Chapter 49

chapter 49

ELLE

I was trying to combat the world's worst migraine haze while I made sense of things.

The ship wanted energy—ALRI had power; I was sure we could figure out how to help it—but we needed to do it fast. One of its sister ships was en route to return to help it, and it needed to send up another beacon, but it didn't have enough energy to do so, while keeping its cargo safe.

But I wasn't sure what precisely that cargo was—until I felt Cepharius's heart lurch.

I blinked up at him, and saw his eyes were for the nearest wall alone.

I followed his gaze—and saw a human child.

"Elle," he said, reaching forward with one hand, but then I drew his back with my own, jostling myself and probably adding another twenty minutes onto my headache, because I could see what he saw, through his eyes, on our 'qa.

It was like being at the optometrist when they had you hold that plastic shield over your eyes—if I saw through his, it was a kraken, if I saw through mine, a baby .

"Ceph—it's not what you think it is," I explained to him softly, feeling his pain at losing his child all over again, only this time much more intimately. I moved enough to make him free me, but I stayed against his side.

"It is not ," the ship agreed. "But it can be . Will you help us? Can we trade? "

"Of course we'll help," I said, and meant it.

The ship opened up the glass and released the baby. Ceph reached for it at once, cradling it inside his hands to pull it close, and I wasn't sure which was worse for my ovaries, seeing him hold a kraken or a human baby.

"Good. This one has volunteered . It is very brave. Choose how you would like it to look and please bring us energy. "

Every time the ship talked the reverb in my head got louder—and I realized it was because the ship was talking as a collective.

But my thoughts were currently my own, because Cepharius was lost in his kraken-baby's eyes. I closed mine, and let myself feel how he did, full of love and the urge to teach and protect, and the stabbing knowledge that we would never have that together hurt me.

I stroked a gentle hand down his back. "What do you mean this one?" I asked the ship. "Just how many are you carrying?"

The nearest lights telescoped back, revealing that the room we were in was full of hexagonal chambers, all lidded with opaque glass. I assumed each one of them was occupied.

"Ceph," I whispered, willing him to look around. He did so, and I caught a strong wave of his confusion.

"I don't understand."

"I do," I said. This was the ship's cargo. It wasn't just a ship—it was a mothership. Quite literally.

Suddenly all the fear the ship had felt for so long alone made sense. It wasn't just responsible for a child or two—there were hundreds of them here.

An entire future's worth of children.

"But you don't need to trade us anything. Of course we'll help." I reached to take the hatchling from him, and he handed it over reluctantly.

The moment it landed in my arms it became a baby for me. Chubby, a little dopey looking with those unfocused newborn eyes, waving its tiny hands, and I felt it, skin to skin. I was flooded by hormones. I liked the way it fit, its weight, the heat of it—I even thought I could breathe its clean scent in.

"Can you show me your real form?" I asked the creature I held. Its appearance muddied and changed, turning from the baby I wanted to see, to something that looked like a furry larva, with six stubby little legs, and a twitching, mole-like nose.

It was ugly-cute—the sort of creature only a mother could love.

"We can cell-shift . This one is willing to stay behind to satisfy your mutual desires for reproduction , if you will but save the other cargo. "

Ceph was awed by this reveal—but not horrified. "It is still a child. I can tell," he said, sending it to me on our 'qa.

"I know," I said, kicking forward to put it back into its chamber. "And too young to volunteer for anything." I bit my lips, watching the glass close and become opaque again. I couldn't help but feel like I was sealing away the only chance he and I would have for offspring.

Because there'd been a moment when I'd been holding it, when it'd felt so right.

So real.

"Elle," he said, his voice low, reaching for me, thinking the same thoughts. He pulled me into his arms and held me close. "I am sorry."

"I know," I said, nodding into his chest.

One of his tentacles pushed my chin up so I was looking at him. It slid up my cheek, to catch an errant tear from my eye before it joined all the other water.

"We have nothing else to trade ," the ship began, interrupting our moment.

"That's okay," I said .

"My mate is right. Of course we'll help you." Ceph swam us forward to touch the outside of the glass briefly, before returning his attention to the 'qa. "How long do you have? And what do you need, precisely?"

It took a lot of thinking for the three of us to understand one another. The ship was convinced it only had one day before the opportunity for rescue.

"Why did you let us sleep, then?" My life would've been a whole lot easier if I didn't have to rely on Marcus or Donna to operate my cable—what if once I returned the habitat, they didn't want to help me come back out?

I could sense the ship's frustration. "We couldn't press you. If your minds exploded like the others, everything would be lost. "

I winced. I didn't want to think about Haberman's mind "exploding" but here we were, and after the ship had first slammed knowledge home inside mine, if I hadn't had the 'qa and Ceph to balance against, I could see how it could happen.

I also had to sit still while the ship went through my mind and showed me what it thought would work—ALRI was powered geothermally, which meant its power was somewhat infinite. The problem would come in bringing enough of the power out for the spaceship—and that was what I realized had happened to the ROVs.

It hadn't killed them; it'd drained them, looking for enough energy to survive.

The ship had identified what it believed to a spare battery in my memories from walking through the engine room, even though I hadn't realized what it was I was looking at, at the time.

"But even if she comes back with the habitat's extra battery," Ceph began, his confusion at how to merge my two-legged technology and alien technology coming through clearly on the ‘qa.

"We will manage . But hurry . PLEASE. "

I put out a warning hand as things got sharp again inside my skull. "At least you're polite. But for my sake—less yelling?"

"And how will she return?" Ceph asked, making my safety paramount.

I thought I felt the ship considering, then a wall in the back of the room opened up, revealing my pressure suit floating in it like a diver in a restaurant aquarium, with its cable now intact.

At seeing it, Ceph and I both paused.

I wasn't ready to leave him yet.

"Nor I, you," Ceph said, in response to my thoughts, as his tentacles wound around me.

" Energy? " the ship thought at us—and I didn't want it panicking.

I was strong. I'd been through worse before. I knew I would survive, but I flung myself against Cepharius, and he wrapped around me, both of us placing all of the contact we might never have again into that moment.

"I love you, I love you, I love you," I thought at him, as he swam us closer to my suit.

"I know, my pearl. I know."

And then I inhaled when I peeled myself away from him, like he was the air I breathed, and I didn't breathe again until my helmet was on, and I was coughing up the strange water I'd been swimming in as my suit repressurized.