Page 74 of Taken to Kor
“Does this mean…”
“I’m your…”
“Your my Xiveri Mate?”
The two start to grin at each other like lunatics while I stare on, stunned. This has never happened before. Has something changed for us?
Us. VoraxiansandNiahhorru.
Or perhaps, we’ve never given it a chance. Perhaps, the humans have given us more than one way to reproduce — not just through their genetic compatibility, but through their ability to bring us together.
I continue to stare, agape as I reel at the possibilities that now lie before us while Svera speaks on, “It would appear that this type of arrangement will work out quite well. And you’ve already sold me on the concept of this beach. But, Deena, with your skills in negotiation and leadership, I think you should consider joining me and Miari in leading this effort.”
“Thank you, Svera, but centare. I’m a pirate to the bone. We’ll definitely have a house there to visit, but our family belongs in the stars and on Kor.”
The room quiets sometime later, once the kits have been nursed and once all of my pirates find a space to sleep on the floor around this much too-small nest. I lie on my back, stabbing through it without care with my tines and I tuck our pirate babies between us, all six of them.
And as Deena finally falls to sleep in my arms and the first kit begins to cry and I prepare for the first of many entirely sleepless lunars, I take the kit outside and stand on the lift, without lowering it.
This scorching world is only warm now, made bearable by the grace of darkness. Wind slips over me, over us, offering reprieve. I keep my little kit against my chest, her head leaning against my shoulder. She is quiet now that she’s outside and I know that she’s a little girl after her father. She doesn’t want to be contained. She wants to be set free.
I look up at the dark sky and at the brightness of so many distant planets looming against it. My ship gleams like a smooth shell against the horizon and I trace its shape with two of my arms as I speak into the shell of my smallest kit’s tiny ear, “This is your ship, little Melianora. One day, you will grow to command it. You will be the most savage of all pirates. I know this because I know that you are much more than you seem.
“You are your mother’s daughter. You will lay waste to armies, battle giants, discover new galaxies, build new ships, and more. Much more. And no matter where you go, and no matter how distant the galaxies are that you travel, just know that you are and will always be loved.”
Twenty-eight solars later…
18
Deena
Oh shrov. Shroving golly gee wiz. Shroving gosh. Gosh rhymes with slosh, which is exactly what my belly’s doing now as I stand with my palms upturned and the blaster close on my belt.
Miari hadn’t wanted me to wear it seeing as we’re supposed to be introducing new humans to this beach world in a non-threatening way, but I saw what those people became on the Balesilha satellite. I didn’t die then and I don’t shroving plan to die now.
Miari shoots me a glare as my hand twitches towards my blaster.
“I’m not going to shoot anybody,” I grumble, but it might be a lie because if anybody tries to eat me, I am definitely blasting the poop out of them. I’ve got a lot more to lose now.
I glance towards the trees where the Niahhorru pirates are waiting. Some had wanted to hover in using Eshmiri cloaking technology, but then the Voraxians got jealous because they don’t use Eshmiri cloaking shields and they wanted to see the first humans, too, and then they got into a big fight and Rhork punched Raku and then Krisxox attacked Rhork and then Gerannu andDiekennoranu, Corvenarennu and Quintenanrret attacked Krisxox and then I attacked Raku. At this point, the Voraxians got confused since they aren’t, evidently, used to fighting females. Raku let me punch him a few times. It was insulting that he refused to fight back.
But then Miari screamed at all of us to calm down and now here we are, just us three humans on the beach. Well, threealmosthumans given that Miari is a hybrid.
“Svera,” she says, glancing to the trees, same as me.
Her mate is in there somewhere next to mine. The arrangements for this whole affair are tenuous at best, but what’s clear is that this beach planet is a gift from the Niahhorru, protected by the Voraxians, and governed by the humans. The Niahhorru and the Voraxians will be allowed onto the planet in reasonable numbers — no more than five percent of the planet’s population will be Niahhorru, and another five percent Voraxian. As the humans population grows, so will that percentage, but for now the goal is not to overwhelm them.
Them, notus.
I giggle out loud at the thought and Miari shoots me a funny look. She looks so odd standing here on the orange sands. Her skin is as red as the leaves on the trees and, against the orange beach, she almost blends in.
I smile at her and wave even though we’re only standing a few feet apart. She just rolls her eyes and shakes her head. Tucking her brown-blonde curls behind her ear, she glances up at Svera and says, “Go ahead, Svera. Open the tank.”
Blarg. That’s the sound that it makes when Svera flips the switch that Gerannu prepped for us. With one touch of her human palm to the yeeyar-modified sensor, the glass front panel swings open. After that, we have to move fast. I move up to meet Svera and reach my hands into the nasty blue goop. Granted, I thought my blue shoe goop was gross at first, too, but this is much worse.
“It’s sticky, Svera,” I mewl.
She just gapes at me over the top of the tank. Her hazel eyes crinkle when she smiles. “You gave birth to six kits one right after the other and you’re complaining about this liquid being sticky?” She laughs at my expression as I stick my other arm in, too, and shakes her head. “Tri-God help me, you truly are a strange pirate.”
