It makes sense, Yuloo thought, the three duchies surrounding the space being utilized having yet to start formal colonization, along with being significantly larger than most of the other duchies in the galaxy. A small blue dot flashed, highlighting a star system on the edge of the newly created duchy, pulling his gaze.
“If I'm not mistaken, Zing, that is a special protectorate?” The name floated on the tip of his tongue.
“Correct, the special protectorate of Earth.” The response set off alarm bells in his mind.
Is there something important about Earth? He pondered for a moment, recalling its basic purpose, as a long-term experiment started by one of his predecessors. But there was something else...something his great-great-grandfather had told him before his death...the memory slipping through his grasp.
“Is there something important about Earth, Zing? Besides its original purpose?” Emperor Yuloo asked.
“Information sealed, unable to provide additional data.” Emperor Yuloo sighed, wondering why his predecessors seemed to enjoy restricting important knowledge; though another idea quickly came to mind.
“Zing, create a special Program with interference protocols and send it to Earth. Have it collect information and find its way into the hands of Johan's daughter,” he paused for a moment, considering, “while it’s active, have it locate a suitable candidate for the courtship, preferably someone uncorrupted, without any standing allegiances......maybe from Earth. Just make sure whoever it is will love and protect her. I sense I may have forgotten something very important in regards to this Earth...” Zing beeped an acknowledgement.
A bit of melancholy crept its way into the smile that formed on his cracking lips, memories of his own loving wife following close behind. He glanced down to the floor far below, where a group of his knight high-admirals responsible for his massive fleets, assembled around an enormous, jewel cut conference table that had risen from the worldstone floors. At his command, his throne began to hover and gently float down the steps.
As he descended his thoughts turned to Earth, and the important knowledge he had long forgotten.
Chapter 1
A lonesome melody echoed from the rafters high above, born of a wayward robin searching a mate within the confines of the decrepit warehouse. But no matter how persistent its song, no robins answered its call, only a sickly cough born of an elderly squatter and the rhythmic shuffle of Trent moving slowly across the crumbling cement floor.
“Not another one,” he whispered, kneeling by the old squatter’s side, covering his nose with a hanky, the stench of human waste and decay almost too much for his already soured stomach. “Here, drink this,” Trent pressed his jug of fresh water to the old man’s discolored lips. He drank greedily, then broke into a coughing fit, blood soaked phlegm trickling down his chin alongside the water he couldn’t swallow.
Trent wiped it away, finding the old man’s skin dirty and pale, hanging from his bones like it was made of melting wax; the outline of his skull, clearly seen. Knowing little else to do, he pulled free a blanket from the old man’s sack, laying it gently over his trembling limbs.
“Thank ye’,” the old man garbled, his unseeing eyes opening to reveal pure yellow-white; the eyes of approaching death.
He’d seen it before, more times then he thought possible in the three weeks since he left Old Boston behind. Within every abandoned building, behind every bush he passed, were those who society had abandoned. They were forced to live a meager existence, like the nomads of old, searching food from nature’s bosom while sleeping under its twinkling stars. Though for most, there wasn’t enough, and the young and enfeebled would soon starve, wasting away.
“Food’,” the old man begged, trying to lift an arm in his direction, but the strength of muscle having long left him. Trent fished a chunk of jerky from his pack, breaking a piece off the end and holding it for the old man, whose toothless gums told it a useless gesture. Reluctantly, he pulled out the treasure he’d been saving, wrapped lovingly in a white cloth. He carefully unwrapped its folds, enjoying the aroma of the aged cheddar being revealed within, worth more than gold to those who wandered the tracks. It took more effort than it should to break off a small chunk and place it in the old man’s mouth.
“Thank ye’” the old man said a little clearer after gumming the cheese down. “I’m Toby,”
“Trent, Trent Marcello,” he responded.
“Could’ ye’ tell this old fool’ one last story, Tren’?” the old man asked.
“I have none that would lighten your soul, I’m afraid,” Trent responded, seating himself against a nearby pillar.
“None do’ thes’ days,” the old man said, Trent having to agree, “the journey of another’ lost soul, howeva’, will do for this old fool’,” Trent grimaced.
“My story, huh,” he reached into his pack, pulling out a large jug of whiskey and taking a swig. “Would you like a draw?” he asked, noticing the old man’s nose dancing.
“Do ye’ even need to ask,” Trent chuckled, pouring a shot into an old tin cup and placing it to the old man’s lips. “You be an angel,” the old man said, having little difficulty swallowing the whiskey.
“The farthest thing from, I’m afraid,” Trent sighed, “but as for my story,”
“From the beginnin’,” the old man told.
“Very well,” Trent took another swig of whiskey, this one much deeper. “Thirty years ago to the day, I think, I was born in Binny, a small New England town like any other, about 10 miles north of Fitchburg,”
“Rachel be’ from Fitchburg, the nights’ we share’ togetha’, before she fell afoul,” the old man recalled. “Forgiv’ me’ the interruption.”
“No problem at all, Toby,” Trent took another swig, “Those early days growing up were happy, I seem to recall. I use to love helping people, you see, and I can still recall Marie from the local corps recruiting office calling my generosity, kindness, and honesty a gift that should be nurtured. But I discovered the hard way that her view of the world wasn’t even close to a universally shared belief,” he took a swig, hoping to numb the emotions called forth by the cresting memories. “These local boys, you see, who I thought my friends, learned of my kindness, and I learned, quite clearly, the type of “friends” they were,” he paused, moving closer to the old man, “The next few years are ones I refuse to recount, I’m afraid, but I’ll tell you this, Toby, the torment and abuse I was forced to endure made me understand the true darkness of the human soul, and the need for me to rethink my path of kindness,” he took another long swig, then poured a shot for Toby.
“This was also when I realized society had little care for my plight,” he went on, the whiskeys warmth coursing through his veins, “My parents ignored me, telling me I must be responsible, having done something to wrong these boys, that I just got what I deserved, while the heads of the local corpies and education departments just happened to be the parents of one of the boys who took glee in my torment. So I took action on my own, or type of action, mind you, isolating myself as much as possible from those around me while enduring their abuse without resistance, hardening my heart and soul to the world until the day I was finally able to escape; being accepted into Motapplesoft Trust’s Technical University in Old Boston.
“It was a much needed change, and started off much better than I could have ever hoped. So I let myself open up, get close to others again, ignoring the warnings of my own mind, that these people were no different than those who tormented me in my youth,” he took another swig. “In the end, they were even worse than my childhood “friends”, these college “friends”, and the only way I survived their torment was to escape into drugs and alcohol. This is when I first learned how to survive on the fringes of society, how to avoid the eyes of the corpies, while escaping into the bliss of nothingness. But the darkness of that time extinguished what little spirit I had left and numbed my mind to anything but self-survival,” he poured Toby another large shot.
“I was able to escape that life, you see, thanks to a woman who shattered my heart, making me realize the life I had been living was no life at all. Thankfully, I was able to grasp a little normalcy by again adopting a motto of complete isolation until the day I graduated. But again, I had little choice but to return to society. So I reluctantly joined the recruitment “zombies”, standing in lines that ran around entire city blocks for weeks on end, hoping to be chosen for one of the few open corporate positions. I was, for the first time in my life, the lucky one,” he gazed to the ceiling, noticing the lonely robin soar overhead, leaving in search of greener pastures.
“The job they provided fit my lifestyle perfectly; an AI Handler whose sole responsibility was to review AI metrics and search for trends or irregularities in the AI’s behavior. It was one of those “burgeoning” job fields that the corps claimed were going to resolve the job crises, “clear the camps, support the corps”, I think their motto was at the time,” he tsked. “Of course, the corps ignored the fact that the AI I was responsible for displaced tens of thousands of workers itself,” then sighed, recalling a past debate with his corps sponsored economics professor over just such an irregularity in the corps reasoning, “but that’s neither here nor there. This job as an AI Handler, you see, it let me stay isolated from my coworkers and continue living in the shadows. This lasted for...what, eight years almost before I met this gorgeously delightful young woman named Samantha...oh, Toby, if you could have seen her,” he took a long swig, cradling the jug lovingly in his arms, “I remember the first time we met, it’s hard to forget given her abnormal fascination with me, those big, baby blue eyes studying me like I was an exotic animal in the zoo or something,” he chuckled. “I tried desperately to ignore her advances, you see, still clearly recalling that horrible devil of a woman from college. But the more I resisted, the more emboldened she became, and she would just intensify her assault,” he shook his head, taking a swig and offering another to Toby, who didn’t respond.
“In all honestly, I was baffled beyond belief at why anybody would try to pursue me, the aura of isolation I worked so hard to perfect usually enough to keep people away. But I was eventually forced to agree to a single date, her persistence wearing, hoping that after she learned more about me, about my distrust of others and socialization in general, or lack of personality as most people saw it, she would leave me alone. Unfortunately, my plan backfired.
“Samantha grasped at my distrust, turning it to her advantage, making me feel as if she was the only person in the universe who understood me, who I could trust, that would never betray me. So I followed her, like a donkey chasing a carrot, and in the end I fell deeply in love, until, like every other time, I was betrayed,” he took a long draw, swishing the warm whiskey around in his mouth before letting it slid down his throat, “I learned by accident that she had a fiancé, you see, and was beyond devastated. I turned back to the drink and everything, my entire world, started crumbling around me. I lost my job for no apparent reason. I was forcefully evicted from my apartment, even though I had paid a year ahead. Then my family disowned me, going as far as removing me from family register in the corpies public record office. I’m telling you, Toby, it made no sense. I tried to find employment, but it was useless, no one would even talk to me. So when I ran out of money, I had no other choice but to flee. I joined a small separatist group, planning on starting over out west, near the desertification zone the corps abandoned years ago. But most of them were caught in those first few days by the corpies pursuit forces, brought to the camps I think, but I was able to escape and...and here I am,” he finished, deciding against going into detail about the terrifying nights he endured while fleeing from the corpies, they being too fresh, and Toby having apparently fallen asleep. Though it took Trent only a moment to realize what type of sleep had taken Toby.
Eternal sleep.
He pulled the blanket over Toby’s face, his last breath having ended peacefully sometime during Trent’s tale, then picked him up in his arms. He carried him gently out into the bright morning sunlight, smelling of fresh dew and nature unspoiled, finding a clearing before a single large oak tree in a nearby meadow. After checking once more, finding no life left in the old man’s bones, he started collecting stones, building a small cairn, then carved “Toby” on the oak’s trunk with his already dulling knife.
“May you find peace away from this cruel world,” Trent squatted before the cairn, splashing a last shot of whiskey for the old man he hardly knew, then taking a long draw for himself.
He stood, staring absently across the unfamiliar landscape. A gentle breeze rolled over meadows of yellowing grass that swayed into the distant horizon, only broken by small knolls of scraggly bushes amongst oaks, maples, and birches, while the tightly packed warehouses that had been lining the railroad tracks for the last 200 kilometer or so, finally came to an end.
A glint caught his eye, born of a small spring near the warehouse he exited, surrounded by green grass and lilies. He called it a spring, but it was more likely the result of a leak in an old abandoned water system or well. But he could care less; water is water, no matter its source. Trent refilled his jug, unable to resist the urge to study his reflection when the ripples smoothed; though no longer did he recognize the man staring back at him.
He had always been of average looks at best. His face one of hard curves and a pronounced jaw; outlining a nose swollen from drink, tiny ears that didn’t quite fit his bobble head, and lightly bearded cheeks covered in a thin layer of filth. His once envied, dirty brown curls were fleeing from his forehead, tangled with dirt, twigs, and other rubbish best left to the imagination. The deep, bloodshot eyes that stared back at him accusingly were the most prominent of his features; a perfect hazel green that was soft, kind, and, most importantly of all, weak.
Trent slapped the image away, dunking his head beneath, scrubbing his thin beard, cheeks, and hair to try and free the filth. He lingered, pulling his head free only when he felt his mind begin to fade, gasping for breath amongst the swaying grass.
He fished the piece of jerky he’d plan to give Toby again from his sack, placing it atop the old man’s cairn, “Goodbye, Toby,” before moving back to the tracks, starting the next leg of his journey...the journey of a hobo.
*********
The view from Princess Sasha Vn’Oco’s private balcony atop Tidelia Castle was beyond stunning; a magnificent sight in which only a few chosen nobles within the NHA were ever blessed to witness.
Though is that fair? Sasha considered for a moment, the idea she was allowed such luxury just because of her standing as the third-princess of the 189th NHA galaxy, as well as being the adopted daughter of the castle’s ruler, Countess Liana, irritated her to no end. But she, like most other nobles of the minority realist standing, knew there was little that could be done about these ancient traditions, only nobles permitted to live on paradise planets like Tidelia.
She clearly understood the reasoning behind the tradition. Paradise planets being beyond rare, only one or two found in each colonized galaxy, with never changing weather and an environment idyllic for human habitation. Meaning, without proper colonization limits, irreversible harm could be brought to these pristine environments.
I still don’t have to like it; she fumed, leaning far over the balcony’s vine wrapped railing, scanning the distant horizon.
Rolling forests of densely packed trees swayed gently in the wind, their rainbow leaves appearing like dense fur painted upon a white canvas created by the perpetual milky mist rising from its depths. Pristine meadows, blanketed with flowers and bushes flecked with vibrant reds, blues, and purples, crept from the forest’s edge, outlining Tileenia, the capital city of the Tidelia Earldom, which spread just below the castle’s gates to intermingle seamlessly with the local flora.
Sasha took a deep breath, letting the clean, sweet smelling air fill her lungs and clear her mind. She extended her bare arms, fully enjoying the gentle caress of warm s
unlight on her fair skin, thanks to one of Tidelia's binary stars.
Tidelia’s standing as a paradise planet was due to a rare gravitational phenomenon, Sasha had learned from her servant and tutor, Gil’Da. The binary stars in which Tidelia orbited, were not only identical, both class 1 of the yellow-white spectrum, but also followed an atypical rotation and orbital pattern. This created a “corkscrew” type gravitational field, allowing Tidelia to also follow an atypical orbital pattern, leading to the planet being equidistant from both stars during its entire orbital pattern.
This resulted in a rare phenomenon where sunlight would evenly bath both hemispheres of the planet during the day side rotation, creating almost identical, temperate temperatures across its entire surface, except in the scattered mountainous regions.
This rare environmental consistency provided an opportunity for local plant and animal life to evolve and thrive, given the inclusion of another required element for carbon based life forms to exist; water. Tidelia had an abundance, though if viewed from orbit, one would think this not the case, only the colorful flora clearly visible and the sky clear of all clouds and weather systems.
On most, if not all, other planets, such a lack of weather systems would be fatal for life, since they were the primary engine for delivery of the all important life giving substance known as water. But Tidelia, based on another unique and rare phenomenon, had a way to deliver water across the entire planet’s surface without the need for weather systems.
The outer crust of Tidelia consisted primarily of a uniquely buoyant soil that floated over a 250 kilometer deep sea of fresh, nutrient rich water. This kept the soil moist, and allowed for the larger fauna’s root systems, including the biological buildings grown to limit human influence on the environment, to extend deep into the fresh, nutrient rich water, absorbing the life giving substance and providing further stability for the thin layer of soil above.
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