Butterfly Wings

Dustin was regretting offering to pose for Aricia. He’d expected her to just flit around snapping pictures like she usually did when she’d gotten permission to take photos of someone that was working, but apparently his offer and lack of tasks to do had changed things. The Lieviran woman seemed to switch persona on a dime, changing from flighty and carefree to precise and demanding in an instant.

“Move your foot back a little bit… no, the one that’s hanging down. Further… further… Stop! Alright, now stare out of the window… more wistfully… more… too much! There! Hold that pose!” Aricia’s instructions were a constant stream, only interrupted by the occasional command to freeze while she busied herself behind her tablet.

He didn’t mind the mild discomfort of holding position too much, but he was glad when she eventually snapped a final picture and waved her device vaguely at him. “That should do it… I’ll tweak a few of the light levels later on, but I’m done with taking pictures now,” the butterfly girl said, turning and drifting over to the nearest automat. “I’ll get us both a drink, you want another mocha, right?”

Sitting holding a steaming mug a moment later, Dustin smiled as Aricia sank down to sit cross-legged on the bench-like windowsill next to him. “Have you gotten to go planet-side?” he asked, sipping his drink and flicking his gaze out to the rocky wasteland beyond the glass.

Aricia hummed, mouthful of her own drink before swallowing to reply. “Not yet. I was scheduled to go today, but after everything that happened to Rye, and with the fact that it’s all underground tunnels… I don’t really fancy going out right now. I hope that’s okay?”

Dustin nodded. He could fully understand why the former Fractal captive might not want to descend into tunnels - even passageways as cheerfully and brightly lit as those of the Uil’l would probably bring back painful memories of darkness and lost dreams. Despite the fact that he wanted to help the Lieviran heal from her trauma, he wasn’t about to push the issue, not when the source of the potential insurrections was still out there somewhere. “It’s totally okay. If you want to spend time on the ship, I completely understand. On that note though, Meli said she’d rearranged the calendar so that today’s your date night. Any idea what you want to do? I’m free the rest of the day if you want to start early.”

As soon as he’d said it, he mentally face-palmed. The answer was obvious for the last of the three women looking to join his bed, so obvious in fact that he could practically guess what she was going to say… “I want to go for a swim.” Dustin blinked. That hadn’t been what he’d expected - in fact, it was so far from it that it took him a moment or two to find his words to answer.

“A swim?” he said quizzically. The butterfly girl had never shown any interest in the water before, but now she nodded intently as Dustin set his mug down.

“Yes. Although…” she frowned, then gestured over her shoulder. “My wings will shed quite badly in water. I can shower first to get rid of the worst of it, but I’m still going to be dumping a lot of shards into the pool regardless, so I don’t think I can use the main swimming areas. I was hoping you might have some other options? A storage tank we could flood or something? Mostly what I really want is to just sit in a big pool of water with you, maybe float about a bit.”

Dustin paused, thinking, then asked “Aricia… do you know what a bath is?”

As it turned out, the butterfly woman did not; Dustin kicked himself for not talking to her about it sooner. The Lieviran people had been pre-industrial or near enough; the idea of interior plumbing or bathing quantities of water with the associated requirement for heating liquid indoors would have been restricted to just the higher echelons of their religious overlords. After a brief discussion of her village, he understood a bit better. “So, you used to just go and sit in the lake in summer to clean off, or shower by standing under a container with holes in?” he asked, at which the flighty woman nodded intently.

“Alright. Bath it is then. Let me just check with Rye that the filters will handle anything that comes off your wings…” Dustin tapped his tablet quickly, before standing. “We can still bathe even if she says no - it just means I’ll need to figure out an alternative way of emptying the pools. But to be honest, she built them to deal with her and Emely’s fur, so I’m sure…” His tablet chimed and he glanced at it, then grinned as he offered Aricia a hand up. “Rye says it’s fine. Do you need to swing by your quarters on the way to get anything? We keep a range of cleaning stuff and towels in the baths, so it’ll be quicker to go via my quarters if you don’t, otherwise we’ll take the side entrance…

One quick turbolift ride later, and Dustin led Aricia into the ambassadorial suite. Rye had apparently returned from the planet’s surface while he’d been modelling for photos, as she glanced up from where she’d been sitting with her heels on the massive table and grinned before hooking her thumb towards the wall that normally opened into the bedroom. “Ya might want to take the other route if you’re going to the baths. The three pregnant ladies dragged Naera and Sammie in there twenty minutes ago and shut the door behind them. Well, actually, they asked if I wanted to join them and then shut the door when I said I wanted to keep looking over the equipment logs from those creeps that attacked me to see if I could spot anything odd.”

The bunny girl’s words made Dustin pause. “Aricia…” he began, but she merely crossed towards the wall.

“Yaerwen told me about your shower-date over brunch, Dustin. And I don’t mind seeing the others… having fun, if we won’t be disturbing them by taking the shorter route.” Her words were firm - but the blush spreading across her cheeks was anything but.

“Ya won’t disturb them, not if they’re in the middle of something. Ya might get dragged into it tho, depending on how frisky they are at the point ya open the door.” Rye observed, setting her tablet down and grinning. “’Course, if ya are planning on that then…”

Dustin frowned at the two of them. “I thought we were just going to go and have a bath.” He observed, adding “also, getting involved with a five-way would technically count as an orgy, and the other two have postponed their welcome parties so that the three of you can join together. It’d be kind of rude to sidestep that.”

Aricia bit her lip and nodded quickly. “Could you see if they’d mind us crossing though? I’d… I’d really like to see what the room looks like” she said lamely, although Dustin was pretty sure he could see the real reason why she wanted him to open the door. Sighing, he walked to the nearest communicator and tapped it to call Meli.

“Darling, would you ladies object if Aricia and I took a shortcut to the baths past whatever you’re up to in there?” he asked, grinning at the butterfly woman as he spoke.

“Mmmfuck, hold on a se…sec, Emely, Dustin’s call….oh god, calling… Sorry, husband, what was that?” Meli’s voice came through breathless, the sound of movement and other women moaning vaguely audible in the background.

Dustin repeated his question, trying his hardest not to laugh at the beet-red colour of the Lieviran standing in front of him or the arched eyebrow and grin on the face of his chief engineer. In response, Meli let out a moan that made his toes curl, followed by the sound of flesh slapping flesh and Emely’s squeak. “Bad girl! I told you to hold on while I talk to our love. Husband, feel free to come through, although I hope you won’t mind if we don’t get up… we’re a little bit busy here. Tell Rye the offer is still open to join us if she’s done being… Trea’k! I just told Emely to stop… Fuck, that’s good…” The line cut at that point, and Dustin didn’t bother to attempt to reconnect it.

“Well, Aricia? Do you still want to take the shortcut?” he asked instead, looking rather pointedly at the butterfly woman to see if she’d change her mind after hearing what the other ladies were up to.

Aricia took a deep breath, closed her eyes, then nodded. Opening them, she smiled at him. “I didn’t bring a bathing suit, and was kind of sort of hoping to seduce you in the… what did you call the pools? The baths? In the baths, anyway. This might get you a little more ready in advance, that’s all.”

Dustin shrugged and stepped over to take her hand as he opened the ambassadorial bedchamber access just enough for the two of them to slip through. As it closed behind them, Rye picked her tablet back up and shook her head. “He ain’t the only one that’ll be getting riled up on the way past. Glad those two are going to have fun… now, where was I?”