I caught his chin and pointed his face in the right direction. He didn’t so much as flinch at my unexpected touch, and that gave me a strange jolt of warmth in the pit of my stomach. “Look,” I said.

“What am I looking at?”

“The only hope for survival I’ve ever seen for a host species.”

“Where?” he demanded, bewildered.

I was aware of Ian close behind us now, listening silently.

“See?” I pointed at the laughing mother. “See how she loves her human child?”

At that moment, the woman snatched her son from the swing and squeezed him in a tight embrace, covering his face with kisses. He cooed and flailed—just a baby. Not the miniature adult he would have been if he carried one of my kind.

Jared gasped. “The baby is human? How? Why? For how long?”

I shrugged. “I’ve never seen this before—I don’t know. She has not given him up for a host. I can’t imagine that she would be… forced. Motherhood is all but worshipped among my kind. If she is unwilling…” I shook my head. “I have no idea how that will be handled. This doesn’t happen elsewhere. The emotions of these bodies are so much stronger than logic.”

I glanced up at Jared and Ian. They were both staring openmouthed at the interspecies family in the park.

“No,” I murmured to myself. “No one would force the parents if they wanted the child. And just look at them.”

The father had his arms around both the mother and the child now. He looked down at his host body’s biological son with staggering tenderness in his eyes.

“Aside from ourselves, this is the first planet we’ve discovered with live births. Yours certainly isn’t the easiest or most prolific system. I wonder if that’s the difference… or if it’s the helplessness of your young. Everywhere else, reproduction is through some form of eggs or seeds. Many parents never even meet their young. I wonder…” I trailed off, my thoughts full of speculation.

The mother lifted her face to her partner, and he kissed her lips. The human child crowed with delight.

“Hmm. Perhaps, someday, some of my kind and some of yours will live in peace. Wouldn’t that be… strange?”

Neither man could tear his eyes from the miracle in front of them.

The family was leaving. The mother dusted the sand off her jeans while the father took the boy. Then, holding hands that they swung between them, the souls strolled toward the apartments with their human child.

Ian swallowed loudly.

We didn’t speak for the rest of the evening, all of us made thoughtful by what we’d seen. We went to sleep early, so we could rise early and get back to work.