by Amanda Milo
I give him a flat look, arching my brows. “‘Wrong ways?’”
“Un-fun,” he clarifies. “You could do many things to my pillow—things I’d pay good money to see,” he says with a leering bounce of his eyebrows. “You could soak it wet; I wouldn’t complain. But tears?” He tsks. “Unacceptable.”
Contrary to his outrageous claim though, he’s brushing my hair away from my face and pressing me to the bed, tugging the covers over me. “But don’t fret. I’ve wanted that model of blaster quite badly, and Prow knows it. This is perfect timing, really.”
“Oh, good,” I tell him, sniffling. “I hope you and this pistol have a really great night together. Don’t forget to tell me how much you enjoyed it.”
He squeezes my hip. “Probably lots. I mean, it won’t be nearly as satisfying as having you, of course,” he pretends to muse before he cuts his eyes to me. “But I bet it won’t urinate on my bedding, either.”
I gasp a protest. “We weren’t supposed to speak of that ever again, remember?”
He nods. “I remember when you told me you weren’t going to speak of it. You even promised,” he adds with a roll of his shoulders. “But if you’ll recall—I said no such thing.” He grins so big, he’s going to blind me with his smile. “Narra, it’s too good not to bring up again.”
I groan.
“And again!” he adds, happily.
My laughter at his teasing cuts off abruptly, because I feel a pop.
Ekan, on his knees beside me, goes still, and he’s not laughing anymore either. “Beth, love—remember when you told us the meaning for your human phrase, déjà vu? You didn’t happen to urinate on me in a retaliatory fashion, did you? Because my knees are getting wet.”
“No,” I say, fear evident in my voice. “Ekan… I think my water just broke.”
CHAPTER 51—BETH
BETH
Everyone refers to this as the ‘miracle of birth.’ Fourteen hours in, and I call yanak bull pies. There is no miracle in this. This is hell.
“She’s taking a long time to litter,” Prow whispers.
“Littering takes time!” Ekan retorts, almost hissing it.
“Guys!” I wheeze. “I’m not dropping trash at a park. It’s giving birth, okay? Giving biiirth—!” I’m cut off by another contraction. Tiernan is stone-faced as he marks it down. He’s keeping track in both Na’rith time, and human time, for me.
Not that knowing how fast my contractions keep coming is helping me any. I’ve tried walking, I’ve tried squatting, I’ve had the guys help move me to all fours and tried rocking—nothing’s happening but lots, and lots, of pain. This has all been pretty traumatic for the guys because they assumed I’d be spawning in a pool, since I’m more or less built like a Na’rith. Apparently, spawning is a cakewalk compared to this. The Gryfala, the other species I resemble, drop an egg and that’s that for them. Sure, it needs some TLC and incubation, but there’s no hours and hours of agony.
Essentially, no one here has a clue how to deliver a baby human.
For the moment, I’m in the larger infirmary on the medical table—complete with birthing stirrups because the guys adapted their equipment for me per my rudimentary sketches a few weeks back. And I’m concerned, because Baby is sitting up higher than I think she should be, which as far as I remember, means it’s not go-time yet. But these contractions are not messing around.
The suffering is never ending. I can’t even wail anymore, my throat is so raw. My eyelids are just about swollen shut from all my crying.
And boy did I find out a thing: nobody ever said labor feels like menstrual cramps. Like the world’s WORST cramps. Why did teachers work so hard to scare us in health class to condom-up? In eighth grade, they brought a former student into class, a fellow teenager with a toddler. The young woman was willing to share her tale of struggles as a teen mother. It was a deterrent for some, sure, but for me they could have led with three words: WORLD’S WORSTEST CRAMPS. It’s safe sex forever for me now, no question. My pirates will be robbing an outerspace condom factory (and there better be a thing) if they ever want to do the nasty again, and that’s really not looking good at the moment. “I’m never having sex again!” I groan.
“Shhh, let’s not be rash,” Ekan pets my tear-crunchy hair away from my sticky face.
I try to glare at him.
Tiernan growls, “Let her be rash, she’s hurting.”
I try to glare at him next. “I’m not ‘being rash!’”
Tiernan’s mouth opens, and closes. Then he brings up his hand, and smacks Ekan in the back of the head with it. “I’m sorry, Beth.”
“What the tevek did I get hit for?” Ekan grumbles.
Something clatters to the floor; Tiernan lifts it—it’s his tablet. “There’s my bad luck for striking you. It was worth it.”
I raw-throat sob a laugh, and both men pause for the briefest second before Ekan barks an order. “Quick! Hit me again.”
I try not to laugh harder. “No, no, don’t—ow,” I tell them, because laughing doesn’t feel good.
Ekan takes one of my hands and brings it to the back of his head, starting to make me pet him like he likes—but then he slides his hand to the back of my head, and he’s petting my hair instead. “What can we do, Beth?” he asks softly.
“I don’t know,” whisper back. There’s a heaviness that’s started up. I’ve been feeling it building, like I want to bear down. Like I need to bear down. But I really shouldn’t if it’s too early, that much I think I know. “Have I dilated at all?”
Ekan moves to look between my legs, and the quiet tells me what I’m afraid of. My labor is not progressing.
Tiernan’s hand strokes along my hip, my thigh, my knee and over my leg as he moves to join Ekan, and tries to determine how things are going too.
He too is quiet though.
From the birthing classes I took super early, I remember hearing veteran birthers share their tales of cervixes—
...Would the plural be cervixes or cervices? (Hippopotami, Octopi, or as Benedict Cumberpatch went down in meme history for: ‘Meme, mem? Meh.’) The itty bitty passage with the tiny porthole to my uterus that doesn’t want to unplug to pop out this baby—that thing—women shared their war stories of pushing before dilation. They ended up with a swollen cervix and a whole lot more trouble than they started with.
I do not want more trouble. We do not need any more struggle on top of this problem-sundae with its sprinkles of terror on top.
I cry through the building of another contraction. Fear has been flirting with me hard, but it’s digging its claws into me more and more as the urge to push becomes a demand before my body is prepared.
When the contraction ebbs, neither Ekan nor Tiernan is trying to tease my spirits up, not even in the strained-way that they’ve been trying the last couple of hours.
“You’re doing wonderful,” Ekan claims, his thumb tracing the shell of my ear so softly, I barely feel it. Worry is knitting his brow.
“No, I’m not,” I moan weakly. “It’s not supposed to go on this long. I don’t think that I can go on for much longer. It’ll just be you guys and Vera again, I’m scared something is...”
I’m even afraid to say it, but maybe something is wrong.
His happy-dolphin colored eyes commanding, Ekan grips my hand almost as tightly as I’ve been gripping his. “Don’t. Don’t think like this. You said it’s normal for it to take time, especially the first time. You will be fine,” he says so fiercely I feel a little stronger. “Our spawn is fine.”
“Okay.” Even as miserable as I feel, it still fills my heart to overflowing when they claim this baby as theirs too.
Tiernan moves in to kiss me. “You think we could enjoy Vera without you?”
Ekan sighs as if he’s replaying the memory. “Beth takes Vera to a whole new plane.”
Tiernan ignores him and sets his forehead on my sticky one. “I didn’t want to ruin the surprise, but we picked up frozen female iiwyk
ia for your birthing day.”
They have my caramelly-tasting alien crustaceans? “WHAT?” I gasp. “You’ve been holding out on me?”
The corner of Tiernan’s mouth quirks. “It was that, or you’d overdose yourself eating a basket of two-hundred cold iiwykia in a sitting. We portioned it out—generously—and we’ve added a lock to the freezer to be sure you only eat a safely allotted amount. But for this? You’ve earned two servings.”
“Two, huh?” I try to snicker, but don’t quite make it. It’s more sniffling than anything.
Tiernan brushes his fingers behind my sweaty neck, his lips skating over mine, comforting. I angle my head back to be accommodating—but gasp into his mouth as pain shoots across my lower back, stealing my breath.
It’s a scary thing when not even the sweetest kiss from Tiernan can soften the edge of the pain. Feeling broken, and scared, I really set into weeping. “Guys?” I can’t see either of them, I’m crying so hard. “Save the baby. Whatever you have to do, save her. I don’t think I’m going to make it.”
CHAPTER 52—OQUILION
OQUILION
“Rut this! I’m dragging the angry human up!” Qolt snarls as he storms away from the infirmary.
Prow catches him by the shoulder and points out the reason none of the rest of us have taken this measure. “What if she makes Beth’s laboring worse? Beth’s not…” Prow swallows thickly, unable to continue.
I finish his warning. “Beth may not recover if Gracie upsets her.”
Qolt’s jaw is locked. He knows we’re right—knew it before he started to storm out. It’s just so cog-damned frustrating to be completely powerless.
We’ve stood quietly in the human version of a spawn-chamber, a delivery room, lending our support but not wanting to disturb a heavily laboring Beth. Our anxiety’s been climbing with every span that drags on with Beth in pain. Everyone’s strained to the breaking point. As if to illustrate my thought, Ekan exits the infirmary and starts beating the hells out of a wooden crate. Bashing it, kicking it, punching it apart—clearly trying to attack some of his tension that’s built up while we impotently watch Beth’s condition and mindset deteriorate. We can’t do anything more for her than hold her hand—meanwhile, she’s trapped in such an unbelievable amount of pain. It’s driving us mad… apparently some more than others.
“What are you doing?” Prow asks him, bewildered.
It’s Qolt who answers. “He’s a luck source.” He sounds almost… concerned. “Whenever their luck power does a whole lot of nothing, they don’t handle it well.”
Prow points to the remains of the unfortunate crate. “Qolt might be onto something. We can bring the angry human up, let her watch Ekan tearing the place apart. With a little luck-sourced coercion, maybe that’ll put her in a helpful mood.”
Qolt picks up a piece of crate planking and whips it at Ekan.
Uncannily, Ekan spins, no surprise in his expression as he rips one of his pistols out of a thigh holster, and fires.
The plank vaporizes.
Ekan’s got countless weapons on his person, most of which are pistols that project loud sounds. But there is no sound to this one, no crack of incendiary that will bother Beth’s nerves. Ekan seems so feckless that even I’m fooled into thinking he’s also an inconsiderate machaii. And that he is—but not always.
Not in this moment while Beth is hurting nearby.
Breathing hard, Ekan doesn’t take his eyes off his brother. But he looks calmer.
Qolt jerks his chin in some sort of silent acknowledgement before abruptly turning and stalking back to the infirmary to join Tiernan’s vigil beside Beth.
I drag my thumbnail over my temple. “We need a hob.”
Prow replicates Qolt’s success by tossing another piece of crate planking in front of our maddened luck source. Ekan makes this flying projectile disappear too before he doubles over, slamming his free fist on the floor and cursing with a great deal of emotion.
In response to my statement, Prow murmurs, “Never heard of them concerning themselves with any race but their own.”
I let my hands fall until they bang against my legs. “Have you ever heard of anyone that asked them too?”
“Hm,” Prow grunts. “A route worth exploring.”
Ekan must think so too because he stands and turns sharply, hitting the mainframe screen on the wall and remotely accessing our course and our coordinates.
“Although,” I muse, “Their females are egg layers. It’s doubtful they’d be able to help her more than what we’ve been able to do.”
Ekan throws me a questioning glance. “What about Rakhii…” but he trails off. Even as crazed as he is to encounter one, he isn’t deluded enough to propose them as a magical cure for our narra’s dire situation.
Unless the Rakhii was mated and had therefore had some experience with a laboring female, they wouldn’t have a better clue on how to help a female to litter than we do—and if they were mated, they wouldn’t be likely to answer a distress signal from some Na’rith crew. And we’ll never get near a female Rakhii.
But perhaps nothing should be ruled out. A Rakhii midwife could be the thing to save our Beth and our spawn. “How far out are we from their planet?” I ask. Perhaps an abduction is in order.
Instead of answering, Ekan throws a glare at the remains of the crate scattered around the floor, and he proceeds to vaporize most of the stray planks—which incidentally, cleans the area up pretty nicely.
“I take it you don’t have good news?” I ask.
Ekan’s head shake is terse. “We’re as good as a rotation away.”
A grim pall settles over us as we consider Beth having to struggle through another day of this. Only worse, because she’s lost so much strength. She’s tired. She’s in unquantifiable pain.
Prow’s pinching the bridge of his nose. “Ekan, can you cast your luck out for some help?”
With a roar, Ekan proceeds to beat a second crate to death—this one not empty—which results in merchandise spilling all over the bay. When he finishes wrecking it all and stands, boots planted, sides heaving, piercing us with a glare he explodes, “I’ve tried! Don’t you think I’ve tried? I’ve held her hands, let her squeeze my bones flat, and begged for her to be able to do this, but…” He hangs his head. “If any of my luck is rubbing off on her, it isn’t helping enough.”
I clap my hand on his shoulder. “I don’t think I’ve ever seen you truly stressed before this moment. Maybe watching Beth suffer isn’t doing your luck any favors. Get out of here. Go to the bridge. Touch stuff. Take a walk and do whatever it is that you do.”
Without a word—an odd enough happenstance for Ekan—he leaves. And he’s not gone for more than half a span when the sound of a distress ping is piped around the ship’s sound system. It’s a text-based signal, so the ship reads the particulars.
“Incoming from Gryfcraft—”
A Gryfcraft is a Gryfala ship, piloted only by three possibilities: a Gryfala, hobs, or (unlikely but not unheard of) a Gryfala’s Rakhii.
To encounter a Gryfcraft cruising a rotation away from their planetside isn’t uncommon. To encounter one that sends a wide distress signal to any nearby ships when their homeland is so close?
Unheard of.
Qolt, Prow, and I are bolting out of Beth’s birthing room and racing for the bridge. I’m crowing, “Ekan, you must be a luck source from a whole other dimension!”
Boots skidding to a stop at the doorway, we find a rabidly focused Ekan. Agitated, he’s swiping screens and stabbing his fingers on the data panels. Prow calls, “Well? What’s their distress signal for? Will they help us?”
Ekan bares his teeth and gives an angry shake of his head. “Presently? They’re rutted. They’re been locked by The Roubari.”
“Tripe,” Qolt curses softly.
I’m gaping. “They need someone to rescue them against Captain Räuber?”
The Roubari is manned by a truly cutthroat crew. Captain Räuber hir
es the filthiest level of pirates—
No—it’s not even fair to even lump them in the same category as a pirate. If a Krortuvian would sell his own mother to a brothel, the crew aboard The Roubari would rut their own mothers first. They’re the definition of ruthless.
Ekan rolls his shoulders and cracks his knuckles, but looks no less tense. “Gets worse. Captain Räuber?” Ekan’s eyes slice to us. “He’s dead.”
“WHAT?” I shout, Qolt’s voice layering with mine as he bellows the same question.
Ekan crosses his arms over his chest. “Mutiny.”
The infamous leader of the violent ship gutted by his own crew? It’d almost be fitting, but what it is, is cause for teveking alarm. If The Roubari’s captain is dead, and the crew has struck out at a Gryfcraft, they aren’t simply taking their murdered leader’s cut and disbanding. This is a mob of sky predators who have no mercy.
Under the brutal, indomitable Räuber, they were a formidable enemy, but at least they were a cautious one. The crew that can engineer a mutiny over him though? We’ve clearly been underestimating the danger they posed.
On a good day, we might hesitate to cross them. There are only five of us—and our luck source is nearly invincible—not invulnerable.
With Beth deep in labor, we don’t dare all abandon her to partake in a mission—but that leaves four Na’rith against The Roubari, and these are the kind of odds a crew hesitates to gamble on when they don’t have a pregnant mate to return to.
Ekan’s hand rakes over his hair. “Distress signal from the Gryfcraft says they have a female aboard.”
We stare, frozen.
“Tripe!” Qolt curses with even more feeling.
Ekan’s nodding to him. “They’re in a bad way.”
“And about to be in a lot more bad if we don’t hustle.” Qolt goes to the wall, and starts holstering weapons, adding a laser-deflecting chest plate. “What’s our timeframe? Got a plan?”
