Feathered Hearts - Eros

As Marco ‘rolled’ the next show of the night, Fortrakt might have been disappointed by the sudden lack of sex among the six of them if he wasn’t so quickly and utterly taken by the latest human movie being projected onto the back wall.

It began with a minute-long display of ‘credits’ that involved multiple movie companies with some rather elaborate graphics, including the image of an enormous tree. When Gilda snarked about the overly-long introduction, Chris pointed out that it was a good thing—that the various companies listed belonged to both sides of the former conflict that the movie was to portray.

“They handled the scenes involving their own respective side in order to keep as much realism as possible,” he explained, to which Giraldi nodded in approval.

A sourceless voice that Tara said was from a former leader of their nation was heard talking about imminent war, and a caption thrown up on the screen about a minute in said that it was “a true account of the events that led to the most important naval battle in American history—one single day that turned the tide of war in the Pacific.” It went on to say that the world itself was ‘now at war’ and a ‘blitzkrieg’ had overrun ‘Europe’.

“Blitzkrieg?” Giraldi pronounced the odd word as he settled in behind a lying Marco with a fresh bowl of cider, nestling his spear between the human tiercel’s fleshy flanks. “That sounds like the language of pony Germaneigh. I believe it means ‘lightning war’?” He turned to Chris for confirmation.

“You got it, big guy. Blitzkrieg was a radical new doctrine of war that proved brutally effective in the opening years of the conflict, enabling Germany and her allies to conquer nation after nation. And as for ‘Europe’, that’s our equivalent of Aresia. In our world, it isn’t controlled by one country but is broken into dozens, most with entirely different languages and cultures,” he explained, causing Fortrakt to blink at the idea of their continent fractured so heavily.

Aresia NOT under the rule of a single kingdom? How strange…

“It’s a movie about Earth’s Second World War,” Marco added as the scene shifted to show not combat, but some uniformed humans trying to comically catch ducks with nets in a snowstorm; they were doing so in front of a bright red pagoda that looked right out of Neighpon. “One of the two theaters of war was the Pacific Ocean—what the ponies call the Sea of Serenity.”

“Which is a really weird name for it,” Chris mused as he continued to walk around filling bowls and mugs with a quite prominent erection; he took some pains to bump Fortrakt’s beak with it as he passed. “It’s way too big to be a sea, and in our world, that’s the name of a dark area on the moon, never mind the fact the Pacific Ocean is often anything but serene. Do griffons have a different name for it?” he asked idly as a blushing Fortrakt found he couldn’t resist a lick of the offered organ, which had given him so much pleasure not long earlier.

I want it back in me! he realized in amazement, even after getting to be with both Gilda and Tara just minutes earlier. He then wondered what it might feel like to have a griffon spear with a bulbed base and tapered tip inside him instead. Maybe I’ll find out! Maybe Giraldi will want to try me next…? He couldn’t quite bring himself to urge it, even if the thought brought a renewed twitch of his endlessly swollen spear.

“We don’t, as we have no borders near that ocean and it is much too far away for us to conduct trade with the races there,” Giraldi said with a grunt as he began to grind himself happily against the human male’s backside, earning Fortrakt’s renewed envy at the attention. “Not when it’s three thousand leagues away.”

“And who would we conduct trade with there, anyway? The Ibex? The Dragons? The Kitsune? The Tanuki? Or maybe the long-gone Elder Rams or Kirin?” Gilda snorted with a roll of her eyes, already looking bored with the proceedings as the movie shifted to show what looked like a state dinner involving soldiers from multiple militaries and some tragically overcooked ducks.

“From what I’ve heard, it’s all earthquakes, volcanoes and magic-charged typhoons out that way, so the dragons and the rest can have it. And by the crows, what they did to those ducks is a damned atrocity! That just killed my appetite, so if I don’t start seeing less talk and more action soon, you can turn this off.” She motioned with her head at the screen.

“Yeah, that duck looked overcooked and very unappetizing,” Chris agreed over the sound of popping corn. “It must have been very dry and tasteless. You know I’d do it better.”

“You and me both, buddy. We’ll make some for you guys later and do it right. In the meantime, just watch,” Marco instructed as he remained laid out on the plush carpeted floor before Giraldi, who draped himself over the smaller human to happily use him as a floor pillow. The large earth griffon tiercel continued to occasionally grind his still-erect spear between Marco’s ‘cheeks’, as Fortrakt had so daintily heard humans refer to flanks, briefly closing his eyes in pleasure as he did so.

“Watch what? A bunch of dweeby humans eating burnt meat and speaking Neighponese?” Gilda rolled her eyes, to which Tara reached up to pull her head into a kiss. The minor intimacy instantly silenced her; the human woman stilling her griffon lover further by pulling a set of talons directly onto her impressive breast.

“I know you’re impatient, Gilda, but they’re just setting the scene and letting you know what’s up. Trust me, I’ve seen this—you’ll get what you want. And I promise you’re going to love it.” She snuggled into her eagless lover’s form a little deeper, whose cheeks flushed. Gilda immediately accepted the invitation to begin kneading Tara’s large chest-mounted mammary, posessively resting her other set of talons on The human female’s deliciously curved flank.

“Seconded. I can’t wait to see how you guys react to more modern human battle scenes!” Marco exchanged a conspiratorial smile with Chris and Tara, who returned equally knowing grins and winks as Fortrakt watched from beside them. With Chris still up preparing another round of popcorn, the young tiercel was alone just then, but he didn’t mind. He found himself content to take in both the movie and the suggestive scenery around him, especially since he didn’t even have to encourage it now. “If you liked 300, I swear you’re going to be blown away by this.”

“I will hold you to that, Marco Lakan,” Giraldi told him, settling in on top of him more fully. “But even if not, I have all I need right here…” he rumbled happily, nibbling briefly at Marco’s ear with his beak.

For Fortrakt’s part, he found his tail twitching with nervousness and anticipation; even his spear seemed to respond to the promise of impending action by swelling up further. He couldn’t fathom a war that involved the whole world, though it was said that the great Pony/Gryphon conflict came close at times for how many races and nations it eventually swept up into its maelstrom.

He gathered this scene was taking place before the coming conflict, with the two future belligerents discussing the tensions between them. They spoke of war, or at least the chance of one, and the background music that played over them was suitably ominous and brooding, gaining his immediate attention.

Humans really do have good music, he decided, and they’ve mated it with their movies well!

Gilda, however, remained unimpressed. “So far, this is just a bunch of dweeby talk,” she snarked a couple more minutes in as she sipped more whiskey-spiked cider from her bowl, sharing it with Tara. “I get it; there’s going to be a war. So start fighting already!”

“Just wait,” Marco replied easily as Giraldi’s eyes were fixed on the screen from above and behind him, while a cleaned-up Chris scooped the hot popcorn into bowls for them to eat. Fortrakt might have felt guilty about the amount of laundry they’d already created for the hotel staff, who had seen him make a mess of himself in his room’s tub earlier, but he found he simply didn’t care much about such trivial concerns as privacy or modesty just then.

Even after all that had happened since, the thought of being witnessed covered in his own cream by the two cleaning mares brought a smile to his face and a renewed erection to his loins as he lay back against Tara at the human woman’s invitation. He felt Ancestor-blessed anew as she reached down his body to fondle his splayed wings and flight muscles while Gilda continued to grope the human breasts he was shortly pillowed against, squeezing them against his feathered head.

It was an act both possessive and pleasurable, and he might have enjoyed that even more if the movie had not already so thoroughly grabbed his interest. As Gilda said, the characters spoke the exotic pony tongue of Neighponese at times, which he didn’t understand, though the movie was polite enough to provide them equivalent Equish text in what Chris called ‘subtitles’. It enabled him to follow the conversations, even if he agreed with another remark from Gilda that it was at least slightly annoying having to watch, listen and read at the same time.

Fortunately, the two main characters switched to Equish halfway through their talk, which went on for the first four minutes or so, leaving no doubt that the two nations and militaries they represented were on a collision course. But before Fortrakt could inquire further as to what they were talking about—China? Fourteen-inch gun? And what’s so important about ‘oil’ that they need to import seventy percent of it?—the conversation ended and the scene shifted, jumping ahead several years.

The word “MIDWAY” was splashed across the image in big red letters that the pink in his vision made all but glow. And then the camera panned across what looked like an ocean surface to reveal…

Fortrakt gaped, his beak falling open as he saw a fleet of massive metal seaships cutting through the waves, far larger than anything the Kingdom had in their airship navy. The one in front showed a nearly flat top with a single prominence located midship while the others further back were smaller with odd protrusions.

“By the Ancestors…” Despite how comfortable he was against Tara, the young tiercel had to raise his head to stare at them, and so did Giraldi from where he lay atop Marco. Even Gilda fell silent at the incredible sight, but only after ordering Fortrakt to ‘move his crow-damned beak’ aside so she could see. “What is that?”

“Like it says in the caption, the USS Enterprise. An aircraft carrier from eighty years ago,” Chris explained with a slightly smug grin as he placed a fresh bowl of popcorn beside them; the movie showing the flat area of the metal ship filled with lightly-dressed human males that appeared to be engaging in various forms of exercise. “To this day, they’re the pride of the U.S. Navy.”

“Aircraft?” Gilda repeated the odd word, her gold eyes riveted on the screen as the figures showed the immense scale of the seagoing ship as the camera seemingly panned backwards. “You mean like those ‘airplanes’ we saw in the other movies? And it ‘carries’ them? How?” she suddenly asked.

“Wait for it…” Marco instructed, and then suddenly the screen was filled with the image of what Fortrakt could only describe as a large metallic bird—some kind of flying machine painted gray but adorned with a stylized blue-and-white star on its side. And inside it were not one but two humans, with the one in front somehow controlling it!

“Crows above… and what is that?” he had to ask again, raising a talon to point while staring in awe of it.

“That, my well-hung friend, is a Douglas SBD ‘Dauntless’ dive bomber,” Chris answered easily but nonsensically. He spoke with an air that told Fortrakt it was a topic he knew well and enjoyed talking about as Marco froze the image just as the humans inside started chatting. “Nicknamed ‘Slow But Deadly’ by its crews, it was one of the most famous warplanes of World War Two. Built as a bomber but also able to give a very good account of itself in air-to-air combat against faster and more agile opponents.”

Gilda screwed up her face. “They’re for air combat? But how? They seem so ungainly…” she protested, her foretalons suddenly still against Tara’s chest; Fortrakt glanced up briefly to see her two digits were frozen in mid-rub against the human woman’s prominent teats. “They look really heavy and they’re completely rigid in build. How can they even get off the ground? Or change direction without being able to tilt their wings or lean their bodies?”

Fortrakt guessed that the front-mounted propellers had something to do with both, given they had similar ones on their airships, if back-mounted and much slower-moving. But he kept silent as Giraldi spoke up next.

“I know not, but such a remarkable machine…” He sat up off a disappointed Marco and leaned closer to the screen to get a closer look as the two humans talked—wait, were they going to try to land such an unlikely vehicle on the flat-topped ship? “I would never have imagined that humans had invented artificial ways to fly if not by airships!”

“Oh, we tried those for a while, but technology quickly outpaced them. As for how they’re controlled, look closely,” Chris instructed with a knowing glance at Marco, who had propped himself up on his elbows as Giraldi sat up off him, the tip of the latter’s erect tiercel spear still snugly nestled between the human male’s flanks.

“There are control surfaces. That upright tail has a rudder like a ship that allows it to turn left or right. It can nose up or down with elevators on the small rear wings. And the big wings have what are called Ailerons which allow them to bank to either side. All of them can be manipulated at once by the pilot—the one in front—to go in any direction he wants. If he’s skilled enough, he can do just about anything you guys can in the air, except it’s much faster. And very heavily armed for the day.”

“Armed?” Fortrakt chorused along with Giraldi and Gilda. “How? I don’t see anything like a crossbow or airship cannon on them,” he had to ask despite his still-erect and tingling member, which Tara needed no mental encouragement to reach down and slowly stroke with both hands.

“Then prepare to be educated in human firepower, my griffon friends,” Marco promised with a conspiratorial grin an enrapt Fortrakt could all but hear. “Just to give Goldberg and company the finger, we’re gonna show you all the stuff they said we couldn’t.”

“’Fire power’? Then those ‘fighters’ can produce dragon-like gouts of flame?” Giraldi peered curiously at the metal bird; Fortrakt began looking for ports through which such a thing could be emitted.

Wait—was that what the odd metal tubes the Marines held were actually for? Did they throw flames like a dragon? That would make an excellent intelligence report for Tribune Narada! he realized, suddenly eager to describe all his experiences with the humans that night to her.

Especially the erotic ones! I’m sure she’d LOVE to hear how much fun humans can be! He imagined himself giving lessons on them to other griffons with Chris and Tara later, showing by example with the latter and Gilda how he could pleasure not one but two gorgeous eaglesses at once.

“Not exactly,” Chris chuckled along with Marco and Tara. “You can’t see them because they’re embedded in the nose and fuselage, but they’re armed with two forward-facing fifty-cal M2 Brownings—‘Ma Deuce’ in military parlance; that weapon is so good it’s still used to this day—and two rear-facing thirty-cals to fend off pursuit. That’s partly what the rear guy is for. He’s a gunner, as well as a radio and radar operator.”

“Gunner?” Fortrakt’s eyes furrowed at the unfamiliar term—the closest word he could think of was ‘gun’, which was what Minotaurs sometimes called the ballistae they made that equipped most Kingdom airships and siege engines.

“I have heard that term from the soldiers I helped train in Equestria. They used it not only for airship cannons, but to describe the pegasi of their newly reformed Aerial Corps who fired lightning bolts from clouds at enemy forces. But the context here seems… strange.” Giraldi noted as he stared at the frozen image of the plane on the screen. “Does that curious craft shoot lightning, too?” he asked, to which Tara chuckled.

“In a manner of speaking, Galen. But how do you know all that, Chris?” Tara asked from behind Fortrakt, to which the pale-skinned and red-haired human only grinned; Fortrakt was so enrapt by the display of the flying machine in front of the ‘carrier’ that he couldn’t even think of anything he wanted Chris to do as he continued to tend the popcorn, delivering it to each group in turn.

“Eh, I minored in history and had a huge interest in World War Two as a kid. Made a slew of warplane models and visited every military museum and old ship I could. Even thought I might want to get a pilot’s license once, so I trained as one on a turboprop for a bit in my early twenties. But it turned out to be too much of a commitment for all the other stuff I was doing, like my masters and doctorate,” he explained, almost wistfully.

“To see stuff like this now, it almost makes me regret it. I could have had my commercial license by now and be well-paid to ferry around passengers and cargo alike. I’d be my own boss and wouldn’t have to put up with the usual garbage from the university, either.”

“Yeah, but then you wouldn’t have met us,” Tara replied, reaching over to squeeze his hand briefly as he sat down between Giraldi and Gilda, rubbing the former’s shoulders, who rumbled happily.

“And none of us would now be here enjoying the company of griffies.” Marco wriggled his rear against Giraldi’s shaft.

“Crows take it… do you have to call us that?” Fortrakt heard Gilda ask in annoyance from behind him. “It’s really dweeby and insulting. Would you want us to call you ‘humies’?”

“I’m afraid I must agree, Marco Lakan,” Giraldi added. He gently grasped Marco’s shoulders in an intimate manner as the latter sat up beside him opposite Chris, kneading the normally taboo area with his talons happily for a moment despite his reproachful air. “It does seem to be a rather condescending term.”

Marco grimaced despite the First Spear’s affectionate touch, allowing Giraldi to pull him against his side. “Point taken,” he apologized, reaching up to squeeze Giraldi’s talons briefly while he moved his laptop closer. “Then I promise I won’t use it again. So now that initial explanations are over with, shall I resume the movie?” he poised a single finger over his portal device.

“By all means,” Giraldi answered as Chris instantly obeyed Fortrakt’s urging to reach in to grasp the earth griffon’s spear; he did so just as the big earth griffon sat up with his wings splayed. “Let us see what these curious human ‘warplanes’ can do…”

* * * * *

Somewhat to Fortrakt’s frustration and Gilda’s continued impatience, combat wasn’t immediately shown as the movie continued to introduce characters and ‘set the scene’, as Tara had termed it.

But they got a quick example of the extent the humans could control their artificial flying constructs, especially when the ‘pilot’ showed he could land his plane on the flat surface of the ‘carrier’ by gliding it in. It also turned out that his guess was right—that the rapidly spinning blades at the front of his ‘fighter’ served the same function as airship propellers, except they pulled instead of pushed the craft forward as was the case on the Kingdom’s airships.

Over the objections of the blue-shirted ‘gunner’—“the pilot is always an officer, while the gunner is always enlisted; that’s why they’re dressed differently,” Chris pointed out—the pilot turned the propellers off, causing them to rapidly spin to a halt. He then turned his bird slightly sideways in the air despite the protests of the younger human behind him; he didn’t understand what they were saying except the one controlling the ‘plane’ said it might somehow ‘save their lives’ someday.

The ‘Dauntless’ then acted in flight just like he would if he just kept his wings stretched and didn’t move them, gliding in towards the metal ship. At first, it seemed like it was going too low, and apparently those on board the ‘carrier’ agreed, but then he suddenly popped back up and landed hard on the deck, a hook on the bottom of the metal beast snagging a wire which then dragged it to a halt!

“Ancestors, that’s amazing…” he admitted, fully able to appreciate the skill it took.

“Indeed,” Giraldi agreed. “He knows his metal mount well to be able to land it when damaged, which I gather is what he was simulating. It’s also a very clever mechanical trick to have retractable wheels upon which it can land,” he mused aloud. “I daresay even the minotaurs would have trouble making their machines mimic that.”

“Then I guess you’re both easily impressed,” Fortrakt knew from long experience that Gilda was forcing an indifferent attitude even though she had her own sense of wonder at the sight. “So they can fly and glide in—big deal! We can do that without any wires, rudders or propellers.”

Chris turned to her and smirked, his hand still stroking Giraldi’s organ. “Oh, really? And can you fly nine hundred leagues without rest, cover one hundred eighty of them in an hour, and carry two thousand pony pounds of explosive ordinance to a target, Gilda?” he asked with a smug grin as he continued to erotically attend Giraldi. “Because that plane can.”

His words caused Fortrakt to blink as Gilda fell silent. “That fast?” he asked aloud in wonder. “We can only reach that speed in a dive!”

“And they carry explosives?” Fortrakt heard Giraldi perk up further. “For what purpose? And how do they deliver them to a target without cannons?”

“I could explain, but you’ll just have to wait and see, big guy,” Chris told him in a sound not far removed from a feline purr as a glance showed that he and Marco continued to rub up against the big earth griffon tiercel, running their paws and talons all over him. Giraldi responded by hugging the pair loosely with his still-stiffened wings and sitting up a little straighter, allowing his engorged spear to jut out further between his legs.

“Yeah, yeah. Fine, they’re fast, and the human riders are clever despite their dweeby outfits and wearing a yellow bib. But how do they fight?” Gilda asked as the pilot’s comrade boasted about going to somewhere called ‘Pearl Harbor’ and ‘pouring a beer’ out on the beach for him with a mutual friend. “Enough lame talk! You said this was a war movie from the biggest war in humanity’s history? Well, I want a battle!”

“Patience, Gilds,” Tara assured her, reaching up with one hand to squeeze Gilda’s talons against her, causing them to immediately relax against her soft flesh. “It’s coming and coming quick. December 7th, 1941 is called a ‘Day of Infamy’ in our country for a reason.”

“Day of infamy?” Fortrakt recalled that the date of December 7th by the pony calendar had been splashed on the screen, leaving him wondering despite how comfortable he was against Tara’s soft body and breasts from what point they measured years from. 1941? But the pony calendar counts from Celestia’s ascension to alicorn and taking control of the sun some eighteen hundred years ago… “Then what—?”

He stopped at an upraised hand from Chris, which he’d quickly learned meant the same thing as a griffon holding up a wing towards somecreature. “I’m sorry to keep saying this, but just keep watching, Fortrakt,” he said with a sly grin, reaching into the popcorn bowl between them as a massive section of the deck suddenly lowered to reveal the cavernous interior of the ‘carrier’, causing Fortrakt’s jaw to fall open anew to see at least a dozen of the metal birds within. “It’ll happen in just a couple more minutes.”

The scene shifted again to show a mustachioed human wearing a brown uniform with a necktie on board a large warship that a red caption said was the USS Arizona, which appeared to be another enormous ship with frighteningly large cannons that was anchored by a dock. He was wearing what looked like a more formal uniform with two yellow stripes on his shoulders—a rank insignia?—removing some sort of luggage from a metal locker.

It was a sunny morning as the human officer approached a younger human that looked barely out of cubhood in a white uniform with a blue neck scarf. The latter was setting up metal chairs for what sounded like some kind of religious service, to which he first complained about the heat and then turned up his nose and said he didn’t believe in whatever deity humans worshiped.

His remark earned a slight harrumph and a teasing tone from the officer. “Well, that’s because your only religion is chasing tail! And the Navy ain’t gonna pay you for that.”

The words elicited a series of guffaws from Giraldi, resulting the movie being paused again. “My apologies. It’s just that that I have said much the same thing at times to newly minted soldiers who were slacking in their duties. And yet, here I now find myself enjoying human ‘tail’ while on duty for the Kingdom…” he trailed off as a sudden whine was heard in the distance that resolved into a swarm of human planes. They were of slightly different colors and shapes than the ones they’d already seen; green or white in hue with each marked with a large red-filled circle where the star had been on the earlier craft.

It wasn’t clear what was happening to either Fortrakt or the characters in the movie until the planes suddenly launched arrow after glowing explosive arrow that impacted the sides and surfaces of the ships, turning whatever they struck into rended metal and outright flame.

“Incoming!”the surprised and visibly fearful officer said as whatever glowing arrows hit all around them, shortly striking down several other humans on the deck of the ship.

“Ancestors…” Fortrakt breathed as the brutal attack unfolded, with the human ships erupting into flame one after the other with no retaliation. “Those ‘warplanes’ are armed with repeating crossbows firing ultra-powerful bolts? How is that even possible…?” he wondered aloud, watching the attack unfold in amazement.

“They’re called bullets, not bolts, Fortrakt,” Chris said as Giraldi continued to stare and even Gilda had fallen completely silent. “And like I said, they’re fired from miniature cannons mounted on the wings or nose we call ‘guns’. They’re very powerful and can even shred metal, let alone living bodies,” Chris said as he rubbed against Giraldi even harder to the sight while a grinning Marco had pulled his portal device from somewhere to record their reactions, including Giraldi’s agape beak.

But then the scene shifted once more to show a young human girl dressed in a skirt apparently playing by herself, standing up to stare at the scene across the bay. She clearly didn’t comprehend what she was seeing, and worse, the seaships under attack were uncomfortably close with her mother nowhere in sight.

“No!” Giraldi exclaimed as he spotted the human youngling; Fortrakt turned to see him standing up and crouching. He pushed Chris and Marco away as he flared his wings for flight, ready to launch himself right into the picture. Then he blinked and caught himself as everyone turned to stare, baring his throat towards Gilda as Marco paused the playback. “My apologies, Decurion. I am a parent. And I fear I nearly acted as one to the sight of an endangered cub.”

She glanced over just long enough to smirk at him. “So like any good dweeb, you want to fly right into the movie to save a little girl who isn’t in any actual danger?”

“Be nice, Gilda,” Tara admonished her as the movie resumed and the girl’s mother came out to retrieve her, though she didn’t know anything was amiss until the dishes she was washing inside the human home rattled to a distant rumble. “He’s a father. And if he reacts like that to the sight of an endangered child, it means he’s a good one.”

“Thank you, Tara Fields.” Giraldi bared his throat towards her. “At least somecreature appreciates the protective instincts of a sire.”

“Whatever. But me, I admit I’m coming to appreciate what those ‘warplanes’ can do…” Gilda replied as the movie resumed and the incredible aerial attack continued, if only briefly interrupted again by another scene inside a different human home that showed the officer they’d first met in Neighpon being informed of the attack over a human ‘telephone’.

But before Gilda could complain about the interruption of action, the movie returned to the horrifically one-sided battle—did the ships have no means of defense and were there no warplanes of their own they could fight back with?

He got an answer to at least one of those questions quickly, as caught completely by surprise, the humans were struggling to respond at first, trying to tend their wounded. But finally, a few repeating crossbow cannon mounts came into the fray, firing back at the invading aircraft—well, what else could he call them? They were somehow a cross between both, given they could launch arrows of their own repeatedly, though they were hard-pressed to target the quick moving raiders.

And then the question of how the planes delivered explosives was answered as a single large object fell from the bottom of one and plunged right through the hull of the ship. Nothing happened for a moment, but the look of abject horror on the face of the officer and the one scarfed sailor he’d been talking to spoke volumes.

“Take cover!” he shouted as it proved to be some kind of horrifically powerful cannonball whose explosion blasted the fore of the enormous metal ship apart.

“Ancestors…” was all Fortrakt could say again, having thought when he’d first seen them that such large metallic constructs were all but invincible to cannon fire. The deep pink in his vision enhanced the flames and sounds to the point they seemed like they were really happening directly before him; he swore he could smell the odor of burning metal for just a bare moment.

“I see… so they simply drop their cannonballs onto the ships, which dwarf the power of our own…” Giraldi breathed softly.

“You got it. And it takes considerable skill to drop one on target from a moving warplane like that,” Chris said solemnly. “Skill the Japanese Navy had at the beginning of the war.”

“Navy?” Gilda repeated dumbly. “The attackers are Navy?”

“Imperial Japanese Navy. You saw one of our aircraft carriers, right? Well, this strike was launched from no less than six Japanese carriers who snuck close to the Hawaiian Islands and attacked it without warning,” Marco noted.

“Not quite true…” Chris corrected from the other side of Giraldi. “We had plenty of warning, but it was either misinterpreted or not passed along due to what can only be described as a comedy of errors. And the formal Japanese declaration of war was late arriving, but we’d already intercepted it and knew an attack was coming. We just didn’t know where, never dreaming they’d hit Pearl out of a mixture of denial and wishful thinking. So we didn’t even have a single fighter of our own up,” he recalled.

“The movie doesn’t show it, but pretty much every single warplane we had was destroyed on the ground and never got airborne. So the Japanese met with no resistance other than ground fire, which was very inaccurate. Especially when you’re not practiced at it.”

“I’ve got another movie that does show the full extent of the attack in a much longer sequence than this one,” Marco added from beside Giraldi. “The battle scenes are very good, but I’m still not sure I’d show it to you. Because even I find the first two-thirds of Michael Bay’s Pearl Harbor movie really dweeby,” he said with a grin and glance at Gilda. Fortrakt couldn’t see her reaction while still laying against Tara, but he could well imagine his superior smirking in reply.

“You said it,” Tara agreed from behind him. “After so much schmaltz, I was rooting for the Japanese by the time the raid hit.”

All talk ceased anew as they were then shown a scene of the entire harbor under attack with every ship within it afire.

“Crows above…” Gilda finally sounded impressed. “Is it wrong this is turning me on?” he felt her begin kneading Tara’s mammaries and pushing them into the sides of Fortrakt’s head again, prompting Tara herself to squeeze his throbbing and drooling organ anew.

“Just wait, it gets better,” Marco told her as he stood up, exchanging a knowing grin with Chris as Giraldi remained standing, staring fixedly at the projected image. “Enjoying yourself, big guy?”

“Immensely,” he confirmed distractedly as Fortrakt glanced back to see Marco move behind the First Spear and began kneading his flanks. He moved on quickly to groping his enormous orbs, which caused Giraldi’s tail to rise, dragged right between Marco’s legs and over his enormous spear. Willing Chris to pause the movie again, Fortrakt turned his attention on them fully, urging Marco to place the tip of his spear against Giraldi’s anal opening again, which was at perfect hip level for the taller human when they were standing.

And what more evidence do we need that human spears and nests are meant for us? he thought in heady delight. They’re always at our eye and tail level!

Despite Fortrakt’s delight, Giraldi’s orange eyes flashed as Marco dared again to take a dominant position with him, giving a warning trill and ruffling his feathers. “You presume far too much, Marco Lakan,” he warned, his tail suddenly lashing and hind claws splaying. But he also made no move to resist as Marco lubed the opening with the clear fluid his human spear was drizzling again, working it inside him with a single thumb talon.

“I presume you’re going to love this, big guy…” The darker-skinned human male said slightly shakily, visibly trembling in what Fortrakt took to be both fear and excitement as he used both thumbs to stretch the earth griffon’s sphincter out before inserting his spear fully despite the implicit threat. “And so will I!” he announced as he claimed the big tiercel’s tail for a second time, beginning to thrust into him with increasing abandon.

“Go, Marco, go…” Chris silently breathed as he began stroking himself to the sight alongside Fortrakt, who was watching in wonder as the First Spear’s cheeks flushed and beak gaped in what the younger griffon guessed was less from the intrusion than pure disbelief over what he was allowing Marco to do. His reaction and obvious enjoyment was only intensified when he began pushing back against the human tiercel as Chris reached under him to stroke his spear, causing his hips to buck once. He shortly found himself in a state of full sensual surrender to the two amorous human males, allowing them to have their way with him and do whatever they wished.

“Ancestors above… what manner of creatures are these human males that they could seduce me with movies instead of a mating round?” a suddenly dazed Giraldi wondered aloud as Marco hilted himself inside him and his spear spurted hard in response onto the floor beneath him. “And how can such a skinny but large-speared tiercel reduce me to a mere eagless, so willing and eager to be tucked?” he asked the world at large as Marco began to piston his hips harder, his hands planted firmly on the First Spear’s flanks.

“I don’t know, but me and Marco aren’t complaining! So don’t fight it, big guy!” Chris implored him as he reached over to restart the movie without ever losing his grip on Giraldi’s spear. “Just enjoy it…” he added huskily as the scene shifted back to the ship where the officer and a few crew were lying dazed by the explosion of the plane-dropped bomb.

They rose to witness the awful damage to their now gutted and fire-filled ship, which was already beginning to list hard, leaning towards another, smaller ship alongside it. The scarfed sailor the officer had originally been speaking to tried to stand up by grasping a metal rail only to recoil as the newly hot surface seared his hands, leaving them burned and bloodied.

Fortrakt winced and several sharp intakes of griffon breath were heard as the young tiercel could well imagine how painful such an injury would be on soft human flesh. A single crewhuman on the smaller ship then tossed them a rope which was tied off to both vessels; the officer then told the young crewman to use the rope to climb over.

“I can’t!” he cried, showing his burned palms. “My hands are burned!”

“Crows above… that poor cub…” he heard Gilda voice in rare concern; turning, he saw she was sitting up from Tara again at the scene of peril and in a half-crouch; her sex-stiffened wings flapping lightly like she wanted to save him herself.

Fortrakt saw her reaction and smiled, recalling that she had teased Giraldi over nearly trying to leap into the movie earlier to rescue the human child. Deciding she needed to be humbled, he urged her to start thinking it was real, and that she alone could save the endangered humans from a fiery fate.

The movie did its part to encourage that mindset as well. “Do you want to live? Then you get to that goddamn ship!” The fearful but resolute human officer grabbed his wounded subordinate by the scarf and shouted at him, but then the scene shifted yet again to show two metal birds from the Enterprise flying towards Pearl Harbor unaware.

The pilot saw puffs of smoke over the harbor—“that’s anti-aircraft fire, also known as flak; it’s basically gun-lofted explosives,” Chris said as he continued to stroke Giraldi—but he barely had time to note it before the two unsuspecting metal birds were fired on by the enemy ones from behind. They quickly went down, though Fortrakt was surprised again when the second bird showed it could return fire from the rear, with the human in back seemingly raising two tubes right out of the plane’s housing which spat incendiary bolts back at the pursuing planes. He succeeded in damaging one enemy craft before he was slain in turn and the plane gutted, leaving its engine on fire and forcing the pilot to ‘bail out’.

“But he can’t fly!” an aghast Fortrakt protested as the human unbuckled himself and prepared to abandon his metal mount. He had to stifle an urge of his own to fly forth and rescue the human pilot only to watch helplessly as he did indeed jump out of his plane with an odd pack strapped to his back.

But there was no time for an explanation before the movie revisited the sinking ship, showing the injured younger human dangling by his seared hands over the area of burning water between the two vessels—burning water? How was that even possible?—before the rope caught fire and broke, plunging two other crewhumans into the flames below as the officer stayed behind, now with no means of rescue.

Gilda flinched again at the sight of yet another human falling to his death, leaving only the scarfed human sailor with injured talons clinging desperately to the remains of the rope. “Crows take it… I’m coming! Hold on!” she cried out, flaring her wings for flight and going into a takeoff crouch; Fortrakt worried for a moment he might have gone too far in influencing her when she looked ready to launch herself right into the wall and was only stopped by Tara’s hand, which grabbed her and shook her hard.

“Gilda!” she shouted as the picture then showed the marooned and doomed officer grabbing an abandoned crossbow mount, firing it at an incoming enemy plane despite his sinking ship. “It’s not real, girlfriend.”

“Huh? Wha—? Oh!” Gilda blinked and flushed again, this time in embarrassment as she stepped back from the wall. “I, uh, knew that.” She covered up her suddenly flustered manner by settling back into Tara’s embrace.

“I’m sorry… and what was that about being so ‘dweeby’ you’d fly right into the movie to save somecreature, Gilda?” a smirking Fortrakt couldn’t resist the dig as behind him, he heard Giraldi coming with a loud roar to the sight of the enemy fighter being struck down by human incendiary bolts fired by the officer, inducing Marco to empty himself into his tail in turn.

Flushing harder, she cuffed Fortrakt hard on the back of his head with an only partially slackened wing. “Yeah, well, at least I don’t want to fire my own cannon at the sight of them firing theirs!” she retaliated with a nod over at Marco and Giraldi. And it was the truth; Giraldi had erupted at the sight of the human officer downing the enemy plane with the large-tubed weapon that all but cut it in two with a hail of glowing arrows, sending its stricken form into the sea with a cry of triumph before he fell in turn to the destruction of his vessel as only the youngest sailor with burned talons made it to the smaller neighboring ship.

Once he’d recovered from his climax, Giraldi and all the griffons rose in deep respect. “A true warrior and officer,” the First Spear pronounced solemnly, if on shaky legs as Marco remained draped over him with his organ still embedded deep inside the First Spear’s tail, the pair panting softly in the aftermath of their mutual orgasm. “He sacrificed himself to save his underlings, accepting certain death to slay an enemy before he and the vessel he served succumbed.”

“Such bravery…” a newly awed Fortrakt felt compelled to add, standing to attention in a stance every bit as rigid as his still-engorged spear. “And such honor.”

“And such good effects and acting,” a still-flushed Gilda snarked somewhat more weakly, earning a roll of Fortrakt’s eyes.

“This really happened, Gilda,” Chris felt compelled to remind her as he, too, stood in respect, happily resting a hand on Giraldi’s head. “What you have to understand is, the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor was real. Due to total intelligence failure, surprise was complete as the US Navy lost the bulk of its Pacific Fleet and planes, including the battleship USS Arizona, whose destruction you just witnessed.

“She sank at the cost of well over a thousand lives, which was almost half the death toll of the attack. She still lies at the bottom of the harbor to this day leaking oil—that’s what was burning—with a floating memorial over her resting place.”

“Much like the IAS Empress Palanor,” a still subdued and breathless Giraldi noted as he stared at the frozen image, causing Fortrakt to nod in agreement.

“The what?” Marco inquired as he stood back off him, starting to slowly pull free of the big tiercel’s tail.

Giraldi had to pause before he answered, leaving Fortrakt guessing he was trying to refocus after being so unexpectedly and enjoyably rutted. “An Imperial Airship of the old Gryphon Empire that was lost in the conflict with Equestria. She was the first of her class and the most powerful warship in existence at the time of her creation. She had a brief but heroic life whose exploits the ponies covered up to preserve the secrecy of an upcoming offensive the airship uncovered,” Giraldi explained, leaning hard against Chris for support.

“Her true story and resting place at the bottom of the Celestial Sea was only revealed three decades after the war ended. She was located by a single crewgryphon who had been unjustly shamed for being the sole survivor,” Fortrakt recalled in turn.

“But why would they shame him for that?” Tara asked, gently rubbing a sitting and silent Gilda’s back, who looked to Fortrakt like she was afraid to draw attention to herself just then.

A still-unsteady Giraldi had to take a few more breaths before he could reply; he turned to the side just enough for Fortrakt to see fresh human cream oozing out of him, partially coating a single fur-covered orb. “Because it was thought that the ship had failed miserably in her mission, and thus dishonored the name of the Empress she held—a dishonor that fell upon all her crew in turn. When the crewgryphon was returned to us after the war during prisoner releases, he was shunned and forced to live a solitary life,” Giraldi explained as the movie was paused again, allowing Chris to lovingly clean up his cum-covered ‘balls’ with his tongue.

He gave another groan at the attention, but found enough focus to continue talking. “He bore a magical compass given to him by the airship’s lost Master, whose final order was for him to survive long enough to reveal their fate and final resting place. It always pointed to a chest containing the ship’s logs, which were eventually retrieved from the bottom of the Celestial Sea.

“Those logs combined with the information the ponies eventually revealed finally exposed the truth—that she had destroyed no less than five Equestrian airships during a running battle as she tried desperately to escape pursuit, attempting to get word of where the upcoming pony attack was aimed—restoring honor to the airship’s name and crew.”

Giraldi turned wistful for a moment despite his continuing afterglow and erect spear as Chris finished tonguing him clean. The human tiercel spared some extra oral attention at Fortrakt’s renewed urging to the First Spear’s stretched sphincter, making the big earth griffon groan and go weak in the knees again. “It was said he cried openly when that truth was finally revealed. He died in his sleep that very night for his life’s mission being fulfilled, and in a rarity for our race, his cremated remains were interred with the sunken ship—with his comrades who perished there.”

“Remarkable…” Chris said as he stood up again and walked forward to rest a hand on the back of Giraldi’s head this time, who turned to nuzzle him; Fortrakt couldn’t resist urging him to return the favor by giving Chris’s prominent and visibly pulsing ‘cock’ a lick. “That’s exactly what happened to some surviving crew of the Arizona. When they died, their remains were interred in the sunken ship by their own request, so they could be with their lost shipmates.” He moved his hand up to Giraldi’s head, turning a little more towards him.

“Such a story only convinces me more than ever that our races are compatible, Christopher McLain. Both culturally…” He opened his beak to engulf Chris’s spear fully, eliciting a gasp and hiss. “And physically.”

He began to bob his head up and down on the throbbing human meat, his tongue wrapped around it while the edges of his beak only barely grazed the fragile flesh as he took the entire shaft in his open maw. He then held the human male in place before him with both sets of talons cupped on his bare backside as the others watched and cheered; Fortrakt couldn’t help but notice that Marco was taking pains to record the proceedings again.

The movie remained paused until Chris came with a groan and an invocation to an unknown deity. After bucking his hips hard a dozen times as he emptied himself into Giraldi’s maw, he eventually collapsed forward into the First Spear’s grasp, leaning heavily on him for support. “Thanks, dude…” he finally said, his slickened shaft still connected to the First Spear’s beak by a single line of viscous seed. “And believe me, I’m flattered and feel like the luckiest guy alive, even though I still don’t get why you’re willing to be with me.”

Giraldi simply grinned as he licked his beak—and his human lover’s shaft—clean. “For three reasons, Christopher McLain. First, I have discovered the many pleasures of human males, which very much include yourself—your soft beaks, tight tails and wondrously dexterous talons are treasures to griffon spears!

“Second, you have proven yourself both an honorable friend and worthy mate for helping Marco Lakan and myself through our first rutting.

“And third, you are clearly well-versed in military history and have a strong sense of honor, to know so much about this incredible story you are sharing with us.” He finished as gently pushed lowered Chris to the ground and then pushed him onto his back, spreading his legs wide before moving to straddle him. Before Fortrakt could even think to urge it, he laid a line of licks up the human’s pale-skinned body, pausing only to give each nub of a nipple a nip.

Chris looked both surprised and flattered, staring awestruck at him. “Wow… thanks, big guy! But still, I feel so weak and flabby in comparison to you…” He made a show of pinching the fat on his side.

“Fear not. For I know by now from far too much bitter experience that I would much rather have a sharp and knowledgeable mind than a purely beautiful body bereft of intelligence or warrior fire. As I am in fact a military trainer, we can work on your physique later if you wish. But for now? Do not rue your ‘flabby’ form. For I find you as soft as any female, your tail as invitingly slick and sensuous as any nest, and your spear deliciously succulent, perfectly shaped for taking tiercel tails in turn.” He punctuated his words by lightly nipping Chris’s small teats with his beak again, eliciting a shudder and moan.

“Speak for yourself, First Spear,” Gilda finally spoke up again as she watched the latest scene of tiercel tucking unfold. “Because I do want a beautiful body, and I’m sure the Second Spear here does as well.” To emphasize her point, she held Tara close and began to caress her prominent hip and chest curves, raining nips and licks down on her face and neck anew.

“Aw… just my body, Gilda?” Tara made a show of pouting even as she squirmed in Gilda’s grasp, returning the attention with her lips and hands.

“And your mind. And your attitude. And especially your strong sense of loyalty,” Gilda quickly added with a rumbling trill as the two began making out in earnest again, causing Fortrakt to urge their legs apart as they lay facing away from him so he could see both their nests at once; he nearly came on the spot when they not only did so, but some of Tara’s nectar dripped right into Gilda’s slit!

“You’re the whole package, Tara. As far as I’m concerned, you're everything Dashie should have been. And after what happened to me before with her, anycreature who stands up for her friends is always an eagless I’d want to get closer to. Doubly so when they’re as beautiful as you.” She emphasized her words with a crooning trill, lowering her head to lick between Tara’s ‘boobs’ as the human woman held her head there and gasped repeatedly.

“Can’t get much closer than this, girlfriend,” Tara finally managed in a breathless tone. “And for the record, you’re way more mature and less needy than the last lady I tried being with. And a lot more fun.” She snaked a hand down between her legs to pry their lips open, giving Fortrakt a spectacular view of their depths that caused him to take an involuntary step forward and trill.

She then invited him to them with a rolling motion of her talons to which his heart leapt and legs went weak. He walked up to them as if in a trance, lowered his head towards their twin slits and began to lap at each with his tongue, gently prying them open with the rounded edges of his beak.

Gilda could only groan as she wrapped her tail around his head like she had done to Marco earlier, pulling him to her harder. “Ancestors above… I’d never have guessed such a dweeby griffon could be so good at oral! Let’s keep him, Tara,” she suggested breathlessly between fresh licks and nips of her human lover.

“Fine by me…” Tara agreed as Fortrakt felt like the luckiest tiercel alive. He could scarcely believe he was getting to eat out both a human and griffon nest at once, their heady female flavors mingling on his tingling tongue.

Just wait until I demonstrate THIS at the cultural training sessions! he couldn’t help but think, imagining the three of them giving lessons on interspecies lovemaking before other griffons. Maybe we could even perform before Queen Molyneux HERSELF!

“Wow, look at them go…” A glance showed Marco was now recording the scene with his smaller portal device while his larger one remained occupied projecting the movie, holding the former up with one set of talons while he stroked himself to the scene with his other. “Not that I want you guys to stop, but there’s a lot more of the movie to see! This is just the first of many battles to come!” he reminded them all.

“And I am eager to see them. So let us not tarry too long in our rutting, Christopher McLain,” Giraldi all but purred as he then pushed Chris onto his back, laying him against the deep carpet as he moved to straddle him. As cheers erupted from the rest of the room, he lowered himself to press the tip of his now-enormous spear against the human male’s inviting lower orifice while running his talons lightly over his chest, positioning himself to enter him in a belly-to-belly human-style mating position—he’d learned that from Tara quickly!—while Chris could only gape up at him in renewed excitement and awe.

“For I am very eager to see more scenes of human bravery and battle. And to hear you describe the tactics and capabilities of these massive ships and wondrous metal birds,” he said as he began to claim the Chris’s tail, who groaned and arched his hips at the renewed intrusion as Marco knelt before them to record a close-up of the scene.

“No problem, big guy…” Chris said dreamily as Giraldi slowly penetrated him deeper, looking to Fortrakt like he was having the time of his life. “Especially if it gets me more of this!”