As the transport closed in on Mars, Krystina's mind was diverted. It had been diverted quite a bit lately, and she'd been distracted more than she could recall in the past ten years. Ever since the Virgo showed up, she thought. One memory in particular kept playing back. A memory of a party they'd had on the Virgo before it had returned to its proper universe and timeline....
"You're never going to believe how real this will seem," Katianna smiled brightly as she lead the way down the corridor of the Virgo with Krystina.
Cassandra had taken a liking to Kat and had decided to hold her hand which had brought a very decided smile to her face. Jordan walked beside his mother and following was Jenara pushing Adrianna in a strolling device. Her infant daughter was drifting in dreamland. They were all dressed for a day at the beach. As they reached the holodeck doors Kat stopped and touched the control pad deftly.
"Inside is the closest you'll see to another planet in another solar system.... Well, for a long time that we know of.... What you're going to see is the beach on Kiltarus III. There are three moons. The sky is violet, but you'll feel that the temperature is still warm. It's a beautiful world."
Krystina was excited. "So this is going to be as real as I always thought it would be?" she asked.
Kat shrugged. "Why don't you judge for yourself?" she said, as the doors slid open.
Krystina and Jordan walked in first and both couldn't believe their eyes. It was as if they had just set foot on another planet. They saw water, sand, trees, the moons in the violet colored sky with ocean birds flying by. They heard their calls, the sounds of the surf, the sound of the soft breeze... they could smell the salt of the water... It was real.
"Water!!!" Cassie yelled with glee.
"This really is incredible," Krystina said.
"We thought you might like it," Jenara said with a smile, checking on Adrianna as she slept peacefully.
"Mom, can I go in the water?"
"Uh, yeah...," Krystina smiled, "I would imagine it's safe, with safety protocols?"
"Oh yes," Katianna replied with a laugh, "And you know what? On Kiltarus III there were animals like dolphins. In fact, they looks almost exactly like dolphins and there is one in this program that if you swim out into the water he'll come out and swim with you."
"Really?!" Jordan asked with excitement.
Katianna nodded. "Maybe we can even get your sister out there to meet him too."
"Me too! Me too!" Cassie replied eagerly.
"Cassie does love dolphins and killer whales," Krystina said.
"Then this program really was a prefect choice," Katianna replied.
Jordan immediately ran out to the water and started splashing around. Within minutes he encountered the Kiltarus III dolphin. It played with him and gave him rides. The women watched from shore and laughed. Cassie sat in Katianna's lap. At one point, Krystina's noticed how Kat looked down at Cassandra with sad eyes and stroked her hair. As their gazes met they held. "You will get Laurissa back, Kat.... I promise you.... I know I'm just an alternate and that I have nothing to do with what's really going to happen.... But I feel it.... You WILL get your daughter back...."
Katianna smiled sadly. "I hope you're right, Krystina...."
"I know I am...."
"Well, lets not let your son have all the fun! How's about taking your daughter out there for some fun too!" she smiled.
"Okay!" Krystina replied, returning the smile.
Just then, Adrianna awoke.
"Looks like I might want to sit in the waves at the edge and watch.... Maybe give Adrianna her first taste of the ocean," Jenara laughed. "I mean, all the kids should have some fun, right?"
"Right!" Krystina agree with a giggle.
Soon everyone was in the water, getting their chance to playing with the dolphin. They were all smiling and laughing. It was a day they would all remember for a long time to come. If only there was a way for a lasting memory Krystina thought as she looked at her kids with the dolphin....
Little did she know someone was arranging a keepsake.
The proximity alert siren came on as the transport pilot announced they were on final approach for Mars. Krystina could never quite get used to seeing the huge ruddy orb so close and almost tangible outside the portal. She still had trouble believing any of this had happened. But it had, and she often wondered what had happened to their counterparts. She knew what they'd written, but what may have happened was utterly different....
Steve looked out the window of the control room as the Mark II Personnel Transport landed on the base's landing pad. Dark red dust kicked up into the thin Martian air as the transport's maneuvering thrusters blasted the ship to a stop. With a lot of work, they'd managed to get a working impulse drive after five years of hard work in the Nevada desert. Practical warp engines were still quite a long way away, but the principle had been proven in the laboratories here on Mars.
The earliest NASA projections for a manned Mars mission had given time estimates of six months or more for one-way trip time for eight crew. The impulse drive had shortened that time to one week--less time than the average Shuttle mission had been in the 1990's. And, unlike the old Space Shuttles, the Icarus had provided artificial gravity. Steve had been part of that mission as a mission specialist. Where NASA had once projected only being able to send six or eight fully-trained astronauts to Mars, the advances of the past few years allowed for a team of thirty more or less average individuals to make the trip.
American, Russian, European Union and United Chinese Republic flags flew outside the domed Mars complex, greeting the new arrivals. Steve was waiting for one in particular. It didn't take long for him to recognize her, even without the "K. CONDREY" stenciled on her helmet, or the sitting cat graphic that allowed for long-range identification. Steve wore a picture of Wile E. Coyote on his helmet, out of tribute to the man who had made it possible for him to be here.
"It's good to see you again, hon!" Steve said as he rushed out the airlock to greet Krystina. Krystina was also a mission specialist in charge of the station's information and communications systems (many of which she had helped the NSA and Russian Academy of Sciences 'invent' over the past few years).
[Oh, it's only been three weeks! We had to wait longer than that when you were still taking Greyhound from Anaheim!] she said through the radio link as they embraced.
[All right, you lovebirds! Let's get this cargo offloaded, zhen we can party!] a stern voice commanded. Colonel Oleg Vishnevskii, Russian cosmonaut, was commander of the base and another veteran of the first expedition. He (unlike most of the fifty Russians on the base) wore a red star on his helmet for sentimental reasons. Only a few years older than Steve and Krystina, he'd taken the role of honorary big brother to both. [I brought ze special stuff you requested, Steven Garyevich.] He had also taken Marshal Igor Smirnov's place in the BIRPG when Smirnov died a few years earlier.
Steve groaned. "Not more borscht, Oleg Ivanovich!" he answered in Russian.
[You nikulturny peasant! You don't like borscht? In days of Soviet Union, ve considered ourselves lucky to get borscht! But zhis time I bring genuine Stolichnaya pepper vodka!]
"That's more like it!" Steve answered in English. "Any news?"
[Ze usual. Ze UN is sending peacekeepers to mediate in Iraqi civil war, North and South Korea are expected to unify by end of year--oh yes! Ze Anaheim Mighty Ducks won Stanley Cup four games to one against San Diego Conquistadors!]
Krystina's eyes rolled. In spite of everything, Steve remained a diehard hockey fan. Were Earth not just leaving superior conjunction to Mars (and had not the sunspot cycle intervened), he would have been watching the finals. Word around the Mars Research Complex was that Steve wanted to seed the entire solar system with relay buoys just so he could get the latest sports scores. Oh, well, she thought. It could be worse--I sat through NASCAR for ten years!
"How's Jordan doing?" Steve asked as the three of them worked to unload the transport.
[Settling in just fine--he loves school and he's thrilled to death to have gone to your alma mater!] Krystina said. [He's even in your old dorm building!]
"Damn, is that thing still standing? How's Cassie?"
[The termite nests hold it together just fine!] Krystina said, laughing. [And about Cassie... why don't you ask her yourself?]
Steve turned around to see a tall, slender young woman (a fact evident even through the pressure suit) emerge from the transport. "C. STRESSMAN" was stenciled below the outline of a dolphin. [Steve!] she said as she rushed to hug him.
"And how are you, chicken-head?" Steve asked.
[Mom, tell him to stop calling me that!] Cassandra (it was Cassandra now, not the baby-ish "Cassie") complained.
[Well, love, you know how it is--say something constantly when you're three and it'll come back to haunt you when you're thirteen!]
"How's your dad?" Steve asked.
[He's, you know, Dad...] Cassandra said as she helped haul the containers to the airlock.
[That about sums it up!] Custody had been a touchy issue when the opportunity for Steve and Krystina to join the Mars colony had arisen the year before. That Jordan was now in college solved much of the problem; Cassie rotated between the two households on a six-month basis, but more and more she wanted to spend her time on Mars. And not just because it was Mars, either.
As soon as they made it through the airlock and doffed their pressure suits. Krystina greeted Steve more properly. "I've got another surprise for you."
"Oh, really?" Steve asked.
"There are really Martians now."
"Really."
"Well, at least one..." she said, glancing down at her abdomen.
All Steve could do was laugh at this unexpected first in space. Krystina, however, became very pensive. "I wonder if Katianna ever found her children..."
"Their road goes ever on, whether or not we're there to write their every footstep," Steve said, answering with a kiss....