Sweetcorn was the first crop Elster and Ariane planted on Liebe.

After a few days spent exploring the woods, mountains, and fields, they started to piece together that they had landed on the planet near the end of what could be called the summer season. Thus, it became imperative to get something planted in time to harvest in the fall before the expected winter chills came in.

It was the first time Ariane worried Elster about how hard she was suddenly working.

“I… will not… eat… those fucking… rations… one day… longer… than I have to!” Ariane spoke between pants as she swung her hoe over and over against the ground.

Elster stood by silently and offered her wife a bottled sports drink when she finally took a moment to rest, which she readily accepted. She popped the cap off and drank half the bottle before gasping for breath, balancing herself against the butt end of the gardening tool.

Elster lightly cleared her throat. “Ari, I think you should-”

“Don’t tell me to fucking rest,” Ariane interrupted, still panting hard afterwards.

Elster frowned slightly and rubbed Ariane’s shoulder. “I was going to say lie down, but, yes, you need rest, love,” she said.

Ariane shut her eyes and groaned.

Elster placed the back of her hand against Ariane’s forehead. “Your body temperature is greatly elevated, your skin feels clammy to the touch, you haven’t eaten anything in over six hours, you’re probably getting dangerously dehydrated, and I’m worried if you stay out here any longer you’ll get an awful sunburn.”

“I was always… way too pale… a little colour… would do me good,” Ariane joked between breaths. She then picked up her hoe again and tried to give it an overhead swing, only for the long-handled tool to slip out of her hands and fall to the ground in front of her. She stared at it for a few seconds before she started to cough. “No… no… I think you’re right… verdammt…” she cursed before she fell first to her knees, then gently onto her back as Elster caught her and slowly lowered her down.

Ariane looked away, unable to meet Elster’s concerned frown, but the Replika didn’t say anything about it.

“Fuck… I’m way too out of shape,” Ariane said as she clumsily raised her hand to wipe away the sweat on her forehead. “All those times I neglected my daily exercise are coming back to haunt me… I don’t think there’s a single part of my body that isn’t covered in sweat right now.”

Elster knelt beside Ariane and softly stroked her hair, still staying silent until her partner gave the word.

“Ok… I give,” Ariane said after another minute had passed. She then smiled and started laughing, with Elster joining in shortly afterwards. “Love? Can you… I don’t think I can move anymore… can you carry me?”

“Of course,” Elster replied, smiling back as she carefully slipped her arms under Ariane’s shoulders and knees.

“Yayyyy…”

Elster carried Ariane back up into the Penrose-512, and set her up in her bed with two fans blowing cool air over her, a second bottled sports drink, and a pack of ration oatmeal cookies to replenish her energy.

“Alright, are you going to be okay if I leave you here for a while?” Elster asked.

Ariane lay on her side chewing a stale cookie which she swallowed before answering. “Don’t chug the drink, finish this bag of stale as fuck biscuits before I fall asleep, don’t go outside, call you on the radio if I need anything,” she repeated.

Elster smiled and nodded.

“Is there anything else, mom?” Ariane joked at her.

“Just one thing,” she replied before leaning over the bed and giving her dry, cracked lips a short kiss. “Love you, Ari.”

“Love you too, Ellie.”

With that, Elster went back outside and picked up where Ariane had left off. Tilling the soil, planting the seeds, watering the fields. She checked back on Ariane after an hour had passed and found her predictably asleep with crumbs stuck to her face and with a movie playing softly in the background. She turned off the cassette player and the television and quickly checked Ariane’s forehead. Still a little hot, but it seemed she would be okay with more rest and hydration. Elster smiled and gave her cheek a light kiss before pulling a thin sheet over her body.

She then stared at the door to her room and pondered for a moment.

Elster soon after walked back outside and saw the sun beginning to set. She grabbed her tools and seed bags and worked all through the night getting their sweetcorn, garlic, carrots, onions, spinach, and sweet potatoes planted, watered, and fertilized.

They would have fresh food before winter came, or so help them.

When Ariane finally awoke in the morning, she couldn’t find Elster anywhere on the ship, so, assuming that she had woken up before her, she slipped on a fresh change of clothes and stepped outside only to find Elster passed out sitting on the first structure they’d built since planetfall: a simple two-person bench with overhead shade which faced the river adjacent to their landing site.

She quickly stepped back inside the ship to grab something and returned to Elster’s side not a moment later, where she gently rubbed her cheek until she woke up.

“Hey,” Ariane quietly greeted her, shaking one of Elster’s bottled replenishment drinks in her hand. “Tag out?”

One year’s worth of revolutions later they had a house, a small greenhouse, a full-fledged farm, a kitchen full of fresh produce and a pantry full of flour, cornmeal, and dozens of jars of preserved and pickled vegetables.

But as Elster soon found out, Ariane had planted one additional crop she never told her about at the time. One you didn’t necessarily eat, or use to create clothing or medicine.

And she found out while fearing that their brand-new house was about to burn down.

She was in their newly created orchard, straw hat atop her head, and wearing a simple pair of beige shorts and a white shirt; unbuttoned since that always drove Ariane wild.

“How do you look even hotter wearing clothes?”

Within the orchard was a small collection of saplings Elster checked on that they had planted that spring. None of them would bear fruit until they matured many years later, but they both knew the best time to plant trees was sooner rather than later, and she smiled while gently pruning each sapling and making sure they had the right amount of sunlight, shade, and hydration. They were the closest things to children they would ever have, so she paid extra good attention to them.

But as she finished, gathered up her tools, and began the slow walk back to the front porch of their house, she noticed something was off. The front door was open, which wasn’t that unusual in itself, as sometimes they kept the front and back doors open to allow a breeze to come through the house, but what was coming out the front door was alarming.

Smoke.

It wasn’t pouring out, but she definitely saw small puffs of gray smoke escaping through the open door.

Elster’s eyes went wide before she dropped everything and ran as fast as her awkward hooves on the soft, grassy soil would let her. She ran up the stairs and burst into the living room, expecting to see a growing blaze somewhere, but found the living room completely normal. She looked around again, nothing seemed to be coming from the kitchen or bedroom either, but she could smell smoke, it was closeby.

“Ari?!” she loudly called out just in case her wife was asleep in the bedroom.

She then heard coughing coming to her left, where they kept the armchairs and television set, but there was no fire there, either, just Ariane sitting on the floor next to an empty mug and a bottle of water while leaning her back against one of the chairs.

It was something she held between her fingers that was the source of the smoke.

“Hey, Ellie,” Ariane greeted, her voice croaking a bit as she spoke.

Elster raised an eyebrow as she walked over and knelt by Ariane’s side. Her eyes were a little red around the sclera, and she was giving her a very toothy, oblong smile, but otherwise, she seemed fine. She then raised what looked like a small paper tube to her lips and took a shallow breath, the end of the tube lighting up in a soft, orange glow before she held her breath for a few seconds and then slowly released a puff of smoke across her cheek, lightly coughing twice afterwards.

Elster sniffed. It smelled very grassy.

“Ari, what is that?” she asked.

Ariane laughed briefly as she showed her the tube in her hand. “It’s dope,” she said.

Elster blinked and cocked her head to the side as she raised her eyebrow further.

“You know? Pot? Weed? Kush?” Ariane explained, pausing to take another drag and exhale just as Elster looked more and more confused. “It’s marijuana, Ellie.”

Elster narrowed her gaze. “Isn’t that illegal?” she asked.

Ariane dropped her hand to her side and stared right at Elster. “Please tell me you’re not going to be a cop over this.”

“No, no,” Elster replied as she sat down on the ground next to Ariane. “It’s more, where the hell did you get it?”

“I grew it,” Ariane claimed while smiling.

“Here?”

“Where else, dummy?!”

“Ok, ok,” Elster said, raising her palms between them. “But where did you get the seeds?”

“Oh.” Ariane blinked a few times and raised her joint to take another short drag. “Can you believe it? Isa and Erika’s mom gave them to me!”

Elster leaned forward and opened her eyes wide.

“The Itous had all sorts of contraband they shared with me, mostly books and movies, but Anja gave me a few seeds hoping we’d find a place to cultivate them,” Ariane explained. She then leaned her shoulder up against Elster’s and nuzzled her head into the crook of her neck. “She said I’d need it if we ever made planetfall,” she said, chuckling softly to herself.

Elster smiled and extended her arm to wrap around Ariane’s shoulder, hugging her closely and gently as she cooed and giggled against her. She raised her joint to take a new breath but stopped just before her lips.

“Hey,” she called out to her. “Wanna try?”

Elster looked down at the gently smoking joint. “Hmm… would it even have an effect on me?” she asked.

“I dunno? But, your brain is biomechanical, right?”

She nodded. “Partially grown, partially manufactured. Some things are too complex for computers to do, like thought and feeling.”

Ariane shrugged her shoulders and held the joint out to Elster, who took it after a small pause. “Take small puffs to start,” she said, watching as Elster took her first drag. “Hold it for a bit, then slowly exhale.”

Elster predictably coughed up a storm as she exhaled. Ariane rubbed her back as she leaned forward, hacking seemingly endlessly, but as she eventually slowed, Ariane handed her the water bottle.

“Small sip, small breaths,” Ariane told her. Elster nodded and followed her instructions as best they could. They leaned back against the chair. Elster took another, shorter drag and breathed out without any complications. Elster passed the joint back to Ariane, who took a long drag on it before passing it back and clumsily getting to her feet. “You hold onto that for a bit… I’m gonna go make some popcorn before I’m physically incapable of doing most things,” she said, leaning over to kiss the top of her head before she walked off shakily toward the kitchen.

Elster watched her for a while as she nearly tripped over everything on her way to the kitchen, but once she was inside and got a large pot on the stove, she looked back to the still-burning joint and enjoyed the grassy smell for a moment before taking another drag.

…..

“It’s too hot!” Ariane cried as she peeled her damp t-shirt off. Beside her, Elster ate from a large bowl of popcorn and laughed at Ariane’s struggling attempts to take her clothes off, but quickly stopped once it was apparent that she wasn’t wearing a bra. She gulped as she stared at Ariane’s perky, but rounding out breasts, with their nipples poking out semi-firmly, then felt her face redden considerably as she panned down her softening curves to the small folds her well-fed stomach now made when sitting down. She looked further past Ariane’s hips and saw that her pants were hiked just low enough to show off that there was nothing underneath.

“Don’t do anything stupid, Elster,” she said aloud to herself, not realizing right away that she had spoken what was meant to be a private thought.

Ariane turned and raised an eyebrow at her. “Like what, Ellie?” she challenged.

“I want to bury my face into your tummy and kiss you all over your breasts and crotch,” Elster again blurted out, immediately covering her mouth with her hands afterward.

Ariane slowly narrowed her gaze at Elster as she took a small drag from the tiny nub that was all that remained of their joint. “Tell me, what do you like about my body?”

“Everything!” Elster blurted out into her hands, which did a good job of muffling her voice. “But right now,” Ariane reached over and pulled Elster’s hands away from her face so she couldn’t muffle her own words, “I can’t help but admire just how much softer you’ve been getting, not just because it looks amazingly hot and attractive on you but also you look and sound so much happier and I’ve also noticed you appear to be much more relaxed and happy to expose your upper body and it fills my metaphorical heart with mounds of joy that you seem to be loving your body as much as I do and also can I please suck on your tits?”

Ariane dropped the last bit of the joint from her hand in shock but quickly picked it up and put it out in the mug she was using as an ashtray. “Holy fuck, Elster,” she gasped as the Replika buried her head in her hands. “You can’t hold anything back when you’re high, can you?”

“That appears to be the case,” Elster cried through her muffling hands.

Ariane immediately cozied right up next to Elster and peeled her hands away so she could cup her face and kiss her. “Love, that felt amazingly good to hear, like, you just made my fucking day and probably the rest of the week!”

Elster sniffled once and weakly smiled. “Really…?” she asked.

Ariane kissed her three more times on her lips and cheeks. “Totally.”

“I’m so glad,” Elster said, now smiling wide again. “But… can you please not also take your pants off?” she asked, realizing her mistake immediately as Ariane started devilishly grinning.

“Why?”

Elster bit her bottom lip for a few seconds until she couldn’t resist any longer. “Because I don’t think I’ll be able to control myself from not pouncing on you if I get even a little bit hornier!” she blurted out.

Ariane tried to stop herself from laughing but couldn’t, and she pressed her back against the chair as she laughed hard enough to lose her breath. Meanwhile Elster beside cried again into her hands until Ariane broke free from her own laughter’s infectious chord long enough to speak again.

“I’m sorry!” she apologised, still having to hold back a few more chuckles. “I couldn’t resist either!”

“Please… no more…” Elster cried, her sobs slowly starting to choke. “I can’t… handle… any… more!” she roared, erupting into laughter herself, which dragged Ariane right back with her.

And then, Elster surprised Ariane by suddenly grabbing her by the shoulders and kissing her fiercely. Ariane’s initial shock faded after a second and she returned the fervor with full intensity. Elster then gently pushed Ariane down onto her back and climbed atop her, peppering her stomach, breasts, face, and ears with endless kisses and the occasional bite or nibble thrown in. But as she climbed higher down Ariane and started clumsily trying to hook her fingers under the waistband of her pants, Ariane began to complain in between brief bouts of laughter.

“Honey! Honey! Not the floor! Not the Floor!”

Elster paused and looked up at Ariane’s grinning, red flushed face and gave her the strongest, sad puppy-dog look she could muster.

“My back, sweetie, not the floor! My back!” Ariane repeated, and Elster finally nodded even as she continued to pout.

Before she barely had a chance to breathe, Elster stumbled back to her hooves and picked up Ariane off the floor. She yelped in shock as Elster pulled her into a bridle carry, and looked on in horror as Elster tried to carry her to the bedroom door on her incredibly shaky legs.

“I-I can walk, Ellie,” Ariane told her as she narrowly missed walking into a chair. Elster continued on, nearly turning into the kitchen before she closed the rest of the distance to the bedroom door. She pushed the unlocked door open and quickly hopped over to the bed, where Ariane yelped once more as Elster abruptly dropped her onto the bouncy bed. Ariane then struggled to try and take her pants off as Elster threw off her shirt and shorts. She then assisted Ariane by grabbing the hems of her pant legs and pulling hard on them, almost dragging Ariane off the bed itself before they finally peeled away and exposed the growing dampness cascading from her folds down her inner thighs and now dripping onto the sheets. Ariane reached down and dragged a finger across her thigh before holding it up to her face and admiring the work she had already done, but then she looked at Elster and saw the vicious hunger apparent in her eyes, and she stuck it momentarily in her mouth to lick clean.

Elster then climbed frantically over Ariane before she even finished another breath. She moaned into her kiss with Elster as the Replika pressed her palm against her crotch, then moaned harder as Elster lightly bit her lip while she tried to work her fingers through her folds. Ariane caught that her love was struggling and she first rolled them both onto their sides before she climbed atop Elster and guided her hand to where she needed it most. But, not content to let Elster have a monopoly on the fun, Ariane leaned over Elster’s neck and bit her polyethylene collar, which made Elster cry out and jerk her hand inside her lover, making her cry out sharply in turn.

Knowing she had more to explore, Elster looked downwards at Ariane’s body and put her lips over one of her puffy nipples, making her mewl as she sucked hard and poked her areola with her teeth. Ariane arched her back so she could press her chest closer to Elster’s lips and began rocking her hips alongside Elster’s gentle thrusts. The message was clear, and Elster now rolled Ariane onto her back before she took over on top, adding another finger to her folds and pressing her thumb into her aching clit just as she clamped back down on her other teat and teased her nipple with her tongue until it poked out firmly, whereupon she bit it.

Ariane cried out her hardest, and Elster slowed down just as she began to pant and shiver throughout her body. She held her like a delicate porcelain teacup as she rode out the powerful waves of her orgasm. Fluid trailed out her crotch and onto the sheets as Elster slowly began taking her fingers out. She sat on her knees straddling Ariane and waited until she was looking her way before she stuck all of her wet fingers inside her mouth and loudly sucked on them.

“Oh, oh fuck,” Ariane moaned hard. She rapidly tapped her hands against the sheets to her side, unable to decide whether she should try and continue pleasing herself in the embers of her coming, or let herself rest and just try to enjoy the show Elster was putting on for her.

After a few seconds, Elster popped her fingers out, panting in perfect synchrony with Ariane. “How’s… that…?” she asked.

“We have got to get high again,” Ariane said.

Elster put her middle finger back in her mouth, swirling it around as she lowered herself above Ariane, holding her upper body up with just her elbow to the side of her head. “Are you… still hungry?” she asked after drawing the damp finger from her mouth and drawing it across Ariane’s cheek.

Ariane couldn’t stop herself from reaching for her crotch and sticking two of her fingers up herself. “Yes, oh fuck, yes, Elster,” she cried, only for Elster to stick her middle finger into her panting mouth, where she sucked on it furiously.

Elster removed her finger after a moment, letting Ariane mewl again as she continued to frantically finger herself. She captured her lips with a long kiss and began to kiss a trail down her body afterwards, going from her cheek, to her neck, her collar, her breasts, her stomach, her hand atop her folds, and then ending at her soft inner thighs. Ariane understood her wife’s intent and retreated her hand to lick clean while she raised her knees and sandwiched Elster’s head with her thighs. Elster drew her tongue up Ariane’s labia and paused to admire her soft, white, fluffy mound as Ariane moaned into her fingers. Elster then pressed her lips over Ariane’s glistening folds and gently coaxed her tongue inside, wasting no time in moving upwards to rub her clit. Ariane dropped her hand from her mouth and moaned and wanted openly into the air, occasionally squeezing Elster’s head with her soft, plushy thighs as she jerked her hips upward into Elster’s face.

It was at that point that Elster felt a small pang of regret as she felt down her own crotch only to find nothing there.

“Hey, come here,” Ariane called out to her, relaxing her thighs so Elster could look up at her with her tranced face. She beckoned her closer her hands and quickly grabbed a pair of pillows to prop her head up with as Elster placed herself directly above Ariane’s face.

Ariane reached up and began sucking on Elster’s formless crotch. At the same time, she ran her fingernails up and down Elster’s back with increasing pressure, with her wife starting to pant harder and harder as she dug her fingertips in more and more. She trailed her hands down to Elster’s rear and squeezed the soft polyethylene flesh there as she raked her bottom teeth against Elster’s crotch, and she had to put a hand against the wall in front of her to keep herself balanced. Elster’s thighs began to tremble, and Ariane moved one hand down to resume fingering herself as she drew the other up to Elster’s stomach, digging her index finger in where her navel would be and sharply dragging it down until she touched her nose. She picked up the intensity in thrusting into herself just as she took her lips off Elster’s crotch only to replace them with her thumb, which she pressed as hard as she could into the harder shell there just as she turned to bite hard into Elster’s inner thigh.

“Ariane, oh! Fuck!” Elster suddenly cried out as her whole body jerked and spasmed. She clamped her thighs hard around Ariane’s head just as she got close to finishing herself off in turn, and as she joined her wife in the throes of passion, each lost a little bit of themselves as they toyed with the limits of Elster's physical reality within their hedonistic high.

“Fuck you taste good, Ellie,” Ariane teased after she was able to catch her breath. “Thank you for sharing your nectar with me,” she thanked, kissing Elster one last time on her crotch.

Elster took a little longer to come back to her senses, but eventually, she shook her head briefly before looking down and smiling at Ariane. “It’s hard to explain how, but… I just got this overwhelmingly powerful feeling that somewhere out there… Lilith is feeling immensely proud of me,” she said.

“She’d be right to, love,” Ariane replied, and she pulled herself up Elster to kiss her just as she walked herself back down from her head.

“Fuck,” Elster gasped when they finally broke for breath. “We have got to get high again,” she repeated to Ariane before collapsing down to her side next to her.

Ariane rolled onto her side facing Elster and smirked at her. Elster smiled back, and the two pecked each other on the lips before giggling in unison.

“You’re not done, are you?” Ariane quietly and sweetly asked.

“Ha,” Elster panted, laughing briefly to herself. “Honestly, I got hungrier after that.”

Ariane laughed alongside her before she cozied herself up against Elster. “Well, I’d be fine with becoming a vegetable and not walking at all tomorrow, how about you?”

Elster grabbed Ariane’s shoulders and rolled her onto her back as she devoured her with her eyes.

“I thought you’d never ask.”