Discordia

     Space, humanity's last great frontier. That's what they say, isn't it? Back home on Mars they've got holosigns lighting up the cities with political ads for the navy. "Join today," they say, "and build a future for tomorrow". Me and my friends always thought it was a big joke, especially my activist fuck of an older brother, Tommy. Hell, the gun on the earlier signs looked like a giant cock; subliminal messaging at it's finest. Then Tommy OD'ed on phaze, and everyone stopped laughing. That's when everything changed for me. Tommy took care of me, and like nothing he was just gone. Joining the Human Naval Academy didn't seem like such a bad idea when my life was a blurry shift between the streets and the next club I could afford. So I said fuck it, and now I'm here. The H.N.A. cleaned me up, put a gun in my hand, and taught me to fly an Auxiliary Repair Ship; the soldiers call them Auxies. They send these repair ships out to fix the scouters looking for who the fuck knows what. Now I travel across the stars from one alien shithole to another fixing up stranded Human ships. After four years, sometimes I still wonder what the fuck the difference is between this and getting fixed on the streets of New Fonta.

Shit, four years...

* * * * * *

     I hate waking up. Evolution really kicked us Humans in the nuts when it decided that every day would start with your dreams ending. There was one thing I hated more than waking up, and that was the damn alarm. I threw off the sheets, and groaned, "I'm up..."

Beep! Beep! Beep!

"I said I'm awake! Alarm, off!"

The holoscreen on the wall of my broom closet room lit up, and the face of my Auxy's virtual intelligence, Hannah, showed up on the screen. The definitive man made model of a woman, with a synthesized voice that was somewhere between a sweet lay and a drill sergeant. She always sounded like such a bitch when she talked to me. "Good morning, Captain Quincy, I trust you had a pleasant rest?"

Yep, she's definitely still a bitch. "Fuck off..."

"I am pleased to hear your attitude has improved since the incident in the lounge yesterday!"

I grabbed my flight suit, and started getting dressed while Hannah scanned my vitals. When I look back, I relate Hannah to this girl I knew on Mars, Serra. She was a checker for this club I really liked, TeChromatic. Every attendee would have their wrist scanned by Serra to see if they were on the list, and Serra would smile and welcome every single fucking one like they were her best friend. You could tell she was a real cunt outside her booth, though. It was like deep down she hated you and if you touched her she'd have to steralize in chemicals to get your stink off. Prude and pretentious, Hannah and Serra would have gotten along just fine. Hannah's holoscreen turned red, which meant I was screwed.

"Captain, your glucose levels are at 117 milligrams per deciliter, I am altering your nutritional intake for future meals accordingly."

"So you aren't going to give me sugar with my nutrient paste? I'm already excited."

"I am detecting sarcasm in your vocal intonation. Are you feeling all right, Captain?"

"I feel wonderful, Hannah, can I go work now?" I zipped up my suit, grabbed my pistol, and swept my fist through the holoscreen, which gave a satisfactory flicker in response. The attack was good enough for me, and I hopped out of my cabin towards the cockpit. I was glad at that moment that I had one of the smaller class vessels. You can't go wrong when nothing is ever more than twenty meters away.

     My Auxy wasn't anything special, but she was mine. A Class-6 Rosenfall Vessel, we called her Raindance. She was designed to carry up to twelve engineers and enough supplies to repair several frigates without stopping back at base for resupply. My crew was at a healthy eight. Lucky for me I only ever had to deal with three of them: my navigator, xenolinguist, and defense operator. The other five engineers generally kept away from the cockpit, and I'm not sure any of them speak English. All things considered, I was in a pretty good spot.

I pulled myself up into the cockpit and settled down into the captain's seat. "Hannah, how's the simulated gravity? I feel a bit dizzy."

"Gravity generation is functioning as programmed, Captain. Your symptoms are related to poor diet."

"Great, I was worried something was up with Raindance. Start up the primary flight display and give me the word on our next waypoint, I want to get going before the crew is up."

"Of course, Captain."

"And Hannah, after you're done with that make yourself useful down by the engines and run a preventative diagnostic, I think we might be getting frost buildup around the intake."

Once Hannah left, I sank into my chair a bit. It was so quiet and peaceful while I booted up the various systems on Raindance. My crew wasn't awake yet, technically I shouldn't be awake yet either. A few months back I convinced Hannah to kick my alarm back half an hour; as I opened the blast shield on the window, I got a good reminder why. The view was God damned gorgeous. More importantly, it wasn't familiar. I reached back to the seat behind mine and turned on the navigation display. The blue holographic light filled the cabin, and as dozens of coordinate numbers floated into place I saw our ships location. Fourteen lightyears off course.

-TBC-