stardust in our veins

CHAPTER 1, Gliese-D

Kari dreamt about them again. The bright blue eyes staring back at her.
She'd seen plenty of spectre with eyes like that. But why in her dreams? Over and over, ever since she'd been a child.
She had no memories of her mother and only faint memories of her father.
She remembered him lifting her up on her shoulders, high in the air, and of him singing her to sleep at night, his voice rough and low. Later, she was told he had been executed as a spy for The Resistance she now fought with.

For all she knew, she never even had a mother. Which of course wasn't possible, yet the idea sometimes ran through her mind like a fantasy. That she would never had to deal with the pain of facing the fact that, whoever it was, hadn't cared enough about her to even be with her as a small child.

She lay there for a moment in the dark and silence, a luxury for her in her world, crowded by voices and bodies. But it was short lived. The morning alarm rang and the room was soon filled with the creaking of cots, the groaning of tired beings, and the shuffling of feet.

Kari swung her feet over the side of her cot, and slipped her feet into her boots. She grabbed her jacket and made her way through the maze of humans, spectre, and cots.

The days on the planet of Gliese-D were supposedly 4 hours longer than the days on the human's original planet, Earth. Kari sighed. She felt it too. Even though it had been centuries since the humans first left their dying Earth and came the Kepler 186F (Kepler for short), many humans still complained of the long days and short nights on their new planets.

The spectre's home planet had been Kepler when the humans first arrived in their corner of the solar system. But humans, being dominant and power hungry, forced the spectre off Kepler and onto the cold and desolate planets of Gliese-D and Gliese-G during the spectre-wars. Then they had gone a step further and declared only the important and elite humans would be allowed to live on Kepler. Apparently they had "learned" from their mistakes on Earth and had realized how precious resources were. So now the majority of the population of humans lived on Gliese-D and Gliese-G, as well as the whole race of spectre.

On her way out of the barracks, Kari bumped into a spectre with shining violet eyes. Even after living her whole 22 years with them, she was still amazed by the spectre's appearance. Their electric colored eyes, their tinted skin, their pointed ears and the adornments and tattoos they wore on their bodies. Yet they were so humanlike in appearance and manner as well. Both humans and spectre knew the two main languages, English and Spectran, so there was no problem with communication.

"Sorry" she muttered to the spectre.

"S'okay" responded the spectre.

Kari made her way down the hall and into the dining hall. Just as she was finishing her breakfast of groutmeal (a staple grain that grew on Kepler), the sirens went off.

She jumped to her feet and grabbed her revolver off her belt. Then the announcements started over the base's intercom.

"All generals please report to the command room. All pilots report to your ships and prepare for takeoff. All other personal, report to the hangar for further instruction."

Kari ran down the already crowded hall with the rest of the people and spectre headed towards the hangar. When she finally got there, she ran to her little ship. The Comet.

She'd named it that because it was a 2nd generation ship. Comets were grandchildren of a spectre and human, therefore being 2nd generation. Star-children were the sons or daughters of a spectre and a human. They were occasionally more spectre-like in appearance, but usually just looked like humans. Except for their eyes. It was said that when a star-child used their powers, their eyes glowed electric like a spectre's. Pure spectre had the power to control nature and read minds, if trained correctly. Star children had the power to read and control minds. But most weren't trained correctly or at all, so their abilities were sporadic at best.