Page 9 of Advance and Retreat
Toni’s heart wasn’t in it.She’d known for years that education, as essential as it was, wasn’t her life’s calling.But how could she disappoint her sister at a time like this?Stacy was focused on keeping Earth II safe from the All and other hazards.The last thing she should be worried about was casting around for Toni’s replacement.Besides, Toni still had no idea about the life she wanted to pursue.
“Thirty-three years of life, and I haven’t learned who I want to be when I grow up.”She laughed and marked how sad she sounded.
* * * *
Joshada
Laughter Lorenz gazed at the application on the holoscreen hovering before her.She felt sensations she’d missed for too long: anxiety, anticipation, excitement.
Hope.
“Send.”She spoke loudly, to underscore yes, she was doing this.She was throwing her hat in the ring for the chance to go on the deep space exploration mission Kalquor was financing.
Her battered computer, a handout courtesy of the Joshadans who were hosting a small group of Jedver’s human refugees, beeped it had transmitted the application.
Soon, I’ll be gone too.Her stomach fluttered, and Laughter blew out another breath.
It wasn’t ego giving her the confidence she’d join what appeared to be a minor armada on a one-way trip beyond the interstellar frontier.It was a given the powers that be would accept her as the mission’s long-distance communications systems manager.She had all the qualifications.
“Hell, I designed the system they’re using to remain in contact with the Kalquorian Empire,” she told the modest but nicely furnished apartment she had briefly to herself.“I wasn’t just on the team.I led it.The design is mine.”
She was perfectly willing to give credit where it was due.She’d had plenty of help implementing the small and easily portable communications relays destined to revolutionize the field of deep-space exploration.Her team of experts had honed the design and fine-tuned the technology, enhancing her dream to perfection.They’d taken the lovely shape she’d molded and added details to bring it to the apex of all it could be.
But the core of the project...it had been her concept, her creation.Everyone acknowledged the fact.
The relay stations, which were capable of being folded so they were no larger than an adult woman Laughter’s size...five-feet-eight...would enable their users to set up com paths stretching hundreds of thousands of kilometers end to end.Communication across such expanses wouldn’t be instantaneous; such was out of the realm of possibility.But information could be sent back and forth over distances once deemed utterly insurmountable.
Part of her speech when she’d introduced the project three years prior to its potential investors had been, “Thanks to my design, the borders of space we’re able to visit in manned ships and transmit data on will be beyond five times the current distance.Probes we currently send out to explore and report won’t return until some sentients’ grandchildren’s time.If you support this project, we’ll hear from those far-flung places in a matter of four years.”
She’d won the support, notably from Kalquor, Alneusia, and Tratsod.In return, she’d given them relay stations capable of expanding known space’s reach into the remote cosmos ten times greater than her projections.
The accolades had been tremendous.She was the darling of scientific, engineering, technological, and exploration circles.Companies throughout settled planets vied to hire her.Various boards of most begged her to lead them.Universities jostled to have her join them to direct vast departments and teach.Laughter Lorenz was the golden girl in elevated circles.
It filled none of the void underlying her life.
She regarded the vast emptiness as the reason she’d run to Joshada once Earthers had evacuated Galactic Council space when the Darks had invaded and taken over.Joshada, the decidedly non-technical civilization that prized craftsmanship and artistry above machinery.What tech equipment the short, colorfully furred Joshadans possessed was gifted to them from their protective neighbor, Kalquor.They were a smart species, adept at learning how to use such items, particularly where medical needs were concerned...but theirs was a peaceful, simple people, content to live out lives in bucolic villages where they turned out handloomed fabrics, hand-carved furniture, and art unmatched by the known worlds.It wasn’t lost on Laughter that in her modest apartment refuge, she was surrounded by chairs, tables, fixtures, and decorative items worth a king’s ransom on other worlds.
It had been this pastoral planet Laughter had escaped to, far from where she might be surrounded by the trappings of success that had come to mean so little.
She switched the floating monitor to show her a diagram of her relay design’s evolution from its prototype to the final design.Here was her baby, which she’d thought she’d have to send out into space under the supervision of others.Now she’d be able to accompany it on its inaugural voyage, leaving familiar space far behind.
Running from civilization is a sign of desperation.
Perhaps.She’d been at a crossroads for some time.Nearly two years, to be exact.She had new ideas, new designs, but no will to carry them out.It wasn’t merely her career she’d lost her motivation for.She was spinning her wheels in all areas of her life, floating in the nothing her existence had become.
It’s meaningless without him.
The door behind her, the entrance from the outdoors to the apartment’s main living space, opened.Her longtime boyfriend Christoph stepped in.
Barely in the door, his assessing gaze took in the fact she still wore her pajamas and bathrobe though it was late afternoon.
“I took a mental health day,” she said and wondered why she justified herself to him.
He shrugged and dismissed it in an instant.He ran his fingers through dark brown curls, which insisted on falling over his eyes.“What’s for dinner?”
“What part of a mental health day did you miss?I’m closed for business.We have last night’s leftovers.Or whatever you order.”There were two nearby Joshadan dining options.Both delivered.They were equally good.
The lines between his brows deepened, and he frowned.“You never cook anymore.”
