Page 57 of Cloverleaf Station

Chapter twenty-four

Kieron left the station before anyone arrived for the next season’s work—even before the new operator came in. He could have stayed longer, could have made his goodbyes more properly to those who’d worked with him for years now, could have explained how things actually worked there far better than Elenus would to his successor, but …

The truth was, he hated goodbyes. He was terrible at them, as evidenced by the fact that he’d made Zak’s entire family cry when they left them on Trakta the first time. He was abysmal at comforting people, awful at telling them what they meant to him, deplorable when it came to promises and fond thoughts about the future.

After all, who could know the future? How could he say he was going to see someone again soon, when he didn’t actually have any clue whether or not that was true? He could wish it, sure, but when had wishing done anybody any good? No, the more goodbyes and “fond” farewells he could avoid, the better it would be for everyone. Bad enough he had to go through it with Elenus and Catie.

Catie, at least, was straightforward. They weren’t really saying goodbye, after all—she was still modulating her sister’s AI as it came online, and so she would have a presence on the Lizzie for the foreseeable future even if she wasn’t doing a lot of talking. Talking took power, and power was something they were still working to upgrade on the Lizzie. Elenus had promised a whole slew of improvements for her as soon as they got to Gania— “Starting with the audio system because don’t think I don’t notice the way you wince every time her voice goes into the upper registers; it’s not her fault, these speakers are shrill”—but until then, she would mostly be a silent partner. The thought of having her with him, though, able to communicate through the Lizzie or even directly into Kieron’s implant, was comforting.

Leaving Elenus wasn’t comforting. Not in any way. It was truly disconcerting for Kieron to look at this tall, lanky, handsome, ridiculous man and feel his throat begin to close up and his heart ache in his chest, like his sternum had just been wrenched open. Catie was … he loved her, but she was a being whose presence went far beyond her corporeal form. She could project herself across light-years, could send her voice through new and different mediums, could reach out from anywhere in the galaxy, and she would still feel like herself because her sense of presence came from the things she said and did, not the sight of her shell or the warmth of her embrace. Whereas Elenus …

Hugs. Kieron would miss hugs. He would miss the simple side-along hug that he got when Elenus was working with one hand but still wanted to touch him with the other; he would miss the shoulder-clasp-to-arm-slide embrace that always ended with a kiss; he would miss the double-armed squeeze that preceded and followed tough conversations. He would miss them.

And kisses. And … the sex. Yeah, it seemed obvious, but Kieron had never craved these things before. He’d hardly even given them a thought, and without Elenus around to remind him of what desire looked and felt like, he couldn’t imagine craving them with anyone else. His heart was already full. The feeling he got when they were together, when they were intimate, was like nothing he’d ever experienced. Kieron already dreaded the thought of going for months without that.

And listening to him talk. Which was sort of ridiculous because the man never shut up, and Kieron loved silence. You would think that the two things would be incompatible, but it turned out that his love of silence only applied to people who weren’t Elenus or Catie. A quiet Elenus was a bothered, a sick, a sad, a dangerous Elenus. When he was talking nonstop, it was because he was relaxed and happy. Elenus’s happiness, as saccharine as it seemed, made Kieron happy.

At least Kieron had the Lizzie. No, just “Lizzie” now. Elenus had brought her AI into function earlier in the week, so that he’d have some time to work out her bugs before sending her off under her sister’s more distant care.

“It’s not that I don’t trust you to be an excellent pilot for her, of course, I do,” he said as he paced around while they both watched her neural network morph and change as the new programming took. “I know you’ll be great for her, there’s no question, it’s just this is a very fragile time for a baby, and you’ve got to be able to help out when things go wrong, and we’ve already beta-tested this with Catie, and I know she can help her sister out of any jams she gets into, but Catie’s still practically a baby herself, and I just—”

“Daddeeee, I’m not a babeeee!”

Kieron had set his hand on Elenus’s arm, pulling him to a stop. “I get it,” he said as he drew him in for a hug—another hug, so many hugs, when had Kieron gotten comfortable giving them? How was he going to get by without someone to embrace? “She’s precious to you. But I promise she’s precious to me, too, okay? I’ll do right by her. I swear.”

Elenus had gripped him back tight, some of the tension nevertheless unwinding from his long arms. “I know that. Don’t interpret any of this as me doubting you because it isn’t, not in any way. This is about me being a hover parent, not about you not being great at it. Lizzie already loves you, this is going to be fine, it’s all fine.”

And it was all fine. Lizzie’s upgrades gave her full AI capacity, but it was clear from the beginning that her personality was a little quieter than Catie’s. She was more mature, perhaps a little less curious, but still an avid learner. She was talkative when asked a question but did a lot of deep processing on her own. She liked to play, but she also liked to sit and be still and listen. They were all madly in love with her, and her affection for them was as easy and sweet as Catie’s.

And now it was time to go, to take Lizzie and travel to Trakta and get Zak back where he belonged. The station had only been back in the safe zone for twenty-seven hours, but that was long enough for Kieron’s brain to start itching. He had one huge task left to accomplish before anything else could happen. It was time to get it done.

“I’ll see you soon,” he promised Catie, whose hull glowed with every shade of the rainbow, including drippy blues and dark, swirling indigos of sadness. “This shouldn’t take more than two standard months if everything goes well.” Which it would. Xilinn was expecting him, he had his visa lined up—it was going to be fine.

“Okaaay, Keeeron.”

“I’ll miss you.”

Her harmonic whine was enough to make his teeth buzz. “I’ll miss you tooooo!”

“Aw, baby.” Elenus patted Catie’s doorframe. “Don’t cry. You at least get to hang out with him from a distance; I’m the one that’s suffering here.”

“But you still haaave meeee!”

“Thank god for that,” he agreed, then turned to Kieron. He didn’t touch him—they’d discovered that morning that prying themselves apart was almost more than they could handle. To start that up again now would just make both their moods plunge. “This place will be up and running with new management in three weeks, tops,” he reiterated. “It’ll take three more to get back to Gania, and then we’re full speed ahead. Everything will be ready for you to come home.”

Home. It was the promise of a place he’d never seen but that held the two people he loved most in the universe. “I’ll be there,” Kieron said. “Soon as I can.”

“Good. Message me. Every day if you remember to.”

“I will.”

“Great. Fantastic. Okay.” Elenus wiped his eyes with the edge of his thumb, then swirled away in a flurry of activity before Kieron could say anything. “Time to take the baby on her first spacewalk! Lizzie, be good for Kieron, okay?”

“Yes, Elenus.”

“Good girl.”

Kieron had already loaded his things into Lizzie’s cargo hold. Now he just had to step on board and leave. He stepped, he turned, he looked back—