An Officer’s Duty Read Free

flight will be short, as we will be landing at Our Blessed Mother Inter-Orbital Spaceport in approximately twenty minutes.
    “As a reminder, all passengers wearing gravity weaves should have their weaves set to Adaptive Gravimetrics on the Low Strength setting so as not to interfere with the integrity of the shuttle. Do not adjust them back to Full Strength until we are fully on the ground and the Gravity Weave permission sign has been turned on. If you need help fighting the gravity to do so, please remain calm, press the button on your armrest, or alert your seatmates, and the cabin crew will be by to check on you shortly,” the captain added politely. “Once we land, only the flight crew are allowed to move about the cabin until we have reached the terminal, so please remain seated.
    “If at any time you experience difficulty in moving, breathing, or even thinking, or feel like you are going to black out during your visit to Sanctuary, these are the primary symptoms of the onset of adjustment sickness, which can lead to more serious complications. If you suspect you are about to be ill at any point during your visit to Sanctuary, contact the emergency Nets immediately, and go straight to the nearest medical facility to be checked out for the possibility of gravity sickness.
    “The government of Independent Colonyworld Sanctuary wishes to remind all visitors and returning natives that it assumesno liabilities, fiscally or legally, for the complications of gravity sickness or any related injuries. Neither does Gateway Inter-Orbital Transit, of which you were advised before boarding this flight. However, we thank you very much for flying with us. We hope you’ll have a safe time while on Sanctuary, and wish you a good day.”
    The shuttle jolted again. Ia winced as the woman next to her grabbed at her forearm.
    “God Almighty!” Amanda exclaimed, bouncing in her seat with the next jolt of turbulence. “
This
is
mild
?”
    Prying the woman’s hand off the sleeve of her brown camouflage shirt, Ia pressed it to the armrest and tucked her own hands into her lap. “Since we’re due to arrive at the equivalent of near-sunset, yes, it’s just one of the mild, daily thunderstorms. If it were a
real
storm by Sanctuarian standards, the pilot would have delayed the flight. This one isn’t nearly as risky as you’d think.”
    “Oh.”
    The other woman started to relax, then yelped a little as the ship bucked again. A flash of light and a not quite muffled
boom
beyond the porthole windows made her yelp a second time, along with a handful of the other passengers. The rest were either too busy enduring the ride, or like Ia and the balding believer across the aisle, weren’t fazed by the local weather. Certainly this turbulence wasn’t as bad as some of the planetfalls she and the rest of Ferrar’s Fighters had made, riding to the rescue of various colonyworlds.
    Now I’m riding to the rescue of my own world, in a way. Though my efforts won’t bear results for a few more years at the earliest.
Enduring the bouncing with stoic patience, she absently rubbed her left hand over the hard cuff hidden beneath the mottled browns of the opposite shirt sleeve.
Presuming all my speculations on the trip out here are in any way accurate, that is…
    I wonder what my brothers are going to think when I ask them literally to shed their blood for me, this week?

    Thorne was the easiest of her family to spot. He stood literally head and shoulders above everyone else waiting on the far sideof the Customs Peacekeepers, as tall as a local doorway and as broad as a tank. His dark brown hair had been trimmed with bangs in the front since she had last seen him in person, though it looked like it was as long as ever, pulled back in a ponytail.
    She’d seen the change in the timestreams, but seeing it in person was another matter. It struck her just how much everything had changed back home. How much she had changed, even though Ia had known it