✅ Project SETI: Surrogates for Extra-Terrestrial Insemination

Part IX: Five

          Six months later...

          Nova recovered from his collapsed lung rather quickly after the procedure. What had caused it to begin with was never determined; Gabriel left the diagnosis as a spontaneous pneumothorax, and so did Julia, when he consulted with her. Since then, Nova had managed to avoid any further complications or illness, and the routine scans he came in for every one-to-three weeks revealed that everything was coming along swimmingly.

          He sat anxiously in the lobby; he watched the door and hoped Gabriel would appear sooner rather than later. He'd actually not been due for his scan for another two weeks, but that morning when he woke up, he noticed that the egg—now roughly the size of an abnormally large cantaloupe—had drastically changed position to sit farther out than it had been up until that point. Even though it hadn't caused him any significant pain, he called it in anyway, and Gabriel told him to come in immediately.

          "Whoa, you're right, it's really sticking out," Gabriel said as he stepped through the door that led to the clinical and surgical area of Project SETI's office. "Let's go see what's up with that, eh?"

          He led him to an examination room that had a machine very similar to the one Nova had seen the last time he was in an operating room, except it was smaller and mounted to the ceiling instead of the floor. There were a few other diagnostic devices and their respective screens, and of course, the table and its stirrups—but this table was a little different than the usual bulky exam table, in that there was a sizeable gap beneath the cushioned surface, where the bottom part of the dual-headed probe could be pushed through.

          "Do you feel any different? Besides for the change in position, I mean," Gabriel asked as he closed the door behind him.

          "My belly is a bit sore," Nova paused to pull his shirt over his head, which revealed purple-red streaks along his lower abdomen where his skin had stretched to accommodate the egg's movement. "But I think it's just from... well, this."

          Gabriel's eyes widened. "Wow. Well, hop up on the table for me, and I'll make sure of that."

          He shed his pants before doing so, and Gabriel smiled and shook his head. He didn't need to do that right now, but he wasn't going to stop him. Once he was settled on the table, he got him on a pulse oximeter and took a measurement of his blood pressure. While the cuff inflated, he pushed with the pads of his fingers all over the distended, bulbous mass.

          Nova watched with intense interest as he did this. He looked so focused, so concerned. He could feel himself relaxing internally in response to Gabriel touching his belly all over, the expression on his face as he did, and the soft chirping of the pulse oximeter as it monitored his heart in the background.

          "Well, it largely feels okay," Gabriel said as he reached for the stethoscope in his pocket. "The outermost membrane of the sac is extremely hard, as it should be at this stage, and it's the right size," he paused to position the earpieces, "but there seems to be a gap...?"

          "A gap?" Nova echoed as he trailed off and placed the stethoscope on him.

          He didn't say anything, he just inched the bell around and made his way along the edge of his round protruding belly. Near the edge of his ribcage on the right side, he found an area that was soft enough for him to press it firmly into his skin. After a few moments of auscultation in that particular spot, Gabriel's eyes went wide.

          "What? What is it?" Nova sounded both concerned and eager as he pocketed his electronic stethoscope again.

          "I'm sorry, sweets. I wanna make sure before I say anything," Gabriel sounded genuinely apologetic as he moved the dual-headed probe over to the table and positioned it so it was underneath and over Nova's stomach.