Total pages in book: 99
Estimated words: 94582 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 473(@200wpm)___ 378(@250wpm)___ 315(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 94582 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 473(@200wpm)___ 378(@250wpm)___ 315(@300wpm)
“Mmm, it’s always a ‘quick bite’ with you, Officer Sky’lar.” He nodded his elongated head, his secondary eyelid flicking briefly over his slitted yellow eyes. “I have a male from the Gun’snx region whose blood might suit you. It has a ‘nutty’ quality, I’m told. Or why not try one from the Frost’nar area—a flavor like aged Frebian wine?”
“Something from closer to home, I think,” Sky told him. No matter what exotic flavor any particular blood was supposed to have, all Serpentine life essence tasted the same to her—bitter, cold, and slightly oily. Still, she didn’t drink for pleasure, as so many Serpentine women did—but strictly for sustenance. Without the life-giving blood, she wouldn’t be able to keep going.
“Well, I can offer you my own blood,” Vm’plx flickered his tongue again—this time in mild flirtation. “Half price for you, my favorite customer.”
“I’ll take your blood, but full price as always,” Sky said firmly. She had no wish to start a romantic liaison with someone she had to see almost every workday. It would make things unnecessarily awkward when it inevitably led nowhere. She had tried such liaisons before but copulating with a Serpentine did little for her.
For one thing, their male shafts were tiny—only the size of her smallest finger, Sky estimated. They were really more for the fertilization of eggs than for pleasure—and of course, as a Mammalian, she didn’t lay her eggs but kept them inside her body. And her eggs probably wouldn’t be compatible Serpentine sperm, anyway.
Though she knew some Serpentine females who liked the feeling of penetration by a male, Sky found it much more pleasurable to use a double-ended shaft and do the penetration herself. She sometimes hired a male Pleasure Worker for this purpose when she had an itch to scratch—which wasn’t that often. But she always packed her pleasure gear whenever she went on a trip, just in case.
For now though, blood would suffice. Vm’plx offered her his wrist—regrettably, her fangs weren’t long enough to pierce through the thick, overlapping scales that covered a Serpentine throat where the blood flowed fastest. But the underside of the wrist was a different story—the scales there were thinner and softer and Sky’s fangs were more than up to the task of piercing them.
She sank her sharp white points into Vm’plx’s wrist now and sucked up a few bitter, oily mouthfuls of his thin, dark blue blood. As the familiar taste spread across her tongue, she felt a flash of energy—her body thanking her for giving it what was needed. She licked the wound closed just as her tube pulled into the station.
“That’s all you want?” Vm’plx asked, frowning—an expression that centered more in his slitted yellow eyes than his wide, lipless mouth.
“That’s it.” Sky tossed him a one credit chip, the usual price. “Thanks, Vm’plx. See you tomorrow!”
He waved one six-fingered hand and Sky nodded over her shoulder as she hurried to squeeze into the already over-crowded tube.
Once inside, she found herself crammed between two businesswomen, doubtless headed for Region Ten—the Finance Region. The Serpentines were a tall people—the females were, anyway—but Sky still stood a head taller than most. Her full breasts were squashed against her chest until she wiggled to get into a better position, lifting her head high to look above the crowd.
She got a few curious stares due to her curvy, hourglass figure, but she didn’t mind. Breasts weren’t an attribute that Serpentine women had. Being Reptilian rather than Mammalian, they didn’t make milk for their young but fed them on live meecelings and other small, warm-blooded animals instead.
Breasts were another nuisance Sky had often wished she could be rid of—especially her large, sensitive nipples which poked prominently at the black mesh of her uniform. She had no scales to shield her delicate parts like her Serpentine counterparts and the nipples presented a legitimate target when she got into an altercation.
But cutting off her breasts was even more complicated than cutting off her hair, so Sky kept both. It was just another hassle having to do with being a Mammalian in a Reptilian world—a slight disadvantage that she worked twice as hard to make up for. If she knew she was going into danger, she wore the overlapping protective scale armor that covered her chest, which had been made for Serpentines with Soft Scale Disorder.
Sky didn’t care if the armor looked strange. Having soft, smooth skin rather than a tough, scaly hide put her at a disadvantage and she had to make up for it somehow.
Anyway, her differences hadn’t prevented her from making Special Agent at work, she mused as the tube finally stopped at her station in the Ninth Region. But then, her direct supervisor, Captain Thal’nx was known for her fairness and cool-headed judgment. Sky aspired to be like her and someday command an entire station of her own. But for now, she was happy to be a Special Agent.