Jack of Harts

Dad officially retired from the Marine Corps over a century before The War. Not that anyone really stops being a Marine you understand, but there’s paperwork and all the official stuff that says you don’t work for Uncle Sam anymore. He officially spent the next century traveling all over the worlds and seeing the sights. He was actually working for the Cybernetic Council, doing all kinds of things that really shouldn’t be public knowledge. More interesting places and people and the like. What can I say? He did things and saw people, and a lot of good people are alive today because of it. And a fair number of the bad ones aren’t. He always tried to make the worlds better when he left. That’s what he told me while I was growing up. That was the real mission.

Dad was a genuine Space Marine for a century, and he did his best to live up to the reputation of the Corps. There were a rather large number of brothers and sisters in the mix before I was a twinkle in Mom’s eye. Some families would make a point of calling them half-siblings, but ours didn’t. Even the youngest were grown adults when I was young, so they were more like aunts and uncles to me. I saw them at reunions and holidays, and they’d come by to visit sometimes. Mom always had a guest room set up for them. Two once Dad helped me build my own little home away from home. They were always welcome, but they never stayed long. They had their own lives. Jobs and professions that always wanted them back as soon as possible. Dad didn’t have lazy kids.

Grandma Carter is the undisputed matriarch of our little branch of the family tree. She is nowhere near the oldest Carter, but she’s walked the walks and talked the talks, so she’s the one the family listens to when it’s time to listen. She spends most of her time on Mars, where she’s got a leading role in the terraforming project that made Mars not red anymore. She actually owns a beautiful house on a lake stocked with the best fish, and loves to have the family over for holidays. She usually keeps her place at Earth normal gravity, which is good for those of us who grew up on Earth, but can give the native Martians real fits if she doesn’t turn it down for them. I try to stop by every time I get back to Earth. It’s good to have family to visit.