Page 54 of Caveman Alien's Touch

“Stay your hand, clansbrother,” I hurry to say. “I’m not a kronk!”

Trat freezes in place with fire in his eyes, ready to skewer me with his spear before he lowers it.

“Noker!” Bronwen exclaims as she bounces to her feet and runs over. “Where you havebeen?”

She embraces me tightly. Her scent washes over me, and I breathe out with relief over having found her.

“I could ask you the same.”

“We been looking foryou,” she says, looking up at me. “All over the jungle.”

“But I wasn’t all over the jungle,” I counter. “I was following the outcasts. Oh, I smelldrap.”

I sit down on the grass, and Bronwen plops down right beside me. Trat stays on the other side of the fire.

“There’s a drap bush right there,” he tells me. “They’re done now.” He uses his spear to pull out the steaming root bulbs.

“Good work, Trat,” I tell him warmly. “You must teach me how to find those.”

“Yes, Noker,” he says, face flushing with pride. “I think maybe they are common in swamps.”

“Could be,” I agree. “Why are you two together?”

They tell me about their adventures as we crack open the draps and let them cool for a while.

I sit there and enjoy looking at Bronwen, being close to her again, and having to put my hands in my lap so my arousal isn’t too obvious to young Trat.

“... and then we made this fire,” Bronwen ends the tale. “We were about to try the drap things.”

“We’ll try them now,” I suggest and let Trat hand me one, which I hand on to Bronwen. “We don’t often enjoy this treat.”

I get one of my own and peel off the charred outer layer, then bite into the steaming, brilliant white flesh of the root.

Bronwen watches me and takes a little bite herself. “That’s hot.”

“The drap fruit can also be eaten cold,” I tell her. “Or mixed with water and nuts.”

She blows on her fingertips and takes a new piece. “This is really good! It’s sweet, but it also tastes likevnila!”

I glance over at my little clansbrother. “Does it taste likevnilato you, Trat?”

He giggles.

“Sorry,” Bronwen says. “Vanillais a flavor from Earth. This is very delicious!”

I take a big bite and let the warm mass dissolve in my mouth. “Drap is the best food I know in the jungle. Except for thesalenfruit. But I’ve only tasted that once.”

“I’ve never had salen,” Trat informs us, his mouth full.

I nod. “Salen is rare. Their trees don’t want us to take the fruit.”

“I love this,” Bronwen says, burying her face in the root to take more bites. “But not easy to find?”

“Their bushes grow all over the jungle,” I tell her as I pull the rest of the outer layer off my drap and put the whole thing into my mouth. “But they look like another bush that only tastes bad.” I hand Bronwen another drap.

“Now you know about us,” Bronwen says when we’ve eaten all the roots. “Where haveyoubeen, Noker?”

I tell them about my pursuit of the outcasts and the tense situation when I had a venomous Small behind me and the outcasts were about to discover me.

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