Riding up the elevator to the ship is beautiful. I look out the window over the vast horizon, and watch as the detailed ground, the streets and trains flow around beneath my view. I feel like I am growing away from the surface of the planet.

Soon the detailed view gives way to blobs of color; flowing landscapes begin to show the sharp contrasts of ecosystem changes. The colors blend and mesh making large groupings of similar colors.

Then as we view entire continents, Auru sits before me, a marble in the heavens. I hold my hand up to my face, my index finger on top and my thumb underneath, as I pretend to hold the world between my fingers. I giggle as I look out to the east and see a thin line, which is another elevator.

I wish I had the capacity to understand the work that went into this massive elevator system. It is incredible.

Violet touches my shoulder, breaking me from the trance the sight put me into, I mutter, “Wha?”

She smiles, “Just want you to know we are almost to the top.”

Turning was worth her smile, because it is so genuine, she radiates happiness, and that is a wonderful trait to have. I turn and place my hands on my lap, trying to smile back as best I can. Although smiling has never been my strong point, I think spending more time with Violet will change that.

The doors slide open as the car comes to a stop and we arise and exit. Looking around I do not see anything to guide us to our parking spot… Of all the things I never thought could be an issue in space. I notice that Violet’s Projector is displaying an arrow. Of course.

I just follow, like I always do and we soon arrive at the tunnel, which leads to the door of the Arrow. Stepping into the Zero-Gee tunnel we arrive at the door, Violet it twice and it opens.

“Secret Code?” I ask.

She smiles as she pulls me in, “Nope, Gene Analysis, it works for you too.”

“Damn, that’s cool, genes as keys.”

Violet simply smiles, “You will get used to it. Besides, you have me to show you the ropes.” Her smile…

We spend the next few hours getting ready to leave, Violet guides me around the ship, showing me various panels, briefly explaining what they do and starting to teach me the basics.

The engine is rather interesting; it uses some kind of electrical field to reduce the gamma draw and the mass of the ship at high speeds. While I do not know exactly what that means, I do know it saves us from getting lost in time!

We load food into the kitchen and the hold in the belly of the Arrow, and make sure everything is in working order. After some extremely productive hours, I take a shower because I feel gross. The shower is so nice; Violet has made sure her quarters are comfortable. Then I realize I do not have a room… does that mean I get to sleep here? Shirking the thought for the moment, I open the closet to grab something to wear, my figure being similar to Violet’s makes sharing an easy prospect.

She has too many clothes anyways. As I shuffle through the various items, I see a light red dress that catches my eye, its long smooth skirt and comfy feeling fabric seem perfect. I pull it off its hanger and tap the wall panel near me, allowing it to become a mirror.

I slip into the dress, smoothing it along my curves. I look in the mirror… and realize that I have gotten one of the greatest wishes of my life. I am now able to beautify and groom myself without being abused and heckled. I run my fingers along the seams of the dress. I look like a princess. I lean over and sort through my personal make-up.

The few things I collected and treasured had never been used when someone else would see the result. Violet would be the first. I polish up with a little makeup, foundation and blush, a light line of eyeliner to define my happier eyes. I smile in the mirror, enjoying the fact that I will be able to become beautiful whenever I like.

I finally feel presentable. I find myself entirely occupied with how I look, and while I am telling myself that I do it because I can… If I am honest with myself, I am doing it because of Violet… I need to look good for her. I really want her to see me as beautiful… desirable.

Then Violet knocks on the door and scares me so bad I hit my head on the wall.

She apparently heard the impact because she laughs, “Did you hit your head?”

I swing the door open, still rubbing my head, “Yeah, you scared me.”

“Sorry Alice… Wow! I like your dress. It looks damn good on you!”

I laugh nervously as I walk out the door, skimming around her. “Thanks Violet.”

“Are you wearing makeup?” My already flushed face turns even deeper red as I look down, Violet’s hands wrap around my arm, “It’s okay Alice, I didn’t mean to embarrass you. You look beautiful.”

She releases my arm, “Try to relax; I’ll be out soon.” She then lightly closes the door behind her.

I turn around and drop down the ladder into the life deck. I enter the kitchen area and open the cupboard, which I know contains something similar to crackers. I grab the bag, and sit at the kitchen table.

I allow my mind to wander as I stare out the window above me, stars twinkling along, shimmering in the sky… I’m so happy I’m here right now, away from Earth and all its problems, with someone who cares about me.

I could hear Violet’s door opening, I turn to see her jump from the ladder, and fall to the bottom, landing gracefully on her feet.

“Holy shit Violet, you landed so… incredibly.” I admire her toned legs that her ensemble revealed, she had donned a knee length dress, which was a wonderful shade of blue, and it flowed out with each of her small motions.

She walks over to me, her damp blue hair hanging around her shoulders heavily. “I’ve got a lot of practice jumping around, “She laughs, “What have you been up to?”

I smile, and continue watching her as she goes to the other side of the kitchen table because her walking is incredible. Her hips sway far more than mine do, her dress ensures that the flowing cloth amplifies her motions. While I am mesmerized, she waves her hand a few times. “Alice?”

I snap back to reality, “What, yes?”

Violet smiles, and leans down onto the table, resting on her elbows. “I asked you what you’ve been up to.”

“Oh, just eating some of these cracker things and enjoying the view.” I smile, trying to maintain eye contact instead of body contact. Which is a weird thing, it’s never been difficult to avoid looking at a body. I haven’t ever considered women, well I hadn’t really considered anyone. I had lived most of my life just trying to feel safe in a hostile environment.

Now that I am free to be my own person, I find myself spending much longer watching Violet’s body than anyone else I have ever met. While this is an interesting development, I’m not really sure what to make of it.

Violet taps on the table a couple times, trying to get my attention again. “I have a gift for you. I know leaving your home was abrupt and shocking, but I may have been to a few facilities, and I have this for you, she taps an object called Earth Connection.

Then a box appears on the table and orients to me. It loads up to the Google Homepage. I sit there in silence, confused. “How did you do this? We are… impossibly far from Earth.”

Violet smiles and leans closer to me, “Remember how tiny I was when I met you? I had been… visiting a few facilities; I left an entangler on a server at a place that called itself “Google”

I felt my eyes go wide as I logged in and was able to access YouTube. I feel an emotion of happiness wash over me, I jump up over the table and embrace Violet, “You saved me, and allowed me to connect with the good things of my home… you are the best Violet, thank you so much.”

She was surprised about my outburst of happiness, but she smiles and hugs back, “Of course, I just want you to be happy, thanks for coming!”

We stay there in tight embrace for a few more moments, until Ed speaks up over the speakers. “Just so you ladies know we have only a few minutes until we have to pay for another day of parking. In the interest of savings, we should leave.

Violet laughs, exiting my embrace and helps me off the table. “Thanks Ed, appreciate the reminder.”

“Of course Miss Violet.” Ed replies in his sterile tone.

Now on my feet, I follow Violet to the front of the ship. I watched her behind the entire way.

I sit in my seat, slightly more aware of things I could help with after Violet’s training over the past few hours. It turns out that both of the front consoles can do everything, so if I do something Violet can see it, and if I do it wrong she can fix it. I activate the engine cooler, which is the first thing to do in the starting sequence.

Violet turns to me, “Good job, you caught on quickly. Now, what comes next?”

I blush and move my hands around nervously, “I don’t remember.”

She laughs again, “That’s okay Alice I’ve got it.” Her hands are a blur as she activates the ship and prepares to leave. “Ed, let the control station know we are about to undock.”

“Of course Miss Violet.”

Then as the ship starts to move the inertia pushes me into my chair as Violet expertly pilots the Arrow out of the structure and into space. This trip away from Auru was much faster than leaving Earth because we started in space. Suddenly one of the moons of Auru is getting much bigger in the window…

“Violet… what are you doing?”

She says nothing, her smile indicating something devious as we rapidly approach the surface of the moon. She rolls the ship over pointing our heads at the surface as we pass over the surface. The surface blurred due to our enormous passing velocity. I feel like I can almost touch the surface. I put my hand in front of my face, pretending to flatten the surface underneath my palm.

Violet gives a wild laugh as she flips some switches and pulls one of her main levers, causing us to lift away from the surface as the engine begins to hum. The stars begin shifting and the screens distort and cover the outside view as we jump into interstellar space.

I am breathing heavily, as is Violet. While we are both breathing heavily, we are doing so for very different reasons.

We both shout:

“That was awesome!”

“That was scary!”

Then we look at one another, and make brief eye contact before simply laughing. I lay back in my chair and enjoy the laugh, because for the first time in years I feel happy enough to have a deep belly laugh. It feels so nice to be this comfortable.

Violet stands and motions for me to follow her. “So why don’t you show me some interesting things about Earth?”

“Sounds like fun!” I jump up to follow her back to the kitchen.  We sit on one side of the table and I push though pages of content, trying to show her some of the popular things on the internet. Some of the more interesting things Earth has to offer.

I pull up some viral videos. The first to make Violet laugh was Psy’s Gangnam Style music video, while it’s a little old, it is a classic representation of everything good about Earth, free-spirited, goofy, and slightly stupid. I also showed her old internet classics like Peanut-Butter Jelly Time and Axel F’s “Crazy Frog”.

Violet lays her hand on my wrist, “What service is this? Who makes all these videos?”

Confused, I reply, “Everyone on Earth does. You don’t have something like YouTube on Auru?”

She waits for a moment before continuing, “No, we don’t.”

“Well YouTube is a sharing platform, anyone on Earth with access to the internet can upload any video they like to YouTube, and anyone can watch them whenever they like.” I am surprised that Auru has not come up with this yet. Maybe we can make some money on Auru with this one…

“Well that is awesome Alice, I like it!” I press a couple buttons bringing up some music videos. I press on of the Armin mixes and the music starts to play over the speakers. Intense, one of my favorite tracks is the base of the mix.

I turn to Violet, “This music has a big beat, and I love it because of that.”

She smiles, “I like it.”

Just then, we hear a huge explosion as we are thrown to the floor, sliding backward all the way to the ladder to the bedroom. Another explosion rings out in the back of the ship. The lights flicker red as all the windows reactivate and show the outside, two ships are circling us both firing their weapons.

Violet stands, “Are you okay?” she offers her hand.

“I’m fine, maybe bruised a bit.” I accept her hand and get back on my feet as more hits rock the ship. Violet leads me back to the flight deck.

“Ed, fire anything you’ve got.”

Ed reports instantly, “Most of the defenses are cycling Miss Violet; there isn’t much I can do!”

“Damn, Alice just try to keep the power settings balanced like I showed you, while I try to get us out of here.” As she gets to work on that, I pull up the power settings and try my best to match the bars. She had showed me how earlier today, but that definitely did not make me an expert.

Violet tried to get us away from our aggressors, but the ship is too damaged and needs time to repair functions. Violet shut down the engines. “Alice, are you willing to fight?”

I sit there for a moment, dumbfounded. I make eye contact with her and nod in the affirmative. She reaches down and taps the panel next to her twice and it opens, she pulls out a couple guns. One pistol and a rifle. Very advanced by the look of them. She tosses me the pistol.

“There is a little light on the back of the gun, it lights up blue when it’s locked on, and red if it isn’t. It knows me, you couldn’t shoot a friend if you tried, so don’t worry.”

Worried, I stand and watch as the ships dock to the side of our ship. I hide behind the kitchen counter, aiming carefully at the door the invaders are entering.

Violet grips the wall and aims from the side. When the hatch opens… I see no one.

The ship is definitely connected, and according to Ed, who is now yelling, “Intruder Alert” we definitely have intruders. I scoot up toward the door to get a better look and I laugh.

Ed is right we do have intruders, but he did not say anything about how big they are. A platoon of tiny centimeter high men stand in the entrance.

“Violet, I don’t think these guys should have come in here.”

She peeks around the corner and sees the sight I am seeing before bursting out laughing. I step around the counter and walk over to the men who realize just how big of a mistake they made. They were not tall enough to reach the hem of my dress. Several of them open fire, I know because my ankles tickled and little flecks of light flew from their guns to my skin.

Pathetic.

Violet drops to her knees, the air blown out by her descending skirt knocks all the men on their asses. She smiles, “Well, you were winning this fight… too bad you chose to meet us face to foot.”

One of the tiny men starts yelling in some language.

I think for a moment what to do with them, since I do not want to kill them, but I would rather not leave them to attack other people. I turn and go into the kitchen, finding a large jar.

I carry it out and kneel next to Violet while she intimidates our prey. Setting the jar on the floor, Violet raises an eyebrow. “What are you doing Alice?”

“I don’t want to kill them so I figured this would work as a jail cell.”

Nodding, Violet giggles, “Damn, that’s a great idea.” I kneel on the other side of Violet, touching my knees to hers and blocking all avenues of escape. One by one, we place the little people in the jar.

Each one yells and screams, but they went in nonetheless. Picking up the jar of people, I place it on the kitchen table until we can decide what to do with our little pirates. Satisfied with the solution I turn and walk over to Violet, and I hug her from behind.

“Thanks for helping me feel safe during that… because you were calm, I was able to keep it together.”

She giggles, “No problem, space is as dangerous as it is beautiful, most threats are a little more… threatening, and a little less stupid.”

She looks back to me, “It was funny to see the big dangerous threat for what it was though… a bunch of tiny men… completely incapable of hurting us.”

I roll my eyes, “Men.”

She laughs, “Tiny men.”

I make eye contact with her, our faces separated by only a few centimeters of air. She seems to be searching for something… as I am. Looking for chemistry, a hint of desire, the adrenaline from the fight makes this search faster. My eyes close as I pull in closer, pursing my lips.

I hope this is not too forward, that this moment of weakness does not end my newest, greatest adventure. I wait to see if she accepts. Then, suddenly, her soft, succulent lips meet mine. She presses lightly the first time.

I hungrily kiss her again, this time deeper and more passionate. Her arm drops down, pulling my stomach in and making direct contact with her.

My first lesbian experience is the best kiss I have ever experienced… something about the smell, the taste of a woman is beautiful. Her lips meld with mine, as we spend this timeless moment together, our lips playing together, activating all the nerves and pathways. It feels so good.

I break the kiss and hold Violet close. I am breathing deeply, as is she.

We both whisper:

“That was amazing.”

Violet turns and embraces me again; resting her cheek on my neck, “So you do like women…”

I smile, “I guess so.”

She pulls back and looks me in the eye. “Judging by that kiss… you really like women.” She pulls me in again, “I’m glad.”

I smile, because now I know that she feels the same.