Exiled for her high ideals, Asa leaves her home planet to continue her medical career on Concordia in the Eulian Outskirts. Though the Celest-ruled empire is a drastic change from her nomadic tribe, she is determined to take the species' knowledge t...
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The nursery was barren.
The colorless gem lighting left no other shadows other than the one snaking behind her. Its pallid gray transformed into a deep ebony, like the eggs sitting in their perfectly square stalls-everything perfect, everything in order, everything simple. It was just as it should be.
Taking a deep breath, Asa stepped into the offshoot room. She had taken Finnley's gem from his trunk after he had gone to sleep. The medic had to do this to prove to herself there was no err in her mission. Nothing would stop her. Hesitantly, she typed in the code she'd seen Lynren use each time Renvir met her here. The glass slowly pushed aside.
With shaking hands, she grasped the shell and pulled the egg out. This was for the better. She kept repeating that to herself. Yet, instead of leaving to get the injection she'd prepared, she stood there. She didn't move.
"This is to help you. You know that, right?" Asa said to the egg. Perhaps she'd lost her mind. They couldn't understand her. Sighing, she took a step forward.
The child shifted inside the egg. The medic's heart skipped a beat. His progeny was still very much alive despite their first encounter. She felt the slow shifting of their body within. Asa took a deep breath, reminding herself why she was here.
Squeezing her eyes shut, she took another step. Scratching sounds came from inside the egg. Asa paused and began to tap the shell lightly with her nails.
"You'll be happier this way. You won't have to experience pain. You won't go through rejection. Or heartbreak," Asa said, her voice lowering to a whisper. The unhatched child gave a few taps on the shell. "Or meet your father..."
Clutching them tighter to her body, she fell into the small chair across from his pod. The child moved once more.
I cannot wait to see you, Renvir's voice echoed in her mind.
Her hands trembled. She ran her fingers across the shell. In the stillness of the hatchery, she could hear the gentle thump of their hearts. Even stranger, she swore she felt their soft kicks inside of her. Everything felt as though she were carrying the child herself. For a moment, the medic smiled. Then, all too quickly, her mood changed. Sadness flooded her chest, and her breathing quivered underneath its weight.
What had she done?
The realization came through like the endless rains of Concordia. Rumbling images of the first-time mother flooded her mind, cracking her cobbled together sense of duty, grating mercilessly against it.
For the first time in four months, she wept.
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