Syl
Syl watched the screen with ice gripping her heart, even as she idly patted Mikasa who was snuggling in her lap.
The fear had set in a few days after the attempted robbery.
It had been a busy few days.
Even ignoring the ongoing courtship with Eymali, who was soon to depart on her journey to her home world with the Nagala safely in stasis.
The clean up process of the entryway to her boutique. Police reports. Suddenly having the “fame” of being a human connected business in a city where humans were one of the most interesting things to happen in centuries.
No, there had been plenty of actual work to do too.
With Mikasa running around healthy, orders had been coming in at an incredible rate of speed for dogs and cats from the crew of the Dauntless. In a fit of brilliance, she'd contacted an old friend to produce appropriately sized axiom litter boxes and other appropriate items such as a near self filling water bowl, all of which would make owning a pet in the middle of a planetary scale metropolis much more comfortable.
They had packaged them with each pet sold, along with a small unit to produce appropriately nutritionally balanced kibble that Mikasa at least seemed to adore. A brilliant modification from one of the young men who had belonged to the Nerd Squad meant it could make a variety of treats too with appropriate materials. It had upped the price a bit, but every customer she’d contacted had voiced aggressive approval, and all the customers who had already placed orders had readily upgraded to the new care and feeding package.
Of course after such a gallant rescue, she also had to make sure to reward her husband for his heroics when she wasn't tending to their bottom line. A bottom line that was looking pretty enough she was preparing contracts to lay in an expansion to her facility... and to their living quarters.
The human desire for pets was indeed strong, and the human need for food from home wasn't to be underestimated either.
She had a contract for the Dauntless alone worth an eye watering amount of credits on her desk requesting mass volumes of beef, chicken, and pork, and in particular something her husband called ‘bacon’ that sounded rather tasty. Then there were orders for top end luxury goods like the wagyu.
The new Undaunted colonial authorities had already come to visit to negotiate livestock for their first colony on Bruel, whenever that would be ready, and she'd sent out feelers to the Undaunted world of Vucsa 5 and was in the process of negotiating with the somewhat retired pirates to provide them livestock as well. Along with rapid domestication services for a large local avian that was apparently rather tasty.
She even had plans in the making for the natural raising and humane slaughter of high end meat on one of the human colony worlds to get an edge on that market!
And all of that excluded orders from high end restaurants and the like who wanted to adapt human recipes and offer Earth meat as an exotic delicacy to their well heeled and enormously wealthy clientele, some of whom would become her clients in turn.
She expected the wagyu in particular would make her enough money to buy a small planet, especially with the tricks she'd been working out with Nadi and her husband in the flesh weaving process that you couldn't replicate with just DNA. Once the process was secured with the patent her lawyer was filing now, it would ensure there would always be a demand for "the good stuff", from people who wanted only the best or most authentic in their various types of cuisine. Even after authentic beef was available from the small ranching operations she was planning.
All in all, life was good, great even.
Her business wasn't thriving so much as erupting to new heights, she was married, and quite happily so, to the most wonderful man she could imagine. She had even come to enjoy Mikasa's company quite a bit. The sweet pup was tightly bonded to her "parents", and wasn't far out of one of their shadows as she continued to grow in seeming proportion to Syl’s business. The cute little puppy was clearly going to be massive when she grew up. Syl thought it was fairly vital that she met Mikasa as a puppy first, because meeting a large, full grown predator would have likely scared the daylights out of her, even if said predator just wanted pats and kisses.
It all made for a lovely distraction from her growing fears.
She was having great sex. Better than her every fantasy about sex and she was getting it almost as frequently as she could ask for it, and he would even initiate! Surprising her in the shower. While she was making dinner. Sometimes just waking up, rolling over and rutting her cross eyed in the most mind meltingly amazing way that never ceased to wreck her morning schedule. It was constant. Regular, and with Nadi most certainly carrying several of Jerry's children there was no doubt of his virility.
Which brought Syl back to the million credit question.
Her own DNA sequence slowly scrolls by on the screen as the testing protocol continues quietly.
Testing like this was supposed to be done at birth, but the average genetic medicine nurse at a hospital was not nearly as well trained as Syl, or Nadi.
Nor were they looking for the truly little things with more broad spectrum scans. They were seeking out the major problems, red flags and glaring yellow flags that would all put a child's life at risk. Which meant that sometimes little things got missed. Little things like Syl not being able to conceive a child on her own.
The chime of the program complete function feels more like getting stabbed as she quietly brings up the results. One warning. She clicks it... and stifles a sob. It was exactly what she'd not wanted to see.
Stolen novel; please report.
There was a problem, a most minor, tiny little problem with the way her womb was functioning, the way her eggs developed, that prevented sperm from implanting. Her eyes blur a bit as a concerned Mikasa licks at her chin, nuzzling her as she holds back tears.
It was an irrational emotion crippling her and what's worse is she knew it!
Syl had been a fertility counselor among other things for years! She'd helped other women with this exact problem! There were things that could be done. A healing coma wouldn't help here, but gene therapy absolutely would, but that could take years and in the end she'd still not be a mother. Though all her knowledge told her that it would eventually get better, it didn't make it hurt less now.
All women in the galaxy generally wanted to continue their line. Not all women wanted to be mothers. Syl had always wanted to be a mother, ever since she was a little girl. She’d wanted to be a mother like her own mother. Kind, gentle, loving, raising her children with a gentle hand and guiding them to womanhood.
She'd dreamed of that happy life for years, and now, at the cusp of it, it was cruelly yanked away from her for more long years of waiting before she and her husband could have the children she so deeply desired.
If she'd even have a husband after he found out about all this! Who could want a defect like her? To risk that defect manifesting itself in their children? She had a deep sense of shame gnawing at her. Of failure. Of...
She's forced from her thoughts by strong arms wrapping around her and pulling her in tight, enveloping her in warmth, security and love.
"Syl? Syl, are you okay? What's wrong?"
She plants her face in his chest and lets herself sob for a few moments as he tries to comfort her. Stroking and rubbing her back and shoulders as she let the mix of emotions pour out of her. Mikasa continues to do her best to assist, nuzzling in and against her mother. She didn't quite know what was going on, but the sharp little puppy could tell this wasn't a good thing, whatever was happening.
It takes a good ten minutes to fully get Syl calmed down, and a further ten minutes over tea, and more of that lethal poison her husband liked to drink that he called coffee, for the full story to come out. Nadi joined them about midway, and concern was etched deep into the tiny reptilian's face.
Many Kohb had what they described as an almost instinctual desire to heal. Likely a genetic hold over from the vast clans they lived in on their home world, where their tight knit society reacted almost like a body to heal wounds of flesh and spirit when they were inflicted upon a member of their community. Nadi’s instincts were clearly going off, pounding with the desire to help Syl as she leans in and strokes her new sister’s shoulder.
The trio sit in silence for a few long moments, everyone processing, Syl trapped in her head with her own thoughts as she wonders what will come next. Jerry wouldn’t just... leave her. He’s not that kind of man, even if she had nothing, was nothing, except loved by one Jeremiah Bridger, then it would be enough to have him with her to the very end of the universe provided she held firm to him. He’d wait. It would be okay. It’d be hard. But they’d have their kits eventually. It could all be theirs still... and in the meantime there would be new business to tend to, new wives to befriend, and children to raise.
All of that would have been as Syl foresaw if Jerry had just been a goodhearted Tret man. Instead however, she had wed a human, and a man of action at that. She’d misunderstood her husband’s contemplative silence for processing, for coming to terms with a delay on progressing to the natural next stage of marriage for the wider galaxy.
“So... how long would gene therapy take to correct it?”
“Several years at least. It’ll be expensive to get the materials and equipment, but most of it can be handled at home with the occasional check in with a medical geneticist.”
“Would a healing coma undo the therapy?”
“Not if it’s done properly.”
Syl folds her ears, fearing an edge to her husband’s tone that didn’t exist. Fearing a judgment that would not come.
“Well. That’s no problem then.”
The big man grins over at his first wife, that damned smile of his making her heart flutter just for a moment.
“I’m not really in a hurry to have children immediately, though if it happens, it happens, and if gene therapy takes a few years so we can have children the old fashioned way, that’s what it takes... But I know having a child together is important to you, and I won’t deny you that joy just because I can be patient and wait to see our first daughter’s face.” Jerry leans in. “It strikes me though... that your womb’s entirely functional, save for some issues with implanting right? And that’s mostly to do with the cell wall around the eggs?”
Syl’s ear twitches a bit as she stares at her husband, confused now at his reaction. He’d brushed off the years and money involved like it was nothing... and now he was planning something else? What in the great goddess was he thinking?
“I... it would probably be fine. I’d have to run a test or two to confirm, but yes.”
“Then we can have our first litter whenever you like. We can combine genes like they would be in the womb in the lab. It’s sort of part of your fertility services. All the pieces are in the brochure you gave me the day we met. We’d have to do some things differently. Pure artificial insemination wouldn’t work, and isn't really part of your business... and we wouldn't want to do pure cloning, but we could more or less clone some of your eggs right? Not normally done, but if we can target certain development stages, why can't we target eggs? Then, with a little careful gene editing we can ensure they’re viable and without your genetic problem. Finally we artificially inseminate the eggs. Then we can have a surgeon implant the eggs in your womb and let the kits develop naturally, or if we think it’s too risky, we let the glass womb do the work and you get to stay trim for your first pregnancy.”
Nadi and Syl’s jaws drop slightly. It was a mad man’s solution to the problem, combining cloning and genetic tech in ways that simply normally weren’t done... a clone, but targeting the egg itself. Minor editing on that level wouldn’t take extensive gene therapy like overwriting the small portion of flawed genetic code through Syl’s entire body would. A matter of minutes, maybe hours, not years. It would theoretically work... and even if Syl couldn’t carry them, she’d have her first kits in months instead of years.
Nadi speaks first, the tiny dragon woman looking over to her former employer turned sister wife and business partner.
"...Theoretically, I don't see why it couldn't work, Syl. It's unorthodox, I mean... we don't mix genetic codes normally for clones, especially when producing commercial meat and the like, but there's no reason we can't do that."
All attention in the room is entirely focused on Syl, her tail swishing behind her as she considers the words of her husband and her former subordinate. There were a lot of questions about how to do it, but the concept. The theory was good. It could be done. It wouldn't even be as hard making Wagyu...
Jerry’s chair smacks against the floor loudly as Syl tackles him out of it. She’s crying again, but happy tears this time. She’s generally making a fool of herself but she doesn’t care anymore, from heartbroken and scared to more full of love than she ever could have imagined in just a few sentences.
That for Syl was the real magic of these humans. With their fresh perspective, they thought outside the galactic box in clever ways that just didn’t strike anyone as obvious. Putting tech together in ways that just weren’t needed normally. Simple solutions to seemingly big problems was their real gift to the universe in Syl’s book.