Exiled to the Stars (2 page)

There was a loud
thunk
as the shuttlecraft docked with the huge L-4 space station, the orbital factory at which many of the ships were built. The colonists stirred and a low growl of conversation broke out, but the armed guards paid no attention except to stop people who were starting to try to release their seat belts.

After ten minutes, the hatch opened, and a parade of uniformed "flight attendants," accompanied by another group of guards, entered and began releasing the seat belts. The belts were designed with locks; only the flight attendants had the necessary key.

"Stay seated," the head guard shouted. "Do not try to get up. We
will
stun you!"

A young man pushed himself out of his couch and drifted free; one of the guards fired his stunner, and the young man drifted unconscious above the other colonists. The guard grabbed a foot and pulled him back down into his couch.

"
Goddammit!
" the head guard yelled, "
now
do you believe me? Now we're gonna have to
carry
that fool to the meeting."

Finally all of the 200 passengers was released. The attendants had them get up by rows and guided them out of the shuttle's hatch under the watchful eyes of the guards. Few were able to make the move smoothly. In fact, movement triggered another round of space sickness in many of them. Many of the rest drifted helplessly, flailing in the zero gee. Ron was faintly proud that he didn't get space sick. He watched the movements of the attendants and the guards, and tried to mimic their techniques when his turn came. He was only partially successful, but judging by the busy attendants and guards, he did better than most.

They swam, drifted, and were pulled down a featureless corridor to a large auditorium. Similar streams of colonists were drifting through a dozen more doorways. An attendant grabbed his foot and pulled him into a seat, again buckling a seat belt, but not locking it this time. Ron shook his head. Seats were rather a waste in the weightlessness of space. One could simply assume a sitting position in mid-air and float. He assumed the seats were more for crowd control than comfort.

Ron chuckled sourly at the seat belts.
Where would I go? Talk about a perfect prison; there's
vacuum
all around, and the only way off is their shuttle!

The hubbub and roar of conversation got louder as more and more colonists were brought in. The large man on his right leaned over. "
Sprechen sie Deutsch?
"

Actually, Ron understood that the man was asking if he spoke German; but that was about his limit in that language. He smiled and shook his head, but he made a mental note to think about learning German once they were underway, since it seemed the Drones had been rounded up in Germany, or at least a German-speaking region.

The man rolled his eyes. "
Naturlich
," he muttered and turned away. Ron shrugged.

The auditorium was almost full by now, but there was little confusion, thanks to the attendants and, of course, the guards. Many of the colonists were still space-sick, and the attendants were kept busy collecting and replacing space sickness bags. Looking around, Ron began to reconsider his note to learn German. Those brought aboard from his shuttle were a rainbow mix of colors; but in this much larger crowd, it became apparent that the vast majority were Asian. They seemed to be overwhelmingly light brown in color, black haired, and their eyes displayed a distinct epicanthic fold. Filipino, maybe, or Malaysian.

Suddenly, Ron felt conspicuous in his white skin. He took comfort from the fact that the German man to his right shared his complexion shade, though the man on his left was a chocolate brown.

Uniformed "flight attendants" drifted by overhead, passing an envelope to each "colonist." The envelope contained a hand-sized card and a pair of featureless beads Ron recognized as identical to the earbud music players in the small bag of personal belongings he had been permitted to bring. He inserted the beads into his ears as a cartoon on the card indicated, and felt them reshape to match the contours of his ear canals. He would have thought them broken except that the man to his right picked that moment to exclaim, "
Mein Gott!
" Ron dimly heard the exclamation around the earbuds, but through the buds he heard, "My God!" Obviously, they were translators.

Ron turned to the slight, bespectacled middle-aged man to his left. As always, the eyeglasses irritated Ron. Vision correction was a simple procedure these days, requiring only a few minutes of minor laser surgery and a few days of recovery. But the administrators of the EarthGov's Universal Healthcare Program had decided that this particular procedure should not be funded. Eyeglasses, they reasoned, worked acceptably well, and provided employment for thousands worldwide in the manufacture of frames and lenses, as well as Opthalmologists to write the prescriptions, and Optometrists to deliver and fit the glasses.

So what if it took over a month to get an appointment for an eye exam, two months to get the prescription approved and the frames and lenses ordered, and another six months to get them to the patient? "The greatest good for the greatest number" was the mantra of EarthGov. So what if all those jobs meant several million people had to go through nine months of blurry or difficult vision and possible loss of their own job? It was only a minor, temporary individual sacrifice, after all.

But Ron suppressed his irritation, and produced a friendly smile. "Do you speak English?" he asked the man politely.

The man chuckled. "That and a smattering of Spanish is all I
do
speak," he replied. He put out a thin, chocolate-brown hand. "I'm Vladimir Renko."

Ron frowned. "Not
Doctor
Vladimir Renko, the roboticist!" Renko nodded, and Ron's frown relaxed into a smile as he continued, "I've heard a lot about you. I'm honored to meet you, sire." He shook the proffered hand enthusiastically.

Renko's eyebrows lifted. "Are you a roboticist?"

Ron shook his head. "Sorry, no. Just a high school science teacher. But
everyone
's heard of you."

Renko smiled gently. "Not everyone. The uniformed thugs that grabbed me for 'antisocial behavior' didn't seem impressed."

Ron grinned. "Is that all? They grabbed me for 'subversive indoctrination'.”

"Ah," Renko said, "A true revolutionary! And with what radical ideas were you attempting to corrupt our youth?"

"I dared advocate mandatory birth control based on ability to support the offspring."

Renko's polite smile had turned warm as he shook his head. "Attacking the very foundation of civilization: The masses' freedom to procreate without limit. Obviously, a racist, elitist class warrior bent on further subjugating the poor! So they permitted you to 'volunteer' for colonization, thus keeping the Earth safe for the billions of illiterates we have created."

Ron hung his head in pretended shame, struggling to suppress a grin. "Yes. I tried to repent my subversive behavior, but breaking into giggles in the middle of the recitation rather ruined the effect."

The warm smile flared into a gleaming white grin in the dark face. "I can imagine. The judge at my hearing decided that working on robots, machines designed to steal jobs from hard-working humans, was obviously prejudicial to the social order and my removal from society the only possible solution."

Ron started to reply, but was interrupted by the speakers mounted around the walls of the auditorium. "
Quiet
!" they roared, and the din subsided somewhat.

After a few moments, the voice returned, even louder. "
SILENCE! In ten seconds, the guards will begin stunning anyone in the audience that is still talking! …9…8…7…6…5…4…3…"

By the time the voice reached "3," the auditorium was deathly silent, except for an occasional cough or sneeze.

Stunners did no physiological damage. But after about an hour of unconsciousness, the victim awakened to a roaring headache and general lack of coordination that lasted for several more hours. Obviously, no one here was willing to risk it, especially since it seemed some information might be forthcoming, and everyone wanted to hear it.

A man drifted out to hover over the small stage at the front of the auditorium. From this distance, that was all that Ron could tell about the tiny figure. In English, the official language of EarthGov, the man simply began speaking. His voice carried through the speakers.

"As you have learned, the earbuds are universal translators. Do
not
lose them. Supplies of spares are limited even here, and aboard ship, spares will be very rare.

"I am the Administrator of the Colony Program for the L-4 station," he continued. "To answer your first question: No, I cannot prevent your shipping out, nor would I if I could. Earth is in the midst of a population emergency, and regardless of your feelings about your personal situation, EarthGov
must
take emergency measures.

"You are colonists on Ship 7N-364. The ship will depart in approximately two 'days.' To answer the
second
question asked at this point, No, there are no "family accommodations" or "married quarters" aboard. There simply isn't room. You will be living in unsegregated dormitories for at least a year, and probably three to five years.

"The back side of the card you have been given contains four numbers. The top number is the deck on which you will be housed. The second number is the compartment, or dormitory, on that deck, and the third number is the bunk number you will occupy. The bottom number, the large one above the bar code, is your identification number, starting now. Place the card, with the bar code down, over the sensor pad on the arm of your seat. Then remove the card, and press your right thumb over the sensor pad. If you do not, the ship will not recognize you, and you will be unable to obtain food or any other automated services from the ship." There was a rumble as those in the audience followed the instructions. While that was occurring, the man continued, "Learn that number. While you are on the ship, that number and your fingerprint will be recognized by the ship's computer, which will provide your allotted supplies and services based on it. We hope that this system will prevent attempts to steal your allotted share of the ship's resources.

"To answer the
third
question, No, we don't care whether you swap bunks to be near or away from someone else. EarthGov, and the crew, simply do not care whether you change bunks, or dorms, or decks. That's your problem.

"Next, the crew," the man continued. "Aboard ship, the crew is the life-and-death authority, and you will obey any order you are given by a crewmember. The Captain
does
have the authority to execute a colonist, if necessary.

"Yes, we are aware that once you leave the Sol system, EarthGov has no power to enforce its will, and some of you fools are already plotting to try to take over the ship.

"Well, understand this: The crew has had years of training in running and maintaining the ship. Try to stage a
coup
, and you're liable to kill everyone aboard. One of the systems they operate and maintain is life support. Threaten the crew in an attempt to become a little dictator, and you may very well wake up one night to find that everyone in your dorm is trying to breathe vacuum. That doesn't work, by the way.

"The crew are also the people who will either land or crash your ship. So, you'd better respect the crew and obey their orders.

"Since you've already had a week-long indoctrination on Earth, that's really all the briefing you need, but I will add this: Once you leave this station, there will be no guards with stunners. Once you leave the Sol system, there will be no EarthGov ships. You will be on your own, probably for years, and a large percentage of you are criminals or troublemakers. Those fools I mentioned won't believe what I say, and will still plot to take over the ship. It will be
your
responsibility to stop them from killing you all. EarthGov has given you everything you need to establish a thriving colony, assuming you are lucky enough to find an Earthlike planet, but
you
are the ones who will determine whether you arrive there alive.

"For those of you that can read English, each dorm has a manual that explains the ship's facilities and equipment. The ship's library computer also contains a copy, and can read it to you verbally if necessary. In fact, the computer contains a significant portion of all mankind's knowledge to this point. Ship's computers are larger and more sophisticated than those found in Earth's largest libraries. Respect it, and
use
it!

"Now, this was part of the week's training you received, but I know many of you weren't listening, so I'll repeat it. The dorms and bunks were designed for use under boost, when there is spin on the ship to simulate gravity. So, when you get to your dorm, you will find that the bunks are mounted to what are now the walls. Under spin, those walls will become the floor and ceiling, and your bunks will appear normal.

"However, you will not be leaving for two days, and in answer to the question of 'where do I sleep,' I reply, 'anywhere you wish.' You are in free-fall. You will find that all you need do is tether yourself to your bunk's frame to keep from drifting in your sleep, and assume any position you desire in mid-air. You will find tethers and thin blankets attached to your assigned bunk.

"Finally, under your seat you will find a box containing the personal supplies you will need aboard the ship, including shipsuits and hygiene articles. Guard it well. We will not replace it if it is stolen. You will be issued two new shipsuits every six months, and other items will be issued on a separate schedule.

"Other than that, all I can say is 'Good Luck. And may your Gods be with you. You are mankind's hope if we are unable to overcome the population problem here on Earth.

"Now," he said in a brisker tone, "You will have noticed that seats in the auditorium are divided into groups of 200. When a guard instructs you, you will rise and follow the Flight Attendants to your dormitory. Each section has been assigned to the same dormitory."