Page 8 of The First Alpha on the Planet
“Wait! You want to put a colthraxian in me? Wouldn’t that like killme?” I scrambled and drew my feet up, ready to run at the threat.
“Nah. Just a piece of the cleaned tissue will turn your immune system off for long enough to take the material. Think of it like sticking a piece of their fingernail in you,” Doc said.
That wasmarginallybetter, but still.
“I promise you it will be fine.” Noel glanced at the paperwork. “Probably.”
“Fine, is the operative term, not the probably.” Doc rolled his eyes and took Noah from Noel with a little coo. “You might have another little cousin to play with here soon. You won’t be the baby anymore.”
“The only reasonyouaren’t prospectively going to bear an egg is that Gorm has been otherwise occupied.” Noel sneered.
“I’ve not even thought about Gorm that way since—you know.” Doc waved a hand and strode out of the room, still fawning over Noah while indirectly taunting Noel about his untimely ovulation.
Unfortunately, I did know. Gorm and I hadplayed aroundwith one another before. It was sort of a rite of passage… Kinda. Gorm had a way of worming his way into your bed and making it seem like your idea the entire time. “Well, at least he’s stopped pestering you for—”
“No, he offered to put me in his schedule the other day. I passed politely. He has plenty of others looking forthat.” Doc tossed a little device to Noel, cold fog rolling off it.
Noel cracked the device open, the shape of it rather like a staple gun from Mater Terra. He pressed a button on the side and inspected it. “Gas chamber is at 73 percent.”
Doc nodded. “I used it twice this morning already, working. So much better than needles.”
I thought so, too.
Fel returned, a sterilized glass petri dish of a sort in hand. In it was a single, desiccated square of something that resembled a perfectly cut scab. “Since you have said you were my friend, I wish to offer you a piece of myself, Wallace!”
I was so very thankful they were shitty at reading facial expressions and that I also had no tail to show the revulsion that went through me at thegift.
“Place it subcutaneously behind his ear. It’s heavily vascularized, and if there’s any scarring or reaction, we can mitigate it faster.” Noel ignored me, and Doc handed Fel a metal box that he wasted no time in opening and inspecting.
“I don’t know if this is—” Fel pulled a panel open on the wall, making a flat surface to spread the contents over. Cylindrical pen-like objects scattered about with gleaming blades so transparent I could barely see them. A form of carbon-based glass on the planet rather like diamonds but with a different molecular structure. I’d become familiar with them in my short time there.
“One moment.” Noel approached my chair and stared at me, his dark eyes a sea of mystery. “It is our intention to cut a small slit in the thinner skin behind your ear. Underneath your dermis, we will implant a piece of Colthraxian tissue and wait until your skin heals over—likely a few minutes. Then we’ll prick your skin every minute or two to see when you stop healing, and that will be when we inject my isolate. Do you consent?”
Thirty seconds ago, I’d been determined to run and fearful of what was to come, but with Noel’s clear definition of what wasto happen and asking me if I consented? I did consent. I nodded. “Go ahead. Let’s do it.”
Noel nodded once, and a sharp sting made me flinch as Fel wasted no time in opening up my skin. I grunted as he inserted a tool beneath my skin, the click of metal near me making my skin crawl. My anxiety wasn’t as bad as Vil’s or Noel’s when it came to labs, but I still had that trauma.
By the time I had fully registered what it was Fel had done, he had pulled away and rested a gentle hand on my shoulder with a squeeze. The touch, while perfunctory, had a certain comfort to it that I’d never gotten in a facility.
As I lifted my hand to rub at my neck, Noel brought a needle over to prick my finger, watching curiously as it healed over in an instant. I glanced at the blood as Noel wiped it away, leaving behind a pinkening streak. “That’s different.”
Noel nodded. “It comes in around the fifty percent mark, gets more magenta.”
“Silicates in the blood, right?” I stared at it as Noel pricked another spot on my hand.
He nodded.
“Interesting fact: our blood is actually silvery white, but the crystalline structure of the silicates in it reflects magenta and gold.” Fel leaned over and inspected Noel’s work before handing him the injection device from before.
“Ready for stage two?” Noel engaged the handle and pressed it to the tender part of my neck as I swallowed.
“As I’ll ever be.” I took a deep breath, closed my eyes, and flinched at a click and hiss so loud it cracked off the walls like a gunshot.
I got maybe two breaths out of me before my chest constricted, and I choked out a breath.
“Sedate?” Fel’s voice sounded out from somewhere.
“Good plan,” Doc said in agreement.
