Back in the Present—Post Eggy Birthday
Stellar date (Earth Time): 08-22-2914
I woke up after an unwelcome nap on my bed in the observatory, though bed seemed to be a very loose term for what it had become over the past month. The blankets I'd gathered and the extra futon made it more like a mound...or a nest, now that there were four eggs bundled up there with me.
I was too exhausted to be anything more than awake. I couldn't see the eggs since they were under the covers, but I could feel them: four warm round rocks the size of two man's fists each, except the fourth, which was only one manly fist. I worried about that one. And my worry confused me a bit. But it didn't matter that they didn't look like babies, they were mine, they had come out of me, and something like me would eventually come out. Something innocent and small and needed me.
The tightness in my chest returned, making my stomach turn, and I curled about them instinctually. Who doesn't like hugging warm things for comfort? Sadly, just that little movement made my stomach muscles twang like out of tune guitar strings and I couldn't help but whine.
Through the clear glass of the dome above me I could see just the edge of the planet Vetas. We were at the position in our orbit we called a 'crescent moon. Past the turquoise of the planet were my stars and galaxies, distant, clear, and steady, with no atmosphere between us to make them flicker.
I felt about my neck, but Gilrack had helped me dress in my pajamas, which meant no collar and no coms button. Levi and Naomi were bound to have noticed something by now. They never left me alone for long and it had been a whole day. I'd gotten the cramps—no, contractions—sometime in the evening when I'd gone to take a shower. Impeccable timing, if I do say so myself, though I'd been crampy all day. I'd just thought it the laxatives Naomi had given me getting to work. Though I'd also pooped plenty—not that you needed to know that, but, here we are. At least I'd seemingly gotten everything out before the eggs came. Would have been several more degrees of worse to have to pluck eggs out of poop water.
Oh crap...Levi...
Nope, not going there. I'm in my dome, under the stars, this is my happy place. Stress can wait outside the door.
Said door hissed open to allow entry of big, red, winged demon alien. The tray of food looked like a toy in his hands. He swiped the lock button before making his way towards me, steps unnaturally quiet as only he could make them and tail held out still behind him.
He greeted me in his own language, a brief triplet of clicks and hum which ended with a brief brush of his finger against the little bit of my face I'd left uncovered by blankets to breathe. I closed my eyes and let myself find comfort in the touch. Now that the anger had drained out of me, all I wanted to do was cry.
Of course, he must have felt it all through his weird telepathy, for his hum turned to a low, soothing crone.
"Food, Jo."
I did not feel like eating. My insides wanted nothing to do with me or their job.
I took a sniff anyway and didn't smell much, but I could already tell what it was. It was the protein porridge we had fed him when he'd tried to starve himself to death. It was a good choice on his hand. I could say what I want about Gilrack, but stupid wouldn't be one of them. Naomi had pointed out more than once that the average human wouldn't have been as observant and learned as fast as he had about living with us.
Perhaps, however, he had been very strongly motivated.
"I'm sorry for..." Okay, no, I wasn't really sorry for yelling. That was a perfectly yell-worthy incident. "You can explain now. About the eggs. And why you didn't tell me."
I felt his apprehension, but let him prop me up on a mound of pillows against the wall and carefully rearrange the eggs about me beneath the blankets. They'd be nice and toast warm.
"Eat," he plead. "I will talk."
I sighed, but I probably needed the food whether I felt like it or not.
The porridge was sweet, in a gentle, just there fashion.
Gilrack told me in his slow, measured way about how he had followed the completely plastered me to my bed in the dome after my birthday. He'd been concerned about me, having felt my mind waves and also still in disbelief that humans could have fun poisoning themselves. There he'd found what I interpreted as a lonely, needy, perhaps horny me, and had taken my drunk acceptance of him as invitation. He hadn't understood at the time that drunk permission couldn't count as permission, nor would that I wouldn't remember it in the morning.
He kept his eyes downturned as he spoke, as I found he did whenever he wanted to hide how he felt. Rather than facial expressions, his kind mostly emoted through their eyes and the shifting shape of their pupils. I didn't blame him. If he were a human man he'd probably be covering his face with both hands.
He went on to explain when he had realized I didn't remember and how he had little precedence in his culture for what to do if a female doesn't remember their mating—or marriage as I suddenly realized 'mating' meant for him. To him, there was no turning back, I was his wife, and the thought to do so hadn't even occurred to him. He'd loved me from the moment he'd seen me, and his eyes flickered up to look into mine as he insisted on that, trembling and dark with rounded pupils, but then looked back down as he listed his fears. First it had been my rejection of him. He justified that if he could convince me he could make a worthy mate and gained my sober acceptance, it could be like the drunk union never happened. He expressed how he couldn't live without me otherwise. He didn't think that drunk me and sober me couldn't be too differently. Surely I just needed convincing.
But then he'd smelled my pregnancy and all that changed. It didn't just involve his own welfare now, but his children, innocent children who had done nothing and who would die if their mother rejected them. Convincing me now had a timeline.
I remembered clearly how he had seemed ultra focused on pleasing me and learning our language, and how Naomi and I had had to convince him to take breaks to let what he learned sink in or at least sleep. He'd been willing to keep us up all night if we would let him.
"But why didn't you just...explain? I mean, when it got closer to me giving birth..." Ugh, those words tasted weird on my tongue.
"Instincts," he said, voice wane.
"Ah." Yeah, he'd been a little distracted. Communicating had been a little difficult.
Apparently, his instinct to take care of me and provide to take care of our young got a good thrashing since he couldn't treat me like a mate or hunt for the fresh meat I craved. It eventually, literally, drove him mad. It got to the point that even when he tried to explain to me what was about to happen, the insecurity and apprehension would rev up his protective instincts again and render him incapable of speech. And even though I had learned my own fair share of alien language, he hadn't been speaking much of it anyway when he'd been under. It had all been desire and intention: I want attention, stay here, you are safe, you are loved.
"Still now," he all but whispered. "Instinct..." He touched his chest with one hand, his other holding the empty spoon. I'd managed to make half-way through the porridge and my stomach had settled considerably. My insides almost felt normal.
I frowned, fingering the smallest egg beneath my blankets.
"So, basically, we're in a right old mess."
His ears perked up in question and he looked up to watch my face, as he'd learned to do with us humans.
"It's just a bad situation," I tried.
His pupils shivered, then glanced down to the blankets where he knew the eggs were hidden and warm, as though to reassure himself.
"I...I am happy for young," he said, very softly, all rumble and smoke. "I am happy you are okay. I...I love you. I love you."
"I know. I believe you."
He whined, letting his hands retreat to his chest, head once more ducked down to hide his features.
"I was afraid you would kill them," he said again. "I was afraid you would be hurt by eggs, maybe die. I was afraid..."
I reached towards him, but porridge, eggs, and masses of blankets kept him out of my reach.
"Gilrack, come here."
He glanced up to see my outstretched hand and pushed aside the tray so he could lean forward to meet my palm with his face. He nuzzled against my fingers and maneuvered my fingers to the base of his horns, all the while a mixture of quiet whines and croons.
"Love," the word was barely decipherable among all the alien noise.
"I know. It's okay. I won't hurt them."
"But you hurt." The whine overcame the croons. "I hurt you."
"You didn't mean to. It was a misunderstanding."
"Kurrlongi," he whimpered, his craggy voice making the word sound like rocks dropped down stairs, and yet the waves his mind sent to me were all warm-hot tenderness and sadness.
"It's okay. We'll just have to make due. I don't hate you. I like you a lot." I hesitated, my fingers tangled in his purple mane. "This doesn't change the fact you need to go back home. You can't stay here, Gilrack." I hesitated. "The...the babies can't either."
His distress pierced sharp through the warm waters over my mind.
"You come with," he meant it as a command, but it came as a plea. "Young—babies need you."
I didn't answer right away. I let myself be overwhelmed for a moment. I hurt so much, I'd just laid freaking eggs, and everything had gotten wildly insane. A good part of me still didn't believe that this was really happening.
But, well...nothing was really happening to me. I'd flown my life to the bottom of the dark hole which was space and intended to die there, curled up and alone. Even Levi's pursuit hadn't struck me as any form of progress, as I couldn't see myself being happy with him, if only because of my own low self-esteem. But there had been a hope, maybe the smallest of thoughts, in the back of my mind of a life with Levi. Something with babies, though it had never gone beyond that, because what was a family alone on a space station where we could be easily forgotten and abandoned by Earth?
But the future on a planet filled with unbreathable argon also didn't blossom with promise. I'd only ever gotten glimpses of his culture and didn't know if I could even find happiness there. They lived underground, in high mountains. Where would my numbers go? Where would my paints go? What about Levi and Naomi, the only friends I had in my life? What about soap and good books and losing myself in the stars?
...Perhaps I'd fallen in love more than I thought with my ambiguous life.
"Let me think on it." Yes, I needed more time to think. This was far too much for my brain to chew.
He must have understood, must have felt it, for he didn't press. Though he did ask with a plaintive look to draw closer, to which I agreed. I needed the comfort as much as he did, which was how I ended up in a hot bundle of eggs and alien in my bed.
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This chapter is late again because my cruel husband bought me the new Zelda game for mother's day. All my ambitious goals to keep the house clean and have my chapters up in time have been frustrated. When I complain to him about it, he just smirks and says, "You're welcome." It's like he likes how much I enjoy it to the point I'm addicted.