Aread

Aread stepped in front of the system archway layered at the sides with wires like snakes crawling around each other. Okay, he thought. No panic. It’s just a simulation. That means it’s not real.

He heaved a sigh, the kind of sigh that didn’t matter if you were part of a plan or not.

You’re a big boy now. You do big boy things. This, right here, allows you to be bigger. Big boy is not enough. Bigger boy is.

Aread checked his neck, his arms, his legs.

Stiff. Yeah, you ain’t been exercising in quite awhile. Need to get in shape before you go to see her.

Aw, shit. Whatever. Time to do this.

Aread rattled his fingers along the screen by the archway. Blue buttons popped up before being dashed away.

“Alright, so let’s go through this,” he said out loud to Trinket, the Supercomputer Artificial Intelligence (SAI) that resided in the systems of his personal ship, Mifter. Aread had bought Mifter from a ship store on another planet almost two years, serving as a corvette and a current home also had tracking missiles that could be enabled at will and lightspeed travel, which in the current year all ships had at least some form of.

With improved technology on board, Aread was able to fix himself up a new artificial intelligence that could hopefully tell jokes and tell time, but most importantly, to be everywhere. Trinket wasn’t sufficiently in the bathroom, but that was the owner’s decision, not the computer’s. Trinket would also become Aread’s one and only companion as he roamed the galaxy for sweet gems and crystals only to return home with buckets and buckets of credits. Hopefully.

“Sure,” Trinket said with a male robotic speaking voice. It felt like a neat thing for Aread to settle with, not having to conform to galactical political ideas about whether robots had genders or not or if they were just fluids. He was a ‘never call robots by ‘it’ unless absolutely necessary’ guy. “Do you want to keep the default settings on? Like lights, the way you would move, so on?” Trinket asked.

“Yeah. Maybe mix it up a little. Just a smidge, so I don’t notice that it is, you know, a‒”

“‒Simulation,” Trinket finished the sentence.

“Why, yes, of course,” Aread said. “And don’t interrupt me again.”

Aread said, moving over to the side of the blackened room. He let out another sigh.

Relax, you big idiot, he thought. Wait, you’re not a big boy anymore. You’re an idiot. Well, idiots have their capabilities too. They’re just more well-known for their incapabilities.

“Turn it up,” Aread ordered and breathed in deep.

“Yes, sir.” Trinket did as told.

The lights in the blackened room first brightened softly like an emerging sunset on the horizontal line. Lights flickered past him, growing out from the ground as if they were sprouts and crashing into one another as they flew. In a second, a sharp gaze of light shot out from one corner and scanned the entirety of the room as if it was parsing gene cells. What was once a regular-sized room in the confines of a space corvette transformed right before him into a glowing, big city with sprawling citizens and a scarlet-coloured sky.

Aread tried to smell the city atmosphere, but his mind stopped him. It had something to do with a simulation of sorts that his mind wouldn’t allow him to go there.

Still, he thought, this whole simulation just never gets old.

Aread walked forward, placing his feet over the other as he reached a shop selling old radio technology. He passed that by before reaching into the city square. Beside one of the passing travellers was a bright neon-sign that had been written in bold: ‘WELCOME TO CALDERAC CITY SQUARE: HOME OF THE SCARLET PLANET!’

Welcome home, me. It feels good to be back.

The swaying branches and the thickets of bushes could barely be heard with the amount of people rushing forwards and backs, some carrying white suitcases made of metal from another planet, others riding in their little vehicles and such. Business on Calderac never stopped for a second. It was always fast, always changing, and for some reason, it just reminded Aread of what he wanted to be when he grew up: just like them. A businessman himself, selling whatever it was they carried in flat white suitcases and talking to people that were either important or very important. However, circumstances change and Aread knew full well why.

The whizzing of large overhead space corvettes didn’t stop either, and as the ships came and flew like portable glittering stars, Aread could tell that the music playing on his ship’s sound system was repeating itself.

Okay, that’s not supposed to happen, but it doesn’t take me out of the simulation. Yet.

Aread had his sharp sapphire jacket, his short black cap to hide away his unkempt black hair, his rocket-powered boots and a walking style that was a dash of debonair and gallant. In truth, he couldn’t be further away from being stylish or handsome, but courageous? Perhaps that’s for his clients to decide. It’s still a simulation. Aread could be anything he wanted. He could be at home. He could be rich. He could finally live the life he had been chasing for so long.

“Oh, sir, here are the roses,” Trinket said, forgetting what his owner had mentioned previously, and a boutique of red roses shimmered into place on Aread’s right hand.

So pretty.

“That’s good,” Aread whispered. He wanted to keep this as real as he possibly could. Any misstep could mean bad things, and Aread had had enough with being associated with bad things. And so, he made the flowers real. He just didn’t have them right here in the simulation. No point in getting it ruined. “Ring in pocket,” he said to Trinket.

“Ring in pocket,” Trinket acknowledged.

A faint blue cold essence swarmed into Aread’s pockets, and now something was there, slightly heavier than he expected. That was a good thing. No bad things. No bad thoughts, he thought.

He approached a lively Calderac market where men and women, many of them elderly, strided in with their whitecaps and white suits, some off to finish deals, others to go home and enjoy a cup of hot milk. In a simulation, things had to be real. Not just for the ‘effects’ and for the ‘style’, but they had to make sense. He wasn’t going to treat this lightly because he was sure that there was no way he couldn’t.

“She’s on your left,” Trinket whispered suddenly.

Aread turned a sharp left and there she was, in her eternal beauty and presence, all alone.

“Galaxy-ridden, Trinket!” Aread whisper-shouted, turning back and away, his face barely hiding the streak of red forming on his face. “Don’t tell me where she is, do you understand?! I’m meant to figure this out on my own. This is a simulation, remember?”

“Yes, I do sir. But on our last recalculation, you said‒”

“‒Oh, you’re pinning this on me now?!”

“No, sir, I was just merely pointing out‒”

“‒Shh, Trinket. I need to do what I need to do.”

Aread narrowed his lips, then his eyes, and watched the young woman from afar intently. He paced forward, then back. His hands shivered in his pockets, fumbling about with the cold hard box in his pockets.

Shit. Shit. Shit.

“Galaxy-ridden, Trinket! Now I can’t do it!” Aread yelled out. Excuses, he thought to himself, but what a good excuse that is! Blaming it on the AI? That must’ve been a first!

“I’m so sorry, sir. Would you like a reset of the system?” Trinket asked. His tone was as melodramatic as a line that could neither go up nor down in a single wave. Aread had made Trinket on the fact that he could probably be in a space war and it would still sound as normal as he could.

Aread inhaled deeply. No excuses.

“No,” he said, “but just stop talking.” Aread placed one foot in front of the other again, and the other, and made his way forward with his heart beating faster than a family’s in a ship that was sinking until the point of no return.

“Right, sir,” Trinket beeped suddenly.

Aread stopped in his tracks. He had almost reached the girl. “Now, what did I just galaxy-ridden say?”

There was silence. Aread lifted one foot.

“Sorry, sir,” Trinket said.

Galaxy-ridden…!

“How about this, Trink. I’ll let you know when I need you. You don’t have to say okay, you don’t have to say right. Nothing. I’ll just let you know, alright?” Aread said.

Silence again. Right, dumbass.

“You can just say right once you acknowledge the message.”

“Right,” Trinket said.

Aread nodded, then his eyes looked forward.

Cold feet. Sharp eyes. Mouth with bated breath. You can do this, you stupid seeker. You’ve got everything you need.

You’ve travelled the galaxy, you’ve got the credits, and now you’re back to live the life you wanted. You both wanted. There is no other time for this very moment. C’mon, make it work.

Aread strolled forward, and then, in a few short steps, he was there. But most importantly, she was there. And when she looked up at him and he didn’t look away, there was a moment of disbelief, a moment of galaxy-ridden and whatnot, and Aread was sure that he hadn’t placed the wrong shoe on the wrong foot, and‒

Shit, Aread thought. Their eyes met, and like the stuff of fairytales, he couldn’t stop staring.

Rosie Millorand. She still looked as pretty as ever with her sportive look that she wore so well. How her bright blue eyes burned with hopes and dreams, how her long chocolate-dipped hair brushed back to reveal the grace and the curves of her ear and the forms of her face. She had those smiles that could keep him watching for hours and hours. She had that laugh that would end up in the back of his mind when he went off on his seeker duties, and when he returned, he figured she was the only one he wanted to share his adventures with.

‘I want to tell you everything!’ Aread’s lips read.

‘You won’t believe just what I’ve just seen!’ His eyes confessed.

‘I finally realized that the future I was searching for never left home’, his heart believed.

Among her stellar features, what really captured Aread’s unyielding attention was her black cashmere dress, coupled with a silver cloak above it all, fitting elegantly with her like nothing he had ever seen before. It didn’t make sense for the seeker as he was absolutely defiant with his thoughts that he had seen her in a dress like that before, probably in a galaxy ball or something like that.

As Aread stood still, a battle of thoughts engaged in his overstuffed mind.

‘She looked like she hadn’t aged…’

‘Well, of course she hadn’t galaxy-ridden aged! This is a simulation. This is, or was, what she looked like when you left Calderac, you idiot! Don’t you remember?!’

‘Oh, you do, don’t you? That’s why you’re seeing the two-year-before Rosie, not the now-Rosie.’

“Hi,” Rosie greeted suddenly, revealing the whites of her teeth. Aread almost fell off his own standing feet, and he would’ve if that was possible.

“Hi,” Aread said, revealing his own set of teeth that seemed to have reeked of burnt peas and other unlikely assorted food. “What brings you here‒ wait, that’s not the right thing to say. Erm,” he said, re-adjusting his posture and his tone as he stood face-to-face with the crush of his life. “Didn’t expect to see you here, Rose,” he said with a bright smile on his face.

Rosie. Rose. Nicknames. Don’t matter. Use them. It’s an advantage.

Rosie returned the smile. “I could’ve said the same, Ace,” she said. “Last I heard about you, you were off on your own. Nobody knew where you went.” She started drifting towards the hectic marketplace like a girl that demanded to be followed.

Aread followed her, of course, now side-by-side as they strolled along the Calderac space that had raised him as a kid. He just didn’t know what caused the feeling. Was it being home? Was it being near Rosie? Either way, it felt undoubtedly good.

“Well, there were just certain things I had to do, you know? And besides, what does it matter? I’m back, aren’t I?” he explained.

Rosie half-turned to look at Aread. “So, you’re not going to tell anybody why you’re back, just like how you’re not going to tell anybody why you left?”

Sick burn. Cornstarch. What? Doesn’t matter, swoon.

Aread was young, he was ambitious. Being a seeker was on every young boy’s mind, and that didn’t exclude his. But being a seeker was also one of the only ways to get a future from a blistering thundercloud, or no one else was going to hand it to you. You either rode the electricity, or bust, and many have bust. Aread was the exception.

“I was going to tell you first, out of everybody,” he said, truthfully.

“And I would assume that it had something to do with me saying something a little explicit to you, didn’t I?” she said.

Aread cocked his head backwards, as if it was the first time he had been surprised in a long time. “What? What explicit thing did you say?”

“I know you don’t remember, and honestly, I’m surprised that I even remembered.”

“You’ve got to jog my memory, Rose.”

Rosie sighed. Even in a short sigh she still looks like a ten.

They stopped at a nearby flower stall. He could feel her face flushed with embarrassment. And then‒

“Oh, right,” Aread said, perhaps believing that his bliss had overwritten the original thought in his head. “Here’s a bunch of flowers I picked up from a planet nearby. I think you’ll like them.”

You forgot?! You idiot!

“For me?” Rosie picked them up and the aroma wafted right to her. “It’s lovely.”

Aread couldn’t stop his cheeks from blushing, and so somehow, the two of them were on the same wavelength without actually ever being there. It felt like the old times all over again, playing out in his head except he was now actually participating in it.

“You were saying about the explicit thing…?”

“Explicit?” Rosie said, remembering the tangent she had left earlier. “Well, it’s a long story, but you’ve got time?”

Aread grinned. “Sure.”

Rosie smacked her lips together before beginning. “It was my birthday, twentieth. A day before that, I had been out celebrating with the girls. With Alissa, Zeeyan, and then I just had a little too much to drink. You know how it is with girls, the celebrations. It’s wild.”

Aread paused to think. He wasn’t sure if he knew about the girls nor the celebrations, nor with them put together, but he nodded sophisticatedly.

She’s going to say something like this, I just know it.

“Continue.”

“Right. Then one day, out of the blue, cause’ mind you, you’d already left. God knows where you went. Chasing tiny balloons? Chasing batterium on some other planet? Maybe some hot girl in the star galaxy had chosen you to be her prince and you tucked tail and ran?”

“Wrong, wrong, wrong, but I do like the idea that I was doing all of those things even though I was clearly not. And a hot girl? C’mon.”

Rosie sniggered.

“Anyway, you messaged me out of the blue, Ace. On my birthday. And you said you were coming back, and you didn’t of course, but back then I thought you did, and I thought ‘What fun it would be if I decided to play a prank on you?”

Aread nodded, putting two and two together. “And you played the prank which I now know.”

“And I thought that you didn’t mind, and I thought it was funny!”

“You asked me a very specific question, Rose,” Aread said, leaning on one of the open ledges of the stall. He thought he looked cool and suave. It couldn’t be further from the truth. “I didn’t know what to reply!”

Rosie couldn’t help but giggle with how their conversation had spiralled, and thinking about that moment.

“I shouldn’t have sent that. I’m so sorry. It was unfair, rude, and I felt like a unicorn.”

Shit, she said it and it still feels so bizarre and weird and… nice.

“Well, you kind of are,” he said.

Rosie looked away for a moment. “Anyway, I think you you remember about the little details and let’s pretend to not talk about it anymore,” she said, her eyes floating around.

Aread watched the girl of his dreams look back at him, and the simulation seemed to stop for a second. Continue or not, he finally realised why he had travelled over the galaxy, risked his life for broken shards and crystals that were found deep and entombed in some underground lair. It was for Rosie.

The fact of the matter was simple. Aread had created a future, and his future would not be complete without Rosie. Truth or not, that was the way. He held in a deep breath, watched her eyes again, and reached deep into his pockets.

Now is the time. I’ve prepared for this. You’ve prepared for this. I’ve prepared for this. Now.

Aread jingled the small box in his pockets. He offered himself all the motivations that he could think of. Go for it! You can do this! Don’t give up! The last one did sound a little wrong.

“Rose,” Aread said. “I’m going to ask you‒”

“Sir,” Trinket interrupted as the whole simulation blackened from a single bolt. Now, only warm white walls occupy the once Calderac exteriors.

What. The. Shit.

“Are you galaxy-ridden kidding me?!” Aread yelled, swinging his fist up in the air. “What is it now?!”

“I’m sorry, sir, but you told me that when a client had called, I was to shut down everything, the simulation, music, movies among others so you could answer in peace. And to shut down the coffee machine too if you were using it. You mentioned the latter quite… vehemently.”

Aread planted a palm up to his face. Of all the times to call…

He walked over to a nearby screen that transmitted the call. .

“Pull it right up, Trink,” Aread said. “And thanks for reminding about the coffee machine.”

The screen wiped clean in an instant, first to black and then blurry images. Staring at Aread blankly with his face gently hidden under a sprawling hat was a large man behind a clean broad desk. Large, as Aread uncomfortably noticed, due to the fact that the camera had been placed too close to the man.

“Mr. Sears,” the man said, leaning back onto his chair with his arms folded. “How nice to see you again.”

“I’ve been waiting. What took you so long?” Aread said.

“I was caught in a predicament. But that is behind me now, and I’m ready to make the deal,” the man said.

“Good. I was just waiting for you to call me. Not that it mattered, just letting you know.”

“Well, time waits for no one.”

“So, perhaps we should discuss about our meeting point?” Aread said.

The man nodded his head. “Before we do,” he said, “I’d like to make sure that you have your part of the deal we intended.”

Aread scoffed. Is he joking?

“I’m a seeker. If I don’t live up to my words, my reputation’s gone,” Aread explained.

“You can always change your name, change your face. The digital identity and imprint is just a game to see who could change the fastest,” the man refuted.

The man did make a good point. In the galaxy, certain planets which didn’t have as robust a system allowed for users to enter, change their imprints and walk out with a wholly new name and backstory to boot. Though, as Aread noted for himself, he wasn’t going to find himself in the dumps to warrant him a trip to a place where they procure last resorts.

“I don’t need to remind you that I’m a reputable seeker, which I know I just did, but if you trust in me to get it done, then there’s nothing to worry. A good seeker never disappoints, but a bad seeker would never have survived the same fate,” Aread said, hoping that his jumbled words would convince the man that he indeed had what the man wanted.

Just show him the case. Show him the crystal. Show it to him, Aread thought. But, on the other hand, No, don’t show it to him. What if he cons us of the credits? We’ll walk away with nothing! The future is at stake here.

What if he’s spying me? What if he already knows my location? What if as soon as he saw the crystal he’d blast me out of space so fast I won’t even get to drink another cup of coffee?

The man nodded inexplicably. It seemed that he just understood what Aread was saying.

“I’ve detected a small piece of land not far away from where we met previously. It’s just him, the owner, his land, his bar and sometimes, passing travellers. Place is Fresnic’s Bar,” the man said.

Aread swiped down below the screen to mute his side of the call. “Trink,” he said, “check Fresnic’s Bar.”

“Already did, sir. Other than parking lots galore, a giant sign and some rough conditions for coffee brewing, the place is rather clean,” Trinket read from the results of his location scan.

“Thanks, Trink.”

Aread unmuted the call.

“We’ll meet at Fresnic’s Bar, then. I’ll see you in two hours. Until then, we won’t call each other or make any surprises,” Aread said.

“Sure, seeker. Goodbye.”

The video call of the man shrunk into the middle of the screen, returning to black, and Aread was with himself again.

“Sir, do you need me to run the simulation again?” Trinket asked.

“Galaxy-ridden, Trink! Now’s not the time for the simulation!” Aread shouted at the screen in front of him.

Though, he would like to go back in there again. Wouldn’t it be great just to see Rosie one more time? Call her Rose? Have her call him Ace? Wouldn’t it be nice?

Excuses. Excuses again.

“Set a destination marker for Fresnic’s Bar,” Aread ordered Trinket, deciding no. He stepped out of the simulation room and headed straight for the cockpit. “And also, make me coffee.”

“Sir, I would like you to know that the sign in the kitchen is still there,” Trinket said, his volume a little softer than usual. “The sign that stated: ‘No coffee in the cockpit’. It was written by you, sir. In big, bold letters.”

Of galaxy-ridden course it was written by me. Great job, Ace!

“Give me a break, Trink,” Aread said, taking the seat to the right which was his favourite seat. The left seat was where he placed the coffee. There was something about the right seat that resonated with him, and since he had bought Mifter two years ago, that was always where he sat. He just didn’t feel that two pilots were enough for spaceships. “You said that there’s coffee on the bar, right?”

“Yes, but the conditions‒”

“Never mind,” Aread said, looking at all the buttons and levers and the shiny dashboard of his. “The decision is made. I shall have coffee on the tiny slab of rock with a bar.”

His hands roamed across the dashboard, flicking switches, turning on the lights and starting up Mifter’s engines. Then he slipped his hands back into his pants pocket, and when the box wasn’t there he jumped.

“Trink,” Aread said, concerned, “where the hell is the box?! It was with me from earlier.”

“Sir, that was a simulation. The box never left its original position,” Trinket answered.

“Oh, really?”

Thank God.

Aread snapped open the side of the drawer of the dashboard, and inside, in a pristine, airtight glass box, was the ice ring. Not entirely round of ice, of course, but it did hold a precious ice gem in which the cracks of ice was allowed to flow and reform.

It was the ice ring of the planet Cormascus. He had remembered it like it was yesterday. It was a simple job, and in the case of seeker schematics, it was a hit-and-run. Literally, as Aread remembered. A simple over-the-top dink, sliding into one of the big black gaping holes, tumbling around before shaking himself clean and getting back on track to finish the job, retrieving the valuable ice ring.

Being the seeker with his own little ideals and dreams, Aread simply didn’t give the dealer what he wanted with the ice ring. It was never sent, never given, and to this day, Aread was going to be using the ring for something else.

It was the ice ring that Aread had seeked out to find, the ring that he was supposed to return, and the ring that he already knew what he was going to use it for. It was in the drawer all along, just as he knew but forgot, just as he hoped.

The hour was coming along, and Aread was getting jittery. He just needed to close out one more deal. It was the final one, and it was coming all quick for him now. When this is all done, and this is all over, he could finally live his life back on Calderac, with his mom, his brother, and…

Rosie.

Aread was getting ahead of himself, and he felt it. Nevertheless, he looked ahead into the blanket of stars and couldn’t help but force a smile. ‘Finally’ used to be a pipe dream. Now, ‘Finally’ was coming home. And it was a matter of galaxy-ridden time.