Galaxy's End: Book One by LeRoy Clary (popular ebook readers txt) 📗

read and calculate. Then he had insisted we take sides on controversial questions and defend them in debates that lasted well into the darkness of the early morning. Later, he’d made us change sides in those same questions to understand there are different viewpoints.

However, Bert never interfered with our scrounging, be it for food or clothing. Bert could have provided a comfortable living with the use of his computers. A few credits invested in the stock market at the right time could have yielded nice returns. He could have instructed us to start a small business. Once, we had discussed the possibility of buying a food cart and selling food on the street. That way they would have an income and food.

The idea had been tossed around for years. There were many problems and many positives. It had never gone beyond discussion. The point stayed the same. Bert could have guided them to more comfortable lives, but he had an unshakable belief that he should never interfere or support them in certain ways. He believed they would learn to find a way and that would serve them better later in life.

With the absence of Bill and Stone from the cabin, I gathered my thoughts. There hadn’t been much time to do so since the first meeting with Stone. It had been one critical exciting adventure after another.

I’d learned so much already. I’d never even been inside the spaceport on Roma. It was all new to me. The worker’s entrance had been unknown, as was the way the captain had bribed the woman to help us—and in turn, she had helped the woman return to her home. A fair trade.

The spaceships, even when seen from afar, had always looked large, and they were. What I hadn’t understood was that most of the insides were filled with massive engines, life support equipment, and fuel.

The air inside the old ship we were on smelled greasy and odd, like tasting metal in every breath, undercut with sweat—not all human, and there was a faintly musty smell as if the air filters needed changing. There was little room inside for people or cargo.

I’d also learned that I trusted Captain Stone even after so short a time knowing her. That was an odd idea because trust usually came slowly to me. Only Bert and Bill had earned it so far. We were friends with others I’d probably never see again, but total and honest trust were items difficult to find in the swarms of people I’d met.

Perhaps I trusted her more than made sense, but she also offered a possible new life for us. A look back at the last few years showed that our future had been bleak. Eventually, we’d have lost a fight, caught a disease, been arrested, or all of those. Even the tax problem we’d encountered would have put us on a work crew for debtors. It was a cycle we had no chance of breaking.

My trust was not because she had bought tickets for us to travel off-world. For all I knew, where we headed could be worse than where we’d left. She might be a slaver or worse. If she were, she would have a story just like the one she was telling.

However, the manner she had handled the green frog named Fang was interesting. Me? I’d have probably killed Fang if he had tried to drug me and then turn me over to the Roma authorities, especially when I hadn’t done anything but play their game and win.

I’d give Bill and Stone two-tenths of time to work things out, and then I’d go join them. I told myself I’d do that to make sure they hadn’t met any trouble. They might need me. What it meant was that I was bored. Well, hungry, worried, and bored.

Staying inside a metal box that was hurtling through space was dull. The speed didn’t matter because there was nothing to judge it. There were constant drone engine sounds, the whisper of air being pumped into each room, both for freshness and temperature control, I assumed. Not a lot else besides metal walls, ceilings, and floors. The drone of the same noises became tiresome.

Maybe I should go across the passage and knock on Fang’s door. I could make sure he was okay. I mean, he looked and smelled different, but I think he’d made a pass at me and that is something to consider when another finds me attractive. It is a compliment, right? Even when coming from a frog with teeth like a shark and at least six eyestalks.

The idea of doing that illustrated how bored I felt.

“Hey, Bert. I need something to watch. An entertainment spool. Or a vid.”

“You need a digital book to read. Do you think I have not noticed your failure to read for eleven days in a row? You and I had a pact. Remember? You read every day and you will get smarter, live longer, and enjoy a better life. That’s statistically speaking and may not hold in all cases.”

“I don’t want to read a damn book. I’m bored, I said.”

“You might want to read one that held my interest when I was your age.”

Bert’s voice was somewhat muffled from beneath the clothing piled on him. I knew he waited for my next question. Resigned to accept the inevitable, I asked, “What book held your interest?”

“Three of them that I can recall offhandedly. All are about Escobar Habitat, our destination. Two are semi-historical, and one fictional. I tend to believe more in the latter than the other two. I think the author wanted to pretend it was fiction, but I suspect he or she was there from the level of detail it contained.”

“Why do I care about any of that?”

Bert chuckled before saying, “It’s not the habitat that is interesting, but the people. It’s not