Sorry for all the confusion. (And thanks, Tikatu, for pointing out the typo!)
63: Pop Up
Endurance-
The method and time had been decided well in advance. On Monday, 27 May 2067, Linda Bennett-Tracy was delivered of a full term baby girl by laser Cesarean Section. (Earth weight 7 pounds, 3 ounces... 21 and-a-half inches long.)
Kim Cho performed the procedure, with Pete McCord assisting; the entire operation taking a scant 52 minutes, excluding anesthesia. Roger Thorpe stood a nervous flight deck watch and updated Houston. John Tracy stayed on the patient's side of the procedure screen, keeping his drugged wife company.
Others might have experienced things differently, but what the pilot chiefly recalled was floating there beside Linda's green-capped head, hearing the laser scalpel hum and pop, listening to Cho's terse commentary and Roger's transmitted questions.
(The Marine was far more nervous than John, or the medical personnel back in Mission Control.)
The father-to-be wielded a suction instrument with quiet professionalism, capturing the few airborne blood drops that escaped their glowing containment field. Hetried not to sneeze at the sharp smell of iodine, and did his best to follow Linda's strange, confused ramblings.
(Something about whether spaghetti or pencil erasers made a better lure for purple killer whales. Okay.)
Every so often, John remembered to nod, but she'd have gone on regardless, probably. Then came the moment when the baby was lifted free of blood, amnion, retracted flesh and containment field; out of warmth and darkness and into reality.
Dr. Kim handed her off to Pete, who stood sideways on a bulkhead Velcro pad with a receiving towel.
"About damn time!" The mission commander said, not very gruffly.
She was disinfected and vacuumed dry. Began to cry when the cold iodine solution hit her reddish skin, and a tiny RFID chip was implanted. The sound… a thin, wavering sob… snapped Linda right out of her drugged haze.
"The baby…!" She whispered to John. "Get the baby, please! I can't move…"
Her panic was real, causing Linda's heart monitor to begin beeping just as the little one's med icon popped up beside hers. John stroked the top of his wife's head, saying,
"Wait here."
…then seized the neck of an extensible operating theatre light and heaved himself around the screen to face Cho and the mission commander. Moments later (before he was actually ready) the blanketed infant was thrust upon him by Pete.
"Mazletov. Now, go away. We're busy."
And they were, too. The other half of Linda was a mess, and he could surely have done without the sight of red-purple organs and blood-smeared retractors. They did get the alarm cut off, though. That was something.
Next, back to the less gory side of the procedure screen, where the tidier aspects of his wife waited to meet her child, the cause of all this fuss. The baby had warmed enough by now to stop crying, which only served to further panic Linda. John quickly brought the infant into her mother's line of sight, close enough so that his wife could kiss her exposed, pensive little face.
Inside him, something pushed very hard against its walls, but he quelled it. Too much going on. Instead, John watched andhe listened.
" 'Lo…!" Linda whispered. "Hi, Sweetie! I know… look differen' from out here… but is me, Baby-girl… i's mommy."
Now exhaustion and drugs took over, dragging an unwilling mother toward dense, black unconsciousness.
"John…?" Her brown eyes were already closing.
"Yeah," he replied, putting a hand to her cold cheek so she'd know he was still there… like he'd done in Persia for Dr. Afshar.
"Stay wi'… 'er. Don'… let…"
"Understood," he cut in, to spare her the anguish of further concern.
And then, with his wife out, Roger bellowing update requests from the flight deck, and everyone else occupied, it was just him and Junior.
He began with the edges, noting pale blonde hair and a compact overall configuration bounded by the tightly-swaddled towel. Unformatted, obviously; with big, puzzled blue eyes. John vaguely recalled despising the confusion and helplessness of babyhood, himself.
"Yeah. Um… Hey. You're new here… so I guess I'll fill you in until your mom's back online."
The baby… his daughter… blinked; trying to focus blurry visuals on the source of a (probably) familiar voice.
"Don't worry about that. As I understand it, vision sort of debugs itself in a couple of weeks… but I'll admit to not having read the manual."
She yawned… like a rescued tabby kitten full of smuggled milk… except that he wasn't allergic to this one. Something shifted around a little, clearing memory for a new relationship. But, another part of him already understood. He pulled her just abit closer and kissed the tiny girl's forehead, saying,
"Hello again, Baby-doll."
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX
She flew before she could walk; learning to push off of people or surfaces and tug at her tether to move around in the weightless little world. Except for playtime in the padded cubicle made by her Uncle Roger, Kara Jane-Ellen Tracy was nearly always attached by mini-harness to someone. Five someones…
Mommy: provider of milk, kisses and contentment. Fast responder to cries and confusion.
Daddy: father/creator. Always busy, but never upset when she grabbed at his hair to pull herself along and stare at the screen or paper.
Uncle Pete: who made a ball for her out of rags and duct tape, taught her to catch… and quickly learned to watch his language.
Auntie Cho: endlessly patient, always willing to play 'where's Janey?' or fix a snack.
Uncle Roger: funny. Maker of toys and not-for-real Marine tattoos.
For the first eighteen months of Junior's life, these people were all she knew; a creaking, rumbling ship and constant checklists her whole world.
She learned not to touch. That, just like her family, each button or switch had a sometimes dangerous job. She would ask questions.
"Why Unca Pete sick?" ('Out in the sun too long.')
"Why Daddy busy?" ('Lots going on, trying to write an invisible RFID virus. Any ideas?')
"Why Unca Roger got one leg short?" (Different answer every time, always funny and scary.)
"Why Janey little than ever'body?" ('New system, still gaining applications. Give it time.')
"What's Moon? What's Earth?" ('Where we're going.')
"Why?" ('Because it's home.')
She had jobs, too: feed Lucky, put fish food for Thing One and Thing Two. Don't eat the fish food. Or Lucky's, not even. They need it!
She could sometimes talk to flat picture-people on the big, big screen… but they didn't come out to play with her. There were movies… the best was 'Star Wars', but 'The Yearling' was good, too, because Mommy would always watch with her and cover her eyes on the scary part.
Uncle Roger made a harness and springy strap for her to push hard off the deck (for her legs), and a rope to pull on to touch the bulkhead (for her arms)… so she could be strong.
She learned to eat food like a big girl, and if she had to go potty, tell someone.
Daddy's computer had fun games in it. He taught her to code 'Hello World' in Python and Steel. She liked that, but she mustn't open the 'Inkblot' and 'Bit-storm' files. Not ever, because that was for later, at home.
She slept with Mommy and Daddy, waking (and sometimes going along) when one of them left the bed to stand watch. That was her world, and it was a happy one. Everybody loved her, even when they got mad.
People on the movies did strange things. She didn't really understand the 'trees' or 'cars'.
(Sort of like Auntie Cho's herb garden, Daddy said, but bigger; cars were like the ship, kind of, but on a flat "road", and not so fast… But she still didn't understand.)
And they went outside, where it was dangerous to kill you with no air…! Janey always covered her eyes when movie people opened the hatch, because that was bad. Mommy and Daddy would never do that. Uncle Roger and Auntie Cho would never do that. Uncle Pete would sure never do that, because he didn't want to fry his a… ("Sorry bad word, Mommy!")
Kara Jane-Ellen Tracy did not really believe in those movie people, or in 'home', either. But then they got to the Moon… where everything happened bad: she was too weak to play, she could not fly, the flat people came out with guns, and Daddy went away.