Page 1 of The First Alpha on the Planet
Chapter One
Wallace
“Space meat.” Noel stared at a tray of food, shoulders rounded. Nexus, their little one, sat snugly in his lap and reached a little clawed hand up to grab a morsel of half-cooked flesh. Up until a few hours ago, the meat had been something that resembled an emu…with teeth.
“Space meat,” I agreed as I stared at it and took a bite. I wasn’t going to learn the name of the creature, but it was tasty as hell.
“Kipu!” their little one, Nexus, announced.
“Ki-poo-ah,” Noel enunciated, and for fuck’s sake, I wasn’t going to forget it.Dammit.
Nexus stared at the food before shoving another chunk of juicy goodness into his mouth. “Spess mea!”
He clawed for another and dropped down, capering on two feet as he escaped the dining room of their home. House. Whatever.
The stay was supposed to be temporary, but they’d given all of us homes, and Noel’s was the biggest, an estate, really. I’d been given a small home, but the amount of amorous omegas they found excuses to come visit, gave me the creeps, and I’d moved my shit into one of theirmanyspare bedrooms to hide. Everyone else may have been prodigious manwhores, but I preferred my penis not to be public property.
Speaking of…
“How’s Gorm doing?” I shoved a fork into a piece of meat and stared at it. Sure as fuck didn’t look like what I remember chicken looked like. More like pork… And fish at the same time. Still good, though.
Noel glanced up from his meal and blinked. “Last I heard, he was in the infirmary with Doc being treated for dehydration…andchafing.”
I shuddered. “RIP his PP.”
Noel nodded sagely. “Space W-H-O-R-E.”
At least they were cleaning up their language a bit.
“I’m surprised there aren’t diseases on this planet you get from PP abuse.” What I wouldn’t give to be able to saydickagain.
“Me, too.” Noel took a bite of some of the vegetables they offered. One of which, they’d showed me, had a tendency to scream when you plucked from it… Delicious, though. Learning to cook it was fun, too, if the omega teaching me kept his paws to himself.
The high-pitched laughter of children ransacking the playroom rattled out in the distance. The lack of children for so long had omegas begging to babysit and care for the little ones. And Nexus? He was the apple of their eyes.
A whirring noise drew my attention as a little drone hovered around the room, circling Noel with a huff of laughter. “Morning, dudes!”
“Wallace and I were having breakfast. How have you been, Merriel?” Noel put his fork down and daubed at his lips politely. Every movement he made had a calculated grace to it.
“Pretty good. I got the results from Wallace’s bloodwork.” Merriel let his drone hover a moment before landing on the table where little spider legs sprouted from the mechanisms on its side, and it crawled about, investigating things in a rather crablike way.
Why is it always crabs?
“Do we know why the transition didn’t happen?” Noel packed up his tray and took it to a slot in the wall where an automated system took care of cleaning it. He carefully didn’tlook at me, which I appreciated. Watching all my shipmates go full Progenitor on me had been a little jarring. I’d been left looking mostly Tal, unevolved and strange. I’d always lamented never having skin on my face, hair. Maybe it would feel weird?
“Pubes?” I glanced up and Noel turned in place, head tilted in that odd way he did when he didn’t understand something, like a puppy.
“Excuse me?” Noel’s pretty brow creased, light-blue hair and glistening scaled forehead a beautiful thing that I felt ashamed to have caused such distress. Even if Noel and others thought he looked strange, I still thought him ethereal and gorgeous. Probably because the same samples that they’d made Vil from had been the progenitor cells from my batch of soldiers.
“If I managed to change, would I have pubes?” I shrugged.
“Oh. I don’t think so.” Noel glanced up at the ceiling, the curved smooth, white surface, an organic flowing shape that allowed the humid air to circulate more effectively, increased surface area for their mortar to handle the moisture better without growing things. They also had a species of moth that laid eggs on flat surfaces, so that helped, too.
“I don’t have pubic hair. Vil doesn’t. Gorm doesn’t…” Noel frowned at the last one.
“Can confirm, dude.” Merriel, operating his new remote probe, crawled over the table investigating things. It was truly amazing the amount of technology the Naleucians had accrued. “I’ve seen, like, everyone’s business.”
“You were human once, Merriel. It seems itchy. Is it?” Noel stared at the little probe, and Merriel tilted his frame to focus optical sensors on him.
