Bolting upright in my chair, I work to get a better view. It’s not great. I am limited to a top down view, and it is in such low resolution I can’t tell if these are the descendants of the lost humans, or some coincidental bipedal analogue.
I have to get closer.
The ship can’t go any lower without coming out of orbit, but there’s a shuttle I can take down quite a lot lower. It’s built for atmospheric entry, and it will allow me to observe these creatures with a much better resolution and degree of accuracy. But I’m not supposed to take the shuttle. I’m supposed to stay on the ship.
Tapping impatiently, I try to get a better view of the action below, already knowing I can’t get a closer shot.
The order I was given about reporting any signs of life has long been forgotten. This is my discovery, and the thrill of it makes me able to ignore petty things like protocol and orders. I push up from my chair and I start getting ready.
I have to prepare the machine, and myself. Leaving the ship means getting protective gear on, a slick suit that conforms tightly to my body enough that no external atmosphere has a chance of penetrating if I choose to wear the hood. I almost never do. It gets sweaty in there and it makes me look like I’m wearing a full body swim condom. Not a cute look, even if I am all alone out in space.
The shuttle is powered up and ready. Its observation tools aren’t as powerful as the ship’s, but I will be able to get so close it won’t matter. I set the coordinates in the navigation panel to the ones I saw the bipeds at, and I set off, detaching from my ship and dropping down into the atmosphere of Hades Exile.
The world rises up to swallow me. I find myself flirting with the sky, zooming over the rolling planet below. The subjects I located on the ship come into view. They are blissfully unaware of me above them as I set my devices to record and start to observe what seems to be mating behavior.
A pack of large males appear to be courting a female. By courting, I mean chasing her about in a field. I zoom in to make sure she is alright—not that I’m allowed to do anything if she isn’t.
There is a big smile plastered across her face as she leads the males on a chase. She is more nimble than they, and perhaps a little faster. Either that, or they are humoring her in her attempts at escape.
The female has long dark hair that flows from her head and she is entirely naked aside from a strip of clothing that covers her sex. It’s hard to tell what she looks like exactly, but my heart is beating faster because she really does look quite human. Not like me, precisely, but close.
The males have overtaken her and are surrounding her. She turns to face each of them, spinning around in place. They seem to be communicating. Are they speaking?
I want to get closer. I hope they don’t move from this field. Mating has always been a fascination of mine but it rarely takes place where I can see it. The resolution on my optics is good for what it is, but I’m still obscured by things like trees and caves, so unless they all start fucking in the open… oh. There they go.
As I look on from my perch in the sky, the female is taken between them. Though she likely only has a single vaginal canal, they seem to be too impatient to wait for that cavity, so they make liberal use of her mouth and her hands, and very possibly her anus as well.
The smaller shuttle has much better optics for being closer. I can zoom right in to the point I can almost see the male members. They are very much like the male anatomy of our own species. Evolution is a mistress of habit. She likes a four-limbed base model, with alternate wings if you insist on them, or flippers if you want to go in the water. Two eyes, for the most part, if you’re going to bear live young. She has rules. Rules that haven’t been challenged for a long time. Our scientists used to try. Why not four arms and no legs? It turned out two arms were repurposed as legs fairly quickly. Why not three eyes and no nose? Also had its disadvantages.
There are ways things are done, even on far-flung planets like this one. One of the rules I’ve yet to see broken is crude, but simple: females get fucked.
Genital configuration is also one of Mistress Evolution’s sticking points. One has an out bit. One has an in bit. Sometimes the out bit will break off and stay in the in bit, as in the case of the Rectari, who mate via the anal canal, but the basic formula is usually the same.