Fugitive From Asteron by Gen LaGreca

Author:Gen LaGreca [LaGreca, Gen]
Language: eng
Format: epub, azw3
Publisher: Winged Victory Press
Published: 2016-01-04T00:00:00+00:00

A few more inquiries that day taught me something about the thing Kristin told me I lacked—manners. I found that when Earthlings dealt with one another, they used manners as a sign of respect. Animals growled and clawed, but men and women said please and thank you. Animals devoured each other, but men and women apologized for so much as stepping on someone’s toe. There was little use for manners on Asteron. The guards there never said please or thank you when they shoved us around. Their violence seemed as jarringly out of tune with life on Earth as manners were with life on Asteron. But the way of the Earthlings was supposed to be the rule of the jungle, whereas the way of Asteron, I was taught, was supposed to be humane. Why, then, were the guards without manners over there?

I had an opportunity later that Tuesday to use some of my new information. With Reckoning Day fast approaching on Friday, Kristin and I had scheduled another practice session to rehearse our two-plane demonstration. As we performed our preflight checks, with our crafts facing each other on the airstrip, she did not wave to me, as was her habit. After strapping my harness and putting on my helmet, I looked at her in the cockpit across from mine.

“Hello, Kristin,” I called to her through the radio transmitter at my mouth.

A flat voice I hardly recognized came over the receiver. “Hi.”

“You are angry with me.”

“I’m not angry. I just don’t want to see you any more outside of work. I want you to stay away from me.”

“Oh, really?”

“I indeed do not want to see you,” she replied, imitating my speech.

“Kristin, I will not fly with you while you are in such a state.”

“If I couldn’t fly perfectly well in what you call my state, I wouldn’t be in this plane.”

“I still will not fly with you until you give me what is called forgiveness.”

“Why should I?”

“Because I apologize. You were right when you said I was rude, but I did not mean to be. And you were right when you said I was mixing up my words—”

“You were?” A note of hope lifted her voice.

“Yes. But you are wrong when you say you want me to stay away.”

“Am I?”

“You do not want me to stay away, Kristin.”

“Did you say you were mixing up your words?”

“Yes, and I apologize profusely.”

“You mean you don’t really think I’m ugly?”

I looked across the field at a dainty figure with a helmet inside a large, powerful plane. “I think you are beautiful, Kristin. Amazingly beautiful.” I paused but heard no response, leaving my words to linger in the space between us. “Now let us fly together, so we can feel the thing you call closeness.”

From my distance I could not perceive any expression beneath Kristin’s helmet. Then I heard her engines start.

“I forgive you,” a soft voice whispered in my ear.

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