Fidgel
Chapter 1
The Ship
Fidgel pushed her hair behind her ears, and looked at her report. She wrote the last sentence, and looked it over. It would probably do well, she hoped. All that mattered was that it captured what she learned and would be interesting to read. She didn’t really mind what she got, as long as it was good, and it would be, they always were. She sent the paper in and heard a groan from behind her.
She smiled, Glara was stuck again.
“Fidgel, this is impossible, how do you do it?” Glara said in an annoyed voice. Fidgel leaned her HuvCha over to Glara’s desk, it glided about six inches off the ground. Fidgel looked over Glara’s report,
“What are you stuck on?” She asked.
“Why did they have marriage? What was the point? And kids, they could have as many as they felt like? If the parents died they just gave the kid to an, an orphanage and they grew up there all the way to adulthood?” Fidgel winced and Glara grimaced, “Sorry,”
“No big deal,” Fidgel paused, it wasn’t really a big deal, she was safe now everything was good and -
“So?” Glara interrupted Fidgel’s thoughts, she did that often, because Fidgel was often in thoughts. Fidgel smiled at Glara’s waiting face. Glara rarely paid attention to the teacher about the apocalypse, but she always listened to Fidgel,
“Marriage was a commitment to another because they loved each other and would take care of each other, they could have as many kids as they wanted because people thought the government shouldn’t control a persons life that much and orphanages were just how they worked they didn’t want to, well, who knows what happens to kids in Anaruko,” Fidgel trailed off but Glara caught her before she got too lost.
“So how did people get married? What happened?” She asked. People didn’t get married anymore, they lived together and it was referred to as homeostasis, romantic right? They would raise children and be together, but if they got sick of each other, they would just remain friends and have new partners, it caused for less disagreements and war. There was very little war in the world. It was all very peaceful.
“Well one of them would get a chunk of chunk of crystallized carbon on a gold circle to put on their finger,”
“What? What’s the point of that?” Glara asked confused.
“It was just a selling scheme for a crystallized carbon company,” Fidgel said, it was funny really.
“So?” Glara prompted.
“Well, then they would plan a very expensive ceremony called a wedding, where the two people would pledge themselves to each other, and the girls would wear giant expensive dresses and the guys would wear something called a suit which,” She paused, “Computer, picture of suit, on screen,” sure enough, a picture of a suit appeared on the large screen. Fidgel looked down at her clothes, it was a pair of loose black pants, and a plain black t-shirt. That was what kids were supposed to wear at their age. Glara’s father, who looked after the two of them, never enforced this rule, so Glara usually wore a more colorful shirt. Today she was sporting lime-green as her color of choice.
“So then they would stay with each other for the rest of their lives? That’s a long time!” Glara said.
“Yeah, it is a long time, but not many people stayed with each other that long,”
“But, they just promised they would,” Glara said confused.
“Well, sometimes they don’t and they would get something called a divorce, where they would separate and not be married anymore, they would give each other back everything and go away and usually they wouldn’t talk,” Fidgel said. It made no sense, if you were to make a pledge, why would you break it? What was the point of making a breakable pledge?
“So then? What was an-” she paused to sound out a word, “anniversary, did I say that right?”
Fidgel bit her lip to surpress a smile,
“An anniversary is when a couple celebrates a time when they have spent a certain amount of time together, so every year they would celebrate the day of their wedding, okay?” Glara nodded and looked back down at her screen,
“And what was up with marriage rights?”
“Well, people didn’t think it was natural to have people of different cultures, skin tones and religions to marry each other,” Fidgel remembered an article she had read about that, it had stated that right around when the apocalypse was starting, everyone was just starting to have equal rights. At least everyone is equal now.
“What was the point in that? And why couldn’t same-sex people marry?”
“Well,” Fidgel started, “There was no point in people not marrying, it was just some people were ignorant. Also, since there was no same-sex implantations like there are now, they thought it was unnatural or something,” Fidgel paused and considered this for a second, “Anything else you want to know?”
Glara bit her lip, thinking,
“That should be about it,” She said, “Thanks,” She leaned back to her desk and started clicking away at the keyboard. Fidgel leaned back to her station and clicked an icon to see where their ship was flying over, more specifically where it would be the next day. To her surprise, and pleasure, the ship would be passing over an area unexplored.
Thought to be dirty and unsafe, there were still areas that were unexplored territories on Earth. Both Fidgel and Glara loved to explore for different reasons. Glara loved the time out of the classroom. Fidgel loved the history of the sights and looking at old Earth relics. Fidgel also loved spending time with Glara without people telling them what to do.
They would go out tomorrow. Glara’s father was fine with them skipping a few classes. She would pack them a snack and they could explore.
Since she had that plan ironed away, she opened the article she had been reading, “Anatomy of a TravelShip; By Glenari Henti” It was an article Glara’s mother had written. Glara’s mother worked writing articles for the interweb. It was a very interesting article about TravelShips and how they were operated.
Soon she was absorbed by hyperdrive, battery cells, and controllers.
