Holos flickered along the sides of the mirror as Elian gazed into its reflective surface . He dismissed them with a touch, as he took in his bloodshot eyes and tired face. His gray-blue eyes were puffy, ringed with black circles. His pupils were large, which was common for darksiders, allowing his eyes to pull in more light. He kept his dark hair cropped short, and his face clean shaven. He looked unremarkable, like most of the Rodite darksiders. Elian stood just under six foot, relatively tall for a Roditian, who were shorter than the inhabitants of most planets, taller only than the Vulcans. He pressed his hand to the mirror, and water dispensed from the tap underneath it. He cupped it, and washed his face, his numb mind enjoying the cool sensation. Drying his face on a towel, he walked out of the bathroom into the apartment.

It was a single room, large enough for a bed and food preparation area. The bathroom he had just come from was separate, taking up one corner, but otherwise the room was square. Instead of a window, a holo flashed on the opposite wall, showing a standby screen. Using a voice command, Elian turned on the streamer, which beamed a control unit into the space in front of him. An implant would have let him control the streamer remotely with his thoughts, but he didn’t know anyone who had one installed. He put his hand into the holo control, and pulled it along as he sank into his bed. The single bed was soft, made of aerofoam, which molded around him as he settled into it. Fatigue washed over him as he flicked through the streams on the front page of the directory, eventually finding one that was showing people from all over the system as they reacted to the announcement. His thoughts drifted back to his father as he absentmindedly watched a pair of tall and pale Dominians, smiling and laughing, as they spoke to the interviewer about the Reseeding. “Oh it’s just so amazing, I cant believe it! We will both be entering,” one said, as her friend nodded enthusiastically beside her. Core worlders were always smiling, bright eyed with their perfect teeth, which annoyed him. He flicked to another view, which showed an Icaran man, probably a hauler, based on the suit he wore and the scars on his hands. His father had the same hands, covered in scars, caused by handling the harvested asteroids during the extraction process. The gloves the companies gave them offered little protection, and any damage to the gloves resulted in burns and cuts.

Elian thought about the sacrifices his father had made for him, having to provide for him after the incident at the fabrication plant had killed his mother, along with thousands of others, over ten years ago. There had been no payout from the company, due to some bullshit legal loophole, which had left him and his father without a second, necessary, income. His father had been an office worker in a data center, but the pay wasn’t enough to provide for both of them, so he became a hauler. He wistfully swiped through the streams as his mind reached back, thinking about everything that had happened in the last ten years. After his father had become a hauler they had lived a somewhat comfortable life, especially since he had started working as soon as somewhere would accept him. The first job he got was as a crawler, crawling maintenance tunnels to do simple maintenance jobs. On the brightside, they had drones to do work like that, but darksiders had to take any job they could get. For the last 2 years he had been working in the shuttle bays, common work for Rodite darksiders. Roditians were usually stronger than people from the other planets, due to living in higher gravity, which suited the heavier work. As a darksider, his eyes were well suited to working inside the shuttles, repairing the small mechanisms that made up the drives, needing less light and being able to make out small details more easily.

He looked at his hands, callused, but not scarred like his father’s, and he knew he really didn’t have many options. He might be able to get a loan, but it would be unlikely that a bank would give him one. A credit lender might provide him with one, but he and his father would most likely both be in debt for the rest of their lives if he took it. Elian sighed, it wasn’t so much that he had an issue with the Reseed, he just hated being in the spotlight. The Reseed was the most televised event in the entire empire, and had been since the planetary systems had been connected thousands of years ago. It had gone through multiple iterations, changing themes and biomes to keep the event interesting. He flicked through the interviews as he wondered what the theme would be for this season, recalling a season that had run during his childhood where the entire thing happened underwater. Last season had been weird, all the entrants had been forced to choose a limb to have immobilized for the first 24 hours, which had been unfortunate, considering they had dropped them in a blizzard biome. The theme for the season was announced only after the application process closed, which was meant to keep things fair, but he suspected it was actually to build suspense. The interviews were always better when people were kept in the dark.

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He flicked the controls, selecting one of the holos for the Reseed that shimmered at the sides of the stream. It opened up, expanding to a full view, with the announcement becoming interactive. Most holos had interactive options to drive engagement, and he found himself presented with nearly limitless options. Flashing words zipped past, providing a running commentary on the reaction of the people in the system, which he ignored, instead opening a view showing graphs and predictions. The charts and figures blinked as they provided real-time data on the number of applicants, with options to break the information down from planet level to even individual living blocks. Unsurprisingly, Dominion had the highest number of applicants so far, both in terms of number and percentage of total population. Unsurprisingly, Frigus had the reverse, with the least total applicants and lowest percentage of population having applied. He was, however, surprised to see that less than 15 percent of Vulcans had applied, since usually at least a third or so of a planets population applied immediately upon the appearance of the announcement. This puzzled him, as Vulcan was the poorest planet in the system, the conditions on the planet so harsh that the population was forced to invest heavily in habitat systems, which were expensive to purchase and upkeep. Usually the less affluent planets saw among the highest application rates. Moving the screen out from the stats, he sighed, and expanded the application information to take up the full view. A countdown blinked in the middle of the screen, with the words 'Apply now!!!' in large font under a neon green timer: currently showing a time of 2 days, 19 hours and 4 minutes. More text sat underneath, providing information on the application process - ‘Welcome potential applicant; Elian, Rodite D- block number 474 room 3,331, pop number 6,534,123. The Reseed welcomes you to apply for the TRAPPIST-1 season, applications now open. Following the closure of the application window, all applicants will be invited to participate in the first of three stages in the application process. Further information will be provided to you upon success in the first stage’. Beneath this was a glowing text that could be interacted with, displaying the words ‘Apply here’, and at the very bottom was a wall of small text, the fine print. A few sentences jumped out at him as he quickly scanned through it; ‘By to applying to the Reseed, you agree to be filmed at any time, by camera, drone, or any other visible or invisible recording device’ and ‘If chosen to enter the Reseed, you agree to be transported to Earth by the fastest means, at the discretion of the Reseed foundation’ and ‘The Reseed gains the right to implant into or otherwise alter your body with non invasive tech, which may result in permanent changes’ and, finally, ‘The Reseed accepts no responsibility for any damage to person or reputation that may occur during filming’.

Elian sighed, pushed his head back into his pillow, and applied to the Reseed.