Going Home: Arrival (8)
20 Jun 2023Vasil Vasilescu
If a home is only a place to live, then the deep void and the Always Lost are my home and have been for decades. Some might call exploring and living on a ship being a nomad or, as my sister Octavia is fond of saying, being irresponsible. Others call it being homeless. But each of those definitions assumes that home is strictly a physical place and ignores the deeper meaning of the word as a place of origin.Though the Cemiess system is my home of origin I had not expected to feel much of anything when returning after decades of absence. All the way from Colonia I had been telling myself I returned only because I was summoned to aid the family and the Empire; because as a member of an Imperial noble family, duty and honor demanded such. But those rationalizations melted away when I exited framespace and felt on my face heat from the sun of my youth. Logically, it was no different than the heat from any other yellow star. Yet, I could not help but feel welcomed by it and forgiven for all the years of being away. I closed my eyes, letting the warmth seep into me as I used to do when a younger version of me wandered the orchards and meadows of our family estate.
After a few minutes of memories, I returned to the present, engaged the FSS, and began searching for Emerald. I could have pulled the information from the system’s nav beacon, but I wanted to discover its position for myself. It seemed wrong to get directions from a beacon, like admitting I had lost my way. Once found, I locked in the coordinates and engaged the super cruise.
I watched Emerald grow from a tiny point of light into a moon, deep green and blue with clouds like white striations in polished marble. Though I was due to dock at Mackenzie Relay I instead entered orbit above Emerald before heading to the station. I can’t say whether it was luck or instinct that I quickly spotted the alpine valley that had been in my family since the Emerald Treaty in 3136. A gift from the Empire for service during the war with the Federation over control of Emerald, the valley lay 15 degrees west of the Imperial Palace, home of Princess Aisling. I knew that somewhere in the valley’s thousands of square kilometers Octavia waited to hear that I was in system. However, I decided that she could wait a while longer and remained in orbit, transitioning from day side to night side.
On the night side of Emerald, cities sparkled like constellations in the night sky, nearly indistinguishable from the stars. It then struck me how Emerald, my family home and space, my physical home, merged into one at that moment, and how both were always a part of me no matter where I was or how much I wanted to believe otherwise.
