by C. Litka
01
At the risk of calling the attention of whatever superstitious forces rule the Pela, I must note that 1,879 rounds have slipped astern like islands in the wide-sky without one unfortunate event rearing its ugly head to threaten me with an untimely death. I'm a bit leery of even mentioning that, so I'll simply add a heartfelt "Thank you" to whatever fates rule the Pela for their kindness. And, for the first time in 1,879 rounds, I've a long stretch of idle time on my hands to not only bring this account up to date, but to be bored enough to do it.
Hissi and I are traveling - as passengers - aboard the S&D passenger liner Komtra Caves crossing the Varenta Sea to Vennora, where I will assume my new duties as Chief Engineer of the Lora Lakes, an S&D freighter. So with time on my hands and a new beginning in the offing, I shall briefly outline my life in the last nearly two thousand rounds, which, as near as I can make out, is something like six Unity Standard years. There is something rather nice about being able to briefly outline six years of living. It was sort of what I expected my life to be like.
Having spent most of my life aboard ships, I easily fell into the rhythm of shipboard life aboard the Telrai Peaks. One watch followed the other, one round after the next, a simple, predicable life. The islands of the Dontas, large and small, emerged from the misty wide-sky, each in their turn, as we made our circuit through them while I never had to worry about anything except my part in keeping the turbines spinning and the lights on. Of course I had much to learn, but starting at the bottom, with a full, and stable crew, I had plenty of time to master my new career at an easy pace. My spaceer experience well qualified me to look after the ship's electrical components, from the large generators, banks of batteries, and the many electric motors right down to the lighting in the passenger compartments, so that quickly became my primary duty. I was, however, still involved with the general working of the engine room and learning my new trade. Being sober and responsible, I moved up the promotion ladder aboard the Telrai Peaks as people above me were promoted and/or moved on to other ships. I finished my stint aboard the Telrai Peaks, as her First Engineer, Chief AvenDar's second in command before being promoted and assigned to a new ship.
A dozen rounds ago, I received notice of my appointment as Chief Engineer of the S&D tramp freighter Lora Lakes. I had 40 rounds leave before I had to report, and the voyage to Vennora would account for 12 of them, but I was anxious to see my new charge, so Hissi and I hitched a ride on the Caves of Jinlopar, the first S&D liner sailing from Daedora for Vennora in the Varenta Island group, where the Lora Lakes had been laid up, apparently for some time now.
In these past six years, I've become quite Saraimian. I dress as one, and only on the rare occasions, like when I'd accompany my shipmates to the iffy dives of some island port did I bother to don my old armored spaceer clothing. I have not, however, abandoned pockets, and have a tailor add them to all my trousers and jackets. I needed some place to put my hands. My shipmates found them funny, and have not followed suit, preferring their belts and assorted compartments and pouches. But if you should be reading this account in the Saraime some 100,000 rounds in the future, and have pockets in your pants, I claim credit.
So all in all, I'm happy to report that I've found a life I'm comfortable living without armored clothing or fearing for my life. Indeed, it's now rather strange to think that this wasn't always the case. Even stranger to realize that there was a time, now a long time ago and very far away, before I became captain of the Lost Star, when I only knew of armored clothing from vids, and even then I likely assumed it as something made up by fiction writers for the fictional drifts.
I was struck, upon entering service aboard the Telrai Peaks, how everything was more advanced than what I'd seen aboard the Cimmadar-built warship, Guardian, except for its Unity, nuclear power source. I'd have thought that Cimmadar, with its access to the technology of the Unity, would have been far more technologically advanced than the Saraime. Perhaps the explanation lies in Glen Colin's hints that the royals of Cimmadar kept Unity technology very much to themselves, fearful of it getting loose and finding its way to their neighboring empires. The Saraime Principalities had no such fear, as isolated as it is by the vast, island-less wide-skies that stretch in every direction from it, known as the "Endless Skies".
These wide-skies are not endless, and the Saraime is well aware of that. They had, in their age of exploration, sent ships out into these Endless Skies in all directions. However, all the distant islands they discovered were either, uninhabited or inhabited by primitive peoples, no different from the thousands in the Saraime, so interest in exploration waned. And yet, at some point, the Saraime must have been settled either from the Nebula directly, or from previously settled islands in the Pela. I suppose the span of 40,000 years provides enough time for humans to spread across even the widest the sky-seas of the Pela.
The Saraime does have an ancient and primitive history - going back to a very long "Myths and Legends Era" that includes the initial settlement of the core islands of the Principalities. But as the title suggests, it's wrapped in magical myths and legends. History begins with the founding of the first Principalities, many hundreds of thousands of rounds ago - more rounds than even scholars can agree on.
Today, the Principalities of the Saraime include some 179 different principalities - many of them multi-island nations - in a close and largely peaceful confederation. Plus, there are thousands of smaller, locally ruled islands, that are independent but tied closely to the Principalities. I suspect that the commercial, and occasionally military, rivalries between these many island nations has acted as a spur to innovation within the Principalities, which the hermit empire of Cimmadar lacks. Whatever the explanation, the core worlds of the Saraime boast of technological levels that include simple transistor based electronics, and perhaps on the big worlds, some sort of nuclear power. However, one of the governing features of the Principalities is that the technological level steeply declines once you leave the core islands, or cosmopolitan cities of every island, behind. Life gets primitive fast beyond the core and major cities, as my six hundred and some rounds in the margin and shadow lands of Daeri can attest to. Whether this is due to the conservative nature of the broad-feathered people who make up the great majority of the non-core islands, or simply the limits of resources and time, I can't say. No doubt I could find studies that would tell me more, but I've kept my research into the Saraime to basic history and geography to date.
The geography of the Saraime Principalities is simple in the big picture, intricate in the details. At the center of the Principalities are the seven core islands, some of them massive enough to be classified as small planets, though all are irregular in shape. And like all the islands, they only tumble very slowly if at all, so they're populated heavily on their bright sides, lightly on their shadow sides. The seven core islands were long rivals, but with the establishment of the Principalities, they built a stable economic and political structure that has largely kept them at peace and ensured prosperity for 300,000 rounds and more. Being the richest, most populated and most powerful islands in the group, the seven core islands provide the political and economic ballast for the rest of the smaller and newer principalities. There are occasional conflicts between the smaller principalities, some even escalating to war. Wars, however, are relatively rare and usually last less than a hundred rounds before the "Seven Principalities" of the core send in their warships to put an end to the conflict.
I don't suppose you can say anything general about the Pela - neither I, nor anyone else, knows enough to say anything definite about it, but I can say that in this tiny corner of it, the islands are arranged in layers, each layer separated by wide sky-seas that are mostly free of islands. The islands in each layer are clustered together to form long archipelagos of thousands of islands. The Saraime consists of four such island layers. Traveling inwards toward the brighter sky from the seven core islands, a Saraime & Desra liner can reach the Dardene Island group,
consisting of 23 large islands and thousands of smaller ones, in six rounds. This is the inward extent of the Saraime, beyond which lies the Inner Endless Sky. Traveling outwards from the core, one crosses the five-round-wide sky-sea of Saraime to reach the 47 large islands of the Varenta group and then outwards again, across the ten-round-wide Varenta Sky-sea to reach the Donta Islands, with 39 major islands. The Donta Sea is probably only a five-round wide sky-sea in an S & D liner ending in the Outward Islands, beyond which lies the Outer Endless Sky, in which the Temtre's Assembly Island lies.
Scientists and explorers have pushed far beyond these limits, out to the edge of the atmosphere, so that my story about sailing in a rocket-powered ship in this space is not quite as unbelievable as one might expect. Indeed, I've had conversations with a few scholars aboard the Telrai Peaks about not only this inner space, but the outer one as well. I should have known better, but more of that later. Some may actually believe me, but until (or if) I ever recover the Phoenix, I have no proof, and must accept my fate as being largely considered an inventive teller of tall tales. I've often been told to set them down and sell them.
Whereas the intelligence of dragons seemed to be only suspected by the Cimmadarians, at least the ones I knew, it is an accepted fact in the Saraime. They have a complete classification system that defines "dragons", which are intelligent beings, and "lizards," that share many superficial characteristics with dragons, but fall under the threshold for beings you can reason with. For the most part, the larger, more dangerous dragons, steer clear of the large, populated islands, and humans. The Simla dragons, though not native to the core and larger islands, are usually considered friendly dragons, indeed, a lucky companion. While it is uncommon for them to live amongst people, they're not so rare as to incite wonder in adults, even on the large islands where Simlas are rarely found.
All this meant that Hissi was welcomed everywhere we went. And as I noted in the margins, she loved to play with children, and they with her. Whenever our island-side leaves take us to a park with children, Hissi is off with a start to play tag, catch, or any of the children's games she can play, leaving me to sit and just watch her having fun, barking with laughter. Not that I minded. I suspect that if you are telepathic, the simpler, more magical minds of children may well be a tonic after spending time with adults.
Aboard the Telrai Peaks, Hissi soon became a fixture in the passenger section as well. She'd spend time playing games or just frolicking about with the young passengers and once they were put to bed, she'd play cards with the adults, before wearily returning to our cabin to sleep.
There's not a vast amount of passenger traffic between the islands. (Between you and me, there's not much difference between them, but don't tell the "Tourist Line," which names its ships after the "natural wonders" of the various islands. They try very hard to entice tourists with the wonders of the next island over...) In any event, most of the passengers are traveling on business, with few pure tourists, so there were never many children on board. We did, however, have regular commercial travelerss who we'd see on a regular basis, so that Hissi developed a regular set of card players during the time we sailed aboard the Telrai Peaks.
The Telrai Peaks called on 21 of the larger Donta Islands, with brief stops at a dozen or so of the smaller ones, in a voyage that lasted a little over a hundred rounds. She was one of six "Tourist Line" cargo/passenger liners that provided scheduled passenger and freight service throughout the Dontas. As I've mentioned, technology falls off very quickly the further one ventures from the core islands so that the Telrai Peaks and her sister ships, built to core island standards, stood out in the crowded harbor islands of the Dontas where most of the ships were wooden island traders, less than 30 meters long, or local-built hybrid ships of iron or steel with cylinder steam engines and kite sails. Even the slightly larger and more modern steel ships were often rusty buckets like the late Bird of Passage, and still equipped with masts for sails. Thus, having secured a berth aboard the Telrai Peaks, I had no incentive to changes ships, and instead, slowly moved up the ranks as I learned my trade and those above me were promoted and/or moved on to different ships.
So it was, shortly after arriving back in Daedora that Chief AvenDar came up to me with a piece of paper, shaking his head, and saying, 'Well, Litang, they've done promoted you to Chief of the Lora Lakes. They're giving you 40 rounds to make your way to Vennora where the ship lies to take some time off and celebrate your good fortune.'
'Really, Chief? Do I have a choice? I'm content serving under you and aboard the Telrai Peaks.'
He shook his head. 'No choice. Your replacement will report by end of the round. Congratulations, Litang. I'll miss ya. But I've taught you everything I can, except how to be a chief, and how to deal with captains.'
'I'll have to find my way as chief, but as for dealing with captains, you forget, I was a captain once. I know how to deal with them.'
He grinned. 'Good. I'll rest easy, then.'
'Any idea what sort of ship this Lora Lakes is?'
'It's an old Lakes class cargo ship. Fifty-five meters, twin prop steam-electric. Not bad ships, many newer versions are still in service. Still, you'll probably end up tramping. I gather it's been laid up for some time now - I seem to recall someone, sometime, mentioning that it was going to be scrapped. Must've changed their minds. I dare say you'll get your hands dirty trying get her into shape to sail again. That's likely why they're giving you 40 rounds to report, hoping you'll put in 25 rounds of unpaid work knocking the rust out of her. They can be rather canny that way.'
'But I should, right?'
'Aye, I would. Breakdowns in passage never look good on your record. It shouldn't take 25 rounds to get her back into some sort of order. But whatever it takes, it'd likely be well worth it. If only to sleep better in passage knowing nothing's likely to go up in a flash and a cloud of smoke...'
'I like sleeping soundly, and since I've nothing better to do, I might as well make my way to Vennora and get to know her, even if it is falling into their trap...'
I checked the mail drop at the tavern for any word of KaRaya and DeVere before I sailed. My letters had been piling up, uncollected, and they were still there when I looked in, so I added one more. I was disappointed, but not too concerned. The last letter she had left had said that they'd taken a berth aboard an Invertara Line liner (a fierce rival of the S&D line), she as a bridge officer and Vere signed on as assistant purser, so that it was entirely possible that they ended up on a ship that did not call on Daedora. It is the nature of the trade. Perhaps I'd run into them on my new run, likely amongst the Varenta Islands.