Aliens Abroad

by Gini Koch

  “We’ll all follow that rule, Aunt Kitty,” Louise said. “I’ll make sure of it.” The other kids all nodded, even JP Junior and Miriam, who I expected to not be allowed out of their parents’ sight, based on Jonathan and Marianne’s expressions.

  I’d insisted that the Maurer family and the Kramer kids stay as well. This meant we’d lose one of our androids, but that meant that those staying in the Apata system would have an android with them, and who knew if they’d need one or not. Mrs. Maurer seemed relieved and Clinton seemed pleased. Yeah, I’d figured he’d want to stay wherever Louise was.

  Tried to get Christopher to stay, but he and Amy were having none of it. Couldn’t complain. Had a strong feeling we were going to need the hybrid kids, and we always needed the Flash. And Amy always came through. Plus White was coming with us, so we weren’t breaking up that family.

  Didn’t even suggest that the Dwyer, Weisman, Muir, and Billings families stay behind—we needed all the flyboys, with Drax gone Brian’s expertise was even more vital, whether Mother allowed him to fly the ship or not, and I wanted the girls with us anyway. Irving was the only one who looked disappointed.

  Abigail sidled over to me. “I’m going to advise the command crew of what’s going on so the guys know. Any objection?”

  “None, just make sure you don’t share this in front of any of the Real Naked Apes.”

  She grinned. “Got it.” She zipped off.

  The hardest decision was the Lewis family. We all wanted Kevin with us, but most of the kids were staying behind, meaning that Denise was going to be more helpful there. It was Sylvia who made the decision. “The youngest children are the ones who are going on. To me, that means you need Denise with you, on the Distant Voyager, not staying behind with the rest of us.”

  “My sister has a good point,” Jeff said, as Raymond and Rachel high-fived each other. Sylvia beamed. Yeah, his sisters thought Jeff walked on water.

  “As the father of the youngest ones, I’m in agreement, too, so thank you, Sylvia,” Christopher said. She beamed at him as well. Not a surprise—Christopher was also a water-walker to the Martini women.

  “What about me?” Vance asked as Abigail returned and gave me the “all good” sign.

  “You stay with Jeff and Kitty,” Raj said. “Because I’m staying on-planet.” Vance didn’t complain, possibly because MJO was going on.

  “Tim wants me to stay on-planet,” Alicia said. “And I haven’t asked him, I just know.”

  “What do you want to do?” Vance asked her.

  “I want to go.”

  Vance nodded. “Then you’re going. I’ll keep an eye on you if he’s busy Commandering.”

  She grinned. “Thanks.”

  “I can help anyone with spin, if and as needed,” Jenkins said. “So, if you’re not sure what to say and Raj isn’t nearby, find me.”

  “What Bruce said.” Hey, wanted to be sure we spun our spin correctly, and the Tastemaker was great with spin.

  Jeff looked up. “I think we’re close to the system. The Ignotforstans just all got excited at the same time.”

  “That means it’s showtime, folks,” Raj said. “Remember—we’re staying because it’s an honor and because we all have jobs to do.”

  “Dirty jobs,” Sidney said, rather proudly.

  “Done dirt cheap,” Lizzie added with a grin.

  “And,” Claire said, “we’re just the team to do them.”

  CHAPTER 92

  “COMMAND DECK PERSONNEL, please return to stations,” Mother intoned over the com. “All others, please strap in. Landing should be smooth, so if you wish to remain in the Observation Lounge, you should be safe to do so.”

  We got the kids strapped in, then Jeff, Chuckie, Drax, and I headed for the command deck doing the hyperspeed daisy chain. Mother didn’t demand that Jeff and I switch with Reader and Jerry, and none of us asked about it, either.

  We were in time to see Kreaving’s solar system come into view. The only Ignotforstans here were Kreaving and Grentix. Had no idea where the others were, but figured by now White and Gower had taken them back to the Observation Lounge.

  Wruck was here as well, as was Lilith. Wruck was staring out the window. “It’s a lovely system.”

  “Looks a lot like Alpha Centauri,” Chuckie said once we’d gotten close enough to the window to see things. “Three suns, two far larger than the third, almost twenty planets.”

  “They’re not orbiting like those in the Alpha Centauri system, though,” Reader said. “We’ve already asked.”

  “We’ve radioed ahead,” Jerry shared. “They know we’re coming and we should get to do an actual docking at an actual space station this time.”

  “Not on-planet?”

  “Nope,” Hughes said. “They have a nice space station that’s conveniently located for all their spacefaring planets, which is about half of the system.”

  “So, Wheatles, you guys are flying around doing interesting things. You have enough spaceflight that your system has a space station. How is it that you didn’t know about the Galactic Council and so forth?” Sure, he’d talked about this with Drax and Gadhavi, but he hadn’t done so with me.

  Kreaving shrugged. “Per all the maps, our system is near the edge of the galaxy.”

  “Much farther out from the core than we are,” Tim added.

  “We haven’t ventured too far from our own neighborhood,” Kreaving said. “We’ve paid attention for centuries to what’s outside of our area—radio waves do carry.”

  “So we’ve been told. A lot. But okay, why no real interaction?”

  “Because we haven’t felt confident enough to try to reach the core. And we were leery about reaching out to others. From what we can tell, there’s some kind of war going on out there, many of them, but one that’s bigger than the others. Our system is at peace, and we all want to stay that way.”

  “They’re not isolationist,” Reader said, in a way that told me he’d definitely talked with Abigail and knew the current party line. “Just cautious. Which, based on what we know, is wise.”

  Grentix nodded. “While we know of many, you’re the first more advanced civilization we’ve met.”

  “I don’t know that we’re more advanced,” Jeff said. “Just more traveled. In some ways.”

  “I’m still shocked that the Anciannas and Z’porrah left you guys alone, honestly. That, to me, seems hard to believe, based on experience.” Very hard to believe, isolationist system or no.

  “They probably weren’t left alone by my people,” Wruck said. “Shape-shifters can blend in.” He changed to look just like he was Wheatles or Grentix’s cousin. Then he shifted back. “Presumably they’re far enough away from the core that the Z’porrah don’t care. Yet.”

  “Yet is the key word, yeah.” Wondered if I should mention us wanting to protect this system or not. “But we’re allies now, so if you need us, we’ll come.”

  “And we’re grateful for that,” Kreaving said.

  “This system may be being ignored simply because the Z’porrah are being more cautious,” Lilith said. “They have lost more and more battles, and their Federation of Planets is starting to question their goals and methods.”

  “Hey, did anyone else catch that the Z’porrah’s group name is the same as the good guys in Star Trek?”

  “We did,” Tito said. “The rest of us just chose not to mention it.”

  “Haters.”

  “Trying to bring in new systems that the Anciannas have already claimed is not wise at this moment,” Lilith continues, “because the Anciannas can call on Earth for backup.”

  “Gosh, we’ve gone from insolent, loser backwater to major player pretty fast.”

  Everyone looked at me. “Yeah,” Walker said, sarcasm knob at ten and rising. “I wonder why the hell that is, Kitty. Wouldn’t be because o
f you or anything.”

  “Um, it’s a team effort.”

  “It is,” Reader agreed. “But we know who’s at the top of our enemies’ hit lists, and that’s you, girlfriend.”

  “I’ll preen later. Right now, let’s check out this cool space station. Wheatles or Grentix, which one of you wants to do the running commentary?” Hoped it would be Kreaving—he had the best voice of those from the Eknara.

  “I will,” Kreaving said. He proceeded to tell us all about the station, which planets in their system had worked to build it, how they’d brought along the other planets in the system, and how the ones that weren’t spaceworthy yet were on their way. The inhabitants of their system were all humanoids that seemed to have evolved from animals similar to those on Earth. Tim had had Mother show Wheatles and Grentix our known allies, starting with Earth and the Alpha Centauri system.

  Kreaving had had their system’s information uploaded to Mother, so we could see what the folks on their various planets looked like. While none in this system were exactly like those we knew best, they were all similar.

  “I wonder if interspecies breeding would take,” Tito mused, more to himself than the rest of us.

  “Why would you wonder that?” Grentix asked.

  “A-Cs and humans breed well,” he replied. “Your canine-based people look shaggy and more muscular than the Canus Majorians, but the overall structure looks familiar. Same with the feline-based race versus the Feliniads. There are other similarities, including those between you and us.”

  “I think we might be rushing the Apatan’s acceptance,” Jeff said. “As in, Tito, stop freaking them out.”

  Wheatles shook his head. “It’s a shocking suggestion to us because it’s not something we’ve ever considered.”

  “No one’s fallen in love with someone from another planet?” Surely humans couldn’t be the only ones.

  “Not that we know of,” Grentix said. She grinned. “But we’ll make a note that humans will mate with anything.”

  This got a tension-reducing laugh, and Wheatles went back to his Space Station Tour Monologue.

  The space station was impressive. Per Drax, not as big as those in some of the busier solar systems and those that were scattered around the galaxy for emergencies, but still, it could dock a dozen ships of any size at one time.

  It looked like a giant, spiky, spinning top with a long spindle at the bottom. And it was spinning slowly to help the gravity generators or some such. Kreaving was happily using a lot of scientific and engineering speak and my ears politely shared that they were bored and wanted to either just listen to Kreaving’s voice without having to try to comprehend the words or to hear music. Probably a good thing I was on the command deck and not being the worst example ever for the kids.

  Knew better than to put my earbuds in at this time, however. It would be rude to the Ignotforstans and there was no desperate need. At least, I hoped.

  The docking took a while and, interestingly enough, was the most complex of any landing we’d done so far. Made the comment that apparently parallel parking was hard for many to master—even though I, personally, happened to be great at it—and received a lot of “shut ups” from the guys, either via expressions or out loud, depending on the guy.

  Of course, the real issue was that our ship was a lot bigger than any ship in the Apatan system, so getting our main airlock to line up with the corresponding airlock on the space station wasn’t as easy as it would have been for the Eknara.

  After some serious complaining on the part of the guys at the controls, Mother did Tito a solid and allowed Randy to take his place. Tim and Reader, however, were stuck, which was obviously a huge disappointment to Joe, since he was hovering behind Reader, ready to offer suggestions at any given second. To his credit, Reader didn’t complain about this. Much.

  Hughes remained cool as a cucumber, and, despite us having to veer off and try again a couple of times, we managed in the end, and without anyone getting flung around.

  Once docking was complete, though, the next part of Mission: Split Up went into action.

  Kreaving did his fist-to-pec salute. “As the official representative for Apata on the Distant Voyager, I would like to formally invite King Jeffrey and Queen Katherine to be our guests for the Festival of Thanks being prepared in your honor.”

  I was standing closest to Kreaving, so I did the bow. “We are honored by your invitation. However, the king and I are required to go on to the next planet that needs our assistance. With your permission, however, we would like to ask that we have some of the Royal Family and many of our retainers of highest importance remain to participate in our stead.” The Washington Wife class continued to pay dividends in the strangest of places.

  Kreaving looked a little disappointed. “You can’t remain?”

  “No. But we can return, once we are victorious. And, since we will be leaving over a third of our crew with you, many of them close blood relatives, you can be assured that we will return.”

  “The Festival takes many days,” Grentix said. “If your next mission completes quickly enough, the Festival may still be going.”

  “See?” Smiled at Kreaving. “It will all work out. But we have to go—we gave our word that we would be coming to help, and Jeff and I don’t go back on our word.”

  Kreaving nodded slowly. “You promised me you would find us and save us, and you did. I cannot ask or expect you to not do the same for others, regardless of our protocols.”

  “We’re leaving my closest advisors, and the next people in line to protect our world if something happens to me and Kitty,” Jeff said. “They can speak for us.”

  Kreaving grinned. “Based on my short experience with you, while they may indeed speak for you, I’m quite clear that no one else speaks for Kitty.”

  “I knew I liked you.”

  CHAPTER 93

  OF COURSE, there was some pomp and circumstance we had to get through at the space station, though not nearly what was coming for those of our crew who were sticking around.

  We had the full Festival described to us and it made any exceptional Earth religious holiday or sporting event victory celebration look pathetic by comparison. Even if our trip to Ixtha lasted longer than our stay on Cradus, the chances that this Festival would still be going on when we got back were hella high.

  The folks we were leaving at the station were all introduced as vital to the running of our planet and solar systems, including Alpha Centauri, in part to make everyone sound even more impressive and in other part because Jeff and I were the Regents so it was kind of true.

  Planetary leaders had come to the station to meet us, so by the time all the intros were done and our explanation for why the rest of us were leaving so fast was given, a few hours had passed.

  Those of us traveling on began saying our good-byes, giving last minute instructions to those staying behind, and getting back on the ship. Christopher spent a lot of time running around and making sure everyone was where they were supposed to be, while Chuckie, Brian, Mossy, and Hacker International spent a lot of time asking Drax every question about the ship they could possibly come up with.

  While this was going on, Kreaving and Grentix pulled me and Jeff aside. “Is it impertinent or insulting if we request to go with you?” Kreaving asked.

  Jeff looked around. “What, all of you?”

  Grentix laughed. “No, just the two of us. The others want to stay home—some to ensure that your family and retainers are well cared for, some because we spent much time thinking we might never see our homes again.”

  “So why do you two want to come, then?” Jeff asked.

  “We’re scientists and explorers,” Kreaving said. “And we heard that you were going to leave the galaxy.” He sounded excited, versus scared. A nice change from most of the Cabinet.

  “We think we are, yeah,” I said.
“And that means it’s a dangerous mission. We’d leave more of our crew here if we thought we could get away with it. And we don’t mean that your system wouldn’t be welcoming. Those going with us want to go.”

  “We do, too,” Grentix said. “Very much. Wheatles and I are disappointed that our mission was disrupted, but the results were amazing. The idea that you’re leaving the galaxy is overwhelming. We truly want to be a part of it.”

  “And you could use more scientists with you,” Kreaving added. “You’re very, ah, light in that regard.”

  “Sold,” Jeff said. “Because you’re right. And you’re both well trained and, frankly, good company. We’ll be happy to have you. Will coming with us cause any issues, though?”

  “No, it will smooth them over,” Grentix replied. “Now we will be a part of your continuing mission and that means we will return with glory for Apata.”

  Refrained from making a Star Trek reference because why bother when no one I was talking to would get it? Of all the old TV shows that Jeff was addicted to, he wasn’t excited about watching any of the science fiction ones, probably because he, like the rest of the A-Cs, wasn’t into documentaries. “And it indicates we aren’t trying to get rid of people we don’t like, too, I’d imagine.”

  Kreaving grinned. “Yes.”

  “We might not come back.” Hey, had to point this out. Truth in Advertising and all that jazz. “I mean, not by choice.”

  They both nodded. “We understand that risk,” Kreaving said. “We almost didn’t return. It’s a risk we all understand. Grentix and I are willing to take that risk because the reward is worthwhile.”

  “Super and duper, how long do you need to be ready?”

  “We’re ready now,” Grentix said. “We had supplies on the space station.”

  “We’ve replaced what we needed, added some things in, and so forth.” Kreaving indicated two rectangular things on wheels that looked a lot like rolling suitcases made for Real Naked Apes if I was any judge, and I was. “We can leave right now.”