Chapter 9 #2
When they reached her cell, the door slid open to reveal Robbie still sleeping peacefully. She crossed immediately to the crib, leaning over to brush her fingers across her son’s forehead. The tension in her shoulders eased slightly as she confirmed what the silence had already told them.
“He’s okay,” she murmured.
“Yes.” He held up his communicator. “I used the datapad to monitor him so I would be aware if he woke.”
She looked up at him, and her expression was unreadable. “You didn’t have to do that. In the examination room.”
“Yes, I did.”
“Why?”
It was a simple question, but the answer was anything but. Because it was the right thing to do. Because he couldn’t stand to see her hurt. Because something fundamental had shifted inside him the moment she’d kissed him, and he wasn’t sure he would ever be able to shift it back.
“Because you’re under my protection,” he said finally. “And I take that seriously.”
She studied him for a long moment, her dark eyes searching his face. Then she nodded, once, and turned back to the crib.
“Thank you.”
He wanted to stay. He wanted to sit with her the way he had last night, watching over her and her son, feeling her warmth against him.
But even as the desire rose in him, so did the certainty that Veyalor would want to speak with him.
That look in the examination room—that calculating, knowing look—wasn’t something that could go unaddressed.
“I have to go,” he said reluctantly. “I’ll come back as soon as I can.”
“I know.”
The words were simple, but there was something in her voice—a quiet acceptance, a lack of argument—that made his chest tighten.
She trusted him to come back. Despite everything, despite where she was and why she was here, she trusted him.
He didn’t deserve her trust. But he would spend every moment he had trying to prove himself worthy of it.
Veyalor’s laboratory was past the examination rooms and deeper in the facility, through a maze of corridors that Becsul suspected were designed to be confusing.
The doctor was waiting for him when he arrived, seated at a workstation surrounded by screens displaying data he couldn’t begin to interpret.
“Captain.” Veyalor didn’t look up from his work. “I wondered if you would come.”
“Did I have a choice?”
“Not really, no.” The doctor finally turned, his yellow eyes bright with interest. “Sit down, please. We have much to discuss.”
He remained standing. “Speak.”
Veyalor’s mouth curved in what might have been a smile. “Direct, as always. Very well.” He tapped a command into his workstation, and one of the screens shifted to display a wall of text. “You’ve read Pagalan’s research, I assume?”
“Yes, but it seemed… disorganized, and I will admit that much of the terminology was beyond me.”
Another half-smile.
“My uncle was eccentric at best. But I assume you understood enough to know that Pagalan claimed to have used a Cire male to successfully impregnate a non-Cire female. What you may not have realized is the specific conditions under which he achieved this success.” Veyalor leaned forward, his clawed hands folding together.
“Pagalan theorized that even with genetically compatible species, the attempt would not produce viable offspring without the mate bond.”
“But that’s impossible if both parties are not Cire.”
“Is it?” Veyalor gestured at the screen.
“I’ve been skeptical as well. The mate bond has never been scientifically documented, and there’s no biological mechanism that would explain it.
And yet…” He paused, his eyes fixed on Becsul’s face.
“And yet I watched you today, Captain. I watched you react to the guard touching that female with a level of protective aggression I’ve only seen in one other context. ”
“I was doing my job.”
“You were ready to kill him.” The words were flat, unemotional. “If I hadn’t defused the situation, you would have attacked.”
His hands were shaking. He curled them into fists, forcing himself to breathe. “What are you saying?”
“I’m saying that perhaps Pagalan was right.
Perhaps the mate bond is an actual biological imperative.
A specific hormonal and neurological response triggered by contact with a compatible mate.
” Veyalor’s voice was calm and clinical, but his eyes were alight with fascination.
“I’m saying that you, Captain Becsul, are experiencing the beginning of a mate bond with the human female. ”
The words hung in the air between them.
He wanted to deny it, but the memory of her in his arms last night—her warm weight against his chest, her scent filling his lungs, and the overwhelming rightness of holding her—made the denial impossible.
“What does this mean?” he asked finally. “For the experiment?”
“That, Captain, is the question.” Veyalor stood, pacing slowly across the laboratory.
“If the mate bond is required for successful reproduction, then the implications are… significant. On one hand, it means there may be hope for your people. If Cire males can bond with human females, and if that bond enables reproduction, then you have a path forward.”
“And on the other hand?”
Veyalor stopped pacing and turned to face him.
“On the other hand, it means we cannot simply scale this experiment. We cannot artificially inseminate hundreds of females and expect results. The bond must form naturally. One male, one female, a specific and unpredictable connection.” His expression was grim.
“Councilor Naran hoped that if Pagalan’s research proved valid, we could establish multiple breeding programs and create a rapid restoration of your population. ”
“But that won’t work.”
“No.” Veyalor shook his head slowly. “If I’m right—if you are what I think you are—then it won’t work at all. We’ll have to find another way.”
His mind was racing, processing the implications. If the mate bond was required and it could only form naturally, then the entire premise of this facility was flawed. They couldn’t force Cire males to bond with human females any more than they could force water to flow uphill.
But it also meant that if what Veyalor was saying was true, then what he felt for Melissa wasn’t just attraction or protectiveness or guilt. It was something deeper. Something biological, fundamental, unbreakable.
It meant she was his.
“Councilor Naran can’t know about this,” he said abruptly. “Not yet. If he realizes the experiments won’t scale, he might—”
“Decide the females are no longer valuable?” Veyalor finished.
“Yes, that thought had occurred to me as well. I also suspect that Naran won’t be easy to convince.
” He moved back to his workstation, pulling up a new set of data.
“I need more information before I make any reports. More observations. More evidence.”
“What kind of observations?”
Veyalor looked at him, and there was something almost sympathetic in his gaze. “Continue what you’ve been doing, Captain. Spend time with the female. Watch your own reactions.” He paused. “And if a bond is forming… don’t fight it. Let it develop naturally.”
He stared at the other male, struggling to reconcile the clinical researcher with the words he was hearing. “You’re telling me to… court her?”
“I’m telling you to follow your instincts. Something you seem quite good at already.” Veyalor hesitated. “As for evidence, the simplest way would be to conduct a separate experiment using another male’s genetic material.”
“Absolutely not,” he growled.
“I suspected that would be your response. Fortunately, there are other females here.”
Veyalor turned back to his workstation, clearly dismissing him. He turned and walked towards the door, his mind churning.
At the threshold, he paused. “Dr. Veyalor?”
“Yes?”
“If the bond is real and it enables reproduction, what will happen to the females? What will happen to Melissa?”
Veyalor was silent for a long moment. When he finally spoke, his voice was quiet.
“That, Captain, will depend entirely on the Council. And on how much power you’re willing to sacrifice to protect her.”
The door slid open, and he stepped through into the corridor.
The question followed him all the way back to Melissa’s cell.