From where I started in the summer, this story continues to surprise me. I’d planned an intergeneration novel about the colonization of Mars, followed by some catastrophe where one or some of the demi-humans went feral. Obviously, they had other ideas.

This segment was what I was shown Sunday morning, and it, too, came out of left field at me. I thought I would have some scientific convos with Kira and politics with Fussy. I never envisioned Allie leaving her home world, but here we are.

May have to do a little research for what comes next. Writing “hard” science fiction, I cannot ignore Allie’s bones and muscles being weaker from growing up in a shallower gravity well. Heck, I’m not even sure where she lands: a demi of the Hartmann family in a Jap spaceship bearing news of aliens under Rus territory. It’s a mess.

Enjoy my content? Buy me a beer!

The city offices were a kilometer away in the other direction, so she did not know how her dad would make it in time, until her mother spoke to her mind.

He just commandeered a delivery bike and will be at the spaceport, Saras thought to her.  I’ve put together a small personal kit.  Three days!  That means averaging over two Gs, Allie.  You won’t be able to move once you’re on Earth!

I’ll be fine, Mom, she thought, rounding the last corner before their apartment block.  If the stares she got on her walk to the cathedral were one thing, this display had everyone stop to look at her.  Up the stairs, her mother had the door open for her.

“I should have had more for breakfast,” she muttered, taking a look at what was in the bag her mother had prepped.  Into and back out of her room, she stuffed her Rosary in, too.

“Nervous?” Saras asked, checking her oh-two for their trot to the port.

“I don’t even know what I feel, Mom,” Allie admitted.  “I’ve been to Central twice but never further than that.”

Martian Central, called Central by all the locals, was the nearly one-by-two kilometer space station in permanent orbit around Mars.  Somewhere deep inside of it was a bank of quantum supercomputers housing the mind of Aqua.

The Neo-Yokohama Spaceport was more just a one-strip airport for local planes, with open space for any reactionless motor craft who might drop in.  They both saw the saucer of Rahab about two hundred meters off to the their left, with Anton already in conversation with Nichole 5.  He had opened to his faceplate of his borrowed, ill-fitting skinsuit and she stood in her blue coveralls, not at all put out by her half-melted face or missing lower right arm.

Which, Alicia kept to herself, still smelled a little when the android leaned to his kiss her cheek.

“Three days, at that G load,” her father returned to what they had been talking about, “will, to put it mildly, not be good for my daughter.  Yes, we exercise her more than most, but she’s Martian born and raised.  She does not have the bone or muscle mass for that, Captain.”

“It will not be a continuous acceleration, Ambassador Alvarez,” she smiled.  “I will have her bedded down – with restraints – for several high-G bursts.”

“How high?” he demanded.

“Six, minimum.”

“You could kill her!”

“I will not.”

“Anton, please,” Saras said, stepping to him and putting her hand onto his arm.  “Nichole’s damaged body before us is how much she values Allie’s life.  I have faith in our old family friend.”

Alicia watched Nichole’s emerald eyes twinkle at that.

“Dammit.  Fine,” he said, not happy.  “I suggest, Dearest Daughter, you find some slightly less hot-shot pilot for your return voyage.”

He shook his head.  “Whenever the hell that may be.  Leaving now?”

“Yes, Ambassador,” Nichole agreed.  “I have permission to bypass outbound inspection at Central and proceed directly toward Earth.”

“With at least three empires backing you, I’d bet you could get away with murder at this point,” he said, still angry.  “So, rule bending is to be expected.  Allie?”

“Yes, Dad?”

He gave her a hug and spoke to her ear.

“None of us know where this is going.  It is entirely possible the fate of two worlds is now in your hands.” He leaned back and took hers with his.  “So, if you can’t to good…”

“Then I’ll do bad well.  I love you.  And you, Mom.  Please take care of my baby brother.  I… I make no promises other than I shall return to my home; my world, my city.”

“God wills it,” Saras said, just beginning to cry.  “Go on, shoo!”

With the demi-human walking to the small ship’s ramp, Nichole, as the only military, raised her right hand to her slagged brow in salute.

“I have just sent y’all a copy of my flight plan and shall update it as needed.  I will protect her on this voyage with my life.”

“And after?” Anton asked.

“You already touched the truth, sir:  there are two emperors and two empress’s who shall let no harm come to the Hero.”

Gone.  Ramp up.  A pause of nearly a minute, likely to get Alicia settled somewhere.  The ship tore a hole in the sky, headed for Earth.