Volume XX, Issue IX: Special Book Section
Josiah
By Bob Kirchman
Copyright © 2020, The Kirchman Studio, all rights reserved
Chapter 14: Unto All Nations
The next few weeks were a whirlwind of activity as Big Diomede readied for the celebration! The little chapel on the island always seemed happiest when it rejoiced with the bride and bridegroom and Mrs. Greene spared nothing in decorating it. But all the while they wondered – who was third on their crew? Both were well trained in the work of spaceflight and balanced simulator time with getting fitted for wedding clothes. Abiyah Ben-Gurion was suspected, but he was getting older and didn’t visit the simulator rooms much anymore. He was, many people noted, taking lots of long walks with Adam now.
Adam had followed in the footsteps of his capable parents and was a great pilot in his own right. He was a loner like his dad had been and everyone assumed he must like it that way. He did seem to have a lot to discuss with dad these days. Was his dad in fact going back to Mars? He still passed the physical – with a few ‘look the other ways’ by the flight surgeons.
We’ll never know for sure, but if the truth be known, I doubt it was clear who would go; Abiyah or Adam, as they talked it out but clearly the father felt some responsibility for the colony and the son loved his father. He had rebelled some as a youth but he now saw how wonderful his upbringing had been. The virtue of gratitude – the only virtue Abiyah would lay claim to, had been passed from father to son!
Though the older Ben-Gurion was methodical in his attempts to discourage his son, he was also quite proud of him. In the end, it was Adam who begged his father for the chance to complete the work that he had begun. Sarah and Abiyah, of all people, were uniquely able to understand the drive of their son. Since they knew Josiah, Adila and Adam quite closely, seeing them work together at school, they saw a team that was every bit as capable as the team of Cohen – Ben-Gurion decades before them. Now they congregated frequently at the Ben-Gurion home for meals and conversation.
After the wedding, the three began training for the mission in dead earnest. All three of them expressed some disappointment that meeting the best launch window meant missing the World’s Fair in Fairgate, but that was a small concern. The Martians were waiting. Josiah and Adila also sought out the company of the Greenes and over macaroni and cheese, they discussed such things as the journeys of Paul in the First Century. Surely they were following in his footsteps. “What constitutes a nation in the eyes of the Divine?” Dr. Greene asked his pupil and his pupil’s wife as they supped together.
The dictionary says, ‘a large aggregate of people united by common descent, history, culture, or language, inhabiting a particular country or territory.’” Responded Josiah.
THE END
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Copyright © 2020, The Kirchman Studio, all rights reserved
