Stars Of Memory

Chapter 15

Jīvitaya has finished the book she was reading and is now bored out of her mind, having nothing to do but sit in bed. Carefully, trying not to cause another flare-up, she crawls over to the window to look out at the stars. She expects them to be cartwheeling past as the ship moves towards its destination. However, she is surprised to see that the stars barely even seem to be moving, as the space between them and the ship is so vast that their movements don't even make a difference. She contents herself for a while to stare out at the nebulas, galaxies, and stars that appear so vivid without the atmosphere and light pollution from Earth blocking them from view. She squints at an empty spot among the multitude of stars.

Jīvitaya yells out a question. "Hey, Kys?"

He calls back at her. "Give me a second!" Indeed, a few heartbeats later, he runs into the room. "What is it?"

She laughs at the bit of concern in his face. "I'm okay, I just wanted to ask you what this is."

She points at the spot, and he approaches to look through the window behind her.

"That's the Aío Void."

"Void?"

"It's a pocket of space that is several millions of light-years wide, and within it there are either a few or no galaxies present."

Her eyes widen. "But that's . . ."

"Impossible? No, it's just very rare."

"Do you know of any others?"

"There is the Tetoobian Void, but I believe you know it as the Boötes Void on Earth. I believe it's one of the largest Voids that are known of, if not the largest, spanning 250 million light-years out of our universe's 93 billion light-years of space."

She frowns, doing calculations in her head. "That is a lot of space."

"It's point twenty-seven percent of the universe, to be exact."

Her mouth drops open before she closes it again. She tries to speak, but her mouth just gapes open like a fish, no words emerging from it. Kysanden laughs at her expression.

"I know, it's hard to believe that there is something that vast in existence, but it's real, it's out there."

She cranes her head over her shoulder to look at him. "Kys, are you doing anything right now?"

"No, why?"

She speaks quietly, "Well, you've ordered me to stay in bed, and I don't have anything else to do, so I want to know if you'll stay to answer questions, because I've never seen this area of space before." She glances at him to see him smirking. "Kys, why are you smirking at me?"

"You were babbling."

Her voice raises in indignation. "No I wasn't!"

His reply is firm. "Yes, you were." Her cheeks redden slightly. "Don't be embarrassed, it was cute. I can stay and answer your questions."

Jīvitaya smiles sheepishly and ducks her head, looking out at the unfamiliar stars. Something clicks in her head, and she raises it to look at him.

"Kys, where exactly are we?"

He points out the window at a tiny galaxy just barely in view. it tickles at the edge of her memory, like she should know what it is. "Do you know what that one is?"

She frowns. "No, but it seems familiar."

Kysanden laughs. "It should be familiar. That galaxy is the Saliente Galaxy. You would know it as the Milky Way."