Greatness

Karen turned the page of the old style comic book, picking up the lit cigarette off the night stand next to her. Out of the corner of her eye she could see the pale skinned woman looking over her shoulder. Studiously ignoring her she kept reading the ancient text, taking in the arcane art style.

"What's that about?" The woman asked. She had leaned in close, the softness of her alien breasts pressing against the muscles of her back.

"An alien, who looked human. His planet was destroyed by the folly of their race, his father sent him to Earth. He then devoted his life to protecting humanity and to showing a better way." She pressed out the butt into the nightstand ashtray.

"What a beautiful story." Karen was getting used to reading her lover's voice, the lack of major facial muscles made the Kelvic woman's face eternally serene and closed. A pang of guilt stabbed at her heart hearing the undertone of honest sorrow.

"It was a beautiful dream," she says setting the book down on the nightstand next to the ashtray. "We had that luxury back then... besides, what would he protect now?"

"Humans. The people left. He would help you find a way to be great."

"Hmm. How exciting, if we counted him in the census we might break a hundred thousand." She tried to cover up the small glimmer of juvenile dream with sarcasm.

The alien woman ran a finger down her spine, it was her way of calling bullshit on her.

"I'm just an old soldier, Shi. I gave up on my dreams of 'greatness' a long time ago." Another stroke down her spine.

"I know you hate my pep talks so I won't bother. But I still believe that humanity can be a great race... We alliance members simply have a bad definition of great." The two giggled at her bad joke, maybe she was getting used to their humor. Soon the conversation was lost to other things. But as she lay, sleepless in the night's warmth, the smallest seed of a plan was beginning to take root.

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Minor note, the kelvic word for irony is a homonym of definition. Also, those from the Northern continent of their third colony tend to find humor in mimicry of the word order and style difference seen on their home planet. She would usually have worded it, literally, 'honorific members in alliance*', but is making a joke by saying it 'we alliance members'. Additionally she is saying members in a significantly informal manner, again a parody of the more laid back home world dialect.

* when using honorifics while referring to alliance members they are always members of your own alliance. It's a bit more gray when not using honorifics, but usually members of an outside alliance will be referred to directly with the alliance name followed by their own name or indirectly with simply the alliances name.