by Mark Zubro
Eph drew close still with a work techno-chisel in hand. He bowed slightly, “No, thank you. Thank you both.”
They ran their hands over the etchings. Mike realized that a section was done in the language of Hrrrm. He took another step and saw that the next section was the same thing done in English. Mike felt tears start.
Eph said, “Joe worked on the translation and did some of the work.”
Mike and Joe thanked and shook hands with each of the men who were working.
Hand in hand they walked to their cubicle.
The next morning Mike and Joe were up early. Pav’s ship had returned and would bring them to the capital for a Senate meeting. At that time all the negotiated agreements would be fully ratified. Although the final result was already assured: freedom for all LGBT people, restoration of all implants, and reparations.
In the dawn the whole colony had turned out on the mesa. New men and women were arriving daily, several thousand by this time. The lesbians had come to set up the whole Perfillian wood concession: growth, production, and distribution. They were working as a collective along with the transgendered contingent.
Miners and workers had arrived for the liquid zukoh factories, but that work had just begun. Hiring quotas had been set up so that LGBT people would have preference: if all qualifications were equal, the LGBT person would get the job.
As he looked at the crowd, he felt pride in being gay and sharing with the men, and now some women, around him what was their own, that no one, he vowed, would ever take from them.
Mike and Joe reached the apex of the bridge.
As soon as the crowd caught sight of Mike and Joe, they began to cheer. Because of the acoustics of the hangar and the nearness of the mountain mass, the sound echoed and reechoed.
Mike and Joe smiled. And the crowd roared, and the roar didn’t stop, the echo came back as their own response, doubling and redoubling for Mike and Joe, for themselves, for the world they created.
At the center of the group Brux and several others had begun the Hrrrm National Anthem. A song that immortalized the bravery of the first emperor who, starting from almost nothing, triumphed over the chaos of the galaxy, bringing it its first true peace. The throng took up the song, learned from their earliest childhoods. Mike had first heard it just a few years before. Mike saw tears running down Joe’s cheeks and on the faces of many as the words and the music stirred them, the story of a single man’s triumph over the hostility and indifference of the galaxy. Mike himself felt the immense pride and elation the words of the song gave him. The melody struck him as a cross between “La Marseillaise” and the US national anthem. Now the words made sense, not as a paean to an empire that had cruelly used them, but for what the song truly was, a hymn to triumph over incredible adversity. The chorus swelled as they reached the hangar end of the bridge.
Moments later he was at the center of the crowd. Brux handed him a microphone. The old VEQ had told him he planned a goodbye ceremony and that he hoped Mike and Joe would speak. Joe had insisted that Mike be the one to talk.
Mike took the microphone. “We have made a home,” he told them. “Where the universe expected us to find dishonor and death. We have built the beginnings of a new world, not a simple colony or a city, but something that will last for all time, a beacon for all gay people, whether dragged here unwilling and afraid as we have seen or someday when the present evil has dimmed in our memories, finally drawn here by our triumph. Because now we know what it takes. The pure air of freedom, the knowledge that we will never live in fear again.” The roar was deafening, greater than they’d made before. They chanted Mike and Joe’s names until the sound rang and echoed. And when the echo died he spoke again simply. “Thank you from my heart. It has been a long journey.”
The cheering rose again, honoring him, for the hope he represented for the hope he gave, for themselves and the reality they had created, and for the great victory he had won.
As he walked to where the road began for their stroll to the ship, Mike and Joe reached out to touch and let themselves be touched. Mike held on tightly to Joe as he walked through the crowd.
Brux walked with them across the plain to the waiting ship. On the gangway, they paused.
Brux said, “I’ve never been so honored to know anyone.”
Mike said, “The honor is ours.”
Joe said, “And it’s not like we won’t be in contact. You’ve got to run this dump after we’re gone.”
Brux smiled. “I look forward to that. Perhaps someday.” His voice trailed off. He hugged first Joe then Mike.
Mike whispered as he broke away, “Perhaps.”
CHAPTER SEVENTY-THREE
Mike and Joe lay in their own suite on Admiral Pav’s ship. It was the night before the Senate meeting.
They were naked in each other’s arms except for a small crystalline vial that Mike kept around his neck. In it was a bit of a drop of liquid zukoh. A last defense if anyone tried an attack, and the only souvenir Mike had requested.
Mike asked, “Do you think I’m making the right decision?”
“Yes,” was Joe’s immediate answer.
“You don’t think I should stay here and use all this to protect gay people?”
“We already are protected. You’ve seen to that.”
“Would you like it all? You could stay and make sure nothing goes wrong.”
“No. That’s a kind thing to offer. We’ve got a structure that’s in place.” Joe pulled Mike in closer but leaned his head back enough so they could look at each other’s eyes as they spoke. “I want to be wherever you are. To me that’s been the point of this whole thing. Us being together.”
Mike said, “For me too.” He pulled in a deep breath. “I love you.”
“I love you too.”
CHAPTER SEVNTY-FOUR
Mike strode into the Senate chamber. Joe walked next to him. Mike let his blue aura encircle them. They wore the clothes they’d had on when taken from Earth, the only such in the chamber.
The silence was complete.
Mike found the absence of Bex comforting. That man’s atoms were somewhere scattered among the stars.
Mike walked down to the center seat. Empty now. Waiting for him. Mike’s main feeling at this moment was, I beat you assholes. Beat you with power and money. You are such shits, and I beat you. He knew how President Obama must have felt after both elections. He was also fed up and disgusted. He just wanted to leave all these people and their politics to themselves. He wanted to go home.
As an alien he was free to make as many billions and trillions as any of them. Mike had double of what all of them had put together. A lake of liquid zukoh. Refineries would be built. Weapons created. Jobs created. And the assurance of mutual destruction might convince them to not kill each other.
The colonists were free. Those who had been on 6743-0A were all rich and planning lives off or on the former colony as they wished. All those collected were returning to whatever planet they wished with full reparations planned. The Senate exile and collection laws had been revoked throughout Hrrrm.
Mike wasn’t into nation-building. He left that to idiot politicians on Earth. He wanted a life of peace and love with Joe forever on Earth. He wasn’t going to negotiate. He was going to give all these people their marching orders.
He didn’t care. He wanted to go home.
He remained standing next to the central chair. He expanded his aura until it filled the chamber, and then he diminished it so that it just surrounded the two of them.
Still the chamber was silent. He saw the tangerine faction, the Religionists, stirring. Their numbers were half of what they’d been when Mike was first here. Mike’s voice rang out over the assemblage. “Here is how things are going to go from now on.”
He explained his plan that he’d already negotiated with Def and the others. Most of those present knew it already. The Religionists faction was cut out of any profit from the zukoh. The Religionist worlds were to pay
reparations to all the gay people for what had been taken from them. Bex’s fortune would also be contributed to the reparations fund. The collapse of their own agriculture prices and transportation industries had caused the Religionist governments on numerous planets to fall.
When Mike finished, Def stood up and said, “I second the motion.”
A tremendous silence followed.
A minute later someone in the back row shouted, “Traitor.”
But a vote was superfluous and Mike and all of them knew it. Money had spoken. Mike had used his cash to create a better world. He hoped. In his heart he didn’t much care.
Mike turned to Joe and said, “I want to go home.”
CHAPTER SEVENTY-FIVE
On the journey of months and months back to Earth, Mike fretted. He’d spent time checking progress in Hrrrm. More religionists had gone bankrupt. Brux and a team of gay accountants monitored all the changes.
The colony had an even greater influx of LGBT people. Now reveling in good jobs, vast wealth, and a world as secure as could be made. Factories were being built, trade was expanding, and the latest crops were flourishing. There were plans to terraform the whole planet. Hot and cold running water was the latest luxury. They’d even built a heated swimming pool and fielded a Death Ball team. The team had won two games and lost two. Mike was pleased to see, no one had died. Brux was the coach when he could get time from running the galaxy. Brux often burbled about the star of the gay team, Kre, a new arrival, who according to the VEQ, was totally hot and totally willing to hold still for Brux’s ministrations. Mike figured it was a start.
Cak had been sentenced to a regular prison colony. Brux said, “He was still cursing you as they dragged him away.”
Mike said, “Being an asshole is another universal construct.”
Mike wasn’t sure his and Joe’s so-called luxury accommodations on the ship back to Earth were that much different from his cell on the way to Hrrrm. Cold grey metal predominated. They had more rooms and the ability to come and go as they pleased, but mostly the difference in their suite was bunches of multi-colored squishy pillows and two chairs made of perfillian wood. And they had wild, mad sex as often as they wished.
Near Pluto they switched from Pav’s ship to Joe’s original one that had brought him to Earth. After making sure all the radar suppression devices were suppressing radar as they hoped and needed, they landed in the early morning in a cold, gray fog and used Joe’s flotation device to float to the Chicago shoreline unobserved.
They ate a late breakfast at Eat-Eat-Eat, Mike’s favorite breakfast place on the near North side of Chicago. They took a train out to the suburbs and his mom and dad’s place. It was a short walk from the train station to his mom’s house.
As they turned onto his mom’s street, Mike’s eyes filled with tears.
It was his grandmother’s birthday. Mike knew the whole family would be gathered for the party. They did every year. There was no point in calling ahead. Mike rang the bell.
Jack answered the door. When he saw Mike, Jack gaped for a second, then flung himself at Mike like a puppy, hugging, nuzzling, making little yips of joy. Jack pulled Joe into the hug. “You’re back. Hey, everybody, looks who’s here.”
Jack pulled them into the living room. As they walked in arm-in-arm, Jack murmured, “How was the galaxy?”
“About average, I guess.” Mike found hearing and speaking English delicious to his ear and tongue.
His Aunt Rose leapt up from the couch and rushed to crush him in an embrace. “Where have you been?” she demanded.
Mike’s mom came in from the kitchen. She clutched a casserole. Jack managed to grab it and put it on an end table before she dropped it.
“Michael?”
Being in her arms, Mike did weep. His dad came in from barbecuing in the backyard, saw Mike and joined the tearful embrace. Joe was greeted with open arms along with strange looks from Mike’s mom and dad. There were tearful reunions and tons of questions. Mike’s mom put an end to them by saying, “Let’s just celebrate.”
Jack introduced his girlfriend, Janet. She shook Mike’s hand then Joe’s and said, “I’ve heard so much about both of you.”
In the den, he found Meganvilia and his husband Ray. Meganvilia leapt up from the center of the couch. He pulled Mike into his gargantuan embrace. Then he hugged Joe. Ray, Meganvilia’s husband, did it in the reverse order.
Meganvilia asked, “So what happened?”
Mike said, “Defeated evil, became the richest and most powerful man in the galaxy, and saved a zillion gay people.”
Meganvilia looked at Joe who shrugged and nodded.
Meganvilia said, “So, the usual. I wouldn’t have expected less.”
“How is everyone here?” Mike asked.
Meganvilia said, “About the same. Hugo’s an asshole at the restaurant. We kept up your apartment. Didn’t change a thing. We always had hope. And Jack needed a base in the city. Mrs. Benton is eager to have you back.”
“I’m glad to be back.”
“Did you want your old job?”
Mike said, “I’m not sure what’s next. I think I just want to be in my old apartment for a while.”
On their way out, he stopped and gave Meganvilia a cutting from a perfillian wood tree along with a list of instructions.
They promised Mike’s mom and dad to answer all their questions at a quiet dinner the next night. They promised the same to Meganvilia and Ray at a meal at Mike and Joe’s place for the night after that. They planned a double date with Jack and Janet. When they entered his apartment house, Mrs. Benton rushed out to greet them.
Once they made it to their apartment, Jack looked around the shabby old place and smiled. Meganvilia and Mrs. Benton had kept it dusted. Jack was spending the night at Janet’s.
Mike and Joe just held each other for what felt like hours. Mike let his husband’s other-worldly tingle surround him. They slipped into bed. Mike thought they might make mad, passionate love for hours once they returned, but he could barely keep his eyes open. He fell asleep in Joe’s arms. Home at last.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Mark Zubro is the author of thirty-two novels and five short stories. His book A Simple Suburban Murder won the Lambda Literary Award for Best Gay Men’s mystery. Dying to Play, which came out in January, is his most recent adult mystery and begins a brand new series, featuring gay private eye, Mike King. His latest young adult mystery, Hope, was out last February. He spends his time reading, writing, napping, and eating chocolate.
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