By Ellen C. Lindow
It was almost dinnertime at the Koenig household. The two oldest children were sprawled on the floor playing the card game "spoon" that their mother had recently taught them. Their friends Dinah Fraser and Joshua Devers played with them. Four-year-old Richard sat behind his brother Alex watching intently as Alex picked up and discarded cards from the pile at his side. Helena watched the children from the kitchen as she stirred the spaghetti sauce, remembering games of spoon from her own childhood with her mother and cousins on rainy days. She wondered briefly what her mother would have thought of her grandchildren and the life they led on the moon.
Moonbase Alpha had expanded, using resources from the planet Loki. The family quarters were reasonably spacious, with a large living room that included a kitchen against one wall and a large table for dining, two small bedrooms for the children with a shared bath and another bath and bedroom for the parents. The apartment had a light airy feel to it with high ceilings and "grow windows" in each room containing a profusion of plants which were connected to an intricate watering system inside the walls and wide-spectrum lights for optimum plant growth.
The Koenig's apartment contained four grow windows, small ones in each bedroom, as well as one in the kitchen that Helena kept filled with fresh herbs for cooking. They also had a terrace that was hooked into the same water system. It stretched across the back of the living room and was large enough to walk into. A swing hung from the ceiling, and the plants included two small citrus trees, a clump of banana trees and a vine that clung to the walls and ceiling. The children called it "the Jungle" and frequently pretended to be Mowgli, Baloo, and Bagheera, out to hunt Sher Kahn.
The children also played in the wide spacious hallway which as twice as wide as the hallways in the older parts of Alpha. There was room for roller-skating, soccer practice, and the ceiling was even high enough for games of catch. Vines and flowers grew from boxes in the walls and the families kept up a friendly competition of growing the most attractive window boxes in the neighborhood.
A clinking of two spoons in the middle of the play scene was heard as Dinah picked up the first one. It alerted the others, and there was immediately a mad scramble for the remaining spoons. Emma crowed triumphantly as she snatched the final spoon seconds before Joshua grabbed for it. "That's it Josh, you've got SPOON!" she cried.
Josh shook his head with a good-natured grin.
"All right, time to put away the game," Helena called. "Emma and Richie, come help set the table. Alex and Josh, walk Dinah home, but come right back."
"Where's Daddy?" Richie asked as he gathered up the spoons.
"He's at a meeting," his mother replied. "He'll be home soon."
"If he doesn't come soon," Emma said joking, "We'll eat everything up."
John Koenig and Alan Carter walked in just as Dinah and her escorts walked out. There were choruses of hellos and good-byes, and John scooped his daughter into his arms. "I heart that!" You'd better not eat up all of Mama's supper, or I'll just have to eat you!" He swirled her around, pretending to gnaw on her shoulder and belly while she shrieked with laughter.
Helena rescued the plates she had just handed her daughter then stopped Richie from distributing the spoons he had just picked up off the floor. "No, dear. Let's get clean spoons for supper," she explained over the din of her daughter's giggles.
Richie nodded, but was delayed from setting the table as John tossed his daughter on to Alan who and swept up his son for equal treatment. Alan threw the little girl high, and flew her around the room with accompanying Eagle motor sounds, then gently landed her on the edge of the counter.
Without a word, her mother ordered her back to duty with a gesture. The girl smiled and hopped down just in time to clear the landing pad for her brother. She distributed plates around the table as her mother handed her an extra plate.
"I assume you'll stay for dinner," Helena asked Alan with a smile. He was a frequent guest.
"Mr. Tactful here can stay, I suppose," John joked, putting an arm around his wife's waist and giving her a quick kiss on the neck as he reached for a taste of the sauce.
"Hey, I was only telling the truth. It really was the most idiotic suggestion ever made." Alan defended himself.
"Oh, this I've got to hear about." Helena said.
Emma chimed in before Helena could ask further questions. "We already have one extra place."
"Josh is eating with us." Helena explained, winding her way through the heavy traffic in the kitchen with the pot of sauce. Alan took the hint and grabbed the noodles while John claimed the salad. "His mom has duty tonight," she continued. "And his dad is on his way to Loki."
Alan glanced at the comm post at the edge of the kitchen area. "They'll be landing in about an hour," It was the first trip to Loki this season, and the Alphans were pushing the envelope. Alan's mind had been more on the flight than on his meeting, even if he wasn't the pilot. He planned to be in Command Center when Tony reported in.
"When can we go to Loki?" Emma asked, settling into her customary spot between her father and Alan.
"When you won't turn into little icicles when you walk outside the Eagle," her father teased.
Alex and Joshua arrived and settled into their places. The adults helped the children fix their plates and they began to eat.
Helena prompted, "How did the meeting go?"
"I've seen better," Carter replied with a chuckle.
"Says the man who nearly started a riot." John added. It was obvious that he would be annoyed with Alan if he hadn't found the situation so funny." We took all the brainstorming ideas for projects on Loki and went through them one by one.
Why weren't you there?" Alan asked.
Helena shook her head. "I'm a bit busy." She gestured at the children.
"I promised she could sit this committee out, and advise only on the final projects," John explained.
"Boy are you lucky," Alan said to her.
"Some of them were pretty bad," John explained.
"Obviously, one was even worse." Helena was waiting for the punch-line.
Alan sighed. "Yeah, some were pretty bad, and we were weeding out a lot of the more cock-eyed ones. Then we came to this one where they wanted to release about a dozen breeding pairs of doves into the wild."
"What would they eat?" Emma asked.
"Wouldn't' they die when summer came?" Alex asked, puzzled.
Alan gestured at the children, vindicated. "My point exactly."
"I'm not disagreeing with you," John replied. "It was your delivery that stirred things up."
"What did you say," Helena asked.
"When we got to that one I happened to mention that it was the dumbest one we'd seen yet, and a waste of electrons to even store the suggestion. That's when I found out that Karen Boyle had submitted that one, she was dead serious, and she was sitting right next to me."
Helena sat back and laughed. Karen outweighed Alan by at least a hundred pounds. She was an outspoken critic of a good deal of the environmental programs on Alpha, even though her field of expertise was electronics. She was one of their most gifted technicians, but well known for suggesting some of the most outrageous projects.
"She meant well," Koenig said. "And she was completely clueless about the objections Alan had. She felt that since the doves started out as pets, they would come back when we called them. I think she wanted to train them."
"That's when I started laughing."
"And couldn't stop laughing." Koenig added. "I thought I was going to have to drag him out of the room. The more he laughed, the angrier Karen got. I finally postponed the rest of the meeting."
"Which is a good thing, because we would still be there going over these idiotic proposals." Alan said, taking a second helping of noodles for himself, and passing the bread to Emma.
"I think I'll transfer Alan to another committee." John said with a smile. He grew more sober as he added, "I wish Maya had been able to stay."
"The time on Loki will be good for her, and Tony too. It's what they need right now." Helena reminded him gently. Koenig nodded.
Alan changed the subject. "Hey, kids, how about joining me to watch Uncle Tony's Eagle land?" He looked at their parents. "I'll have them back by bedtime."
The children looked hopefully at their parents; especially Richard who had dish washing duty tonight. John glanced at Helena for confirmation, then nodded. "I suppose so. I'll help Mama with the dishes tonight."
Amid the children's grins, Richard offered some serious advice, "Try not to break anything. She's happier that way."
"Oh, I have ways of keeping your mother happy," his father replied with a wink at his wife. "But thanks for the advice."
Alan laughed and hurried the three children. "Let's get out of here before they change their minds."
To Salvazione