Mickey was thrilled. Donny took
the next flight out from Osaka Itami International and Ayame promised to follow
him as soon as her mission to the International Space Station IV returned the
following week.
Ayame threatened to quit if she wasn't instantly reassigned on loan to
STC and NASDA acquiesced immediately because their funding had just increased
considerably as a consequence of her last such mission. They saw her as the goose that laid the
golden egg.
Verna could barely speak when she got the call. She choked out a yes, disconnected and
started to cry. She was going to see her
sweet baby again. She didn't know how or
why she could miss Lyle so much, but she needed to be with him desperately; so
much so that, even though she got the call at 5 in the afternoon, she packed up
and headed to the airport and waited 7 hours for a flight to Houston on
stand-by.
At an impromptu party in Donny's hotel room in Houston, there was much
hugging and general banter about what they'd been doing and what the future
might hold. They drank a lot of
Alternahol and talked into the night.
Halfway through the party, Donny got a call on his new SPECTACL and it
was from the Space Station V construction module. Everyone shared the SPECTACL stream.
Ayame was in her NASDA jumpsuit, floating about, smiling and laughing
into a wall-link in the close quarters; blowing kisses at all of them. She introduced a few of her crewmates to
them, speaking only Japanese.
Mickey suggested that they pick Ayame up in space so she could avoid
the reentry but Ayame just laughed and told him that the module was
incompatible for docking with an STC craft and anyway, pilots aren't supposed
to hitch a ride with somebody else!
Donny told her he loved her and then they all told her they loved her
and they said their good-byes because the chat was costing a fortune.
They would all remember this exact moment at this party as having been
a moment as close to perfection as any they'd ever experience. Together, they had become something that none
of them could have imagined they'd be -- they were the very best of friends. And no one would ever take that away from
them--though many would try.
The End of
The Boomers Must Die
Next begins a preview of
the continuing story:
Those Infernal Eternals
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