· · · · · · ·
Jake stood by helpless. He only caught bits of pieces of info of the battle outside — the Aing Tii's force incoherent, the queen running on sight that meant nothing to him, and the overwhelming sensation of aggression.
Sarah clung to those weird mutants, eyes closed. Shadhahvar had run off in a futile attempt to help. The Auton were outside, firing futilely.
Ayo was on her knees as if praying. Even as her skin changed, hardening almost like a xenomorph. She clung to the walls, which began to grow around her.
He approached without knowing what he could even do.
"Stay away!" she shouted just before the walls absorbed her entirely.
She was still there, he could sense her. In there, changing, and reflecting out there.
One of Ayo's kind?
· · · · · · ·
Kirindi stuck, Eliath occupied doing that. Odygos was caught up too close. Karga'te fumed at the mess this had turned into, and she almost could the same.
The enemy climbed up the wall, tried to spin to catch his head, and Odygos tackled him to the ground. Eliath kept himself between the struggle and Kirindi, only slashing as far as that allowed.
The enemy threw Odygos down and tore open his wounds further. Eliath broke the ribs just to be thrown away. It climbed back up the wall, trying to get across Karga'te. Odygos still held on, getting in the way of a plasma bolt.
Kirindi tried climbing a pipe, and there was Eliath again. By now Karga'te had lost it and shot one of Eliath's back spikes off. In the screaming, Kirindi pulled one of her back spikes out and took up a short pipe from nearby. She shot past.
Karga'te held out his arm. She jumped up and he launched her at the enemy. Latching onto the rib cage, she dodged the elbow trashing back ward. Odygos let go at last, falling with a painful thud.
Clawing onto its spine, she rammed the blade deep into a shoulder joint, then fell back to slam the pipe through the hip. She jumped away. It was right behind her, but so was Karga'te's plasma bolt.
The head exploded. During the regenerating, she landed on her feet. The enemy fell down behind her, a headless body trashing and unable to stand.
Karga'te launched a rope across its back. The second failed to anchor as the enemy trashed, so Kirindi grabbed it and hooked it around a column, while shooting a glare at her shadow approaching.
Odygos tried to get up, just to fail at more than crawling. Kirindi shrieked, and finally Eliath took the cue to help. He dragged in containers with fluid. Karga'te helped pour it onto the trapped enemy. Just as the head grew back, Karga'te set the fire.
Karga'te roared in triumph at the fire, then turned for the other enemy.
Odygos collapsed from blood loss. Kirindi stayed to close the wounds, so Karga'te went alone.
"~ Catch up. ~"
Eliath still didn't move, projecting some kind of curiosity at Kirindi.
"Don't protect me like that, okay?" she said.
He didn't understand.
"The future, think about that too," she said. "And my present. The enemy we defeat sooner is less threat for me later, and less hurt for all the people we can't yet add to the hive. I need to be part of that."
Eliath didn't really listen to what she wanted when it came to what instinct said had to be done for her. Her own instincts said different, and she always added to it with what she learned. He could do that too. He knew it when he looked at what Odygos achieved.
"So give me the same and don't get in my way."
Still not response, but at least he moved to help patch Odygos up.
She drew onto Karga'te's rage, savoring it for whether it'd help her as tried to figure this out. How to get involved with battles when Eliath was being an obstacle. To. Their. Own. Hive.
The feeling almost stuck.
· · · · · · ·
Foreign resolve pushed Jake to his feet. Snatching a gun — just knew the strange thing was one — he raced to the now open gate. She told him exactly where to aim, so fast he couldn't make sense of what triggered his finger until seconds later. The joints.
Of ... holy hell.
The enemy covered most of the hangar before them. Noasyvé didn't so much fight another creature as ward off an encroaching terrain, barely held back by fire of the Auton and the Aing Tii.
Patches of acid were around, sacrifices drones halting the growths with blood, now running out. The hostile core was hidden behind Noasyvé, she the one thing keep a total upmarch at bay. Everything that leaked grew like hive resin, too fast, too painful, like sucking up space he'd taken for granted.
Even the flamethrowers weren't enough. The thing leaked even from the ceiling. Endless, dark biomechanic mass.
Neither despair not wonder could flourish in him. He fired until the rattle lost its beginning. He exchanged weapons when he could, provided by the living ship itself.
Inch by inch, Noasyvé was pushed towards the ship. The enemy grew partially over her and her screams hurt it, but were muffled by it all the same.
A bright sensation broke through the shroud on his mind. A woman peaked around the edge of the dock entrance, clear somehow despite the dark chaos. Too fast too discern more than long hair and marks like the Aing Tii.
The enemy relented against Noasyvé, shifting focus to her.
A burst of blue fire erupted from all over. The sharp light forced Jake to look away.
Noasyvé pushed the enemy away from the ship, into the fire, then spun back. Her tail hooked along the Auton, and him too.
After pushed them through, she started tearing the growths off the ship. The Aing Tii flocked to help while the Auton kept fire on the last of the encroaching mass. Jake aimed where he could, but the threat subsided. The main thing had moved away, following the ... bait?
The torn holes grew shut almost at once, thinning the walls. Noasyvé repeated this with the very infection, hurrying along the process before stepped. The now seamless hole closed behind her.
The sudden silence might as well have knocked Jake off his feet. As she collapsed, he went along.
What few drones remained clustered around her, offering a strange comfort Jake could not share. He was just human, she wouldn't even feel him.
Noasyvé just lay there, steadying her own energy and reconnecting with the dark network through the universe. With every beat, the hivemind grew clearer. A glimpse of how alone they were in existence, dread spared because they could huddle close. To her.
The sensation of violence remained in the physical outside and Jake feared ... oh, but it wasn't here at all.
Within a blink, the ship vanished back to Kiyasumeni.
All tension released Jake, and he let go a disjointed wail as stress caught up. His heart pounded, and it wasn't over. Humanity caught up still, passed over all the minds — detached Sarah, anxious Ayo, strange Aing Tii, hurt drone, disappointed drone and what the hell was Karga'te doing?
· · · · · · ·
"~ Stop! ~"
Karga'te tracked the enemy only with delay cause it had changed back to the smaller form, allowing it to crawl into small spaces. At the backdrop of chaos and distraction somewhere far in space, he'd almost gotten into a hunter's rush that would make Nra'tex-ne proud.
Almost.
Having a vexed alien queen humming in the back of his mind had been both obnoxious and encouraging. She too fought one of these things. He might have liked her for it if she wasn't so detached.
Now she was quiet, disinterested in the enemy and no more match for his hatred. He could ignore her call to stand back easily, even as Eliath obeyed.
" Dammit, he's fleeing! ~"
That was less easy once Jake started hollering in his head too, bringing along all merciful shit about sparing the underdogs. He'd ignored that as he cornered the thing in a cellar hall. Naked and in human form, crawled behind empty crates and trying to get into a sealed vent.
The vent would be too small to escape through, but that went for Karga'te too. He didn't want to end this with a fishing session, so he started kicked and knocked the metal crates aside.
He saw the top of the head now and ...
Just in time for Jake to tumble into the hall behind him.
Dammit indeed.
Jake had a whole lot of Auton too, and those had the nerve to get between him and his prey; had there not been so many he'd have throw them aside, but he didn't want to trigger the enemy into another transformation.
"Seriously, what are you doing?" Jake held up his hands pathetically. As if that would stop him.
"Revenge," Karga'te snarled.
"He's not the leader," Jake said. "That thing on Enigma II is. That's just someone who's working for it."
Jake had been throwing that idea at him for a while, it wasn't worth replying to in sound form either. The truth was none of his business.
Karga'te took half a turn to him, raising his arm just slightly. Jake backed off right away, as did the Auton.
Kirindi walked up to the prey, arm outstretched with a drop of her blood poised to infect.
Hguthreeit tuned in with an even more obnoxious, "~ Will you quit complicating my political leverage! I'm running an excellent burdened vacation resort manager facade here. ~"
That came with complimentary visions of the space marines scattered across the city and in the wilds, with their sergeants, full of complaints about their ridiculous mission and no apparent interest in starting a bigger war. Hguthreeit wanted to keep this game.
The prey shuffled away from Kirindi as far as it could and locked eyes with Karga'te.
"Listen, I won't fight. It's not even my battle. You know what Jormungandr is? Right? It needs to be stopped."
That took the last wind out of his threats.
"You work for it."
"I survive."
He thrilled his mandibles in bitter laughter. "Others didn't."
That couldn't be undone. But the words did keep him in a nasty position. He hadn't wanted to be part of the hunters either while surviving meant doing exactly that.
"Stay," Karga'te told Kirindi.
Stunned, she turned pleading, confused eyes on him.
Andrew scrambled further against the wall while Karga'te scrambled for something to do other than blood rage.
"Why?" Kirindi asked.
"It'll help us if there's a traitor in our enemy's midst," was all he said. "Assuming he is not lying."
He'd never known that one couldn't sound like oneself this much.
"I'm not!" Andrew sputtered. "I work for Naseim Rajaei, you can have someone look her up. A transhumanist devoted to the advancement of humankind, she'd allied with it trying to undermine it."
Karga'te nudged Kirindi to probe whether he actually believed that. She balked at mentally linking any further than surface thoughts, but still did it.
"He wants to believe it."
He faced Jake. "I'm staying to watch over this. You and the bots keep at a distance," he said, and telepathically added, "~And lead Ti'chai-di out of here. They can sense her somehow, but the other one is occupied.~"
Jake said with surprising clarity, "~There is a third in orbit, but they are not strong enough mindreaders to notice her pass. Go to the moon quickly, she really wants to meet Lemura, and she wants to meet the new Sarahs too!~"
Oh, right, that. Lemura had a kid, Sarah was a constant now, and ... new Sarahs?
Goddamn hardmeat with their freaky genes.
· · · · · · ·
Just like that they were back at Kiyasumeni. Teleportation. That was the only word she had for this and the one word she couldn't accept. It should be impossible by the known laws of the universe and yet, she couldn't even care to make it acceptable.
There was more to live for right now.
They were within a cave on one of the moons, hidden well from the enemy vessel over the planet.
The space marines would remain on the planet for a few weeks to "obtain dinosaur DNA" and find evidence of Autons or Amy B. Noasyvé expected that to be cut short once news of Enigma II's destruction hit. Hguthreeit intended to let them stay, playing nice until it was time to sue the humans for all sorts of minor infractions.
Enigma II had sent special forces, as expected, but they'd been dealt with off record and without contamination. Noasyvé added they'd been dealt with by their own extended hive, with a hint of both pride and vexation of the details of it.
There was nothing left to worry about and no more goal to achieve.
Enigma II didn't own her anymore. Sarah waited for the triumphant relief, but it didn't come. The only prominent feeling was the overpowering wholeness of Noasyvé's freedom. With every breath the fiber of the hive solidified into her cold, beautiful serenity. Any sense of anxiety ebbed away in favor of complete clarity.
She was in a small room surrounded by her own sub hive, clones of herself, malformed by imperfect growth and mental under-stimulation. She would have to find out herself how to tend to them. Noasyvé did not know, but she would help in whatever way she could.
They were all pink, making white Lemura stand out as she picked and poked at them. She looked for hair, they had none. Lemura wanted to know whether they were all Sarahs, and why they were different from her.
Sarah ought to name them first, but was distracted by the newcomers. Those humans who had just been saved from Enigma II, sequestered away by the Auton, shuffled onto this moon. Noasyvé welcomed them, those who bore her children.
Jonah was not among them. He was either dead or had escaped. She dimly hoped it was the former, but didn't want to unravel whether she cared for him still. Not now she much more important people to love. The hive would grow so much more.
The door grew a hole and in stepped a shaggy, downtrodden Jay.
"Hey ... Sarah. How is it?"
"So much better than before," she said with a genuine smile. Her first in so long.
Jay sat down opposite of her. "Jay's been uh, cloning you. Part of a deal with Utara. We got a lot of our privileges out of it, I guess. Like the decent food."
She stared past him, quietly marveling at her own clarity.
"Sarah?"
"It's alright," she said. "We're all monsters trying to survive."
Jay shook his head. "Is ... is this why she attacked Bison? Did she sense anything?"
"Lemura responded to Eliath being rather contrary to hive unity," she said. "I may have dreamed of that. Bison's disconnected, it wasn't about him."
At least, she thought. Lemura wasn't the most self aware yet.
Jay shifted uncomfortably. "It's scary, all of this, but it's getting less. The scary, I mean. Is she making it go away? The queen, I mean?"
"Yes, but don't worry. It will be better understood once Kirindi begins cooperating with her. You're only unsettled because she can't offer the same peace as human minds need, Kirindi will smooth that over."
That should've gotten a genuine smile to match her own, but he got damp eyes instead.
"I don't want this," he sobbed. "It's not who we are. How can you sit there and not be angry about anything?"
She frowned. "If I were like that, how would I live? They enslaved me and experimented on me and destroyed all of my life. I can't afford to break down now. She gives me the peace I want. You don't have it because you don't want it. Your choice is not mine."
"But what's left then?"
"Someone who isn't going to be angry at Bison for this." Sarah nodded at the listless monsters. "Or would you want that? That I go over to Bison and attack him, like Lemura did? Or just shout at him? What?"
"It would be better than this. You used to be so indignant, and now—"
"I have to think about names. Go feel what you want elsewhere, please."
He gave a shaky sigh, got up, and gave her her peace.
· · · · · · ·
Andrew sat at the edge of the scorched segment, curled up against the cold wall. The Auton left him alone after handing a blanket, but he dared not flee. The xenomorph was free and paid attention.
Between that, the shoes appearing before him were out of nowhere. He looked up.
"Hey."
Andrew recognized the man in more way than one. His face had passed by as one of the intended hosts, and the one who'd telepathically encouraged him to talk to the hunter.
"I'm Jake. Your bosses once tried to use me as incubation chamber." He laid down a bundle of clothes. "Get dressed. You're heading back soon."
"Why did you save me?"
"Meh, I just stalled him enough for our esteemed city overseer to nag some sense into him."
Andrew nodded. "I must thank you and this overseer both."
"I'll take the thanks, but you and the overseer worm are gonna be pretending none of this happened. I don't get all this complicated shit with the Alliance and the space marines, beyond this shit: we all benefit if you go back there and tell the nice people with the guns that you ran into a hunter. My friend there's going to make that convenient and then a little bomb will go off and you can all go home and pretend whatever thing you were after was destroyed."
"Ah." Because that was the best he could conjure up with being informed of this level of intrigue. Satchasisa had absolutely been stringing them along and he would bet there now was evidence sent into space of space marine activity on this innocent vacation resort.
"The Alliance has certain trade agreements across space. It relates to this, and the outlawing of megacorporations," he muttered. Explaining was the least he could do for the man.
"Uh, yeah, like I said, complicated paper stuff. I'd much rather know what Jormungandr is."
Oh god. Where to even begin?
Andrew stood up and walked behind the nearest crate, starting to put on the clothes. It had to be something from Jake's own reserves, as the material was foreign but the form was fit for a human, albeit one taller than Andrew.
Jake continued on. "Hguthreeit mentioned it in relation to an ally. It's important somehow."
Andrew's head shot up around the edge to stare at Jake. "There were others trying to fight Jormungandr?"
Jake nodded. "They kept missing it though. So what is it, or are you as much out of the loop as I am?"
He finished dressing quickly, and rejoined the man.
"Jormungandr is a hostile artificial intelligence of unknown origin, which had been contained on the planet Ghilsaer. My former organization was already in the process of deteriorating it, even while it continued its experiments. It eventually escaped to the hunter civilization. When it returned to human cyberspace it had their technology, thus something to tempt with. After gaining human allies it caused a technological revolution. The enhanced star travel that brought you to Enigma II is an example of that. In short, it's big, invisible and very ranged in threat level."
"Sounds big. So how did you get wrapped up further in this?
"One of the allies fetched us, we in turn associated with Naseim Rajaei to ... well, at least I did. She's been a tempering force on Jormungandr's range."
"But she's still an enemy of the girls." That was the first tone of accusation Andrew heard from him.
"They're ... a curiosity." He looked away. "What are they trying to do anyway?"
"Just live their life, really." He handed Andrew a pair of shoes. "Which is what you should get back to doing as well."
"I have no life to get back to."
"I don't either. I mean, I've been a bag of sand hanging around doing nothing till just now. I'm gonna try to keep it that way, cause I want my old life back."
Andrew gave a wry smile. "Wanting things is a luxury."
He put on the shoes. Tying the old school laces took a bit of effort, long enough for Jake to disappear.
· · · · · · ·
Odygos tried to kill time by contemplating the best way to hate being bedbound.
There was the jostling as androids hauled him on acid resistant sheets and then onto a plate thingy, and then the empty room he was put in without computer or anything else to do.
There was the separation from Sarah, who was finally here at last. Also his mother, but he wasn't primed to have her around, it was just nice.
There was the lack of moving. He would be fine within half a local day, but knowing that did nothing about how boring everything was right this instant.
Kirindi eventually arrived to give him a computer, and he stopping spite the seconds. She didn't really understand his boredom, but stayed with him and started producing resin to cover the wounds. Eliath could do that faster, but she didn't want him around right now. He was acting very contrary to the hive, which Odygos would wholeheartedly agree with if he had a heart.
Whole brained, Kirindi suggested. Ah, that she got. Also nice.
Sarah busied herself finding places to rest for the weird ass hive expansion thing that Bison had done. That took a boring while, but once the door opened, he wagged his tail for her.
Kirindi launched at Sarah for a hug. Sarah needed a moment before she could return it, leaning down to the girl. Kirindi offered a gentle welcome without language, and Sarah allowed herself to forget foreboding.
She'd missed the hugs so much. Odygos got all of this through secondary experience along, and added it to his list of things to learn to enjoy. Kirindi giving kindness was a standard factor of life that satisfied her, but it really looked like something that might work both ways.
Sarah knelt at his side then, running a hand over his shoulders. A quiet hello. Her story, told first rushed, and then in detail when he asked for more. And please stop the wagging, he wasn't a dog. He should be a drone. Her drone. They had a great mission to stop Nuitar and Jormungandr. For that she needed an assistant, not a dog.
Noasyvé allowed him to follow her.
It hadn't even occurred she might order anything else. Follow, and ... he recalled Kirindi's dissatisfaction with Eliath.
Follow how, and to what goal, and what did she need more than just assisting? Tell everything. He wanted to know for his own curiosity, his own purpose, and for her.
· · · · · · ·
Karga'te finished being seen by the marines, blew up the Auton part of the plateau with the tiniest bomb, then took his first step on the freaky Sanhedrim subvessel. Within a blink he was on one of the moons, which held an underground base being filled with air suitable for humans, or close to humans anyway.
He stepped out into a mostly empty hall, which had just the larger Aing Tii ship and the Philidon, which the Aing Tii were in the final stages of covering with some veil to teleport it along.
Ti'chai-di wandered between the workers, a keening hum rolling from her throat. He'd never heard her be this happy as now she had not just Kirindi sitting on her skull, but also her own child. The blobiest of the chimera girls yet. Kirindi was introducing her to all her Auton friends and talking of how one day they'd join the hivemind. When he entered she wanted to introduce him right away, but he declined and put his cloak on.
He needed time to cool down after that shit.
Him being involved because Noasyvé's whim had been believable enough; Kirindi's whims also relied on hey, this person is here and useful, let's add them.
Now that wasn't so trivial anymore. To just run into this human from Ghilsaer here ... and he'd been so ready to end that nuisance, and then dammit, he had to see himself. Fuck this all. This bullshit must be why so many hunters rolled with the life; it was easy living if there was just you and the things you killed for yourself.
He should never have chased down Carly. How did a decision so simple, just murder some humans, lead him to this? Past chimeras and androids, towards that thing. Noasyvé, the goddess of death, the mother of two pain in the ass hardmeat, pivotal bug to the future of the galaxy, and future pain in the ass herself. He could tell. All xenomorph were.
She stood in a shadowed corner, twice as tall as the typical queen was meant to be. Cold enough to blend with the stone and dark enough to be little more than a pearly shimmer in a lone ray. Karga'te might've missed her altogether if she wasn't so damn loud with the telepathy.
The humans who had been rescued from Enigma II clustered around her, almost reverent. They'd been infected by her embryos, but like Sarah early on, it wouldn't have been noticeable to the equipment the Auton would have.
Sarah was among them, swaying along and speaking in hushed voice. She explained with sound to avoid them overloading while Shadhahvar handed out that weird liquid of hers.
Like an initiation trial, flanked by the drones to keep anyone from running. Not that anyone wanted to.
Jake arrived, took one look at the scene, and shuddered. After climbing on a perch near Karga'te he said, "My head's full of voices except without words or sound or anything. Is it like that with you?"
"Yes, but it'll tune out. Kirindi appeared like constant chatter in the beginning too."
"Were there ever this many people within the hivemind though?"
"No."
"Think Kirindi will get over herself and add Ayo too?"
With telepathy being so much clearer now Ti'chai-di was putting in an effort to streamline everything, he caught Jake's subtext. Was this gonna get worse and was Karga'te gonna have to deal with the dude he'd just tried to murder at some point.
"You were wrong about the reason," he grumbled.
"What?"
"Why I fought that thing."
Jake waited for more, but didn't get anything. Especially not the cue to drop the topic. "About that, you knew how to fight these things. Odygos told me what happened, you came in prepared."
"I've sparred with them before, I know the rules. That's all."
"That have anything to do with you knowing how to kill them?"
Karga'te growled low. Jake shifted uncomfortably before getting up.
"Where are you going?" Karga'te asked.
"Sitting with people less cranky and more willing to tell me what the hell I landed into."
"I meant where you're going to live."
Jake looked rather surprised. "Does that mean your uh, arrest on me is cancelled?"
Karga'te gestured at the whole xenomorph hive. "I fucking found out more than your secret, there's no point keeping you around. This was your cue to scram, human."
"Aww, that hurts my soul," Jake said with an exaggerated faint. "Seriously though, I still don't have a lot of options. When Odygos kicked me out I tried to mingle with that lot, maybe formulate an escape plan or at least start a colony somewhere, but nobody agreed on anything. It was just small groups pining for lost lives or getting jobs here. I guess I'll just stick with the Auton, see whether they'll eventually give me some fun missions."
He chortled. "With them? You have no idea what they're even going to do now they think they have telepathic monsters working for them."
"You don't trust her."
"It's about what I get, and that's nothing from her. She's no different."
He had never asked her that. A simple little fact that echoed through his mind, not his own thought.
Jake shifted again. "You should talk to her to be sure."
Given Noasyvé's sneaky telepathy, maybe he should get some clarity. Still cloaked, he passed the walls, but she knew and was not in the mood for a secret meeting. In fact, he had her attention as much as she had his.
With reserve, she stepped into the light, sauntering at him. Those in the immediate vicinity grew quiet. There lay more weight on this meeting than he'd expected.
She walked on all fours, but stood on her hind legs once closer to him. Seven fingers on her massive hands.
He didn't look up, no point playing into her posture of greatness.
Both massive hands planted next to him. Her arms were so long they passed him while her head was just a little over his. The translucent teeth drooled, firmly shut together. The ability to see color was welcome here, hideous as her arching, bony skeleton was. Lots of subtle colors. The only thing of her worth anything, and he let her know that.
She could match that triviality of his existence with her eons, then shoved it aside for the present. They were here, aware of their own weakness and an uncertain future before a common enemy. He had the child that she had wanted and the war that had drawn him in as he passed Ghilsaer.
There he at last found something he wanted from her.
"~ Tell me what brought me into this. ~"
The initial idea of the bad blood clan had been to trade off the chimera eggs in some vain idea; whether that was true didn't matter, cause the ship mysteriously stranded on an invested planet. As Sarah had told Kirindi, she'd been weak at the time from a confrontation with an enemy.
An enemy shared with Ayo's team.
Ayo had already located him before and asked Noasyvé to try to establish a link. A favor as part of the alliance, but she hadn't liked what they had found. Meke'tor and a few others were viable as a recruit though.
After a tribal war broke out between Noasyvé's allies and Shanderah, Noasyvé had drawn them in to fixate them on finding her materials while she was occupied. She had had two more corrupted yautja clans and three more with other species. Their goal, to find as many mutations of xenomorph and hivemind potential.
She knew of Oihana. Damn Ayo had told her her'd cared, so Noasyvé figured she might as well assign the egg mission to his clan and suggest him on top of it. Karga'te wasn't actually supposed to steal the eggs and try to hatch a monster in some ill fit idea of revenge on his own clan, and Kirindi wasn't supposed to arrive in her care already partially formed.
A slight miscalculation of assholery, she called it.
Here, they stood similar : she did not care at all he'd been willing to sacrifice innocent life, but the overwhelming majority of their current allies did. Child murder issues were better kept between them. As did the murder of yautja. He lived again, the girl lived partially, and that was that.
She was persuasive in her acceptance, but he was stubborn. "~If I have what you wanted, when am I expendable? ~"
The answer stark, devoid of emotions to judge it by. Kirindi saw him as leader. Even she could not will that away because imprinting.
He rephrased the question. Could she ever grow up, beyond seeing him as leader?
Perhaps she laughed. There was no answer.
"~What will you do with Kirindi now?~"
The same as Kirindi already wanted, expand the hive. Kirindi might not be the entirely humanoid drone she had wanted, but she still was a good contribution to a shared hivemind. The planet Noasyvé would go to was wild and free, with room and nature for even Ti'chai-di.
It would depend on him though, since Kirindi would follow him and would know if he was forced into anything. Noasyvé sufficed with a DNA sample of her, and would let them go. She had no use for a child attached to a loose cannon, no matter what Kirindi's potential might be.
He had one other place to be, his brother, wherever he was. A wild chase with no clues yet. Kirindi had come with him here, he might as well go with her next. If that meant getting a chance to ask Ayo to do some supernatural tracking, all the better. She had some explaining to do anyway. He'd see where that left Kirindi later.
"We'll take the ride to your home."
· · · · · · ·
