Chapter 29
Scarlet
“Scarlet! Something is wrong!”
With a cry of surprise and fear, Scarlet shot up in bed at the loud, panicked shout from behind the cracked door of her room that led into her clinic. She could see that the light was on inside and heard someone quickly moving around.
Her sleep fogged brain didn’t register who until Atem appeared, panting and disheveled, in the doorway, forcing it open fully, making the mechanism beep in protest.
“Scarlet! Awaken! Peony needs you.”
She was already up and rushing to the clinic even as Peony, half dressed in a skirt and bra, nest blanket covering her torso, appeared behind him looking at once amused and embarrassed.
“Atem, I’m fine,” she stressed as he made way for Scarlet.
“What happened?” She asked, brushing her wild hair from her face as she checked her friend over for some sign of bleeding or pain or injury.
“Nothing,” Peony gave a strained laugh. “He’s panicking.”
“She might be in labor,” Atem said, hovering as though afraid to put his hands on her. “It’s too soon. Scarlet, it’s too soon!”
“Peony, are you having contractions?”
“No,” she snickered. “I’m waddling.”
“What?” Scarlet, though up and moving in response to the emergency, wasn’t yet firing on all cylinders and didn’t quite understand. “You’re… why is that, er…”
“You must do something,” Atem insisted. “She walks as though the baby comes. Like this.”
He then proceeded to demonstrate, and Scarlet had to bite back a snicker at the sight of this big, buff alien, tail flicking with agitation, mimicking a pregnancy walk. Back bowed, feet apart, legit waddling across her clinic. Peony was making no efforts to hide her amusement.
“I’m not doing it right,” he said, frustrated by their lack of response, as he pushed his hand through his hair. “It is how females walk when they’re about to deliver. Scarlet, she’s too early!”
“Okay, calm down. I get it,” Scarlet laughed a bit, looking to her friend. “Any contractions? Any pain? Any fluid loss?”
“I’m fine,” Peony said again, rubbing her bare belly with its dark stripe down the center.
“I woke up this morning when he did. He was getting ready to go to the meeting. It’s the last day of arguments, you know.
We’re all excited. I thought I’d go with him since it’s the last day.
He protested. I just want to walk and be out of the nest for a bit.
But when I walked to the closet, he saw me, and I was waddling. He freaked.”
“Yeah,” Scarlet chuckled, trying to fix her mussed pajamas now that she realized there was no actual emergency. “Waddling is one of the signs that a female domini is about to deliver. Like, imminently. That day. It usually appears along with contractions.”
“Exactly!” Atem gestured to Peony. “So, you must-”
“But,” she cut him off with a calm smile, “humans are different. We begin to waddle weeks, tendays, before the delivery. It marks the beginning of the end, but you still have lots of time. If she’s not having contractions or her water hasn’t broken, then she’s not near her labor.”
He blew out a long breath, running a hand through his hair again. Messing it up further. “You are sure? I mean, she has had no other human symptoms.”
“I can check her if you like,” Scarlet smiled.
“But for the domini, waddling and contractions begin simultaneously. Not so much for humans. If she’s got no other symptoms, this might just be because our bodies begin preparing for birth much earlier than yours do.
Which isn’t that surprising considering that your females have much shorter labor times than ours and your females don’t have to undergo such drastic changes. ”
“Like what?” Peony asked this time.
“Your pelvis has to widen to fit the baby through it.”
Peony grimaced. “Already regretting that I asked.”
Scarlet chuckled. “Come on. Climb on the table. I’ll scan you so Atem can stop panicking and we can get on with our morning. It’s the last day of arguments; that’s exciting.”
Exciting, because she finally got to spend time with Havali tonight.
They weren’t done with the Coalition meeting yet.
There was still the voting to do. But there was a break between the end of arguments and the start of voting to allow everyone one last chance to sway other members to vote on their side.
Mostly, just to keep things fairer for the species that joined later who did not have as much time between presenting their arguments and the vote to gather allies to their cause.
There were two species left to hear – the first of whom began their arguments yesterday. And since the last topic wasn’t supposed to be anything major – something about adjusting the Standard to account for a new technology or something, she hadn’t paid attention – it wasn’t going to take long.
Which meant that, for the first time in tendays, Havali was going to be back at a reasonable mark, and they were going to be spending proper time together.
He was taking her out on another date tonight. Well, part date, part work. The place they were going to was popular with Coalition representatives and if they happened to see anyone they could convince, they were going to do so.
But mostly, they were going out to enjoy each other’s company.
Atem and Alanna were going as well – though Peony likely would not.
So, arguing their case wasn’t going to be on her shoulders and she could focus more on Havali, on their date.
The event was going to be a good precursor for later tonight.
Tonight, Scarlet was getting laid.
She wanted Havali so badly. She was tired of dancing around it. The only thing that held her off this long was his duty and now that they had a chance, she was eager to have their consent discussion so her hot alien vampire boyfriend could finally bite her.
Voting wasn’t going to take as long as arguments – hopefully. Provided there were no ties. There was an even number of representatives, so it was possible. It shouldn’t take more than a day or two – since no one was allowed to leave until all the voting was done. Then, they could finally go home.
Their trip to the energy pole of the ring was scheduled for the day before voting. Already, Scarlet was looking forward to it.
That was going to be a fantastic date.
The next few days were shaping up to be great ones. She was trying to focus on that and not the nervousness of knowing that the fate of the entire Earth would be decided in the coming tenday.
Peony sat through the scan, calm and unconcerned while Atem hovered nervously.
As Scarlet predicted, the waddling was a result of hormone production making her joints and ligaments extra relaxed in preparation for the birth, but not because there were any contractions actively occurring.
The hormones that controlled labor remained stable.
It was Peony’s first human pregnancy symptom and knowing it was happening, weirdly, made the brown-haired girl happy.
“I was really beginning to wonder if this baby would have any human in him,” she chuckled as Atem helped her back to her feet. “Glad something of me is in there after all.”
“I’m glad too,” Scarlet agreed, putting her scanner back to sleep. “The baby is too big to fit through the pelvis without it stretching a bit. That’s true for humans too. If your body didn’t start changing, I don’t think you’d be able to give birth naturally.”
“I’m actually not mad about a c-section,” Peony grinned.
“They don’t do surgery like that anymore.”
“Surgery?” Atem looked horrified. “What, like, physically cut the baby out of her? Why would we do something like that? We have modern technology.”
“Wait, so how do you get the baby out if something goes wrong?” Peony looked back to Scarlet.
“Essentially, we use the mediring to expand your body,” she gestured to the ring over the scanner.
“It would basically be like what your body is doing naturally, but just to the extreme. And we could fix it again immediately afterward. Physically cutting you open and taking the baby out through your stomach would be reserved for only desperate measures. Like, the scanner wasn’t working, or we were away from any sort of medical equipment. ”
“But we won’t be, right?” Peony looked back at the ring, a bit nervous now.
“Of course, not,” Scarlet laughed. “You’ve still got time before you need to think about it. If your waddling is based on human timetables, you’d be at about thirty-two weeks right now.”
“I thought it had been longer than thirty-two weeks.”
“It has been. But we have to estimate based on what we see and how the individual species’ pregnancies would go.
So, you’d still have a couple months left if these symptoms were appearing as a pure human pregnancy.
If you’re following domini timetables, if we remove the waddling, you have ten tendays left. You’re a long way off.”
Peony sighed, rubbing her belly. “You know, pregnancy isn’t as bad as I thought it would be, but I just want it to be done. I want to meet the baby already.”
Scarlet smiled, “It’s not that bad because it’s been so similar to a domini pregnancy. But domini babies cook a bit longer than human ones. Be patient. You’re doing great. Baby is fine. You’re fine. Just be patient a bit longer.”
Atem gave Scarlet a grateful smile as he put his arm around Peony. “Thank you. I’m sorry to come in like that. I didn’t intend to disturb you that way.”
“Don’t worry about it,” Scarlet waved away his concern. “That’s what I’m here for.”
They thanked her again and left, allowing her to return to her room. It wasn’t too early, so she opted to just get ready for her day.
All the while, eagerly anticipating spending time with Havali tonight.
***