“Consider the mode of reproduction of wheat,” Flint continued blithely. If his plan worked, he could nullify her harmlessly. He didn’t want to kill the entity possessing such an aura! “There are male and female elements, the pistils and the stamens. But they do not reproduce directly. There must be the intercession of a third element, to bring the pollen to its proper place. This is the wind. It carries the pollen from one plant to another. Without it, the wheat would not reproduce. Some other plants use insects as the third agent. The wind or the bee may be considered a catalyst, enabling the act to occur. It promotes reproduction, though of itself it may be sexless.” Now they were approaching the Impact zone boundary. Beyond it was the Sibilant zone: forbidden territory. But thanks to his distractive discourse, Llyana did not yet realize this.
“Now the Spicans actually have three sexes,” Flint continued, guiding her on through the veil. “They are interchangeable, after their fashion. The third sex is always the catalyst, initiating the act without being affected by it, like the wind or the bee. The other two sexes become the sire and the parent, depending on the order in which they meet. This is complicated to explain. Perhaps it is simplest to identify the pattern by means of the catalyst If the catalyst is an Impact, the offspring will be a Sibilant. If the catalyst is an Undulant, the offspring will be an Impact. And if the catalyst is a Sibilant—”
And now, of course, they encountered a Sibilant, for this was the Sibilant zone. It saw them and tried to take evasive action, but Flint zeroed in on it, bringing Llyana along, forcing an encroachment within the critical range. Like a man suddenly confronted with an act of human copulation in progress, the Sibilant had a reaction. But in this case voyeurism was not sufficient; it had to participate. Because this was the nature of this species; proximity was courtship and consummation.
The Sibilant turned about and closed on them. Llyana did not yet realize the danger; Flint’s explanation, despite its accuracy, had prevented her from exploring the practical aspect of her host’s knowledge. He had not told her the whole truth, just as some humans fail to tell their children the whole truth.
For the Sibilant was the third entity, the separate one, the catalyst. Position, not sex, determined the roles of the three participants in any sexual encounter. Since the approaching mergence was involuntary—at least on Llyana’s part—this was technical rape. But the investigation would show that the Impact and the Undulant were intruders in the Sibilant zone, exonerating the Sibilant. Flint, as Bopek the courier, had to have known this. Therefore he was the true rapist—again.
Now the compulsion of propinquity was upon the Sibilant. Like a buck winding a doe in heat, it jetted right into contact, extending its substance to interact with that of Flint and Llyana. Now she realized something was happening. “You are overlapping!” she exclaimed, exactly like a woman goosed in a crowd, indignant but not wanting to call too much attention to her complaint. She tried to move away—but could not.
The throes of mergence were upon them. Stimulated by the envelopment of the catalyst—as if it were a cup of fermented honey, or a soft bed of fragrant foliage, or a lovely nubile nude girl—Flint proceeded to what was natural.
Llyana was a beautiful creature, literally. Her torso was as sleek yet rounded as any he had experienced, and her perimeter was delightfully permeable. She was formed to be permeated, penetrated, suffused, and as the ineffable environment of the catalyst brought them together he did all these things with her. Her potent aura enhanced the effect. He thought of Honeybloom as his flesh sank deeply through hers, and the whole of his being expanded with instant love. This was not after all so different from human mating; in fact it was better, for the presence of the catalyzing entity guaranteed a perfect union. There would be no last-minute hitches, no frustrating feminine changes of mind, no awkwardnesses of mechanical copulation. And the volume of interaction was so much greater; the whole body was involved, not merely one small organ. Like a perfect program, it scored—every time.
Llyana was struggling. “This—this—I am being violated!” she protested. “Who are you? What are you doing?”
“I am Sissix the Sibilant,” the catalyst replied. “Let the inquest show that I did not seek this union. Nevertheless, I do not protest it; you are both handsome specimens.” Actually, the catalyst had little reason to protest; catalysm was as close to completely free pleasure as this world provided. The parent was responsible for the offspring, and the sire gave up a healthy chunk of his flesh; the catalyst experienced the same triple orgasm, but without penalty. The Spican sentient’s traditional view of heaven was a warm ocean filled with pairs of the other two sexes, so that the individual could travel from pair to pair in perpetual catalysis. Unremitting ecstasy!
“Your motions only enhance the interaction,” Flint told Llyana, knowing this was like telling the victim of ongoing rape not to struggle.
“This—this is mating!” she screamed, shocked. Her message came through her body as much as her vocal apparatus, for they were now overlapping each other’s nervous systems.
Flint had never before felt such extreme pleasure. In the human body, the joys and pains of various experiences were actually self-generated. No actual transfer of sensation occurred, merely external stimulus. But here there was the enveloping joy of literal mergence, of becoming one with one’s species. Sissix and Llyana pooled their nervous impulses with Flint’s to make a symphonic unity of amazing depth and intensity. Before, when Flint had been the inadvertent catalyst, he had been too revolted by the concept to appreciate the pleasure; now he relished it.
“And what a mating!” Sissix agreed. “No wonder you two sought a catalyst! I have never partaken of such a powerful union before. By pure chance, I am a participant in a greater experience than I ever could have initiated deliberately.”
Still Llyana protested. “I am not your kind! This is an abomination!”
And there it was: her open confession of alien status. With that unguarded admission in the presence of a witness (actually so much more than a witness, for this verification occurred on the complete range of apperception, not just sight), Flint had the key. Overlapped as he was, he could read it directly from her own system and force further testimony. His defense against the charge of rape would hinge on his own identity as an envoy from Sphere Sol, and Llyana’s identity as—who?
“You are… an agent of an inimical system, from far, far away, beyond Sphere Knyfh… no, in another direction,” he repeated, picking it out despite the almost overwhelming urge to complete the procreative act. “Your home Sphere is—”
“No! No!” she screamed, every nerve jangling with a current that only increased his pleasure to the bursting point. “Three different species… miscegenation!”
What an experience humans missed, unable to draw directly from their lovers’ systems. To experience their mates’ orgasms; in fact, to mate the orgasms themselves, fashioning a pyramid of rapture impossible to any single entity.
“What an experience!” Sissix agreed, picking up part of that impulse. “I feel as though I’m careening through the vastness of an infinite ocean, seeing clusters of glowfish—”
“That is deep space,” Flint informed it. “Those glows are stars. We are aliens from distant Spheres.”
“Noooo!” Llyana reverberated. But she could no longer hide it; her own nervous system, so powerfully animated by her intense Kirlian aura, betrayed her. The two strong auras were the real source of the enhancement the Sibilant felt; because it was actually sharing their aura-imbued systems, it was for the moment an enhanced entity. Yes, it would definitely be able to testify as to the alien nature of its mergence companions.