The Two Percent - Part Three

     The door slid shut behind me as I paused on the walkway. I was still surrounded by the dark Caldari steel as I slowly panned my head from right to left, taking in the surroundings. It was hard to imagine how big a station like this really was, from the inside or the outside but for very different reasons. The outside is easy to explain, it's all about scale and perspective, the stations are huge, sure but not compared to the moons or planets that they are often anchored in orbit around. Not to mention that ships move so fast that by perspective even something 50 kilometers long or wide or tall doesn't seem like all that much when you're traveling at 3,575 meters a second.

     From the inside it's even harder to get your head around just how big of an orbital body you're in. Take for example the large chamber I'm currently in, which goes by the name Terminal 7. It looks to be about five by ten kilometers and, if I walk to the edge of this promenade and take a look up and down, I could guess that to be about three kilometers. Five by ten by three? That's 150 cubic kilometers in this terminal alone, and judging from the number I'm assuming there's at least seven other terminals just like it, and that's not even taking into account the reprocessing plants, the medical bays, hangers and repair yards, or the hundreds of thousands of offices. I remember reading somewhere that the station was 100 kilometers long and while not a cube by any means it's certainly not a long, skinny thing either. Anyway I'm sure you get it, it's big.

     Out here there was more than just the dull hum of the stations inner workings. Despite being on the second level mezzanine I could still here some of the hustle and bustle from below, the sound of a crowded marketplace full of people browsing and buying and killing time before the next InterBus shuttle. InterBus, or IB as it was often referred to as, was one of those interesting cases where no matter who you had actually booked with, people had the tendency to just refer to it all as IB. One of the perks of being the largest interstellar transportation organizations in the business of ferrying people from one station to the next, I suppose. Out here one could also hear the occasional announcements that echoed out from the more congested areas, repeating the message three times for those who didn't speak the four main languages or have a handy translator like I did. The down side to this translator implant was, of course that I got to hear each notice about no sleeping in the terminals or the next all-important Quafe product three times.

    To my right was lined with offices for the Caldari Militia with Loyalty Point stores every so often as far as I could see, so I turned from that to head toward the cafe. There wasn't too many people on this level with me, at least not by Jita standards and I slipped in behind a group of five or six headed the same direction as I was. I was trying not to become too distracted of their conversation as I kept an eye out for the telling purple sign of my destination. The group laughed as one of the shorter guys told a story of a time he was piloting some ship full of strippers who he, by his own account, had to "fight off" of him while he piloted the ship. Judging from this man's looks, vulgar descriptions, and the smell I was suffering through while following the whole group I had a hard time imagining anyone vying for his affections. Apparent from a second roar of laughter his buddies did as well.

     One of the holoscreens on a pillar at the edge of the mezzanine caught my eye with a familiar sight. It was the  flash of The Scope news logo as one of their quick reports started, or ended. It was the ladder in this case but the follow up was an advertisement for tonight's race. They showed a clip of each top competitor's ships in a previous race which included mine, and the particular clip they showed was of one that happened a few weeks ago. I had been flying in Hibi when-

     "Hey!" I walked right into someone headed in the opposite direction, apparently in a hurry. In my distraction I'd wandered from behind my shield of stripper-toting crewmen into oncoming pedestrian traffic. The man I'd hit head on was, fortunately and unfortunately, much smaller than I as he stood nearly ten centimeters shorter than I and must have only weighed 45 kilograms. Fortunately I wouldn't be getting any sort of ass beating for this, but unfortunately I'd almost knocked the poor fellow to the ground and in stumbling back he'd dropped the datapad he had and hit a couple more people, now I was getting much more attention than I wanted. Being as he'd already caught himself I reached down for the pad instead, picking up it's thin frame in my right hand. "Sorry about that." I said as I stood up and extended my arm, offering him the datapad.

     He nodded, eyeing a bit too suspiciously as he slowly reached out and retrieved the pad. Before even checking to see if it was broken he stole a quick glance back toward the holoscreen which had now switched to an ad for Egonics, a music company. "You alright?" I asked. I took a moment to actually look at him and not only did I decide he looked so truly Amarrian I felt no reason to try any other language I also noticed that he was rather young. I got a light shoulder check from someone passing me and as they did I noticed it was one of the security officers who didn't even bother to look back and see if I'd noticed his warning. We were in the way.

     My real fear wasn't a fine for impeding traffic but more that the victim of my distracted wandering had recognized me and was going to out me in this crowed. Maybe I'm overreacting, it does always make me think I've become some self-important bigot, but I really just can't stand that much attention especially when I'm not ready for it. "Are you..." The young man started.

     "I get that a lot." I said, cutting him off. "C'mon, let's go make sure you're data pad is working." I gestured toward the outside of the mezzanine with a quick nod of my head before slipping through the foot traffic that had been passing us by, grateful that it wasn't mid-day busy. I looked over my shoulder as he waited for a gap in the seemingly endless stream of people and I'd nearly turned to face him before he gave up on waiting and quickly hopped through the crowd. Once he was through I continued on, noticing a sign near us that just said "Diner" in faintly glowing yellow letters. I stopped out front and turned around to face the man, wanting to refer to him as a kid each time more and more. He hung back a bit from but I could feel his gaze on me as if he were inspecting me. To be honest, it was pretty weird.

     I nodded slowly. "How about I get us some coffee while we make sure I didn't trash your datapad?" His eyes widened.
     "What? I mean, that would be great, but it's not mine. Well, I get to use it, but it's actually my father's. I'd still like to though, I mean if you want to, but you don't have to..." His words had started trailing off after he mentioned the datapad was his fathers but eventually they became inaudible all together. I couldn't help but laugh quietly as he turned bright read.
    "We'll get some coffee, you can tell me more then." I gave the diner a quick nod as I turned toward it, starting to suspect more and more that this 'man' was a lot younger than I'd originally thought as I headed inside.

The Two Percent - Part Two

     The hallway was dark, being in power-save mode, but that was certainly about to change. I turned back to my door, tapping on the small lock button on the control panel next to the door at the precise moment that I'd realized my data pad was inside. I swore under my breath, which just came out as a quiet grunt as I started pocking the panel again. Open, passcode, verify, enter. I gave these buttons a bit more of a jab, because it's the machines falt I fucked up, right? The doors slid open and I stepped back inside, making my way over to the table and grabbing the data pad on top of the short stack. I decided to give myself a quick pat down this time to make sure I'm not forgetting anything else and end up grabbing my smaller communicator as well. Why not, right? It's not like I don't have enough pockets.

     With the handheld communicator in my pocket and the data pad in my left hand I was back int he hallway locking the door again. All the ceiling lights were off and only every third of the wall lights on each side were powered on, reflecting their faintly blue light off the cold and dark steel. There was one small light on above each door that was perfectly in between each of the glowing chair rails that lined the hallway. This pattern repeated for as far as I could see down the dark hallway to my left, the right however ended fairly shortly in two larger double doors imbued with the backward C within a bigger C that was the Caldari State logo. Though I'd noticed it failed to mention anywhere that it was an elevator unless you got close enough to see the up and down arrows on the panel next to it.

     When I headed for the unmarked elevator the lights in the corridor started silently snapping to life but only in the direction I was headed. My boots where making that distinct noise that happens when you move about on a catwalk, which was no doubt because I walking on the grated floors that showed off various pipes and systems beneath my feet. Some might think that the hallway outside the moderately expensive estate rooms would have some decorations or at least a solid floor Shariykah's mother certainly did when she first visited Jita. But what you have to realize is that, being the industrialists that they are, the Caldari not only don't see a problem with the exposed machinery but even often times come to enjoy it. Being that I was my own mechanic for a number of years as an amateur ship racer I can very much see where they are coming from though and I don't really see the necessity of hiding away the things that keep us alive in this decollate wasteland of space. At worst it's just a reminder to pay your repairmen a fair wage.

     It only took a few seconds for the lift to arrive and once aboard I turn to scroll through the list on the panel inside until I found the button labeled "L" and managed to look up in time to see the lights in the corridor shutting off as the doors closed. I turned to face the back of the elevator and propped myself up against the railing as he looked out the polynanite glass at the astounding view. Astounding to me, anyway since I've always had a great interest in spaceships since I was a kid and, like most boys, the bigger the better. Through this thick pane was visible one of the massive sections in the even large hanger that saw some of the most traffic in the cluster. In a testament to its size it my perspective didn't noticeably change even as the lift raced downward to the lobby. At the moment I could see several of the huge Caldari and Minmatar freighters docked and one Amarr freighter heading through to the outer hanger. While their demotions varied based on the hulls they were all a couple kilometers long, I know the Amarr freighter hull Providence is almost two and a half and can hold at least seven hundred and thirty five thousand cubic meters of cargo. Oh and of course, they cost over one billion ISK.

     I'd gotten a bit distracted but thankful the helpful chime as the lift came to a stop brought be back to reality. It's an important thing, you see, because unlike the standard lifts in most regions of the cluster which give you nearly five seconds of delay before they start closing their doors (baring any people or objects in the way, of course) the Caldari lifts tend to only give you three seconds. It's the little things, right?

     The lobby was as dark as the corridor had been but the lights quickly spring to life as I stepped out into it. I made my way to one of the three holopanels near the door to the main terminal to check and see if the food court nearest this block was open because they tend to have one of the four closed at all times for cleaning. "Welcome valued customer." Stated a woman's voice as I approached the center panel. "You are... here" the voice paused to allow the screen to zoom in to Terminal 7 Block C, where it placed a small read dot. I picked food from the short list to the right and watched the screen and it zoomed out a litte further and some flashing yellow squared showed up over the blue outline of the map. Seems the nearest foot court was closed though in all honesty that was alright with me, while I'd enjoy the crowd the combination of every type of dish from each of the four big factions in the cluster, most of wich included many types of fish, was never something that got my stomach ready for eating.

   I poked one of the pulsing yellow boxes highlighting a cafe that was nearby and the ad imminently popped up displaying silver 3D writing shimmering over the purple background. "Quafe Ultra Premium Cafe" it read, which caused me to quietly sigh. It's not exactly what I had in mind as far as cheap food went but it was a lot better than nothing, and being perfectly honest it was better than half the food in the food court anyway. The terminal shut itself down after I took a couple steps away and headed for the door, and as they slid open with a muffled hiss I stepped out into the slightly cooler air of Terminal 7, Jita 4-4.

The Two Percent - Part One

     I realized that I was staring at the ceiling. The small room was completely dark except for the dim glow of the time being projected on the ceiling between the two twin beds. The faint blue numbers read 02:46 and I watched as that six became a seven. Today was a race day and as part of my inadvertent tradition I had woken up approximately six whole hours before I needed too, and a full fourteen hours before I needed to report for the race. I wasn’t nervous, as assumption which this story nearly always provokes, but I was ready.

     As per usual I continued laying there under the light sheet from the bed as I watched the clock and when it failed to suddenly become 09:00 I stretched my arms above my head as I flexed nearly every muscle I could manage, as if I was in a medieval torture rack. With a sigh I went limp and watched the clock roll over to 0300 before sitting up, tossing the sheet toward the end of the bed and swinging my legs out over the floor. Between my movement and the light pressure on the floor I’d managed to trigger the lights which faded on silently in a dim, amber glow.

     All that could be seen of the woman in the bed adjacent to mine was some of her long red hair for she, as well as all of the women I’ve ever befriended or dated, was always cold. Shariykah was my copilot and cause of much and varied gossip regarding our relationship, some of which was true. I am not an evil man so of course my intent was not to wake her, though as I rose to my feet the increased weight on the floor caused the lights to rise a bit as well. I stepped lightly toward the door as quickly as I could, slipping through it as it quietly slid open. The lights in the bedroom dimmed as she doors shut automatically behind me.

     Thankfully this wasn’t an Amarr station so my presence in the main room of the quarters had no unwanted effects. Well, perhaps you could consider the raising of more amber lights an unwanted effect since they were not as friendly as the dim glow of the bedroom. At least here in Caldari stations the startup or “wakeup” sequences for estate rooms didn’t include notifying and thus waking adjacent room, which back home was the slave’s chambers. With my eyes squinted so far they were nearly shut I leaned in close to the control pad on the wall just to the side of the doorway I’d come through, stroking at it desperately in an attempt to minimize the lighting. With a stroke of luck, pun intended, I managed to get the lights down or more accurately off, but it wasn’t dark. The startup sequence for the room had also included activating the picture frame window to my left so that it allowed more light from the enormous, cratered moon to reflect its way into the estate room.

     I’m sure you’re wondering where I am outside of the Empire that has the trademark amber lighting and the answer is an expensive estate room in Jita, Jita 4-4 no less. Now I don’t know if the room has biometric sensors that pick up my Amarrian genes and assume that I want that classic taste of home added to the dark Caldari steel or what but instead of getting offended at the assumption or in the other direction, lack of polysteel tables that morph into different style furnishings, I just take it for what it is because life if much too short to worry over stupid shit like that, I’ve got enough real problems without making up new ones.

     I took a few steps forward into the room before turning to look out over the dark, likely-fake-leather couch and the dark metal coffee table, and through the window. I reached over my head as I stretched again and this time let out a quiet yawn before dropping my arms back to my sides. While the moon was a nice view the fact I could see it through a window in my quarters wasn’t exactly the ‘remember the good old days’ I was looking for. Maybe once I got some clothes on I’d head out to the terminal in search of some coffee and light breakfast which was the second part in my unintentional tradition of waking up far too early.

     “Good morning… guest” the computer in the galley behind me stated dryly and much too loudly in the quiet room. I spun around as the lights in the dining area came on and the four screens on the walls as well as the 3D holoprojector on the table came to life with advertisements. I hurried to the central panel and quickly jabbed at the “Silence” button before it could continue with its overtly boring morning greeting, which always made it sound so dry and uninterested in what it was saying that it was almost satirical. It often left me thinking that the AI was actually displeased at my being there. Intruding my unmistakably and inexcusably biological body into its perfectly calibrated machine paradise. Or, you know... something like that.

     I dimmed this set of lights as well as I turned back toward the window, the darkness kept further at bay by the newly added holoscreens. I sighed as I looked around the kitchen at the three smaller screens all displaying ads for various Quafe products while tiny red and green stock tickers scrolled prices on either edge under or over the ads. The light from the screens gave the mostly metal galley a purple glow between white flashes as the screens switched between ads, even the main panel behind me had an advertisement in the upper left corner for some random products involving food. The holoprojector in the center of the table was showing people dancing on stage and no doubt had some type of voice over that I’d managed to mute. Once the loop was finished it displayed “Echelon Entertainment” slowly rotating in a circle before it would start over again.

     Thankfully this was a small room, at least compared to what we could have been staying in, so it was a community closet outside of the sleeping chambers. I headed over and slid the doors open effortlessly, causing a small light to come on inside. I couldn’t help but grin a bit to myself, as I did every time when I looked at the number of outfits Shari had compared to my measly four. I had a particular plan though, purposely bringing only two designer outfits, my jumpsuit, and a “casual” outfit. I’m sure you can guess which one I grabbed before sliding the doors closed again and moving in front of the mirror. I stepped into the baggy pants, the fabric wrinkled in places from poor folding and the belt already through the fraying loops. The state of these drove Rahn mad, and while he won’t admit to understanding why I’d want to wear such things he has at least agreed not to replace them. He’s a good man.

     After fastening the light metal belt buckle on the dark pants and pulling on a olive green undershirt I grabbed the tan jacket with brown accents and a copious amount of pockets. The pants had a couple cargo pockets on each pant leg, as well as normal pocket and this was understandable, but this jacket? This jacket had two normal pockets, two lower front pockets, a breast pocket, a pocket on each arm, and then four more pockets on the inside. Honestly, who needs that many pockets? If you have that much stuff just get a bag, at least that way it would be easier to remember where you put everything, but this is how the trader’s dressed so it made for great cover.

     Now to add the final touch which is a pair of shades and a beanie. I tugged the hat down so that it was covering most of my ears and  came down just above the eyebrows. This way I could hide the black “fohawk” as they’re calling it and the upper half of my fading green tattoo that encircles the outside of my right eye socket. I’d say that I pop up the collar to help hide the bit of a beard I’ve got going on but to be totally honest I’m not sure it would really stay down on its own despite the jacket being made of some pretty heavy material. After I gave myself a quick once over in the mirror to make sure I looked dirty enough I headed for the door. It might be 3:30 in the morning but that’s part of the beauty of Jita 4-4, and rightly any station in this system, it never sleeps.