Earth Fathers Are Weird (Earth Fathers #1) - Lyn Gala Page 0,57

of could have done better. His only consolation was that the asshole who had kicked him would be dead a whole lot longer than Max would be bruised.

His hand-to-hand combat instructors would be proud. Shocked, but proud.

“Max!” Rick came around the corner, one side of his oversized hat crumpled. Max felt another wave of rage at that reminder of the violence they had all suffered. “You awaken.”

“Clarify. Woke up. ‘Awaken’ is too formal.” Max rubbed a hand over his face.

Rick stopped at the doorway to the medical room. “Query. We are not formal?”

Max snorted. Considering where Rick had put his tentacles, they were on a first-name basis. “I was surrogate for your children. We passed formal a long time ago.” Max lowered himself to the floor, and the pain didn’t increase. That was a good sign. “Thank you for treating the burns.” Max held up his arms.

“Energy damage,” Rick said.

“Yes, I was there when I damaged them.” Max frowned. “Query. Where are the weapons?” The offspring might be cognitively mature, but so were the men and women in boot camp, and no one had trusted them with live ammunition until they had been drilled on safety until their hair fell out. Even then, training accidents happened. Too damn many. Cognitive maturity did not preclude stupidity.

“I placed in secure storage. Query. Will I bring you a weapon?”

Max leaned back against the table. He didn’t want to feel like he needed to walk around the ship armed, but after the invasion, he had to admit he felt a little vulnerable. “Do I need one? Query. Will more invaders come?”

Rick gave a low, rumbling trumpet before saying, “That ship never return.”

“Query. How did they get in your ship?” Max asked.

Instead of answering, Rick curled a couple of his longer tentacles so the orange-red tips dangled under his head. “You are warrior.”

Something was bothering him. Max set the issue of invasions aside for the moment. “I told you that.”

Rick’s tentacles twitched. Max waited for Rick to say something. He didn’t. Eventually Max said, “Yes, I am a warrior. I’m a fighter pilot. I prefer to fight using machines, but I trained to fight with my hands.” At the time, his instructors had been more concerned about pilots having to bail out of aircraft behind enemy lines, since alien invaders hadn’t been on the table as a serious discussion. One disabled captain had taught a class on improvised defensive weaponry by creating imaginary scenarios that included aliens and vampires, but everyone who took the class agreed that Captain Evans had been trying to avoid sounding like a racist by having them prepare for jihad terrorists. Now Max wondered.

“I didn’t set the statement to truth.”

“Ah.” That made sense. “Clarify. Correction. You thought I lied.” Max leaned back against the exam table.

“Yes. Lied. I thought you lied.” Rick stretched out his tentacles and then squiggled them back up again.

Max sighed. “I didn’t. I worked hard to become a fighter pilot. I don’t like to kill, but I trained to protect my home.”

“You are a warrior,” Rick repeated.

This was getting a little obsessive, even for Rick. “Query. Why do you care?”

Rick slid into the room and curled a tentacle around the nearest support leg on the exam table. “I hired a warrior to surrogate offspring for compensation.” Rick trumpeted and curled two tentacles.

“I accepted compensation to surrogate. I love Kohei and James and Xander.”

“Query. Clarify love.”

This was territory Max didn’t know how to navigate. He wanted the children healthy and successful. He felt pride when they handled a situation with cool efficiency, and Max didn’t normally internalize others’ performance. He felt all that and more for Rick. The children were... well... children. But Rick was sweet and caring and not a child. And Max had no idea how to explain any of the various forms of love he felt for the family. He said something that Rick would understand. “I would kill for them.”

Rick trumpeted again. It was a noise Max hadn’t heard often. Rick then added, “You did kill for them.”

“Yep. Hopefully the pirates won’t come back.”

“Unintelligent energy shapes,” Rick said with an unhappy belch.

“Energy shape? Clarify.” The translator had missed that one.

Rick touched the computer and a screen appeared. The general display switched to the curved and expanded alien version of a periodic table. Rick chose an element on the lower right side and selected it. A structure with dozens of electrons zipping around the central nucleus appeared and then a yellowish brown rock appeared, and