by Mike Luoma
“I’m sorry,” he says.
Maybe I’ve been the one afraid of it all this time…
“Stop apologizing!” she says louder. She leans in to kiss him again. Suddenly, BC realizes his arm is soaking wet. He can’t help himself, and starts to laugh, breaking up their kiss.
“What?” Anita says. “This had better be good! You better not be laughing at me! You’re not laughing at the way I kiss, are you?”
“No! My arm, look,” he says, holding up his dripping sleeve. “You spilled my wine, that’s all.”
“Too bad.”
“I wasn’t laughing at you, Anita. If anything, I’d laugh at myself for letting what I said earlier slip out!”
“You can’t take it back now, you know,” Anita tells him.
“I can’t believe I said that.”
“Said what?” she says coyly, innocently.
“You want me to say it again?”
“If you dare. If you can. Can you?”
BC looks her in the eye.
“I love you, Anita. I think I did the moment I first laid eyes on you, as corny as that sounds.”
“What, back when you knocked me out with that hatch cover on Lunar Prime?”
“Yeah, you remember, just before you tried to kill me for the first time,” BC says sarcastically. “I remember thinking you looked like an angel… didn’t know you were the Angel of Death!” He jokes.
“What a way to start a relationship, huh?” she says, and laughs.
“But, seriously, I do remember thinking way back then that you looked like a sleeping Latino angel,” BC says, softening his tone as he smiles.
Anita stops laughing. She smiles a kind of crooked smile as she looks back at BC.
“I love you too, BC.”
“So. You can say it too, huh?” he jokes softly.
“Guess I can.”
“Well, then, right back at ya!”
Anita frowns and pulls back.
“That was not romantic at all. Way to kill a moment, BC. ‘Right back at ya?’ What was that?”
“Sorry.”
“I thought I asked you to stop apologizing!” she says in mock anger. She laughs again, and then leans over to kiss him again.
“Ahem.”
A man clears his throat next to them. The waiter. He’s looking askance at the mess on the table top, the spilled wine dripping off and onto the floor. BC and Anita grin up at him sheepishly.
“Sorry,” they manage to say in unison. Anita reaches over to cuff BC on the shoulder.
“Hey!” he protests.
“Add any extra costs to my bill,” Anita tells the waiter.
“You’re getting this one?” BC asks.
“My treat.”
“Thanks!”
“Thanks for admitting how you feel. I know that wasn’t easy for you.”
“It wasn’t. I’m sorr…” he stops himself. “It had to come out when I wasn’t thinking about it, I guess. I didn’t think I was ready.”
“What, to say it?” Anita asks.
“To accept it. You know…” BC struggles to find words. “I’m flawed, Anita. I don’t wanna lie to you. I’ve been a horrible person. I’ve killed people. I did it for ‘God’, supposedly. But I did it mostly just to save my own skin. I’m a bad man… I’m just not good enough or, I don’t know, it’s… I’m not ready, or somehow, I don’t know, fixed enough, somehow, to be worth loving… god, that sounds pathetic!”
“No it doesn’t,” she says. “Confused, sure, but normal enough. But if you wait until you’re perfect before allowing yourself to love and be loved, you’re going to be waiting your life away. You’ll be waiting forever. Nobody’s perfect, BC. We’re all flawed in different ways. That’s a part of love, though, forgiving those flaws, or seeing past them. It’s part of it, BC. You love me, and you know how flawed I am.”
“Nobody’s perfect, I know…”
“But what? You’re still expecting yourself to be perfect?! You’re not perfect! So deal with it. You’re never going to be perfect. Never!” she raises her voice slightly as she makes her point. Then she quiets down a little. “It’s okay to try to be perfect; I guess that’s natural enough. But it’s a process. Life is a process. It’s not over until, well, you know, when you die, you know? You’re never done, not so long as you’re breathing! If you don’t think you’ll be ready until you’re ‘done’, you may never be ready. Not until you’re dead.”
“You know, I know that,” BC says, “but knowing it and feeling it are different. They’re different things.”
“Are you feeling this?” she asks, point blank.
“That tickles,” he jokes. Anita frowns.
“I’m serious. Do you really feel ‘this’, between us?”
“I do. I think I’ve finally let myself love someone, love you.” He looks Anita square in the eyes.
“I love you.”
And I mean that.
I think.
“I love you too, BC,” she says, and she kisses him.
They leave the restaurant and head off together to Anita’s quarters to spend the night. BC awakes to a new day the next morning.
Funny how love can change your whole attitude!
He looks over at Anita, still sleeping. He lies back down and assesses the larger situation, the so-called ‘big picture’.
The Eldred are dead and dying. At least all the ones we’ve encountered are. We don’t know where Eldray is, so we can’t check out their homeworld. Or maybe just one of their homeworlds. But the Eldred seem to be dying off.
Dolomay must have been telling the truth. Without his continued presence, the fight has left their race. More than that, their very will to live seems to have died with their Ancient Enemy. Anita stirs next to him. He sits up in bed.
“Mornin’,” she mumbles out sleepily.
“Good morning,” BC replies. “Sleep well?”
“Uh-huh,” she says, and then yawns.
“I was thinking…”
“Uh-oh,” she interrupts. BC glares at her in mock anger. “Sorry,” she lies. “Go on.” She sits up and waits for him to stop glaring. His fake glare melts into a grin.
“Can you help me convene a meeting of the heads of the human colonies here at Ceres Central?”
he asks her.
“Wait a second,” she says. “That’s what you were thinking about?”
“It was… I’m sorry, is that bad?”
“Well,” she says, looking down. She looks back up at him. “Let’s make a deal from here on out. We don’t talk work – no politics, no nothing – here in the bedroom. Okay?”
She’s really serious! I feel like I just crossed a boundary or something…
“Okay,” BC agrees.
That will be tough… I don’t have any control over what I think about or when. Just have to keep my mouth shut!
“I think we should at least try to keep our personal lives and our business lives separate,” Anita explains. “They will inevitably bleed into each other. That’s going to happen. But we can at least try to keep the bedroom as our sanctuary from the outside world, don’t you think?”
“You’ve got a good point there,” BC admits. “I hadn’t thought about that, but you’re right. We need a place to get away from the madness!”
“Good,” she says, smiling at him. “I’m glad you agree.”
“But… before we start that… do you think you could set up a meeting? Sometime in the next week?”
Anita whips her pillow around and into his face! BC throws his arms up to defend as she pummels him repeatedly. BC picks up his pillow to battle back. They both begin laughing. Soon all thoughts of the meeting are forgotten, as the two of them entangle and delay getting out of bed for another hour.
Anita does set up the meeting for the middle of next week. BC will meet with the leaders at Ceres Central on Tuesday, the 13thof September.
The governors of Crankshaft, Depot, Cat’s Eye and Rigel Four all attend. The Ayat
ollah comes from Mars. Amanda Erskine attends for the Moon, Wentworth comes for the UTZ Council, and M’Bekke, as Pope, represents the NcC. BC, as Prime Representative, represents the Solar Alliance government.
When they are made aware of the meeting, the Domo and the Flaze also request permission to send observers, as they actively seek peace and alliances.
Most of the meeting covers government forms and functions. Democracy. BC’s a fan. With the threat of war declining, he wants to insure they act quickly to return power to the people. BC wants to get back to having each governor popularly elected, balanced by the representatives recently elected to the Alliance’s House of Representatives, and an appointed judiciary. The meeting attendees begin to take on the government-building with vigor, and over the next two days the simple meeting turns into a full-blown constitutional conference.
BC ponders the enormity of the conference as he walks to a smaller meeting he’s scheduled for Thursday morning.
This has turned into more than just a meeting! I suppose we’re making history. I just want to keep it simple. Simple rules, simple structures, simple laws. The rule of law, not of man. This should be interesting…
BC enters a simply appointed conference room. Two other figures wait at the table: the Ayatolla and M’Bekke.
“So… how goes the book?” BC asks the two men.
M’Bekke and the Ayatollah look at each other, and then back at BC. Neither says a word.
“Going that well, huh?” BC prods them. The Ayatollah looks off into the distance. M’Bekke looks down at the floor.
“There is no book yet, is there?” he says, confronting them with what he’s pretty sure is the truth.
“We can’t…” M’Bekke starts.
“It’s not…” The Ayatollah says at the same time.
Both stop. They look back and forth at each other and BC.
“I’m afraid it is impossible, Campion,” the Ayatollah says.
“We have tried, BC,” M’Bekke assure him. “But it is not possible. It’s not…”
“It is just not right, I’m afraid,” the Ayatollah finishes.
BC just shakes his head.
What can I say? One crazy dream down. Maybe I was reaching too high?
“There are too many sacrifices required, too many compromises. There would no longer be the proper forms and phrasings of the Prophet,” the Ayatollah insists. “We considered many permutations, but all compromises were, ultimately, sacrifices too great to make.”
“Perhaps,” M’Bekke says softly, “you will have to be content with merely restoring peace between the faiths.”
The Ayatollah chuckles.
“Yes! You have stopped many folks from killing each other. Some would be satisfied with that,”
he tells BC.
“Why stop at Mars?” BC wonders out loud, chuckling to himself.
“What about Mars?” The Ayatollah asks.
“Just something someone from the Project asked me once,” BC half explains. “Has to do with going beyond expectations. Not stopping with what is expected or asked for.”
“You haven’t stopped at Mars, BC,” M’Bekke says, a little puzzled. “You’ve united us all from, what now, six different planets, a moon and an asteroid? Some would be satisfied with that.”
“Some would,” BC agrees, “some who didn’t have as much to make up for, maybe,” he says, knowing M’Bekke knows what he means and pretty sure the Ayatollah does, too.
“You did as you were ordered to do,” M’Bekke says to him. “What you were forced to do. I know.”
“‘Just following orders?’ Seems to me that’s the lamest defense in the book,” BC says.
“Indeed,” the Ayatollah agrees.
“I’m not defending myself or what I did, or making excuses,” BC says.
“No, no excuses,” M’Bekke says, with a touch of sarcasm, “you’re just trying to unite two historically opposed religions, that’s all,” he points out.
“Aim high,” BC jokes.
M’Bekke and the Ayatollah exchange a look.
“We… have agreed. On something,” the Ayatollah informs him.
“Oh, really? Do tell,” BC says, encouraged.
“We have agreed to each acknowledge the divine inspiration behind each other’s book, and to accord each other’s book an honored place in our respective houses of worship.”
Well, that’s something!
“I guess that’s a start,” BC says.
“It’s more than before,” M’Bekke offers.
“It is the best we can do, now,” the Ayatollah tells BC.
“I guess it is,” BC admits. He starts to get up, unofficially declaring the meeting over. But then another thought occurs to him. He settles back down. “Tell me, gentlemen – where do aliens fit in your religion’s view of the cosmos?”
“Well,” M’Bekke says, but he stops, at a loss.
“Interesting,” the Ayatollah. “We have not had much time to consider them, what with working on this project of yours, BC.”
“We have not spent a lot of time considering the aliens ourselves, either,” M’Bekke admits. “We did only find out about them officially a short time ago. Theology moves rather slowly, I’m afraid. Some theologians and religious ethicists have pondered alien life in ‘what if?’ sort of terms and scenarios, but we do not have a standing policy or philosophy in place on extraterrestrials. No set dogma, at any rate.”
“I guess there’s work to do, then, huh?” BC says.
The other two nod a little.
“Maybe. Maybe not, BC,” M’Bekke says. “Wouldn’t it be wisest to assume that we are all God’s creatures?”
The Ayatollah brightens.
“Indeed! My friend M’Bekke speaks with great wisdom,” he says, nodding. “They, too, can serve Allah, may his name be forever praised!”
BC nods.
“Sounds like you’re off on the right foot,” BC says. This time, he does stand up. “And on that note, I’m off. I want to take a break before the next big group meeting.”
BC leaves the two holy men. He hopes to get a nap in before the final scheduled meeting later in the afternoon.
By the time the attendees travel home on Friday, the Solar Alliance has been given true structure and form. The conference is productive. The leaders set up the structure of their colonies’ future governments, agreeing that those structures should be ratified by the governing bodies in each colony, themselves to be elected by popular vote in the next thirty days. The Solar Alliance is solidified. With the meetings adjourned and judged a success, BC contemplates taking a vacation. These wheels need to turn for the next thirty days… so I have thirty days. Might as well enjoy them. I trust the people I have in place – they’ll get this done. They don’t need me hovering over them. The less I do, the better. I don’t want to seem to be meddling in local politics. I want real democracy to work. Let the process work.
So, then – where can I go on my vacation?
Chapter Twenty-Three
BC decides to vacation at each colony, to spend a little time at all of humanity’s homes over the course of the month, so the Prime Representative doesn’t seem to be playing favorites. Anita puts the itinerary together for him, a skill she still has a knack for. But she won’t be able to join him on his excursion, as she points out she has political processes and elections to oversee on Ceres Central. BC finds himself on a shuttle to Earth, alone, as he begins his vacation. He’s traveling with light security, two plainclothes SAIF officers. His first destination: Boston. BC is visiting the parish where he was first a “priest” in the New catholic Church.
He’s trying to avoid crowds, but somehow word of his itinerary has leaked out. There are people milling about outside the church when BC arrives. He waves to them as he gets out of his transport, but then he makes a beeline for the church’s front doors.
St. Gabriel’s Church was built sometime back in the nineteen hundreds. It’s a grand old white wooden building
with two square towers. The building’s two longer sides are lined with rows of stained glass windows depicting the passion of Christ.
As BC climbs the white marble steps he thinks back ten years to when the NcC began and he was transferred here.
I knew I was in over my head at that point. I’d never set foot inside a real church before this place!
BC opens the heavy wooden main doors at the front of the church and disappears into the darkness inside.
He has his security detail wait outside as he tours the old white clapboard church. He wants to take it all in by himself, alone.
They only agreed to wait when the local priest told them he could lock the doors behind BC, so he couldn’t be disturbed. As BC enters the church foyer he hears a slam and some clicking. The doors are closed and locked behind him.
BC’s eyes adjust as he walks through the foyer, through another set of heavy wooden double doors, and into the main hall of the church.
He walks up the aisle toward the altar.
BC is looking up at Jesus on the cross, at the crucifix suspended over the altar, when he hears the church’s doors open behind him.
Huh… thought they were going to keep those locked. I told them I didn’t want to be disturbed…
BC turns to see a woman and a small child standing in the dim light of the foyer, in front of the church doors. The two begin to walk forward. They pass through the stained-glass colored sunlight streaming in through the windows of the church as they walk up the aisle towards BC. There’s something familiar about her…
“I thought I’d find you here,” she says to BC as she approaches. She clutches her coat closed in front of her with one hand while the small boy holds on to the other.
“Me?” he asks.
“Hello BC,” the woman says, drawing closer. She stands beside him with the small two or three year old boy at her side. “The priest was kind enough to let us in when I told him we were family,” she says.
BC stares into her big brown eyes, trying to remember who she is.
“You don’t even remember who I am, do you?” she says, seeing right through BC.
“I’m afraid I don’t. You look familiar…”
“We were once close,” she says. She looks down at the boy. “Quite close.”