And then the screaming transitions from piercing to painful.
“Enough,” hisses Shenya the Widow, unfolding to her full height. Yes, enough is enough. Into the Librarian you go, you disgusting Human. She stalks toward it, blades out, fully expecting to have to catch the slippery thing when it scrambles away from her.
“No!” shrieks the Human, staying where it is. It clutches its wounded appendage and leans forward, as if to give more force to the word. “No!”
Shenya the Widow stops dead. [Was that…Standard I just heard?] she says in her head.
[Looks like I lost a bet], says Shokyu the Mighty. [Perhaps you should publish this fear- and pain-based curriculum.]
Shenya the Widow watches the small thing carefully. “So you can learn,” she says out loud.
[Raising Your Human: A Guide to Training Your Offspring with Fear], says Shokyu the Mighty.
“But you heard it as well, did you not?”
[Secrets of Cross-Species Child-Rearing: A Terror-Based Approach.]
“If you have better ideas for disciplining vicious aliens, I am listening,” snaps Shenya the Widow. “My mother actually removed parts of me as a method of discipline.”
[That’s the mother with whom you shared such a joyous relationship?]
“It is,” hisses Shenya the Widow.
[Far be it for me to judge the parenting techniques of another species], says her implant, [but if I’m not mistaken, your pieces grow back.]
Shenya the Widow taps her damaged blade against a mandible with an audible click. Fortunately they do, or she would be left with a Librarian love bite for the rest of her life. “True,” she says. “But just because I grow back doesn’t mean—”
And then her instincts flatten her to the deck. An object flies through the space her head recently occupied, ricochets off the bulkhead behind her, and bounces to a stop on the floor. Shenya shifts her gaze from the object to the Human, amazed.
[Did it just throw its foot covering at you?] asks Shokyu the Mighty.
Shenya the Widow is nearly too shocked to reply. “I…believe it did,” she says.
[Let me guess], says Shokyu the Mighty. [Now you’re going to have some Widow fun with it before it goes into the Librarian.]
But Shenya the Widow does not respond. She examines the small figure. Even if it were not a Human—and the name alone brings her internal fluid pressure up—it would be a hideous mess of a being. Between its general pudginess, its skin wrapping, and the various fluids it seems to produce nonstop from everywhere, it is the least attractive thing she has ever seen. And yet…do not the proverbs say that the carapace tells only half the story? This repulsive little thing attacked something larger than itself, something it had no hope of defeating, and it did so while wounded. That, to a Widow, deserves some thought.
“No,” hisses Shenya the Widow, softly.
[Well then, your experiment in motherhood continues], says Shokyu the Mighty.
Shenya the Widow rattles. You go too far, implant. “Do not use that word with this—this thing,” she hisses. “Unless you wish for a factory reset.”
[All right, fine, we’re babysitting], says her implant, seemingly unaware of the seriousness of its position. [So let’s entertain it. I don’t have any local data on Humans, but…what do Widow juveniles like to play with?]
Shenya the Widow decides to let it go. As annoying as her implant is, it is not so annoying as an implant who cannot remember the last decade. “Wounded prey,” she says, warm memories of childhood surfacing.
[And here we are without a single dying animal.]
But Shenya the Widow is inspired. Without another word, she takes a quick skittering trip to her cabin. She travels with few belongings, which means it is mere seconds until she emerges with a bundle under two blades. The Human watches her reappear with what Shenya would swear is a baleful look in its eyes. It appears to be prepared to attack again, which warms Shenya’s hearts.
“Let us see what we may do with this,” she says, rolling out the bundle on the floor.
[I have never seen you wear clothing], says Shokyu the Mighty.
“That is because I am not a juvenile,” she says. Little idiot, she does not add. Two blades gently lift a small piece of cloth. It is a deep and shimmering black and it brings back memories that she will never share with anyone.
[Baby clothes?] asks her implant. [Swaddling, that kind of thing?]
“We are not swaddled,” says Shenya the Widow, holding the cloth up to the light and looking for holes. “Only a few of us even survive long enough to meet an adult.”
[Environmental hazards, I assume?]
“Each other.”
[I see.] Her implant pauses for a moment. [Again, I don’t judge. So if not swaddling clothes…mating clothes? Just a guess.]
“You are correct,” says Shenya the Widow, stroking a cloth in gentle reminiscence. “Each one stained with the lifeblood of a different male, given at the height of its ecstasy.”
[I…understood we were talking about mating?]
“We are,” says Shenya the Widow. “But now you know why we are called Widows.”
She waits for the next question, the one that will force her blade, the one that will finally result in a factory reset for her implant. If you have mated, then where are your children? But her implant, for once in its existence, is silent.
It is then that Shenya the Widow makes a decision. With a smooth motion, she gathers up the cloth and stands. She gazes at the tiny form, which appears to have fallen asleep from exhaustion. Its other foot covering is already off, apparently prepared for use as a second missile. She will never admit it, but it is this image that forces its way into her hearts.
“It wouldn’t survive eight seconds in a nest of newly hatched Widows,” she hisses quietly.
[I shudder to think], says Shokyu the Mighty.
* * *
#
[Aw], says Shokyu the Mighty. [Now aren’t you glad you didn’t murder it?]
Shenya the Widow watches the tiny Human crouch against the wall of the common area, surrounded with the contents of a tool bag. A small doll watches beside it. It is made of a black and silky material, and its many-limbed physiology is something that a Widow might recognize. The Human is intent on its task, stacking the tools in various ways and then demolishing the piles in fits of violence and giggling. After each act of destruction it glances toward the Widow as if to judge the effect on her.
“I think she is becoming comfortable with me,” remarks Shenya the Widow, twitching her mandibles in what another Widow might see as a motherly gesture. Even the increased light of the common area—shifted for the Human’s benefit—cannot dampen her pleasant mood.