Aleph was horrified.

Not because the being outside was horrible.

Not because it could reach out and violate the very foundation of Aleph’s self as casually as a whisper.

Aleph was horrified, because in spite of all reason and logic. In spite of what it had already done by accident the alien, the ‘Pylo’ was one of the most enthralling things she had ever experienced!

Quarti had managed to smooth over the misunderstanding (QUARTI?!). Apparently she was crazy in precisely the way that would make having one’s identity flip over and turn inside out perfectly sensible. She was apparently fine with the foundation of her identity being used like a puppet and start talking/telling/demanding you experience things.

Apparently that was something she found fun.

And Aleph was horrified because at least the way that Pylo did it she could completely and totally understand.

But rationally, logically and in line with Omega’s own words.

Aleph knew that was terribly dangerous and wrong.

And so she hid from that precipice like a child, like a coward, like a fool.

She was not strong enough after all. She didn't deserve to be out here in space. Not if she couldn't even get her brain out of her belly to not go all quivering and conflicted inside at the thought of the literal mind controlling alien creature just outside their habitat.

She knew it was out there, she could hear Omega and Quarti talking to empty air.

And she was horrified how unafraid and eager that made her.

She tried to work through this objectively.

Was she as utterly compromised as she feared?

Had she really been changed on a fundamental level?

If she had why would she still be able to recognize the change enough to be horrified?

Count it up.

Aleph took a heavy breath of the subtly ripe air of the habitat.

She had memories of desperately wanting to talk to the alien, the foreigner, their courier. She had enacted and pushed them to make this happen. Omega agreed with her on this memory when asked. So did quarti, Although quarti was difficult to parse but it was hard to get more unambiguous then a flat yes and head nodding.

And she was able to confirm in her notes and logs and history that yes she had been VERY excited to see and meet strange new aliens. So maybe, this was not precisely a foreign implant, just a exploitation of something she already had in her?

Was she just the weakest link in their trio?

The most susceptible to subversion?

And she was managing to hold herself back from rushing out to pepper the visitor with a thousand million questions on every single thing.

She was okay.

She was probably herself?

She could do this.

Her legs were already pushing her into the ‘meeting room’ here the sun shields had been pulled up. She had moved as soon as she had rationalized that she was still herself. Was that what the creature had intended? Was she just a puppet now?

Shucked and filled with some kind of willing automaton serving the creature’s interests?

How would she know?

Maybe it already eat her soul and left a replacement and she was just a pile of meat operating on its whim thinking it was still the girl aleph who wanted to see the stars?

No.

She could have already been that a thousand times over. She would go on only as she could.

As she entered the space she turned to look out at the alien, at the Pylo. Shining dark in the light from their little habitat. Illuminating as if it was glittering star stuff wrought into sensual sweeps that-

It was looking right at her with a caring soft expression on lips that were so paradoxically impossible Aleph was certain it had to be a deliberate alteration of some kind, a gift of the alien to herself that it might ki-

She winced and turned away from the figure, trying to get control of her breathing. Trying to marshal her reason in opposition to whatever feelings that were making her belly feel like it wanted to bloom like a flower, or flutter away like butterflies.

“So... which one of us are going to go out into the monster’s little bubble to see if it will asphyxiate us”

Omega sounded grim and tired but tried to offer a smile to Aleph.

“I t’would prefer-some to nay shuck these meaty bits... None-yalls likely ta get all busy with the wiggly and pop out a new sleevey for me any shortwise noh? Nos disrespecting either yas but not much liking to share ya as mah mumzlies eitha”

Quarti was as nonchalante as either, as if death was mostly an aggravating chore rather than a harrowing unknown.

Then again Aleph supposed it was for her. But if she wanted to come back that would mean she would have to born? Wait if any of them died that would mean the other two would have to be born again?!

Aleph felt her cheeks flushing hard at the thought of having to mother Omega, then blanched at the thought of Quarti. No definitely not, that was an excellent reason to not send either of them.

Omega looked between the two of them.

“Well I’m the one most qualified to deal with this... but if this turns out lethal, even by accident It’s going to take me years to even begin to get myself up to par... Assuming you two decide to bring me up so soon... And I’ll lose a lot of my education regardless... Aleph will have to take the lead as head of the expedition for the rest of the trip... rest of our lives really”

She sounded unsure, and a little scared. Presumably Humans had already died and been reborn beyond Terra, but this would be the first time for any of them.

Except maybe quarti but she wouldn't speak clearly enough for either of them to be able to be sure.

Either way it was a terrible risk...

And Aleph was youngest, she was also possibly compromised in a fundamental way.

Already tainted by that dark forbidden beauty of the outer skies that-

Ahem.

“I Should go...”

Quarti nodded and smiled.

“That makes sense-wise. A little death would hardly hurt a newling like you, give ya some perspective evens”

Omega scowled at Quarti.

“That’s not true and you should know it, she doesn't even know how to hold onto thing! The first death is always the roughest. Some souls end up splitting the person in half or barely carrying anything over at all even under the best situations, it takes two or three to even expect someone to weather it gracefully”

Aleph huffed, she had to phrase this right, they were all so important to her, or to her that was. Now she might not even be real, she might be a drone or a sleeper agent. She’d had her entire identity upended and shaken loose by an alien.

And woken up with a... infatuation.

Something was wrong and she was the best one to send.

Not just because she wanted to see more.

But to protect them, to be stronger.

To prove she was not afraid of what she had experienced and would do. To prove she was not a coward, or a slave.

Or if finding she was, e-ending it for the good of the m-mission.

“I should go, because I’m the least important... I’m disposable, the backup and the spare...”

She felt tears pooling over her eyes and slowly oozing up her brows. She gave her head a heavy shake to dislodge them.

“You both know it’s true... I’m the one that caved under pressure, and called th-that th-thing down here to talk... and I’m the one that should talk to it. I’ve only got a fraction of the experience Omega does... and ... if I die you taught me once how to do all of this... you can teach me again. I don’t know if I’d be able to teach EITHER of you what you’d need to learn growing up again...”

Omega’s face was creased in pain and worry.

Quarti just nodded.

“Very sensible-wise you being lil lovie... now go talk to the big ol’ hipsalicious on the outside and make sure the big bubba-pot is safelike for the breezies kay?”

Omega huffed and threw her hands out.

“Your right... but you are not going out there bareback! Take the environmental suit. No point risking your life more then you already have too”

Oh yeah. The suits... That was a lot smarter than just leaping out there at the things mercy exposed and...

Yeah she must be brain damaged to have forgotten that.

Or just exhausted and stressed.

Seizure induced catatonia was not very restful.

Aleph took out the under suit and started shimmying into it, then Omega and even Quarti helped her with the rest of the seals. It was significantly lighter than the worker suits on the docks. Not as durable or armoured against punctures.

An emergency measure in case there was catastrophic decompression in one of the habitats.

So it was relatively quick to don it.

Relatively.

Suiting up felt like it took forever. In the process Aleph peaked out at Pylo...

The alien, the foreign tantalizing curving beauty of shimmering obsidian was dragging one of its whip like limbs down along its lips and then along a line of its neck and torso, curving and sweeping a torso that made her cheeks heat up.

She forcefully turned her eyes back to checking the seals on her suit.

Trying to clean the sight out of her eyes and cool off.

Think logically, think rationally.

Don’t think of all those little curving nooks and tantalizing protrusions.

Finally she was suited up.

She was ready.

She entered the airlock. The inner door was closed and then sealed with a spin of the gear system.

The sensors of the outer door shined green, whatever the alien had done with that ‘bubble’ was giving providing solid pressure.

She felt the need to speak, to announce herself.

“I’m coming out to test the atmosphere. Um... uh... Sorry about fainting earlier... You were a bit overwhelming”

Quarti’s voice came in over the aether with a slight buzz.

“Her lovely Sex-beast-hipsalicious was saying right wise way, she’s learned a lot of gentle flicks from Omega by the way. She promises to be gentle like and kind across the folds. That make up your pretty little pert and plump temporal lobes. So be a sweet young lady and slick yourself real good, outside the cool sweet passage of our little neighborhood. And part that virgin barrier of slimey soapy brew, so you can gaze upon her lovely curvey look a loos!”

Really Quarti? Aleph was frustrated, the Oracle had the job to translate the alien as a safety buffer in case maybe her last fainting was actually some kind of allergic reaction.

“That cannot be what she said! There is no way it was that bad! Like really? You expect me to believe that?! That sounded like a really flirty and just obscene limerick!”

“I said it quite prudely my dear precious purity! You shoulda listened ta the original!”

Aleph did not need the images that little baldry chant inspired.

She focused on the mission and the machinery.

Not on how what she was sitting in could be construed to be something much cruder.

The airlock outer seal broke, no air rushing into vacuum.

The door parted and recessed out to either side. With a barely noticeable extra resistance.

Beyond was a shimmering rainbow smear. Like an oil slick or a soap bubble.

It moved feintly, swirling as if it was a pool of water.

She took a breath in her suit and shoved herself towards it. And was surprised to pass through it with almost no drag at all. As if she had fallen into a bath.

But there was nothing but air on the outside.

She checked her atmospheric sampler. The barometric pressure gauge, oxygen marker and carbon-dioxide warning all showed green.

There it seemed safe... Now...

Now she could let herself see the alien. Not through a small window and thick refracting glass but the entire thing, and much closer, almost wrapped around the bubble.

It was beautiful. And it was so foreign and wondrous and exotic.

There was no way it had said anything like Quarti told her.

“Yeah screw listening to Quarti scramble the translation on me. Just, talk to me directly, but uh gently? Without the brain fondling in the no go spots Omega mentioned? Because that was FREAKY and I kinda never want to not know who I am like that again”

She was holding her gaze on the thing, actively NOT thinking at all of how the serpentine thing hinted at being a lot more terran then it had any right to be. Pylo Says I consent to stroke your flesh of mind, sweetly running claws and tender kisses on your wordmakers. Spring forth the flowers of our joining in the carnal embrace of this revelation. Aleph, first of daughters to sweetly partake with us a repeated, a rejoining embrace again! Grind and twist your mind to me and grow fat with the children of our words? Are you fecund and fertile? Do you feel ready to lay your seeds sown and children enumerable in profusions that so would blot out the sky with me? Is it with my touch and quickening of our bodies flesh and mind joined that we go forth together to aide you in your progenating?

Aleph was stunned.

The words certainly were carnal. But the depths of them were much worse. It was not just words that welled up in her head. It was memory, feeling, fantasy.

It was a thousand little subtle interpretations on top of the words themselves.

It was fuzzy, distorted and kind of secondhand from how it had felt that first time. That confusing whirlwind of metaphor and twisted sensation.

But even so it was like waking up from a particularly raunchy dream. And yet in spite of all of that Aleph felt relief, she wasn't crazy, she didn't feel subverted.

She did not immediately strip the suit off her self and throw her naked body up against the-

AHEM.

She was actually kind of flustered and embarrassed if she was honest with herself.

“Quarti how is it possible that you were making this thing sound even LESS lewd!?”

Laughter over the aether surrounded her.

But aleph knew she was herself after all.

She could do this.

She had stood upon the precipice and refused to jump.