Omega held the tone in her soul. She felt the slight spasms of pain, aches, the burn of far too much activity in the symbiote glands in her brow and along the inner side of her spine.

She was starting to sweat to dump the heat. It was like being a novice all over again. In some ways it was worse than a novice.

She was slathered in yeasty goop because she could not hold any spirit aligned with her well enough to argue otherwise.

She was being watched like a hawk by the demented and unyeilding death glare of a face that was younger then Aleph and yet guided by a spirit older then her particular breed of humanity’s time on Terra.

“Okay! Stopah Britchin Blue! Ya burnout ol the gribbly helpas in yo friendly puss sacks”

She let go of the partial choir, she was already breathing deep, strong, tightly controlled breaths. Her throat burned hot and she had a headache.

Her soul was clumsy, awkward, raw and the hurt was awful.

And because it was so clumsy she had none of the finesse and so her symbiotic cultures that had been with her since she was born were being over-worked by her flailing.

It was so deeply frustrating.

This was not just something she had from a share, this was her skill, her soul, her ability and it had been taken away from her.

Stripped because the ship was itchy and got close to a star.

She clenched her eyes shut and then exhaled and started peeling the slimy goop off her body.

It sucked at her pores and tugged on hair all over her body as she did. It also naturally was something that required that she be completely and utterly indecently unclothed. It gave her goosebumps feeling the air and she rushed for the shower to try and wash the feeling of floating in a semi-permeable mass of biofilms and spores and who knew what else that Quarti had whipped up for her.

At least the Quarti had grown her a batch separate from the one the elder used. If they had to share the dense muck of organic ‘things’ and spores and so many other things Omega would probably have combusted from entirely non-resonance related heat.

The shower was good.

It let her scrub her skin raw with contraceptives. Even if there was practically no medical chance of that (She had nearly burnt out her neck holding onto a medical student’s soul long enough to memorize that comforting fact). Even if Quarti’s current body was pretty.

She shuddered and shook in the little floating bag they had set up for washing now that Tunie had stopped acceleration.

“Aye blue-liscious, yon knows I only jonesie wit ya. Not any kind of want for the slick-an-preggers here gal. Yor beastly batch totally clean virgin like sludge meesa promise! Sides! Not any fun doing it without skin ta skin anyways ya wierdo doughlovin perv!”

She threw a bar of the contraceptive sporacidal soap at Quarti blind, but didn't hear it land.

Still it drew her attention away from brooding on how she had lost the only skill that was wholey her own.

Because Quarti decided to prod at her hormones and wierd early life insecurities in the worst way.

Intellectually she knew it was fine, perfectly safe and it's not like she wouldn't mind (she thought) being a mother (mostly), she’d done it before in an earlier life. But so far it was always different and each life it still felt awfully awkward.

And nope, not thinking about that anymore. This was by far one of the worst parts of living again.

She knew she was being stupid and awkward and flustered for no reason. She remembered being totally secure and okay with herself and her body and other people’s bodies.

She’d been that way several times over.

And it never helped!

Hormones, Experience, Cultural imprinting, whatever immature brain bits that were also her in each new incarnation. It always muddled everything up.

And set her back to square one each life.

She thought maybe this time she had mostly a grasp on it.

But Quarti and the brain reading alien that apparently refused to move in any way that was not suggestive proved that wrong.

Ugh.

So much for the theory that a life of scholarly study and stoic focus would give her a handle on herself.

Maybe she would try to be a hedonist again next life to see if that did anything.

Not that would happen anytime soon!

Soaking up the water that clung and smeared to her body with a glob of whatever the weird cloud stuff that covered the ‘Terran quarters’ of the ship she sighed and composed herself.

Calm. That was the trick right? Calm and don’t reach for anything, don’t try to share the skills of the departed.

Just be here in herself undistracted and only using what she herself had learned.

Okay, now to get out and help Aleph with the maintenance, she could do that. Okay not as well as she SHOULD be able to do it yet but she was probably getting better.

It had only been months since the episode.

Not even half a year.

Yet.

It was going to be half a year in a few weeks right?

She reached for-

“OW! Quarti! It was just for some maths! Just a few minutes!”

And Quarti beaned her between the eyes with a spoon.

“OIY! Not til your healed! Everytime ya strain it yo gonna make it take longer! This why ya not better after only three weeks ya gangrel moofin nyaner thot!”

She curled up a bit in space over that.

“An Git dressed! Ya distract Aleph like that lugujugs!”

She hurried over to grab an outfit before Aleph got back. Face burning as much from the fact that she still could barely focus enough.

The constant attention to stop from-

Another spon thunked off the back of her head.

“Oh COME ONE QUARTI?! I WAS NOT EVEN GOING TO DO IT THAT TIME!”

“Aye went easy on ya and ya started tearing at ya souligiments so they growed in crooked! No maor softie fluff on ya idjit thot! No Soulsin cept ta stretch!”

Omega rubbed at the likely bruise forming but sighed heavily.

It was probably the right call, not that she could KNOW because Quarti beaned her with whatever cutlery and dishware was on hand if she tried.

Stupid unfathomably old hag in the body of a cute litte-

She shoved her palms into her eyes and screamed in frustration.

Aleph’s voice was exhausted from nearby where the stupidly silent airlock must have opened at some point in their exchange.

“Quarti... I know it’s to help her but can you... not be quite so mean?”

And now to add even more insult to injury to shame to her utter wretched uselessness her apprentice had to step in and protect her like an invalid.

Omega kept her hands pressed to her face to hide the blobs of water sticking to her eyes.