"After all that you're not hungry?" Gene asked. Aisha growled and looked over her food at the Outlaw. "So...you're really..."
"Yes," Aisha said icily.
"And it's..."
"It's yours," Aisha said, cutting him off and staring at him with a dark and grim expression.
"Listen, Aisha," Gene said. He paused as he noticed the moisture building up in her eyes.
"My life is over!" Aisha declared suddenly, bursting into tears and laying her head down onto the table and shaking with sobs.
Gene looked about, nervously aware of eyes on them and unaware of what he should do.
"Ah, come on, Aisha," Gene said. "It'll be hard, but it's not that bad."
"Not that bad?" Aisha said quietly at a growl. "Not that bad?! NOT THAT BAD!?!" She bit off the end of that shout as she noticed people staring at them. "Let me tell you what's not that bad, Gene Starwind. Before I met you, I was a daughter of Ctarl-Ctarl nobility shining in the light of the stars! I was going to be powerful, important!! And then YOU!"
She paused to take a breath and gestured about the restaurant.
"This is a Starbucks compared to the places I used to eat at," Aisha snapped. Gene imagined the ancient, seemingly unkillable chain of coffee shops compared to the restaurant they were in. "And now, I'll never be able to go back home."
Gene watched her slump back down in defeat.
"Because of you!" Aisha snapped. "You and Hilda lost me my rank! And then, YOU stuck me with that bill and I had to spend months living hand to mouth, eating out of trash cans, hitchhiking, stowing away...I commandeered a ship to get to you! The empire blamed me for the Ctarl-Ctarl's failure at the Leyline! And now..."
"This kind of stuff happens all the time," Gene said. "There's nothing political about..."
"Interbreeding with humans is forbidden!" Aisha snapped. "Sex before marriage is forbidden! Changing mates is forbidden."
Gene remained quiet for a long minute before he answered.
"If it's so much of a problem," Gene said reluctantly. "There are...procedures, nobody ever has to know."
Aisha's silence was longer than Gene's had been.
"Is that what you want?" Aisha asked, whispering.
"Honestly," Gene asked. Aisha nodded. "No."
"Good, because that's even worse," Aisha said. "And it leaves traces, so it wouldn't work."
"You can't say this has never happened before," Gene said. "Ctarl-Ctarl aren't any better at controling their emotions than humans are. In fact, from what I've seen, they're worse at it."
"It's happened before," Aisha said darkly. "A lot with commoners, but...I'm nobility. My family..."
"Your family, right, shouldn't you contact them?" Gene asked.
"As soon as they hear about this," Aisha said. "They'll deny I ever existed. My name will be removed from the tree, and should I ever return to Empire space, I'll be arrested as a whore and tossed in some backwater prison colony. My child will probably end up being a stripper in some cheap dive like at Blue Heaven! Or sold on the slave market to someone that wants a 'safe' Ctarl-Ctarl."
"I don't think so," Gene said gruffly. "If you're having my baby, it's not going to end up somebody's bed slave. And I'm not letting anybody push you around either, empire or not. You're no whore." He reached forward and brushed his gloved hand against her cheek.
He spoke firmly and with such confidence that Aisha raised her eyes up from the table and her food.
"You don't want to get rid of me?" Aisha asked.
"Hmm," Gene said. "Hardly."
"But Melfina," Aisha said.
"It'll be hard, but we can figure things out," Gene said. "You're part of the Outlaw Star's crew, nobody's going to push you around while we're here."
"Mwrw?" Aisha said questioningly.
"Let's enjoy the food," Gene said firmly.
Aisha nodded and bent to the dinner, letting the rest of the meal pass in mostly silence until they were nearly finished.
"By the way," Aisha said, curious. "Why'd you get so upset at the waiter, you always call me an animal."
"When I do it, I'm teasing," Gene said. "That worm was just being a cowardly prick."
"Oh," Aisha said.
See other episodes by Thrythlind
(Posted Fri, 11 Jul 2003 20:17)
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