Laura Jo Phillips (56 page)

“For us, using our instincts is as natural has using our eyes, so we understand their importance,” Jackson said.  “There were a lot of people in that lab yesterday.”

“Yes, there were,” the Director agreed.  “And every one of them is currently being held for an intensive security check.”

Hope didn’t like the sound of that, but at the same time, if there was a traitor working for the Xanti, he or she was responsible for Grace’s death.  Hope couldn’t make herself feel too much sympathy for such a person, no matter who they were.

They came to a heavy door with another set of guards in front of it.  The guards opened the doors and the Director, the Bearens and Hope entered, this time without the armed guards who stayed out in the hall.

The room was quite large and had a very high ceiling.  There were several big tables in the room, each surrounded with chairs, but other than that the room was bare.

“This is the GalactoGraph--think of it as a holographic map room,” the Director explained.  “We didn’t have time to move the tables out.  If you need them removed, we can do so.”

“Let’s see how this works first,” Hope suggested.  “If we don’t have to move them, then let’s not take the time.”

The Director nodded and walked over to the nearest table.  He reached into his pocket and removed the small black square that Hope had read the day before and placed it on the table. 

“I brought this just in case you need to read it again,” the Director said.

“I don’t think I need to, but I will anyway,” Hope said reluctantly.  “Just to be sure.”  She reached for the object, hesitated for a moment with her hand hovering over it, then quickly snatched it up.  She closed her eyes for a few moments, then shuddered as she opened them and put the object back on the table.

“Yep, it’s where I thought,” she said, scrubbing her hand on her jeans as though she had touched something dirty.  “Let’s do this.”

The Director turned to look up at a small window near the ceiling and nodded.  The lights dimmed, and suddenly they were standing amidst an ocean of stars.

“Re!”
Hope said, her voice filled with wonder.  “This is beautiful!”

Jackson, Clark and Rob smiled indulgently as Hope spent a few moments taking in the beauty that was the galaxy they all lived in.  The Director waited patiently, enjoying the sight himself, as he always did.

“All right, show me where we are right now,” Hope said after a few minutes.

Clark walked across the room toward an insignificant, yellow-white speck.  He placed his hands around the speck and made an expansive gesture, causing it to magnify, revealing the Sun and its family of worlds, including the cloud-wreathed blue planet that Hope recognized.  She went to stand beside him, then turned slightly so that she was facing out toward the rest of the room.  She closed her eyes for a moment, then opened them and looked around carefully before frowning.

“Director, is this the biggest image we can get?” she asked.

“I’m sorry, Hope,” the Director said doubtfully.  “I’m not sure what you mean.”

“Is this the Thousand Worlds that we’re looking at right now?” she asked.

“Yes, it is,” the Director replied, “and a bit of the galaxy beyond its borders.”

“I need to see more, beyond the Thousand Worlds,” she said.  “Is that possible?”

“Of course.”  The Director placed his hands in the air in front of him, palms facing each other, and brought them slowly together, changing the scale of the image and causing a larger portion of the galaxy to become visible.  Hope could now see the brilliant glow of the galactic center, and several of the glittering spiral arms that wrapped around it.  Slightly more than half of the galaxy was now visible.

“Is that enough?” the Director asked.

Hope shifted her gaze slightly, looking beyond the galaxy’s outermost arm, her head angled somewhat downward.

“No,” she replied.  “It’s still out there, somewhere.”  She pointed to a spot across the room, on the floor.  “Can you show me more?

“Yes, I think so,” the Director said slowly.  “Are you saying that the Xanti home world is outside of our galaxy?”

“Yes,” Hope replied.  “I’m afraid so.”

The Director was shocked, as were the Bearens, but they kept their feelings to themselves.  They didn’t want to risk interfering too much with Hope’s concentration. 

The Director used the scale changing gesture once again, and now the whole exquisite, barred spiral of the Milky Way Galaxy was visible as a brilliant image about eight feet in diameter in the center of the high-ceilinged room.  When everyone’s eyes adjusted to the change in brightness, other, dimmer objects became visible as well.  Close by, the galaxy was surrounded by hundreds of brilliant, blurry dots, like fireflies clustering around a streetlamp.  Further away, scattered around the room seemingly at random, were a handful of softly glowing, irregular blotches, reminding Hope of Rigellian glow-moths, fluttering dimly in the darkness.

Hope gazed around her with an expression of confusion until Clark guided her over to where Earth was now situated.  She smiled her thanks, and reoriented herself.  After a few moments, she began walking across the room.  She bumped into a table and Jackson hurried over to her and picked her up.

“Just point where you want to go,
Niha
,” he said.

Hope pointed, and he carried her, climbing effortlessly over the tables that blocked their way.  When they reached the furthest corner of the room, Hope tapped Jackson on the shoulder.  “Stop,” she said. 

Jackson stopped and lowered Hope to her feet.  She stood looking at one of the irregular blotches, about ten feet across the room from the representation of the Milky Way, floating just above floor level.  It had a roughly oval shape, sprouting one dim band of stars that twisted away from it, as though the oval was an undersized runt of a galaxy that had managed to grow only one stunted, misshapen spiral arm. 

“The Xanti home world is right here,” she said, pointing to a location near the center of the glowing oval. 

“That’s the Large Magellanic Cloud,” Clark said in a subdued voice.  “A small irregular galaxy that’s a satellite to ours.  It’s over one hundred and sixty thousand light years from here.  Few have attempted to travel so far.  Of those, none have ever returned.”

Chapter
58

Hope opened her eyes, confused at first by the sight of the unfamiliar room.  After a moment she remembered where she was.

After she had pointed out the Xanti’s home world, the Bearens had insisted on taking her to the hospital to have the bump on her head looked at.  The doctor pronounced her fine, as she had known he would.  They had gone up to visit the babies for a few minutes, but Hope had been swaying on her feet with exhaustion by then.  The Bearens had taken her back to their bungalow, outright refusing to take her to the one she had been going to share with Grace.  They’d put her into the bed she’d used before and she’d fallen asleep almost before her head hit the pillow.

She sat up, the light coming in through the window indicating that the afternoon was over and evening was well on its way.  It had been a very long day, and she was a little surprised that it wasn’t even over yet.  She climbed out of bed and spotted a stack of clothing on the chair inside the door.  She smiled as she went through the clothes and selected a clean outfit before heading for the bathroom.  Obviously one of the guys had gone next door and gotten them for her.  When she entered the bathroom and reached into the shower to start the water, she saw that they had collected her toiletries as well.

As an adult, she had never been treated with such constant consideration and thoughtfulness as the Bearens showered her with each and every moment.  And they loved her.  She knew that.  She felt it from them.  She had avoided the knowledge, avoided admitting it even to herself.  She hadn’t wanted to trust it, and now she wondered why.  Why had she worked so hard to resist being loved? 

Hope unraveled her braids with practiced fingers, then removed her clothes and stepped into the shower, sighing with pleasure as the hot water cascaded over her.  She stood there for a few minutes, letting the heat soak into her muscles until she felt them begin to relax.  She reached for the shampoo, her mind still turning her last question over, examining it, trying to understand her own feelings and reactions.

Why was it so easy to accept her quick friendship with Grace, but so difficult to accept the Bearens’ feelings for her, and hers for them?  Isn’t that why she had gone to Jasan in the first place?  To find her destiny?  What was wrong with her?

At first she was hurt because she thought the Bearens were in love with Ellicia.  They did love her, but once they explained it, and she knew that what they told her was truth, she’d still resisted.  Was it really because of time? she wondered.  Did it really matter so much whether it took one day to love someone, or one week, or one year?  Wasn’t love itself the point, not how long it took to feel it? 

As she shampooed her hair and took time to rinse it carefully before reaching for a washcloth and a bar of soap, she asked herself these questions and more, trying to understand herself.  When she was finished with her shower she reached up to flip off the taps, and her eye caught on the lettering embossed in the metal.  One said
Hot
, the other
Cold
.  As she stared at the one that read
Cold
, she thought of Grace, and how quickly and unexpectedly her life had ended.

It could just as easily have been her rather than Grace, and she knew it.  If she had died, what use would all of her resistance have been?  What would the point of it have been?  She didn’t know, but one thing she did know.  She had been offered the chance to love and be loved, and though she had not exactly turned her back on it, she had held it at arms length.  If she had died this day, she would have missed something rare and special.  Something that could have been hers at any moment, if she’d simply accepted it.  How sad was that? she wondered as she stepped out of the shower and reached for a towel.

She dried herself off, pulled on some clothes, and began rubbing her hair with the towel to get the excess water out before drying it.  She looked up and caught her reflection in the mirror, her eye catching on one of her earrings.  She paused, staring at the earring, remembering the day her mother had given them to her. 

The fine gold hoops piercing the small round pearls were symbolic, her mother had told her when she’d given them to her on her twelfth birthday.  They were meant to remind her that once she gave herself to a man, there was no going back.  She needed to be sure she was with the one she would spend her life with, and no other, and she must never forget how important that was.  Hope had promised that she would never forget, and that she would wait until she was married.

Hope examined her feelings carefully, but she knew she loved the Bearens.  She had known they were meant for her before she knew them.  But she had fallen in love with them, one by one, the moment she’d placed a tiny, newborn infant into each of their arms, and seen the instant glow of love in their eyes for the sons of a man they had never even met.

Hope wasn’t sure what her mother would think of her loving three men, but that didn’t trouble her much.  Humans had interacted with many peoples from many different worlds for centuries, and, compared to some alien sexual practices, the Jasani custom of three men to one woman was fairly tame.  When you took into account that it was, in fact, a physiological necessity for Clan Jasani, not just a custom or a preference, she doubted her mother would have batted an eye.

What was important to her, what would have been important to her mother, was whether she loved them, and they her, and whether they planned to marry her, and spend their lives with her.  Her promise to wait until she was married seemed a bit old fashioned.  She decided that, as long as she was certain the Bearens loved her and wanted to marry her, that was close enough.  Hope was certain that she could answer each of those questions with a resounding
Yes! 

Hope dried her hair and braided it, struggling to build up the courage to do what she now wanted very much to do.  Once she was ready, she paused nervously, considering putting it off for another day or two.  She instantly thought of Grace, straightened her shoulders, turned off the light and left the bathroom.  She went straight up the hall, through the kitchen and into the living room where she found Jackson, Clark and Rob sitting quietly, seemingly lost in their own thoughts.

The moment she stepped into the room they all leapt to their feet.  “How are you?” Jackson asked.  She felt his worry, and his tension, and was confused by it for a moment.  Then she understood.

“I’m fine,” she said, smiling at them.  “I am sad about Grace, of course, but I’m okay.  I would like to talk to you guys though, if you don’t mind.”

“Certainly,” Jackson said at once.  “Come on over here and get comfortable.”  He guided her to the chair he had been using and she sat down.  As soon as she sat, they all took seats too.  Hope looked at them, trying to decide how to start.  She was nervous, but every time she considered changing her mind she thought of Grace. 

“Grace’s death forces me to realize that life is a gift that holds no promises,” she began.  It is up to us to do with it what we will, and if we do not live each day to its fullest, then that is our loss.”