Project Aike-4 (working title)
an excerpt

Chapter Two
The skies over Citadel A were a dusky light red; they lightened to pink at sunrise and became a deep and violent shade of maroon at nightfall. Jani Mourro remembered the dark blue of his home planet and sighed. Whatever else might have been wrong with Aike-4, at least they hadn’t polluted the skies the way other races had. When he closed his eyes, he could still remember the brilliant green foliage that covered the soft, rounded mountains that surrounded his hometown. When he inhaled, he could still smell the musky flowers that he’d tended in his small garden plot. Citadel A was too full of people, too technological, too dirty and too crowded. His new apartment was tiny, the shuttles and trains he had to take to work were always overcrowded with dozens and hundreds of other working men, and his desk was crammed into an office that would have made a small closet back home.
Before the war had escalated, Jani had been to Citadel A a few times as a tourist. He had been intrigued by the dark metal of the city, its smooth oiled surfaces merging seamlessly into one bizarrely organic superstructure. He had visited its wild neon districts, amazed and slightly disgusted by the sheer hedonistic overindulgence of it all. As a younger man he’d been able to appreciate the nonstop party in some of lower levels, and he’d spent countless hours soaking in the majesty of the city planet’s hundreds of huge museums. Nowadays, though, Jani didn’t bother going to the neon districts unless he was there to arrest someone, and he only went to the grand museum of art only once after the bombs dropped. It was too painful to walk into a room of twenty paintings and sculptures, and know that it was the last remnants of your entire culture.
Running a gloved hand through his sandy hair, he made his way into his office, straightening out his uniform once before taking a seat. He carefully arranged his desk. The in-papers were each read exactly twice, stacked neatly in front of his right hand, and weighed down with a precisely-placed pen. The out-papers were reviewed only once, before being stacked neatly and pressed into a folder for the secretary when she came through. The badge of the Aikean military police was polished, then leaned against the dark ceramic cup that housed his other six pens. Once Jani felt completely sure that his desk was in order, he affixed his new badge to his chest. The letters CAPD were etched darkly into the brilliant chrome shield, which contrasted wonderfully with the drab green of his uniform.
The secretary waited a full twenty minutes after Jani had arrived to enter his office, aware of how meticulous he was about arranging his workspace. When she’d decided that enough time had passed, she entered slowly, two of her arms already full of folders off of officers’ desks.
“Officer Mourro, Captain wanted me to remind you that you have a meeting this morning with that Aikean parolee from Tau,” she said, handing him a file chip with one of her free arms. He took it with a small smile and a nod, watching her leave. She was pretty enough, although he didn’t like dark hair and it was kind of bizarre to imagine her with her four arms. He was pretty sure there was a policy against dating other officers, though. Jani sighed, plugging the file chip into his desk. There just wasn’t any such thing as a nice Aikean woman anymore. Grumbling, Jani examined the file of the parolee he’d been assigned. Definitely not a nice Aikean woman- some rowdy nine, of all things, had brutalized a few people before being sent to Tau. Jani’s upper lip curled in disgust. None of his sisters, all respectable threes with important husbands and beautiful children, had survived. It was grossly unfair that this worthless nine had taken the place of one of them on the escape transports.
Jani took extra care in putting his desk to order before the nine could be sent in. His right ear twitched and he frowned, scratching it in irritation where its single earring pierced the flesh. The door opened and he straightened in his seat, a scowl forming on his face as a tall blonde entered the office. He opened his mouth to ask her to please step outside, because he was expecting someone, and froze. Nine dull earrings hung from her long, drooping ears. Bright blue eyes regarded him, and she took a seat in the only available chair.
Kam leaned back, eyeballing the thunderstuck three, and grinned. “Officer Mourro, right? Kam Raurben,” she said cheerfully. He regained his composure, stonily assessing the file and seemingly paying her no mind. Kam waited for about thirty seconds, before jumping up to her feet. “Right. Well, if you’re busy, I can wait outside,” she began cheerfully, reaching a hand for the door.
“Sit. Down.” Jani’s voice, normally moderately pleasant, was a deep growl. Kam gaped at him for a moment, too stunned to do anything but take her seat again. Even before going to prison, she hadn’t interacted much with any other Aikeans since leaving the refugee orphanage. Even with her painful, ugly memories of home, she’d never really thought that the old prejudices and caste hatred would survive the war. A nervous grin broke out over her face, and she silently berated herself for even thinking it. Of course the parole officer doesn’t hate her because of her caste. That’s completely paranoid.
She fidgeted in her seat, nibbling on the plastic wrist cuff with her identification on it. Finally he raised his pale honey-colored eyes to her, the same look of furious disgust stamped into his pale features. “It says here that you were originally sentenced to two years, but you received another year’s term in your first week at Tau. Why is that?” Kam licked her lips, shrugging slightly.
“I let myself get pulled into a fight with my cellmate. It was really stupid and I was overreacting,” Kam said, grinning faintly. “But I’ve had three years to learn how to get along with people. I took all the prison literacy courses, that’s in my file, right? I can speak four languages now, if you count Galactic Standard and Classical Aikean. And I got my certificate in accounting. I mean, I…” She trailed off, slightly puzzled at the unchanging expression on his face. “I… I worked really hard in there, and… well, I mean, the judge thought so too. So… I’ve changed a lot since I first got sent in, I mean.” She opened her mouth to say more, but Jani interrupted.
“I don’t want to hear your life story, I just asked why you were making trouble while incarcerated inside a prison facility,” he snapped, going back to the paperwork in front of him. Kam blinked and slumped down in her seat a little, oddly subdued. After a few more minutes of furious silence, he turned to her once more. “It is our policy here to assign our parolees some sort of transitional job with which they can earn some money, put their acquired occupational skills to good use, and give them a sense of community. However,” he continued, scowling down at the file in front of him, “as you seem to have no occupational skills whatsoever, I’m going to have to just assign whatever I think is best for someone of your… dismal qualifications.”
Kam’s jaw dropped, and she straightened up in her seat a little. “What do you mean, no occupational skills? I just told you, I’m fluent in Moskai and Selikian, I could work as a translator or an interpreter or… or a secretary, even! I have my certificate for accounting, too, I can work in shops and... look, just read my file, you’ll see right there that-“
“SILENCE,” Jani thundered, slapping the file down to the desk. “The number of jobs that require those particular skills are few, far between, and have waiting lists of vastly qualified people in line to fill them! You, Miss …Raurben,” he spat, as if the name itself tasted bad in his mouth, “are not nearly as qualified or skilled as the rest of the people I need to assign jobs to.” She couldn’t think of a dignified response to that, so she just folded her arms over her chest, gazing unhappily at her knees. It couldn’t be that classist Caste bullshit, could it? These were modern times, now. Kam had read the latest survivor reports; she knew that Aikean numbers had dropped from nearly five thousand galaxy-wide to just a little over three thousand five hundred in the past four years. Even with a few births bolstering the numbers, Aikeans were either killing themselves, overdosing on narcotics, or just… dropping out of life, going peacefully in their sleep. Small communities here and there had sprung up, populated mostly by fives, sixes, and sevens. Those castes had represented the majority of the merchants and journeymen, so it only made sense that they’d be in the greatest numbers. Caste fighting hasn’t even been mentioned in any of the reports, although it occurred to Kam that perhaps that was because fives, sixes, and sevens had never been much different from one another and had never fought much before.
Still, the one constant theme in each of the interviews she’d read had been solidarity. The reports told Kam that Aikeans were now cleaving together in their time of adversity, in a way they never really had in their prewar civilization. Kam had walked into her meeting with the only Aikean member of the Citadel A police department with the cheerful hope and acceptance of a new way of life and interaction between what was left of the high and low castes. Perhaps she was wrong. In fact, as she looked over the glowering three behind the desk, his ears twitching furiously at her, Kam was pretty sure she was utterly and completely incorrect.
“Lucky you,” he growled, pulling up a grid on his vis-screen and tapping it impatiently. “There’s a job open for an unskilled laborer such as yourself. It requires you to be alert, unless you want to lose a finger or a hand.” He pushed a small digital map across the desk toward her, yanking his hand back before she could accidentally touch it as she took the map. “Report there tomorrow morning before sixth hour.” She looked at it and nodded, standing slowly and giving him a small, uncertain smile.
“Get out of my office.” Jani didn’t even look up as she flinched, then backed out of the small office and quietly shut the door. Once he was alone, he put his elbow on the desk and massaged the bridge of his nose, breathing slowly and deliberately. The blood was pounding in his head, and his sinuses felt suddenly overstuffed. His eyes watered slightly, and his ears tingled unpleasantly. How angry could she have possibly made him? Was it really that nine’s fault that she’d had one noble parent and a worthless whorish one? Was it really her fault that she’d had the features of what damn near amounted to a demi-god on their lost world? Was it her fault that she sullied it with all those dull ugly earrings?
The low, animal growl surprised him at first. Jani’s first wild thought was that some sort of wolfhound had been let into his usually pristine office. It took him several seconds to realize that he’d made the sound deep in his own throat.
That night, Kam gazed up at the ceiling of the room she was given in one of Tau’s halfway homes. There was water damage in the corners, and yellow-brown smoke had stained the higher reaches of the walls. The coffin-like room was too quiet. Kam had gotten used to hearing a constant barrage of tapping, restless sleepers, half-hearted muttering, humming, the buzz and whirr of the sentry ‘bots, the faint, indistinct chatter of guards that strengthened and faded in an almost rhythmic cycle. Her head ached trying to replace the noise of Tau with the keening empty silence of the house.
The morning was only that in name; the sky was still the velvety shade of violet that refused to yield to the glow of even the closest suns and planets. Kam had not slept well, and had woken up with an uncomfortable ringing in her ears. In the hour before her alarm went off, she’d tried to massage her ears into feeling better, but even that did nothing to alleviate her discomfort. Walking now under the artificial glow of businesses that never slept, Kam began to wonder if she had not been better off in prison.
The food hadn’t been very good, but Kam had spent her entire life eating poorly. There was no real privacy, but what part of Kam had ever been hung up on that? Kam let herself contemplate the idea of committing some petty crime right here and now, but her logical side quickly rejected the thought. Citadel A was strict when it came to “career criminals” like Kam. You go to prison once, you’re expected to make something better of yourself. You go to prison twice, you end up on a maximum security with no living contact for twenty years, and if you’re not completely insane by the time you get out, you’ll still have wasted the better part of your life in a tiny cell with nothing but yourself for company.
There had to be some way to adjust to life again. Kam stopped when she reached the building marked on the map, inhaling shakily. It would be a catastrophe if she somehow failed at this. Then again, Jani had told her that it was perfect for someone who had no skills, and he definitely thought of her as an unskilled laborer. The memory of Jani’s little tirade of the morning before turned Kam’s stomach, and she scowled despite herself. Still, she reminded herself, if she can prove him wrong- if she can not only do her job, but do it well- then she will have scored a minor victory in the war against caste discrimination. She also reminded herself that all she needed to do was keep this job for a full year. After that, she would never have to see Jani Mourro’s snide face with its three tiny earrings ever again.
Thus cheered, she straightened her borrowed clothing and stepped into the front door.
The shift was supposed to last eight solid hours, from sixth hour until fourteenth hour. Kam’s workday lasted only six.
Her illusions regarding how easy the job could be for her were quickly dashed once she realized what the actual job entailed. Kam had been brought in to replace a ‘bot that had short-circuited. The business had turned out to be a refinery of metals used in delicate tools and equipment, such as the tools used by some surgeons and the body armor made for races with more joints than could possibly be defended well. Kam’s job had been to pour the molten metal from one container into a larger container where it would be mixed with another molten metal to form specific alloys. Kam was nowhere near strong enough to carry the containers; the only reason she moved faster than a snail’s pace was because she couldn’t stand the unbearable heat. Even with protective gloves and thermal sheathes, Kam had blisters on her hands and was constantly bathed in sweat. She had only completed five runs in a time that should have seen at least twelve finished, and at the end of her sixth she had collapsed.
When Kam opened her eyes again, her hands and arms were wrapped in thin bandages, and she’d been paid for half a day’s work. She’d also been fired. Losing one’s job was always a tense experience on Citadel A, where unemployment for longer than approximately three months was considered punishable by jail time, but as a parolee, it meant Kam had to go to Jani’s office the very next day to receive a new job assignment.
Kam really and truly did not want to go. She spent that night in pain, trying to dredge up any excuse, any reason at all, that would enable her to somehow postpone her meeting with Officer Mourro. She was injured, after all. Was that enough to delay her meeting? Somehow, Kam didn’t really believe that Jani would be sympathetic or understanding.
When morning came, however, Kam painstakingly pulled on her clothes and proceeded to the Police station. She sat and waited for a couple of hours before the Liantu secretary, eyeing her sympathetically, told her that she could go on in. While Jani wasn’t at all surprised to see Kam back, he was a little alarmed that she was back so very soon. After a certain point, it would reflect badly on him that he assigned her to jobs that he knew she was unfit for.
He regarded her in stony silence after reading the letter from the employer, which stated why she’d been terminated from the job. Even though some part of him knew that it really wasn’t her fault that she’d been physically unable to handle the work environment or the demands of the job, most of him was hanging between annoyed at her incompetence and furious at her laziness.
“So,” he finally said, glancing over to his vis-screen again. “Let’s see if there’s something you can’t zhug up, Miss Raurben.” Kam opened her mouth to protest, but her words died in her throat. Nothing she said would make any difference at all. Kam sighed and slumped back in the chair, leaning her head back to stare at the ceiling. Whatever Jani had in store for her, she could only hope that it had nothing at all to do with superheated metals or heavy lifting. However, judging by his reaction to her presence and the way he’d completely ignored the stained bandages covering her hands and arms, she had to admit that even that meager hope was unjustified.
“Here’s something,” Jani finally said, shoving new map towards her. “Tomorrow at eighth hour. Be there. Do NOT be late.” His mouth twisted into a fresh scowl. “And TRY not to zhug it up. It’s a little complex for someone like you, but even an uneducated ex-con nine like you should be able to figure out how to file information.”