Beginnings

Marcus sat in the terminal, tapping away at a palmtop game while waiting for his ride to arrive. He'd only been there for ten minutes, but with his nervousness, Marcus felt like he had been there for hours.

"Attention passengers for Galaxy Cruises flight 2574", announced the loudspeaker, "the ship will be docking shortly. General boarding will begin in fifteen minutes."

At that comment, Marcus looked up from the screen and out the windows. To his right, across the corridor, spun the Earth, spinning slowly against he star-speckled background of space. Out to his left sat the moon, littered with lightly glowing colonies, and behind that, peering over the North Western hemisphere, was the Sun, slightly dimmed by the self-polarizing glass of the window. However, it was to the relative East of the Moon that the real show was starting.

A shining cloud of stardust appeared suddenly, its brilliance surprising even the polarization controls, so that a blinding flash briefly lit the terminal. When the room returned to its normal brightness, Marcus got a clear view of the starcloud. The effect that preceded every starship dropping out of lightspeed was actually created by super-heated particles that had collected on the hull being flung off during rapid deceleration. The term stardust was simply a colloquialism, most likely named by some traveling child on her first space flight who thought the display looked pretty. However, it had stuck, and the beautiful starclouds have lived up to their reputation. After a few seconds, the stardust began to dissipate, and passing through the haze, Marcus saw the starship.

My starship, he thought. The Galaxy Ship Calista. Technically, the ship wasn't his. It would be more correct to say he belonged to the cruise line. At least he would for the next few months. Great, my first year out of University and I contract to be a bellhop for a year. Marcus knew he was just being selfish. He'd wanted to get off of Earth see the galaxy, and though there were more glamorous ways to do it, at least this one paid well.

And really, there were worse ways to see the stars. The Calista was state of the art, just out of the Galaxy Cruises Shipyards. Its sleek, silver/blue rocket shaped body featured six protrusions near the back end: three engine and stabilizer wing assemblies and three dome-enclosed habitats. There were no more uncomfortable and motion-sickness inducing magnetic boots needed to walk around. The ship had multiple gravity axes, and used a system of state-of-the-art mini-grav generator on each floor to prevent disorientation. Marcus had seen the plans for the gravity junctions, and they were pretty ingenious. They used evenly spaced mini-gravs to create a feeling that...

"She's a beaut', huh?"

Marcus was snapped out of his inner musings by a rough voice coming from behind him. Shifting his vision revealed what could only be described as a roguish grin on a friendly face. Turning around, Marcus saw a man wearing a uniform similar to his own, though with a few slight alterations, looking in the same direction he had been a few minutes ago. "The ship?" he asked. "Yeah, she sure is something."

"No, not the ship, her." The man pointed just right of where the ship was beginning to dock, and Marcus saw a gorgeous flight attendant. "Her name's Brenda. She's on a college internship. And," the man made an over-exaggerated motion of relaxed contentment, "if you want to know more about her, you'll have to ask me in the morning." He made a seemingly overconfident wave in her direction, and she smiled back at him, though Marcus couldn't tell it apart from the smile all flight attendants gave their passengers. "Jake Long."

"Excuse me?"

"You're a bit out of place up here, aren't you? My name's Jake Thomas. Doctor Thomas, actually." Jake pointed to the red cross symbol adorning his shoulder. "Ship's physician, G.S. Calista. And you are..?"

"Marcus Swain," stammered the flustered boy. "I'm... I'm, uh..."

Jake gestured to the tag adorning Marcus' uniform. "Pest Control." When he noticed Marcus' confused look, Jake clarified. "That's a little joke, what we call 'Guest Comfort'. Not when anyone's looking, of course."

"Of... Of course..." Marcus was cut off by the loud speaker, announcing crew boarding.

"That's us!" Jake got up and headed towards the staff-only entrance. Marcus, somewhat nervously, followed his new friend towards what would become his new home.