Maria was busy going through the day’s worth of presidential work that had piled up while she was helping Allison. She was in her personal apartment. She glanced over her shoulder to look at Eyre who was fading in and out of existence. That indicated her niece was concealing her existence. There was no chance against Maria because she was her elder.
“Could you imagine the scandal if my niece was caught visiting me.”
Eyre’s form solidified as she sat down on a chair she dragged over to Maria’s desk. She crossed her legs and adjusted her knee length designer black dress.
“After you vanished without a trace for four hours and panicked the investors? It is bad enough they know I’m in New Amazon after I told the board and council everything is fine. Me visiting you would declare to the Alliance, ‘I’m concerned’. Now, hurry up, spill it, so I can get back to the Yellowstone Refugee Support Gala I am donating an absurd amount of credits at to explain my presence in your dome.”
Maria looked up.
“I did not receive an invitation to that.”
Eyre shook her head.
“You likely did, your staff probably politely declined it like they do with all the other charity events. Wouldn’t do to have the Iron Fist of Alliance law showing that she has a soul. You do have a soul don’t you?”
Maria looked up from her tablet without lifting her head.
“What is that supposed to mean?”
Eyre leaned back and waved her finger indicating the pile of tablets and Presidential briefing data bundles littering the desk.
“You tell me that my sister, a sixteen-year-old girl with a penchant for detonating planet destroying antimatter bombs has time travelled to the past, with a fighter full of antimatter and you come home and work instead of, I don’t know, calling, or stopping by to see your long-suffering niece?”
Maria put her current tablet down and looked directly at Eyre.
“I vanished for four hours, and work piled up. I thought it was best to put in a public appearance and keep the wheels of commerce going rather than extending my disappearance flying to NAFTA dome. I did not believe a call was the right medium for this discussion, unless we are planning on releasing the existence of time travel to the Alliance at large and I have not heard about it.”
Eyre sighed.
“Just tell me what happened already so I know why I littered hints of a sixteen-hour conference across twenty different datastores. Then made it look like those were covering up an omega level classified file that is entirely redacted. It was a lot of intricate work that I could not hire outside help for.”
Maria stood up.
“You are right. I need to make a show of being back, in good health, and in control. We are going to the Gala.”
“You really don’t want to tell me do you? The last time you willingly had fun Pompeii was still inhabited. So, this must be bad.”
Maria walked to her room and pulled off her t-shirt and leggings. She started pulling on her presidential uniform. Which was one of several dozen armored suit-skirt combinations. Eyre leaned on her bedroom doorframe.
“Rip the bandage off Aunt Maria, Allison will tell me eventually.”
Maria buttoned up her blouse.
“I highly doubt that. I told her that discussing time travel with anyone but me was an executable offense and there would be nothing I could do about it. Not that I think we could manage to actually execute her.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
Maria buttoned up her jacket.
“How do I look?”
“Very presidential, now what is that supposed to mean?”
Maria tapped her AR HUD and made a call.
“I need a security detail; We’re going to a charity event.”
She swept the details to her security chief and started looking for her shoes. Eyre was watching her every movement. Maria sighed.
“She somehow broke her neck and healed in seconds. Short enough she actually remembered her body dying this time.”
Eyre sighed.
“That kid is lucky she’s Amee’s daughter. Now where and when was she.”
Maria threw up her hands.
“Fine, if the data I received from her scans are accurate based on residual temporal radiation where she arrived and on herself, one hundred thousand years ago, give or take. In the Andromeda galaxy.”
Eyre took a few moments to process her Aunt’s words.
“Jesus fucking Christ.”
Maria gave Eyre a dirty look.
“Watch your language, just because your mother was a foul-mouthed former pirate, it does not mean you need to be.”
“A hundred thousand years? What kind of damage did she do?”
Maria shrugged.
“As far as I can tell, nothing. She kept some future data out of the hands of locals, hid out on a planet she knew was going to be destroyed by a supernova and kept a low profile while collecting a bunch of samples and a historic record.”
Eyre narrowed her eyes.
“Does that sound like Allison to you?”
“Not at all. Which is why I have made a request to replace the historic data the League shared with us to compare it with the data they have already sent. I told them it was corrupted in transit. Any discrepancies between them will be an indication she did more than she let on. Since our current data is in a temporal shield, and there’s was not, it will be a simple test.”
“That child is a walking, breathing, menace to my sanity.”
Maria nodded.
“I do have something we need to discuss if you are done with your interrogation.”
“Sure but hurry it up I need to leave soon.”
Maria pulled on her shoes.
“Okay here are the details of what she brought back so you understand the reason I am asking. She brought back enough seeds, biological samples and soil samples that we could use them to reproduce Qual’sa’s biosphere. Do you remember that AgriPrime dome?”
Eyre nodded.
“The one on Tritan, joint CUS-SA ecosphere to make the CUS less reliant on Alliance food. SA paid a third, CUS paid a third and AgriPrime paid the rest. Then AgriPrime promptly went out of business when you blew up their main customers, and their head offices.”
Maria checked herself in her mirror.
“We, as in the System’s Alliance has been stuck footing the bill for maintenance. No one wants it, no one wants to touch it. Everyone just wants to forget Tritan exists. It is empty and was built to simulate an ecosphere. I propose Allison buys it outright, or well a corporation whose primary owner is Allison’s trust fund, managed by you of course, to monetize samples retrieved by a survey said corporation sponsored in the uncharted region of Andromeda. We both know the board is desperate to wash their hands of it, it has been paid for already. The only stakeholder still here is the SA. Her corporation offers to take over maintenance buys it for one credit, in exchange, Tritan is the sole property of the corporation. You figure out how to obfuscate its true ownership. We hire xeno-biologists, soil biologists… whoever we need. An entire genetic history of a planet I guarantee we will find useful compounds. Maybe new crops, possibly new meat sources. I project ten years it will be paying for itself; Fifteen her trust fund will start growing again. Long term we use some of those funds to do what Allison wants to do with the samples, we make a new Qual’sa for their remnant, on a planet in the Andromeda Galaxy. We will need to know what to look for in a compatible atmospheric and soil content.”
Eyre looked skeptical.
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“It’s a lot of credits, it will cost her in future interest, and it might never be profitable.”
“She made the mess; She needs to pay to clean it up.”
Eyre sighed.
“Maybe seeing her trust fund go down steadily will remind her to stop fucking around and finding out.”
Maria gave Eyre another dirty look. Eyre just held up her finger.
“No, I am allowed two swear words tonight. You are not the one who has to talk to Apiyo about this.”
*****
Allison was floating above the final resting place of the League Science Fleet she’d sent hurtling into the past. She imagined their last moments. Terrified and confused. They would have no understanding of why they were suddenly heavily damaged and thrown into the middle of a massive space battle between two sides of a long forgotten war. She reached out her hand and touched the transparent cockpit covering the ship graveyard that was created when the remnants of the battle had crashed to the planet’s surface. Life was just starting to return to the area the hulks had crashed into. The radioactive decay from the elements created in the aftermath of their antimatter storage leaks had wiped out life on a swath of the continent. Some of the ships had been so massive she could see them sticking up from the surface even from high orbit.
Those League ships had crews who had families. Families who would never know the truth of what happened to their husbands, wives, daughters, sons… They would never know that a reckless sixteen-year-old initiated a causality loop with only one possible conclusion. Their loved ones would die. She had been able to ignore it on Qual’sa, but here, with the consequences of her actions laid bare she was forced to confront them. Her scanners had confirmed everything her aunt had told her happened. There were still signs of the temporal radiation on the League wreckage Maria had described to Allison. She had tears in her eyes.
Bit was quiet. Perhaps the AI was still angry with being shut down, or perhaps she sensed her pilot’s emotional distress. Either way she let Allison work through whatever was going through her young mind in silence. She gave her several minutes of contemplation then prompted her.
“Allison, is something the matter? We have completed our scans, and we have a schedule to keep. The loss of life is terrible, but it occurred an eon ago.”
Allison wiped her tears away and sniffled.
“Bit, we need to erase all signs of the temporal radiation from the data bundle we’re going to provide to the League and make it appear as though the League fleet crashed yesterday. Then encrypt it with the encryption key provided by the League. Can you do that for me? Or do I need to reach out to Aunt Maria?”
Bit didn’t respond. She just created the requested data bundle.
“It is ready. I have charged the wormhole projector for the next stage of our mission and injected the coordinates you calculated.”
Allison rubbed the back of her hand across her nose which was starting to leak after her tears.
“Is the beacon here targetable via the wormhole network?”
Bit responded.
“It is on the secure hub requested by the President and is transmitting telemetry data through the wormhole network.”
Allison took one last look at the legacy of her recklessness and banked the fighter away from the planet and FTL jumped out of the system. She stared at the initiate wormhole command on her holo-HUD like it might bite her. Bit spoke.
“Allison, I do not understand why we are doing any of this. A blind wormhole jump this far was extremely dangerous. My cargo bays are full of very odd things. The cockpit barely fits you. We are carrying a League Data Beacon that has not been touched. Now a blind wormhole jump to League space? Within two light years of their capital world? We have no orders. None of this was authorized. You looked at that planet like you had seen it before. You knew just where to scan. You have been exposed to identical temporal radiation to what we found on the planet with a one hundred-thousand-year decay offset. And your holo-phone is showing a time error of approximately eighteen months. Please tell me what is wrong so I can assist you in fixing it. What did you do when I was offline?”
Allison lowered her hand.
“I cannot explain any of it Bit. Aunt Maria was clear, no one, even you. I am sorry I took you offline and disengaged your power relays. It was wrong. I would do it again because if I had not done it, you would be dead right now. Let’s just get this done and go home. It has been a very long day. It feels like over a year since I’ve been home, I just want to bury my face in Oozies fur, hug Aryna, hug Robin, hug and kiss my mom and get on with my life.”
Allison initiated the wormhole jump. When they crossed the event horizon they arrived just outside the Silwra system. She opened hyperwave comms to the High Council.
“This is Shadow One. I have just transited to Silwra sector. I have the package. Requesting further instructions.”
Allison waited for a response. It came in the form of a text message, providing a secluded private landing bay on the southern continent, along with a request for her to approach under cloak. She followed the instructions. The coordinates led her to an industrial sector that looked like it had been long abandoned. She landed the fighter under cloak pulled the doctored data bundle from her planetary scans and hopped down. She heard movement and drew one of her pistols. It was two black scaled Silwrath one man, one woman. They were far more lithe-looking than the average Silwrath she’d seen. They held up their hands.
“Shadow One. We’re here to take delivery.”
He provided the challenge phrase and she responded correctly. She slid the pistol into its holster, then popped the cargo pod holding the data beacon. It took the three of them to unstrap it and move it to their waiting shuttle. She offered up the doctored data bundle.
“Bonus data. I’d offer to hook the SA up for recovery operations but there really isn’t much left of the fleet after it hit the planet. Sorry I’m late, there was an issue with a space-time anomaly, and I could not safely get here before now. I think it was the anomaly that took the fleet out, if they were surveying the planet and got hit without shields. I got hit with full shields and it still left a mark.”
The female Silwrath took the data bundle.
“The Primarch asked me to tell you that, she wishes to thank you for this personal favor, and that she appreciates your discretion and expediency. Until next time, Shadow One.”
Allison held up her hand and wasn’t sure if she’d be willing to have a next time after this mess. Or if there was she’d prefer it be after she finished paying for this time. She returned to Bit and began her trek home to Eden. Her arrival kicked the hornet’s nest. She delayed her short FTL jump until she detected incoming FTL signatures. So, the alert fleet that would be trying to track her FTL jump would need to waste time recharging their FTL drive for another jump while she was safely landing under cloak at the embassy.
“Bit, head home please. I’ll come by and see you tomorrow, I have a feeling mom is going to have a few things to say.”
She reached under her rear seat with some difficulty and yanked her backpack free causing bundled dresses to rain down on her head. She stuffed them back and huffed.
“There is too much in this cockpit. Ugg. Okay Bit. Thanks. I’m sorry… I really am.”
The AI launched the fighter wordlessly. She had her bright pink school bag which was stuffed to bursting with her clothes. She looked in the direction she knew Bit would fly to go back to the hanger and hoped the AI would forgive her sometime soon. It had been just over sixteen hours since she’d left at least for everyone she knew and loved. She activated her cloaking field and hurried down the stairs out of the cold wind. She changed and tracked down T’hyl. The Yorleer was packing up for the day and noticed Allison.
“Oh… you’re out of the conference, I hope everything went well.”
Allison smiled and nodded.
“I will see you later. I just wanted to let you know I was done and say thank you, I know my mom was probably challenging.”
T’hyl smiled.
“It was nothing, Battlelord. Do you need a ride home?”
Allison looked out the nearby window. Snow was starting to fall.
“You know what, I would really appreciate that it has been a very, very long day.”
T’hyl made a call and shortly afterwards she was riding in a car beside a corporal from the System’s Alliance who was on loan as a driver since the League didn’t really use cars in the same way as the SA. The ride was quiet. The corporal went out to open the rear door for Allison.
“Thank you.”
He saluted her.
“You don’t need to do that, I’m not in uniform.”
“Ma’am, it is my genuine pleasure to salute a true hero. Yellowstone was my home. If you hadn’t risked your life like you did, my wife and my baby girl wouldn’t be here with me.”
Allison glanced around.
“Corporal, that information is classified.”
He looked embarrassed.
“I’m sorry, ma’am, it was on the news, I thought it was okay to talk about.”
Allison took a deep breath and looked up at Eden’s blue moon.
“I stand corrected, I am sorry I’ve been in talks with the League High Council for sixteen hours I had no access to outside information. I was just doing what anyone else would do.”
“Begging your pardon, ma’am, but I do not believe there are many other people who would risk their life, and imprisonment to save people everyone thought was already dead.”
Allison wasn’t sure how to deal with this.
“You’re welcome corporal. I hope everyone is feeling okay.”
He saluted her again.
“Good night, ma’am.”
She returned the salute, hiked her bag on her shoulder and went into the house. When she appeared it was a race between Robin and Oozie to see who could reach her first. Oozie decided to let Robin win. Allison took the hug in stride.
“It’s been less than a day. Did you think I wasn’t coming back?”
Robin blushed. Aryna was looking at Allison’s hair. Allison could have kicked herself. She still had the Qual’sa style hair clip in her hair. Apiyo was watching all of this go on from the kitchen. Allison hung her coat and hat up. Apiyo finally spoke.
“I know you’ve been dealing with the council overnight, but you have school work to catch up on, Aryna had the teachers update your school tablet and left it in your room. Come out here and do it at the table. I don’t want you falling a sleep before supper and waking up in the middle of the night.”
Allison grabbed her school tablet and sat at the kitchen table to start her work. Robin rushed to get her school tablet and sat in the chair beside Allison. Aryna leaned on the chair at the head of the table.
“Allison, did you do something different with your hair?”
Allison shook her head. She did not have to touch her hair. While she was in the past besides eating and drinking her body had basically stayed disturbingly static. She pulled the clip out and put it on the table.
“You probably haven’t seen this before. I found it while I was working on that council stuff. They said I could keep it.”
Aryna picked it up and looked it over.
“I have an identical one, only it’s an amethyst instead of a ruby. It was my mother’s. It was part of a set of three, one sapphire, for my grandmother’s eyes, one amethyst for mother’s eyes, and one ruby, to match my aunt’s eyes. Though my mother and aunt had a falling out and she said she did not have the heart to keep it. She told me the ruby one was given to a friend she had grown close to before I was born, that she was like a sister to her.”
Allison shrugged.
“There are probably a ton of them floating around from before the Sal’nash. The League junk store I was at had a ton of old Qual’sa jewelery. It would be fitting if somehow it was it though, wouldn’t it? Since we feel like sisters?”
Aryna smiled.
“Yes.”
Allison snapped her fingers.
“Do you have the sapphire one?”
Aryna nodded.
“Yes, it was in my belongings on the ark. Oh, perfect the sapphire will match Robin’s eyes.”
Aryna vanished into her room and offered the hair clip to Robin. Allison was hesitant about that; she knew how easily she lost things when she was Robin’s age. She almost said something but the look of awe in the little girl’s eyes had silenced her protests.
“This is very special. It belonged to my grandmother. Please take good care of it.”
Robin quickly clipped it in her hair. Allison put her ponytail back in and Aryna did the same with her amethyst hair clip. Apiyo watched all of this from the kitchen out of the corner of her eye. None of the girls saw her hidden smile, or the sad look in her eyes. Finally, she said.
“Enough chattering, get your homework done if you haven’t finished it yet. Supper is getting close to ready."