The Jovian Legacy (28 page)

He
was giving himself a headache.

Jack
was confused as to what to do. He’d only been living on Jovian
five minutes, or so it seemed. Jack knew only too well that people
generally didn’t like change and it would be a
gargantuan
task. He knew he’d be swallowed up in bureaucracy, which would
definitely take its toll on him.

“I
don’t need the hassle,” he said to Megan. “Let
someone else do it if they want to; who cares about their problems
anyway, it’s boring stuff. And I don’t want to be a
friggin’ martyr. Life’s too short for that. I want to
be left alone with my perfect girlfriend and family.” He
scooped Megan up in his arms and slapped a wet kiss on her lips.
Akila, Kenza, and Jordan came in to see them play fighting on the
couch.

“Come
on, let’s do something cool today,” he suggested to
Megan’s clones, waving his hands in a backwards circle and
jumping up and down as if he were the same age. The girls giggled.

The
family packed a large picnic lunch and flew off in their new utility
air vehicles. Jack and Megan thought it would have been better if
they could have all travelled in the one vehicle, but knew it was
impossible with such a large family. Sobek, Ben, Nancy, Megan and
Jack each drove a vehicle, but with GPS monitor screens they could
view each other on the large monitors. Jack lead the way as they
flew through the city and out towards the coast, gliding over the
rooftops of palatial homes and beautifully landscaped gardens.

“The
airways are busy today. Everyone must have had the same idea,”
Jack spoke to Megan through the screen.

“This
is such a beautiful place,” Megan stated happily.

“Oh
yeah, it’s awesome alright,” Jack agreed, blowing kisses
into the viewer. His spirits were high.

Bo,
Cecile, Kenza, Chione, and Akila, who were travelling with Megan,
giggled amongst themselves. Sakmet, Ain and Layla were travelling
with Ben and too were listening to Megan and Jack’s
conversation.

“You
and Mum are always talking about how great this place is,”
Sakmet remarked. “What was it like where you came from?”

“Well,”
Ben began, “I guess some parts of our home country are very
much like here. I'm probably biased but to us it was the prettiest
country in the whole world. It was a small country on a large planet
and everyone wanted a piece of and was becoming overpopulated in the
cities with foreign immigrants who also started buying large chunks
of the coastline. Then the indigenous people became threatened by it
all and started fighting for their customary rights.”

“Oh,
look over there!” Jack cried, interrupting his father. All the
girls looked out their windows to see a valley of huge leafy trees,
the land covered in enormous purple flowers.

He
lead the way over, the AVs hovering for a while so they could take it
all in. At that moment something strange happened. The flowers
closed up like sea anemones, to burst open again, emitting a sudden
spray of crystals and creating a sparkling, iridescent blanket. Jack
took his vehicle down to take a closer look, the girls crying in awe.
The crystals, they ascertained, were actually diamonds, that
cascaded down through the trees and settled beneath them, some
landing and bouncing gently on the leaves, sliding off when they
could no longer take their weight. The family watched, spellbound,
as it happened again.

“So,
that’s where they source their diamonds from,” Ben
exclaimed, “the secret is out now.”

The
utilities went on their way in single file out towards the ocean.
The girls spotted miles and miles of sand dunes in the distance
bordering the coastline, sand so white it appeared more like snow.
Screened behind the sand dunes glistened a cluster of beautiful blue
dune lakes. One of the lakes, they observed, was a lagoon that
spilled out into the sea, the water so clear it was like viewing
through glass. Small fish of the most striking colours darted back
and forth, making a spectacular bird’s-eye view of sea life as
they hovered over them.

After
landing their AVs the girls jumped out, excited, racing each other to
the water’s edge while the others found a nice spot to set up
the picnic. Thankfully Sobek thought to pack their air vests and
jetboards, Akila and Cecile being the first to get changed and grab
their boards. They buzzed off in their jet-propelled waterboards
with Nancy calling after them to be careful. Before long the
normally tranquil lagoon was abuzz with twenty-four jetboards, their
riders having a fantastic time trying to outdo one another while the
rest of the family kept a watchful eye over them.

“Nah!”
Jack said to Megan.

“What?”
she looked sharply at him, startled.

“This
is the life. I’m just going to carry on with what I was
originally asked to do, and that was to establish communication
between families up here and the ones they left behind.”

Chapter 22

J
ack
immersed himself in his telecommunication project. He chose Carlos
Dimitri as his first client, who he’d already promised to help.

It
was proving a very difficult undertaking, as it had been years since
Carlos had gone ‘missing’ a hundred and forty miles west
of Bermuda, and he didn’t have any idea where his family would
be now, and even if they were still alive. Well, his child most
likely would be anyway. The son or daughter would only be in his or
her late twenties. At times Carlos became impatient with progress,
as every time they thought they had a lead they got knocked back.
Jack became frustrated with it also, and Carlos’s attitude was
starting to irritate him.

One
of the major problems of contacting family members was that not
everyone on Earth owned computers yet, and it was more than likely
the older generation didn’t have them. Their only hope was
that Carlos Dimitri’s child would have one, so they decided to
concentrate on locating him or her. The son or daughter may not even
carry his name as the mother may have remarried and given the baby
her new husband’s name. That was Carlos’s biggest fear,
and another, whether or not his child would want to know him; he may
not have been told that Carlos existed and had grown up thinking his
mother’s husband was his biological father. Jack and Carlos
had to remain positive however, as it would have been a fruitless
exercise if their fears proved correct.

They
put in long hours at the research unit, and Megan started complaining
that Jack wasn’t paying enough attention to her. Jack, in
turn, felt somewhat pressured by this.

The
tiny computer clock ticked over silently, keeping perfect time, Jack
inadvertently making a habit of glancing at it as he worked. He used
the GPS technique of searching, and through computer electronic mail
networks had narrowed it down to one locality. Finally they had a
hit. There were forty-two Dimitris listed in the area where Carlos
had been stationed when he met his fiancée. The names that
Carlos and Glenys had chosen were Sarah for a girl and Robinson for a
boy, so although it was a long shot, they keyed in the email address
that was registered under the name of ‘S. Dimitri’.

An
image came into view, a view of someone’s bedroom. The
furniture in the bedroom was seemingly childish with soft toys neatly
propped up together on a shelf. Not what they would have thought
from an adult female’s bedroom. As they surveyed the room Jack
felt it rather intrusive. He spotted a clock on the bedside table
and zoomed in to make out the time: 2.07 p.m.

“They
must be at work, we’ll have to wait a few hours. Do you want
to go home and get some sleep first?” Jack asked Carlos.

“What,
are you kidding me? How am I supposed to sleep wondering if this my
son’s place? Or daughter’s?” Carlos replied
excitedly, correcting himself.

“Well,
okay, stay here then. I’ll go and grab us a hot drink and
something to eat,” Jack said. He was feeling tired and a bit
grumpy.

Is
this really going to be it?
he
asked himself, trying to shake himself out of his irritable mood.
Worth the work if it is.

Jack
and Carlos sat in front of the computer, the screen showing an empty
room, for the next three hours. Due to the inactivity they both fell
asleep.

In
the small hours Jack roused and peered at the computer. He shook
Carlos awake, who nearly fell off his chair at what he saw. The
image was marred with horizontal lines and ghosting, but they could
quite clearly see a young woman’s face staring back at them in
shock. Instinctively Jack typed in a message telling the girl not to
be afraid, trying to make clear to her that they weren’t cyber
criminals. He glanced at Carlos who was also in shock. In fact,
their expressions were so similar it was plain to see they were
related, without a doubt. Jack prompted Carlos to type something
into the computer.

“Is
your name Sarah Dimitri?”
he typed. The wide-eyed young
woman nodded. Carlos made a visceral sound.

“Keep
typing!” Jack instructed, waving his hand at the keyboard.

With
trembling fingers and slow to type, Carlos keyed in the words,
“My
name is Carlos Dimitri and I am your biological father.”

They
watched as Sarah’s eyes lowered to read the message, look up
again, and then disappear from view altogether. She had obviously
fainted.

“What
the hell do we do now?” Carlos said, his voice raised.

“Nothing.
Just wait. She’ll come round soon,” Jack assured,
trying to calm him down. At that moment they saw the bedroom door
fly open and a toddler appeared. A little boy carrying a teddy bear,
thumb in his mouth and rubbing the bear’s arm over his nose
simultaneously. He stood gazing at Sarah on the floor for a few
moments, then dumped his teddy on the floor and ran over to her.
Carlos and Jack were unable to hear anything, but could see the boy
cry out, ‘Mummy’.

“I
have a grandchild. A little boy!” Carlos cried, his face
splitting into a wide grin.

Jack
tried to angle the camera towards the floor, but could barely see the
top of Sarah’s head with the little boy bent over her. He then
lay down beside her and snuggled into her side, putting his thumb
back in his mouth. Half an hour passed before Sarah came to. Her
face appeared in the screen again. She looked pale and frightened.

Jack
began to type again,
“We are sorry for giving you a scare
and hope that you are okay now. It is true, Carlos Dimitri is your
father, who disappeared in 1976, just after he found out your mother
(his fiancée) was expecting you. He didn’t perish in
the Bermuda Triangle but was brought to Jovian, a planet thirty-five
light years away from Earth. It has taken us a long time to locate
you,”
Jack typed, realising that it was similar to the
message he’d read when his parents first made contact with him.

Sarah’s
expression switched to one of elation, tears streaming down her face.
She splayed her hand on the screen and mouthed ‘Daddy’.
Carlos started crying as well. He matched Sarah’s hand with
his. Jack felt a lump in his throat, admitting to himself that it
was a tender moment for him too. Sarah said something to her father.

“What?
What’s she saying, Jack? I don’t know what she’s
saying to me!” Carlos exclaimed frantically.

“Tell
her to type it. Type it to her. Tell her to use the keyboard,”
Jack instructed.

Carlos
tried hard to stop his fingers from trembling as he plonked away
painstakingly slowly to ask Sarah to type her message, telling her he
couldn’t hear her. Once she’d received it, her fingers
flew over the keys and within seconds her message came through.

“Mother
told me you had gone missing in the Bermuda Triangle. They found
wreckage, but no survivors. Everyone was presumed drowned. You were
out in the middle of nowhere in shark-infested waters,”
Sarah typed. Jack and Carlos saw her shiver when she typed that bit.

“How
did you get there?”
she continued.

Carlos
got Jack to type in the full story as it would have taken him
forever. After Jack had finished typing, Carlos took over again, and
typed,
“I have a grandson?”
He saw Sarah smile and
turn to pick up the boy. She sat him on her lap so his face was
fully in the screen.

Carlos
stated, “He has my eyes. Look Jack! He has my eyes, and my
mouth! Look at him. He’s smiling - that’s my smile!”
Carlos said feverishly.

“Don’t
tell me, tell Sarah. Type it in to her,” Jack said. Carlos
did as he was told. Sarah laughed with joy. It was an incredibly
emotional few minutes to witness.

She
typed,
“This is Joseph.”
She said something to
the boy and Joseph smiled and waved at his new-found granddad.

Carlos
typed,
“Hello Joseph,”
and as he did so he said it
to him. It was as if he was having a conversation with a deaf
person, using a keyboard instead of sign language. Joseph carried on
grinning. After a couple of minutes the little boy became bored of
the computer game thing and started to fidget, so Sarah put him down
and he shot out the door.