Galactic Standard time 7912, Life, 120.
The rain had not change much over the years, it was still as cold, as crisp, and as biting as that day almost three years ago. Earth, as my people called this planet, is a beautiful blue, green, and brown globe when viewed from the window of my drop pod. The guards, who escorted me to Earth, told me that the ancestors of our race, or humans as they called themselves, escaped this planet after they had milked every drop of its available resources dry. Yet after only a couple of millennia, the planet seemed almost unblemished. The ugly scars of humanity, which has marred its surface, gone without a trace. During my descent in my unmanned drop pod, I felt a small sense of hope bloom in my chest. The planet reminded me of the rose, a flower that had originated from Earth, a place filled beauty and a place that I may fall in love with. I looked down at my hands, callused and pale, contrasting greatly against the soft and sickly white skin of three years ago. This pair of hands proved that a rose is not a rose without its thorns.
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Galactic Standard time 7909, Life, 97.
“Pack your bags Sanguis! We are here!” A gruff voice, accompanied by the sounds of knocking, woke me from my slumber.
Opening my eyes, I was greeted by the constant dim blue glow of the bioluminescent lamps that tinted the room with a blue hue. My back ached from the barely padded metal frame that served as my bed for the past month.
“Day mode.” I croaked, my voice leaking through my throat.
With a click the dim blue lights began to grow bright, until the room seemed as if it was under the sun.
*Thump Thump* The metal door at the opposite end of my bed sounded.
“Hurry up Sanguis! Your exile begins in about 30 minutes!” The gruff voice sounded again.
“I’ll be out in a minute.” I called, but my throat was too dry, so what came out was barely loud enough to be heard.
Looking around, I found nothing that I needed to pack. In my groggy haze, I had forgotten that I had been stripped of most of my possessions during the suspension ceremony. The guard who had called me had probably said that due to his dark sense of humor. The only possession I had left was the pendent that my mother had given me before I had gone off to war. It was constructed of a silver metal, and lined with gold which was uncommon for an Orphic accessory. The design was odd too, the string was attached to a small silver circle with a radius of about one centimeter. From this circle at exactly sixty, one hundred and eighty, and three hundred degrees three gold lined silver metal sticks of about two centimeters long protruded from the disc shaped metal. While gently caressing the pendent, I once again noticed the color of my hands, they were not the pointed black and crimson hands before the suspension, they were soft and almost snow white. As I was staring fixedly at my new hands, a hiss came from the door before it slid open. In came the guard who had been calling me outside my room. He saw me looking at my hands and sighed.
“Come along boy, we are going to be late,” he began, while placing his pointed navy-blue hand behind my back, “exile is not like the death sentence, if you make it back to Orphic society, your sins will be annulled.”
I couldn’t reply to his words, not because of some sentimental or heart aching emotion, but rather I was too busy wincing from the pain of his pointed finger tips digging into my flesh.
“Oh, sorry, sorry! I forgot they skinned you.” Noticing my discomfort, he exclaimed, as he hurriedly withdrew his hand.
I shook my head slightly and comforted: “Its fine, I had about two months to get used to it.”
“Its just that,” I complained, “I still don’t know how to feel about having something that you wore your whole life taken away from you in about two hours.”
“That’s why I said they skinned you,” he said as he guided me out of my room, “the suit is the skin of us, Orphics. I mean think about it, when we were babies, not even an hour since we came into this world, we were required to put on this suit. It was something that kept our abilities stable so that we would not explode into tiny baby bits.”
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“Yeah, it without probably only one in a hundred would survive infancy.” I agreed.
“But,” he added, “it, like us, also grows as it collects our body information. It become our soul mate in a way, as it later amplifies and prevents our bodies from exploding when we use our abilities.”
I nodded slightly and stared into the guard’s blue tinted visor. “it’s quite cruel, isn’t it? Taking away something so precious to us.”
“It’s like taking away your arms or legs.” He agreed.
“But, a sin is still a sin. I may not hate you for what you’ve done, but those who are affected by your actions still demand a punishment.” He added.
I slightly shook my head and justified: “There is no right or wrong in war, ever since the days of our forefathers, the humans, there existed a saying:’ History is written by the victor.’”
The guard shook his head, but said no more. The two of us continued our walk down the blue tinted hallway in silence. After about ten minutes of walking, we arrived at the end of the hall where a sliding door, with a small green monitor fixed on its center, was positioned. The guard stepped forward, past me, and placed his palm onto the screen.
“Authorization code:Virgil, prison guard Nodius escorting war criminal Sanguis to exile on purgatory level planet Earth.” The guard declared loudly.
As soon as the guard, Nodius, finished, the screen whirled to life, and began scanning his palm. Then the screen flashed blue and an emotionless robotic echoed through the room: “Authorization cleared, prison guard Nodius, you may escort war criminal Sanguis to drop ship bay thirty-four to board the Inferno class dropship.”
After the voice finished its instructions, with a click the magnetic locks popped open and the door gradually slid sideways into the wall. Through the opening, I saw another hallway that ran a good hundred meters down, lined with metal tubes about one and a half meters in radius. Walking down the metal tube painted with the number thirty-four on it, the guard sighed and pulled a lever beside the tube.
“I used to admire you, you know?” He said as the metal tube hissed open, “You were the hero of the Orphic people. The great prince, Slayer of the…”
“That’s the past now, and let it be that.” I said, cutting him off.
He shook his head in disappointment and said in a serious tone: “As per the rules of purgatory level exile, you are given some support from us to aid you in your survival. If in some spectacular event that you make it back to Orphic space, you will be acquitted of all sins as per the ancient rule set by our forefathers. May the Flow guide you in your exile, Sanguis the twelfth prince of the Orphic Empire.”
I nodded and entered the metal tube. Inside there was a single padded chair and on the floor beside it two hatch doors that probably contained the supplies that the guard mentioned. As I went to sit down on the chair I felt a soft impact on the back of my head, followed by the clank of the object hitting the metal tube’s floor. Turning around and looking down, I saw a black box with glowing blue lines that ran on the surface of it.
“This is good stuff, third generation storage unit.” The guard explained, as he pointed to the cube, “the one provided to you by the empire is out dated, heavy, and a chore to carry around despite the same size. This one is made of Nano machines, merging into your body and virtually weightless. Just put your hand on the object and say store. Just like the old generation, it rips apart reality and creates an alternate space for storage. Quite advanced stuff for nano machines, if I so do say so my self.”
I looked at the guard, trying to see his eyes behind the visor of his suit helmet.
“why are you doing this?” I asked, “and don’t give me any of that ‘out of the good will of my heart’ bullshit.”
The guard paused for a second before replying: “My brother, sided with your faction. He told me three weeks before the battle on Oberon, the one that he died in, to follow you and carry on his footsteps if he were to die, which he did. I am a timid man, and I saw that you would not win the war so I never joined.”
“So, this is like some sort of apology?” I asked.
“No! Not to you!” He snapped, before taking a deep breath and explained: “This is more towards my brother who died for your cause. Of course, it is also out of a small sense of respect for you.”
I nodded and picked up the cube.
“This reason, I’ll accept it.” I declared as I watched the cube melt into countless nano machines and disappeared into my hand.
Walking up to the seat in the center of the tube, I sat down and facing the guard.
“Good bye, and for my brother’s sake good luck.” The guard said as the door slid closed.
“Thank you.” I whispered in the silence, thinking that I will be alone for a truly long time.”