Diaries From My Time in a Interstellar Truck Stop
Jun 7, 2017 20:29:29 GMT -5
mintedstar/fur likes this
Post by Alligator on Jun 7, 2017 20:29:29 GMT -5
This is a little space for me to post writing practice work and have it read by others. I hope that, by putting my work out there, I'll be able to work through immense shyness while also getting plenty of eyes on my work. I'm definitely a hobbyist, not a professional, though I often treat myself as if I should be putting out content worthy of one. I like to write across varieties of genres such as science fiction, fantasy, horror, and surrealism.
I'll try my best to figure out a schedule for this, probably at least once a week depending on what's going on. If you like my content, feel free to follow and comment your thoughts. If you don't, let me know! It'll help me be better. Thank you for your viewership.
New sections will be added in a different font color, may not always be in diary form.
Log Date xx/xx/31xx, 18:30
I just made it to my first shift and I think I hate it.
Today Log, I started my first job away from home on good old Feralter 34V. I miss Mani and Gani, but I would have to leave sooner or later. The job is at a fuel stop a few systems away from the old homestead on a blistered piece of rock barely big enough for the Big Guys to call it anything. The manager I met with the flecked and speckled shedding scales said it was called Petrol Z after an old old fuel. The wobbly pebble doesn’t have a lot of other use to the Corporation.
The manager’s name is Mr. Knogul (pronounced noh-gil, not k-no-gull) and he sold the job pretty well. There’s a bus that comes by Petrol so I don’t have to get my own cruiser or anything just to get to work and I don’t have to pay the Galactic Corporation’s way too high rent staying in special housing on site. He made it sound fantastic, great. They just needed one more person to run the shift from 14:00 to 17:00 and close up shop in time to catch the 17:30 bus.
They didn’t say anything about the strange masses of interstellar weirdos that come through Petrol Z Fuel and Coffee. I’ll admit I grew up on a pretty fenced in planet, but the absolute gall of some folks gets me riled up.
A Renbovyan came through the swinger doors half an hour after I came in all puffs and eyes. I only know what he, she, they were because my only workmate mumbled it to me later. The patron huffed and grumbled about something I couldn’t make out until the workmate stepped in and took the meaty handful of money in exchange for StarGas. Sorry biletrap kept glaring at me as he left for his rustbucket of a craft out on the fill-up pad.
My workmate is a nice guy, really. I haven’t met a lot of humanoid subspecies besides my own in person before leaving home and he still makes me a touch nervous. I know I’ll get over it once I stop being such a jittery thing. Fres is an Ohgbid, a bit taller and broader than myself and with fewer arms and more eyes. His eyes are what really get me.
Fres has four of them, two sets stacked right on top of each other. The irises and pupils take up most of his eyes so you can barely see the whites. If were any good at drawing I’d show you, but they’re really unsettling the first couple times you see. They’re sort of set in his face like the graze deer back home. I can tell you about home another time though.
The rest of Fres looks pretty similar to a standard human as far as limb inventory. He’s bipedal, two arms, mostly human face. He’s short a couple digits, like me, but they’re thin with thick nails. His skin is covered in this dark brown fur, but it thins and thickens in different places. He’s even taller than me, like I mentioned earlier, so he feels a bit like home that way. It gets a bit tiring dealing with all the short folks I’ve talked to since leaving home.
Far as personality goes, I’m the livelier of the two of us by far. He’s more well-traveled than I am, but far less personable. I think my being so sheltered is the one thing keeping him from skulking around in the back. He’s quiet with me, but not unfriendly quiet you know? It’s like he doesn’t really have much to say.
Some creep came in and did his business around a half hour before we closed up. Fres grunted next to me. I think he was upset or bored or something, I can’t really read him with all those eyes. Creeps McGee came in, a Phgie Fres said later. Big ole bug eyes with goggles hanging around his neck and maybe a little under a meter and a half tall, one hand stuffed in his pocket and the other handling a yellow stained money pouch.
He went about and did his shopping; some truck snacks and cough medicine. I didn’t take my eye off him for a second, Fres watching me whenever I looked back at him. It made me a tad self conscious until Creeps got to the register and finally looked up from the PlaySqyg magazine in his free hand.
It was like he’d seen a ghost or something. As new to the galaxy and its children as I was, I knew better than to give that mouth open and disbelief stricken mug to new folks I met in my travels. And this fellow what supposed to be a truck driver going all over?
“Oh,” His voice sounded like ripping dry grass while he fumbled for his wallet and gave the most stomach churning hint of a smile behind his mandibles. “Weird to see one of you working a register, huh Feraltera?”
I heard Fres’s foot start a steady uncomfortable tap from his chair at the other register. My mouth froze all possibility of a good retort that wouldn’t get me in trouble for mouthing off to customers on day one. Instead I gave him the smile he might’ve wanted so he’d go about his business.
“That all, sir?”
“Eh, yeah,” Creeps dropped his goods to the counter for scanning, women’s magazine face down. “I thought all you Feralterns were diplomats and scholars and stuff. How’d you get here?”
“Plastic okay?” I kept ignoring his questions because he got half his premise wrong and I didn’t want to talk about it. The foot taps across from me got more vigorous but the stranger at my register kept his egging. Shouldn’t I be over in central? Or at some college over in the Education System? Was I a dropout or a criminal?
“No, sir. Please take your stuff and go if you don’t mind.” That came out more rude than I meant it to. He started wheezing about service and employee transparency. Fres stopped tapping his foot and piped up.
“She said buzz off flyboy, take your mag and go,” His grumble rose past the creep’s complaints and intimidated him into silence. Continued glaring encouraged him to take flight back out to his truck. If I could read the logo I’d have looked him and his company up.
Fres didn’t say much for the last fifteen minutes. He said he’d close up, I could go on home and he’d meet me at the stop to go.
“Thanks, Fres.” I said after tugging my pack over my shoulders, two arms stuffed in my pockets and the others gripping the shoulder straps.
“What?” He turned from the NuSteel rack in the employee room where Knogull kept all his keys and keycodes.
“For warding off that weirdo earlier, I appreciate it.”
“It’s nothing. You have to stand up for yourself now and again, there’s not really a need to be too nice to them when we’re all they have this far out.” He had a good point and I told him so. We parted after that and the rest went pretty smooth.
I guess looking back isn’t so bad. I did have to tell him about the difference between the High and Farmer Feralterans on the shuttle back to the mainland and I think he understood what got me in such a fuss.
High citizens of Feralter 34V are the diplomats, scholars, lawyers, and such that my planet is famous for. It’s a rare thing when the better half of your planet is what you’re known for. The higher class lives in the big cities with coffee shops, schools, colleges, and everything else you’d expect from big cities.
Farmer Feralterans are exactly what you’d think and they get little attention because the bumpkin half of the Feralteran race isn’t very remarkable. We share the “exotic and attractive” advertising maid and representative agencies advertise, but get more sunspots on our photosynthetic skin. We work out in the country and in all the service and factory jobs that the high class citizens are too qualified to take on.
There has to be a less educated and less high up half to work for the greats, right? That’s how Mani and Gani explained it anyway. Freckles on everyone’s cheeks from working out in the hot sun, wired from the same sun and racing about the fields as little ones, watching city kids spit and gag on sourbee honey run through my head as I lay my shaggy white haired head down tonight.
Fres said he’d meet me at the stop tomorrow when we go to work. I hope he’ll be just as good a friend as he was today. I’ll log in again later about how things go, maybe tell you more about home if I get homesick!
Best wishes, Aebby Hauip
I'll try my best to figure out a schedule for this, probably at least once a week depending on what's going on. If you like my content, feel free to follow and comment your thoughts. If you don't, let me know! It'll help me be better. Thank you for your viewership.
New sections will be added in a different font color, may not always be in diary form.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Log Date xx/xx/31xx, 18:30
I just made it to my first shift and I think I hate it.
Today Log, I started my first job away from home on good old Feralter 34V. I miss Mani and Gani, but I would have to leave sooner or later. The job is at a fuel stop a few systems away from the old homestead on a blistered piece of rock barely big enough for the Big Guys to call it anything. The manager I met with the flecked and speckled shedding scales said it was called Petrol Z after an old old fuel. The wobbly pebble doesn’t have a lot of other use to the Corporation.
The manager’s name is Mr. Knogul (pronounced noh-gil, not k-no-gull) and he sold the job pretty well. There’s a bus that comes by Petrol so I don’t have to get my own cruiser or anything just to get to work and I don’t have to pay the Galactic Corporation’s way too high rent staying in special housing on site. He made it sound fantastic, great. They just needed one more person to run the shift from 14:00 to 17:00 and close up shop in time to catch the 17:30 bus.
They didn’t say anything about the strange masses of interstellar weirdos that come through Petrol Z Fuel and Coffee. I’ll admit I grew up on a pretty fenced in planet, but the absolute gall of some folks gets me riled up.
A Renbovyan came through the swinger doors half an hour after I came in all puffs and eyes. I only know what he, she, they were because my only workmate mumbled it to me later. The patron huffed and grumbled about something I couldn’t make out until the workmate stepped in and took the meaty handful of money in exchange for StarGas. Sorry biletrap kept glaring at me as he left for his rustbucket of a craft out on the fill-up pad.
My workmate is a nice guy, really. I haven’t met a lot of humanoid subspecies besides my own in person before leaving home and he still makes me a touch nervous. I know I’ll get over it once I stop being such a jittery thing. Fres is an Ohgbid, a bit taller and broader than myself and with fewer arms and more eyes. His eyes are what really get me.
Fres has four of them, two sets stacked right on top of each other. The irises and pupils take up most of his eyes so you can barely see the whites. If were any good at drawing I’d show you, but they’re really unsettling the first couple times you see. They’re sort of set in his face like the graze deer back home. I can tell you about home another time though.
The rest of Fres looks pretty similar to a standard human as far as limb inventory. He’s bipedal, two arms, mostly human face. He’s short a couple digits, like me, but they’re thin with thick nails. His skin is covered in this dark brown fur, but it thins and thickens in different places. He’s even taller than me, like I mentioned earlier, so he feels a bit like home that way. It gets a bit tiring dealing with all the short folks I’ve talked to since leaving home.
Far as personality goes, I’m the livelier of the two of us by far. He’s more well-traveled than I am, but far less personable. I think my being so sheltered is the one thing keeping him from skulking around in the back. He’s quiet with me, but not unfriendly quiet you know? It’s like he doesn’t really have much to say.
Some creep came in and did his business around a half hour before we closed up. Fres grunted next to me. I think he was upset or bored or something, I can’t really read him with all those eyes. Creeps McGee came in, a Phgie Fres said later. Big ole bug eyes with goggles hanging around his neck and maybe a little under a meter and a half tall, one hand stuffed in his pocket and the other handling a yellow stained money pouch.
He went about and did his shopping; some truck snacks and cough medicine. I didn’t take my eye off him for a second, Fres watching me whenever I looked back at him. It made me a tad self conscious until Creeps got to the register and finally looked up from the PlaySqyg magazine in his free hand.
It was like he’d seen a ghost or something. As new to the galaxy and its children as I was, I knew better than to give that mouth open and disbelief stricken mug to new folks I met in my travels. And this fellow what supposed to be a truck driver going all over?
“Oh,” His voice sounded like ripping dry grass while he fumbled for his wallet and gave the most stomach churning hint of a smile behind his mandibles. “Weird to see one of you working a register, huh Feraltera?”
I heard Fres’s foot start a steady uncomfortable tap from his chair at the other register. My mouth froze all possibility of a good retort that wouldn’t get me in trouble for mouthing off to customers on day one. Instead I gave him the smile he might’ve wanted so he’d go about his business.
“That all, sir?”
“Eh, yeah,” Creeps dropped his goods to the counter for scanning, women’s magazine face down. “I thought all you Feralterns were diplomats and scholars and stuff. How’d you get here?”
“Plastic okay?” I kept ignoring his questions because he got half his premise wrong and I didn’t want to talk about it. The foot taps across from me got more vigorous but the stranger at my register kept his egging. Shouldn’t I be over in central? Or at some college over in the Education System? Was I a dropout or a criminal?
“No, sir. Please take your stuff and go if you don’t mind.” That came out more rude than I meant it to. He started wheezing about service and employee transparency. Fres stopped tapping his foot and piped up.
“She said buzz off flyboy, take your mag and go,” His grumble rose past the creep’s complaints and intimidated him into silence. Continued glaring encouraged him to take flight back out to his truck. If I could read the logo I’d have looked him and his company up.
Fres didn’t say much for the last fifteen minutes. He said he’d close up, I could go on home and he’d meet me at the stop to go.
“Thanks, Fres.” I said after tugging my pack over my shoulders, two arms stuffed in my pockets and the others gripping the shoulder straps.
“What?” He turned from the NuSteel rack in the employee room where Knogull kept all his keys and keycodes.
“For warding off that weirdo earlier, I appreciate it.”
“It’s nothing. You have to stand up for yourself now and again, there’s not really a need to be too nice to them when we’re all they have this far out.” He had a good point and I told him so. We parted after that and the rest went pretty smooth.
I guess looking back isn’t so bad. I did have to tell him about the difference between the High and Farmer Feralterans on the shuttle back to the mainland and I think he understood what got me in such a fuss.
High citizens of Feralter 34V are the diplomats, scholars, lawyers, and such that my planet is famous for. It’s a rare thing when the better half of your planet is what you’re known for. The higher class lives in the big cities with coffee shops, schools, colleges, and everything else you’d expect from big cities.
Farmer Feralterans are exactly what you’d think and they get little attention because the bumpkin half of the Feralteran race isn’t very remarkable. We share the “exotic and attractive” advertising maid and representative agencies advertise, but get more sunspots on our photosynthetic skin. We work out in the country and in all the service and factory jobs that the high class citizens are too qualified to take on.
There has to be a less educated and less high up half to work for the greats, right? That’s how Mani and Gani explained it anyway. Freckles on everyone’s cheeks from working out in the hot sun, wired from the same sun and racing about the fields as little ones, watching city kids spit and gag on sourbee honey run through my head as I lay my shaggy white haired head down tonight.
Fres said he’d meet me at the stop tomorrow when we go to work. I hope he’ll be just as good a friend as he was today. I’ll log in again later about how things go, maybe tell you more about home if I get homesick!
Best wishes, Aebby Hauip
