Thanks to Malady for his help editing and for ideas.

To Return Home 1.6

Daddy shook his head. “That bastard really threw a problem our way.” He was mad. Livid, even. Although his voice was steely calm. I don’t think I’d ever seen him that way before.

“How so, Vern?” Mama asked.

“Search his memories, Bernie. He didn’t leave any DNA information from the people down there,” Daddy said in a furious voice. “What they are now, is what the computer records them as. Even down to pictures.” He showed us the picture of Belinda. It was her as a ‘horse’. Below the picture was the word, Deceased. “The computer record even goes on to say what happened to her, and what ‘dish’ she made. The guy is even more sick than we thought.”

He shook his head, and some tears ran down his face. “I’m not sure what we can do for them all. I’ve even looked through the medical records. There is an independent database there that holds the DNA. It’s been altered as well.”

“We know who they are, don’t we?” I asked.

“We have a rough idea. If we can get a hold of their memories from before the change, we can find out, but their DNA would be the problem.” Daddy said, nodding his head.

“In their memories,” Marc pointed out, “They’ve seen themselves in mirrors. We could at least tell their bots to make them look like that.”

“It’s better than nothing,” Paula pointed out.

“I want complete control of his bots,” Daddy said to Mama.

She didn’t say anything, but nodded.

“Daddy,” Carla said. “I have a special ‘gift’ for him, after all he did to me.”

I had to admit. It was fitting.

-=#=-

My office was in use again. Since I was broadly in charge of the rescue of the people downstairs, we were basing our work there.

In many ways, by being placed in charge of the rescue, I was back in command. Yes, Daddy was in charge of the ship, but this wasn’t Star Trek. While a starship might make it from Earth to another planet in a day or two, on Neo22, you gave the command to ‘engage’, and then waited a thousand years before giving the ‘disengage’ command.

My choice to relinquish command had nothing to do with giving those commands. I mean, start and stop, or engage and disengage are easy enough to say. It’s the responsibility for a large percentage of the remainder of humanity that bothered me. It wore me down. Tired me out.

Daddy, being in command, and John his XO was fine with me. This gave me something to focus on. I didn’t like people micromanaging my activities, but I reveled in micromanaging theirs.

Mama, Rachel, Carla, and I were discussing our options when my office door opened, and Daddy, Paula, John, Marc, Rashda, and Pearl entered.

“Yes?” I asked, not at all happy with my visitors.

“There’s not a lot going on in command, so we thought we’d offer our help,” Daddy said.

I know my eyes had to have blazed. John didn’t sit down, which he knew he was always welcome to do in my office. In fact, he had a chair that was well known to be his, and no one ever sat there, even when John wasn’t present.

Daddy, however, sat down. Not in John’s chair, mind you. He wasn’t that crazy. Pearl, being my daughter, and well liking to wind me up, just stood near the door with a smirk on her face.

I considered things for a moment. I loved every one of them, and I didn’t want to create a scene, but I had to know if Daddy was going to take the job from me.

“Daddy, can I see you outside?” I asked. At that moment, I wanted to make him stand up. The audacity of invading my space and then sitting down like he owned the place… Well, it infuriated me!

I saw his eyebrow raise quickly followed by the corner of his mouth. It was like he got the response he expected. I paused halfway through standing, and considered sitting back down. I almost did, but I had to know what he intended.

We got outside my office, and I counted on the soundproofing built into my walls and doors. I was a musician, remember. I did a lot of composing and practicing in that office.

“What the hell are you doing?” I asked at the highest volume I could manage, and still keep my voice under control.

“Offering help,” he said, completely calm.

“You said this was my project!” I screamed. “Now, you’re here to take over!”

“Rosie,” he said, just as calm as ever, “Please settle down.”

“No!” I yelled. “This is my project!”

“Yes, it..”

I shook my head. “Why are you here?!”

This time, he didn’t try to say anything. Instead, he very deliberately crossed his arms and waited. I did a lot more shouting, but what I yelled, I’m not sure. I don’t think I knew at that time either. I just shouted, screamed, yelled… I took out all my frustrations on my daddy, and he stood there and let me.

Finally, I ran down and slumped onto a bench we had sitting in the hallway beside my door. Only then did Daddy move. He sat down beside me and said, “You have absolute control over this situation, Rosie. I have no desire to contradict any of your decisions.”

“You promise?” I asked, almost talking in a little girl voice.

“I promise, Rosie.” He paused, took a deep breath, and then said, “I’m going to go one step further, and I’m not taking no for an answer this time, Sweetie.”

“No!” I said, knowing what he was going to say.

“Nope,” he said. “My last order as commander is for you to take command.”

“If you want to give up command, Daddy, then give it to John.”

“Rosie,” he said in frustration. “Stop being a martyr! I saw your face when I suggested you take command when you asked for this project. Clearly, you wanted it, didn’t you?”

I couldn’t lie to him. “Yes.”

“Why didn’t you take it?”

“Because I’ve gone back and forth. People need to trust their commander to make solid decisions. Instead, I’ve not known what to do half the time. How can they trust me?”

“Do you believe that your family – everyone in that room is family – would let you down? You make a mistake, they’re going to let you know what they think. You know that.”

I shook my head. “I believe that in theory, but I could never have given the order to split the ship. There’s no way I could have.”

“Maybe so, Rosie,” he said, smiling, “But right now, what needs done, is getting those people rescued, and the ship put back together. I was willing to let them, and us, die to stop Amos.”

“You’ll fight just as hard to rescue them.”

“Maybe, but you’re proving my point. You’re saying that I don’t see something in myself that you do see.” He smiled gently. “I see that you have things you don’t see as well.”

He paused, then said, “I’ll give you a way to transfer command back to you in as gentle a manner as we can.”

“How?” I asked. I had to admit, I was intrigued.

He grinned. “Only four people will know that you’re in command,” he said.

I laughed. That would be the command staff, meaning, Daddy, John, Marc, and Paula.

“I have a counter proposal, Daddy.”

“And what’s that?”

“When we were exiled to N21, I suggested that we have a command committee. I still believe that would be the best bet for our situation. However, instead of three people, I propose we have five. Those same five people, but with you as a ‘tiebreaker’.”

“And what would be each of these five people’s jobs?” His eyes were full of merriment.

“John knows this ship like no one else. He designed N21, and this ship is just a supersized version of it.”

“So he commands the ship itself. Marc?”

“He’s a genius with computers and electronics. We have lots of those on board that he controls anyway.”

“Okay. Your sister?”

“Security, obviously.”

“We get rid of Amos, and hopefully, we won’t need security.”

“Daddy, you know that’s an air castle. It sounds great, but it won’t last. Eventually, we’ll have kids who don’t remember what Amos was, and we’ll be right back here. Probably not as bad, but we’ll need security.”

“Besides,” I went on, “what happens when we reach Earth? I believe we’ll be able to turn off those bots. Amos thinks we will, and I think he’s probably right.”

“You think we’ll need a security force then.”

“Paula did it before. She can certainly do it again.”

“What’s your job then?”

“Rescuing those people.”

“Uh-uh. That doesn’t last. Once that’s done, you conveniently get out of command. Not gonna happen, Rosie.”

“Culture. It may not seem important, but it really is. We’ve got to think beyond survival, otherwise, why survive?”

“Because we want to live,” he said.

I shook my head. “Things will get boring.” I laughed. “Call me the ‘morale officer’.”

“And me? Am I just to break ties?”

I frowned. “I misspoke, Daddy. You have the biggest job here.”

“And what’s that?”

“I trust you. You have been my father since I was born.”

“Obviously.”

I playfully punched his arm. “I’m serious! You are, as you said before, level-headed. You can make a decision when a hard one has to be made. You’re the patriarch of that family in my office.”

“I’m not patriarch to everyone else on this ship.”

“Are you aware, Daddy, that you’re the oldest person on this ship?”

“No I’m not. There are many people who are much older than me. Carla is older than me.”

“You were born before any of these people. Even though you may be physically younger than Carla, you’re still older. You’ve lived through the same time that she has. It’s just that for some of your life, time moved slower for you.”

I took a breath and considered how to proceed. “You have the experience of living before Amos was in charge. These people don’t know how to lead like you do. Even when Fred took over on Earth, there was a government that controlled everything. It had to, because people didn’t know how to live without it. You do, Daddy. We need that.”

I could see in his face, that he was listening intently to what I had to say.

“You’re leaving me in command,” he said finally.

“It’s your place, Daddy,” I said. It was hard to say, because I did want the job, but I had to admit. He was much better at it than me.

He nodded. “Okay. How do we propose this to the other people?”

“Just put it in place.”

“Nice idea, Sweetie, but I don’t think that would be appreciated.”

“Then you ask.”

This time he laughed hard. “No, Rosie. You’re the morale officer. You ask.”

“No. There’s no way I’d ask for that without your approval. That wouldn’t be good or moral. Besides. I’m not morale officer yet.”

“Yes, you are.”

“Daddy!” I whined. “Don’t do this to me!”

His grin was broad. “Let’s go in and make our suggestion.”

I nodded. At least it wasn’t entirely mine.

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--Rosemary