I am Gideon: Chapter #16

Realizations

As it turns out, we were heading to Demeter with a back-haul of prime quality horse hay from Viridia, whatever that meant, which we’d gotten from a ship heading to Calumet to pick up Mahogany …something.  At that point it meant nothing to me.  I sat in the launch chair I’d been assigned, smile plastered on my face, and felt the whole ship shaking itself to pieces as it prepared to escape the atmosphere.  I had time to wonder what I’d been thinking to do such a foolhardy thing – I think I may have even asked that out loud, but the roar was deafening, and I don’t think anybody heard me. 

For a few minutes I was desperately sick, clammy and shaking with panic.  I didn’t actually throw up, but that was mercy on the part of the Creator Spirit.  I’ve long since lost the clammy, panic-stricken part, but I always feel a bit nauseous when we first launch, be it shuttle craft, Imperial Stormclass Cruiser, or the tube home from the Great House.  But that first day … I really thought I was going to die of fright.

Here’s a bit of a lesson on ships that land and takeoff from the ground rather than space dock.

They land flat, but they’re sitting on a pad that’s a bit like those rubber spring platforms kids like to jump on.  They pull the ship down just a bit and then give them a super-heated fling toward space.  We have a friend who launches that way – dear Josephus and his grand old rust-bucket.

This ship didn’t seem much better than a rust-bucket, but launch we did.   I went about my cabin-boy duties, and when I went back to my bunk after supper, I discovered that my rucksack had been dumped out onto my bunk and my jacket was missing, along with my spare trousers and a foul weather cap.  I was devastated.

“Can’t trust nobody,” drawled the Tarkelian in the bunk below me.  “Should ‘a put it in your locker.”

I had a locker?  I felt myself droop.  All praise to El’Shadai, I’d kept my money in my trousers pocket. 

Somebody else showed me where the lockers were, gave me an offhand apology for not showing me sooner, and went off to join a card game.

For the first time in months, I felt really alone.  The others were jovial enough, but they were not my friends.  Civility is not friendship.  I was here, not because I was liked, but because I could work.  It took me a couple of days to realize and accept that, and things got easier, though I missed Azar.  I realized I’d trusted him.  He was honest with me, and he paid me for the work I did.  He trained me for the work I did.  I wondered if I’d told him how grateful I was for the time he’d put into me.

The ship was huge and constructed without frills.  It was meant to do one thing – haul materials from here to there and back again.  It was dark and uncomfortable, and there was no privacy whatsoever. At the inn, I’d had a mattress on the floor in a back room, but I could shut the door and be alone.  Here, I could pull a curtain across my bunk.  Period.  There were always voices, and, for me, always suspicion.  I thought these men – those men at the table – wanted me here because they liked me.  I realized now that they just wanted to see if they could lure me away as a prank on Azar.  I wasn’t here because I could work.  I was here because I was the punchline in a joke.

Image by Hollis