It had been 50 years since “the occupation” but he was born way after it happened.

From what he could read, humanity was better now than it had been by itself. Climate change, wars, poverty, racism, religious conflicts, discrimination.. all that were things he read in history books.

The Empire was formed but a myriad of races and humanity was one of them.

His studies had been outside Earth from a small age, the human concept of family was something they would study about just in case one wanted to be a colonist, but he always knew he wanted to be an explorer. It was not forbidden and some humans would do video conferences with their families and even spend their vacation time in their homes but he was really not that interested, he preferred to spend his free time in the library learning about all the different races and places and stuff.

That was possible because the Empire didn’t suppress previous history and knowledge, all information pre-Empire was available for everyone to read so they could see how much humanity had improved.

But there was also available the history of all races part of the Empire and, for historians and everyone with a bit of intelligence, the consensus was that the Empire was a good thing.

But amongst all races of the Empire humanity was in a class of their own. There were more bipeds carbon-based, but few were omnivorous. There were more species whose cradle was a death-world, but few were death-worlds as dangerous as Earth and of those few, none were carbon-based or omnivorous. And above all, none of those species born from death-worlds had the artistic capabilities of humans, which was something that intrigued the Empire from the beginning, and one of the reasons they decided to conquer us.

After his mandatory studies he did his internship on the Exxavian, a scientific ship dedicated to analyze newfound systems. They would analyze the composition of planets and evaluate their capability to contain one of the Empire races, to be terraformed or to just extract minerals.

During his two years internship they didn’t find any new species but they did find some ruins of previous civilizations in some devastated planets, he remembered thinking “if the Empire would have found them sooner, they could’ve saved them”.

So, now, at 24 years old, he was officially an explorer full grade, and a new ship was waiting for him in the Starport of his choice and he had chosen the one near Barcelona, he was born by the Mediterranean after all.

The Exxavian had docked in the Sol system station, a huge base capable of hosting 4 million beings and 200 ships located in the L4 Lagrange point, and he had said his goodbyes and best wishes to everyone who worked with him. He had learned a lot but never really mingled, his was a lonely soul.

Now, in the Shuttle on his way to Earth, he was preparing for his first solo mission.

He was reading all the communications from the explorer guild, he would have the ship and everything he needed for free provided that he kept accomplishing the guild quotas, which wasn’t really difficult to be honest.

Since he had marked his preference for a solo mission his ship was a small Kirkugger class, a vessel 30m long with a lot of automated systems and self-replicating bots. The funny thing about the Kirkuggers though was that they were half organic, so things like lights and food would grow automatically by themselves. The bots were capable of healing everything but the core, and the core was so protected that it would be safe even if impacted by a Supernova, the ship shields were that good.

While reading the guild communications there was one flagged as ‘very important’, it was his assigned psychologist.

He clicked on it and it was a video, a reptilian face, yellow eyes on a green patched body with scales that seemed like a crown on top of his head, appeared on it.

"I’m Dr. Vann’hra, first congratulations on becoming a full fledged explorer, I can see on your report cards that it’s been kind of easy for you, you humans never cease to surprise me. I can see you’ve opted for a solo mission and been assigned a Kirkugger, that’s fine and all but I won’t have you really going solo. You will have a pet, this is not optional and it will help you on the ship.

"Attached to this message you’ll find a ticket you can exchange at a shop on the Starport, they already have one I personally selected for you. Despite being quite young it has been modified a bit so you don’t have to train it, it will know what to do and how to do it, we wouldn’t want an Empire ship dirty with animal feces and urine would we.

"I wish you good luck and remind you about the mandatory contact with me once every six months for the first 3 years of your mission. Please answer once you’ve accommodated on the ship.

That was weird, he hadn’t been informed of that, but the psychologists had this kind of power, the Empire worked because everyone was behaving according to Empire regulations after all.

He read a bit more messages, about supplies, the systems he had to go to first, and more detailed information regarding the Kirkugger.

When the shuttle started descending to the planet he received a message from his family, they have kept in contact and talked a bit throughout the years, they had been informed about his visit to Earth and wanted to have dinner with him before leaving and left an address; he confirmed the visit, why not? It could be fun and wouldn’t hurt to have some personal contact before his solo mission.

The first thing he felt when he was leaving the shuttle was the smell of the Mediterranean, something struck him and he got goosebumps all over his body and, somehow, he couldn’t even walk while a few tears descended from his eyes. Did he miss it that much? He had only spent his first five years of life before being sent to the intergalactic school but that salted wind was bringing back some memories.

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He pushed back the melancholy, smiled to himself, with some time in his hands he decided to go check his assigned vessel.

He left the shuttle hub, ignoring the buzzing activity around him, walked straight to the information cabin where he could see 5 humans and 3 beings from other species, a reptilian like his psychologist - those were the Ravnars - a purple gas being inside a cylindrical tube - probably Yuren, but he always mixed the gas beings - and a sand colored insectoid towering among all others, one of the Grhjujiik. Almost all were attending someone else so he approached one of the available humans, a young blonde girl with green-blue eyes.

"Hi, I’m citizen XEA-6889475861, I have been assigned a ship" - he said in galactic showing his ID card

The girl scanned the card and looked at her screen.

"Pleased to meet you mr. Jordi Roig" - she said with a really accented galactic, giving the ls a totally different sound from what he was used to - "your assigned vessel is on dock G-25, please put your hand on the terminal so we can finish the registration."

A terminal emerged from the table in front of him and he did as requested, the terminal had a gelatinous substance and he felt a tickle on his palm. After a few seconds a green led blinked and he removed the hand, which was completely dry much to his surprise.

"Thank you!" - she said with a smile - "enjoy your ship and congratulations. Always happy to see a new explorer."

"Thanks" - he said nervously, he really wasn’t used to this type of interaction.

He located the dock quite easily, one thing the Empire had was order and once you’ve been in one Starport you could find yourself in any other.

He arrived at the dock marked G-25 and passed his ID in front of a terminal by the door, the door opened and there it was, the ship held by two clamping dock legs held in the middle of a spacious hangar.

The first thought that came to him was that the ship was beautiful.

Looking at it from the side the ship looked like a long silver needle with a mushroom growing at the back. Two lines of green lime color went from the mushroom thing to the center of the ship.

He walked to see it from the front and it looked like a manta ray head, without flippers.

He circled it just trying to get the size of it all while thinking “my ship, my own ship”, there was no way he could suppress that smile.

He approached the door and something like a huge eye appeared on top of it, looked at him and disappeared from view, the door opened and a ramp appeared.

He entered the ship feeling really nervous. The moment he stepped in a warm orange light illuminated the entrance and a robotic neutral voice sounded through the comm system.

"Welcome to your own Kirkugger. Would you prefer I refer to your galactic ID or to your designated name?"

He continued walking and exploring the ship, spacious rounded corridors that were being illuminated with that same light the moment he stepped in.

"My name is fine, thanks ship."

"Acknowledged mr. Jordi Roig. Please remember you have to finish this ship customization before first lift off. The mandatory customization items are ship’s name, AI voice and behavior, internal colors, and leisure database. And please keep in mind this ship has limited space for the leisure database, the limit is 10 peta-bytes."

"Mmmmh, I think I know what to choose about AI and behavior, do you know those old human superhero films ‘the Avengers’? Friday rings a bell?"

"Researching"

And about 30 seconds later the ship spoke to him in a familiar feminine voice.

"Research finished. Hi Boss."

The smile he had been wearing since he entered the ship was now a huge grin.

"This is awesome, you are awesome, this is going to be FUN!"

He continued walking towards the front of the ship and saw there were a few rooms already prepared and furnished like a huge bathroom, the kitchen, and such.

"I’ve been informed that there will be a pet joining us" - the ship said - "and the necessary equipment has been ordered, it should be delivered and installed soon. Also, I’ve organized the rooms in a way that I thought you would like from the data that I received but feel free to make any modifications, all interior walls can be moved or removed if necessary."

He stood in front of a large room with a king size bed in it, over the bed he could see a window that was as long as the wall with the shutters closed. There was a huge wardrobe on one of the walls, when he opened he saw all kinds of clothes already there, he had no doubt everything was tailor suited.

Left the room and continued walking towards the bridge, there was also a gym and a leisure room with a sofa, a big screen and a billiard table.

He continued walking and finally arrived at the bridge, which was basically a seat and some screen panels all around it. It was the smallest room on the ship but he wasn’t going to spend much time on it, apart from the jumps and some system navigation he would be somewhere else.

He sat on the only chair at the bridge and began thinking about names. He was sent young to the academy but his parents always spoke in catalan between them and that was something that stuck, he even took some classes to be able to speak it properly.

"Friday, can you check if the name Espurna is available?"

"Espurna is not currently assigned to any Empire ships, I’ve checked with the register and you can use it."

"Please set the name of the ship to Espurna then."

"Done! Before continuing I need to remind you about your pending call with Dr. Vann’hra and that you still haven’t collected your assigned pet."

"Oh right!" - He looked at the bridge and sighed - "I suppose I should go before it gets late."

He left his ship and exited the hangar. He was told the pet shop was in the Starport so he checked his datapad to find the location and after a few minutes he was standing in front of it.

He could see shelves filled with different foods, toys and a counter with a massive and slender Grhjujiik, their six hands busy. He approached and noticed a sweet scent emanating from them.

"Hi, I have an assigned pet?" - he said while showing his ID

The six hands stopped and the eight eyes, spider like, looked at him and the ID. One of the hands grabbed the scanner and passed it in front, he thought they were frowning somehow.

"Ah!" - A soft voice with a melodic timbre came between those mandibles - "Yes, yes, the mackerel tabby trained for a Kirkugger, right?"

Somehow he thought they were smiling, he hadn't had much interaction with the species but the voice surely sounded like it.

"And the report said it is your first pet, right?" - they continued - "Don’t worry, this cat has been genetically trained to do things properly the only question is how well will you adapt to her"

Again their voice sounded like they were having fun. A cat, he never had any pet but he had watched some cat videos, who hadn’t?

"Be right back!" - they said disappearing through a door.

After a couple minutes they came back with a straw basket, inside he could see a pink blanket and over it, a small ball of fur with ocher and black stripes that ran perpendicular to her spine and lined her legs, she was sleeping in a fetal position hugging her tail.

"She was tired after the treatment, poor thing" - the Grhjujiik continued - "it is important for her to get used to your smell, please keep her close to you the next 24h."

They passed him the basket and he hugged it, keeping it close to his chest.

"Like this?"

"Yeah that’s perfect! I believe all her things have already been sent to your ship, do not hesitate to contact us if you need anything else." - they said waving him goodbye.

He started walking towards his ship looking at the small thing that was going to accompany him in his travels.

"Well, that’s you and me now" - he said with a soft voice - "but what do I name you?"