Inspired by the Fairy tale

by Hans Christian Andersen

PROLOGUE

It was written by the Predeciders that the planets of Indira and Mano were once a single planet. After centuries of mining the giant planet’s core for thermal power, the millions of thermal chimneys drilled into the planet’s shell caused it to split in a cataclysmic event that became known as the Great Schism.

The Predeciders, discovering their folly too late, evacuated millions into space aboard Astral Repatriation Communities (ARCs), where the survivors orbited the twin remains of their decimated planet even as the ragged halves remained locked in their own gravitational dance. After many generations, the planets were deemed once again inhabitable, and the pilgrims returned. Some to Indira. Others to Mano.

After many centuries of rebuilding, the wars began…

ONE

The cracked quilt of the desert floor stretched before the soldier like a puzzle with no end, reminding him of the mosaic-patterned tiles in a palace from his childhood. Everson couldn’t help but note, with more than a little self-pity, that his childhood was now a world away, both physically and metaphorically. His own planet, Indira, was lush and green, yet another luxury he would never take for granted again.

He trudged forward on the barren rock that was the planet Mano, home of the enemy he had come to kill.

The twin suns of Femera and Amali beat down on him unmercifully, without the considerate benefit of a single cloud. The heat intensified the throbbing pain in his head, as if his temples were pumping boiling blood through the veins in his cranium. He hadn’t seen it coming, but he suspected that the errant hoof of a fly-by birdun had struck him solidly in the head, sending him into blackness. As a silver lining, and in spite of the monstrous headache he now endured, he was sure that being rendered unconscious had probably saved his life. At the moment of impact, he had, after all, been involved in mortal hand-to-hand combat.

Everson turned and looked back toward the Grand Schism, where the Indirans, his people, had landed to begin—in his mind—their unwarranted invasion. There was only the singular line of his footsteps, a reminder of the many missteps he had taken in his young life to bring him here, the middle of nowhere.

He had no idea where he was going, and perhaps it was high time to formulate a plan. He half hoped to be discovered and saved from the brutal heat. However, the other half dreaded the treatment he would receive. He would certainly be recognized as an enemy soldier, with his swarthy skin and full battle gear. That is, if he wasn’t simply killed on sight.

This thought irritated him more than frightened him, especially since he hadn’t willingly chosen this path for himself—the path of a soldier. No, that was someone else’s idea. And so, resentment fueled Everson’s feet methodically toward a dubious future where even death would be a vindication. Not that it would change anything about his current predicament, but it gave Everson a smidgen of satisfaction to think that he had been right that the battle should never have happened.