Chapter 26: Embarrassed Arrival

The skiff the Embassy had rented was a 28-passenger model. Mike and Yuki hoped it would be enough – they hadn't asked how many people were in the family, but Yuki was sufficiently familiar with the Port of New Orleans to know this exceeded her allowed passenger count.

"Did I tell you recently how much I love you?" he asked, grasping his wife's hand and getting lost in her eyes. He loved getting lost in those orbs, ever since he and Maggie had first met as university freshmen.

"Not since this morning," Maggie replied, grinning. "I was afraid you'd forgotten since then."

"Well, I do. And I'm grateful for the support you're giving me today, and I hope that the wife of our new charge is as grateful as I am." He gave her a smooch and turned to his daughter Millie and her friend Aiko. "I know, adults shouldn't get all lovey-dovey in front of their kids, makes them gag. Sorry. You're not here on a pleasure cruise, though, you've got work to do. From the mother's overreaction on the phone call, I'd guess the kids haven't ever been nude in social setting in their lives either, and I need two teens who can show them it's no big deal. Plus, Mom probably won't be in any condition to properly look out for her little rug rats, so you might have some light babysitting to do."

The two girls nodded obediently. Millie was actually more amused than embarrassed, and truth be told a little jealous – she wanted a relationship with a boy that would last like her parents' relationship had.

The skiff drew close to the docking port at the main station, then docked gently with the hatches. The lights above the rear hatch turned green and the door opened to reveal Captain O'Malley, now dressed in Spican pink, aside from her wristwatch, cap and sandals. She also had her Merchant Marine Academy ring on, but that was it.

"Captain O'Malley," greeted a relieved Mike.

"Tiffany!" his wife called, happy to see an old friend.

"Ambassador Mike Miller, Mrs. Maggie Miller, let me introduce Ambassador Charles Whitman and his blushin' bride, Mrs. Bethany Whitman." Captain O'Malley leaned in close and whispered conspiratorially, "In the end, me crew had to strip her."

Mike and Maggie both winced. Not how they'd prefer to be introduced to naturism, at all. Bethany was glaring at her husband, covering her breasts with her right arm and her genitals with her left hand.

Mike offered his hand to his fellow Ambassador. "My deepest apologies on the traumatic nature of your arrival. As I said earlier, if we'd have known beforehand, I could've sent some recommendations as to how to adapt to the Spican lifestyle. These two," he gestured behind him, "are my daughter Millie and her friend Aiko." He took in the four shy forms hiding behind their mother. "Your children?" he enquired of her.

"Yes," Bethany replied, indicating each child in turn still keeping herself covered as best she could. "This is Felicity, she's twelve, this is Francine, she's eight, Scott is six and Samuel is four." She patted her swollen belly. "And we don't know what gender the next one is. We could find out, but we wanted it to be a surprise."

Millie and Aiko took over the kids, talking to them and drawing them out of their shells, while Captain O'Malley went along to hand over SS Port of New Orleans to the dockyard and Mike and Maggie helped the Whitmans sort their luggage into "required on Spica" and the items – mostly clothes – to be stored until they left. Yuki worked the phones, confirming the rental of a three-bedroom apartment, arranging office space at the Solaria Federation embassy, leasing storage space for their clothing, arranging a meeting with Kurt Meier, Minister for Foreign Affairs, and alerting the local elementary school of incoming students.

The flurry of activity had finally died down by afternoon tea-time. The three oldest kids were registered with the local elementary school, the furnished apartment had met with the grudging approval of Mrs. Whitman with additional beds arranged for from the landlord, and over luncheon catered by the Embassy staff, Kurt Meier had accepted Ambassador Whitman's credentials.

Charles now found himself in decidedly unfamiliar territory. His government did not hire females, and now he found himself working with the intensely competent Yuki and the very knowledgeable Carole Hargreaves, within an office whose population appeared to be about half female – and with females in roughly half the major roles. And like their male counterparts, the ladies were all nude, which Charles found more than a little distracting at first. To make things even more distracting, the office next door housed the Denebian planetary representative Shirley Templeton, who while mature was most attractive in her own right.

"I managed to get a professor of law from the University of Spica," Carole was saying. "Theresa Baumgartner, recently retired from Harvard Law School."

"I remember Professor Baumgartner," Charles exclaimed. "She taught me interstellar law when I was at Harvard Law School. She is excellent, and should help us considerably."

"We'll need all the help we can get," confessed Carole. "The Denebians have the stronger claim. We'll have to show that the sabotage happened before the ship left Arcturus. If it happened while SS Bucyrus was travelling at lightspeed, it'll be officially Denebian territory, and they would have first claim. If the bomb was on a timer that was set while she was in orbit to blow later, that's in our favour, but if the bomb's timer was activated later, it's a blow for their side. And that's even if the bomb was placed before the ship left port."

"Well, that is a lot of facts to be determined," Charles mused in the ever-so-precise speech pattern that marked him as an Arcturus First Family man. "Let us see what we have got. The Bucyrus logs of course do not show anyone setting a bomb, I'll be bound?"

"That's right. However, there are notable gaps in the video coverage of the engine room and the lifeboat hatches. It looks like he prepared this over a number of days, including while the ship was at lightspeed."

"It is not looking good for Arcturus' claim," Charles fretted.

"If only we could identify this man, maybe we can have more luck with at least getting to interrogate him." Carole passed over a picture of the suspect.