Date: Wed, 02 Jun 1999 21:19:43 PDT
From: "J.O. Dickingson" <authorsix@hotmail.com>
Subject: "Choice" (Of Chance, Destiny and Choice 03) celeb

Author's note.  This is the third part of the three-part sequel "Of Chance,
Destiny and Choice".  At the end of Part Two, Jake Sisko and the two
current loves of his life, the Dorvanian called Chilam (and formerly known
as Wesley Crusher) and Jake's bonded brother, the Klingon Gowran, were
investigating the rumour of Cardassians looting in the Chi-pan ruins.  As
Chilam approached the Cardassian camp from the right and Gowran from the
left, Jake, from his vantage point on the canyon wall, is about to witness
his two loves being killed by Cardassian snipers.  Star Trek, The Next
Generation, Deep Space Nine, and all characters from the series are
trademarks of and copyright by Paramount Pictures Corporation.  The other
characters in this story other than Salene have been created by this
author.  The names of the Dorvanian Gods, what they represent, and their
nature has been based on ancient Mayan religion.  Special thanks to Richard
of Colorado and to Nathan of http://members.aol.com/slashjake/jako.html for
their assistance and support in writing Part Three.  I hope you enjoy the
conclusion of this story in the ongoing saga of Jake Sisko.  Trek fans,
Dorvanians, Maquis, Mayans, and gay men and boys of all ages can write to
the author, Aardon Beta, c/o authorsix@hotmail.com where he has a subspace
temporal portal link for communicating with the past when he is in
transmission range with Earth.

		       Of Chance, Destiny and Choice
                                
			    Part Three:  Choice

     Jake's cry of frustration ricocheted off the high walls of the narrow
ravine.  The Cardassian who had climbed the tree to get a better shot at
Chilam was the first to respond to the cry, automatically swinging his
weapon around and firing at what appeared to be the greater threat.
Fortunately, for Jake, the Cardassian sniper was in a hurry and his aim was
poor.  The phasar struck low, blasting the rock overhang Jake was standing
on.
     "Fuck!" cried out the eighteen-year-old as he felt the rock give out
from under him and he began to fall.  "Fuck-fuck-fuck-fuck," echoed the
ravine above the background rumble of falling rock.
     Jake tried his best to stay on his feet as he and what was left of the
ledge slid into the canyon.  That was impossible.  Losing his balance, he
dropped his weapon and rolling himself into a ball, he began to tumble and
roll down the steep embankment.  He heard more phasar blasts as he smashed
into another overhang fifteen metres further down and stopped falling.  The
wind being knocked out of him, he lay there stunned and gasping for air.
Part of his mind told him to get up and find out what was happening, or at
least seek cover, the other part advised him that any movement was going to
be painful and could draw the attention of the shooters to him.  The sound
of angry voices and lack of phasar fire prompted him to slowly lift up his
body and glance down into the ravine.  Below him stood Chilam and Gowran
pointing their weapons at five Cardassian captives who had their hands
raised in submission.
     Slowly and gingerly getting to his feet, he cautiously picked his way
down to the bottom of the ravine and painfully limped over to join his
companions.  His shirt and jeans were torn and coated with a film of rock
dust, large patches of which were beginning to cake as the rock dust mixed
with Jake's sweat and blood.
     "Brilliant tactic," beamed Gowran, "truly brilliant!"
     Jake was glad that the Klingon's hands were occupied or he would
surely have slapped him on the back.  Just breathing was painful.
     "Yes," agreed Chilam.  "Very wise choice."
     Jake looked from one to the other.  "What happened?"
     "Well," said Chilam, taking the lead, "When the Cardassian who was
going to fire at me fired at you instead, it gave me the opportunity to
seek cover.  When he turned to redirect his fire at me, or rather, where I
had been, he was wide open.  I was easily able to incapacitate him."  He
pointed to the injured Cardassian sitting on the ground, his arm being tied
in a sling by a colleague.
     "And the fellow on the roof who was about to fire at me," continued
Gowran, "was momentarily distracted, allowing me time to see him."  Jake
looked around.  "He is dead," Gowran said flatly.  "Dead warriors carry no
grudges."
     "Hearing the noise and firing, the rest of the archaeology crew came
out of the building they were digging in, and seeing what had happened,
immediately surrendered," finished Chilam.
     "They are scientists, not soldiers," said Gowran, with a hint of
contempt.
     After tying up their captives, Chilam saw to Jake's injuries, most of
which were painful but superficial.  Miraculously he had not broken any
bones and had managed to avoid getting a concussion in his tumble.  A
couple badly bruised ribs, a large blue-black welt on his right hip, and
assorted cuts and abrasions, mostly on his arms, legs and back, were easily
taken care of by a poultice of local herbs to prevent infection and a foul
tasting drink to kill the pain.
     "I'm sorry," Chilam whispered in Jake's ear.  "There is a much faster
and far less painful way to take care of your injuries, but I cannot risk
the Cardassians finding out about that."
     Jake had no idea what Chilam meant.  Making love to him made Jake feel
wonderful, but even with the Soothsayer's skills in that area Jake doubted
if Chilam would be able to make him forget his present pain.  Besides,
under the circumstances, it was not likely that Chilam had love making in
mind.  Jake had to smile.  Despite his injuries his dick head itched at the
thought of Chilam's caresses.  Jake chuckled at its eagerness and
immediately regretted it as his ribs protested.  He made a note to ask
Chilam what he meant later.
     While Chilam and Gowran prepared a meal from the birds the injured
Cardassian had caught and other supplies from the Cardassian camp, Jake
rested in the shade and thought about what had happened.  His two
companions had commended him on his choice, which of course he modestly
protested had simply been an impulsive act.  Now that he had time to think
about it, he wondered.  Had his response and that of the two snipers been
pure chance, or had it been destiny, part of an overall plan of the Gods?
The decision to expose himself and scream out in frustration and anger had
been a decision.  He did recall thinking the thought a second before
following through.  Well, score one for Choice.
     His companions had prepared far more food than they needed, upon
Chilam's suggestion, and when they were done they set up the table to make
it look as if the Cardassians had been interrupted during the middle of
their meal and had just mysteriously disappeared.  They made sure there
were no signs of a struggle nor any traces of blood, and they did their
best to camouflage the evidence of phasar blasts.  Chilam's thinking was
that if it appeared that the team had mysteriously disappeared without any
signs of conflict, perhaps that would give the Cardassian leader who had
come up with the plan to sell stolen artifacts to raise money for their war
effort second thoughts about disturbing the ruins in the future.
     They rested during the heat of the afternoon, and then began the long
seven-hour hike back to the village.  It was a painful journey for Jake,
who was too proud to be carried or to receive any assistance.  All the way
back Gowran urged, cajoled, and when neither worked, finally demanded Jake
write a song about their adventure.  Trying to explain to Gowran that just
because he planned on being a writer for a living it was not that simple,
and then trying to come up with something that would satisfy the bullheaded
Klingon when he wouldn't accept the first response, at least took Jake's
mind off his injuries.
     Their arrival back at the village late that night and news of their
success were occasion for celebration the following evening after the heros
had recovered.  It seemed to Jake and his companions that these people
lived from celebration to celebration, and in a sense they did.  For one,
that was part of their heritage.  For another, when people are under
oppression, they are eager to celebrate life every occasion they can.  So,
while the heros rested up, the rest of the village prepared for the
celebration.  That evening, dressed in their finest, the three were lead to
their place of honour.
     Chilam was first, accompanied by Swift Ocelot who walked a respectful
step behind and carried a large fan of brilliant feathers resulting in a
rainbow of colours.  Chilam was resplendent in the ceremonial clothes of
his position, a goldenrod coloured loin cloth and a similar coloured manta,
a square of cloth which could be used both as a cloak or blanket.  The
colour complemented the twenty-three-year-old's rich brown tan, and the
scant clothing revealed his smooth, young chest and his hairless, muscular
arms and legs.  The manta was woven of soft wool and was inscribed along
the hem with black lettering and symbols which denoted his position.  He
wore sandals, gold anklets and arm bands, each studded with a single large
emerald, and an intricate hair band of spun gold.  Hanging from a hair-thin
gold chain about his neck and resting in the centre of his smooth chest was
a large turquoise gem that matched his deep blue eyes.  His long, brown
hair flowed down to his shoulders like wisps of silk and Jake ached to
reach over and run his fingers through it.  He looked gorgeous, and Jake's
body ached for him even worse than it had ached after his tumble down the
canyon.
     Gowran was next, proudly dressed in his military uniform, the black
leather freshly oiled and the metal studs so highly polished they glittered
like jewels in the firelight.  In concession to the heat, Gowran had
forgone his shirt and padded leather vest in preference for a studded
leather and chain noose harness and a studded collar.  His naked, smooth
chest rippled with Klingon muscle, and his tight black leather chaps showed
off his strong, shapely thighs and calves. Jake noticed not a few women and
an equal number of men eying the muscular teen hungrily.  Good food and
hard exercise had added muscle in all the right places.
     Gowran's chaps were tucked into highly polished, metal tipped boots
that extended half way up his thigh and whose tops were spiked with sharp
metal spines.  A fifteen-centimetre wide, studded, black leather belt with
a huge steel-coloured buckle bearing the head of a fierce looking Klingon
beast, and a barbed leather codpiece added to his ferocity and sexuality.
Jake figured the contents of that codpiece had to be very hot, and memories
of the scent of Gowran's animal sweat made him ache for a whiff of that
studded jock.  Jake smiled as he thought how popular his bonded brother
would be in a San Francisco gay bar back in the 1990's.  His cock twitched
as he thought of the times they'd given themselves totally to their lust
drive and had wild, savage sex, and his heart ached for the chance to do it
again.
     Jake came last, and he too had opted to go shirtless.  He wore a rich
burgundy-coloured silk vest which he had left unbuttoned, and several thin
silver chains which were seductive in their simplicity.  He had chosen open
toed sandals and a pair of tight, white slacks that felt like chamois and
which showed off his crotch and accented his dark skin, which Swift Ocelot
had insisted he oil for this evening.  Although not as muscular as Gowran,
these past events had started to harden his body and had begun to add
definition to his pecs and deltoids.  Jake noticed that he too was
attracting the attention of a number of individuals, male and female, and
the looks in their eyes made it quite clear what they were thinking.  That
was not something he was accustomed to, and he found he was enjoying it.
     The tables were laden with products of the field and forest, sweet
yams and squash, roasted grouse, several types of baked fish, pots of brown
beans, plates heaped with maize, stacks of fragrant, freshly baked wraps
made of cornmeal, hot red and green peppers, fresh mangos, wooden jugs of a
drink made from toasted maize and cocoa, and of course jugs of fermented
honey.  The aromas billowed up from the table and mingled to result in a
delightful mix that caused mouths to water in anticipation and young boys
to snatch tidbits before the official blessing of the food and the first
offerings to the Gods.
     As they began to eat, music was provided by a group of young men in
loincloths with wooden drums, gourd trumpets, and bone whistles resulting
in a unique and mystic sound that was like nothing Jake had ever heard.
While the honoured guests ate and talked, their conversation turned to the
events that had taken place most recently, and as they drank, they began to
discuss the significance, and the causes, of those events.
     "I still say what happened at Chi-pan was pure chance," argued Jake.
     "It was not chance that we found the team at the site, or that we
descended the ravine at noon," countered Chilam.  "We had reliable
information that the team was there, and our hike to the ruins was
scheduled so we would arrive before the heat of the afternoon."
     "No, of course that was not chance.  Some things are planned."
     "All things are planned," argued Chilam.
     "I did not plan on taking a tumble down the ravine," Jake observed,
"or bruising my ribs."
     "You did not, but the Gods did," commented Gowran.
     "Then what did I ever do to anger them?"
     "I do not know," Gowran replied solemnly.
     "I was joking."
     "It is not proper to joke about the Gods," Gowran replied, glancing
around as if he expected one of them to be sitting nearby listening in on
their conversation.
     "So, the two of you agree with the Bajorans," Jake commented.  "Life
is not just random chance.  What happens is controlled, by gods, or by
Prophets, or by whatever."
     "Yes," both Gowran and Chilam answered instantly and with no doubt in
their voices.
     "So what is the point of life?  What is the point of this resistance
to the Cardassians?  If everything is controlled by some superior being,
why bother doing anything?"
     "For the honour of our ancestors," announced Gowran predictably.
     "When I say that our lives are planned, I mean Destiny decrees what
will happen," Chilam tried explaining.  "Destiny establishes the patterns.
Because there is a pattern to all things, if we seek for that pattern and
learn its nature when we find it, then we can act accordingly.  That is why
we do things.  That is why we act."
     "So our actions can actually account for something."
     "Of course.  Knowing our destiny, we can capitalize on it.  We can act
accordingly."
     "The Gods act, but so does a warrior," added Gowran in support.  "We
can make our own destiny.  There is a Klingon saying that a man is the
product of his actions, so all actions should be honourable ones."
     "Are all Klingons pragmatists?" Jake asked.  Gowran looked at him
quizzically.  "For a pragmatist, the value and truth of an idea depends on
its practical consequence.  If there is no practical consequence, there is
no value."
     "Yes, then all Klingons are pragmatists," responded Gowran, confident
in his sweeping generalization of his race, and probably right.
     "So, if destiny gives you lemons, make lemonade.  That is the limit of
our control over life."
     "Should there be more?"
     "Suppose I don't like lemonade?"
     "Then sell the lemons and buy a jug of IwHIq."
     "Not everyone likes Klingon bloodwine either," smiled Jake.
     "Then those are the ones the Gods have taken a dislike to."
     Chilam and Jake laughed.  Gowran did not see any humour in what he had
said.  His two friends being too choked up to explain, he shrugged, downed
his mug of balche, a concoction of fermented honey and tree bark, and
called for a refill.  As they continued to eat and drink, the conversation
turned to lighter topics between intermittent tales of past exploits and
well-known legends recited by the storytellers of the village.  Throughout
the evening one or another of the villagers toasted the heros and more jugs
of the fermented drink were brought out.  After much encouragement and
drinking, Jake was prompted to stand and sing the composition he had
written about their adventure.  Gowran and Chilam joined in for the chorus:

              Venturing out in the hot jungle sun,
              The Soothsayer, Warrior, and Writer,
             With stalwart hearts each mother's son
               Vowed to make the future brighter.
             With sweat streaming from their brows,
             And causing arms and chests to gleam,
              To the people they kept their vows,
                 And advanced the Maquis dream.

     Jake felt awkward with the applause that followed, and even more
awkward with the praise being heaped upon him considering the role he had
really played in the capture of the Cardassians.  He felt unworthy of such
adulation.  Besides, he was shy by nature and unaccustomed to being the
centre of attention.  If that was not bad enough, he was further
embarrassed by the references many made of the rejoicing that the three
warriors would partake in later that night, and they left no doubt just how
the three would celebrate.  In part that was no surprise considering the
nights Jake had spent either in Chilam's hut or with Gowran.  In part it
was also of Jake's own doing.  The ballad was heavy with homoerotic images
and detailed descriptions of the masculinity of the three adventurers.
Back on DS9 where homosexuality was hidden or taboo, the references would
largely have gone unnoticed.  Here on Dorvan V, the imagery was much more
likely to be recognized, and it was.  Not everyone joined in the ribaldry.
Jake could not help but notice the glances of the Bajorans, and the obvious
condemnation in their eyes.  He immediately thought of Nolar, and wondered
what was happening to him.  Life here under Cardassian occupation was hell,
but his life back in a Bajoran institution for simply being himself had to
be even worse.
     Jake put those thoughts out of his mind.  There was nothing he could
do for Nolar at the moment, and nothing he could do about the Bajorans on
Dorvan V.  Both were definitely in Fate's hands.  So, let those who
objected think what they wanted, Jake reasoned.  He would not let them ruin
a wonderful evening.
     Actually, although he was having a fantastic evening, there was one
problem that was weighing on his mind more and more as the evening
progressed.  Torn between his love for Gowran and his love for Chilam, he
did not know what he was going to do later that evening.  He wanted very
much to celebrate the conclusion of their adventure in true Klingon style
with a rough and aggressive bout of lovemaking with Gowran, and he knew
that Gowran was expecting no less from his bonded brother.  However, he
also wanted to celebrate with the tenderness and love that was Chilam's
style, and as a revered leader among Jake's hosts, he knew the villagers
expected it from him.  He would have eagerly celebrated with both at the
same time, but considering their different techniques and personalities,
that hardly seemed feasible.  Besides, for Gowran their lovemaking was not
only a matter of ritual and honour, but something that was very personal
between just the two of them.  It was not something which could be extended
to Chilam.  As for Chilam, the Soothsayer was into intimate one-on-one
relationships, relationships in which he gave a hundred percent of himself
for the other, not group orgies.  So Jake assumed from his experiences
anyway.  How was he to choose?  He did not know at the time, but he need
not have worried about the outcome of the evening.  The three of them got
too drunk to do anything.
     The next morning, despite his hangover, Gowran insisted on
accompanying the team which was escorting their captives to a location
where an exchange of prisoners had been negotiated.  Chilam was off to
another village that needed his soothsaying services.  Jake was left alone
to continue his writing, and to think.  Slipping on a plain white loincloth
and taking a PADD, he sat down at the edge of the jungle to write, but he
could not concentrate on writing the novel he had begun.  There were other
things on his mind, troubling things, things that were buried deep but
which kept bubbling to the surface, and they were bubbling to the surface
more and more frequently lately.
     He was still sitting there in the shade several hours later, staring
out across the encampment, when he was joined by Swift Ocelot.  The
ten-year-old boy had become attached to him, and seemed to take it as his
responsibility to see to his every need whenever Chilam was away.
     "I brought you some fruit," he said, placing a plate of fresh melon
and berries before him.
     "Thank you," Jake said, looking up with a smile.  The boy stood there
silently.  "Will you join me?"  The boy grinned widely as only
ten-year-olds can, and sat down cross-legged beside him.
     Jake thought back to when he was ten.  He was on the USS Saratoga at
the time.  Those were happy times, his mother Jennifer and his father
Benjamin being so much in love and their home so filled with happiness.  In
his short life Jake had already lived on one planet and four starships.  He
had over the years become adept at scoping out a new terrain and
assimilating quickly.  You had to when you moved around like he did.
Although he had learned how to assimilate, he did not exactly fit in
wherever he was.  Jake was getting accustomed to that too.  In that he had
developed an inner fear of forming new friendships because he lost them so
easily, not fitting in was actually to his advantage.  It gave him a good
excuse for not becoming close with anyone.
     Aaron Hanson had been an exception to that.  Aaron's father was a
bridge officer, and when he was transferred to the Saratoga Jake had hoped
that meant Aaron and his family would be stationed there for a while.
There were few boys Jake's age on the Saratoga, and he was beginning to
feel lonely.  Keeping his distance from his peers was one thing, being
isolated was something totally different.  His own father being the first
officer with the rank of Lieutenant Commander placed the two families in a
similar social position.  That Jake could not care less about, but it did
mean they lived in the same section and saw each other more frequently.  It
also meant both of their parents often attended similar functions, which
left the two ten-year-old boys many times alone.
     Jake had begun a collection of holodeck programs of places on Earth
and Aaron had a collection of starship 3-D cards. The two boys spent hours
together with each showing and explaining his collection to the other.
Jake was just as interested in Aaron's hobby as Aaron was in his which
resulted in many happy hours for the two of them.  The two boys were
otherwise as different as their appearances.  Aaron's hair was fine, blond,
and worn long in the back over his collar.  Jake's was black, wiry and
curly.  Aaron was as light skinned as Jake was dark, and his eyes were a
deep blue whereas Jake's were a chocolate brown.  Whereas Jake was quiet
and shy, Aaron was full of energy and bounced from one thing to the next
with buoyant enthusiasm.
     Jake remembered one afternoon in particular.  They were at Aaron's
looking at his collection and Jake had to take a leak badly but didn't want
to interrupt his new friend.  So, he did as many boys his age did, he
reached down and squeezed the tip.  Aaron of course noticed.
     "You gotta take a leak?"
     "Yeah."
     "Bad?"
     "Yeah."
     "Me too."
     "Yeah?"
     "Wanna have a contest?"
     "What sort of contest?"
     "Bet I got to go more than you."
     "Bet you don't."
     "You're on."
     "So what do we do?"
     "Com'on."
     Leading Jake into the bathroom, Aaron took a potty out from under the
sink.  "This is for my little sister," he explained.  "You wanna go first?"
     "You go ahead," Jake replied, still not certain what his buddy had in
mind.
     Pulling down his fly, Aaron slipped his little dink out and proceeded
to piss in the pot, straining at the end to be sure he'd drained every last
drop.  Carefully marking the level, he dumped it in the toilet and handed
the bowl to Jake.  They watched intently as the level once again began to
rise, but Jake ran out of steam before he was able to reach Aaron's level.
     "Told ya I had to go more," grinned Aaron.
     "So you're full of piss," replied Jake with a smile.
     "Was full of piss," corrected Aaron, also with a wide grin.  He
glanced down at Jake's limp dink.  "Yours is pretty big."
     Jake looked down at his, and then at Aaron's.  Aaron had not yet
tucked his back in.  Besides the obvious difference in colour, Aaron's
entire dick head was sheathed in skin.  "Yours looks different."
     "Yeah.  Yours too."
     The boys stood there, studying each other for a moment.  "Yours feel
good if you fiddle with it?" Aaron asked as he reached down and rolled the
tip of his in his fingers.
     "Oh yeah," grinned Jake.  "But I get heck if I get caught doing it."
     "Me too," said Aaron with a grin, happy to have found someone else who
shared his secret.  He continued to roll the end of his dick between his
thumb and first two fingers.  "Yours get stiff when you fiddle with it?" he
asked, his penis starting to swell in response to his manipulations.
     "Yeah," replied Jake, his also starting to swell just from watching
Aaron.
     "Let's go to my room."
     Leaving their penises hanging out of their flies, the two boys went to
Aaron's room.  Sitting there on his bed, they continued to play with
themselves, marvelling at the still awesome sensation that pleasuring
oneself brought, and stealing glances at each other.  Soon the two young
boys were stiff.
     "I've never seen a, well, the dick of a boy, well, your colour,"
observed Aaron.
     "I'm Afro American.  I was born on Earth."
     "Yeah?  Neat.  I've never been to Earth.  Dad says maybe some day
we'll spend a holiday there."
     "Well, I don't remember it much.  We've moved around a lot."
     "Yeah, us too."
     "I've never seen another guy when his thing is hard before."
     "Feels great don't it," Aaron said, more as an observation than a
question as he studied Jake's cock.
     "You can have a good look if you want," Jake offered.
     "Okay," said Aaron as he bent closer to observe the first black cock
he'd ever seen.  Jake did not know it at the time, but he was well hung,
and at ten his stiff cock was already four inches long.  He was circumcised
and back in those days when he got hard the skin pulled back just a little
way to reveal the piss slit and not much more.
     "Want me to pull the skin back?" Jake asked.
     "Sure."
     Jake pulled it back slowly, shivering at the sensation.  His swollen,
dark purple-black head was slowly revealed.  It was widely flanged, like
the top of a flattop mushroom.  Releasing his skin, it crept back up.
     "Can your skin go back?" Jake asked innocently as Aaron sat back up.
He had seen uncircumcised boys before and his dad had explained the
difference, but he'd never seen one erect before.
     "Sure."  The ten-year-old slowly began to draw back on his skin and
Jake bent closer to watch.
     Aaron's dick head was more bulbous than mushroom cap shaped, and it
was much redder than the rest of his penis.  Jake felt an urge to reach out
and touch his new friend's organ.  He also wondered what it would taste
like.  It looked like a strawberry ice cream cone.  That he had such
thoughts surprised him, but did not offend him.  He was simply curious, and
wondering bout Aaron's penis was no different from wondering about anything
that was new.  He did know that this intimacy would be frowned upon by
adults though, so he did not attempt to follow up on his desires, and the
two boys, satisfied for the moment, tucked their stiff cocks back in their
pants and began to play starships.
     They played with themselves several times after that, simply because
it felt good and it was great having a friend to share the experience with.
Neither boy knew anything about orgasms and neither ever went that far.
Nor did they ever offer to try doing it to each other, though the thought
certainly crossed Jake's mind.  Then Aaron's father got transferred to
another ship, the Melbourne.  Jake wondered if Aaron and his dad were still
on the Melbourne when it was destroyed in the Battle of Wolf 359.  He hoped
that Aaron and his dad had survived as he and his dad had.  Jake was not
very hopeful.  It had been Aaron's grandfather, Admiral J.P Hanson, who had
lead the defence against the Borg in that battle, and Jake knew for certain
that he had been killed.
     "What are you thinking about?" Swift Ocelot asked, bringing Jake back
to the present.
     "Nothing."
     "It was something about sex."
     "No."
     "Your tongue says no, but your reed says yes."
     Jake glanced down at the erection tenting out his loincloth.  He could
not deny the evidence.
     "Was it about your lover, Gowran?"
     Jake winced.  He was not used to anyone referring to Gowran and him in
those terms.  He was even less accustomed with a ten-year-old boy speaking
so openly about adult relationships.  "We are bonded brothers, Dhom
R'uustai.  And, no, I was thinking of something long ago, when I was a
boy."
     "Why are you not happy?  If I were you, I would be so happy I would
feel like bursting like a ripe kumquat."
     "And why should I be happy?" asked Jake, both amused by the boy's
innocence and feeling a sense of sadness at his own loss.  His boyhood
innocence had long ago been replaced by confusion, and at times even
bitterness, about his life.
     "You are admired by everyone in the village, even by those who are
highly respected themselves.  People say you are a brave warrior, cunning
and wise, and a talented scribe.  They speak of your loyalty to your lover
and of your virility with awe in their voice.  You have had great success
in battle, and you have even saved the life of the Chilam, who gets as much
pleasure from you as you do from him when you lay together, which is not
always so with other men.  You have much to be happy about."
     "I am happy," Jake responded, wondering how the boy knew so much about
Chilam's personal life.
     "You are sad.  You walk about as if you are worthless.  You behave
like a man who has no purpose in life."
     Jake bristled at the boy's comments.  If he had ever spoken to an
adult like that when he was ten he would have received a severe scolding
and told to mind his manners.  Jake had to admit, however, that what really
made him bristle was the fact that the boy was right.
     "Perhaps if I pleasured your staff you would feel better," the boy
offered, reaching over for the tent in Jake's lap.
     "No," Jake said sharply as he drew away.  "I ... I just want to be
left alone."
     "You are a strange man," the boy observed, his eyes showing his hurt
at Jake's rejection as he got to his feet.  "Your tongue says you are
happy, but your eyes say you are sad.  Your tongue says you are not
thinking of sex, but your staff says you are.  Your tongue says you do not
want to be pleasured, but your heart says you do. You willingly offer
others your help without question or requesting payment, but you spurn my
own offer."  His eyes flashed angrily as he pressed his lips together.
"Well, if you will not accept my help, you should seek Chilam's.  You are
not in harmony."
     Before Jake could think of a reply, the boy turned and stomped off.
As he stared at the retreating figure, several thoughts came to his mind.
The first was anger, anger that a child would lecture him so.  Who was he
to tell him he was not in harmony?  How did he become so wise at such a
young age?  Actually, what the boy had really said was that he was lying.
If he had ever talked that way to an adult, his father would have given him
the longest and sternest lecture of his life and would have grounded him
for at least a week.
     As Jake sat there staring at the space where the boy had stood, that
anger was gradually replaced by guilt.  The boy was right.  Despite his
insolence, he had called it correctly.  He had said he was happy, but in
reality he was sad.  He had said he had not been thinking of sex, but he
had been.  He had said he did not want to have sex with the boy, but deep
down inside he had.  He never hesitated to offer another a helping hand,
but he had refused the boy's help.  The boy was right.  His tongue said one
thing while the rest of his body said the opposite.  He was not in harmony.
     From guilt it was an easy step to self-pity.  Jake had spent a lot of
his life engaged in self- pity.  Why not?  What he had been going through
over the past four years, nobody could understand.  Hell, he could not
really understand what was going on himself.  All he knew was that others
were much luckier than he was.  Everyone he knew, knew who they were and
what they wanted and how to go about getting it.  Jake was not sure who he
was or what he wanted.  Some days he felt as if he did, and other days he
rejected those thoughts.  The problem was that he was different.  He was
different from his friends, and from every other boy that he knew in a very
fundamental and very significant way.  Nobody knew that, not even his
father, and there was no way that Jake was ever going to tell anyone.  That
was his problem.  There was nobody he could tell what he was going through.
He was not in harmony, and there was nobody he could tell.  Jake stood up
and went for a walk.  It did not help.
     Not wanting to face anyone, and especially Swift Ocelot, Jake returned
to the small hut he and Gowran shared and spent the rest of the day cooped
up there.  Chilam returned that evening and knocked on the pole outside the
door of the small hut.  Seeing who it was, Jake told him to come in.
Normally he readily welcomed the opportunity to talk to the
twenty-three-year-old, but this evening he was even too depressed to be
cheered by the Soothsayer's presence.
     "Can I get you something to drink, some fruit?" he asked hospitably.
     "No, thanks," Chilam answered, tossing back his long, fine hair as he
sat down on the mat opposite Jake.
     "How was your mission?"
     "Fine.  Everything went well.  And how was your day?"
     "Fine too."
     "That is not what Swift Ocelot has said."
     "Oh?" snapped Jake.  "And what did he have to say."
     "Don't be angry with him.  He is concerned about you.  We all are."
     "Well thank you, but I can take care of myself."
     "We just want to help."
     "There is nothing any of you can do."
     "True, but the Gods can."
     "Suppose I said I don't believe in your gods, or mine for that
matter."
     "Then I'd say Swift Ocelot was very observant.  What your tongue says
and what your mind says are not in harmony."
     "And how do you know what my mind says?"
     "I know Jake Sisko, and I know that the person in front of me is not
the true Jake Sisko."
     "So who do you think this is in front of you, a shape shifter?" Jake
asked irritably.
     "I think who it is in front of me is Jake Sisko all right, but not the
true one."
     "Fuck it all, even the true Jake Sisko does not know who he is."
     "There is a solution, if you would listen."
     "I'm sorry," Jake said apologetically.  "Chilam, I don't know what it
is.  I don't mean to be so snarly.  Nog always said I was the most moody
person he'd ever met."
     Chilam sat there, saying nothing.  Jake poked at the earth floor with
a stick.  "All right," he finally said.  "What is the solution?"
     "A vision quest."
     "You want me to starve myself and work to the point of physical
exhaustion so I can have a hallucination?  Why don't we take the easy way
out?  There are several dozen chemicals that can be swallowed, smoked or
injected that will have the same effect."
     Chilam sat there silently, his face revealing nothing.
     "Shit!  I'm sorry, again.  I don't mean to belittle your beliefs or
anything.  I didn't mean it that way.  I got nothing but respect for other
people's ways and cultures.  It's just, well, it's just. .  . ."  Jake
looked at Chilam pleadingly and in frustration.
     "You're afraid."
     Jake bit his tongue as he fought back the anger and the retort that
had leaped into his mind. "Yes," he said softly after a long while.  He did
not say what it was that he was frightened of.  He did not have to.  "So,
what do I have to do in this vision quest?"
     "We will commence tomorrow," Chilam replied, taking the question as
acceptance.  He was right.  In having asked, Jake had accepted.  "For
tonight, perhaps I can make things more pleasant for you," the handsome
youth said, reaching over and placing a hand on Jake's thigh.
     "No, not tonight, thanks," Jake replied.  He wanted to, he wanted to
very badly, but he knew that tonight no matter how skilled Chilam was, it
would not be good.
     "Fine," Chilam said as he rose.  "Then it begins tonight.  Are you
ready to face yourself?"
     "Yeah, sure," Jake said as he got to his feet also.  "Yeah," he said
firmly, "I am."
     Pausing at his hut, Chilam filled a small sack with several objects,
and then lead Jake out into to the jungle.  They walked for most of the
night.  The sun had begun to rise but had not yet penetrated the jungle
foliage when they arrived at a fresh water spring.  Having Jake remove his
loincloth and sandals, Chilam filled a bladder skin from the pool and then
lead Jake downstream from the spring.  Having him stand and hold out his
arms, Chilam began to bathe Jake using a coarse, powerful soap and his
hands.  Even though he was exhausted from the all night hike, and even
though the water was cold, Jake felt himself becoming aroused.  Chilam had
a way with his hands.  By the time he had worked his way from Jake's hair
to his groin, Jake was erect, and by the time he worked on down to his
toes, Jake's cock was jerking with eagerness.  Normally he would have been
embarrassed having an erection, but with Chilam it just seemed natural.
     Taking a fifteen-centimetre reed out of his sack and having Jake bend
over, Chilam inserted one end up his rectum.  Jake inhaled nervously.  Then
taking a mouthful of water, the young Soothsayer blew it up Jake's ass.
The shock and cold water caused him to go limp.  Pinching the end of the
reed, Chilam repeated the process half a dozen times and then had Jake step
into the bushes and empty his bowels.  It was Jake's first enema, and he
was not certain he would ever want another.  Having cleaned Jake's body
inside and out, Chilam led him back to the pool and had him submerge
himself up to his neck while the Soothsayer prayed silently for the Gods to
guide Jake in his quest.  By the time Jake got back out of the pool the
cold water had chilled him to the bone and had shrivelled up his testicles
and penis so they were as small as they were the day he was born.
     Placing Jake's loincloth and sandals in his sack, Chilam led him on
through the jungle.  They walked for another kilometre along the stream and
Jake watched while the older youth built a sweat lodge.  Filling the
central pit with rocks and heating them, Chilam stripped and poured water
on the hot rocks, filling the small thatched chamber with steam.  Before
long they were both drenched with sweat.  Their bodies, one black and one
with a rich tan, glistened as the sweat beaded and then trickled down over
their muscles in little rivulets.  Jake felt as if every pore in his skin
had opened up.  Never had he felt so clean.
     After several hours they emerged from the sweat lodge and walked
further into the jungle, now travelling along animal trails that became
fainter and fainter and that evidently few men had ever travelled.  The two
naked youths could easily have been mistaken for animals themselves as they
made their way silently along the trail.  They finally came to a hole in
the ground, the remnants of an old lava tube, the opening to which was
barely large enough for Jake to squeeze through.  Lighting a pitch torch
that hung just inside, Chilam led Jake farther down into the cave, finally
arriving at a small chamber whose roof was blackened from years of burning
torches.  The walls were brightly decorated with a multitude of symbols and
glyphs that Jake could not read.
     "This cave is called Naj Vulpacutli.  It is one of the doorways to the
Otherworld," Chilam explained.  "Through these ch'en, these sacred caves,
one can travel beyond this world, beyond death itself, to the realms of the
Gods and one's ancestors.  These gifts will explain to the Gods why you, an
Offworlder and not one of the people, seek their help."  He placed four
chicken feathers on the floor, a white to the north, red to the east, black
to the west, and yellow to the south.  In the middle he placed a green
sprig, which he said represented the tree of life.  Finally, he lit three
candles which began to give off a sweet-smelling smoke, not unlike burning
hemp.
     "Now," he continued, "I have purified your mortal body so you may
travel in the Otherworld.  The incense from these candles will help you.
Inhale deeply and allow the incense to fill your lungs.  It will purify
your mind and help it focus.  Concentrate on the tree of life as you pray
for guidance in your quest. Focus on that request and think of nothing
else.  You must block all other thoughts from your mind except your prayer
for guidance. "
     "Whom do I pray to?"
     "To whomever you want.  Are you Christian?"
     "Yes.  Southern Baptist."
     "Then pray to God, or Jesus, or a patron saint.  Pray to an ancestor,
to your father, to Kukulcan, the Mayan supreme god, the god of resurrection
and reincarnation.  It does not matter to whom you pray.  They are all one
and the same."
     Pray to Jesus, his father, or Kukulcan for guidance . . .  yeah,
right.  Like one of those three would know all about what it was like to be
a gay teen!  Jake pushed the negative thought out of his mind.  He had to
be positive.
     "That leaves only one last gift to make to the Gods."
     "And that is?"
     Chilam plucked one of the leaves from the twig and to Jake's surprise,
it immediately turned brown and brittle.  Giving it to Jake to hold, he
took a cactus thorn from his pouch.  Then with a sudden movement, he
grabbed Jake's penis with his right hand and stretched out what remained of
his foreskin.  Before Jake could react, he jabbed the thorn through the
loose skin and quickly held Jake's hand under it so his fresh blood dripped
on the leaf.  Catching half a dozen drops of blood on the leaf, he then
held it in the flame of one of the candles.  "Repeat after me, 'This, my
blood, is for you, Camaxtli, God of Fate, so you may lead me on my quest
and reveal to me my true self'."  Jake repeated the prayer.  "You must make
this sacrifice and recite the prayer the morning of each day, the moment
you awake."  With that final instruction, Chilam stood and began to leave.
     "How long do I stay here?"
     "Until you know your true self.  Until you know your true name."
     And with that, he turned and left.  Jake sat and stared at the wall of
the cave opposite him.  What was he doing here?  He was no descendent of
the Maya.  Shit, he barely knew anything about them.  He certainly didn't
believe in their gods.  Jake quickly brushed that thought from his mind and
found himself apologizing to the gods he did not believe in.  All right, it
was not logical, but he figured why not give it a try?  At least he was
doing something, and at this point he was willing to give anything a try.
He could not keep on living the life he was living, delighting in his
gayness one day and hating it the next, admitting and embracing it one
moment and denying and hiding it a moment later.  He concentrated on the
tree of life and inhaled deeply as he focussed on his mission.  His
foreskin ached where Chilam had pierced it.
     He concentrated harder and inhaled deeper.  The candles gave off a
spicy fragrance and as he inhaled and exhaled his vision began to blur.
Jake wondered what hallucinogen he was inhaling, and then quickly pushed
that thought out of his mind also.  It was just a means of helping him
concentrate.  He had to be positive.  The eighteen-year-old youth wondered
whom he should pray to.
     His first thought was his father.  He loved his father, loved him more
than any other person.  Benjamin Sisko was strong physically and mentally,
determined to the point of being bullheaded, highly moral, and respected by
everyone who knew him, even his enemies.  He was dedicated and
hard-working, and a Starfleet Officer to the core.  He was the type of
person that inspired admiration and loyalty, the type of person that was
put on a pedestal as a role model to emulate.  Of course in his position as
the Emissary, he was even more elevated in the eyes of the Bajorans.  To
Jake, he was all of those things, but also a warm and caring dad, a dad who
would do anything for his son, a dad whose love was unquestioning and
boundless.  Jake loved him too.  He always had and as he grew older that
love just grew deeper.  They had an exceptionally close relationship,
closer than many sons and dads he knew.  It often seemed as if his dad knew
exactly what he was thinking and exactly what he was about to say.  He
often found that his dad understood how he felt even better than he knew
himself.  There was, however, one major exception to that, a very major
exception.  That he could not discuss that with his dad caused an ache in
his heart, but he simply could not do it.
     Jake's next thought was God, or Jesus.  His mother had been the
religious one in the family.  His dad was often too busy, or had an
emergency that had to be taken care of, so it was frequently just his
mother and he who had attended church services.  Then she had died and Jake
stopped going to church even though his dad had encouraged him to continue,
and had even arranged to have time to go himself.  That was another example
of how deeply his dad loved him.  How many dads would place their son
before duty?  Jake could not continue going to church however.  How could
he?  How could he go to a church that worshipped a God that allowed what
had happened to his mother to happen? How could any God cause him such
pain?  Of course over time Jake realized that attitude was wrong and that
he was in no position to question God's will, but by then the habit of
going to church had been broken.
     Jake realized that was probably just as well.  Had he been deeply
religious, what he was going through right now would be even more difficult
than it was.  He knew that almost all Christian faiths, and in fact most
religions, condemned same sex relationships.  Those people who believed the
strongest in their faith could even quote sections of the Bible or the
Koran or some similar religious text to support their claim.  Jake had
never thought much about the religious controversy.  As far as he was
concerned, God had made him, and if God had made him, then He must have had
a reason making him so that he liked other boys.  Still, everything
considered, Jake decided that God or Jesus were not likely sources for him
to pray to for guidance on this issue.
     That left Kukulcan, the Mayan supreme God, the God of resurrection and
reincarnation.  He had no idea what the God looked like, what He did, or
anything else about Him.  Jake smiled.  He knew a lot about his first two
choices but he could never pray to them, and the last he knew nothing
about, which made praying to him impossible.  So, concentrating on the
green twig, he prayed to Camaxtli, the God of Fate.  Almost everyone he
knew whose opinion he valued seemed to believe in Fate, so why not pray to
him?  Besides, if he was going to have to puncture his foreskin every
morning for the guy, then of all the choices he had to pray to, Camaxtli
owed him the most.  Jake smiled at that thought and hoped the God saw the
humour too.
     Jake concentrated hard on his request for guidance.  There was no
thunderclap, no booming voice, no visitations by mysterious spirits or
half-man-half-beast creatures.  He concentrated harder.  Nothing, not even
any shifting images to raise his hopes.  His dick still hurt.  Jake
concentrated with all his strength, which considering his lack of sleep,
lack of food, and the exertion he'd been through, was not exactly all that
great.  He soon drifted off to sleep.
     While he slept, he dreamed.  He dreamed about all those who had been
an influence in his life, his father and mother, his grandfather, Nog,
Mardah, Gowran, Onaya, Salene, Nolar, Chilam, Aaron, Major Kira, Doctor
Bashir, Richard back at the Utopia Planetia Fleet Yards. . . .  They all
floated in and out in a fog, all telling him what he should do, all telling
him what he should be.  He packed up his bundle and followed Richard along
the back alleys and narrow streets near the Martian docking bays where they
eavesdropped on drunken and clandestine conversations, and snickered and
jabbed each other in the ribs as they listened to off-colour jokes and
shipmen's tales of fantastic sex.  He hid behind the crates of supplies
destined for Quarks and jerked off with Nog.  He dodged the mortar and
phasar fire on Ajilon Prime with Doctor Bashir, and naked and anxious he
followed Chilam along the narrow trail in the dense jungle to seek his
Destiny.
     When he awoke, stiff and sore, he found himself laying on the spongy
moss carpet of the jungle floor.  It was early evening.  He slowly raised
himself on his elbows as he tried to remember where he was.  When he had
fallen asleep he was in the lava tube cave.  He glanced around but nothing
was familiar, which did not surprise him.  One part of the jungle looked
like another as far as he was concerned.  He remembered bits and pieces of
his dream, but nothing that was of any help explaining what had happened.
He must have left the cave in his sleep somehow, although he had no history
of sleepwalking.  The green twig, a candle, a piece of flint, the cactus
thorn, and Chilam's empty sack lay beside him.  Putting the things in the
sack, Jake slowly got to his feet.  He had to go to Kopocactyl.  He did not
know why, or how he knew, or where it was.  He did not even know what it
was, except that it was a place.  He just knew he had to go there.  Jake
headed out along the jungle path.
     For two days he travelled, subsisting on the few berries and roots
that he recognized as being edible and could find.  Each morning he plucked
a green leaf from the twig and watched it instantly turn brown and brittle.
Each morning he stretched out his foreskin, gritted his teeth and clenched
his eyes as he quickly pierced it with the thorn, and dribbled his fresh
blood over the dried leaf.  Each morning he held the leaf in the flame of
the candle and prayed to Camaxtli to lead him on his quest and to reveal to
him his true self.
     In the afternoon of the third day a tropical rain storm hit.  Jake
sought refuge under a huge tree with dense foliage that the rain seemed to
be unable to penetrate.  Another of the forest sentinels had fallen years
ago and lay on the forest floor under the umbrella tree.  Jake sat on it
and watched the rain, something that he'd had rare opportunity to do having
spent most of his life on starships and DS9.  The rain began to come down
ferociously, pelting the ground much like he had seen hail strike in old
clips of Earth.  In the darkness caused by the black clouds and pelting
rain he saw something running down the path.  At first he thought it to be
a fawn, but realized as the creature drew nearer that it was a child.
Seeing the tree and thinking the same as Jake had, the child raced toward
it, splashing through puddles without any effort to avoid them until he was
under the shelter of the huge tree.
     He was a small boy of about seven or eight, skinny, and naked.  His
skin was the colour of a hickory nut, his thick, curly hair pitch-black,
and his wide eyes dark brown.  The boy was carrying a pole twice his length
with the end whittled to a sharp point.  He smiled, a broad smile that
immediately made Jake smile back.  His middle tooth was missing, his entire
body was dripping wet, and his legs were mud-spattered half way up his
thighs.
     "Do you mind if I join you out of the rain?" he asked politely as he
placed his left hand on his right shoulder in an act of submission as was
proper for a child addressing an adult.
     "No, of course not.  It is really coming down hard."
     The boy looked around as if looking for a dry place to sit, and
finally choosing a clear spot on the forest floor before Jake, he sat down
cross-legged facing him.  The boy stared at him openly until Jake glanced
away and shifted uncomfortably.
     "What is wrong?" the boy asked.
     "Nothing."
     "Why do you lie to me?"
     Jake bristled.  Were all children in this culture so blunt and so
observant?  "All right, where I come from, it is not considered polite to
stare at another person."
     "I was not staring, I was examining.  There is a difference."
     The boy's explanation did nothing to appease Jake's temper.
     "Examining?"
     "I have seen dark-skinned men before, but I have never seen a man that
was black."
     "Well, in that case, look to your heart's content," Jake commented
sarcastically.  Besides naked, he was tired, cold, wet, and hungry.
     "You have a good-looking body.  I would like to have a body like yours
when I grow up."
     Despite his foul mood Jake had to smile.  He remembered being that
young.  He also remembered looking at the bodies of older boys and flexing
in front of a mirror and wishing he had bigger muscles.  He'd been skinny
back then, and even though now he was filling out, he still considered his
body as being awkward and gangly.  Everyone was always telling him he could
add a few pounds.  Jake looked back at the naked child.  The boy could
certainly benefit with a few more pounds, quite a few more.  His arms and
legs were thin as sticks and looked like you could easily snap them with
your bare hands.  You could see every one of his ribs, and when he hunched
forward it looked like his shoulder bones were going to push out of his
skin.
     "Are you staring, or examining?" the boy asked.
     Jake's temper immediately flared once more.  Little boys in this
culture were not only blunt, they were downright insolent.  The tone in the
boy's voice was not one of rudeness though.  He had spoken in the manner of
making a statement, and actually, the boy was right, he had been staring.
Jake had to smile once again as he calmed back down.  "Examining."
     Getting to his feet and walking over to where Jake was sitting, he
hopped up onto the fallen tree and sat beside him.  "So why are you naked?"
     "I am on a vision quest."
     "So, that is why you are out here in the jungle."
     "Yes.  And what about you?  What are you doing out here?"
     "Hunting."
     Jake suppressed a smile at the boy's comment and wondered just what it
was that an eight-year-old boy hunted.  "So that is why you have the
pointed pole."
     The boy nodded and grinned, and Jake had to grin back.  The boy's
smile was infectious.  It was too bad boys grew up to be men and learned to
hide their feelings.
     "I was following a wild tapir, and I almost had him when this darn
rain came and I lost him," the boy said as he began to swing his feet.
     "A wild tapir is a very dangerous animal."
     The boy nodded, this time more vigorously, and again flashed Jake a
wide grin.  "And very tasty," he observed.
     "I would not mind a little wild tapir right now," Jake admitted.  "I
could eat a whole one all by myself."
     "I found a large twilberry bush not far from here.  I can show you
when the rain stops.  Can you eat on your vision quest?"
     Jake thought for a moment.  Chilam had said nothing about fasting.
"Yes."
     "Then I will show you," the boy said.  He sat there for a moment, and
then observed, "my hunt was not totally unsuccessful.  I found this."  The
boy opened his hand and showed Jake a smooth, polished pebble, a treasure
for any eight-year-old in any culture.
     "Nice," Jake observed.  "Can I see it?"  The boy handed it over and
Jake examined it.  "The colouration is very unique," he said handing the
treasure back to the boy.
     The boy's face broke into a wide, gap-toothed smile with Jake's
acknowledgement of the value of his find.  "So, what are you seeking in
this vision quest?"
     "To understand more about myself.  To find out who the true Jake Sisko
is."
     "So, what is it that you don't know about yourself?"
     Jake stared out at the rain.
     "It is so bad you cannot tell me?"
     "No.  It's not bad."
     "Well then?" the boy asked, swinging his feet more vigorously.
     "It just isn't something I wish to share, especially with one so
young."
     "What does being young have to do with it?"  He began to swing his
legs alternately, swinging the right out as he drew the left back.
     "There are some things that are not for young people to know."
     The boy laughed.  It was the honest giggle of boyhood, from the heart
and thoroughly and openly enjoyed.  "That is funny.  Usually I am told that
I do not know enough, and that there is much yet for me to learn.  I am not
usually told there is something that I should not know."
     Jake had to smile also.  He felt very comfortable with the boy, much
like he had felt back when he was on the Saratoga with Aaron.  He had
forgotten how much fun they'd had.
     "So, is it because you are black?"
     "No."
     "Because you are human?"
     "No."
     The boy leaned back on his elbows and spread apart his legs.  His
little penis was no bigger than Jake's little toe, and his testicles as
small as grapes, and just as smooth.  Jake looked away.
     "Why do you turn your head?"
     "I didn't."
     "You lie."
     "All right.  I did."
     "Why?"
     "I am not used to seeing naked young boys."
     "You do not like looking at naked boys?"
     "It's not a matter of liking.  I'm just not used to it."
     "Do you like looking at naked boys your age?"
     "Yes."
     "You like looking at naked girls your age?"
     Jake considered lying, or not answering, but decided the truth was the
best course.  The boy would probably just accuse him of lying anyway.  "No.
Girls do not interest me as much."
     "Do girls make your thing stand up?"
     "Now you are getting into those things that young boys should not know
about."
     "About girls making a guy's thing stand up?  That is dumb.  I know
about that stuff."
     "You do?" Jake asked with a smile.  When you are eight you can be so
confident.
     "Sure.  I can make mine stand up," the boy announced proudly.
     Jake thought back to Aaron, and the fun they'd had.  It would be nice
to be that young and innocent again.  The boy reached down and began to
fiddle with his little penis.  Jake's organ began to swell in response even
though he wasn't touching it.  "You shouldn't do that."
     "Why?"
     Jake was not sure why.  Almost everyone he had ever known was opposed
to boys fiddling with themselves, and they were certainly opposed to a boy
doing it in front of others.
     "It feels good," the boy observed.
     "Yes."
     "It is not harmful."
     "No."
     "Yours wants you to do it too."
     Jake glanced over at him.
     "I seen it move.  Let's make our things feel good together."
     "Where I come from men and boys don't do that together."
     "Do boys do it by themselves?"
     "Yes."
     "Do they do it with other boys?"
     "Some of them do, sometimes."
     "Do men do it by themselves?"
     "Some.  Some do it together with other men also," Jake said,
anticipating the question.
     "But not men with boys?  That is dumb."
     Jake knew that in some cultures, and in some specific periods in
Earth's past, men and boys did engage in sex together.  From the comments
made by Swift Ocelot, and now this boy, he suspected this culture at this
time in its history was one of those cultures.  He also knew that the
majority of races throughout time considered such a thing legally, socially
and morally unacceptable.  Jake did not want to get into that conversation
with the boy.  The rain began to let up.
     "Would you like to go pick those berries now?" the boy asked.
     "Yes, I would," Jake quickly replied, glad to get out of the awkward
situation he had found himself in.
     As he followed the skinny boy up the trail, he could not help but
notice how small his buttocks were, and how enticing.  As Jake's penis
began to swell once again he shook his head.  Why was he thinking such
things?  This was not like him, but then, he had not had many occasions of
being in the company of naked eight-year-olds.  After a feed of
twilberries, the two continued up the trail.  That evening their meal
consisted of a few thick white roots that the boy dug up.  They sort of
tasted like raw turnip to Jake.  A little later the boy stood up and openly
and unashamedly began to take a leak.  He directed his spray at one leaf
and then another as if trying to see how many leaves he could drench before
he was done.
     "You know what I like about being a guy?" he asked, turning and facing
Jake as he shook himself off.
     "No.  What?"
     "Guys don't have to squat to take a leak.  And they can make fancy
patterns with their pee or practice aiming and stuff while they do it."
     "That's true," Jake agreed with a smile.
     "What about you?  What do you like about being a guy?"
     Jake had to think.  "Well, I like the way that guys think, and the way
guys act.  They are different from girls and women that way."
     "Yeah," agreed the boy as he half sat and half lay on the fallen log
Jake was sitting on and stared at the fire they had built.  "Guys get right
to the point and don't waste a bunch of time talking and talking and
talking.  And they don't get all emotional and mushy and stuff."  His hand
crept down to his crotch and he began to fiddle with himself.  "This is
another thing I like about being a guy."
     "Yeah, that is a nice thing about being a guy," Jake agreed.
     The boy gave no indication that he was going to stop, and after a few
moments of hesitation, Jake yielded to temptation.  He slowly reached down
and took his limp tool in his hand.  He bounced it with his fingers, and
tugged on the base.  His manipulations and the sight of the boy beside him
tugging on his little penis soon had Jake stiff.  As he wrapped his fingers
about the stiff, black rod protruding from between his legs, he noticed the
boy's little pricklet was stiff also.  Holding it between his thumb and
first two fingers, the boy began to slowly move his hand up and down the
short shaft and back and forth over the little knob.
     The two lay there on the jungle floor side by side and slowly jerking.
It had been a long time since he'd done something like that, pleasuring
himself openly and willingly along with a friend.  Jake thought back to
when sex was so simple, back to his boyhood.  It was a pleasant time, a
time of innocence and exploration, a time when sex was a novelty and a
mystery.
     "Know what else I like about being a boy?"
     "No," Jake said with a smile.  "What?"
     "Having a staff," the boy said with a grin.  "Besides being funner to
pee with, there's so many ways you can have fun with it, so many ways to
feel good.  You can use your hand, your best buddy's hand, his mouth, his
bum . . .  a melon."  He gave Jake an impish grin.
     Jake smiled.  The kid was right.  It was good to be a boy, but not
just because of his urogenital system.  Being a boy was a way of thinking,
a way of acting, a way of being that was different from that of a toddler,
a man, or a female.  Unhindered by experience and social restraints, a boy
had more choices and freedoms than anyone else despite the controls placed
on him because of his age.  Of course boyhood came with its own problems,
but it also came with many blessings.  In a way, boyhood reflected all that
was good about being a male.  Jake smiled.  He was glad that he was a male.
     Noticing that the boy had stopped playing with himself, Jake
reluctantly stopped also.  He debated telling the boy that if he continued
it got even better, but he decided against it.  The boy had a right to his
naivety.  The two lay there on their backs, their cocks stiff and sticking
up in the air, both itching for attention even though one was seven inches
and the other barely two.
     "Chilam says with practice a guy can pleasure himself like this for
five or six hours."
     Now Chilam had never told him that!  Jake was about to comment when he
remembered that Chilam was both a name and a title, and every village or at
least group of villages had a Chilam.  The boy could be talking about
someone totally different.  The Chilam he knew was very talented, but five
or six hours?  Now if that were only possible!  "Five or six hours you
say?" Jake asked, repressing a smile.
     "I can only do it for forty minutes."
     "Forty minutes?  That is a long time," Jake observed.  He knew that
when he was that age he was able to fiddle with his dick for a much longer
time than when he was older and could ejaculate, but even so, he had never
done it that long.  "How do you manage to do that?" he asked, playing along
     "You know, by relaxing your whole body and breathing slow, letting
your mind relax, using your bum and peehole muscles to hold it back, stuff
like that," the boy said.  "Guess that's not long compared to what you can
do."
     "Believe me, forty minutes is a great accomplishment," Jake said, not
willing to admit that not once since Nog had taught him how to jerk off had
he ever done it that long.  "By the way, what is your name?"
     "I am known as Backlum Chaam."
     "I'm Jake Sisko."
     As the boy resumed playing with himself, so did Jake.  He relaxed all
his muscles and breathed slowly and rhythmically as the boy was doing.
Glancing over at the boy, Jake felt strange watching him stroking his stiff
little penis.  He had always felt that all the secrecy about jerking off
and the social taboos against doing it were dumb, and watching the
eight-year-old openly and unashamedly enjoying himself, that position was
reaffirmed.  It felt good, and it certainly was not harmful. Even laws and
social taboos that prohibited men and boys from enjoying this together had
to be questionable.  They both did it, so what was the harm in doing it
together?  Jake had often found his thoughts were out of step with everyone
else's in the past, so that last thought did not totally surprise him.
     Despite his efforts, Jake had difficulty holding back.  Before long
the head of his stiff cock was itching to release his load and he had to
stop and tightly constrict his sphincters to hold himself back as he tried
to concentrate on something as nonsexual as he could.  He concentrated on
Odo.  The unyielding, humourless law enforcer was a good choice.  His
desire slowly began to fade.  Backlum Chaam looked over at him and grinned
with that gap-toothed smile and Jake had to grin back.  Yes, it was good to
be a boy, and to be a male.
     And so they sat there side by side, man and boy, each slowly pumping
his right hand up and down his stiff organ, pausing and fighting back the
urge to continue, deep breathing to calm himself, and then once again
resuming that self-stimulation that brought such exquisite physical and
mental pleasure.  Jake lost track of the time.  At least forty minutes had
to have passed.  Each pause had to be longer and longer before he dare
resume.
     Finally the boy's eyes glazed over and with an exhausted whimper, the
naked eight-year- old began to jerk his hips uncontrollably and to tremble
with the awesome delight of his dry orgasm.  The exquisite look of pain and
pleasure on his young, flushed face was too much for Jake.  The
eighteen-year-old shot off a load like he had never released in a long
time.  It shot up into the air and away from his body to land on the jungle
floor several feet in front of him.  Shot after violent shot erupted out of
his throbbing cock.  Even when the force subsided, his hot, slimy juice
continued to ooze out of his irritated slit and down over his glans and his
fingers as if it was never going to stop.
     He finally glanced over at the boy.  Backlum Chaam was grinning with
delight at the sight.  Despite their difference in age and background, and
despite the fact the boy could not yet ejaculate, he knew exactly how Jake
was feeling, and being there with him and a part of his experience brought
him as much joy as his own orgasm.  Jake sighed as he felt the tension flow
out of him.  This was jacking off as it should be, open, unashamed,
enjoyed, and shared.  That was how all sex should be.  The eight-year-old
snuggled up to him and Jake put his arm around him as the two naked boys
enjoyed the bliss that followed a male's orgasm.  Only another male can
understand and appreciate that feeling, and that was one thing that was so
great about being gay.  That was the thought on Jake's mind as he drifted
off.
     When he awoke, it was morning and the boy had gone.  He thought about
the previous day.  It had been an unusual, but a fantastic, experience.  It
had reminded him of his boyhood.  He had liked being a boy, and at the
moment he liked being a man.  The eighteen-year-old reached down and
fondled his limp tool and damp balls.  He got up and took a leak, directing
his spray at first one leaf and the other, trying to see how many he could
drench before he was done.  He liked the physical attributes that made him
a man, he liked the psyche that defined him as masculine and he liked that
he liked other men.  To paraphrase the Klingons, it was a good day to be
gay.  As he bent to pick up his small sack, he noticed the boy's polished
stone beside it.  It was strange the boy would have forgotten it.  Jake
slipped it in the sack with his other meagre belongings.
     After his blood sacrifice to the God of Fate, Jake continued on his
way.  That afternoon he came across an ancient, exceedingly corpulent man
sitting beside a cairn beside the trail.  He wore only a pair of worn
sandals and a plain white, low-slung loincloth.  A simple pouch hung from a
leather strap across his chest and he wore a thin, silver ring.  He had to
weigh at least three hundred pounds, and most of that was stomach.  His
reddish-brown skin was blotchy with dark liver spots, his head bald and
glistening in the sun, and the hair on his chest, which looked more like an
old woman's breasts, was coarse and white.  Most of his teeth were worn to
the gums and what were left were yellow.  The man had at least three chins
and the circumference of his forearms and thighs was at least triple
Jake's.  He looked like he was in his eighties, and he looked like he was
not going to last much longer.
     "Yam Poctyl?" the man asked, looking up at Jake.  His eyes were white.
Looking closer, Jake found they were covered by cataracts.
     "No, sorry."
     The man sighed.  "I'm waiting for Yam Poctyl.  He is my beloved."
     "I see," said Jake, and then immediately felt guilty for using such a
phrase.
     "Will you sit with me a while?  It is very lonely, and I have been
waiting a long time."
     Jake hesitated.  He was anxious to get on with his mission.  He had no
idea how far he had to travel yet to reach Kopocactyl, nor what he was to
do once he got there.  Besides, he could sense that the man was one of
those types who once he got your attention would never stop talking.
Still, Jake could not help feeling compassion for him. That was one of his
weaknesses, or one of his strengths, depending on how you looked at it.
"Sure.  For a while," the teenager said as he sat beside the man.
     The stranger reached out and placed his hand on Jake's leg.  His first
impulse was to push the old man's hand away, and as his fat, stubby fingers
began to slowly caress his thigh, Jake felt his skin crawl.  After a few
moments, his caressing stopped and his hand began to slowly move upward,
over his hip, across his waist and up over his chest and neck, and finally
explored his face.
     "Yam Poctyl is a lot like you," he said after many minutes.  "A
bright, handsome young man, twenty-five and strong as a bull, and hung like
one too."  The man chuckled.  "I am fortunate to be his lover."
     "Indeed," agreed Jake, and then realizing how that could be taken,
quickly added, "I mean, he sounds like . . .  quite a man."  Glancing at
the cairn in the hope of finding something else to talk about to get him
out of the awkward situation, what he saw caused him to shake his head and
take a closer look.  On the marker was the name Yam Poctyl.
     "My name is Camaxtli."
     That revelation on the heels of his first surprise left Jake
speechless.  His first thought was that this was the God of Fate at last,
come to answer his prayers.  If the old man was, he certainly was not the
image Jake had had in his mind as he'd made his sacrifice each morning.  He
debated if he should comment on his vision quest and his daily blood
sacrifice to see how the old man reacted, but decided against it.  The man
could not be the real God of Fate, if there even was such a God.  He was
just an old, fat man named after the supposed Being.  "Jake.  Jake Sisko,"
he said at last.
     "So, Jake Jake Sisko, are you some man's beloved like my Yam Poctyl?"
     "No.  Not exactly."
     "Are you attracted to men?"
     Jake hesitated responding.  He had asked himself that very question
with growing frequency lately, and after a lot of soul searching, he had
always arrived at the same answer.
     "Yes, I am," he replied.  Nobody having ever asked him that question
before, he had never said the answer out loud until that moment.  Saying it
caused goose bumps to form on his arms.  Somehow, saying it gave it more
certainty, made it seem more tangible, even though he had admitted those
feelings silently to himself hundreds of times in the past.
     "Do you find yourself wanting to know more about men loving men?"
     "Yes," Jake admitted.  Ever since his first experiments with gay sex
with Nog, he had searched the DS9 files, the Starfleet library, and any
other information sources he could get his hands on for information on that
topic.  He could not admit having that interest to anyone else, not to
anyone who worked at DS9 or in Starfleet, not to his father, nor to any of
his friends.  He could not even admit that to Nog, his very best friend.
The Ferengi saw their messing around as just that, messing around to
relieve themselves of their horniness.  Jake certainly could not admit his
curiosity to anyone who cared about him, but he could to this dying old man
on an unnamed jungle path on an unimportant planet.  The stranger's opinion
of him, and whether or not he approved, was transitory.  His opinion and
approval were important even though they had just met, but not being
long-lasting, confessing his curiosity was safe.
     "You've had sex with another male before?"
     "Yes."
     "With more than one?"
     "Yes," Jake replied, wishing that he could discuss these things with
those he loved as easily as he was discussing them with the old man.
     "Was it pleasant physically, having sex with these others?"
     "Yes."
     "So this is the life you want to lead?"
     Jake hesitated.
     "What is it about such a life that bothers you?"
     "Well, I'm not exactly bothered . . . ," Jake began.
     "Yet you hesitate.  Do you find your attraction to other men
disgusting?"
     "No, of course not," replied Jake.  "Not me."
     "But others do."
     "Yes.  Some do.  I know some of my friends would, Doctor Bashir, Miles
O'Brien for sure, Quark, Major Kira. . . ."
     "What sort of friends are these that would find you disgusting?"
     "It's not me they would find disgusting."
     "What then?"
     "Well . . .  homosexuality.  The idea of men having sex with men."
     "Why should that bother you?"
     "Well, because they are my friends."
     "If they are your friends, then it should not bother them."
     Jake had thought of these things before, and had made the same
arguments as the old man was making now.  After all the arguments were done
with, the facts remained that those closest to him felt same sex
relationships were disgusting, and they were his best friends.  "It is
. . .  well . .  .  just how it is where I come from."
     "Is it?"
     Jake's heartbeat increased.  Dammit, this was not the first time he
had thought about this.  Of course that was how it was.
     "What of your father?" the old man asked before Jake had a chance to
form an answer to the first question in his head.  "Would he be disgusted
too?"
     "No.  Not disgusted.  Not exactly.  More . . .  dissatisfied."
     "Dissatisfied?"
     "Well, yeah, and disappointed.  He was disappointed I didn't want to
enter Starfleet.  I'm pretty sure he'd be disappointed to find I was gay,
that I . . .  well . . .  don't want to have sex with women like other
men."
     "Do you consider yourself a man?"
     "Of course I do," Jake retorted somewhat angrily.  "Being gay does not
mean I'm not a man."
     First the boy, and now the old man.  The people of this place had an
annoying habit of being blunt and irritating, especially strangers.
     "Would your father consider you a man?"
     "Well . . .  there's an attitude that if you are gay you aren't a real
man."
     "But you don't agree with that."
     "No."
     "Then your father is wrong."
     "Yes, well, not wrong, just misinformed."  Jake was making excuses for
his father.  He knew that, and he knew Camaxtli knew that.  "Anyway, it's
more than that."
     "Such as?"
     "Well, he'll be disappointed I won't be carrying on the Sisko name.
He'll be disappointed that he won't be having any grandchildren."  Jake's
mind flashed back to Salene and the conversations they'd had about him
being a castrati.  Those conversations had been just as unpleasant as the
one he was having now.
     "And how would your mother feel?"
     "She's dead."
     "If she were alive.  How would she feel?"
     Jake thought for a minute.  "I think she would understand," he finally
said.
     "She wouldn't think it wrong?"
     "No."
     "But?"
     "But others would.  Starfleet has a regulation that you cannot be a
member if you are gay.  If you want to join Starfleet you have to undergo a
process they call psycho-surgery to . . .  well . . .  remove the
condition.  Besides, my Church says anyone who is homosexual is condemned
to hell."
     "Do you agree with these things?"
     "No."
     "You do not support all these things, but still you are not convinced
that the life Destiny has laid out for you is the life you want to lead."
     "No.  Not totally."
     "Those you've had sex with, have you loved any of them?  I mean truly
loved, in your heart, not just lusted for in your groin?"
     Jake thought of those he'd had sex with.  Nog, Salene, Nolar, Gowran,
Chilam, Aaron, though in his case they had never touched, Richard, a
classmate back on Mars with whom he'd had several experiences that could be
considered of a sexual nature he had loved all of them, loved each of them
in a way that was more than just liking, more than just the comradeship one
has for a buddy, and that was totally separate from any feelings of lust.
"Yes."
     "Good."  The old man smiled, showing his yellowed, worn teeth.  "It is
not enough just to accept what you are with your mind, you must accept what
you are with your heart.  Such was the case between Yam Poctyl and myself.
We gave ourselves to each other from the heart.  From the moment we met it
was so.  From the moment we met we knew we were meant to be lovers."
     "So you lived together?" Jake asked, glad to get the topic off
himself, but curious also, not just how a twenty-five-year-old and an
eighty-year-old could be lovers, but what it was like for any two men to
feel that way toward each other.
     "Yes.  We had a wonderful life together."
     "What happened?"
     "An accident," he sighed.  "It should not have been.  It should have
been me to go first, not a young man with so much to live for."
     "So . . .  he . . .  died."
     "Yes."
     "Ah . . .  when you and I met . . .  you said you were waiting for
him."
     "I am.  We will be together again soon."
     It took Jake a moment to realize what the man was saying.  Placing his
arm about the man's expansive shoulders, he drew him close.  The old man
said nothing at first, and then he began to talk.  It was as Jake had
suspected.  Once Camaxtli had his attention, he talked incessantly, telling
him how he and his lover had met, the life they had lead together, their
many happy moments, and their sad ones.  The old man rambled, sometimes
becoming incoherent, and other times his mind sharp and clear.  More and
more frequently though he became confused, at one time talking to Jake, and
at another to Yam Poctyl.
     As he talked, he ran his fingers over Jake's skin, as if caressing him
was soothing his own pain, and in a way, it probably was.  Camaxtli's touch
was gentle and caring, and although they had just met, and despite his aged
appearance, Jake found he did not mind the man's familiarity.  In fact as
the caresses and hugs became more intimate, he found himself becoming
aroused.  Brushing his stubby fingers against Jake's semierect cock,
Camaxtli chuckled.
     "So, Yam Poctyl, you still find your old lover's touch arousing."
     "Yes," whispered Jake as he caressed the old man's broad back.
Pretending to be his lover was a minor deception, and caused no harm.
     Camaxtli ran his fingers along Jake's hip and nudged him, indicating
he wanted him to roll over.  Jake did so, laying on his stomach in the tall
grass beside the trail.  He inhaled and held his breath as he felt the old
man's forefinger touch his anus.  As the man caressed it gently, Jake's
cock became fully erect.  Camaxtli reached into his pouch and took out a
stone jar.  Unstoppering it, he scooped out a bit of paste with his
forefinger. He applied it to Jake's anus, and then slowly slipped his
greasy, stubby finger into Jake's rectum.  As he slowly finger-fucked
Jake's tight hole, Jake's cock throbbed hotly against his stomach.  The old
man worked his finger in and out of Jake's rectum for several minutes, by
which time Jake had begun to leak precum.
     Finally removing his finger, Camaxtli scooped up more of the lubricant
with it and his middle finger.  Jake knew the old man's intentions but he
did nothing to stop him.  The old, blind man thought he was about to fuck
his young lover, so why not indulge him?  The idea of an obese,
liver-splotched old man mounting him was far from erotic, but the knowledge
that he was going to bring the ancient a few minutes of pleasure was
stimulating.  They say that love, true love, is blind.  Well, let the old
man think in the short time he had left that he was making love to his
beloved Yam Poctyl.  Jake glanced back and watched the ancient grease up
his stubby, eighty- year-old penis.
     Pushing apart Jake's legs, the old man knelt between them and then
bent forward, placing his forearms on either side of the teenage boy.  His
broad, fat body totally hid Jake from view, and his flabby stomach came
into contact with his naked buttocks long before the greased knob of his
penis did.  Camaxtli was old and feeble, but he was also experienced and
skilled.  Shifting up closer on his knees and reaching between his legs, he
expertly guided his stubby penis to Jake's greased hole.  As the stubby
penis penetrated him, Jake was not in the least disgusted, and as
Camaxtli's three-hundred pounds of flabby flesh pressed down upon him, Jake
did not mind.
     The old man began the rhythmic to and fro motion of lovemaking
familiar to gay couples across the universe.  His movements were slow and
gentle, the movements of a tender and caring lover.  Jake lay there
passively, enjoying the physical stimulation of being fucked and the mental
satisfaction of knowing he was bringing the man above him a unique and yet
universally known pleasure.  As the man's cock slowly eased in and out of
him, as his hot, soft body slowly slid to and fro across his back, Jake
felt his passion slowly rising.
     Camaxtli's breath slowly became more laboured.  He was sweating
profusely, providing a natural lubricant as his chest and stomach slid back
and forth over Jake's back and buttocks.  The heat of the old man's body
combined with the heat of the jungle caused Jake to begin perspiring
also. He could feel his sweat trickling down over his ribs and down along
his ass cheek to where Camaxtli's hot cock was now being thrust in and out
of him urgently.  The old man finally drove forward and withdrew with
short, rapid thrusts and he groaned loudly.  As the man's semen shot up
Jake's rectum, Jake's cock, pinned between his stomach and the ground,
suddenly throbbed and the teenager's own semen gushed out of his body and
up along his stomach.
     His limp cock slipping out of Jake's hole, Camaxtli rolled off him and
sat up with his back against the nearest tree.  Jake crawled over to him
and snuggled up to his hot, flushed body.
     "Yam Poctyl," the elderly man sighed, "it is so wonderful to be with
you at last."
     The old man slipped off the sliver ring on his finger, and taking
Jake's hand, slipped it on his.  He died within the hour.  A hole had
already been dug beside the cairn.  Jake lowered his body into the grave
and buried him there beside his lover.  Piling the rocks up above the
grave, he extended the marker so it joined Yam Poctyl's cairn and he
scratched Camaxtli's name on a flat stone and set it in place.  He knew
just as their bodies were lying side by side, their souls had to be
together in Heaven, or wherever souls of these people went.  He hoped that
as the old man looked down upon him, he forgave him his deception
pretending to be his lover.  He had little difficulty believing Camaxtli
did.
     Jake had much to think about as he continued on his way.  It had been
a strange, almost macabre experience, but he felt at peace with himself.
The love between the old man and his young lover was proof that two men can
love just as can a man and a woman.  The love between Camaxtli and Yam
Poctyl gave Jake the hope that he too might find such a future.  Although
he found nothing to eat, that night he slept soundly.
     "This, my blood, is for you, Camaxtli, God of Fate, so you may lead me
on my quest and reveal to me my true self."
     As Jake said those words the next morning, he could not help but think
of the eighty-year- old Camaxtli, and he made a quick request to the old
man to help him too.  He walked for as long as he could until the heat
became too oppressive, and then he lay down in the shade and rested until
the day began to cool off.  Then once again he wearily got to his feet and
continued on his way.  As it started to grow dark, he began thinking about
finding a place to sleep.  Suddenly he came upon a small clearing, in the
middle of which was a campfire.  A hunk of venison was roasting on a spit,
and after subsisting on berries and roots and having nothing at all the
past two days, the aroma was as enticing as a flower to a bee.  He quickly
glanced about.  There was nobody around.  Other than the stone fire pit and
the roasting venison and several large packsacks, there was nothing else to
be seen.  He cautiously took a step forward.
     Suddenly a man leaped out at him from the tall grass, but this was no
ordinary man.  He was huge, six-foot-eight with a girth to match, and he
was as black as the night.  Jake was no match in his weakened state, and he
was caught by surprise despite his caution, but he was young enough and
alert enough to put up some resistance.  Falling upon the ground with the
man's weight fully on top of him, he had the wind knocked out of him.
Thinking he had incapacitated the youth, the black giant rolled off him.
To his surprise, Jake grabbed a handful of dirt and throwing it in his
face, scrambled to his feet.
     The man grabbed him and tripped him before he could get away.  Jake
kicked out blindly, and managed to connect with the man's head.  Only
momentarily stunned, the man retaliated by grabbing Jake by the foot and
twisting violently, causing pain to shoot through his ankle.  So the two
fought, delivering blow for blow, until finally the man flipped Jake on his
back and pinned him to the ground by sitting on his chest and holding down
the boy's arms at the elbows with his huge feet.
     "Well," the black man grunted, "what a delightful morsel the Gods have
delivered me to satisfy my loins before I satisfy my stomach.  And already
naked as a bonus."
     Holding down Jake's arms with his hands, he raised his body and
slipped down so he was laying flat on top of him face to face.  To Jake's
surprise he kissed him.  It was a rough, forceful kiss, the type of kiss
Gowran might give, or the type of kiss a rapist would give his victim.  As
he lowered his head again, Jake raised his and returned the kiss just as
violently.  The coarse giant laughed and then descended on Jake's neck,
giving him a hickey.  Jake responded by giving the man's ear a love bite.
     As the man's large hands began to caress Jake's chest, Jake tugged the
man's shirt out of his trousers.  It was already unbuttoned and he slipped
it over the man's shoulders.  His chest was solid muscle and densely
furred.  Jake ran his fingers through the thick, coarse hair in tight
circles.  The man, meanwhile, was massaging his smooth pecs and running his
fingers in circles just beyond the areola of his nipples.  Slipping farther
down, the man kissed Jake's hairless chest, and then fastened his mouth to
his right nipple.  As he sucked on it, his right hand ran over Jake's left
nipple, massaging it gently but firmly.  Jake groaned with the assault on
his nipples and lustfully worked the stranger's back muscles with his
fingers.  In no time both of Jake's nipples were hard and protruding.  As
the man finally drew away and half sat up, Jake saw that the man's teats
were erect also.
     "So," the man growled as he grinned down at Jake, "You like sex with
men."
     "Some men," Jake replied, raising his head and giving the man a lusty
kiss.  "And you like sex with men also," he said with a smile as he reached
up and tweaked the man's firm nipples.
     The man laughed, a deep, rumbling laugh.  "Some men," he replied.  "It
would seem we are well matched."
     "Let's find out," replied Jake as he reached down and untied the cord
of the man's trousers.  Quickly unlacing the man's fly, Jake pushed down
the loose, baggy trousers.  The man was wearing no underwear, and his cock
was already semierect.  Jake pushed the man's trousers on down and the man
squirmed out of them.
     The two began to run their hands over each other's body, caressing
thighs and buttocks, chests and backs.  They kissed and licked each other's
body, and as their lust increased the kisses and licks became more frequent
and forceful.  Their lovemaking was urgent and lustful like two wild
animals in rut, and yet it was loving and caring too.  Jake had never made
love to a black man before, but it had been one of his more favourite jerk
off fantasies ever since he'd discovered the joys of male to male sex.
     Now, being embraced and embracing another male of his own race far
exceeded his greatest anticipation.  He honestly had never felt a higher
level of arousal than he did at that moment.  Running his hands over the
man's black skin, inhaling his unique, musky aroma, and tasting his sweat
was making Jake ache from scalp to toe.  Seeing and feeling the man's dark
black hands caressing his smooth body, seeing his black hands against his
black skin, sent ripples of pleasure through him.  Jake reached down and
cupped the man's massive balls and delighted in the feel of their weight.
He wrapped his fingers about the man's throbbing cock and for the first
time in his life the colour of his hand and his partner's cock matched.
Perhaps to others that might seem insignificant, but for young Jake it
doubled his delight.  Placing one hand above the other, Jake was amazed,
and delighted, to find the knob and a bit of shaft was still sticking out
beyond his hands.  That black beauty had to be at least eight inches, maybe
even nine.
     Finally rolling Jake over on his back, the man worked up a mouth of
spittle and drooled it over his knob.  As Jake watched the bubbly, white
spit ooze down over the man's dark glans, his own mouth filled with saliva.
The man smiled knowingly, and moving up closer, he told Jake to add his own
spittle to the cock that was about to fuck him.  Jake did so eagerly, and
between the two of them, they soon had the man's raging, black cock fully
lubricated.
     Grabbing Jake's calves and raising his legs over his head so that his
tight black buns were elevated in the air, the stranger knelt before him.
As Jake reached up and grasped his ankles, the man reached down and placed
his spittle-slick knob against Jake's eager hole.  The stranger eased
forward slowly, being gentle but at the same time unyielding.  The two
grunted and panted, and slowly the man's thick cock penetrated the hot,
perspiring youth.
     Jake's breath shuddered as he exhaled.  The sensation of that thick,
hard rod slowly penetrating him was awesome even though it was not the
first time it had been stretched by a cock that size.  He relaxed and
pushed out with his sphincter to make it easier and less painful, but the
saliva and the black man's skill made it unnecessary.  Slowly Jake felt
himself being stuffed with the nine-inch black sausage.  Grinning down at
him, the huge man slowly bent forward and the two kissed.  He slowly began
to gyrate his hips, easing his cock in and out of the boy's hot hole.  The
two began to perspire with their exertion and the heat of the jungle, and
the odour of their sweat mingled and became one as the two of them worked
as one toward a common goal.
     As their desire increased, the two of them kissed more fervidly,
forcing lips against lips, kissing cheeks and necks with growing
excitement, first one taking the lead and then the other.  The big man
thrust his cock in and out of Jake's body with an urgent need now, rocking
the youth on his back.  Jake reached down and wanked his aching cock, eager
to let off a load.  His cockhead was burning, and so was his rectum.  His
partner's breathing suddenly changed, and anyone with experience would have
known why.  His entire body contracted and his hot seed shot up Jake's
rectum.  He grunted and shook with the delightful release.
     Jake trembled also, with the joy of having his rectum filled with the
black man's hot cum, with the joy of having been responsible for the man's
delight, and with the ecstasy of his own release.  His own cum erupted from
his burning cock, flying through the air and striking his chest.  Ropes of
his hot, white juice erupted from his body and laced his black chest,
striking his hard teats and oozing down his sweaty ribs.  As the blasts
subsided, the remaining shots struck his stomach in white blobs, and the
last oozed out of his flushed black cock and over his fingers.
     The man eased his now limp cock out of Jake's body and he lay down
beside the boy.  The two of them closed their eyes and revelled in the
memory of their union as their heaving chests slowly calmed.  The man
finally got to his feet, and taking two plates from his packsack, handed
one to Jake and motioned for him to join him.  As they ate, the man
introduced himself as Ekchuah, a merchant on his way to Kopocactyl.  They
ate with ravenous appetites, and when they were done, they had sex again
with just as much force and lust as the first time, perhaps even more so
now that their bellies were full.
     Their foreplay was longer, the two of them kissing passionately and
extending their tongues in each other's mouth.  They caressed each other's
buttocks, and ran their fingers along each other's cracks and massaged each
other's butthole.  When they became erect this time, it was Jake's stiff
pole that was basted with their saliva.  Watching the merchant bend forward
and drool his spittle over his stiff cock was so erotic Jake had to hold
back the urge to give free reign to the feelings and to explode untouched.
Soon his cockhead and shaft were slick with slimy, white spittle.
     Ekchuah lay on his back this time, and as the merchant elevated his
butt, Jake knelt down and fasted his lips to the man's hole.  His black ass
tasted even better than the roasted venison, and Jake's mouth rapidly
filled with saliva.  He pressed his lips tight and blew his spittle up the
squirming man's asshole.  Before he removed his lips, Jake inhaled deeply,
and the aroma of that black ass and the sweaty cord that extended between
it and the man's massive balls made the teenager shudder with pleasure.
Knowing he had to get on with it before his nuts exploded, Jake knelt
before the black giant and placed his knob against the man's hot, prepared
asshole.  The man was as expert being buggered as he was doing the
buggering.  Jake's eight inches were soon buried up the hot black ass and
his loins were pressing against the man's cheeks.
     Jake began to fuck the merchant with as much enthusiasm and desire as
he had been fucked earlier.  He eased his eight inches in and out of the
man's hot, pulsating hole, enjoying both the pleasure that brought him, and
the pleasure it brought the merchant.  As he worked his hips to and fro,
Jake reached down and grasped Ekchuah's stiff black cock.  It was as big as
Gowran's, but lacking the Klingon's boney ridge, it felt totally different
although it was hard and just as hot.  Jake began to work his hand up and
down the length of the thick shaft in time with the movement of his cock in
and out of the man's rectum.
     Jake was thoroughly enjoying this, and from the look on the black
giant's face, so was he.  If there was any doubt, it was soon erased as the
man began to grunt and gasp with his approaching ejaculation, and Jake did
likewise as he felt himself approaching his.  He rocked back and forth on
his knees faster and faster, driving his irritated, aching cock in and out
of the man's hot, moist hole.  He pumped furiously on the black man's long,
thick cock.  Finally the anticipated moment arrived.  Jake lunged forward
with a cry of ecstasy as his throbbing cock shot out his cum.  At the same
time Ekchuah released his load, his second load of cum just as copious as
the first but thicker.  The first white ropes streaked his black chest and
the later blobs resulting from lessening force oozed over the curvature of
his stomach or clung to his curly, black hairs.  The two inhaled deeply and
shuddered with their joint release.  Jake bent forward and kissed the man
on the mouth.  It was a long, lingering kiss.  The two snuggled together
that night, content in mind and body.
     "This, my blood, is for you, Camaxtli, God of Fate, so you may lead me
on my quest and reveal to me my true self.  And," Jake added with a
whisper, "thank you for last night."
     That morning Ekchuah gave Jake a pale tan, kidskin jock, a manta of
the same colour with a design of two rainbow coloured parrots done in
bright beads, and a pair of soft sandals to wear.  When Jake protested that
he could not accept such finery, the merchant insisted that it was a minor
gift for the wonderful evening they had spent.  Jake still protested but
finally had to relent with the agreement he would tell others the name of
the merchant from whom he had gotten such fine clothes.  They headed for
Kopocactyl in great spirits, although Jake was apprehensive and worried.
He had no idea what he was to do once he got there, or if he should have
indulged in the pleasures he'd had on the way.
     Upon arriving, they separated, the merchant heading off to trade his
merchandise and Jake wandering about the town aimlessly in search of some
sign to tell him what to do next.  Kopocactyl was a large town, at least
ten times the size of Uxalpoctl, with the huts on the outskirts being small
thatches but those closer in being made of stone and some type of mortar.
As the day progressed and the sun began to set, Jake worried that he had
somehow offended the Gods. He saw nothing that hinted what he was to do.
     Then, in that early part of the evening, in the twilight when shadows
stretch across the width of the courtyard and early revellers are lighting
lamps to ward off the dusk, Jake spotted him, the most beautiful youth he
had ever seen, a boy even more beautiful than Chilam, which Jake would
never have believed possible.  Skin of dark reddish-brown, like royal oak,
long black hair that bounced and floated whenever he moved his head, and
hazel eyes that at once sparkled with a childish mischievousness and
smoldered with a hot teenage lust.  He was wearing a white loincloth
embroidered with bright green leaves and delicate red and blue flowers.  A
pale blue mantra was draped over his shoulders and held in place with a
silver broach.  He wore silver arm bands about his biceps, a thin gold
necklace, and small silver studs in his ears.  Jake forgot about his vision
quest as he watched the youth, and despite the previous night's activities,
he felt desire welling up in his groin.  His constant vigilance for a sign
and his worries that he might miss or misinterpret the message were
immediately forgotten.  As the youth wandered the marketplace Jake followed
him.  He paused frequently to talk.  The youth seemed to know almost
everyone, and everyone greeted him with a warm smile and embrace.  That was
not surprising considering even just his looks.
     Arriving at the town square, the boy suddenly turned and his eyes and
Jake's met for a moment.  The youth smiled, his perfect white teeth
gleaming in contrast to his dark lips, and Jake's knees went weak.  The
youth slowly walked over to Jake and placing his right hand on his left
shoulder introduced himself as Yum Caax, son of a local farmer, in for the
maize festival.  Jake introduced himself, explaining he was on a vision
quest.  A look of disappointment passed over the boy's face and he
apologized for interrupting him on his mission.  When Jake replied that he
was not interrupting anything at the moment, the boy's smile was even wider
than the first and Jake's cock began to swell.  Three musicians were
standing at the far end of the square, one with a wooden apparatus that
looked like a xylophone, the other two carrying gourd rattles, shell
clappers, and willow whistles.  Jake and his new friend listened to the
musicians and watched several young men and their ladies dance to the
music.
     "Let's dance."
     "Ah," Jake replied, glancing around for two unattached young women.
There were none in sight.  "I don't see anyone available."
     "Very funny," the youth said with a wide grin, and taking Jake by the
hand, he led him into the centre of the square before Jake could protest.
     "Ah, I don't think I know the steps."
     "There are no steps," the boy said with a sparkle in his eyes.  "Just
move with the music."
     So saying, he began to slowly gyrate his hips and sway his shoulders.
Before he drew attention to himself just standing there motionlessly, Jake
began to do likewise.  At first he was very self-conscious and he nervously
glanced about, worried what others might be thinking of two men dancing.
Realizing that nobody was paying any attention to them, he began to relax.
It was a catchy rhythm and not unlike some of the calypso music he'd heard
in New Orleans one time he'd visited his grandfather.  Jake had a natural
ear for music, and before long he was swaying and moving with the music,
improvising his own steps as the tempo increased and decreased.
     Yam Caax gyrated his hips suggestively and leered over at Jake
seductively as he danced up close to him and rubbed his hip against Jake's
before dancing a circle around him.  Jake responded likewise, snaking his
body and running his hands along his naked thighs.  Like two strip artists
putting on a private show, the two youths danced for each other, running
their long fingers along their smooth, hairless chests and along their
sinewy limbs.  Jake felt himself becoming aroused but he did not care.  In
fact he smiled to himself as he thought of what the reaction of the
revellers and market-goers would be if his hardon snapped the cord holding
up his jock.  The two boys danced openly and seductively, their eyes
smoldering with desire, desire for each other.
     There was no question about their feelings, and seeing them, the band
purposefully increased the tempo to a feverish pitch.  It was impossible
not to notice the two handsome, dark- skinned youths and the revellers
paused to admire their movements, and their half-naked bodies now
glistening with sweat.  They clapped in time with the music and laughed and
cheered them on, sharing in their merriment.  When the music finally
stopped, the two youths embraced and leaned against each other for support,
their young chests rapidly rising and falling as they gasped for fresh air.
Several of those watching clapped, and it was only then that Jake realized
they'd had an audience. For a split second he began to flush with
embarrassment, but he was feeling too happy to really care, and from the
look on the faces of those about him, there was nothing to be embarrassed
about.
     He and Yam Caax strolled along the market, walking hand in hand and
stopping to admire or to further check out the merchandise on display.  He
had never walked hand in hand with another male before and again glanced
about nervously, but seeing that they attracted no more attention than a
handsome boy and beautiful girl might under the same circumstances, Jake
quickly adapted.  He was good at adapting, and the feeling of contentment
and joy made this assimilation easy.  Yum Caax bought a cluster of dark
purple grapes and as they walked they fed each other.  He bought Jake a
thin necklace of woven silver at one of the market booths, and when Jake
objected because he had no money himself to buy anything, Yum Caax replied
that he would think of some way that Jake could pay him later.  The glimmer
in his eyes and the slight curl of his lips left no doubt what he had in
mind, and the delight in Jake's eyes and his wide smile left no doubt what
the teenager from Earth thought of the idea.
     Arriving at the booth of a young male artisan, Jake commented that
since he was already in debt, if Yum Caax would advance him a loan he would
like to buy him something.  He selected a pair of rainbow coloured burettes
made of feathers and shaped like parrots to hold back the youth's long,
soft hair.  They sat on the open patio of a restaurant and shared a hearty
plate of stew consisting of fresh garden vegetables, chicken, and hot
peppers in a thick brown gravy which they mopped up with freshly baked
cornbread.  They continued to stroll the market drinking from hollowed-out
coconuts, maize curd spiced with hot chili peppers.
     They walked with their arms about each other's waist, and occasionally
they embraced and exchanged pecks on the cheek, and occasionally they even
caressed each other's smooth, rounded butt.  Nobody paid them any more
attention than they would a pair of any other lovers.  They returned to the
town square and danced some more and talked.  As they gave their legs a
rest they snacked on a flaky pastry consisting of honey and nuts
alternating with layers of thin cookie dough, and they drank fermented
passionberry juice.  For Jake, it was the most wonderful evening he had
ever spent in his life.  It would not have mattered if the evening had not
ended in sex.  He was deliriously happy and contented with himself just
being himself.  He and the youth at his side were not lovers.  They were
kindred spirits, two young men who shared beliefs and a life style that
were as unique and marvellous as they were precious.
     They did have sex, or a more appropriate description would be that
they made love, hot passionate, wonderful love.  There in an open niche in
the jungle, beneath the full Dorvanian moon, the two youths stood and
embraced and kissed.  Their kisses were soft and sweet, and as they pressed
their bodies close to each other and caressed each other's soft, smooth
flesh, their lips touched ever so lightly and they inhaled each other's
sweet breath.  Their hands glided over each other's hips and untied the
sashes that held up loincloth and jock.  Their mantas were laid on the
ground end to end and they lay upon them and kissed and caressed, fingers
running over smooth, naked bodies, one ebony and the other a dark
reddish-brown, both with dark-skinned hands and light-skinned palms.
     They caressed each other's silky balls and fondled each other's limp
cock, carefully and reverently drawing back the skin and gently caressing
the sensitive, exposed knob.  As kisses progressed from tender lips down
over smooth, young chests to savour and delight in each other's tender
nubs, their breathing began to grow heavy.  As their lips continued,
following the hollow between their breasts and ribs, they paused at each
other's belly button and tongues darted out to savour and delight before
the boys continued on over young flat stomachs to their goal.
     Jake inhaled deeply, delighting in the fragrance of the handsome
youth's genitals, allowing the uniquely scented air to fill his lungs and
ignite his passion.  He nuzzled close, rubbing his nose against the silky,
damp skin of Yum Caax's balls, inhaling deeply and allowing the heady
fragrance to make his mind spin.  He kissed them, the right and the left,
and ran his tongue over them.  He slipped his lips over the lower one and
sucked on it gently, and then releasing it, he did the same to the right.
     Yum Caax sighed deeply with the sensations passing over him as Jake
licked and sucked his balls.  He too nuzzled the black youth's testicles
and delighted in their scent.  They were much larger than his own, as dark
as the rest of the youth's skin, and smelled delicious.  He nibbled on them
and delighted to feel them roll in their loose skin in response to his
kisses.  He nuzzled his nose in the boy's curly black hairs and felt the
boy's cock swell against his cheek.  He slipped his lips over the knob of
the still limp black sausage and let it lay there on his tongue, allowing
just the warm and moistness of his mouth to arouse it.  He savoured the
taste of that slowly swelling boy meat, the spicy taste of black sausage,
and he savoured the joy of knowing he was turning the handsome youth on.
     Jake was getting aroused, and he knew his new found companion was also
as the boy's cock began to lift up.  The boy was uncut and as his cock
began to engorge with blood the loose foreskin began to slip down over the
knob.  Jake stuck out his tongue and ran it along the length of the growing
tube of teenage meat, causing it to growth even faster.  Soon it was erect
and sticking out at a ninety-degree angle to the youth's body.  The
foreskin had slid back to form a collar below the knob and Jake now reached
out and stretched it the rest of the way back.  The boy's cock was the same
dark reddish-brown as the rest of his body, becoming more red than brown
just under the knob, which itself was a darker hue than the shaft.
     Jake slipped his lips over that inviting boy tube and in doing so it
throbbed in eagerness.  He eased his lips farther down, taking in the knob
and half the shaft.  He delighted in the thought of having the boy's cock
in his mouth, the idea alone causing his own cock to throb and the first of
his precum to ooze out of the tip.  Tightening his lips about the youth's
hot, firm reddish- brown dick, Jake sucked on it gently and ran his tongue
over the mushroom cap.  He was rewarded with a dollop of the youth's own
precum, a droplet of pure honey.
     Having similarly savoured Jake's first offer of precum, Yum Caax also
began to suck on the thick, black cock filling his mouth, hoping to draw
out more of the delightful boy nectar.  So the two naked youths lay there
in the moonlight savouring the taste of each other and delighting in the
marvellous experience of arousing and satisfying another boy while being
aroused and satisfied himself.  That was what making love to another boy
was all about.  It had nothing to do with procreation or survival of the
species.  It had nothing to do with spousal obligations or societal
expectations.  It had nothing to do with satisfying oneself, nor one's duty
to satisfy another's needs.
     No, this was none of those things.  This was a sharing, a sharing of
love, a sharing of pleasure.  This was about joining and melding as one.
This was acting together with such a common bond, that the two became
indistinguishable.  This was about existing together as one.  They were two
interlocking pieces forming a single whole.  The two boys were of the same
mind, and of the same will.  Each delighted in the sight and the feel of
the male body, each delighted in his and the other's masculinity, and
together, they celebrated their gayness.
     Jake worked his lips up and down the reddish-brown cock as Yum Caax
worked his lips up and down his.  The pleasure of being sucked off and the
pleasure of sucking another flowed into one indescribable level of ecstasy
for each boy.  Both were a long time reaching their orgasm, not surprising
for Jake considering his recent activities, and he suspected for the youth
delighting in his throbbing, black cock this was a skill he had perfected.
     As Jake felt the tension building in his groin as he finally
approached his climax, and as the ridge of his glans burned and itched with
that combination of pleasure and pain, he knew instinctively that Yum Caax
was feeling exactly the same.  As the Mayan descendant kept up the suction
and worked his moist mouth up and down the hot, rigid black cock of the
Afro-American, as he savoured the taste of that throbbing male organ and
delighted in bringing it pleasure, he knew that the same thoughts and
feelings were flowing through Jake.  That sensitivity and awareness were a
part of what being gay was all about.  The union of male with male that
went beyond the physical, that included minds and souls also, was only
possible for those who truly accepted themselves.
     The two youths moaned simultaneously, signalling each other that they
could no longer hold back.  Hot teen juice finally gushed up the two
throbbing cocks and spurted into eagerly awaiting mouths.  Throb after
throb of creamy white cum spurted out of the two organs, one black, one
dark reddish-brown.  Two mouths eagerly swallowed the slimy offering and
two tongues savoured the unique taste of boy.  As hot cum spurted into the
one boy, his own hot cum spurted into the other.  The two youths trembled
with the delightful dual orgasm, theirs and their partners. They grasped
each other's hot, naked buttocks tightly as they filled and were filled
with that delightful and unique cream.  Like a circle with no beginning and
no end, they throbbed out their creamy juice while they swallowed the
other's.
     Afterwards they lay there side by side, arm in arm.  They marvelled at
the joy that only two men can know.  They kissed tenderly and fondly, lips
meeting and parting with gentle thanks.  Two pairs of hands caressed warm,
soft buttocks.  Two pairs of hands moved up to caress smooth, hairless
chests.  Their postclimatic play gradually became foreplay.  The kisses of
gratitude and love became kisses of desire and lust.  Fingers lovingly
caressing damp, sensitive balls marked the commencement of a new round of
lovemaking.  Warm cocks, soft and sticky- tipped, began to swell.  Desires
began to well up in youthful loins.
     Their foreplay was more extended this second time.  Yum Caax massaged
Jake's feet as the trembling boy buried his face between Yum Caax's
reddish-brown cheeks and licked the youth's delightful pucker.  The
Dorvanian youth inhaled the delightful aroma of the black boy's feet and
kissed and sucked on his long black toes as he felt Jake's hot tongue lap
at his asshole and try to worm inside.  Feeling the youth's hot mouth
envelop his feet made Jake suck even harder on his hole.
     Eventually their mouths worked back up to each other's genitals.  Once
again lips fastened on erect, aching cocks, once again moist mouths
enveloped eager flesh, and once again the two boys gave suck and sucked
simultaneously.  They delighted in the physical pleasure of being sucked
and of sucking cock, and they delighted in the mental joy of being
pleasured and of pleasuring another.  For a second time their young nuts
tightened, and for a second time they spurted out their seed and accepted
the other's.  They were young and it was a perfect night.
     When they were done, they lay again nestled in each other's arms.
Jake sighed with a contentment he had never before known.  Above his head
he saw a large diamondback snake slither along the tree branch.
     "Happy?" asked Yum Caax.
     "Deliriously," replied Jake with a wide grin.
     "Why?"
     "Because I love men."
     "That is obvious," the youth said with a smile.
     Jake kissed him softly on the lips and then leaned back.  "What I mean
is that that is my nature," he said as he watched the diamondback wrap its
body about the tree branch.  "Whether I was born to love men, or came to
love men because of my experiences, whether it was by destiny or by chance,
it does not matter.  What matters is that today I choose this life.  This
is the life I want to lead."
     The diamondback hung down from the tree, and then began to shimmer.
Jake watched as if transfixed as the snake became a bright shimmering light
and began to pulsate.  "I am Itzamna, Lord of Knowledge," came a voice from
inside the shape, a deep resonating voice, and Jake knew it was the voice
of a God even though he had never heard a God speak before.  "It is time
for the naming.  Will anyone speak for the naming of this youth?"
     "I will speak for him," came a youthful voice from the branches above.
It was the voice of a young boy.  Jake looked up into the trees, and
finally spotted the eight-year-old he had met in the downpour sitting on an
overhanging branch.  He grinned down at Jake with his tooth-gapped grin and
swung his feet.  He was still totally naked, and holding the wooden spear
in one hand while he fingered his little erection with the other.  "When I
first met this nameless one, he was denying what he was, but while I was
with him he celebrated his maleness with me, and when I left him he had
accepted in his male sexuality."
     As the boy spoke Jake had the impression the child was not really what
he appeared to be.  The boy was right though.  Even though he had known
that he was gay for some time, he had always found excuses for his
behaviour.  He and Nog were just experimenting, Salene had just been an
infatuation, his relationship with Gowran was only a ritual
bonding. . . . Homosexuality was something disgusting, something people did
not talk about, and in many cases something outright forbidden, so even
though he knew he was gay he had denied it, consciously or subconsciously,
and along with the denial he had denied his male sexuality.
     Being a boy again that day in the rain changed all that.  He had
delighted in being a boy when he was a boy, and would not have wanted to be
anything different.  His delight in the innocence and joy of playing with
himself and the pleasure his penis brought that afternoon in the rain
reminded him of that.  Now he was a man, and he delighted in being a man,
and being in the company of other men.  He would not want it to be
different.
     "I will speak for him," came an ancient, weak voice that Jake
recognized immediately.  Slowly stepping out of the darkness of the jungle
on wobbly legs was the corpulent old man he had buried.  Considering the
appearance of the boy, the appearance of the dead man was only mildly
surprising to Jake.  "When I first met this nameless one, he worried about
the opinions and disapproval of others, and allowed what others thought
about him to determine his actions, but while I was with him he made love
with me openly and with compassion and with disregard to what others felt,
and when I left him he was no longer afraid of what others thought.  He has
accepted his fate in his heart."
     The old man was right too.  He had been afraid of what others would
think of him until he saw the love that existed between the old man and his
young lover, until he realized that if he wanted that type of relationship
he would have to ignore the opinions and beliefs of others.  To prefer the
love of men over women was his fate, and he would no longer let others
detract him from it for that was what he wanted.
     "I too will speak for him," came a booming voice as the merchant he
had met strode out of the jungle. "When I first met this nameless one, he
was frightened by his homosexuality.  He knew little of such a life style
and was afraid of the unknown, and even more afraid of the power of his
feelings for other men and his anger against those who would eliminate his
kind, but while I was with him he learned there was nothing to fear.  He
learned how to control and use that anger and power, and when I left him he
was no longer afraid of his homosexuality."
     He hadn't realized it until then, but the merchant was right.  The
idea of being gay had frightened him, because he did not understand it,
because everyone said it was forbidden and wrong although to him it was
delightful and good.  The merchant had helped him see that being gay was
not something disgusting or something to hide.  He helped him realize the
raw power that underlay his homosexuality, and to understand how that power
and determination could be used.
     "And I will speak for him," announced the youth beside him as he got
to his feet.  "When I first met this nameless one, he was unhappy being gay
and behaved accordingly.  He was bitter because others knew who they were
and what they wanted.  He knew who he was and what he wanted too, but he
could not admit it, not to himself, and even more so not to others.
However, while I was with him he delighted in his homosexuality, and knew
that he was free to choose this life or to deny it.  You heard his
declaration and his choice."
     That was true.  Being gay was not what he was, it was who he was, and
he was proud of whom he was.  The night he had just spent had been the most
delightful night he had ever had.  He had said this was the life he chose
to lead, and he had meant it.  He was gay and glad that he was.
     "Then stand and be named," said the voice of Itzamna.  Jake got to his
feet and stood there naked before the God.  "You have faced your fears, and
have accepted what you have seen.  You know now your true self.  Know now
your true name. From henceforth you shall be known as Ekbalam, Black Jaguar
Spirit."
     "You have proven yourself, Ekbalam," said the eight-year-old as he
swung his feet.  "So say I, Backlum Chaam, God of Male Sexuality."
     "God?  But you are a boy," Jake dared to observe.
     "So are all men inside," the boy replied with a tooth-gapped smile.
     "You have proven yourself, Ekbalam," said the ancient man.  "So say I,
Camaxtli, God of Fate."
     So, the corpulent old man was the God of Fate after all.  He was not
the image Jake had of a God either, but it had been appropriate.  As he
glanced over at the merchant, he figured the Gods likely chose whatever
form they wanted to.
     "You have proven yourself, Ekbalam," said the merchant.  "So say I,
Ekchuah, Black War Chief, God of War and Fallen Warriors, Patron of
Merchants."
     "You have proven yourself, Ekbalam," said the youth he'd just had sex
with.  "So say I, Yum Caax, Lord of the Woods, God of Maize and
Agriculture, and of Perfect Male Beauty."
     "Know then your name, and your true purpose," said Itzamna as the
bright light began to approach Jake.
     He was momentarily blinded and then the five gods began to fade, and
after them, the forest.  Jake blinked his eyes, and found himself sitting
in the lava cave.  The green twig was there on the floor before him but all
of the leaves had been plucked, and the candles, still in their places, had
long ago burnt down to nothing.  At first he wondered if this all had been
a dream, a hallucination existing only in his mind.  As he rubbed his chin,
he noticed the thin silver ring he'd received from the God of Fate and then
about his neck the silver chain from Yum Caax.  At his feet were the pale
tan, kidskin jock, the manta with rainbow coloured parrots, and the pair of
soft sandals from Ekchuah and his small sack.  He opened it up and removing
the polished stone, he turned it in his fingers and admired the
colouration.  Backlum Chaam had not left it behind by accident.
     Jake smiled.  Yes, he knew now his true self.  Chance and Destiny had
combined to make him what he was, and would continue to determine what he
would be, but he'd always had a say in it even if he hadn't realized, and
he always would, but now with more purpose.  When one knew one's destiny,
one could choose his path accordingly.  Or as Itzamna had explained to him,
"We become what we most think we will become."  As he had left, the God of
Knowledge had touched Jake's mind for a fraction of a second.  In that
moment that their minds had touched Itzamna had told him much, about the
nature of man, and about himself and his new name.
     The Balamob, the Black Jaguar Spirits, were traditionally four, and
protected villages and households from evil spirits.  The Balam was
benevolent but feared, acting as a guardian and protector.  So was Jake in
this time one of four guardians.  In this recurring cycle of creation and
destruction he had a role to play.  It was his lot in life to defend and to
promote homosexuality.  It was appropriate that Itzamna, creator of
writing, would be the one to tell him in that fraction of a second that
their minds had met that through his writing and his actions he would lead
the Federation and the worlds of his time to a better future.
     Jake had always been different.  He had always been proud of that and
unafraid of marching to his own drummer.  His conviction of his beliefs and
his ability to forge his own path had always been strengths of his.  He
realized now that facing the fact that he was gay had meant facing the fact
that once again he was different from others, this time in a very
significant and frightening way.  He had momentarily been afraid to admit
that difference, to risk the friendships he had developed on DS9, but he
knew now if they were true friendships they would not be at risk.
     Jake also knew now that difference was not a threat.  It was a
strength.  His creativity and artistic genius, his sensitivity and
compassion for others, and his sexual identity were linked.  One could not
exist without the other.  They were what made him what he was, and his
unique skills could be put to good use.  Putting on his jock and manta and
picking up his small sack of belongings, Jake got to his feet and headed
for the entrance of the cave.  Ekbalam, Black Jaguar Spirit, had places to
go, and choices to make.