I wasn't really a people person. I have always preferred the solitude and quiet of the wilderness, it seems as if all my life, I've been trying to escape the turmoil of the sprawling Imperial megalopolis of Tarnova in which I was born and I grew up.
My life as an aristocrat of the Tarnovan Empire, the central governing body of the territories encompassing the vast majority of space settled by humans, allows me enough money to escape into the wilderness of alien planets whenever I feel like it.
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On the 18th day of the Sixth Month, year 3151, I arrived on a barren desert moon called Ortom orbiting a massive blue gas giant called Dayar circling around a white dwarf star called Numeia. Old ascendant race language names.
There was nothing but sand and a massive southern ocean in it. Experts speculate that the ascendants strip-mined the crust clean of any useful resources. The planet is covered in a waste byproduct of mining. At least they were considerate enough to leave a breathable atmosphere and an entire ocean of water for the future settlers. Thanks, I guess.
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The town, called Mayfair, sat right next to the spaceport was unlike anything that I have seen, perhaps with the exception of a carnival right on the pier extending out into the sea, a circus surrounded by colourful tents, every building from the stores to the medium rise housings was made from wood from a local cactus analogue growing in the vast, planetwide desert.
If not for the presence of bright neon lights and annoying holographic people advertising stuff and dancing, you'd think you have been transported to the days of the Star peoples, but this is the present day no doubt. The distant past and the sickening presence, walking hand in hand.
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I set up camp a few kilometres south of the town, the bright, colourful lights and holographic advertisements danced around like distant electronic ghosts in the dark as Numeia sets into the Ocean.
A kilometer to the south-west, a collection of wooden shanties with stilts extending into the water, a Slum built to segregate the poor and the social outcasts from the affluent and middle class citizens of Mayfair. It was called Bittersea.
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My inflatable tent was spacious, warm and comfortable, shielded from the cold winds of an Ortom night. I took a night stroll along the beach with an electro-torch, wanting a better spot to admire the town and lie in the sand and gaze at the amazing starry night sky above.
I suddenly stepped on something hard, I turned my electro-torch and saw that the beach was littered with small black squares, I bent over to pick one up and upon closer inspection, it was some sort of an electronic device with a green and red light, a switch and a wire protruding from what I will guess, the battery pack.
Some sort of a primitive communications device. I put it in my pockets and went back to the tent. Some other time then.
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Next morning, I immediately came out of the tent and saw a few children picking up the black devices along the coast, putting them in metal buckets, I came close and asked one of them, a scrawny child probably around 7 or 8 years old, and most probably lived in Bittersea, what the electronic devices was. The kid looked at me as if wanting to ask something in return but was hesitating. I pulled a candy bar from my pocket (a luxury for a planet where only edible fungus grows) and gave it to him. His face lit up and thanked me.
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He said that those were tracking beacons used to guide smuggling boats crossing the Great grey ocean carrying contrabands. I didn't ask what sort of contrabands those were but I am almost certain that those were narcotics and illicit firearms for the bandits, even resistance groups fighting the Empire.
Feeling worried for my safety, I asked the Kid how often do smugglers unload their cargo here, he said Once every three months, and their last smuggling run happened just a few weeks ago so it would be some time before they come back. Relieved, I smiled and walked away from the kid.