Big update, heading into what for most in FUSA is a 3-day weekend. I have a half DayJob tomorrow and much, much more to write. Which is, of course, my real job.

Graf recovers and we get a tiny glimpse into how Pai thinks of him. I really is a kind of Aragorn-Arwen story, choosing a mate you know is not at all like you and shall be a distant memory in a thousand years. Yet, she seems quite taken with the simple lad. After, Alix twigs to just who they are about to meet and it nearly kills her. It also allows me to introduce the barest leading edge of what may become the plot of this story.

Everyone have a good weekend. Love your families; time is short. Deus vult.

Enjoy my content? Buy me a beer!

Following a brief shower, where she took the initiative to wash him down, producing a typical response for a late-teen boy…

“I said no,” she scolded him, getting out first and handing him a towel.  She just stood and waited until he was finished.  “Good.  Come along.”

I can never forget her body’s – this body’s – strength.  I better tell Alix to take the insults down a notch.  She pushed him to the side of the bed then into it.

“If you wake up, which I doubt, I’ll have some snacks for you, what having lost most of you dinner.” A blink of her wonderful eyes.  “I have summoned snacks.  I will not leave this room until morning, in case you have a physical or mental event.”

“Pai?  Intended?” he mumbled, aware she was putting a sheet over him.  “I wanted to know…”

“I allowed you one question.  Asked and answered.  Be silent.

“Yes, Dear.”  She did allow herself a bit of a smile, at that, moving from the bedside to open the door just before a non-combatant legionary knocked and disturbed him.

“Thank you,” she said, taking the small tray of meat and cheese before again closing the door.  He seemed shocked at her state of undress.  That onto a table, Pai first looked at one of the office chairs, but shook her head.  Carefully, she eased into the bed, just not touching him but watching his face, wondering what his dreams were like.  “Am I in them?”

Graf knew some of the things he saw made no sense.  Every time he opened his eyes, it was dark.  But Pai was right there, propped up on right elbow, her face inches from his.

“…always here for me…” before falling back to sleep.

“I could ask mom what you two talked about,” she barely mouthed, “but that would be rude.  I am content with this timeslice of my life.”

A cloudy morning, Pai sent a message to Alix’s phone that, while alive, Graf was a little tired, and she would let her know about breakfast.  “And,” she thought to her rival’s device, “after, we must go to your Engineering Center to retrieve my ship.  Arrange transport, so-called officer candidate.”

“Bitch,” was Alix’s reply.

“Fancy a trip to St. Petersburg today?”

“I retract my accusation.” Pai smiled as she read the other’s discomfort.  Graf made a sound and rolled onto his back.  Seeing he was waking up, she leaned in to kiss him.

“Best morning ever,” he said, blinking.  “Hey, you’re naked.  Can we…?”

“No.” Her tone was absolute and made his breath catch.  “You are still too stressed.  Go do what you need to do in the bathroom, then pack.”

“Over there,” she pointed at the chair she declined to use, “is a non-legionary uniform.  That will mark you as an outsider so that no-one says anything they should not in your presence.”

“Even if they did,” Graf said, sitting up and stretching, “I’ve have no idea what they’d be saying.  I’m just a farmboy from the upper Midwest.  Hey!”

He did take the liberty to take her chest into his hands while he kissed her.  She didn’t move, returning his affection.  Until some time passed.  Then, she leaned away.  “I’ll get dressed, too.  We have breakfast with that smelly girl and then are off to my ship.  I want to be in Russia no later than fifteen hundred.”

“Huh?” He stood, not understanding.  “Russia?”

“Yes.  Should take about two hours in my Shcha,” as she pulled her panties, then now-cleaned coveralls.  “We shall meet with someone at the Engineering Center before proceeding on to my Imperial Capital.”

She saw he was having trouble moving.

“I’ve already said I love you and want to marry you,” she barely heard, “but all of this is so beyond me.”

Doing what he needed to in the bathroom, he considered Pai’s latest putdown.  I don’t think Alix smells bad at all.  Wait, if my Intended thinks that human does, he looked over his shoulder before back to spit out his toothpaste, then what does she think of me?

“I,” she said, opening the door and waiting for him, “love your smell and taste.  All three of us are playing a new, complex game to be older.”

“Behave at breakfast?” he asked.

“No guarantees,” she kissed him and took his hand.  “But as you are my pending husband, I shall obey and not cast the first stone.”

Walking into the café, Alix was waiting on them while reading an old paperback book.  “Studying, Alix?” Graf asked in what he hoped was an upbeat tone.

She held it up for them.  Martian Wonderland, the story of Autokrator Áris, he read.  “Fiction?” She doesn’t smell at all…

“You think she is?  Really?” she snarked a little.  “What you two said, about me and Mars.  I guess I thought I should educate myself.”

Pai dropped his hand and strode over.  Alix stood.  Thinking their verbal catfight was about to light up, he tried, “Hey, now…!” Only to see Pai put her arms around the other’s neck and whisper, “So proud of you!  What food can you suggest for my Intended?  We need to leave in thirty minutes.”

Now the human took his hand and dragged him to the prep bar.  “You get some fruit juice and coffee.  I’ll made one Belgian waffle, each.”

Back at the little table, and after her short prayer, swallowing her first bite, Alix asked, “What’s the rush?”

“We’re meeting someone before our trip and she a tight schedule and hates tardiness,” Pai explained.

“Who?” she asked, after another too large bite.

“I’d rather not say.  And that is enough for you to understand, is it not, officer candidate?”

Graf could tell she was still confused before suddenly choking on her next bite, only washing it down with the rest of her juice.  “I’ll get you more,” he said, standing.

Behind him he just made out, “You have got to be kidding me!  I’m nobody!”

“Not anymore,” Pai replied, still trying very hard to be nice.

A minivan awaited them outside.  It was no more than ten minutes later, through the trees that they were at the main gate of the Engineering Center.  The technological heart of the imperium.  On that short drive, Pai spoke.

“When I fell off the outside hull, onto my new husband, here…”

Alix’s teeth ground.

“…my ship continued on autopilot until into imperium claimed land, specifically, near the capital of Kentucky Province, Frankfort.  A signal from the ground halted it, then, after some confusion as to why there was no pilot – I was expected, after all – it was guided in to this facility.  The legal term is ‘interred,’ but that is a fiction to be resolved in a few minutes.” She paused.  “Rival?  You are breathing very heavy.”

“I…” Graf saw Alix gulp and try again. “I cannot just, like this, meet her.  I’ve never… she’s… and her family… for over a hundred years!  I cannot meet someone who is like a goddess!”

What the hell?  Graf thought.

“SSRIs are illegal in the Polar Alliance, so I cannot help you there,” Pai continued easily with a smile which bordered on sly.  “I suggest you pray very hard you do not make a mistake.  If you do, you are not coming with my beloved Graf and I to Russia.”

Sly went to sneer.

“Leaving him to me completely.”

Graf watched Alix’s head drop and hands go together as they bounced down the road.  “Almighty God, Lord Jesus, help me, help me, please…” he heard her pray.

This is uncomfortable.

“So who are we meeting before our trip?” Graf asked, totally clueless.  “And, can we stop by my home again, to tell Dad and Sis what’s going on?”

“You’ll see.  And yes,” Pai replied, leaning her right shoulder into him.