"Beer, cold and cheap."

The bartender nodded at the man as he walked into the room.

"Anything else?"

"Not for the moment, thanks. Here, how's it that this place is so empty? I thought this bar used to be popular with the outer-system types."

The bartender shrugged as he pulled the man's pint.

"Not many people left in the outer system anymore I'm afraid. Never was to begin with, of course, but most of the folks that lived here have moved on out to the colonies."

The man sighed heavily.

"That bad here as well, huh?"

For a little while there was silence, broken only by the sound of a full glass being slid over to its recipient.

"I'm afraid so. Whereabouts are you from, the Main Belt?"

"Yep. Let me guess, accent gave me away?"

"Hey, it's more than a little distinctive. I've known enough people from the Main Belt to be able to recognise it when I hear it. I take it you worked there as well?"

The man nodded a little and held up a finger as he took a few gulps from the top of his pint.

"Sorry about that, it was thirsty work getting out here. And to answer your question yes, yes I did. I was a miner up in the Main, as most of us from around there were. Of course things are different nowadays. The change started when the government started getting buddy-buddy with the corporations, started caring for the profits of their friends over the lives of their people. We probably could have done something about it, you know, voted the politicians out of office, but everyone was just so apathetic about the whole situation nothing was ever done to challenge them. Then two years ago, as you might remember if you kept your eye on the news about the rest of the system, the corpos rolled out their fancy new 'autonomous mining drones'. The work of ten men could be done by one piloting a robot, so we were all laid off. Hopefully the colonies are in a better state than home."

The bartender nodded sadly at the man in understanding. He'd seen the news back then, had heard more than one story from miners passing through here since the layoffs had begun. Still, the time for action had passed them all by and, as the man in front of him had said, no-one had though action to be necessary at the time. Combining the apathy of the public and the friendship of the government, the corporations had provided the miners with a fait-accompli.

"The colonies are always looking for more workers," the bartender responded, "especially those with experience in the primary industries such as yourself. Farmers, miners, technicians; you'll never run out of work in the colonies. I hear the Reaches are actually trying to kick-start their orbital mining industries at the moment, so if I were you that'd be my first stop. Well, assuming you're leaving Sol for good, after all."

The miner huffed out a laugh.

"You get that many people leaving that you know all the best spots, is it?"

"Something like that, yeah. A few of them try and keep up contact with me in case I decide to leave as well, so I'm normally able to keep up to date on happenings outside the system. But yes, you are also correct. Very few people come this close to the edge of the Solar System these days, but those that do come to this place are always doing the same thing."

"And what would that be?"

The bartender smiled knowingly at the man, who was just about finished with his pint.

"Well, they're here to contemplate things, mostly. They want a quiet place, a sedate conversation, and to put off their leaving for just a little while longer."

The man breathed what seemed to be a sigh of relief.

"Huh. I was worried that it was only me who felt... I don't really know how I feel about leaving. Sad? Annoyed? Proud? Probably all three and then some, I would wager."

The bartender motioned to the man's empty pint glass with a nod of his head, the man simply nodding back in response. In a few moments the glass was full of cheap beer again, and thus the conversation continued.

"It's a big step to take, moving out of the system. I don't blame folks for taking some time to mull it over. Most people that pass through here seem less angry and more mournful, as though they're drinking at a wake instead of a leaving. In a way they are I guess, after all, as soon as you leave the system there's no getting back in again. People like you or me haven't the money to make it any more than a one way trip."

The miner chuckled.

"Hey, way to make a man feel at ease about his future."

"In my defence, you still haven't told me if you're moving out or not."

"Come on, that was more than implied."

The bartender nodded his acquiescence, absentmindedly cleaning a glass with the cloth in his hands.

"Touché. You got any family out in the colonies then?"

"A cousin of mine out the Reaches. If what you're saying about their orbital mining is right then I'll probably seek him out, ask for some help settling in then pay him back when I can hold down a steady job."

"Sounds like a fine enough plan to me, if you don't mind me saying."

Love this novel? Read it on Royal Road to ensure the author gets credit.

"One day the corporations will look to the colonies again. They won't stop just at Sol."

The miner conceded the point while smiling.

"Aye, that they will. This time though, it'll be different. This time people will care, won't just roll over and let it happen. This is our chance for a better life, and if there really are so many people that have been pushed out of Sol by the corpos then there's no chance of the monopolies succeeding again. I'll fight it by myself if I have to, on the picket lines or... or, if it comes to it, on the frontlines."

"You'll be in good company," the bartender replied, "after all, can you see the Reaches just letting something like that happen without organised resistance? Or the Frontiers, for that matter; they aren't stupid out in the fringes, and they know for a fact that if the Reaches go the way of Sol then they'll be next. None of them out there want that."

"That's good to know. If they've got more of a spine than we all did then there might be hope for us all yet. I take it you're staying here?"

"That's the plan, yep. The landlord and lady are both nice to me and the pay is fine enough, not that there's really anything for me to spend it on out here. Still, I can't stay here forever; I'm not blind to the world outside, and I know I'll be following you all out soon enough."

"Why not come with me tomorrow?"

The bartender chuckled a little, shaking his head.

"That's an awfully kind offer and so I'll thank you for that, sir, but I can't."

"Why not? Personal reason, money problems?"

The bartender shook his head again, smiling softly.

"Someone's gotta give the people who pass through here one last night in Sol. Like I said, all sorts come through here, and the stories I get to be a part of are worth more to me than anything else."

"Any examples?"

The man's query was met with a nod as he finished what was left of his second pint, sliding his glass back across the counter for another refill.

"Well," the bartender began as he pulled another pint, "believe it or not but I've been working here since I was seventeen. I'm twenty-five now, and in that time there's been so many go through here I can hardly keep track. I can broadly break it down into three stages though."

"Christ, you look young for twenty-five."

The miner leaned in a little closer.

"And yet you also carry yourself in an extremely mature fashion. Your eyes are older than your face."

The bartender raised an eyebrow at the man's musings, who leaned back how he had been previously and waved away the unspoken query.

"Cut an old man a little slack, I was only mentioning how grown-up you were. Anyway, you were saying something about three groups, or stages rather?"

The bartender nodded.

"Aye, I did. Starting from now and going back, this current stage is the last. It's the people like you moving on from Sol, moving away to the colonies in search for a better life. There's a melancholic sort of mood as you all pass through, the wish to linger a little longer. By and large, people in this stage know they should have left already, that they shouldn't have stopped in here, but they can't bring themselves to leave just yet. They can't face leaving behind everything they've known, and so they sit here and drink until, despite still being too scared to leave Sol behind, they're so weary of staying in what our home system has become that their fears are outweighed."

"This isn't exactly a happy stage, is it?"

The bartender shook his head sadly.

"No, it isn't. The stage that came before was better; for the majority of my time here, when the first stage had ended but the stage we're in now hadn't yet started, most of the people coming through were small time businessmen who were managing to hit it big in the colonies, families moving abroad for a better life together, people with genuine hope for the future and not just weary resignation. That was a good time, of that you can trust me. The bar was filled almost every night then, with live music every Saturday and a pub quiz on Thursday. There were other people holding down the bar then, half a dozen of us at least. Those were some good times..."

"They certainly sound it. What was the first stage, the one this place was in when you started?"

The bartender looked around the empty room then sighed a little.

"To tell you the truth, it wasn't much different to how it is now. It was empty most nights, with one or two people coming through every day or so. They weren't being pushed to the colonies by the corporations, though. Hell, the colonies didn't even exist yet."

"So who were the people passing through then? Why were they as sad as the people that come through now, by your reckoning?"

The bartender smiled sadly.

"They were explorers and trailblazers. They didn't want to leave Sol behind, they didn't want to give up the security of everything they'd known, but the universe called to them and they had to answer. They were drawn to the stars, and so they left behind the lives they'd had to go and become the first explorers of the galaxy. They'd sit here, like people do now, and they'd linger for just a little while longer, as people do now. Then, when they'd run out of money to spend on drinks and excuses to convince themselves to stay a little longer, they'd leave."

The man whistled a little.

"So when you were a kid of what, seventeen at this point, something like that? When you were a kid of seventeen you actually met a good number of the people that went out to explore the Reaches?"

"A couple went beyond the Reaches and out to the Fringes, if I'm not mistaken."

The miner nodded and smiled.

"Not a bad selection of stories then. The night is coming to a close for me, but if ever you should make your way to the colonies I should like to hear them some day. Here kid, have my details. If you need a hand getting settled in if and when you leave, don't hesitate to give me a shout."

The bartender nodded, sliding over a notebook and pen so that the man might take down his details and leave his own. As he did so the bartender pulled out a second glass and reached for the miner's empty pint, filling both glasses from the taps. When he'd done so he slid the man's glass back over to him and raised his own glass into the air in a toast. It was rapidly approaching the end of his shift after all, and there was hardly any risk of another patron walking in and requiring service.

"Here. On the house."

The miner nodded, smiling happily.

"Thank you for the drinks, young man. Thank you very much indeed. I'll stay in the bar a little longer tonight, but if I don't see you in the morning, then... well, I guess I'll see you around."

The bartender nodded, and the two men ignored the small spark of melancholy that came about from the knowledge that the new friend they'd made might not see them ever again.

"Yeah. I'll see you around."

They clinked their glasses together and drank to drown out that feeling. He was more than happy to have given the man a free drink at the end of the night, if for no other reason than the company had been a nice change from the silence of the bar most days. Besides, he'd often found that the people who stopped through here nearly always needed that small kindness at the end of Sol.