Chapter Eleven
“Home sweet home,” Max said as they walked through the shadow created by the overhead garage lights and the alien ships. More alien than Hidden one alien ships. At some point, Max had stopped thinking of the Hidden ones as aliens, but all other aliens were still alieny.
“Sweet home Alabama,” Rick added as they approached the hull.
“Do you even know what Alabama is?”
“Geographical area defined by banjos,” Rick answered.
Having his family learn about Earth through television was reinforcing some stereotypes. Max might have corrected Rick's assumptions, but the ship’s hatch was sliding open.
“There you two are,” Dee said. “Do none of you know how to work a radio?”
“I don't know how to work a Hidden one radio, and I don’t have one,” Max said.
Dee crossed her arms and turned her glare onto Rick and Kohei.
“That gets one of you off the hook. Would you two like to explain why you didn't call to tell us what was going on? It’s a little disconcerting to be on a ship while it’s getting dragged underground.
” She gestured at the massive cavern occupied by a dozen ships of different designs.
Xander hurried past Dee, his tentacles waving with excitement. “Many many storms. I informed Dee that storms do much damage, so ships are shielded underground.”
“That explains the giant garage.”
James appeared at the top of the ramp, but instead of racing toward them as Xander had, he stood next to Dee. “Hidden ones dislike outsiders,” he said in the universe’s biggest understatement. “They offer outsiders inferior land for trading.”
“I said that,” Xander trumpeted. “Storms. Many big storms. Trading city is on storm path of Executioner Sea. No one wanted land until outsiders came.”
“Hidden ones still dislike land,” James said. “But they seek profits. Now that Rick Father and Max Father have returned, I will go to city and sell many, many, many weapons.”
Xander blew raspberries, and Rick’s tentacles curled a little at their children's blatant disrespect of each other. “Hidden ones eschew weapons, prefer hiding.” Xander’s tone made it clear that he thought James was an idiot.
“Outsiders are at spaceport. Hidden ones cannot hide from all outsiders. The time required to evacuate Trading city would negate the value of hiding. They need weapons,” James trumpeted back.
“Can we avoid triggering any arms races?”
Max expected a protest from Rick, but he did not expect the bellow of unhappiness. “James offspring is foolish and shortsighted, but he will make foolish and shortsighted decisions of his own and we will respect,” Rick exploded.
Max stared at his husband, and even the children were shocked into silence, which was not easy to do with their kids.
Rick slowly rotated until the last of his tentacles was free from Max’s hold, and he rushed the ship’s gangplank as fast as his undulating walking tentacle could carry him. “I require time for working.” James and Dee scrambled out of his way as Rick charged past.
Dee looked at Max, but all he could do was shrug.
Was his husband in a foul mood? Yes. Was his husband being weird?
Again, yes. But Max had no explanations.
And given the general state of confusion amongst his children, he had to assume this wasn’t some cultural misunderstanding. Rick was genuinely being weird.
Max rested a hand on Xander's waist or at least the section of his bulbous head right below the last of his eyes and right above where his body spread out to accommodate tentacles. “Let's go back inside.” He pushed Xander toward the ramp.
“I will sell weapons. Many weapons. Useful weapons. Weapons with high profit margin.”
They had created a monster. “Maybe you can create your global arms conglomerate later.
Right now I would like the whole family to sit and talk about what's going on in the city versus what you guys may have found out in the spaceport.” Max knew his children, and they had not been sitting quietly in the ship while waiting for Max and Rick to return.
James did a weird little guilty shuffle-left shuffle-right undulation that told Max he was right.
“Come on James,” Dee said. “You can explain how you hacked the communication network while Xander did the heavy lifting of translating.”
James still had his tentacles curled unhappily, but he made a honk of agreement.
“I require elimination of bodily waste,” Kohei announced before he raced up the ramp, passing James halfway up.
“I require food,” James said. “If I cannot sell many many weapons, I will eat.” He raced after his brother.
Max was not an idiot. He suspected James would try to pressure Kohei into telling him everything he had found out about the Hidden ones in the city because he was still focused on selling weapons, but at least all the kids were in the ship.
Xander didn't even bother making an excuse before he went after his brothers, leaving Max and Dee standing at the top of the ramp.
“How was it meeting your in-laws?” Dee asked when Max got to the top.
She leaned against the side of the hatch, her eyes scanning the spaceport.
Even in the ship she was like that, constantly on edge.
Then again, while Max was busy building a happy family, she had been isolated and working for pennies as she tried to figure out a way back home where none was available.
“I didn't meet any in-laws. Hidden ones don't form families like that.”
Dee scoffed. “Those three kids think the sun rises and sets with you. I am pretty sure that's called fatherhood.”
“I'm not exactly a Hidden one, am I?”
Dee frowned. “Sometimes I think you're not entirely human, either.’
Max stared at her, uneasy at that comment.
“So, what happened to your leg?”
“Hidden ones don't understand the structural fragility of boned tentacles,” Max said with a shrug. “It was a genuine accident, although the Hidden one who broke my leg is still an ass. He just isn’t an ass who intentionally broke my bones. Good news, Hidden one medicine is better than human, so I will be out of the cast in a week or so.”
Both eyebrows went up. “Impressive. I wonder how much our military would pay for that sort of technology,” she mused.
“I assume that all the governments of the world would be willing to come together and trade for Hidden one technology.”
She stared at him blankly, and Max grew increasingly uncomfortable. “So,” she said, drawing the word out, “is that what took you so long to get back?”
“No, that would be the ball that the Hidden ones threw to celebrate Rick coming home.”
She snort-laughed. “A ball?”
Her laugh was infectious, and Max relaxed for the first time since they’d landed on the planet.
“That was my reaction. I thought they didn't like him. But apparently, that was a misunderstanding or something because as soon as they figured out who he was, they tripped over themselves to impress him. Apparently he created the interplanetary net that disrupts navigation and keeps outsiders from flooding this part of space.”
She blew a long, low whistle. “Impressive.”
“His official name is Great Thinker, and they threw a big ball to welcome him home.”
Dee angled her body so that she could look toward the interior of the ship. “That did not look like an octopus who has been welcomed home as a returning hero.”
“Yeah. Something is going on with him.” That was an understatement.
Max wished Rick would explain what was going on.
Sometimes his husband was a grouchy, introverted, testy octopus.
Cute, but the annoyance levels broke the damn chart.
“I think it is safe to say he has a difficult relationship with his people.”
“Difficult how?”
Max shrugged helplessly. If he knew the answer to that, he would be a lot less worried.
“Difficult as in we need to look at exit strategies?” Dee asked.
Max ran his fingers through his hair. “I have no idea. Something is going on, but Rick is buttoned up tighter than a submarine.”
Dee stood stiffly, her gaze still drifting across the garage, but now she had an air of wariness. “That does not make me feel better.”
“It doesn't make me feel better either,” Max said with frustration coloring his tone. “He's my husband, but he won't talk to me about whatever is going on.”
She laughed so hard that the corners of her eyes crinkled. “Welcome to married life. It's good to know that marriage pretty much works the same no matter what species are involved.”
“What are you talking about?” Max’s parents always talked to each other. He and his brother got annoyed with their “united front” parenting. Other kids could play their parents off each other, but that didn’t work in Max’s family.
Dee shook her head as if he were being a particularly amusing toddler. “I've been married for fifteen years,” she said. “Sometimes, I am the last person my husband wants to confide in and I know there are lots of times that I tell you idiots in the unit more than I tell Henry.”
“What?” That made no sense, not if they had a healthy marriage.
“When the unit was shipped out to Iraq, how were you feeling?”
“Not good,” Max said, but he didn't want to get in more detail than that.
Dee nodded. “Exactly. Hell, we all talked about it. We all wondered if we were going to fight. We all drank a little too much and worried a lot too much, and spent excessive time on the flight simulators. I had the engineers rig mine to practice missile strikes on the wings over and over and over again. I wouldn’t talk to my husband about any of that shit. ”
“Why not?”
Now she looked at him like he was a brain-damaged toddler who had shoved a crayon up his nose.
“He didn’t need to hear that shit, not when he was dealing with fears of his own.
Being married doesn’t mean you share every stupid thought in your head, especially when those thoughts will hurt your partner. ”
“So, what am I supposed to do? If he’s doing some weird protective thing, how do I get the idiot to talk to me?”