ve got a lot of planning to do tomorrow.” Meli nodded, letting Rye head out first before turning back to Dustin with her ears in a playful position. “I’d offer to stay and carry on with our research, but as you say we’ve got a lot to do tomorrow and I suspect our chief engineer is going to have you trekking halfway across the ship. I wouldn’t want to be the reason you failed in your duties, captain.” Dustin felt that last word should have probably caught fire even as the door closed behind her. Shaking his head, he turned back to his own bunk room. “Alien women are going to be the **** of you long before any space hazards are at this rate” he muttered to himself, barely pausing to finish undressing before flopping onto his bed. He hadn’t realized how tired he’d gotten - playing the part of the competent captain for all those interviews had worn him out and it wasn’t long before he drifted into a deep sleep.