Chapter 12

I wake up in pain. My head throbs, my ribcage aches, and my hands and fingers burn and itch like exposed nerve endings. It's dark, and my body is rocking gently in space. There's a smell in the air I can't name. Antiseptics, plus fish?

I blink rapidly, trying to figure out what's going on, and a robotic voice says, "Diagnosis and triage treatment plan complete in order of responsiveness required. Mild traumatic brain injury. Pain reliever administered intravenously. Suggest remaining still and calm. Try to sleep as much as possible over the next few days. Three fractured ribs. Trauma care not possible in this unit. Until trauma care can be received, suggest monitoring lung function. If no trauma care is available, expect lengthy recovery time. Forehead laceration. Sutured. Abrasions and lacerations on fingers and hands. Sterilized and wrapped. Dehydration and malnutrition. Intravenous rehydration and renutrition not possible in this unit. Poorly fused ulna with unhealed status. Trauma care not possible in this unit. Suggest rebreak and reheal. Pregnancy proceeding without complication. Estimated gestation time, eleven months."

The voice stops at the same moment my brain fritzes in my skull. I'm hurt, healing in some sort of medical unit, and I'm pregnant.

There's an alien baby in me.

My hands, wrapped in something soft and smooth, move to rest on my abdomen. Under my skin, a new life is fluttering around, rearranging my insides. I knew it was likely, but somehow, hearing the words out loud, I'm still both horrified and astounded.

How could my body be capable of this? Building a baby with DNA so alien from my own? A new thought freezes my insides, and I shudder. Maybe it's not my baby at all. Maybe Inde sent an already fertilized egg into my womb. . . Something weird.

I need to find a doctor. I need to know what's growing inside of me. And I need to decide if I'm going to keep it.

I swallow hard.

And I need to heal my broken ribs, et cetera.

Wait, how did I break my ribs? And why am I still rocking back and forth?

The light brightens around me just enough that I can see I'm reclining on a bench, and little robot arms are taping something across a shallow cut on my knee. The bench moves me upright, and I suck in a breath as sharp pain explodes in my rib cage.

"Remain still," the mechanical voice says.

"Can you bind my ribs?" I croak.

"Not advised. It may restrict your breathing too significantly. Trauma care required."

Great, no problem. I'll just go find a trauma ER and have them give me an MRI.

I look around as the roof over my head retracts and drops. The smell of raw seafood intensifies, making my stomach churn a little with nausea. I'm in a small, plain room. There's a bed along one wall, neatly made and unoccupied, and the far door is open to a dark hall.

"Hello?" I call out. I don't like that I don't know how I got here. My brain is so foggy. I press my wrist against my forehead, wincing at the size of the goose egg on my temple.

In a rush, I remember the gnaar, the vine, the rock. Then nothing. Did someone rescue me?

I look down at my wrapped hands, recalling the hours I spent writhing under Viz'en's vine until I finally freed myself. My fractured brain flashes me images of my fingernails breaking as I dug them into the vine, my lungs stuttering in my chest as the gnaar appeared out of the night, its claws like sickles.

Viz'en trapped me in the jungle, the gnaar hunted me, and then I almost died. Why aren't I dead?

My heartbeat thuds in my chest, a dull rhythm. I escaped the reptilian predator, obviously. But I don't know how or why.

And, honestly, as I flex my hurt hands, inhale shallow breaths, and contemplate the idea of an alien life growing inside of me, I'm not sure I care. What does it matter who rescued me and brought me to this medical pod thing? It's just going to be someone else who will use me or abuse me. I have no agency in this alien world. I don't belong here. And no one cares about what happens to me.

Tears build behind my eyes, but they don't fall.

My body rocks in place as I stare at the beige wall across from me. The fog in my brain thickens, turning my memories opaque. They're distant now. Almost like dreams. Or nightmares.

Am I still a nurse? Is Slimer due for his vet check? Am I so skinny because I've been sick?

My wrapped fingers trace the implant at my ear.

No.

I know where I am. The abduction. The aliens. I remember it all again in a cresting, heavy wave of images. The lab. The beasties.

But it's vague. My emotions, churning below the surface, are only a cold imprint.

Fog blankets everything, a layer I don't care about penetrating. On top of the fog, my body ebbs and flows with waves of pain. And on top of that, my mind is a dull mirror.

I know what I've done; what I've seen. But I don't care. It doesn't matter. Nothing I do has any effect on the things that keep happening to me.

A figure appears in the doorway, and I tilt my head, trying to focus. My vision is wonky, probably from my concussion. I should be scared. But I can't muster up the energy.

"I have some clothes," a male voice says.

I don't know that voice. I squint at the doorway.

"Your other ones were ruined."

I look down, absently noting I'm nude in the pod. How odd. I try to straighten up, then wince as my ribs sing with pain.

"Who are you?" I manage to rasp. "Did you rescue me?"

The figure moves into sight. A teenager, I think, with red skin like Viz'en but much smaller horns and no tusks. He's tall and thin, with curly black hair. He shakes his head. "I'm Zuko. You're on my boat. You've been unconscious for a long time, hours, in the med pod."

A boat. That explains the rocking and the reek of fish. Interesting. Or, not really.

"How did I get here?"

"A male carried you out of the jungle. He told me his name is Viz'en."

I rear back, a spark of fear bursting to a flame and burning away the fog of my dissociation.

Viz'en's here. Is he going to try to kill me again?

My eyes dart past the kid, Zuko, expecting to see the larger man looming in the hallway. Expecting to see his angry eyes and jutting chin. Expecting his hands to reach for me.

But Zuko's alone.

I exhale shakily.

Viz'en's not here. But he'll be back. It's only a matter of time.

I hold out my hand for the clothes. Zuko passes them over, his gaze studiously pointing away from my nude body, and I can't help but smile to myself. A polite alien. How novel.

Awkwardly giving him my back, I pull on the loose shirt so I'm covered before I try to stand to drag the pants over my hips.

Behind me, a shocked breath hisses out.

"What happened to you?"

My shoulders rise to my ears. He must have caught a glimpse of the scars on my back from Aezok's whippings. I haven't seen them, but I know they're there. Bumpy stripes that crisscross my skin.

I hate that he saw them. My cheeks heat with shame, with anger, maybe both, before I force myself to shrug, turning and straightening the clothes. They're simple, well-worn from repeated washings, but clean and soft.

"Where's Viz'en?" I ask instead of answering his question.

"We docked in Landis about an hour ago. He helped me unload the fish, and then he said he had to go do something."

I stare absently into the empty hallway again. He's probably talking to the police right now, telling them about the lab and my part in keeping him prisoner. I swallow hard, imagining how I'll have to tell them everything I saw and did there. The questions they'll have. The judgments they'll make about my actions. My hands twist at my side.

"Are you safe?" Zuko asks softly, and I realize he's moved closer. His dark eyes are curious and sympathetic. "I can get you away from him. If you need help. My mother—"

I don't stop to think, nodding before he finishes his question. I don't want to be here when Viz'en returns. I don't want to see him again. Whatever right he had to justice against me died when he left me tied to that tree. He's as much a monster as Aezok, valuing my life so little.

Zuko gestures to the hall and says, "Follow me. We should hurry. I'll take you to my mother's house. She will hide you while you decide what to do."

He gathers a small backpack from another room, hands me a pair of oversized boots to slip on, and leads me onto the deck, all the while keeping up a running commentary that I listen to with half an ear. The other half of me is too focused on the expectation that at any moment, I'm going to be surrounded by armed police officers and arrested.

Apparently, we're on a medium-sized island, Landis, where Zuko and his mom own a fishing business. They sell their catch to a conglomerate, which then resells the fish in Flex, this planet's largest city. Zuko is fifteen and works on the boat at the same time he attends remote schooling.

Ushering me up another set of stairs, he says, "My mother will be happy to help you. My father was not a good male. We left him when I was very small. Some people helped us hide. Now, we help others. My mother has many contacts."

As the sun hits my upturned face when we walk onto the deck, I realize Zuko thinks that Viz'en abused me. That I need help escaping Viz'en before he hurts me again.

I feel only a little bit bad about allowing his misperception to continue. If it gets me free of this entire situation, then it's just another morally gray decision in a long string attached to the kite of my soul already.

My eyes widen a little as I take in the setting around us. The boat, although made of a material I don't recognize, is so much like an Earth fishing boat that it's uncanny. Although, I guess if a design is functional on one water planet, it will likely work on another. Empty nets are coiled on the deck, and I watch my step as I follow Zuko to a ladder.

Below us, a small wharf bustles with activity. While most of the people working on their boats and walking here and there are the same red color as Zuko and Viz'en, the Kral species, I remember, there are other kinds of aliens as well. I can't stop myself from examining their features, but I don't see any other humans.

Off the boat, Zuko leads me away from the wharf and down a side street lined with little shops and cafes. No one pays any particular attention to us, though I'm definitely walking funny in my oversized boots, my posture hunched with pain from my ribs. The street is obviously alien, with storefronts advertising goods and services my translator has no English words for, but it's also just a street in a seaside town. There are kids running by with balls and sticks. Women and men tote shopping bags, sit at open air restaurants. The breeze carries the scent of the sea.

Zuko eventually stops at a narrow building with rows of windows. He waves his hand at the door, and it opens automatically. At another door on the second floor, he knocks.

My chest is aching with the pressure on my lungs from the long walk, but my head seems to be clearing the longer I'm awake. I'm eager to meet Zuko's mother. I'm eager to find out if she can really help me. I'm eager to see an actual female, even if she's an alien.

I'm due for some good luck, right?

After a few moments, a tall woman opens the door. She's wearing a long, skirted wrap dress, and her skin is a deep purple-red color, like wine. She's very curvy. Her black hair is plaited away from her face, and she doesn't have horns or tusks. Her face is gently lined around her dark eyes and mouth, and she smiles warmly at Zuko.

"Back so soon, Egenti-Dah? Did you come to have dinner with me?"

Zuko moves slightly, exposing me behind his shoulder, and the woman gasps. Her eyes trace me from my head to my toes, lingering on the bandaging on my forehead and my hands before she reaches up like she wants to touch me and then stops herself.

"What's wrong, little one? Are you okay?"

I open my mouth to say, what, I don't know, when Zuko gestures me into the apartment and his mom moves quickly out of the way. Her hands flutter at her sides, reaching for me and dropping again. It's not threatening though. Although she's larger than me, and so very alien, I somehow know she's not going to hurt me.

For some reason, that knowledge sends tears to prick behind my eyes.

The room we enter has high ceilings and an open concept, with low chairs and tables scattered around in muted colors. It's warm, and the windows are open to the street below. There's a pleasant, spicy scent in the air. I inhale shallowly and feel my lips curve into a tentative smile. Maybe they're going to feed me, too?

Zuko says, "This is Mara. She needs help. I must return to the boat and move it to another dock so the male cannot find me to ask where she went. Here"— he touches his ear and then mine, something beeps "—call me on your comm if the male tracks you down. I will bring the others. We will protect you."

My mouth falls open to protest. I didn't think about getting Zuko into trouble. What's going to happen when Viz'en returns with the police, and I'm gone? "I shouldn't have come," I say quickly to Zuko as he turns back to the door. "You're going to get in trouble."

Shaking his head, he says only, "No one will know," and then he's gone.

The woman shuts the door behind him and gestures to a couch-like piece of furniture. Before I can protest again, she says, "Zuko will be fine. He's quick and smart."

I hope she's right. Nerves light my insides when I sit at the edge of the couch. I can't recline without hurting my ribs, but it's nice to be off my feet. These boots are rubbing blisters into my heels.

"I'm Heza. Please tell me how I can help you, Mara."

She sits beside me, and I stare at her unfamiliar face, her concerned expression, and feel my lower lip tremble. My body hurts, fear is a constant buzz in the back of my skull, and it's all of a sudden too much.

I can't help it. In this stranger's house—the first woman I've seen in a year and only the second person to be kind to me in that same time, after her son—my emotional dam breaks. It does more than break. It bursts.

Tears flood my face as I cradle my ribs and start to sob. The jerky movement hurts, but I can't stop. Not even when a knot grows so large in my throat, I can't breathe around it. Hands touch my head, my shoulders in small pats, and, distantly, I'm aware Heza's making clucking, shushing noises. But I can't stop. I can't stop. I can't stop.

In between my heaving breaths, I tell her everything. From the moment I woke on the spaceship to just a little while ago when I woke on Zuko's boat. I don't leave anything out. Not the treatment I suffered at Aezok's hands nor the way I helped him harm the beasties. Not what happened when Viz'en and I escaped. I tell her everything.

My tears slow, but never stop, as my story torrents out of me.

When I'm done, I feel like an overcooked noodle. I'm flat on the couch, Heza's hands still in my tangled hair, and my throat hurts from talking so long.

My thoughts are quiet, hazed with the catharsis of my word vomit and general tiredness.

"I'm going to take you to a doctor first," Heza says after a few minutes. "There's a clinic with a full medical unit and a female doctor on staff. No one will ask you any questions or report anything about you to the police. You don't have a Federal identification, so I can't take you to the hospital. But the clinic won't ask for an ID if I tell them not to."

A clinic sounds amazing, but I shake my head. "I don't have any money."

"This sort of clinic doesn't take money from injured females. After you're healed, and you have information about what's inside of your womb, you can decide what you want to do next."

If it wouldn't hurt, I would laugh. Me decide. The thought is heady.

HEZA gives me some soup to eat as she leaves a message for Zuko, telling him where she's taking me and that he should go back out to sea for a few days, in case Viz'en gives the police his description. Then she types a message into a small screen on the wall, letting me know she's informing the clinic we're coming tonight.

The soup is savory, fresh and full of chunks of a delicate white fish, and I almost start crying again when I eat it.

When night falls, I follow her down to the street. I'm wearing a tunic dress now, similar to Heza's, although it's a little too long for me, and my head is covered by a thick black scarf. I swapped out Zuko's old boots for a pair of Heza's slippers that are still a little too large for me.

The clinic is several streets away, and by the time we arrive I have a new, small blister on my heel, but it's worth it. The moment we enter, another hooded woman sweeps us out of sight of the door and down a long, dimly lit corridor. Without speaking, she gestures to a large room, and Heza guides me inside.

My jaw drops. It's a full operatory suite, with a hospital bed in the center and a thousand little robot arms dangling from the ceiling. A Kral woman in a lab coat looks up from the tablet screen she's holding and smiles. She's similar in age to Heza, and her face is just as kind.

The next several hours pass in a blur of anesthesia and various medical treatments. The mechanical arms drop from the ceiling in a flurry of synchronized activity, painting things over my hands and wrists, scanning my head and ribcage, pressing things against me and inside of me. There's no pain, just various moments of pressure and instructions to turn this way or that.

Heza stays near my head, sitting on a stool and murmuring to me about what's happening. Her voice is soothing.

It's peaceful. My body relaxes, and my brain turns off.

Eventually, the robots still and I realize the doctor is standing next to the bed. I blink at her slowly, my brain still marveling at the entire situation. And the fact I'm not in pain. And the fact someone is taking care of me.

"The unit healed the trauma to your skull and ribcage," she says in a firm voice, reading off the tablet in her lap. "New skin was grafted to your hands and wrists. You've received intravenous fluids compatible with your biological needs."

She sits, clearing her throat, and I can't help but brace myself. "If you would like treatment for your broken ulna, I advise proceeding with care. The break is almost a year old, and the bone has healed over it. If we rebreak it and add new bone, while we may be able to straighten the arm, the muscles surrounding it have atrophied. You would need to regrow new muscle as well, and then strengthen that new muscle with physical therapy. It's a process that would take several weeks."

"Okay. I don't know what I'm going to do next with my life. So maybe let's wait on that decision."

She makes a note on her tablet and then scoots closer. Heza leans forward to put a hand on my shoulder. I brace again.

"The medical unit confirmed your species as Terran. You're from a Class 7 planet, which means contact with the United Federal Planet system is forbidden."

"Forbidden?"

"Ships are not permitted in your solar system."

I touch the base of my neck. "But how did I get abducted? A ship definitely took me from there."

"Smugglers, most likely. Finding slaves with no Federal identification to sell for labor or other things. People no one will be looking for."

I swallow hard, remembering the other women on the ship with me, the auction. "So how do I get home?"

Her grave face is all the answer I need.

"There's no way home, Mara. No legitimate ship will travel there. And if you make a deal with a smuggler—"

"—I'm asking to be kidnapped all over again," I finish her sentence.

If I thought I was all cried out, I was wrong. New tears prick behind my hot eyes. I can't go home. It was a long shot, of course. But the loss of hope is still devastating.

"There's more," the doctor says in a soft voice, her gaze on my abdomen.

"We've confirmed the fetus in your womb is a male of a hybrid species. While the majority of the genome appears to be Kral, there are also Terran genes from you, and a third species of non-humanoid origin." She taps her tablet with a sharp fingernail. "We believe the third genetic component belongs to a small mammalian species; we call them Kryllians. They're native to the Kral home planet."

I close my eyes. The beasties. Of course. Isn't that the cherry on top of the terrible sundae of my life?

The doctor continues, "While it's too early to say what effect the Kryllian genes will have on the viability of the fetus, there are observable abnormalities at this time."

"Like what?" I croak.

"There are wing buds."

My eyes fly open. "Wings?"

She nods.

Behind my shoulder, Heza murmurs, "Lots of humanoid species in the universe have wings."

"That is correct," the doctor agrees.

I rack my brain, trying to think of how to articulate all of the questions building in the back of my throat. "The Kryllians are not intelligent. They're just little animals. Will the baby be like that?"

"It's impossible to judge intelligence at this stage of the pregnancy. If you decide to keep the pregnancy for now, in a few months we will be able to do a brain scan. You could make another decision about termination at that point."

My brain works harder.

"Can you tell who the Kral DNA belongs to? Like, which Kral?"

The doctor shakes her head again. "Not without DNA comparisons."

My eyelids shutter. I don't know if it's Viz'en's baby. Or Aezok's. At least none of it belongs to Inde. I want to scream. How dare Aezok do this to me? Put the burden of this choice on me? How can I possibly make this decision, to keep or lose this baby? I feel sick even contemplating aborting it, but seriously, how could I continue?

It's too much. Too hard.

I didn't want this. The potential dads donating their DNA are both bad guys. The baby might not develop right.

But it's innocent. It didn't ask to be made this way.

My breaths huff in and out of my lungs at a rapid pace. My hands clench at my sides.

I can't decide now. It's too overwhelming. I feel panic building under my breastbone, like a scream welling from deep within me. I'm not ready to be a mother to an alien baby who might have severe special needs. How could I possibly handle that?

I rest my hands on my abdomen. It's way too soon to feel movement there, but I can imagine it. Wings. That's incredible.

Heza pats my shoulder and reminds me, "There's no rush to decide, Mara."

The doctor concurs and tucks her tablet away. She helps me stand, and I marvel as I look down at my healed hands. The skin is a little pinker than the rest of me, but otherwise, it's like I was never hurt. There's no pressure on my ribs either. I don't know how the unit healed me so fast. Maybe my chest is full of metal bars now instead of ribs. Bionic Mara.

My lips stretch into the shape of a smile, the movement unfamiliar. That would be cool. This whole setup is cool. The robot arms, the artificial intelligence involved in the medical unit itself.

"Can I come here again?" I ask the doctor. I don't even know her name. Heza told me it's safer if I don't know it, but it feels weird I don't know the identity of the person who just healed me. "I was a nurse on Earth. Um, Terra. I could learn how to help you provide medical care? This setting is way more advanced than I'm used to, but I'm a fast learner, I swear."

Smiling at me, the doctor says, "If you decide to stay in Landis, I would be happy to speak to you about a job."

I grin back. It's not much, but the idea of helping people again, of following my calling, lifts my spirits even more than knowing my body is free from pain, and I'm not a captive anymore to either Aezok or Viz'en. I can make choices about my future. I can be useful. I can make a home for myself and begin to heal.

On the walk back to the apartment, Heza talks to me about the clinic and its work with domestic violence victims. She doesn't reference her own history, but I remember what Zuko told me, that she left her husband. I want to ask her about it—did he have a problem with anger management like Viz'en, that Wrath thing? But I don't want to pry.

Does the Wrath make Kral men angry and volatile? How can anyone make a family with someone who will choose violence when they get upset?

"Whether or not you decide to stay," she finishes as she leads me to a small bedroom off the main living space, "I have contacts who can help you build a false Federal identification. That way, at least, you don't have to worry about being jailed for being illegal."

"With an ID, I can go anywhere?"

"Anywhere in the United Federal Planet system."

I'm overwhelmed once more. I have no idea what that means, or how many possibilities exist in this universe.

After Heza hands me a sleeping gown and shows me the bathroom setup and how to turn off the lights, it takes me a long time to find sleep, despite my exhaustion.

I don't know what to do now I'm free. I don't know how I can possibly make the right choice. But still, the idea that I have a choice keeps a frisson of happiness swirling in my stomach long into the night.