Welcome back to this episode of My Kind my darlings! I am so happy you guys keep coming back as we get down to the end of things here 😊 This will be the LAST chapter in the main story, and then we will have an epilogue afterwards which will be super fun! That means we will have a total of 39 chapters. This has been an incredible journey and I'm so happy you guys love this as much as I do! Love you all angels!
CHAPTER IS UNBETAED. SORRY. THE LAST ONE WILL BE TOO SO MINOR SPELLING MISTAKES AND GRAMMER MAY BE PRESENT. THANK YOU FOR UNDERSTANDING.
Chapter rated T for depictions of body modification, brief mention of past suicide, non-explicit nudity, brief heavy language, mild suggestive themes and general adult content.
Here. Now. The potential end of the line for the family they had built.
Purple had woken up first, gently rustling his slumbering husband awake before dipping across the house as quietly as he could manage to poke into the guest room the Vortian prison system had allowed their captive to stay in until his trial the next day. Everyone figured he was going to be sent to death, a lost soul searching for redemption that wouldn't come far too late and destroyed in body and mind by his own creeping karma. It had been so dark and chilly that morning as he padded across the desolate floor and silently alerted the razed form of the half blind man he still hated more than anything as he sat up against his headboard in a sore, agonized fugue with his partner's arms slung around his waist. Pem had only nodded and brought his finger to his lips to hush Purple's hurried words, nodding painfully down to the tranquilly sleeping body of his tiny daughter sandwiched inbetween him and Lard Nar as she clung to his leg through the comforter. Teem and Kez were to stay behind for the trial and watch Nea, to take her to the local park and oversee her as she innocently played, unknowing of her renewed father's potential death sentence and the atrocities the man she looked up to had committed in his recent past. Still, they were a family within a family, a bizarre concoction of adopted love and renewed senses brought back from the darkness of the unknown and brought beautifully to the radiance of morality and unwavering light. It hadn't taken long for anyone to get ready, greeted by the clinking of plasma pistols against the fabric belts and buckles of Vortian security carefully guarding the perimeter of their home and ushering them out into the frigid air of dawn to the tiny police cruiser that would rocket them all off to the decision that would chance them all for the better…or worse.
Red had been completely silent as Lard Nar had been asked to change into his stately attire and help Pem slide his deep blue prison uniform back over his bloodstained sweater, zipping it up the front as a mark of servitude and incarceration that none of them knew how to feel about anymore. He looked disgusting at this point; a mess of charred, mangled flesh obscuring half of his face and improvised stitches messily closed over the now completely empty socket that once housed his obliterated eye. Kez had wrapped gauze around his thin middle to keep his deep gash clean against his clothing and every attempt he made at a smile showed off the disgustingly empty socket stamped in the front of his once perfect teeth. He was beautiful once, innocent and absolutely perfect in skintone and glittering eyecolor now reduced to nothing more than a culmination of his own dastardly, horrendous actions come back to haunt him. He didn't talk either through the half numb feeling of dead nerve endings dotting his form or the blistering feeling of fire ripping through his face at the fringes of his massive burn, instead choosing to stare halfheartedly through the windshield as the cruiser jetted away from Hatalca and out towards the coast to meet the Vortian High Court once and for all. Lard Nar had made a few feeble attempts at conversation, quieting down and letting his words die on his lips when he realized Purple had fallen back asleep against his husband's shoulder and Red himself was beginning to unwittingly doze in the pale light he hadn't been willing to awaken to. None of them were prepared to deal with the consequences of what Lard Nar had done to his administration in his cloning efforts, minds reeling so fast that they fluttered away to nothing more than a jumble of screaming thoughts drowning out one another the further they neared the craggily cliffs of the oceanside and attempted to sedate one another with forced warmhearted glances of false reassurance. Everyone knew that Pem was completely doomed. He was a dead man walking, destined to be plunged back into the swirling primordial waters oozing up from within the strange Vortian mantle never to surface again. He deserved it, and everyone knew that whatever he earned he would have to take gracefully. It wasn't his choice anymore, or even the choice of any of them at that point or the court of officials; they were merely there to act as representatives to usher in the light of the Great Universal Mother for her own divine intervention as to whether his and Lard Nar's souls should be spared.
Vort was ethereal. It was bizarre in the best of ways and technologically astounding, but absolutely, cosmically ancient and unlike anything Purple had seen in the cold, unfeeling cities of Irk. They had a special connection to the very lifeforce and twirling gaseous energy that had formed them all in the beginning and breathed the essence of sheer, misunderstood consciousness into every plant, animal, and rational being in the vast blackness cradling every orbit and nebula flittering aimlessly around them. They were the product of something none of them understood and had never seen with a direct line to heavenly, spiritual communication with an omnipotent force that had no name but did in the same breath. She was called She. She was called Bab Ut'alla. She was called the Irken Original. She was called The Great Universal Mother.
She was to decide if Pem deserved to live in freedom or die in custody. She was to decide if Lard Nar was to remain in power or be thrust out into the streets to tame the masses with no defense.
All they could hope is that she would be merciful.
The four had arrived early, landing alongside an infinitely steep cliff as Pem was forced to his feet and shackled once more, groaning under the nearly unbearable sting in his skull but still moving out of fear of what lay before him should he waver. Purple had shaken himself awake and taken Red's hand as the hatch fazed open and revealed the surprisingly sweet scent of the goopy black ocean splayed for thousands of hazy miles under an overcast drizzle, the beauty captivating him as he descended the steps with his partner and locked eyes with the gargantuan living mythos Red had showed him in flight months before. He longed to touch it, to bob amongst the unknown chemical swells of unadulterated, comforting darkness lapping enticingly at the smooth glittering stones of pure quartz and incredibly firm diamonds beneath their feet. The cliff itself was so infinitely vibrant it was almost like walking on untainted glass, a display of shimmering, delectable gorgeousness expanding endlessly beneath them down into the crust and showing off murky images of what lay miles below refracted back through millions of prisms as a flawless rainbow of pure light. Under different circumstances, this place would have brought tears to Purple's eyes as his partner grazed his knuckles with his thumb and stared out against the gentle breeze and the cooling rains against their skin at the amorphous eddy of raw natural supremacy beckoning them back to the landscape where they all belonged deep down at the very center of their technologically shrouded souls. He wanted to stay here forever, lost to the crystal throbbing with unpolluted vitality beneath his boots and feeding his body up his spinal cord, washing over his PAK in waves to soothe every ache in pain in his body as guards retrieved ceremonial dress and ancient oil lanterns from their cargo hold.
Purple had slung a deep black, velveteen shroud over the broad shoulders of his other half as Lard Nar helped his own, clasping Red's too short robe at the front and watching as he took on an almost glowing, stunning visage of vivacity that millions of other Vortians had taken on their annual pilgrimage to this sacred place. He shuddered as Red smiled back warmly and threw his hood up over his sensitive antennae, helping Purple to dress in return. Purple had leaned into his partner and fought back a slew of unexpectedly warmhearted tears when he realized that finally, after everything they had been through together as a family, as enemies and lovers, as friends and brothers…they were all the same. The thump of gorgeous energy beneath their feet had uplifted them and wormed its way into every neuron in their biological brains as they pulled back and grasped for the ancient, worn handles of twinkling plasma lanterns to make the mile pilgrimage along the coast to the most sacred, guarded place in the whole of the cosmos.
The further Purple walked hand in hand behind his King and brother, the more he eyed the struggling yet astoundingly determined limp of his former enemy, and the more he felt his partner's grip soften against his to something reassuring and extraordinarily tender through their rain-slicked doubt, the more he realized that his epiphany was true. Every step against the firm crystal and glint of faint orange light against the stone as they trudged the countryside to meet the court wound deeper and deeper into them all as they exchanged tiny glances and noticed nervous, yet serene, twitches of hands in the pale peek of radiance cresting over the ocean thousands of miles away. Pem had begun to chant under his breath in time with Lard Nar, holding their lanterns out before them to placidly mollify any unseen demons that may be penetrating such a consecrated, hallowed circle and appease the millions of hidden nature spirits Red had read about in his books by lamplight at night to his partner. They didn't know the chants or the words to the primitive Vortian songs that began spilling in tandem from the lips of the horned beings ringing them as they fell in line, the two glancing up to the cloudy blanket spanning above them and watching the lazy patter of millions of ships hovering above in anticipation for their King to be judged by the very light of the Vortian High Court and Bab Ut'alla.
There was no race here.
Though no Irkens had ever been allowed to set foot in a holy, consecrated space such as this, Red and Purple weren't looked upon as Irken any longer. They had proved themselves to the public and the administration as formidable heroes and benevolent at heart, nullifying the fears and quenching the bloodthirst between their hardheaded peoples for good to live in harmony amongst the beings they had once mutually detested and loathed. They were men of two worlds; Irken in body and technology but now considered Vortian in mind and soul, integrating seamlessly into a culture profoundly different to their own stanch lack of spirituality and brotherhood to find it millions of miles away on a crumbling, dying world restored to the peak of lush, elegant sentience. Their lack of horns or milky green skintone no longer mattered, the way their antennae flicked and picked up every minute sound fascinated Vortlings in the best of ways, and their PAK technology made them no different to the billions of biological bodies living genially around them. Here, in the archaic, primal hum of strung together accents and lilting staccato bouncing over their quivering stalks as they were showered in sour smelling, flittering smoke to ritually cleanse them to meet the court, as they stooped on command and had their cheeks smeared with herby balms and pastes to ensure now foul spirits or luck would follow them beyond the threshold, Red and Purple were Vortian.
Red stuck out his tongue to the gritty feeling of salt and goopy herbs smacked up over his skin as he straightened back up and continued to follow behind the gently bouncing horns of his esteemed King and best friend. "This is kind of weird, Pur." He whispered under the droning throng of continuous song. "I feel like I'm in a cult or something."
Purple rolled his eyes and hushed him under his breath with a hiss, blinking when Pem glanced back over his shoulder with a tiny, one-eyed warning stare to urge them to keep their talking to a minimum as ritual words were exchanged to clear the air and raise the energy they would need to cross whatever threshold they were told about. "I know it's weird, but they requested us to be here so it's not like we have much of a choice." He mumbled back, turning to watch his lover out of the corner of his eye. "It's just one trial, Red, how bad could it be?"
Red shrugged under the thin flittering material of his robe, growing visibly uncomfortable with the amount of strange syllables grazing his senses that he didn't recognize as anything he had learned from his Vortian lessons. He wasn't even sure if they were Vortian to begin with, a concocted mix of startling yet otherworldly echoes of past formalized times leaking and bubbling up into the present to show off their unearthly, wraithlike beauty in the now. He couldn't think in the noise, feeling it almost become a part of his own carefully shrouded thought processes as he readjusted his loosening grip on Purple's hand when they neared a distant row of rigid cloaked figures, every bounce changing him at the molecular level and showing him the finer side of life he had previously never believed in. Red knew at his core that there was no such thing as deity; if there was a higher power, he wouldn't have been forced to suffer for as long as he had under the power and invisible thumbs of the now long deceased Control Brains or felt the need to turn to substance for even a twinge of happiness. Purple wouldn't have been brutally shamed for his concealed sexuality in the beginning of their friendship and would never have been forced to see the grisly horrors of bloody, organ spilling war. Lard Nar would have never been thrown in prison or have undergone the forced rape of his once prosperous planet as he lost everyone he held dear. Teem would never have to live in the world with dead eyes and a scar riddled back and Kez would never have been shamed for her diminutive stature in favor of her beautiful skills. And, Pem would never have been ruthlessly tortured for military advancement on Irk and his innocent daughter and wife would never have been ripped from his grasp, snapping his threadbare sanity and causing a booming chain reaction of mayhem and unneeded bloodshed throughout the star system. Red couldn't believe in a benevolent higher power like he had heard Lard Nar tell stories of how children still starved, women still felt pain, and men still died on the battlefield.
"Welcome."
Red blinked when he felt his partner's fingers slip respectfully away to fall at his side at the boom of a deep, resounding voice flooding the pinnacle of the gargantuan crystal cliff they had made their way to in the past hour. It was blinding, every ray of sunlight weaving through the light rain beaming back into the sky as an indistinct, magnificent foxtrot of wavering color and blistering spectrums of glowing celestial vapor licking around boots and ankles as Lard Nar helped Pem to the massive pedestal in the center of the icy clearing ringed with the staunch faces of the Vortian High Court. Each one seemed older than the last, grey and mauve skin dotted and painted with deepest stress wrinkles and beady eyes glaring back in unnerving hues from beneath dark, shadowy hoods as a guard cleared her throat behind them and ushered Purple and Red on together to follow from where they stood, wary of the unknown events to come. They took a tentative, joint step forward towards the incredibly massive, interstellar crystal protruding nearly a mile into the sky, its jagged tip obscured by the welcome comforter of clouds slowly peaking away to reveal the light of the powerful sun beating down upon them all and searing them into submission. It was by far the largest natural wonder either of them had ever had the privilege of witnessing first hand, a true marvel of the astounding, formidable abilities of mother nature to overshadow any form of unnatural technology popping up in cities to drown out the resonance of the planet. Purple was just as nervous as Red, following close behind and watching in utter confusion as Pem reached out with a shaky hand and placed his palm against a well worn area dug into the crystal with age, a place every other criminal and truth-seeker had the audacity to touch for thousands upon thousands of judiciously masked cycles. It was a wonder that Miyuki's Elite didn't destroy this sacrosanct place, leaving it completely intact for some unknown reason rooted deep in mind-numbing fear and utter, unbelievable respect even she couldn't surmount out of understanding that her own life would be in perilous jeopardy. Lard Nar did the same, falling in next to his now trembling partner as he took a deep shuddering breath and smoothed his palm up into a well-touched dip in the milky quartz as he flinched, glancing back for further instruction as Purple and his mate waited with bated breath and unnerved disorientation when the High Council began to mutter pointlessly under their antique breaths to one another.
"Please, take your places. We are excited to have your kind here with us today." A voice sounded from the head of the ring, stepping forward with a small nod beneath her hood when Red blinked and opened up an argumentative spat Purple wasn't expecting.
"What do you mean our kind? Take our places for what?" Red asked suspiciously, eyeing the Head Judge with skepticism when she pulled back her shroud and revealed a curiously unanticipated young face of a woman barely past 200. She wasn't Vortian, but Inquisitorian, her bright cherry eye and feelers rubbing delicately as she looked Red head to toe with increasing curiosity.
Her face was painted with strange symbols and smeared with creamy white herbs neither of them recognized and her long eyelashes were coated in a generous layer of pastel glitter, her needlelike feet clinking delicately against the crystal as she moved forward to ignore Red's question completely and instead caress the gargantuan gem like a child. Her quivering mandibles shivered and her spine visibly twitched beneath her clothing as she let her great eye roll back in her skull, words spilling from her tongue in hundreds of dialects faster than any of them could possibly comprehend. The circle around them held firm, linking hands as Purple glanced in unnerved stiffness over his shoulder when the rest of the court bowed their heads in unwarranted, undying respect for whatever disturbing scene was unnervingly unfolding before their bewildered gawks, Lard Nar and Pem doing the same as the provisional prophetess writhed and twitched dexterously against the cool surface, moving forward to plant a kiss to the side of the crystal as a gargantuan pulse ricocheted in the form of a powerful flood of bright magenta light through the cliff followed by a ground shattering throb, nearly knocking Purple off of his heeled boots with a yelp of stunned surprise as he scrambled to grab at the crook of his husband's arm for leverage, swallowing his mounting anxieties when the Inquisitorian woman turned back with a glassy look behind her retina. A Vortian man broke the circle, bounding forward with a handful of light herbs and flower petals to scatter them over the prophetess's form as she took a deep, near bottomless inhale of the floral scent and nodded with an odd, otherworldly knowing that only set Red further on edge as he watched.
She brought a touch to her lips with a faint, motherly smile and silenced his ferocious inquisitiveness before he could snap once more, leaning forward to pierce his soul with her fervent gaze and feed on information neither one of them understood how she knew. "You're so full of anger from the hundreds of conflicts you've fought, Irken man. I can see every plasma shot flying from your pistol as you killed, every tear you shed for the children's lives you were forced to take, and every lonely night you spent drinking yourself to numbness because you couldn't handle what you'd done." She whispered, taking a few steps forward again speaking before Red could open up a hot, feral dispute at the private swathes of humiliating information being spread before him. "You hate yourself at your core," She mused, narrowing her eye before flashing him a loving smile, "and you are still addicted to sedatives no matter how hard you've tried to keep your tongue away from the. But…there's something else." She reached up and lightly prodded Red in the center of the chest with a pointed mantis-like appendage. "You are worthy to go."
She turned away from the look of stunned silence and instead eyed Purple, scrutinizing every nervous vault of his eyes and twitch of his fingers as he unconsciously moved further into Red's arm for warmth. "With you I can see internalized hatred and self-loathing for the creature you think you have become. You were so lost in the beginning, child, yet so aware of everything you were when you fell in love with an angry man who paid you no mind and first left you to your ways. You tortured yourself in the name of love and never once gave that very same feeling of acceptance to yourself." She brushed aside Purple's cloak as he jolted and opened his mouth to speak, blinking in shock when he found his voice had been disturbingly stolen by some unnatural force as he glanced to Red, noticing his husband had been trying to frantically shout something to no avail, reaching up to snatch at his own throat to try and massage the sound free with no success. "There is still some of that self-doubt lingering inside your heart and keeping you prisoner to your own uncertainties, but, I suppose you are also worthy of going."
Going where? Wasn't this supposed to be a trial for Pem? Wasn't this to determine if he was to return to prison or not? Why were he and Red becoming involved? What did all of this nonsense mean and how did this prophetess and High Judge know about their deepest, most guarded secrets and mistakes? Why were their friends digging their fingers into the colossal quartz spanning the atmosphere in front of them and why did it seem to have a mind of its own?
Uncomfortable. Visceral. Galactic. Eerie.
She took Purple's hands between her feelers with a gentle grin, trying to get pacify the mounting distress he felt for his voice having been so ruthlessly taken from his throat, following out of terrified respect for the strange judge's power as she guided him on to his place against the crystal and helped him to latch his claws against the smooth side before going back to Red and repeating the same. The two exchanged a look of utter terror as she extended up on her non-existent toes to pat them both gently against their balm smeared cheeks before moving joyfully on to Lard Nar, who held his breath in tentative anticipation for the bizarre evaluation taking place before the equally odd trial could begin.
"Ah, the new King of Vort." She chuckled airy, as he silently gulped and gave her a tiny nod to keep going. "You are so nervous about everything, always worrying excessively of what you are doing is right or wrong in the eyes of others and thinking that every time you indulge for yourself that you are somehow selfish. There is kindness in you, but you also allow others to trample you like an insect which is highly unfair to your own mental health." She brushed up between his horns and shrugged. "Your friends and family will help you see your own personal power in time. But, still, you are also worthy to go."
Lard Nar visibly slacked and sighed in relief, slumping against the surface of the crystal and flashing his tall brothers a wide-eyed beam that had them curling their lips in utter misunderstanding. None of this process had been explained; Purple had expected them both to waltz into a courthouse like the Spike of Judgement, watch Pem be ruthlessly grilled under a searing hot spotlight, and then heartlessly judged by the High Court for his wrongdoings before carting him away to his incarceration for the rest of his days. His daughter would go to Lard Nar like the two had agreed, and Lard Nar's political credibility would be forever tarnished for bringing back a terrorist no one had asked for. But this, this was transcendent, oracular, and alarming all in the same breath, a mashed concoction of ancient Vortian mysticism, judicial freedoms, and divine power rolled together to become something that any unsuspecting Irken would find erroneous. Pseudo-spiritualism wasn't present on Irk when the Empire existed, many Irkens believing that technology was the key to life rather than unseen forces that were unexplainable. But here and now, Purple didn't know what to believe, disturbed by the uncanny knowledge the Inquisitorian seeress had over his thoughts and terrified to think anything else should she somehow hear.
The seeress chuckled and gave him a playful wiggle of her feeler, alerting him that she could hear every question lilting and bouncing through his confused mind as she moved on to Pem at last, tutting her tongue against the roof of her mouth as she evaluated the extensive damage that had been done on his body the previous day from his karmic torture.
"Pem Goor, you are a true enigma." She shook her head teasingly as he tried to blink away his agony from his pounding skull. "You are not the worst here, believe me, we have all been forced to do terrible things. But, what appalls me most about your past is that you did these things under the guise and excuse that it was needed to perform revenge against those who wronged you, becoming wrong yourself." She whispered through the drizzle, watching as Pem attempted to open his mouth but failed. "You cannot continue on this path of self-destruction or you may not have another chance at the life you have been so graciously given. But," she took a deep breath and thought as the little Vortian waited with a sudden horror paling his wounded features, "She will allow you to go. This time."
The High Judge pulled away completely when Pem threatened to cry in reprieve, thankful beyond his wits for the opportunity he had been blessed with to move on to whatever trial they were going to together.
"The other three shall be along shortly. Don't worry, She has put them somewhere safe for the transfer to the Beyond." She explained, tapping carefully on the crystal and giggling when Purple's voice was restored with a gasp.
"W-What are you talking about, the other three? Where are you taking us?!" He blurted out on impulse, searching the young, genial face of the cosmic prophetess as she merely sighed in delight.
"You are going to have your souls weighed against the judgement stone. All seven of you who She has brought together from the moment of your birth. You were entwined to meet, you were destined to clash, and prophesized to save. And here you are, standing at the Trial I knew you would come to from the moment I was conceived and given rational thought, fulfilling your final purpose before you are released from the cycle of pain you have been tasked to endure for the cosmos." She breathed, leaning forward and smoothing over Pem's eyelid with her feelers as Purple watched through his escalating pulse as she leaned down and kissed him upon his lips.
A powerful, retina-searing, green light bounded forward from his palm and shot up the length of the crystal, illuminating the sky and the dissipating clouds as it rocketed off and out of sight, leaving his body to fall cold and limp against the ground as Purple cried out and pulled his hand free from the gemstone beneath his fingertips.
"What the hell?!" He shouted, reaching out and ripping his husband's hand away to clutch protectively at his wrist. "What did you do?! What was that?! None of this is making any sense with all this stupid talk of trials and then bodies are hitting the ground?! I'm not doing that!"
"Please," The High Judge remained patient and soft, "replace your hands on the transmitter so you can follow your brothers. Where they are going, is where you shall be tried in the name of your lives. Your bodies will be kept safe here in the circle with the High Court while you convene with Bab Ut'alla, and when she returns you, you will be placed in your proper vessel once more." She did the same to Lard Nar who took her touch willingly, letting his eyes flutter shut as she stooped to brush her mouth against his and spasmed, this time a bright yellow light flew forth and rippled beautifully up the length of the quartz as his knees buckled and he fell to the hard ground. "Which one of you would like to follow next? The others, Teem, Kez, and Nea Gen are already waiting to begin their assessment with your family."
Red threw his hands before him and shook his head in defiance, moving forward to glare down at the now indifferent seeress staring back up at him with an unmoved blink at his supposed threatening bristle. "I'm not going anywhere and neither is my husband. I'm not letting you touch him, and we're not doing any of this creepy Vortian bullshit. I don't care what you think you're trying to achieve with all these stupid magic tricks, but they're not gonna fool us." He grumbled irately, slinging his arm around his partner's hip to guide him on back down the coast. "Come on, Pur, we're leaving."
"I was hoping I wouldn't have to do this, but unfortunately, this way stings a bit since you're not touching the transmitter." The High Judge mumbled forlornly, reaching up as Red spun back around in confusion before snapping her fingers with a smile and watching as they both tried to shout before collapsing completely to the ground in a heap atop one another, two balls of bright violet and crimson light streaming forward and fazing through the powerful mineral and following the same path as the others.
The seeress stared up at the sky and let her smile fade, instead bringing her long feelers together with a slow blink and a thick swallow as she bowed her head in respect and went to collect the limp bodies of the accused.
"May the truth be shown."
Purple coughed when he was met with a face full of spongy dirt coating his teeth, immediately pushing up and spitting violently to the side when his body swallowed on impulse. He gagged a bit and plucked a pebble from his tongue in disgust, shaking the woozy, bizarre dissociation from his mind and immediately realizing that his partner had landed on his back when the seeress caused them to fall to their knees. He grumbled irritatedly under Red's weight and elbowed him hard in the side, feeling him groan at the stiffness in his bad shoulder and roll off to stare up at the now star speckled display unfolding above them. Purple couldn't feel his toes, rolling his ankles and digging his claws into the soft moss beneath him before freezing when he realized his clothing had been completely stripped away and he had been left completely nude.
Where…where were they?
What had the High Judge done to them all?
He began to panic, forcing himself up to a sit and realizing in utter dread that they were no longer on the diamond speckled, carbon cliffs of the Vortian coast but instead in the middle of a deep, yawning forest splayed with magenta foliage and thin trees waving gently in the sweet breeze. He closed his eyes and drank in the enticingly familiar scent he hadn't had the privilege of knowing for over a cycle now, almost immediately letting go of his abrupt fear in favor of taking in the gorgeous realizations he had dreamed about. It was Naphrus; fluttering velvet grass kissed at his naked body as he crossed his legs and stared up at the pristine Irken Nebula stretching infinitely in hues of violet and deep pinks, taking away his breath as the homesick tears he had held back for months threatened to spill out across his cheeks when Red too laid awestruck in the undergrowth cradling his spine. There was no pain here, every bodily ache moving down to Red's fingers as he sighed against the ground and rolled onto his side, letting every lingering twinge and remembrance flood away from his appendages and ground itself miles beneath him, leaving him completely free of the wartime shackles that had loitered in his bones and his devastated muscles for over half of his grueling life. Purple felt it too, running his fingers up over his massive scar to trace every raised bit of flesh he could find and smiling softly to himself when all his mind-numbing agony and memories of his time in battle were muted to leave behind only the warmest, most pleasant feelings he had ever known.
Happiness, elation, true love, brotherhood.
Red struggled to his feet, not bothering to cover himself as he glanced about apprehensively through the light in the trees and noticed that the rest of their family had been thrown into the bizarre reality they were now sharing together. Pem and Lard Nar mumbled under their breath as they came to, followed by a tiny sneeze from Nea from where she had landed in a soft floral shrub. Kez and Teem fought to maintain their balance against the moist, sun warmed dirt beneath their bare toes, antennae hard at work discerning the familiar sounds and sights of their home region with increasing curiosity and suspicion. Red frowned and extended a hand down to his mate, tugging him up and shrouding him away from the prying eyes of the world as he pressed their chests together and held him close, immediately trying to form a plan of attack.
"Where are we?" Kez piped up, clamping a hand between her legs with a humiliated peep of mortification when she realized the rest of her family could see her body. She screeched and bounded behind Teem who threw her hands on her hips as if she didn't care, scenting the air with her feelers and coming up short for what could have happened. "Don't look at me! D-Don't look at my bits! W-We were just getting ready to leave the house for the park when…when…I don't really know what happened!"
Teem stuck out her tongue to physically taste the atmosphere as Pem wheezed and forced himself up, blinking in confusion when he found the excruciating burn in his face had subsided. "Weird. This place smells like home." She breathed, leaning down to run her fingers through the grass, plucking a blade and bringing it to her mouth to suck on the saccharine liquid pouring from the cut. "Oh my Vort, it is home! We're home!" She exclaimed wildly, flying down and feeling for Kez as she shrieked and tried with all her might to keep herself concealed, spinning them around in the beautiful clearing as she laughed enthusiastically. "I can't believe were actually here! I don't even care how we got here all I want is for the bar to be cleaned up so we can get her back in business and-"
"I'm not sure this is home." Red cut her off, digging his claws protectively into the small of Purple's back as he placed his hands upon his shoulders. "It looks like it, and smells like it, but there's no way we're actually here. Irk was torn apart by canon fire and I've seen the pictures of what Naphrus looks like now. It doesn't exist anymore." He mumbled warily feeling his sensitive instincts begin to kick in as he scrutinized every falling leaf and every slight breeze. "Lard Nar, Pem, what the hell was that back there? What did that judge do to us?"
Pem sighed shrugged in equal bewilderment, staring up at his new family with a look of genuine perplexity glazed in his good eye. "I dunno. I've never been on trial and what I've heard about them is that you touch the crystal, kiss the lady, and then Bab Ut'alla sends her a message if you're guilty or not." He explained uncomfortably as Nea hopped down from the bush with a giggle and bounded over, unperturbed by her lack of clothing. "It's supposed to be a simple five minute thing where She evaluates all the witnesses and comes up with a verdict but…I don't even know where to begin with this." He grew twitchy and unnerved, gesturing shakily to the Irken countryside he had only set foot upon a few times. "This isn't…is this real? Are we all dead or something?"
"D-Dead?! W-We're dead?!" Lard Nar reached up and raked his hands down his face, scrunching into himself as everyone began to shift with quickly escalating terror. "Pem is this what it feels like to be dead?!"
Pem clenched his fists and began to pace. "How should I know?! I don't remember what it was like to be dead because…I was dead! I didn't have any memory because I was a rotting corpse!"
Kez shivered into Teem's hold. "But how are we here if you all were thousands of miles away at the coast?! We weren't in a teleporter or anything and I'm pretty sure no one knocked us our or kidnapped us!" A single horrified tear rolled down her cheek as she nuzzled against her wife's chest and threatened to give in to her terror. "I-I don't wanna die! I'm not ready!"
"I don't wanna die either!"
"Daddy, are we gonna die?"
"No, sweetheart, everyone else here is just a dimwit."
"Hey! Don't call me a dimwit, dimwit!"
"Great comeback."
"Vort, at least come up with something creative to call one another!"
"Everyone, calm down, this isn't getting us anywhere!" Purple snapped suddenly, raising his voice and immediately hushing everyone's incessant chatter as he pulled away from his partner and clamped a hand between his legs when Pem decided to evaluate him for the first time. He turned back to Red who had begun to try and get his bearings, scanning the sky and mapping out the stars in his mind, throwing his hands out in front of him in utter bewilderment when he noticed they were completely different than he remembered. "Honey, do you remember that book you were reading from the human world when we were still Tallest? I don't remember what it was called, but I'm pretty sure it talked how humans try to leave their bodies to go other places." He pointed out, watching closely as his partner ran through the massive amounts of information stored in his mind.
Red cocked his head when his antennae shot straight in understanding. "Hey, wait a minute, you're right!" He cried out, grabbing his mate by the shoulders with a wide grin of final understanding. "Pur, you're a genius!"
Teem groaned from behind, shying back when she felt Nea laugh to herself and skitter across her foot in the undergrowth as she innocently played with fallen leaves. "Geez, why don't you tell the rest of us, dumbass?" She demanded sarcastically, rolling her sightless eyes when she was sure her friend had shot her a look.
Red cleared his throat and spoke back up, glaring in Teem's direction for the entire duration of his strange, otherworldly explanation. "I had this book that talked about the methods of spiritual communication amongst planets around the universe. I don't remember where I picked it up or why, but there was a section in it about how Earthenoids can separate their soul from their body to travel to different existences." He paused for a breath, letting the information sink in as disoriented glances were exchanged. "They all call it astral…astral something. Projection maybe? I don't know but, if Purple is right, couldn't that be what's happening? The High Judge said we would return to our bodies after the trial was over."
Pem snorted in disbelief, shaking his head in incredulity with a flippant eye roll. "Ugh, that's ridiculous!" He laughed dismissively, stooping to scoop up his daughter in his arms when she grabbed up for his hold. "That's the most unscientific thing I've ever heard in my life! You really think that we'd leave our bodies just to come back to them later?"
Lard Nar blinked at the statement, walking between the two when they shot daggers in each other's directions. "Actually, it's perfectly logical. I brought you back from the dead." He pointed out, earning a confused gape from his partner as he tried to rationalize that he had been wrong for once. "And I watched your essence shoot up the crystal. I figured it was something theatrical to scare us into compliance, but I guess not."
Compliance? Was this all some strange, drug-filled tactic to gather information for the trial while they all slumbered together in some government controlled facility? No, Purple shook the strange connotation from his psyche as he continued to think things through rationally. This place was sensory; it smelled of sweet sugar, it felt of soft plants, and it glittered with immaculate starlight. The sounds were infinitely realistic down to the tiny insects buzzing aimlessly about their antennae, and the notion that they would all be able to converse actively in the same dream state was improbable. He grimaced, shrinking back into Red's shoulder and staring down at the familiar yet alien ground beneath their feet; this was real. They were all here together…wherever here was.
"Excuse me, if you're all done with your squabbling may I have a word?"
Everyone froze simultaneously, clinging to partners and eyes shooting wide when a small Vortian woman called out casually from the light undergrowth, waving her way around downed vines and protruding roots to step free into the clearing, the glow from the galaxy above illuminating her sparkling face as she sighed longingly and put her hands on her hips to look over each and every one of the beings she had waited so long to physically meet.
"Would you look at you all?" She sang beautifully, her voice echoing like a phantom throughout every nook and cranny in the cosmos around them before permeating the deepest reaches of their minds. "I'm so happy I could see this through."
"Who…" Red tried to speak up, immediately letting the words die on his lips when the being giggled and morphed before everyone's stunned eyes, stretching and contorting to take on the form of a tall, lanky Irken to better suit his stature. "H-How…how is that even possible?! What are you?"
The being wavered a bit more, observing every look of terrified awe before transforming yet again into the familiar face of someone long since passed on, a tall, cerulean man with an overdone crown and a vivid cherry eye raring for exploration and the coveting of fine art. Ab Seldhob. When the being spoke, it was not through his voice but it instead mimicked Purple's, stamping his high pitched whine throughout the whole of its vague explanation and tutting its tongue as it sat cross legged on the grass.
"There, this is an image that I know will make you all comfortable." Its voice switched again, bounding and leaping to pick up on Pem's nasal tone. "You are here because you are my kind. You are all my kind, and you must be evaluated."
Kez broke free from her wife's hold, leaping down and landing on expert feet. "E-Evaluated for what, exactly, Mr…Mrs…yes?" She mulled around how to address the formless anomaly as it laughed through Sledhob's mouth and reclined back, crossing its legs and staring up at the stars.
"Ah, yes. I am the one they call She. I am the one they call Bab Ut'alla, the Irken Original, the Great Universal Mother, and billions of other long lost epithets. You may call me what you wish." She waved her false feelers about as She tried to figure out where to start. "This is technically the trial of Pem Goor for war crimes against his state, and the Vortian planet has asked for divine guidance as to whether or not he shall be pardoned. But, I could not pass up the opportunity to finally meet you all in person. I made you to be my kind, to do something important for me and undergo a journey unlike any other seen in our universe, and I want you to see what would have happened if you had not followed the course of divine intervention. Sit, please."
No one objected, sitting immediately on the grass and huddling together in mutual fear for the omnipotent, whimsical being unfolding and shimmering before them as they listened to the final tale that made everything come together in complete, utter harmony, shock, distain, and warmed everyone completely to the bone when they realized they were all meant to be together once and for all.
"I help everyone find their path and you all are no exception, with a tiny bit more importance than some. I wanted that small invader to open up the Florpus and show then Tallest Purple what death was like so he would appreciate life and realize he needed to spend that with his partner. He was so cold and lost to his own animosity and forbidden love that he needed that push to venture to Naphrus and save his now husband, Red, from the fear of being lonely and desolate for the rest of his life. If you two had not gone to Naphrus, you would have been assassinated in a week by Prime Minister Ab Sledhob's personal guard during a conference over leadership on Vort. War would have erupted and Pem Goor would have given up his plot to overthrow you to head a faction of rebel terrorists to take over the west half of the planet by force and drive out the Inquisitorians, while Lard Nar would battle for the eastern half in the name of peace with the Resisty. You would have met in the middle and Lard Nar would have fallen in battle by the accidental shot of the man who loved him from prison, causing Pem to spiral into disarray and heartbreak and take his own life in his stronghold three miles beneath the surface. Without their leaders, the Vortian rebel alliance would fall, and Inquisitoria and Irk would attack each other's planets, killing billions and destroying both Empires. Nea Gen would be sold off to the children's black market and ended up as a slave on Plookesia to a man who would eventually starve her to death and mine half of the gold deposits from Vort, crippling any chance of economic regrowth on the planet. Teem and Kez would be shot by Inquisitorian soldiers in an IRM raid of an Irken military outpost and drown in their own blood. Racism would be rampant, the star system would fall into unbalance, planets would fight for control and annihilate whole races, and the Control Brains would sweep through the chaos and commandeer the rest of Irk and use the bodies of survivors to enslave everyone they came into contact with. Need I say more?"
Silence.
No one spoke for a long while, keeping to themselves as they watched in stupefied disbelief as the perfect mirage of Sledhob sat up with a sly nod. "Yet, you did not follow what you were destined to do, now did you? Why is that?" She waited for an answer, pushing herself up to her feet when She received none. "I did not want to see billions upon billions of my children die at the hands of something so unavoidable, so I altered the course of things a bit with that dastardly space hole. I'm sorry that you all had to endure so much pain, but your heroism has prevented one of the greatest catastrophes to date that even I can remember. I had to wait and see where you took things from there and I could not be…prouder. You really are my kind."
"Prouder? My kind? I don't understand." Pem breathed, shooting up when She beckoned him forward.
"Yes, my kind. A group of souls destined for greatness and willing to give up everything to save one another." She reached out and tapped Pem between the eyes when he reluctantly moved forward on shivering feet, squeaking in terror when She pulled up a massive screen of all of every memory he had ever had, looking them over with eager, judgmental scrutiny and the occasional nod. "You, Pem Goor, shall be pardoned by your people and walk free. In three cycles time you shall finish a full cycle of community service, reintegrate into society, attend the university of Hatalca for film and media and become…ah. This is quite unexpected now, isn't it?"
Pem swallowed, glancing up with his good eye at the eerie, planetary smile glittering back at him from above. "Is it bad? I-Is it that bad?" He mumbled under his breath, preparing for the worst as he squeezed his eye shut, allowing it to shoot wide when the ancient being chuckled.
She shook her head with a tiny giggle of amusement at the unneeded fear lacing his vision. "Oh, no, my darling. You'll become a successful talk show host for a Hatalcan television station. Your partner told you once that you're great with words, and you'll captivate millions with your sharp tongue and your charm. Please, however, stay on your medication and keep that tongue at bay when it's needed. Alright?"
Pem pulled away from She's feeler and stumbled back, landing hard on his side as he burst into tears at the incredible weight of death flooding away from his shoulders. "Y-You…thank you! Thank you for sparing me! I-I don't deserve this at all I don't-"
"I didn't spare you." She cocked her head in confusion, glancing to Lard Nar and snapping for him to walk forward, amused when he stumbled along gracelessly. "I don't understand you beings sometimes. You were made in the image of my people, but we are not gods; I am the one designated to evaluate your quadrant and keep balance here." She paused, tapping Lard Nar between the eyes as well and grinning when his thoughts were splayed for everyone to see. "We evaluate your existence and predict what is to happen based on your actions. Of course, we have some influence to sway what those actions may be, but the choice is ultimately up to you. Pem Goor, you saved yourself when you apologized and took the nasty beating you did."
Lard Nar held his breath when She bent down to look him over from behind his goggles, scrutinizing every nervous flicker of his eyes as he twitched and wrung his hands, trying to keep up with the blur of images flashing over the manifested screen.
She watched carefully, admiring every streaking color and flash of teeth. "You will also be pardoned for your actions and retain the love of the public. The Irken half of the planet will come to accept you as their leader once more in time, you will marry Pem Goor, attend several wars, and survive. Nea will be your adopted daughter with your husband and you shall both teach her the Vortian language on top of the Irken she knows." She giggled and let go of Lard Nar's face, growing bored with Sledhob's image with a yawn and transforming into the image of a human woman none of them recognized. "You will be alright, my son. Please don't worry too much about the little things anymore, alright?" She caressed down the side of his face in reassurance, lingering against his skin as he folded into her touch and let go of his internalized fears.
Lard Nar exhaled long and low, nodding and moving back when Nea bounded forward with excitement for her own turn despite her misunderstanding. "Oh! Oh! I wanna go! I wanna go! I wanna see the stuff too!" She screeched excitedly, grinning up when She barely touched her and immediately competed the sequence of her short life, watching as Nea's face fell flat in disappointment.
"Sweet child, you have not made enough decisions for me to see your course of action yet. All I can see is that you and your father have a chance at happiness now, and that you will never be alone again in this world." She breathed, stooping to press a gentle, tender kiss to the tip of Nea's budding horn as she wrapped her arms up around the strange being's shoulders, letting go with a toothy grin before bounding back to where Pem had taken Lard Nar's hands in his, leaning in to place a tender, slow kiss to his lips and seal their future together for the rest of their days.
She glided like air, twirling through the renewed hope growing in the clearing and stopping to hover above Kez, transforming into the vision of a small Irken male shorter than her by an inch, warming the officer's heart when she realized for once in her life that she felt taller in the moment. "Let's have a look at you, dear." She mused, quickly folding through Kez's anger filled tears at being too short for the Armada, her despondent time working in food service, and her profound love in finding her life mate. "I like you…Kindness is your greatest virtue. You and your wife will move down the street from your friends to have a home of your own where you will live until the end of your days. You will become a five star officer in the Royal Vortian Military as a communications specialist and you will remain in the top of your field until your retirement. Then, you will open a bakery from your home and sell the best strudels in Hatalca."
"Really? Y-You think they'll be that good?" Kez purred with a yawn, watching in peaceful confusion as Lard Nar, Pem, and Nea all proceeded to lay down and tranquilly fall asleep in the grass, fading out to nothing and disappearing gently from view as she too lowered herself down and reclined against Teem's bare leg.
"I know so, lovely." She reassured, turning into the spitting image of Utna and reaching up once more so brush back Teem's antennae as she shuddered serenely into the loving waves rushing down her body and showing off every idiotic thing she and Red did in the Smeetery as children, her first flight as a commander, and her dastardly time in the IRM trying her best to make a difference through illegal means. "Mm. You're a tough nut to crack, aren't you, Teem? Then again, that's how you always have been, isn't it? You will gain your sight back soon, my dear, when a doctor in the city develops new ocular implants for Irken patients struggling with sight malfunctions. You'll be able to fly again with your good friend, Red, and will join the Royal Military as a commander because you're bored with being retired after having seen how fun the toils of war have been for you. When you retire again, you'll help your wife with her pastries and write a novel about your time in the IRM that will become a bestseller."
Teem grinned, biting her lip as she allowed herself to be drug down by Kez, planting a victory kiss to her lips as they wrapped their arms around one another and were overcome by the incredible innocence of the moment unfolding around them. Every puzzle piece was clicking back into place, the two fading away into each other's grasp as She nodded in approval and turned finally to the only two Irkens left in the clearing.
"What am I going to do with you two?" She whispered, taking on the image of Purple's own visage and grabbing Red around the waist against his will, twirling him out into the swirling glass as She giggled and threw her head back at the awkward gawk plastered over his face as he tried to turn to Purple for help, looking away for one second before moving back and locking eyes with himself. "You've always been one of my favorites, Red. You're so worn out but still so absolutely strong." She chuckled, tugging him into a loose embrace as She watched Purple over his shoulder with a loving, affectionate half smile. "I've watched you two ever since I was given control of this part of the universe and I knew you would be destined for greatness under the right circumstances. I hate to say it, but you needed to be broken in order to heal properly for the first time." She took Red by the hand and brought him over to where Purple stood, flying up to tap them both between the eyes at the same time and watch the glorious, long, sometimes harrowing life they had built together.
There was war. Screaming. Bloodshed. Plasma fire. Pills. Alcohol. All of Red's vices streaming in rapid succession as She watched carefully and evaluated the worth of his soul, ticking off every bad thing he had ever done and weighting it with the good as images of his terrible expansion as Tallest came next, watching as he threw empty cans in the faces of his subordinates and laughed at his service drones when they tripped out of sheer exhaustion. Purple was no better, cowering on his own and shrouding his secret love interests as a mechanic, dodging service, and fighting violently with Red as they exchanged words of malice as Tallest before becoming good friends and torturing those around them for the sake of the fun of it. Then, came the anguish in Naphrus, the disgusting, visceral, gory explosion of the Massive, and the war that they had fought together to overcome everything they both feared more than anything. But, sprinkled inbetween, there was a bottomless, undying, persistent feeling neither one of them managed to fight off no matter how many others had told them they would never make it…love.
Love.
She took special care with them both, slowing down every memory the two shared slow dancing in their room at night because they wanted to feel close, every tiny gift exchanged just because, every amorous, incredibly gorgeous kiss planted against eager lips after their radiant ethereal marriage because the spark between their beating hearts had never died down. All they could do was watch, standing nude in the warmth of the false Irken summer swirling around them like the caress of an ancient mother, entwining fingers and bringing soft lips together when She stopped on an image of the two in the Spike of Judgement overcoming their deepest, most grisly, horrific fears as they stood before the Control Brains and shared the monumental kiss that shattered what little respect their people had for their position as Tallest, labeling them as social pariahs and exiling them a full cycle in advance when they would be officially asked to leave by force. They had done that over the Intergalactic News, splaying their relationship for everyone to see regardless of the consequences, reminding them both how far they had come for the sheer, unabridged feeling of a devotion so pure, so unadulterated that they would rather die than never be next to one another as the flawless halves to a whole.
Red felt his partner cry against him, sniffing and reaching up to wipe away his tears from his flushed cheeks before Purple closed his deep violet eyes and brought their foreheads together to listen to the beauty of what She had to say about their future.
"Red, I won't lie to you, you're going to struggle with drugs for the rest of your life. You will get high again." She whispered as they snuggled closer to one another and smoothed up over gentle, delicate shoulders, noticing the strange formless feeling within their stilling chests grow as She gave them their final proclamation and freed them from the cycle of destined war and torment they had finally beaten once and for all. "But, you will have your husband here to keep you safe. Look at me, son."
Red didn't want to pull away, grinning into the feeling of Purple's soft lips against his cheek as he turned with wide, curious eyes to where he stared back at himself. "You mean we-"
"Yes. You'll be together happily until the day you die. You will have your ups and downs, you'll have a bit of financial trouble at first, but you will grow to live comfortably and peacefully on Vort until you die. When the Vortian Relief Movement is no longer needed, Lard Nar will ask you to join the Royal Military as his General where you'll lead successful campaigns and come home safely to your husband. You'll be very popular with the crowds, you'll run a summer camp for children after you retire to teach them how to fly, and you'll be….oh. Oh! Oh my, this is unexpected!" She pulled back in shock, immediately closing off the string of memories as Red was overcome by a bizarre sleepiness unlike any other, folding into Purple's hold as he yelped and tried to keep his weary partner upright, panicking a bit when his form wavered and faded in his grip, fading out to nothing and slipping away like the others.
"Wait! Wait, Red? Red?!" Purple glanced about the clearing as he called, looking back to where She had grown flustered, shrugging a bit and letting her eyes trail down to his abdomen as she thought. "Why did he disappear where is he? Where is everyone?"
"Hush now, love." She whispered, trudging over in the false body of his lover to graze a palm over his tear streaked face, looking deeply into his eyes with a profound adoration and boundless pride for who he had grown to become. "None of you will remember anything after this. I brought you here to release you from what you were destined to achieve and allow you to live normal, happy lives as a family. You deserve that, Purple of Veloria. You deserve that." She leaned in and wrapped her arms up under his, squeezing him tight as She took a deep, shuddering breath at the anticipation of what was to come.
Purple rested his chin on the shoulder of the guardian that had watched over him for cycles without his knowledge, feeling genuinely, truly safe in her hold despite not knowing her true name or origins. She was She. She was the Universal Mother, the Irken Original, Bab Ut'alla. She was the guardian of them all regardless of where they came from or who they were, who they had hurt or who they had helped, and she was the cosmic mother Purple had always secretly hoped he had somewhere out there in the stars.
"So, I won't remember you?" He mumbled against her skin as she grazed her fingertips along the edge of his PAK. "I won't remember any of this? What will I think happened?"
"You'll remember…one thing. We'll get to that in a minute." She whispered sheepishly, pulling back and retrieving his memories once again from his mind. "When you wake up back at the transmitter on Vort, you'll just think that Pem was pardoned by trial like you should. He's misguided, darling, so try to give him some extra support in this liminal time and keep him on the right track to his destiny."
Purple swallowed and reluctantly nodded at the thought of having to be nice to someone once so terrible, looking back to the flickering screen behind her as She grazed the surface with her palms. "Aren't you lonely here?" He asked suddenly, the question spilling from his tongue against his will and immediately sinking into himself when he realized how unnecessary it was. "Ah…I'm sorry. That's personal, I guess."
"I'm not lonely." She replied genuinely, urging him to relax with the sincerity in her voice as she sighed and weighed his soul's worth. "I meet everyone when they die, sometimes we meet earlier like now, and we get to be good friends when they move on to the Beyond. We have dinners and we dance and have fun like a massive community." She giggled and sat on the tenderly flittering grass, enjoying the wind on her face and delighted when Purple joined her. "Ab Sledhob is there and he's a riot, always telling stories to the younglings who passed on early. Utna was reunited with her father Hoc Nulol, and Urb Yen and Slad Nuch cook together every Friday."
Purple couldn't help but chuckle a bit, watching as a beautiful, fast-paced meteor shower opened ahead and lit up their faces with streaking colors, casting shadows gently over their angular features. "So…when we die everyone goes to the same place?" He didn't understand, thinking back through what he had been taught as a smeet that they rotted in the ground and their PAKs were then transferred to a new body. "What about Irkens? We're given life through cloning and PAK technology. We usually take a new body when-"
"You only took a new body because your Brains told you to." She retorted, laying back with a flippant yawn to admire the flaming balls of ice and fire juxtaposing together through her fake, makeshift atmosphere. "You were once born the way all others were, with a mother and a father, but your ancestors thought it would be more efficient if you became half machine. Your bodies were created for warfare and prolonged life, but do you truly understand the beauty of life?"
Purple thought a moment, running over every tiny Smeet he had the privilege to meet on the planet after they had defected from the horror that Irk had become. They were all so innocent now that they weren't training constantly for bloodshed, poking at shiny things and toys like the rest of the children on Vort and being scooped up by improvised parents across the countryside to raise like Vortlings. They were interesting, strange, and infinitely curious about everything around them, something that Purple himself didn't remember feeling as a child. All he remembered was the cold touch of a robotic appendage, the rolling band of a conveyer belt, and the excruciating fit of a PAK to his back to give him "life." Now that the Control Brains were dead and gone, PAK technology had become a vessel purely to house the personality of an Irken and all of their equipment; there was no more body regulation, no more mind regulation, and no more controlling of the senses like had become so typical of his society before. They were free to feel powerful emotions such as love and anguish, pain and sickness, need and longing.
Was this…life?
He shook his head, coming back to the shock that She had experienced at looking at Red's own lifetime in the future, frowning when he realized she hadn't told him the whole of what was to come. "My husband…you didn't tell him everything. Why?" He muttered under his breath, falling back to her level. "Is there something bad coming in his future you didn't want him to know about?"
She saw the misperception flash over her son's face, rolling onto her side to swipe a soothing touch down his arm as he thought. "Let's talk about your future, shall we? Then, things might make more sense for you two. I…hm. I never like having this talk because I never know what kind of reaction people will have to things like this. Sometimes it's ecstatic elation, other times it's despondent depression." She began, propping herself up on her elbow as she spoke. "You will remain on Vort with your husband until you both are gone, building up your little home with pictures of your wedding and having date nights like you both enjoy. You personally will become so well known for your skills as a mechanic that you will work on the vehicles of the Vortian Aristocracy and become a designated stop for all career politicians stopping through the capitol. But…there's something else that I didn't expect to see. I never thought about it after the Control Brains were deactivated and their influence was removed from your technology that something like this could even conceivably happen, but I should have known."
Purple grew uneasy again when a flushed color flooded up to She's face, coating the image of his husband with a bright, uncharacteristic pink that was almost hilarious to witness. "It's nothing bad is it?" He desperately wanted to know, wanted her to scratch the itch deep inside his mind and finally pacify his disturbed discomfort, freezing when She reached out and placed a shaky palm over Purple's abdomen.
"Here."
"…What?"
"It's here."
"What's there? Am I sick?"
"No. But you're going to change. Your life, and the life of your husband, is going to change for the better for what I see. All of the Control Brain's blockers inside your hardware were removed. Medical blockers, psychological blockers, and breeding blockers."
Purple nearly choked, shooting up almost slipping down the gentle slope they had decided to lay upon. He clamped a hand over his mouth as his thoughts raced with harrowing, unexpected possibilities for what the wraithlike creature could mean, settling on the same damming conclusion each and every time as he cycled back through his personal timeline in his mind. No. That was impossible. Sure, Irken males held both male and female biology, but it didn't work that way. The Control Brains had deemed it to where breeding was defunct, completely extinct and rendering the race infertile to the extreme for hundreds upon hundreds of tedious cycles.
The Control Brains were no longer.
Their policies and influence were no longer.
Did that mean…did that mean….
"Do you understand?" She leaned forward and took Purple lightly by the shoulders, running her comforting touch up to his jawline as he started to cry, slinging himself forward around her formless, ever changing body and feeling the same scars dotting his husband's back under his fingertips as he grappled with what the world-shattering news meant. "I didn't want to say this before your mate, even if he will forget, because this is your news to give."
"What news?" Purple could barely squeak the words out, a flushed wave of terror combined with a strange, otherworldly happiness almost knocking the precious wind out of him as he sobbed openly into the bare shoulder of his interstellar mother. "I-I…I never thought…when is it gonna happen?!"
She shushed him leisurely, brushing over his antennae as his mind swam with torturous overtones and swelled with gorgeous reverberations alike, a firestorm of clashing emotion swamping him down in his own sticky tears and shuddering shoulders as his PAK alerted him to his failing cognition. "It's happening now. This is the one thing I want you to remember when you leave this place; that you're going to be a parent to you your husband's smeet."
Purple pulled away, feeling his insecurities melt away into something deeper and substantially more profound as it leaked into every crevice of his being and filled every cell with a glowing radiance that he couldn't fathom. He brought a hand down to his abdomen and caught himself smiling through his blinding tears and bleary eyes, utterly shocked and floored with thick disbelief and skepticism, terrified of how he was to care for a life so tiny, but oddly, excruciatingly excited beyond his rational belief as he threw his head back and yelled to the glittering cosmos around them, screaming and laughing out every thrilled, eager noise bubbling up in the back of his throat.
"You won't have to worry about PAK technology. I remember natural born smeets when Irkens were first formed from carbon and hydrogen, before the Control Brains demanded those be fitted to your biology to control you." She laughed over his enthusiasm when he burst into another round of untamable tears and clamped his hands over his eyes.
"H-How?! How?! My…m-my smeet is gonna…oh Vort I'm having a smeet!" Purple shouted on a repeated loop through choking sobs and giddy, adrenaline fueled giggles. "W-We…we…Red and I…just…holy shit! How? Red is gonna be a father?! I-I'm gonna be a father?! But I don't know how to be a parent! T-that's not in my coding!" He peeled his hands away and blinked away his salty smokescreen, feeling his core warm when She laid him back down in the grass and pressed a slow, lingering kiss to his forehead before using the long fingers of his husband to dry his raw cheeks.
"It's in your DNA…love. That's what you're made of now and," she snaked a hand down to his bare stomach as he began to lull and drift off, fighting against the heavy, swimming feeling of infinite sleep taking his mind and cupping it in its affectionate hands, "so is this one here. I'm proud of you for saving billions because you've been so brave, but I want you to have the life you deserve now. The pain is over, the violence is over, you will never have to kill again. Your husband will be a pilot in the military but will return safely to you, and your daugh-…I mean your smeet will grow up to be safe and healthy with the most courageous, loving parents I will have created yet."
"W-what? Did you say...daughter? I-I...my...where…where am I?"
"Don't worry, you're going home now. Rest, darling…rest."
"Purple, come on."
Purple jolted from where he had been sitting, blinking the sleep from his eyes and swallowing his disgust when he noticed he had been drooling down his chin. Ugh. He glanced about, shivering in the abrupt cold wind of the coast and looking up when Red extended a happy, gracious palm down, hoisting him up with a grin from the hard backed crystal he had dozed off on.
"Geez, you idiot. You slept through the whole trial." Red chuckled, guiding his exhausted partner on towards the edge of the cliff as Pem and Lard Nar were met with the chatter of thousands of reporters swarming around their police ship, all trying to snap a prime photo of the new couple in the light of Pem's pardon.
Huh. Pem had been pardoned. Purple frowned when his husband moved his hand to the crook of his elbow as they strolled, overlooking the gorgeous, deep obsidian of the ocean below. It was almost as if a crushing weight had been lifted from their lives as his mind cleared and a fog lifted, the two passing by the High Judge on her way out of the consecrated circle as she flashed a strange, uncanny blink in their direction and hurried on out of sight with her entourage. Something felt…no. Purple didn't know what he felt. He lowered himself down when Red moved to the dangerous edge of the highest peak in the drop-off, dangling his legs over the smooth crystal and placing a hand over his partner's as they watched a gaggle of chipper seafaring creatures jump from the cavernous gelatin staring back up at them and splash back down as they cackled and played.
"Hey, Pur?" Red mumbled under his breath, tightening his grip on his lover's hand as he looked up. "I have a feeling things are gonna be way better for us now. I'm not sure why, but there's just something that tells me we're gonna be ok."
Purple met his deep, crimson gaze, remembering the first time he had ever had the privilege of seeing them, tracing every minute color shift behind his ocular lenses and grinning into the soul-piercing beauty of absolute, pure love shining back at him. "I'm glad you ended up being my kind, Red. I never told you that but…" He trailed off when a switch flipped in his memories, pulling his hand away and smoothing up over his abdomen through his long black cloak, digging his fingers into the tiny, firm pit in his stomach and letting his jaw go slack with an unanticipated tremor he hadn't been prepared for. "Holy…holy shit." He breathed, letting his eyes snap back up as Red eyed him suspiciously.
"Are you…alright?" He chuckled out his confusion, halfway choking when Purple reached out and slung his arms around his neck, holding him tight and burying his face in his partner's jaw as he came to the gorgeous, primitive, absolutely weightless realization that his sudden epiphany was true.
It was true.
All of it.
All of what?
Did it even matter now?
Purple smiled against Red's skin when he warmheartedly returned the embrace and pulled his partner in close, pressing their chests together and feeling his powerful pulse thumping in time with his through his PAK.
"I'm fine, Red. And…we're gonna make it. Teem and Kez are gonna be fine, Lard Nar and Pem are gonna be fine with Nea, and," he pulled back and leaned in, pressing a light, ecstatic kiss to his mate's lips and giggling when he flicked his antennae forward to savor the feeling.
"We're gonna be ok, now, as long as we have each other…all three of us."
THIS WAS THE LAST MAIN CHAPTER OF MY KIND LOVELIES! LIKE IS SAID, WE WILL HAVE AN EPILOGUE AFTER THIS TO CHECK UP ON HOW EACH AND EVERY ONE OF THESE WONDERFUL CHARACTERS ENDED UP, SO I HOPE YOU TUNE IN FOR OUR FINAL UPDATE!
I have a holiday function to go to soon, so our FINAL update will be on;
Monday, December 30, 2019 at 10:00 pm CDT (UTC-5)! I love you all and I hope you join me for the last update soon!
I'll be making another standalone RAPR fic after this one! I'll be filling a few requests from viewers, but also publishing a fic called "Fire in the Snow" which features Purple and Red meeting on the battlefield as cadets in the Elite. I can't say much else, but it'll be dark, somewhat sadistic, but also romantic (I can promise scenes too for those who want them) and will carry that signature dreary, desolate vibe of Charlokitty work! Love you all and that will be going up on January 1, 2020 at 10:00 pm CDT (UTC-5) and will take over the My Kind schedule if you're interested!