Her eyelids slowly fluttered open as Carissa rolled her too dry tongue about in her mouth and grimaced slightly at the grit she felt between tongue and teeth.  Turning her head and spitting out a bit of the muck, she groaned and lifted up on one arm to look about her.  It was dark and murky, as it always was here in the swamp pens.  Her arm sank down a bit in the squishy mud.  There was no good way to tell from her surroundings just how long she had been lying there.<br/><br/>“Hello?”  She called out tenuously, received no answer.  She tried again.  Still silence.  There did not seem to be any sign of the Amphros either, though this place was huge and the creature could be lurking in any of several dozen spots in the murky habitat.  Thoughts of him and what had happened here earlier brought a shiver down the spine of her sweat and mud slickened body and a deep rosy blush to her cheeks.   She let herself fall back to the ground with another groan, rolling back onto her back.  Light, but she was going to be sore!   She felt strange too, heavier – and it was not difficult to know why.   Her belly rose from the muck, rounded and full.  Idly, she wondered how long she would need to carry before the eggs could be safely extracted.  She would have to talk to Charlie about that.<br/><br/>After a moment, the young woman gave a rueful shake of her head and a small smile as she wriggled to her feet and made her slow, sore path through the muck to the exit of the habitat.  “Time to get cleaned up.  A long, hot bath sounds wonderful right now.”    Thoughts of clean water put an extra spring in her step as she found her way to the showers and turned the hot water on.  Soon the air was filled with steamy vapor as she slipped in with a long, luxuriant sigh, her arm cradling her belly protectively.<div class="messageTextEndMarker"> </div>