Chapter 50: Are mermaids fetal or oviparous?
Translated by Addis of Exiled Rebels Scanlations
Editor: Karai
Lin Xu moved, the tip of Heinrich’s high nose slid up to his hairline, the muscles in Heinrich’s arms tensed, but the final force fell just enough to hold Lin Xu’s back in a vague hug. If Lin Xu had intended to push him away, he would have waited in silence. But Lin Xu just raised his hand to support the rabbit-cat, let it stand firm, don’t slip and fall, almost all his and the rabbit-cat’s weight pressed on Heinrich, as if filling some kind of vacancy. But the light was not his, the moon was in someone else’s arms.
Heinrich remembered the red Chinese roses rejected by Lin Xu. Lin Xu had expressed courtesy and distancing, and it was he who was unwilling to give up. Shouldn’t he let go now, let go of his greed and all the covetousness he shouldn’t have?
But that person never showed up, and he would never have known that Lin Xu had a child, and that Lin Xu was no longer in love with that person. If so, then Heinrich could actually… Keep the moon with him. He breathed shakily, “Who is that person?”
“What?” Lin Xu’s voice sounded right next to Heinrich’s ear, low and magnetic and plush.
“Are they an alpha, or a beta?”
Lin Xu tilted his head, trying to step back to look at Heinrich, but his back was softly wrapped around his waist. If he stepped back any further, he would have slipped out of his embrace. Lin Xu stopped moving, and when he looked up, the tips of their noses brushed against each other, but the room was dark, and even if they looked at each other, they couldn’t see anything.
Lin Xu moved back in, leaning slightly down against the side of Heinrich’s face and rubbing his ear against his cheek. “There’s no other person.”
“Not a person?” Heinrich became nervous. If Lin Xu’s orientation was not human, then he would have little chance of winning, “mermaid? or some other extraterrestrial?”
Just as the words left his mouth, he heard Lin Xu let out a sneer and slapped Heinrich on the shoulder with a snap.
“Heinrich Chu, what image do I have in your eyes?” Why would he get into bed with extraterrestrials? Lin Xu didn’t mean to discriminate against extraterrestrials in any way.
“… You have a tail.”
“Do you mind that much?”
“No, no… It’s beautiful.”
The sudden, blunt compliment brought a sudden silence between the two, and Lin Xu calmed down and rejoined, “If, and I mean if, there really is a child, maybe the child is mine, but not someone else’s.”
“What do you mean?”
Lin Xu had already broken up with the lover of an unknown race? “Marshal Heinrich Chu…”
Lin Xu had begun to use honorifics, sounding gritted.
“As long as it’s not your blood and dragon scales that enable chromosome exchange, then this child that may exist will not have the DNA of anyone other than myself… Or the DNA of the species.”
With his cheek pressed against Lin Xu’s ear, it took a moment for Heinrich to register what Lin Xu meant by this passage. There was no other person. The moon had been hanging alone in the night sky, its silver glow shining over the rivers, not plucked by anyone. Heinrich shuddered and tightened his arms, holding Lin Xu in his arms, this nonsensical loss and recovery caused numerous ripples in his heart. Will the moon belong to him?
The rabbit-cat was squeezed and whimpered upward, finally squatting on Heinrich’s shoulder with his front paws and sitting on Lin Xu’s shoulder with his buttocks, shaking his fur ball tail and wondering why the two humans were holding each other so tightly.
Lin Xu vaguely felt Heinrich’s emotions, patting his hand on Heinrich’s shoulder upward to stroke the back of his head. His short hair was trimmed in layers, but the silver hair was soft and shaggy and not at all tangled.
“But… I shouldn’t be able to reproduce myself, and it’s not clear what the situation is now, so maybe the test is wrong and needs to be confirmed again.” This was the second test, the error was unlikely, it just didn’t make logical sense.
Heinrich, “Let’s go to Zhou Pingbo and have him do another test.”
“Hmm.” Lin Xu didn’t move. He said, “Wait a minute, hold me for a moment.”
The words instantly made Heinrich’s throat tighten and he widened his arms from holding Lin Xu’s back to completely enclosing Lin Xu in his arms with such force that he took a step forward.
Lin Xu did not resist, his right arm across the back of Heinrich’s neck, his left arm around his waist from below, and buried his head on Heinrich’s shoulder, really like he wanted to nestle himself in. A shallow layer of vetiver breath was sweetly stirred and muddled together, indistinguishable.
The restlessness cannot be soothed by an embrace, and Lin Xu only felt the sharp restlessness ferment into a mellow longing that stretched over every inch of musculature and bone, accelerating blood circulation and sending heat and hormones to every corner of his body.
There were blurred footsteps and conversations outside the utility room, as people hurried by, not noticing the darkness in this narrow, dark space. Lin Xu’s nose and forehead rolled, and his whole body became dizzy.
“Marshal Chu…”
Heinrich stiffened for a moment, but quickly replied, “Yeah, I’m here.”
Lin Xu let out a deep breath and yanked back his sanity that was about to fall into the sea of madness, “We should go.”
Any longer and someone was going to get out of control. He lifted his head and waited for Heinrich to slowly let go of his hand before letting go and backing away, taking Blackie back into his arms and starting to squeeze the cat’s paw again. The room was still dark, and they could only hear their breathing, not see each other. Heinrich said, “Ruth, turn on the light.”
“Yes, the lights have been turned on for you.”
As Ruth’s soft voice rang out, Lin Xu made a meaningful sound, “Ah… I remember if Ruth has a night vision video function.”
Heinrich pursed his lips, “Ruth, encrypt the video recording just now.”
“Okay, Marshal Chu.”
The lights came on and Lin Xu noticed Heinrich’s military cap had fallen aside when its owner was roughly pushed in by Lin Xu, he picked it up, patted the dust and walked over to Heinrich. Heinrich’s silver hair was a bit disheveled, and a few strands fell in front of his golden eyes. Lin Xu raised his hand to straighten his hair, and Heinrich obediently bowed his head and let Lin Xu help him put on his cap. Only Lin Xu’s flushed cheeks and lips reminded him of what had just happened. Lin Xu took a step back and gazed from top to bottom, as if checking Marshal Chu’s grooming for cleanliness and neatness.
“Let’s go.”
Lin Xu then walked ahead and pulled the door open a little, making sure the hallway was empty before fully opening it to let the two out. Heinrich followed behind him, his golden eyes lightly confused as to why Lin Xu was still calling him Marshal Chu.
—
“Pfft–” Zhou Pingbo sprayed a mouthful of drink on the operating table. The robotic arm assistant flashed red, “Warning, warning, experimental sample genetic contamination.”
Zhou Pingbo hurriedly backed away and let the robot arm clean up the water stains that landed on Zerg’s slice, and he looked to Heinrich and Lin Xu, “Say again, who’s pregnant?!”
“It’s me.” Lin Xu replied, “The hormone level test showed pregnancy.”
Zhou Pingbo opened his mouth, full of questions, “Good for you Heinrich, you lied to me and said…”
He said he didn’t know whether Lin Xu liked him or not, didn’t know what he should do next, his feelings were rolling with someone early, but didn’t confirm his feelings? How come I didn’t find out before that Heinrich still has scum potential.
No, Zhou Pingbo tried to convince himself with reasoning, how long had Heinrich and Lin Xu known each other, when did this happen…
“Did you two mate on S105???” Zhou Pingbo, who mainly studied Zerg, was very blunt in his wording. S105 was Heinrich’s susceptible period, so he did more than just bite Lin Xu? No wonder he had to ask Metz to give him legal advice, which was close to the crime, only Lin Xu does not care. The dang Abyss Fleet’s Marshal, what is this all about?!
“No.” Heinrich squeezed his gaze, Zhou Pingbo’s wording made him feel penetrated all over, “It’s not mine.”
“It’s not yours, it’s…” Whose is it? Zhou Pingbo blinked, suddenly feeling that this situation was even more difficult than the one just now, and had to look at the person in question, Lin Xu.
“I didn’t have sex with anyone, no one else.” Lin Xu replied. Zhou Pingbo raised his hand to push the goggles, but because he was too involved in his thinking, forgot that his gloves were still covered with Zerg’s body fluid. The mucus smeared his nose, he sat back down and let the robotic arm assistant wipe the dirt off his face.
“Shouldn’t ah… Is it a false pregnancy, did the doctor do a follow-up?”
“No. That’s why we came to see you.”
“Me? Heinrich, it’s not like I’m going to deliver a human baby.”
“Lin Xu has a fishtail.”
Zhou Pingbo, “?”
He looked down and saw Lin Xu’s two long, straight legs wrapped in separate space uniforms, with smooth, very nice lines, but absolutely no marine life features whatsoever.
“I have both fishtail and leg forms.” Lin Xu had to add under his gaze.
“You’re really a mermaid.”
Zhou Pingbo’s sentiment was interrupted by Heinrich, “The doctor could possibly see the abnormality, I’m not sure, so I came to find you, don’t let a fourth person know about this.”
“Okay, okay, okay,” Zhou Pingbo said, “let me think, mermaid… I’ve never touched it either, I don’t know the exact state data, let’s just look at it, so it’s a straightforward view.”
“Look at what?” Heinrich asked.
“Look for any embryos.” Zhou Pingbo got up and looked around at the lab equipment, “Or the uterus, is the uterus used for mermaid fertility as well?”
“I don’t know.”
Zhou Pingbo gave him a look, “Well, that’s okay.”
Lin Xu had secrets he didn’t want to tell, and he shouldn’t be the one to pursue them, but the technical question still had to be asked, “The human fishtail is considered to have two sets of thoracic and abdominal systems, if there is an embryo, is it in the tail, or in the stomach?”
After saying that he doubted himself for a moment, human legs and fishtails could be freely switched, if the embryo was raised in the fishtail, then where to put the embryo after turning back to human legs? He was confused.
“It should be the abdomen.” Zhou Pingbo said naturally to himself, looking for a suitable location in the lab, “…I don’t have a suitable location here.”
He looked at the test bench normally used to put Zerg material, the metal surface glowed with cold luster, Zhou Pingbo crossed his arms and held his forehead, thinking it was a bit unsuitable for people to lie down, but there was no other place.
“Let’s do it here,” Lin Xu’s voice was a little cold, “with what instrument?”
“Ultrasonic imager, used to view the condition of the organism’s internal organs.” Zhou Pingbo tugged the mechanical arm to the opposite side to turn over the instrument, “you can lie down, the procedure is not complicated, do not be nervous.”
Lin Xu walked over to sit on the lab table, a long-lost sense of shackles and powerlessness rushed up along with memories, he closed his eyes, not to look at those scalpels Zhou Pingbo used to cut Zerg slices.
“Through the clothes, it’s not that cold.”
Heinrich’s low voice made him open his eyes and meet Heinrich’s eyes, golden eyes still calm and cold. Heinrich took off his military jacket and spread it behind Lin Xu to make it easier for him to lie down. Blackie crouched on another desk, looking quietly at a few humans with emerald cat eyes.
Underneath Heinrich’s uniform was a white shirt, buttoned tightly all the way to the top, but the hem of the shirt was tucked into his military pants, revealing Heinrich’s strong waistline.
Lin Xu’s eyes lingered for a while before he slowly lay down and leaned against the still warm uniform, the faint scent of vetiver warmly wrapped around him, he raised his hand. If the occasion was not wrong, he really wanted to touch Heinrich’s shirt. Heinrich reached out and took his hand, hard calluses rubbing gently against it. Well, nice hands too.
These two really look like a newlywed couple coming to the maternity ward, Zhou Pingbo sighed while pushing an ultrasound imager taller than him, which was usually used for Zerg and designed to be large.
He finished debugging the data and then looked at Lin Xu who was lying down, “Uh, this may need to take off his shirt.”
Zhou Pingbo finished looking up at Heinrich, and found that the other party’s gaze was really cold.
The zipper of the space uniform was strangely designed on the back, he reached for it, and Heinrich was quick to help him lift his long hair and pull down the zipper. But he stopped halfway down and said stiffly, “There.”
This was just high enough for Lin Xu to easily pull the zipper all the way down with his backhand, and he took off his uniform top and slid back into Heinrich’s uniform jacket, his pale skin almost transparent against the black uniform lit by the lab’s bright lights.
Heinrich’s hand rested on the edge of the lab table, his fingertips slowly moving a few centimeters forward, able to feel the scent emanating from Lin Xu’s skin, but not quite touching it.
Zhou Pingbo’s expression froze at the sight of Lin Xu’s scars, but he quickly returned to his calm and professional demeanor, pulling the semicircular probe to Lin Xu’s abdomen and scanning around it. Since he was not sure where the mermaid’s gestational organs were located, the scan covered a wide area.
The instrument screen began to show a real-time black and white image of the organs working individually.
Zhou Pingbo looked closer and read the words, “Stomach, spleen, left kidney… What’s this down there?”
He confirmed the oval-shaped object in the image several more times and asked Lin Xu with a subtle expression, “Are mermaids fetal or oviparous?”
Author’s comment.
Not long ago, Marshal wondered if Lin Xu didn’t like alphas.
Now, Marshal also wonders if Lin Xu doesn’t like humans.
Marshal almost made up his mind that he would like to raise his wife.
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