by Juno Wells
And as our child grew inside me, I began to feel a change in my body. My breasts swelled, and my limbs felt light and tingly. I developed an insatiable thirst for water, guzzling whole liters at a time in order to stay hydrated. I didn’t feel invincible, or indestructible, but apparently I was. I had to know: how did it work?
Finally, my curiosity got the best of me. Aster was sitting in front of the main control panel, making adjustments to the ship’s course. I was in the kitchen making myself a snack. The baby I was carrying wasn’t just thirsty all the time; he was also insatiably hungry. I’d only been awake for a few hours, and it was already my third meal of the day.
As I sliced long stalks of some sort of Alluvian fruit – Aster had told me the name of it, but I couldn’t remember – I began to consider the knife I held in my hand. What would happen if I tried to plunge it into my body? Of course, I wasn’t going to do that. Just the thought of it made me physically sick. But a tiny cut wouldn’t hurt me… Just a teeny little nick…
I gently pushed the small blade against my fingertip. At first, a tiny spot of blood rose to the surface – no more than a pin prick. And then, something truly amazing happened. Water came out of my fingertip. Before I could make so much as a small slice, a thin layer of icy blue water rose up and covered my finger. I pushed down on the blade, but the water acted like an impenetrable barrier between the knife and my skin. I literally couldn’t even cut myself.
“Holy shit,” I blurted out.
Aster was in the kitchen within a split second, a panicked look on his face. “What happened? Are you okay? Is the baby okay?”
“Sorry, I didn’t mean to scare you. I’m fine. We’re fine. It’s just…” I held my finger up in front of me. “You weren’t kidding about being indestructible. I just tried to cut my finger, and–”
“You tried to cut your finger?” Aster’s eyes darkened. “Why?”
I shrugged, suddenly feeling stupid. “I don’t know. I just wanted to see what would happen.”
“Ava, don’t ever do anything like that again.” He put his hand on my stomach, and I felt a little rumble in my belly. “It puts stress on the baby. And we need this boy to be born strong and healthy.”
“Man, I’ve only been pregnant a few days and I’m already making terrible decisions as a mother.” I sighed, feeling like an idiot. “I just…”
“I know, you got curious.” Aster leaned down and kissed me softly on the forehead. “Your curiosity is one of the things I love about you. But if you try anything like that again, you’re going to get a spanking.” He winked and playfully swatted me on my butt.
“Ooh, you promise?”
“Don’t tempt me,” he said. “I have work to do.”
The days passed. Or at least, they seemed to. On Earth, I was used to the setting sun and the rising moon, but in space time passed in a different way. There was no day or night, only time. It threw my internal clock completely out of whack, like the worst jet lag ever. I slept when I felt tired, which was often, thanks to the child quickly growing within me. When I wasn’t sleeping, I was eating. And when I wasn’t eating, I was naked, with Asterion.
On the seventh day, Aster woke me with a kiss. My eyelashes fluttered open, and I looked into his indigo eyes. “You should probably wake up,” he said.
“Is everything okay?” I stretched my aching legs and tried to stifle a yawn.
“Everything’s fine,” he replied. “I just thought you’d like to see this.”
He walked me over to the ship’s window. I looked out and saw a beautiful blue planet. There was water everywhere – gigantic, breathtaking indigo oceans wrapped around small landmasses. “Is that Alluvia?”
Aster nodded and took my hand. “We’ll be home soon.”
Home. The word struck me like a ton of bricks. In my life, I’d known plenty of homes. The house where I’d grown up, in Georgia. My college dorm. My first apartment. And as I looked out at the beautiful blue orb of Alluvia, I realized, for the first time, that this was my home now.
Chapter Twenty
The ship landed with a thud. And as we touched down on the planet’s surface, it felt like a whole army of ninjas were kickboxing inside my stomach. And it wasn’t just the half-human, half-alien fetus inside me. I was nervous. More nervous than I’d ever been. I heard loud, chattering voices outside the ship, which only intensified my anxiety.
“Sounds like we have a welcoming party,” I said. I gave Aster a nervous smile.
“The whole planet has been eagerly awaiting our arrival. The prophecy has come true. This is a big deal, Ava.”
“The whole planet’s here?! Like, everyone?” It wasn’t that I was terribly shy, but the thought of being greeted by an entire planet was a little overwhelming. I thought I might throw up. I tried to convince myself that it was just morning sickness.
“Not the whole planet, but almost everyone. Don’t worry, they’re going to love you,” he said. He took my hand and walked me to the door of the ship. “Are you ready?”
“Ready as I’ll ever be,” I replied. I took a deep breath and tried to calm my nerves. “Let’s do it.”
The ship’s door opened, and we stepped out. Immediately, a chorus of cheering voices erupted. The sound was deafening. Before me was a sea of people, as far as the eye could see. Some were young, and some were old, but they were all tall and black-haired, just like Aster. Little children jumped up and down, and women held up bouquets of flowers in the air. They all clapped and cheered and yelled, smiles spread across their faces. And I couldn’t help but smile too. I felt like a rock star, like royalty.
An older man and woman stepped forward from the crowd, followed by a girl who looked like she was in her late teens. “Asterion, you found her,” the woman gushed. She took my hand in hers and I saw tears welling up in her eyes.
“Ava, this is my mother, Vissa,” Asterion offered. “Mother, this is Ava Clarke.”
“Hi,” I managed to eke out. “It’s nice to meet you.”
“Oh, you’re beautiful, my dear.” The woman took a lock of my hair in her hand and smiled. “Your hair is like gold. I’ve never seen anything like it.”
“Give her a little space, mother. She’s overwhelmed. Don’t ogle her,” Aster scolded.
“My apologies. I’m just so excited! She’s pregnant already, I can tell. The prophecy has come true.” She turned to the older man standing next to her. “Vestaran, look how she glows! She’s carrying our grandchild.”
The man looked at me and smiled. I recognized that sweet smile. It was the same as Aster’s. “This is my father, Vestaran,” Aster offered. He gestured to the young girl next to us. “And this is my sister Prix.”
“We’re so excited to have you here. Every Alluvian on the planet has learned your language and customs in preparation for your arrival,” Aster’s sister said. She gave me a formal handshake, like we were at a business meeting. “I think this is how people on Earth greet each other, correct?”
“It is, sometimes,” I said. Prix looked so sweet, and so happy to see me, that it warmed my heart. “But we hug a lot too.” I shrugged. “Should we hug?”
“I thought you’d never ask,” Prix squealed. She wrapped her arms around me, her long black hair tickling my face. “We’re sisters now, Ava!”
Aster’s father, who had been quietly watching this interaction, finally spoke. “Prix, let the woman breathe.” His voice was stern, but his eyes were kind. “Miss Clarke, welcome to Alluvia. I hope you’ll be happy here.”
While all of this took place, the crowd of Alluvians surrounding the ship stood and watched. It was an understatement to say I felt self-conscious. There was literally an entire planet’s worth of people looking at me. “Am I supposed to… I don’t know, say something, or do something?” I gestured at the massive crowd and raised my eyebrows. “They’re not expecting me to make a speech, are they?”
“Let’s all just wave at them,” Aster suggested. “I think that’ll do.”
&n
bsp; “Excellent idea, son,” Aster’s father said.
We stood together, the five of us, and turned to face the crowd. Then we all waved. Everyone went nuts again, cheering and clapping. Someone threw exotic looking flowers at our feet. And every indigo eye of every Alluvian in the crowd was looking right at me.
After a few minutes of awkward waving, Aster’s father addressed the crowd. “Friends, many years ago there was a prophecy,” he bellowed. “The elders foresaw that my son Asterion was unique among us. It was his fate to mate with an Earth woman. Alluvian blood and human blood would join together, and from that union a child would be born. A child like no other. A child that would grow to become the keenest Alluvian fighter the universe has ever seen. A child who would wipe out the scourge of the Zatharians once and for all, and finally restore peace to our warring galaxy. And I’m happy to say to you today that the prophecy has come true.” The crowd erupted once more into a deafening roar. He waited a moment for everyone to quiet down, then he continued. “Now we await the birth of our prince.”
“Wait, did he say prince?” I shouted to Aster over the din of the cheering crowd.
Aster gave me a sheepish grin. “I suppose I should’ve mentioned this to you. My father is the king.”
“The king? Of the planet?” Aster nodded and shrugged. “So what does that make you?”
“I’m a prince.”
“So what am I in all this?” I didn’t know how Alluvian royalty worked. I didn’t know how anything worked.
“You’re a princess now, Ava.”
Chapter Twenty-One
The citizens of Alluvia accepted me with open – albeit curious – arms. I was a novelty to them: a foreigner, an alien. And I stuck out like a sore thumb. Everyone on the planet was at least six feet tall, with long, lean bodies and straight dark hair. And there I was, a curvy girl no more than five and a half feet tall, with an unruly mop of dirty blonde curls. Even if I wasn’t a princess pregnant with the future prince who was supposed to save the planet, I still would’ve gotten stares.
But I was, in fact, a princess. An alien princess. It was quite a change from my life back in Georgia. I was used to working with surly cops, and eating Chinese takeout on the weekends. Now, people bowed when I passed by them and called me Princess Ava. I thought of my friend Beth back home. She’d always been so obsessed with the British royal family. She would’ve been so jealous of me.
As the weeks passed, I began to feel more at home on Alluvia. It was like a tropical paradise, full of lush foliage and flowers unlike anything I’d ever seen on Earth. There was one flower in particular, with a completely unpronounceable name, that had bold yellow and purple leaves as big as school buses. And Aster was right: everyone on Alluvia really did live by the water. The shoreline was dotted with small cottages, and there wasn’t a day that went by where people didn’t go into the ocean. Every morning, Aster and I woke together and went to the water’s edge. I’d lay in the surf and let the waves tickle my quickly growing belly while Aster swam out to sea.
At night, sometimes we’d sneak down to the water, strip off all our clothes, and make love in the Alluvian Ocean while the rest of the planet slept. I was happier than I’d ever been, and though my surroundings were strange and new, I quickly began to feel like Alluvia was my home. And I grew close to Aster’s parents, Vissa and Vestaran, and his sweet sister Prix. I truly felt like a part of the family.
Still, I missed my family back home, and my friends. And my dog Pepper. Aster did what he could. A month into my time on Alluvia, Aster sent the planet’s best technician on a ship to Earth to manipulate a satellite that circled the planet. And once he’d hacked the code with a secret backdoor program, I was able to contact Earth with a reverse-engineered cell phone. I couldn’t believe it. It was one hell of a long-distance call.
Beth squealed when she heard my voice on the other end of the phone. She demanded to know everything I’d been up to. I lied and told her I was in Paris.
“Ooh, Paris! How romantic! So I take it that things are working out with this mystery man of yours?”
“They’re working out better than you would believe, Beth. I’m in love.” I almost didn’t tell her the rest, but I couldn’t help myself. “And we’re having a baby.”
“A baby! Holy shit, Ava! That’s incredible! So when do I get to meet this guy? What’s his name again?”
“His name is Aster. And you’ll meet him... eventually. But that’s the thing, Beth. I may not be back home for a while. I’m going to sell my house. And I’m going to have the baby here. In, uh, Paris.” I looked out at the Alluvian Sea before me and couldn’t believe I was actually talking to a person in a different galaxy. Alluvian technology, man. It never ceased to amaze me. “There are a lot of things I need to explain, Beth, but I just can’t do it over the phone.”
“Well, I’m just glad you’re happy. And don’t worry about Pepper. I’ll take good care of her until you get back to the States.”
It killed me to leave Pepper behind, but interstellar travel wasn’t exactly recommended in my condition. Aster had explained to me that Alluvian babies came whenever they were ready – some took three months, some took twelve. So I had no way of knowing when I’d go into labor, but from the looks of things, I had a feeling it was going to be sooner rather than later. I was only a month along, but I looked like I was ready to pop.
After I talked to Beth, I phoned my parents in Fort Lauderdale. My mother answered and immediately started telling me about the new rescue dog they’d just adopted, which just made me miss Pepper more. I had to interrupt her and let her know that this wasn’t a regular phone call just to check in.
“Mom, mom! I’m actually calling because I have some big news to share.”
“Oh, big news? Hold on a sec honey, let me put you on speaker phone so your father can hear.” I heard her yell out to my father. “Roy, come here! Ava’s got news! I’m putting her on speaker phone.”
A moment later I heard my dad’s voice. “Hey, pumpkin. What’s new? How’s the PI business?”
“Well, mom, dad... a lot has happened. The PI business isn’t really a business anymore. And I’ve moved. Uh, to Paris.” I hated lying to my parents, but what was I supposed to say? That I was calling them from a hacked cell phone, beaming out to a hacked satellite, from another planet? Sometimes it’s best to keep your parents in the dark about certain things.
“Paris! Honey, that’s fantastic. Your father and I went to Paris back in 1976, I think it was. Have you been to Montmartre yet? Oh, you have to. And you have to—”
“Mom, there’s more. I know this is sudden, but I’ve met someone. I’ve met a really incredible man. And we’re in love. And you’re finally going to get that grandchild you’ve always wanted.”
My mother squealed so loud that I had to hold the phone away from my ear. “Oh, honey! I’m over the moon! A grandchild!”
“It’s about time, kiddo,” my dad joked. “But I hope this Parisian man is going to make an honest woman out of my daughter.”
Oh, right. Marriage. I hadn’t even thought of that. I’d agreed to have a baby with Asterion without even considering that maybe we should get married. That was an oversight on my part. But leave it to my traditional parents to mention it immediately. “Oh, absolutely,” I lied. “We’re eloping. It’s... sort-of a French tradition.” I had no idea what the Alluvian tradition was, but I figured they had to do some kind of ceremony.
“So, tell us everything, sweetie. Who is this man? How did you two meet?”
Obviously, I didn’t tell them everything. I kept it vague, and talked about Aster’s personal qualities instead of the specifics of how we met. I told them that he was a sweet, strong, caring man. From an influential family. Close to his parents, and his sister. Loved the ocean. I wanted to tell them everything, but there was no way they would believe me. The only way they would believe me would be to show them for themselves, and that would have to wait.
Eventually, my alien rig
ged cell phone started to run low on battery power, and I said goodbye to my parents and hung up. I stood at the window of our cottage by the sea and looked out at the clear blue water of the Alluvian Ocean. The phone call to my parents had made me consider things I’d yet to consider. Yes, I was living a life on different terms, on a faraway planet where customs differed. But there were still things I wanted, things that meant something to me. And I wanted to get married.
I was so lost in thought that I didn’t notice Aster had come in until I felt his hands slip around my waist. He cupped my pregnant belly and kissed me on the back of the head. “Everything ok?” he asked.
“Well, yes and no,” I said, turning around to face him. “Do people not get married on your planet? Or have you just forgot to ask me?”
Aster let out a small chuckle. “Right. Marriage. That’s a tradition on Earth.” He took my hands in his and smiled. “We’re already bonded, Ava, as far as Alluvian traditions go. We’re mated. Sealed by blood. But if you want to do it your way...”
