The Outsider

"And what exactly do you think I am to Milo, then? I would tell you but I don't think you'd believe me. Though maybe you could help me if I did... It's a difficult situation and I'd have approached it more gently and delicately, but there aren't many alternative ways to get in touch with my own son now, is there? I don't understand the technology here, and I want to see him in person anyway-- me and my wife do. I... I know he's going to be mad and upset but there isn't any other option but to turn up and explain to him-- I'm assuming you know what he is? I don't think he could have hidden it when he first arrived here," she smiled, falling silent after the babbled concerns she had. Revealing it all to a practical stranger didn't feel right, and it wasn't something she wanted to do, but in her mind, it might help. She imagined Milo would be beyond upset when she told him who she was, but having Max present to diffuse the situation would be beneficial to everyone.

At least, she hoped it would be.

"It's just us; my wife and me. We haven't arrived with a spacecraft full of aliens," she snorted, the very word making her eyes roll. "...We just had to come and... take him home, where he's supposed to be. We didn't want to send him here, it was... unavoidable."
 
Staring at the other in shock, he had to stop himself from spilling his tea onto himself. After realizing he was staring a bit too much, he chuckled awkwardly. He figured it was the case the moment she had insisted she knew Milo but he sure as hell didn't hope for it.

"I guess you'll be disappointed to hear he won't be leaving. I mean, we're a happy family here and that's how we want to keep it. Plus you came at a bad time, yeah? I mean, we're just settling down properly and my exams are almost up, suddenly uprooting everything would not be ideal."
 
This was where her tolerance for humans hit a wall. She was fine with the ones who didn't know what she was, taking their ignorance and rudeness with the understanding that they didn't know she could break their necks with a single hand. Max, however, was aware of that, which made his bluntness all the more shocking... and all the more offensive to her.

"Don't speak to me like I'm some child, how dare you. That boy is my son and the idea was to return to take him home. Don't you dare assume you have some sort of ownership of him. He needs to come home and I won't be leaving until he does so. I recommend you show me the respect I've shown you," she snapped, eyeing the phone the moment it buzzed with Milo's hurried reply, indicating he'd be home as soon as possible to meet the stranger that apparently knew him.

"...That'll be my wife," she murmured as a knock on the door sounded, leaning back against the sofa with a disgusted frown. "Let her in and maybe we can talk about all of this like adults?"
 
"I'm talking as politely as I can to someone who abandoned their son only to want to whisk him away now that he's capable of taking care of himself," Max quickly replied as he took a rigid sip of his tea, the suddenly hostile environment only growing once in opening the door, albeit reluctantly, to another woman. The fact that he was left alone with two women who were clearly hostile in taking away his boyfriend.

"Ah, hello," immediately greeted a woman, that of whom was nervously adjusting her weight. Easily reading the tense environment, L'oui's smile wavered as she shot her wife some sort of reassuring glance. "Sorry, had to find a proper spot. So many people live in this place... aha..."

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"I don't understand why you bothered getting us a car for the month, L'oui. It's more of a hindrance than a help-- it doesn't matter. This is our son's boyfriend, apparently. He thinks we abandoned him. I don't have the energy to explain that it's quite the opposite. He's being incredibly irritable and you're the people-person out of us two, you deal with him," she muttered flatly, though her stoic expression did allow a brief smile to break once realising that L'oui had arrived at the address safely, without harm.

"...Apparently his name is Milo now," she continued with a brief nod to the crib, her smile finally breaking on her face again. "And he has a... daughter, I assume? Soleil-- look, Max, isn't it? We aren't here to cause trouble, we just want to see our son. I don't think that's such a huge thing to ask. We didn't abandon him-- you won't understand, and I haven't got the hours it'll take to explain to a human like you, okay?"
 
"A human like me?" He repeated, his head tilting. "What does that mean, exactly? Are you implying that I can't comprehend something like aliens having some weird reason to send their son into space in the hopes that he would be taken in and cared for? You do realize that any other family would have shipped him off to the CIA the minute they realized he wasn't human? I don't appreciate being put down so much by two strangers," he grumbled bitterly.

Laughing nervously in response, L'oui attempted to approach the situation with less anger. Taking a seat besides her wife, she folded her hands neatly while taking in the environment.

"Ah, she... doesn't mean it that way," she reassured. "We're just very unfamiliar to the whole situation, to be honest. Like she said, the... situation is complicated. We just want to see 'Milo' -" she paused, giggling at the ridiculousness of the name, "and see how he's doing. 'Milo' is very special, Max."
 
"We sent him out to stop him getting murdered, is that what you want to know? If he stayed, he'd have been murdered by a minority of people who thought his birth was a curse-- it's all silly nonsense, of course, but the only real hope we had was to send him away. If he came back an adult having survived all these years, it'd shut up those people who thought he was... cursed. We didn't know what else to do," she continued, trying her best to be a little softer in tone just to prevent an argument kicking off. She had no probem putting a human in their place, but if this was someone Milo liked and whose family had raised Milo all these years, she had to try to be on best behaviour.

"Where we're from... our entire species is female, we never knew that could change until Milo was born. Most people saw it as a miracle; some saw it as a curse. We just wanted to protect him-- so don't insinuate we didn't give a shit about. He's our firstborn, we love him more than... than anything else--"

"...Max, babe? You alright?" Milo called out just after the front door slammed shut in his evident panic. Some woman he was certain he didn't know was in his house, claiming to have met him at a party when that didn't happen. Of course he was freaked out, having rushed home and abandoning his shopping in the process. Once his eyes settled on the women, his brow arched at how nice and normal they seemed. He didn't know what to expect, but this wasn't it.

"...What's going on? The vibe's tense, I don't like it," he laughed weakly, hitching Soleil up more in his arms as a response to her gurgles. "...Everything's good, right Max? I... I'm confused, this is weird, ain't it?"
 
"It's very weird, yeah," he confirmed, getting to his feet to join Milo's side out of his own discomfort. Glancing back at the couple, he tried to offer a smile though it was laced with a mix of fear and anger. The women didn't seem dangerous - far from it - but that didn't mean they couldn't get violent if they didn't want to.

"They're saying you're their son," Max explained as he watched L'oui's eyes begin to well with tears, taking in her son. In her fit of passion, she wasn't able to hold back her true form before pulling Milo into a deep hug.

"My baby - you've grown so much," she quickly spoke, her voice cracking before forcing herself from the hug to carefully step Besides her wife. Changing back to the human form once noticing Maxwell's sudden fear, she let out a nervous laugh. "I'm sorry - it's just... I was so worried you had died."
 
How was anyone in Milo's situation supposed to absorb what was happening? He didn't remember his parents-- at least, he hadn't until now. He had had vague dreams about them, but seeing L'oui change form and appear like the woman he vaguely knew from his dreams was all he needed not to just realise they were being truthful, but also to unlock the memories he had assumed were lost to him. He had been just a child when he was sent away, but he remembered various things all of a sudden that he hadn't before.

That wasn't to say he wasn't still mad. He knew, very vaguely, why they sent him away, remembering their emotional words to him just before the event, but he was still furious that they had done it, and then just turn up like things could go back to normal. He had Max now, of course, and he had always been focused towards creating a life for himself that was human. He wasn't against recognising what he was, but he wanted to fit in. To be confronted with his parents only reminded him that he wasn't normal and couldn't fit in, which wasn't a nice feeling to be hit in the face with.

"...You can't just fucking turn up and think I'd run off with 'ya both, that's... stupid," he mumbled, rubbing his throat once feeling it grow tight with emotion. He didn't want to just start bawling his eyes out, not when he had his daughter staring up at him in confusion. "...Max, take Soleil-- go out in the garden or something, she... she likes that--"

"Max can stay and talk. If he's important to you, we don't mind talking about things with him present," began Lucero slowly, having somehow found the strength to stay in her human form, just to prevent Max from growing fearful. Retracting from her own hug, she awkwardly rubbed her arm with a meek smile. "...We missed you, we... never stopped thinking about you. Nobody did. We... the whole kingdom, we always thought about you--"

"I could have died, you know that, right? Max's parents could have killed me on the spot. You knew that, you must have known that. You shouldn't have sent me away, that's-- do you fucking know what it's like being the only guy like me in this city? How abnormal I've felt my whole life?!"
 
"I'm so sorry, sweetie! We just - we panicked a-and didn't know what to do. It was the most reasonable," L'oui quickly defended, clearly being the more emotional of the two as she wiped the tears from her eyes quickly, her attention from her son only breaking once seeing Max take the baby and awkwardly walk out to the back. After all, it was finally nice enough that he knew Soleil wouldn't get ill if they sat on the grass for a little while.

"You don't understand. We... knew it was always a possibility, that you wouldn't make it, but the chances of you surviving were greater this way. It seems we were right this whole time...? Just... please forgive us."
 
"I wouldn't ever fucking send my daughter halfway across the fucking universe away from me. I've only been a... father for a month, and I wouldn't dream of losing her for years, not knowing if she was alive or dead. I can't just be like, hey, I understand. Cos I don't; I don't get it. You raised me for years and then you just sent me off, like... was I too much trouble to you both? Did you just hate me and prefer my sisters, or what? What is it?" He grimaced, his strong arms folding over his chest in an attempt to hold himself together and seem stern. In reality, he was just as emotional as his mothers evidently were; he just didn't think they deserved to see him in that raw state.

"...You're not... listening, we had to take a risk and it paid off, luckily. Do you think we wanted to do that? No-- but we had no other choice. We didn't want to wake up to see you slaughtered in your bed, Haule," the other woman began, the only indication of her emotions rising being the strained voice and the fact she used his original birth name to address him; something Milo flinched at in recognition. "...We want you to come home. Bring your daughter, we'd love to...get to know her. She seems adorable, Hau-- Milo. She seems adorable, Milo. Just... take your time, but we need to know before the end of the week-- we don't want to go without you."
 
"Why would you want to stay on this horrible planet, anyway?" Added the other alien, her expression that of worry when realizing Milo was so reluctant. Taking Lucero's hand in her's anxiously, her cheeks grew red in clear distress.

"Listen, we came all this way to this stupid planet, we just want to bring you back home and start all over, especially with a cute little granddaughter. You can find someone less rude than this 'Max' fellow."
 
"...Max is the love of my life, he's... I love him, don't call him rude. He's protective, Mom," he retorted, though his anger had clearly taking a step down. He didn't know why he wanted to stay that badly. He always felt like an outsider and that feeling often depressed him. Being the only one of his kind in the city and, for all he knew, the whole planet was ridiculously lonely. No amount of time on it would make him feel differently.

Besides, he didn't want to kick his mothers out and never see them again, despite how furious he was. He wanted to be with them, to get to know them again.

Obviously, being with Max complicated what would have normally been a relatively easy decision for him.

"Could he come with us?" He asked as he sat down onto the couch, adjusting his jacket nervously. "...I can't just... leave without him. Soleil loves him, she... she never cries when he holds her. She won't be happy without him; I won't either."
 
"Oh, honey, that's silly," L'oui replied with a soft chuckle. "For starters, he's... not us. He would be gawked at and imagine how others would treat you? That doesn't even include the possibility of incompatibility with our atmosphere. Humans are far less superior in adaptation, clearly - your friend wouldn't be able to change his appearance, would he?" She reminded with a soft smile.
 
"He's more than a friend, he's my boyfriend. Don't be rude-- he's been in my life more than you have, after all. You barely know me. Whereas, he knows me inside-out, so don't fucking disrespect him. If he doesn't leave, then I don't; I'm happy here. And I have Soleil-- she's half-human. Maybe she won't adapt back 'home' either," he grunted, his arms folding again. He knew he was dealing a few low-blows, potentially ones that were out of order, but he felt he had a right to make digs at the fact they hadn't been in his life. It was hardly a lie and, really, they deserved to feel guilty.

"...Can't you stay awhile? Hell, why can't you stay here? Like you said, we adapt better, yeah? Why can't you stay here? I... want to get to know you both, I guess," he shrugged awkwardly, glancing back outside with a faint smile. "...You don't have to go back. Max wouldn't mind if you stayed here, you could help with Soleil 'cause... that'd be really good for us."
 
"Oh, no! No, no, no. We... can't stay here, sweetheart. We have children back home, your sisters. To learn that you had a child? They'd be estatic," she explained with a knowing nod. "There's nothing we would love more than to introduce you to your family. If we were to hypothetically bring your, Ah.... boyfriend along, then what?"

With a small smile, her attention was taken away by Nax reentering the room with a grimace. As much as he was willing to take care of the baby, like hell was going to change her diaper. "I... need you to do this for me, Milo. I'll... go work oh my final paper while you three talk. I don't eantto interrupt."
 
"You can't change a diaper? Really? It's not that hard, you're such a wimp," he snorted back at Max, at least grateful for the small slice of normality that came from the exchange. He didn't want to give that up. He had spent most his life being an outsider and it wasn't a great experience, but selfishly, he wanted Max to come with them if he did decide to make that change. Leaving him behind, with nobody, wasn't an option... but he couldn't just let his parents leave without him either.

He wanted them both in his life, and leaving with them seemed to be the only option. All he had to do was convince Max that it was the best choice and if he disagreed, he didn't know what else to do.

"Let me handle her, you talk to your boyfriend," smiled Lucero, eagerly reaching over for the baby. It didn't take her that long to realise the child's disability, but it wasn't that big of an issue; she was just glad to have her first grandchild in her arms.

Realising Soleil was in good care, and smiling appreciatively at the women for the help, he parted ways for the moment to head upstairs with Max, breathing out heavily once safely in their bedroom.

"...They want me to leave with them," he began slowly, taking an awkward seat on the bed. "This is fucking insane, Max-- I get that, it's weird, but they're my Moms. I... can't just watch them leave."
 
"Yes you can, Milo. They literally abandoned you for our entire childhood and suddenly they show up, just for them to want to take you back? That's not - that's ridiculous, Milo," he protested, his flat expression growing to a frown as he sat into his bed, slipping his laptop over.

"This is all ridiculous. You're home is here, with me. You were raised in this house by my parents way more than those two ever cared about you. I know it's harsh but... it just makes sense," Max murmured, shaking his head in disbelief at the fact the other was even considering the whole thing. "We have friends and... and I need to get my degree."
 
"You have friends; I have people who like to party with me and that's it. I dunno, Max. They said they had no choice and-- and I have family there; sisters and cousins and... and I don't know. I won't leave you, obviously. Maybe you could come? Clearly there's oxygen there, and... and it might be fun, yeah?" He eagerly smiled, trying his best to sell the idea. However, when all Max wanted was a quiet life, he didn't imagine an agreement to leave to an unknown planet would arrive all that quickly.

"...I'm thinking about it, I don't know what I want to do yet. Is it so bad that I want to go and met family I never knew I had?"
 
"You want to uproot our entire life that we've built here for a slim chance of being able to be even slightly accepted in this place? That's... incredibly selfish. I'm trying to make things better for us and you want me to just abandon my effort? I... am happy here, Milo. You barely know these woman - you barely know them!"

He sniffles, closing his eyes briefly to relax his brief anger. "I had a shit night, Milo. Can we not talk about this right now? This is way too much shit right now."
 
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