Gateway Station

Legend of the Rat-king

Part three:  Gateway Station

As we exited the rift, the screen nearest me showed a remarkable vision.  Here, in the heart of the Sagittarius rift, the sky is almost devoid of the normal sprinkling of bright stars so familiar to residents of the galactic arms.  The empyrean void is nearly unadorned, save the luminous glow of the galactic plane, and the towering form of Gateway Station.

Gateway Station is a tremendous cube, 150km to a side.  The side facing the rift bristles with turrets, missile batteries and deflector shields.  In the center of this face, is a prominent, circular opening that leads to a central shipyard, and around the edge of this gaping maw are circled thousands of high-power laser emitters, the elements of a massive Kugelblitz projector.  On occasions of war between the Reach and the Empire,(which does happen from time to time), it is the system's first line of defense against a direct attack.  This was its original purpose, having been constructed at the close of the Great Reckoning, although it now also serves as the port of entry to ships arriving from the old core worlds.

Inside the station, four titanic cylinders counter-rotate, providing gravity to the residents.  Generally, these are divided along functional lines.  Alpha-cylinder is a parkland habitat with rivers and forests.  It even has a small game reserve where you can hunt some of the smaller dinosaur species for a price.  Beta-cylinder is mostly a high-density residential zone. Gamma-cylinder is given over to industrial activities that require gravity: agriculture, manufacturing, storage, and distribution.  Delta-cylinder is the commercial and entertainment district, a bustling market for goods and services from across the galaxy.

Thousands of ships arrive and depart here every day.  Everything from small shuttles to huge battleships.  Being politically neutral has served Berwynne's Reach well.  I once even saw an AR clip of the Black Swan and the Angel of Annihilation berthed side by side here.  It was not only notable for the peaceful coexistence of bitter enemies, but for the sheer mass and size of the ships.

A few of the old star-gates are still in operation, scattered around the outskirts of the reach.  Most of the original gates were destroyed during the Great Reckoning because they opened to systems that fell to the Empire.  Midori has a gate, as does Bravaxia.  During the last and greatest days of the Planetary League, there was even a gate built to New Albuquerque,
and it is still there.  They all have their entry stations as well, but nothing close to competing with Gateway.

Howard burbled on the floor next to me, indicating he had a message.  "That's odd", I thought,"why didn't they just message me directly?"  Howard unfolded a small screen on his head, holding it up for me to see a message written by my father ten years prior:

Sam,
I hope this message finds you safe and well.  I told Howard to show it to you only if you ever traveled outside the Empire.  If you can, you should take Howard to the nearest Temple of Troniac.  There is more to his, and to our family's history than you have been told. Please understand, this was hidden from you for your own safety.
You are a grown man now, and deserve to know the whole story.
Best,
Dad

With my interest thoroughly piqued, I got ready to disembark.

Departure

Legend of the Rat-King

part one:

Departure

It was the Year of our Emperor 721 if my Qareen tells me right.  I was living in a capsule apartment on Serenity Station, doing the work of a janitor for the station's shopping sector when I realized I was stuck in a rut.

Too many days coming home with feet aching from the constant patrol, too much mind-numbing routine.  The work was light enough, commanding a small strike-force of clean-up drones, Room-bots, and butler-droids, but being in charge of mindless automata has a way of deadening the soul.  Some of their automatic nature wears off on one, draining the color from everyday life.

One of the perks of being a jobber is that it is easy to pick up and move on when monotony sets in, so that is just what I did.  What I needed was to see the universe, to taste adventure, so I decided to find a ship. Station life is fine for a while (even a long while if you wish to settle down), but it isn't grounded like life on a planet.  There is a general lack of the natural elements: no sky to gaze up at, no earth to dig into, water only comes from a faucet or a bottle.  This has the general effect of making the whole affair seem less established, although it may in fact be well established indeed.  Serenity Station, herself, was nearly 1,000 years
old at the time, her thick micro-laminate hull having withstood centuries of hard radiation and impacts.  Yet, the general sense of impermanence makes a nomad of nearly everyone.  The people come and go, yet the station remains (in accord with the appellation "station",
meaning immovable in some ancient dialect from old Earth).  Don't get me wrong, there are plenty of parkland stations where deep and dense ecosystems grown in thick layers of soil with flowing rivers and cool ponds.  I have taken some respite recently in just such a place,
but only the remarkably well off could ever afford to live there.  They do quite a trade in fresh air and water, replenishing beleaguered space-dwellers tired of what comes out of the recycling system.

The owner, and sole employee of "You Got It!" was a friend of mine, an elderly Lu’Tak named Bem.  He was a bit let down to hear of my plans.  Bem was nearing retirement, and planned to move permanently underwater, as many of his kind do at that age.  I suspect that he wished for me to take over his shop, selling specialty ingredients grown exclusively on a few dozen far-flung worlds.  Such is life station-side.

I have nothing against aliens.  They do a fine service in the alien legions, and some select few are even elected to the Kingdom of God, but I just can't ignore their strange ways and inhuman natures.  It takes all types to make up the galaxy.  We are all made by the same creator, but it was to humans in particular that the gifts of civilization and refinement were given.

At the end of my shift, I registered my resignation with the shopping sector management system, and went home to pack.  This type of employment is especially easy to slip out of because the management system simply put my task-force into full automation mode until a replacement could be found.  The condition of the sector would suffer for the lack of supervision, but things would continue, mostly uninterrupted.

Not since the ancient Rubric of Duty was laid down by the Planetary League at the close of the Second Robot War has any robot built in a civilized star system been allowed to possess that great and general type of intelligence that leads inexorably to willful rebellion.  Organic life-forms are allowed to possess it only because it is inborn, and if the Holy Empire of Man could eliminate it, it would entirely cease to be. 

By the way, I have yet to introduce myself.  I am your humble narrator, and you can call me Sam.

When I got back to my apartment, a metal tube socketed into the wall of one of the outer rings of Serenity Station, so that it had an uncomfortable excess of gravity, I set about preparing for my departure.  I activated Howard, an old cargo hauler folded up under my bed, who had served my family for close to a century.  His long life was due in no small part to my grandmother's penchant for meticulous maintenance. I have been taking good care of Howard as well, keeping up on maintenance, and even installing some upgrades along the way with an eye toward passing him on to the next generation one day.

Howard's longevity isn't due solely to careful upkeep, he was built to last.  A Pegasus Cybernetics C-8400, his chassis is a heavy-duty, quadrupedal frame with both a cargo bed and a hold. Howard's cargo hold can withstand the vacuum of space, extreme temperatures, high pressure, and he's waterproof to 500 atmospheres.  In addition to this I installed an aft loading arm, and a special heirloom memory chip to hold family history, especially anything featuring Howard.

I have always been a dreamer.  Growing up, I was often told I had the head to take on a complex and serious profession: be an engineer, a naval officer, a lawyer. . . I may have the head, but not the heart. I'm sure they are satisfying careers for those who pursue them, but for me they lack inspiration.  My idea of a satisfying life, on the other hand, is to keep my own affairs rather simple so I can see what's on the other side of that hill, what's down that blind alley, or what's on that uncharted planet.  I gravitate toward novelty and interest.  One thing that strikes me as interesting is the thought of Howard, steadfast, unrelenting Howard, serving his function down through the generations.  I wonder sometimes, what stories lie half deleted in his memory banks, never recounted.  I am proud to say that I have invested some time, effort, and expense into his preservation.

Into Howard's cargo hold, I committed the essentials of my life.  My desk fabricator and recycling pod, personal media devices, a collapsible suit of powered armor that has seen me through some interesting situations, and a few other handy items.  I make a point of traveling light. Having done this, I notified the station's recycling service of the leavings of my apartment, and returned the key to the attendant at the rental desk, a sour-faced Dogarri woman with glowing yellow biotats that highlighted her blue-grey skin in a really lovely way. 

The small remittance from the recycling service would partially offset the final bill from the rental.  I would still have to pay a few thousand credits after the determination had been made in about an hour.  Luckily, I had some money saved for just such an occurrence, as I often suffer from wanderlust.

Howard followed dutifully as I headed toward the docks to book a passage to Berwynne's Reach.