Chapter 3

ERIC

The young Gaalsien was lying down, anxious and sweating having woken himself from a dream. He had been aboard Scaffold for two weeks now, having come up on the fifth transport. The station had been alive and busy around the clock in this time to prepare the colony ship for launch. He had fairly little contact with anyone, preferring a solitary lifestyle and knowing from experience that trusting others often ended him up worse off than where he started. His lineage played a part in that.

Regardless of his circumstances, he knew being from the clan he was would make him enemies whether he had any relation to the terrorist factions or not, and to his dismay, he did in fact formerly have ties with them as a child. He didn't know much about the world at the time. Now, he holds on to that guilt. He seldom spoke of his past for that reason, the other reason being nobody has gotten close enough to ask.

He decided there was no place for him on Kharak. His family had been killed many years ago in a bombing, he was barely scraping by on what workplace would accept him, and he had no connections left to his kiithid or any other for that matter. He took up a janitorial position on the Mothership hoping he could make a living elsewhere. He was lucky to have been given the position, only having it because of a minority quota given to smaller clans with no colonists frozen aboard the cryotrays. Even so, he found it necessary to destroy all evidence of his past, which was not hard because of bad record keeping within the Gaalsien.

He stood up and prepared to pack his belongings. Owning very little and most of what he did he would be willing to part with anyway, there was not much to take with him. All he really wanted to keep were the books and his notes on them. He thought of himself as a scholar of sorts though never having the privilege of actually attending one of the Sjet universities due to his disposition, and fascinated himself with Kushan history. He'd collected many historical works in the past few years and kept them for reference. Most originating from his kiith, being the oldest clan known and widely believed to have lived in the original First City. Millennia took their toll on his people.

He stepped out the door of his small apartment once finishing up. Others doing the same crowded the halls ahead and behind, men and women of all clans. Children of the crew were suspended in cryogenic sleep explaining the lack of anyone younger than fifteen or so. Scaffold housed the entire crew of the Mothership ahead of its launch, for some this orbital station had been their home for decades. Fifty thousand people were the sum total of the colony ship’s crew, all of which have either been living on Scaffold or the Mothership itself. A veritable city in space: the Last City.

He blended in with this crowd despite his background. The Gaalsien and Manaan are identical in appearance, and as their clan would suggest, many nomads were part of this expedition. It lessened the anxiety he usually felt when in a crowd, though he still kept his gaze low as he walked along.

The hall he walked into next had a long window overlooking the planet, but he was too lost in thought to pay it any mind. That is, until he walked into someone who had been stopped staring out.

“I apologize, I should be moving not standing around looking dumb, haha.” He was a cheerful character of northern accent.

“Nah it's fine, I wasn't watching where I was going.”

“Then I guess we're both to blame, so there's nothing too it. I'm Jasiid Naabal, by the way, call me Jay,” he said continuing on alongside him. There was a certain aspect of this character that welcomed trust. Perhaps it was his smile or his attitude. Either way, he seemed to be a good person.

“Eric Gaalsien,” he said. He watched curious what his reaction would be, expecting some form of disrespectful remark, but none came out of this man.

“It’s okay, since you’re wondering. I don’t care what clan you’re from. I’m here for a new beginning, why shouldn’t everyone have that chance?” He agreed. “Besides,” he said looking out, “all the conflict and hatred down there doesn’t seem to matter when seeing how beautiful it actually looks from up here.”

***

He parted ways with his new companion once onboard the colony ship. Jay being a corvette pilot had to attend a debriefing, while he had to find out where his new room would be. The boarding trams left him inside the hangar deck which was far brighter than he preferred. The nearest elevator would take him up to the pilot lobby and from there he knew where to walk. The further away from the hangar he got, the less crowded it was around him.

Coming up on his door, he entered the code he was given and it slid into the wall revealing the small quarters he would be spending most of the next year within. It was dark, even with the lights on; he had no problem with this. He put his suitcase and bag down and laid on his bed already provided with a mattress, a pillow, and sheets.

“So this is the view now,” he said to himself staring at the ceiling. Grey metal without much texture to it. No window at all on the walls. There was a desk in the corner beside his bed with a chair and power connections for a computer. There was another door on the opposite wall that led to a shared bathroom between him and his neighbour. It was still larger than the one he had on Scaffold. He had no complaints about the physical bareness of it; he spent most of his time in his mind anyway, there was not much of a loss to him other than not having a view of the outside.

He made a list of necessary appliances and headed out to buy them. He had a small amount of money put aside for that. He needed a small bookshelf above all else, considering most of his suitcase was exactly that. He also needed new clothes and personal care items. Shaving was against his clan’s culture, but all that was to change now. He would also need a few new notebooks. He had many ideas to write down, and his current ones were all full.

The last floor of the bridge section was a mini mall. He decided to look there first. He paid close attention to the varying regions of the ship as he moved closer inward. The metal became rusted and more aged, as these were the parts of the structure built first. It was hard to understand how old it was, more than twice his age. He was impressed at how sturdy it still seemed. The lighting, however, was visibly ancient. Orange and dim bands ran centred on the ceiling all the way down the halls.

He found an elevator shaft that ran upward to a terminal area with nicer floors and walls, possibly made more recently or had been refurbished. It was more crowded there than anywhere else on his walk, probably many new people figuring out where they’re going the same as he was. A clerk at her desk pointed him to another elevator that would take him to where he was going. He made a note to add a map to his list.

***

A cart assistant brought his bookshelf back with him, being too big to carry and all. It was not hard to put together. It wasn’t wood. No, that was a luxury that nobody but the richest could afford, even less so up in space. The metal structure was five shelves tall and fit all his books and had plenty of room for more.

He had little to do for the rest of the day, so he turned on his new desk lamp and opened the drawer where he put his new notebooks. He began to write. He had scribbles of ideas in his head all the time. He sometimes wrote poems, but most turned out more boring than sad. Fiction was his preference, but inspiration came in short-lived bursts.

He had a half-completed novel that was a collection of short stories surrounding the first inhabitants of Khar-Toba. His fellow Gaalsien didn’t take kindly to his blasphemous imaginings of times long thought of as sacred legends. He had written a dozen chapters on a boy who grew up in a war zone, but abandoned it deciding it was too autobiographical. He began a new project a short time ago. A story not about him, but about everyone. Not in the past, but a story to be made out in the present. There would be a long journey ahead of him, the Kushan’s second great cosmic escapade, the Exile’s Return. He liked the ring to it.

He heard that the fighter testing would occur later in the day. He’d often dreamed of flying, but who would let him? He thought maybe this journey would change people, including himself. He was not just a Gaalsien, but a Kushan—no, a Hiigaran. And he was proud of that fact. He hoped others would see it the same way.