Chapter Two
“You are an incredibly healthy, resilient woman. I think I’d need a week to recover after that jump, but look at you, two days later, and you’re up and ready to roam about the ship.
Your partner, Farhet, should be here in two days.
I asked him to wait until you were more ready and rested, but he was too eager.
” Dr. Marcus sat across from her in the med bay, a kind smile on his face and a plate of delicious, delicately flavored little cookies between them.
He pushed the plate towards her now. “These are floribunda biscuits, made by Kamau, our chef, and chief ‘farmer.’ We have goats on board for fresh milk and cheese, plumcotta trees are growing, and a whole bay that’s been terraformed for gardening.
There’s a lounge with games, a media viewer, and even some physical books! ”
“What, like made of paper?”
“Yes, from the Lynxian System. Paper, stone, and wood are still used extensively there. It’s a rustic place, indeed, but very welcoming. If you want to visit a wonderful human-Felid community, we’ll be making a stop at Lynx-Nineteen each year.”
“I won’t be here for a year? Will I?”
Marcus shrugged. “Not if you don’t wish it, naturally, but there may be a delay in conception that could cause you to be here longer.
You have several cycles to conceive, and then pregnancy lasts about five cycles.
A lot depends on your reaction to the compatibility booster that will create Felid-identical biomarkers in your hormones and in your body chemistry. ”
Sasha nodded. She understood how the surrogate program was supposed to work, and why it was different than back in the days when humans on the original Earth and Sapien-One and Sapien-Two had been allowed to practice surrogacy and reproductive medicine—before the population strain was so great that such things were outlawed.
There would be no collecting samples and pumping them into her with tubes.
Felid semen had to be delivered in a natural fashion, since their ejaculations didn’t contain live sperm unless the female’s bodily fluids triggered the release.
“I have some medical training. I went to nursing school for one year before I lost my funding for it. I understand that even the most fertile couple doesn’t always conceive on the first try.
But you mentioned the boosters will create a feeling of desire—at least on my part—so I shouldn’t mind trying extensively during the two-week window when conception is likely? ”
“Exactly.”
“But what about the male partner? How is he supposed to... Well, I’m a human, he’s a Felid. No offense, but it’s not like there’s a natural attraction across our races.”
“That’s very true, but it can be a delightful acquired taste,” Marcus smiled.
“This ship is currently staffed by Felid and human partners, and Canid and human partners. The physical attraction seems to grow quickly once a friendly bond forms. Farhet knows what he signed up for, and I’m sure if he had any reservations about the matter, he wouldn’t have.
You’ll have private quarters and all the time you could want to develop a friendship and then a...
a working relationship with the goal of producing a healthy little cub.
It’s very noble work that you’re doing. I know mere credits are not enough compensation, so I hope that our hospitality and full run of the ship’s leisure, dining, and social facilities will add to it. ”
Sasha nodded. “They do!” Her quarters were luxurious—and oversized.
They were clearly built with Felid height and width in mind, but she didn’t really mind.
She felt safe and surrounded by silky sheets, able to swim in what was probably a standard tub, and she was swallowed up in softness on the couch that was three times the size of the one in her childhood home.
She didn’t think about the little apartment she had shared back on Sapien-Three.
Grungy. Littered. Dangerous. Her roommate wasn’t home most of the time.
Weeks would pass without a glimpse of her, and she was stuck with the credits due for rent and utilities most of the time.
The pay for her constant string of short-term jobs was abysmal.
Sasha was already beginning to wonder about settling somewhere in the Felix Orbus Galaxy when this was over.
She’d certainly have the credits for a little flat somewhere.
Maybe she’d become a permanent surrogate.
Maybe... Lots of maybes, but she had one certainty.
So far, she liked this place better than Sapien-Three.
“You don’t have to keep to your quarters for meals any longer now that you’ve passed all the screenings. Would you like to come down to dinner with us? I warn you, we’re a noisy group. There are a bunch of cubs on board.”
Sasha bit her lip and nodded. She was not someone with maternal instincts urging her to cuddle and coo over babies.
She passed the surrogacy test because she had positive feelings about pregnancy and delivering a healthy child, but she wasn’t inclined to keep one.
She wasn’t in a position to, and the way things were on Sapien-Three?
Unless you were wealthy, you had to be out of your mind to even think of bringing another mouth to feed into the world.
If I see all those little families, will I be able to go through with this?
Of course I will. I know what I’m getting into, and the alternative is sitting alone for six cycles. Egh. “I’d love to come to dinner and meet everyone. Abi and Nessa have been great. And Skyla and Kay have answered all my questions and taken such good care of me.”
“I’m glad to hear it. Abi is my Queen. Did you know that? Val and Mara are our children. You could hold them if you want.”
“She mentioned! I might take you up on it,” Sasha said with a polite smile, secretly deciding that she would hold off for a while. It wouldn’t do her any good to get attached to these people. Well, not too attached.
As Marcus showed her out of the room and began a more thorough tour of the ship, Sasha couldn’t keep her mouth from popping open in wonder.
It was so clean and spacious, so organized and beautiful.
She’d been in large, spacious, modern buildings on Sapien-three before, of course, but all of them felt scary and sterile.
Aboard the Comet Stalker, there were touches of hominess and personality.
Good smells wafted from the kitchen, and laughter and chatter echoed from one room to the next.
No, it wouldn’t do to get too attached to the people here.
Not yet.
But maybe... Maybe she and Farhet would hit it off.
Not as lovers, probably, because romance was firmly forbidden in her mind, something that years of bad dates and worthless creeps had ruined her taste for, but as friends.
One day, she and this Leonid might look upon each other as partners who had shared some fun times in the act of making his child, and then maybe she would always want to be a part of the child’s life, an auntie, someone he video-called on his birthday.
Maybe with friends like Farhet, Nessa, Abi, and Dr. Marcus, in six cycles, she wouldn’t want to go back.
And what else would she do while growing a baby, besides rest, eat well, and make sure she had her regular required check-ups, but socialize?
Socialize, and surf on the database computer placed in her quarters.
She could spend hours trying to get media from Sapien-Three, or...
She could look at the lodgings in the different Felid systems, take a chance to see what sort of offers her contract might fetch, and research different opportunities across this brand new galaxy where women were prized and valued, where families weren’t some ruinous old convention.
Yeah, there were a lot of maybes, and the one that was playing on repeat in her mind was that maybe, just maybe, she might not want to go back to Sapien-Three.
“HE’S HERE AND GOING through medical screenings and forms right now.”
Sasha looked up from her millet porridge with fresh citrine syrup and an edible pale yellow blossom perched on the edge of the bowl.
Kaylee, the young woman with long, jet-black hair done up in two elaborate buns and wearing the insignia of a member of the medical crew, rushed into her quarters as soon as Sasha gave the command to admit her.
Kaylee’s morning visit wasn’t unexpected.
Someone checked on her each morning out of necessity, and then several other crew members checked on her during the day out of sheer kindness.
She was regularly invited to sit in the nursery with Wendy, Abi, and Layla.
Even Talos, the enormous Tigerite who scowled at everyone but his wife and daughter, sought her out in the lounge once and brought her a Tigerite delicacy of crunchy rice and heavenly-tasting fish.
The news wasn't unexpected, either, but Sasha’s heart started to pound, and her palms began to sweat. “But I... I haven’t shaved my legs today.”
“What? Oh! For goodness sake, I don’t think he’s going to expect to jump on you the second he arrives.
And Canids and Felids are covered in fur.
Some of them are freaked out by how smooth we are.
Stubble might make him feel more at ease,” Kaylee laughed, but patted her shoulder in a comforting fashion.
“I haven’t had the shots. I’m not in the right place in my cycle. I need to wait a couple of days.”
“Again, I don’t think Farhet is going to demand physical activity.” Kaylee frowned. “You know, you don’t have to be intimate with someone you don’t like. This isn’t a Pleasure Park.”
“No, no, I know. I read Farhet’s profile and everything. I liked him—on the screen, anyway. We were supposed to have a few times to communicate over comms, but we never lined up our schedules. He’s like... some wealthy governor of a city on Leonid-One?”