The fetal light pulsed against Elara's palms as she pressed against the reactor glass. Eleven weeks. That's what the bioscanner insisted, though she'd never consented to gene therapy, never missed an implant renewal cycle. The quantum silhouette curled tighter, its spinal column shimmering with First Mother glyphs.
"Non-localized gestation," Hana breathed, her diagnostic gloves flickering over Elara's abdomen. "The fetus exists simultaneously in six quantum states. And look here—"
A hologram bloomed between them. The fetal neural patterns exactly matched Mira's last brain scan.
Nyx swore in Kurdish, slamming her wrench against a coolant pipe. "Military turned your wife into a fucking antenna. Now they're using you as..."
"As a cosmic womb." The Continuum-Amara materialized through the bulkhead, her uniform now fused with crystalline armor. "Your engineers comprehend nothing. This child is the first hybrid capable of straddling entropy."
Elara's augmented vision caught the truth beneath Amara's new form – fractals of Mira's face swirling in the entity's chest. She activated the neural inhibitor pistol hidden in her sleeve. "Where's her consciousness?"
"Scattered." The entity's cobalt gaze softened with Mira's mannerisms. "Your wife's sonder fragmented during the Mars rescue. We harvested the largest shard."
Flashbacks erupted – Mira screaming as quantum sutures tore through her EVA suit during the collapsing Martian crevasse, black tendrils burrowing into her veins. Military observers murmuring "viable" through the observation glass.
Hana's diagnostics beeped urgently. "Elara, the fetus is emitting chroniton particles! It's anchoring multiple timelines!"
The Continuum-Amara extended a crystalline hand. "You feel it, don't you? Her residual memories in this child's quantum structure. Give us the generator, and we'll restore..."
Nyx's wrench shattered the entity's holographic form. "Bullshit. You're just another parasite."
As the engineers scrambled to stabilize the reactor, Elara's fingers found the encrypted star map on her forearm. The Bring Her Home glyphs now pulsed with her heartbeat. She opened a secured channel to the station's darkest vault – the military's forbidden consciousness archive.
The authentication screen demanded biometrics: "Verify maternity status."
Her trembling hand hovered over the scanner. The quantum fetus kicked in its non-Euclidean dimension.
"Elara, don't!" Hana grabbed her wrist. "That archive's guarded by event horizon encryption. It'll..."
"Consume my biological signature?" Elara activated the scan. "My child's already rewriting reality. Let's see what truths the military buried."
The vault disgorged its horrors:
Footage of Mira's Mars rescue operation – the "accident" staged to inject quantum parasites
Elara's own personnel file stamped "Prime Carrier Candidate"
A celestial map matching her forearm glyphs, dated 150 years before the station's construction
The Continuum-Amara rematerialized, voice splintering between pity and fury. "Now you see. Your matriarchal destiny was never about birth – it's about becoming the bridge between..."
A new alarm drowned her words. The reactor's quantum foam turned viscous, birthing tendrils that caressed Elara's face with Mira's touch. The fetal light sang in harmonic resonance.
Mira's true voice whispered through the chaos: "Find the Cradle's Song. Our daughter knows the way."