FTL…12 Faster Than Life.

Chapter 12

I’m really focused on scan now that we have real live alien VIP’s on board I have visions of something coming after us because of it and thankfully I’m wrong and the one thing I do notice is.

Nav-Command didn’t treat us any differently than any other VIP shuttle. We’re treated with the same respectful indifference. I know one thing and that’s I’m glad I’m not flying. There’s a lot of pressure I can imagine.

It’s uneventful except for the looks that we’re exchanging back and forth. The girl I sort of made eye contact with before is really trying hard not to do the wide eyes thing and rubberneck.

I’m not sure that I’d be able to hold back either.

We land and there’s words between on of their middle command people and the flight commander. Stillwater comes over. “Alright crew out first they want to thank you all before the rest of this goes on. And stick around command wants a word.”

It’s a bit tense as we line up and the alien…these Makere VIP’s get off the transport and they shake our hands like we do but it’s some thing they must have been taught because there’s no fluidity of the gesture.

I lock eyes with the young staffer and there’s a bit bigger of a smile between us. Then they’re escorted off by their guards or soldiers and some of ours with both the Consort majors the heads of the military companions. The ships, our ships commander comes up to us.

“I know that this goes without saying but this is a classified need to know only flight mission. You don’t talk to this about anyone other that command staff from this ship only. Are we clear?”

“Yessir!” we all answer.

“Alright dismissed, enjoy your leave.”

He leaves and I watch him go. I’m usually way too into him to be all reflective but this is something really serious. I mean real aliens, and me frying to figure out what it all means.

We’re not even out of the bay when Astrid Jenkins asks Stillwater. “So why are they here?”

Stillwater just looked at her. “Do I look like command Private?”

“No Corporal…”

“Exactly.” Two MP’s showed up likely called by her implant. “Take the Private here into secure holding and make sure she stays there under guard until command talks to her. Command staff only no one else.”

Jenkins looks panicked and scared but she goes with the guards.

“We’ve been ordered not to talk about that unless it’s with command staff for this ship only and that includes all of us…each other.”

One of the others asks. “Jenkins in serious shit Corporal?”

“Enough, she’ll likely get a good dressing down and she’ll be in segregation until this is open or she gets assigned into the middle of this. Loose lips people…we’re professionals, we are soldiers, we follow orders. Got that?”

“Yes Corporal!” we all call out.

It sort of seems harsh but then again what we just did is pretty huge. This is second contact…which means there was a first contact and we’ve never heard even a whiff of it so it’s very top secret stuff.

And I don’t blame the government for that.

Okay, we have lots of sciences and we’ve come a long way but there are also the religious ones for example. They’ve come right along too with us and they…well what happens to the whole creationist thing when you’re confronted with life, real intelligent life from non-earth backgrounds.

Then add it the paranoids, the conspiracy nuts types, anarchist, and the list of people that would run amok about all of this is huge. Some of the theocratic star colonies would very likely go to war.

So secret and quiet makes sense.

Even Soleil makes sense. I mean this place is our shore leave and is essentially our last hurrah before we get dropped into the crucible of what will be our academy days. It’s like that old earth college concept of spring break?

Who would even thing to look for aliens even blue ones in this place? The cosmetic mods and the gene mods of some of the different sections of the C.U. armed forces are that varied and widespread that they won’t really stick out that much.

A good place for a summit meeting really.

I’m sort of feeling better about things for figuring out the stuff that I have figured out and I head back to my quarters and start to pack my few things I’m taking with me for shore leave and then head to medical for my tint injection.

It’s just a type of nano-bot that works its way to the surface layers of your skin and it helps you tan safely rather than burn. It’s not a standard injection for non-desert op staff so it costs me about two hundred credits but I’m told that its money well spent.

I meet Patrick down at the transports and it feels so strange to be off duty and going out off ship all free and clear. This has kind of been my life for awhile now.

………………………….. The first thing I notice is our public implant functions get turned back on as we break into the atmosphere. I see a few relieved and glazed looks as people delve into VR headspace like they’re getting their fix.

Me…it’s too noisy and I shut down all but a few functions. I leave my translator on and here they speak natively earth french for the actual natives so I keep that app ready if I need it and my military message com up but that’s about it. I don’t even have the private chat function on between me and Patrick.

I like actually talking to him a whole lot better.

The second thing that hit’s me is the sheer plethora of kinds of people here when we hit the terminal, hundreds of different kinds of people here if you count the different ethnics and the different mods.

“Wow.”

“Hmm hon?”

He called me hon. Okay that’s seriously normal life boy girl stuff. I smile and lean on him just taking it in.

“There’s so many different kinds of people here it’s confusing and chaotic and busy. I wasn’t expecting this.”

“It’ll be like this at training for you Erin, the whole planet is set up as training and all the support stuff there plus command stuff and member embassies.”

“Oh.”

“It’ll be like this but about ten times the numbers and all in great big cities and stuff.”

“I’m glad I’ll be on base.”

“You’re going to be there for year’s hon. A lot of cadets get places off base to live.”

“Huh, that’s allowed?”

“It’s the training planet; the whole thing is really a base.”

“Oh okay why the apartments though. I mean doesn’t the closeness foster teamwork?”

“For some units but you’re going nav, that’s a lot of schooling and some people like their study space.”

“Wow, that’s a lot to think about.”

“Nah, don’t stress it they’ll keep your on base the first year pretty much for full on basic.”

“I though the ship was basic.”

“No, its training and it’s getting you cadets ready for basic but it’s really to eval people and to weed out the undesirables.”

“Oh…so do things we learn on ship count there?”

“Oh yeah they add into the requirement slots/course for you MOS. (Military occupational specialty.)

“Good I think I’ve been doing good.”

“Yeah, according to scuttlebutt you are.”

“Oh?”

“Yeah you’re being looked at by some interested parties.”

“So what does that mean?”

“You know what cherry-picking is?”

“Uhm…not fruit harvesting.”

“No it’s where you wait to get a turn ahead of someone else for something before someone else.”

“Uhm okay…”

“There’s certain ships and commands to get assigned to that are better than others right?”

“Right.”

“Well some of those aren’t just handed out to the ones with the scores but the cadets with the “right stuff.” Well they’re the ones that get cherry picked for these positions by the commanders.”

“Oh…and I’m going to get cherry picked?”

“From the rumors there’s a good chance of it unless you really screw up in training.”

“Oh…”

“Ready hon?”

“Ready.”

…………………………………..Oh I wasn’t ready. We stepped out of those doors for a hover-cab and I get hit by this wave of heat and humidity that staggers me almost. Ship’s are pretty much on the cool side, home was too…lush and green but misty and damp too. Summer heat was likely mid twenties in Celsius; thirty was a heat wave home. Here I’m betting it’s thirty easy in the shade…and then there’s the humidity…shallow ocean waters dumps a lot of evaporation in the air.

I’m sweat soaked by the time we get to our bungalow.

Yes, Patrick’s seriously spoiling me and we rented a bungalow for the whole stay and it’s right down on the water off of this really nice beach and it comes fully stocked and…and he’s paying for the whole thing.

We don’t even really unpack that first day that we’re there…we drink these fruit drinks that he makes and I get a bit loopy and we sleep, we tan…we tan naked and I get to rub coconut oil all over him and him rubbing it all over me and that leads to sex…to lovemaking five times! Five times and it wasn’t just sweet lovemaking but it was good…hard…fast…intense make me scream into the sheets lovemaking.

But the slow stuff was just as intense.

Naked in the bedroom of this small cabin like place with this big bed and this light sheets and the scents of the tropical plants, the salt water and us in the air and stirred by the breeze…as we slowly made love.

Three of those times were just that this cycle of making love in between periods of just letting the sex drain our energy to where we slept again.

I love it here already. The others can party it up and likely are but right now I’m just wearing this wrap around my waist, it’s 02:33 hours local and I’m on the beach where there’s a fire going and Patrick is cooking us food since we’re starving now. It was so cool watching him just take this net baggy and walk into the surf and catches our supper. He’s literally raised to forage like this. His people are all gene-mods from a seriously aquatic colony and he looked like……this much more exotic vision of Neptune coming out of the surf in just his swim wear and the coconut oil and the natural scaling parts in his skin glittering in the light thrown off by the planet.

I love planet light, it’s like so much stronger better moonlight….I have waited all of my life to live real moments like these. We come close to burning our fingers off the rock lobsters and the shellfish he brought up and the giant prawn things that are like the size of bananas…just simple stuff too eat them with…some cut lemons and limes, some butter in a bowl to dip the hot meat into that’s it and the spice of getting fed by my lover.

I’m going to treasure this…I have to soak this into my heart because after this we’re gone…he’s off to an assignment and I’ll be headed to fleet training.

But here and now absolutely everything’s been worth it.