Science doesn’t take sides

[Zelen]

“A scientist must question—or be worth nothing.”
― Vul Isen

Zelen hid in the dark.

She was not afraid of the darkness. She used to be, yes, but not anymore. She knew this dark. She’d been living in this darkness.

Ever since she had seen her parents slaughtered.

The bunker was cramped, but not as cramped as it was supposed to be. She had practiced hiding here, and when they had pretended the war was coming and it was time to be safe, they had hidden together.

But Zelen was alone now. It had been seven days.

She had a satchel with her, a few possessions she'd crammed into the bag when the sirens warned them it was time. Pride of place was her father’s wrench – it smelled of him. Not a cologne, or even a skin smell – but it had an industrial aroma – and that, to Zelen, represented her father.

She squeezed her eyes shut – as if the darkness was not enough. She wondered if death hurt. She supposed it must.

It was so dark.

Zelen lit a lantern. The shadows danced along the interior of the bunker.

They reminded her of the troopers that wiped out the homes in her neighbourhood.

“Someone will come,” she told herself, the sound of her voice tinny and fragile in the darkness.

 

[Zelen]

When Zelen awoke the next morning, everything seemed too dark. There were no windows and the air smelled funny. Her heart thudded as she tried to wrap her mind around the disorientation of waking up in a place that wasn't home.

Zelen rubbed her eyes. They were dry and scratchy, and then she remembered that she'd been crying. And then she remembered why. Her stomach churned, acid rising in her throat. She couldn't push back the memories of the previous week. The sound of their bodies falling, lifeless, to the ground. The waiting, waiting, waiting for someone to save her while she hid in the bunker.

But that wasn't true. She hadn't been waiting for someone. She'd been waiting for hope – nothing more. Hope was supposed to save her.

A flare of rage washed over her, surprising in its intensity. She had never felt anger like this before. And even though she knew in her heart that it wasn't fair to blame her parents for not being able to save her, she held on to the emotion. It was better than the sorrow that threatened to drown her.

And her stomach ached with hunger.

 

[Zelen]

Two years later…

She tried to believe. To hope. But fear was the bedfellow of hope and when hope faded, fear took hold. So, one day she stopped hoping and changed her philosophy – to one of survival.

The air smelled clean and fresh now. It had been raining. She walked through the field towards the small woods ahead. They’d survived the aerial bombardment and were the best place for Zelen’s traps. She caught small mammals to supplement the diet of vegetables she’d existed on until she’d learned to cook – or more accurately, summon up the courage to kill and then eat something that was sharing this desolate place with her.

She was still hungry; she had been hungry ever since the day her parents died – but she ate enough to live, and that was the plan.

To her right was the remnants of a farm – including irrigation units and a droid harvester – that she’d cannibalised to rig up a number of devices that allowed her to live.

For, despite her presence of mind to survive, she was only six years old. Six going on thirty.

 

[Zelen]

The wrench became an invaluable tool. Initially it was a comfort – in much the same way that children had favourite toys. It reminded her of a time when everything was right.

Then it became a blunt instrument – handy for bashing things. Soon it became used for its intended purpose, as her natural inclination for engineering – plus everything she’d picked up from watching her father came to the fore. And she’d found some records. Nothing sensitive, but rudimentary notes on schematics and the like.

And finally, it had become something new – a weapon. The traps she set for the creature she ate attracted animals higher on the food chain – and following a close call with some feline predator, she’d learned to use the wrench first as a club – and then as a projectile. She could hit a wolf’s head from six metres away – killing it instantly.

 

[Zelen]

The planet was temperate – at least the part Zelen habited. But every now and then, there was a storm. Because she had no real way of measuring time – and no idea how long a year was – her understanding of when they were due was limited – until she realised that nature understood.

She noted a number of plants changed when the squall was imminent – and animals disappeared. So, she soon learned when to take shelter in the bunker.

But one day she was exploring and had been high up a tower, looking to strip some communications equipment when she looked out and saw the storm forming on the horizon. She knew immediately that it would be a big one. It was time to go.

It was – perhaps paradoxically – always quicker going up than it was going down. Going down, you had to worry about gravity in a whole different way, and hurrying was a good plan to get yourself hurt. She knew that from experience. She took it fast, perhaps too fast, but descended unhurt.

Then it was a race for home, running flat out, the rising wind chasing her.

The storm had almost caught her by the time she reached the bunker. The sound of the storm was growing deafening, the wind a near-constant shriek. Thunder exploded above her, making her flinch, and she squinted skyward in time to see the last of the sunlight being eaten away by the swirling clouds.

Lightning arced and lit the sky as if daylight had returned. She barely managed to wrench the hatch open enough to stumble inside, and then, just as quickly, slammed it shut again.

For a moment, Rey crouched in the darkness, catching her breath, listening to the storm rage outside. The noise was diminished but still sunk through the bunker’s duracrete.

She sat on a pile of dirty blankets and rested her head against the wall, listening to the storm beat furiously against her shelter.

She closed her eyes, feeling very much alone.

 

[Zelen]

The storm lasted three and a half days.

She had finished one bottle of water and half of another, guarding her thirst, because she didn't know how long it would be until she'd be able to get more. She was out of food by the second day, and by the time the storm was over her headache was so intense she was lightheaded and had to go slowly when she emerged into the sunlight.

 

[Zelen]

She'd jury-rigged a computer using pieces scavenged over the years, including a cracked but still-usable display. There were no radio communications to speak of – no way to transmit or receive signals, but she’d found a stash of data chips, and after painstakingly going through each and every one of them, she'd discovered three with their programs intact; one of them had been a flight simulator.

So, when she wasn't foraging, sleeping or just sitting and tinkering with bits and pieces she’d foraged, she flew. It was a good program, or at least she imagined it was. She could select any number of ships to fly, from small atmospheric craft to a wide variety of fighters, all the way up to an array of freighters. She could set destinations, worlds she'd never visited and never imagined she would, and scenarios, from speed runs to obstacle courses to system failures.

At first, she'd been truly horrible at it, quite literally crashing a few seconds after take-off every time. With nothing else to do, and with a perverse sense of determination that she would not allow herself to be beaten by a machine that she herself had put together with her own hands, she learned.

She learned so much that there was little the program could throw her way that would challenge her now. She'd gotten to the point where she would, quite deliberately, do everything she could think of to make things hard on herself, just to see if she could get out of it. Full-throttle atmospheric re-entry with repulsor-engine failure? Multiple hull breach deep-space engine flameout? It was, if nothing else, a way to pass the time.

But to what end?