Chapter 2
Tom Ben did seek out his second oldest child to congratulate her. Despite his rough words to Fancy, he was immeasurably proud of LizE. She was outside on their property watching the twins taking a series of complex measurements at one of the greenhouses.
LizE laughed quietly as Mara and Mark clambered over one of the seven greenhouses nestled around the gardens. Measuring lasers lit up large and small lengths of the alloy and glass structure as the meticulous twins took detailed measurements.
"Are you sure you have enough?" LizE teased as Mara measured the inside eave for a second time. Her next youngest sister glared at her with narrowed dark eyes. Most of the family had dark coloring like their mother: dark hair and eyes. Juno and Luna had been blessed, according to Mrs. Ben, with blue eyes—which were rare in the 21st century. "A recessive gene that does not get displayed overly much," Fancy Ben would say. She would worm the fact of it into conversations if she could, "but which we were blessed with. Who knew I had a recessive blue in me?" Tom Ben had blue eyes yet it never seemed to occur to Fancy that the daughters' blue might be their father's, not her recessive blue ones.
Mara and Mark were twins, with Mara beating Mark out of the womb by three minutes. She never let him forget it—that she was older, and that he also had three older sisters. LizE had a soft spot for her only brother and tried her best to shield him from the hysterics that often went on in a household so full of women; and one in which her father was so often absent. It helped too that she had a fondness for being out of doors and up trees or in mud puddles when they were growing up, which made LizE and Mark close companions as children.
The twin bond between Mara and Mark was strong as it often is, despite being of opposite gender. At some moments they seemed to speak a special language between them, one that was often not verbal. Rather than an interest in science, like the other family members, their interest lay in engineering, hence their Uni project on improving the efficiency of greenhouses.
Tom Ben laughed with his second child, enjoying the fresh air and the antics of his third and fourth before he headed back to his desk, his comm screen, and work.
He congratulated LizE formally at dinner, in front of Fancy, as a way of placating his wife.
She sniffed in approval. "You know, dearest Tom, the Netherfield Institute is going to have that Grand Gala in October. What a fine thing! A party. The girls can get all dressed up, and Juno," she looked at her oldest who, like her father, had her comm screen sitting next to her at the table with her eyes focused on it, "can forget about work for once, and maybe socialize a bit?"
No one said anything. The two youngest, KitE and Luna, like Juno, were glued to their screens.
"Put those things away!" screeched Fancy and she slapped the table. The teenagers jumped and reluctantly shoved them away from their places at the table. Tom did not even flinch and Juno remained glued to hers.
"Hey Mom! I haven't started work yet. I don't have a comm screen in front of me," placated LizE.
"Well before you get too immersed in work, you need to make sure you get tickets for the Grand Gala! That is going to be quite the local to-do according to Daria Lucas. All the neighbors are going. You should see if you can get extra tickets for your family to attend," she smiled broadly.
"I have no idea what the Gala entails or why I would want to go," answered LizE as she picked through her dinner.
"You should use it to meet your work colleagues and perhaps some of them are handsome young men!" encouraged Fancy.
"Really Mom!"
"Well Juno, do you think you can wrangle some extra tickets for the family?" Fancy asked her oldest.
Juno finished some bit of work before she turned off her comm screen and put it into a bag she had hanging on her chair.
"I can ask," replied Juno. "There have been rumors that some scientist may be visiting the Institute so it may be a little difficult to get extra tickets."
"It might be a good opportunity for the twins to have some exposure to post-Uni life," suggested Tom looking up from his screen.
"The Institute does employ a lot of college-age interns so I think I can get tickets for them," Juno replied.
"That would be cool," replied Mark.
"And educational," continued Mara.
"Dad you should come too, I think there might be some folks from the Central Soil Institute coming up for a visit," Juno continued as she nibbled on her cold dinner. "It really is supposed to be a Grand night for science."
"Huh, I had not heard, perhaps I should comm the main office down south," and he quickly did some searches on his comm screen as Fancy looked on with closed lips, muttering about her nerves.
KitE and Luna moped at their end of the table as they watched their father's fingers on his screen their hands inching towards their own. "Don't even think about it," warned Fancy and they leaned on the table with their heads in their hands.
"We have practically grown up there. Aunt Meg and Uncle Ezra worked there since, like, forever, at least since we've been born," Luna pouted at the table though to no one in particular, "We have been to all the open houses you'd think we would be invited too."
"Well it is a night-time sort of event and with what sounds like all the extra attendees, they will definitely need some of the militia on guard," remarked their father, looking over at the two teenagers with their identical pouts.
"Oh they are dreamy, the militia," said KitE.
"No, savory," said Luna as she looked down at her plate.
"You know, they are a co-ed corps, so you're saying the women officers are dreamy too," remarked LizE as she set down her fork and looked at her two youngest sisters.
"Yes, well, anyone in a uniform is dreamy," sighed Luna and batted her eyelashes to emphasize the fact.
"No, she doesn't mean that, she's got a crush on that Joshua Denny," and KitE knocked Luna's elbow out from under her.
"Oh shut up," yelled the youngest Ben.
"Okay you two, settle down, or go outside and play or something." The two girls rolled their eyes grabbed their comm screens and left.
"So, Juno, any word from Alex Morris?" asked Fancy.
"Mom we work together in the same group, we can't date. Sort of not a good work policy to date people at work anyways, things go wrong, it affects your research, big disaster," she took another reluctant bite of food.
"But if you marry, like your father and I?" prompted Fancy.
Juno gave her mother as withering a look as she could muster (which was not much) and which only made Fancy smile.
"Any word on any other big wigs that are to attend?" asked Tom as he scrolled through items on his comm, though he did catch Juno's eye.
"I heard there might be some visiting scientists coming, that was all. You know how political some institutes can get; I suspect they might be coming to look at us, sly-like, to consider moving shop. It can be hard, once you have established yourself (and in particular if you have an original line of research) to move to a different institute since they are all privately funded." Fancy looked more pleased as Juno spoke. Juno continued. "I can understand why they used to be publically funded or underwritten by government grants in the old days. It is can be nice not having to think about the money."
"Yes, but sometimes you never got funding at all. You'd have to beg. Very unpleasant." Tom was looking up from his comm screen and at a point in the middle of the table. "Having the private institutes made it a lot easier to get your research done."
"Yes, but you still need to compete for the money and so often there's politics involved, ugly," remarked Fancy who had the same far-away look. The remaining four children looked at their parents turning almost in tandem from Tom to Fancy. "But now two of your work at Netherfield, and you're helping to contribute to the federal seed bank registry and making a little money and," she paused to catch her breath and smiled, "in a place to meet nice young men!" Her children groaned and dinner was over.