Gabatrix: The Pirates of Palora

Chapter 1: January 22nd, 2351 AD

The curtain of darkness fills our vision. Our eyes are attuned to see light, and yet the only things that we see are the vast array of stars in the expanse of nothingness. Space has served as a conundrum. Even if we could live in it, the distance of the objects near us is so far away that it becomes meaningless. For the humans and the Itreans, to be trapped in this great void is a path to insanity.

Only the sound of my deep voice provides any hint of relief in the expanse of nothingness. There is no doubt to some that space is the ultimate frontier. It is a barrier that has to be overcome. Humanity had it quite easy during the beginning of its lifespan. There were too few people but plenty of land to expand upon. The air was breathable, and land cultivated to meet their demands. Even the harshest of weather could ultimately be overcome.

But the luxury of passing through the seas, moving through the deserts, or finding shelters in the ice-cold tundras serves as false glory for an infant race. The great black sea lies above them, almost mocking their achievements. While the stars serve as waypoints and guideposts, the true challenge remains. They lie trapped to live the fate of their home planet. Whatever happens to it can affect all of them.

Of course, you already know this, and I'm not here to placate the mundane. Instead, we alter our point of view and turn our gaze into an almost 100-degree arc. Our focus remains in the great void of the cosmos. But, in the distance, a pair of binary stars are much closer than they appear. Both of them seem to be infantile in their current states. They are recent stars, perhaps just past their protostar phase of about 1 to 2 million years old.

There is a faint haze of orange and yellow all around us. Since we sit at the northernmost edge, there is something else that fills our view. The countless scores of rocks, most being planetesimals, are debris that is slowly gathering to form into larger bodies. The hints of forming protoplanets can be seen as the solar system is ever so slowly developing.

We are essentially at the edge of a giant asteroid field. While taking up most of the material, the two stars have left a sizeable portion behind for at least five planets to eventually form in the millions of years to come. Since time moves at its current rate, it is almost a still shot for us. We only watch as the hundreds of rocks slowly float and move past us as new ones continue to fill our view.

Humanity would later identify the pair of young binary stars in 2110 as Clarisa and Zwicky, located over 5,000 light years from Earth. For the Itreans, we call this developing solar system "Wee'No *click* Breio Ho Hinta," or "The Pale Forest of Hinta," in the English language. It was only discovered 57,000 Earth years ago by Yutilian clan adventurists looking for new places to mine and exploit. While there was little to be found, a small observation outpost would be placed on the furthest protoplanet from the system, a common trait for all the clans as a symbol of claim. The outpost would be abandoned 5,000 years later and untouched for over 10,000 years. Young proto-systems, such as these, were not particularly valued due to the minimal high-value mineral content, but they would become one of the hundreds of cataloged early developing systems in Itrean astrology.

Despite the solar system being mostly untouched by Itrean hands, the Pale Forest of Hinta would see a slow revival during the rise of the Jalgren Empire. During the early days of Jalgren's blockade fleets, most ship crews would work tedious lives of extreme boredom. This was mostly because the fleets were responsible for slowly breaking the resistance of Itrean planets that failed to surrender. While Itrean biology was quite resilient against physical harm and diseases, there was still the aspect of mental health. We called it "Victii's Quv'eep" or "Enclosed Space Madness," where continuous claustrophobic elements could drive crew members to insanity. Jalgren the Great was well aware of this potential mental health crisis and did his best to help create crew rotations to relieve this, but even then, only so much was done about it. The need to maintain the blockade fleets was a higher priority.