“Wake up and welcome to your new home! Base 225!” The driver shouted, flicking on the lights I hadn’t even notice had been switched off.

I blinked the sleep out of my eyes and looked out at the giant sprawling compound in front of me. It was the only one I’d seen today that didn’t have a fence around it instead I could see almost the whole base. There were multiple buildings, a combination of older red brick ones and newer metal and biobrick ones. The buildings were so much nicer and cleaner looking than the orphanage and even my school! They had huge windows and were surrounded by open green spaces.

So much arti-grass! I thought, looking around.

I realised belatedly with sadness that I must have slept through our journey on the cruiser. I’d missed my first chance to see the sea.

“Okay, everyone out! This is the last stop and your home from now on.” The bus driver opened the doors and climbed down.

I followed him quickly, eager to see more of the base. A path wound over from where the bus had pulled up next to a row of other buses surrounded on both side by more flower beds than I’d ever seen before and tall leafy trees before leading up to the biggest red building.

He waited until everyone had exited the bus and scanned our wrists before checking to see if there was anyone left on the bus. There wasn’t so he led us right across the grassy space towards the building, ignoring the path completely.

I stumbled slightly on the bouncy floor, expecting it to be more solid than it was. It couldn’t be arti-grass, that had concrete under. It must be real grass! That’s what that smell was.

Slightly sharp and somehow a little bit comforting? I thought with a wide smile, breathing in deeply again.

I caught up with the group quickly, still amazed by the real grass. It was the first time I’d actually walked on it rather than just seen it through the school bus window as we went through the wealthier part of town. The ground below it was soft and a little bit springy, very different to the scuffed arti-grass we had outside the orphanage that was so old and worn there were holes in it.

The driver walked confidently into the building, pausing briefly to hand the keys and his baton over to the grinning, silver jumpsuit wearing person who was sitting at a window in the wall before leading us towards a set of double doors where the voices could be heard chattering and laughing animatedly.

“Okay kids, the canteen is in here. Help yourself to as much food as you want. Sit anywhere and talk to anyone. There’s an assembly for you lot with our director in 40 minutes so make sure you’re finished eating by then and follow the directions on your wrist monitor. Welcome to your new home, you’re going to love it here.” He grinned widely at us before disappearing through the doors and leaving us standing awkwardly outside.

I could hear kids talking, like in the canteen at my school. My old school. I gathered my courage and pushed through the doors, the rest of the kids following me. The canteen was similar to the one at school, there were rows of tables lining the halls with some circular ones dotted about. It smelt delicious, rich aromas wafted from the buffet stations along the back wall. The smell was similar to the market I sometimes snuck out to back home but way more intense. I didn’t know food could smell that good.

There were even more people in there than I had expected too. They were mostly kids, a few older ones sitting on one table including our bus driver who already had a heaped plate in front of him and was laughing loudly at something one of his friends said. On another table, there was a group of adults talking excitedly, their arms gesturing vaguely.

Tutors, I assumed based on the badges they had pinned to their chests.

Most of the kids and the adults were wearing shiny silver jumpsuits. It was easy to tell who was new here. They were either wearing the plain coloured, badly fitting jumpsuits from the orphanages like us or shiny new looking clothing, obviously volunteers.

Some of the kids were talking too, I realised as I looked around in confusion. Most of the kids were and no one was being told off for it. In fact, the opposite appeared to be true. A tutor stopped by a table of kids on the way back from the buffet and I could see it from here, she was talking to the kids! Not shouting at them, she was laughing. I shook my head slightly in confusion, unsure of how to react and decided to just ignore it and get food instead. At the far side of the room was a buffet, like the ones at school we weren't allowed near. I walked over to it, not hungry after my sandwich on the bus but not wanting to miss out on the chance of food just in case we didn’t get it again for a few days.

There were so many options to choose from, some things I recognised like mashed potato, some sort of pasta dish, salads and endless vegetable dishes. It was all so vibrant and real looking but I wasn’t sure what I wanted. At the orphanage we always had mush and at school we had artificial stuff. I had some knowledge of food from school or from things I’d seen when I snuck out of the orphanage but I’d never had this much food to choose from. I didn’t even know what I liked.

I picked up a plate and began walking along the buffet, sniffing to see what smelt good and choosing a few small scoops, not wanting to be punished for greediness. There was a whole separate area for sweet foods but I didn’t want to risk eating it, it was probably only for the tutors.

I sat down at the closest mostly empty table, trying not to make eye contact with the girl sitting opposite me who was also staring at her mostly empty plate. I poked the broccoli with my fork, trying to work out if it was real or just a good fake.

Surely they wouldn’t waste real food on trainees? Sallis used to tell us how expensive that stuff is and how it would be a waste to give it to us.

I shrugged internally, realising that even if I ate it I wouldn’t know if it was real or not and decided to just eat it anyway. It was delicious, slightly sweet, crunchy and still warm with a creamy coating. I sniffed another piece.

Does it have butter on? Like, real butter? I thought incredulously, remembering the smell of the pie crust from the market near the orphanage.

It was better than any of the food I had ever eaten before and suddenly, I was ravenous. I couldn't wait to eat more. I ate quickly, relishing the food, savouring it and wanting more before I had even finished.

“Hi!”

A girl sat down next to me, her plate overloaded with food and holding a second plate with several slices of pies and cakes crammed on it.

I glanced at her quickly before looking down at my almost empty plate again. I was anxious, unsure if I should talk or if I was even allowed to.

“It’s okay to talk here, I asked one of the tutors. They said they hate that we aren’t allowed to talk in the orphanages and that it’s stupid.” The girl said, laughing a little.

“Really?” The question quietly slipped out before I could catch it.

“Yep!” The girl shovelled food into her mouth before saying, “I’m 10877, who are you?”

“I’m 10683.” I said, finishing the food on my plate and trying not to stare jealously at her food.

She noticed anyway and laughed.

“Are you still hungry? Do you know what any of this is? I don’t either but this is my third plate so I know what’s good! Do you want me to show you?” She jumped up, pulling me with her.

“Will you make sure no one takes my plate please?” 10877 asked the scared looking blonde girl who was sitting opposite us who nodding slightly without making eye contact.

10877 grabbed a plate for me and strode confidently along the buffet.

“Do you want sweets or mains? They have all kinds of desserts here but I’ve only tried that one so far,” she pointed, “so I don't know if the rest are any good but I have a bunch more at the table so I’ll know real soon!”

“Urm, savoury I think? I’ve never really had much sweet food. The orphanage director didn't give it to us, she said there was no need.”

“Ours used to say we weren’t worth it!” 10877 laughed but it didn’t reach her eyes. “Okay, so I had some of this, it’s really good. And this is mashed potatoes, I used to steal some from the school kitchens sometimes but this one is so much better. And this is ‘macancheese’! I don’t know what that means but I heard some kid say it.” She continued, walking down the line and pointing out dishes, waiting for me to nod or shake my head before moving on.

She grabbed another plate as she moved, barely managing to balance both but pushing me away when I went to take one from here before going back to grab a few of the things she said were her favourites and carrying them back to the table for us.

“Here you go!” She said, placing the plate down in front of me. “And here you go!” She slid the other plate that I had assumed was for her over to the frightened-looking blonde girl who looked up in shock.

“I’m okay.” She said almost silently, shaking her head and pushing it away.

“I saw you looking at mine and you look like you’ve barely had anything to eat so I got you some extra.” 10877 said with a soft smile.

The girl bit her lip and pulled the plate towards herself quickly like she was scared we’d change our minds.

“Thank you.” She whispered.

10877 smiled broadly before looking back at me.

“Eat! Don’t let it get cold. It’s still good but not as good. So, where are you from?”

“Eastern Shora, you?” I said, taking a bite of the thing she called macancheese.

I sighed happily, it was creamy, sharp and delicious.

“That is the best thing I’ve ever eaten.” I breathed, instantly going back for another forkful.

“Right? It’s so good!” 10877 replied, looking proud of herself.

I saw the other girl try some too, a small smile appearing on her face for a second before it dropped back into an anxious frown.

“New Dustone, we travelled all night to get here. Shora isn’t too far, is it?” 10877 continued.

“It’s approximately 400 miles away.” The blonde girl added quietly.

10877 whistled. “That’s impressive. Do you really like geography or something?”

“Urm… not really. I like it okay, I guess. I didn’t go to school much before but I used to live in Shora too and wanted to know how long it would take to get here. Like, if I had to use the bus or something.” She said, looking down at her plate and fiddling with her fork.

10877 looked confused.

“Oh, are you not a draft?”

I had assumed she was too. She was thin and timid looking, like most drafts, and she wore the same dull jumpsuit we did.

“I am.” The girl paused. “Kind of.”

“How can you kind of be a draft?” I asked.

“I was a volunteer before but…” The girl swallowed loudly. “I… my parents… I lived in an orphanage for the last six weeks.”

“Why?” 10877 asked, taking a large bite of a fluffy looking brown bread.

“My parents died.”

I froze, unsure how to react. From the corner of my eye, I saw 10877’s mouth drop open. She cursed quietly.

“Oh, I am so sorry.” She looked panicked, glancing around slightly before sliding her other plate into the centre of the table and hurriedly asking “urmm, do you want some pie?”

The blonde girl looked up in surprise, a small laugh tumbling out before she could stop it.

“Okay.”

“This is so cool! We’re living together!” 10877 pushed past us and further into the room the servBot had led us to.

I followed her into the dormitory, looking around in wonder. It had six beds in it but, as the interim director Andrew Gaddon had said earlier, most rooms would only have three or four kids staying in them because not that many people were accepted into the Space Corps that year. We were in the big red building with the canteen and we’d been told we’d be staying in here until we either moved in with a crew or graduated. Apparently, that’s how they did things on this base rather than having people move about every year like in some of the bigger orphanages were the rooms were split by age and gender, here our dorm was ours until we left.

“No offence but I thought you were way younger, Peg! You’re so little!” 10877 said, flopping down on one of the beds. “Oh this is so comfy! I want this one!”

“It’s okay, I think I’m quite small for my age.” She replied.

She had told us earlier that her name was Peggy but when she arrived at the orphanage it was changed to a number, 11066, like all of ours was. 10877 had immediately asked if she wanted us to call her Peggy and begun to do so.

“Is that a door to another dorm do you think? Oh my gods, we have our own bathroom! Look at that! That’s a bath! And a shower! This is so cool! Wait, what’s this other door then? Two bathrooms! They both have showers! This is awesome!” 10877 ran back and jumped onto her bed again.

“Which bed do you want?” Peggy asked, still standing with me by the door timidly.

One of the beds was next to a large window, overlooking the landing bay. I stared out of it for a second at the ships idling by on their way to the garage.

“I’ll take this one.” I said, sitting down on and not taking my eyes off the ships.

I might be able to see the stars at night. I thought with a small smile, remembering when I would sneak out of the dorm back home and onto the roof during the night to sleep in the quiet under the sky.

“I’ll have this one then.” Peggy picked up her bag from where they’d been left by the door and put it down on the nearest bed, looking around the room with apprehension.

“So we have until dinner to get settled, right? What do you want to do?” 10877 asked, lying back on her bed.

“We should probably get changed into the uniform, right?” Peggy pulled a silvery jumpsuit I’d seen other people wearing around the base out of the wardrobe next to her bed.

“That looks so uncomfortable.” 10877 laughed, reaching into her own wardrobe.

I picked one up too, stroking the material in wonder. “It’s actually kind of soft.”

“Oh, good. They have some long-sleeved ones here too.” Peggy clutched one tightly to her chest, looking around the room worriedly.

“It’s so warm here, why would you want long sleeves?” 10877 asked, already getting changed.

I put the jumpsuit down and began stripping too. We lived in dorms at the orphanage so I was used to changing in front of people.

“Urm… I don’t like having my arms out. I kind of have a lot of scars.” She stared at the floor, refusing to meet our eyes.

“Oh, I get it! Don’t worry, us drafties have quite a few scars too. Look, this one here is where I fell down the stairs and smacked my chin on a step.” Gem stepped forwards, still undressed and started showing off the scar on her chin. “And this one is from when I got pushed off the swings, This one is from when a bully stabbed me in the leg with a fork. I don’t even know how I got this one, probably doing something dumb. And then do you see this one? This is from when I broke my arm. The bone stuck right out and everything, it was so gross.”

I could see Peggy relaxing more and laughing with 10877 so decided to join in.

I held out my right arm where the skin was puckered and marked.

“Look at this one, I slipped climbing up a ladder and scraped my arm down the side of it and it got infected. And here’s where I got pushed into traffic and broke my wrist.”

Peggy giggled and 10877 smiled proudly.

“See! We all got scars! I got into a fight at the orphanage and he broke my nose real bad. See, it’s still crooked, it didn’t used to be!”

I looked at 10877’s face. Her freckled nose was bent slightly to the left but she was still grinning at us as we examined her.

“You know, if you’re not comfortable, you can always get changed in the bathroom? Did you have one in your dorm back home? I never did! We had to share one with the older boys and it always stunk.” She held her nose with an exaggerated gesture.

I laughed. “We didn’t but we had one for the boys and one for the girls but they were always so nasty and blocked.”

Peggy nodded. “So was ours at the orphanage. I’ll go get changed now then.”

She turned and walked into the bathroom. 10877 watched her and waited for the door to shut before leaning towards me.

“I have an idea.” She said, her eyes glittering as she got up and bounced towards one of the unused wardrobe.

She flicked through it, pulling out the long-sleeved jumpsuits and throwing them onto the spare bed. I watched her whilst getting dressed as she grabbed the jumpsuits off the bed and dumped them onto Peggy’s.

“What are you doing?” I asked finally, still unsure.

“I’m giving her all of the long-sleeved ones so she doesn’t need to wear any short-sleeved ones!”

I grinned. I liked 10877 already and it was a great idea. I jumped up to help her go through the other unused wardrobes. We had just finished dropping all of the long-sleeved ones onto Peggy’s bed when she walked out.

“These aren't actually as uncomfortable as they look. I quite like them but I think it’s a bit long for me but the Director did say we could get different sized ones from the store if these didn’t fit… What are you doing?” She stopped and looked at us.

“There! Now you have all of the long-sleeved ones! You can even have mine, I don’t need them! I don’t care about my scars!” 10877 gestured happily to the pile.

Peggy bit her lip and looked at us, tears gathering in her eyes. “Thank you.”

“Any time! Now, let’s go explore before dinner! I’m hungry already. Do you think dinner will be as good as lunch was? I really liked that. I wish the food had labels on so I know what I like and what I hate. That macancheese was so good though. I loved that. Do you think they’ll have it again? Probably, right? Do you think we could get more food before dinner or do we have to wait until then? Didn’t the Director say something about the stores? Can we just go get food? He said we didn’t need to pay for it here, right? That doesn’t seem right but like, I want more.” Gem grabbed our arms and pulled us out of the door.