by Viola Grace
“And yet, you handle babies.”
Max snorted. “I am not only strong. I have dexterity and a full range of nerve endings in my skin. I can feel pressure, and I stop when there is yielding. Usually. I mean, always with babies, but some guys have a fetish for tall women, and I have to carefully dissuade them.”
Jianik chuckled. “I can see by your lack of fatalities in your record that you have self-control.”
“That, I was apparently born with.”
Jianik looked at her clipboard. “What about your sedating effect?”
“It isn’t so much sedation as mood elevation. The pheromones that I put out are peculiar, and in general, they keep folks from getting aggressive with me. I have to be at full height for it to work though, so I am guessing that the pheromone output is related to my growing and shrinking.”
“Interesting. Do you mind if we look into it?”
Max shrugged. “You can. I have been told I have half unidentifiable DNA, so any information would be good.”
“Unidentifiable, not just alien?”
“No, I am not human on half of my genetic makeup. The other half is plain old human.”
Jianik nodded. “Hmm. I know of another case like yours, but it is far more recent.”
“Really? Like me?”
Jianik shook her head. “I am fairly sure that you don’t share the same genetic donor. The other case is definitely different, but the alien link is interesting.”
The investigator paused and made some more notes. “Do you know any more about your birth parent?”
“No. She was single, she was in the city, the day disappeared, and then, a few weeks later she found she was pregnant.”
Jianik nodded. “Missing time is also interesting. Have you met your birth parent?”
Max smiled slightly. “I have. She left the file open, and I went to see her while I was in the city for medical instruction.”
“Was she surprised to see you?”
Max laughed. “She was surprised that I look exactly like her, only bigger.”
Max had a seat again. “So, what else do you need to know?”
“What is the heaviest thing that you have ever lifted? Can you throw items? How fast are you? Do you jump or fly?”
Max smiled. “The heaviest thing I have ever lifted was a fully loaded livestock train. There were six cars that had derailed, and the animals were being crushed to death. I got a call from the peacekeepers and got there as fast as I could. I lifted the central two cars, put them back on the line, and then, I moved the next two cars and the final two. After that, I pulled them into position, and they were able to be seen by vets. It was a new dairy herd and most survived.”
“Train. Very good. How about throwing?”
Max blushed. “I throw vehicles and occasionally people. Not at the same time.”
“What sized vehicles?”
“Transport trucks are the largest thing I have tossed.”
Jianik made more notes.
“What about your speed? How fast can you run?”
“Normally, I can run about the same speed as your average fit female.”
“What do you mean, normally?”
“When I send the power into my toes, I can use my strength via my legs to propel me considerably faster than normal, like long jumps. I don’t do it often as it tears up the road. The same goes for high jumping, and I don’t fly.”
“How high can you jump?”
Max wrinkled her nose. “Two hundred feet. Landing is awkward. I am out of control on the way down.”
The other woman paused and narrowed her eyes. “Yes, I can see how that would be awkward. Going up, you have propulsion, but when you reach the apex, you are just a dropping rock. How does your body handle the impact?”
“It doesn’t hurt me, but I am a little jarred. It feels like my limbs are a little loose when I try and move again. There isn’t a fast recovery.” She sipped at her coffee again.
“Noted. I think that could be worked on. What you have to get into your mindset that working as a team member, you would be allowed to churn up some asphalt and crack some concrete.”
Max blinked. “That sounds a little violent.”
“It might be. The teams go into life-and-death situations, and it is their lives on the line. You might have to fight your way free or fight to save a teammate. If you can’t do that, then this might not be for you.”
Max cocked her head. “They are all women?”
“They are.”
“I can do this. I am educated and trained to help women. I can work with me, but I can be a teammate with a female. That is what delivery is all about.” Max set her cup down and turned her cuffs down. She was almost back to normal.
“What is the smallest that you get?”
The change in subject made her blink. “Uh, the smallest I get is eighteen inches. I can still lift a truck but finding a place to grab it is difficult. People think lifting things is easy, but you have to find an area with structural integrity. You try and pick things up in the wrong spot, and they just come apart. When I am small, I can run to rescue someone in an overturned car, and I just end up pulling strips of metal out of the door if I choose the wrong spot.”
“Huh. I hadn’t thought of that. Trying to peel a citrus fruit with the tip of a pen would be difficult when a standard knife blade is a much better option. I will make a note.” She did indeed make a note.
She opened her mouth to ask another question, but Max got a call.
“Timsa? What do you mean she is early? She was due yesterday.” Max sighed and listened to her sister’s husband shriek in shock.
She looked at her guest and cocked her head, she lifted her face from the mouthpiece. “Did you want to continue this conversation? I have to go to and deliver a niece or nephew.”
Jianik looked surprised. “I can come along?”
“Sure. It will be nice to chat with someone for a change.”
The investigator looked nervous, but she nodded. “I am interested to see you work.”
“Timsa, I am bringing a friend with me. She is curious about Demyanis and wants to see what I do after the first part of my name is—”
She grinned as he yelled, “Whatever! Just get over here!”
Laughing, Max collected her kit, and she cocked her head. “Did you want to follow me or come with me?”
“My driver will follow us so that you are not restricted by my presence.”
“Excellent. Let’s go. Liidar is a bit loud at the best of times, and this isn’t her first, so Timsa is really flipping out. He doesn’t like her in pain.” She grinned and headed back downstairs while Jianik spoke into her com unit and told her driver where they were going.
For Max, it was just another day, but she had someone to chat with during the drive, and that made things more fun.
Chapter Six
“So, is that how it works? You just get a call, and you go?”
Max buckled up and looked at Jianik until she did as well. “You know that Yothan is matriarchal regarding inheritance, right?”
“Sure. What does that have to do with it?”
“While the women control the inheritance, the men control the household. Did you notice it was my brother-in-law that called and not my sister? That is his job. If he weren’t watching the early signs of labour, he wouldn’t call. Liidar wouldn’t hold to ceremony though. If she were really in pain, she would have hit him.”
“But do they just call on you?”
“Yeah. I know their due dates, so I am ready, but when I get a call, the baby will usually emerge within an hour or two.”
“Isn’t that fast?”
Max shrugged. “That is why I am there. My sisters can’t give birth without a Demyani present to help them dilate enough for the delivery. Their bodies wait for the pheromones that let them continue the delivery.”
“Does it ever happen that a Demyani die
s before her charges have finished having their families?”
“Occasionally. Demyani live lives that are marginal. We can’t properly belong to any society, so we are often the target of predators. That means we are targets for violence. Deaths happen.”
“What happens to the families?”
“The other Demyani step in.”
“Have you ever stepped into one of those cases?”
“Twice. In another province, so getting there took hours. The woman was nearly dead when I arrived, but she perked up almost instantly and soon delivered a healthy baby girl.”
Max filled in, “Her Demyani had been killed in a vehicular accident three weeks before the due date.”
“Ah. So, she was stuck.”
“Yes. Fortunately, she was the youngest, and she already had a daughter. This child would complete her line.”
“Is lineage important?”
“Here, it is everything. The men marry into landed female lines, knowing that their children will get better upbringings than they would have otherwise. The problem has arisen in that the mineral content of Yothan seems to neutralize the female sperm in some masculine lines. That is where my kind come in. We override the chemical effect, blocking the minerals that keep all sperm male in our families.”
The investigator looked around and jerked in surprise. “How fast are we going?”
“Faster than it looks. We will be there in five minutes.”
“It is an eighty-minute drive.”
Max wrinkled her nose. “I know a back way.”
Her passenger looked out at the bent grain, and she blinked. “We are in a field?”
“We are. My truck has a hover function. I stripped the parts out and worked on it for a few seasons until it functioned properly. When I slow down, it lowers to the treads that are already turning.”
“You built this?”
“I did. I am an excellent anatomist, no matter what I am working on. I am also a passable building engineer. I have developed a few local buildings for schools and libraries.”
“You are very impressive.”
“Yeah, not when I have exerted myself. I get small.”
“But still strong.”
“Yeah. I can’t shake that.”
Jianik chuckled. “We don’t want you to.”
Max looked at her for a moment before returning her gaze to the field in front of her vehicle. She wanted to join the team. She felt in her bones that it was what should happen. It felt right to share her energy and the strength she had been gifted with.
They came out of the field and cruised across the drive of Liidar’s home.
Max parked the vehicle, and she grabbed her kit. “Come on. Don’t worry. She just likes to yell. She has since she was a baby.”
“Is this her first?”
“No. Timsa will take the children to his parents’ home, if possible. If not, they will go to the homestead of the Zenackas.”
“I always thought home births were a family affair.”
Max chuckled. “They are, for most Demyani. For me, if I am there, the older children want me to play with them and get quite strident if I don’t. It rather wrecks the mood, so the children are driven home as soon as everything is done.”
Jianik chuckled. “So, we just go in?”
“We do. I will introduce you. Have you ever witnessed a birth before?”
“Um, no.”
“Oh, good. This will be fun for you.”
Jianik was quiet for a moment, and then, she sighed, “The things I do to recruit heroes.”
Max chuckled and patted her lightly on the shoulder. “Everyone comes into the worlds the same way.”
Jianik nodded. “That is what I have heard.”
Two hours later, Max handed Liidar’s baby to her, and they waited while the placenta did its work to provide the infant with its proper blood supply.
Liidar smiled at Jianik. “Max insists on us waiting until everything attached to the baby has done its job. A friend of mine has a midwife that cuts the cord right away so she can get on to the next delivery, and her babies always turn yellow. Max’s deliveries all get healthy and stay healthy.”
Max caught and accounted for the placenta. All pieces were intact. When the pulsing had stopped, she tied off the cord, and then, she cut it with surgical scissors.
Jianik had watched everything with focus. “Max, did you know you get smaller when you deliver a baby?”
“Only when they are one of my family. It takes a bit of energy to get my sisters to cooperate.” Max wrapped the placenta for burial in the family orchard after it was burned to ash.
Liidar chuckled and stroked the cheek of her daughter. “Well, after this, it is down to sons. No more weekend visits at the garage while you and Timsa work on the family car.”
Max smiled. “Good. Jianik here has offered me some off-world work, but she understands my family has the priority call for me.”
Liidar waved her hand. “As long as you help with our firsts, it is fine. We just call you for the others because... well... we have to.”
“If—for whatever reason—I can’t attend to one of you, there is an arrangement for another Demyani to deliver the babies. There is a precedent for that.”
Liidar blinked. “Have you talked with Mom and Dad about this?”
“No. My part in their lives is over. They don’t require me to be here.”
Liidar looked at her baby and laughed. “I don’t mean that. I mean they are your parents, and this is definitely the kind of thing they will want to know more about. They love you, Max. We all do. I know that your brain doesn’t process it the way we do, but we do.”
Max sighed, and she finished tidying up. “I will call on them when we leave here.”
Jianik cleared her throat. “Doesn’t she need stitches?”
Liidar laughed. “No. Whatever it is that Max puts out, it acts as a painkiller and dilator. None of us tear, no matter how big the baby.”
“I will tell Timsa that he can come in, and I will call Mom and Dad to bring the others home.” She gathered all of the grimy and bloody supplies, tucking them into a discrete bundle. She looked at Jianik and jerked her head.
The investigator got to her feet and smiled at the new mother. “Congratulations. She is lovely.”
Liidar leaned back and sighed in relief. “And she is whole, alive, and here in my arms, thanks to Max.”
Max blushed slightly and opened the door to let Timsa in. She would normally have invited him inside, but he aggravated Liidar, and they had learned at the first delivery that it was easier to just have him wait outside until she was happy with her waited-for baby.
Jianik left with her, and Max let the eager husband in, watched him move in timidly and then with sure strides when his wife showed off their newest daughter.
She closed the door and headed for the exterior of the house, moving for the firebox that was ready for her, and she set all of the supplies into the small blaze.
“What are you doing?”
“I am cremating the equipment, gauze, pads, everything that can be construed as biohazard. These devices were crafted for just such events.” She set the side panels in place, turned up the gas access, and it roared into a crematorium.
“Why do you burn all of the supplies?”
“At first, it was because I was told to, but then, I did some research and found that my sisters are actually contaminated materials. Their bodies cannot be allowed to rest in the soil. That includes the residue from birthing.”
“What about their daughters?”
“They are fine. It is exposure to the Demyani that causes contamination. It is a very complicated situation. I need to scrub up and call my parents. It is time to meet the new sister.”
She headed back to the house, and once her hands were clean, she called her mother. “Liidar’s new one is here. It is safe to come back.”
Her mother l
et out a rich chuckle. “Good. She is as hard to keep occupied as you were. We will be there in twenty with some coffee and pie.”
Max sighed. “Oh, good.”
“And a proper dinner for anyone awake.”
“Hooray! I also have a friend here I want you to meet.”
Her mother chuckled. “If you are talking about the investigator, I have already met her and given my blessing. You need a life that matters, love. You were made for so much more than our family.”
Max looked at Jianik, and the investigator shrugged and turned the clipboard so that Max could read it. Step 1. Get mother’s permission.
Max chuckled and nodded. “Good. I want you to help me work out a plan because the others might not be so generous with my time.”
“They will be. I will see to it. Retired Demyani Strigga has already volunteered to help out.”
Max grinned at the sound of her instructor’s name. “That is excellent. She’s very good.”
“I know. You talked about her endlessly when you came back from training, so I thought she would be a good first call. She said yes.”
Chapter Seven
The trials were easy. She did strength, agility, and problem-solving testing in a matter of minutes. It was when she had shrunk in the middle of the waiting area that Jianik looked at her and made a call.
The name Mini Max was sort of cute, and with none of her sisters near delivery, Max had plenty of time to grow into it.
Jianik smiled and checked her chronometer now and then.
“What are you waiting for?”
“The answer to your clothing worries. I know that this is a strange coincidence, but one of your teammates is a seamstress with some detailed technical skills geared toward the gifted. There are a lot of them on this world.”
Max blinked. “She wasn’t at the trials if she is home today.”
Jianik nodded. “I may have been less than honest about the trials. They are simply to show the other teams and the Team Project what my chosen selections can do. The other teams haven’t even had one candidate that can beat the ones I have put forward. They all went for straight power, no substance.”