…..

…..

…. No, it’s, it’s fine, he’s allowed to use. Their time together. To show him. What he means. It’s. It’s for bridges of communication and and and it’s. It’s okay. She can consent, none of Zash’s previous partners can do so, and she’s not against someone being introduced to porn human reproductive practices through her.

(But she’s going to be super embarrassed and hide about it. Squeak. Yes she’s sure about this but no she’s not going to look at either of them about it BYE)

Here it goes.

(It's kind of hot. He hopes Yvette doesn't mind that he finds it kind of hot.)

Humans feel that way about breeding?????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????

Evolution has caused humans to have erogenous zones and those trigger emotional responses so yes actually! Humans feel that way about breeding! And other sorts of things that aren't breeding but that involve breeding organs!! And then for some reason humans also evolved erotic responses in body parts that aren't directly used for breeding, such as breasts, or necks, or inner thighs, or...

And... they feel private about it. And Zash was suggesting that they do something like that together? Because it feels nice?

It wasn't a serious suggestion, it was kind of a joke.

He doesn't understand why it's funny.

It's funny in a 'playful wordplay that will often unbalance humans' kind of way, because humans are weird about this subject. See: their human right now. Who is still helpfully assisting in translation/communication even while she's slowly turning pink. Look, her ears are now pink!!

(She doesn't mind that Zash finds it hot. ... It is admittedly kind of hot.)

So... it's funny because... humans... don't usually breed... and think breeding is a private topic... and so bringing it up breaks the expectation for normal social interactions while... simultaneously being about a social taboo.

How can something be funny when you need to keep track of so many different things for it to make sense???

He loves Nai so much.

Nai kind of feels like he's being made fun of.

No, he's legitimately very cute, and human culture sounds incredibly insane when he describes it. It's kind of amazing, especially in contrast to her own experience. As a certified once-human, it was absolutely normal to keep track of lots of these social things because ?? something about humans being very social and liking reliable expectations and set cultures about stuff. She's not entirely sure. She went into engineering, she is not a very social human.

He's never going to understand any of this.

Yes he will, Zash believes in him.

...also Zash is kind of starting to cry again. That's a thing that's happening.

...why??? Nai isn't crying anymore and he's the one who had an unexpectedly pleasant surprise after being very sad for a while.

(Which is Naispeak for "oh oh oh no I don't know what to do please don't cry why are you crying?? I didn't mean it I swear", Zash helpfully translates to Yvette. While still crying.)

(Honestly it's so useful that they can still manage to translate to each other while Having Emotions! Go them.)

Zash is going through an adjustment period and hadn't let himself cry in a very long time; this involves a lot of crying. Which is fine, poor man needs it so much, it's (one of the reasons) why she's required to be in constant physical contact for the foreseeable future. He is crying from relief because he missed Nai so much and here he is, he's back. The Nai Zash loves, not the Knives that Zash had... kind of super complicated feelings about.

...but... he was here all along.

Was he, actually? Or was it Knives? If Zash walked into February, would it be Nai or Knives that would've greeted him?

Yeah.

He really, really missed you, Nai.

Snuuuuuuuuggle. They're really cute and she's really glad they can be together properly now.

.... Do either of them mind if she just, you know, scootches them all over to the console and gets back to some kind of work...? Listen she's an unapologetic workaholic, it's how she copes with things, okay.

This is stupid, is what Nai thinks as he unceremoniously floats them all at the same time so they can go be by the console. Why would anyone need to scootch? He is made of Nai. He can do these things.

Zash starts sobbing.