Hadrian's Colony: Chapter Eighteen, Part Two

 Notes: Let's have some recovery, shall we?

Title: Hadrian's Colony, Part Two

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Chapter Eighteen, Part Two

 

Photo by Brandon Stoll

Kieron woke up feeling like a blank slate, emotionally and physically. There was still an IV drip in his arm, one that had been going for a long time given how badly he needed to pee, but he didn’t feel the fog of Regen blanketing him anymore. Instead, as he gingerly shifted his limbs, Kieron realized that nothing hurt. Oh, there was still an ache in his arm and collarbone, and he was very aware of the emptiness of his stomach, but he didn’t hurt anywhere. Not even inside.

Well, Regen was a hormone stabilizer in addition to a healing serum. Small wonder he wasn’t in an active bout of depression after being asleep for…he checked his internal time sense.

Over twenty hours? Really? And Elanus was nowhere to be seen, although given that there was a glass of water beside him and a blanket smoothed over his body, he’d been here recently. Catie’s interior was dark, with only the emergency lights on, and rather than feeling abandoned Kieron just felt soothed.

He carefully got to his feet and walked over to the bathroom. Once he took care of things, he washed both his hands and his face—which was already free of dirt and blood, he noticed as he looked at his reflection. He was wearing a clean pair of loose pants, too, the ones he liked to wear back home for how soft they were but didn’t pack for this trip because he’d thought there wouldn’t be any point. When would they have time to relax, anyway?

But of course Elanus had packed some for him. Of course he had. Kieron smiled a little as he headed for the storage compartment and pulled out a matching shirt. “Catie,” he said quietly.

There was a faint hum that slowly got louder, then, “Keeee!” It was said at a lower register than Catie usually used, but was still enthusiastic. Elanus must have had a talk with her about being gentle with him or something. It should have annoyed him.

It didn’t. He was just happy to hear her voice. “Hey, baby. Where’s your daddy?”

“He’s outsiiide, playing with his trebuchet.”

Is that what we’re calling it now? “What’s a trebuchet?”

“A siege weapon.”

What the ever-loving… Kieron pulled out a pair of slippers—he could feel that his feet were still sensitive and needed the soft fabric a while longer—and put them on, then turned to the hatch. “I think I’ll join him.”

“Okaaay. Blobby is there toooo.”

“Bobby, not Blobby,” he corrected absently.

Catie huffed. “Whateeever. I don’t like him. He’s a big show-ooooff.”

Kieron paused. “What do you mean?”

“All he wants to taaalk about is how braaave he was when you were captured, and how much you had to do togeeether, and how you love each other the very best. But you don’t love him the bessst! You love me and Liiizzie just as much!”

Ah. They were in for another round of siblings learning to live with each other, then. “I do love you all so much,” Kieron confirmed. “Bobby is still very young. He doesn’t know everything we’ve done together or how close we are as a family. He’ll learn.”

“He better,” she muttered. “Or Liiiizzie will short out every circuit in his booody.”

Well, that was…progress? “Let me out now, honey.” The hatch opened, and Kieron lowered himself carefully to the ground as he blinked against the surprising amount of light. No storms were centered over them right now, it seemed. About thirty feet away, Elanus was standing beside a device about half his height, two slender poled set two feet apart and a wide base to support them, an axis at the top that a much longer pole was connected to in the middle, and on each side, two boxes. One box looked to be solid, while the other—

Elanus pushed a button, the solid box fell, and the other box rose with a “twang” and released a load of pebbles at a shockingly high speed. In the distance, a swathe of sparse grass evaporated from the impact.

“You just can’t help yourself.” Kieron had meant to chide him, but it came out fond instead. He walked over and leaned in to Elanus’s side, wrapping an arm around his waist. Their height difference made this sort of casual embrace a little more complicated than it would be otherwise, but there was no one to watch them make a spectacle of themselves here. Unless… “Are you sure we’re alone?”

“Catie sent up a mini drone to check for incoming while the weather is cooperating, and we’re in the clear.” Elanus leaned down and kissed the top of Kieron’s head, then his lips as soon as he looked up. “And I needed a way to pass some time without tinkering on the bots.”

“Yeah, about that.” Kieron poked his side. “No more kids, okay? We’re going to have a hard enough time getting these three to get along.” He looked around. “Where’s Bobby?”

“Collecting pebbles. He’ll be back soon.” Elanus sat down and pulled Kieron down after him. He settled in Elanus’s lap, finally eye to eye. “How do you feel?” his lover asked.

“Better,” he said. “Less…” Hopeless. Hurting. “Dramatic.”

“I’d say you had reason to be a little dramatic, given everything you went through.”

Ugh. He didn’t know the half of it yet.

“Bobby filled me in some,” Elanus continued, and Kieron breathed a sigh of relief. “Only the parts he knows, which miss a lot of your interactions with your family, but I think I understand most of the action scenes, according to him.” His eyes went soft. “You spoke to Lizzie?”

“I did. She’s fronting a presence up there, but I wasn’t able to clearly ask her anything. I don’t know what she’s going to make of it, honestly.”

“She’ll come after us, of course.”

Well…yeah, that was probably true. Lizzie hadn’t wanted to be left out of this awful trip in the first place. The question was, would she come alone or with a pilot? “I hope she does it carefully.”

“She’s our most careful kid,” Elanus replied. “I think she will. It means we’ve got at least a potential rescue on the way, regardless of how long it takes her to get here, which could be weeks given what I remember of the gravity wave predictions.” Interstellar travel between Central System planets followed well-charted paths that accounted for the worst of the universe’s roadblocks, so to speak. Out in the Fringe it was harder to navigate the best route, and here? In practically un-charted space? It was slow and tedious even for the smartest ship.

“So we’ll be here for a while,” Kieron murmured.

“Probably.”

“We should find a more secure place to hide.”

“We will, once the drones come back with their topographical reports.”

Kieron raised an eyebrow. “More drones? Are you trying to give us away?”

“Just taking advantage of the weather,” Elanus assured him. “They’re designed to go inert at the first contact with sufficiently advanced technology. No one will be finding us with them.”

Eh, it would have to do. “All right, then—”

“And since we’re not in a hurry, I think we should take some time away from the kids to talk.”

Well that sounded ominous. “About what?” Kieron asked apprehensively.

“About how we’re going to ruin the fuckers who took you captive before we leave this place for good.”