Side Effects May Include
Zola
Iwakeupfeelinglike I’ve been run over by a cargo hauler, backed up over twice for good measure, then used as target practice by someone with questionable aim and unlimited ammunition.
Every scanner in my medical bay is having what can only be described as a complete electronic nervous breakdown. The advanced biological monitoring systems I requested after reviewing the other inspectors’ reports—equipment specifically designed to detect and analyze unknown biochemical threats—are now flashing warning lights in patterns that would give a seizure to a strobe light.
I’d insisted on the upgrade after reading about Ng’s “unknown toxic compounds” and Gluxor’s “imminent biological threat” reports. State-of-the-art xenobiological analysis equipment, enhanced pheromone detection arrays, real-time biochemical compatibility assessments—everything I thought I’d need to safely inspect whatever had driven three veteran inspectors to emergency evacuations.
Now I’m regretting every single requisition form I filed.
The screens flicker between readings that make no sense: BIOLOGICAL CONTAMINATION DETECTED/ROMANTIC COMPATIBILITY OPTIMAL/QUARANTINE PROTOCOLS ADVISED/RECOMMEND IMMEDIATE THERAPEUTIC INTERVENTION/SUBJECT CLASSIFICATION: UNKNOWN BUT PROBABLY ATTRACTIVE.
Thanks to KiKi, my medical scanner seems to have developed opinions about my personal life.
I try to sit up and discover I can’t move my legs.
There’s something warm and slightly damp draped across them—something that’s purring like a malfunctioning engine and glowing soft lavender in the medical bay’s dim lighting.
“Jitters?” My voice comes out rough, my throat dry.
The blob creature on my legs makes a pleased warbling sound and carefully lifts what might be a pseudopod to pat my knee with surprising gentleness. The gesture is so earnestly comforting that something in my chest tightens unexpectedly.
He’s been here the whole time. Keeping watch. Offering what comfort a sentient blob creature can provide to someone who’s unconscious from biochemical bonding shock.
“Thanks,” I whisper, and the blob glows brighter pink, vibrating with what I’m beginning to recognize as happiness.
“Zola?” Crash’s voice comes from somewhere nearby, rough with concern and what sounds like carefully controlled panic. “Are you... do you feel...”
I turn my head toward the sound and immediately understand why my equipment is having an existential crisis.
Crash is sitting in the chair beside my medical bay, close enough that I can feel the heat radiating from his skin, and he looks like seven kinds of disaster wrapped in golden scales and desperate concern. His hair is disheveled, his coveralls are torn in several places that show tantalizing glimpses of golden skin and black geometric patterns, and there are faint traces of that luminescent fluid along his temple that suggest his biology is still having opinions about our proximity.
But it’s not his appearance that makes my breath catch. It’s the way every piece of medical equipment in the room is reacting to him like he’s some kind of walking biochemical anomaly.
Which, I suppose, he technically is now.
“I feel like I’ve been electrocuted by my own scanner,” I manage, struggling to sit up despite the way my head spins with the motion and Jitters’s concerned grip on my ankle. “What happened to my equipment?”
“It is... responding to the bonding,” he says carefully, and I can hear him trying to choose his words with diplomatic precision.“Velogian biochemistry appears to be... confusing... to your ship’s medical protocols.”
As if to prove his point, my diagnostic array chooses that moment to display: SUBJECT TEMPERATURE: ELEVATED FOR OPTIMAL REPRODUCTIVE COMPATIBILITY. RECOMMEND IMMEDIATE... The text scrolls too fast to read, but I catch fragments about “enhanced ventilation” and “privacy settings.”
“My medical scanner just recommended privacy settings,” I say flatly.
“It has been doing that for approximately forty-seven minutes,” Crash admits, his face flushing darker gold. “Along with suggestions for optimal ambient lighting and what I believe are romantic music recommendations. Your ship’s AI appears to have decided we require... assistance.”
Jitters warbles agreement from my legs, still glowing pleased lavender like he approves of the matchmaking efforts.
I stare at the readouts cycling through increasingly enthusiastic suggestions for enhancing romantic ambiance, and realize that my professional-grade medical equipment has apparently appointed itself as my relationship counselor.
“This is a nightmare.”
“Yes,” he agrees quietly. “I am very sorry. This is entirely my fault.”
The genuine distress in his voice makes me look at him more closely. He’s sitting carefully at the edge of the chair, like he’s trying to maintain respectful distance despite being close enough that I can smell that intoxicating vanilla-lightning scent that seems to be permanently embedded in my sensory memory now.
His hands are clenched on his knees, knuckles pale beneath the golden skin. There are dark circles under his eyes that weren’t there before—he hasn’t slept, I realize. He’s been sittinghere the entire time I was unconscious, watching over me with the kind of protective vigilance that makes something in my chest ache.
