“Ow… Wow… ow… um… this… this is… ow…”
Elksia sat up straight, clutching her stomach in pain. The first thing she did was glance at her desk, where she’d written a few notes down, then tut to herself.
“Fuck. I’m early. Really early.”
Clutching her stomach some more, Elksia grunted in pain, then tried to alter her position, to find a spot where things were less painful. Really though, Elksia needed to get out of bed and make her way towards the nest she had prepared in advance. But right now the pain was getting to her and, weirdly, Elksia’s time powers didn’t seem to be cooperating. She’d seen the pains coming but had misinterpreted when it would all happen. She thought she had at least an hour.
The pain was increasing, and Elksia realised she didn’t have her communicator on her, so she couldn’t call Tenuk to help her. Luckily, Elksia had other methods of communication, but her body made the decision for Elksia, and she accidentally screeched out in pain. This immediately caught the attention of a few people, and Elksia felt Retvik stomping towards her bedroom before she heard or saw him.
“Elksia, what is wrong?”
“It’s… it’s happening…”
Another, much more friendly face appeared behind Retvik.
“It’s happening?” Tenuk asked.
“It’s happening.”
“What is happen-”
Before Retvik could ask any more questions, something zipped past him and Tenuk. With a flourish of purple telekinetic energy, Arkay gently moved Elksia into her nest, then grabbed some extra pillows and cushions. Once he had sat Elksia down, he inspected her briefly with blue-glowing eyes, disappeared then reappeared with a plastic sheet, which he put between Elksia’s legs.
“I think Arkay’s borrowing my powers!” Elksia weakly giggled. “Also, the egg is here. I’m about to lay.”
Arkay suddenly teleported around some more, teleporting Tenuk to Elksia’s side, placing her hand in his.
“Well, I was going to do this anyway…” Tenuk muttered.
Elksia giggled some more, then twitched in pain. The pain was getting a lot worse. It felt like a rolling wave of agony up and down her stomach.
“Do you need me to do anything?” Retvik asked, remaining at the door but on guard.
“Not really…” Elksia muttered. “Was gonna ask you to call Vexer… But I don’t think he… ugh… needs to hear me laying an egg…”
“Could just call him and place the phone by your vagina!” Tenuk suggested.
“I mean… heh… that would be funny…” Again, Elksia grunted in pain. She glanced at Arkay, who nudged Elksia backwards, tucked her knees up then placed cushions all around her, keeping her in place. “Arkay, lil bro, you can… ow… chill…”
“IknowwhatI’mdoing!” Arkay replied, talking a mile a minute. “I’vedonethisbefore!”
“You can slow down though.”
“Oh…” Arkay did as asked. “Sorry. Time powers tend to get ahead of me. Even when borrowing your awesome system… I’m just tweaking all the strings to make sure everything goes fine.”
“Everything will be fine!” Elksia smiled. “I can see the strings too. But what do you mean, you’ve done this before?”
“I was present when old-universe future King Ver was born…” Arkay calmed down properly, then grabbed Elksia’s communicator and handed it to her. “Give Vexer a call.”
Elksia giggled some more, dialled her sperm donor, put it on loudspeaker then handed the phone to Tenuk. It took a moment for Vexer to answer. When Vexer did pick up though, the first thing he heard was a sudden scream of pain.
“AAAAHHH!”
Elksia didn’t mean to shriek, but she had no choice as the muscles of her womb contracted then pushed. That pain though almost instantly vanished, as her whole body shook and suddenly relaxed, and an egg appeared between Elksia’s legs.
No one said anything at first. They just stared at the egg, which was a grey-green with blue and lime green speckles. Inside, it had a warm glow and, more importantly, Arkay could sense a heartbeat inside it. A steady, gentle heartbeat.
“What the actual fuck?” a voice suddenly shouted over the phone. “What the fuck is going on? Elksia, did you just fucking call me AS you were laying?”
Elksia didn’t answer. She picked up the egg and inspected it, wiping off gooey fluids and blood and checking it for cracks.
“Elksia?”
“Yeah, she just laid…” Tenuk eventually managed to mutter. “And she’s checking over the egg now. Didn’t know Vrekan eggs were colourful and matched their mother…”
“What colour is it?”
“Grey-green with spots.”
“Huh. Neat. Is Elksia alright? Must have been really fucking painful.”
“Yeah… it was…” Elksia was shaking. Tenuk noticed and wrapped his arms around her, holding her tightly. “I… I have an egg now…”
Since Elksia was rather distracted, Retvik decided to take a moment to ask Vexer some questions.
“Vexer, do you know the best temperature to incubate an egg at? And how long does it take to hatch?”
“Um… not too hot… just standard room temperature I guess. Whatever 25C is out here in the void. And it should take a month to hatch.”
“Assuming it’s not early…” Tenuk added. “Elksia, babe, are you alright? You’re not hurt, are you?”
Elksia still didn’t answer. She was transfixed by her egg. Thankfully, Arkay was silently inspecting Elksia and checking she was healthy, then answered for her.
“She should be fine. There’ll be a bit of bleeding but it’ll stop in an hour. You should stay with her though. I’ll speak to everyone, tell them to keep away and leave you both alone, and I’ll tell Vikalos to give you both as much time off as possible.”
“Do you want me to stay guard?” Retvik asked.
Elksia nodded but still didn’t say anything.
“If you can stay outside by the door, that’d make us both feel better…” Tenuk sighed. “Feel free to take breaks though. We don’t need constant protection.”
Arkay’s eyes glowed blue again. “Actually, it’ll make Elksia feel better. I’ll arrange something. We’ve always got someone around who can keep guard.”
“Alright, thanks, Arkay. And thanks for the help.”
Arkay smiled, then started cleaning up around Tenuk and Elksia. “No worries. It’s the least I can do for my old Dessaron buddies. Anyway, let me clean up all this mess, and I’ll leave you both to it. Congrats, Elksia.”
Elksia blinked, then smiled at Tenuk, Retvik and Arkay. “Heh… yeah, thanks… It’s all up from here…”