Page 28 of Yorix

I laughed. “I was wondering if I was included. You took off so fast, I hadn’t had time to pull on my boots!” I pointed down at my bare feet, and her cheeks reddened.

“Oops! But you need to hurry. We don’t have long before the next shuttle leaves.”

I chuckled again, going to the alcove next to the door where we’d placed a small cubby for our footwear, not wishing to mark up our floors unnecessarily. I plucked my boots from it and quickly slid my feet inside. I took a step forward, and the boots adjusted to fit me snugly enough that they would not allow my foot to slide about.

“All done, see?”

She laughed.

“Sorry, I know I’m being a bit ridiculous, but it’s the dress! Every girl dreams about what she will wear to her wedding, you know? And now it’s my turn to actually go choose for real!”

I slid her smaller hand in mine, lifting it to my lips for a kiss. “Then let us go forth, milady,” I said in the manner that we’d seen on the medieval fantasy vid she’d chosen for us to watch yesterday.

Her cheeks pinkened again to my pleasure, and she giggled. “Oh, you,” she said, but she didn’t pull her hand away from mine, and hand in hand, we went through the door.

We arrived just in time for final boarding, and so a very short while later, arrived on The Star Blade.

“Hey!” Chris called out to us from where he was waiting nearby. “Are we ready to do this or what?”

“I definitely am! I’ve had a picture in my head since I was like six of what I wanted for a dress, so the first one even close to it is mine!” Lynn told him, and he laughed.

“Why does that not surprise me?” he teased her.

“Food first,” I reminded the pair, and Lynn nodded while Chris looked worried.

“Okay, but I’m not sure if I can eat a whole lot. My anxiety is a bit much at the moment.”

Happily enough, a cup of hot jasmine tea seemed to settle most of his nerves enough to eat, and he put away an impressive amount of food from the buffet. So did my Bride and I, and I made a mental note to make sure we had Chinese at least once a week as she really enjoyed it. It was with full bellies that we walked slowly over to the wedding attire shop.

“Well, with a food baby this size, at last we know my dress won’t be too tight on the day!” Lynn laughed.

“It’s only a couple of days away,” I pointed out.

She patted my arm. “You haven’t seen how much I can pack away when I’m stress eating.”

“Hello!” a petite dark haired female approached us. “I’m Lucille! You must be Lynn, Chris, and Yorix. Xero told me to expect you.”

“Great!” Lynn said.

My kunnarskyn went off, the tone indicating it was urgent. I frowned down at it.

“Excuse me,” I said, stepping off to the side to find I had an urgent voice comm from my lab.”

“Yorix,” I said, answering it.

“Sorry to bother you, but it’s Hormel! They insist as you’re the senior technician on this project, they will only speak with you,” Zebulaw replied, looking harassed. “H says if you don’t come to the product launch discussion, they’ll pull the plug and all our work will have gone to waste.”

“Hormel? But the Spam licensing was before my time and we’ve had that available for over three years now.”

He grimaced. “They own Skippy as well.”

Hazzlehop’s head popped into view. “It’s Mark Judd. He owns a large number of their shares and he wants to discuss the science behind it. Something about commercials playing up the replicator angle down on Earth.”

“Why would they- nevermind, I suppose I’ll have to find out on my own.”

“They're meeting with Commander Gundar and Milarti from Public Relations right now. Sorry, but he asked if I was senior and I stupidly said I was in your absence and that was that,” Zebulaw said with a contrite expression.”

“It is what it is. Hopefully it will not take long. Inform them I will be there shortly. I’ll get a shuttle to take me directly.”