/ Duel Universe
/ Author: The Cowboy of Oklahoma
/ Ch 13.1: Babies, Conferences, Kuribohs?
/ word count: 1691
Washington Platform:
Christopher Lee and his wife Sarah Lee were sitting in the uncommonly quiet commons of early morning. Their baby girl, Melody Lee, named after her Grandmother, had just woken them up about half an hour ago. Bags under their eyes showed just how much sleep they both were missing out on. Since there was a limited amount of baby formula to be had and can't be freely sharded, every parent was given a limited supply and was told that "mother's milk" will have to make up the difference. The mothers were then assigned a few extra rations for that fact. The fathers were given double shift duties during the mothers maternity leave grace periods. This is why Christopher was so tired, and Sarah was just barely getting some sleep while also watching the baby. There were, in fact, nearly two dozen babies in the entire fleet, across multiple ships, but there seemed to be seven on the Australian platform, Jeparit, alone. General Marcellus gave every new parent a reprimand for not keeping the policy of "no babies," or "no baby making" rules. Doctor Harold Jacobsons was in a cell for attempting to have an orgy in his assigned quarters less than a week after coming onboard. It was his designated place to be if he wasn't on his scheduled sleep rotation. Michelle visited him often to gloat about the fact that she had warned him on Mars. Akiza III, and some of the other older children and teenagers were recruited as occasional babysitters, since many were in need of something to do while the fleet sat in orbit over Kepler. There were two couples onboard the Washington with babies, the Lee's transferred over from the Baddeck, larger ship, more room, bigger quarters. The grandmother was furious about Christopher and his family leaving the Baddeck.
"How am I supposed to get a chance to see my grandchild everyday if you leave the ship!?" Melody questioned.
"I'm sorry Mom, but the Baddeck just doesn't have the room we'll need for the first few years of the baby's life. I'm sure the captain would be willing to give you some time to come visit. It's not like there'll be a planet between us." Christopher pointed out.
"That's beside the point!" She counters. "I want to be able to see my grandbaby as often as I want!!"
"Come on Mom. You and Dad have a job to do here, it isn't forever, and hey, if this planet pans out, were all going to be on the ground together soon enough." Lee said hopefully.
But the planet didn't pan out and now there was a huge debate going on onboard the Washington about just what to do next.
It's a good thing the ones in hypersleep aren't aware of what's going on at the moment. The first leg of the trip was in vain and there was no clear course to take next. Every current leader or representative of their respective ethnic backgrounds was onboard the Washington except for the General and the Egyptian President Aten. This was for the reason that, if anything happened to the Washington, every leader wouldn't be in danger at the same time, and President Aten wasn't fully trusting of others. He was well aware of the situation and why they were out here, but he still didn't like it. So the meeting went on and on about which star to point the ships at now. They each were just as promising as the one they currently orbited now, so the decision can't fall on just one's shoulders.
"We cannot just blindly follow these few stars in the data banks, we have no way of telling if any of them are viable." Oriental Ambassador Chun Zhang stated.
The debate went on for nearly seven hours before a recess was agreed upon for everyone to get something to eat before debates continued. Some of the others chose to eat in private temporary quarters. The Mars couple
walked to the commons to get some grub. Avery held Sharon close, with each other's arms around the other's waist.
"You think we'll get out of this situation Ave?" Sharon asked. "I mean, I don't have to sit in on these meetings, my position is mainly academic here." She pointed out.
Avery scratched his chin, "I think you should be there. I know you and the rest of us in the Mars program were mainly trained to handle the Mars planet, but if we happen to find a planet similar to it, you should know immediately and our team would be the best suited to go down first." He said optimistically.
Sighing, she laid her head on his shoulder, "What do you say if you and me disappear and do something illegal?" She asked while leaning into him persuasively.
He fidgeted a little then looked around the commons area as they walked up to the station to get their rations. He squeezed her closer and after they got their food, he maneuvered them out of the commons quietly.
The meeting started again after two hours, everyone was filing back into the meeting hall. Doctor Reinhart stepped in a few moments after the last person was seated already, taking her seat. A few noticed that her hair was not in it's usual bun fashion, instead it was down and unkempt a bit. She cleared her throat a bit, and then Major Bensen reopened discussions on where the fleet should go from here since, even if they couldn't make landfall just anywhere, they would need to resupply somewhere eventually.
"Please Major, don't bring up the resources we are all very much aware are finite. We have enough, with our new engines and power output to reach anywhere within 3000 light-years from our current position." Doctor Malone stated.
"But we can't make multiple jumps to lightspeed if we make even one more mistake. We will forever be stuck at the next location no matter what your science says!" He countered.
The debate went for another hour before Bensen lost his cool and flat out went full sexist mode to simply suppress the good Doctor. Shortly afterwards, the Washington was rocked by an external impact to her port side.
Later:
"KURI, KURI!" The creature had bounced and ran from these crazy humans for longer than it liked. It finally saw an open doorway and dived inside the darkened room. Then instead of finding a hiding spot to see if it was safe, it immediately found a much smaller hole, changing its shape, it slithered through the miniature opening. A few seconds later, the small hole sealed behind it and it decided to not stay put. It had a mission and it needed to find the one who held it's card, it was told.
"You will know which human to trust if you can find your own card little one." Mistress had told him. "And once you find them, bring them to me. Now go, and be safe."
Well he definitely didn't feel safe around these humans. As soon as he was spotted, they started shooting at him. He had to harden his outer layers and change shapes quickly and repeatedly just to evade them. Only one of them had managed to strike him, and it didn't feel good. He made sure he was unharmed for the most part. The small piece of metal didn't penetrate his hide. He kept crawling through these long tubes, eventually feeling like he was getting closer to home. That's not possible, home doesn't have these tubes or humans and their strange metal devices. He wished his brothers could have come along too. They were always stronger together, but they each held a special talent, like himself, and would have to go off and fulfill a mission from the Mistress. He was almost to where he felt the feeling of home when another feeling became stronger as well. He started to feel as if there was another one of his kind here. His exact kind. But that was impossible! Mistress only sent one of him. He was the only one of him to send. It was coming closer! Wait! Maybe this is the one he was meant to find! Maybe one of his kind was out here and alone with these scary humans. He would have to rescue him from them. There was a light ahead, he slowly crept up to the hole, peeking out cautiously. Voices!
"KURI, KURI!!" It sounded a bit like one of his kind.
"The rest of you stay out here…" That didn't sound like his kind.
A door opened then shut. He peeked around the corner to see two humans in the room with it. One was big, the other was skinny.
"Kuri, kuri!"
The humans somehow made a noise just like his kind. He moved quickly but he bumped some of their weird things on the metal shelves.
"Kuri, kuri!"
There was that noise again. He moved behind them to get a look at what was making the noise. He bumped something and had to hide again. But there was something odd about the bigger one, he was emitting the same energy as his own kind. He slowly stepped out from behind something and looked at the big one.
"Kuri, kuri." He spoke out.
"I think that's enough Captain. We don't want to anger it further." The small one said.
The big one turned its head to look at the small one behind it.
"That wasn't me." The big one said.
Then the small one looked over the big one and they both looked at him funny. Then the big one held up a card with his picture on it. Wait, 'look for your card,' Mistress had said, and he had the card!! He leapt for joy, he had found my card. He jumped up and touched the card, then he felt the pull to return home, and he was to bring them, that had his card, with him. So he used all his energy to surround them both in a protective shell and he took them home.