Welcome to the Journal of Now and Forever. This Journal is a collection of my Star Control and Star Control 2 fiction. Note: Some of this material is, by necessity, extrapolation from the slim information provided by canon sources.

New fiction is posted first at My Livejournal before it appears here. This story is in response to 15 Minute Ficlets' Challenge #68.

The word came down from on high: as with the ground-pounders, the spacers had to exercise too. Otto accepted it without trouble. After all, it was necessary. If it didn't stay healthy and in shape, the body would have trouble efficiently fighting off the effects of space.

That didn't mean the exercises were fun, but at least they made sense. Not for the first time, the majority of spacers were glad that artificial-gravity generators had been developed before the Exodus. The negative effects of extended weightlessness had been known even to the Earthlings, long before the Androsynth were Created. That was part of the reason, too, that the spacers were encouraged to regularly spend time on Eta Vulpeculae 2 – not only to reacquaint themselves with ground life, but to experience natural gravity and circadian rhythms.

Otto had managed to avoid ground time. It didn't interest him. His friends and acquaintances were all on the Starbase or in ships, not on the ground. He had no interest in ever returning to the surface. As long as he stayed in space, he could return to hyperspace. As long as "ground time" was encouraged but not mandatory, he'd continue to avoid it.

He suspected, of course, that sooner or later someone would put the pressure on him to shake the metaphorical dust of micrometeorites from his clothes, go planetside and spend time there. But until then, why invite trouble? He made sure his record was good, as close to spotless as possible, so that there'd be no reason to ship him down.

It wasn't antipathy to the planet. He supposed it was all right. He simply had no desire to be there.

Time had passed and the fear generated by the probe had faded with the lack of new information. Everyone knew someone else was out there, but with no other signs of them, the knowledge had passed on to the same level of awareness as Yes, the sun exists - there, but not important enough to think about on a daily basis. Even Otto didn't let it impact him anymore, even on patrols. Sometimes he wondered about it, but such speculation was ultimately fruitless.

The funny thing about space work was that there was, after a time, very little to do. Those who culled minerals and radioactives from neighboring worlds at least had the slight novelty of a new world and hunting for said minerals, sometimes avoiding earthquakes or bad weather or the occasional aggressive lifeform. The very capriciousness of a planet at least meant the resource cullers had a moderately varied existence.

In space, there was a lot less of that. Yes, they had weather, of a sort, depending on the size and stability of the closest star, but hyperspace in particular was very uniform to most of those who traveled in it, once they were accustomed to the groans and shrieks from outside. But the patrol crews regularly raided Starbase for any new books or funroms or vids, no matter the quality, and after the initial grumbling, the exercise programs had highly enthusiastic participants. If nothing else, there was always competition over who could lift the most weight or continue pedaling the longest.

It wasn't exactly Otto's cup of tea, but he went along with it, enough to make sure he passed physicals. There was talk of challenging other ships' crews to some grand contest, something like the Olympics back on Earth. Well, if that was what they wanted, he was happy to go with the group, so long as he got to drive.

Comments? Email me: laridian at aol dot com