Biosynth 21 Hatching

Schroeder had a feeling his two young guests had been a little... what was the best word to use? Worried? Leery? Apprehensive? No, too strong, too negative. More like... tentative. Yes, that was the best he could decide on. He had a feeling they'd been feeling a little tentative about their future offspring ever since they'd met their firstborn, Jadekith. They'd be too polite to say so, but they were probably relieved on some level that he would be staying at the place of his birth. Not in the sense that they were happy to leave their first child in the hands of relative strangers, oh no, of course not, but what parent-to-be fantasized of having their first child being a troublemaking little hellion?

For that was exactly what Jadekith was, and if his parents hadn't gotten exasperated with him at all in the time they'd gotten to know him while waiting for the rest of their children to incubate, then they were made of far sterner stuff than the majority of the Destiny's crew. Jadekith was as sharp as a tack and got bored at the drop of a pin: a combination that left him getting into more trouble than one child had any right to.

At least at the moment he was limited to harassing his siblings and anyone else trapped on the floor of Bravo Bay with him. So far he hadn't been able to do anything worse than spill a tray of toast off the breakfast-laden feeding tables and drop one poor Archivist's datapad into a pitcher of orange juice as he attempted to figure out the "catalogue" function of the device. Having since been chased away from that particular source of amusement, the dragon-child now focused on drumming juice-sticky palms on the eggs of his siblings.

"Come on, come on, come out!" he demanded of one, claws scrabbling across the shell as if he could find a crack or crevice to get things started. "You're supposed to be hatching! Hurry up!"

After a few moments, it seemed the focus of his attention decided to oblige him. With a forceful peck, an eggtooth-tipped beak jabbed through the shell, and Jadekith eagerly leapt to assisting his sibling break its way free. The first-hatched proved to be a dark red female, who gave her brother a dry look once she was standing on her own and had wiped the goo from her eyes.

"Don't," she informed him blandly, "tell me what to do." Then with a disdainful flick of her tail, she was trotting off towards the candidates.

Jadekith clacked his beak in annoyance and for a moment seemed on the verge of chasing after her, but the rest of the eggs had started to rock and crack as well, so he let her depart. Instead he hurried from egg to egg, pulling off chunks of shell wherever he could wedge his claws in, more interested in finally seeing what his younger siblings looked like than just in wanting to help them out. There were only eight eggs, making for nine children with the firstborn included, and they all were very scaly little things with very little of their mother's phoenix heritage to be seen. Feather-buds along the sides of their tails and between the nubby horns on their heads were the extent of softness on their bodies -- everything else was scale, horn, and spikes, small and soft at the moment but certain to be more evident in maturity.

The children took to the gathered bonders and sponsors like naturals, thanks to the partnering instinct that had been genetically introduced. And, thankfully, Schroeder recognized the girl who settled at her parents' feet as one of the more pleasant children. Oh she'd keep their hands full alright, but not nearly as much as Jadekith would have.

As the records were finalized and the newborns enjoyed their first breakfast, Schroeder made sure to offer the young couple his best wishes. He hoped parenthood would agree with them.