Chapter 16

Time: Monday, December 24, 2018 5:14 PM

Everyone except Emily was standing by the covered pool, waiting for its grand opening. Through the windows, they followed their Janitor-in-training make her way through the first floor rooms to join them.

Mark thought sunset today occurred exactly at 4 PM or maybe even a minute before. It was remarkable to think of the changes occurring so quickly. From some preliminary observations yesterday night, he had already found a new star that would serve as a pole star and had approximated their latitude at forty-five degrees, very similar to what it was at Burlington, Vermont. But as for the tilt of the planet and its orbital period around the orange sun, those topics still required more observations.

Jada and Hannah had gotten back late, less than half an hour ago. Jada had given him a cryptic comment that they had some last-minute Christmas shopping to do. Jada also had found that the mushroom locks were superbly designed to lock a mall door with a simple twisting insert. It took a bit of experimenting, but Jada and Hannah finally figured out how to make the locks work.

There were six tumblers in the fat part of the mushroom that stayed outside the indentation. When unlocked, the tumbles could be programmed with a small electronic key to accept any six two-digit configuration. The simple, rugged devices allowed for a trillion possibilities for the correct code. Jada had picked 26-53-58-97-93-23 for the dozen locks she had set, including the one on the locksmith store itself. Emily had laughed in approval when she heard of the combination. She was the only one at home to recognize that Jada had picked the next twelve digits of pi after skipping the first six of 3.14159.

“Hi everybody,” Emily called out as she approached the pool. “Sorry I took so long to change. Should I just open the pool?” She paused and then teased. “I thought maybe I should make a speech first.”

“Emily, it’s a little chilly out here!” said Hannah shivering. Like everyone else, she was standing barefoot in the sand wearing just a bathrobe covering her bathing suit. After a high of 19C that afternoon, the temperature had fallen to 16C and there was also a cool night breeze blowing.

Emily nodded and got right to work. Within seconds after typing at the console, the great cover quickly retracted. Emily also activated the great underwater lights. The pool was beautifully finished in smooth mosaic tile similar to Islamic geometric designs. Hannah tested the water with her foot and then shed her robe and dived into the sparkling blue water, followed quickly by Jada and then Emily. Jada went for a deep dive. The other two women broke the surface almost immediately.

“Wow,” said Emily. “Nice! A bit on the cool side though!” She climbed out and shivered as she ran to the console. “I’m changing the water temp from 22C to 24C. According to my lessons, it should only take ten minutes.”

“What?!” blurted Mark. His mind tried to estimate the power required for such a feat.

“That’ll make a difference. Bravo Emily!” Hannah called out.

Jada broke the surface. “Oh wow, this is wonderful. There’s nothing like the feel of swimming in deep water! Smooth as silk!”

The remaining four members shed their robes and a moment later all seven were playing under the star-filled sky.

Five hours later... 10:09 PM

There was a knock on Mark’s bedroom door and second later Jada poked her head in. “Hi! I saw your light on outside. Waiting up for Santa Claus tonight?”

Mark smiled and shook his head. “Just till midnight. I want to watch my phone clock and the house clock when the day turns over. Jada, don’t you get cold walking around outside in just pajamas?”

“Oh, a little. I think I’m more chilly from my swim actually. Got any heat?”

Over the next two hours, Mark thought he had perhaps the most enjoyable moments of his life. He and Jada cuddled on his bed for a while, warming each other with their bodies. It was an amazingly easy and relaxing time, a time to get to know each other and test the bonds that were forming between them.

There was gentle petting and foreplay, but it was all done in a spirit of playfulness and affection. By unspoken mutual agreement, they knew nothing overtly physical would happen tonight. Their caresses explored the boundaries of sexual appreciation but did not cross over into sexual arousal. And otherwise they just talked, talked about everything great and small. And as midnight neared, they sat together on the floor, intently watching both clocks.

“There! Did you see it Mark? Just before it should have turned to 23:59:07, the house clock turned to 00:00:00.”

“Yes! And I agree, it was almost a full second, but maybe just a hair faster. Call it a 53.1 second jump. My conjecture is this planet is spinning just a bit faster than Earth did, and the house clock is showing us by how much.” Mark sighed and put his arm around Jada’s shoulders.

She hugged him by the waist. “Merry Christmas, Mark. Or am I a bit early?”

“No. Adopting the local time zone seems the right thing to do. Merry Christmas Jada, and a belated happy festival of lights.” They shared a long kiss and the Jada felt a brief tension in her lover’s body.

“Something wrong?”

“Oh, I was just reminiscing. I suspect this planet has a faster orbital period than Earth. That’s why the lengths of the day are changing so rapidly. This might be the very last time we celebrate a December 25’th.”

“Ah. Yes...” They lost themselves in another kiss. All sense of time disappeared. Somehow they found themselves lying on the floor, hands inside each other’s pajamas.

“My beautiful Jada,” Mark whispered. He was gazing at her in pure adoration, his hand inside her pajama bottoms, gripping the flesh of her hip on the left side of her pelvis, his forearm brushing against the curls of her pubic fur.

Jada became aware of her surroundings when she tore her eyes away from the depths of Mark’s gaze. She realized she was panting and whispered, “The sleeping tigress we talked about earlier, Mark. She’s almost awake, and it’s too soon.”

Mark was panting too, and his eyes were blazing with hope and affection. “Such strong forces, Jada...”

“Yes, strong forces, strong and beautiful.” She gave him a sexy purring sound. “But my love...”

“Yes, I know. You’re right. We should wait.” Mark sighed heavily and kissed Jada’s cheek. “I think that’s the first time you called me My Love.”

Jada smiled and traced his cheek with the pads of her fingers. “It’s very late, and I can feel my will power slipping away.” She sighed. “So goodnight, Mark. Thank you for an enchanting evening.” They shared one last kiss and were both in their own beds a minute later.

Time: Tuesday, December 25, 2018 9:00 AM

It was a delightful Christmas morning. It seemed that everybody had managed to find a little time for present shopping in the great mall below, and in the dead of night Madison, Hannah, and Ashley had gotten up and decorated the lounge for Christmas. Everybody was up by dawn, which was recorded in Emily’s sketchbook as occurring at 8:08 AM. They all had breakfast by the tables at the kitchen’s eastern windows, cleaned up and were ready to open presents by 9 AM. Mark’s eyes were on a huge package meant for him. He recognized Jada’s handwriting.

He tore the wrapping paper and his eyes lit up brighter than the Christmas tree. “Jada! How?!”

She laughed and clapped her hands at his delight. “If you’re thinking of the weight, we used the bike with the side-car attachment. It’s a wonderful way to transport heavy cargo.”

He nodded as he continued to unwrap his present. “Where did you get it?”

“There is a specialty optics store just beyond the locksmith, about a kilometer past the bike shop. It wasn’t hard.”

Mark finished unwrapping his present, a 12-inch top-of-the-line Meade reflecting telescope. He then hopped over and gave Jada a very affectionate kiss.

And the present openings continued. Mark had picked jewelry for everyone. It had felt a little strange yesterday, walking around in a nearby store in the mall below, just taking things he thought his new friends would like, but it was all he had time for, pins and necklaces for everyone except Jada who got a ring. It wasn’t too pretentious, a simple gold ring with small diamonds and amethysts. Jada seemed very pleased with her gift as she put it on.

Mark was the first and last person to open a present, one last compact but heavy wooden box from Hannah. He opened it up and looked inside and gave a small smile. He reached inside and picked up one of the dozen four-sided black steel spikes, chiseled on one end to an ultra-sharp beveled point. The spikes were very thin, about 18 cm in length and 150 grams in weight. He looked at Hannah and said, “How did you know?” Hannah just grinned in reply.