Chapter Text
"..they may change color, swim side by side holding tails or grip the same strand of sea grass with their tails, and wheel around in unison in what is known as a 'predawn dance'. They eventually engage in a "true courtship dance" lasting about 8 hours, during which the male pumps water through the egg pouch on his trunk which expands and opens to display its emptiness."
Ugh, what was he doing again?
Ryland Grace sat there on the couch, head lopsided to the left, glasses discarded elsewhere, as per usual. He was starting to get distracted while he was reading and typing up storms of papers worth lives if he was still on Earth, which was frustrating him to no end. The molecular biologist remembered how his life was re-spun upside-down after meeting Simon and getting punched in the stomach by the guy, but that wasn't what he was dwelling on right now. Right now, he was dwelling on how the hell he's going to continue writing these papers on such a slow monitor. Damn Microsoft Outlooks, cause he opened two of them and both aren't working. Seriously, it's probably just the internet connection and signal being down for the past week, but darn he really needed to kill time that wasn't another book or something like that.
Maybe he should make something in the kitchen? No, the sink's out right now.
Play something on his piano? Nah, just because Stratt downloaded the whole internet on Mary doesn't mean he could play something new.
Paint..? Paint what, exactly?
"Ngh.. It's so hot all of a sudden.." He muttered, annoyed, as he rubbed his forehead drenched in sweat. To that, the temperature dwindled dramatically, becoming too cold before it shot up to a comfortable 24°C. The xenobiologist was wondering why the temperature was being so weird. It was unnatural for the intense spikes and dips in heat. That's when a memory popped back in his head; he remembered that the heating & cooling systems malfunctioned at some point during the night, so the Eridians came by to fix it for their human saviour when he couldn't sleep. Seems like they finally fixed it, even if they got a little too comfy with the heat before realizing that Grace would get sick when it got that hot.
"Thanks Adrian. Thanks Rocky. And thanks to the rest of the crew." Grace said from his room, hearing the symphony of musics from the other cliffside. They really were a reliable bunch.
The Eridians were some really clever creatures, able to create great inventions made out of strong materials that last centuries, making sure that every generation could see it in all its glory. Humans could never unless that was their intention. Usually, they like to make things on a whim and toss it around like junk, getting jealous of others when they put more thought into their possessions. A weird thing that the teacher couldn't wrap his mind around, however, was that...
Not now Grace! You need to get your mind back up and running!—The teacher slapped his cheeks together, getting worried trills from the cliffside before he said he was fine. Let's see, I'm still at home, in front of my laptop, writing a ton. Rocky is with Adrian, fixing the heating & cooling systems with Adrian's crew. Simon is out in the greenhouse, planting a lot of produce and tending to the flowers.. Wait why am I the one stuck at home?—He wondered, thinking about his teaching job with the Eridian children before his laptop slid off the curvature of his stomach. The man caught it before it fell to the floor, but then he also saw the reason as to why he was stuck in the house for a long time.
"What are these again?"
"Mammoth Seahorse Eggs."
It had been some time since Simon joined them on Erid, the ex-convict joyous at the salvation he got after escaping death in the blood ocean and meeting the angel of his dreams (Ryland doubted that was true, but Simon insisted). However, it seems that not everything from his prison days could be left behind. The mutated man held an egg up, irked while watching the insides just slosh around in the casing. Rocky chirped, running around the beach for a moment, excited to be with Grace after being in space for a long time. "They look as big as chicken eggs, honestly." Grace said casually, the brown Eridian stopping its little prancing in curiosity. "What is chicken, question?"
Rocky was genuinely curious, leaving Grace to wonder if he never mentioned it before to the alien. "Oh, basically, it's an Earth bird that people usually eat or use in farms. I'll show you what they look like later and—hm?"
A larger, blue-green Eridian came by, the smaller brown-colored creature running towards it happily. "Adrian! Adrian!" Damn the little guy; he really likes his big mate. "Oh, Adrian! Good to see you here, but Why'd you come by?" Grace greeted the other Eridian, the latter chirping hello before explaining why they came by. "Rocky wanted Adrian to hang around. Cannot refuse, especially with friend Grace and friend Simon." The blue Eridian explained, the blonde-haired man nodding along. "Ah, so it's 'cause of Rocky as always, huh?" Rocky huffed through his air vents when he heard that, but Adrian let out a series of chirps akin to a giggle, loving how this was going.
"Rocky begged, statement."
"Did not."
"Did too."
"Because Adrian is amazing mate. Great great great."
"Thank you. Rocky also great great great."
"Hey Rocky, where'd you find these again?" Grace asked his friend, the Eridian turning his attention back to the human, a few trills coming from the carapace of the Eridian. "Rocky new crew found sac floating on discovered water planet, brought sac back and cut open. Many squishy spheres inside." Rocky replied from the xenonite casing he was in, Grace nodding along. The scientist was going to ask for more information on it before—
POP!
"AH! What the—"
"Why friend Simon destroy egg, question??"
"?"
Well, it wasn't exactly the type of reaction that any of the three expected from Simon, but then again, he seemed more intimately familiar with the eggs than the three of them, a sort of disgust spread on his face as the blue contents of the egg caked his right hand. The black-haired man exhaustedly shook his right hand as if to pretend that it didn't even happen in the first place. "Oh right, this must be new for you guys, right?" He asked with a forlorn look on his face, his eyes seeming faraway. "I'll explain why I did that." Simon said casually, dropping his hand to his waist.
"These things are Mammoth Seahorse Eggs, which is why they're as big as a chicken egg, or whatever Grace called them." He started, trying to remember the exact analogy the doctor made. "They're big and squishy, like what you said, but these things are also darn invasive. Since mammoth seahorses live in incredibly hot environments, even temperatures like this is already chilling the eggs like they'll hatch later, and that's the worst part. These little shits as eggs have soft thick walls to protect the insides, and evolved to chill at lower temperatures, wait to get eaten whole by a male predator, then grow an incubator or whatever body horror shit inside them, grow a quarter bigger than a human kid or whatever, then pop out like nothing happened!" Rocky wanted to interject, but Simon didn't let him. "And no, they die or do nothing in a female host. But obviously, that's not the worst part." The ex-convict exaggerated his tone, not his words.
"These fuckers know how to disguise themselves like they're part of their host's species. And when they reach the right age… Bam! They disappear as a seahorse and go somewhere else, spreading their little problems everywhere." Simon finished his statements before staring back at his egg soaked hand, squeezing it. "It's more of a personal vendetta why I hate them… But…"
***
"Hey did you hear? 'pparently some guy got a parasite from the weird eggs we got yesterday for breakfast."
"What? No way. He's probably faking like crazy so he could escape in the hospital."
…
"From the [Redacted] Prison, more than 80 casualties have been reported, inmates having fish-looking parasites that ruptured from their stomach walls. Onto the next news.."
***
"So the logical approach is to crush the eggs, question?" Adrian's question snapped the mutant out of his trance, a sigh escaping his lips. "Yeah, it's the fastest way to get rid of them without risking any injuries. 'less you guys wanna experiment on them to see what else they do. Guess that's fine.." Simon mumbled under his breath, staring at the rest of the sac, looking at the rest of the pile with disgust in his eyes.
"Why Grace have look of interest on face, question?"
"… Grace, no. You're not gonna eat any of them."
Thanks a lot Rocky; he foiled the scientist's plans. "No—I mean… Mmph…" Without an excuse, Grace couldn't exactly justify that he maybe wanted to eat one. Like, just a little inkling that it wouldn't be so bad, right? "Grace will die, statement. Will not allow." Darn you too, Adrian. They sounded a bit amused, however; obviously not at the thought of the man dying. They had more dignity than that and care a lot more than they'll admit. It was the idea that Grace was stupid enough to eat something that would potentially kill him that they couldn't wrap their head around. Then again, not to be rude, he was a human. Humans would do anything even for fun, even if it would kill them. It was like the story Rocky always complained about in front of Grace; when they went "fishing" on Adrian (Tau Ceti e) and Rocky repeatedly told Grace to just come back into the Mary because their taumoeba collector, of which Rocky insisted Grace to get, was now about to fall off the ship. Grace, however, in a fit of malicious compliance, defiance, and tenacity, figured a way to make the collector come closer to him and jumped after it, acquiring it and going back inside to drive. (Then they both almost died, but oh well.)
If there was one thing that Adrian knew, it's that, unless there is no reward or nothing is pushing them to, humans would go after literally anything for any reason, and good luck if you even try to convince them and forget that they'll force loopholes. The blue-green Eridian wanted to tell Rocky that it was pointless to argue with the human saviour, but he already got on his feet, so nevermind, again.
"But what if Grace give birth, question? What will do when offspring tries to crawl out, question??"
"We could just C-section it as soon as we can!"
"And what if it's faster than that, Ryland!? What if it thrashes around and kills you!?"
"How sure are you that that's going to happen?"
"Tsk, don't be stupid, Ryland. I've seen them crawl out with my own eyes and heard the screams of my own cellmates!"
"And you never wondered if it's a confusion of biology?!"
"… The hell are you talking about?" Simon paused his yelling, genuinely confused by whatever the hell Grace was saying, but the other two Eridians already knew to quit arguing for a while. This was the side of the scientist that was willing to do anything to prove a point, even risk everything if that meant his way. "Did you look closely at your cellmates? Did they ever start becoming more secluded even when they were in the shower? Afraid to take down their pants? Afraid to show their body that mutated into something childbearing? Or did you not look because you couldn't? There are many, many factors that could affect an exper—event into fatal circumstances, and what I meant by biological confusion was that aside from being birthed by males, seahorses are born swimming up and away from their father's pouch, unlike how humans birth through females, down and out the birth canal! What if they often chose animals with similar biology, so they were baffled when there was 'no exit' in the human womb!?"
"Ryland, that's literally not—"
"One egg."
Adrian said from their loafed (Grace would love to call it loafing because he missed the cats back on Earth) position in their xenonite casing, having already urged Rocky to go somewhere else to talk with the other Eridians. And Simon being confused? Yeah, that was taking it like he was a child and was wondering why cold water wasn't hot. He was fuming at the casual enabling of Grace's crazy experiment, but Adrian knew that this would happen to some extent, so they elaborated on why the molecular biologist was allowed such. "If Grace hypothesis correct and can maneuver offspring to natural or mutated body orifice safely with no death, will allow incubation to continue. However, if there is no way out and offspring can only exit violently through torso with high mortality rate, termination must be immediate."
Well, Adrian made themself clear, and Simon, although reluctant, decided after some time that as long as they could detect any anomalies early, Grace wouldn't be in much danger.
And that nod was the last thing Grace needed before he promised to them: "Thanks guys. I promise I won't put myself in more danger if my hypothesis is incorrect and it's the worst case scenario too." With a pep in his step and a brave face, he walked over to the sac and looked for an egg that he felt spiritually connected to. Holding a sphere from the inner part of the pile, he smiled, placed it in his mouth, and..
Gulp.
It had been five months & 2 weeks since that day, and Grace's hypothesis was correct. His body transformed into a more feminine and childbearing one, growing female organs most likely for a temporary time only just to incubate the child. "Ah, you little bug, keeping me indoors because I'm pregnant. Or should I say fish?" The teacher complained fondly, rubbing the bump that was growing there.
Simon was right, however. Well, it was in the name, but damn the kid's getting huge real fast.
"Heh, I wonder what to name you."