Page 14 of Kazmyr: Molten for Her
Jenna pulled back enough to see Maya's face, her eyes wide with recognition. "How did you?—"
"You didn't ask for any of this," Maya said, her voice low but carrying. "Neither did I."
Jenna froze in the embrace, her muscles rigid with shock. I watched her face cycle through confusion, suspicion, resistance… and then something broke. Her breath caught sharp against Maya's shoulder, and her arms came up slowly, then with sudden desperate strength, clinging to this woman who understood what no one else in the galaxy could.
My chest ached at the sight. Some tight, anxious knot inside me unraveled as they held each other. For all my attempts to explain, to protect, to prepare Jenna for this new reality, I could never give her what Maya offered in that silent embrace: the knowledge that she wasn't alone, that someone else had walked this path before her.
When they finally pulled apart, Jenna's eyes were dry but bright with emotion. She swallowed hard, composing herself with visible effort.
"So you've both been through this?" Her voice caught slightly, that wary suspicion returning as she glanced between Maya and Vylit. "The whole 'surprise, you're genetically matched with an alien' package deal?"
Maya nodded, her mouth curving into a small, bitter smile. "Complete with pirates, corporate betrayal, and a rogue AI matchmaker with questionable morals."
"Don't forget the part where your governments sold your genetic data without consent," Silvyr added cheerfully, his projection flickering closer. "Earth's medical privacy laws have more holes than my firewall after a Voraxx cyber-attack."
Vylit moved to stand beside Maya, his hand coming to rest on the small of her back with casual intimacy. The luminous patterns beneath his skin synchronized subtly with her proximity, a visual echo of what my marks did whenever Jenna was near.
"We faced the hunters," he confirmed, his deep voice rumbling through the chamber. "They tracked us through three star systems and cornered us in an underwater cavern before we found sanctuary."
I watched Jenna's face as she absorbed this. Shock registered first, not at the danger, which she'd already experienced firsthand, but at the realization that she truly wasn't the only one who'd been thrust into this chaos. That others had been stolen by the galaxy just as she had been.
"The difference," Maya said, her eyes fixed on Jenna's, "is that you get the benefit of our experience. We had to figure it out as we went."
Silvyr chose that moment to expand his projection, filling the center of the chamber with holographic charts that spun and shifted in three dimensions. Traffic patterns, ship movements, data flows… all converging around points marked with the IDA's official insignia.
"The Registry's still bleeding data like a stuck Gorgolian fish," he announced, his fingers dancing through the projections, pulling forward certain sections and expanding them. "Every genetic sample, every match prediction, every compatibility assessment… all accessible to anyone with the right access codes or enough credits to bribe the right admin."
The data streams formed a network, threads connecting to a central hub labeled with a single designation: Asset P.
"And our friend here," Silvyr continued, tapping the hub, "is still pulling all the strings. You're not special, Maple… you're just the next one in the queue. Asset P's been tracking pre-bonded mate genetics across three sectors, building a collection. You and our volcanic friend here were simply the latest on the shopping list."
Jenna bristled visibly at being called by her last name, fire flashing in her eyes. My ember marks flared in response, pride surging through me despite the gravity of the situation.
"How deep does the leak go?" she demanded, taking a step toward Silvyr's projection. "Is Earth complicit, or just incompetent? Did the IDA ever actually intend to protect us, or were we always just inventory to them?"
Maya reached out, her fingers brushing Jenna's arm in silent solidarity. "Both Earth and the IDA have pockets of integrity and corruption. The system was designed with good intentions… helping species on the brink of extinction find compatible genetic matches across the galaxy."
"But power and profit corrupted it," Vylit added, his luminescence dimming slightly. "As they often do."
"They took our choices," Maya said simply, her voice steady but with steel underneath. "And now we take them back."
Jenna absorbed this, her eyes narrowing as she processed the implications. Then she turned toward me, and the full force of her fury hit like a solar flare. My marks pulsed erratically, responding to both her anger and my shame.
"So you all knew." Her voice was low, dangerously controlled. "You all fought. You all suffered through this before me." She gestured around the chamber, encompassing everyone present. "And you still thought I could just step into this cosmic clusterfuck without asking questions? Without demanding answers?"
I bowed my head, unable to meet her gaze as my marks dimmed to a dull glow. Shame burned hotter than any heat-phase I'd ever experienced, flowing through the scars etched across my body. She was right. We had known… not everything, but enough. And still, I'd dragged her into this half-blind, feeding her scraps of truth only when necessary.
"I believe," Vylit offered into the tense silence, "that protection sometimes manifests as withholding. It is... a cultural miscalculation."
"Bullshit," Jenna snapped, but there was less heat in it than I expected. "It's control. Dressed up as care, but still control."
Maya's expression softened with understanding. "When Vylit first found me, he tried the same approach. Thought he was shielding me from 'unnecessary distress.'" She shot her mate a look that mingled exasperation and fondness. "I nearly hijacked his ship trying to get back to Earth."
"You disabled three essential systems and locked yourself in the navigation chamber," Vylit corrected, his luminescence brightening with what might have been pride.
"Smart woman." A ghost of a smile flickered across Jenna's face before she suppressed it. "Space couple therapy and a how-to guide for stealing spaceships.."
"Scientist," Maya replied with a shrug. "We tend to be resourceful when cornered."
