“Perhaps.” Al stood up from his chair, stretched his arms high above his head, then put a hand on Titan’s shoulder. “For whatever this knowledge is worth, you should know that everything I have ever done has been met with disapproval from our parents, and I have survived. More than that, living my life the way I felt desire to do is what led me to this planet. To Jude. You said to me previously that Ezra has helped you realize that perhaps the being you have always expected to become is not a being that is admirable. Perhaps it is time our parents learn this lesson as well.”
“Perhaps,” Titan agreed in a small voice. Al squeezed his shoulder briefly, then let go and headed back into the house. They exchanged good nights in their native tongue, and Titan heard rather than saw the sliding door squeak closed behind him.
For some time, he stared out at the sky, in the direction of his homeworld. He imagined the headlines that would occur once the scandal of his coupling with the Great Slut’s son became known. He knew that, professionally and politically, there would be little real damage done. It was not all that long ago that the former leader of Darvrok 6 gave birth to Slime Worms after her affair with the Worm King of Sector 2.72.3, and she still served another two rotations, and one of her Slime Worm offspring currently worked in Titan’s father’s office. Titan’s actions would serve as considerable entertainment until the next scandal broke, but that was all it would be, he was certain.
His father, however? He suspected his father would have less certainty about the ramifications, or at the very least would not handle the temporary embarrassment with grace. He would be disappointed that Titan had brought that sort of shame, however momentary, to their family.
And Al was absolutely correct—Titan had no idea how to deal with it.
Perhaps his abundance of concern was unnecessary, however. After all, since first setting foot on this once foreign, now familiar planet, Titan had experienced a considerable deficit of predictability. He was constantly having curved balls pitched in his direction, as the English saying went. Could it be that he had finally been pitched enough of themto have gained mastery in the unknown?
He pulled his communication device from his pocket and, with a deep inhale of Earth’s soothing, oxygen-rich air, put in his parents’ coordinates.
Perhaps, he thought wistfully, his father would surprise him.
33
Titan
Titan’s father did not surprise him.
On the contrary, the conversation had gone exactly how he had predicted, and he was handling it… less than ideally. A heaviness had settled in his chest during the call, and it had not gone away, not even though the sun had risen and brought with it a new day.
“Father has never spoken to me in such a manner before,” he said, sprawled out on the living room couch with his head in Ezra’s lap. His eyes, previously pinned to the ceiling, flicked over to his brother, who was sitting adjacent to him in one of the recliners. At Al’s feet were three of his offspring, although Titan could not be sure which ones they were without using his touch telepathy, as the seven of them had recently taken to disguising themselves as each other for no reason other than to cause chaos, which was their favorite form of entertainment. They were playing what humans referred to as a “boring game,” with the objective of this particular one being to roll dice, whose sum would determine whether they ascended a ladder toward prosperity or fell to their potential doom down a slide. “Brother, Father has had indignation for your life’s choices since our youth. I must ask—does it always cause such considerable feelings of… I believe this emotion must be… shame?”
“Yes, with frequency,” Al answered easily.
“But in this instance, I have done nothing wrong. I am not ashamed of my actions, nor do I believe there is anything shameful about the one I choose to love”—Ezra squeezed his shin affectionately at that—“and yet I carry shame within me anyway. I do not comprehend this.”
“It is simply a skill Father possesses. He is very proficient at causing others to feel negative emotions using only his words.”
“This is a true statement,” Kyle, who was on the floor with the group of unidentified offspring playing the boring game, added. “It is part of what makes him an efficient politician.”
“What exactly did he say about it?” Jude piped up. He was across from Al in the opposite recliner, sitting at an odd angle with one leg tucked underneath him and the other slung over the arm of the chair. “All you’ve told us is that he ‘had much displeasure and did not have fear to express it.’”
Titan sighed. Reliving the scene caused him tremendous distress, but he had no other choice. It was either he discuss it with those in the room—his family—or replay it incessantly in his head, where it would linger and cause additional harm.
“While he has respect for Ezra as a skilled ambassador between our worlds,” he said uneasily, avoiding eye contact with his someday mate in a way that was likely conspicuous, “he stated that his true heritage is now a matter of public knowledge, and news of our coupling will bring unwelcome attention to our family. When I objected on the basis that Ezra and I have great love for each other and thus such details were irrelevant, he stated that while he was sympathetic, it was selfish behavior on my part to put my own desires over the family name.” Out of the corner of his eye, Titan saw Ezra wince, which made the heaviness in his chest that much worse.
“This makes me feel anger,” Al said with a very humanlike eye roll. “All families of importance have at least one scandalous occurrence, and if they do not, then the media fabricates one for them. It is unavoidable. Had it not been for my miraculous mating with Jude, this scandal would have been mine to shoulder, and had it not been you, then one of our clutchmate sisters or our older siblings would have been the one to bring shame. And what shame is there in having feels of love for a being whose only indiscretion is the origin of his blood? Ezra is otherwise a highly respected diplomat whose dignified behavior earned Father’s favor during his previous visits to Earth. Do not let him discourage you. Father clings to antiquated views, but forgets that Darvrok 6 has become increasingly progressive as our universal outreach has expanded. You both remember the Slime Worms, yes?” he asked Kyle and Titan, who both nodded while Ezra and Jude exchanged a glance full of furrowed brows.
“Do we want to know?” Titan heard Jude whisper in Ezra’s direction. The other human—or, well, mostly human—hummed noncommittally, although he did so with a grimace on his face.
“Yes, I do remember what happened with the Slime Worms,” Kyle said, “but if you will recall, your father was appalled by the incident, believing such behavior to be unfitting for a being in a position of authority, and rescinded his support for our former leader during her reelection.”
“We also cannot forget that his was one of the dissenting voices that denied the Sea Beasts financial assistance from the government after the Cataclysmic Shift,” Titan added.
“The Cataclysmic Shift?” Ezra asked.
“Several rotations ago, one of the largest plates beneath the Darvrokian sea made a sudden shift that reactivated a previously dormant underwater volcano,” Titan explained. “The ensuing eruption caused immeasurable destruction to the Sea Beasts’ most populous city. This occurred shortly before the Mating Festival, which is a crucial time for the Sea Beasts, as it is when they partake in wanton and near-constant copulation in order to produce as many offspring as possible by the following spring. The relationship between Darvrokians and the Sea Beasts is tenuous, and while many government officials wished to provide aid, the dissenters—our father amongst them—barred them from receiving additional assistance, which led to them being unable to host the festival. This was extremely detrimental to their species.”
“I don’t necessarily agree with your father’s stance, but you both know as well as I do that the tenuousness between land and sea on our planet is not over petty disagreements, but due to past bloodshed,” Kyle said, clearly struggling to toe the line between understanding of the brothers’ frustration, and respect toward his long-time employer. “I hold no ill will toward the Sea Beasts, but they are a violent society, and your father had to be mindful of this fact when making decisions for his fellow beings.”
“It matters not to me if their society is violent. Because of those who perished in the volcano eruption, those who succumbed to the severity of their heat, and the low birth rates that year, the population of the Sea Beasts has dropped to such a dramatic degree that they are struggling to maintain their society at all. They no longer have the numbers to enact violence toward land Darvrokians even if they felt desire to do so, and it is the opinion of many that this was the secret desire of the dissenters all along,” Al argued, getting incensed.
“I feel no desire to have a political discussion,” Kyle said with a decisive air to his tone, although Titan was sure Kyle knew as well as he did that Al’s increasing anger was not truly about politics at all. No matter how complicated Titan’s relationship with their father was, he could not lose sight of the fact that Al had been harboring resentment for many, many revolutions, and even with the reluctant acceptance of Jude and their clutch, Al and their parents would likely never have a close relationship.
But then, maybe Titan would not either. He had thought thathe was close to his parents—to his father—but the genuineness of that closeness did not hold up to scrutiny if it could be so easily taken from him when he did anything contrary to their expectations. And as he considered it, the more it seemed inevitable that something would have eventually gone wrong. If it had not been his relationship with Ezra, then it might have ended up being something like a disagreement over politics. What if he had gained more authority within the government, but then opposed his father’s views? Even the old Titan—the one who believed he could do no wrong—would not have been able to agree to such antiquated opinions with any degree of sincerity.
