FALAHA'S JOURNEY: A Spacegirl's Account in Three Movements

Episode #11

I stood in silence, watching Eyuran cope with the shock. Tears, hot and fat, rolled down my cheeks. I had no choice. It had to happen someday but I wish it hadn't been like this.

He quickly pulled himself together and got back on his feet.

"Does it hurt anywhere?" he asked. I shook my head. "Good." He smiled and held out his hand to me. "Let's go then." I nodded.

As though in a daze, I cautiously put my hand into his, bigger than mine and always so warm. We hurried to check on Uncle Orewen, Eyuran squeezing my hand tightly the whole way. There were no signs of trouble in his father's Node, but still...

"Don't worry about things. Everyone has a different kind of strength and, as long as you keep that in mind, you are not alone. I'm sorry I frightened you," he said.

Orewen was still unconscious, but his regeneration was progressing faster now and his vital signs were getting stronger. The problem was the huge square hole in the metagrid wall, leaving him visible to anyone or anything passing through the hallway. Under normal circumstances this programmable metamaterial with self-healing and grid-computing properties would communicate with the ship's Mainframe and restore the damage. But we couldn't be sure it would happen before someone found Orewen.

"Let's relocate Dad to the store room. There is no central lock."

I agreed.

While Eyuran dragged his father down the hallway, I carried the blood packs connected to Uncle Orewen's IV armband. We hid him behind the last set of shelved racks. Eyuran did a final checkup on him and made sure he was as comfortable in this hiding place as possible. "All good. We can be on our way now."

Before leaving the store room, Eyuran rummaged through the shelves, stuffing items that might come in handy into two small bags. He handed one of them to me. It felt like we were going on a hike, albeit a far more dangerous hike than any wilderness could provide.

We returned to the recently opened entrance to the communications pathways. As we were about to climb in, Eyuran paused and looked at me. "Your request earlier—" He blushed again. "Close your eyes and stand still, I want to give you something."

I was surprised, but for once, I obeyed.

He approached and I felt one of his hands on my shoulder; the other carefully lifted my head by the chin. And then he suddenly bowed down and softly touched my lips with his.

At first it wasn't anything special, but then my heart pounded wildly and a weird sensation propagated through my soma like a shockwave. My cheeks burned and my blood was very excited.

What was that?