Chapter 23 Khur
Khur
One Month Later
There is one pesky piece of hair that keeps sticking up, right between my horns. I lick my thumb, still not used to the blunt claws at the end and try to smooth it back for the hundredth time. Within seconds it springs back up and I make a frustrated growl in the back of my throat.
“What’s wrong?” Destiny pokes her head around the doorway of our washroom.
Our washroom, in our apartment. It didn’t take long for me to move into Destiny's apartment. No one wants to hear the things we get into when we are locked in our sleeping room. Not sleeping, that’s for sure. Destiny's human phrases never cease to amuse me.
Turning back towards the mirror above the sink, something Destiny insisted I install, I point at the erroneous tuft of hair.
Her sweet laugh fills the washroom and lifts my mood a bit as she comes in and sifts through the human hygiene products she’s collected since they finally started stocking them in the supply station.
“Ah-ha! This will help you,” she says, crooking a finger at me.
Obediently, I crouch down on my knees, making us eye level.
She squirts a dollop of clear gel onto her hand then smooths it down between my horns.
Grabbing a short comb from the countertop she brushes the hair back in long strokes.
When I look in the mirror again, the hair is perfectly smooth and straight and I admire the look.
Not Dhugaren, but something a bit more human.
It makes me think of the leather and granite hair clip I gifted her recently.
It looks exotic and a little erotic on her, but I’m sure I am the only one who thinks the latter.
I’d better be anyway. I just love seeing how our lives, our cultures, are intermingling, creating something new for the brand new being we’ve created.
Her belly hasn’t yet started to grow with my cub, but we confirmed he is in there last week, even listening to his quick little heartbeat.
I am equal parts overjoyed and completely terrified, but every time I look at my perfect mate, I know that we can handle it together.
The changes this tiny human woman has made to my life in five short weeks is unfathomable.
I thought my life was over, that I was destined to live and die alone, terrified to grasp at anything that may have cracked the icy shell I’d built around myself.
Now, I am planning a human wedding—a concept I am still learning the intricacies of, but enjoying immensely, expecting a child, and about to attend a station-wide conference I helped organize.
Once word got out about our idea, everyone wanted to participate in some way.
What started as an engineering conference of sorts, turned into more of a general education showcase.
So many citizens had something to share, we ended up having to group everyone into common subjects and split everyone onto different divisions.
Luckily, the physical sciences were being hosted by the fifth division, so Josep, Meshi and myself had opted to stay and keep things running smoothing here.
“You look so handsome, my big guy," she whispers. "I'm so proud of what you've accomplished today."
“Thank you, my love.” I'm proud of myself, too, but I'm not sure how to say that quite yet. Sometimes, the last month feels like a lifetime. My life before and after Destiny two entirely different realities.
On my knees like this, we're almost eye level, so I wrap a hand around the nape of her neck and one at her waist, pulling her close.
Our lips meet in that imperfectly perfect way and she immediately deepens in, licking my fang and bottom lip.
I want to follow her lead, like I always do, but for once I resist, knowing that if we keep going, we'll definitely be late.
So I break our kiss and say, "today is your accomplishment just as much as mine.
We've all created something amazing today.
Now, we better get going before we're late to it. "
She giggles and kisses my nose with a smacking sound before releasing me to rise off my knees.
Over the last month, Destiny has revealed her true calling—interspecies liaison.
She met with representatives of each race on Sanctuary and got all of their ideas and suggestions, from topics for panels to who we should hire for food stalls.
She flawlessly mediated way too many disputes and was quick to offer fair compromises.
While helping division five with their part of the conference, she also started a human support group, with assistance from my own regular therapist, Minnik.
There were a weirdly disproportionate number of human females compared to males accepted as citizens of Sanctuary, and most of them are around Destiny’s age.
A few brought aging parents, like Destiny, or younger siblings, but almost all of them are single.
I have my suspicions about this, but Josep is tight-lipped and I am not interested in stirring the pot.
Whatever the reason, it has brought my Destiny to me, and I can’t complain about that.
The main corridor of Division Five has been converted into an impressive academic conference over the last week.
Now, instead of the colorful stalls of an open market, the walls are lined with booths showing off different presentations, from little-known innovations of different races to histories of left-behind technologies, the corridor is a wealth of knowledge.
The conference is set to begin in just over an hour but due to the public nature of the location, there is already a small crowd of people milling about.
Destiny is immediately pulled away by a trio of human girls who have decided to work on a project together.
“Good luck. Come find me if you need anything,” she says before blowing me a kiss and going to join her friends.
Furga will no doubt be joining them soon.
Destiny is like a star, pulling everyone into her gravity field.
She usually has a few of the girls in her support group rotating around her at any given time, and Furga often joins them, as well.
Huffing to myself to shake off the nerves, I make my way to the supply station, where Josep and Meshi will be meeting me.
Now that the conference is here, there isn’t much we need to do to keep it running—make sure everyone shows up for their assigned panels and just generally be present in case of emergencies.
On the way I just soak in the feelings of community and camaraderie that are radiating around me.
This is what I’d been missing, and I hadn’t even realized it.
Josep had been right when he said the humans would change things.
I don’t think any of us could have realized how true that really was.