Stepping into the living room with Greg in tow, Alicia
smiled when she spotted Franklin and Valaria come home from school, greeting
their father at the door with a hug that nearly overtook the man at the couch.
Joining Alicia to sit across from the Richards family, Greg leaned towards
Alicia and whispered.
“Who are they?”
“Those… I guess are your human siblings, they are Susan’s
first son and daughter.”
Blinking back at the two children laughing and telling their
father about their day, Greg observed their behaviour, studying their every
action but remaining silent as Alicia had instructed him. That is until Johnny
piped in with a joke.
“So Greg, how is it we’ve never heard of you? I mean, not
one to pry but you kinda just came out of nowhere."
"I came to be just yesterday."
"You mean like from the airport?"
"From the basement sto…"
"GREG... Works in storage... Down south, he doesn't get
much time to talk when he's down there, time zones and all..." Alicia cut
in, almost desperately.
As everyone began to chat, Ben Grimm noticed something when
he watched Alicia turn her head and turn her eyes watching everyone talk. No
longer glassy or pale, her eyes were sharp and alert and bright green.
“Hey Alie, what happened to yer eyes? You’s can see now?”
Caught off guard, the woman brought a hand to her cheek and
smiled sheepishly, trying to find the right thing to say. “Uhm… Yeah, I
recently got a new treatment. I can see again.”
Taken back, everyone congratulated the woman who covered her
face with both hands smiling. “I… I wanted it to be a surprise but with
everything happening today, well…”
“Say, where’s sis? She should know this too.” Wondered
Johnny, looking around to not find Susan within earshot of him.
“Oh! She knows, I think she’s busy downstairs getting something.”
*
Crouched down on the resin caked floor cradling one of the
newborns in her arms, Susan was surrounded by her and Alicia’s many newborns
crying out for their turn to be fed while she breast fed the rapidly growing
toddler in her lap, her costume undone to expose her chest while the squirming creature
in her arms sucked and sucked away. Hanging over her head were dozens of cocoons
freshly hung that added to the others who were already looking ready to hatch
any day if not hours from now. Looking up at the collection of throbbing,
pulsing fleshy sacks, it almost looked like the honeycombed wall of a bee hive.
In front of her, the group of adults passed one book after
the other amongst themselves, each time they did, their eyes fluttered, and a
look came over them, one filled with intelligence instead of raw instinct. The lust
was still there, especially when they looked at her, but now it seemed tempered.
“So… I take it we can have a conversation now. I thought the
dictionary would help if all else failed.”
“You left…” Spoke one of the big males, his deep voice
making Susan shiver despite herself.
“You did not want us outside the lair… You left, so… We
prepared for when you would get back.” Answered another, carefully placing one
of the books on the floor before looking over to his sibling and passing it to
him instead. “Temporal Mechanics, interesting…”
Sighing as the toddler she cradled squirmed to be let down
on the floor, she watched it wander before tentacles sprouted from its
translucent green flesh and was enveloped in a cocoon to join its many siblings
on the ceiling. “So why are you jerking off… all over the place?!”
“We are preparing the nest, our fluids are also a resilient coagulant
or resin, it will insulate against the cold and dryness to keep our lair warm
and humid.”
On some level, Susan knew that, it scared her that she knew
that. Picking up another demanding infant from the ground, Susan cradled the
tentacled creature in her arms where it instantly latched to one of her nipples
and began to nurse like its sibling before it. She still had over a dozen to
feed, she didn’t want to, if anything every cocoon hanging from the ceiling was
another monster, she had to keep an eye on. But she also felt compelled, an
instinct she could not ignore… Just like her drive to have sex. “Why are you
all still here? Why aren’t you all just storming off to rape every woman in
sight like you were before?”
“Do you want us to?” Asked the third male, his eyes lighting
up like the others as if waiting for permission.
“NO!”
Low hisses and growls filled the lair, just when Susan let
the toddler free and watched it join its siblings among the low hanging fruit
that were the collection of cocoons. To show how serious she was, Susan
reverted to her other form; her fingers becoming sharp talons, her golden blond
hair slithering into a mass of snapping tentacles, her smooth skin becoming
dark green and translucent and her eyes sharp and reptilian.
“Here’s what I know already, I’m dangerous, we are ALL
dangerous.” She proclaimed with a hiss as she fed another infant. “I am setting
ground rules right now! No more sex, not with the human population outside, you
DO NOT instigate anything with them!” Hearing their growls of protest, she
continued. “Pregnancy with us is lethal to them, you leave a pile of hollow
corpses anywhere and I’ll soon find a lynch mob at my front door with torches
and pitch forks.” Narrowing her slit eyes, she glared at the four males. “I won’t
have that”
“And if we disobey?” Catching her son off guard as the rest
of the male creatures surrounding her, Susan’s fingers and thumb had merged
into a scything thin crab claw. One that held the insolent creature up a foot
off the ground where his clawed feet dangled, struggling with the razor sharp appendage
holding him up with inhuman strength yet delicate enough that his green blood
oozed from the paper thin cut from his neck, with just a little more exertion
she could snip his head clean off. But instead she let him drop like a stone
where he rubbed at his rapidly healing neck.
Still cradling the infant in her free arm, Susan looked at
the chitinous blade where her hand used to be, watching as she concentrated
back the razor-sharp boney teeth and thick carapace to sprout additional
fingers, and flex her talons once more.
“This creeps me out, but I’ve gotten better at controlling
my body, do not think for a single second that if I get wind of any dead people
or more ‘siblings’ hanging from this place I won’t hesitate to decapitate each
and every one of you!” Including myself… She thought ruefully.
“We obey our progenitor.”
“We obey our matriarch.”
“We obey our queen.”
Finishing with feeding the newborns, Susan looked up to the
thirty or so cocoons pulsing and throbbing like beating hearts and breathed
sharply, returning her appearance to her human self again.
“I’ll bring more books for you all to read, and cloths to
cover yourselves up, I expect the same with the… Others when they hatch.”
Getting a knowing look from the closest male, Susan turned
and went to the elevator, pressing the button for the descent and entered the
elevator chamber, holding herself tightly after the doors closed behind her.
*
Zipping the back of her costume up and exiting the elevator,
Susan stepped out in the hall where she could hear her family talking in the
living room. Smiling more warmly now that she could, Susan moved to join
everyone, her smile beaming when Franklin and Valaria jumped from their seats
and hugged their mother, a little taken back by her now younger complexion and
more curvaceous figure. “Hi kids! How was school?”