Petr's Mate

by Petr's Mate (mobi)

  “Something she fully understands,” Petr said. He shifted Lennox to his other side so he could twist to see his sister and her husband without smacking the little boy into Sam’s side. “The odds are extremely low that any others from her world made it off. I have not found anything in our records that would indicate any Earthlings, but we have to go back some cycles to be sure. She was in space for over nine hundred of her years. Even if the balance of her people waited for better technology before leaving, they could have gotten to our space before her, given the condition of her craft. I’ll send through what information we have recovered from her databases when I send the next letter. It may help you to narrow your searches or assist in determining who may be from her world.”

  “Any information would be wonderful. I just would like to know that I’m not truly alone in this world. I have Petr and his whole crew that have accepted me as one of their own, but it would be very nice to be able to see if any humans survived, you know?” She knew how strange that sounded, but there it was. She wanted to know she wasn’t the last of her kind around. Even though she knew the odds were not good. She was enough of a realist to understand that everyone in her species was probably dead and gone. Either that or they had blended with other races that had a stronger genetic makeup.

  Petr took her hand in his and squeezed. “It may be a faint chance, Samantha. If there is any chance at all, we will look for it. The odds may be against us succeeding, but that hasn’t stopped any of us thus far. The odds were against Adira and Fintan, and look where they are now. Never give up hope.”

  “Thank you,” she said with a smile and nodded. “The two of you did overcome a lot to get together, didn’t you?” The story of Adira and Fintan was a true love story. It was surreal to her that two enemy races could be blended so perfectly. “The two of you are like Romeo and Juliet. If we could figure out how to charge my Kindle, it’s a love story that I could send to you guys.” Because in all honesty that seemed to be what Adira and Fintan were, modern day Romeo and Juliet.

  Petr was the one to answer the questions the other couple had on their faces. “It’s a device that holds books. The one, in particular, she’s been telling me about does not have quite the happy ending that you two have.” Stopping before a door, he let Lennox lean in to punch in the code with a laugh. “Smart little man. Did you pick that up from your parents?” Lennox peeked around Petr’s head and nodded with a mischievous grin. Petr waved Sam inside the rooms that were much like his on the cruiser, with a slightly different layout and more space.

  Sam stepped into the room and laughed when Morgan wiggled out of her arms. She set the little girl down and couldn’t help but grin. “So beautiful.” She watched the child race off and run for what looked to be a shelf with toys on it. “Did Petr tell you how he found me?” she asked Adira when they all took a seat. Sam was shocked when the little girl climbed back into her lap with a small device. “What have you got here, sweetheart?” she asked with the data pad in her hands.

  Petr let Lennox down and moved over to sit next to Sam. “It’s for them to learn their shapes, letters, and in time to do the classwork they will be given. At this age it is all for fun,” he explained. Morgan turned to give Petr a kiss on his cheek before patting the wet spot like she wanted to ensure it stayed there. “Thank you, princess.”

  “This is actually great.” She took the pad from the little girl and snickered when both the girl and boy clambered up onto her lap. “Have you guys noticed just how similar that all of you look? That even though you are of other races you still look alike? Your coloring is off, but if that is the only difference between your races, could it be that you all came from the same place?” Obviously they were genetically compatible or the two children wouldn’t be there. It was odd but also reassuring.

  “It’s something we’ve been investigating,” Fintan told her. “The electronic records only go so far back, and then it’s a lot of digging through boxes of fragile, and often partially destroyed, paper records. Adira’s found a few things, as have some friends of ours, but it’s slow going. Our language evolved through the years into what it is today, so even when we do find something, translating it is a challenge.”

  “Maybe I could help with that. I had a thing for learning new languages when I was in my time and I am over nine hundred years older than you guys, so maybe it’s something that I might know?” Samantha was willing to help them all no matter what. “It would give me something to do, well something other than following your brother around and watching him all day long.” She looked at the data pad and held it for the little girl, reading it along with her so that she didn’t get upset about not having all eyes on her, so to speak.

  “It would be something for her to do,” Petr said quietly. He shifted closer to her before wrapping an arm around her waist.

  “We have had our people scanning everything into a closed system due to the fragility of some of our finds. I’ll give you copies when you go, and then we can get you anything else that comes to light on other trips,” Fintan agreed.

  “Thank you. I appreciate anything that you guys will give me to do.” She pressed a kiss to the top of the little girl’s head and continued to look at the data pad with her, helping her draw shapes and color them in. “I can’t keep following Petr around. I think his men are starting to get nervous because I’m constantly asking questions, but I’m also just a little,” she held her fingers apart slightly, “clumsy. Just a little bit,” she added with a grin.

  “You are not clumsy,” Petr said, squeezing her and the little girl she held closer. “The men like having you around. They only become uncomfortable when you ask questions they don’t have an answer to.”

  “I know. I just keep forgetting that I’m no longer in my time or on my planet even.” She leaned her forehead to the little girl’s and brushed a kiss to the side of her head, then released her so that she could continue to play with the data pad. “There is so much that I’m trying to learn right now. I miss it sometimes. Earth, that is. But then I look at you and nothing else matters because knowing that you love me is more than enough to replace that nostalgia.”

  “I know that, little one. We’ll find our balance together as you are finding your balance in the strangeness of this new world and time you are in. I’ll always be here for you,” Petr said for her ears alone. “I would do anything for you, Samantha. All you need to do is ask and I will see it done, no matter the cost.”

  “I love you, too,” she whispered, shifting the little girl on her lap. She looked at Adira and Fintan and grinned as she watched the way that they acted together. “The two of you are perfect together,” she told them. “So Petr tells me that you guys had a great deal to overcome to get together. The things that you had to go through only made you stronger. I like that about you both.”

  “The fact she forgave me makes me love her all the more.” Fintan leaned in to kiss Adira hard, and the woman blushed when he drew back. “I was not particularly nice to her in the beginning. Yet she still assisted me in getting free and gave me a chance to love her.”

  “Yeah, but I have a feeling that you more than made up for it, didn’t you?” Sam asked. “I know that I would have forgiven Petr if he had done something to me. I happen to really, really love the heck out of him and I would do anything for the man that I had to.” It was strange, she knew it was, but it was also the truth.

  “She is still with me despite her brother’s best efforts to dissuade her, so I assume I must have a few things she is fond of.” Fintan pulled Adira in close. “You would have to ask her to be sure. She’s being oddly silent this visit, quite unlike her whenever her brother is here.”

  Adira laughed and shook her head. “I’m honestly just a little shocked because of the way that Morgan is acting around Samantha.”

  Sam frowned and asked, “What do you mean?”

  “What I mean is the fact that she never acts like this with strangers. Look at her. She’s twirling Samantha’
s hair around her fingers. Don’t you find that a bit odd?”

  “Oh.” She laughed and looked down at the little girl. “She’s just loving the fact that she has so many people who are right now paying her and her brother so much attention.”

  “Adira is right. Morgan does not take to strangers this quickly,” Fintan said. “Yet she took instantly to you, Samantha. It is impressive. My little girl is very particular about who she trusts. It took us quite a while for her to settle with her guards. Part of that is Lennox. He’s highly protective of his little sister, and my boy has good instincts.”

  “As any big brother should be,” Sam said and reached out to stroke her finger to the boy’s cheek. “It will drive her crazy one day, but right now she’s going to let him. He will always protect her and that’s how it should be. I’m assuming that he’s the older of the two by a few minutes?”

  Fintan nodded while he watched his children. “He actually kept Morgan hidden from us for a long time. It was a bit of a shock to find out we would be getting two little ones when we’d thought it was only the one. Took a little adjustment to wrap our minds around it. Still didn’t seem entirely real until they were here where we could hold them.”

  “Oh, I can imagine.” She then turned and looked at Fintan with a small frown. “How could he have kept her hidden? I would have assumed that the medical advances in your time would have guaranteed that you knew everything about the children.” Even in her time there had been 4-D imaging that people could get to make sure that everything was okay with the children. How strange. “He’s a protector. Was there a reason that he felt he should protect her? I personally strongly believe that children can feel their outside environments while in the womb, so maybe there was something happening that he needed to keep her safe?”

  “He was being difficult, like his father,” Petr said. Fintan’s glare didn’t seem to bother her man any, made him smirk, though. “Even with our advancements there is still further to go. He is a large child, was in the womb. He seemed to know where the scanner was at any given time so he was between it and Morgan.”

  She looked down at Morgan, who was quiet and taking it all in. “I think she’s going to be your peacemaker and her big brother is going to be her protector. No one will ever be good enough to be in her life, I have a feeling, at least in his opinion.” She was poking fun at the men in the room, just a bit.

  “Speaking from personal experience, no man is ever worthy of a little sister,” Petr agreed. When Adira shot him a dark look that promised pain, he let out a sigh. “But there are some that may one day achieve the stature if they keep to their current path.”

  “I feel so loved,” Fintan said in a droll tone. “Adira, do you feel the love?”

  Adira snorted. “Yeah, feeling all kinds of love for you.” The woman moved and settled herself in the massive man’s lap once more and that one action told Sam that they did this often.

  “Well, I never had big brothers and my parents passed early in my life, so I had only myself to answer for. I will tell you now, however,” she pressed a kiss to the girl’s cheek, “it took me coming here to find someone that was good enough for me. It’s more than just the siblings, you know. She’ll find someone that will rock her world in the best way possible. Just wait and see.”

  “She will have to wait until I am long gone from this universe,” Fintan said. “My daughter will not be dating, fraternizing, or otherwise associating with any male other than her immediate family until such time. If she does, the male will find himself on a long journey aboard a slow freighter bound for nowhere.”

  “I second that,” Petr said with a firm nod.

  Sam laughed. “Oh my God. Nothing has changed. In all this time, all this distance, every man seems to think that the women in their lives need protected from the opposite sex. Do you feel the same for Lennox? Does he have to wait until you are both gone from this world?” She was snickering, she couldn’t help it, because she knew that the same restrictions wouldn’t be on the little boy. When she looked at Adira, who was barely holding in her laughter as well, she knew she’d hit the nail on the head.

  Fintan opened his mouth, closed it, opened it again, then seemed to think better of answering her question.

  Petr didn’t have the same problem. “Lennox will be too busy watching over Morgan. When she is eventually settled happily with someone he approves of, and knows we would also approve of, then he’ll see to his own happiness.”

  Samantha burst out laughing at that pronouncement and noticed that Adira was, too. She was snorting from laughing so hard. It was hilarious because the truth was that they all knew better.

  Sam looked down at Morgan and smiled. “One day you will find someone and he’s going to be everything that you could have ever wanted. I have a feeling that your daddy and uncle will bend to your will easily. You already have them wrapped around your little fingers, don’t you, darling?”

  Morgan looked up at her, then smiled angelically. The little girl knew her power, Sam realized. Especially when she proceeded to turn to look at Petr and lift her arms. Her lower lip gave a quiver, and instantly Petr scooped her up to give her a cuddle. The look Sam got when Morgan rested her cheek to Petr’s shoulder said it all.

  Sam snickered and leaned over to kiss the girl’s cheek. “Little lover. You keep that up, darling girl.” She looked down at Lennox and smiled. “Looks like it’s just you and me, little man. How about I tell you a story?” She grinned when he kicked his feet. “Let’s see, what story fits?” She had to think for a moment. Then she adjusted Lennox on her lap so that her hands were free and began to do the spider song, using her hands to move the song along. “The itsy-bitsy spider climbed up a water spout…” She was singing very softly because she hated her voice when she sang, even if others liked it.

  Lennox clapped his hands when she finished. Turning, he looked up at her with pursed lips.

  Fintan chuckled softly. “He wants a kiss, if you weren’t picking up the signals,” he told her. “My son has discovered he is thought highly of by most of the females on board and has also learned that if he acts cute he can earn kisses.”

  Sam couldn’t deny the child. She leaned down and gave him a kiss, then tickled his belly. “Okay, here is another one.” Lennox was watching intently now. She started to do the “Little Pigs” on his toes and snorted when the little boy laughed with her. “That’s awesome,” she said with a grin. “I have all kinds of them, darling. I will have to make sure to leave some of them with your parents so that you can learn more of them and maybe pass them along to others.”

  “You have made a friend for life in that one, Samantha,” Fintan said. “He will now demand we tell him these same stories every night.”

  “How many do you know?” Petr asked her. Turning her head, Sam saw Morgan playing with his hair, tugging on the short strands with a determined look on her little face. Petr sat there taking the abuse and occasionally shifting Morgan’s little feet so she didn’t step on anything she shouldn’t.

  “It’s been a long time since I’ve had to think about them, but I know a lot of them. There was also a book that came out a long time before I was born called Aesop’s Fables, which had a bunch of stories for children.” She paused when she heard an alarm and frowned. It wasn’t obtrusive or loud, but it was coming from Petr.

  “The communicator,” he muttered. He shifted slightly to dig it out and slip it into his ear. “Go ahead,” he said softly. He listened for a time, his brows drawing lower until he grimaced. “Understood, we will be returning shortly.”

  Pocketing the device, he lifted Morgan to kiss her on her chubby cheek. “I’m sorry, little one, but I have to go now.” He passed Morgan to her mother, then stood to take Lennox from Sam. He cuddled the little boy and gave him a hug. After passing him to his father, Petr dug out the packages from the satchel he’d brought along to set on the table before the seating. “I’m sorry, Adira. I wish we could have had more time, but it seems there is a
vid conference I have to be a part of. I will let you know what’s going on when I can.” A quick hug for his sister, then he held out a hand to Sam.

  Sam watched Adira cling to her brother for several long moments. She felt the tears prickling behind her eyes and watched as Adira fought not to cry. She gave the woman a hug and pressed kisses to both babies’ cheeks and put her hand into Petr’s. She gave it a squeeze. “I’m with you,” she told him softly as they started out of the room. She could practically feel the pain radiating from Petr for leaving his sister.

  He smiled down at her and wrapped his arm around her shoulders. Petr hugged her tight to his side as they made their way quickly through the destroyer and back to where they’d started. “I hate leaving her,” he said while he prepped the crawler for departure. “I know she is safe, happy, and loved, but it doesn’t make it easier.”

  “I can’t imagine that it would,” Sam admitted. “Hopefully, one day there will be peace between your people and you will be able to spend more time with them. All that we can do is continue to work toward peace, behind the scenes, of course. Hopefully, we will be able to find more information. Speaking of, did Fintan send the data that I asked for to the crawler so that I can look over the Craegin history?”

  He lifted the crawler off the decking. Then they dropped down outside of the destroyer. When Petr had them underway, he leaned over to press a few buttons on her side and shot her a look. “Still downloading. If he started it when we were there, or even right after we left, we should have the full download before reaching the border. Which is good, since the asteroid field would mess with the signal if we are more than halfway through it while that is still transmitting.”

  “Okay. Good.” She wanted to cross check the history of the Craegins to the history of the Imarians. She was buckled up in her seat and closed her eyes when they lifted up to take off. “I enjoyed meeting your family.”