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  A rattling, crackling noise disrupts my spiraling thoughts—and I realize it’s me making the sounds, my sternum punching out hard, and dropping fast.

  Simmi’s watching me in shock.

  My gaze moves to the one whose reaction matters the most to me.

  Skynan’s eyes are on me, but she doesn’t look astonished.

  She appears… hopeful. “Erreck, I’m sad when I think of leaving you too.”

  “Yet your countenance doesn’t currently reflect sadness,” Simmi offers. “I’m confused.”

  I hiss at him.

  Simmi’s frozen look tells me he wasn’t expecting this. But then his eyes gleam, and the end of his tail flips itself over. He turns his attention to Skynan but addresses me. He raises his tail, acting as if he’s idly beginning to wipe it down. “If no one else is going to address the metaphorical massive, prehensile-trunked herbivore in the office, then I will. How would matehood work for the two of you when Skynan must remain a secret—and when she plans to return to her home?”

  My already souring mood nosedives and crashes to the ground like an airship shot out of the sky.

  Skynan turns a patient look on Simmi. “We’ll work it out, Simmi. Erreck and I need a chance to talk.”

  With the hand holding his tail up for cleaning, Simmi flicks his auxiliary fingers. “Of course. Continue. I’m nearly experiencing bated breath for hearing the outcome of this.”

  “Thank you for your support, Simmi,” Skynan says, cheek pits flashing.

  Simmi nods absently. “Oh, you’re welcome.”

  If I could roll my eyes like Skynan, I would. “Stop talking.”

  “That will make this discussion very difficult to have,” Simmi notes, still intent on removing all germs from his tail.

  “I mean you,” I tell him.

  “Ah,” Simmi says, folding his antimicrobial cloth into quarters so it will better fit between the upright triangular plates of his tail. “That makes more sense.”

  I give him a loud look.

  Skynan laughs.

  Immediately my attention is back on her. “I need you—” I force myself to alter my declaration, because Skynan has a good cardiac muscle, and I don’t want her to feel trapped. “Would you consider becoming my mate?” There. You managed to ask her; not beg. But my hands are shaking. My antennae are trembling too; everyone can see it and I don’t miss Simmi’s muttered, “This is almost painful to watch,” as he openly stares.

  Skynan nods shyly. “If you want to be mine, Erreck.”

  “YES!” I say so fervently, she full-out smiles. She looks relieved.

  Haltingly, I move to her, and take her small hands in mine, raising them to the level of my sternum, to my racing cardiac muscle. “I don’t know how we can make this work, but Skynan—I want to be beside you all of the time.”

  Simmi coughs into a cough-isolation net (an invention he championed for hard in his former position, where he had to deal with the general germ-carrying public). “That’s not the only place he wants to be.”

  Skynan rolls her eyes in his direction. “We’re having a moment, alone—please.”

  Simmi draws himself to his full height “Well! My apologies for thinking it was acceptable to take part in conversation when it happens in our significantly small, shared office space.”

  Skynan twists to face him. “I’m sorry, Simmi; I didn’t mean to hurt your feelings. It’s only that Erreck and I are working out relationship goals before we… hmm, what word won’t terrify you?”

  “The list is very small,” Simmi says amicably, taking up a microbe-defeating rasping cloth in order to buff the end of his cleaned tail.

  “Erreck and I have life decisions to make. Matehood decisions,” Skynan declares to Simmi—but her eyes are on me. “And then we’re going to bang each other’s brains out.”

  If it’s possible for a cardiac muscle to explode from joy; mine does. An exploding organ should be indescribably painful, but it’s the lightest, most wonderful thing I’ve ever felt. “I don’t even know if I know what that means,” I breathe, clutching my sternum as if it could stall any other organs from bursting with happiness, “but I want to do it with you.”

  Simmi scoffs. “It sounds violent and threatening. Do humans have the ability to scramble good sense? She seems to have successfully hijacked yours.”

  I ignore him. “I know you can’t stay here, Nancy. I will go with you,” I vow. “Wherever you go—I want to be beside you.” I stare down at her, willing her to feel my sincerity.

  Skynan’s lips curve, and the sheen over her eyes almost makes them seem as if they dance. “I hear that’s not the only place you want to be?”

  Despite the strength of my feelings, and the depth of commitment with which I mean my declaration, I huff a laugh, my eyes never leaving hers.

  CHAPTER 20

  By the dawn of the next daycycle, we haven’t discussed much. In fact, nothing of import at all.

  We practice procreation though, lots of it—not that the two of us could produce offspring, but the exercise is choice. Skynan and I couple frantically under the spray of the water—standing upright during the entire encounter!—and I’m nearly moved to take her again when she’s standing in front of me with my hand closed protectively over her eyes during the dry-off. She’s so enticing that I can’t help myself. As soon as she’s dry, I’m toppling us to the floor. At least I manage to do the gentlemanly thing and it’s my back that lands on the unforgiving drying grates. Her knees suffer a little, but she declares after that it was worth it.

  When we race, breathless, to arrive at the office before anyone else is moving in the dorms, we attack each other as soon as the door shuts behind us. Just our mouths; we’re aware we’re no longer alone.

  Unfortunately for Simmi, he’s the unwilling viewing participant to this, and he calls, “That’s revolting.”

  Most unexpectedly, I’m suddenly bristling. Swiftly I press Skynan behind me, putting myself between her and Simmi’s judgement. In my extreme, instant aggression, I appear nearly a half size larger than normal thanks to my instantly-swelled dorsal protuberances. I feel almost as shocked as Simmi appears—but I try not to let this show. “I will pop off one of your tubes if you insult Skynan like that again.”

  “Shh,” Skynan soothes, grinning as she pats me on the sternum. “Calm down, tiger. He’s just uncomfortable at the idea of an alien encounter.”

  I turn enough that my eyes can meet her dancing ones. “But they were divine encounters.”

  Simmi makes a disgusted noise. “I was referring to the fact you had her pressed up against the waste receptacle. Do you know how much bacteria that surface alone is likely harboring?” During his complaint, he stares at the waste receptacle near the door where, indeed, I had thoughtlessly pressed Skynan.

  “Oh,” I say. “Sincerest apologies for assuming, Simmi.”

  Simmi sniffs and stands.

  I take Skynan in my arms again and try to control myself so that I’m lip-brushing, not attacking her with my mouth.

  Apparently, I need more practice. “Will you two get a dorm?” Simmi sighs.

  I groan and set Skynan away from me. She should really maintain a safe distance. “We can’t rush to the dorm for furtive coupling every time the urge overtakes us—unfortunately,” I say to Simmi, though I’m sending Nancy a hot look.

  “Use the facilities,” Simmi says with a sigh. “But for galaxy’s sake, be quiet.”

  He moves past us to press the waste receptacle further against the wall and more out of the way—and to do this, he uses the end of his writing instrument.

  This done, he then pitches this writing instrument into the waste receptacle and procures a new one. Because Skynan had shifted closer to watch him in the throes of an obsessive-compulsive episode with a rubbish canister, when Simmi turns, he pokes his new instrument into Skynan’s back to urge her to move out of his way.

  “Simmi,” I warn, “I’m experiencing an aggressive reaction. Pleas
e don’t physically engage Nancy.”

  Simmi stops, gazing at me with interest. “Really? Are you exhibiting symptoms of territoriality and/or protectiveness?”

  “I believe so,” I confirm.

  Simmi flicks Skynan’s shoulder with his long fingers. It’s a light flick; but to my system, he may as well have viciously attacked her. Because without a second warning, I lunge for him.

  I haven’t used my fangs since I was a toddler, and graduated from wearing mouth guards when I learned the control not to bite when other children attempted to claim my toys on the playground. But I recall I was very good at using them—my fangs, not the guards—I almost always got my toys back.

  Simmi must have been a much more civilized child, because he barely lands any bites to my vulnerable areas at all—most of his attempts do no more than glance off my almost waxy-surfaced chitin. Waxy because mated males can produce a shine, a smoothent that makes them harder to grasp in battles if we were an uncivilized people who engaged in battles.

  I’m very suddenly feeling very uncivilized.

  Simmi grabs one of my antennae threateningly, making me swiftly return to myself. “I’m done,” I declare after I spit his arm out of my mouth.

  “Are you certain?” Simmi asks.

  “I am. Don’t break it.”

  Simmi releases my antennae and immediately procures a disinfecting cloth for his gnawed-on limb.

  “Any damage?” I ask when I see him checking his arm for dents.

  “Thankfully no,” he returns. “But what an interesting development,” he muses.

  “What is?” Skynan asks, a little horror leaching into her voice, matching the still-stunned expression on her face.

  I stand, but before I dust myself off, I offer Simmi a hand up. He accepts—although he still washes his hand after.

  “It’s interesting,” he answers Skynan, “That Erreck is so aggressively territorial over you.” He sends me a sardonic look. “Rather touching.”

  Skynan looks to me and I clarify. “Genneӝt aren’t an aggressive people. We haven’t been for a very, very long time.”

  Strangely, this bit of news wipes the uncomfortableness from Skynan’s expression, and she gives me a warm, thrilled stare. “Oooh.”

  Simmi and I both cock our heads at her sound. Simmi glances at me. “I believe that’s human-speak for ‘Erreck is getting ridden all darkcycle.’”

  My cheekbones rouge—but Skynan simply sends me an affirmative grin.

  ***

  “What will you do about your family? Our superiors? Our research? Are you planning to simply disappear?” Simmi asks reasonably, not a half-cycle later.

  Troubled, I clutch the adjustment knob on my microscope, but I’m not looking into the lenses. I’m staring sightlessly past the lab table. “Do I have a choice?”

  “How do we explain your disappearance?” he asks—also reasonably.

  “I don’t know.”

  “We could remove your tail,” Simmi says calmly…

  NOT REASONABLY AT ALL! “What?!”

  Skynan squawks. “WHAT!”

  “Think about it,” Simmi says, voice perfectly rational. “One small act of dismemberment and arson and we’ll have provided a plausible explanation for your disappearance, one that officials and your family members will be able to accept. I can create a controlled explosion in the lab, blame it on you, and it will explain your death neatly.”

  “One small act of arson,” I mutter in disbelief.

  “And dismemberment,” Simmi adds as if I’ve forgotten.

  “Why his tail?” Skynan cries. She knocks over a stack of her notebooks, making them flap to the floor.

  Simmi settles back in his chair, hand to his chin. “The predominant reason being that it’s not a limb necessary to his survival. And just think,” he addresses Skynan, his tone turning chipper, “You’ll no longer be the only freakish one without a tail.”

  Skynan’s eyes narrow. “I spit on your chair.”

  Simmi leaps from his chair like it’s on fire. He can’t soak it in disinfectant fast enough.

  Meanwhile, I’ve started packing up my station. “Let me think about,” I say worriedly to no one.

  CHAPTER 21

  By the end of our shift, we have a plan. An uncomfortable one that Skynan is vehemently against, I’m queasy over, and Simmi seems to be looking forward to with a little too much glee for a Genneӝt who prefers not to deal with unpleasant liquids (such as saliva, bodily fluids, blood) until it suddenly comes to amputating part of his officemate.

  I try to soothe Skynan. “He’s correct that this is the neatest way for me to leave the planet. Otherwise, there will be questions, and it isn’t like Simmi can provide answers, not without admitting he helped me harbor you.”

  Skynan frowns, her brow furrowing prettily. She’s obviously not liking this news, and more, she’s worried for Simmi. Then she looks up at us with hope. “You could both come! Where I’m from, we’re used to lots of races. You won’t feel like the odd alien out, believe me. And my family, they just want to see me happily matched. They’ll accept you as my mate, Erreck, and Simmi, they’ll accept you as a friend. We’ll be happier there, with more freedom. You’ll see, I promise.”

  I turn to look at Simmi.

  “Simmi, will you come with us?” Skynan pleads with him. “Seriously, it’s a big world out there! And we have these places called cleanrooms. You’ll love cleanrooms.”

  Simmi squints. “Why would I find this appealing? Besides the name, I mean.”

  Exasperated but giddy at the alternative to dismembering me, I think, Skynan laughs under her breath. “Because, they’re the cleanest places on worlds. They are stringent about maintaining like zero particulate matter and organisms. They’re absolutely sterile environments so they can build computers and work with pharmaceuticals and things. It’s basically going to be your kind of happy place.”

  Simmi’s antenna lift. “That does have an appeal.” But then he drops his gaze to his notes for the daycycle. “I thank you for the invitation, but I have no interest in delving into a new culture on a new planet full of new and stressful experiences.”

  “Simmi…” Skynan pleads—but she pronounces his name correctly, Sihmee—and she manages it without a hitch.

  Instantly, Simmi’s dropping his tapscreen and using his writing instrument to point at her. “I knew you knew how to say my name!”

  She doesn’t acknowledge that she’s been teasing him by mispronouncing it all this time. She only folds her hands in earnest pleading.

  Seeing this, Simmi smiles softly. “Again, I thank you for the offer.” He shakes his head. “But I’ll stay. I’m afraid I don’t have the constitution to be surrounded with beings’ bodies as freakish as yours—no offense whatsoever,” he assures her, quite serious.

  Nancy snorts, but it sounds as if she’s producing her amused sound from underwater. Her nasal cavities sound full of liquid.

  How alarming.

  Simmi must find it so too because he widens his eyes and spreads his hands in a silent, This is exactly what I’m referring to, you strange little thing. But then he pauses and his gaze flits away as if he’s uncomfortable with what he’s about to share. “You should know that I’m uncharacteristically touched with emotion that you’d ask.” His eyes come back to rest on her. “Thank you. It means… it means an unquantifiable amount to me.”

  Nancy looks as if she’s about to produce eye-liquid.

  While he’s distracted and growing tense watching her rapidly-wetting eyes, I move in and clasp Simmi in a hug.

  He goes unnaturally still, giving me three cardiac muscle-pulsations until his tail taps the back of my hand. “This is incredibly uncomfortable, but yes—well, yes, I suppose I’ll greatly miss you too.”

  CHAPTER 22

  By the end of the workcycle, we’ve thoroughly defiled the lab’s elimination facilities. Simmi declares that he’ll need to burn the room, and decides this is where my tail (i.e., me) wil
l meet its ‘accident.’ How he’s going to string together a plausible explanation for why there was a chemical explosion in the facilities, well, that’s on him.

  Skynan’s pupils are still dilated slightly, and she’s still shivering and shuddering from the aftereffects of being plugged with my spendpods—but I want to pin her down and spear into her, shoving past my pods and expelling another into her hot, tight grip. It’s debauched, to be so consumed by these thoughts. But from the way Nancy’s eyes continue to linger on me hungrily, I believe she too is contemplating the idea.

  But this would be the third time that I’ve been forced to haul her off for frenzied mating, and apparently three times is Simmi’s tolerance limit per daycycle.

  Because soon we’re both shamefaced before Simmi, who stands, hard upper lip curled, glaring down his snout at the pair of us. He shows us what he’s holding in his hand: a set of small vials. “I have here anti-lust injections. If you two insist on cavorting all the daycycle long, I will be forced to issue you these suppressors!”

  ***

  “I thought he really was going to give us those shots,” Skynan whispers when we’re properly ensconced in the dorm.

  Well… ‘properly’ might be a stretch.

  I rutted her right up against my door.

  It was a long torturous wait until the stairwells would be clear enough for us to rush here and couple. We were wild and fevered for each other by the time we reached here.

  If I worked in a field other than science—music, for instance—I’d have access to a sound-dampening room, and that would be ideal. Because when we made it back and locked the door behind us, I wanted to be loud with Nancy. I like how she is loud. I wanted to drop my hand from where I was forced to muffle her sounds and finally hear just how the invasion of my crozier in her soaked tunnel makes her scream.