Bethany lay on my left, Naomi on my right; both were dozing, nude, but I lay mostly awake. It wasn't any one thing that kept me up - I just didn't really sleep well at all in those years; even after the awkward and intense threesome we'd just had while crammed in this tight little spot. My thoughts went to my children not there with me - both those still in this world at that time, and those not.
The bare-bones aircraft we were on rocked and shook with turbulence, but all of us had long since gotten used to sleeping through that. We were between two heavy storage containers with our hardsuits and their associated gear stowed inside, my back against the airframe and part of a folded seat while the two girls nestled on either side of me - my discarded clothes functioning as a fractional blanket between the three of us. It was still more than we'd had to make do with on a number of occasions.
Glancing through a small window over my shoulder, I could see the night air around the outside was clear, for once, and the stars were passing by through the outer window. Emily would be up front, flying us in, but the plane's onboard computer could have gotten us to Malta on its own easily enough.
I felt the aircraft's nose inch downward slightly, and knew we were on final approach. A tap of my foot to the side of the crate and I sensed my J5's readiness. It was at full charge, and very much wanted to wrap itself around my body and turn me into a killing machine... but I let it sleep. A precaution only, to bring it - and parts of it would be recycled for the new one that I was due to be fitted for, later on this trip.
Instead, I stood up, letting the girls snuggle together and rummaging for a real blanket to put over them before getting dressed again in my dress pants and white collared shirt. An additional twenty pounds of muscle filled out my frame now, the product of endless training in the Vault - there wasn't much else to do there.
The cockpit was a change of pace after a six-hour flight from the UK and endless diplomatic meetings. The world may have considered World War 4 to be over, the Imperial Peninsula to have been reduced to a crater and its ally Axum now under the effect of every embargo and sanction imaginable to keep its power in check - but we knew better.
I had no doubt that Nadine was fighting tirelessly to get us more air support from NATO, but despite all that effort, we were still woefully short of what we needed. NATO simply considered the Axum - and thus Naglfar - problem to be... contained, to northern and eastern Africa. New Malta, Osana, and the million refugees there were a tertiary concern, a money sink for charitable donations but not a real political problem.
Emily sat in the left of the two side-by-side seats in the cockpit. Her blue neoprene flight jumpsuit, form-fitted perfectly to her skinny frame, would have been indistinguishable from nudity had it been too dark. The seam on the front was loose down to her navel, carelessly allowing a glimpse of a dark and stiff nipple. Large, old-school headphones covered her ears, a boom microphone hovering in front of her mouth.
She tapped the pedals with her narrow feet in an entirely unnecessary manner, only her head, fingers, and toes visible through the openings in her outfit. She could easily have controlled the whole plane from anywhere inside it. Any of us could. Maybe she was just staying in practice, in case the electronics went.
"Hey." I thudded down in the co-pilot's seat, finally buttoning up my shirt. She didn't respond, so I put a headset on and spoke into the mike. "Hey. What you thinking about?"
"Hmm... oh." She glanced over at me and gave me a weak smile. "Just now? You, actually. Glad you're out of the Vault. We need it. Need you."
I wasn't sold, but I wasn't about to argue it either, given why I'd come out. "Sorry about before. Hadn't seen you in what, three years now? We meet up in Toulouse, get on the plane... and I spent the whole first two hours in the plane having a nice little fuckfest with those two." I stabbed a thumb toward the back of the cabin. "They'd just been out to the Vault too. You could have joined us, you know. This thing isn't old enough to have no t-pilot."
She shrugged. "We kissed, and linked a little. I wanted to go over it all in my head before we talked anyway." She smiled and nodded back toward the cockpit door. "So? Were they rusty when it came to real men? I think they've only eaten pussy full-time for most of a year."
I waved it off. "They remembered quick enough."
We both smiled, and kissed again, this time more deeply. I had leaned over her and practically lifted my sister out of the pilot's chair this time by the time it broke, and felt her hot breath on my face as she stared up at me for a few moments after.
"You're so tired... but so wound up too." She gave me another quick peck. "Beijing go well?" She paused. "Dumb question?"
"Yes and no. There's no deal, obviously." I frowned. "Still learned a lot about their development plans for the Gobi, though. Talked to Nadine and the triplets after - it's not as bad as we thought for Elysium. The water table won't be affected much. We think a few strategic stock buyouts will keep Baikal free of carcinogens until..."
I went on for a few more minutes. My warnings from 15226 of a world drowning in its own poisons, thrashed by its own unchained weather, and sick with super-bugs all seemed not so distant and unlikely now. They were practically common knowledge, even among regular humans. Politics in those days was really all about making sure someone else paid the price.
"That's good." Emily shrugged. "Maeve already knows?"
I nodded; Maeve's own daughter had been there in Beijing with us and had flown directly to Elysium after. Maeve is Nadine's fifteenth daughter; another gorgeous, pale redhead, fresh from four years spent as liaison to a naval picket around the Horn... but by then interested in taking more of a hand in our other affairs.