Piece Simul ✔

Chapter 19-Tiptree-On Our Way

The flume deployed from miles away, shooting up into the sky and dispelling a trail of smoke in its wake.

Another flume went up. Then another. Dozens more appeared, until the sky became a blue patchwork full of intersecting lines which rose and fell.

"But where do the flumes go, Ami?" Tiptree's ten-year-old face pressed against the window.

Her small hands splayed on the glass surface. Occasionally, her palm opened and closed, grasping at nothing.

Her aunt Ami assessed her own faint outline in the window. She kept blinking and touching her eyes. Tiptree couldn't understand why. Just like she couldn't understand the mass exodus in the sky.

Aunt Ami seemed to consider the question with gravity. "They go nowhere." She paused. "And everywhere."

"Is it where my parents went?"

Eyes brimming with tears, Aunt Ami nodded. "Yes, your parents went into the sky, like all the other departed."

"Why can't they stay?"

"Because, they're already gone."

As they spoke, the flumes continued departing, disappearing into the clouds and beyond. Ami and Tiptree stayed at the window to watch. Each deployment lasted seconds, but the total iteration lasted an hour.

Hundreds, or thousands, of flumes carried into the void. Uncle Joo had called them ships, but they most certainly weren't.

Out of sight. Out of mind.

Tiptree had heard this about the flumes. When the flumes left, she was supposed to forget? She could never forget her parents.

Ami's eye twitched, and when she wiped at it, her hand came away smeared with red. She used disinfectant to clean it off, trying to appear casual. Her demeanor was calm.

A small gray button blinked slowly on the wall next to where they stood. Ami's hand hovered over the button. Discreetly, she pushed it. The blinking increased from slow to rapid pulses.

After the deployments ceased, Tiptree crawled into Ami's lap. Her aunt told her comforting, familiar stories. Anything to help lessen the horror of what the flumes contained.

"We're lucky to have been relocated near a deployment station," Ami said.

Tiptree nodded, her brown eyes opened wide in a beautifully brown face. She glanced from their sleeping mats to the cooking area. She struggled to form words.

Finally, she spoke from recovered memory: "Even though the infection only started months ago, it's spreading too quickly to contain, right? The flumes carry out the infected. Tell me the truth, Auntie, I'm big now."

Ami kissed Tiptree's forehead. "That's right, little girl. You're too smart for me"

The child's chubby hand caught Ami's face and tilted it down so that they were looking into each other's eyes. Ami's eyes were ringed with blood. On the interface reports, blood tears were an indicator of infection. Even Tiptree knew that. Still, she asked anyway.

"And you'll not become infected anytime soon?"

"Not anytime too soon, lovely."

She knew her aunt was lying.

Ami hugged Tiptree closer, watching the last of the smoke trails dissipate into the air.

~*~

Tiptree tried to shake her nerves, but they clung no matter how many deep-breathing exercises she tried.

"Just in case," Forster said, handing her an extra oxygen converter. "And you'll be fine."

She watched Samuel, who chatted away to himself while calibrating a bot. His nerves, if he still had 'em, where no where to be seen. 

"Thanks, I think I'm past the 'throw up' phase," she said, smiling weakly.

A minute passed, and she feigned a confident attitude while suiting up.

"I would send Russ with you, but she's still recovering," Forster said, watching her. "Samuel is a good partner. I have every confidence in you two."

"We'll be fine!" Tiptree lied.

Forster nodded. From the way he looked at her, he didn't believe her.

Everyone knew she was nervous about returning on mission. After her last adventure, no one could really blame her. But she had a job to do, and not even apprehension could keep her from it. She stared at the photo of Kass once more, calm pulsing through her.

She considered insisting that Russ join them, then she remembered the ansible. If she wanted, she could radio the request. Samuel would have to be enough.

"We're nearly loaded, and it's time to go," he called.

When she joined Samuel in the air ship, she appraised her travel partner accordingly.

"I've never seen you like...this before," she said, evading the word 'confident'.

He grinned. "I've never felt like this before."

"Like what?" Tiptree asked.

"Like anything's possible. I've already been down once, and nothing happened. Scans of this planet indicate possible signs of intelligent life." When that didn't rattle her, he added, "You're a theologian. Aren't you interested in what, or who, we find?"

She wished she could borrow some of Samuel's positive attitude, but it didn't seem catching.

"Might turn out differently than you're hoping. And we're primarily here to ensure that kids on Earth make it to Forster's age," she reminded him.

His brows met in the middle, but his grin refused to fall. "I know that."

"Well, keep your shit together on the ground."

Though, she meant it more for herself than she did for him, and they both knew it.

~*~

A/N: Dedicated to a fav Wattpadian of mine, krazydiamond

Read one of her many works, or the two I'm into, Marrow Charm and Zombies vs Aliens :P