***Previously***
She could only imagine how the doctors who had helped conceive them felt when they were finally born.
*****
It must have been gut wrenching.
And bitter upon the tongue with envy and fear.
She didn’t fault them, no matter how much she wanted to, because she knew the story, they all did, of how humanity lost its mortality and home world to chaos.
But she despised the way her family had suffered for no reason at all.
The swooshing of the cabin door pulled her from her thoughts and Tasya turned with her wife to smile at their children who scrambled up to hug them before going to their own seats.
“Are we really about to pass Mars,” asked Mosi, their eldest. He leaned as far forward in his seat as he could, his hazel eyes alight with curiosity and fascination.
Sitara nodded, glancing at their son as she adjusted their flight path.
“We are just passing between Remus and Romulus now.”
“They are so big,” whispered Mosi’s twin, a hint of fear in his young voice.
“They are empty now, Atsu,” Tasya assured him, swiveling around to run her fingers through his shaggy blonde hair that mirrored her own and give his chin an affectionate squeeze. “Besides, they are the first colonies, remember? Where your great great grandparents were born. No reason to fear them.”
“Not completely empty,” muttered Sitara as a new series of scans came across the dash.
“What have you got,” she asked as she turned back and leaned over towards her wife to see what she and the sensors were reading.
“I thought the initial blips I received were due to the self automated robots still completing their tasks within the frameworks, but this second series of scans suggest that there is at least someone moving about in the sentries,” Sitara replied, glancing up at the structures as they cruised slowly between them, her eyes searching for any outward signs of life beyond her readings.
“Did you send out a hail?”
Sitara shook her head. “No, I wanted to be sure before I-”
A channel suddenly opened on its own in their cabin, cutting her off and filling the room with a loud staticy voice—startling them all.
“Private Vessel, this is station security on Remus, please stop your advancement where you are and identify yourself,” asked a male voice, his distorted tone firm but not harsh.
They all stared at one another in surprise.
“Who was that,” whispered Mosi.
Who indeed?
Putting a finger to her lips to hush her son, Tasya listened intently as her wife replied hesitantly, “Station security, this is private class vessel Bron. We are a family of five traveling to...Earth.”
The mothers shared a glance.
Should they have said that?
Was the individual talking to them even human?
It was not uncommon for some robots, left to their own devices, to reach a certain state of sentience. For all they knew, the man was a machine.
A few heart pounding beats later the voice ruptured through their cabin again.
“For safety measures, all traveling vessels entering Earth’s outer planetary space must direct themselves to the ISS for docking and boarding. Please adjust your flight plan accordingly.”
“Thank you, Remus,” replied Sitara, sharing another nervous glance with her wife as she reached for the steering column and laid out their new flight plan.
“Welcome home, private class vessel Bron,” the male voice echoed in reply before closing the channel out.
Well now.
That was certainly unexpected.
“Are there people here,” asked Atso, his eyes swinging between the two colonies as they drifted further between them. “Like, humans? Or like us?”
“That’s what we’re going to find out,” Tasya replied, her mind racing through all the scenarios she had predicted. There were some key elements, she was realizing, that she had not taken into consideration.
Like the International Space Station becoming a border hub or outer planetary port.
After the first set of Amaras had been sent out to live there temporarily while they built the two colonies, the ISS had undergone many significant upgrades. It was no longer some floating research center testing the boundaries of space. Instead, it became an outpost, or warehouse, full of machines and people reproducing every material needed for the surrounding worksites.
It had living quarters, as far as she recalled, but they were no more than military style bunkers. It had sustained life, for as long as it had needed to, but unlike the other sites on Mars or the Moon, there had been no self sustaining robots left to keep the station functional.
It was the first to be abandoned—left behind as nothing more than a floating relic.
It would seem now, however, that was not the case.
“Whoa!”
Tasya turned, as did the others, at Nysa’s words and felt their hearts skip a beat in wonder at the sight growing before them.
Whoa didn’t cover it.
There, in the outer space and planetary hemispheres between Mars, Earth and the ISS, were floating homes—some interconnected, others drifting alone—like boats on starry waves.
“Are these...,” Sitara drifted off, speechless.
“New,” Tasya asked.
Sitara nodded and so did she, their eyes devouring the fascinating constructs around them as they glided between the compact structures.
“Yes.”
Very new.
Had she known about this, as a child, Tasya would have returned to Earth a lot sooner. Some of the homes were boat shaped—miniature sails extended—while others were domes or even oddly flat spheres. There were even a few that had what appeared to be hollow half domes with the main home features secured underneath.
“Those ones look like that weird fish I saw at the museum,” said Mosi, pointing at one of the homes in particular. “I think they called it an Urobatis?”
“Those are Stingrays, like those flat homes over there with the pointed tips,” Atsu corrected his brother. “The dangling ones look more like Jellyfish.”
“These are unbelievable,” Sitara whispered in awe and she wholeheartedly agreed. “They must use the transparent dome tops as a form of propulsion, I think I see thrusters just underneath.”
“I don’t think robots built this,” Tasya thought aloud. “It’s too...human like. Why would machines, even sentient ones, need homes beyond their work sites?”
Her wife nodded in agreement.
There was a growing hope, then, that when they arrived at the ISS, they would find themselves face to face with humanity.
An hour later they were doing just that, docking at the overwhelmingly impressive International Space Station. The large white solar paneled structure had not only been improved upon, but it was abuzz with activity—small private vessels and large freighters alike docking and undocking beside them—all coming from Earth.
Tasya looked towards her wife with watery eyes, a multitude of emotions swelling up inside of her, and grasped her hand—as well as the hands of their children firmly—and stood in the entrance of the docking platform to take everything in.
Gold accents, mosaic patterns, and spiraling walkways circled up and down adjacent to the platforms like an ancient rail station. There were sliding glass doors that sealed themselves into the station’s main framework when not open to allow for a constant circulating atmosphere. Large bubbled out viewports with benches where people could rest, watching the space activity outside go by, were placed every so many feet around the slowly rotating port. And booths stood out near each platform, housing a single individual to process people as they came and went.
It was warm, light feeling, and so much more than she had ever expected.
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