"Insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results... much like parenting."
One year later...
Heads Up!
The helmet's indicator panel below my chin flashed red. A fantom glow that echoed the eerieness of the void. Already aware of the problem, I glanced at the suit's wrist-comp for the time remaining. Damn. Only nineteen minutes left in the can. I switched off the warning. Should've swapped out the scrubber before going on a walk.
Eyes scanning the amorphous, characterless dark masses of debris on their ceaseless drift through the void. Each charred chunk of metal was as indiscernible as the next which meant there was nothing of monetary value worth scavaging. So at this point, it was for curiosity's sake... and, of course, more importantly, a few minutes of kid-free time for my sanity's sake. Beggers can't be choosers when adrift amongst a sea of stars. The closest habitable planetary system was a few light years out of reach.
I can spare two minutes. That'll still leave enough oxy to get back to the Try Hard.
The Endeavor, or more fittingly, the Try Hard, was originally a Bougainville-class attack transport that was later retrofitted as a deep space hauler... not all science produces progress. But, aye, she was home. And big enough for this werewolf to run loose in when needed.
The comm suddenly crackled painfully in my ears.
Piece of junk! The void take you!
"Hey, mum!" Devika squealed breathlessly, her four-year-old squeaky girl voice amplified by about a thousand. Sure the helmet came with sensitivity control, but I've yet to find a helmet with dampeners set to werewolf specifications. I doubted I ever would, but one could hope. So every time Devika's lively voice came over the comm, well, let's just say an ice pick to the brain would be marginally less painful.
"Dev, sweetheart, what have I said about using the comm system?" I touched my shoulder to my helmeted head in a futile attempt to make the ringing stop.
"Oh, right-" Devika abruptly cleared her throat. "-sorry. Oh, right." She whispered that last bit. Unfortunately, her jittering excitement was about as subtle as a klaxon. "Mum?"
A quick tap of the jet control and my angle adjusted, the momentum lazily pinwheeling me in a half-circle until Endeavor came into view.
"What does f-o-r-e-i-g-n b-i-o-l-o-g-i-c-a-l spell?"
"Foreign biological..." Bewilderment tightened my features. Prior scans hadn't detected any traces of organic matter. Of course, I'd only been scanning for Xenomorph pheromones because those particular apocalyptic cockroaches are one of the few things that could survive the near-vacuum of space.
And she'd said foreign. So not human. And not Xeno. Damn! I wish I could use my nose!
"I was right! I win!"
My silence must've given me away. In spite of the acute ringing gelatinizing my gray matter, a smile stretched out the snarl that had begun to form across my lips.
"Perhaps," I considered aloud. Eyes carefully traversing the remnant field with renewed interest. It rankled my wolf heart something fierce not to be able to use my nose, but there wasn't much that could escape my keen eyes.
"Mum!"
My whole body tensed at the raking shrill of her excitement. Kids seriously have no understanding of volume control. "Yes, sweetheart?"
"See anyphing?"
"Not yet." I double-checked my oxy. Fifteen minutes left. I glanced at the Endeavor, time to head back, and yet, a foreign biological signature could mean something. Was it worth the risk? My tired mom brain decided that yes, yes it was. It might be nothing, and it likely was nothing, but hey, another looksie meant more me time- relatively speaking anyway. And I would hold my breath if I had to in order to stretch it out.
"Have you tried using your nose?"
I snorted, "If I did that, my lungs would freeze into useless oxy-pops." Giggles filled my helmet. In actuality, my lungs would rupture in the near-vacuum but that wouldn't've been quite as funny. "Glad to know I'll be missed." That only made her laugh harder. I smiled too, even if the joke had been at my own expense and my dying a terrible death. "Dev, do you still have the goosies?" I asked while adjusting my path again.
"Yup!"
Some humans had the gift of second sight, my daughter experienced what she characterized as the goosies. A beneficial, albeit strange second-sense, but invaluable to a pack of salvagers living off the detritus of humanity and other space fairing species. Her perceptive skin crawlies were like a divining rod, only alarmingly more accurate. Well... most of the time... 75%- no. 80% of the time.
Profitable junk aside, Devika's goosies have landed this wolf stranded in hot water more than once.
And snow...
Warmth. Love. Pack. The stirrings of maternal ardor shocked my lips into a playful dancing grin.
"Hey, Devika-" I pushed forward a little, ghosting my way through the field. "-where's Sesshi'ki?"
Sesshi'ki and Devika were nigh inseparable. Any closer and one might subsume into the other. They were roughly a year apart. Devika was four and Sessi'ki was somewhere around five on both the physical and maturity scale to that of a human child. However, it was difficult to say for sure because Yautja aged differently than humans. And to complicate things more, Sesshi'ki and his brother, Roku, were half-bloods which made it even more difficult to pinpoint age.
"He had to poop," she trilled.
I rolled my eyes. Lovely. Okay, that one was on me. Bowel movements might be the only reason those two ever separated... though, not always. On the same wavelength, as it were, which was why I surmised they were close in age. Roku, on the other hand, well...
"And Roku?" I knew the answer, but I couldn't squash the compulsion to ask and hope to be surprised. Mother henning at its finest, and as a werewolf, I felt the urge twofold.
"Ro-ro's in the salvage room." Her baffled tone uttered an unspoken, "Where else would he be?"
I grunted. Not much else to say.
A soft continuous chirrup roused me from the unrest that had taken up residence in my heart. A ten-minute warning was displayed on my HUD. I tapped the highlighted alarm on my wrist-comp, silencing the noise.
Shit. Well, if there was any foreign life out here, it's dead now.
"Hey, Devika, remind me to update the software's biolo-"
"MOMMA!"
The sudden piercing alarm in my daughter's voice ushered in a physical cascade of pins and needles. I caught the gold of my irises reflected on the inside of the faceplate. Blood thundered in my ears, a shift here would've meant instant death.
"I'm sorry! I'm sorry! There was a head!"
"S'okay," I managed. Teeth clenched, chest tight, I reigned in the lapse in control. Without the weighted influence of Earth's moon, a panic exchange from skin to fur rarely occurred. But it seemed no matter the distance, I always knew when the moon was full. Like now.
Then, my brain caught up to what Devika had said. "A what?"
"A head! I saw a head floading out there!"
A head?
Unsettling... meh, a bit. Worse, it was unprofitable.
"I'm sorry you had to see that, lovey." My human brain reminded my wolf heart that a four-year-old would find that very upsetting. "Coming back."
"No, wait! Get it!"
Or maybe not so upsetting. "Pardon?"
"I think it's a synth."
Bing-go.
Hope it's not another Working Joe class.
Although sophisticated in their design, Working Joe's were expendable and sold by the dozen. Now a David 8 or a Walter model were potential gold mines depending on the kind of information stored in their heads. 'Course a whole unit would've been a killer find. But, so long as the brain case was still intact, the head alone would do.
"Where did you see it?"
"Ummm... behind the floading blueish-black fing."
Red flashed across my HUD. Five minutes. If this were a desert, then the blueish-black things were sand.
"You're gonna have to be more specific, lovey."
"Okay, okay. Uh, it went behind the chunk that looks like Ro-ro's head."
That was actually helpful. Unlike, Sesshi'ke, Roku's Yautja heritage was very prominent; his enormous forehead and mandibles being the most notable.
"I see it."
A little nudge with the booster and I closed in. Propelled my body forward and down to dive below the table-sized fragment only to come nose to plate with the eyeless head of a synth. Its face had been almost completely degloved, exposing musculature homologous with that of a human. Hard to say if this AP was ever a David or a Walter which meant its value would be determined by its data package.
Five minutes blared an angry red. Time to go.
Tucking the grisly parcel into my chest, I made my way back.
"Mom! Sesshi'ki has toilet hands!"
Three more minutes...for fuck sake just three more minutes...
Dear readers, thank you for all the kind words and for hitting those favs and follow buttons. It's slow going but I am finding moments here and there to squeeze in some writing time. With my time so limited, I'm not sure if I'm totally happy with this chapter, and so I just wanted to let y'all know its contents are subject to change.
Special thanks:
Akari Wolf Princess: So happy you're still surfing the fanfiction. Werewolves and Yautja are two of my favorites as well. I've tried to bring them together in past stories but never managed. Hopefully, things will be different this go-round. Thanks for your kind words :)
NeverNeverLady: Oh, how I missed you! I was so happy to receive a notification from you. Thank you so much for your kind words. Without power or much else to do, I had ample time to write that chapter, lol. And by the by, I'm doing okay, thanks for asking. Thankfully, we were spared the worst of Ian's wrath.
angel897: You always show up with kind things to say. I'm really glad you enjoyed it. Thank you :)
Ayawamat: Lol, okay, your review brought a huge smile to my face. Thanx :)