“Good men, the last wave by, crying how bright

Their frail deeds might have danced in a green bay,

Rage, rage against the dying of the light.”

Dylan Thomas, 1947

The Girl and the Boy sat on a crate, sharing the piece of fruit.

All around the landing – pad, a hive of activity was centered around the battered – flanks of the mining – shuttle, a ponderous bulk whose hull was still hissing and ticking slightly as the residual heat from it’s passage down from orbit bled off into the dew of the morning.

“So, what do your people think it is?” Asked Challa as she used her knife to portion off another section of flesh from the bulbous pod of Krenna – fruit, her slim grey fingers working with the practiced ease of someone who had performed the action since birth. She handed the segment to the boy shyly, with a small smile.

Peter took the proffered fruit and bit into it, bright purple juice flowing down his chin which he stemmed with the back of his hand and his freckled – nose frown and his sandy – eyebrows came together as he mumbled through a full mouth.

“No one’s really sure.” The boy admitted openly as they dangled their feet over the edge of the large cargo – container on which they were perched. “A lot of the grownups are arguing about it, but that’s nothing new really.”

The girl nodded sagely, as if their combined youth somehow amounted to some reciprocal mutual investiture of wisdom and she spoke.

“It’s the same here, when they’re not complaining about the harvest, they’re worrying about The Blackout and whether the Union will come and save us.” Challa observed as the pair watched the adults loading the cargo into the shuttle, focusing on the task at hand instead of perpetuating mutual enmity for once.

“Honestly, I think that they’re scared.” Peter nodded and tsked as he notice that the dark purple ichor of juice had stained the chest of his coverall. Challa noted this with quiet amusement. The boy’s Singlesuit was so stained with the evidence of life lived aboard a Mining habitat as to be positively patchwork with a miasma of different hues of dirt. She thought the purple gave it an almost festive aspect.

“I’m scared.” Challa looked into Peter’s beautiful, human eyes. Blue like the grasslands that swam in the wind on the planet where the farming collective of New Providence plied their meagre trade.

She bit her lip and added, “Aren’t you?”

The Terran boy snorted at the prospect and shook is unruly mop of sandy – coloured hair and Challa wondered, not for the first time, what it would be like to run her fingers through it?

“What’s to be scared of?” Peter shook his head, as if to dispel the notion. “It’s probably just one of those natural phenomena that will pass sometime soon – like when we occasionally get those Ion – storms out in The Belt. You’ll see, it’ll probably just go away and life will return to normal and people will just get back to being miserable to each other again.” He grinned and spat a Krenna – seed in a high ballistic arc, so that it carried over the next cargo container and was lost from sight.

Challa did not reply and looked far from convinced. Her slim hands remained clasped nervously together and Peter found himself wondering at how slender her neck was, when you really came to think about it and…

“Peter!!” A perennially angry voice called out, breaking the spell. “Stop talking to that goddamned ‘Grey’ and get your skinny – carcass over here and help with the loading! I want to break orbit within the hour and don’t want to hang around this dung hole for longer than I have’ta !”

Peter sighed and rolled his eyes as they followed over to the owner of the voice, a rangy – looking human with a shock of grey hair, a grimy Singlesuit and an equally grimy beard, who stood as if the world owed him something and pointed angrily to the large Mining – shuttle, still plinking and cooling on the pad.

“My Stepdad.” Peter muttered as if that was something unpleasant he had stepped in. “I’m so sorry….” He began, a pink flush of embarrassment effusing his broad features at the snide slight aimed at his friend.

Challa’s dark eyes flashed momentarily, but she put her slim grey hand over his and reassured. “It’s okay Peter, I’ve heard worse.”

Peter folded his large fingers around her own and frowned so deeply, the action left a deep furrow in his brow.

“No it’s not alright.” The boy said quietly, but like most children, he was hostage to the prejudice and petty hegemony of adults -until at least he grew enough to present an equal threat to their domination.

Challa smiled and for a moment all other thoughts were forgotten.

“It’s okay Peter, you should probably go and help.”

The boy looked pained at the twin prospect of leaving Challa so, and of having to rejoin his Step-father and listen to him bitch and moan all the way back up into orbit and all the way back to the Mining – Belt. But those were the cards fate had dealt them and what else could you really do when you’re a kid?

“I guess.” Peter said unhappily and with a final squeeze of her hand, he hopped down from their perch on the crate and landed lightly on his feet. He started towards the shuttle, then was stopped suddenly as Challa called out, his heart doing that thing it did sometimes when he was in proximity to the girl.

“PETER!” She called and as he turned she threw something towards him and he only just reacted in time and caught it in his hand.

He looked down and saw the familiar bulge of another Krenna – fruit.

“For your journey home!” Challa laughed and waved, as she climbed to her feet.

Peter felt himself blush and he returned the wave.

“Will you still be here when I come next?” He called.

Challa frowned then laughed again.

“Of course I’ll be here you idiot ! Where else is anyone going to go at the moment?” The girl challenged playfully and with that she was away, hopping lightly from container – top, to container – top until she was lost from sight.

The boy grinned to himself. It was a pretty dumb thing to say, when you considered all that was going on. He turned and strode across the busy landing  – pad to where his Step-father was busy arguing with a tall, thin Cardassian farmer.

“What are you trying to pull here Tomar?” Gallen McCandless glowered as he gestured to one of the crates being loaded aboard his Shuttle, some of the produce inside was noticeably spoiled. “Half of this shit is as spoiled as your daughter !” The miner spat unkindly on the fruit inside.

“If you people actually delivered the amount of Dilithium that was originally agreed, we’d have sufficient power to run our orbital mirrors accordingly – as it is we can only operate them for part of the harvest, so as a result bind – rot has set in to whole sections of the crops. What you’re getting here is largely better quality that what we’re keeping to eat ourselves.” Tomar Gehna protested, his grey face holding no less regard for the Terran than he for his own.

“Thieves and charlatans, the lot of you.” Gallen glowered as Peter rejoined him and went to secure the last of the crates of food into the hold. “A pox on you bloody Greys!” He spat again and broke off the conversation in disgust.

“Boy! Get that shit stowed ! “ Gallen bellowed as he turned his back on Tomar and stalked up the loading ramp “The stench of this place’s making me wanna puke! Let’s GO!”

Challa stood at the end of the wall of containers, her heart heavy as she watched Peter’s shuttle lift off from the pad.

It was so unfair that her people and Peter’s people hated each other so. With the clear lens of innocence that only the young possess, the girl couldn’t see why their people of the Colony and the Belt just couldn’t agree to put the past behind them and work towards a better future. Especially when anyone could see how much their mutual survival really depended on each other?

Even moreso now with The Blackout cutting them off from the rest of the Galaxy.

She frowned against the morning sun and shielded her eyes with a hand as she strained to maintain a view of the Mining shuttle as it clawed at the misty – streaks of cloud that mantled the pale azure sky, she could see the bright sunshine glinting against the hull as it tore up through the stratosphere towards the vastness of space beyond.

Suddenly a vivid line of purple light intersected with the shuttle, lancing down from above and for a moment the spacecraft hung in space before exploding into a violent fireball.

The breath caught in Challa’s throat as her dark eyes widened in disbelief.

As the debris from the mining shuttle slowly began to cascade back to the planet below, jagged contrails trailing in their van, finally her scream came.

Vicious, dark arrow-head shapes began to scythe down from the heavens, violently slamming into the ground, indiscriminate about what they destroyed in their wake, sending up huge showers of dust and debris where they crated the earth.

Challa stood immobile, her mind struggling to comprehend what she was witnessing as from the dark – arrowhead shapes, purple energies began to shimmer and gather – the transporters they carried beginning to disgorge multitudes of figures in brown uniforms, who quickly dispersed from the machines and began to mercilessly open fire on the stunned Cardassian farmers and settlers as they fanned out.

High above, the remains of the shuttle were still falling and, through her tears, all Challa could think about was that she would never see Peter’s beautiful blue eyes ever again.