The Dead Dove Locker -- "I don't know what I expected."

[Mamorien]

Princess of the Void.

“You’re not flying this year?” Grant asks, as the children vacate.

Lakai shrugs. “Nah.”

“Why not?”

“I dunno,” Lakai says. “Just seemed sorta boneheaded. Just sorta dumb and dangerous. Like what do I need to prove, you know? I’m hanging out in the Prince’s box, I’ve got a girlfriend and a boyfriend… y’know. Life’s all right.”

“And it wasn’t last Cloudsprint?”

Lakai tilts her head and gives this consideration. “I thought it was. But no. Not really.”

Grant notices for the first time as her neck lengthens with the tilt. “Do you have…”

Lakai’s shoulders hunch. “Do I have what?”

There’s a pale scar on the side of Lakai’s neck. The kind Taiikari women give their mates.

“Is that from Wenzai?” Grant whispers.

Just a dumb whatever thing.

Her face goes crimson. “It’s whatever. It’s just a dumb whatever thing. It’s just whatever.” She plucks her collar further up. “It doesn’t even really work on girls. It’s not like I can knock her up. It’s not a big deal.”

“You’re their breedmate now, right? That seems kind of like a big deal.”

“Uh, yeah. I guess. It’s whatever.”

He closes his laugh off behind his hand. “You just seemed like such a no-fucks-given runaway Lady sort of individual. Now you’re…”

She cocks a challenging eyebrow. “I’m what?”

“I’m not trying to put you down or anything,” Grant says. “Pardon me. I’m just… I don’t know. Curious.”

“I know what this is,” Lakai says. “You’ve got the daddy jitters.”

“What?”

“The daddy jitters.” Lakai triumphantly puts her hands on her hips. “You’re projecting. You went right from your backwater planet to being a prisoner on the Pike and now you’re about to be a dad and you’ve never jetted around the firmament, hiking mountains and wrestling wild throoks and fucking nubile skimmer pilots. And now you’re afraid you missed out on all that and you’ll have to spend the next few hectos rearing your heiresses instead.”

“That isn’t—” Grant corrects himself. “That isn’t entirely it. I mean, I’m not entirely sure what’s out there. And if I’m gonna live three hundred years, I’m not stressed about giving a little piece of my life to the next generation.”

“Three hundred whats?”

“Maekyonite thing. Pardon me. What I’m worried about is… will I be good. For them.”

She scoffs. “Of course you will.”

“I just—I had an outlaw for a father,” Grant says. "A father who rebelled against his society. And I see those same impulses in myself. What I think is right—what happens if I teach it to my kids? It’s what my dad tried to do, and I resented him for it until the day he died.”

Lakai rolls her eyes. “That’s so dumb.”

Grant’s taken aback. “What is?”

“The whole thing. If Your Majesty will pardon me. Did any alien ever abduct your dad?”

He breathes out his surprise at Lakai’s brashness into a soft chuckle. “Good point.”

“I was a bit surprised you weren’t a dad already. You’ve got such dad energy. They’re annoying when they’re squirmy little bald weirdos, but they turn into people quick enough. If I like my kids, you’ll like yours.”

“Your kids, huh?”

“I’ve cleaned up enough spills at this point. They’re mine. They’re mine, Tik.” This she delivers over her shoulder to Tikani.

He looks from his holodisplay view of the frontrunners. “What’s yours?”

“The kids.”

“Oh, sure.” Tikani hands Ana off to Wenzai and sidles over to where Grant and Lakai stand.

“You didn’t squeeze ‘em out,” Wenzai says.

Lakai flicks her the horns. “I’ve squeezed you out.”

“Hellfire, milady. In front of the Prince of the damn sector, really.” Tikani’s arm drapes around Lakai’s shoulder and lightly but firmly pivots the younger woman to face him. “If they’re yours, you can take them down to check that T-8 out after the race.”

Lakai taps her chin. “I’ll think about it.”

Tikani’s hand slips from Lakai’s shoulder to the nape of her neck. He whispers something into Lakai’s ear that puts a flustered crook in the Lady’s tail.

She tugs her lapel downward, revealing—accidentally or not—more of the scar the Countess left on her neck.

“Whatever,” she mumbles.

https://www.scribblehub.com/read/1419041...r/2229272/
https://www.royalroad.com/fiction/120617...s-whatever