by George Olney
Frenchy continued running through the routine, noting Nos's expressions and actions, but comforted by the fact that the boy seemed settled and relaxed. Dallas, having grown up with two step brothers, was quite aware of what was passing in Nos's thoughts, but didn't mind. It was harmless and kind of cute. That thought led to other, darker thoughts, but she resolutely used the exercise to push them from her mind.
Frenchy saw the cold, forlorn expression, flit over Dallas's face, but pretended to ignore it. It wasn't the first time she'd seen it in the last two days. It seemed like every time she came upon Dallas unexpectedly, the cold expression was on her face. Nos seemed to have something to do with it, too. She resolved to try to catch Dallas someplace quiet and talk to her. Something was bothering her friend, something important.
Later on, in the shower, Frenchy started thinking hard about something else. Yelen was with her, trying to help, but Yelen had no more experience as a mother than she did. Frenchy didn't even know anybody that did it right, except on TV, for Pete's sake! Grete could help her figure out what to do with the boy, but she was still a week and a good many light years distant at the moment. It was up to her to decide how to manage the child. Nos was running free, and seemed to be satisfied, but Frenchy wasn't. There was something missing, something she ought to be doing. Too bad kids didn't come with instruction manuals. Maybe it was her own childhood never-ending cycle through constantly changing foster homes and endless different schools that left her feeling there was more she should be doing for the boy.
Hm, maybe that was it. School. A boy his age ought to be getting formal training. But how to carry out such a program on the ship? Stepping out of the shower after the hot air dryer had finished with her body, she walked into the sleeping compartment, toweling her hair. Grae was sitting on one of the compartment's chairs, apparently deep in thought. She decided to ask him about her school idea. "You know..." she began.
"I agree," he said. "The boy needs to continue some form of schooling, if only to keep him busy for the rest of the trip. I think I'm going to start him on a self-defense workout program. Once he gets to the Freehold, he'll probably find himself needing it at some point. Boys that age have a tendency to be combative, and the rest of the youngsters there will expect him to stand up for himself."
"Oh, Grae," she said with some concern, "do you really think he'll get into a fight? I don't want him to get hurt."
Grae shook his head with a grin. "Oh, he won't get hurt, beyond a possible black eye, and it won't be serious, but I predict at least one scuffle. More, if he's of a mind to not take any guff from someone.
"All a part of growing up," he finished breezily.
Frenchy gave him a look that spoke volumes about her opinion of that part of growing up for boys.
It wasn't until later, as they were lying in bed, that she realized he'd answered a question she'd never asked.
Yelen woke her again. Once more, there was something wrong. Nothing specific, but something wrong. Frenchy was a little fuzzy with sleep, but she obediently got out of bed and went to find out what was bothering Yelen. When she entered the passageway, she intended to go to the medical compartment and check on Nos. There was a shortage of bunks on the ship, what with four adults and the boy, so the med compartment had become his by default. The sound of weeping deflected Frenchy's planned route.
Dallas was the one weeping, sitting alone in the wardroom. She, like Frenchy, was nude. Arm ships didn't run to nighties and neither saw a reason to dress up to sleep.
"Dallas, babe, what's wrong?" Frenchy said urgently as she hurried to sit and gather her friend into her arms. "What's wrong? What's happened?"
Dallas turned in Frenchy's arms and hugged her desperately, her quiet weeping turning into deep, heartfelt sobs. Finally, Dallas was able to gather her breath and managed to gasp out, "Frenchy, I'm pregnant!"
"What?! How?!!"
Dallas leaned back and smiled at her through her tears with a trace of her normal humor. "I'm pretty sure it was by the usual method, babe."
Frenchy was in shock. "But-but-but are you sure?"
Dallas nodded, beginning to get control of herself, again. "I haven't started my period, and I'm as regular as a clock. I figure that's a pretty good indication."
Dallas sat back out of Frenchy's arms and took a deep breath, regaining her composure. Her next words were calm. "Frenchy, it looks like we both have children, now. I'm keeping this child. I'm sure they have abortions, here, but I'm not going to do that. I want this baby to live."
Frenchy faced her friend with equal calm then asked softly, "Why?"
Dallas's face grew totally expressionless. "Because I didn't keep the last one. If I had, it would be Nos's age right now. Every time I see him, it reminds me. I'll never do that again."
Frenchy nodded, her eyes showing respect for Dallas's decision and sympathy for her pain. "I understand. I never knew, babe, but I understand. Kids aren't for strippers, at least for career strippers like us."
Dallas shook her head. "No they aren't. But you're not a stripper anymore and neither am I. I don't know what I'm going to do yet, but I'm keeping the baby."
Frenchy's practical streak came to the fore. "Well, I know what we're going to do, right now. We're going to wake up that man of mine and we're going to find out if you're really pregnant. If you are, don't worry."
Dallas looked concerned. "Why?"
A dry masculine voice answered her. "Because Mother will give you a home."
Frenchy's head snapped around. Grae was standing in the entrance to the wardroom. "You know, don't you?"
Grae nodded. "Mistress, you and I need to put on some clothing and move Nos out of his bunk. Then we'll give Dallas a full scale medical check."
"You got it! Come on, Dallas. We'll get this thing settled right now!"
Shortly, a very sleepy Nos found himself barely awake and taken to the wardroom. "Come on, son," Grae said quietly. "You'll be sleeping in the wardroom tonight."
Nervously, Dallas lay still while Grae operated the medical scanners. After a moment, he stood back from the screen and looked down at her, his face expressionless.
"Well?" Dallas demanded.
"You're not pregnant."
Dallas let her breath out in an explosive gust of relief. Then she saw his face. "But?"
Grae showed a grim little smile. "For two reasons. First, either the slavers that took you or someone else administered a galactic birth control treatment."
His smile grew ironic. "I explained this to Frenchy after I treated her. Our method represses ovulation and all the physical aspects of your menstrual cycle. It doesn't affect the emotional aspects, you're still very much a woman, but as I once told her, you have much the same sexual situation as a man."
His face got grim, again. "But there's another problem. I came to the wardroom in time to hear about your abortion. Whoever did that was a butcher, Dallas. There is so much scar tissue in your ovaries, I doubt you could ever conceive normally."
Dallas gasped. Frenchy interrupted. "Grae, can it be fixed?"
He nodded. "I think a doctor at the Freehold can correct the problem, but it won't be easy. I just hate to see the damage she has and didn't know she had."
Leaning over the bunk, Frenchy gathered up the crying Dallas. "You'll be okay, babe, you'll be okay," she murmured over and over as she stroked her hair.
Dallas worked an arm free, grabbed Grae, and pulled him into the embrace. "I know I will, guys," was all she said.
#####
At the beginning of the next ship's "morning" Nos found out, to his horror, he was going back to school. This produced some rather vocal arguments, none of which fazed the Mommy in the slightest. However, when the program of instruction was explained to him, things settled down. "Nos, we haven't got time for you to work on general subjects, like I'm sure you were taking at home."
Surly silence.
"Instead," Frenchy continued calmly, but definitely, "you're going to use the ship's
library to learn all you can about Lycanth. It's the place we're going."
Nos brightened. He'd heard about Lycanth, and everything he'd heard was tremendously interesting. He began to rethink his objections. "Will I have to do this all day?" No sense in being too accommodating.
Frenchy smiled. She was already able to read her young charge. "No, but there's some other classes you're going to take."
She waited for his face to fall again then applied the capper. "Grae wants to teach you self-defense. He can't do it in the morning, since Dallas and I will be using the gym. But you men can have it after lunch."
"Really?! Grae will be teaching me?! WOW!" The boy broke out into a bright grin.
Frenchy smiled back. "Yes, honey. He'll be teaching you. He's a good teacher, too. He taught me."
Nos's face betrayed amazement at the idea of a mother knowing how to fight. "Wow!" he breathed.
She turned him around and headed him towards the library. "He'll teach you, but only if you do your morning studies. Lycanth is Grae's home, and my home, now. It's very easy to get in trouble there if you don't know what you are doing, so you need to study hard before we get there. Understood?"
"Yes, Lady! Can I study about how the ship works, too?" Nos was all enthusiasm, now, especially when Frenchy nodded her approval. He proceeded to tell her how interested he was in Lycanth, the ship, and learning self-defense from Grae. At some length.
Frenchy calmly guided the chattering youngster to the library then got him settled in the teaching machine. Once she had him safely in the machine's learning trance, it was time for another cup of coffee. After that, she intended to hunt up Dallas and head for the gym.
Frenchy's newly adopted mother persona gave her the thought processes of a woman with over eleven years of experience in dealing with active and intelligent young humans. Included in this persona was the desire to get the kid settled some place where she knew he was under control so she could enjoy a little time of her own. Ergo, school, coffee, and the gym.
She was sitting in the galley, sipping her coffee and mulling over any number of thoughts when Dallas strolled in, wearing her workout singlet. Plopping herself down in the chair opposite hers at the galley table, she commented brightly, " 'Lo, babe. You look like you're a million miles away."
Frenchy nodded. "Thinking about a lot of things, especially Nos. Dallas, he's really beginning to think of me as his mother. At least that's how I read the signs. A kid his age needs a mother. And I damn sure know that if anyone does! Question is, the boy already has a family, so I know I'm going to lose him as soon as whatever lawyer they've got finds out he's alive, especially since he's worth at least a cool couple of billion or so."
Dallas sobered up for a moment. "Frenchy," she said quietly, "I understand how you feel. I feel like, counting last night, I've lost two potential children. Nos is a real one, and you think you're going to lose him.
"If neither of us was exactly motherly before, we both are now. I think we've grown up, babe," she said, reaching over to hold Frenchy's free hand in hers. "But I think we ought to see what Grae and the Arm come up with before we worry about losing him. Might be that lawyer is in more trouble than he knows. After all, someone in his family wants the boy dead or next to it. He's safer with you than with them. I think we ought to find out what's going to happen before we just figure he's gone for good."
Dallas waved her other hand airily, her good humored smile returning. "Besides, babe, while I grant you we're getting a little long in the tooth, we've still got a couple more child bearing years ahead of us. You and Grae can make a baby of your very own, you know. Hell, if I can catch a decent man, I think I want to get into the business myself."
Frenchy looked at her friend in surprise. "Oh, you don't know, do you?"
"Huh?"
Frenchy smiled wryly. "Good thing you're sitting down, babe, 'cause I've got a bombshell for you."
Dallas's expression became concerned. "What?"
"Well, for one thing, you're going to live about five or six hundred years longer if you don't go and get yourself killed on Lycanth or something."
"WHAT?!!!"
Frenchy nodded with a grin. "Yep. You know how they always have those longevity treatments in science fiction movies and TV shows?"
Dallas nodded dumbly.
"Well, out here they're real. Somebody gave you one, along with the birth control treatment. It's a pretty standard thing. Grae treated me when he took me. He told me you had one last night after we broke up. Tell me, since you got out here, have you been feeling better than you ever did before?"
Dallas nodded. "Now that you mention it, I feel like I did when I was a kid. This treatment sort of rejuvenates you?"
"Yep," Frenchy said. "Makes you feel like you were nineteen, again, babe. Bottom line, we have plenty of time to have a family, and we can afford to take ten or twenty years out to do other things, too."
Dallas's eyes got big as she digested all this. "Wow," she said softly.
"To put that in more immediate terms, Grae's over a hundred and Justa's probably about our age. Folks here seem to take longer maturing than we do at home. Truth to tell, I'm not even sure of Nos's age. On the other hand, they have the time to grow up," Frenchy continued.
Her eyes grew thoughtful. "You know, you settled one problem for me. You're dead right about Nos. He's mine right now and he just might stay that way, at least in some form. I'm Arm, now, and I know Arm policy. We're not about to let that boy go back into danger, especially if his family is the danger. If it's not, and he has to leave, I can handle that. We're just going to have to wait and see what comes of the investigation."
Dallas sat back and waved her hand. "Hold it, hold it, hold it. I'm still getting used to living half a millennium. Soon as I get that under my belt, I'll allow you just spoke common sense. First, I gotta get it through my head what you just told me."
Frenchy smiled at Dallas's somewhat poleaxed expression. "Don't take too long, babe. We have to work out, and I only have so long before I have to check on my kid. Mommies have responsibilities, you know."
Later in the gym, Frenchy looked around to find Grae standing in the hatchway, arms crossed, watching with obvious enjoyment as they went through an exercise. "Something new, mistress," he began without preamble when she stopped. "We are about to have a guest."
"A guest?" Frenchy reached for a towel to dry the sweat then tossed one to Dallas.
"Can you do that in outer space?" Dallas asked.
Grae nodded. "It's Red. What happens is that he slaves his ship to ours through datalink, then uses a tender whose tachyon field generator is set to the same strength as both ships. Sounds complicated, but it's easy and rather normal between accompanying ships.
"We talked for a while a few minutes ago then he suggested a visit. He's an archeologist, and he's on the trail of a pre-human interstellar civilization. There are unexplained ruins scattered throughout the Barrens. I've done a little digging on several sites, myself. He thinks they're the missing link he's been looking for to confirm his theory.
"Anyhow, he wants to come over and talk shop, and I thought it might be interesting. Besides, he's never been to Lycanth. He needs to know a little bit more about the Barrens before he gets out there by himself. This will be a good chance to educate him."
Frenchy shivered at several memories. She'd come close to being lee'thal food a couple of times herself. She could certainly approve of anyone learning more about the dangers of the Barrens before trying them out! "I agree with that! Look, will you have time to give Nos his first lesson? I promised him you were going to start today, and I hate to go back on that."
Grae smiled. "No problem. Red's not coming over until later. A meal, a few drinks, some talk. Just a visit. Don't worry, mistress. I'll make time for the boy."
Frenchy wrapped the towel around her neck and kissed him on the cheek as she walked out of the gym. "Okay, we're finished here. I'll go get the little guy."
Dallas c
aught up with her in the passageway after she'd delivered an excited Nos to Grae. "Babe, Justa's racked out in our compartment. Mind if I use your shower?"
Frenchy shook her head with a smile. "Only if I get first dibs."
Dallas smiled back. "Done deal."
Frenchy was in the sleeping compartment, stripping off her singlet when Dallas entered, carrying two bottles of cold water from the galley, as well as fresh clothing. Catching the bottle thrown to her, Frenchy tossed her damp singlet and used towel into the laundry receptacle, grabbed a fresh towel and headed for the shower. "Back in a moment," she said, taking a quick drink from her bottle.
"Don't take too long," Dallas replied, as she began to remove her own sweaty garment. After tossing it into the laundry receptacle and mentally blessing the fact that the ship automatically did dirty laundry, she grabbed her own bottle of water and flopped into a soft chair. Mopping herself with the towel still draped around her neck, Dallas sipped at her water bottle for a moment then decided she was curious about something. "Hey, babe," she called out.
"What?" The muffled reply came from the shower.
Dallas pitched her voice loudly enough so Frenchy could hear her. "Grae mentioned doing some digging at old ruins on Lycanth. Was he an archeologist, or something?"
The shower's drying cycle turned off, and Frenchy emerged toweling her hair. She strolled casually into the sleeping area and flopped into another chair. "Well, babe, this was when he was younger. He told me once he studied to be an archeologist before the War then ended up in the Arm after it was over."
Dallas stood up, set her bottle of water down and tossed her towel in the laundry receptacle. "War? What war? One of those interstellar wars like in the movies and computer games and things?
"Hold that thought," Dallas continued, headed for the shower. "Let me get cleaned up and we'll continue."
Frenchy began to brush her hair. "Fine. I'm not going anywhere."