Chapter 2- First Companion

What to do? What to do? I wasn’t so sure anymore. I was so excited to help and teach Ryko but it's so obvious to me now that I haven’t a clue what I'm even doing. My mind is so cloudy, it feels like I'm back where I started in the nebula all those years ago. I can’t even focus as I'm wandering through somewhere I'm supposed to know like the back of my hand? What is wrong with me? “Agh-,” I knew I wasn’t focused, but who knew it was enough to shamelessly assault some random guy! “I’m-,”

“Ma’am I am so sorry, I should’ve looked where I was going- and, are you hurt? Do you need medical assistance? I carry a first aid kit-” the man just started talking at what seemed to be the speed of light. I could barely understand what or why he was saying anything because I had bumped into him. “Excuse me. . . would have been fine as it is, but either way I bumped into you!” I put my hands up in a signal for him to stop digging through his messenger bag. He does, but looks up at me for what seemed like a milenia (maybe it was) with pale green eyes that I thought had seen a supernova, and he started crying. “Oh, oh I'm sorry did I say something wrong? I didn’t mean to, I swear!” “No, it’s just that. . .no one has ever been so *sniffle*, kind to me.” I was shocked to say the least, if not on the verge of laughter. Could it be true? Was this the result of the war? Was he a red dwarf too? Or maybe a - “I’m a brown dwarf so, you know since everything happened we haven’t gotten much respect at all. -

*Brown dwarfs are a sort of in between for high mass planets and low mass stars. They are properly considered substellar objects or even substars. Though they cannot fuse hydrogen and helium at a constant like stars do; They can have solar systems and use a type of temporary nuclear fusion.

It’s hard to find people who won’t take something like what just happened as an insult worth hitting me for.” What did he just say? Hit? “Even after the war, couldn’t you file a complaint? There’s no reason to assault someone simply for an accident?” “You. . . don’t understand. The war didn’t just take away the responsibility on the supergiants and main sequence stars for our mistreatment, it allowed it. Any star, including a supergiant can mistreat us without any consequence, complaints are completely ignored. I tried once,”

I held my mouth in horror, who knew things had gotten this bad. I had always thought the conditions of red dwarfs were so horrible too, when people like him couldn’t even make a simple mistake without being hit? What was wrong with the cosmos? “I- I can’t believe that, I’m so sorry. I didn’t know things had gotten that bad. . .our elders were right. We really can’t trust them. Not anymore.” The man looked down with sorrow and patted his damp eyes, it was rightfully so. Ever since the war no one but the larger stars were safe. People weren’t even advised to play nice with their planets anymore. “What’s your name by the way? It’s good for us low masses to stick together you know? Even if you’re a brown dwarf and I'm- not,” I handed him a notepad as well. “Oh and also, if you have the flare app, you can write down your user on here. . . that way we could keep in touch you know?” He nodded his head and started aggressively writing. “It’s Braun, by the way. What’s yours?”

Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

. . .

“Have you heard about the tournament for the new supergiant position?” Braun asked me. I figured I'd walk with him for a while, I had no clue where I was going anyway. His reddish brown loose - curly hair sat right under my shoulder. Every once in a while I'd use his head as an armrest. “What? Oh, no I haven’t. I’d hope it’s someone kind who wins though. We need more of the good ones. Supergiants, I mean.” Ever since the war, the elder’s recommendation system was gone. Now, the supergiant position was chosen by a big tournament with a lot of fighting. Millions of stars gather through the millenium to participate and win, though I’d argue they have no idea what they’re getting into. “You should come and see for yourself! There will be many watching, and it would be nice to have someone with me. The other journalists are always so horrible, and the announcers are usually elsewhere.” It sounded cool, though I was skeptical. Where would I stay? What would I do? I wanted to make a life for myself outside of the cluster I came from, could I even make one there? “I don’t know. Right now I'm kinda looking for something to do. Maybe a job? Something that’s important to . . .people I don’t know. I just. . . I Just can’t tell if i’ll be able to be productive while watching a tournament.” He thought for a bit, and crossed his arms. “Well maybe I can get you a job, or better said my mother star could help. You may know her if you're near her prefecture. Sahl? The prophecy supergiant?” “Sahl is your mother?” I was dumbfounded. The words had brought me back to memories millions of years ago when I first started . . .well, living. “She was the first person I ever knew actually,” I grinned. “Is she still as sweet as she was back then? I remember her being very nice to me.” His mouth widened into a crooked smile. “Fortunately yes, she is! And even to me she’s a great mother star. Even after the deal that caused it all.” “There was a deal involved? I’d like to hear about that,” I mentioned.

“It starts with two of the supergiant stars, my mother Sahl, and her coworker Mekomia. They had neighboring prefectures, but never ever got along; Though for good reason. Mekomia was and still is a proud bigot and constantly bad mouths low mass stars and planets. She swore on her life that all of them were below high mass stars and were simply less smart and couldn’t perform as well. Well, my mother disagreed. She said that since the war they haven’t been given the proper resources, and if they were, they could do just as much as any other star could. And so, they set up an experiment," “And?” “The experiment was me. I was raised by Sahl as her son for around 2 hundred years; got the hang of all the star essential knowledge. Then, at 3 hundred I was given a test on all that stuff I learned, provided by Mekomia. It wasn’t hard and I passed, but short answer, she didn’t care.” I could believe it. I had heard stories from far and wide of her prefecture and how badly red dwarfs were treated there. Me and Ryko always stood clear of it. “That’s just horrible. People will do anything to be hateful, even ignore what’s so obviously in front of their eyes,” I noted. Braun nods his head. Suddenly a bright, luminous figure appears over me and Braun, and his deep green eyes light up. “Miss Sahl!”