Page 25 of Monstrous Hunt
“May I examine you to see how you’re healing?” Snryx asked.
“Of course.” I focused on him as he moved closer, watching how the implement stretched out toward my knee. It was still soft and flexible, touching me so lightly that I barely even felt it.
The rest of his coils were different. Stiffer, rattling against each other. The ones down the back of his head, neck, and spine stood up tall like his creature. A warning to Axxol. Snryx might be the medic, but he’d defend me against his alpha too.
The thought made my throat tighten and my eyes prickled with emotion. Snryx was always so reserved and withdrawn, keeping his head down, the tentacle-like tools pressed tightly against his back to hide his shape for fear that he might disgust me. Yet without him, I would have died several times. The infections from the bite and river alone would have killed me.
Impulsively, I lay my hand on his arm. His head jerked up, his glowing amber eyes slitted and intent. I could almost see the words flickering in his gaze.What’s wrong? What do you need?
“Thank you,” I whispered. And I didn’t pull my hand away as he worked.
12
SNRYX
Her biologic readings streamed through my sensors, a steady flood of statistics that normally provided the information I needed. Heart rate, blood pressure, or even the chemical composition of her blood told me nothing about why she voluntarily touched me.
I wanted to know why. And I desperately wanted more. So much more.
For all my medical enhancements, I’d failed to comprehend the power behind such a basic need as physical touch. We were soldiers. Killers. Special assassins sent in to eliminate nests of Myrm before planetary extinction. We didn’t have physical needs. Even feeding and sleeping were completely managed and controlled by HQ. In all my training and service, I’d never noted how a simple touch made my own heart rate accelerate. Let alone the way my hormone levels skyrocketed.
“How’s the baby?” She asked.
I blinked, forcing myself to focus on her readings, not my own. “Strong and developing rapidly. Its growth is comparable to a human embryo at ten to twelve weeks.”
Her eyes flared wide and she swallowed hard in a loud gulp. “Has it even been two weeks since I ovulated?”
“The embryo is growing much faster than we originally estimated,” I admitted. “Instead of doubling its development, I expect it’ll be ready to emerge in another thirty days.”
Her cheeks paled, and her fingers trembled on my arm. Her heart fluttered rapidly, skipping a beat before steadying. “A month?” Her voice quivered, hoarse and rough. “We’re having a baby in a month?”
Kroktl wrapped his arms around her. “All will be well.”
Her eyes shimmered with tears and her chin quivered. “I’m not ready.”
Intellectually, I knew I had given her the proper, correct information that she needed for her own peace of mind. However, physically, I felt like Axxol’s BGR had pummeled me into a smear on the patio. “He’s correct. Everything is progressing well. Biologically, your body is adapting and providing a perfect haven to nurture the youngling.”
“Is this place even safe? What if they hunt us down again? Where can we go? I don’t even know what this baby will need, or how I’ll deliver it. You said emerge. Does that mean it’s going to rip out of meAlienstyle?”
I wasn’t sure what she meant—until Rizan played a vid on the grid from an Earthling movie that almost made me laugh. “Not at all. The embryo will deliver through your vaginal canal as a typical human birth.” I could also deliver it painlessly via cesarean but I didn’t want to alarm her with the idea of me cutting her open.
“Is that how dyni are usually born?”
“Not at all, but this is no sterile laboratory in the Sirian quadrant. Dyni haven’t beenbornin thousands of years. We’re engineered.”
Lohr returned with another healthy amount of food but from the queasy look on her face, I wasn’t sure that she would manage to consume any more nutrients. “Based on million-year-old paleontology records gleaned from across the galaxy, wild dyni would have procreated by laying egg clutches. Our original biology was much more reptilian than it is now.”
“I’m going to lay an egg?” She whispered, swaying.
Kroktl chuckled, giving her a squeeze. “Not at all, baby. I wish you could see what I see when I look at our youngling. You’d have no further worries about its development.”
“I have an idea…” Head cocked to the side, Rizan stared blankly for a few moments and then abruptly stood. “I’ll be back.”
I wasn’t sure why she snorted at the dramatic way he announced his departure, but I was grateful nonetheless. Trying to keep up her lightened mood, I moved the implement to her lower stomach. “One heart, beating at two hundred beats per minute. Other organs are still developing. The embryo swims in approximately one hundred milliliters of amniotic fluid, and while I do detect calcium, it’s forming into bones not eggshell. Two arms, two legs, and tiny buds that are starting to form into fingers and toes.”
She gave me a tremulous smile that fisted deep in my gut and shredded my intestines. “Can you tell its gender yet?”
“It’s female.”
