Category: Shattered Space

Shattered Space – Part 3

This morning I was sitting in my private transporter, one of the few places where I felt was sufficiently private for me to write my thoughts down in preparation for this week’s meeting. I have long gotten past the frustration of having to constantly fret about what I say in a private conversation even though I am a top level government official in the Earth Union Worker’s Republic. Nowadays it’s just a fact of life. The shadow state is always watching me. They need me; they lack my talent for organisation and strategic planning. They hate me for it. They would have killed me if any of them could do the work I can do. That’s what life is like for everyone on Earth. We are born with a death sentence temporarily suspended so long as we’re useful to the state.

I am a minister in the government, an Alpha double plus class citizen, but I’m no less a slave than the lowest delta class scraping a sewer pipe clean. We’re all slaves in a system of total centralisation of power to one man, and that one man himself is a slave to his vices. However, if you turn on the Global News Network you would think the chairman of the party was God’s own son come to lead humanity to the chosen land. An old Earth philosopher once wrote that a prince can rule through love or fear. But the chairman wants everyone to fear and love him in equal measure. As I look back over my career in politics I have unwittingly been serving his interests. All I wanted to do was to reduce the poverty and homelessness on Earth as much as was humanly possible, but what did they used to say in old times? The road to Hell is paved with good intentions.

Continue reading “Shattered Space – Part 3”

Shattered Space – Part 2

Designer Gede Eugen’s Journal

This planet is cold. It doesn’t matter how high I turn my thermal suit up, the cold still gets through. It winds its way through my bones into the marrow. I have been squatting in this cave for weeks now. I ran out of ration packs two days ago and now I rely to the potage the locals offer me. It tastes like boiled snot but I suppose it’s better than going hungry. A shuttle did drop by a few days ago and the crew were obviously bounty hunters so I kept my distance. They walked off with Lucy though. Which means sooner or later they’re going to come back. I just hope my aristocratic pen pal arrives sooner to pick me up. He said he had a lot of wealth and his personal space ship. A beautiful ivory and gold detailed star hopper called the Audacity that he liked to brag about.

Ahhh… star hoppers. Those are neat little bugs. How I wish I had one of those beauties; a space capsule the size of an old fashioned suburban house. Capable of 80 times the speed of light. Not fast really, but efficient. Once a star ship got any bigger than that the power requirements to maintain a warp fissure increased astronomically. Not to mention the bane of all inter-stellar travellers: gravitational flux. Big ships could easily travel a 1,000 times the speed of light nowadays, but they daren’t ever enter a warp fissure within two astronomical units of a star. Good safety protocol was to only ever enter or exit a warp fissure on the outer perimeter of a star system and taxi in on sub-light engines only.

Wow. This is my first attempt at a journal and like a typical space engineer I am prattling about unimportant matters like the basic realities of space travel. It’s hard to imagine now that only five weeks ago I was thirty-seven light years away in the orbit of the moon standing comfortably in my office chewing protein biscuits instead of cowering in an ice cave on an obscure planet in the Gliese 623 System. Continue reading “Shattered Space – Part 2”

Shattered Space – Part 1

Doctor Agnethea Komnenos’ Journal

When someone started knocking on my door today I thought I was imagining it. I continued working on my computer simulation of polypoid gene expression dismissing the sounds as just part of the normal rumblings of a spaceship’s innards. Alas, because I detest distractions when I am working, I heard the knocking again. Yes, someone was definitely knocking on my door. I started to wonder why they didn’t just use the intercom then I remembered that I had turned the volume down to almost zero a few days ago just to escape these interruptions.

Days ago? Yes… I suppose it must have been three or four days since I last left my cabin. I had become so engrossed with my botany research I hadn’t bothered to even venture out into the ships mess to eat with the rest of the crew. Why bother anyway? It’s not like we have much in common to talk about. I would be a lot happier if I didn’t have to interact with people at all. My computer and my plants are all the company I need.

I opened my cabin door and found second officer Stott grinning at me mischievously with a large rusty wrench in her hands.

“I was knocking on your door,” she said indicating that she had been using the large metal tool. Continue reading “Shattered Space – Part 1”