The blue sunlight hit my eyelids, waking me up. The blinds were usually closed, keeping the light out and letting me sleep in. Even when we still had to go to school, I liked to sleep in until my alarm clock woke me. The alarm was always so much more gentle on me than the light. But that was why Kenya always woke me up by opening the blinds.

"Wake up, sleepyhead," Kenya called out. She jumped onto my bed, jostling me around in the process. "Graduation day. Can you believe it? Oh, get up, Dor. No time for sleeping on this glorious day. The suns are shining. There are only three mana clouds in the sky. They fixed the pothole on Main. Everything is coming up us."

"That's one way of looking at it," I grumbled. "Another way is that I want to sleep another two diddies and you're interrupting."

"Two diddies? How can you sleep two diddies if the ceremony is in one? Are you going to sleep through graduation?"

"Sure, why not?" I asked. "It's not like anything good is coming out of it. All the good stuff isn't until later in the day. I want to be well rested for that."

"Well, we both know you're already awake. So, you might as well open your eyes and seize the day."

With one last grumble, I did open my eyes. The blue sunlight of Kepler 1985, or Kep for short, was harsh on the eyes when not properly filtered. That was why all the windows were designed to do just that. Still, it hurt my eyes to see it so early in the morning. It took a moment for them to adjust to the brightness.

To spare my eyesight, I flicked my eyes around the room. In the corner was my suitcase, already packed for the trip we were planning. Looming over me was the overbearing form of Kenya, my best friend in the entire universe. Her mocha skin glistened in the blue light of the sun, showing that the day was already way too humid for anyone to be outside. I noticed that she hadn't mentioned that when describing the weather. And, finally, to my closed door on the wall opposite from the windows. Kenya had never met a closed door that stopped her from opening it.

"Nope," I said. "Sleep is still calling."

"Oh, don't do that," she said.

She grabbed the pillow next to me, slapping it against my stomach playfully. The pillow bounced back up, spinning three times in the air before coming back down to the bed next to me. The low gravity of New Kansas had a strange impact on pillows like that. Or, perhaps, it was the low level of mana that seemed to flow through the very air of the planet. It wasn't high enough for Mom's tastes, and certainly not enough for it to have an impact on electronics.

"Your mom is cooking a special breakfast, just for us. The least you could do is actually get up to eat it. Come on. I'll let you get ready. But if I have to come up here again, I'm eating your pancakes."

"Fine, fine, fine," I said. I rolled over, closing my eyes and burying my head with the pillow that she had thrown at me. Only after the words played their way through my head did I realize what she was saying. "Pancakes?" Graduation was one thing, but I'd get up early in the day for pancakes.

My alarm clock read 2:84, which surprised me more than anything else. That was probably the earliest that Kenya had ever woken me up. Anything before 3:20 was an ungodly hour that no one should be awake during. Of course, my father was always a morning person, and usually got up closer to 2:00. Mom was more like me. She was probably just as annoyed to be up that early, even if it was a special day.

I paused between my bed and my dresser to look out through the window. The blue light coming from Kep seemed unusually bright. Then I noticed the mana cloud in front of it. The pink cube hovered there for a moment as it slid across the sky. There were five of them up there, all playing with the sun, with two just coming up over the horizon from the factories in the distance. They were exhaust clouds coming from the stacks that stuck out into the sky, an unavoidable biproduct of the refining process. As kids, we would reach up towards them, trying to pull the mana out of it by our wills alone. There was an urban legend that the more powerful mages could do just that. Of course, when we grew up, we learned that such things were impossible.

Then again, neither Kenya nor I was a mage.

Once I made it past the window, and into the small corner by the dresser, I pulled my nightgown over my head and tossed it towards the laundry hamper in the closet. I said goodbye to that old nightgown, which I knew I'd never need to wear again. There was a fresh one in the suitcase next to me that I had bought special for our trip. If everything played out the way I knew it would, Kenya and I would ship out soon after the party that evening. I tried not to think about it as I pulled open the only drawer that still had anything in it, throwing on the dress that I had selected for the day. It's not the dress that I'll be wearing to the party after graduation, just until then. It wasn't anything fancy, only my normal attire for heading into school. In the blue light from Kep, it perfectly matched my eyes, though it was closer to white under the overhead lighting of the room.

The dress caught on the implant on my wrist as I pulled my arms through it. The time played across it for a moment before switching over to the life signs monitor screen. The three green lights hovered there in the circular glass. Each light was linked to one of my parents, with the third being mine. I tapped the glass again, setting the screen back to its usual blank. I had gotten the implant before I could remember. I was so used to it that I would often forget it was there.

Before heading out of the room and down to the others, I headed back over to the window for a moment. The other two clouds had joined the rest of them, dancing around Kep and lighting up the area so brightly that the filters on the window struggled to keep it bearable. I looked down at Kenya's car, parked in front of the house in her usual spot. The smart pavement that made up the street was gobbling up as much of the extra energy as it could, sending it over the hills to the factories in the distance. It would be a high output day for the factories. I just hoped that would put Kenya's father into a better mood when we ended up leaving later.

Leaving New Kansas, hopefully never to return.

"Ah, there she is," Mom said, as I came down the stairs to the ground floor.

Enjoying this book? Seek out the original to ensure the author gets credit.

The house had what was once called an open floorplan. The living room, dining room, kitchen, and game room all flowed into each other, with just the occasional pillar to break up the space. With the harsh light of Kep blocked out of most of the room, it was easier to see the space as it opened up around me at the base of the stairs. Mom, Dad, and Kenya were all sitting around the island in the kitchen, where most meals were eaten. My plate was already loaded up with a five stack and bacon. The entire place smelled glorious, and I wanted nothing more than to eat it all in one bite.

"Happy Graduation Day," Dad said.

Dad was staring at the island next to his plate, rather than looking at me or paying attention to what he was eating. His own implant was on the counter, angled just right to interact with the smart surface. It took some practice if you weren't used to it, but then it became second nature. He would, of course, be reading the news. Usually, by 3, he was up to the Terran Alliance news, rather than just the local stuff. I tried not to eye what he was reading as I settled down into my usual stool.

"Anything good?" I asked, meaning the news.

"It's all good," Kenya said, around a full mouth. "It's pancakes."

"Just the usual pancakes this time," Mom said. "Your father is being stingy again."

"We don't need to have magic pancakes every day of the week," Dad said, without looking up from the table. It was the same old argument that they got into every time we had regular pancakes. "Everyone else on this planet eats the regular stuff all the time. I don't see why--"

"Because it's a special day," Mom said.

"Well, then, maybe you should have saved some of the mana from the last time I splurged on it," Dad and I both said together. I said it teasingly, knowing Dad would say it. Dad actually meant it, but he didn't mean any offense from it.

Despite being grown and refined right there on New Kansas, mana really was expensive stuff. It was the thing of magic. Really. It let mages do wonders, like traveling across the galaxy in a few days, and the universe in a few millennia. Or like making pancakes taste like pure happiness and provide zero calories. Not that regular pancakes didn't already taste like happiness.

"I only use the mana on the important stuff," Mom said.

"How is cleaning the house important enough to use mana?" Dad said. "All you ever use it for is to clean the place with a snap of your fingers. Half the time you forget to close the container and it just evaporates. Barb, honey, I love you. But you have to be the ditsiest mage in the universe."

"Oh, I've met ditsier ones," Kenya said. "So has Dor. Remember that one guy?"

"Oh, yea, no," I said, shaking my head. "Mom is totally ditsier than that guy." I didn't actually remember who she was talking about, but I remembered the day that we ran into him. This was mostly because of how often she'd bring him up.

"Okay, okay," Mom said. "I'll be more careful with it next time. Maybe I'll even do something useful with it. It's just... I don't know, I feel like my affinity is just going to waste out here. Back in the day, back when I was in the fleet, I had an actual purpose."

"Well, maybe now that this one is going off on her own again, we'll look into going back into the service," Dad said.

Dad tapped the counter twice, closing the newspaper. Instead of turning to us, though, he opened a new one. This one was actually the classified paper that only Mom and Dad were supposed to see. He was a former captain in the fleet, and she was a commander. They both had kept their clearance, though only Dad used it. I looked over at the counter, trying to see if I could make anything out. The words were all jumbled up, though, the letters moving back and forth in a way that made it impossible for me to make anything out. Dad never seemed to have any problems reading it. Mom never seemed to try.

"Hey, all power to the both of you," I said, as I finished off the pancakes. As usual, they were glorious. "I'd never be caught dead in the fleet."

"Me, neither," Kenya said. She raised her half empty glass in a toast. "To never being stuck in the fleet."

"Oh?" Dad asked. He couldn't hide his smile as he flipped through the paper in front of him. He had always known how I felt about the fleet. And yet, he never seemed to take offense. "And what if the Pilgrims don't take you? Huh? Ever think of that?"

"Not going to happen," Kenya said. "With our grades, we're a shoe-in."

"And the letters of recommendation from all our teachers, plus four former members of the fleet, didn't hurt either," I added.

Our neighborhood was largely made up of retired former fleet members. New Kansas was somewhat of a backwater planet, with one of the lowest costs of living around. That meant that we were pretty much rich. Kenya, on the other hand, was the daughter of a factory foreman. She came from a long line of factory foremen. Her biggest nightmare was getting stuck in that same factory as her dad. Just as mine was getting stuck in the fleet.

Only her nightmare was just around the corner if the Pilgrims didn't take us.

"Anyway, we'd better be going," Kenya said. "We have to start setting up the party."

"What are you talking about?" I asked. "We're not in charge of that. That's Jenny's job. She wanted to plan it. She's in charge of setting up."

"Didn't I tell you earlier? Why did you think I was waking you up this early? It's on us now. Jenny enlisted."

"Oh, god, no. Not another one."

"Yea, she and Amy both did."

"Which one was Amy again? The weird one?"

"No, the other weird one."

"That's what I said. That weird one."

"No, you said the weird one."

"Do you think they actually know what they're talking about?" Mom whispered to Dad.

"I don't think I care," Dad said.

"But, yea," Kenya said. "There's a rumor going around that they were dating. For like two years. Can you believe that? Dating."

"Jenny... and Amy?" I asked.

I stared over at Kenya in complete shock. It was impossible. It was unheard of. It was cause for banishment and shunning. It was...

"It's not that big of a deal," Dad said. "Out in the fleet--"

"But we're not out in the fleet," I said. "This is New Kansas. It's just not done. I mean, two girls? Dating? Each other? Ew."

"Oh, uh, yea, ew," Kenya said. "Who'd ever want to do that? I mean, seriously?"

"Exactly. Well, I guess they deserve to enlist then. Anything to get off this blasted planet."

"Oh, now, that's enough," Dad said. He lifted his implant off the counter and the newspaper immediately disappeared. "I know you're eager to get out and explore the universe and everything, but there's no need to badmouth this planet. It's your home. It's the only home you'll really know, if you're on ships for the next few decades. We've done our best to make it a home you could feel comfortable in. Comfortable to be yourself in. I'd hate to think that you'd take this place, take your mother and me, for granted. You never know what tomorrow may bring. Or take away."

"Sorry, Dad," I said.

"Yea, sorry Mr. S," Kenya said.

"I know you have your hearts set on the Pilgrims accepting you tonight and shipping out with them. And maybe you will be, maybe you won't. I just want you to know that your mother and I are here for you. That we will be here for you whenever you need us."

"For as long as we can," Mom said. She nodded her own agreement to the sentiment.

"I know," I said. I reached over to Mom and Dad from across the island, trying to pull them into a hug. Kenya got mixed in there as well, but that just made it better. "I love you all. I'm going to miss you guys when I ship out tonight." There was no "if" on that. "Will you guys still be up when we get home from the party? Keppy should be up by then. You're never up that late."

"Oh, we've seen Keppy set in our day," Dad said.

"Yea, but that doesn't count. You probably always see Keppy set. It sets at like 1:65."

"I don't get up that early."

"But we should be getting going," Kenya said again. "I'm driving?" She asked that every morning, as if it would be any other way. As rich as we were, comparatively speaking, Dad always refused to get me a car. Kenya had worked for an entire summer one year just to pay for her crappy, run down one.

"Bye guys," I waved to my parents, thinking that would be the last time I'd see them for a while.

Or, at least, see them in person.