Page 90 of I Married Kayog
At first, it was a trickle. Each time, he would message me as soon as the candidate left his office and would pretty much lose his mind. He would jump all over the place, doing a happy dance that had me in stitches. He was so excited. To him, every match was like winning the lottery.
In no time, the number of pairings almost became a tsunami. He traveled so much and met so many people that it became easier with the massive database organically stored in his wondrous mind. He only deplored the cases that would sit idle on the shelf of his brain as he failed to find their partner. It messed with him receiving messages after a few months from candidates he had met and who were distraught that he kept finding mates for others but not for them.
Some of them truly broke his heart, but others were downright infuriating. Entitled messages demanding he get off his ass and find them their partners happened a few times too many. The worst were those who became flat out nasty, calling him names and insulting him for ‘not doing his job.’ And then, there were the idiots spreading rumors that he was lying about those pairing being true soulmates. The candidates were just brainwashed into believing they were actually in love with their match but that it was all an illusion, a hoax that would eventually come crashing down and leave them devastated.
I wanted to tear them a new one, but Kayog always calmed me down, truly amused by their nonsense. He wisely remindedme that there was no point arguing with fools, in that time would prove him right.
A few of those ‘fools’ turned out to berivalmatchmaking agencies, pissed off that many of their candidates would just flock to the PMA. A few even tried to sue my mate over unfair practices over the fact that his services were free. The incentives from the UPO in the form of free relocation and dowries further constituted unfair advantages in their eyes. Those lawsuits were dead on arrival as they were founded on the false premise that they were competitors. Kayog catered to a very specific group that those agencies always snubbed. It wasn’t his fault that their other candidates came to him instead.
Anyway, my husband was far too proud and honest for that kind of shady behavior. It turned out that Kayog was constantly cataloging the soul of every person he encountered, even those who were married. He was almost obsessive in his need to hear people’s songs. To my shock, he revealed that he had defined a personal chart based on those melodies. Apparently, the rhythm, tonality, amplitude, and complexity of a person’s song revealed specific common traits about them.
For example, he could already narrow down certain things about people only with that, which in turn help him identify the species or type of candidate that might be a good match. It still boggled my mind how he could recognize two people from the insane pool of potential partners. But he made it work.
Above all, he got to live his dream of visiting and interacting directly with countless primitive species under different levels of restrictions of the Prime Directive. He was taking very seriously writing amendments and reforms to the guidelines specific to different planets. What I loved most about him was the fact that he didn’t simply push for his personal ideas and opinions on the matter. He used his incredible empathic abilities to discreetlyassess the local population’s feelings about his ‘innocent’ comments regarding specific issues faced by that species.
Each time the laws were modified to reflect his suggestions were a massive victory.
However, all of this made coordinating our respective missions harder. We parted often, though thankfully for fairly short periods. But our steamy reunions more than compensated for it.
We had just gone out to celebrate his 250th official pairing when I suddenly felt faint. Before we even reached our table, I got hit by three dizzy spells back-to-back. Not wanting to take chances, Kayog insisted that we go to the doctor immediately. I wasn’t too thrilled about it as it was a forty-five-minute flight back to the research center where we still lived. But my mate’s genuine worry swayed me.
I simply thought low blood sugar from not having eaten a proper meal all day had been the cause. The verdict I should have seen coming instead actually took me by surprise.
We were pregnant.
My excited squeal—not to say screech—instantly died in my throat when Kayog remained stoic. A wave of worry surged within me when I perceived nothing but great tension emanating from him. Why such a cold and reserved reaction? We had spoken about having children, and my mate always expressed his desire to have lots and lots of them. I shifted my attention to Arafin. Discovering that he had blocked his emotions from us—something he had never done before—had my blood turning to ice.
Of all people, Arafin knew that he couldn’t block his emotions from Kayog. So either he had done so subconsciously, or he was deliberately trying to hide something fromme. I opened my mouth to ask what the fuck was going on, but Kayog spoke first.
“There’s something wrong, right?” Kayog asked, his voice as devoid of emotion as his face.
I held my breath, fear wanting to take root in the pit of my stomach as the doctor lowered his eyes for a moment, an air of sorrow and guilt fleeting over his features before he collected himself.
“Currently, we cannot see any anomaly with the fetus,” Arafin said carefully. “However, Linsea’s blood tests confirmed something we dreaded.”
“Something you dreaded?!” I exclaimed, torn between fear and outrage that he might have kept some vital information hidden from me. “What’s going on?”
He glanced at me with an apologetic look before turning back to Kayog.
“To be frank, we thought you would be sterile. Your hormonal discrepancies affect many of your organs, which in turn grants you those incredible powers,” the doctor said instead of answering my questions.
“Clearly, I’m not sterile,” Kayog retorted in a clipped tone. “So what gives?”
“Based on the blood samples taken from Linsea, your child is provoking the same hormonal imbalance in her, but to a lesser degree,” he explained.
As one, Kayog and I recoiled with complete shock.
“Linsea is becoming an Edal?” he exclaimed, reaching for my hand, fear soaring inside of him. “Is she going to suffer like I did?”
Arafin lifted his palm in an appeasing fashion while shaking his head. “No, she’s not,” he said before turning to me. “Your pineal gland is normal, so you cannot become an Edal.”
“Then is our baby one?” I asked, my hand tightening in my husband’s grip for comfort.
The doctor hesitated. “Yes and no.”
“What the fuck is that supposed to mean?” Kayog snapped. “If it is, surely you can use all the testing and research you’ve done on me to protect it?”
“The baby is not an actual Edal, although I believe it was initially going to be,” Arafin replied, choosing his words carefully. “In all the cases where this kind of hormonal anomaly occurred during a pregnancy, the baby was not viable.”
