Date Point 10y8m3d AV
The Box, Omaha, Nebraska, USA, Earth
Xiù Chang
The best part of the Nest was the middle. It was the one place where Xiù could sleep deeply, soundly and without dreams, sheltered on both sides by warm and loving bodies.
The problem now was that the conversation Julian had teased her with that morning hadn’t materialized. He’d returned to the Box with Allison after time on the obstacle course, and as their evening wound on through cleaning up, dinner and preparing for bed, she caught them giving each other those looks. The ones that usually presaged them vanishing into the shower together at some point.
Feeling a little hurt and neglected, therefore, she made up their nest-bed early that night and lay down to sleep in the middle of it. It wasn’t her turn, but they could damn well give her some affection once they were done with each other.
To her surprise, not only did they not complain but they didn’t steal away into the shower either. They joined her. Julian designated himself as the “big spoon” and tucked up behind her with his right arm under her head, while Allison wriggled into her shoulder and put her head down with a slight smile.
Xiù knew that smile—that was a mischief-smile, and Allison usually only wore it when she was about to do something tormentingly sultry to Julian.
But… they’d laid down and said their goodnights and had both apparently drifted off to sleep. Which meant she found herself lying there wondering just what the hell they had been up…
…to…
It dawned on her that there was something firm pressed against her butt, and that Julian’s warm, strong right hand was resting tantalizingly close to her breast, much closer than usual. His dominant left hand, meanwhile, was draped over her hip to rest lightly on her upper thigh. Suddenly she couldn’t think of anything else but where those hands could so easily go if they only moved a couple of inches…
In the vague hope that doing so might somehow resolve her predicament, she wiggled a little closer into his embrace, only to find that she’d achieved precisely the opposite. He responded sleepily to the contact by holding her closer, and his right hand moved slightly. Instead of resting nearby, his hand was now on her breast, applying a steady and sensuous pressure through her shirt…
She bit her lip and closed her eyes, and wriggled closer still. His fingers squeezed gently and he kissed her neck.
”Oh, God, you’re awake…” she whispered, suddenly on the brink of panic.
“Mm-hmm.” His lips brushed her ear and raised every goosebump she had, and his thumb played with the tiny tent in her t-shirt at the summit of her breast. “So, about your sex life…” he whispered, and God! Who knew that five whispered words could jolt through her like that?
His left hand tickled her a little as he trailed it up her body from hip to chin, and gently guided her into turning her face so that they could kiss. When they did, he took the opportunity to squeeze, gently but perfectly.
“Mm!” she said. It wasn’t a word, but pleasure given a tiny cautious noise. “W-what about it?”
”I thought maybe instead of talking about it…” he whispered, and his fingers lightly pinched her nipple through her shirt, making her shiver, ”…we could play a game I call ‘traffic lights’. Red means stop. Yellow means slow down, Green me ans-’
“Green!”.
He chuckled low and irresistibly in her ear. ’Yes ma’am…’
To her dismay he stopped playing with her breast, but only for long enough to run his hand down her tummy, slip his fingers under her shirt and glide them back up. HIs attention felt even better when it was applied directly to her bare flesh..
She felt his teeth lightly on the side of her neck, felt him playfully pinch her nipple while his left hand slid down her leg, round and then back up her inner thigh.
“Yyyellow.”
She said it a bit louder than she’d meant to, but Julian immediately justified her trust in him as his hands stopped where they were.
“Y’okay?” he asked.
“What…” Xiù licked her lips and moistened her mouth to try again. “What about Allison?”.
”What about me?” the only other voice in the room asked. Xiù jumped, her eyes jolted open, and she found Allison watching her from inches away at most with an absolutely licentious smile. ”Do you want me to join in?” she asked, “Or should I just watch?”
“I, um… I don’t… I…”
Allison’s smile got wider and she met Julian’s eye. “Damn, baby, you got her so turned on she can’t even talk.”
Julian chuckled, but he kissed Xiù’s ear again. “This is all about what you want,” he murmured. “You’re in charge.”
Xiù was shaking, but her panic was fading fast. The shakes had nothing to do with anxiety now. “You promise?”
Allison kissed her. “Let us love you, bǎobèi.”
The Chinese term of endearment sold it. “G… Green.” she whispered, and shut her eyes again.
Julian kissed her, and his hand resumed its migration up her inner thigh until he was pressing gently on her through her underwear. Primordial instincts took over and she pressed back, chewing on her lip as the contact sent pulses of pleasure through her. She heard Allison make a happy noise, felt two slim, strong hands peel her shirt off her and she lifted her body and raised her arms to help the obstructive garment come off. She settled back into Julian’s arms, and felt soft lips on her ear, her neck, her throat, her shoulder, her chest, her breast, her nipple…
In the quiet erotic eternity that followed, none of them made any noise louder than a whisper, a murmur, a kiss or a soft moan. They were almost… reverent in their intimacy. Every so often, Julian and Allison would whisper an instruction to one another, or check in with Xiù. Her answer was always the same: “Green”.
She lifted her hips to shed her underwear, and when Julian’s clever fingers—oh such clever fingers!—returned she then learned just how much that thin barrier of cloth had been robbing her for sensation. She felt her lovers wriggle out of their own sleepwear to wrap her up in a skin-on-skin embrace, to kiss her and sometimes each other and always, always, to make her the center of their world.
She felt pleasure, yes, and so much of it…But most of all she felt loved. And it was the love, more than the pleasure, that carried her off and away as confused, strange and almost dreamlike thoughts began to swirl around her head until they crystallized around her, and she screamed so silently that when she did finally make a noise—a shocked gasp—the crystal shell broke and she came crashing down to herself again.
She pushed his hand away babbling “nomorenomoretoomuch…too much…” and then lay there, trying and failing to open her eyes. Tiny lightning bolts of bliss were still scampering around her, making her body shake, making her forget who she was for strobing half-instants.
“Ho-oly…” she managed eventually, and after a breath for strength she conquered the rest of the sentence. “Ssshit.”
“No kidding, babe!” Allison had a wild smile on her face. “That was fucking hot!”
Xiù tried to sit up, then aborted the attempt as her abdominal muscles sent urgent shaky signals that they’d like a few minutes to recover, please. “Ohhh my God…I’ve never come that hard in my life!”
“Y’okay?” Julian asked.
“Uh-huh.”
Allison laughed softly. “Good, ain’t he?”
Xiù nodded emphatically. She was feeling so energized that she would have loved to spring up and blitz around the room doing anything, but her legs were still feeling entirely too shaky for that. “Uh-huh!”
She grinned as she saw Julian affect a modest smile, and sank her head back onto his chest and closed her eyes, smiling.
A thought struck her.
“…What about you?” she asked.
“Us?” Allison asked.
“Yeah. Aren’t you… wanting, now?”
Julian kissed her. “We’re fine.”
“You’re sure? ‘Cause I can feel how hard your—”
“This was all about you, remember?” Allison quietly interrupted her.
“And what if I want to watch?” Xiù asked.
Allison laughed. “Well I won’t lie,” she said, “I was kinda hoping you’d say something like that.”
“Well, I want to,” Xiù told them firmly.
Julian chuckled and carefully rolled over to deposit her on her side in the middle of their by now thoroughly messed-up nest. “I think we’re honor-bound to obey,” he joked. Allison giggled, then looked at him and licked her lips.
“Julian?” she asked.
“Yeah, baby?”
“I’m sick of this third base shit. Come over here and fuck me.”
He blinked, surprised. “…You sure, now?”
Allison’s smile changed. Now it had that raunchy edge she used when she played at bossing him around. “Did I fucking stutter, Etsicitty?”
Julian was suddenly grinning like the Cheshire Cat. “No ma’am,” he said.
“What did I say?”
“You said I should come over there and fuck you, ma’am.”
“So…?”
He carefully climbed over Xiù, kissing her on the cheek in passing, and then pushed Allison firmly onto her back. She wrapped her feet around his waist. “Yes ma’am. At once.”
Allison gasped, her eyes fluttered and she rested her head back as he guided himself into her. She looked sideways and met Xiù’s eye, bit her lip then linked her hands at the back of his neck and pulled him down on top of her. “Oh yeah…” she purred. “That’s a good, good boy…”
Xiù propped her chin in her hand and watched.
Date Point 10y8m4d AV
Uncharted Class 12 deathworld, Near 3Kpc Arm
The Dancer.
“Hey…”
“Mmnurgh.”
“Heeey.”
“Mznbr…”
“Hey. Sky-thinker.”
“Muh?” Sky-thinker woke up properly, blinking. Dancer smiled down at him and stroked a stray strand of his fur crest out of his face.
“It’s nearly dawn,” she said.
He dug something crusty out of the corner of his eye and pushed himself up onto all fours. “…Right.”
She trilled softly and shook the sand out of her fur. It was funny how a man named for his tendency to drift off and think about things like clouds and the moon was also one of the most focused and practical in the village. “Come on. I made food,” she said. “We have a long day ahead of us.”
The tribe was stirring early today, which was good. Everybody was taking Sky-thinker’s warning seriously, though she would have thought they were absurdly stupid if they hadn’t. Bringing home a set of burnt giving-away beads was evidence enough, but a Singer’s bowl and a peace totem for good measure? Only a catastrophic fool would have ignored that.
She had ritual duties to perform, and so she handed Sky-thinker his breakfast in her favorite bowl, the one with the bright green glaze and the spirals around the rim. They couldn’t take any of the pottery with them anyway, so it may as well see some last use.
She met the Singer in the sacred circle. The old woman looked haggard and exhausted.
“Haven’t you slept?!” Dancer asked her. “We have a long journey ahead of us!”
“Oh, sweet girl…” the Singer sighed. She was leaning heavily on her cane, which she was usually much too proud to use. “Did you think I could come with you?”
“But-!”
“You can’t drag a limping old woman with you while you run away, dear.”
“But-!”
“Hush.” The Singer turned to face the dawn. It would rise behind the third stone today. “Dance for the new day.”
Dancer wanted to argue, but the old woman began shaking her music-stick and tapping her staff and sang the throat music.
She fought back her tears and played her part, called up her will and began the steps to greet the home of the gods as it came up from under the world.
For the first time in her young life, the dance seemed lonely. Hollow. As if she was just a tiny thing in the middle of infinite emptiness, making a silly gesture for forces that were so far beyond her that even Sky-thinker, who saw further and dreamed higher than most, probably had no real understanding of them. Instead of feeling the dawn flow through her and connect her to the world, she felt… cold.
What kind of a day started with the Dancer feeling nothing? Surely portents could not come much worse…
At last the sun was above the third stone, and she finished her dance by bowing to all the gods, then stood and brushed the sand from her hands.
The Singer sniffed and rocked her staff thoughtfully in the dust.
“The world is all upside-down,” she declared. When Dancer only nodded, she turned, and handed her the music-stick and the bag off her back. “My gift to you. I wish there was more time, you still have a lot to learn… but you know all that you need to.”
“Singer, no… please? I’m not ready.”
“Nobody ever is, sweet girl. Do you think I was?”
“But I don’t have a given girl to train!”
“You can sing and dance by yourself for a while, you’re strong enough. And if you need another’s strength then turn to Sky-thinker. He almost has a woman’s magic.”
Dancer didn’t reply. She looked at the music-stick in her hands and nodded as strongly as she could, pulling back her tears.
The Singer hugged and kissed her like a daughter. “Did he fill you last night?”
Dancer nodded. “He did.”
The Singer put hand on her belly. “You make an old woman very happy, dear.”
“…You make a young woman very sad.”
“That’s the burden of age, loved one. I’m sorry. We have to go away sometime.”
Dancer had performed the funeral rites for dozens of the tribe in her time and she knew the truth of that observation as well as anybody could. Still, it hurt her deep in her core.
“…I will miss you.”
The Singer hugged her. “I will miss you too, dear. Be strong—the tribe needs you.”
Dancer looked around. Sky-thinker was in conversation with Stone-tapper and the Given Man. Everywhere she looked there was a laden, ready-for-travel look to everybody.
The Singer touched her elbow lightly pushing her forward. “It’s time, dear. Sing.”
Dancer nodded, then looked her mentor in the eye. “…Goodbye.”
“Goodbye, dear.”
Nobody paid any attention to the Dancer as she returned to her hut and retrieved the favorite bowl. Sky-thinker had been considerate and washed it for her, so she whispered farewell to it, took it back outside and then, with a sigh and a moment’s regret, she flung it into the village fire where it smashed.
Everybody jumped. Then, understanding what she had done, they took their own pottery, and began to throw it into the fire as well.
Under the old Singer’s watchful eye, the new Singer shook her music-stick and sang the song of leaving home. Then, once the last baby had been helped to throw a pot into the ashes, the tribe hoisted their bags, turned to the west, and left home forever.
She didn’t look back.
Date Point 10y8m4d AV
The Box, Omaha, Nebraska, USA, Earth
Kevin Jenkins
“Jesus! I’d ask what happened to you three but I think I can guess!” Kevin cleared his throat, aware that his mouth had just taken unilateral action without running things by the committee first. He forgave himself: He’d never seen anybody walk into a room looking so thoroughly post-coital before, let alone three at once. Terrifyingly though, Julian looked relaxed and energized rather than exhausted and Kevin made a mental note to hit up Dane for a copy of the lucky bastard’s fitness regime.
Allison threw herself into her chair, nursing a large travel mug of coffee. “None of your damn business, that’s what happened.”
“You know, that’s exactly what I guessed.”
Xiù gave him a crimson-faced glare that promised another broken nose in his near future if he didn’t immediately find something else to discuss, and he promptly adjusted his collar and sat down. “Uh… Anyway. Ericson says Misfit is ready to fly.”
They lit up at once. “He does?” Allison asked.
“His exact words were ’BGEV-Eleven has passed stage three operational readiness tests’, but fortunately I speak fluent aerospace engineer.”
Julian nodded appreciatively. “Ahead of schedule!”
“Major Jackson was kind enough to share some observations about the ESFS array.”
“That was nice of her,” Allison commented.
“Yeah. Guess whatever Kirk’s shindig is has made AEC super-keen to get us a scout ship out there, even if it belongs to Byron Group. It’d have to be pretty fuckin’ big to make them forgive the fiasco with Creature of Habit.”
“Why, what happened?” Xiù asked.
“Some limp-dick strategist decided that leaving the only human organization conducting extrasolar flight missions in the dark about our friends Big Hotel was a smart idea, so when the ship hit its emergency recall and popped into Lunar orbit…”
“Ah.” Allison nodded.
“Yeah. Moses got a phone call which was, and I fucking quote, ’not for mortal ears’. D’you know what it’s like when one of the richest guys in the world walks away from a phone call looking like a naughty kid who just got spanked? President Cthulhu musta tore him a backup.”
“I take it you voted for the other guy,” Julian observed, drily.
“You kidding? I wrote in for the dipshit with a rubber chicken for a hat. If some asshole’s gonna spend four or eight years walking around being followed by a dude who’s carrying the nuclear launch codes, I want it to be somebody who gets the fucking joke. Anyway.” Kevin realized he’d gone off on a rant and reined it in. “Point is, you kids better pack your bags and say goodbye to the Box, because we’re transferring you to the ship tonight.”
“But the Mars trip isn’t for-” Xiù began.
“Yeah, I know. But you’re still gonna want to get settled in, sort out any concerns, get ‘er good and ready and take her up for a shakedown. She might be cleared to fly, but your asses still have two months of training left before you head out. Time to bring all that simulator practice into the real world.”
“Any other good news?” Julian asked.
Kevin grinned. “Let’s just say I think you’re gonna enjoy the new-and-improved hab when you move onto the ship.”
“What about lessons and simulation?” Julian asked.
“We got a car laid on to get you back and forth, and they’re setting you up with simulators in the hangar. Anyway, you’ll head over there tonight. Morning schedule’s pushed back and your PT with Dane’s been cancelled for the day, so go get your shit packed up and ready to move, say goodbye to the Box, do your thing and I guess I’ll see you this evening…” Kevin gave them his best and rarest stern look. “And for fuck’s sake, guys, clean up a bit more?”
“…Are we really that obvious?” Xiù asked.
“Well, you don’t actually smell, but… yeah. You are. And you’re gonna be in front of the cameras this evening, so maybe put the extra effort in to look as slick and space cadet as you can, right?”
“Oh come on,” Allison objected. “Are you really gonna tell us people don’t suspect anyway? You kinda dragged us into the spotlight…”
Kevin raised an eyebrow at her then sighed and nodded. “Look, I like you three,” he said candidly. “And I know you’ve got mixed feelings about the limelight which is why I’m giving you that advice, okay? Sure, yeah, people suspect. So what you’ve gotta ask is if you wanna go out there and add more fuel to that fire, or if you wanna keep up some kind of a wall so it all stays as harmless speculation and gossip.”
They all looked down at the table, and Kevin pushed the point home. “I think what you have is beautiful. Hell, I’m envious. But for fuck sake, guys, you have so little privacy left why would you jeopardize it?”
“Maybe because it’s not a fucking problem?” Julian growled. “Shit, the VP’s gay and the biggest grossing movie this year has a leading man who used to be a woman! But three instead of two, oh no, that’s gotta stay in the closet? I call bullshit.”
“Fuckin’ A.” Allison agreed. Xiù just nodded.
Kevin spread his hands. “Hey, I don’t give a bent fuck about the apple-pie traditional marriage shit myself,” he said. “And if you wanna be the Poly community’s Freddie Mercury or whatever, go for it, that’s your prerogative. It’s my job to advise, not to decide.”
“So what do you advise?” Xiù asked, quietly.
“…I’d advise that…” Kevin paused, and sniffed as he thought of his argument. “Okay. So. Part one: You clean up, look professional, head out into space and let the conversation percolate for a couple years and then when you’re back if you decide there’s a cause there that needs fighting, that’s when you fight it,” he told them. “But you’re not gonna make things better by dropping a bombshell and then fucking off and maybe never coming back. Don’t forget, you could all end up dead.”
He looked around at them. “You nearly died once already, remember,” he pointed out. “So if you get back and decide that’s a fight that needs fighting? Go for it. But for now, I say it’s eyes on the prize. Don’t get distracted now you’re on the home stretch. That’s part one.”
Allison and Julian looked at each other, then at Xiù, and as one the three of them nodded and listened expectantly.
“Part two? I honestly think the smart people in this country—and by some miracle that’s actually most of ‘em—don’t even give a fuck. They don’t even care. So if there’s a fight there at all, it’s against the handful of authoritarian pricks who think their religion gets to rule other people’s lives. And that means your allies would be the kind of reactionary dumbasses who are too shit-stupid to just let assholes be assholes, right? So maybe the thing to do is to just not make a big deal of it. Say ’yeah, that’s us and we’d like to be left alone please’ or whatever and then quietly let the whole shitstorm play itself out without you.”
“You’re contradicting yourself,” Allison pointed out.
“Not really. It’s a balancing act, right? You’ll wanna be here enough to put your oar in, but you’ll also wanna stay out of it enough to not wind up surrounded by regressive fuckwits who wanna use you for their Che Guevara poster child bullshit.”
“Fuh-lay-ming…” Xiù muttered.
Kevin frowned at her. “Huh?”
Julian waved him off, though her cryptic interjection clearly meant something to him. “…Fair point,” he said. “And…. good advice. Thanks Kevin.”
“I ain’t just a pretty face. ‘Specially not since Xiù broke my nose.”
“Aargh, you’re never going to let that go, are you?” Xiù observed. “I said sorry!”
“All is forgiven, I just like to joke around,” Kevin assured her. “Anyhow. I wanna see y’all red carpet quality this evening. Can you do that for me?”
“We’ll do that,” Allison assured him and stood. Julian and Xiù followed her and Kevin was soon alone, left to sit down and stroke his beard pensively.
After a few minutes of thought he fished in his pocket for his phone, and composed a quick email for Gabriel Arés.
Date Point 10y8m4d AV
HMS Sharman (HMNB Folctha), Folctha, Cimbrean, The Far Reaches
Technical Sergeant Martina Kovač
“‘Bout time you showed up! What’d you bring?”
Martina snorted and handed over her tupperware. “Nice to see you too, ‘Horse. I’ve got Lokše.”
They were having a ’Grandma’s cooking’ night to go with a rare good movie seeing as it was just the four of them for a change. With the SOR deployed they couldn’t leave the base in case the Protectors needed to scramble, and of course that meant alcohol was off-limits too, and the huge reinforced couch just felt empty with only four people sitting on it. Especially when one of those people was Martina.
Picking a dish hadn’t been been tricky at all. Arés had insisted on ’ethnic’ and if there was one thing that fit beautifully into the carb-and-fats kingdom that was SOR nutrition, it was Slovakian food from her dad’s side of the family.
Fortunately, her dad had scanned Babička’s box full of index-card recipes way back when, and a quick skim through the PDF had swiftly turned up just the thing. Lokše—potato pancakes stuffed with goose fat (the moister the better) and filled with pickled cabbage. They’d come out pretty damn good, she thought.
Firth meanwhile had showed up with a chunk of venison the size of a suitcase, reportedly a gift from his ’pop’ who’d shot it himself. It came with a warning to watch out for the deer slug, because Poppa Firth hadn’t been able to find it, and he was out front tinkering with some arcane-industrial culinary apparatus of Rebar’s making, allegedly “smoking it to Kentucky perfection” under the patient attention of the SOR’s titanic dog, Bozo.
For some reason, there was something about an enormous slab of red meat that converted the usually incorrigibly excitable canine into a poised statue of laser-focused watchfulness.
Arés popped the tupperware curiously. “Lokše?”
“Nuh-uh, big guy. Eat it first, then I tell you.”
“See, now you’re just making it sound ominous…”
Adam of course was Mexican on both sides of the family, and had clearly decided on something a little lighter on the palate to balance out the mountain of red meat that Firth had brought. Martina could see corn tortillas, whitefish, a couple of limes…
“What’re you making anyway?” she asked. “Fish tacos?”
“Yup!”
“Brother’s been eating a whole lotta fish taco recently,” Burgess joked, joining them with a casserole dish in his arms. “You’d think he’d be sick of it.”
‘Horse promptly went red as Martina laughed. Word had got around about where his callsign came from and the way the rest of the Lads told it, whenever they went out drinking there was almost a queue to ride the battle pony these days.
Reality was probably a little tamer—Adam was still Adam after all—but he wasn’t saying either way and Martina hadn’t pried. There was honestly no jealousy involved, but she wasn’t interested in knowing the details and he wasn’t interested in sharing.
“Alright, alright, what’d you bring?” he asked, trying to spare his blushes. “No, lemme guess. Mac and cheese, again.”
Burgess grinned. “Since when do you shit talk my grandma’s Mac?”
“Since never, your grandma’s Mac is a fucking religious experience! But you need more than one move, bro.”
Base put the casserole dish down. “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it. Anyhow, Firth says ten minutes.”
“Too bad Dexter couldn’t be here,” Martina mused. “Be kinda fun to add a Gaoian twist to this.”
“Dude,” Adam turned slightly green around the gills. “I heard one of the staples of Gaoian food is a giant bug…”
“Oh please, humans eat grosser you wuss,” she retorted.
“I heard it’s, like, as big as my arm!” he insisted. “Name me one thing that’s grosser than that!”
“I could get sergeant Friðþórsson in here,” she suggested, referring to one of the training simulation techs. “How’s rotten poisonous shark that was buried in the ground for a few months sound?”
“No way is that a real thing,” Burgess denied. “I don’t believe it.”
“Hakarl. Real thing. Look it up. Eat it if you’ve got a hankering for a nice hit of ammonia with your dinner.”
Burgess snorted and examined her Lokše. “Hold the fuckin’ phone, is that sauerkraut in those pancakes?”
Grinning, Martina nodded that it was so. “Uh-huh.”
He turned plaintively to Adam. “European food is fucking weird, bro.”
Adam shrugged. “Dude. Menudo. Chitlins. Rocky mountain oysters.”
“I’ve known you to eat all of those! But a Gaoian staple food squicks you out?” Martina asked.
“It’s a bug as big as my arm!”
“Granted, that’s a big-ass bug,” she agreed, considering the limb in question. She was pretty sure she had bras that wouldn’t quite fit round those biceps. “But it’s still just meat.”
Adam shuddered and made a yuuurgh noise.
“Horse getting squicked out by food?” Firth asked, stepping inside trailed by Bozo. He’d swapped his trademark hideous Hawaiian shirt for a truly offensive apron that on a smaller man might have briefly conveyed the impression that he was an impossibly petite and busty french maid. On Firth, it looked more like he’d fallen on one and hadn’t got round to peeling her off yet. “That’s a new one.”
“It’s a BUG as-”
“As big as your arm!” they chorused. “We heard.” Martina finished.
Even Bozo chimed in: ”WURF!”
Adam gave up. “…You pick a movie?”
“Oh, sure. Ask the gal who literally keeps your asses alive in a spacesuit if she remembered to pick a movie for movie night.” Martina teased. “No faith!”
“So, that’s a…no?”
This earned him a friendly middle finger. “I’ll go load it up, meat stack.”
She’d picked ’White Raven’, a big-screen fantasy movie that bore little relation to its source material, but kept some of the coolest imagery. She especially liked the bit where the giant waded across the Irish sea with a fleet of ships behind him.
The guys joined her a few minutes later once Firth’s venison had been declared “perfect”, and it really was. The Mac and cheese was maybe not quite a religious experience but it was unquestionably sublime, and the fish tacos…
Her earlier assessment of the capacity of the couch was off by a bit: she’d failed to account for Bozo, who hopped up and snuggled down the moment he was allowed. Between his own disarming size and the similarly arresting proportions of Arés, Burgess and Firth, Martina soon found that the most comfortable position for her was actually to sit across them with her legs on Warhorse’s lap, and that plus Burgess’ quip about fish tacos earlier got her to thinking.
Fortunately, the Lads had their kitchen system worked out well. Whoever did the bulk of the work got to skip on the cleaning, and today that was Arés. Being a guest got Marty a free pass too, so they hung out on the couch and discussed the movie for a while while Marty massaged the dozing dog’s ears.
As was the nature of conversations, however, the subject soon wandered, straying briefly into politics, backing out of there onto the subject of aliens, from there onto inebriation, and from there finally onto the subject of his recent, as Firth had so antiquatedly put it, ’wild oats’.
“…Between you and me, I kinda wish Base would stop playing wingman,” he confessed.
Marty raised an eyebrow at him. “The way I hear it, he’s good at it.”
He shrugged expansively (as if he had any alternative but to shrug expansively) “Yeah…”
“I hear a ’but’ in there…”
“I dunno. I guess maybe I’d prefer to earn a girl’s attention myself rather’n have my buddies throw them my way. You know?”
She nodded. “I hear ya. Where’s the fun in easy mode?”
“Right…” He looked distant.
“…Penny for your thoughts?”
“Uh…” he scratched the back of his neck. “…is it weird talkin’ about this with you?”
Martina shook her head. “‘Horse, we talked about this. You need to relax and enjoy yourself and get your head sorted out. Have you?”
“Relaxed? Sure. Enjoyed myself? Hell yeah!”
“And your head?”
“Fuck, I dunno. How’s a guy supposed to really know where his head’s at?” he asked.
Martina gestured with her hand palm-upward. “So, where do you think it’s at?”
“…I’unno.”
“If you don’t know where it is then you’ve not sorted it out yet.”
He frowned. “Hmm. Seems obvious when you put it that way.”
“Mmhm.” Martina nodded. She considered him for a second then decided to go with some straight talk. “Look, I still feel the same way about you as I said before, but until you’ve got your head in the right place we’re just good friends. You understand that, right?”
“…Sorry, Marty.”
“Don’t even start apologizing,” she instructed. “It’s good to know you still care what I think.”
“Of course I do!”
“Yeah. And you’re good at showing it, too.” On a whim, she kissed him on the cheek. He blinked and put his fingers gently to where her lips had touched him. “We’re good friends,” she repeated. “The kind who can talk about anything. Got that?”
He nodded.
“So… anything you wanna talk about?”
He chuckled. “There is one thing…”
“What?”
“When are we getting ‘round to the pancakes?”
“Shit!” She suddenly remembered the tupperware in the kitchen and scrambled off him and the couch. The exclamation woke Bozo who fell off Adam’s lap and onto the floor where he rolled upright in a scrabble of bewildered claws. He wagged his tail uncertainly and followed her into the kitchen where she secretly treated him to a scrap of the venison by way of an apology.
Fortunately, the Lokše were almost as good reheated in the microwave as they were fresh.
Date Point 10y8m4d AV
Uncharted Class 12 deathworld, Near 3Kpc Arm
The Old Singer.
Sky-thinker’s description had been accurate in that the demon did broadly resemble a Skithral. He had fallen far short of reality, however. Far, far short of it.
It was bigger than any hut that the Singer had even imagined. It was as big as trees, but it still moved with the easy grace of a living creature swarming over the rough terrain and through the forest as easily as a sure-footed man. Nothing that big should be able to flow like water—it made a Yshek look as clumsy as a landslide despite being many times larger.
She had known it was coming by the way the forest had gone silent, and had decided that she may as well see the thing that killed her. She had taken up her cane and hobbled outside, quietly glad that Sky-thinker was vindicated. It would have been a shame to die of thirst or exertion without seeing the destroyer for herself.
Even though she was perfectly calm and accepting of her fate, the sight of it nearly sent her fleeing into the woods anyway.
It was…
There was simply no material in the Singer’s experience that was even similar to its carapace. It was as black as the night of a summer solstice, and yet the sunlight sheened off it in hard white lines. Every edge of it looked as bright as the edge a flint knife, and even the smallest movement made those knife edges slide and scrape over each other with a whispering susurrus that even somehow managed to sound sharp.
Slung under where its mouthparts might be if it were really a skithral were instead two appendages as thick around as a man’s chest that glowed like forest fungus. Unlike a real skithral it lacked claws or a tail, but made up for that lack with a clutch of what could only be Sky-thinker’s ‘death birds’ on its back. These were launched skywards with sharp bangs as the creature scuttled into the clear space around the village, and they flashed this way and that with their flaming wings deployed, sweeping the huts with their baleful red eyes in search of hiding tribesmen.
The beast itself slowed its approach and walked up to her, pausing only when it was nearly directly above her. The Singer tapped her staff on the ground and gazed up at it expectantly. If it was a beast of pure destructive violence, then it certainly was not acting like one. No, this was the calculated consideration of a Person.
It turned its gaze—the dozens of tiny twinkling red eyes that glowed like fire—away from her and took in the village before finally deigning to acknowledge her again.
She decided to break the silence.
“Do you have a name?” she asked it.
There was a long, cold pause.
“Ah…” she sighed. “So you’re a beast after all. A shame. A person would have the courtesy to talk with an old woman.”
It tilted its… for lack of a better word, its head at her and spoke. ”Others.”
It had a voice like rock-slide or a tree falling. So deep that it was almost not sound at all, just a modulated rumble that she heard with her lungs.
“Oh! not a beast! Well…if you wish to know where the others went, tell me your name.”
More icy silence, until it presumably grew bored or else reached whatever laborious conclusion it had been working toward. ”Yours.”
“What kind of a silly thing are you? Don’t you recognize these tattoos? I don’t have a name, I gave it to the gods when I was a girl. I am the old Singer of this village.”
”Singer.”
“Yes. And yours?”
”Six. Six. Five.” it growled, as if numbers were any kind of a name. ”Others.”
“They ran away. Did you really think you could destroy our daughters and their husbands in the east and we would not notice?”
”Futile. Direction.”
The Singer trilled laughter. “Creature, what makes you think an old woman would betray her grandchildren?”
The creature stepped back and regarded her some more. Then it spat blue fire and destroyed her.
She went to the gods laughing.
Date Point 10y8m4d AV
Salt Lake City, Utah, USA, Earth
Jacob Buehler
“She’s changed so much…”
Jacob shot a glance at his wife. It was the first time that Amanda had commented that that was their daughter on the news. Estranged and rebellious though she was, it was impossible not to feel proud, albeit more than a little sad that she hadn’t responded to their attempt at reaching out.
He surreptitiously compared the woman on the screen to the framed picture on the wall, one of the few ones they had where Allison had actually been smiling. Behind the same bone structure was a very different person to the sulky tearaway teenager he remembered: Allison looked strong, composed and professional. She was surveying the crowd and the reporters with tight politeness and leaving the talking to the asian girl in the front. Whenever a question was asked of her personally, she answered it directly and economically. Not entirely changed then—she had always hated being the focus of attention.
“She’s pretty!” one of the twins announced. Ramsey, probably—he usually sat on the left, but it was hard to be certain from behind.
“She’s going to Mars, sweetie,” Amanda told him. “That’s more important than how pretty she is.”
“But she is!”
“Ramsey Buehler, she’s an astronaut, not a supermodel,” Amanda said, firmly.
“…Yes, mom.”
Jacob decided for once not to snap the boy back on his tone of voice. They sat and watched the press conference for a few minutes longer.
“She’s holding his hand!” Tristan pointed out suddenly, pointing at the screen. Sure enough, Allison’s fingers were interlaced with those of the rangy, shaggy man who was apparently the crew’s field researcher.
“Mm-hmm. He’s her boyfriend,” Amanda said. “Didn’t you see the picture?”
“Ian at school said he heard the other lady’s her girlfriend too!”
“We don’t listen to disgusting rumors like that, sweetie.”
“…Yes, mom.”
“Boys if you can’t respect your mother you can go to your rooms and stay there,” Jacob corrected him.
“But dad-!”
“No buts!”
Tristan bowed his head. “Sorry.”
Another question was directed at Allison on the TV, and they listened with mounting curiosity. ”Miss Buehler, according to your family you haven’t spoken in nearly fifteen years. Do you have anything to say to them?”
They watched as Allison froze for a microsecond, then leaned forward to the mic. “Uh… Apparently I have two little brothers nowadays…” she began. Ramsey and Tristan looked at each other excitedly. ”I guess I’d like to tell them that they’re welcome to write me. I’d like to hear from them sometime.”
”No message for your parents?”
”No.”
They boys were so excited that they completely missed (thankfully) the contemptuous edge to the word.
“Boys, go clean up for dinner,” Jacob told them.
“Wha-? But Dad!”
“Now, Ramsey.”
The twins gave each other a confused look, then chorused “…Yes dad…” and trudged out.
“So she got the letter…” Amanda mused, the moment they were out of the room.
“I just don’t get it,” Jacob sighed. “She hates us. You could see it in her eyes.”
“Where did we go wrong?”
Jacob looked back at the TV. His only daughter had retreated from the microphone and was staring distractedly off at nothing. He had no idea what she was thinking.
“…I wish I knew,” he said.