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For the first few minutes, familiarity mixed with belief to make the room gentle and safe.

# **Captain Erica Joubert**

## **The Victor Who Came Home**

### Chapter One — The Return

The stars had never looked so bright.

Captain Frans Joubert stood alone on the observation deck of the *Resolute*, staring through the enormous forward windows at the blue-white planet growing steadily larger beneath them.

Home.

After eleven months of war, the word felt almost unreal.

I looked hard at his parents, just before giving myself a mental slap. Their ‘boy’ hadn’t been a child for rather a long time. Geeta stepped forward to put a hand to my forearm.

“Things move on, Mike, but you have had so much on your plate, and our son… Dal was terrified that it might make things worse for you, bring up old ghosts”

Magnolia Blooms & Sakura Petals
By
Rebecca Anna Coleman

-4-
Who is Heather Elizabeth Croft?

A few days ago I think I had an epiphany. I think I decided on a whim that my real name was not “William Alexander Croft” but instead it was “Heather Elizabeth Croft.” A revelation I'd not dared to share with anyone in fear of being laughed at or at worst being put aboard a south bound train to Chamberlain Hunt, a private military school that was located in Port Gibson, Mississippi. Some one hundred and fourteen miles south of Greenville, Mississippi.

CHAPTER 59
That said all I needed to hear. Two days later and we were finally off to the reef, which was a surprisingly long ride, around an hour and a half, in a large catamaran with the entire back end forming a full-width staircase. LC made it very clear that the boat should have had sails, while Maz simply settled into her bird-naming trans, bless her. I didn’t care; Ish and I stretched out on the sundeck while our girl was treated to a high-chair on the bridge.