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I nod. “Yeah. Pentaris intelligence service had a file on you. You were seen as one of the architects of the Mark-10 programs.”

“No, not an architect. Just refining the work done before me.” She sighs.

“The Bond worried me, too. How the body changes during an Aurelian pregnancy—and it’s not going to stop here.

I’m sure people will talk, over the universe, just like they used to make jokes about Queen Jasmine, when she was with her sons.

It doesn’t bother me. I never really cared what people thought about me.

But you don’t have that luxury, as a politician and all. ”

I shiver, already imagining the headlines, the comments.

My polls in Pentaris show high favorability ratings. The consensus is that I made a great sacrifice, to bring wealth and power to our planets.

But even now, there must be jokes in the bars, in private conversations, calling the Prime Minister of Pentaris a harem wench.

And if I let them Bond me to them, get me pregnant, I can only imagine the changes in my body. I’ve always had a willowy, tall build, common on Virelia, but my breasts will swell, my hips widening, becoming curvier as I become the essence of fertility for the alien species.

There’s no re-election coming up, but at any moment, a vote of no confidence could strip me of my title as Prime Minister of Pentaris.

And when the citizens view me as a breeding sow, a fucktoy for the triad, they won’t see my accomplishments or the drive that brought me to lead.

They’ll see my body changed, molded to be Doman’s perfect Mate, to produce an endless line of sons for the alien conquerors.

And through the universe, I won’t be known firstly as the Prime Minister of Pentaris. I’ll be famed as the second princess of the Aurelian Empire.

“Does your back hurt?”

“Ha! No, not at all, but I can see why you’d ask.

You’d think it would take some getting used to, but it didn’t.

I used to wake up with aches and pains when I’d hunch over a desk until 4 am.

Now… I could work three days straight and feel fresh and light.

My body feels more… mine. I don’t know exactly how to explain it.

But every movement is more natural. I can do things I couldn’t before. ”

“And your mind? I’m just… look, I don’t know how to say this.”

Her smile reassures me that I’m not probing too deeply. “Ask away. I wish I had someone to talk to before I was Bonded to Bruton’s triad. It wouldn’t have changed my decision, but it would have prepared me. Knowledge is power.”

“I’m scared. I’m scared the Bond’s going to wipe out everything that’s me. That the only thing I’m going to care about is getting pregnant by those three.” I look down at the floor, fixing my attention on an errant piece of crumpled paper with furious notes scribbled on it.

“Hmm. Give me a second,” she says, as her smart-watch blinks.

“A sim just completed, I need to update the next one, sorry,” she says, and a string of data feeds into a holo-vid against the wall.

She blinks twice, and it disappears, only visible to her as she concentrates deeply.

“Okay, all done. Look, it’s not like that.

When I was Bonded to Bruton, the first times we slept together, I couldn’t get pregnant.

It requires this… surrender, this wanting.

I was too terrified that Bruton was going to go running off to war, that he’d die on the frontlines and make me a widow with his child.

It wasn’t until he told me he would stay here, on Colossus, that my body would even let me become pregnant.

The Bond works differently than you’d think. It doesn’t force you to do anything.”

I breath out a sigh of relief. “That’s… that’s reassuring. The rumors of the Bond are terrifying.”

“They’re half right. I don’t want to be too vulgar here, but you deserve the full picture.

From a scientific perspective, the Bond functions crudely with positive reinforcement.

For me, it’s dormant right now, because I’m with child.

Now it’s shaping me physically, preparing my body for birth.

But when it was active… I could have a passing thought about Bruton, or imagine kissing Tarik, or…

anything tiny like that, and I’d get a flood of what feels like the most potent rush of dopamine and oxytocin you can imagine.

It’s not a chemical process though. I did a brain scan and—oh sorry, I won’t bore you with the mechanics of it.

” She runs her hand over her baby bump, and I see this peace in her, this completeness.

“I don’t know if you want kids, Adriana, but I did.

And whenever I imagined getting pregnant from them…

it intensified the need to levels I could barely believe. ”

“It sounds like it’s fucking with your mind.”

“My situation was different than yours. I lost my triad. I thought they were gone in the Rift, trapped in that place and…” She gets teary eyed and grabs a tissue, wiping her face.

“Sorry, hormones. I thought they were gone, and when they came back from that darkness, all I wanted was to feel them in my mind. There was no hesitation. I wanted to link myself to them and never lose them again.”

I reach out, gently stroking her hand. “I’m sorry that happened to you.”

“It’s okay. It’s over now, and nothing’s going to take them away from me again. Nothing.”

“It feels like the biggest decision of my life,” I say, pulling my hand back and crossing my arms.

“It is. Look, all my life, all I wanted was to understand reality,” she says, running her hand over the simple wood of the desk, staring at it as if it’s the most interesting thing in the world.

She knocks her knuckles against it. “I remember thinking as a kid that I didn’t have enough time.

Now I’ve got thousands of years. And the more I study things, the more I realize how little I know.

Why? Why are there immutable laws of nature, and how does the Rift function outside of them?

The Bond has elevated me. In a million ways.

I can do a handstand, and I’ve never trained gymnastics.

I can do multiplication in my mind, plot functions that I would have needed a computer to work out.

And my memory… I can remember things so clearly, it’s like I’m there.

Birthdays parties with my family, hugging my mom, I can imagine the time I fell off my bike so intensely my leg pangs.

How can I explain it? It’s like if my brain was a computer, it wasn’t connected properly.

The Bond rearranged it, put new pathways.

And every time I sleep with my triad, the effect gets stronger. ”

I shiver. “Right back to positive reinforcement. You fuck your triad, you get rewarded. Sorry. That was crude. I’m sure I’m less diplomatic than you were expecting.”

Evelyn seems to come back to the room after she was lost in her deep thoughts on reality.

“Crude, and half true. I wouldn’t go back to life before the Bond.

No way. It’s made my life so much richer.

And I’m connected to my triad in a way I never could have imagined.

I can bounce ideas on them, just feel them…

” She smiles, warm and natural. “Humans are alone. You just don’t realize how alone you were until you share your mind with the three people you love.

Right now, I can tell that Bruton’s intensely focused on whatever Doman is saying.

Huh.” Her brows furrow, and her smile weakens, concern painting her face.

“Tarik and Griffon are returning from the factories. That’s strange, they were going to stay overnight.

Whatever Bruton and Doman are talking about, it must be serious. ”

I swallow, a pang of guilt shooting through me.

She has her happy ending here, pregnant by her triad, focused on her dream research.

And I’m going threaten everything she built, everything she suffered for. I’m bringing chaos into stability.

“There’s something eating me up.”

“What is it? You know what’s going on?”

I nod.

“Doman’s telling Bruton about our plan. We’re breaking Fay out. On my wedding day.”

Evelyn’s face goes pale.