Free The Solar Flare by Laura E. Collins

              ∞
     
         The following morning Naomi arrived in her own courier to pick Ava up. Always stylish, Naomi was dressed in white cropped pants and a silver tank top with silver sandals.
         “Good morning Ava, did you sleep well last night?”
         “Yes, very well actually. How are you today?”
          “Wonderful. It’s great to be home. Space travel is exciting, and the Andromeda is my second home, but it’s nice to be in one place for a while.”
         “I know what you mean now.” Ava smiled at her friend.
         Naomi fired up her small vehicle and off they went. The first stop would be the shopping center. Naomi wanted to make sure that Ava was well stocked on work apparel as well as casual clothing, toiletries, shoes, sunglasses, hats, and much to Ava’s shock, bathing suits.
         “ I’m not used to wearing anything so clingy,” Ava said over the dressing room door to Naomi, referring to the metallic blue swimsuit she was trying on.
         “You’ll love learning how to swim!” Naomi replied enthusiastically. After a long try-on session Ava ended up with two one pieces and two bikinis, which she could hardly believe was enough to wear in public as she still had not gotten used to the hot climate of Kyanos.
         After a quick stop at an outdoor café, Naomi brought Ava to the Capitol building to help her with the online process to become a citizen and be issued a new ID. Since she had been brought there by Wesley, the officials did not ask many questions, so unlike the grilling procedures used by the ITO.
         “We are essentially a closed colony, there isn’t much immigration of humans. Once you are here, you are pretty much here . . . unless you choose to leave us,” Naomi said solemnly.
         Within two hours, Ava had a new ID badge and new accounts for credits set up in her name, which Naomi arranged for . Ava was given a large sum from Wesley’s account wired into hers so that she would have some “personal” credits to spend however she wished.
         “Are you sure he won’t mind? That’s a lot of money.” Ava sounded unsure whether or not this was a good idea.
         “Of course he won’t mind, I’m just following his instructions, this is what he wanted you to have. Believe me, he won’t miss it.” Naomi waved the whole matter off like warm breeze.
         “When do you think I’ll start my new job?”
         “Well, today is Friday, I’m sure Wesley has a meeting arranged for you to meet Dr. Sullivan next week. It will be good for you to have a few days to adjust anyway, after all that you have been through.”
         “Naomi, are there any more Asterions like you on Kyanos?”
         “No. It’s only us. But there are other Asterions in existence. Bryant for example, is one of us.”
         “Bryant? The man that was looking for Wesley, the one that talked to me on my way home from work once on Orionis?”
         “Yes, that’s him.”
         “Why were all of you so worried about my conversation with him?”
         Naomi didn’t want to alarm Ava with any of the news of Xavier or Kaden, that would be Wesley’s job. She decided to keep it simple. “We were concerned because we weren’t sure if he would try to hurt you.”
         “Why would he want to hurt me?”
         “To get at Wesley. Unfortunately Bryant was once part of our crew, along with his wife, Alisa. We were on a mission that became very dangerous due to the unstable environment we were working in and Alisa was injured severely. This was very long ago. We were so isolated, there was nowhere to seek medical help from.” Naomi looked down, clearly upset by the memory. “Anyway, to make a long story short, Wesley tried to heal her but he failed and she died.”
         “She died? I thought that Asterions were like, almost immortal?”
         “Not immortal, resilient to aging and