Magnificent Trio

Chapter 12

  "Mind if I....swab." Fitz held up the white stick with a cotton top. "It's for, uh, for....DNA."

  "All right." Opening my mouth, I let him swab my cheek as I sat on a rolling stool in the lab. The others were gone now, so it was just us as he was flitting about.

  "I'm thinking that, um, because you have hair, your skin might be like....a-a dolphin or whale rather than you having sc-scales."

  "You want to check, don't you?"

  "Yes."

  "Fine." I sighed while lifting my arm, and Fitz scraped my arm over a microscope slide to rub off what would either be small scales or epithelial cells.

  "Simmons would be better at this." I heard him mutter as he put the slide under the microscope to look at it. "Well, these are skin cells, but I can't.... I don't....know what like."

  "I see."

  "Lungs." Fitz perked up before looking at me again. "How do your lungs work?"

  "Like a fish? I don't know, but they're connected to my primary lungs-"

  "Primary?"

  "Yeah. Primary set for oxygen air," I waved my hand to gesture around me. "secondary set for oxygen in water."

  "....You have two sets of lungs?"

  "Yup." I popped the 'p' while nodding. I could see the curiosity and excitement in his eyes as he waved his pen.

  "Two hearts?"

  "Just the one."

  "Stomachs?"

  "Also just one. My organs are actually very similar to a human's. One of the many reasons I've been able to blend in so long."

  "Oh. Oh, that." Fitz pointed. "How do you....do that?"

  "Look human?"

  "Yes."

  "Limited camouflage is the best I can explain it. I can only make myself look human, but not like anything else."

  "If you're an alien, how can you do that?"

  "Probably the same way the Asgardians look human but are from an entirely different world." I shrugged.

  "....Huh." He then turned to write on his clipboard. Fitz was taking this whole alien thing better than I thought he would. Maybe because he had months prior to now to process it.

  Fitz leaned on the table as he was writing while periodically swinging his pen. My gaze ended up wandering as I waited, and I was soon looking right at his ass. Just like his new haircut, his new pants did him justice.

  "This question is in the name of science....don't think I'm-I'm being weird." Fitz turned while holding his clipboard, and my eyes shot to his face.

  "I never like when you lead with 'in the name of science'."

  "Well, you don't have to answer."

  "Just ask."

  "Penis. Do you have, um, do you have a penis? Or, uh, tentacle. Clasper? Do you lay eggs? How does your species....reproduce?"

  "....Ah." My brows raised, and I felt the heat rising in my face.

  "Oh, my.... Are you blushing? Your, um, face is getting....darker."

  "Your question just took me by surprise." I cleared my throat. "We don't lay eggs. It's a live birth, like mammals. As for, uh, genitals....we're hermaphroditic."