And so, life went on. The rest of primary school went by me before I even knew it. The rush of the moment watching the infant Metropolitan naval force came to pass. In time we’ve come to learn that the campaign my father partook in was a ruinous disaster for the Federation. When he returned, briefly, for a year or two, something about him was different—and even my mother picked up on it. He got skinnier to the alarm of mom. He let his goatee grow out, his hair seemed to gray faster than before.

And… he became reclusive. Whenever people asked him about the ill-fated maiden expedition, his eyes would get narrow, often averting gazes; the somber attempt to change the subject. He made attempts at drinking more but that’s where mom put her foot down.

He felt alienated to us; and at the same time, it felt like he was trying to be overprotective of me. He made attempts to get more involved in my life, something that invoked criticism from my mom; “you’re becoming a bloody helicopter parent, you know kids don’t appreciate that” she would object with things like that.

But even still, in the few years after he retired from the military, my father kept giving me chances to tag along with him whenever I was on school break; rather that be fishing, gaming, or simply camping out in the rural wilderness of say, Indonesia.

But dad would say only if I wanted to say since mom otherwise would nag him for‘bothering me too much.’ But honestly, I enjoyed it. I see Friederika pretty much any other day. Plus, if I have to sleepover at her house one more time and hear an endless chorus of snoring Trachenbergs I think I would lose my sanity quicker. I needed the escape just as much as my father did.

In the last summer break before primary school ended, the two of us invited the senior Trachenberg and Friederika out on a camp out to an area in south Indo-China. The place we decided on for our trip is of the few regions of continental Asia that, according to my father, hadn’t been reduced to scarred reminders of the Great Resource Wars. And boy, did the two of us quickly regret the decision to bring them along. In the first few days of our camping trip, Friederika and I slept together in the same tent, but it was silently agreed to have both Trachenbergs and Schwarzenbergers contained to their own. I wounded up having mine to myself since I wasn’t comfortable sleeping with dad. In the end, though, Friederika would sometimes sleepwalk to my tent and collapse on top of my cot. The Trachenberg bloodline works in mysterious ways.

On one particular day, the old man and I decided to go out hunting—more of an impromptu thing than anything though my father did pack with us some a few rifles and ammo ‘just in case I get the itch’. One thing about my dad did not change; he loved to hunt. It was his one and only passion, but not so much as mom’s. But back home in Australia dad always expressed facing difficulty dabbling in his hobby whenever he wanted to. Especially true when he was younger—before he enlisted in SEATO and met mom. When dad was around my age or older, wildlife was unsustainable for a long time and it was only a few generations ago or so that most animal habitats were back to pre-Horatio levels of growth. Even now the Indo-China locals seem to be fussy about their recreational hunting laws here since their wildlife suffered a great deal and possibly dozens of species went extinct as a result.

There was a bit of a fuss at first as dad had to get hunting permits, but at the end of the day, he told me not to sweat the small details—we were good to go. Neither Trachenberg had the stomach to join us, so we left them at camp where they admired the breathtaking scenery—a wilderness that, despite its animal residents, was left nearly untouched by nuclear infernos that had been unleashed further inland. They say even with the success of terraforming alien worlds, scarred wastelands proved to be even more difficult. It’s only now that the feeble fruits of labor across the vast Eurasian continent and Amerigo, whose north continent suffered the most. With more recent events recorded in our history books, it could be several more centuries before the rest of Terra regains pre-Horatio levels of habitation.

We eventually wound up in a lightly wooded area, the tall grass that we slowly trudge through is almost up at chest height. But it doesn’t block my vision too much, and it’s also thanks in part to the bright orange vests we wear where it’s easy to keep track of one another in case we get lost. This is also just in case either Trachenberg decides to join us and doesn’t accidentally nail us in the back lethally.

“Come to think of it—” Father’s deep voice breaks the silence, “this is the first time I’ve ever actually taken you hunting like this, isn’t it?” He’s in front of us, no less than a few yards away. “Your gun isn’t too heavy for you, is it?”

“Mm… I think it weighs fine, it’s easy to pull up when I need to. I think it weighs less than throwing Kiki around.” I reply. This is the first time I’ve more or less held a gun on my own; usually, I would just trail dad and confirm any downed game for him with binoculars.

“I think your mum would kill me if she knew I was letting you shoot guns like this.” He says trudging slowly through the blades of grass. “She never liked guns—or my collection for that matter. … Did I ever tell you the time when she got engaged, she told me it was either her or—”

“Dad, there’s a deer in front of us. You see it?” I cut him off, frankly not too enthusiastic about hearing dad’s poorly constructed memories. I’m too trained on the polka-dotted animal that was maybe about 20 meters away from us, but it’s hard to say. Dad stops in his tracks without another word. He hasn’t turned back once to face me and always keeps forward.

“Good eye. I was wondering when you would notice it.” He says. A smooth recovery, but he was clearly about to head deep into memory lane and not care for much else. If Friederika was out here with us she’d no doubt say her thoughts about her—and thankfully she isn’t. I imagine she’d cause an accident if dad even dared think about giving her a gun to use.

Dad brandishes his gun, and after a few seconds of anticipating a deafening sound—he lowers it midway. “You know… I think it would be better to shoot.” He says, not once turning back to address me. “You know how to shoot, right?”

“Er…m… I think… so.” I kneel, keeping a mental note of where I saw the deer because of the tall-grass obstructing view. I raise my gun and push it against my shoulder, and get ready to take aim—

“You remembered to take off the safety?”

“Yeah, I think so.” I lie through my teeth, quietly fixing my error.

“You remembered to feed cartridges into the loading chamber and…” He dragged this on for a few more minutes. After everything is finally said and done, I firmly steady the rifle against my shoulder and rest my cheek on the stock, looking down the iron sights. Taking deep breaths, I gently proceed to squeeze the trigger—

“A little to the right,” Dad points off to the side, “just a little more. It moved after we were making adjustments.” I’m not sure adjustments is the right word here, but I don’t complain about it. I slowly adjust my aim again, and…

A flat CRACK —followed by another flat CRACK. Startled birds take for the clear blue sky afterward.

Our way back is more of the usual silence. We confirmed the kill and proceeded to tie it up so we could bring it with us. Dad has to do it though, since it’s too heavy, like several Friederikas’ worths. This time I lead the way, and I glance back at dad. He looks reasonably happy—and it’s rather rare to see him not frowning. “By the way,” dad suddenly asks, and I resume looking ahead to make sure we’re going in the right direction, “how was it?”

“How was what?”

“Taking the life of another living thing.” He answers dryly. I happen to be drinking from my canteen at the moment and do a spit take. “Hey! That’s good water” He says slightly irritated.

“Well…I mean, don’t ask…er… weird questions like that!” I sputter as I put the lid back on. I guess it’d be more reasonable to say it was good water—but now it’s quenched the hungry soil. “I think… I felt a little accomplished—you looked happy afterward with the result, so I figured I made you proud.”

Dad doesn’t say anything in response for a while, but it’s not before long that he does. “You know… if you do plan on joining the military, you can expect a lot more of doing that.”

“Huh?”

“Taking another person’s life.” This has suddenly gotten a bit too dark. Is that what he was hoping to get to after all this was said and done? Frankly, it leaves me so bewildered that I don’t even know what to say in response. “Sorry—that was a bit too grown-up for you. I… I’m… sorry.” He sounds awfully genuine about it, but I don’t want to look behind and see him sulking now.

“Victoria…” I don’t hear his boots crunching on the grass anymore, and I stop to turn around and face him at last. His ever-aging tired eyes gaze at the ground before me. “Are you still interested in joining… the Federation’s navy? You know I can secure you a position in SEA—”

“Of course I am. You always said our family’s tradition was in the military. Gramps was enlisted, great gramps was enlisted, great-great gram—”

“Victoria, that’s our family tradition. Is that what you truly want?” He cuts me off before I can say any more, “space… space is no laughing matter— war is no laughing matter. If something happens to you, I can’t just…” He stops, he looks up with sorrowful eyes into mine, “… I can’t—I won’t be there to help you out. I won’t be mad at you if you don’t… want to pursue that career. It’s your choice; I didn’t have a choice. My father—your granddad,—and his father insisted I enlist in SEATO. I don’t… want to have you make you do something you don’t want to. If your mom was here…”

“I think she’d be upset you’re ruining the moment,” I reply honestly.

“Do you think I’m ruining the moment, Victoria?” He says, a bit hurt.

“No, I don’t think so,” I again reply honestly.

“You know I’ll… support whatever it is you do. It might hurt me, but…”

“Pops… let’s talk about this some other time, OK?” I gesture for us to continue walking to camp. He tries to say something but ultimately agrees in silence. Thus, we make our way back without another word.

When we came back to camp both Trachenbergs were practically dying from starvation. Like, father, like daughter I suppose. They were rather delighted when they saw us arrive, but shared less enthusiasm with the realization that we still needed to clean the kill and properly cook it. My old man was more than happy to do all of it, so in the meantime, we were free to do other things, which usually involved stargazing and being homesick.

“By the way, Vicky, did you have fun with your papa?” Friederika asks as the two of us lay in the grass gazing at the moonlit sky, as the pale blue light clashes with the bright campfire’s orange glow.

“Yeah… I did. It was fun, I kinda wish you were there.”

“Only kinda?” Friederika asks as she rolls next to me directly into my face. Talk about personal space.

“Yeah, who knows what you might do with a rifle—you might mistake me for a bright deer and shoot me,” I say as Friederika can’t help but scoff.

“Hey! That kinda hurts,” She gives me a friendly pinch, “you now I’m good at shooting in those gun games at the arcade!” She pouts, “probably one of the best in Canberra!”

“You know, I wanna say that’s not a high bar, but…” I want to say more, but the friendly pinch hurts more the longer she is irritated.

“Oh shut it already!” Friederika whines as she finally let’s go. “I wanted to shoot some animals too! I’m a bit bummed you didn’t invite me.”

“I know, I’m sorry, but it is you who looked squeamish when my dad presented a gun to you. Holding and firing a gun is a lot different than those intense gun arcade machines, you know.”

“You think so? I wouldn’t know since you didn’t invite me!” She says with one last pouting face.

“Yeah yeah, I heard you the first time around…” Bringing up all this gun talk reminds me of the talk about killing with my dad earlier, and that sorta dampens the mood a bit. Friederika takes notice and lays next to me again.

“Is something bothering you, Vicky?” She asks a bit worried, “did something happen between you and your papa after all?”

“Yeah… well, er… no… we just kinda…” man, I was in such high spirits that thinking about it again is putting me in a bad mood, “Kiki… were you still thinking about enlisting in the academy with me?” A slight beat around the bush.

“Huh? Yeah, I mean… of course, I wasn’t joking when I said I have to keep an eye on ya.” She tilts her head, “why? What’s up?”

I don’t feel like I should confront her about it. Friederika is… well, she’s Friederika. I don’t want to make her sad or anything. I think it’s best if we just confront that kind of stuff when the time comes. There’s no point in discussing it and ruining the mood of the trip so far. “No, it’s nothing. Let’s get back to the camp and eat. I’m starving.” I say getting back up, Friederika gives me an odd look, but shrugs and joins me in walking back to our camp.

The next few days went by without anything interesting happening. Although I did let Friederika fire off my lever-action gun, and she wasn’t lying — she is good with shooting after all, even better than I am, in fact. But that’s just how it is. I don’t know whether or not I should be impressed or worried that a goofball like her can handle a gun so easily.

But that said, with the start of the new academic year less than a few weeks away, it meant we had to break down camp and head home in preparation for the life that lies ahead for Friederika and I at the Canberra Naval Institute.