CH28 (107)

Alexis was out with Elena, they didn't know doing what.

Martha had offered to watch the girls. "It'll give me a chance to hug them some more before you move to Ariel."

Martha had seen them on the video chips but it had been 3 years since she saw Emily and couldn't remember if she had ever gotten to see Kali except on those video chips.

"Martha, … It sounds like you like Tellus. You know you can come with us, right?" Kate didn't want her to think they were taking away her grandchildren from her.

"Katherine dear, since I've been here I've learned I'm a big city lady. You and Richard obviously like Ariel. It sounds like it will be a lot like your summer home. I'm sure you and your family will love it.

Maybe when Ariel gets bigger. …. And for now I have one more year on my contract for what I'm doing here.

It's a lot like New York here, just hotter. And I'm having fun. … Don't worry about me dear. …. You can let me know when your ship is ready and maybe I can join you for a while. Take a vacation of sorts." Martha put up a smile for Kate.

"I'll hold you to that Martha. I took you away from Earth. I don't want to take your grandchildren away from you too. You're family." Kate would tie her up and drag her to Ariel if she thought she needed to.

Martha takes her hands. "I'm fine dear, honest. I was an actress when I was young. I took any job I could find and dragged my son along with me. I worried constantly that I was doing the right thing with him.

Then he became a famous writer and gave me my first grandchild. Now he has you and you two have given me even more grandchildren. I'm happy for you and my son. You two are perfect for each other.

I'm convinced someone somewhere sent you to him, and when I find out whom that was; I'm going to thank them. You've made Richard very happy. He may have been happy before you showed up, but he is positively glowing now.

I'll be fine dear." Martha tries to see her point of view. "You go to your dinner dear. We will be fine."

Rick had offered to take Kate out to dinner. Just the two of them. They hadn't done anything alone just for themselves since Emily was born.

Rick finally walked in wearing a new suit that he had found in a store on Tellus. It was not very Earth like.

"WOW, you clean up nice husband of mine." Kate was impressed. He looked great wearing Tellus fashion.

Kate conversely was wearing a long Burgundy dress with a very high slit on one side that was almost backless and exposed one shoulder. She had gotten it from a store that tried to duplicate fashion from Earth. It was from something Alexis had downloaded. It was a picture as part of the information she had downloaded.

Rick was melting as Kate walked up to him to run her fingers over what Rick was wearing.

"You look amazing wife of mine. I'm going to enjoy taking my time removing you from that dress later tonight." Rick leaned down and kissed her cheek, not wanting to mess up her makeup.

"And what makes you think you are going to get to do that." Kate teases, since she was now looking forward to it as well.

Rick rubs her exposed arm lightly with his finger tips. "Because I love you and I intend to prove it." Leaving Kate with goose bumps as his fingers past over her skin.

"Let's go husband, I want to show you off." Kate had gold and she wanted all those other women to know it.

The restaurant they had chosen was small, rather dark except for the light over their table. Making it feel like they were alone even though they were in a public place.

Kate noticed that most of the food was typical Tellus that most places didn't serve. However a lot of the fruit and vegetables were definitely Earth type.

"What do you think they will do?" Rick asks Kate after giving their order.

"I don't think Kevin is going to go for it. It's a lot of work and I think they want to stay together." Kate knew they had been doing everything together for the last 3 or more years. Breaking up now didn't seem likely.

"He might make a very good detective. Just the time it will take for him to get there." Rick kinda agreed.

"Lanie will be welcome anywhere. Cyliene could certainly use her expertise." Rick had noticed.

"Lanie would be welcome anywhere, here included." Kate agrees.

"You think Javi was interested in a sniper school? I mean Earth is gone thanks to conflicts. Sniper school is teaching how to kill from long range. Killing is something Tellus had done well at preventing." Rick points out.

"Yea, but if we're going to survive what is coming, we're going to have to learn. He obviously has the experience." Kate didn't want to follow Earth. Look what happened doing it their way.

"What do you think about the request we received?" Rick changed topics.

"Talk to this Admiral from Earth? I don't know what he wants. We're not military. I don't know what we can tell him." Kate didn't understand why he wanted to talk with them.

"He was way out in the Pacific. He's not someone I know. I don't know. …. I suppose we could talk with him. It wouldn't hurt us to listen to what he has to say I suppose." Rick wasn't enthusiastic. Listening to his planet die from Roy first and then Kate's friends was two times too many. Doing it again with some Admiral.

"We don't have to go babe." Kate reaches across looking for his hand.

Rick reaches out to take it. "I just don't need to hear Earth die all over again. …. All those places and all those people." Good and bad, all gone.

"Then we don't go." Kate is willing to put her foot down for him.

Rick wanted off this topic. This was their dinner. "What do you think of Elena?" Rick had his opinion.

"I'm so glad we sent Alexis to school. She shouldn't be growing up creating colony planets. If they find another one and she is older she can decide for herself. I'm really glad we sent her babe, really glad." Kate had stolen years from Alexis already due to the way things had gone. She didn't want Alexis to lose any more.

Rick was nodding his head. "Being here has been good for her. Just like being back in New York. But what about Elena herself?" Rick wanted her opinion.

"She's nice. She is a lot more outgoing than Alexis. I'll bet she got Alexis out of school and away from Martha often enough for her to live and meet new people. …. She actually reminds me of Kali. The first Kali. Elena is so, …. not Alexis. I'll bet she has shown Alexis a whole new world.

Kali, my Kali, the first Kali, was so adventurous. So out going, willing to take risks. She brought all the fun in mine and Mags lives. I guess that's what hurt so much after we lost her. Mags and I just didn't know what to do after that.

That's what I see in Elena." Kate hated talking about losing Kali, but liked remembering the good times.

Rick reached across searching for Kate's hand this time. Getting Kate to take it and smile at him.

"Maybe Alexis will teach Elena to slow down and see the fun in doing nothing while on Ariel. Kinda like she did for you back at the summer home." Rick points out.

"We're going to need to find a way for them to get off the island when they want." Kate points out.

"Alexis knows how to fly a shuttle, but yeah, we need another method so no one feels trapped. Maybe a simple boat like a ski boat or something. Something that can hold a few people and have the range we need. …. Maybe Lucy can find us something." Rick offers.

"Does Elena swim?" Kate has noticed that has been a problem. Not a lot of people used the lakes to go swimming in. Even her, Madison and Kate didn't go there when they were young.

"I don't know, but Alexis can teach her." Rick thought she would be willing to do that.

Their food was delivered and they suddenly found they stopped talking as they enjoyed the taste.

They declined desert since they knew that desert was going to be before they even left home.

Next up was a leisurely stroll thru a local mall hand in hand, being way over dressed. It wasn't much of a mall really. It reminded Rick more of a Saturday Market where people displayed items they made. Plus there were these little places to eat or get snacks. Or in this case, ice cream, which did not get passed by.

Rick was licking his ice cream cone. "Have you met Elena's parents?" Getting Kate to shake her head.

"We should probably fix that. She is going to be staying with us for a number of months, on another planet." Rick wouldn't let Alexis go without meeting them.

"Alexis has met them, maybe they think that is enough. We can talk with Elena about it. I don't want to force ourselves on them." Kate had been thinking about that too.

"And when did you get to be so smart?" Rick traced a finger across his ice cream cone and deposited it on the tip of Kate's nose. Getting Kate to scrunch her face and glare at him.

Rick just grins and leans in to kiss the ice cream away. "Have I mentioned how gorgeous you look?"

"Not since dinner." Kate grins back wiping at her nose to make sure all the ice cream was gone.

"Where can we get a can of whip cream I wonder." Rick was talking to himself mostly.

"What do you need whip cream for?" They were already eating their impromptu desert.

"Well since you're my desert tonight, I was thinking of spraying some whip cream on it. In all the right places of course." Rick was grinning wide.

Kate stopped breathing, just imagining what Rick was going to do with a can of whip cream on her naked body. "Let's go." Kate takes his arm and starts pulling him in a new direction.

Caught off guard a little Rick stumbles along behind her. "Where are we going?"

"We're going to find that can of whip cream. …. Maybe even two. One for you and one for me." Kate grins back with a little hint of what was to come in her eyes.

That had Rick walking faster to try and keep up with her.

It was hours later when they were both giggling at each other standing in the shower together trying to get the sticky parts off of each other that their tongues didn't get. "We need to go back and get some more." Rick tells her.

It gets Kate to grin at him. "And take it with us to Ariel." Kate finished his thought for him.

"And keep the girls away from it or they'll have it on their pies or whatever." Rick adds.

Kate simply kissed him in response, which slowly made its way into round three.

Rick and Kate had just finished with a meeting with one of the council members. They had talked about the possibility of Javi opening up a sniper school, provided that he wanted to, along with a couple of other topics.

So long as Javi and or Kevin, if Kevin joined him, passed their psych evaluation they had no problem in letting him start one on any planet of his choosing, including Cyliene. Though a planet like Athos or Callisto would likely work out better.

"There is an Admiral Quast that would like to speak with you two." And watches Rick and Kate's face and posture drop a little. "He has been told you have no desire to go over what happened on Earth, yet again. He has assured us that this is not about that." Getting Rick and Kate to look at each other.

"He is in another room waiting. It is your choice." He honestly didn't care if they did or didn't talk with him.

Rick gives a heavy sigh. "Sure, send him in."

A few moments later, Quast enters. Rick and Kate see an older man, maybe early 60's. A little under 6 feet. It looked like he had lost a lot of weight recently. His face was a little thin and his service uniform that he was still wearing didn't look like it fit him very well anymore.

And his eyes told them that he had seen too much, but he walked with a purpose and had an air of authority around him.

"Mr. Castle, Mrs. Castle. Or around here it's detective Castle." Quast shakes their hands. "It's a pleasure to actually meet you. I'll try not to take up too much of your time."

"What can we help you with Admiral?" Kate wanted to finish and get out of here. Rick had been thru enough already.

"Please, call me Phil. I'll be changing out of this when we get to Cyliene. Not really an Admiral without at least one ship. And there is no reason to build warships for a sea when there is no enemy on the ocean." Quast smiles. Maybe it was time to retire. A lot had happened; it was time for the kids to take over.

"I wanted to know how much you downloaded from Earth. James had managed to track down some of it I was told but I never got a full listing or what it was about." Quast just wanted to know one little thing.

"James?" Rick asks.

"Sorry, James Comey, director of the FBI. Well what was the FBI." Quast smiles lightly. So much had changed.

"Aahhhh, Alexis would probably have a better listing than we do. Basically it was a lot of entertainment stuff. Movies, TV shows. I think she selected everything that didn't have violence in it.

There was also a lot of data on power generation, how to grow food in a desert environment.

Even every drawing necessary needed to build Disneyland and a water park. She's a big Disney fan so there is probably a lot of movies or even TV shows, like Wonderful World of Color. That kind of thing." Rick answers his question.

Quast was grinning, and then started giggling lightly. "James was convinced you were stealing more secret information. How to build nukes, laser technology, ICBM's, how to create biological weapons, Stealth, that sort of stuff."

"We've worked very hard at trying to remain peaceful. That type of information kind of defeated the purpose." Kate tells him.

Quast nods his head. "Except for this interstellar war headed this way, or so I'm told."

"We didn't know that at the time. But it changes nothing. Most of what you are talking about is used to kill each other, not an enemy from space." Kate points out, defending her planet.

"Except now you have to learn to be killers if you want to live." Quast counters. "But that is a problem I'm glad I won't be around long enough to try and solve. … Wars are messy. We thought they were messy enough that we could avoid them. Apparently we were wrong." Quast suddenly looked sad.

"You lose someone?" Kate asks. She could almost feel the sense of loss rolling off of him.

"My daughter. … She lived in LA at the time. I'm hoping it was quick and painless, but I don't know." Quast pulled out his wallet and handed over the only remaining picture he has of her.

"She's lovely. …. Was your wife living there also?" Kate now felt sorry for him. Everyone on those ships had lost someone.

Quast however shakes his head. "My wife died in a car accident years ago. It was just her and me. Except when I was on deployment." Quast takes his photo back and puts his wallet away.

"I'm sorry. We all lost someone it seems. I lost a lot of friends and people I knew. My daughter lost her best friend that she'd had for years." Rick speaks for the first time.

"Try not to fall into the same trap we did. …. It's good to know at least something came away from Earth with you. Except for people and our memories, we didn't bring much of anything.

Thank you for your time. I hope your daughter has found some new friends and isn't too hurt by what we did to ourselves." Quast shakes their hands and walks off.

"He looked tired babe." Kate whispers out watching him exit the building.

"Bone tired. … A man who has seen and done too much." Rick agrees.

"You don't think, …." Kate was suddenly worried.

Rick however knew just what she was thinking. "No I don't, … He's NAVY. He may be tired and he may not have ships to command, but there is no quit in him. He'll find a way to do everything he can.

He'll fight the enemy he is given until he can't anymore, and then he'll rest." Rick didn't have any fear for his future. Army, Navy, Marines, it didn't matter. You did the best you could until you couldn't anymore.

SEMPER FI