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“I wish I’d taken baseline measurements of your vitals before we started out.” Sazahk bit his lower lip. “Your breathing seems heavier. Your body is definitely in distress.”
Garin’s mind was in severe distress, but his body was better described as desperate. He ground his teeth together and willed the sensations in his lower belly away, but they fought him like they’d never before.
“When did this start?” Sazahk’s dark eyes were worried and Garin’s stomach curdled with guilt. The things he wanted… They were all wrong. It wasn’t okay to think this way about the man as he fussed over him. And it wasn’t okay to keep it a secret. But the thought of admitting to the desire eating away at Garin’s mind nauseated him.
He had to tell Sazahk what he was feeling. But the flushed skin, the dilated pupils, the increased heart rate…it didn’t take a genius to diagnose Garin, and Sazahk was more than a genius.
“Was it after you inhaled those spores?” Sazahk swabbed a bead of sweat from Garin’s temple and carefully bundled the swab away for later analysis. “Was the onset immediate? Delayed? Gradual?”
Garin licked his dry lips and thought back. He’d been so concerned with the shame and embarrassment of his feelings it hadn’t occurred to him until they’d grown extreme that they might have an external cause. “Delayed. Gradual.”
God, Garin wanted him. Needed him. Needed to be touched by him.
Garin gritted his teeth and shook his head. “It’s getting worse.”
Cool hands cradled Garin’s jaw and tilted his face up. Sazahk held his gaze, red and brown licking across his cheeks. Red meant fear. Garin had pieced that much together. But he’d never seen brown on Sazahk’s skin before. Sazahk brushed his thumbs over Garin’s sweat damp skin. “Are you in pain?”
Garin’s cock strained to fully erect, rubbing against the zipper of his pants and throbbing with need. Garin grimaced. “A little. Not much.” Not yet.
“You don’t have a rash, your breathing isn’t impaired, and your heart rate is high, but not concerning.” Sazahk’s eyes flickered across Garin’s face. “In any other circumstances, I’d hypothesize simple heightened arousal.”
When Garin didn’t reply, understanding crept into Sazahk’s expression and Garin wished he could crawl back up the chute he’d rappelled down and hide in that dark, narrow passage forever. “Sazahk.”
“Oh.” Sazahk yanked his hands away and scrambled back. “Is that…” Sazahk swallowed as his eyes darted up and down Garin’s curled posture. “Is that how you would characterize your current sensations?”
Garin wrapped one arm around his knees and covered his face with his hand. “Yes.” Please, please, please touch me. Garin’s balls ached as he locked the words behind his teeth, refusing to give in.
A long pause stretched between them before Sazahk spoke in a careful voice. “In the interest of gathering more evidence in support of this hypothesis,”—Sazahk touched Garin’s knee lightly— “may I?”
Hand still over his face, heart pounding, Garin nodded.
Sazahk coaxed Garin’s knees apart and Garin let his thighs fall wide, displaying the hard ridge of his erection pushing against the front of his pants. The act of exposing himself, even clothed, forced a needy sound from the back of Garin’s throat.
“Oh.” Sazahk’s palm disappeared from Garin’s knee.
“I’m sorry.” Garin dropped his hand from his face and gouged furrows in the dirt with his fingers. “I’m don’t know what’s happening.”
“You don’t have to be sorry.” Sazahk shuffled closer again, and it took every bit of Garin’s willpower not to lean into him. “You’ve nothing to apologize for. You’re suffering under the effects of an unknown biological agent. It’s not your fault.”
Garin pressed his lips together and nodded, emotion welling up in his chest at Sazahk’s serious, determined expression.
“I’m going to help you.” Sazahk brushed Garin’s sweaty hair from his forehead. “We’re going to solve this. You’re going to be okay.”
Garin nodded. He had no idea what Sazahk had in mind, but when the Qeshian species state had faced a new threat, they’d called Sazahk out of exile to help them with it. Well, Garin was certainly facing a new threat now and if anyone could help him, it was Sazahk.
He’d never felt so out of control, and it shook him to his core.
“Drink some water. You’re sweating out all your fluids.” Sazahk pressed an open canteen to Garin’s lips and despite water being a precious resource, Garin gulped down two swallows. “Good.”
Garin watched Sazahk twist the cap onto the bottle and tuck it into its proper place in Garin’s pack. His long fingers danced across the canvas bag and colors rippled across the surface of his skin: red, brown, gray, and, of course, green. His near constant light green but also a deeper forest green, which was always accompanied with a touch of gray.
“Alright, let’s lay out what we know and all possible courses of actions.” Sazahk swiveled to face Garin directly and sat on his heels. “You are experiencing extreme, involuntary arousal, correct?”
Garin closed his knees again and nodded.
“The arousal did not begin until after we’d entered this cavern. I am not suffering any of the same symptoms. However, although qesh and human physiology have many similarities, we have many differences as well. So, it’s possible that I’ve been exposed to the same substance currently triggering this reaction in you and have merely metabolized the substance differently.”
Garin followed the swaying motion of Sazahk’s long braid as he wobbled his head back and forth as he spoke and imagined the strands slipping through his fingers.
