- Ava -

“Yes, just me.”

The communication screen could show a three-dimensional image, but Ava usually had it display in two-dee when she was talking to someone with it. She didn't like the feeling of the other person being in the room with her, especially if it was Dr. Gertrude Goanesi, the President of Space Expansion.

“We think that's inadvisable,” the gray-haired woman said. “You're very valuable to us. To Earth. Your experience with aliens is priceless.”

Ava stroked her hair back from her face. “I've done it before. All alone. Believe me, I attract more than enough attention among the other aliens when it's just me. But a whole gang of us? We'd be like a travelling circus. We'd never find what we're looking for.”

“We agree that you have accomplished a great deal on your own. And of course we defer to your experience in many matters,” the bureaucrat said. “Including this one. But not to the point where we'll gladly send you into enemy territory unprotected.”

Ava sighed. That was exactly the attitude she had come to expect from Space Expansion these days. “But they're not our enemies! That's the whole point. The more warlike we seem, the more likely that they will see us as a threat. The best protection is friendliness. All our experience with aliens shows that. Starting with the Acerex themselves.”

The other woman looked past the camera, and Ava got the impression that the leader of Earth's efforts to expand society into space was far from alone in her office in New York.

“Even so. We will not allow you to risk everything. But in view of your unique expertise, I'm willing to compromise. You will bring three other officials with you when you try to track down the Kunuru. Secretaries, assistants, consultants. Call them whatever you want. Everyone needs some help now and then. Even aliens must understand that.”

“And these officials will all be military officers and spies, right?”

The other woman inclined her head. “They really will function as your assistants. And they will keep you safe. You will not be disappointed in their competence.”

Her skirting around the question was a confirmation as good as any.

Ava shook her head. “No chance. I'd rather not go at all than bring any member of Earth's armed services to a new alien species, no matter how bad that species is said to be. Everything we've done here so far has been based on honesty. On transparency. It's bad enough that I've been snooping around in places where I wasn't strictly invited.”

It was Dr. Goanesi's turn to sigh. “You're making this unnecessarily difficult. It's only common sense not to go all alone. The Kunuru are perhaps not our enemies. Yet. But we have every reason to think that they're bad news. They must know about our friendship with the Acerex by now. If they see you trying to track them down, it's not exactly a long shot to imagine that they'll to their best to eliminate you.”

“I've thought about that, too. But the experience we've had with aliens this far all points to friendliness and discretion being not just the best way to achieve our goals – it is the only way. I'm willing to take the risk. And it is my opinion that the risk is much reduced if I go all by myself. Even aliens have morals. Straight up murdering a lone female alien like me is not something that any of the ones we've seen so far will do.”

There was clearly a discussion going on in the Space Expansion office, but the president had muted the sound.

Ava looked out the window of her quarters in the spaceship Friendship, now back in orbit around Acerex after the brief funeral excursion to Bosh, the Fire Planet. The planet looked so much like Earth that it was hard to think of it as separate. Many things had changed there since she and the other girls arrived in the Acerex part of space. Their queen was now Harper, an Earthling. The far too deadly Trials on the Fire Planet had ended and been replaced by much less lethal, but just as challenging Trials in the Freeze to the far north of Acerex itself. Many tribes had started to use Earth technology to make their lives easier, and Ava had also felt the atmosphere among the inhabitants slowly change and become less jaw-clenchingly grim and more cautiously optimistic.

Harper being their queen had not only been good for Harper, but also for the Acerex people.

And Ava was a close friend of Harper's. It made her position in Space Expansion pretty strong. Dr. Goanesi had to tread carefully. Maintaining the friendship with Acerex had to be the president's first priority. Nothing else would be as important for Earth's future. And if Ava was pissed off, then the administrator knew which one of them it was easier to replace.

She sound was turned up again.

Dr. Goanesi had a resigned look on her face. “I see that you're set on this. And it's hard to argue with your results so far. But I will not agree to send you all alone. If you insist on that, you leave me no choice but to cancel your diplomatic status. You can't demand of me that I send you straight to your probable death. I will not be responsible for that. But I'm willing to compromise. Here's my last offer: you bring one other person with you. Someone who can protect you somewhat. A bodyguard, in other words.”

Ava thought about it. Being all alone among sometimes very strange aliens was often stressful. Someone else to talk to? Maybe it wouldn't be so bad. Just one other person. It could actually be a good thing to be able to share some of the load.

“I suppose that could be done. But not a spy. Not an officer.”

Dr. Goanesi nodded once. “Very well. And since I know you'll never trust anyone I send to you, it will be an Acerex. All I want is for you to be safe. Nobody can keep you safer than one of those.”

Ava's jaw hung open. “An Acerex? An actual enemy of the Kunuru? Do you actively want me dead? Nothing else would get me killed faster than showing up all over space holding hands with an Acerex.”

“No, we don't think so. The Kunuru already must know about the friendship between our two worlds. You wanted honesty in this, right? Nothing could be more honest than you being seen with an Acerex. Hey, we are friends. Why try to hide it? Of course none of you will carry any weapons. It will be a completely peaceful mission. With you in charge, of course. I will ask Queen Harper to assign a suitable warrior.”

“A warrior?” Ava spluttered. “Have you lost your mind? We're trying to make friends with the Kunuru here, not shove our alliance with their arch enemy in their damn faces!”

“Nobody will shove anything in anyone's face. It's not a recognized diplomatic technique. We don't even know if they have faces. No, this is just total honesty. Complete transparency. Your own word. It keeps anyone from wondering what our deal is. Well, our deal is that we're friends with the Acerex, and we also want to be friends with everybody else. So we're dragging the Acerex along with us to help them make friends. It's real, too. We do really want them to not always be at war, so we show them how things can be done. You know, peacefully. Who knows? It might actually defuse the whole situation with the Kunuru.”

Ava looked out the window again. Yeah, Harper would be all over this idea. Dr. Goanesi had expertly talked her into a corner. “Just make sure everyone knows that I'm in charge. And that there is to be no violence or threats of any kind at any time.”

“Oh, certainly. The Acerex in question will be a warrior, but he'll also be a diplomat.”

Ava frowned at the image of her boss while her mind tried to catch up with all the insanity she was hearing. “An Acerex diplomat? Does such a thing even exist?”

“If it doesn't, then it's about time it did, right?”

It was hard to fault the logic. “Just make sure it's a bright one. Some of these guys are pretty gung-ho. I want a smart dude with a bunch of common sense.”

Finally the president of Space Expansion smiled, and her face took on a shark-like quality. “Oh, don't worry. I'll ask Queen Harper for the best one they have. The very best.”

- - -

The shower was small and tightly enclosed, and the water pressure was weak. It was mostly air, anyway. The Friendship was the largest and most advanced spaceship Earth had ever made, but some of the basic inconveniences of space travel were present. Like the need to conserve water, so that the giant recycling machines deep underneath the living section could keep up with the constant demand from its large crew. But at least the water was warm, and steam filled the little cabin as Ava finished rinsing off the soap of the special kind that the recyclers could easily separate from the water.

“I must be losing my mind,” she muttered. “Agreeing to bring a damn Acerex warrior on a mission as crucial as this ...” Well, she didn't have a choice. Harper would love it, and it was either this or not going at all.

And a part of her liked it, too. She had felt slightly unsafe once or twice while visiting the more exotic aliens with no features that she could recognize or any easy way of communicating. Not being all alone might help her keep her mind on the mission and not necessarily about not dying. If someone else could handle that part, it would be a load off her shoulders.

On the other hand, being all alone among aliens had often made the other species respect her and treat her well. It was a sign of trust that she supposed was universal to all sentient species, something that they all appreciated and understood. She was pretty sure that her willingness to be vulnerable had often opened doors that would have remained shut otherwise. 

Someone to talk to, someone to consult with while she investigated where the Kunuru might be found -  it could have a value all in itself. If the Acerex who came with her was good. He had to be intelligent. He had to be trainable. And he had to have a certain kind of friendliness towards aliens which she knew was going to be hard for Harper to find.

And of course he would be a total hunk, like all Acerex warriors. While hardly any of them had ever given her any attention, because of their system of fated mates, she enjoyed feeling their manly energy when she was among them. A warrior assigned to her couldn't ignore her completely. And maybe, just maybe ...

The Acerex would sometimes have relationships with someone other than their Mahan, because many never found fated mate. Some would even marry a woman who was not his Mahan, because it was possible to love someone even if they were not fated by some mysterious spirit. As far as Ava knew, those marriages were no less successful than those between Mahans. Not as close, perhaps, not as glowingly warm, more like the lukewarm marriages that were common on Earth. Maybe a warrior assigned to her would be open to something? It would make things less complicated that they were not Mahans.

She looked down her body and felt the mirage vanish in her mind. No, enough dreaming. That would never happen.

She took the shower head down and rinsed off the intricate, glittering sleeve of tiny metal rods and exotic materials that covered her left leg from above the knee and all the way down to her toes.

The exoskeleton could not be seen when she was wearing pants or long dresses, and it allowed her to move normally, but it wasn't an ideal solution. When she was born, the degenerative illness that had malformed her in the womb could not be reversed. Later, medical advances had made it possible to fix the consequences for infants. But for Ava, it was too late. The muscles in her left leg would always be weak and the bones thin. And if there was one thing the Acerex didn't like, it was deformities that had not been acquired in battle.

The exoskeleton was state-of-the-art, and it made her left leg much stronger than the right, normal one. She mostly didn't even notice wearing it, and it hadn't been any problem for her career in Space Expansion. Pretty much nobody knew that she even had it. But if she were to take off her clothes for an Acerex lover, and he saw her major imperfection, then he would turn away in disgust.

Not that she had experienced it. But she had seen similar things happen, and it had tempered her high opinion of the Acerex.

Maybe it was because the harsh life they led meant that babies born deformed almost never lived. Or it was because with a limb missing or weak, you couldn't be as good a warrior as otherwise. Or it was some psychological thing that was hard-wired into their alien minds. Or maybe it has any one of a thousand reasons. Most people would never notice, but Ava was sensitive to it and had seen the signs too many times to discount: the Acerex despised congenital deformities and the unfortunate people who had them.

It had surprised her to see, because they were a very tolerant and open species otherwise. And they loved showing off their war injuries, to the point where they'd rather live with only one arm than have Earth medical tech regrow and attach a new one. But it you were born without it – nope, that was very different for them.

She sighed and flexed her leg, making it move soundlessly just like normal muscles would, except here it was a fancy material outside her leg that contracted and expanded, not natural tissue inside it.

“Oh well, it's not like any of them will ever see it.”

She wouldn't judge the Acerex too harshly about it. Even Earth men had sometimes been scared away when they saw her leg. Still, it took the luster away from the attention she had gotten from Xark'ion. If he'd known about her leg, he would have ignored her.

No problem. She would go on this last mission, locate the Kunuru and then try to make friends with them. Then she would return to Earth and think long and hard about her future. After all these space adventures, a house and a picket fence in some quiet town far from everything seemed pretty attractive. With a firefighter husband, sure, why not. And then some kids. Human kids. Two of them. Or maybe three. She'd write the book, do the shows as a space pioneer, milk the temporary fame for all the millions she could get and then she'd be set for life. Get a white house with a huge lawn where the kids could play. A pool. A fireplace for the dark winter evenings. A rocking chair in a well-lit nook for reading.

The shower decided that she'd spent her water ration, and the trickle stopped.

Oh yeah, and a water heater the size of Peterbilt truck.

She wrapped herself in a big, pink towel. Space exploration had been good to her. But it couldn't give her everything.