lilfluff

Title: Home at Last
Fandom/'verse: Possibly the same as the Galactic Academy stories, possibly new, still deciding on that.
Summary: The victem of an actual alien abduction finally arrives back at Earth after spending more than half his life on the journey home.
Word Count: 707
Prompter:

rix_scaedu, with the prompt, "Lasting long enough to get home."

Twenty-six years. Twenty-six years to get back to Earth. The pale blue dot he grew up seeing on TV hung outside the viewing port. Twenty-six years it seemed was long enough for the pale blue dot to gain a near ring of stations.

Carter placed the cargo loader's key back in its off-duty slot and turned, finding himself face to face with the ship's executive officer.

<<If you change your mind we'll be docked here for another hundred hours.>>

<<Thank you for the offer,>> Carter answered in Trade-B, the one language he had in common with the rest of the crew. <<but I have been trying to get back here more than half my life.>>

<<Should you change your mind later I have added a letter of recommendation for any other ship of our clan.>> The insectoid creature held out a slim folder in its claws and Carter bowed while accepting it.

<<Thank you again.>>

A quick visit to the crew quarters to retrieve his bag and out the crew hatch it took but a few minutes to reach the customs and immigration desk. Nearly an hour to proceed through the line but after twenty-six years he wasn't going to complain.

The woman behind the desk was staring at him and he realized he'd missed what she'd said. She spoke again, words full of liquid syllables he couldn't understand a bit of. She'd actually moved on to try another language before he realized she'd tried a line of English. He could even recognize the next attempt was Spanish even if he didn't speak a word of it.

"Wait... English." At the lady's look he added, "Not spoken in twenty-six years."

"I think you know as well as I that First Contact was fifteen years ago."

"Only known the last few months."

"Right. Passport, purpose of your visit, and destination."

Her expression didn't get much better when he laid out a Vellstia Refugee passport, Merchant Federation Cargo Handler's license, and a battered Westmont High School student ID card.

"Returning home, Colorado, United States."

"Did you lose your original passport?"

"That's first passport. Lucky had wallet when I got grabbed."

She scanned his refugee passport and read through the translation then rescanned and reread it. She gave him another look before tapping away at her computer. A moment later he could see a missing persons flyer pop up on her screen with a picture of his old teenage self.

"I'm sorry Mister Price, I'll have to call over a supervisor. This is outside the everyday."

"Twenty-six years. A few more hours are nothing."

She gave him a smile for the first time. "If only everyone else felt the same." She handed him a numbered plastic chip. "The orange arrows lead to your waiting area. They'll call your name when they're ready for you."

A few more hours turned out to be three days and multiple interviews with the International Space Agency's customs officials, the US state department, FBI, and even a pair of shuttled up officers from the Westmont Police Department.

Finally one of the state department officials handed over a new passport, "Welcome back to Earth and the territory of the United States . From what I've read you've had quite a time getting hear. Earth hasn't had official contact with Vellstia yet but it sounds like we need to send them an official thanks for their role in helping you start your journey home."

"You're welcome. It has been rather an adventure. Maybe I'll get a book or two out of it, who knows. But for now I just want to head home and finally get back to my family."

"I've got good news and bad news. We finally finished tracing the records and most of your immediate family immigrated to the Iona colony nine years ago. The good news is you qualify for assistance. Given all that's happened I'll see if we can get the ticket upgraded, but if you want to head out to Iona we'll pick up the cost of an economy class booking."

Carter closed his eyes and sighed. "Twenty-six years. Actually I checked, twenty-six years, five months, and ten, now eleven days. What are a few more weeks on top of that?"

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

From:

rix_scaedu

Home isn't supposed to move while you're on your way back to it!

Ah well, he does have language skills, work skills and references.

Edited Date: 2013-01-02 07:06 am (UTC)

lilfluff

True, it is rather inconvenient for home to move while you're away.

But as you say he's got skills and references, so he ought to be welcome on the colony beyond simply having family there. And likely at least a bit of a nest age saved up in his journey funds since he doesn't seem to have accumulated much in the way of physical goods.