Chapter 12: Chapter 12: Foes and Families

Another lost life in Ultra Ricardo II left Svetlana groaning. She’d never been good at platformers, but she wanted to work her way through some more big name classic games. She looked over at Cartridge, waiting for her friend to mock her poor playing, only to find the other woman staring blankly at the cash register.

“What’s up?” she asked.

“I… you’d probably know, O’tmyil,” Cartridge said, getting the alien android's attention. “Do… uh, do Svetlana and I have actually functional—y’know” she said, gesturing to her lower torso.

“Intestinal tracts?” O’tmyil asked, tilting her head.

Cartridge blushed. “No. Ovaries.”

“Oh. Yes,” O’tmyil replied flatly, before going back to her reading. 

Cartridge nodded, before tears started to well up in her eyes. Svetlana wasn’t sure what was going on, and hopped to her feet, when Cartridge turned to her with a smile. 

“It just hit me, after the folks at the support group were asking about it; if we actually have all the bits now, then… then I could have a kid. I could be a mom one day. I didn’t—didn’t realise how giddy that idea would make me feel until I had it,” Cartridge said, as Svetlana realised those were happy tears.

Svetlana blinked, a hand going to her own abdomen as the idea sank in. It felt… well, it seemed nice? But in a somewhat abstract way. It wasn’t hitting her with the same force it seemed to be having on Cartridge.

While she was happy for her friend, she did end up having to spend a good chunk of the rest of the shift convincing her not to call up Geordi and talk about wanting to have kids as soon as possible. Reminding her that she was still in her twenties and her ‘biological clock’ had lots of ticking left to do. As well as pointing out the two of them had only gone on a handful of dates so far. It was a bit early to seriously talk about kids.

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The heat bugs were screaming as Svetlana tried to get to sleep. Of course the week the building management scheduled for HVAC repairs was the worst heatwave of the year so far.

Rolling over and grabbing her phone, she saw it was 3pm. A normal time for most people to be awake, of course, but not for her. The downside to working nights was having to try to sleep during the hottest hours of the day. Though, with a heatwave like this, she wasn’t sure 3am would have been all that much cooler. 

Dragging herself out of bed, the apartment felt lonely. O’tmyil was in sleep mode to avoid overheating. Plynx and Mynx were staying in their climate controlled spaceship. Cartridge had slept over at Geordi’s.

Svetlana kind of cursed not doing the same, but: Thisbe’s place wasn’t air conditioned (vampires didn’t care about heat); Vivian worked days (making cohabitation tricky); the spaceship had annoying low hum below the range of Issiod’rian ears but within human’s hearing range; and… well, things were still sideways with Augusta. 

So, Svetlana wandered over and stuck her half-awake head in the freezer for a bit. When that failed to actually do anything she gave in and got dressed. Pocketing the disk that was the slumbering O’tmyil, she headed out in search of air conditioning.

Her grumbling stomach reminded her she needed to eat. Feeling cheap and wanting to go to the closest option, she popped over to the nearest Horny Ron’s (or, Ron Horance’s, if you wanted to call the doughnut chain by its actual name… Ronny’s for people not from Hammer City). Stepping in, she let out a sigh of relief and the sweet sweet central air. She ordered an ice capp, a sandwich, and a Boston cream before sitting down to eat and surf the wifi on her phone. She had the day off, and was wondering what to do after an hour or so of checking twumblr and her cacophony chat groups, when she got a text from Vivian.

The text was a reminder of what she’d mentioned on her last day off, after patching things up Plynx: Svetlana hadn’t told her parents. Vivian had offered to go with her.

Svetlana deflated for a moment, air escaping her as she thought about how her dad might respond. He wasn’t transphobic or anything, but he hated surprises. He was the type who gave friends and family a list of acceptable presents for his birthday and Christmas, and coordinated to make sure no one bought duplicates. He was a very good accountant due to his highly organized approach, but… a bit stressful to grow up with.

Still, spending time with Vivian was nice, and it had been a while since she’d seen her mother. So, she agreed and set off to Gore Station, moving down to the A-line platform, and waited for Vivian there. It wasn’t air conditioned, but it was cooler down here. There was also wifi, and Svetlana was about to start scrolling through the websites she’d been bored of five minutes ago, when she felt O’tmyil vibrate in her pocket. Svetlana let out a sigh, getting the message. She moved over to an empty corner of the platform and began to work through a routine of a training exercise Plynx had taught her. It was sort of like Issiod’rian tai-chi, and so didn’t involve messing up her clothes too much. 

She was almost done when she felt like she was being watched and turned around, expecting Vivian to have arrived early. 

Instead, she found herself staring at a Kobaroian. A male, so he was shorter than Svetlana, but he was still built like a tank, with a nearly foot long horn growing out of his forehead, tusks, and a clubbed tail. Which meant he could be trouble if he wanted to be, even if he was unarmed. She’d learned that the hard way the few times she’d met one in the flesh. Their robot soldiers were so much easier to deal with.

Svetlana slipped into a ready stance, her hand moving into her pocket to grab O’tmyil, when the alien man’s eyes flashed with panic.

“Ahh! No! No! No trouble!’ he yelped, raising his hands up in a placating manner. “Just watching.”

“Just—” she started, before realising the alien fellow was dressed in a set of scrubs. Svetlana blinked as she processed that. “You’re a… doctor?”

“Veterinarian,” he replied. 

“In town?” she asked, pointing a finger nowhere in particular as if it would reinforce the point.

The solidly built alien nodded. “Couple weeks ago, just moved in.”

“Huh,” Svetlana replied, relaxing a bit. She kept her one hand on O’tmyil’s disk form, though. Just to be safe. “… how are you finding it?”

The alien smiled. “It is nice. Peaceful. Green. Food is cheap.”

“Ah, well. That’s good to hear,” Svetlana replied with a smile. 

“Making friends?” Vivian asked, walking over from the stairs.

“Maybe?” Svetlana replied.

The alien man turned (prompting Svetlana to take a step back to avoid his tail club), and stared up at Vivian. “Earthling Females get that big? I did not know.”

Vivian blushed slightly at the look of pure reverence on his face, glancing at Svetlana for help. Neither knew what to say before the Kobaroian man spoke again.

“You must have many Earthling husbands, so big. Could easily have two in my society,” he explained. “Maybe more.”

“Uh… thanks, but I’m a lesbian?” she offered.

This time the alien blushed, waving his hands and (deer-like) ears in panic. “Apologies. Apologies… your wife?” he asked, gesturing to Svetlana.

“Well, not yet,” Vivian replied, while Svetlana felt a rush of pure excitement.

Wife. She’d just been thought about as a wife. It made her so giddy she completely missed the alien man’s goodbye, only realising he was gone as she saw him heading up the stairs. She also barely processed anything else as she followed Vivian on to the southbound A-line train, heading up the Mountain. They rode quietly until Fennel, getting out and grabbing a bus west. The houses got larger and nicer for a while, though were starting to dip back down to ‘average’ when the pair got off. 

Walking past the large upper middle class homes, Svetlana felt out of place. Her parents had only moved here after she’d moved out. Not having to worry about the extra mouth to feed coming around the same time as a promotion for her father had helped them out. Not that she’d ever felt all that at home at their old neighbourhood further east on the mountain. The lower city was her home now.

She ignored the sense of disconnect from her childhood as she stepped up and rang the doorbell for her parent’s new(ish) home. After a few moments, her mother appeared, a large smile framed by greying blonde hair. 

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“Ke—wait, um…” her mother said, giving Svetlana a once over.

“It’s me, mum, but, um… alien tech happened. And I liked it,” Svetlana explained.

Her mother stared for a moment, before tears started to well up in her eyes. Svetlana wasn’t sure what to say, how to reassure her mother, when she found herself pulled into a hug. She returned it, having missed being around her mother. 

Her mother eventually broke the hug and glanced at Vivian, before turning back to Svetlana and dropping to a whisper.

“Did… did the other girls leave, then?”

“N-no. Well, most of them didn’t. Having some issues with Augusta,” Svetlana explained.

Her mother weighed it for a moment, and with good reason. The last time Svetlana had tried to visit her parents Augusta and Plynx had gotten into a fight that had seen significant property damage to her parent’s home. Sure, Augusta had paid for the damages eventually, but it had become clear Svetlana’s parents hadn’t liked visits much as a result.

“Well, if the self-proclaimed Tsesarevna isn’t here, then do come in, Kevi—you’re probably not going by that anymore, are you dear?” her mother asked while stepping back to let her and Vivian in.

“Uh, no. Svetlana, actually,” she replied as she took her shoes off.

“Ooh. Little Sveta. Cute!” her mother said with a grin.

“I’m 6ft,” Svetlana protested.

“You’ll always be my little baby,” her mother replied, while leading her and Vivian into the living room. “Your father should be home in a bit. He actually comes home at a reasonable hour nowadays.”

Of course, her mother had wanted more information than ‘alien tech happened’, and Svetlana had answered what her mother asked. She had been left more than a little stunned to see her mother seem to approve in Vivian now dating O’tmyil and Thisbe.

“I thought you’d see that as even further from a ‘normal relationship’ than how things were before,” Svetlana said, before grabbing a cookie to nibble on.

“Oh, no, dear. I didn’t care that your situation wasn’t ‘normal’, it was the… well, since you’re actually a girl it was a silly worry, but… I had thought I’d raised you with more of a feminist outlook than juggling five different women all in love with you had seemed to imply,” her mother replied, smiling softly. “But all female polyamory, that’s a whole different matter, and, obviously, gives fewer ‘outdated patriarchy’ sort of feelings.”

“Oh…” Svetlana replied, nodding to herself.

She’d known her mother was modern, but not that modern. Before the conversation got any further, the front door opened.

“Dear, do we have guests?” her father’s voice called out, wavering a little.

“Yes, in the living room. Our baby is visiting, and h-she only brought Vivian with… her.”

Svetlana’s father walked in, his normally olive complexion looking rather pale as he did so. “So the destru—she? Wait…”

He then stared at Svetlana, his mouth hung open.

“H-hi, dad,” Svetlana offered.

Her father’s eyes whipped over to her mother. “Dear, did you s-secretly have twins and not—not tell me?”

“No,” her mother replied softly. “Kevin transitioned. She’s Svetlana now.”

“That—that… ah,” her father said, seeming to calm down before nodding a few times.

Then he fainted.

Svetlana and Vivian moved him over to the couch, while Svetlana’s mother hurried off to grab medication and some water for her husband.

As she returned, Vivian offered her an apologetic smile. “I’m sorry, Mrs. Fujikawa. I should have remembered what your husband was like with surprises and not improvised this visit.”

“It’s fine, Vivian dear. Something like this would have probably got the same reaction out of Dan either way,” she replied with a smile. “Also, you can call me by first name, dear. Especially since there’s good odds you’ll be a Fujikawa soon too.”

“Uh,” Vivian said, before turning an adorable shade of crimson. “You… um, you’ve been ‘Mrs Fujikawa’ or ‘Svetlana’s mom’ so long that I… um…”

“Karyna,” Svetlana’s mother replied with a giggle.

Vivian nodded rapidly, still beet red. “Karyna. Right. Yes.”

The three women then jumped back a bit as Svetlana’s father bolted upright, seeming wide awake. He blinked a couple times, before turning to Svetlana.

“Sveta, dear! You should have phoned if you were coming,” he said with a warm smile. 

“Are you ok, dad?” Svetlana asked.

“Why wouldn’t I be? My baby girl is visiting again. It’s been too long,” he said.

Her father proceeded to spend the rest of the evening acting as if Svetlana had been AFAB. Her mother seemed roughly as confused as she was, but, then again, they’d never sprung this big of a surprise on him before. They probably should have expected an odd response.

He had stuttered a little about how to think about Svetlana’s girlfriends, but had quickly accepted they were (mostly) all still together and moved on to declaring that Svetlana had been a total tomboy growing up and hoping she’d actually wear a dress to her wedding. 

Which, of course, distracted Svetlana a bit as she thought about it.

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