Chapter 3
Alanna
Like his tail was on fire.
That was how Alanna would describe the way First Voice Survii escaped the room.
Which was unfortunate because she really wanted to talk to him about their job.
She wanted to make sure they presented a united front, a team, but not so much of one that her fellow Earthlings would accuse her of having gone full native and abandoning them.
Which kind of felt true, but also not? Alanna certainly didn't plan to live the rest of her life on Earth. Not when she knew, and had already seen, so much of what was out here. And there was so much more! There were over two hundred planets in the Coalition, and she hadn’t even really explored Turv.
How could she give that up for a plain, boring life on Earth?
At the same time, she didn't actually want to lose that connection to Earth. That was why she was here, fighting so hard for this protectorate agreement. She wanted to explore the universe but not lose that connection with her family.
A family that she hadn’t seen or properly spoken to in over a year. Missing them was an ache deep in her chest that had only deepened when seeing them again became a real possibility.
But it was going to be hard to work towards that goal when her partner just ran out on her.
“Hey, Alanna,” Peony called out to her. The other girls had all gathered around. The guys were talking with a few of the others. When had everyone moved? How long had she been staring at the door Survii vanished through?
“What’s up?” She asked, getting to her feet as well.
“We’re going to the viewing platform so we can see Jupiter when we drop out of the subspace swing. Want to come?”
“Yeah!” Alanna perked up immediately and rushed towards her friends.
Their energy swept over her like a well-worn, comfortable, familiar blanket that kept her body and heart equally warm. Four girls that, a year ago, she hadn’t known existed, she now couldn’t imagine existing without.
It was fascinating just how tightly bonds could be formed under duress. She would trust any of them, even the skittish Holly, with her life. And she knew that for sure because she already had.
Since she still had some time until she had to track down Survii and force a conversation – she didn’t really want to push herself on someone who clearly didn’t want to talk to her – she was eager to follow her friends.
They were going to be the first humans to see Jupiter up close and personal!
There was no way she would let herself miss that.
The viewing platform of the ship that they favored was something like a terrace garden with a glass half dome overhead. It wasn’t really glass, but Alanna didn’t know what that material was. It was clear like glass anyway.
When they stepped onto the platform, the others grimaced and looked away. Right now, the viewing platform was showing subspace.
Subspace was weird and beautiful and incredible. It was the fabric of reality itself, translated in the only way her brain could comprehend it – colors.
Looking directly at the view, it was bright and swirling and majestic.
Every color at once, never the same color twice, and almost fluffy in appearance.
However, the subspace on the periphery of her vision was black and white and gray, sharp and jagged and erratic.
They didn’t blend, and when she turned her focus, the once monochrome colors became rainbow colors.
Always moving, always changing. The others called it nauseating.
Alanna was convinced that subspace was the truth of the universe – her mind simply wasn’t capable of understanding it fully. She enjoyed staring, nonetheless.
The other girls did not share her appreciation. They deliberately looked away while they waited, chatting with each other. Talking about the things they were most excited to see. To eat. The people they couldn’t wait to be reunited with.
Peony didn’t really have any family, but she was the only one. Holly had a huge family. Alanna, Hattie, and Scarlet were somewhere between the two of them. Scarlet didn’t even really get along with her mother, but she was still excited to see her again.
They were swapping family stories, laughing at past misadventures, when the colors outside the window suddenly vanished. Alanna, who was the only one who could comfortably face the swirling subspace, was the first to notice their loss.
She gasped, stepping past the others. Wide eyed. Shocked. The others turned as well. Their dumbfounded silence echoed along with hers in the room as they slowly, thoughtlessly, approached the viewing window.
She knew what to expect yet was still somehow shocked by the reality.
It was Jupiter, in all of its incredible magnificence.
There were the alternating color bands, swirling with storms that must be so fast on the planet, but from this far seemed to be slow moving ripples in a pond.
They alternated colors from red to beige to brown to maroon to gold.
And there! Its spot! It really had a massive, swirling spot like a red and gold eye watching over the solar system.
And it had northern lights! Sparkling blue and purple, swirling above the ever-moving storms, like the trails of fairies dancing over the surface of a muddy pond.
“Holy shit…” Peony murmured, struck dumb.
They had seen Turv from above when they both came and left from the domini homeworld. It was beautiful – primarily purple and green from its vegetation and ocean respectively. They had seen pictures of Earth from afar; they knew what their big blue marble looked like.
But this was Jupiter! Big brother of the solar system! Guardian of the outer planets. Jove himself – the king of the gods in his holy, celestial form. They now stood at the base of his throne and struggled to grasp with their eyes the truth of his divinity.
“It’s so big.” Hattie hugged herself, as though she needed the comfort of her own arms.
Alanna could understand why. It was humbling. She knew how big the Jutiron Stor was. It was a large, metropolitan city that couldn’t even land on a planet. It was too big to safely descend into an atmosphere. It had even been built in space.
But it was a grain of rice, a speck of sand, next to Jupiter.
And if the city sized ship was so tiny to that massive planet, what were they?
Alanna laughed breathlessly. Stunned by the moment. The realization of just how insignificant she truly was in the vast cosmos.
It was a beautiful, unspeakable, frightening feeling. Staring at Jupiter’s spot as it continued to spin on its endless trek – a storm that had been going for maybe longer than man had been staring up at the sky, questioning the origin of those twinkling lights.
“Guys,” Holly grinned from the planet to them. “We’re home!”
Alanna laughed as she felt someone’s arms go around her. She didn’t know whose. She only knew that she threw her arms around someone as well and, in a matter of seconds, they were laughing and crying and embracing in the shadow of Jupiter’s all-seeing eye.
A long, long way from Earth, yet still, somehow, this felt like home.