"Tsk!" sniffed Eloia Rand. "More of those greedy bloodsuckers, Kyra, can you believe it?"
Kyra glanced up from her lunch, her gaze taking in the stern disapproving set of her mother's profile and beyond her, the thorny white ship descending to the docking gantry.
The outer wall of the First Colonial Mall's sustenance court was force-window from floor to ceiling, making it seem as if nothing stood between the diners and the spaceport. Dozens of ships, from the hulking Oullian freighters to the dart-shaped interplanetary messengers, moved in computer-guided harmony. Beyond the spaceport, several of Cahaldra's other moons were silhouetted against the ever-changing purple and gold swirls of the gas giant.
"What's the matter, Mother? It's just a Bram craft," Kyra said, with a shrug that wasn't half so indifferent as she felt.
"That's my very point," Eloia said. "You'd think people would stay where they belong. Hmf. Isn't anyone's homeworld good enough?"
"Wasn't ours?" Kyra countered.
"That's different, and you know it. Your grandmother was --"
"On one of the first terraforming crew from Earth ..." Kyra joined in by rote.
"Don't be smart," Eloia said. "What matters is that we made Rannok what it is today, and it's being taken over by aliens."
"We're all aliens here," Kyra said. "They're only looking for the same things we are. Homes, jobs, good lives. They're not that different from us, really."
"Oh, and how do you know so much about them all of a sudden?" Eloia's voice took on the patronizing tone that had so infuriated Kyra through the first twenty-five years of her life, something that didn't seem likely to change now that she was into her second quarter of a century. "I can't imagine many Bram come to places like Sunspots."
"No, of course not." Kyra shut herself up and went back to concentrating on her meal, though nervousness had stolen her appetite.
"Good. And even if they did, I'd hope any daughter of mine would have the sense to stick to her own kind. Now, hurry up and finish your dinner. I still need to find something for your sister's promotion gift and be on our way before we're swamped by aliens. Why they built the spaceport concourse to deposit those leeches smack in the middle of things is beyond me."
"I'm done." As she started to rise, her foot bumped the bag resting beside her chair. It fell over and sent her purchases rolling every which-way across the glassy-smooth floor.
"Kyra, I swear, sometimes you have all the grace of an Oullian block-lizard," Eloia sighed in exasperation. "Here, I'll help --"
"I've got it, thanks, that's fine, I've got it!" Kyra dropped to her knees and began sweeping items back into the bag.
Where was it? Where was it ...?
She saw it directly under her mother's chair, the black and white box with its red lettering.
Why didn't those marketing people use a little discretion? She wasn't asking for a plain brown wrapper, but did it have to have such bold and dynamic design?
Eloia bent to collect her own parcels, and her hand brushed the side of the box. Kyra's adrenal system dumped panic into her bloodstream by the liter. She lunged for it, too slow. Her mother picked up the box, glanced curiously at it, and began to hand it to Kyra. Then Eloia froze, a statue in the shape of a woman. Her complexion paled until she was nearly the shade of a Bram. Slowly, ever-so-slowly, she looked back at the box.
"Kyyyyyyra?" She drew it out into a wavering accusation that packed a galaxy worth of "this had better not be what it looks like" into a single word.
"It's not mine," Kyra blurted, rooted to the floor.
Her position instantly reduced her to a child again, especially as her mother stood. Kyra had inherited her height, or lack thereof, from her space-jockey father. Eloia was tall and robust terraformer stock. As she towered over her abjectly horrified daughter, she seemed a monument to some forgotten goddess.
She gingerly extended her arm, holding the box as far from her as she could. Her face wrinkled as if she smelled something nasty.
Kyra's chagrin was not helped by the fact that they had drawn the attention of everyone at the surrounding tables. All of them could easily read what was emblazoned on the package, and looked at her with knowing smirks or scandalized shock.
"It's not mine," Kyra said again, with a little more strength and a little less blatant guilt. "Well, I did buy it --"
"Oh, Kyra!"
"But it's not for me," Kyra finished. "It's for ... um ... one of my friends from work! She asked me to pick one up for her when I mentioned our shopping outing."
Inwardly, she was kicking herself black and blue.
Never, never buy things like that with your mother! Don't even go into that aisle! You thought you were being so tricky, that she was too involved with the new ficvid releases to notice, and you lucked out there, but did you really think you could pull this off, Kyra? Now look! Just look!
"Not for you," Eloia said.
"Not for me," Kyra assured her as fervently as she could.
"For a friend."
"A friend from work."
"She ... does this sort of thing?"
"She said she met someone at a club. I didn't ask for details."
Her mother, with a grimace of distaste, let the box fall into Kyra's open shopping bag. She wiped her fingers on her napkin. "I hope this isn't a person you spend much time with, Kyra Jane."
"We barely know each other." She crammed everything else into the bag, hiding the offending article.
Eloia held her spine stiff as a titanium rod, her manner as imperious as a queen as she proceeded toward the lifts that would take them to the shopkeep levels. Kyra trailed after, not daring to speak.
Well, Donovan, she thought, after all this, you'd better be worth it!
**
"Tonight's the night, is it?" Vinkiri asked, hopping onto the corner of Kyra's console. Her bronzed skin gleamed, her hair shined like a spill of rubies in the solar spa's artificial sunlight.
"Shh!" Kyra hissed. "I don't need the whole planet to know!"
"But everyone here already does," Vinkiri pointed out. "You've done nothing but talk about him. Donovan, Donovan, Donovan. Is he picking you up here?"
"No ... we're meeting at my place."
She lowered her voice to what she probably thought was a conspiratorial whisper, which would only have carried to everyone inside Sunspots. "Did you get it?"
"I did. But, Vinkiri, I don't know."
"Honey, if you're going to do it, you've got to be protected."
"What if it's too soon? What if I'm rushing things?"
"You like the guy, don't you?"
"He's great. Sweet, charming, romantic --"
"Gorgeous," Vinkiri added.
"Gorgeous," Kyra agreed. "But we've only been out three times. I don't want him to think I'm ... well, easy."
"Oh, come on, Kyra! That way of thinking went out four hundred years ago!"
"But this is different. It's risky."
"That's why you use protection. Relax."
"And what if he's not attracted to me that way?"
Vinkiri rolled her eyes expressively. "Would you listen to this woman? Not attracted to you that way? Those big brown eyes, that golden skin, hair like a selkie's mane, those darling titties ... Kyra, I'm attracted to you that way! If he isn't, get him to the medics, because he needs help!"
Kyra laughed. "Thanks, Vinkiri, I think. I just want this to be right. It's bad enough knowing what my mother would say. She still won't admit that I'm an adult."
"This isn't about your mother. It's about you and Donovan. You're prepared, you know what you're getting into. Enjoy it!"
**
Kyra's shift ended, leaving her with two hours to get ready before Donovan arrived. She'd been able to put her edgy excitement away while she was at work, but now, on her way home, she gave in to the thrill of hopeful anticipation.
Would tonight be the night? Was she ready? Were they ready?
What she'd told her mother hadn't been a complete fabrication. She'd met him in a club, having been dragged there by Vinkiri when the vivacious redhead was in one of her experimental moods.
Kyra had been expecting to have a dreary time, spending the evening alone in a corner nursing a Nebula Blue while Vinkiri took to the dance floor with one partner after another. Men, women, nats, alters, aliens ... didn't matter. Hers was a freedom that Kyra, having grown up under her parents' strict instruction, found unnerving and enviable.
She'd been sitting there for almost an hour when she'd become aware of the man at the next table. In nearly the very same pose as her. Nursing a drink, watching a more outgoing companion writhe to the music.
He'd sensed her looking at him, caught her eye with a marvelous ice-green gaze, and tipped his drink in a rueful shared toast. And then, though she'd never done anything like it before, Kyra had gone over to him and introduced herself.
