I would miss my family if I left, and I know phey would miss me. I would also feel guilty about leaving and no longer contributing to pheir welfare.
Our parents, Myarte and Kholarten, are very involved in our lives, in a loving way. Phey both work for a local estate.
My next youngest sibling, Colarmin, makes almost as much as I do, and works as a conservation specialist overseeing mining companies’ operations in regions where there are sensitive and endangered species of plants and animals. Phey also coordinate with law enforcement to help prevent outsiders from poaching certain animal species, which, because of their rarity, are becoming quite popular with illegal collectors on other worlds.
Dholartin, the third youngest sibling, works for the government as an orbital transport controller, helping prevent collisions between shuttles and orbital ships and stations. Although pheir position is at the transportation hub station on the ground in the city closest to our home, phey rarely travels into space.
My youngest sibling, Olartmin, works with our parents on a nearby estate, helping run the household and operations there.
None of us make extraordinary salaries. However, we can live reasonably comfortably because we all contribute to the household finances. It also gives us a stronger emotional bond.
Perhaps one of the double-edges of coming from a lower-status family is having little other than love and affection to bind you to each other, so you place a higher premium on it than others might who were born with more privilege and wealth.
When you do, however, that love is fiercely strong and difficult to imagine living without.
* * * *
I work as an engineer crew supervisor in the space station’s mining berth sector. This means that, among other operations, we dock, load, and unload mining vessels, cargo vessels, and deal with related logistics. Sometimes, this entails loading or transferring mining ore, or equipment, or other cargo. It is not unusual for mining vessels to ferry cargo to the station, so they are not traveling empty, and then they pick up a load of ore. We also handle moving vessels to and from dry dock berths when they need repairs or overhauls.
In the official course of my duties, I deal with a wide variety of crews of different species. Most of our vessel traffic is owned by Maxim Colonies, or are ships contracted with them.
Today, I am returning to the space station to settle in ahead of my next shift starting in two days. I like to return early so I can readjust to the different gravity and the different sleep pattern I will no doubt encounter by being back in orbit, attenuate myself to the space station’s time, and resume my usual personal routine ahead of returning to duty.
I do not socialize much while on the space station. It is not that my coworkers are overly objectionable to spend time with, but I see them all day. I amwithpeople all day. I cannot spend time in nature while on the space station, so I use my off-duty time to find my necessary solitude in other ways.
Usually behind my apartment’s closed door.
Most of my crew of twenty-five workers are fellow Pfahrn, but I also supervise two Shalfin, two Onyx, three humans, and a Carmidian. None of the non-Pfahrn are objectionable to work with, usually. Although one Shalfin in particular is proving himself to be a detriment to my team, even though he has only been in my department for a little over six months.
Once we have reached the space station, I shoulder my large carryall and debark with the other passengers, most of whom are also station personnel, or family of personnel. None of the personnel traveling on this shuttle work with me or my crew, and I barely know any of them, even in passing. The space station employs over ten thousand full-time personnel. At any given time, there are usually an average of twenty thousand or more souls on board, depending on how many ships are berthed, or how many personnel dependents are aboard.
Considering my duties, it is not surprising I know few outside my department.
When I return to my quarters, I pause in the doorway, as I always do, and survey the apartment.
It is sufficient. Those of us from Pfahrn are housed in a section where the rooms and fixtures are designed to take our greater height and size into account. In most places on the station, the ceilings are adequately high regardless, although we Pfahrn still find ourselves ducking through doorways so frequently that we usually stoop automatically, even when unnecessary, to protect our foreheads.
But it is notahome. It is notmyhome. Not to me. Perhaps there are some who thrive here.
I know I am not one of them.
Yet staying on Pfahrn for the rest of my life will mean settling for scraps.
I desire more for myself but cannot yet will myself away from everything and everyone I’ve ever known. Loneliness defines so much of my life. Leaving Pfahrn will only compound that.
Once I finish putting away my belongings, including several tubs of food sent back with me by my family, I sit down at my small table to eat.
Growing up while in school, other children of lower status such as myself would talk of dreams of making a fortune and finding pheir way off Pfahrn. Our planet had not long before entered the coalition and opened up a vast landscape of options our ancestors could have only dreamed of.
I never allowed myself to indulge in fantasies such as those. I did not wish to face the inevitable disappointment later of realizing such things were impossible for phose like us.
I hold no resentment over my lot in life—I am loved. That is itself a blessing I would not ever wish to lose or take for granted. Still, it does not alleviate my desire to have a family of my own. Siblings are wonderful but phey cannot help ease lonely nights.
My preference is not to raise a child alone, either. If one cannot be wealthy and high-born, at least phey can be loved. I wish for my child to have two parents, not simply a reproduction contract between myself and another.
Besides, it is difficult enough to make ends meet when one is not wealthy. Adding a child is an extra financial burden it takes two parents to shoulder. I know I could enter a contract to produce a child and my family would help support me and my child, but that is also another burden I do not wish upon phem.
* * * *
