Scene 1-- http://www.youngwriterssociety.com/topic23975.html
Scene 2-- you are here
Author's note: Forgive the disgusting lateness of this piece. Enjoy!
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Fortunately for me, Onari Seven was a popular place among businessmen and laborers alike. There was always somebody headed there and willing to carry a little extra freight for a price. It was just a matter of finding that somebody. So I went to the only place I knew to go.
"One tonic," I said to the bartender.
The fizzing drink materialized before me. "Enjoy," the computer responded flatly.
For some reason, I nodded. Then, I tuned my ears to the conversations conversations swirling around me, listening for any mention of Onari Seven.
"Kid, always look on the bright side," said a man to what I supposed was his son or apprentice. "This war between the Stratians and the Arnoli means more money for the rest of us."
"How's that?" said the child, who looked little more than a toddler.
"Each side needs weaponry," said the man, "and each side will be diving to pay the most mullah for the best weaponry." The boy's eyes lit up as if just had a great epiphany. "The demand will cascade through nearly every industry: robotics, ships, mining, and so forth. When the Stratians leave the Arnolis confused and defeated, they'll have to rebuild their society. Which means money, money, money," he sung.
The boy cringed at this last thought.
Sensing the child's sentiments, the man continued, losing none of his initial ebullience. "Don't fret about them, kid. After the Stratians conquer them, somebody, someday, will conquer the Stratians, and so will it be--so has it been--throughout history. Besides, there's not much we can do for them anyway. The Stratians have too many corporations under their wing. Or the other way around."
The child nodded. I turned away, unable to ingest more of the man's "tutoring." But most of the conversations were of the same caliber: chat, laughter, debate, all revolving around business. Everywhere, there seemed to be a group of finely suited men feverishly debating about politics or economics. I found some transitory relief watching a young couple exchanges smiles nearby--a fresh pair of lovebirds, still oblivious, as I was, to the cage we were all caught in.
"I'll see you in three months," the man whispered to his girlfriend.
"Do you really have to go? They'll be more profit," she said, licking her scarlet lips, "if you stay."
"I wish I could," he whispered back sincerely. The gullible fool. Her physique sported more than he alone could handle. With a body like that, she must have had two other rich, enamored buffoons supplying her with the same kind of useless crap that adorned it. "I'll catch up with you when I'm done at Onari," he breathed.
That was my cue. I waited patiently in the shadows as they finished their goodbyes. I rose to intercept the man, but they turned once more to each other. Grumbling, I sat down again, ordered another tonic, and watched them out of the corner my eye as their mouths joined in what would become a ludicrously long kiss.
Seeing the way the man handled her--the naive passion with which he held her against him--I could not help but reminisce. Like ghosts, women crept into my consciousness, their presence there as much a part of me as my alcoholism and nicotine craving. Yes, I had loved the earliest with my heart, but they had loved with their minds; like parasites, they had drained me for what I was worth, and then, leaving me dry, latched to men with greater assets, with more than a history of vague mining operations.
When the couple finally disconnected, my entire drink churned furiously in my stomach. I rose and stepped briskly after the man, checking my preemptive distaste for him.
"Hey," I said behind him, following him as he walked out of the bar and into the corridors.
"What do you want?" he said, without turning to me.
"I hear you're going to Onari Seven."
"Says who?"
"I'll give you sixty credits to take me along with you."
"I'm not a shuttle service."
"Ninety credits."
"One-hundred," he said.
My bargaining skills were well-trained. He would be too rational to turn down ninety credits. "Ninety credits," I repeated.
He turned to me finally. His black hair was slicked back, leaving his face, where two black, beady eyes silently registered me, exposed in its paleness. "Name's Acklar," he said, shaking my hand. "We leave tomorrow. Bay 21."
I nodded, and we parted.
I met him the next day, boarded his small ship, and watched the station shrink in the distance as he set to igniting the warp drive. The place looked exactly the same as it did the last time I saw it from the outside, which, by my hazy calculations, must have been months ago: a metallic leviathan, revolving statically in the emptiness of space. When I had packed my bags, I had packed them all; I was leaving a place that was never for the living, only for the brooding, where I had spent months rolling in the muck of my own existence, cursing the memories that no drink could abridge. I foolishly vowed to take this new opportunity and never again return to it or any place like it. Surely, I thought, there was somewhere else, somewhere beyond cigarettes and tonics and economics and politics; some place where men did not rationalize the destruction of cultures, where people loved from the heart and not the mind.
I was convinced that there was such a place. Indeed, I could feel it even then, extending its long reach across the galaxy and pulling, albeit faintly, on my soul.
Before I had even accepted the mission, my course had been set.
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