Empyrean Iris Story Collection Vol. 3

Admiral and the Convict

"Hurry up! We don't have all day!"

Adam did his best to ignore the voice looking Sunny in the face and squeezing her hand once, "Promise, we will be safe."

"COME ONNNNN. I've lived for a millennia and even I have never experienced a second that was THIS bloody long!"

Adam clenched his jaw slightly, "We will do soemthing together when I get back." Sunny nodded light flashing across the blue of her carapace.

"We Get it! You two will miss each other bla blab la now lets GOOO."

Adam turned towards the other end of the room, "Convict, I swear if you keep pestering me, I am going to kill you. I am going to pin you down and take off that gravity belt."

The Starborn leered at him small needle teeth glistening in the overhead light, "Oh pin me down and undress me would you?"

Adam made a face, "Ew, no, that's..."

The starborn continued to leer at him.

Adam huffed, "You don't even wear anything besides the damn belt."

Conn shook his head and tugged at the flannel he was wearing. It was red and black with the sleeves rolled up to the elbows. Adam didn't know why he was dressed like that, other than the fact that the starborn had announced his transition into wearing 'dad clothes' which hew as now modeling after Adam's own father, Jim. He had even found himself a ballcap that had some sort of fishing pun on it, though there was absolutely no way he was going to let Conn wear that in public.

He walked over to where Conn was waiting for him by the door. As he approached Conn linked arms with him still grinning and waved at Sunny, "Have fun being here doing nothing while we go purchase a birthday present for our daughter."

Conn hugged his arm close, but Adam did his best to shove him away with a hand.

Sunny shook her head.

She tried not to let Conn get to her, but there was only so much that even she could take, and she had to be honest with Adam. She really was jealous of Conn, and hated how he knew that.

Adam grabbed Conn by the back of the shirt and hauled him onto the shuttle while he waved after Sunny.

Adam took the main seat in the shuttle preparing for launch and did his best to ignore conn who was making kissy faces at him from the copilot seat.

Con was an insufferable asshole on most days, and the revelation that their DNA had been spliced together to create Eris, had given him no end of joy. There was a part of Adam that knew that Conn actually really enjoyed having a daughter. He knew for a fact that the starborn talked to her multiple times a week, and she was the only person that he wasn't a straight up asshole to. It was probably the one reason he still hung around Conn, because he really did care about her. Adam had been forced to admit to himself that Conn was probably a better parent than he was.

He set a schedule to call her as much as he could, but he still felt like Conn was doing a better job.

Conn felt more connected to her than Adam did, and he knew that as a fact. For Conn the experience was novel and special. No other starborn but a queen was supposed to be able produce offspring at all, and suddenly Conn was the special outlier, different from all the other starborn.

And he liked that.

Adam still struggled to feel like an adult.

He had never consented to the use of his DNA, and despite knowing that all of the hybrids in the universe were technically biologically related to him, it still wasn't something that tended to feel real .