The city of Zetlank is unmotorious in its isolation.
- Carved into the Scrumtollian hills.
- On a rocky moon.
- That nobody ever leaves.
- Or visits.
I began to recall the previous night’s partying. I’d been celebrating the night before my wedding. Everyone was telling me that I had to drink the léargas, that all Zetlankians drink it once.
It took time to find somewhere that sold some, but I eventually found a spot down a narrow side street.
‘They told me you’d be calling. Come in. Take a drink’, croaked the crone who answered the door.
I did:
- And my head began to spin.
- And I fell to the floor.
‘Wake up maggot!’
The command was barked by someone in uniform.
Behind them was a large window revealing the most amazing display of stars I’d ever seen.
‘I hope you’re not talking to me’, I said.
Their reply was to aim a kick at my ribs.
I grabbed the extended leg and yanked them onto the ground. I hopped their head on the floor until they stopped moving. I stood up and looked around.
There was a gaunt figure cowering on the other side of the room.
‘We’ll be killed when they find the body’, said the crouching figure.
‘Where am I? What happened?’, I asked.
‘Onboard the IGS Triumph. You were shanghaied. To fight in Andromeda.’
‘Why?’
‘How can you not know? There is no why. Life is short and brutal. The entire universe is at war and it has always been so.’
I could tell from the tone that it was the truth.
- My head began to spin.
- And I collapsed for a second time.
‘I take it you’ve had enough’, laughed the old woman.
The city of Zetlank is unmotorious in its isolation.
- Nobody ever leaves.
- Or visits.
An Roinn Ultra - Irish Science Fiction 