Chapter 3: We Are Family

The majority of the Travelers were still too shocked, ill, disoriented, depressed, or perhaps some of all that and remained attached to the place they were off loaded. Some few, less than a couple hundred, had ventured out in order to find food and provide for those incapable. Poor food, water, and sanitation alone would kill. Something must be done, must change dramatically, and soon.

The left Bub and went to see how the Travelers were preparing their meals.

“Scarlett?” Honey asked as she and Scarlett were paired up and walking towards one of several communal dining facilities the more able refugees had established in various area restaurants.

“Yes, Honey?”

“Would it be okay if my sister lives with us?” Even new to interpreting Traveler body language, Scarlett could see Honey’s pleading expression. “Since our mother died, I’ve sorta been a momma to both her and my father. Now my father will have less time than ever for her.”

‘Interesting distinction that the translating device made between mother and momma and the slang... ‘ Scarlett thought to herself. ‘This technology is good.’

“How old is your sister?” she asked aloud.

“She - let’s call her Sugar, okay?” Honey asked, received a nod, and started over. “We aren’t accustomed to measuring by any planetary cycles - much less yours. Sugar’s body has started maturing to its full reproductive ability, but she is not quite there yet. She could have a child, but it wouldn’t be a good idea. She’s very smart, and other than a few youngling type mistakes, also very responsible.”

“So, in our terms, fourteenish - maybe a little older, maybe a little younger...” Scarlett estimated. “Subject to meeting her and input from Beryl, I see no reason she can’t stay with us. I’m sure my sisters would agree.”

They entered under the red awning of Lombardo’s Restaurant, and as Scarlett held the door open for Honey to enter, she inquired, “But why are you asking me?” She blinked in the dimmer light of the dining room.

The tables appeared to be set up in a typical restaurant pattern. Many Travelers were seated and eating. There was an empty round table that would seat six, and Beryl led her new family over. The Trips each selected a chair, unslung her rifle, and hung it on her chair back. Then the group proceeded to a makeshift serving line to pick up their meals. When they entered the line, Honey waved at a younger version of herself standing and serving.

Beryl whispered, “That’s Honey’s sister. Why don’t we see if she can join us? She’s rather special.”

‘Well, that’s one question answered,’ Scarlett told herself. ‘I’ll pitch it to Violet and Rose, but I know which way the wind’s gonna blow.’

They reached the-soon-to-be known-as ‘Sugar’, and Beryl told her, “If you can get free, grab a plate and come eat with your sister and her new family - over there. She pointed to the selected table.”

The food was dreadful! If you could stand it, it probably wouldn’t kill you - might even provide sustenance. The offerings tasted like the preparers had cooked looking at menu pictures rather than following recipes. Bland tomato sauce, soggy spaghetti noodles, stale bread, and no spices - the reality of what faced them suddenly hit the sisters with full force. The lives and wellbeing of over twenty-five thousand beings were now in their hands.

The Trips ate enough to stave off hunger pains and slipped large portions to the two dogs that had been content to lie at Beryl’s feet.

Shortly, Sugar slipped into the empty chair on her sister’s right and next to Rose. After introductions, Rose turned to her and announced, “Cooking classes just jumped into the top five categories needing attention. This food is fucking awful. You, Sugar! Beryl says you are special, and tomorrow, you start proving it to us. You are going to learn to cook. You are going to teach your people how to cook Earth food. You are going to be the head chef and supervisor of all the kitchens and food preparations.”

“Sugar? Who’s Sugar?” squeaked the youngster’s translator.

“Oops, forgot to tell you,” Honey told her. “You are. And from here on out, I’m Honey.”

The youngster was stunned. “If you say so. But I don’t see how our people will agree to follow me.”

Rose looked her in the eye, grasped a hand and kissed it, telling her, “At first they will do it because we say so. Then they will do it because it will be clear that you know more than them - and prove it. And then they will willingly follow, because you are going to be great. Tomorrow, when you aren’t with me, stick with Beryl like glue. Learn English. Learn to read. You have a week.” She grimaced, “Actually, a hell of a lot less. We need decent food by tomorrow’s evening meal or we’ll all starve!”

“Got that Beryl?” Rose asked. “Little weakens morale more than poor food or not enough food. Tomorrow you start teaching Sugar to read and speak English. Start her learning on recipes. We’ll figure out some palatable menus for her, and she’ll start getting the point across to the cooks. All of them. Call a meeting for after breakfast and lay down the law!”

Scarlett looked to her two sisters, who nodded as expected. She smiled, reached across Honey to give Sugar a one-armed hug, and said, “Welcome to our family, Sweetness; welcome to your new family.”

Returning to pick at her meal, she next looked to Honey. “You never answered my question. Why did you choose me to ask about Sugar? Why not wait and ask the whole family - we’re all equals.”

“Really? Not so much,” Honey answered. “My father was training me to be the Travelers’ next negotiator, contract administrator, or something like that. The translator told me it doesn’t have the exact equivalent. Anyway, I’ve watched you closely since before I volunteered to join you.” She was smug - at least Scarlett read it that way.

Honey nodded at each of Scarlett’s sisters and declared, “If it’s important, the two of you always defer to her. Those ‘rock, paper, scissors’ or ‘one potato, two potato’ rituals you go through - you two make sure she is the one.“ She turned to Scarlett, and asked, “You never noticed?”

Violet blushed and smirked. “Me and Rose learned early that if Scarlet cared about something, she was going to end up the boss. We never discussed it; it just seemed to end up that way ... Yes, indeed, Scarlett is oldest, and she’s the family matriarch.” She stuck out her tongue at Scarlett, smiled, and said, “So there, Miss Bossy! The Boss. We’re just her lieutenants, her minions. Although sometimes she delegates...”

Rose turned to Honey, and asked, “Do these translator thingy’s need to be located close together to translate?”

“No, not at all,” Honey told her. “They can’t reach through a planet, but they have a long enough range, even through walls, that they have a selector,” she turned hers over, showed a dial, and continued, “Their real function is communicator; the translator module is an add-on because we work with so many different species. Beryl loaded your language from hers to ours.”

Honey returned to the original demonstration, “These are set for a distance of about ten of your arm lengths. This is a privacy setting, and this will broadcast to all units in line-of-sight. There are other settings as well.”

“If we needed to reach each other or Bub, how would that work?” Scarlett asked. “Show me how to reach your father.”

Honey showed her the setting, and Scarlett seized upon the opportunity to call him, “Bub, do you have a staff or maybe a committee of function heads?” Receiving an affirmative answer, she told him, “We are very tired and plan to find an unoccupied room to sleep, but I think a meeting with my sisters, you, your function heads, and their deputies is needed. Do you agree?”

Bub answered his agreement and she suggested midmorning in the breakfast area of the Drury Inn. Then she added, “I’ve drafted your youngest. She’ll be serving as head chef.” She listened, and then answered, “Drafted? That means placed in a position whether she wants it or not. I think she does - she seems happy - but we don’t have a lot of time. Sometimes the only way to handle a teen is to wind them up, point them, and watch them run. Like I told her, the food served here was fucking awful ... There is no excuse, none!”

“Teen? Wind them up? I’ll explain later - not a big deal. Jeesh, until now, I thought these translators were pretty accurate. We’ll need to be careful of meaning. Look, Sugar will be staying with us ... her sister, tonight. Her first cooking lesson starts in the morning. You’ll get to taste the results at the meeting.”

Scarlett looked up to see a table surrounded by curious faces. “What? Your translators didn’t pass on Bub’s side of the discussion? Hmmm, that just might be useful, but this time he didn’t say much.”

Scarlett turned to Sugar and asked, “Have you ever cooked?”

Headshake ‘no’.

‘Hmmm, same body language, or has she learned already?’

“Ever warmed up food?”

Nod ‘yes’.

“Can you talk?”

Grin, nod, giggle.

‘Yep, teen! Young teen!’

“Look, Sugar. This job is important, and I need you to give it a chance,” Scarlett encouraged, “But if you don’t like it or feel you can’t do it after you’ve tried, we’ll find someone else. You’re our new sister - not our servant or slave!”

She thought Sugar appeared puzzled, so Scarlett told her, “You really don’t know? I’ll explain the terms another time. Just know that you are family and valued.”

Sugar pushed back from the table and stood. Walking around her sister, she stood behind Scarlett, placed her cheek to Scarlett’s face, and lightly rubbed. It was going to be okay.

During the short walk back to their hotel, the dam broke and a flood of questions and observations poured from Sugar. Torrents. ‘Teen!’

Back at the Drury, Violet went behind the reception desk and logged into the system. The Trips were part-time employees at Columbia’s Drury on Stadium Boulevard - had been throughout college - and had even been a part of the launch of the new Drury Plaza. They each had login IDs and passwords.

Noting that the suite with two queen beds was vacant, Violet coded six keys and passed them out. “If you guys will fetch the Winnebago and bring up the luggage, I’ll make keys for all the vacant rooms. At least some of the Travelers can sleep in comfort tonight. I’ll call Bub and ask - might be good to have him and his staff here. In the morning, someone can remove the bodies from the occupied rooms and free up those rooms as well. I’ll teach a techie how to hack and use other hotel systems. I think they’re pretty much the same...” Having said more at one time than she had all day, Violet ran down and was silent.

“Right!” Scarlett picked up. “I’ll take Beryl and Honey with me when I go to bring the RV. I’ll show them what we’ll need, and while I go for the Sienna, they can take stuff up to our room. There shouldn’t be anything we need for tonight in the van, but I might as well get that done. I’ll take the pooches, too. They aren’t likely to stay if Beryl goes.”

She turned to Rose, “You started on the cooking path. Why don’t you take Sugar into the kitchen and see what supplies are on hand? If we need a grocery run, make a list, and Google the nearest grocery store location. If you need anything for the morning and maybe lunch for the committee, you can find a car or something with keys in it ... Coffee, lots of coffee! AND chocolate - I doubt we have enough with us, certainly not enough varieties.”

The essentials from the Winnebago had been unloaded; the newly formed family entered their new room; and Scarlett pointed to the sofa and easy chairs, “Sit!” She paused. “I hope you won’t be unhappy that you appointed me the family matriarch. Tonight’s your last chance to change your minds. Too much is at stake to switch horses in the middle of the race.”

She stopped and looked at the three green-hued girls to see if they understood the analogy. Evidently, the translator made her point.

“Sugar, Sweetie,” she looked over, “One last time. You just got a little taste of the big job I’ve handed you. Are you up to it? I think you are.”

“Yes Ma’am, Captain!” Sugar responded vehemently, “I can, and I will!”

“Okay, all - biology discussion,” Scarlett launched into a new subject. “New sisters, do you have any taboos or prohibitions about discussing reproduction or procreation acts? Sex?”

She received puzzled looks from the three, so she explained, “Humans have an amazing variety of practices around procreation. In fact, we derive great pleasure from sexual acts, even when producing offspring is not the purpose. Sex bonds us, and it can even divide us.”

She turned to Beryl and told her, “Your sexy smell is driving me wild, and I see my sisters squirm every time you are near them. I hope you’re receptive to my jumping your bones, because I think I’ll die if I can’t!”

Then, she turned to Honey and Sugar and told them, “You two are sweet and cuddlesome, but damn! I’ve been getting hornier all day, and Beryl is about to push me beyond my ability to control.” Her sisters were nodding vigorously in agreement.

Beryl looked fearful, and she said meekly, “I think I know why, and you aren’t going to like it. Even more, you won’t like the bigger picture, and I’m afraid to tell you. You might make me leave.” She stood, faced the group, and began explaining, “But I must. I am and want to be in your family, and you need to know.”

She took a deep breath and continued, “You are part of an experiment, part of a plot. For generations the Seeker have manipulated the genes of various species to make them susceptible to negotiations more favorable to Seeker. They always play the long game.” She turned to Honey and Sugar, “I’ll tell how this applies to you in a minute - but one piece at a time.”

“Several generations ago, your planet was discovered by one of our ships. Initially, the usual plan was put in place: Develop a means of changing your - I think you call it DNA - genes to make you more malleable. Then, disperse an agent around the planet to become active at the same time. Because I am an aberration, and otherwise useless, I was trained to be one of the Seeker’s negotiators. I speak most of your planet’s significant languages.

“BUT - your species is the first the Seeker have encountered that has not yet spread beyond your home planet. Plans changed when greed took over.” Tears were flowing, and not only Beryl’s. “We have a saying, ‘orbits within orbits’.”

“We say ‘wheels within wheels’,” Rose injected. “Go on - please.”

“Well, three units - we call our family and clan unit a Nexus - were performing the design and experiments. I think there were about twenty-five human births as part of the testing. You three meet the specifications I saw. That should give us hope some other humans survived.”

“For some reason, you experiments were not developing as planned. My father thought that you were too smart and not sufficiently malleable. So without telling anyone outside his Nexus, he decided that all humans would be eliminated, and that the Seeker should take your planet. His Nexus was in a higher orbit, you see, and one of the three lower Nexuses was nudged to the new direction, and your planet died.”

Beryl continued between sobs, “My people don’t have your concept of ‘evil’. They know ‘good for me, good for mine’ and ‘bad for me, bad for mine’. My father even directed that your people should be programmed so that their corpses would not decay - or at least not for a long time. That would make for easier disposal once the Seeker occupied your planet.”

“Don’t you see,” she wailed, “I know they are evil! I didn’t know then, but was traded away, because when their plans changed, I had no other use. You love my smell because it was programmed into you! My people killed yours, and you are forced to love me.”

“No such thing!” Scarlett yelled through her own tears. “You are not your father. You are ours - one of us - FAMILY!” She crossed to the crying woman and held her.

Shortly, she directed, “Honey, you and I are going to shower - to take care of Beryl - get her calmed and relaxed. The walk-in shower will hold three. Rose, you other three should push the queen beds together. We all sleep together from here on out. Show Sugar how to lay out the chocolates, dip ice cream, and make hot chocolate. Dig out enough shorty pajamas for all of us, then relax. You get the shower when we’re done with Beryl. Then it’s time for girl talkin’.”

The concepts ‘Shower’ as facility and process were both novel to the two dragooned aliens. Limited space and water recycling aboard a spaceship meant that the cleaning of one’s body was a quick, solitary process. However, it was soon apparent that for Honey and Beryl, exposure to each other’s body was not a new experience.

Honey watched in awe as Scarlett adjusted water flow and temperature from the two showerheads. Then, she removed her belted shorts, stepped from her sandals, and began to sensuously remove clothing from the still weeping Beryl. She kissed her friend’s body as she worked and used her hands - oh, Honey had three fingers and a thumb - to soothe and gentle. And kisses, there was at least one bedroom commonality.

Just before she removed her translator, Honey softly told Scarlett, “Beryl likes to have her nipples sucked, and so do I. But I like mine nipped, too.”

Once the three women were completely nude, Scarlett pulled the pair under the flowing water. She watched the pleasure flow over them as they luxuriated under the warm water. She lathered the shampoo with her hands, pushed Beryl partly from the stream, and began to wash the long, beautiful hair. Wondering how Beryl coped with her tresses aboard a ship or space station, she received an answer when Beryl whispered, “Oh, so wonderful. I’ve had to keep my hair braided for so long, and now it’s free - like me!” Then she paused with a startled look and asked, “I am free, aren’t I?”

“Even better,” Scarlett answered, “we all belong to our family.” Ignoring the shampoo she leaned in and gave Beryl a full out passionate kiss that was avidly returned. When the kiss finally and reluctantly finished, with a few parting pecks, Beryl turned to her friend - lover? - and translated.

Yes! Lover! Honey’s arms circled them, and she kissed back and forth until the giggling Scarlet gently pushed them apart. “Clean now, hanky panky later,” she told them. She took Honey’s hands from Beryl’s tits and guided them to the process of giving pleasure with a shampoo. Not to be outdone, the pair bracketed the human woman and showed that they had learned their lesson well. Then, even Honey’s short helmet yielded pleasure when massaged, pampered, and cleaned.

Hair clean, the trio turned to learning new convexes and concaves as they soaped and caressed one another. The three bodies, though exotic during the ‘education’ process, were startlingly similar - including erogenous areas. Beryl continued to smell wonderful, and her taste when she orgasmed on Scarlett’s tongue - magnificent!