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#8

Author's Note:

Wrapping up, one imagines very unsatisfactorily for some but such is life.

This happened. Did it happen? Who can say.

But better to have something to read than nothing, that's my position.

It took some time for anything to actually happen.

Twilight did hang around for a few days (more than two, in the event) but did eventually have to leave if there was any hope of any progress being made. Swearing up and down that she would come back no matter what she peeled Jack off of her, had some brief words with Nova to the effect of ‘Keep taking samples, keep an eye on Jack’ and departed at speed.

Jack proceeded to bend Nova’s ear almost daily about his glee at the prospect of having people moving in, going on at length about how delighted he was knowing that, maybe soon, there would be actual, proper plants around and other stuff that he hadn’t been able to manage and also people to talk to and food and so on and so forth.

Generally Nova just went ‘hmm’ and ‘oh’ in all the right places, which worked.

The Hegemony - true to form - took Twilight at her word when she reported what had been found and were - again, true to form - more than happy to let the residents of her habitat transfer to the planet if that’s what they wanted. The planet in question was, after all, fairly far outside the Hegemony’s nominal area of control so they could do what they liked.

A small, impartial group of various other member species was dispatched of course and did submit a report of their own but it was by-and-large supportive, if bewildered by the planet and in particular by Jack.

Things moved ahead.

The process of moving everything and everyone over was enormous and is indeed still ongoing. Little by little. The early and opening stages - and where the process is presently - largely focused on trying to get Jack’s rather amateur faux-ecosystem more towards something resembling something that actually, you know, worked.

Which wasn’t hard, it was just time-consuming. And Jack did help, bless him, as best he could.

For her part - and much to her consternation, given she was seeing history in the making - Nova eventually had to leave continue exploring the galaxy. She was the captain of a science vessel, after all, and so it was technically her job.

Twilight moved permanently on-planet after perhaps a year or two, once sufficient progress had been made that actually living on the surface for any extended period was possible (the water was potable and atmosphere wouldn’t kill you, yes, but Jack’s utter inability to have made anything especially nutritious might get to you after a while) and a fair number of bold early-adopters had set up.

More coming every day, too! The thrill of knowing they have an actual, bonafide planet to settle on and work on and make their own - and which was and had been their own, no less, now returned to them! - wasn’t something any of them had honestly ever expected.

Twilight’s new office isn’t quite as magnificent or shiny or tall as the last one, and the view isn’t quite as grand or sweeping. She’d picked the spot on a hill that overlooked the two mountains.

Not the same hill that Jack and her had been on. This one was further along, closer to a river so that a settlement could be built there. The view remained good though, and the different angle had the unexpected benefit of making it so that, when the sun set, it set right between the peaks.

It later transpired that Jack might have had a hand in that. A cheap trick he would be the first to admit, but also something he would fully admit to rather enjoying seeing however many times.

Other than that the view wasn’t quite as impressive or flashy as it used to be, admittedly.

But she likes it more.

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