Out of Bight, Out of Mind

Chapter Twenty-Eight

With excitement and trepidation, Emi sat at her console on the bridge and watched as the hover lifts slowly moved the Tamora Bight from the hangar to the launchpad. There was something comfortingly familiar about the feelings washing over her from her men. Their pleasure and excitement over returning to space, combined with their contentment that their family was not only complete again, but expanded with the presence of Yanna and Pabo on board.

“It is a very slow process,” Yanna noted as he looked out into the distance where the heavy tugs awaited them on the launchpad were visible through heat shimmers rising off the pavement. “It did not take this long to lift from Mars.”

“Yeah,” Aaron said. “Gravity, atmosphere, and population densities.”

Next to them, another set of hover lifts were being set up to begin the process to move the Kendall Kant.

I wonder if Donna feels like this before a lift.

“I can’t wait to get the hell off this rock,” Emi said. It wasn’t until she realized Aaron, Caph, and Ford were looking at her with smiles that she said, “What?”

Caph leaned over from his station at the console and kissed her. “I never thought I’d ever hear you say that again. Damn, is that good.”

After two days at the orbiting hub, they headed out for Mars for resupply before their next assignment. Their first evening away from the hub, Emi sought out Ford on the bridge, where he had night watch. Without a word, he held his arms open to her and helped her snuggle into the command chair with him. She laid her head on his shoulder and closed her eyes as she felt him wrap his arms securely around her.

Safe.

The safest place in the world. Not that Aaron and Caph didn’t make her feel safe, because they did. But she’d never admit a tiny little part of her held an even more special bond with Ford for what they went through on the B’autachia. The first few snippets of memories she recalled were with him, in his arms.

It didn’t make her love Aaron and Caph any less, but it made her appreciate even more how fragile life could be.

And the other shared grief they had in common would always bind them more tightly together.

He kissed the top of her head. “You all right?”

“Couldn’t sleep,” she mumbled against his shirt. She belatedly realized they were both speaking Beyant.

Something else they would always have in common.

He gently stroked her back and remained silent.

After a few minutes her stress melted from her. “I don’t know what to do.”

“About what, babe?”

She kept her eyes shut as she aimlessly plucked at the front of his shirt.

He let out a sad sigh as he rubbed his chin across the top of her head. “We’re all still young. We have plenty of time to try again later.”

“They won’t force us out if we do. I looked it up in the regs. We have seniority and we’re not in battle.”

“No, but do you really think this is the right environment to have a baby? We’re not supposed to be in dangerous situations, but look what we’ve been through so far.”

“I know.”

His melancholy always tinged his blue aura with a green somewhere between melon and fern, different than the green of Caph’s content state. She felt it now. Not quite sadness, but not completely happy either. The little girl who never had a chance, even with their advanced technology.

His baby.

Their baby.

As she sat there in his arms, she felt the range of emotions flow through him as his thoughts bounced from one thing to another. The melancholy, the sadness. The grief that flowed into anger over what Kayehalau had done not just to her, but to all of them. Of the time he stole from them, her memories.

Their baby.

Eventually his feelings settled into a royal blue, his normal relaxed state, a mix of love, his mind partially on his duties, and tinged with a little lust over the way her bottom rubbed against his cock through his trousers.

“We’ll try again one day,” he softly said, still speaking Beyant.

“I know.”

“And it’s not the DSMC we have to worry about when we do.”

Confused, she opened her eyes and tipped her head back so she could look into his eyes.

He smiled down at her. “Rah’tien. Duh. Do you honestly think he’d let his little girl stay in space if she was expecting?” He hooked a thumb over his shoulder. “Yanna would rat us out to him faster than we could blink.” He settled his hand flat over her tummy as he let his forehead touch hers. “I doubt he’d force us back to Beyantaeux, but he’d ground our asses on Earth or Mars or somewhere. And wherever that new somewhere was, he’d immediately get busy building an embassy station there to keep an eye on you.”

“He reminds me of my dad,” she whispered. She knew she hadn’t talked about her family much with her men before everything that happened. The trip to Bozeman had been her first time visiting their graves in several years. Going through the sim while retracing and regaining her memories had also unearthed a fresh harvest of grief and loss to work through.

Or, maybe she never had completely worked through it before.

“Oh, sweetie. I’m sorry.”

“It’s okay.” She laid her hand over his and laced her fingers through his. “I’d like to go visit Beyantaeux sometime.”

“So would I. The pictures and videos are gorgeous.”

They sat in comfortable silence for a while, her ear pressed against his chest and his pulse thrumming through her. “Can we go to Kels’ grave when we stop at Mars?”

He kissed the top of her head again. “Of course we can.”

She lay there a little longer. “Can I ask you something else?”

“Of course.”

She switched back to English standard. “What the hell is an M-squared, and why does the thought if it absolutely turn my stomach?” It was a small thing that had been bugging her, a question she’d never remembered to ask before, but knew it was one of those tiny missing pieces in her mind.

He laughed and kissed her again. “Oh, babe. I get to teach you the right way to drink this time.”

THE END

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