There was a knock on the door and Flip woke suddenly. “ Here is some food for you and the even girl.” A tall skinny man opened the door and left a plate and two cups.
Flip felt extremely tired as he sat on the side of the bed. 22 had not stirred, she was still fast asleep. He walked over to the plate but to his disappointment it was filled with vissume and some sort of fruit, no spoons.
He picked up one of the cups and took a drink, it was nice to have something wet to drink. The dust from the floor of the cell was often in the air and made his throat dry.
He walked back to the bed and shoved 22. “ Do you want something to eat?” He held out the other plate.
She opened her sleepy eyes and groaned. “ Oh no, I hate vissume. I’m too tired anyway.” She groaned once again.
“ There is a drink here for you.” He held out the cup.
“ It’s water, I never drink water, it has no taste.” She rolled over to face the wall.
“ I do believe I’m seeing a different side to you. You never told how grumpy you get when you wake up.”
“ I’ll be sweet and feminine again later, just for now I want to be left alone.”
Flip considered her. She had been on her best behavior when they first met but had rapidly adopted a strange attitude towards him… bossy, pushy, manipulative and flirtatious. Now she was just being like any other annoyed female who no longer cared if they impressed a male or not.
Flip looked at the window, it was too high for him to see out of and he was curious to see what was going on outside. He pushed 22 again.
“ What do you want?” she snapped.
“ I want you to stand on my shoulders and look out of the window.”
“ What for?” she muttered into the pillow.
“ I want to know if the odds are getting their weapons ready.”
“ You humans are a nosey people. Why do you have to know? It won’t change the fact that we cannot escape from here.”
“ I feel somehow responsible that this rebellion is going to happen much sooner than it would have.”
“ I do not know why? I walked into the house and saw the weapons, not you.”
“ I was with you, when it happened, so I just feel that way.”
“ Oh you are a strange one, earth man. We can do this later. I wish to sleep…”
“ NO, now 22. You owe me. You got me into this. I was just going to go to bed in my quarters but no, you had to drag me out here with you. Now come on, get up and help me…”
“ Oh cease your chatter! I will do so…but only if you will be quiet!”
A few moments later he managed to convince her to stand on his shoulders. She looked around the compound but there was nothing to be worried about for the moment.
“ It is quiet. There is nothing happening. It is as if we are alone here in this compound.”
As he lowered her down she smiled at him like she had done the night before. He looked at her suspiciously. What was she up to now? Her lightening changes of mood didn’t endear her to him, it just made him feel even more wary.
Before he could ask (and he wasn’t sure that he really wanted to, exactly) she flung her arms around him kissed him quickly and firmly on the lips
Just like before he lost himself while they were kissing and when it was over he was lightheaded. He broke away from her and staggered to the bed to sit down.
“ Why do I feel so dizzy whenever I kiss you?”
“ Because you love me.” She still had that worrying smile.
Flip wasn’t sure how to handle this comment so he pretended she didn’t say it. “ It’s more than that. I feel as though you have taken something from me.”
She smiled ever so sweetly. “ Don’t you know that I have in fact taken something from you?”
“ So I didn’t imagine it?”
“ No you didn’t. Whenever you kiss me it lasts at least thirty minutes even though it appears to be seconds. Tarragon women become pregnant by kissing, did you not know this?”
His jaw dropped and his eyes widened. “ What?”
“ It can only happen if the female wishes it. And I wish it.”
He felt panic rise up and he snapped, “ No, you can’t do that without me having a say in it. Are you sure about this?” At her smug look he added hurriedly, “ I mean, we are not the same species. We humans, well, it doesn’t work this way on my world, females become impregnated differently.”
“ It makes no difference, I am able to take it from you and this is why you become dizzy and lightheaded.” She was still smiling that annoying smile that made him want to smack her. Since meeting this female he had more trouble than he had ever had to deal with before. He took a deep breath and thought, approach this logically. Emotion was not going to help. He looked sternly at her.
“ So let me get this straight 22. Without you warning me… we have kissed three times and you could have become pregnant any of those times? Is that correct?”
“ This is correct and I will know in a few days. I have never had a baby before and I’m hoping this one will have your eyes. He or she will be half-Tarragon and half-Human, this baby will be neither even nor odd. The thought fills me with excitement.”
Flip felt anger rising up within him. “ And I have no say in any of this? You could have told me what was happening. As its father I have rights too. You planned all this behind my back… I don’t trust anything you do. You have gotten me into more than one mess and I am not happy with you at the moment. You had no right.”
She looked taken aback. “ It is always the female’s choice on our planet. I had no idea your species did things otherwise. That human fathers can decide these things? I did not know. On our world all the care taking of offspring is done by females only. The men do not raise their offspring. When the child is old enough he may then proceed with training but up until then, it is up to the females on Tarrago.”
“ Well we don’t do it like that. We raise the child together and in fact the male is responsible for a lot more than that.”
She sighed. “ I am sorry Flip. But even if I had known this, I think you would never had kissed me if I had told you.”
He nodded. “ That’s probably true. Tell me though, is this what happens with odd women as well?”
“ No, odd women are not the same species as us evens.”
“ So you have different races of people on this planet. That’s interesting.”
“ They are not really from this planet. Two centuries ago some people from this planet traveled to a neighboring planet and brought some of the blue skinned people here to be servants to the green skinned people. That was when they invented the evens and odds concept.”
Flip nodded his head. “ So they were brought here to be servants and slaves.”
“ Does this bother you?” she asked.
“ Yes it does. We outlawed slavery centuries ago. The same thing happened on my planet until then, as what is happening here. It ended up with civil wars worldwide. It took a long time for Earth to become the peace-loving planet it is now. But as important as our chat on child rearing is just for now though we have more pressing matters at hand. We have to try and break out of here.”
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Star Yawns Episode 7. A Few Good Cadets by David & Sabine Williams Smashwords Edition Copyright 2014 Page 8