Page 45 of Alien on the Moon

She pointed to a vreben plant. A white and pink flower poked out from beneath the increasingly green leaves. It had climbed up the stalk of a bral plant, which also seemed to be flowering. “We did it! We have flowers!”

She threw her arms around his neck. He stumbled in surprise but still spun her and set her down with a kiss. “We did it,” he repeated and ran his thumb along the soft flower petal.

He almost couldn’t believe it. The moon had life, and it looked as though it could be sustainable. Once they had the atmospheric conditions more similar to Thryal, the bral and vreben were going to thrive.

“We need to tell Arccoo,” she said, taking pictures of the flowering plants.

They headed to the office, and Elena used the prince’s private channel to call him. When Rylan asked about it, she shrugged. “Being the royal sister-in-law has its perks.”

Apparently, it did indeed. Rylan would have had to go through a minimum of three layers of bureaucrats in order to finally get to Prince Arccoo, but the royal answered Elena on the second ring.

“Elena, is something wrong? Are you okay?” the prince asked as soon as his hologram appeared. Rylan almost felt bad for worrying him, but Elena had no such qualms.

She arched an eyebrow. “Why would you assume that something was wrong?”

Even with the grainy hologram image, it was obvious that the prince was rolling his eyes. “Because you only call this private line when either you’re in trouble and you don’t want Carmen to know about it, or it’s her birthday and you don’t want her to know what you’re planning. And I know her birthday was about six months ago. Ergo, something is wrong.”

A shit-eating grin crossed her features. “Nope! For once, it’s good news. Rylan is here, too, and he can tell you that.”

“It’s great news, Your Highness,” Rylan said, unable to hold back his own grin.

Elena pulled up the pictures of the flowers and sent them to the prince. “Check your messages.”

The hologram tapped the comms on his wrist. Then his face spread into a grin. “Is that what I think it is?”

She nodded. “We’ve finally got flowering. I’ll send you the brief on what our problems were and how we’ve solved them, but for now, we have a couple of hives of pollinators waiting to be sent up. With any luck, we’ll have our first crop in a couple of weeks.”

“You’re right. That is excellent news.” Prince Arccoo typed into his comms again. “I’ve just sent the photos to the royal council and let them know that I’m going to give you an additional three months. If you have a crop by then, we’ll see about continuing this project indefinitely.”

Rylan respectfully put his right fist over his heart and inclined his head. “Thank you, Your Highness. Your restored faith means a lot to us.”

“Restored?” Prince Arccoo raised his eyebrows. “I never lost it. Your team is one of the most brilliant in the galaxy. I knew if anyone could figure it out, you would.”

Rylan didn’t know what to say to that, so he simply repeated the Thryal gesture of respect. “I am honored to be among those you hold in such a high regard.”

“Tell Carmen and Sofia I won’t be coming back for another couple of months,” Elena said. “And that I love and miss them.”

Prince Arccoo smiled. “Of course, little sister. We all miss you, too.”

With that, they said their goodbyes and shut off the comms. For a moment, they just stood staring at one another in shock at this sudden turn. Then, with a squeal, Elena threw her arms around him again.

The zegs arrived on the base the next day, and they set up something that Elena called an apiary. “On Earth, we have honeybees,” she explained as she finished putting together the slots in the wooden boxes.

“The insects collect nectar from flowering plants and return it to the hive to make honey, which they eat. But they make it in excess, so humans take what they don’t need and use it as food.” She opened the box of zegs. “According to my research, zegs and honeybees are remarkably similar, so I was thinking that even if we aren’t harvesting their byproducts like honey, apiary techniques will help in keeping them alive and healthy.”

Reaching inside the box, she pulled out a smaller cage, which seemed to carry the zeg queen. She set it inside the apiary and opened it, letting the insect crawl out and explore. The rest soon followed.

She smiled up at Rylan. “Now, all we have to do is wait and see if they take to this environment.”

In a couple of days, over half the field was blooming, and the zegs were hard at work pollinating the plants and building theirhive with the apiary as their base. It was fascinating to watch. Though there were only a handful of flora and fauna species so far, he was endlessly amazed by the way life grew out of what began as a barren wasteland.

And it was all thanks to Elena and her clever way of seeing the world.

But then, one night, he found her in the field looking oddly melancholy.

“Isn’t it a bit late to be running soil samples?” he joked.

Elena didn’t rise to the teasing. Instead, she gave him a bittersweet smile and waved for him to come over. “We have some pods. They’re not ready to be harvested yet, but maybe in a week or so.”

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