Page 18 of The First Omega Made
I stripped in my small bathroom that I’d cleaned up moments before, hefting sloughed sheets of skin into the carbonizing incinerator. In the mirror, my true self pulsed beneath skin that wasn’t my own. TheSargeof my host, a human male well into his sixties—though I didn’t look a day overmid-thirties. The hybreeds and their lack of understanding of human age made being around them so much easier. Easier to hide, at least.
The pulsing scar of my intrusion bore tendrils that spread out—spiderlike patterns, inky black that radiated through my lymphatic system. My groin, harboring many lymph nodes, bore pocked flesh, darkened skin, and flaking patches that weren’t healing fast enough. I could imagine Noel somewhere seeing it.Space herpes.
Then again, he never hit me as someone that would be disrespectful of a medical condition. If I told Noel, he’d understand.And still call it space herpes.
It was Vil I worried wouldn’t.
He didn’t know what Sarge was. What he had been.
Why he’d escaped a human colony and why he desperately hid among the hybreeds.
Why he didn’t want his genes backed up in a database.
If it weren’t for the fact that Serjio Vaskez was worth more to society as a vessel for myself than he was alive, said plenty.
It said nothing for all the damage he left in his wake.
And said volumes about his memories that I refused to access. I’d been down that road once. Catching him in that brothel in K-D94 before he could hurt that child made me feel better about myself.
I’d broken my own agreements to my people—not to body swap. But I’d done the right thing. I still sent money to that girl on occasion—a grown woman now, had her PhD in something or other. She was one of the few people I’d ever divulged my secrets to.
As I lost myself in thought, the door to my room opened—Noel likely. I finished my shower, threw on a robe, and tied it tight, making sure I covered everything.
Noel knelt beside the bed, Doc’s hand in his own, feeling for a pulse that beat with remarkable similarity to his own. A second heart had manifested…amid other things. Some things—thing, had disappeared, though, and Noel discovered that with a quick peek, perfunctory and brief in a way that didn’t fluster me. “His change is coming along. I didn’t know it could be done this way, so fast.”
“Yeah. There’s a reason I suppose they don’t want what you are mobile. If that’s all it takes, it’d be hard to control your spread.”
“Seems more efficient if I am to spread my genes to be allowed freedom, no?”
“No traceability.” I rummaged in my closet and gathered my clothes before returning to the bathroom to change.
“That’s true.” Noel covered Doc up and patted him. As I went to sit on the bed beside him, a lump moved under the covers, not his tail but Nexus, rooting out to greet me.
“Sard!” He grinned, and I offered him a pat to his head. Dark-blue locks ruffled under my fingers, sticking up at odd angles. “Doc nap.”
“Yes, he is napping.” I moved to sit next to him and earned an affectionate nudge of his head into my palm before he scooted over on all fours and slapped me with his chubby little tail. I’d come to learn it as a sign of affection.
“Sard play?” He blinked up at me, eyes as endless of a blue as his father’s were black.
“Sure. You want uppies?” I played a game I usually did with the little one, holding him up in the air while he worked his little wings free to flap uselessly. He liked it and Noel permitted it. The omega was strikingly calm when it came to his child. Not like most Naleucians had claimed omegas were.
“I should warn you that the general crew side of the ship has been made so that Shafa can roam.”
I winced at the comment. “I’ll make a note to stay here.”
“You are mere human. I will protect your mate as best I can from him. It is clear to me that Shafa has no good will toward omegas. Not as you and Vil do.” Noel watched me playing with Nexus.
“I thank you so much for your help, Noel. I really do.” Part of me wanted to tell Noel the deeper part of why I hid, but it was pointless. Death was inevitable. Maybe Shafa could see a better way and treat Doc well.
“Think nothing of it. I want Nexus away from that creature, too. Naleucians are horrid things, I’ve seen so far. The hybreed are much better. If not hornier.” Noel nodded sagely.
“They’re space Naleucians,” Doc’s raspy voice perked up, and Nexus wriggled in my arms until I sat the little one down to cuddle up with him. He nestled against Doc’s chest and purred hard.
“Doc.” Nexus cooed and covered his face with his tail as he curled.
“Mind if I leave him to take his nap with you?” Noel smiled at us and Doc gave him the thumbs-up.
“Have Merriel summon me when you’re tired of him or he wakes.” Noel’s trust of us with the little one made me yearn for young of my own in such a visceral way that made no sense. Biological children for what I was, meant to take the life of another. My young would have core memories of our species and be ready to inhabit a body of their own in weeks, and I would be responsible for so much death.
