The wooden crate sat on the archaeology lab's table. It wasn't particularly large, a bit bigger than the size of a shoebox. Neve Saunders knew it had been sent to her advisor from a colleague from Britain, but whatever it was hadn't been told to her. She was interested in seeing what it was.
Dr. Lain came strolling into the lab, finally finished with his last class of the day. He was in his late thirties, having lucked into a tenure track when the school had finally
strongly suggested
that his eighty-one-year-old predecessor as the chair of the archaeology department become a "professor emeritus." Neve had a small crush on him, the way young people who meet someone young enough that it's not like talking to their parents or grandparents but old enough to have some grey in their hair often do. He gave her a wave, then headed into the lab's office to put away his things.
"Your box came," Neve told him when he came out again.
"Oh, great!" he exclaimed. "Let's take a look."
He found the claw hammer and gently separated the top of the crate at each nail, putting it aside when he was done. Then he got his cotton gloves and brushed away the straw it was packed in.
Inside was a penis.
"It looks like a giant stone dildo," blurted Neve.
Dr. Lain's cheek had a faint blush, but he shook his head.
"The Sumerians wouldn't have considered this phallus erotic," he said. "It would've just been a symbol of fertility to them, probably on a statue of some god."
"It's so lifelike, though," observed Neve.
"Well, they'd want to
honor
the god as best they could," explained Dr. Lain. "But it's just a piece of the body."
"Why isn't this in a museum?" she asked.
"We have a museum," said Dr. Lain.
"We have a climate controlled room on the first floor with some display cases and a lot of pieces of chipped rocks and potshards," said Neve.
"
Ancient tools
and potshards," corrected Dr. Lain.
"Which most people can't tell from chipped rocks," said Neve.
"Your passion for this field is inspiring," said Dr. Lain, but he grinned all the same.
"Why is it so big?" Neve asked.
The phallus wasn't exactly an unreasonable size, but it was quite large. Larger than any man Neve had ever met. Or seen, maybe. She could only imagine meeting a man packing such a cock in his pants, how it would feel stretching her open. Ramming into her, again and again from behind, her ass in the air, her moaning as she finally collapsed forward and just let him have her. Her pussy throbbed, and she blushed.
If Dr. Lain noticed the flush in her cheeks, he pretended not to.
"I'm sure the ancient artists exaggerated it for effect," he said.
Goddamit
, Neve thought. What a horrible time to get horny. It was just a phallus. It wasn't even the real thing.
"Maybe the Sumerians were all just really hung," Neve joked, without thinking about who she was talking to.
Dr. Lain laughed.
"It's an interesting contention, Ms. Saunders," he said. "Maybe you'll find some archaeological evidence of it when it comes your time to do field work."
Neve laughed too, the idea of finding a tablet or something that described a merchant's order for, say, bronze cockrings that had to be made larger because the smaller ones didn't sell leaping through her head.
Of course, then there was the idea of an entire culture with beefy cocks, probably sweating in the fields as they raised sesame and wheat, then going to bathe off in the Tigris...
Not again
! thought Neve, as she pushed the idea of a bunch of toned, tanned hung laborers skinny dipping in a river out of her mind.
"Well, I won't have time to examine this properly until tomorrow, I've got papers to edit," said Dr. Lain, putting the phallus back in the crate. "It should be safe out here in this room, since it's temperature controlled. But keep an eye on it, will you, Neve?"
"Yes sir!" said Neve as he walked towards his office. "Not a problem!"
"Thank you!" called the professor, as he closed the door.
***
The phallus sat in its crate for the rest of the day, and for some reason Neve found herself glancing at it occasionally. It was remarkably well preserved, and Neve would almost say
detailed
, even. And it was distractingly large.
She needed to get laid, and soon. This was becoming untenable, she thought. Getting distracted by some hunk of rock that had been chiseled five thousand years ago just because it vaguely resembled a penis.
She resolved to think about something else, she needed to buckle down and do her work anyway. Making sense of the data from the soil layer work from the last excavation, that's what she was supposed to be doing.
And for a while, that's very much what she did, managing to make a fair amount of progress, stopping briefly to go get some dinner, then back to the lab to keep at it, since she was on a roll.
It was nearly 9:30 when she realized she was the only person in the lab. The hallway outside was dark, the cleaning staff had turned off the lights. They'd probably locked the doors, too, not that that would keep her from getting out with her badge. But it always felt strange to be alone in the building. The only light on in a six story science building.
The phallus was still sitting in its box. Still distractingly large.
Neve glanced around again. Sometimes Dr. Lain was still in his office, but she could see that the light was off tonight. He'd gone home, too. She should go home as well. She should get some rest.
But Neve didn't do that.
Instead, she walked over to the box and looked down at the phallus. Then she went and got some gloves and came back. She lifted it up with both hands, careful to make sure it was supported. As she'd thought, it was pretty heavy, being so large and also solid rock. She took it over to the light, turning it over to examine it. There were some markings, cuneiform, around the base. And there were channels that looked for all the world like veins. But that was ridiculous. Phalluses had been discovered belonging to all sorts of civilizations from all different time periods, and none of them had
veins
on them. It took a careful hand and fairly sensitive tools to make that sort embellishment, and Neve had seen ancient Sumerian art. It wasn't exactly what you'd call detailed or accurate.
She held it up again, one hand on the shaft, and one cradling the scrotum, and looked at it again, trying to figure out what it was that was drawing her towards it.
It throbbed in her hands.
Neve almost dropped it in shock, fumbling with it, and catching it, pulling it in close to her chest.