CHAPTER 2

I really liked her. I couldn’t explain why. I just did. She was a little older than me, not as intelligent; but dangerously attractive. I walked at an even pace through the cool evening rush hour. So, why was I sweating? The more I tried to concentrate on not sweating, the more I felt like I was sweating. I checked my shirt under my arm for dampness, but it was dry. I had to stop thinking about it. I focused on the pinks, oranges, and blues of the near twilight hour. Normally I would have been impressed as the sun streamed through the scattering clouds, burning their edges. But not tonight. Tonight – I was going to ask Lorelai to go out on a date with me.

My Stars & Wrenches shoulder bag filled with books was meant to cement my cover. The look I was going for was a handsome young tutor - because that is what I was. I finger combed my sandy brown hair as I crossed another intersection. I couldn’t see the outcome, but it had to be better than it was when my hair was in my face.  My sophomore year was dedicated to preparing to attend the Zarkona Physics and Technology University. Lorelai was just trying to graduate with minimal effort.

My dream was to own my own ship. I wanted to travel the galaxy performing repairs on ships docked in space stations, or on distant planets. I was hesitant about working on ships floating around space. It was a growing field because you could charge a higher rate. A higher rate meant more risk. There were stories of people who were kidnapped on those kinds of jobs. Sometimes for ransom, others were just never heard from again. To reduce risk, you had to bring security. But, that meant relying on other people to keep you safe. And sometimes, the security teams were former mercenaries. And sometimes, those former mercenaries would rather collect on the ransom than keep you safe.

Depending on where you were stranded, any cost was worth it. Space was endless, and we were constantly discovering new threats. New aliens, new elemental dangers, and new atmospheres. Space storms were amazing to watch from a safe distance. Their origin was unknown. It could be a result of the increased traffic in space causing ripples through space that reacted with debris. Debris would spontaneously rotate, spiraling out of control, grabbing up particles, trash, ships, and anything else in their path - if they were strong enough. The effect was similar to a tornado that could be pulled in different directions based on the mass of nearby planets and stars. Unite the Universe scientists are still trying to determine root cause. Other guesses have been solar flares, and even some theorize they are an alien race testing a potential weapon.

Repairing space ships would be an exciting transient career that would allow me to see the universe. Hopefully, not made more exciting by being kidnapped. I don’t think I would make a good prisoner. I like to eat regularly for one thing.

A motorist brushed past yelling at me to watch where I was going. I was on the sidewalk.  The motorist was riding on one of the new hovering saucers. Very expensive. He tore through an alley and disappeared leaving pedestrians shaking their heads grumbling.

 Flashing lights played off store fronts as some government vehicles maneuvered their way through the traffic as their sirens blared. As they disappeared from sight I let out a breath. Which was odd because I had done nothing wrong. A cruiser sped around the corner a block away, taking the corner so hard it was literally on its side. It was followed by several other vehicles including a Prisoner Containment car. The “c” in “car” is lower case because it is more PC that way. Actually, I’m not really sure why they have the “c” in car lower case. Maybe someone made a typo that they decided to live with. Who wants to reprint all those brochures and decals for their vehicles?  

I knew they were tracking an intergalactic criminal to Zarkona. The notification stated he was wanted for non-violent crimes. The government traffic must have been related to the notification. I wasn’t worried though. The advertisement holograms were still trying to convince me to buy something I didn’t need, for a reasonable price. The blue-shaded people roamed around pitching their products shamelessly to frustrated citizens. Nobody cared for this type of advertising. You could tell them to get lost, or curse them off in any language - or dialect - and it had no effect on them. The only thing you could do is walk more quickly and tune them out. Fortunately, they were restricted to certain areas. Unfortunately, the restricted areas were always places you needed to travel.

A gust of wind from the mines tunneled down the street blowing my hair in my face. My father worked in the mines. Miserable job. Long hours, smelly containment suits, possibility of collapse, oh - and the gusts. The miners had to wear weighted boots to keep them grounded. The biggest danger in the mines were the tools though. They had been known to fly out of worker’s hands before ending the life of a fellow miner. When I told my father I wanted to attend school to learn about aerospace engineering he didn’t really react. I thought he would be proud, and he was. His pride was in his job though. To him it was a way of life. It was in our blood he told me. He expected me to be a miner - and my children to be miners. Since when did I have children?

We got in a fight about whose dream mattered more. I don’t really remember what was said. I do remember storming out though. He went back to the mines, I went to tinker on a jump drive at school. Jump drives were awesome technology that could transport a ship, and everything within it, to other galaxies. The problem was you couldn’t decide exactly where you wanted to end up in the galaxy that was your destination. The system just looked for open space of the appropriate temperature and climate. I was trying to figure out if I could adjust the jump drive to go from a dock in orbit, to another specified dock. Teleportation more than traveling. My dad could barely understand how to change the fuel cell in his hovercraft. Just the topic of space travel was enough to set him off. “Witchcraft,” he would say as he spit some hyinth from between his teeth. A rubbery stimulant that was common among miners. It was a bluish-gray color that often tinted your teeth. Pretty disgusting, and it also clearly divided the society by economic status.

Speaking of class division. I had reached the end of the main street in Zarkona East. Which meant I was coming to the market. You couldn’t walk very far in the populated cities without running into a sales pitch from holograms, aliens, or people. A woman with an apple cart began juggling as she tried to convince me to purchase some apples. I wondered how many had been dropped during her act. She misunderstood my glance for one of a potential customer. I quickly looked down to see a dirty cobbled street, strewn with shopping bags, cans, and other litter that I would not want my food rolling around in. First rule in the market, don’t make eye contact. But it was too late.

The apple peddler caught all of her apples but one, slyly unbuttoning the top button of her tan shirt as she held out one of her apples. I couldn’t help but see what she was trying to show me. I think the apple was red?

“See anything you like?” I decided it best not to answer that.

“You dropped an apple.”

“First time for everything,” she miserably failed at seduction. But to be fair the gaps in her teeth didn’t help. “Wait, where are you going?” She called as I hurried past.

She was the first cart along the street through the market. Zarkona was not known for its agriculture, which meant many of the vendors came from neighboring planets. The cost of travel is not cheap, so it was generally a weekly - or monthly - trip made by the vendors. They have some kind of handshake agreement on scheduling that I don’t understand. But there are rarely more than two or three vendors selling the same items. This meant they got to charge very high prices.

It was an outdoor market so when the mines expelled their gas it tossed signs, decorations, and occasionally some of the hand crafted items.

“Try my bread? Yes?”

I looked straight ahead and didn’t acknowledge her. If you made eye contact they have been known to follow people home. Or wherever they were going. Maybe the people in the markets were worse than the holograms.

 There were no laws limiting these vendors since Zarkona needed the produce. Most of the vendors wanted to be able to test the market in multiple areas. So, none wanted to commit contractually to any one planet, city, or franchise. There are rumors that the farmers have agreements with those that sell their product; where they work out the supply and demand relationship to use it to their advantage. I imagine the conversation to sound something like, “Don’t send many apples for a few months, then you can raise the price for a short time while you build back up the supply. Once you have caught up on apples-” a twinkle in their eye, “It seems there is an orange shortage.” You get the idea.

“These bread come from Anduras. Best bakery. You see. Try it.”

She was still behind me. And now other vendors were barking at me. Was nobody else around? Maybe the lights and sirens distracted people from going to the market temporarily. Generally, I liked traveling this way because it smelled so good. Also, I really liked honey. One of the vendors always saved a jar for me. She was short with auburn red hair, and I would think she would be beautiful if she wasn’t so unhappy. Or cared to try harder. As it was, she had the look of a girl that could be quite stunning if you could see past the dirt, matted hair, and tattered clothing on the surface. I looked at her usual spot, but she wasn’t there today. I didn’t expect her to be since I had just purchased some honey from her last week. She had been uncharacteristically chatty about her bee farm giving more information than I had ever been interested in.  Her eyes were brighter than I had ever remembered and belatedly recognized that she had flirted with me. I didn’t know if I wasn’t interested in her because I was being shallow, or because I really was that interested in Lorelai. Or if I didn’t ask her out because I knew she would say yes. Who knows? I was thinking about her now though. Strange.

I escaped the market without anyone tagging along. Which - if you knew Zarkona markets - really was an accomplishment. On the other side of the street was the military district. The military district consisted of several blocks of concrete structures that resembled castle walls more than homes. They commonly were built with high ceilings, where the windows could stretch further up allowing for more natural lighting. The gardens that opened in the middle of the housing often connected several units of similarly ranked families. For high ranking officials, this was meant to impress the guest and amplify the owner’s inflated sense of power. Or something.

The sirens, vendors, holograms, and sounds of my thoughts, had all blended in my head as I stepped out onto the street. A horn blasted knocking me off balance. I fell backward in time to avoid a hover scooter. It was carrying a man with pale blue eyes and high cheek bones. Why does nobody yield for pedestrian? I gathered my Stars & Wrenches bag from my lap where it had fallen, and stood. I looked up and down the now quiet street. No vehicles, or scooters, or saucers, or anything. I crossed successfully.

I took a deep breath as I approached her front door. Why was I nervous? I had tutored many other people. I also had girlfriends before. But for some reason, this girl made me nervous.

With so much of life being automated, it was surprising how many manual traditions still existed. And of those - it was equally surprising how often these manual traditions cause you to wait. You still have to wait in traffic to get to work. At restaurants, it is surprising how slow the service can be. And when you go to receive medical care, well - be prepared to waste half your day. Currently, the tradition I was keeping was to wait on a doorstep. The door clicked, the handle turned, and the maid appeared. She was wearing a knee length black skirt, topped with a white button up blouse that snugly fit around her neck. The tight bun in her hair matched her plain, boring attire. Her pale lips barely broke into a smile as she greeted me without saying anything. They pay her for this?

"Um, hi. I’m the tutor. I was here last week." So, maybe you could say, “Hi, nice to see you again?”

The maid ushered me into the foyer where I was instructed to wait for Lorelai. I clenched and unclenched the shoulder strap with my sweaty palms. Were they sweaty? I analyzed my palms but didn’t notice any evidence of sweat. My hands were a little rough for a kid my age. That happened when you spent long hours in the machine shops. Why didn’t I just bring my school bag? Who uses their work bag to carry school books? Footsteps approached the stairs raising my anxiety level. I checked the mirror, and tossed my hair around a bit. I turned just in time for her to walk right past me. Hello?

“This way,” she called nonchalantly.

I hurried behind her, catching the joulen flower fragrance as it floated off her chocolate brown hair. I didn’t say anything. The last time I was here I got the impression that her parents had hired me, and she was dealing with it. Her desire to learn was as to my desire to go in the mines Great.  I think in standardized test analogies. No wonder Lorelai was bored by me.

She was heading for the study where we spent our last session. Even though the house was enormous, I was pretty good with directions.

Should I say anything? What was there to say? Hey, Lorelai. Did you happen to notice me? My name is Bryce. I am a little on the short side at five foot ten, but my easy smile makes up for it, right?

I was trying to figure out my next move when I almost ran into Lorelai. She had performed a sudden about face. “Uh, watch where you are going.” She was polite albeit apathetic.

I did get a smile- so that was something. Her lips parted gently, revealing her perfect teeth. She had a sweetheart shaped face framed by dark, curly hair. Last week it was straight.

“Sorry, I was thinking of what we would discuss.” Believe me?

“Uh-huh.” Hard to tell, time to change the topic.

“What happened to the study?”

“The maids are cleaning it. We can use my dad’s office.” They have more than one maid? Are they all as pleasant as the one who answered the door?

“Are you sure he will be ok with that? We can always reschedule.”

“He’s got some business thing today. If he wasn’t home by dinner, he told me not to wait up. Generally, that means I won’t see him until tomorrow.”

I followed her chocolaty hair as it bounced into her father’s office. I was still not completely convinced this was a good idea. But I would go wherever she led. I was dumb that way. The office was a large room, with an ornate desk at the center of the far wall. Two tall bookcases, framed the desk as they reached up for the ceiling. There was a small sitting area with a low stone table in front of the fireplace, roaring with flames. Above the fireplace there was a map of their civilization on Zarkona. There were some papers scattered on the desk, like he was working - or like he would shortly be returning to work. I didn’t think a man of his stature would just leave papers all over the place. The dancing flames in the fireplace told me he had been here recently. I looked at Lorelai to see her reaction.

She didn’t return my glance, “You can put your books down on the desk.” Really? Where?

There were two chairs on our side of the desk. I took the nearest and she took the other. She twirled her hair and toyed with the SND3 on her wrist. It was the third generation of the original SND, a Social Networking Device. Needless to say she was not paying very much attention to me as I fumbled through the papers in my bag. Some of my books slid out, I might have uttered some apologies for my lack of organization - but it probably sounded like gibberish.

“Here we are. Do you have the assignment on what happens to a ship as it exits hyperspace?”

Lorelai was playing with her fingernails, “I thought you were going to help me with that?’ She cooed as she spoke, and if she had been staring longingly into my eyes I might have fallen for it. Since I was associated with the lowest social class, being the miners, she was not really supposed to pay attention to me. No more than she had to anyway. People of the working class existed to make sure she made it into and out of hyperspace safely, even if she didn’t understand how it worked. It was her place in society to maintain the peace between the various planets. At some point. Hopefully, no time soon.

"Yes, I am going to help you. But I can only help after you’ve worked on the assignment. I need to see what you understand, and what you don’t."

"Why don’t you just show me the answers and then I’ll tell you what I don’t understand?"

She barely looked at me, as she toyed with the SND3. I had only met her in passing a few times and the school set me up as her tutor. I always thought she was beautiful, but I never knew how difficult she was. Last time her father had been in the room. Maybe she had only pretended to pay attention to make her father happy.

I wanted to ask her if everything was OK. But that might or might not violate some unwritten rule and possibly offend her. Since it wasn’t written down and I had never seen anyone disobey the unwritten rule - I wasn’t really sure if it was true.  If she offered information about how she was doing, then I could discuss. I was not supposed to introduce any personal topics though. What a crazy place. I couldn’t wait to get off this planet.

A deep male voice rumbled around the hall as it rapidly approached. It could only be her father.

"And what of the transport? Well done! Let me know when it’s finished." He walked in his office. The phone was still in his hand as he entered. He was a sturdy man, late thirties or early forties.

Lorelai’s eyes widened, and her mouth hung open. She looked pale. This wasn’t going to be good. At first he didn’t notice us. Her father strutted right to his drink cabinet and poured himself a small amount of an amber colored liquid into a short glass. He swirled the glass. It was clear that he was happy about something. Although, I didn’t think that would last long. I didn’t know what to say. Lorelai was frozen. I watched as he smiled to himself. It wasn’t a smile meant to be photographed. He regarded the cup in his hand for a half a minute before he poured about double the initial amount. He took a sip, and noticed us over the rim of the glass as he turned.

I pretended to be very involved in my book. No way was I taking the heat for this. I wasn’t going to say a thing.

"Lorelai, what are you doing in my office?" he roared. I think the fire got a little hotter. He noticed my bag on his desk. "Clean up that mess and get out!"

"Father! Please don’t yell. The study was being cleaned."

"I don’t care if every other room in the house is being cleaned you are not to enter my office!" I wondered how often they had this conversation.

I shoveled everything I thought was mine into my bag. Lorelai followed me to the door I imagined with her head as low as mine. Tonight was obviously over. The twilight would be over. The vendors would all be packed up, scattered to - well, wherever they go. The excitement of the sirens would be over. And my infatuation with Lorelai might be over. The holograms would still be advertising useless junk though. That was something.

"I’m sorry about tonight. My dad can be rough." She smiled sheepishly. As we exited the office the air became lighter, cooler. I didn’t think it was just because of the fire, either. She actually looked at me for a few seconds, “We can reschedule.” Her eyes were a sea foam green. I loved the sea. Almost as much as I loved space.

I didn’t want to seem too eager so I smiled without teeth and nodded. “I look forward to it.”

So, maybe my feelings for Lorelai were not completely gone. But the other things were definitely over. There was no criminal in the streets – no obvious one anyway. No more sirens, and the night sky had overwhelmed the sunset. Walking home was not as bad as it could have been. If her father hadn’t walked in, I would likely have awkwardly spent an hour trying to justify why I was there tutoring her. Instead her dad ended the night early and showed me that Lorelai had a heart. Or a momentarily lapse in judgment. I would take either.

One of the holograms approached me, “Hello, citizen! I have the newest social networking devices. They can link you to anyone within three planets of whatever galaxy you are in. Three planets!”

“Do they help you tutor?”

“Yes, of course they can help you tutor.” The hologram displayed the technology. “See you can manage your contacts, their calendars, where they live, what time you would have to leave depending on where on Zarkona they reside-”

“You mean where on which planet they reside. Within three planets, right?”

The hologram winked and said, “Good listening. Yes, it will review all transportation delays and advise when it thinks you need to leave. Also, you can use it to reserve seating for your transportation.” It went on and on about how much the device could do to make my life simpler. “Are you interested?”

“Very, but I can’t afford one.” I smiled and left. I wondered if it pissed off the holograms when we did that. The holograms had gotten enough of a feel for people to know if a group of kids were coming, generally, they were there to torment them. They were probably programmed to target certain kinds of people, but you could pull them into conversations if you played the game right.  

I didn’t want to talk with my dad right now so I went through the backyard. The tree in the corner of the yard had been there since before I was born. The branches had been strong enough to bear my weight for as long as I could remember, so it was easy for me to come and go undetected. Even though it was dark out I had rehearsed this so many times that I effortlessly climbed the old tree. I let myself down onto the roof above the sitting room, and tiptoed to the window. It squeaked gently when I slid it open. I threw my bag onto the bed as I entered my room. A bunch of papers fell out. Mainly they were my school papers. Except for a few. My left brow raised as I analyzed what I saw. There were a few pages that looked a little brown. The papers must have belonged to Lorelai’s father. Should I look at them? Who has canvas paper anymore? Canvas paper had been used by explorers in early space travel. There were many rolled up in the archives that nobody looked at anymore. Not since all the maps were made digital.

That was a profession I would have loved. Travelling the galaxy charting your adventures. Once you got too old to enjoy traveling and charting, you simply converted all your maps to digital copies. Too bad the profession was all but extinct. There was much of space that was still uncharted. Actually, we have no idea how much of space there actually was. The reason we stopped expanding is because you can only control a population so far. People on the fringes of space were already mostly on their own. The Unite the Universe armada couldn’t be everywhere and to continue expansion there would need to be many more troops. We called the planets at the edge of the Uni jurisdiction the Foundation Planets. Although, they were more like, Ancillary Planets. And they were treated like the Orphan Planets.

My house was pretty quiet. The house wasn’t very large, so you could tell where people were fairly quickly. I carefully made my way to the door, trying not to step on the creaky floorboards. This, too, was once a well-rehearsed act. Two steps to the left, ahead five steps, right one step, then one large step forward to the door. The boards that I could step on discretely had been painted long ago so I could memorize the steps, but that paint had faded long ago leaving stretches of dull boards amidst the less dull creaky boards.

I listened to the silence for a few minutes, until I heard the hyinth wrapper. My father was probably in the kitchen, grabbing some rubbery leaves to chew on. He complained he couldn’t sleep. Maybe chewing hyinth before bed wasn’t the best idea. The good news was that meant he would be sitting down with his story shortly. I wouldn’t be interrupted.

I backtracked my steps so that I was standing in front of my bed. The brownish papers were strewn amongst my notes and books. They were half-covered, but I could tell they were charts showing a specific galaxy. It wasn’t my business and I shouldn’t look. But I had never seen charts like that before. The writing was definitely Classical American English, but it was an older version. I could kind of read part of it. “Milky”?

My curiosity got the better of me, I spread the charts out over my bed. There was no mistaking that these were extremely old. Possibly valuable. They would need to be returned in a way that no one knew they were taken. Maybe if I told Lorelai she would help me.

My mind was spinning. How much were these worth? I had to stop thinking about that. The right thing to do was return them quickly. I touched my left temple until I felt the capture button. Most people on Zarkona had a small capture button under their right temple that is attached to their memory. When you press the button it acts like a photographic memory. Touching the button would have one of three reactions depending on pressure and duration. Capture an image, review an image, or project the image being reviewed. Eyes naturally captured light, so the technology they implanted reversed the eyes natural ability. It was not known that I was left-handed when I was born. The technology was new and every baby that came out received the implant in their right temple. When I moved into eighth grade, I learned more about the technology. By that point I had already taken apart and rebuilt a jump drive, so learning about the MED - Memory Enhancement Device - did not take long. I created one of my own and implanted it in my left temple with the help of some of the lab robots. I hold my secrets in my left temple.

I paused. My finger was hanging in the air next to my temple. The charts were staring at me waiting for me to copy them. There’s always a moment of regret before you do something that could be foolish. Sirens blared outside the window and interrupted my thoughts. The computer display on my desk lit up and I saw that the camera outside was picking up movement.

Obviously, this was related to the documents on my bed. It had to be. What else could it be? What should I do? Time was against me, so I pressed the button to create a copy. Just in case I needed the proof.  I stuffed everything back into my bag. What next? I sat at my desk with my school work. They would probably just take the documents, yell at me about personal property, and leave. I was just a kid after all. They wouldn’t arrest me for accidently taking these charts. Would they?