Page 4 of Cozy Prisons (Human Pets of Talin: Origins #4)

Daxus

Although Daxus would rather Nataly stayed in the medical building until Healer Falkilm finished all his analysis, he understood how much it would disappoint her to miss out on the frivolities.

They’d all been working hard to build the colony and this party unofficially marked the completion of all the basic infrastructure. They had reliable water, power, and enough housing that everyone could live separately if they wanted to.

There was still a lot to be done, but it could be accomplished at a more leisurely pace.

In truth, his assurance to Healer Falkilm to stay at Nataly’s side wasn’t a hardship; it was a blessing from the ancestors. He’d been fascinated by the quietly confident human since the first time he met her.

She’d been cordial to him, but nothing more. Unfortunately she worked mostly in isolation. Every time he’d tried to spend time with her, something came up. He couldn’t tell if the ancestors were sending him a message to leave her alone or if it was all simply bad timing.

Then she seemed to withdraw and he rarely saw her except for the evening community meal. She seldom left her domicile, and it became common for everyone to bring problem units to her instead of asking her to go anywhere to fix them.

He’d tried to ask the other humans if she was feeling well, or if perhaps he’d done something wrong, but all he got were cheerful non-answers.

It wasn’t until Riff took the processing unit from a cleansing machine to Nataly’s domicile that he realized how he could see her again. All he needed was to find a malfunctioning piece of equipment! He’d been searching ever since. Unfortunately, nothing broke in the right way!

Then she fainted.

He hated that she was sick and was obviously not telling him or Falkilm everything, but he thanked the ancestors that he’d been in the perfect place to save her.

“Nataly!” Ula called out from across the room.

The seven-year-old human had arrived not long ago along with her small family.

Iris and Damascus found the impoverished family barely surviving on a Tiltimun-owned space station.

They’d arrived too late to buy a human woman who was up for auction, but were able to offer the family a way off the station before they, too, ended up on the auction block.

The human-Talin couple ran much of Palathum’s station building empire. As a Talin, Damascus was the face and Iris was the brains. By taking over, they gave Palathum the freedom to stay on the colony she was building from scratch.

Daxus was invited to join the clever Iris and devoted Damascus as they searched the galaxy for humans who might want to live on Arise.

Then he’d met Nataly during a resupply visit and knew that settling on Arise was the right choice.

Now he was going to spend the evening with her. It was a small thing, but it felt significant.

“Nataly, you’re going to be so impressed!” Ula said, skidding to a halt in front of them.

“Hi, Ula,” Nataly said, smiling down at the excited little girl. “Why am I going to be impressed?”

“I programmed Iffy to do a trick,” Ula explained, jumping up and down with excitement. “Come see!”

“Iffy?” Daxus asked.

“It’s the strider Nataly gave me to practice my programming,” Ula explained with an air of impatient excitement. She gave Nataly a massive grin and hopped in place. “Let’s go!”

“Of course,” Nataly said. Daxus could tell she wasn’t as eager as she appeared, so he sounded a negative rattle.

“The strider’s trick will need to wait until Nataly’s eaten,” he told the little girl. When Nataly didn’t object to his declaration, he knew it was the right call.

Ula’s smile only dimmed a little as she looked at him, then back at Nataly. “I guess that's okay. Sima made cake, and if we left we might miss it. But promise that you’ll come see it before you go home!”

Nataly nodded. “I can’t wait.”

“Ula, let Nataly eat,” Rami called from where she was sitting with her partner Illea.

“Mom, she can eat while I talk to her,” Ula yelled back. Her logic was sound, but more than that, Daxus was impressed with her boldness. As a child, he learned early to obey all commands quickly and without comment or risk his caregiver’s displeasure.

Ula was an excellent example of how children should be raised: to be bold and questioning.

“Ula, please join us,” Illea said, their voice soft but firm. Ula made a loud, exaggerated sigh and stomped over to her parents. Daxus couldn’t help the rumble of amusement that slipped out of him at the child's dramatics.

He wasn’t the only one, Nataly and Rami also chuckled.

Nataly’s arm was still wrapped around his, so he guided her to a table laden with food. Quite a bit of it was already gone.

“Oh, there’s jorjuk!” Nataly exclaimed and pulled her arm from his.

He missed her touch but liked that she picked up a bowl-plate and filled the entire bowl section with hearty, thick, jorjuk.

Then she filled the plate area with mazo and a couple of pieces of black flat bread. All were good choices for her.

He wasn’t hungry, but he knew humans didn’t like it when others didn’t eat with them. He picked up a plate and put a token amount of food on it.

“There’s a place to sit over there,” he said, pointing to a bench. It was the only empty seat and it put them in a spot by themselves.

Another gift from the ancestors.

Nataly straddled the bench and placed her food in front of her. He mirrored her so they were facing each other. He took small bites and chewed slowly, waiting for her to eat her fill.

He was burning to ask her questions about what he saw before she fainted, but needed to do it carefully.

They didn’t talk as she ate. When she finally sat back and gave him a satisfied smile, he judged that she was finished.

“Feeling better?” he asked.

“Much,” she agreed. “I guess I was hungrier than I realized.”

“Do you think that’s why you felt dizzy earlier?” he pressed.

Her smile turned brittle. “Probably. You know us humans, always having fits for all kinds of trivial reasons.”

“I don’t think that’s true at all,” he countered. “I know I’ve only been here for forty rotations, but the humans on Arise are quick to help and slow to complain.”

She gave him a surprised look before covering it with her standard non-committal smile. He noticed she did that a lot. It was the smile she gave many Talins, and it never reached her eyes.

“If you knew what our life was like on Dandilow II you know the work we do here seems easy,” she answered.

“Everyone here knows how dangerous and difficult it was for you and your friends on Dandilow II. Most of the Talins here think that you were lucky to survive.”

She tilted her head. “You don’t think we were lucky?”

“I think you worked and fought for your survival. There was no luck involved."

Her eyes widened briefly before she gave him a genuine smile. “You’re unusual. The others constantly tell us to stop for the day or work only every other day. They think we’re weak.”

“They are mistaking size for strength," Daxus said. “Many Talins do.”

Her smile disappeared, replaced with a look of interest. “Size is strength, isn’t it?”

He reached out slowly to take her hand then curled all the fingers under until only her first finger was extended.

She gave him a quizzical look but didn’t stop him or pull away.

Her hand felt small and fragile in his grip, but he knew better.

These humans had far more grit than most Talins gave them credit for.

“With this finger, you could kill everyone in this room,” he said. “You could destroy fleets, eradicate planets, and even end entire civilizations. With this finger, you have the same power to fire a weapon or launch destruction drones. Size means very little when we look at the bigger picture.”

She snorted. “Sure, I could use tech as well as you, but you’re forgetting one important thing. There is no human empire with stockpiles of weapons or drones. There isn’t even a cohesive human government.”

“That’s true, but you humans did something most species never could,” he countered, reluctantly letting go of her hand when she tugged.

“You survived despite overwhelming adversity.

When the Niknom homeworld was destroyed, they all died too.

They were a species with advanced space flight, like humans, and even more importantly, a fully colonized secondary, self-sustaining planet.

But without their homeworld, they sank into chaos, and I don't think any of them survived.”

Her eyes went wide. “I’ve never heard of the Niknom. If they had a colony planet, they should’ve been fine. Well, not fine, but better off than we humans. We only had colonies on planets that couldn’t survive without help from Earth.”

“Without their leadership and access to the sacred sights on their homeworld, they fell apart,” he explained.

“Nihilist cults formed that insisted everyone end their lives. Some of the cults told their followers that it would force the universe to restart and bring everyone back. Others said it would transport them to a parallel universe where their planet was still whole. In the end, it didn’t matter because the end result was the same, death. ”

“The entire remaining population couldn't have thought that way,” Nataly argued. “There had to be a few who realized the truth.”

“Some didn’t agree, but it was believed they all had to die before anything could renew or restart.

Dedicated cult members hunted down every member of their species before ending their own lives.

It took about twenty solars, but by the end, there wasn’t a single Niknom alive in the universe.

There are a few hybrid individuals who were spared, but that’s it. ”

“And why are you telling me this super-depressing story?” she asked, frowning up at him.