Courne Supremacy

In thirty minutes the sun’s last photons would arrive at the planet. After that perpetual twilight would overtake the world. The lingering heat would dissipate over the next few days and after that The End. Taro stopped long enough to catch the streaks of fire rising into the last clear blue sky this planet would [...]

I remember being eight years old and rummaging through the steering room of our yacht. I came across some old registration papers for a man named Benjamin Ohne. I know for a fact that we have no relation to him, and when I showed my mom, she took the papers out of my hands, and I never saw them again. There’s a conspiracy between parents and grandparents to hide this truth from us, not just me, but all of us younger than twenty. I keep asking the same question though: Why did we give up the land for the ocean? I used the Fleet’s network and did a search but all I could find was current news and old historical documents. Nothing about the last 20-30 years. There’s a gap no one wants to fill, and it’s time I took matters into my own hands.

I’m over half a century old but I’d like to think that I’m still young at heart. Henry Glover’s my name. Back in my youth I used to work for corporations like Celestine Mining and Winthrope Unlimited doing a lot of asteroid drilling. I was doing eighteen hour days. I’d get home real late and Emily, my darling wife, would have dinner. It’s eat, shower, sleep, repeat. I had enough of that life. A man’s spirit shouldn’t ever be broke. “Live free or die,” that’s what my great-granddaddy used to say during the Revolution.

I met Ashley in fifth grade. Her family moved here from America. Her father had a new job overseeing the giant terraforming project here on Olympus Mons after repairing the environmental disaster on Earth. The other kids teased her for being small, for being from Earth, and for being the new kid. They threw stones at her and called her names like “Tory.” My folks and I came from Luna, so I had gone through being called a “Tory” myself even though we had nothing to do with the Terrans or Martians. Even three hundred years after the war, Martians can still be huge douchebags about winning. The kids tossed rocks at her; I stood in front of them and let each one hit me until they stopped.

They ran. I chucked a rock and smacked one of them right in the small of his back. My dad arrived just in time to catch me in mid-swing. He ran through the kids fleeing from my pitching arm. He chewed me out. Finger waggling. A grounding on the spot. The old man could be a hardass. When I stepped away he saw Ashley standing behind me. This scared little girl cowering behind me for protection. He clamped his hand down on my shoulder. “Nevermind what I said.”

[I'll end each story with some of my thoughts just so you can get an idea of where it came from. I've edited the story somewhat so hopefully most of it is spelled correctly and grammatically correct. ]
Admiral Amanda Rhodes held onto a railing on the bridge of the MCS Yorktown. Behind her [...]