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He felt the structure of the hull behind him wane against his back before the long drawn out sound echoed throughout the chamber, like they were in the bowels of a deep sea creature as it made subtle alterations to its path. The emanation of the sound burrowed deep, reverberating throughout the entire dimly lit cargo bay, vibrations moved across the floor like ripples in a pond, causing the others to shift their bodies to compensate for the unwanted movement, their biology responding naturally to the natural reactions of pressured metal. Rats playing at being human in a broken submarine as it plummeted through an open expanse. As he gradually came out of his reverie, his eyes carefully took in the scene he found himself in, and the diversity of life that was displayed before his greying eyes. The chamber was long and narrow, barely six feet in height and barely the same in width across. The shape of the room shifted as the lights flickered and dimmed, causing the mind to not fully comprehend the environment it found itself in, and yet some unfortunate souls had found themselves there, lost in the ether. Refugees, vagabonds, outlaws and others of distinctions less obvious to the naked eye, all of them gripping metal gratings for fear they might slip out of a crack in the hull and spend the rest of their days as an icicle in deep space. Like most, they feared a loss of control. He could hear silent whispers throughout the room, if you could call it that, messages passed between guests like a sport of words. Some spoke of the wars ongoing, the tyrants that had fallen and the ones that were rising, but most didn't speak on such matters, most didn't care for distant debates and the deaths of scores of people they had never met. Most just gripped on, wandering levels of eye contact, trying to stay in control.
"John?"
"John!!!"
"Wha-...what?"
"I asked you what it's like to be a smuggler,
you said you lie all the time and then I-
where you even listening?"
"...sure."
"I-"
"Look, Naomi, you hired me to smuggle you,
not to play philosophers in the bottom of a bucket,
I didn't ask you what it's like to be an engineer-"
"We tell the truth ."
"...now I KNOW you're a liar."
BOOOOOOOOM
"That was the hyperdrive,
we just dropped out of lightspeed!!
Somethings happening, it must be affecting the
whole ship's systems!!
WE HAVE TO DO SOMETHING!!!"
"Naomi, are you sure?!!"
"We. Tell. The. TRUTH!!!"
"...and go quietly into that long dark night,
for your fear might conjure a blinding light for all to see,
a cleansing light for all to share. Though you think yourself free,
those who walk in shadow...will treat you without care,
as shadow is no place to be."
"Have you ever lied to yourself?"
"....sure."
"Have you ever believed it?"
"....sure."
"Have you ever believed it?"
He felt the structure of the hull behind him wane against his back before the long drawn out sound echoed throughout the chamber, like they were in the bowels of a deep sea creature as it made subtle alterations to its path. The emanation of the sound burrowed deep, reverberating throughout the entire dimly lit cargo bay, vibrations moved across the floor like ripples in a pond, causing the others to shift their bodies to compensate for the unwanted movement, their biology responding naturally to the natural reactions of pressured metal. Rats playing at being human in a broken submarine as it plummeted through an open expanse. As he gradually came out of his reverie, his eyes carefully took in the scene he found himself in, and the diversity of life that was displayed before his greying eyes. The chamber was long and narrow, barely six feet in height and barely the same in width across. The shape of the room shifted as the lights flickered and dimmed, causing the mind to not fully comprehend the environment it found itself in, and yet some unfortunate souls had found themselves there, lost in the ether. Refugees, vagabonds, outlaws and others of distinctions less obvious to the naked eye, all of them gripping metal gratings for fear they might slip out of a crack in the hull and spend the rest of their days as an icicle in deep space. Like most, they feared a loss of control. He could hear silent whispers throughout the room, if you could call it that, messages passed between guests like a sport of words. Some spoke of the wars ongoing, the tyrants that had fallen and the ones that were rising, but most didn't speak on such matters, most didn't care for distant debates and the deaths of scores of people they had never met. Most just gripped on, wandering levels of eye contact, trying to stay in control.
"John?"
"John!!!"
"Wha-...what?"
"I asked you what it's like to be a smuggler,
you said you lie all the time and then I-
where you even listening?"
"...sure."
"I-"
"Look, Naomi, you hired me to smuggle you,
not to play philosophers in the bottom of a bucket,
I didn't ask you what it's like to be an engineer-"
"We tell the truth ."
"...now I KNOW you're a liar."
As the ship shook once more, a woman near the end of the cramped chamber holding a large container close to her was suddenly aghast as the ships random change in velocity caused the container to spring open. Two children fell out of their hiding space, covered in filth and grime. Their colourful but crude toys scattering across the metal grating of the floor all around their unsuspecting traveling companions. Stowaways weren't uncommon in such trying times, smugglers were smuggling smugglers, after all, cramming children inside of suitcases in the hopes of opening them into a better life didn't seem that far gone. John wondered how many laws were broken by a mother's wish and how many lives were lost by those wishes being broken, but this was the world now. It barely felt like a world anymore, John felt like he was stepping through someone's memory of a galaxy and the memory was fading. He contemplated the moment, the instance in which we decided not to die, a moment that returns to us every day, sometimes many times. He wondered why it was, that these people, minds and hearts changed forever by wars they had no part in, shifts in geography they were helpless to avoid, pressed on, instead of accepting an easier fate. Accepting a lack of being. And then he saw it. The other passengers, young, old, some sick and some clearly criminal in their leanings given their attire, all got down on their hands and knees to help pick up the crude figurines. Soldiers, Jedi, Spaceships, some of the toys depicting weapons, they all stepped one by one towards shaking children and handed them back their imagined worlds. Those weathered by time handed them the same thing they clung to at night, something beyond the physical, something that wasn't really there but we were capable of believing was real, despite the cost. As beings, they had laboured under their illusions of self, they had carried the burden of consciousness, something that should never have existed by natural law. Something that equipped them with an arsenal of depth and consequence, an inheritance of faith. It gave them hope.
Pressure was exerted upon the hull yet again, only this time it piqued John's interest rather than a second nature acceptance, as the pressure continued to build. Vibrations began to resound throughout the chamber as the entire structure started to shake violently, suddenly any semblance of light that remained in the bay was extinguished, causing panic amongst the other passengers. John and his cargo jumped up to their feet rather than crouching down to accept their fate. Without warning, the far door burst open and a man stumbled into the room, the light from the flames that clung to his body illuminated everyone fiercely. He would have heard the screams that followed were it not for the intensity of the ships violent oscillation, as it built and built, people were abruptly thrown about the room into one another until finally, the screams grew loud enough to hear as everyone feared being thrown towards the man on fire. A mans skull cracked wide open right in John's face as a piece of metal piping thrust through it, burst forth by a small explosion of electrical sparks. As quick as it happened, John reacted fast, he grabbed the dead man around the waist as the ship's gravity itself began to fail. As everyone began rising up, in a sudden fluid movement, John unhinged the long dagger strapped to his waist and plunged it directly into the corpses heart, piercing right through the ribs. He quickly followed with a clean cut across his throat and then directly into his groin, then kicking the body towards the flames, showering them in a floating miasma of oozing crimson. The blood choked the flames until they faded from existence, filling the air with the stench of burning smoke, replacing the smell of sweat and desperation that had clung to the chamber for weeks. The engineer looked at John in absolute horror and as he looked down, he saw the children clinging to their petrified mother. With no other hope in sight, John had done what he needed to do. What he had always done. He resisted the stare of the abyss, with eyes wide open.
Pressure was exerted upon the hull yet again, only this time it piqued John's interest rather than a second nature acceptance, as the pressure continued to build. Vibrations began to resound throughout the chamber as the entire structure started to shake violently, suddenly any semblance of light that remained in the bay was extinguished, causing panic amongst the other passengers. John and his cargo jumped up to their feet rather than crouching down to accept their fate. Without warning, the far door burst open and a man stumbled into the room, the light from the flames that clung to his body illuminated everyone fiercely. He would have heard the screams that followed were it not for the intensity of the ships violent oscillation, as it built and built, people were abruptly thrown about the room into one another until finally, the screams grew loud enough to hear as everyone feared being thrown towards the man on fire. A mans skull cracked wide open right in John's face as a piece of metal piping thrust through it, burst forth by a small explosion of electrical sparks. As quick as it happened, John reacted fast, he grabbed the dead man around the waist as the ship's gravity itself began to fail. As everyone began rising up, in a sudden fluid movement, John unhinged the long dagger strapped to his waist and plunged it directly into the corpses heart, piercing right through the ribs. He quickly followed with a clean cut across his throat and then directly into his groin, then kicking the body towards the flames, showering them in a floating miasma of oozing crimson. The blood choked the flames until they faded from existence, filling the air with the stench of burning smoke, replacing the smell of sweat and desperation that had clung to the chamber for weeks. The engineer looked at John in absolute horror and as he looked down, he saw the children clinging to their petrified mother. With no other hope in sight, John had done what he needed to do. What he had always done. He resisted the stare of the abyss, with eyes wide open.
BOOOOOOOOM
"That was the hyperdrive,
we just dropped out of lightspeed!!
Somethings happening, it must be affecting the
whole ship's systems!!
WE HAVE TO DO SOMETHING!!!"
"Naomi, are you sure?!!"
"We. Tell. The. TRUTH!!!"
John cursed to himself as he began to propel forward with the help of various objects around him as the other passengers continued to scramble around in fear. Sparks continued to fly as did everything else in every direction, he began to push the screams of the random civilians and privateers into the background as he approached the engine room door, still agape from the sudden exit of the engineer who just died in the warm embrace of a dead man's blood. The young engineer Naomi that John had agreed to smuggle may have been from a small, superstitious farming moon, but she was an incredible intellect with the same perception for technology that John had for his own line of work, however chaotic his line of work tended to be. Her assertion proved truthful, which would have been to John's chagrin where not currently locked in a life or death struggle in this calamity of a privateer ship. The engine was dead, no lights emanated from the usual places, and the all too familiar hum of its heartbeat was no replaced with the echoes of screams in the far chamber. John had been around his fair share of engines and despite his lack of knowledge when it came to engineering, even he knew something was strange about its state. Before he could even speak, the young girl was examining it and her own facial expressions and the shift of her body said it all, she had no idea what had caused the engine to fail and she was clearly more frustrated than he could ever be to realize this. Before she could even begin to bombard him with a waste of time on technical jargon, John darted towards the cargo bay next to where the ship's owners had been housing the refugees, this chamber held the 'actual' cargo, numerous crates carrying contraband of all kinds of innumerable values throughout the Outer and Mid Rim territories. They were magnified so they were still fused stuck to the metal grating beneath them. John instantly began unloading all of the pressurized containers, dumping millions of credits worth of goods onto the floor and screaming for the others to enter the chamber. One by one the remaining passengers entered the adjacent cargo bay and one by one they entered the cramped crates, John found some standard nearby oxygen tanks, typically present in case of pressure loss when entering atmosphere or during combat. Instructing them to share as much as they could, he sealed those who listened in, while others protested and looked throughout the ship for alternatives, leaving the remaining dead bodies lost in the chaos to float in their new floating tomb. Naomi protested entering any of the crates and insisted on following him.
Kicking off from a nearby metal beam, his body thrust forth in zero gravity towards the cockpit. The ships vibrations had grown to a ridiculous intensity, with the tremors and fluctuations affecting them physically despite having no permanent contact with the physical space around them. With the little engineers help, they managed to pry open the cockpit doors open. Suddenly the pressure thrust them inside, with some minimal gravity still remaining in the cockpits chamber, they were dragged to the floor in a heap. John spat on the ground, she surrendered to a fit of coughs and gasps for air as they both gradually stood up to scan their surroundings. And that's when John felt true awe for the first time in his entire life. Fear gripped him like the ever present claws of death and shook him to his very core. A vagabond his whole life. A broken wayward soul, spat on by life's absurdity, was witnessing glory for the first time in his entire life, he looked on upon a miracle of nature. An endless field of ships, some clearly ancient, were stretched out in a veritable graveyard before them, some illuminated by the lights of stars, some obscured by the darkness between them. Every single vessel thrashed about like motes of dust in an endless wind, crashing into one another with reckless abandon, each of them more damaged and broken than the last. Every ounce of air felt like it had escaped John's body, he couldn't even feel his physical self anymore. He was a child, dumbfounded, looking upon the dance of creation itself, as his eyes focused towards the centre of all this chaos. It was suspended in the background, a great ominous omen-like presence that presided over this endless field of floating mausoleums the size of cities, like a distant god observing its awesome domain. For a brief moment, he caught himself thinking that it might be a star, locked in the throes of death, but with a breath of air, he looked closer until he realized the truth. This was no star.
Kicking off from a nearby metal beam, his body thrust forth in zero gravity towards the cockpit. The ships vibrations had grown to a ridiculous intensity, with the tremors and fluctuations affecting them physically despite having no permanent contact with the physical space around them. With the little engineers help, they managed to pry open the cockpit doors open. Suddenly the pressure thrust them inside, with some minimal gravity still remaining in the cockpits chamber, they were dragged to the floor in a heap. John spat on the ground, she surrendered to a fit of coughs and gasps for air as they both gradually stood up to scan their surroundings. And that's when John felt true awe for the first time in his entire life. Fear gripped him like the ever present claws of death and shook him to his very core. A vagabond his whole life. A broken wayward soul, spat on by life's absurdity, was witnessing glory for the first time in his entire life, he looked on upon a miracle of nature. An endless field of ships, some clearly ancient, were stretched out in a veritable graveyard before them, some illuminated by the lights of stars, some obscured by the darkness between them. Every single vessel thrashed about like motes of dust in an endless wind, crashing into one another with reckless abandon, each of them more damaged and broken than the last. Every ounce of air felt like it had escaped John's body, he couldn't even feel his physical self anymore. He was a child, dumbfounded, looking upon the dance of creation itself, as his eyes focused towards the centre of all this chaos. It was suspended in the background, a great ominous omen-like presence that presided over this endless field of floating mausoleums the size of cities, like a distant god observing its awesome domain. For a brief moment, he caught himself thinking that it might be a star, locked in the throes of death, but with a breath of air, he looked closer until he realized the truth. This was no star.
As John tried to quantify the scope of what he was seeing, he found himself turning, only to see a typically reserved Naomi on her knees, eyes closed, gripping a symbol of faith that hung from her neck fiercely and without pause. She was whispering to herself through inconsistent whimpers as John's survival instincts finally kicked in, still overwhelmed by the sight before him that he still couldn't hope to understand or even begin to decipher, it felt like he just saw beyond the curtain, that he had opened a door he should never have known existed in the first place. He felt himself slipping again before he began finally appraising the seriousness of their situation. He scanned through every monitor inside, flicking triggers and buttons, pushing over the corpse of a heavily burned pilot that was evidently electrocuted to death by malfunctioning consoles, their corpse slumped to the floor as John hopped into the pilot's chair in an attempt to take over manual control. Soon every monitor that had remained active began to flicker away and fail intermittently as the vagabond smuggler realized that power was completely failing on all systems. Even fluids from the life support and water filtration systems began bursting out of the seams of the ship's very foundations as John scrambled around desperately looking for a way out. He would survive. He had always survived. It couldn't end now, not after all this. Not after all that he had done. All that he still needed to do. He caught his breath. He counted down and up numerous times as he took breaths intermittently, like a soldier during wartime, remaining calm in the face of absolute adversity and uncertainty. He turned to Naomi, hoping for reason. Hoping for a way out, yet her whimpers only grew louder and more hysterical, until finally, John could understand every word she was saying, as an ominous sermon escaped her tear soaked lips, as her eyes finally opened, raising her hands, still clasped together, gripping her holy symbol as she gestured towards the unspeakable sight before them. Louder and louder her cries grew, until John was helpless but to listen, as power completely failed around them.
"...and go quietly into that long dark night,
for your fear might conjure a blinding light for all to see,
a cleansing light for all to share. Though you think yourself free,
those who walk in shadow...will treat you without care,
as shadow is no place to be."
