When we last saw Red …
she was tolerating her Mum, making a plea, making a vow, and mourning EchoHub.
No one around to stop her. Red inhaled, holding the breath long enough for the door to slide closed behind her. Ti Tayme was carrying the future of humanity. Surely, somewhere aboard, her solution lay in wait.
She just had to find it.
This morning she had three days left until docking. Now, just two and a half. Time mattered now—tick-tock.
The young explorer moved about the ship without drawing much attention. One of the benefits of being unseen. Today, in particular, palpable electric energy filled the air as Origins, the first to awaken from stasis, and GenOnes, their offspring born during the journey, were buzzing. Energetically eager for their arrival on solid ground and a new planet.
Talamh Ru loomed ahead, the first world many would finally call “home”.
Hmph. Red pondered the GenOnes’ enthusiasm for a so-called “home.” She doubted that Talamh Ru, once they arrived, would feel much like home. Still, the lively atmosphere around her was refreshing—even though it couldn’t entirely mask the growing unease in her gut. She had no time for further setbacks. Tick-tock.
She scanned the bustling mall. Vendors hawking wares, neon signs blinking hypnotic lures. The hovolators droned, ferrying people between decks. The air swirled with the tang of fried algae snacks and the sweet perfume of hydroponic blooms.
Then—she saw it.
A flicker. A flash.
ARU—Augmented Reality University.
Red thumped her forehead. AR goggles, of course!
With augmented reality goggles, Red would be able to see what she already felt—that the cosmos wasn’t just light filling empty space. It was a living tapestry. And somewhere amid the roar of cosmic winds whirled a ‘voice’—the one she had hoped to capture with Echo. The one she hoped she would now ‘see’ through the goggles.
And she knew just where to find a pair. Tera.
Tera had a pair—so did all the others. Everyone over the age of twelve had a pair of AR goggles. But not Red. She wasn’t old enough.
Red could simply ask Tera to borrow hers, but time was short and no telling about Tera’s mood, being smack dab in the middle of puberty. Plus, she doubted Tera would even miss them.
She was desperate.
She had to act now, while most of her siblings, including Tera, were preoccupied with mall chaos. With a plan, Red hurried home.
Mum’s sitting-room door was closed. Tea time. No one else was home yet.
Perfect.
Tera’s room, just across from hers, was its usual disaster. Clutter everywhere. But there—untouched—sat the goggle case. Too pristine. Too obvious. Red’s heart thumped. She had seconds.
Red crouched low—a stalking panther stance—inched across the floor. Case open. Goggles in hand.
Larger than expected. Lighter. Sparkling with embedded nanoparticles. She barely had time to admire them.
Then—
A voice. Too close. Too familiar.
“I’m home.”
Red froze.
Mum intercepted Tera with a curt, “Good,” and headed toward the kitchen. “Check on your sister.”
Red cringed at the muffled exchange between Mum and Tera. She feared she was about to be caught red-handed. No time to escape to her own room.
“Okay, baby GAGA, come out, come out, wherever you are,” Tera taunted from too close.
Don’t call me that! was all Red could think as the pit in her stomach sloshed and kerplunked.
Tera was one of a set of triplets, genetically the same as Una and Delia, yet unique enough to be the sole confidant of Red among her siblings. Until Red, Tera had been the ‘baby’, the last born—the last intended.
Spending five years as the ‘caboose,’ Tera had surely developed a sense of solitude—even if she couldn’t entirely grasp Red’s. Tera was born four minutes after her next older sibling. For Red, the distance was years.
“Oof!” Tera cried as she bent to the force of her little sister plowing into her at the doorway.
“Whoa there, GAGA12 ...” Red—the last of twelve Finns born on the Galactic Alliance Generation Ark (GAGA).
“I told you not to call me that!” Her eyes turned hard and flinty.
“Well, whoa there anyway,” Tera teased. “Where do you think you’re going so fast?”
And suddenly stern, “What are you doing in my room?”
Red stole a glance down at the goggle case in her hands, and Tera quickly caught on.
“You little thief, those are mine.” She snatched the case away.
Red rocked onto her toes, heart pounding. She had seconds before Tera shut this down.
“I need them. Just for tonight. Please.”
“Let me guess.” Tera snorted. “Your stupid stars again?” She shook her head.
“Seriously, Jayla, do you ever stop?”
The words stabbed deeper than they should have. Red stiffened, refusing to let the tears come.
I’m not just a kid. I’m the one who sees what’s out there. That’s what she wanted to say, but didn’t.
Instead, Red’s eyes locked onto Tera’s. “I thought you understood.”
Tera flinched. A sympathetic heartbeat. Then her smirk faltered. Red’s determination was annoying, sure—but it was also something Tera wished she had. She didn't understand why her little sister needed the stars so desperately, but maybe that’s because she herself had never dared to need something so much.
She sighed and surrendered the goggles.
“Take them,” she said, “but if Mum finds out …”
“She won’t. I promise,” Red said as she happy-danced at Tera’s feet.
“And you better not break them—if they even work.”
Red stopped dancing. “What do you mean, if they work?”
Tera lightened. “How would I know? You’re the star girl.”
Tera’s eyes glossed for a wistful second, then returned to Red. “I want them back tomorrow.”
“Midnight before docking. Please?”
Tera couldn’t help but admire Red. She pulled at her ear. “Fine. By midnight!”
Red squealed and reached to hug her big sister, but pre-teen Tera had already turned away, disappearing like a vanishing mood.
Red smiled anyway. Maybe someday they’d be friends for real.
But right now—
The stars were calling.
Gliding into her room, Red quickly separated the goggles from their case and shoved them into her sling pack. But then, she reconsidered what Tera had said. Her fingers twitched. Slowly, she pulled the goggles back out of the bag.
What if they didn’t work? What if this was just another EchoHub catastrophe?
Time forgotten. Tick—no more.
Red’s hands trembled as she tightened the straps around her head. She needed to know. The nanoparticles brushed against her skin—soft, warm, humming with energy.
A tingling spread through her, curling at her fingertips. Then—
Her world shifted. Her room was no longer just a room. It breathed—the walls, the fabric, the air itself—vibrant with color and sound. The blanket draped across her bed became a living weave of fibers, each thread whispering secrets to the next. She turned to her potted lavender plant, now a symphony of tiny purple flowers flowing in a magnificent kaleidoscope of colors, pirouetting in a delicate dance.
For one extraordinary moment, Red became entangled in a tangible aura of wonder.
What would she see in space?
Next: Episode 4—Grounded Fire
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Bonus Content
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Fantastic imagery. I want AR googles.