Hello, all. It's finals week of my college summer courses, so I'm up late finishing any work I have left. I had a descriptive essay due for English Comp, and one of the choices was "describe a crowded or hectic place." Because I picked Forine, I though I'd post it here just for giggles.
Now, don't expect a masterpiece.
I'm decent at composition, but this was written in a hurry. I'm sure I could have made better choices in wording if I were really trying to write a professional piece of fiction. Probably I missed some typos too, but I think I got most of them. As to the content, most of it was stolen from, er.. I mean based off of, the Traveller wiki descriptions, with a little bit of Soylent Green and the text version of Johnny Mnemonic thrown in for color. I made up the sweeper-bot, I think. Maybe I remebered it from something too. I meant to describe the heavy air traffic more, and elaborate on the conditions inside the dome, but I was running out of time. Besides, it only needed to be 700 words. Since it was already over 800, I just called it good. Anyway, hope you enjoy.
Begin transmission.
I'm stuck playing errand boy again. This time, it's a parts-fetching run to Dome 837-42n-23w - clear on the other side of this nearly airless, god forsaken, dome encrusted hell-hole known as Forine. Thankfully, it won't take long to reach my destination -- the planet is only about 5000km in diameter -- but I'd rather have stayed on Up-Port with the ship. Those are the breaks when you're the low man on the totem pole.
About now, the captain is likely enjoying a thick grazer steak and a bottle of rare Terran wine with the port administrator, a close friend of his from the Fourth Frontier War. I'll be lucky if I get a package of the reprocessed stuff what passes for food on this rock. The thought makes my stomach quiver a little. I'd rather do without until I get back to the ship.
The shipyard facilities of Forine Up-Port are decent enough, probably class A by the standards of the Imperium, but the vast amount of traffic it receives causes lengthy delays for visitors; lengthy enough that the official rating is Class D. We'd be stuck here for weeks if not for this little run, so I guess I should be grateful. The captain struck a deal with the administrator to pick up a cargo container full of spares -- one which got "lost" in shipment -- in return for squeezing us in ahead of 300 other customers. That, and a couple of cases of the exotic foods we brought in from the ag-world of Tarsus. So, off I go.
From orbit, the surface of Forine seems to be one endless structure; a sea of lights as far as the horizon. As I pilot the cargo hauler around to the daylight side and move lower, its true nature becomes clearer. Below me, an endless sea of domes honeycombs every square kilometer of space and houses nearly one-and-a-half billion sophonts. Here and there are clusters of shiny new structures containing the luxury estates and garden domes of the worlds few wealthy inhabitants. Most of the domes are poorly aging relics built by Firmaments Unlimited a couple of hundred years ago, before the practically embezzled Imperial funds were cut off. Dome 837-42n-23w is such a relic.
After waiting nearly 3 hours in a line of air traffic at the dome's lock, I'm finally inside and gliding northwest toward the warehouse I need. Looking up into a slight haze, I see the smoke-darkened areas on the transparent dome structure caused by the illegal cooking and heating fires of the squatters who reside in the domes rafters. Getting closer to ground level, I notice the masses of pedestrians shoving their way along the "streets." Near them, a glitching sweeper-bot is attempting to pick up litter, but it is in such disrepair that it drops nearly half of what it sweeps.
I park the hauler on the second story landing of the warehouse I need and step out onto the balcony. The air is stale and somewhat acrid. On a building across from me, someone has scrawled a crude joke about the rumored nature of the local reprocessed food-stuffs poorer Forinian inhabitants receive as a government welfare service. Forine Green is made from sophonts! God, I hate this place.
End transmission.
Now, don't expect a masterpiece.
I'm decent at composition, but this was written in a hurry. I'm sure I could have made better choices in wording if I were really trying to write a professional piece of fiction. Probably I missed some typos too, but I think I got most of them. As to the content, most of it was stolen from, er.. I mean based off of, the Traveller wiki descriptions, with a little bit of Soylent Green and the text version of Johnny Mnemonic thrown in for color. I made up the sweeper-bot, I think. Maybe I remebered it from something too. I meant to describe the heavy air traffic more, and elaborate on the conditions inside the dome, but I was running out of time. Besides, it only needed to be 700 words. Since it was already over 800, I just called it good. Anyway, hope you enjoy. Begin transmission.
I'm stuck playing errand boy again. This time, it's a parts-fetching run to Dome 837-42n-23w - clear on the other side of this nearly airless, god forsaken, dome encrusted hell-hole known as Forine. Thankfully, it won't take long to reach my destination -- the planet is only about 5000km in diameter -- but I'd rather have stayed on Up-Port with the ship. Those are the breaks when you're the low man on the totem pole.
About now, the captain is likely enjoying a thick grazer steak and a bottle of rare Terran wine with the port administrator, a close friend of his from the Fourth Frontier War. I'll be lucky if I get a package of the reprocessed stuff what passes for food on this rock. The thought makes my stomach quiver a little. I'd rather do without until I get back to the ship.
The shipyard facilities of Forine Up-Port are decent enough, probably class A by the standards of the Imperium, but the vast amount of traffic it receives causes lengthy delays for visitors; lengthy enough that the official rating is Class D. We'd be stuck here for weeks if not for this little run, so I guess I should be grateful. The captain struck a deal with the administrator to pick up a cargo container full of spares -- one which got "lost" in shipment -- in return for squeezing us in ahead of 300 other customers. That, and a couple of cases of the exotic foods we brought in from the ag-world of Tarsus. So, off I go.
From orbit, the surface of Forine seems to be one endless structure; a sea of lights as far as the horizon. As I pilot the cargo hauler around to the daylight side and move lower, its true nature becomes clearer. Below me, an endless sea of domes honeycombs every square kilometer of space and houses nearly one-and-a-half billion sophonts. Here and there are clusters of shiny new structures containing the luxury estates and garden domes of the worlds few wealthy inhabitants. Most of the domes are poorly aging relics built by Firmaments Unlimited a couple of hundred years ago, before the practically embezzled Imperial funds were cut off. Dome 837-42n-23w is such a relic.
After waiting nearly 3 hours in a line of air traffic at the dome's lock, I'm finally inside and gliding northwest toward the warehouse I need. Looking up into a slight haze, I see the smoke-darkened areas on the transparent dome structure caused by the illegal cooking and heating fires of the squatters who reside in the domes rafters. Getting closer to ground level, I notice the masses of pedestrians shoving their way along the "streets." Near them, a glitching sweeper-bot is attempting to pick up litter, but it is in such disrepair that it drops nearly half of what it sweeps.
I park the hauler on the second story landing of the warehouse I need and step out onto the balcony. The air is stale and somewhat acrid. On a building across from me, someone has scrawled a crude joke about the rumored nature of the local reprocessed food-stuffs poorer Forinian inhabitants receive as a government welfare service. Forine Green is made from sophonts! God, I hate this place.
End transmission.
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