Chapter Text
Lilith gave Nikanj its life back when it might have died, and in that moment she became a traitor to the humans.
Despite Nikanj's talent for humans, it did not know any human way to express the emotion of this, of knowing the fate that Lilith had spared it from and what it had cost her. Gratitude was part of it, and easy to understand, but there was more underlying it.
"I don't deserve any of this," Lilith said to Ooan, after the human Gabriel had berated her for saving Nikanj.
In so few words, she had expressed what Nikanj found so difficult, for there was also no direct Oankali equivalent for "deserve". When systemic fairness was the understood way of things, there was nothing that anyone deserved; only what one should have or shouldn't. What one could safely be given or should reasonably be denied.
Lilith did not deserve this. In ways, she was slighted. The humans she had taught and protected now treated her with contempt- betraying the good she had done for them, betraying the memory of Joseph. Unfairness was such a human burden, so awful and enticing. Nikanj understood, now, that it felt drawn to correct these things by giving her good feelings whenever it could.
It made her pregnant as soon as its sensory arm was well enough. It did not tell her this until later.
She had no companions among the humans, now. She was comfortable in the company of Nikanj and Ahajas and Dichaan, but also frustrated with them and discontented. It gave her a companion. A same-sex child who would understand her better than they did and understand them better than she did.
Of course, she was furious with it for surprising her, but Nikanj knew her body and knew that it was and would remain a friendly and welcoming environment for the child. At times, it saw her laying a hand over her womb- not feeling it in the way that Oankali could, but touching in a human way. Acknowledging the baby as part of herself, part of Joseph. (Part of Nikanj.) She only ever did it in private, for which Nikanj was glad; her body did not yet show signs of pregnancy, and the humans around her would likely react with violence if they learned that she was carrying the construct child of her ooloi. She did nothing to indicate her condition to them. She had time to continue helping the humans, before her pregnancy made it impossible.
Then, she would get to spend time with their daughter.
It was what she...deserved.
(Now that Nikanj was conscious of its own affinity for the "deserve" concept, it could enjoy putting it into practice.)
There would be more humans for her to help, soon.
"Another batch," Lilith said. "I wonder what I'll do differently, this time." There was irony in her tone, and bitterness in her body- it made the unborn child curious.
"We both know better what to expect, now," Nikanj said.
She didn't say anything.
Choosing not to speak when there was no reply needed was common and tonally neutral for the Oankali; in humans, Nikanj recognized that it was often a sign of discontent or passive aggression. Lilith had been more silent than usual, with Nikanj, since news of her pregnancy. Of their mate group, she mostly spoke to Ahajas, lately. And even that was infrequent. It was a fairly impactful method of protest, if only because it showed her dedication; while Nikanj would always be able to read her mood, her needs, her pains, her pleasures, from the language of her body, speaking aloud was humanity's main mode of deliberate communication, and she was willing to part with it to scorn Nikanj.
Rather than argue, or rant, she said nothing. She let her frustration grow through each silence, worsening her own mood perceptibly.
One day, she took a long walk.
It would have been longer- and perhaps should have -but Nikanj thought of Joseph and ended up bringing her back after only a few hours. Her mood was better, when it brought her back. She spoke more. She let it heal her mosquito bites.
It was not her last long walk.
(Much later, when they planted their town on Earth, there would be many walks. All much longer. Out of reach, untouchable. Racking Nikanj and herself with intense physical need each time.)
At home, she curled up after dinner (in the way humans "curled up", bent at stricter angles than Oankali, at a result of their different skeletal structure) and laid a hand over her womb sleepily. Nikanj could feel her love through the floor of the ship. And her bitterness, still.
It went to sit beside her, after she had closed her eyes, and wrapped its strength arm loosely around her midriff and its sensory arm loosely around her neck. Lilith pretended to be asleep even though they both knew that Nikanj knew that she was not- because she was not finished being angry with it, but she also did not have the energy or inclination to act on that anger just now by rejecting its touch.
They did not share sex, then, but Nikanj shared mild pleasures with her, as she drifted off. Before she was asleep, but after she had begun to near it, Lilith's hand drooped to touch Nikanj's strength arm. (An unintentional slackening in her muscles.) Blearily, she murmured, "Nika?"
"I'm here," it said.
She sighed serenely, resting her head against Nikanj's body. Her fluffy hair stimulated the sensory tentacles on Nikanj's shoulder- not uncomfortably. It allowed its tentacles to revel in the touch of her hair and her skin, catching and quieting her impulse to shiver before it could bear fruit. Combing every tangle of tension from her muscles, sowing a hum of good feeling into every cell that could feel. After a minute, she asked, "How long before I start showing?"
"It won't be long."
"Won't be long."
Nikanj's tentacles smoothed. "It will be soon."
She was anxious, and she was excited, and she was bitter, and she loved.
Nikanj helped her to sleep and sent pleasant impulses to the developing baby.
The humans Lilith had awoken first had been sent to Earth two days prior. Tate and Gabriel, once friends to Lilith, once mates to Ooan, were off to survive on Earth, infertile without an ooloi.
There would be more humans for her to help, soon.
They would be very similar to the first group she'd awoken.
They would be as wonderfully full of potential and contradiction as all humans were.
They would not deserve her.