No Space for Family [Chapter 24]

I somehow managed to sleep through the night with only a few nightmares of my mom and dad getting separated. When I woke up, I heard the sound of power tools being taken to the outside of our ship. Since Terren was already up and out of the room, I guessed it was him and Dad fixing up the door.

The common room was empty again. I made myself breakfast from the synthesizer and ate it alone. About halfway through eating, Dad came marching up from the back of the ship toward the cockpit.

“Morning, kiddo.” He said, nodding at me. There didn’t seem to be anything different about him.

“Morning,” I answered, pretending I was still half asleep.

I heard his voice as he settled in. “Okay, let’s see if it works. Fingers crossed.”

I set down my food and joined him in the cockpit. “What are you doing?”

Dad glanced back at me. “We’re going to see if we properly integrated the new hatch into our systems. So we can operate it properly. Terren’s outside to see if it will open. Ready?”

“Ready, Dad,” Terren answered through the intercom.

Dad fiddled with the systems screen, accessing the appropriate on-screen button. I heard a mechanical grumbling back in the hallway before the lights in the cockpit and common room suddenly shut off. “Dang,” Dad mumbled.

“Oops,” I added lowly.

I heard the patter of my mom descending the ladder from the loft. “What’s going on, Jeff? Why are the lights off?”

Dad twisted back in the seat. “Trying to get the new hatch hooked in. Probably just blew a fuse in the auxiliary system.”

Mom stood at the door, head shaking and arms crossed over her chest. “And how do we fix that?”

Dad shrugged. “The new hatch probably needs a voltage converter. And we can just synthesize a new fuse for the system, three minutes at max.”

“And what happens if we pop a fuse that runs the synthesizers themselves?”

Dad huffed and shook his head. “Well, we’re here on a civilized, settled planet. They probably have a synthesizer or even a fuse or two at the ready.”

Mom moved her hands to her hips. “I thought you didn’t want me going to Sakura for help.”

“Who said anything about her? I’m sure they have a warehouse or something nearby here.”

“We won’t be here forever, you know,” said Mom, leaning in. “Those goons might show up again. We need to be prepared for anything, have the ship ready and fixed.”

I felt the tears welling up in my eyes as I wavered back and forth between each of my two parents. “Stop! Mom, we can get this fixed. Don’t run off with Sakura! You’ve got to trust Dad!”

“Run off?” Mom scoffed, looking me in the eyes. “Sola Rae, what makes you think… Mom?”

Grandma chimed in with a sweet voice. “Yes, dear?”

“What have you been talking about with Sola?”

“What, I can’t talk with my granddaughter now?”

Mom stepped out into the common room, talking up at the ceiling. “Did you say something about Sakura to her?”

“Grandma said that you were in love with her once,” I recounted.

Mom laughed for a second before gritting her teeth. “Mom, Sola… you both have this situation all wrong. Yes, I did have a… fling with her. But I think she liked me more than I liked her. As the colony grew, though, she got more and more attached to her work. She had less time for me, and so we both decided to break it off. Which is when I met your father here, Sola. And I’ve never been happier.”

“Except for this whole thing right now,” I grumbled, wiping at the bottom of my eyes. “Because nothing is going right?”

Mom scoffed and smirked. She was smirking over my head at Dad, who was at the door of the cockpit, smirking too and shaking his own head. “Plenty is going right,” she said. “We’re all together, working as a family, all safe and sound. I think… we’re all just a bit overwhelmed now.”

Dad pulled me in and rubbed at my shoulder. “But thank you for reminding us what we need to focus on, Sola.”

“Mhm,” Mom nodded. “Which is to get Grandma Aida back in her body so we can more easily watch over her. Before she puts more weird thoughts into her grandchildren’s minds.”

All three of us nodded in quiet understanding, my dad still hugging me from behind. Terren marched up to join us in the common room. “What’s going on? Why’s nobody saying anything? Oh god, it’s all dark up here. Did something happen?”

Dad let go of me and sent me off with a push to my back. “Just blown a fuse.”

My brother huffed. “That’s why the intercom cut out. I was waiting, then I decided to come back in through the cargo bay. Mom, are you okay?”

My mom slumped her shoulders and turned back to face my brother. “If Grandma Aida ever told you anything… compromising about me or this family, you would tell me, right? Before you accepted it as fact?”

“Huh?”

“Never mind,” said Mom with a shake of her head, stepping past him. “I’m going to… wash my face.”

“What is going on?” Terren asked, staring up at the ceiling. “Grandma?”

“I won’t say anymore,” Grandma replied. “Nothing again you, dear.”

Dad stepped up. “Hey, this new hatch of ours isn’t going to reinstall itself. Open up the fuse panel and find which one popped so we can push its schematic to the synthesizer.”

“Sure…” sighed Terren, wiping his brow.

---

After much fuse replacing and fiddling with wires and power converters, I watched as the space hatch opened under its own power and computerized instructions. It was kind of noisy, slow, and none of the paint matched the Ora’s color scheme, but it did what it was supposed to. Terren stood on the outside of it, clapping in my direction as it finished articulating open. “About time. Hey Sola, give Dad a yell to make sure it will close back down on its own.”

I almost nodded and did as asked when I spotted something crossing the landing platform off in the distance. “Wait now, what’s that?”

My brother shifted around. “Some sort of delivery for us? Something pretty big, it looks like. Did Mom or Dad ask them for something?”

No Space for Family [Chapter 23]

After using the office’s communications equipment, we managed to get into contact with Dad and the ship. It was a while later, but the Ora eventually came to settle down on one of the landing pads there within the confines of the colony. The hatch at the back of the cargo bay opened up to let us back in.

Terren met us first in the hallway. “What a ride.”

I noticed that our once mangled hatch had been replaced with the one from the bad guys’ ship. “It looks like junk,” I said.

Terren poked at my shoulder in a teasing way. “Better than nothing. We had barely gotten it attached and bolted down before you contacted us. I heard it rattle the whole way over. Was worried that it would pop right off if we hit the wind just the right way. Definitely not space-worthy.”

Mom shrugged. “Good work, my strong boy. And at least now you have a proper flat place to work on the ship.”

“Amelia,” Grandma interjected, “What can they do for us here on this planet? Will you let me contact my lawyer now and tell him that I’m not dead?”

“The lawyer, really, mom? Tell me, have you been paying him?”

“Most of the time.”

“Then he should mostly be fine with waiting around to hear back from you. As for everything else, we should discuss it with Jeff.”

“I’m up front,” Dad called back in response to hearing his name. “You must have got in with the Overseer pretty quickly.”

“That’s the good news. Sakura is still the overseer,” Mom said as we met up with Dad in the cockpit. He was powering down the engines and shutting down the other energy-hungry systems. “You remember her, right?”

“How couldn’t I?” Dad said with a slight groan.

I couldn’t help but notice that both my mom and my dad seemed to feel way different about that woman. I didn’t want to mention it though.

“So the bad news…” Mom continued, settling into Terren’s usual seat there at the rear of the cockpit. “They’re dealing with their own thing here, a slight epidemic. So both their medical teams and cryo pods are all spoken for. I also think… Dr. Pois’ little stunt to get into contact with us over the beacon cut them off from regular communications here for a bit…”

“I was right,” I exclaimed, stomping my foot.

“Indeed you were,” Mom sighed. “But we don’t need to let them know that. At the very least, I’ve let them know to expect the doctor. Apparently whoever’s… hunting us down warned the colony not to let anyone land here without going through them first.”

Grandma sighed. “So we’re on the lam, that quack doctor’s on the lam, we can’t get any help here, and my lawyer probably thinks I’m dead and gone.”

Dad hung his head low. “Aida, the lawyer is the least of our worries. At least we have some support here. In the meantime, we need to get the hatch fixed up and space worthy, and wait for Dr. Pois to arrive.”

Mom stood and stretched her arms up in the air. “I can’t argue with that. Tomorrow morning I’m going to go back to Sakura and see if I can’t negotiate something with her… see if we can’t free up some resources for the both of us.”

Dad let out a sole huff and stood like he was going to follow her. “Is that really necessary? To go and interrupt her when she’s so busy?”

Mom stopped in the door and turned back to face my dad. “Not interrupting. Helping. You know, all that consulting and logistics experience I’ve built up over the years? Plus there’s no dedicated AI here. Maybe we can put you to work too, Mom, see if you can’t… heuristic matrix out an attack plan for solving this pandemic of theirs.”

“You know more than I do, hon.” Grandma

“Heuristic matrix isn’t a verb, either,” Dad complained.

I felt like I was in my own binary star system right there between my mom and my dad, ready to be burnt up in their coronas, or get ripped apart by their opposing gravitational pulls. I didn’t even know who was right at that moment.

Mom sighed and shook her head. “Well, I’m tired and sweaty. I’m going to wash off this makeup and make some food for me and Sola. You better let me know if you want some too before I start synthesizing.”

“I’m an adult, I can handle getting food on my own,” said Dad, sulking down in his chair.

---

After eating, I pretended I was going back to my room, but I instead snuck back to the cargo bay. The rear door had been closed since Terren and my Dad stopped working for the day. I closed the interior gently so nobody would hear.

“Grandma?” I asked lowly.

“What seems to be the matter, dear?”

“Mom and Dad were kind of… fighting, weren’t they? I’ve never seen them talk to each other like that.”

“Ah…” Grandma trailed off. “Before, back in the cockpit. You might call it fighting. But I’m sure you can feel it too, this stressful situation. If I had a body right now, I would be exhausted right about now. Worrying about this whole lawyer situation. And the whole bad people trying to get us situation too, of course. Stress makes people do things and say things they don’t mean.”

I nodded in understanding. “There have been some fun parts of this trip, but… I wouldn’t be sad if it were over.”

“Business as normal,” suggested Grandma. “This Sakura Ishii lady definitely isn’t helping the situation.”

“Huh? She is helping us, though.”

Grandma half laughed and half sighed. “If only you knew, child.”

I stopped pacing and leaned in toward the AI core. “What? Tell me! Maybe I can help Mom and Dad out.”

“You’re… 20 years too late for that, girl.”

“What happened 20 years ago? That’s how long they’ve been married, right?”

“Not quite. But your mom loved someone before Jefferson came along.”

“Huh? Who? No…”

“Sakura Ishii.”

I imagined the lady I had seen earlier that day. She was nice. She was probably about the same age as my mom, too. And then Mom talked a lot about her and how great she was.

“How do you know that?” I asked.

“Let’s see… it’s funny how easily I can access my memories here. Yes, it was while your mom was working in this system for the first time. I remember it because I had waited so long to hear back from her, but they hadn’t installed a communications repeater or whatever. Then they did, and she finally gave me a call to tell me that the void of space hadn’t swallowed her up. That was great. But then she didn’t want to talk to me about herself. She wanted to talk about her job and how everything was being settled. But also about some girl named Sakura who she loved working with and talking to. She said she wanted to live permanently here on this settlement to be with her.”

“No way,” I said, shaking my head. “But that didn’t end up happening though.”

“Well, I’m getting to that,” said Grandma impatiently. “Now you might think that I would have put my foot down right there, said no.”

I hadn’t thought that right then, but it made sense. I decided not to say anything though.

“And I might have been against it,” Grandma continued. “I mean, your mom is my only child. And I couldn’t have gone on without having any grandchildren. But you know, right after that call I did some research. It turns out the technology is around now to get two ladies to… donate their DNA and have a kid just like the old fashioned way. I won’t go into the details of all that but… well, I guess you might have learned about the birds and the bees already.”

“Grandma, I don’t even know what that means!” I huffed, hiding behind one of the storage arrays. “Those are two different species! What do they have to do with kids?”

“Well, actually I would have been a little upset if this Sakura girl was some other species. I don’t know if I could have handled my grandchildren being little mixed abominations. But I looked up the name and it seems that Sakura is of Earthly origin.”

“What about Dad though?” I asked, pacing in between the arrays. “When did he come into the picture? Why did Mom decide she wanted to marry him and not Sakura?”

“Ehh, your dad…” Grandma groaned. “I don’t know what happened there, apart from him being someone who worked here too. And I was certainly surprised to find out that your brother was conceived out of wedlock. Ahh, and if you’re wondering, that means—“

“Grandma, please,” I begged, shaking my head. “Do you think Mom and Dad are going to be okay?”

“Sure.”

I sighed.

“As long as this Sakura lady doesn’t try to get in the way. I mean, if she’s an Overseer, watching over everything here on this planet, she must be pretty capable and powerful. And while your dad’s great, he’s just been dragging us all over the place without being able to produce any results for me or anyone else. Sakura sounds like she may be able to help. And that might end up reigniting the spark, if you know what I mean. Then again, what do I know? But you needn’t worry, Sola. Whatever comes about, both of your parents and me will still love you.”

I felt my heart tighten. “Thank you, Grandma. Goodnight.”

“Goodnight, dear.”

I snuck out of the cargo hold door, making sure nobody would see me leaving. I peeked in the door of the bedroom where I saw Terren listening to music on his bed and staring up at the ceiling. I tiptoed out next to the common room. The table had been cleared of any signs of our meal, and nobody was in there. Mom must have been up in the loft. Finally, I made one last stop at the edge of the cockpit door. Dad was lounged back in the pilot seat even though no systems or readouts were active. I wanted to say something, but I couldn’t think of anything.

No Space for Family [Chapter 22]

It was still early when me and Mom left for the colony. Dad and Terren were running loud tools to try to take apart the bad guy’s ship. It wasn’t too hot there on the planet, but they both had their shirts off. Mom shook her head when she saw them. I saw Dad wink at us— well, just Mom probably— before we went in the opposite direction. Mom smirked and hid her face with her hand before waiving back at them.

There were no roads or paths out there. There was just nature. And rocks. I kept glancing around, reminding myself that at one point only one of those things had originally covered the planet’s surface, and it wasn’t nature. No life at all. And all of those plants there didn’t look like most plants I had seen before. I guessed that they had originated on planets with similar climates to Yuzumaru.

“A lot of these trees are probably about the same age as Terren,” I observed randomly.

“I suppose they are,” Mom smiled back. “I think we have about another two kilometers. You’re not getting too tired, are you?”

“No,” I said with a shake of my head. “I’m fine.”

Mom sighed and wiped her brow in an exaggerated manner. She wasn’t even sweaty. “Well, this is the first proper exercise we’ve gotten in some time. But at least it’s in a nice, temperate place.”

“What if we run into a fence or wall or something? Or some guards?”

“Hmm,” shrugged mom. “Last I remember, there were no fences or guards. I mean, there are no wild animals here on this planet that are going to get into things. And it would be just another thing to have to maintain. Though, thinking about it… there may be some perimeter sensors. But probably only for looking out for the inhabitants.”

“Inhabitants? Like the people that live here? What would they be doing?”

“Well,” said Mom, slowing her pace up an incline. She touched her finger to her lip. “Sometimes older people get confused. They might take a wrong turn. End up headed out here and get even more lost. They might wear a sensor on their clothes or body to have someone come looking for them if they stray too far. This place was built for that reason, to help older folks take it easy for the… later stages of their lives.”

I nodded because it made sense, at least for me. “Grandma didn’t seem like she liked taking it easy.”

Mom laughed, urging me forward ahead of her for the last bit of the rocky slope. “Well, Grandma Aida isn’t as old as some Grandparents.”

“She’s older than I thought she was, actually.”

Mom smirked and held at my shoulders. “Well, don’t let her hear you saying that.”

“But now…” I began, thinking about our situation. “Her brain… the one inside the computer… it won’t have a chance to get old and worn out. She won’t end up confused or get lost. At least not how a person would. Doesn’t it seem like… she’s better how she is?”

Mom stopped for a little bit behind me, taking in a breath and scanning the horizon. “I can see how that could make sense. At least for some people. But having your brain in your body also makes a lot more sense. Like… how might Grandma feel about not being able to give her grandchildren hugs anymore?”

“I’ve never gotten a hug from Grandma…”

“Well, Mom was never big on that stuff, was she?” Mom laughed before yanking me up into her arms from behind. “But if you or I were stuck in a computer, we wouldn’t be able to get nice hugs like this. How would you feel about that?”

I laughed and slipped away, jogging along the flat area ahead of us. “I guess I would miss it… though…”

“Though?”

“Back when Hows was still with us… I asked him why Grandma was so mean. But it’s not like she’s really mean, just…”

“Cold?” Mom suggested. “Or you could say… distant.”

“Distant…”

“I can tell you, that’s just how she’s always been. But she’s also diligent, gets things done, and makes sure everyone around her is taken care of. I think seeing all of us content fulfilled, and self-reliant got on her nerves a little bit. Also that she was having to rely on us, instead of the other way around. That’s how she shows she cares. I mean, if that weren’t the case, would someone like her be so involved with the whole ship’s computer?”

“I guess not.”

“Right? Look, Sola,” she changed the subject suddenly, finger pointing ahead. “There’s some buildings.”

---

It was less naturey the closer we got to the buildings. There was more concrete and metal. There were nice flat paths to walk on too. Around the outskirts, there were several boxy buildings with lots of attached machinery and pipes and wires. The biggest building there was further inside the colony and it looked a lot different.

It was made up of a pair of wide, elliptical arches built of a concrete material that looked like they held up the rest of the building. There were very few sharp corners on the building, and it had many hallways and corridors and walkways that ran all the way through the building itself, which was about eight stories tall. There were more trees about, but they looked like they had been planted there instead of having grown there naturally.

“That’s Hanmaru Hall,” Mom said, pointing at the flashy building. “The flats there are sold off to people who come here to settle down and retire. At least that’s what the intention was when I left. I actually helped to build that place, you know.”

“No way,” I said, glancing back between her and the building.

Mom let out a sole laugh. “Well, in a very technical sense. My hands never actually touched the building at all. It was back before I got pregnant with Terren— I worked with a geologist to pick a spot that was sound enough for such a big building. All of the other planned buildings fell into place after. Then there was a lot more work… and workers… to bring in supplies and put it all together.”

“So you’re lying again.”

Mom laughed harder. “I knew you were going to say something like that. But I came back to see it completed and watched the first guests to move in. Man, I hope Sakura is still the Overseer for this place.”

As we got closer, I expected to see people out and about, enjoying the weather and generally being old and happy (at least happy compared to Grandma.) But all the grass-lined pathways and little benches and sunny raised walkways and flower beds were vacant. There were a few lights in the windows, but there was no welcoming party for us.

“Strange,” said Mom, glancing down the building’s corridors. “Where are all the people? Let’s go straight to the administration building for now.”

The structure next door was more blocky but still carefully designed with rounded corners and wide ground-level windows. The glass front doors opened automatically to let us in.

I was kind of surprised to even see a person behind the front desk, the first and only person we had encountered on this planet.

“May I… Visitors?” said the plump green-skinned lady with a puzzled look. “What brings you here today? Strange, the ground control folks didn’t tell us of anyone arriving.”

Mom put her hands on the reception counter. “We’re… visiting, with the prospect of… business. And it’s a little tiny bit of an emergency situation, too.”

“Oh my,” grunted the receptionist. “In what way can we help you?”

“I’d like to get in contact with the Overseer. It isn’t still Sakura Ishii, is it?”

“Madame Ishii is still our acting Overseer, yes. But I’m afraid she may be busy for the time being. Is there anyone else…”

Mom smacked her hands on the desk, causing the green lady to flinch in her chair. “Please. Uh, sorry. But I must see her, specifically. Let her know it’s Amelia Ankern. Please.”

The receptionist took a breath and picked up her phone without another word. She waited a bit before speaking. “Overseer. Yes. I’ve got someone here asking for you. A human by the name of Amelia… Ankern. Oh, okay. Sure.”

My mom bobbed her head a little as the receptionist put down the phone. “She says she can see you. Take the elevator to the left here, up to the fourth floor.”

Mom grabbed up my hand and nearly dragged me to the side. “Thank you!”

After the doors closed and my mom punched in the floor number, she turned back and flashed a smile. “Sakura is still here! She’s wonderful. You know, it was her Grandfather’s original idea to settle here and make this exact colony. He didn’t live long enough to see it completed, but her father was a big part of the planning process afterward, and then when he retired she adopted the title of Colony Overseer. Back during my first days here, we worked together a lot. What a dear she was.”

I had never seen my mom talk about someone so much, especially without anybody asking. When the doors opened at the upper level, someone was already waiting there for us.

“Sakura!”

The woman looked to be about the same age as my mom, also a human like us, with tanned features, narrow eyes, and short dark hair. Mom hugged her around her shoulders but the Overseer didn’t move her arms from her sides.

She allowed my mom to pull away before nodding at her. “Amelia. First thing, this may not be a good time. But of course, you’ve not come out all this way for nothing. I will hear you out at least. Walk with me to my office and you can tell me anything.”

I tried my best to hide behind my mom as we walked and she talked. “Uh, well, it’s a bit of a story. My mom, you see… my husband… you remember Jefferson, right? Well, we were on a job, my mom was along with us… and we had an accident. My mom needs medical attention… I mean she’s stable, but the longer we wait… I need to use one of your cryopods to make sure she doesn’t get worse.”

We arrived at a large corner office with lots of wood furniture by the time Mom finished putting together the story. Out the windows was a good view of the bigger building. We both settled into the chairs in front of the desk while Sakura took her own seat behind it.

“This is your daughter, then?” She said, smiling and making eye contact with me for the first time.

Mom patted my shoulder. “Yes, this is Sola. And Terren is with us back at the ship, with my husband and my mother.”

Sakura turned her chair about and glanced out the window. “You must have set down outside our airspace. Is that a result of an accident as well?”

“Sort of,” Mom grimaced.

The Overseer turned back. “We had an important-sounding body drop by a few days ago, looking for a ship called the Ora. They said not to let any ships land for the time being, and to pass any ship’s communications through them. I had our air controllers do as they asked. We can’t keep a strict watch over our airspace in the best circumstances, and we have bigger issues here at the moment.”

“We can offer to help in exchange for you helping us,” said my mom, leaning forward. “Can you tell me what’s going on here?”

Sakura bridged her fingers. “There’s an active quarantine right now. You might have been able to tell. Something’s going around.”

“That’s terrible.”

“It happens,” shrugged the Overseer. “Older folks can succumb to stuff like this more easily. We’ve lost more than we anticipated, and we’re low on resources. Those Cryopods, to name one thing. And on top of that, the communication relay has been jammed with some strange signal for the past few days, so we can’t send any communications out and ask for help or supplies. It just happened to stop now, which is good.”

I gulped, remembering the encoded message from Dr. Pois. “That might have been… sort of our fault.”

Sakura glanced at me. Mom slapped me across the chest with the back of her hand. “Shush, Sola.”

“Either way,” continued the Overseer, “We can’t really spare any medical staff for the time being, nor do we have any pods to spare. And I’m not quite sure why you’d want or need one if your mother is still in a stable condition. Are you expecting her to get worse?”

“We… we can wait,” decided my mom. “If you’ll have us. I mean, we dealt with those people who reached out to you. Just… returned a tool of theirs they forgot. A very important, expensive tool. So if we could take up a space on your landing pad, that would be great. Oh, and we’re expecting a guest, too. So if she could land here too with no problem. And don’t worry, we won’t ask any more of you.”

Sakura leaned back in her seat. “I’ll let ground control know. And it’s nice to see you again, Amelia. You and your happy little family.”

No Space for Family [Chapter 21]

Landing the Ora usually wasn’t a problem. I think it was pretty easy to land, or maybe my dad was just a good pilot. Rarely did we have to think about strapping in before landing. When I was younger, I apparently even slept through some of our landings, there in the rear cockpit seat.

But never did we have to land with another ship forcibly latched onto us. It might have been possible to access the bad guy’s ship and force them to undock out in space, but our spacedock hatch was cut apart on the hallway floor instead of protecting us from the cold and airlessness of the outside. And so we descended to Yuzumaru with a little extra weight.

“Hold on tight,” said Dad, his hands tight on the controls. We had just hit the gravitational pull of the planet. Mom had already scanned a landing area that was both not too far from the settlement but also not occupied with trees and sharp rocks that would damage us further.

As gravity did its thing, I felt myself being pulled to one side of the Ora by another force. The horizon and everything below it began to move sideways past our front windows as we spiraled down, the port side thrusters and flaps struggling against the extra weight.

“Jeff,” Grandma spoke up. “I’m no pilot, but this does not seem like the best way to…”

Dad grunted, leaning with the movements of the ship. “Aida, thank you, but I’d rather… the ship’s power go to the engines… and not your calculations.”

With a movement like he was wrestling a big animal, Dad pulled us out of the spin, flung out the landing gear and set us down, heavier side first. I felt the sudden thump all throughout my body, but mostly in my chest.

“Perfect landing, Dad,” Terren cheered, stretching up from his seat to pat our dad on the shoulder.

Dad flopped his hands down from the controls and sat back. “No problem. All those years as a proper freighter pilot weren’t for nothing. Sometimes a load shifts and throws off the center of mass, but you don’t find out until gravity takes you again.”

Grandma cleared her simulated throat. “Well, now that we’re settled, I can speak once more, I assume. First, I may have spoken out of turn which may have been distracting. Secondly and more importantly, the power for the ship and the power for my systems are completely independent of each other. I know because I have the schematics at my computerized fingertips!”

“You caught me, Aida,” dad chuckled.

After the necessary systems checks were run and the ship’s engines cooled, we opened the rear hatch to let fresh air in for the first time since… well, not many planets we had visited on this trip were that fresh. I had almost forgotten what trees looked like. I went outside with Dad and Terren to make sure the landing hadn’t damaged any exterior systems.

A fourth person followed us out, all of his meager belongings packed in his one little bag. Plip bowed to us there on the cargo door.

“Good family, I bid you a well-deserved goodbye. I do hope that you can sort out whatever’s wrong with your AI in there and that you are able to do so without someone to tell egregious lies in your stead.”

I waived at him. “Don’t worry, I think my dad’s got the lying part figured out.”

Dad held my head with his hand and made me bow. “Yes, but better to do so the truthful way. Don’t get into too much trouble, now, Plip.”

That was possibly the shortest goodbye my family had ever had. But I guess it made sense. I mean, the bad guys’ ship was still attached to ours.

With a little bit of help from Grandma, we remoted into its systems again and forced its locking mechanisms to disengage. It separated itself from our ship and flopped to the ground with a loud crash and thump. All that we were left with was the hole in our own hatch.

“We can rip the hatch module from their ship and put it on ours,” Terren suggested that night at dinner.

“I was thinking the same thing,” Dad concurred. “A good bit of work, but it will make it more functional than just patching over the hole. Plus we’re not going anywhere until we meet up with Dr. Pois and figure out what to do with Grandma’s body.”

“Remember to make sure everyone knows that I’m not dead,” Grandma said. “And I can’t forget to reach out to my lawyer now that we’re near a communications beacon.”

“I don’t think that’s a good idea yet, mom,” said my mom.

“Agreed,” Dad added with a nod. “When those phony security guys don’t call back to their boss or whoever, someone’s going to come searching for them. Which technically means they’ll be searching for us. Any more communications going out could be a means for them to find our location.”

“The people here on this planet seemed to be cooperating with them, though,” said Terren.

“Well,” Mom shrugged. “Little colonies like this don’t always have the agency to say no to things like that. And they don’t have the manpower to monitor and oversee their entire airspace, just around the major settled areas. If they noticed us setting down out here, hopefully they figured they didn’t need to engage in our little parley with those two… strangers.”

“Parley?” I asked.

“A negotiation,” Terren snickered. “Like how we negotiated those two cons off into space in the escape pod.”

I laughed with him. “I get it.”

“But if more of them come…” Dad sighed, hand to his cheek.

“The colony overseer might still be the same person as back then,” Mom suggested, wagging her fork. “I was on good terms with her. We were going to head into the colony sooner or later to see about options for… the body. If we can meet with the overseer and tell her what’s going on, they might be able to keep any more of those people from coming around.”

“And make sure Dr. Pois gets here safe too,” I added.

“Of course.”

“That’s what we’ll do, then. Amelia, you and Sola can go,” Dad said. “Terren and I will have to stick around here and get the ship fixed up.”

The next morning after breakfast, I got dressed in proper clothes and with proper shoes. It seemed like we were going to have to walk a while to get to the colony. At least it was going to be like a nature walk.

“Are you ready yet, Sola?” Asked my mom from the bathroom nook.

I joined her to answer. “Yes.”

Mom was staring at herself in the mirror, putting on makeup which was something I hadn’t seen her do in a while. Her hair was also brushed straight.

“Who are you and what have you done with my mom?”

Mom laughed. “What, I can’t choose to look good? I mean, maybe I just want to look like we haven’t been through heck and back this last week.”

“…That’s kind of like lying, isn’t it?”

Mom grabbed me before I could do anything and started tickling my sides. “Maybe that’s why those bad guys are after us. Because we’ve been lying too much.”

I struggled and laughed even after Mom let go. “I know… I know we’re lying to stay safe.”

Mom smirked and took another look at herself in the mirror, wiping away at a smudge under her eye with the tip of her pinky finger. “Well, in this case, I’m lying— appearance-wise— to make a proper impression.”

“How come you never wear makeup for Dad?”

Mom chuckled. “I wore plenty of makeup in the early days of us dating, even a bit into us being married. But then I figured out that your dad likes me for me, not me for what fresh face I can plaster onto myself.”

No Space for Family [Chapter 20]

After cutting the communication, we continued our approach to Yuzumaru. I think I saw it first. It looked like what we had seen on the star charts, but a bit greener.

“There she is,” Mom said with a wistful sigh. “Looking more lush every day.”

“Does that mean that the biosphere is expanding?” I asked, settling in close to my mom there at the front of the cockpit.

“It does,” she said, putting her arm around my shoulder. “After the primary process of terraforming a planet’s atmosphere, plant seeds and biomass get dropped around different places on the surface to jump-start the biosphere. Even in places where people won’t be settling. It helps to sequester carbon dioxide on planets like these that were volcanically unstable for a while. After a while, mother nature takes over and—“

“There’s someone contacting us,” interrupted Grandma. “From the surface of the planet here.”

Dad clicked his tongue. “Well, I was hoping we could just land without any fuss or having share credentials or visitor passes, but I guess even places like this care about their security too. Aida, put them through.”

The cockpit’s speakers crackled, allowing the voice through before my dad could say any more. “Identify yourselves.”

“We’re just passing through,” lied dad. He was getting better at that. “We were hoping just go set down for a bit, have a picnic, touch some grass, let some fresh planet air into our hatches. We wouldn’t disturb a soul.”

“We are cooperating with sector security in the search for a ship designated the ‘Ora’. Your hull type and weight class match their description. Again, identify yourselves, please.”

Mom looked at Dad, who looked back at me and my brother. I slid out of my mom’s arms and settled back into my seat.

Terren shook his head. “Sector security? That’s not a real designation, is it?”

“It sounds real enough to anybody that doesn’t want to deal with fact-checking,” said dad.

“There is a ship approaching,” announced Grandma.

Dad swiped the communication screen out of his way and latched onto the flight controls with both hands. “Damn, what are they trying? Aida, scan them for any weapons systems.”

“None that I can tell. Their ship is smaller than ours. Two life signs.”

“Jeff,” my mom interjected. “I agree that these people are probably up to no good. But if ground control on Yuzumaru is cooperating with them, whoever they are, doing anything to antagonize them would make us look suspicious. Not to mention, we’d be putting Dr. Pois in danger when she comes here.”

“Forget this place,” Terren huffed. “We can head somewhere else! Tell the doctor to come up with another meeting place.”

“No!” I whined back at my brother. “We’d be putting the doctor in more danger by radioing her again. She’s probably scrambled her frequency so they can’t trace her through us!”

“Jefferson!” Whined Grandma. “They’re hailing. And trying to line up with our docking port!”

Plip leaned his head in the cockpit door. “Hey now! I’m just an innocent bystander. Please tell me there’s a hatch or something I can hide in before they storm this place?”

“Jeff!”

“Dad!”

“Everyone shut up!” Dad shouted. It was louder than I had ever heard him yell before. When his voice stopped echoing, all we could hear was the hum of the engines and the low clunk of the other ship coupling with us. “I can’t think when everyone is trying to talk over each other! One at a time. Aida— the docking door?”

“I sure as heck won’t open it. And I know how to protect against a brute force attack.”

“Good. Kids?” asked Dad, turning about in his seat. “Nothing’s going to happen to us, don’t you worry.”

“That’s a nice though, Jefferson,” Grandma interrupted. “But there’s a large, concentrated heat signature on the outside of our docking hatch. They’re taking a literal approach to the meaning of ‘brute force’.”

“How much time do you think we have, Aida?”

“Based on what the specifications of the ship say… I’d imagine we have ten minutes.”

Dad jerked up out of his seat. “Okay, think. Yeah, we can make something of this. I have an idea and we’ll need everyone’s help. Especially you, Plip. No hiding for you, unfortunately. We’ll need your acting skills for one last time.”

“What now? Acting?” Plip huffed. “Don’t you know the phrase ‘shoot first, ask questions later?’”

Dad patted him on the shoulder as he marched out of the cockpit. “That’s not how we operate here, I’m afraid.”

“I’m talking about them!”

---

After about seven minutes, the hissing, sizzling sound of the cutting torch penetrated the door. I could smell the odor of singed metal and melting paint. I was up in the ceiling panel above the hallway there, peeking out through the holes in the access panel. In my hand was the hastily wired switch. Just below me was our guest, shifting back and forth with his arms crossed.

I held my breath as the final bit of the hatch door was caved in, along with the chairs that were packed in a makeshift barricade. They didn’t really do much. Through the forcefully made passage came the big brute, covered head to toe in a sort of light armor. He was followed by a lanky fellow, similarly dressed in defensive coverings. Plip raised his hands to the air with a gentle motion.

“To what do I owe the pleasure, gentlemen?” He asked.

The brute raised an energy pistol up off his belt in response. The lanky one moved around to get a better view around his partner.

“Whoa, whoa. No need to shoot. Let’s talk,” Plip encouraged, both hands now in the air.

“Who are you?” hissed Lanky. “This is clearly the Ora. We were told it is piloted by Earthlings.”

“Is that the name of this ship?” Plip shrugged, putting his hands down and back across his chest. “You’re right, it was piloted by Earthlings, humans. But I’m in control now. Any dealings you had with them might as well be null and void now.”

“Jefferson Umburter!” huffed the brute, banging on the metallic cabinet doors lining the hallway there.

Lanky sauntered forward a bit, stopping to glance up and down the main hallway to the cockpit and back to the storage hub door. “Yes, that’s the name of the man we were imagining to find here.”

Plip snickered and leaned against the wall. “Ah yes, him and his family. Well, first thing about him— humans in general— they’re too trusting. Picking up someone like me. They were nice for a bit, but I got impatient. Second thing about that man, he cared too much about his family. I was going to let the lot of them freeze to death back there in their cargo container. I’m not a gun-to-the-head sort of guy, but I couldn’t let them scheme and try to take the ship back. Four against one, you know. So I let nice Mr. Umburter sit it out alone there. And then I opened the back hatch and let the void take him.”

Lanky glanced back at the brute with a suspicious gaze. “You’re saying Mr. Umburter is out of the picture?”

“That’s what I said, didn’t I? What, did he have something of yours?”

Lanky smirked. “Just a matter of knowing too much. But speaking of that, we’re also dutied to… deactivate the AI core that this craft was carrying.”

“Deactivate, huhu,” chortled the brute, patting at what looked like an explosive on the back of his belt.

“Hah!” Plip laughed. “That Artificial Intelligence. What a nuisance. Yeah, I unplugged that loud bitch the first moment I could!”

I nearly ruined the whole plan by laughing out loud. I imagined Grandma wanting to shout at him for that. Only by pinching hard at my cheek was I able to stay silent.

Plip paced a bit and continued. “Yeah, I think the core or whatever must have ended up in the void with the man of the family. The wife and kids are still here, ‘course. Locked nicely in their rooms. I’m not that bad of a guy. I was about to drop them off on this planet here. But then you two decided to drop in instead.”

Lanky ground his teeth. “The wife probably knows too much, too.”

Plip sighed and shrugged. “If she does, good luck having her tell you about it. She’s been bawling her eyes off since her husband got offed. Moaning about keeping her kids safe, too. She’s right though this way if you really want her. Would that be enough to get you folks off this ship of mine?”

Lanky hissed through his teeth. “Move to the side. Bugan!”

“Yes, sir,” said the brute, marching forward and shoving Plip to the side. He went to the door at the opposite side of the ship and smashed at the controls with his meaty hand. Just as the escape pod’s exterior door hissed open, the plan went into action.

Terren jumped out from under the hallway’s floor panel, while my dad pushed out of the bathroom. They both ran at the intruders, shoving Lanky first and shunting them both into the awaiting doors of the escape pod before they could react.

“Hands free! Sola, now!” Shouted dad.

I hit the switch and hoped hard that it would work. The security doors closed to prevent the ship from losing pressure and the pod ejected, sending both of them off in the little sealed container.

Plip leaned against the wall, letting out a long sigh. “You lot are crazy. You’re sure they won’t be able to do any more funny business from there?”

Dad chuckled, shaking Terren in celebration. “Sola and Aida reprogrammed the systems in there so they’re pretty much locked out. Not even a distress beacon. There are at least some rations in there for a good week or two.”

“A week for that big guy, I’d say,” Terren laughed. “We’re lucky he fit through the door of the escape pod.”

Dad stood on his tiptoes and slid the ceiling access hatch open, right by where I was hiding. “Swing around Sola, feet first.”

As my dad got me down from the ceiling there, mom opened the door of the cargo hub, a long metal bar in her hands. “Good show, boys.”

I heard the faint hum of the speaker system crackle on. “Loud bitch, you said?”

“I was acting, you damn computer!” Plip said up to the ceiling. “What a… dreadful experience. I mean, I’m not always on my best behavior, but I’ve never had to role-play as some… pirate… scumbag… murderer.”

“Maybe you can start an acting career,” I joked as I found solid ground again.

Mom set herself beside the hatch and the sections of door that had been cut away. “I guess we’re not going to be able to disengage their ship. Can you still land it on the planet with them attached?”

“Doesn’t seem like we have a choice but to try,” said Dad, rubbing the back of his head. “Aida, get to hacking their systems in case their location is being tracked.”

“I’m on it. And I’ll do so as quietly as possible, so as to not disturb our guest any further.”

“Like I said, acting!”