Planet Athion: The Complete Series by Angel Lawson

Epilogue

Three Years Later

The ward isfull of pregnant women. Each with their own rooms—doctors and midwives. The nursery holds cries and squawks and the muffled sounds of babies—most healthy. All wanted. The dreams of Emperor Elrin and the government of Earth finally coming true. Athion is a place of birth and renewal for the pioneers willing to take the risk. Our societies have merged, fully, and a new race has evolved.

I’m proud to be part of creating it.

Most days I’m filled with boundless energy. After two years of living on Damon’s ship and building a family in the way only tight quarters can produce, we returned to Athion. To my surprise, my men had been busy during our time away. They’d purchased and secured a lot of land, had a home built from the ground up and presented it to me when we returned.

A home. One made for all of us, big enough for the whole family and then some.

Once we settled in, we started the process of building a family. I knew in my heart it was a long shot. My age. The struggles and stress my body had gone through as a slave. We tried, and I mean that…we tried, hard. Four men, five virile cocks, countless love-making sessions. We did everything. I used all my mid-wifery tricks. Certain days of the month. Certain times of the day. Body temperature. Ovulating. Hanging upside down to give the sperm chance to settle.

I took test after test, month after month and none gave me positive results despite the fact I was convinced my symptoms proved otherwise. After the final disappointment three months ago, I spoke to a colleague. She told me what I’d been avoiding.

“You’re probably in perimenopause. It’s a trend for the women that arrived from Earth past their thirties. It seems to onset faster in this environment.”

Menopause. At age thirty-five.

The strangest thing is that I never expected to have babies. I came here to help other women. I certainly didn’t expect to fall in love with four virile men, and there aren’t expectations—not verbally. They’re busy with their jobs, their missions and careers. They love the carefree nature of our relationship, but I sense it in the empty bedrooms. One adjacent to my own—nursery-sized. I sense it when I see them look at other children, the combination of human and Athion skin and features.

Which is why, when my menopausal symptoms escalate, it hurts that much more. The headaches, the mood swings, the cramps. I appease myself with their bodies and pretend they don’t notice the slight bloat at my waistline. I happily forgo birth control because it doesn’t matter. I stop tracking who I have sex with like I had in the past, so that if I did get pregnant I’d know who the father was—it would make a difference since two of my men are human and the other Athion.

The abandonment of any sort of structure, routine, or control seems to please my men and one night, after several glasses of mead, we let our final inhibitions go and do the one thing we’ve never done before.

Have a full out orgy.

It starts with a kiss from Alex, who I’d never tell the others is the best kisser of the group. His tongue and lips are perfection whether he’s kissing my mouth or other, more sensitive spots. Kissing in front of one another has never been a big deal and even two of us enjoying one another’s bodies at the same time is common. But the five of us? I’m not sure what overtakes us, if it’s the mead or the upset over my infertility or them wanting to make me feel better, but it happens.

And they do.

They do make me feel better.

We’re by the fireplace when Damon strips me of my clothes and I’m barely aware as theirs fall to the floor as well. It’s an overload of muscled chests and laddered abs. Fuzzy hair travels down to hard, darkened cocks. There are hands and fingers everywhere and I feel them, sense them, as I’m laid on the rug before the roaring fire, the light glinting off skin and flesh. I close my eyes, knowing I’m safe and wanted. I feel the gentle brush that brings the hair on my body to stand on end, the wet heat between my legs to pool, and the hunger deep in my belly to roar.

I’m spread wide.

I don’t know how long it goes on; the coaxing, the tugging, the biting and licking. They bring me to the edge over and over again. They bring themselves to completion. I hear the grunts. I see the slack jaws. I see hands rubbing, stroking, and it makes my body twist and squirm to know they’re touching one another. Exploring the territory I claim as my own. I want them to mark it, too.

I take them in my mouth, my ass, my pussy. I taste their seed, lick their shafts clean, feel the warm, slow drip between my legs.

We end the night spent and in a heap. Bodies slick with sweat, hearts racing, hungers appeased. I feel their warmth. Their love. Their commitment. They tell me. Show me. Promise me.

And even though the ache in my womb doesn’t completely subside, I’m fulfilled, knowing I already have a family.

* * *

“Someone get the doctor in here,”I call, trying to keep my voice calm. I look up at the sweaty, pale-faced woman. “Take a deep breath. Just keep breathing. You’ll be fine.”

But she wouldn’t be fine. I knew it, there’s so much blood and she’d lost more before she got to the hospital. There’s been a tragic accident—her mate lost on the way here. The woman, eight months pregnant, is fighting hard. She doesn’t know about her mate, but I can tell from the look in her eye that she does know she’s in trouble.

“Please,” she says, in a hoarse whisper. “Save my baby. Promise me.”

I nod.

The doctor rushes in. Dr. Valdez, actually—my physician from when I’d almost died back on Cryron. She gives me a concerned look. If I’d called for help, things had to be bad.

Together we work to save the woman—to save the infant—but the first fails, her heart stopping midway through the attempt to slow the bleeding, the light fading from her eyes.

“Extract the baby,” I demand. “Cut her open.”

Valdez looks wary—the machines show no signs of life. “Mercy…”

“Do it.” I hand her the instruments. “I made a vow when I came here. It’s my mission.”

She exhales and takes the tool, quickly making the incision. Inside is a blueish newborn—eyes clenched—mouth frozen. I pull her out, cleaning her airways, and tears pop in my eyes when she squawks with life.

“Let me take her,” the assistant says, reaching for the child like standard protocol.

I grab the blanket on my own, wrapping her tight. “No,” I say, already feeling the bond forming. “I’ve got this one.”

I take her through the motions, cleaning, testing, assessing. I bring her to the nursery and hold her, feed her, change her. And when my men come to find me later I hold her up for them to see, wonder spreading across their faces.

“Her name is Juliana,” I tell them, “and if everything goes smoothly, she’ll come home with us in a few days.”

I tell everyone that when I left Earth, it was because I had a mission. The truth is that I was running away from the pain and loss of my home and my sister. It’s been a long, slow journey filled with love, loss, pain, and war. It’s also been filed with redemption and success. Love.

As I look down on this baby girl, with amber eyes and pale blue skin, I didn’t know what the future would hold, that my fear would lead me here, to be in the place to share my life and love with this abandoned child. One that needs a home.

As much as I did.