“I don’t know,” she told him. “I don’t know if I’m saying anything at all. It could be something completely normal. I’ll be the first to admit that I have never gone on a mission like you have. I’ve never left Earth, so I don’t know what would be normal to bring with you on a quest like you were going on when you first left for Penthos. There’s just something about it that seems strange to me. It almost seems…” her voice faded and she shook her head. “Never mind.”
“It almost seems like what?” Jonah asked.
Aubrey hesitated, seeming to search his face for indication of what he was thinking and feeling, as though it would influence what she was going to say to him.
“It almost seems like someone put them there on purpose. Like someone might have known that you weren’t going to be gone for as short a time as you thought that you were going to be, or that you may end up somewhere where you were going to need the seeds.”
“Who would do that?” he asked.
Aubrey shook her head.
“I don’t know,” she said again. He looked down at his lap, feeling the angry tension building up in him again. “Do you ever get homesick?”
The question startled Jonah and he looked up at her sharply.
“Homesick?” he asked. “What do you mean?”
“Do you ever miss the settlement on Uoria? You were there for a long time. Do you ever wish that you were there?”
Jonah wasn’t sure how to respond. He thought about it for a few moments.
“I haven’t really had much chance to think about that,” he said. “I’m guessing that there will be a time when I do miss it. Like you said, I was there for a long time. It was my home. Even though I was never one of the ones who was convinced that we were always going to be there.”
“What do you mean?”
“Even from the beginning, I didn’t want to just give up. I wasn’t resigned to the fact that we didn’t have anything left. I wanted to get off of Uoria so much. I wanted to be back here where we could figure out exactly what happened and ensure that those responsible got what they deserved. I always felt like there was so much more that we could do. That I could do. That’s why Rain and I spent so much time designing the vehicle that we brought here. It took years and there were plenty of times that I didn’t think that it was actually going to work. But I couldn’t give up. It was like as long as I was working on it, there was a chance. Even if that vehicle wasn’t going to work out, as long as I was doing something, anything, I wasn’t giving up and I was ensuring that one day I was going to be back on Earth.”
“Is that how Rain felt about it, too?”
Jonah could hear the slant in Aubrey’s voice, like she was trying to sound casual but the faint touches of jealousy and nervousness in her voice were breaking through the façade.
“I think so,” he said. “She and I had been friends for a long time, but it wasn’t like we spent huge amounts of time talking about our feelings or anything.”
“You didn’t?” she asked.
Jonah shook his head.
“No. We talked a couple of times about how it seemed like everyone else had given up and that we still wanted to find a way to go back to Earth. We were angry while the rest chose to be sad. They were longing for the memories of Earth and what they felt like they had already lost. We still believed that there was a chance that we could get back and keep working on the mission that we had started with. We didn’t want to lose anything. We wanted the careers that we had spent so much of our lives studying, training, and preparing for.”
“When you were thinking about everything that you had left behind on Earth and everything that you might not be able to have if you didn’t get back, was a family ever something that you thought about?”
“My family?” Jonah asked.
“A family that you didn’t have yet,” Aubrey clarified. “Did you ever think that being on Uoria for the rest of your life would mean that you wouldn’t get married or have children?” She glanced down uncomfortably and then back at him. “Or was there someone on the settlement that you might have been interested in having a life with if you didn’t ever get a chance to leave?”
Jonah held her hands tightly and stared into her eyes, trying without saying anything directly to reassure her that she was everything to him and that there was nothing for her to be jealous about.
“I had plenty of time to choose someone else. If I had wanted to, I would have. But there was never a time when I was on that settlement that I even thought for a second about getting married or having a family.”
“And now?” she asked.
“Well,” Jonah said with a grin as he lifted her hand and kissed her ring, “I think that I’ve already answered the question about getting married.”
“And having a family?” Aubrey asked. “Is that something that you’ve ever thought about?”
She looked suddenly smaller, more fragile and vulnerable. Jonah didn’t know what to say. He didn’t want to hurt her, but he also didn’t have the right words to answer her properly.
“I don’t know what to say to you that would be an honest answer. I don’t know where life is going to take me. Us. Right now all I know is that I have you and that is more than I ever could have hoped to have had. The rest is something that I will have to figure out as the time comes. One step at a time.”
Chapter Seven
Rain stood at the window of her former bedroom and stared out over the settlement. She remembered the first time that she had stood in that room, more than a year after they crashed on Uoria. Up until then they had lived in small, temporary shelters that they were able to cobble together. Some had tried to piece together blankets and other fabric from the crash to make tents, but they were quickly found to be inadequate. Over time they had collected more of the remnants from the crash and gathered resources from the surrounding planet to help them make more permanent structures. Out of the salvage of the StarCity rose a village, and they surrounded it with a stone wall like the one that they had seen at the kingdom of the nearby Mikana. It gave them a sense of permanence, anchoring them on the planet that was now what most of them considered to be their home.
It was a wonderful feeling to have a more permanent home in the settlement after spending so much time hunkering in shelters that barely protected her from the unpredictable and sometimes brutal elements of the new planet. At the same time, however, there was a strange sense of forced happiness that hung over the building. She knew that there were some members of the crew who were thrilled that the skeletons of the settlement were finally fleshing out and building into homes, gathering places, shops, and other buildings that made them feel more like they weren’t just floating, hovering somewhere in space, but truly secured to this frontier. Rain, though, wasn’t as jubilant. This place still didn’t feel like home. She felt like nothing more than a visitor there, borrowing the time, the space, even the very air that she was breathing, from the natives of Uoria. She was surrounded by what was left of their time on Earth and it made her feel as though everyone else in the crew was trying to recreate it, pretend that the salvaged pieces had never been a ship, almost as though they had always been there. Over time, she had become more accustomed to the space, even found herself enjoying the peace and comfort of a room that belonged entirely to her rather than having a bunkmate and feeling as though she was never really alone. But it had never taken away the longing for Earth. She had never resigned herself to this reality or given up her dream of one day returning to her home and completing the goals that she had made for herself.
Rain still hadn’t given herself over to the settlement in the way that the rest had and she knew that she never would. She looked down at those who still had a spark of adventure and a desire for justice within them gathering in the street beneath her. It had been more than two days since she had arrived back at the settlement to ask for the help of those who were willing to go back to the Mikana kingdom and then on to Penthos with her, and finally th
ey were nearly ready to leave. Those who were going with her had bags sitting around their feet and weapons strapped to their backs. Some had their partners with them, others were clinging to them, saying goodbye. These all held the false smiles, the air of dismissiveness as they pretended that the weight that was pushing down on all of them wasn’t there. They pretended that when they said goodbye it was only for a short time, just a brief jaunt just as they had planned for their first visit to Penthos. In the backs of their eyes, though, she could see the pain of knowledge. She could see that they knew that it was very likely that many of them would never set foot on this planet again, and that when they stopped touching their loved ones to journey to the kingdom, it would be the final time that they would feel the touch of those people.
Rain stepped back and looked around her room again. She didn’t have any of the falseness in her heart. She had the strong sense within her that when she walked out of the settlement to return to Penthos, those fleeting final moments would be the last time that she would see this place, that she might never come back. There was unexpected sadness in that feeling. She had been wanting to get out of the settlement and back to Earth for as long as she had been there, yet this place represented so much to her. This is where they had been through some of the most difficult parts of their lives and prevailed. This was where they learned that they were far stronger than they had ever known that they were and could overcome things that they never even knew existed. This was a place that would always be indescribably impactful to her. But had been stuck. She had been trapped here and was beyond ready to put it behind her. This was her chance for freedom and to finally break free of the control that the Covra had tried to hold over them once and for all.
Below her she saw a man hug his brother and then step back, his hand reaching down to envelope the tiny hand of his child who stood beside him. The little girl had glossy curls that hung to her shoulders and the eyes of her mother. Rain remembered them before they left Earth. They barely knew each other then. Now they had built a family and neither wanted to leave Uoria. An involuntary thought ran through Rain’s mind and she wondered if perhaps she was wrong about never seeing this place again and if there would be some day when she would bring her children there to see the settlement and learn about her past.
The thought brought emotion to Rain’s throat and she fought tears that stung in the bottoms of her eyes. This was a challenging thought for her. When she was younger, she had always assumed that she would one day have a family. Once the days of her missions were over and she had accomplished all that she thought that she was going to, she would find someone to love, get married, and have children. It was what was expected of her and something that she never questioned. That all changed when they got to Uoria, however. No longer did she think of a future with anything more than herself. She had too much else on her mind to even ponder the potential of finding someone to love or one day being responsible for the lives of children. There were moments when she barely felt that she could handle the responsibility of her own life.
Then she met Lynx. Everything changed. So much more than she ever thought that it could. So much more than she even knew until now. Suddenly she could imagine having a family again. Part of her that had been hiding away for so long was open and alive again, and this filled her with a new sense of resolve. This had to be done. Wherever it took her and whatever she had to do, she wasn’t just fighting for what had happened, but also for what could have been, and what still may be.
Rain gathered her bags and rushed out of the room, closing the door behind her before running down the stairs and out into the crowd.
“Rain,” one of the men said as she approached. “How many people can you fit on the vehicle that you brought with you from the kingdom?”
The realization sank in and Rain realized the tremendous gap in her planning. She had taken the vehicle because it would bring her to the settlement far more quickly than walking, and she didn’t want to waste any time. She hadn’t thought about who might be coming back with her, and now she realized that far more of the men from the settlement and even some of the women were primed and ready to go along with her, but she didn’t know how to transport them back to the kingdom efficiently. She looked to the man who had spoken.
“I can bring a few on the vehicle with me,” she said. “The rest of you wait here. When we get to the kingdom we will get other vehicles and return for the rest of you.”
Part of her expected that they would protest, but instead, they nodded and several stepped forward, offering themselves to go along with her on this first leg of the journey. She helped them to put their belongings into the vehicle and then climb aboard before assuring the rest still standing in the center of the street that they would soon be back for them. She started the vehicle and they headed out, going toward the kingdom as fast as they could.
Chapter Eight
Ivy closed the door to the infirmary as carefully as she could, not wanting to wake any of the injured that might be resting. Nylek was sitting up in his bed, one hand holding Mina’s hand while the other grasped a piece of fruit. He smiled at her as she approached.
“Hi,” she said, resting her hand on Mina’s shoulder. “How are you feeling today, Nylek?”
“Much better,” he admitted. “I wish that one of the healers was here so that they could do a full healing and I could be done with this, but I’m just grateful for the supplies that Ciyrs left with us and the efforts of the doctor here. I really didn’t think that I was going to survive that.”
Ivy smiled at him.
“You did fine,” she said. “You’re strong. There’s nothing that a little hybrid army can do to you.”
Nylek laughed.
“I’m so glad that you have so much faith in me,” he said. “But it seems like those hybrids were fairly good at doing something to me when we were on Penthos.”
“Not anymore,” Ivy said. “We’ll be ready when we get back.”
“We?”
Ivy turned around at the sound of the familiar voice and saw Ellora standing in the doorway. Maxim’s mother looked concerned and curious, and Ivy took a step toward her.
“Ellora,” she started.
“Is it safe to assume that by ‘we’ you mean that you intend on going back to Penthos with the rest of us?”
As she had largely since they met, the Mikana woman sounded suspicious of Ivy, as if she thought that now that they were back on Uoria, she would take the opportunity to rush back to the Denynso compound and call for a shuttle from Earth. Ivy knew that the time had come to tell Ellora about the baby. Though she still felt hesitant to talk about it, and would have hesitated longer if she thought that she could, she knew that things weren’t exactly what she thought that they were and that there was even more to what was going on than she thought. Now was the time when she needed to be honest with Ellora and tell her what was happening so that the older woman could finally understand her thoughts and believe that she was fully and utterly committed to Maxim and didn’t want to return to Earth without him. Telling Ellora about the impending birth of her first grandchild would be a way for her to connect more closely with her and to give them, all of them, more motivation in the fight.
“Could I speak to you, Ellora?” Ivy asked. “I know that you’re busy, but I need just a moment of privacy with you. There’s something that I need to talk with you about.”
Ellora nodded and Ivy looked down at Nylek with an apologetic, encouraging smile before starting out of the room. They exited the infirmary and made their way across the village toward Ellora’s house. They walked along in silence, Ivy trying to bring to mind what she was going to say and how Ellora might react to the news.
Finally they arrived at Ellora’s house and they settled onto a couch in the front room.
“Can I make you a cup of coffee?” Ellora asked.
The offer made Ivy remember the first time that she met Ellora. She had been so surprised to find out that this section
of Uoria had a beverage that had come from coffee beans from Earth. The fact that they were able to grow the beans and create them into a hot, strong, bitter beverage was truly impressive to her, but it also just made her grateful for the deep swallows of a beverage that she often couldn’t do without for more than half an hour when she was at home in the laboratory. Her mouth watered at the thought of the coffee, but she knew that she shouldn’t drink it. She drew in a breath and shook her head.
“No, thank you,” she said.
Ellora looked at her strangely and settled onto the couch beside her.
“Is something wrong?”
“Um,” Ivy said, looking away as she tried to gather her words. She looked back up at her and shook her head. “No. Nothing’s wrong. I just don’t think that drinking coffee would be good for the baby.”
It was blatant and rushed, no buildup, no preparation. It was the only way that she could bring herself to get the words out. She saw them pass through Ellora as if they didn’t make any impact on her at all, and then her face started to change. The muscles tightened and her eyes widened slightly, not as though she were surprised, but almost as though she were trying to take in more of Ivy as she spoke. Her breath trembled in her throat as she drew it in.
“Baby?” she asked, her voice barely above a whisper.
Ivy nodded.
“Yes,” she said.
“You are carrying my first grandchild?”
Ivy nodded again.
“I am,” she said. “That’s why I came back here to Uoria rather than staying on Penthos with Maxim. He wanted to make sure that I was safe and he wanted me to come see the midwives so I could find out about the pregnancy.”
“What did you find out?” Ellora asked.
“I left the midwife before I was able to find out much. I didn’t feel right being there by myself. This is all so new to me and I didn’t know what to do. I didn’t want to find out everything alone.”
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