Another effect of sacrifice.
For this has all been sacrifice. A constant giving. For revenge. For life. For survival.
And for some of my brothers, sacrifice for that thing the hyu’mankin call…love.
My attention remains on the outside, only my head tilting slightly at Dri’ro’s words.
“I have nothing more to offer.”
My technology, the weapons I developed to kill this scourge that infested Er’th, has been my life’s work. Revolutions of research on Edooria. All paid off. My obsession. My intent. Fulfilled.
I have succeeded.
“What more…” I begin.
What more can I give? What more am I worth?
For I have given my all.
I have given myself.
Dri’ro releases a breath, his ba’clan shivering, and I commend him silently on his control. For not all of my brothers can remain composed in my presence. And even those that can, have trained themselves to do so over what feels like eons, while I tried to accept the one thing that sets me apart from the rest of my kin.
That I am now Other. Not Vullan, but something else altogether.
“A meeting,” he says. “The females think one of the arriving Er’thkin was important in the Before.” His gaze slides to mine, all darkness with no light. I can see myself reflected in those eyes. Like a white shadow.
Strange.
Unnatural.
An aberration.
Such a sight should make my hackles rise. But those instincts? Dimmed. Memory of such responses is a fading mist in the back of my mind.
“Hyu’mankin no longer have castes,” I reply. “They are now all equal. Now they rebuild. Together.”
Dri’ro’s lips pull back in a hyu’manlike grin that shows how much we’ve adapted since arriving here. His fangs bare as he speaks. “If you spent more time observing them, you would know they are not like us, brother.”
He turns his attention back to the viewscreen and I sense his words bear twice the meaning.
But he is wrong.
I’ve spent many cycles observing the very beings he thinks I ignore. The females. The ones who’ve mated with my kin.
Their differences, their intricacies, their desires…all of it fascinates me.
But it is not something I can indulge in.
Ever.
I’ve seen them inside out. Yet, they surprise me.
“There,” Dri’ro says. Far below, a vehicle pulls into the settlement, dust rising in its wake. “They’ll be waiting for you.”
Why?
My brethren all know there is a reason I restrict my movement to the surface. A reason I keep to the ship.