He’d shown her the basic controls before they even left, explaining some of the high tech gadgets as well, espescially the radar, San Diego was a busy port. Then he’d pulled the boat adeptly away from the dock, backing it slightly out in a curve towards shore, before correcting course, and, well, Amelia had not been happy when he’d slammed the throttle down and they jumped forward a shot from a cannon. But Olivia had been nearly jumping for joy as she very impatiently waited for a turn at the controls.

He’d demonstrated for a few minutes, quickly taking them further away from shore, just in case. Then he’d stepped back from the controls, and waved her in front of him. There was, after all, only one real way to learn, and that was by doing.

Amelia’s eyes grew large, and she looked ready to protest but he had just looked at her and mouthed, “Please.”

As he stood behind and, while obviously taller than their daughter, when she turned and said, “Please, Mum?”, the echo of familiarity across their stances……and she swallowed her objections, nodding.

“Slowly,” he said to her, as she grasped the throttle, “unless you want us all to swim the five miles back to shore.

For the next twenty minutes, he stould lightly behind her on the balls of his feet, balanced as if to strike….which in a way he was, just in case she faltered. But he knew, as he’d known when he’d let her take the controls of Alliance II on that first flight home, when everyone had been asleep. What he had known after watching her ride that motorcycle like his brother.

She was a natural pilot, probably with any kind of vehicle. Just like…..well, it really wasn’t fair to keep comparing her to the ghost of the dead.   For a moment, his face tightened in grief, as for the first time he acknowledged, at least to himself, her death.

Finally, he’d just said, “Alright, time for dinner.” Olivia seemed to shrink with disappointment for a moment, and started to step away from the controls, when he said, “Where you going? I didn’t relieve you.”

She jumped at the command in his voice momentarily, but then stepped back into the console and followed his directions. She navigated the whole  rest of the way, Amelia getting paler by the second as the sea lanes became overloaded with sailboats, freighters, even an American naval destroyer not to far away. Brett just calmly murmured details of right away and bearing and speed adjustments, until finally taking over as they pulled near the channel headed into some docks.

He deftly pulled the boat into a small slip for visiting boats, while the valet “dockyard” workers jumped to tie down the boat.

He turned to one of the tenders, and handed him a card, before turning back, “Ready for dinner? Its about two blocks that way, nodding to the north.”