Page 34 of The Last Hope

Never did I dream about someday,one day,coming face-to-face with these three humans. Who are, for better or worse, entwined messily in my history.

I considered them dead and buried.

I moved on with my life without them.

No thought. No care.

Never even imagined what their fate was like. Never predicted what age they reached before a cold planet and misfortune stole their lives.

Why would I?

Meeting three humans who should’ve died on a Saltare planet that I should’ve called home was never in the cards.

Today wasn’t supposed to happen. How they managed to stay alive, how they even left Saltare-3—the least developed and most deficient Saltare planet of all five—is nothing short of a miracle. Or so the fleet admirals told me.

I don’t see the miracle in their survival.

I just see an undisputable testament to the human spirit.

But I reckon none of that matters. Not me being whiplashed and thrown figuratively overboard while I try to come to termswith two guys named Mykal and Court and a girl named Franny.

I have a job.

A bloody purpose, and there is no braking. No stopping or slowing down to gather myfeelings.At the end of the day, what I feel is trivial.

Especially in comparison to the many human lives on theLucretzia.

Once Court, Mykal, Franny, and I are off the ship and safely inside the silent docking bay, I turn to them, walking backward so I can see their faces. “I know what you’re thinking.Why’d this guy bring us to an eerily quiet docking bay?”

I mean, I can’t name a time where it’s beenthisquiet on the tarmac.

“I wasn’t thinking it, but now I am,” Court tells me sharply.

“Good,” I say, brushing off the coldness in his tone. “Because all you need to know is that it’s late here. Usually, there are more people around.”

The difference, for me at least, is startling. No rev of engines, no Catapult Officers in mustard-yellow tunics darting back and forth, signaling to pilots. No loud crash crew in red tunics, yelling at one another, or the even rowdier maintenance in purple.

Destroyers, battle cruisers, and combat jets are stationary. Noiseless, statuesque, and recently buffed like they’re on display in a spacefleet museum. Eerie. If I didn’t know where everyone was, maybe the hairs on my arms would be standing straight up.

Good thing I know what’s going on.They don’t.And I know what it may seem like, but I take zero pleasure in keeping information from them.

Franny scopes out her new surroundings. Black hair oily and unwashed, and face dirtied from weeks in the brig. She inhales the magnitude of the docking bay.

I skim her once and twice over, not able to tame my curiosity. A human raised as a Saltarian is a uniqueness that only these three share.

Bitterness twitches my lips.

I am a Saltarian raised as a human who has never stepped foot on a Saltare planet, and I share this in common with me, myself, and I. What I would’ve given for one to become three.

“Is that why no one is here?” Franny asks me, voice flaming like she’s constantly set on fire. “Everyone goes to sleep early?”

I pause, considering my choice of words. If I scare them, they could become overwhelmed and form an outrageous plan. Like stealing a ship and flying to a toxic or dangerous planet where they’lldie.

Humans are scrappy but they’re also startlingly dim when spooked.

“Some of the crew are sleeping,” I say, skirting around the answer.Evasiveness: some might say I’m a master at it.

Mykal cracks his neck and scrutinizes the roof. Staring at him too long is a bad idea. I start ruminating over a life forgotten, and I’d rather chew on a pack of nails and yank out another molar or five. Grenpale, my birthplace, and all my long-ago history isoff-limits.I’m putting it there. For my own sanity.