Page 23 of The First Omega Made (Scales and Tails of Fate #2)
Sarge
We made port less than two weeks after Doc had our egg.
As much as I didn’t want to part with Doc, I had to.
With Noel at my side, he trusted me enough to go buy needed supplies.
Doc had placed the order through the embassy and TAOD, and the price on all our medical supplies had suddenly halved now that we weren’t paying the hybreed tariffs.
Vil, to his own amusement, had me dressed in the ceremonial Naleucian replica garbs that I wracked my brain for and couldn’t find anything but leisurewear that matched the description. The holy garments? Their equivalent of sweats. Wonderful…
Noel and I drew gasps and whispers wherever we went, Vil behind us with Nexus in hand.
The world knew him as a hybreed, a textbook and common example of soldier-class hybreed.
Still, the reverent nods and whispered prayers amused me.
I used my body’s memories of the old language to speak to him, letting Merriel translate for Vil through his earpiece as he had only recently initiated studies.
We all needed to be fluent. “A guy could get used to this.”
“It’s been a long time since you could step on a base. Is it much different from then?” Noel cast his impartial gaze about before nodding at the odd visible hybreed with a deferent smile. His approval of hybreeds as high servants for his kind had done much for their status in only a few months.
“Not too much. Food is different.” I stared down a food stall and inhaled rich spices and the telltale scent of smoke and meat. I sucked in a breath, hissing over teeth saturated by a flood of saliva.
“Then let us sample something?” Noel turned his head over his shoulder and made a gesture of hand to mouth at Nexus.
“Mea!” He threw his hands up and barked a cry of glee that made Vil laugh. The babe was boisterous and would hopefully find a playmate in Noah soon.
Noel made a point to attract the hybreed stall worker to take our order as we each took a paper-wrapped bread of some sort filled with…
I checked the sign with a squint. It said it was something called takalpa and had a white flaky texture not unlike fish.
I ate it wordlessly while Noel nibbled on his and Vil shared with a rather ravenous Nexus.
Noel ended up giving the last half of his to Vil to share with their babe, lips pursed.
His gaze cut toward mine and Vil stared at the food with scrutiny. “What is takalpa?”
Vil shrugged.
I coughed.
“Sarge?” Noel’s tone sharpened.
“I do not have a skin-pig word for it.” The closest thing that Naleucians had for humans was rather insulting and kind of apt.
Why they had a word for pig and not human? Probably because meat was more important than fodder.
Noel licked at his teeth as Merriel broke the terrible news into our ears. “It’s an invertebrate not unlike an Earth insect but like, huge and—”
“Space cockroach.” Noel sighed and continued his sojourn toward TAOD’s temple. As Doc would say, The TOAD hole .
“Please do not use that word. It’s disrespectful to the intelligent insectoid species, and it’s kinda specist.” I finished mine and disposed of the wrapper in a receptacle nearby.
“Space slur,” Noel sighed. “I’ll be mindful. Merriel, please compile a list of words that are no longer okay to say. I do not wish to come off as bigoted.”
Merriel must have responded to Noel’s earpiece alone, as nothing came through mine.
When at the temple, we were warmly greeted and welcomed inside, bright eyes and folded hands in awe at our procession—even with all our hybreed companions.
Vil passed Nexus on to Noel, and we flanked him in our trip.
The extravagant halls and opulence of the place put a sour taste in my mouth as I recalled how dutifully the poor and indigent donated to the church to “earn forgiveness.” Noel swore he’d dismantle the place, though, and I had to believe him.
When we were welcomed into the antechamber, a scent caught my attention that I didn’t want to recognize, yet immediately, I understood who and what it came from. Colthraxian.
Noel must have scented it too because his gaze slanted toward me and Vil tensed up, likely feeding off of his mate’s senses. “Bishop Sonderson.”
The male that we’d only recently convinced Noel to stop referring to as Space Pope , nodded at us and met my gaze with a fierce expression.
My hearts seized in my chest. I recognized his face.
It’d aged considerably since last I’d seen him.
He cleared his throat and folded his hands, making a gesture with his head that dismissed his attendants, the uneasy zealots with him skulking away like scolded dogs.
“My progenitor,” Bishop Sonderson said, giving Noel a sweet nod.
“We already know, and you may call me Noel,” Noel replied, carrying Nexus toward his desk to take a seat in one of the backless chairs that had been brought out for us.
“Know what?” The bishop, just a boy last I’d seen, folded his hands and didn’t move.
“That you’re Colthraxian.” Noel rubbed his thumb at a spot on Nexus’s cheek and glanced over his shoulder, face unreadable. “And Sarge was, too.”
“Was?” The bishop glanced toward me and narrowed his gaze. “You’re clearly in violation of the Leminiscate Resolution. Who were you at the union? Iskarrta? A Revulon, right?”
“I was.” I nodded sagely at the bishop and watched his expression turn foul.
“I’ll explain on his behalf. His current form is my work, and you can scan his body. There’s nothing left of his original form save for some ganglion masses and proto-organs.” Noel waved his hand dismissively. “He was in a Revulon host, and as an act of kindness took over a human host…”
Noel spoke for me, describing the infected Shafa, a body frozen since before the resolution. The fact I’d been desexed and the Colthraxian Shafa had attempted to breed.
“We were all desexed, fortunately. But, I thought that a Naleucian host would destroy us…” Sonderson stared me down with a mix of disgust and intrigue.
“It does. Hence why it took me several hours to merge the two and why his original body is being absorbed.” Noel waved a hand dismissively.
“I see. And he is of use to you, my progenitor?” The bishop’s hat almost fell off as he bowed to Noel.
“Much use. And he’s mated to another omega aboard our ship. Another Naleucian egg has been born, and we are soon to journey back to Paradise.” Noel put on an arrogant tone when he spoke, and the more he did so, the more it seemed to delight Sonderson.
“Intriguing. We’re at a loss for what to do with you, Sarge.
You are a progenitor now, but you did break the accords.
Death would be your punishment, but there’s nothing left of you that we can kill.
” He sighed. “There’s so few of us left, anyway.
I haven’t seen another one in twenty solar rotations.
But it is the will of the holy ones. You must have done great things to be given a body of your own so ethically. ”
“I loved an omega and was kind to a hatchling. It was all the reason he needed.” I nodded to Sonderson and made a gesture with my hand, a signal we passed between Colthraxians. He returned it with a smile.
“So I see. And the little one is beautiful.” Sonderson shuffled toward Noel and made a gesture as if to ask permission to touch the little one, and Nexus answered for Noel and extended his head for a sweet pat. “I’m glad you understand our plight.”
“I understand the ethics of it. It is sad for an entire species to be destroyed—but my kind do that often. In their own way.” Noel offered a smile.
Sonderson’s face fell, though. “I’m not so certain. As we Colthraxians have gone away—so too have the Naleucians. I fear something grave has happened. You will return and tell us what has happened to Paradise?”
“I will give you a report.” Noel nodded.
“And if it’s dire, please keep it secret. You understand how much this would disrupt our society.” Sonderson shuffled around the desk and seated himself behind it, folding his hands once more. I recognized the tremor in his digits because my body hadn’t been dissimilar so long ago.
“I do, so much so that I would offer a compromise with you, Bishop,” Noel said, stroking over Nexus’s head. “We may be able to reverse some of the damage to your body.”
Sonderson shrugged. “I’ve accepted my fate is coming to a close. I’ve sent word to another of my kind that I will have take my place. It’s good to see another Colthraxian, even if you’re not following our protocol.”
“I signed the resolution as a moral imperative, and a greater moral imperative was presented to me with no ethical consequences.” I bowed my head and Sonderson nodded, leaning back in his chair.
“I understand. And how long will the journey to Paradise take?”
“Two months. We brought enough salvage to sell that will last us if we can get more supplies. Meat, primarily. My little one will hatch there or on the way.”
“And how does it feel to have reproduced? My host never has and I’m not certain I would feel any way toward it.” Sonderson twisted his lips, true wistfulness in his stare.
“How the procedures were performed makes me feel like part of this body. Noel assures me that our genetic material has fused, so I do feel strongly for my child. It bonded to my heart, and I hear it in my soul.”
“And how did you circumvent Naleucian biology killing you?” He stared me down with interest that I didn’t want to foster.
“I’m uncertain. I’m certain that the prior occupant of this body had modified it somehow, but that secret died with him.
” I offered a shrug that he accepted without question.
Whether or not he’d change his mind and demand more answers down the road was another question.
The fact he disregarded me as Naleucian or progenitor was promising, though.
I was simply an accessory to Noel and their little one.
“In any case. If you return with grave news—we’ll see what we need to do as far as if I need to be around to help the humans.” Sonderson sighed. “Now let’s put on good faces for my clergy, yes?”
“Agreed,” I said, nodding once.
The bishop called his clergy back and went to business that bored me beyond all reason, making attempts at filming Noel and his little one to send out on the broadwave, sending a new age of hope and prosperity.
Most of it was meaningless drivel to carry a status quo that had been in a state of rapid decline and evolution into a new brand of caste system that had harmed so many others.
And at the crux of it, from what I gathered from Shafa and the words Sonderson didn’t say, was that the Colthraxians had been a large player in it.
Vil, though, took Nexus when he was no longer useful as a prop and stuck with me, a different male than I’d known a solar rotation ago. He’d gone from the freewheeling feckless horn dog to a father, and I hoped that I was as good of one as he was.
Though, when Nexus escaped his grasp and caught a pigeon before we could corral him once more, I rethought it…a little.