Red Pirate ship Star Map Draftsman I: Federation War

“Going to the moon base or Mars base is just one more four-legged monster in space. What difference is there from living on Earth?” That was the first thing his wife said, in a bad mood, when Dawn Lucius and she were discussing the Mars base after the space agency announced the allocation of housing quotas for the engineers. Mrs. Lucius had always believed that there was no difference between the other inhabited planets in the galaxy and Earth: no green men with four hands, no gray men with big heads and small bodies, and no insects that ate people. “Think about it, if people on Earth look like this, what can people elsewhere look like?” If she were around Dawn Lucius right now, she would be very proud of her summary.

Dawn Lucius woke up to the sound of bumps and cries and found himself inside a large metal cage. There were two children beside Dawn Lucius, and he recognized them as the two who had been taking care of him. He didn’t have the strength to speak, but in his heart he called them big kid and little kid. The shackles on the feet and hands were like a spell that prevented them from moving. When Dawn Lucius raised his hands, he found himself in shackles, and the cold iron struck the wound on his wrist, making his skin feel as if it had been cut by a sharp blade. He couldn’t help crying out. Little kid handed him a wet cloth, and when Dawn Lucius looked at him, puzzled, little kid wiped his own skin with the cloth, showing Dawn Lucius what it was for. He took it to heart and wiped the skin near the wound under the shackles, and the pain eased a lot. He supposed that in their long life of slavery they had gathered a lot of valuable experience, finally concentrated into an anesthetic hidden in the cloth, which helped relieve the pain of wounds.

Dawn Lucius pulled back his shirt and looked at his chest. The hole was gone, but the color of this skin was noticeably different from the skin around it, and when he pressed it with his fingers, it felt as if someone had buried a bunch of cactus thorns in it; the tearing sensation coming from the muscles told him he was not dead after all. Dawn Lucius tentatively shook the shackles, and the dull thumping sound told him they were firm. Then he looked at the flexible screen on his arm and the wrist brace locked into his skin. The device seemed to have become a patch of his skin and could not be removed.

“So tell me, what about the slaves?” Just as he was about to find someone to ask about the situation, two men outside the iron cage that held them began to argue, one of them with a gun in his hand, pointing at the people in the cage and questioning the other in a loud voice.

“What else do you want to do? Ah.” The other man violently pushed the gun in his hand aside, forcing the man back half a step.

“You’re the captain of the Red Pirate ship, and you’re asking me now?” The man with the gun stepped back up in front of the man and pressed the question.

“So you still know I’m the captain. I’m trying to save your little life.” The man poked the gunman hard in the chest and continued. “If you were not my brother, I tell you, the others would have thrown you off the ship long ago. You know the Strath people’s methods. They want the Red Pirate ship, and they want the slaves on it to go to Gyaly Planet to fight the war. If you want to haggle with them over terms and prices now, will the Strath people agree? Will they let you and me go?”

“Big brother.” The gunman pressed the muzzle against the captain’s chest and looked down at the floor.

“What do you want?” The captain stared coldly at the gunman.

“You’re too cowardly.” The gunman spoke, his tone low like the wilderness before a storm, so steady it took your breath away. “The Strath people can’t beat Moreth Federation, can’t beat Ashton Federation, and don’t you forget, these slaves are Strath people.” The gunman’s gun was still pressed against the captain’s chest, and he added after looking past the captain’s body at the people in the cage, “The Red Pirate ship makes its living by selling Strath people as slaves, and now you want us to hand over Strath people unconditionally, hand over our slaves without even asking for money. Where has your backbone gone?”

“Backbone doesn’t save lives.” The captain pushed the gun away and put his hand on the gunman’s shoulder, like a father speaking to his child. “Staying alive is most important. Go, go reply to the Strath people.” The captain said this, turned and walked out. What he did not expect was that the gunman would fire. The cage shrank back in fear; the fear was like a wave that had just risen and was rolling toward the beach, and the slaves pulled their feet inward just before it reached them.

“You brute.” The captain struggled on the floor and crawled out, the gunman close behind.

“Brother, leave the Red Pirate ship to me, don’t worry.” The gunman followed him mockingly, with a regretful expression on his face, but his voice was all accusation. “Pirates handing over slaves without asking for money, have you lost your mind, ah? You may be shameless, but I still want to make a living on Orion Arm. I don’t want people to say I’m the worst pirate.” With that, the gunman fired another shot, and after seeing that the captain did not move, he checked the gun while walking toward the iron cage, his intention all too obvious.

Some people in the cage began to beg for mercy, and when they noticed the gunman still approaching, some turned their backs openly, while others lunged across the cage toward the gunman. Dawn Lucius tried to remember what to do. He hadn’t learned these things in his courses at the space agency; he never thought he would be sold as a slave in a cage, or that there would be a gun outside the cage pushing his life to its end, and he didn’t want to go through death again. Dawn Lucius had picked something up from the conversation just now: it looked like three gangs were taking slaves, and Strath people were slaves but Earthlings were not, and this identity seemed to be what would keep him from being killed. So he raised his hand and shouted, “I’m not a slave, I’m an earthling.” Unfortunately, the cries of the crowd drowned out his voice. The gunman did not hear his shout and kept pulling the trigger; even among the slaves crouching in the back row, people were sporadically shot, and when the gun turned to big kid and little kid, Dawn Lucius instantly threw the two children to the ground. After the bullets flew, he checked whether he had been shot. There was no pain in his back; he was still safe. The gunman didn’t stop; he was shooting at the restless crowd as he pleased. Dawn Lucius decided to grab the gun; perhaps dragging it inside through the bars was the way to go. So he lowered his body and felt his way forward, and he had just reached out his right hand when someone behind him tugged on his shirt and pushed him hard to the floor.

Because the person pushed so hard, Dawn Lucius felt the skin around the wound hurt as if it had been torn open. “What are you doing?” Dawn Lucius demanded loudly, and as he turned his face he realized that the one yanking him was a woman, the one he seemed to have seen in the house, though he didn’t know her name was Sandra.

“To save your little life.” The woman answered him while looking warily at the gunman.

“Save it how? By lying down and getting killed, huh?” Dawn Lucius jutted his chin in the direction of the shooter. He tried to keep crawling forward, but the woman still held down his shoulders.

“Don’t be such a frog at the bottom of a well, will you?” The woman laughed contemptuously and continued. “Things here aren’t as easy to handle as in your level zero civilization.”

“Why do you say that? What is a level zero civilization? Where is this? You brought me here, didn’t you?” Dawn Lucius had more questions. The conversation between those two just now had mentioned Strath people, Moreth Federation, and Ashton Federation. If he had not traveled back to some medieval time, then he had been taken to some small island that still had indigenous people. But that was not right, ah. On Earth, people’s knowledge of the sea had increased to 30% from the original 1%, and the level of technological development would not allow any place on Earth to remain undiscovered.

The woman didn’t answer him, she quickly stood up and took off her tattered clothes to reveal a silver and white suit that looked like it symbolized some kind of senior position. The woman held her hands up, walked in the direction of the gunman and shouted, “Hi.” The gunman stopped firing and looked the woman up and down, his mouth unconsciously slightly open.

“Who are you?” The gunman asked, staring at the woman.

“You see me in this outfit and you don’t know who I am?” The woman asked contemptuously in return.

“Ashton Federation diplomat?” the gunman asked tentatively.

“You guessed right.”

“Gee whiz, don’t try to scare me. Anyone can get a suit and pretend to be a diplomat of Ashton Federation. How do I know you’re real?”

“Do you know the penalty for impersonating a diplomat of Ashton Federation? In all your life, have you ever heard of anyone daring to impersonate an official of Ashton Federation?”

The gunman hesitated, looked at the woman and asked, “So how did you get caught up in the crowd of slaves?” As he asked, he walked up and shook the iron cage as hard as he could to test its firmness.

“Use your head and think about why?”

“What’s that got to do with me?” The gunman scoffed ill-humoredly.

The woman sighed and raised her left hand, intending to call up the communication device on her arm. The gunman looked at the projection above the device with some fear, while the slaves in the cage looked at the woman’s back as if expecting a savior. “Hey.” The woman sighed again and slowly walked toward the gunman, then suddenly lunged forward and kicked the cage hard. The gunman backed away in fear and hurriedly pointed his gun at the woman.

“What are you doing?” The gunman asked with an angry roar.

“You stupid bastard, the Strath people are coming to attack Gyaly Planet. I came to tell them to prepare in advance, only to have your stupid ass ruin the plan.” The woman stared at the gunman viciously, as if she would like to tear him to pieces.

“That’s none of my business. Why didn’t you take another ship?”

The woman clenched her fist and waved it in the air, slowing her voice: “You’d better hurry up now and take me to the spaceport while the Strath fleet is still catching up. When they catch up, what do you think they will do to you? You sell Strath people; don’t you want to keep your head?”

“You don’t scare me. The Strath people are going to fight Ashton Federation, not me.” The gunman touched his neck and went on to ask, “Why did you sneak onto the Red Pirate ship? You could use Moreth Federation’s Star Bridge, ah, and jump to the spaceport faster.”

“Are you stupid? The Star Bridge of Moreth Federation cannot be used to take part in war. This has been the rule of Orion Arm for thousands of years, signed into the peace agreement. Use your brain a little, okay?”

“Then what do you want me to do?” Without realizing it, the gunman pointed the gun at the floor and, as he spoke, looked at the woman like a child who had made a mistake.

“Let us out and hurry to the spaceport. I have Moreth Federation’s identification information; they’ll let us into Gyaly Planet.”

“Then all the more reason I can’t let you out.” The gunman smiled smugly, then scanned the woman’s information and turned to leave. Dawn Lucius summed up the rest of the story in one word on his lips: “huh.”

Dawn Lucius was not curious about how he had come back to life; he was more concerned about how he could get back to Earth. When he asked the woman, she looked impatient at first, but then gave him a general idea. In the space knowledge of the earthlings, there are five arms in the galaxy, and the solar system is on Orion Arm; that much was right. What was wrong was the rest. For some reason, Orion Arm is managed by three Federations. Moreth Federation and Ashton Federation are second level civilizations. Moreth Federation has Star Bridge technology, and most places on Orion Arm have Star Bridge entrances and exits, greatly reducing the time of interstellar journeys, but the galaxy coin to be paid for each use is expensive. “No.” When Dawn Lucius asked the woman whether the Star Bridge was time travel, she denied it. From her explanation, Dawn Lucius understood that so-called time travel does not exist. Time is a dimension that measures displacement, and no one can travel in time. How to put it? Probably it means that time is not like a road where a person can choose which point to start walking from; it is a dimension that comes after something has happened. “If you time-travel, do you think you traveled through time, or time traveled through your body?” the woman asked rhetorically.

“I travel in time?” Dawn Lucius replied tentatively.

The woman shook her head and continued. “No one can. As I just said, time does not exist before an event has occurred. Say you travel to the future: for you, the future hasn’t even come yet, so where would you travel to? As for going back to the past, that is even more impossible. An event that has happened is already determined; it is no longer in the state before it happened. If people travel back, where would they go back to?”

“So going back to some known point in history doesn’t work either?” Dawn Lucius still thought that it was possible to travel back in time, as if, for example, a person on Earth went back to the Middle Ages to see the Renaissance, or to the Chinese Song Dynasty to see the lotus flowers on West Lake.

The woman continued to shake her head before opening her mouth and asking, “Does the Song Dynasty still exist?”

“It doesn’t exist anymore.”

“Since it doesn’t exist, and as I told you, time is the dimension that measures displacement, the point you would travel back to doesn’t exist, so no displacement can happen, which means time travel doesn’t happen.”

“When you put it that way, it seems to make some sense.” It was the first time Dawn Lucius had heard someone explain time this way, and he did think it made more sense than the explanations of scientists on Earth.

As for why the solar system is not under the jurisdiction of the three major Federations, the woman’s explanation was that the solar system’s level of civilization is very low, and human knowledge is not enough to take them out of the solar system. The Earth is nothing special, just one of many zero-level civilizations. If the people of Earth cannot find a way to fly out of the solar system before the sun burns out, there will be no Earthlings in the end, just like the other zero-level civilizations that have disappeared.

“What’s a galaxy coin?” Dawn Lucius asked this question, not that he wanted to get rich here, he wanted to know just how much galaxy coin he would need to get back to Earth.

“It is the settlement currency of the three major Federations. It is also a stable coin with a complex collateral mechanism behind it: each Federation sets aside assets in its own star field as collateral for galaxy coin, so that neither side feels anything is unfair when trading.” The woman replied.

“Then I think I understand.” Dawn Lucius pondered. There had been stable coins, or supersovereign currencies, on Earth too; for example, a certain currency on Earth had later been backed by many corporate fixed assets, creating a supersovereign stable currency, and everyone in that community of interest settled in it.

“How did you end up here?” The woman asked.

“Here?” Dawn Lucius gestured at the space between them.

“No.” The woman continued after giving him a blank look. “How did you get to that mining planet before this?”

“I don’t know.” That was a problem for Dawn Lucius, who remembered only what happened on the Sane ship and then waking up, unexpectedly, as a slave locked up here.

“What’s your name?” The woman asked.

“Dawn Lucius.” After answering, Dawn Lucius froze for a moment before opening his mouth to ask, “And you?”

“Sandra,” the woman said with a smile.

“Amazing. I thought aliens were ......” Dawn Lucius took a closer look at Sandra; she was not much different from a woman on earth.

“Were what?” the woman pressed.

“We always thought that aliens were all monsters.” Dawn Lucius replied a little apologetically.

“Pretty ignorant.” Sandra wasn’t being polite.

“Yeah.” Dawn Lucius tucked in his feet and sat up straighter. He didn’t know why he was here; the talk of the Strath people wanting to hijack this ship and attack Gyaly Planet didn’t seem to have anything to do with him. He was more concerned about how to get back to Earth. He continued to ask Sandra: “How can I go back to Earth?”

“Back to Earth?” Sandra was a little taken aback.

“Yeah.”

“Not much of a chance. You don’t stand a chance of earning enough galaxy coin, not to mention we’re being chased by Strath warships now, and when they catch up, who knows what will happen.” Sandra shook her head.

“You said Moreth Federation has the Star Bridge technology, what about Ashton Federation? Do they have the Star Bridge technology?” Dawn Lucius asked.

“No, they don’t.” Sandra looked at Dawn Lucius and simply went on to tell him about the Federations. Ashton Federation was also a second level civilization. They had mastered a medicine technology called White Crystal. She had heard that White Crystal was some kind of secretly extracted substance. Most of the rich people on Orion Arm take White Crystal, which helps them prolong their lives. Together with Moreth Federation, they are the two most developed civilizations on Orion Arm. Neither civilization likes to fight; even if there is a war on a planet in their own Federation, they will not interfere as long as the war is not too big.

Hearing this, Dawn Lucius was a little puzzled. How did they measure whether a war was modest in scale? He didn’t go any deeper on the issue as he lifted his shackles and continued to ask, “So what’s the deal with the Strath people?”

“The Strath people are the administrators of Strath Federation, but there is a strange problem: in the star field governed by Strath Federation, no planet’s civilization has advanced for thousands of years. They have remained at the level of a first class civilization, capable of using very primitive flight technology for interstellar travel, which is more time-consuming, but they cannot develop technology like the Star Bridge.”

“Why are they, like, chasing this ship?” Dawn Lucius pointed to the outside of the cage.

“I don’t know, but my guess is that it has something to do with Gyaly Planet’s ground-based air defense.” Sandra replied thoughtfully.

“Ground-based air defense?” Dawn Lucius asked, puzzled.

Sandra nodded.

Gyaly Planet is a very special planet. It is not covered mostly by oceans like Earth; this planet is almost half land and half ocean. In addition, the planet is very large, with abundant plants and crops on it, and as for its location, it is at the junction of the three Federations’ star fields. The Ashton people first set up a trade reception point on Gyaly Planet, where they transported White Crystal to Gyaly Planet for storage, and rich people from other star fields who wanted to buy White Crystal came to Gyaly Planet to purchase it. Later, the rich people felt that the interstellar route was too time-consuming, so they paid galaxy coin for Moreth Federation to build the Star Bridge near Gyaly Planet. After years of evolution, Gyaly Planet today is made up of three kinds of forces. Ashton Federation people are responsible for the administration and security on the ground of Gyaly Planet, which makes these Ashton people the administrators of Gyaly Planet, while those who provide labor are Strath people who come for the gold rush, and some Strath people are sold over as slaves after committing crimes.

“What’s the other kind of power?” Dawn Lucius asked impatiently.

“Moreth Federation.” Sandra pointed up and continued. “The ships that come to Gyaly Planet are loaded with cargo, but the gravity of Gyaly Planet is too strong, and if these ships go down to the surface of Gyaly Planet, it will be difficult for them to escape its gravity and fly out. So Moreth Federation set up a spaceport above Gyaly Planet as a transit station for trade ships coming and going.”

“Haha, I understand this. Our ship was also built in orbit around our satellite.” Dawn Lucius said with a smug smile.

“That’s what’s happening with Gyaly Planet at the moment.” Sandra concluded.

“And what is this ground-based air defense you speak of?”

“It’s a security mechanism. All ships entering Gyaly Planet need to get identification information from the spaceport, or they will be shot down by the ground air defense.” As she said this, Sandra instantly bounced up from the floor.

“What’s wrong?” Dawn Lucius saw the look on Sandra’s face and stood up with her.

“Oh no, I know why the Strath Federation’s warships are chasing us.”

“Why?”

“Because the Red Pirate ship has passage identification information.”

“So.” Without waiting for Sandra to finish speaking, Dawn Lucius spoke up. “The Strath battleship is trying to hijack the Red Pirate ship so it can avoid the spaceport’s fire and, by taking control of it, get access to the surface of Gyaly Planet, right?”

Sandra did not answer. She rushed to the iron cage and began to study its structure and material. After the surviving slaves had sorted out the dead and stacked the bodies in another corner of the iron cage, they fell silent again and went on staring at the air in front of them with expressionless faces, as if, as long as they did not die, everything else was irrelevant to them. The smell of blood, more tenacious than the slaves’ fear, wandered through the air, and it also woke Dawn Lucius up: if they did not find a way to save themselves, the next wave to be killed could be them.

“How about we find a way to get out of here?” Dawn Lucius spoke up as he walked up behind Sandra.

“How do you escape?”

“By opening the cage, of course, huh?”

“Crap, would I still be here if this cage could be opened?” Sandra glared at Dawn Lucius.

“How about we do it another way?”

“What way?” Sandra half-turned to look at Dawn Lucius.

“Think about it. You told that killer who you are, and the result was not good; the problem is that your argument didn’t move him, ah. If you tell him that you have a big pile of galaxy coin on Gyaly Planet and can give him half, he will probably be moved and fly to the spaceport as fast as he can.”

“Why?” Sandra asked half-heartedly.

“Pirates, they are pirates. In the end it’s all about galaxy coins.” Dawn Lucius was so anxious that he gestured in the air for a while.

“Oh.” Sandra turned around and continued to examine the metal cage.

“You don’t believe me?”

“It’s not that I don’t believe you, but what you say sounds very childish, like playing games with children, hey ......” Sandra let out a long sigh; she was now doubting whether the person in front of her was really Star Map Draftsman. She took a deep breath and said, “I am a diplomat, not a businessman. I wouldn’t have a large amount of galaxy coin stored on Gyaly Planet. And even if I happened to know a rich businessman who had a large amount of galaxy coin on Gyaly Planet, and this businessman told me where the galaxy coin was hidden and also told me the password to open the safe, why would I take him there to open it? Never mind ...... you can’t even make up a story.”

Dawn Lucius listened to Sandra, swallowed the saliva stuck in his throat and then said, “I mean, if you say that the officials will reward him with more galaxy coin, he will believe it more. After all ......” Dawn Lucius pointed to Sandra’s clothes and continued. “You are an official, ah.”

“How can you just say that?”

“All right.” Dawn Lucius listened with some disappointment. He looked down to check the shackles on his feet, trying to find some chance of getting out. Just then, there was the sound of dense gunfire behind them, and the iron cage was instantly gripped by fear again.

The gunman came back. Before Dawn Lucius had time to get to the other side of the cage, the panicked slaves hit the floor. Two dozen people emerged behind the gunman, and Dawn Lucius noticed that several of them wore the same brown shoes, not the style of pirates, but more like standard army issue. Dawn Lucius looked at Sandra, who was now staring at a man behind the gunman as if she knew him. As Dawn Lucius looked at the group of people, another group of brown-clad people came in carrying several boxes, set them down in front of the metal cage and opened the lids; they were filled with guns.

The man Sandra was staring at calmly walked up to the crowd and waved his hand to signal the slaves out of the cage. Some of the older people went first, and the rest naturally followed. Sandra mixed into the middle of the crowd and went to stand behind the slaves, and Dawn Lucius followed her closely. He had a bad feeling. Why was the gunman so obedient? Who was this person who had come? What did the boxes of weapons mean? Also, the pale young man seemed mild, but he was probably up to no good.

“Brothers and sisters, I’m sure you don’t know me.” The pale young man said this as he walked over to a box, and after picking a gun out of it, he faced the crowd and continued. “But you will soon get to know me. I am the one who has come to free you. No one is born a slave, and no one may enslave others, yet in the whole of Orion Arm, only Strath people are sold around as slaves, while Moreth people and Ashton people are never treated as slaves. They treat us as ordinary commodities; in their eyes we are worth less than an umbrella on a rainy day. They kill Strath people wantonly and plunder Strath people wantonly, and some Strath people are even born slaves. Do you think this is fair?” After the young man finished speaking, he looked at the crowd and found that no one responded. He walked to another box, picked up another gun, and together with the first one, handed it to the nearest slave. Then he turned around and walked a few steps with his back to the slaves, as if he were framing what he was going to say next.

The young man turned, scanned the crowd and then quickly plunged into it, and when he came out he was holding a young man’s hand. The two walked to where he had stood when he first spoke, and he held the man’s hand up in the air and spoke coldly: “Strath people have always been at a disadvantage in trade. Ashton people use White Crystal to control the people of other planets; they can dump their goods on us without fair pricing, but buy our food at the lowest price. And in their eyes, the hardworking Strath people are treated as slaves and trampled on with impunity. Some of you may be sold as slaves for the first time, but think carefully: your grandparents, your parents, your brothers and sisters, in order to make a good life for their children, toiled in the vast nebulae of Orion Arm, looking for a chance to earn more money, and as a result, Ashton people encouraged the pirates to plunder them and treat them as slaves, and you have never seen these relatives since.”

The young man shook his head. He let go of the man’s hand, put his hands behind his back and leaned his body forward, his eyes as fixed as if he had spotted dropped candy on the cold, raw floor. Some of the slaves began to stir, the sound of tiny footsteps spread across the floor, and a woman who had lost a loved one began to cry. Dawn Lucius looked around, hoping to find a door that would open onto any part of the earth, as long as he could go back.

“Okay, I’m going to ask you one more thing. Which of you has four galaxy coins on you? Raise your hand and show me.” The young man’s eyes turned stern as he stared at the old man in front of him, and he began to jab hard in the air at each person as he continued. “You haven’t had even four galaxy coins in your long lives. Do you know that even if this ship brings you to the spaceport of Gyaly Planet, the Moreth people make each person pay four galaxy coins to go down to the surface of Gyaly Planet? They prettily call it giving each person an ID card, but do you really have an identity? Ask yourselves ......” The young man hammered his chest hard, swallowed and continued. “When has your life ever belonged to you?”

“Never ......” someone among the slaves answered.

“Speak up and tell me, when has your life belonged to you?”

“Never.” The person who had just answered raised his voice, and a few voices matched it.

“Very well. The spirit of the Strath people has not been destroyed by cruel fate. Let me ask you, do you want to make your lives your own?”

“We do!” The crowd answered in ragged waves.

“How badly do you want it?” The young man rushed up to the crowd, walking back and forth anxiously.

“Very much so!”

“Speak up.” The young man raised his hands in the air and shouted.

“Very much so!” The people’s voices changed from scattered shouts at the beginning into a single, unified slogan.

“Finally.” The young man raised his hands high, and after the crowd quieted down, he clenched his fists and continued. “There’s only one way to make your life your own, and that’s to fight.” He pointed to the crates of weapons on the floor and turned to the crowd before shouting, “All I can do is unshackle you and get you to the spaceport with my fleet. To get your lives back, destroy those who have taken them away from you, the Moreth people and the Ashton people. As soon as they are gone from Gyaly Planet, you will be truly free. Now, those of you who want to be free, go and pick your weapons.”

As soon as the young man finished, some of the slaves rushed toward the weapons boxes, snarling and shoving anyone who might grab the weapons they wanted, while some were unmoved, including Dawn Lucius. He did not want to go to war. He had not seen what Gyaly Planet’s weapons looked like, could not predict how much killing power they had, and could not find any meaning for himself in this battle. He hoped the young man would hurry up and take the people who had chosen weapons back to their warship and leave the Red Pirate ship behind; then he could find a few slaves who could fly the ship and talk them into taking him back to Earth, or simply ask Sandra to take him back, so that he could see Stacean Lucius again. He had thought it over: once he got back to Earth this time, he would never leave. Dawn Lucius instinctively looked at Sandra, but found that she was gone. He was looking around when he saw her picking out weapons at the weapons box.

“What are you doing?” Dawn Lucius asked, puzzled, as he walked up to her.

“Picking a weapon.” She replied without turning to look at Dawn Lucius, her back to him.

“Why are you going, ah? Don’t you understand? The Ashton people they’re going to fight, aren’t they the ones you were going to warn? Instead of warning them to prepare their air defense, you’re picking weapons to fight them. Why, ah?”

“Shut up. I suggest you hurry up and pick a weapon.”

“I’m not picking. It’s not my fight.”

“If you want to stay alive, take one of these and get up next to me.”

“I want to live, but I don’t need a weapon.”

“I say, are all of you level zero civilizations so stupid? No one is asking you to fight. Weapons have many uses; besides killing the enemy, the most important is protecting your own life. Don’t you understand this?”

After hearing Sandra’s words, Dawn Lucius approached the case half-heartedly. He was wondering whether to take the big one or the small one when Sandra casually took out a gun from the case and dropped it on Dawn Lucius’s chest. Dawn Lucius grabbed the gun firmly while looking around warily, deeply afraid that someone would accuse him of possessing an illegal firearm. “Give me a small one.” Dawn Lucius said to Sandra.

Dawn Lucius was about to ask, but Sandra seemed to have finished picking out her weapon, weighing it in her hand and then tapping it to her satisfaction. Dawn Lucius said, “Stay close to me,” and then walked quickly into the crowd of people who had chosen their weapons. The others did not choose any weapons but just stood silently where they were, and the two groups formed a stark contrast, like soldiers already in battle formation, ready to go to war.

“Excellent.” The young man stood in the middle of the two groups, looking back and forth before repeating the words. He put his hands behind his back again and paced back and forth between the two groups. No one knew what his true intentions were. Those who had not chosen weapons hoped the young man would say they were free to go; those who had chosen weapons had more mixed feelings. Some longed to kill for revenge, others longed to leave sooner, and Dawn Lucius was among the latter.

“So now, will the Strath people who did not choose weapons please go back inside the cage? Even though you chose not to take part in the battle, I will give you back your freedom, permanent freedom; you will never be slaves again. Time is short, please move.” After the young man finished speaking, the people who had not chosen weapons began to move. Some walked confidently toward the cage, while some looked back outside as they walked in. When the last of them stepped into the iron cage, the young man gave a look to the adjutant beside him, and several soldiers walked to the iron cage, quickly shut the door behind them, and padlocked it while they were at it. Before the people in the cage had even reacted, the soldiers who had locked the door had retreated behind the young man, weapons loaded, vigilantly watching Dawn Lucius’ group.

“Raise your weapons, please.” The young man turned to Dawn Lucius’ group and took a long time pointing at almost all of them. He no longer had the passion he had at the beginning; it looked as if all his spirit had dissipated. He tilted his head, let out a heavy breath, approached the armed crowd and continued. “My father said that truly brave people are those who recognize their situation and have the courage to take up weapons again and resist. You are the people my father respected. You are the real Strath people; you use your courage and boldness to take back your own lives. You, too, are the people I, Burt, respect.” The young man raised his hand in a gesture, and a group of soldiers came back in through the door carrying several large pots of food, whose scent caught everyone’s attention, and several other large locked boxes.

“Well, brave Strath people, go and enjoy the food you have struggled for. This is what you have earned for yourselves. Go.” The young man waved his hand. The hungry slaves could not care less about the weapons in their hands; they dropped their weapons to grab the food, and some people’s outstretched hands were even chewed on as if they were food. Shouts and cries mingled, and listening to them, Dawn Lucius felt a bolt of fear in his heart. He would have liked to go and eat, since he had tasted hunger on the Dawn ship, but seeing them eat like cannibals, he lost his appetite. By the time the hungry crowd had finished eating, they were herded back to where the soldiers had just been. The soldiers who had carried the food in carried the scraps out the door the way they had come, then rejoined the other soldiers in the crowd to tag those who were still holding weapons, and Dawn Lucius and Sandra were tagged as well.

After a soldier said something at the young man’s side and retreated to the still-locked boxes, the young man raised his hands to the well-fed crowd and said, “Anyone with a tag, please step over there.” The young man pointed over to the crates, and Dawn Lucius went with Sandra to join the tagged group and took up a position behind the crates. At this point, the young man went to a box and unlocked the latch, and a soldier grabbed the galaxy coins inside and handed them out to each of the tagged people. Those who were not tagged cast envious looks. When the soldier gave Dawn Lucius the galaxy coins, they felt no different from coins on Earth, and he was quite happy inside; at least he could save up to pay for the Star Bridge and jump to the solar system faster.

“Do you know why I gave you galaxy coins?” The young man grabbed a handful of galaxy coins and scattered them back into the box. They clanged as they landed, like the moment before a trial begins, when the judge raps the gavel hard. Just as the crowd was puzzled, the young man continued. “A real warrior does not throw away his weapon for any reason. You should know that weapons are the only thing you can rely on to win your freedom. When you go into battle, you have no one to rely on; you only have your weapons, and only your weapons can make your enemies know you anew and let them know that using you as slaves was the greatest mistake of their lives. So these galaxy coins are a reward for the real warriors. As for you ......” The young man pointed at the crowd that had just thrown down their weapons to grab food, with a disdainful attitude, still jabbing hard in their direction. After turning to look at the people in the cage, the young man seemed to think of something. He looked at the group of slaves staring at the discarded weapons, and in that look, Dawn Lucius could not see any good intentions.