Chapter 2: Kael & Jax

  — Jupiter Orbit Shipyard

  A small, box-shaped shuttlecraft with a small vertical ring surrounding its edge glided its way through the empty vacuum of space, from small space stations to space stations, ultimately entering Jupiter’s orbit. Jupiter, the solar system’s largest planet, a gas giant painted in bands of white and brown, long considered Earth’s gravitational shield. And now, the caveman who once looked to the moon and wondered how high it is, now stretch their habitats far beyond the mere silver plate in the sky.

  The shuttlecraft approached an asteroid, size of a small town and landed swiftly on its surface. Its thrusters blowing the ancient dusts into a roaring hurricane.

  As its hull stabilizes, the door slid open with a sharp, grating screech as Soren walked out in a thick, bulky space suit. She glanced back towards the shuttlecraft, towards the pilot seat for several second before turning away. The light on her chest plate illuminating the ground before her as she carefully made her way onto the centre of the asteroid. There, right in the centre, was a small rectangular cabin, the size of a public toilet in the park.

  There was no sound, she could hear nothing but her own breath and movement noise from within the suit. Just before entering the cabin door, she looked down at her feet, just two centuries ago having your footprint left on the moon was a leap for humanity, but now she sees many different-sized footprints beneath her.

  She opened the cabin’s door. In contrast to its shabby appearance on the outside, the inside was a standard elevator, with silver metal walls and white crystal floors and a black crystal ceiling.

  On a glowing pad she scanned her suit’s ID and pressed a button. The door before her closed swiftly without making a noise she could hear as the light within flashed on. Followed by, at first barely audible noise of gas leakage, then a female voice saying: “Cabin pressurize successful, oxygen level safe, radiation fixation complete, temperature stabilized, you may remove your helmet and suit.”

  She did just that.

  As the elevator door finally popped open, this time with the classical smooth sound of a mechanical sliding door that she could hear, immediately she noticed a strong scent of metal, that tickles your lungs from within. Then she sees a massive structure of metal frames, shaped somewhat like a javelin, with its pointy tip and long thin hull, but the stern’s end was flat, and in the centre the structure curved around as if there was an invisible sphere between.

  On the surface, countless cat-sized robots scuttled across the metal plating, pausing to insert their tiny tubes. Each contact sent a shower of sparks spraying outward, golden droplets dancing like fireflies in a storm.

  At the far end of the construction site, a transparent bay opened to the void of space, its edges lined with gleaming rails both along the sides and beneath the hull. The rails glinted under the workshop lights, as if ensuring that the ship could glide smoothly out into the stars just now. A barely-there shimmer of engineered aluminum wavered over the bay, the experimental particle shield flickering faintly under Jax’s careful adjustments.

  She stepped forward and rested her weight on the metal bar before her, overlooking the production line when the faint vibration of approaching footsteps traveled through the floor plating. Suddenly someone tapped her from behind.

  She flinched slightly and turned.

  “Soren, you are finally here.” She turned around, it was a boy, somewhere around her age with a crazy messy hair and black paints over his face. “I am sorry but our communication arrays was hit by a small meteor last week, so our com was down.”

  “It’s okay, how are you doing, Jax?” She asked with a soft smile.

  “Not very great, you theorists make the worst blueprints, no offence.” He snorted under his breath, swiping his thumb across a smudge of grease on his cheek. “Regarding the thrusters and quantum variators, I did a few tweaks on their subsystem to fit the energy deposit available for them.”

  “That is how we make proper blueprints, I learnt it back in university.” She folded her arms loosely, half teasing, half defensive.

  “Well the…Aric or whoever gave you those ideas definitely did not study the fundamentals of quantum science engineering very well.” He spoke in a fast pace as he swept a towel over his sweaty face and neck.

  She let out a small chuckle, eyes still on the construction project. “You are right, he did not major in science, at least not this kind of science.”

  “Then you still get ideas from him? You are a top engineer. If professor Locke didn’t give a hand I can never even make a start.” He raised an eyebrow, along with a confusing smirk when a sudden sound of bending steel tickled their ears.

  “He once told me that There are people who think, people who design, and people who build.” She shifted her stance and finally met his gaze. “All are vital to humanity’s advancement, though society often only credits all but the first one.”

  “So, he is a dreamer? That convinced you to pour in hours for his imagination and indirectly convinced me to make this my life project?”

  She hesitated a moment, her fingers brushing the rail. “Didn’t you want to prove to the world you are something? Even without their approval?” She asked softly.

  “Yeah, our world is screwed,” he huffed, flinging his hand upward in a half-dramatic gesture before staring down at her boots. “Remember how the university accepted you but not me, and the number of people they can accept are fixed, if one succeeds, the other has to fall.” He turned to stare out of the bay’s shield.

  She stared along towards the bay’s isolated section, facing the vacuum of space. “Isn’t it funny how we have so much space, our technology grew to a technical utopia, yet our society and psychology still lagged behind?” She turned to look gently but Jax’s seemed unfazed, as if he didn’t hear her.

  “But what if I say possibilities for success aren't fixed, the world is so big yet we claim this tiny dot the centre of our life and possibilities.” He threw a small nail into the air towards the bay. “And I say, what they could not see in me, I have it, and have more than what they wanted!”

  “I believe you do, I really do,” she added. “The same way I believe Aric have something to offer to the world that they just couldn’t see it yet.”

  “Well, I hope you are right, cause I know how to make stuff but I can’t fly a ship myself,” he scratched the back of his neck.

  “I do know, I was on our school’s flight team.”

  “No one cares what team you are on the moment you graduate buddy,”

  “I really should have chosen pilot programs over engineering,”

  “So…who's gonna be Odyssera’s captain?”

  “That we have to decide on later,”

  “Anyways the ship will be ready next month, let that son-of-a daydreamer know.”

  “What does your prof say?”

  “He…somehow liked the Aric guy.”

  — Earth, San Francisco

  “So, there’s now a space signal, that Soren received on Plato II?” Kael asked as he squinted his eyes a little. Hands rubbing against each other while subtly avoiding eye contact with Aric; who’s sitting on the other side of the wooden table.

  The room has a smell of freshly baked cookies and potatoes. Just a meter away from the table’s right is a waterfall, placed right in the centre of the square-shaped house. On their left is a series of grassy hills, with people playing magnetic golf balls, and every few minutes Kael would peek over to ensure no reckless teenager is planning on scoring on his windows. This was Kael’s house in his youth, and to Aric’s surprise, he still calls this place home.

  “Think about it, humanity has been searching for company in the cosmos for centuries,” Aric exclaimed, the afternoon sunlight casting gently on his slightly aged face. “If we go out there and discover whatever or whoever was sending those signals first, we make history!”

  Kael frowned at Aric’s smiling face as he leaned back into the chair, tilting it off-balance slightly. “I must say, from high school, you have been thinking about and hypothesizing about those…mates across stars. I can’t believe you truly found a glimpse of possibility.” He smiled briefly then pressed his lips together.

  Stolen novel; please report.

  “That’s what I am talking about,” Aric’s smile turned even wider. “We are not alone in this vast universe.”

  “But the thing is…eh.” Kael shifted his weight forward, elbow onto the table and dropped his chin onto his hands. “I know I told you decades back I am going to support you…which I will, don’t worry.”

  “And?”

  “Listen I can try to see if my authority could override the security code to the primary threadwork radar, but if you are ever planning on taking me to space, to that thing.” He leaned even closer to Aric’s face. “I am not coming along.”

  Aric’s smile faded gradually.

  “You are not?” He questioned, and Kael couldn’t tell if was to his refusal or towards Aric himself. “But you always wanted to go out there. What happened to your dreams of outer space now that you have a chance to go?”

  “Listen, we didn’t know a thing back in high school, I know better now.” Kael responded, almost in a screech. “And that dream is fulfilled, I have gone to space just two months ago to Mars for diplomatic purpose.” He pointed his finger towards the ceiling and made a pausing deserted as he suddenly squeezed his chest. “It was the worst roller coaster ride I have ever been on, I puked right as we took off into Earth’s orbit.”

  “Well that’s normal, so did I with a lower class ticket on a rusty space plane.”

  “That’s not the core reason.” His voice rose and cut sharply before taking a deep breath and soothing down his tone. Outside, the sun began descending down hill, casting a faint red light over the green hills and their wrinkled faces. “I have a stable, good job,” he swallowed and hesitated for a second, “I have family, property,”

  Kael’s eyes slid to the living room—children’s bags on the sofa, half-finished projects on the floor.

  “I finally built something that stays,” he said quietly.

  Just as Aric’s smile completely faded their door swung open as a mature yet pretty woman came in with a tray of freshly baked cookies and tea.

  “Hey, Mr Cole,” she smiled happily as she puts the tray before Aric. “I heard that you were one of my husband’s close friends in high school, and you are a professor in astronomy, physics, math and philosophy?”

  “Self…self proclaimed professor, yes.” He let out an awkward smile as Kael on the other side let out a small chuckle then winked at him, swinging his neck lightly towards his wife. Aric immediately stood up and held out his hand. “And you are? Mrs Baker?” He assumed she went by Kael’s last name, which is Baker, which is weird that no one in his family was ever a fan of overpriced goods from bakeries.

  “Call me Kristen,” she shook his hand, her smile still as authentic and warm as ever. He responded with a respectful smile.

  “And just call me Aric, I get little embarrassed when people call me by my last name.” Aric said as his cheeks turned slightly red.

  “What are you doing daddy?!” Just then did they both realize that there were a two children, a girl and a boy, aged around five, following closely behind Kristen and each other that none of them noticed. In an instant they charged towards Kael like bullets out of barrel. Kael quickly lifted the visually smaller boy up to his lap and chuckled at Aric. “Daddy, who is him?” The children looked at Aric with their big, curious eyes as they waved their soft hands at him.

  “Riker, Anna, meet, professor Cole.” Kael turned their heads towards Aric.

  “Are you a teacher?” Riker asked curiously.

  “Not really, maybe could teach you some basics of things.” Aric responded casually. Meeting Kael’s eyes with every word.

  “What do you do for a living?” Kristen placed another tray of magnetically stabilized bowls, and inside are steaming white rice topped with raw salmon and tuna, with a touch of soy sauce and sprinkle of sesame. “Come on sit down with us.” She said as a chair slides across the floor on its own from the nearby shed.

  “Thank you, I appreciate your offer, truly.” Aric chuckled as he sat down. “Well I do write articles for creative future technology and society, fairly recognizable in the field.”

  “Wow, so like a pioneer?” She exclaimed.

  “Kinda, but in reality, I just published them on free sketchy sites.” Aric shrugged. “Most of my readers don’t know whether I’m brilliant or unhinged, resilient or stupid.”

  The children scratched their heads as if they did not catch the meaning of his words.

  He smiled. “Sometimes I’m not sure either.” Then stabbed his fork into a piece of raw salmon with his fork and lifted it up, squinting his eyes as he scanned its texture.

  “Searching for what?” Kael asked with a mischievous face, the kind that rarely appears on faces above 25.

  “I am tasting many roughness in it’s tissue.” Aric muttered as he rotated the fork. Eyes tracing the white fats and red muscles.

  “Of course there is, we consider as family of culture, we don’t trust biological synthesizers here in this neighbourhood.” He points out the window, the sun have completely disappeared down the horizon as darkness took over the sky. But strangely enough, there was no cloud tonight, clear to the point they could see the red laser connecting the spatial solar panel complexes from the orbit to their ground counterparts on a distant mountain. Following Kael’s finger, Aric could see the a bridge without support piers, relying entirely on the durability of polarization materials and mature magnetic forces. “There’s some old-schooled salmon Fishermans, we get our fishes directly from them.”

  “Anyways, so you are really not coming along?” Aric asked, leaning back slightly as he took a mouthful of the dish.

  “Nope,” Kael responded quickly, almost with a stubbornness in his voice. “I will help you locate the signal, out of our friendship, but going there, that’s your mission.”

  Aric pressed his lips and stared down at the table briefly. Then looked up at Kristen, Riker and Anna, and behind them, scanning the living room. The warm, yellow light of the ceiling, the clean black floor, the considerably messy sofa with children’s bags on them, not out of place, but like decorations that signalled a family lives here.

  “Well, it is good to have a family,” he said slowly, turning back to look at Kristen. “I suppose it is very precious to have a beautiful woman to love you, to choose you from the crowd.”

  “Thank you,” she smiled.

  His glance then went to the two kids. “And to have a family, people to depend on you and people to be dependent on.”

  “Yes, we are human, deep space exploration is for robotic satellites. I have found peace on this lonely blue dot over the years,” Kael said hesitantly. “Maybe you should to, after all, with our current flight speed, we can’t get to anywhere without hibernation, and become men out of time, or die aboard the vessel. But Earth is always here for us.”

  “Yeah, right, right,” He stood up, eyes watering slightly. “I also tried to live life like yours, tried to find someone to love, to find an actual job, but every time I looked up at the starry sky I just…”

  “Daddy, why would you not go to space?” Riker asked in a high pitched voice as his deep black eyes stared at Kael’s grey eyes.

  “Yeah why? It is so cool, you will have so many good stories for us!” Anna added. “We are tired of your love story with mom.” Kael and Kristen immediately blushed and turned their faces away.

  “No, if daddy left, there’s no telling how long I would be gone, and I wouldn’t want to miss you growing up.” He said as he patted Anna’s head gently. But his expression was strange, not smiling, not sad about his kids asking those questions, but simply a stare towards the floor as if something is lodged in his head.

  “Then I will!” Suddenly a girl’s voice came from the other end of the room, near the half opened door to the hall stood a teenage girl leaning against the wall. She has long running but slightly messy blonde hair, a red and blue auto-AC (air condition) sweater and a loose black pants that are obviously too baggy for her. The first things Aric noticed was her sharp and pointy nose tip and her lowered head with defiance in her blue eyes.

  “Melanie, we talked about this,” Kael’s face suddenly turned from smile to rather, concern mixed with authority. He gestured towards Aric and forced a chuckle. “I am sorry, she’s in her slightly rebellious phase of life.”

  “I don’t want to become a civil servant.” She kicked the wall lightly. “I don’t want my future issued with a badge and a desk. There has to be more to life than working like that.”

  “Who said about civil servant? I meant you can become politicians, like me…” just as Kael was about to finish Aric cuts him off to his surprise.

  “She’s right,” Aric said. “The universe is bigger than the world around you.” He nods to her. “And you reached a level of wisdom many struggled to acknowledge in their middle age.” He winked at Kael.

  “You are going to space?” she asked, her sharp blue eyes flicking between Kael and Aric. Despite her rebellious posture and slightly messy blonde hair, there was a quiet softness in her gaze, Aric sensed she might actually be thoughtful, introspective, even caring, under that tough exterior. But maybe he’s just imagining things, seeing good in everyone that may not exist as he always does.

  “Maybe,” Aric replied carefully, his voice calm. “I just need a set of coordinates, which your father can provide, and a functional starship, that I will figure out myself.”

  “Can I come along?” Her question cut through the room like the laser outside piercing through the atmosphere, sudden and direct.

  The room froze. Silence stretched. Kael’s eyes widened and Aric raised a brow.

  “No. Absolutely not,” Kael said firmly, standing up from his chair. “You are not leaving school. It’s only half a year until graduation!”

  “But I feel out of place there,” she argued, her voice rising slightly. “All they teach is from some dusty notepads. Why shouldn’t I see these theories, these stars, these planets… in real life?!”

  Aric exchanged a glance with Kael. He could see the stubborn streak in her, the same kind of spark he’d admired in Kael decades ago. A part of him had wanted to dismiss the idea immediately, apparently she was under eighteen, but he also recognized the hunger in her eyes. If Kael agreed… then maybe she could come along. But what would she be doing? Perhaps his first ever, real student.

  Kael sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose. He had hoped this day wouldn’t come, but the way she glared at him made it almost impossible to argue further.

  “You don’t order me around,” she snapped, crossing her arms. “You’re only my brother, don’t pretend like you are our father.”

  Aric blinked. “Brother? How late did your mom have you, exactly?” He chuckled, shaking his head at the audacity of the girl. Kael snorted, though he couldn’t hide the reluctant grin tugging at his lips.

  “Look,” Kael said slowly, exhaled right before the first sound came out of his larynx, “I’ve known Aric for decades, though he’s always a bit unpredictable, but if Aric thinks you can handle it, then… perhaps there is something in you that deserve to walk a different path. This doesn’t mean I’m babysitting you out there, but I will have to…”

  Aric paused as he reached the exit door, smirking back. “Babysitting her? I suppose you are coming then?”

  The girl’s grin widened, victorious. “Finally!”

  Kael appeared speechless, yet a faint of crimson appeared on his cheeks as the edge of his lips begin lifting up. He turned around to look at Riker and Anna, and Kristen.

  “You are really going?” Kristen asked unbelievably, her tone slightly shaky as her eyes watered, her nose turned faintly red. “So, no more work next week?”

  “I say…” he grabbed by the hand before turning to check Aric; who gave him a small friendly grim. “To hell with my work, it has been trapping me for decades.” She let out a small chuckle. “But I will come back, I promise.”

  “Yeah, I know.” Tears begin rolling down her eyes, as they did on Kael’s as they hugged each other tightly.

  After they released, he turned to kiss the children on their cheeks one by one.

  “Daddy is going to space, and I will bring you good stories back. Stories from a world so much bigger than ours.” He turned them to their backs, their faces staring into the dark night sky. “If you ever miss me, go to our backyard and lie on the grass, look to the stars, one of them is coming from daddy’s ship.”

  “A good news and a bad news, to you and Melanie.” Aric suddenly added. “Soren is expecting the ship to be ready about next months or so, not just a week. School and work are not done yet, and I still need your help locating the signal.”

  “Damn it!”