CH36 (115)

Ok, Ok, I get it. I'm not deaf you know. Wench, winch. Stupid automatic spell checker. Get's me into more trouble.

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It was now 9 months later:

Alexis had finished her first year of college on Ariel. Kate and Rick had gotten her a studio apartment in the city tower to live in. Alexis had wanted the full college experience.

Didn't mean she didn't go home to stay weekends at least once a month, or that Kate or Rick didn't visit her, since they did.

Andre Schurrle and Alexis Castle were still together and Alexis was finally admitting that he was her boyfriend. In fact he was with them in their shuttle as they were all landing on Athos.

Rick had gotten Andre's attention that first time Alexis had brought him home to meet her family.

Rick had been true to his word, he had his rifle out on the dining room table and was giving it some much needed maintenance.

"Hey, how did you get your hands on a pulse rifle?" Andre was interested as he stands over the parts Rick had it broken down into.

"You know about pulse rifles?" Rick's plan had just sprung a leak.

"My older brother is in the Marines and he has taken me onto the base and even taken me to the firing range a few times." Andre was trying to keep a straight face, since he was lying thru his teeth.

Alexis had warned him ahead of time what to expect.

Rick's plan was now in full on sinking mode.

"Well in that case you can help me put it back together." Rick slaps his back.

"Actually I was going to help Alexis with, …." But Andre gets interrupted by Rick.

"Kate and the girls are keeping Alexis busy, so you can show me what you've got." Rick pushes him down into a chair.

Sometime later after Rick has done all the work and watching Andre stumble his way along.

"You've never touched a pulse rifle in your life have you?" Rick glares at him.

Andre looks defeated. "No sir. …. Alexis told me what to expect and we created a story to follow." Andre hangs his head low.

"Uh, huh. … Tell you what. You understand that if you hurt my little girl I will shoot you and we can pretend that Alexis's little plan worked." Rick offers a compromise.

"YES SIR! I can do that." And to keep the deal Andre sat there and helped Rick put his rifle back together.

The shuttle landed at the pad and Kate was the first one out.

Outside she found Madison, Shawn, Matt and Elena. "Elena!" Kate rushed over and hugged her. "How are you doing honey?" Kate asks blinking back tears.

Elena however was not holding back her tears. "I'm fine mom. It's great having you here. I've missed you."

"I've missed you too honey. I look forward to seeing what you've learned." Kate moved on to Madison.

After everyone had been introduced they started making their way to the GETS train that would take them to the ship.

"My parents said they would meet us at the ship." Madison tells them.

Elena was walking with Alexis and both were trailing behind the group. "So, … boyfriend huh!" Elena gives Alexis an elbow in her side.

Alexis blushes. "He has a brother who is a year older than him. He's in officer training school on Tellus. He seems nice. I've listened to what Andre and his parents tell me. … I've even talked to him a little with Andre using Lucy."

"So, he's been over to the house?" Elena was grinning.

"Several times actually. … Dad had his gun spread out all over the table the first day he was over. Andre and I came up with a plan to deal with it. …. Except I think dad saw threw it since he kept grinning at me the whole day." Alexis was pretty sure her plan had gone up in smoke, even though Andre hadn't said anything.

Elena stopped and grabbed her sister. "Have you? …. Please tell me your wearing a stem."

Alexis blushes and looks down at the ground, before looking back up. "No we haven't yet. And yes I am. …. Mom took me to get one. It was soooo embarrassing."

Elena hugged Alexis. "I'll try and keep everyone away if you two want some privacy. … And I may want an introduction to this brother." Elena still remembered what her mother had told her about sticking close to Alexis.

This got Alexis to squeal and hug her sister back. "Come on, before they sail without us." Elena offers.

Madison was waving at her parents as the group approached the ship were it was docked.

The Quellers hugged everyone, including Andre after introductions were made. "This is a beautiful ship you two." Mrs. Queller was impressed already and hadn't even been on board yet.

"Lady Kate, huh" Mr. Queller comments since they were all at the stern of the ship.

"The girls wanted "Mommy", and we compromised on Lady Kate." Rick explains, happy that it was named after the woman he loved so very much.

"Well let's go see this mansion of yours." Mr. Queller offers. "Owners first." He sweeps his arm.

Up the ramp they go with Rick and Kate first hand in hand. Elena elected to be last right behind Andre and Alexis as they went up hand in hand also. With Elena grinning at them.

"Where's my dad, and Martha?" Kate asks noticing that people were missing for the first time.

"Your dad is waiting for Martha to come down from orbit and then they will be on the same GETS train out here." Madison supplies the answer. ""Give them about an hour or so."

"Well let's get everyone in their rooms and unpacked and we'll give everyone the two cent tour." Rick offers. … "Old Earth saying." Rick adds looking at everyone's blank faces.

"We've got 13 people and 5 guest bedrooms so we're going to have to make do." Kate breaks the bad news.

"Girls I was thinking you two could have one of the bunk bed rooms. Mags, you, Shawn and Matt could have the one double bunk bed room. Mr. and Mrs. Queller, …." Kate is interrupted.

"Kate you can call us Victor and Jennifer or Jenn for short honey. We're going to be around each other for the next two months after all." Mrs. Queller points out.

Kate grins, starting to blush. "Victor and Jenn, I was thinking you two can have one of the one bed bedrooms. I was thinking Martha and Jim could take the last of the bunk bed rooms. Alexis, you and Andre can have the last of the one bed bedrooms, Elena honey, I can give you a choice. Bunk with Madison and Shawn or we can pull out the one and only sleeper sofa, while Rick and I take the master. …. Right babe." Kate turns to grin at Rick.

His daughter sleeping in the same bed as Andre!

Kate slaps his arm. "Right babe?" Kate glares at him.

"I knew I should have brought my gun." Rick mumbles getting everyone but Kate to laugh. Alexis and Andre to their credit were blushing.

It was a little later as everyone started to tour the ship. "It's gorgeous you two, simply gorgeous." Jenn was beyond impressed.

Then Rick opened one of the two refrigerator freezers. "Uh Oh!" Getting Kate to look and then open the pantry. "We're in trouble babe." They had found out it did not come delivered with food.

"We need a lot which means a lot of hands." Rick points out.

"Mags, you and Shawn are with us, we need to do a lot of shopping. … You two think you can keep Matt entertained for a few hours?" Kate looks at Emily and Kali.

"Piece of cake mom." Emily tells her. Getting Kate to hear some Rick or Alexis in that comment.

"We'll watch out for Martha and Jim while you four are gone." Jenn offers.

"Wait mom, wait." Alexis runs back inside. Then comes running back outside. "Nothing to cook with either." Alexis is forced to tell them.

Kate's mouth falls to the floor. "Seriously!"

Rick whispers something into Kate's ear. "Ok everyone change of plans. … Madison, Shawn, Rick and I will get the food.

Alexis, Elena and Andre will get the plates, glasses, silverware and cooking equipment. That means ice cream machine, pasta maker, mixer, … just think what we have at home and we need it.

Victor, Jenn, you two can go get sheets, towels, pillows, comforters, mattress pads, and anything you can think of.

Let's go, we'll meet Martha and Jim at the GETS station. You two behave yourselves and DO NOT leave this ship and wait for Martha and Jim to get here. Or you two will be in big, big trouble."

The group had met Martha and Jim at the GETS station and they were now at the city tower ready to buy the place out.

"Here is my card." Kate hands it to Jenn. "We will use Rick's card, Alexis will use her card that we gave her. … We'll meet everyone back at the ship. Buy it if you know we need it and buy it even if you think we might need it." Kate split everyone up.

"We need at the very least 1 month of food. Two if we don't want to dock and do this again.

You two start with the non-food items, like dishwasher soap, clothes washer soap, body wash, toothpaste, antacid's, vitamins, the works.

Rick and I will start with frozen food and perishables then we can gang up on dry goods." Rick and Kate head one direction while Madison and Shawn go another.

It took a lot of work but everyone was headed for their rooms for the night after Rick cooked dinner. They were going to set sail first thing in the morning.

Kate fell backwards onto their bed. "I'm too tired to be tired."

Rick steps over and lifts up one foot and takes her deck shoe off. Then lets it drop and does the other foot.

Next Rick is undoing her pants and is pulling them off without getting any help. "What are you doing?" Kate asks as her pants finally clear her butt and Rick is now yanking them off down her legs.

"We're going to inaugurate this new bed and new sheets." Rick explains.

"Oh we are, are we?" Kate didn't think so since all she wanted was sleep.

However Rick has started kissing from her foot up her leg. By the time he makes it to Kate's panties, Kate is mildly interested. Then Rick goes down to the other foot and starts working his way back up.

By the time Rick makes it to her panties again Rick finds them soaked. So he starts working at taking them off her. With Kate lifting her butt up off the bed to help him.

Then Kate sits up and starts working on Rick's shirt. "Too many clothes."

"I knew you'd see it my way." Rick grins at her then gives a quick kiss.

"Shut up and make love to me." Kate wasn't tired anymore.

Kate was laying on top of Rick in her usual position, with her ear over Rick's heart listening to it beat. It relaxed her and it felt like his heart was her heart. Without it she wouldn't be alive.

Suddenly Kate's head shot up. "LUCY! …. I forgot to plug in Lucy!" Kate hops out of bed and starts searching for Lucy. "Lucy where are you?" Kate is opening suitcases, cabinets, drawers.

"Help me find Lucy babe." Rick was just lying on the bed.

"She's sitting on the server waiting for you to plug her in." Rick tells her.

Kate turns on him. "Seriously?" Kate was ready to shoot him.

"I knew you weren't going to trust me to do it, so I left it to you." Rick shrugs his shoulders.

Kate grabs a robe since she was still wearing nothing after having made love to her husband and heads for the server.

Plugging Lucy into the server and running a test she turned her on. "Hi Lucy, sorry about the delay. The ship came empty of pretty much everything. It forced us all to go shopping." Kate apologizes.

"And break in the bed I see." Lucy teases. It was payback for forgetting about her.

"LUCY!" Kate's eyes pop out and her mouth hangs open.

"What? … You're glowing, your features are soft and you look happy. … Are you pregnant?" Lucy twists her head to try and look at Kate differently.

"No I'm not pregnant." Kate instantly tries to remember when her last period was and what today was. "I don't think I'm pregnant. …. We didn't get any test sticks either." Kate sits down.

"I might be pregnant." Kate whispers out not sure how to take it.

"Are we at sea? …. Scanning. … Satellites show us still tied up at the dock." Lucy changes the subject.

"We spent the day shopping, we had nothing." Kate moaned as she was getting tired again. "I'm going back to bed, I'm tired. You can see everyone in the morning. … Sorry Lucy." Kate shuffled her feet back to the master bedroom.

"How is she?" Rick asks as Kate puts on one of his shirts and buttons a couple of buttons to keep it closed, then snuggles into bed next to Rick trying to make herself comfortable.

"She's fine. … She wanted to know if I was pregnant." Kate was grinning, wondering what Rick would say to that.

"Are you? Lord knows we've had lots of practice at it since you last stem expired." Rick stroked her arm with his fingers.

"I don't think so, no." Kate suddenly lifted her head to look at him. "What if there is something wrong? Maybe I can't have any more children. The first two came so easily." Kate was worried now.

"Relax Kate. There's nothing wrong. …. And if it means that much to you we can have Madison look at you. …. And me.

But we have 4 girls babe. Two of them you gave birth to. Just how many children did you plan of having anyway?" Rick knew they had talked about this, but did Kate really want another one that badly.

"But you don't have a son yet." Kate looked hurt that she hadn't given him a son yet.

"What makes you think I want a son? I've got 4 beautiful talented girls. One of which is following in her mother's footsteps." Rick counters.

"But I heard you talking to Shawn when Madison had Matt. You sounded, …. I don't know. Envious." Kate finally tells him about what she overheard that one day.

"BABE! …. I was happy FOR him, not envious OF him. I've got 5 women in my life. One has changed my life in so many ways. One has helped us create colonies. One is following in her older sisters footsteps. One loves everyone she comes in contact with. And one is trying to be a detective just like her mother.

I'm beyond happy already. I'm not worried about passing my name on to the next generation. …. We've made history Kate. Look at what we've done." Rick was convinced they were going to show up in history books the school kids were going to be reading about for years to come.

"You're sure?" Kate really thought he wanted a son.

"Positive." Rick softly pushes her head back down on his chest. "Now go to sleep, we've got a big day tomorrow. We get to see if we have learned how to sail without actually sailing."

Kate couldn't help but smile into his chest. He loved her even if she didn't give him a son, and he was right. Tomorrow was going to be interesting. Using Lucy as a simulator was one thing, tomorrow was going to be the real thing.

Plus she wanted to see what Elena had learned already.