<div class="floatleft">(http://elliquiy.com/elluiki/images/f/fa/Mars_test.jpg)</div><table class="bbc_table"><tbody><tr><td><strong>Character name:</strong></td><td>Lt Colonel Louise Cotter</td></tr><tr><td><strong>Location:</strong> </td><td>Observation lounge, then dining hall</td></tr><tr><td><strong>With:</strong> </td><td>Laura mum-to-be Hicks, then joining anyone in the restaurant.</td></tr><tr><td><strong>Doing:</strong> </td><td>Getting some food.</td></tr></tbody></table><br/><hr/><br/>My heart jumped into my throat as Allie froze. Was she going to say no? Could I stand that? But she just said yes, simply and factually, as if I'd asked her get me tomorrow's duty roster. And some how, that was enough. We knew each other well enough by now that a simple word like that conveyed more meaning than an entire book. I smiled. "Thank you", I said softly, putting the same amount of meaning in. Oh, I had no doubt whatever that there would be plenty of women lining up to have the base commander's children, but Laura was going to be first! I was physically incapable of being mother. Oh, they had reconstructed my womb following the original hysterectomy, the one that left the scar across my belly that had grown with me. The reconstruction had happened when I joined the air force. But the shock of ejecting from a fighter at Mach 2.2 during Oil arW2 had driven the reconstructed organ against my pelvis and left it useless, and a second removal and reconstruction was simply not possible. Or so the docs had told me.<br/><br/>And until now, it simply hadn't been important. I would go see the medical staff, I decided, see if there was anything they could do.<br/><br/>Right now, though, I grabbed Allie's panties, held them to my nose and breathed in deeply, blushing and making her blush in turn. "You smell so good!" I muttered, and tucked the lingerie into the pocket of my own fatigues. "You can have them back later..." I told her<br/><br/>I accessed the bluetooth node again and sent it a message:<tt class="bbc_tt">Command override. Authorisation: Cotterpin jib one seven eight eight. Access restriction, Main dome level one, remove. Access unrestricted.</tt><br/><br/>Again the reply slid instantly into my head.<tt class="bbc_tt"><em>Command override authorised. Access to Main Dome Level One restored.</em></tt><br/><br/>I pushed the button for the lift and it arrived a few seconds later. "Lets go eat babe"<br/><br/><hr/><br/>The dining hall was deserted, which surprised me, I would have expected it to be filling up by now. I wandered up to the serving counter, also empty, and called out "SHOP!"