Earth Fathers are Weird, chapter 9 (Patreon)

Max floated in the pool. Since he had convinced Rick to raise the temperature a few degrees, it was much more comfortable. And as a bonus, certain body parts no longer had to suffer embarrassing shrinkage.

The door opened, and Max tilted his head to watch Rick slide into the room. A cramp struck, and Max rubbed the huge lump just above his hip bone. Kohei had grown a lot in the last five month, and now his brother was large enough to create a second lump. Weirdly, Rick looked sorta pregnant. He also looked a little like a cartoon snake that had swallowed a bird and the shape of the bird was still visible through his stomach. Sometimes the Kohei lump even moved. And the pain had become a constant companion.

Considering that these two had already caused more discomfort than basic training, Max was surprised at how much he worried about them. Even Rick admitted that they were growing faster than anticipated and they would likely come out early. Rick slid his hat off and set it aside. One good splash fight and Rick had decided to avoid exposing his clothing to that sort of soaking.

Rick swam closer. He was so much more graceful in the water with his undulating tentacles, and Max was even getting used to the weird and random eye placement. “Query. How is your health?”

“It kind of sucks.” Max rubbed his protruding Kohei bulge. The cramps had passed too much bad Mexican food and entered into holy crap I think I might need to visit the hospital territory. At this point, Max was starting to have some very unpleasant thoughts about those chest bursting aliens that showed up in so many B-science fiction movies he had watched as a kid. The 80s really had been obsessed with things bursting out of bodies. Whole generations of children had been traumatized by fake blood and cheesy aliens.

“Offspring arrive soon.” Rick started swimming around Max in lazy circles. Max closed his eyes and floated. Rick had started this weird ritual about a month ago, and it reminded him a little of those videos where fish swam around and around to disturb the sand into fancy patterns to attract a mate. Considering his species often used non-sentient species to carry their young, it was probably some sort of instinct to make sure the host surrogate didn’t eat the children. 

Host surrogate. Max still had trouble wrapping his head around the idea. It would be like his mother deciding that carrying children was too much hassle and having the family dog do it for her. Max might not tell Rick, but he understood why other aliens had a problem with Rick’s species and their weird reproductive habits. That division between Rick’s people and others had to be pretty deep too. When Max had tried to get the name of Rick’s species, he had only been able to call his own people, “People.” But when Max had asked what others called them, all the tentacles had curled up like an octopus on a hot griddle. 

“I'm concerned about how the offspring plan on arriving,” Max said.

“Translation matrix failure. Query. Clarify.”

The translator was so much better after months of work, but they would still run into trouble in the weirdest spots. “Query,” Max said. “Will offspring damage me?” Rick had assured him a number of times, but considering how large the children lumps were getting, Max needed to hear it again.

“No damage. Discomfort.”

Max rubbed his stomach. If this was discomfort, Max did not want to see what Rick would define as pain. If he ever got home to earth, he was going to buy his mother the biggest box of chocolates he could find. Having a living squirming being inside your guts was not a comfortable feeling. And right now Max felt guilty about every time he’d kicked her in the bladder.

“Query. Does Max feel damaged?” Tentacles brushed across Max’s stomach.

Max twisted and flailed in the water, and that woke Kohei who immediately started writhing in Max’s guts. For a half second, Max thought he was going to go under the water, but then tentacles curled around him, pulling him tight up against Rick’s body. Surprise made Max gasp. Rick was warm, far warmer than Max had expected given that his tentacles ran on the cool side. “Query. I remove you from the water?”

“No. I’m fine. You startled me.” Max tried to pull away, but Rick held on. Max had an ex-boyfriend or two who had gotten pretty handsy, but nothing prepared him to deal with dozens of tentacles all wrapping around him at once.

“Query. Clarify startled.”

“You moved too quickly or touched me unexpectedly, and my muscles reacted before I made a decision to react.”

“Query. Correlation startle with fight. Correlation startle with flee.”

Max snorted. Of course that’s where Rick’s big brain went first. He was all worried that Max’s instincts would make him hide when the pain of childbirth kicked in. Max had survived a basic training accident where his parachute hadn’t fully deployed. The backup had worked as designed, but the extra time in freefall and an unanticipated wind had blown him into a wooded area where he’d impaled his leg on a broken tree limb. If he got through that, he wasn’t going to get illogical about a baby octopus crawling out his ass. “I’m not going to flee. Startle doesn’t correlate with either. And if I were going to run when I started to hurt, I would already be running. I feel like someone has taken a very large rock and hit me in the stomach several times.”

Several Rick's tentacles shriveled up into unhappy little balls. “The water is nutrient rich. I have overfed offspring.”

Max peeled the remaining few tentacles away from his arms and pushed away. Part of him didn’t want to because Rick was deliciously warm and squishy. He was like a big bean bag, a hot water bottle, and a body pillow had a kinky threesome. The fact that Max enjoyed his comfort was the biggest reason to avoid it. He couldn’t afford to emotionally rely on Rick. “So that's why you always encouraged me to go swimming. These nutrients aren't anything gross, are they?” Max hoped he wasn't swimming in the alien version of mother's milk.

“Query. Clarify gross.” Rick withdrew his tentacles and allowed Max to swim free, but he kept pace with Max and swam close enough to be within tentacle reach.

There were so many ways that Max could answer that. However, he chose to go with the definition that concerned him the most. “Clarification. Gross: relating to the bodily fluids of another. Occasionally, relating to one's own bodily fluids if they are fluids that one would rather have on the inside of one's body.” 

Max could remember once or twice when he had been particularly gross. As a young man, most of those cases involved alcohol not alien impregnation. Of course the tree impaling incident had also been a little gross. Both blood and urine had been involved, and the medic’s attempt to reassure him by explaining how peeing was natural had traumatized him more. Somehow having someone compare him to gazelle who apparently peed themselves when getting chased a lion had not done anything to restore his dignity.

Rick's tentacles slowly uncurled. “Water is not gross.”

“Well that's good. So now I just have to worry about the fact that your child appears to be trying to crawl out of my bellybutton.”

“Clarify bellybutton.”

Max touched his own stomach where his outty bellybutton was on display since he had not so far managed to explain bathing suit in adequate terms. It was also possible that Rick understood what a bathing suit was, but simply thought it was stupid. Either way, Max had grown used to skinny-dipping. “This is a bellybutton.”

Rick brushed a tentacle across Max's stomach. “Bellybutton lacks internal channel to intestinal tract.”

“I know.”

“Query. Offspring cannot appear through bellybutton.”

Max sighed. “Answer. Exaggeration in order to emphasize an argument.” Max was getting frighteningly good at these verbal games. He felt like he should earn a merit badge for annoying alien linguistics.

“Query. What argument are you making?”

“Answer. Offspring cause pain.”

A flurry of air bubbles came out from under Rick’s mantle of tentacles. Either that was an alien sigh or farting was how Rick expressed frustration. Either was possible. However, in the last few months, Max had grown very familiar with how Rick expressed aggravation. “I regret offspring cause pain.”

“Thank you, and I accept your apology, but I still hurt.”

Rick used his largest tentacle to stroke the Kohei bump. “Offspring arrive soon.”

Max frowned. Rick didn’t make mistake conjugating his verbs anymore, not unless he was trying to talk about things that might have been but weren’t. Rick and his computer both sucked at translating might haves. No doubt a linguist could draw some deep, meaningful conclusions out of that. However, Rick’s verb implied that more than one kid might come out. Kohei was ready. Given the way Max's stomach had formed unnatural bulges, the second child might be ready even if he was smaller, but Max had yet to see anything from that third child. He had never gotten a cramp that had not come from either Thing One or Thing Two. “Query. Number of offspring that will arrive soon.”

“Query. Clarify soon.” Maybe Max was imagining it, but that seemed like an evasive answer. Max groaned as another cramp hit him. If soon wasn't within the next few hours, or at the very least the next few days, Max was going to seriously consider giving himself a cesarean.

“Query. When will first offspring arrive?” Max asked.

“Zero to six hours.”

Relief slapped Max right across the pregnant stomach. “Oh thank God. Query. Will other offspring appear within zero to six hours?”

“Unknown.” Strangely, Rick's tentacles now drew up tightly. 

Max frowned. “Query. Should other offspring appear?”

Rick swam backward, taking him farther away from Max. “I dislike ambiguity of the term should.”

“Okay, now you're just playing word games with me. So why don't you ignore your personal feelings about the English language and tell me what will happen if other offspring appear soon.”

Rick took up his circling sentry duty again. “I am unable to predict future.”

“Define probabilities,” Max challenged him. 

“Probability.” After saying that word, Rick fell silent. No way had the computer mistranslated it. The damn thing adored using that word to test Max’s understanding of technology. It would show him a picture of a ship approaching a space station or an asteroid or a planet and then ask for probable outcomes. Max had learned that the computer had a diverse and disturbingly creative imagination for ways a pilot could crash his ship. After a time, Rick answered. “Second offspring will appear soon after first. Development has been more rapid than anticipated.”

The tenseness in his tentacles suggested that Rick didn’t like the answer. “Query. Do offspring usually appear one at a time?”

“Yes.”

Max waited. Rick was painfully uncomfortable talking about reproduction, and Max had learned that patience worked better than verbal sparring. Rick might play dumb, but he knew how to misinterpret questions and get the conversation off track. He was a master at it. After another long pause, Rick continued. “First offspring appears days or weeks first. It helps to care for other offspring, or in the case of nutrient shortage, cannibalizes other offspring.”

Max stopped swimming. Immediately Rick was there at his side, reaching out with tentacles, but Max swam backward. “You had better tell me that there are a lot of nutrients on this ship, because if one of these children tries eating any other children, I am not going to be happy.” Max’s stomach rolled at the very idea. At least now Max knew why the computer had included cannibalism in a lesson that had defined herbivore, carnivore, and rock-eating. At the time, Max had suspected that some linguist was bored and having a really good time fucking with newcomers. Apparently not.

“Offspring being cannibalized is not optimal.”

“If you had any other opinion on the issue, I would take two of your tentacles and tie them in a knot,” Max said firmly. Then he pointed at Rick. “And I would pick really important tentacles.”

Rick shifted all of his tentacles so that they were on the other side of his big bulbous head as though trying to protect them from Max. However, he couldn't be too threatened because he continued to float right next to Max. “Pool has excess of nutrients. Arrival of two offspring will not result in lack of nourishment.”

Max frowned. “Query. Is there enough nutrition for three offspring?”

“Nutrients exist in sufficient quantity for three offspring.”

Max didn't need a secret decoder ring to figure out what Rick wasn't saying. The two bulges in his stomach were enough to suggest there was a problem. Max lacked subtlety so he came right out and asked, “Query. Is third offspring large enough to survive.”

“Unknown.” The computers translated voice sounded so unemotional and factual, but Rick's tentacles drew up into spiral curly fries of unhappiness. Max had never planned to have children, and if he had, adoption would have been choice number one with surrogacy and fostering two and three on the list. Alien impregnation was not something he had ever contemplated. But now that he was pregnant, he found himself surprisingly upset at the idea that one of the offspring was too small. “Query. Will small offspring remain inside?”

“When two offspring arrive, digestive track is wide and flooded with hormone signal to arrive arrive arrive,” Rick said. His words grew faster. “Third offspring may arrive early.”

Max caught the edge of one of the filter islands and pulled himself upright. “Do you have medical equipment for a premature birth?”

“Translation matrix failure. Clarify.”

“Birth. Clarify. The arrival of offspring. The pain involved in arrival of offspring.”

“Query. Why would human females continue to carry offspring if to carry offspring is to suffer pain?” Rick asked. It was a classic change of topic, but Rick’s refusal to answer told Max what he needed to know. His guts ached. He didn’t want any of the children to die, but if Rick didn’t know how to help, there wasn’t much Max could do. But upsetting Rick even more didn’t seem kind, not when his tentacles were all kinked and curled.

“Humans like sex,” Max said. He immediately corrected himself. “Almost all of us like sex. It's fun.”

Rick stopped circling and started his undulating version of a dog paddle. “The creation of offspring is entertaining?”

“Very. And women like to be entertained just as much as men.”

“The value of entertainment is greater than the distress of pain. Interesting.”

“And untrue,” Max said. “The pain is greater than the entertainment.” Max wasn’t sure if that was true for women, but he found that his one blissfully and erotically sexual encounter with Rick’s eggy tentacle didn’t make up for months of gas, stomach pain, vomiting, cramping, and general misery.

“Carrying offspring is illogical.”

“But people like offspring. They want offspring. If the only way for you to have offspring was for you to carry it yourself, wouldn't you?” Max asked. Rick didn’t answer immediately, and it occurred to Max that Rick might not have the right equipment. If Max ignored Rick’s many tentacles, the trunk of his body was significantly smaller than a human. His walking tentacle was so long that Rick appeared to be larger, but his body was small. He might not have a digestive tract long enough to give the children space to grow.

“I am unsure,” Rick finally said. “Offspring cause pain. I would rather compensate another.”

Max rubbed his largest bulge. “I can see why. Your children are large.”

“Yes. The size of offspring and manner of incubation is gross and distasteful to other species.”

Considering that Max had just defined gross as involving bodily fluids, Max chose to ignore that part of the statement. No doubt Max's body had all sorts of alien fluids, but denial was his happy place right now. “Do other species bear their own offspring?”

“Many prefer external fertilization and growth within protective barriers.”

“Eggs,” Max translated. “They lay eggs. Right now, I'm thinking that might be a biologically smart move.” A stronger cramp rippled through his gut, and Max clung to the water circulation island.

“Offspring come,” Rick said. Tentacles wrapped around Max’s limbs. Max might have complained, but the strongest cramp yet hit him. Max cried out and curled his legs up as white-hot pain seared his nerves.

Chapter 10: https://www.patreon.com/posts/earth-fathers-10-23532146 

Chapter 11: https://www.patreon.com/posts/efaw-chapter-11-23538325 

Chapter 12: https://www.patreon.com/posts/earth-fathers-12-23553922 

Chapter 13: https://www.patreon.com/posts/earth-fathers-13-23591315 

Chapter 14: https://www.patreon.com/posts/earth-fathers-14-23693389 

Chapter 15: https://www.patreon.com/posts/earth-fathers-15-23715331 

Chapter 16: https://www.patreon.com/posts/earth-fathers-16-23798161 

Chapter 17: https://www.patreon.com/posts/earth-fathers-17-23902574 

Chapter 18: https://www.patreon.com/posts/earth-father-18-23938595 

Chapter 19: https://www.patreon.com/posts/earth-fathers-19-23961630 

Chapter 20: https://www.patreon.com/posts/earth-fathers-20-24034384 

Chapter 21:  https://www.patreon.com/posts/earth-fathers-21-24119410 

Chapter 22: https://www.patreon.com/posts/earth-fathers-22-24165545 

Chapter 23: https://www.patreon.com/posts/earth-fathers-23-24253737 

Epilogue: https://www.patreon.com/posts/earth-fathers-24266071