Dreams among Stars Read Free Page A

yelling “… o intent to harm.” Suddenly one of the soldiers points “Attention, there are rebels!” and while the soldiers take formation against the out of frame enemy I can hear the shrill shrieking of the woman “You mustn’t fight here!” while she is shaking the troop leaders arm.
     
    He shakes her off and she takes to her heels and tries putting as much distance between the soldiers and herself. I root for her and while the both troops clash and massacre each other assisted by the defensive turrets, which have sprung to life by now, she seems to have a chance.
    Suddenly the troop leader of the soldiers appears from the raging mass and my breath halts as with the drill of a veteran warrior he sends a spear towards the path of the awakened woman.
     
    She has no chance and this recording ends as the two before with tragic - no idiotic carnage.
     
    But I was able to learn something new.
    There are organized humans, a faction that sends soldiers and a faction that sends rebels to watch the exit, so at least two groups are out there.
    But how the hell could some troubles with the canalization result in such heavy social problems?
    And why all these primitive weapons?
     
    Before drawing premature conclusions I decide to watch the latest video.
    But first I have a small break and drink some nutritional paste, which lies heavily in my stomach, while the gruesome images float through my head.
    “ You poor thing” Marple tells me “I am so sorry you have to watch all this, but we really hope you manage to survive out there.”  
     
    The technician in the latest recording is a portly old man, which I do imagine probably even bribed someone to get a place on the ship. Nonetheless he would need to have the abilities needed to actually fulfill a maintenance technicians duties.
    His strategy seems to bear fruit, right after exiting he activates an energy shield.
    After slowly taking in the scenery he yells “I know you are out there! Show yourselves - I want to negotiate!”
    Low calls are audible and after a while an unarmed elderly soldier is nearing, wearing the familiar uniform. Now I am able to distinguish that it consists of red and blue squares and that he wears something like chain mail above it. This relapse into barbarianism stirs sadness within me.
    With a difficult to understand dialect the soldier reassures my colleague from the past that no harm to him is intended and that the threat from the rebels has been eliminated.
    To the question against what the rebels where rebelling the soldier only replies that the Benefactor could answer this and all further questions.
    This reply yields a very dissatisfied from the technician, but apparently he still decides to come along with the company.
    After the group leaves the line of sight Marple exclaims “The next 15 minutes nothing happens, but then we recorded this sequence” the empty landscape extends on the screen, then suddenly a loud bang shakes the screen and shortly after I see one, two no at least five burning people running in the distance and then thrashing themselves on the ground.
     
    Its becoming pretty clear that heavy arms are insufficient to overcome the dangers outside.
    Nonetheless I fetch multiple energy shields from the arsenal.
     
    The rest of the day I spend with endurance training, while I ponder the freshly attained knowledge.
    In a fit of heroism I decide that my discoveries have to provide a better survival chance to my successor.
     
    Marple and I concur with the assumption that the witnessed conflict has taken hold of a large portion if not even the whole of the ship. Possibly even more than the two already witnessed groups are preparing for the exit of us awakened technicians, taking place every 25 years predictable as a clockwork.
    With such amassed concentration of conflicting powers all around the exit my chances are looking very grim, to say the are slim would mean playing it down.
    I figure that speed could be key to