Anise Flower:
No one wants to travel to other planets.
Even though I was born in the most technologically advanced country, with ships capable of traveling through space at faster-than-light speeds and luxury comforts, citizens fear the unknown of the deep cosmos. This is why they send us in their place, as human curiosity outweighs fear or reason.
“The Freed”, is the nickname we receive. Children without names abandoned by their parents who end up in an orphanage without conditions, captives until they reach adulthood and are sent to the unexplored dressed as astronauts.
If it weren't for the fact that the masses would speak horrors of them, they would send us at any age, but luckily I could somewhat enjoy my closed-off childhood. No games, no friends, only raised with the same purpose as the others: to be a disposable explorer.
The only good thing about this whole farewell parade is that I still have nothing to lose, no one to miss, in fact, I’m eager to leave, to sit at the damn control panel and crash the ship as soon as it leaves our planet's orbit.
(…)
Finally, all the streamers and carnival songs were over.
My companions, complete strangers, packed food boxes in the ship’s pantry. I wasn’t going to be the lazy one on the crew, so I also started carrying some boxes until I saw a girl fall to the ground with a box in her arms.
I don’t know why I approached and helped her up, but once I looked at her closely, I noticed, confirmed by the tone of her voice, that it was actually a boy.
“Thanks… I guess I tried to lift more than I could…”
He looked up as a nervous giggle escaped his mouth, revealing a face that for some reason seemed so radiant that I was compelled to look away.
Is he a living example of the word “beautiful”?
I noticed him leaning to lift the box again, so I stepped forward and carried it before he could. I worried he might fall again for no rational reason, blaming it perhaps on that small, defenseless animal face…
“I’ll do it…” I murmured as I turned toward the ship. My face strangely burned and I had a stomachache. We hadn’t even started the trip and I was already feeling nauseous. Incredible.
The boy grabbed the sleeve of my shirt, making me stop and focus my attention on him.
“Wait… it’s just… I don’t know anyone here… and you seem like a nice person… so…” He looked as nervous as I felt. I couldn’t blame him. Who knows how the other members have been trained. Some might even be dangerous.
It would be very cruel of me to leave him alone to be torn apart.
“… if you want… we could meet up again on the ship…”
His eyes, already large, widened a bit more, shining like the gems in books about objects to seek on other planets.
“Great! I was afraid of being rejected… what’s your name?”
…
Oh.
Does he have one? They were definitely more lenient at his training center.
I knew he wasn’t asking out of malice, but the word “name” isn’t something that “The Freed” usually possess. Another thing that prevents us from living a normal life.
I hesitated whether to make up one or tell him the truth, eventually just shaking my head.
“Don’t worry about it now. We’ll have more time to talk later.”
Mentioning to a stranger that in my fourth-rate orphanage they didn’t even bother naming their future puppets didn’t seem like a good topic to start a conversation.
(…)
After equipping all the boxes, checking engines, doing a headcount, a brief physical exam, etc., the anticipated moment to board the ship arrived.
I noticed several crew members chatting animatedly among themselves while distributing the real suits we would wear throughout our mission. They were all different bright colors, as if my childhood home wasn’t the only place where its creatures weren’t named. Apparently not.
We were 17 crew members. Seventeen people without names or relevance to anyone outside the organization.
Nine males and eight females.
We were lined up by height, given custom-made uniforms for each of us.
The first was the boy from earlier, who was given a suit of Zima Blue, or so it said on his identification as he passed by and showed it to me with a proud smile.
They continued handing out the uniforms as we changed.
Red, Yellow, Lilac, Lavender, Orange, White, Turquoise, Violet, Peach, Olive Green, Pink, Gray, Black, Brown, Sky Blue, and finally me, Anise Flower. I’d say they actually gave me a yellowish-orange suit with flecks of brown, but I’m no painter, so I didn’t comment on it.
A man in a military green uniform with several pretentious medals stood in front of us, wearing a look of superiority as he stood on a small platform with his chin up and hands behind his back.
“You don’t matter to me. I don’t know you, so remember this well: The main rule is to only communicate among yourselves using the names on your identification. Anyone who breaks this rule will not be allowed to work with us again. You know what that means. I assume you’ll understand the rest from your previous training. Get going, you bunch of scum.”
He basically said, “Since you won’t be useful for not being able to follow something so simple, we’ll get rid of you and no one will notice.” All that was left was for him to spit on each of us to finish it off.
Some watched in shock as he left without changing his expression, questioning several parts of his slight pep talk.
As if we wanted to work with them in the first place.
(…)
Everyone took their respective seats before fastening their seatbelts and waiting for the countdown to take off.
I looked around, curious about who my seat neighbors would be.
To the left, a pair of girls trembling and holding hands, along with two other girls and three boys.
In front, a boy and a girl at the helm.
The countdown ended, but even with the ship’s trembling, I recognized that the person directly to my right was the boy I had met earlier. He remained still with his head slightly resting on his shoulder, so I assumed he was asleep. Or fainted.
Apart from him, there were three girls and three boys scattered in the seats.
A blinding light and terrifying noises hit us as we passed through the atmosphere, settling into complete calm while small objects floated around the ship without needing the thrusters.
I looked to my right again, clenching my fists due to anxiety.
This time, he had his eyes half-open, apparently bored.
Seeing him so relaxed despite the tense situation was making me sleepy as well, but as soon as I decided to give in to sleep and close my eyes, a loud crash shook the entire ship, almost throwing us all out of our seats.
Did we just leave and already get hit by a satellite or asteroid?
I thought I’d have to crash the ship myself. This is really good service.
Once the ship’s movement settled and the artificial gravity took effect, we started checking if our transport had sustained serious damage and if we needed to return for immediate repairs.
Some stayed in the control room, while the rest of us split into teams to better check the ship’s surroundings. My partner was that boy, “Zima Blue.”
We couldn’t find any leaks in the oxygen tanks, so it wasn’t necessary to use helmets.
One less worry.
Zima Blue walked surprisingly calmly through the corridors, pointing his flashlight at the darker areas between the exposed circuits on the walls.
I found it strange to see all the mess of cables, but since my partner showed no interest in it, I assumed it wasn’t relevant.
“There doesn’t seem to be any damage here… should we finish checking this corridor or go to another area?”
“… I think we should ask the others how they’re doing, but let’s finish checking this corridor first.”
He looked very upbeat despite being in a somewhat dangerous situation. What if the ship had a hole that could open at any moment due to the collision? If it were in the area where we were, we’d be at high risk of being blown into the infinite void and dying frozen at any moment.
“Ah, wait! What’s that?”
He directed the light to one of the ventilation hatches, where there was a strange viscous and transparent substance.
“Ugh… the cables seem to have cracks… or maybe they used expired oil…” He touched the substance with the tip of his index finger, letting out a disgusted groan and wiping it on the wall when it stuck to his glove.
At least it wasn’t acid.
“Why would a cable need oil in the first place?”
He looked at me with a slightly furrowed brow, curling his lower lip in a pout.
“Well, then tell me what that stuff is and why the cables are also covered in it.”
I opened my mouth intending to give an intelligent explanation, closing it again after seriously thinking about it.
Why would they want to lubricate the cables? That would only make them harder to handle.
“… it must be something with modern ships…” I replied while shrugging.
Zima Blue sighed and crossed his arms, pointing (I hope accidentally) the flashlight directly at my face. I used my hand to shield my eyes, seeing a white spot with each blink.
“You’re right, it could be some kind of cooling substance or to move the cables more easily.”
“Yes, good analysis, now please stop shining the light on my face…”
He quickly moved the flashlight away, turning it off so clumsily that it almost fell more than five times. He, not the flashlight.
Somehow, that seemed… cute…
“I-it’s true… I haven’t introduced myself yet… my name is-.”
I stopped him before he could sabotage himself. He looked surprised at how quickly I had covered his lips with the tips of my fingers.
“Remember that we can't say our names. For now, we are Azul Zima and Flor de Anís. Okay?”
He lowered his head, staring at the ground for a few seconds.
“But… when the mission is over… will we still be friends and will you tell me your name?”
My mind went blank.
Friends? Were we friends? I had never had a friend before, mainly because at my upbringing center, all the children were isolated so they wouldn’t waste time on silly conversations and would focus on lessons and scheduled physical activities, so I didn't know how to get one. The idea of him being my friend felt… pleasant...
I wasn’t sure how to handle the fact that my lips curved upwards persistently. I hoped I didn’t look like a fool.
“… if you want… when we get back to Earth… we can still be friends…”
He jumped into my arms, wrapping his own around my shoulders. I returned the gesture, holding his waist without worrying about his feet touching the floor.
Was there something that scared him on the ground, or was he just happy?
“Hooray!” He laughed with a beautiful trill close to my ear. My stomach twisted again. I cleared my throat and let him carry his own weight again. He tilted his head, looking at me with an expression I couldn’t understand, but it didn’t seem threatening. “Let’s go back to the others; there doesn’t seem to be anything strange or out of place here.”
We headed back to the pilot’s room. No one had found anything unusual.
Black Tulipa
