Sealed with a Kiss

* BANG.*

The detonator flew out of Jax’s hand, shattered into plastic shards.

Jax blinked. He looked at his empty hand. Then he looked at Kara.

She was standing ten feet away, her sniper rifle smoking. She had shot the detonator out of his hand from the hip.

"We don't do tragic backstories, Miller!" Kara shouted. She threw her rifle down and stomped toward him.

"Kara, are you insane? She’s going to kill us!"

"Look at the baby, you idiot!" Kara pointed.

Jax looked. Squishy wasn't cowering. Squishy was glowing a bright, furious red. It was looking between Jax and the Mother, vibrating with anxiety.

"The Mother isn't attacking because she hates us," Kara realized, grabbing Jax by the vest. "She’s attacking because the baby is stressed! And the baby is stressed because *we* are stressed!"

"So what do we do? Therapy?" Jax yelled.

"No," Kara said. She grabbed his face with both hands. "We fix the vibe."

"How—"

Kara didn't let him finish. She pulled him down and kissed him.

It wasn't a tentative, movie-star kiss. It was a desperate, adrenaline-fueled collision of teeth and lips. It tasted of blood and ozone and five years of wasted time.

Jax froze for a second, his brain short-circuiting. Then, he dropped the C4 bricks and wrapped his arms around her, lifting her off the ground. He kissed her back with everything he had held in.

The effect was instantaneous.

Squishy stopped crying. The red glow faded, replaced by a soft, warm pink. The wedding chapel re-stabilized, but this time, the confetti wasn't screaming. It was just... confetti.

The baby cooed. It clapped its tentacles.

* HAPPY,* the psychic voice boomed. *THEY ARE HAPPY.*

Above them, the Mother paused. The storm clouds parted. The crushing pressure lifted.

The colossal entity lowered its massive head. It looked at the happy, pink baby. It looked at the two humans making out in the mud.

The Mother let out a sound like a whale song—low, resonant, and strangely gentle.

She reached down with a tentacle the size of a train. She didn't crush them. She gently scooped up Squishy.

Squishy waved a tentacle at Jax and Kara. *BYE BYE.*

The Mother lingered for a moment. She extended one tip of her massive tentacle and patted the roof of the Rover.

* Pat. Pat.*

The roof crumbled under the weight, the metal screeching.

Then, with a burst of displaced air, the Mother and the Baby vanished into a rift in the sky.