Oh no!

Chapter 1

Part I

In space your screams will not be heard. My decision to be a passenger on the colonizing ship "Principle 5", does not obey the need to explore new horizons, nor the tendency to create a new civilization, with new rules and virtues. For me, the world with all its defects, is so wonderfully natural, that the effort to change it, exceeds my potential capacities to adapt to any situation, no matter how adverse or unpleasant they may be. But there is one that exceeds my limits of tolerance. My mother in law.

A despotic, hypocritical woman with a bad intention that does not fit into her obese and horrifyingly asymmetrical anatomy. She made my life bitter with her intrigues, and handling of her daughter, my wife. She turned the love of my youth against me progressively, to the limit of what was bearable. And she made me finally get saturated with both. As repugnant as she may seem, she came to live with us, without consulting me about her decision. And it is that my father-in-law, an innocent victim of her emotional poison, opted for the easy way of suicide, jumping from a 52nd floor. My mother-in-law repeated to exhaustion that he fell by accident, changing an emergency lamp on the balcony. But many witnesses from neighboring buildings declared that when he fell he did so screaming: Freedom!

As said, she came to live with us after his death. And my father-in-law, whom she had forced to sign a life insurance policy for $8,000,000, left her with the grand prize and all he had. With that amount she made my life miserable, reminding my wife, I didn't have much money, and constantly humiliating me in front of her, unfortunately she soon assumed the same position as her mother.

The earth in the year 3013 was in chaos. After the 3rd world war that lasted 3 months, and after 5% of the atomic bombs were fired, humans discovered that it was suicide to continue using them, and decided for peace and disarmament, again. World leaders, devoted themselves to search for new spatial domiciles, achieving this, after receiving information from the exploration probes, sent 70 years earlier, and the manufacture of proton drive engines and the development of hibernation by biological clock control.

Pioneering flights from the Moon, Mars, and Titan were planned. Synchronized trips with gravitational, energetic, food-producing, sanitary units. When these units showed autonomy, the possibility of achieving a planet with sufficient natural resources, and a climate that guaranteed life with minimal resources was sought. The construction of huge combat satellites, led to the production of gigantic colonizer ships, powered by the new engines that by repeated pulses achieved near-light speeds.

Conditions on these ships were like a hotel. And did not merit special physical conditions. The passengers were chosen by recruitment agencies, to use them as employees of an international complex of transnationals, advised by the UN and technologically supported by the countries that ensured a quota of travelers. I was a simple farmland specialist. Which at the time was practically useless on Earth. But very necessary in the new colonizing projects. My home situation forced me to offer myself as a candidate for a position on the expedition. And I did it impulsively, and obviously without consulting my wife, which I regret, and did not follow up on the matter.

After a few months, I was called to travel on the Ship Principle 5, I said yes, and as I had informed that I was single and without commitments, they had already assigned me a passenger number. Principle 5 was not itself a spaceship, it was a 7-level platform transporting passengers, cargo, machinery and infrastructure, necessary to form a small base city, for several contingents of travelers. It acted as a mother ship for two planetary space carriers, for a thousand passengers each, and two booster ships that would serve as motor and power plants, for the main space ship.

Chapter 1

Part II

Principle 5 was so bulky and heavy, that passengers had to board it and leave in carrier ships, or small vehicles, for up to 100 people, with the capacity to exit and re-enter the planetary atmosphere. It was the night of July 22, 3015, at 12 noon, and without looking back, I said: No more! And gave a farewell look to my wife and a relief and eternal goodbye to my mother-in-law... I boarded a taxi that would take me to the Stellar Center, an installation of detailed information on the characteristics of the ships, its functions and the data of the trip, plus guidelines to follow on certain circumstances. The capacity of the complex was for 5,000 passengers, 500 crew members, who would also act as authorities of the group. Some remaining in Principle 5 for a few years, as support and supply ship members, until the planetary adaptation was carried out. We stayed 5 days in the complex, after which, we boarded the transport ships to Principle 5. For me everything was exciting. It was a one-way trip to live in a new solar system, a new planet and a city and towns that we had to build ourselves.

On the 27th, we left at 6 a.m. terrestrial time, from Iceland's takeoff port. The trip to Principle 5 lasted 30 minutes, and the accommodation in our cabins or capsules lasted 3 hours. These were practically cylinders with a bed, and a dispenser for food and medication. Food was a nutritional ultra-concentrate that supplied the basic needs of the human body and a drug that slows metabolism by 90%, making you sleep 23 hours, and wake up one, to walk and do your physiological needs, lengthening this period gradually, until reaching a wake up time, once every 3 months. All this regulated by a supercomputer, and a shift of 50 helpers per shift without the use of the dangerous and unstable hibernation capsules, that had cost 1,550 lives on the Exodus3 ship to Mars.

In the weeks that followed our departure, the drug was doubled, modifying our biological clock, to come out of deep sleep every 48 hours, for one single hour. This time I visited a part of the ship called Colosseum. It was a central patio surrounded by sitting spaces, from where you could see the ship patio perfectly. I took advantage of seeing the messages on my phone, which I had not opened since departure, as I did not want my wife and mother-in-law to know where I was heading. There were no traces of any concerns from them. There was only a message that simply said: Goodbye. I thought that somehow, they found out about my departure, and that was a way to respond… The strange thing is, their message was sent the same day I left home. So perhaps, they knew about my secret…

In the amphitheater they were showing a short documentary, after doing our exercises. I was distracted, when all of the sudden, the inconceivable happened, 5 rows below mine, I saw my wife and mother-in-law, chatting and laughing from time to time. I hid, and made sure not to be discovered. The paperwork to travel lasted more than 6 months, in other words, they had thought in parallel to travel and leave me on Earth!

They left from their places when they heard the bell that announced the return to the cabin, and I followed them. Their cabins were next to each other. Two levels above mine, and I wrote down their numbers. Suddenly two crew members noticed that my identification did not correspond to such level, so I told them I had made a mistake. My regulating drug and my pasty food were waiting for me, so I would go back to sleep for another 48 hours. In spite that, a repetitive thought was on my mind, while my heart rate was slowing down: Oh no! What the hell am I going to do now?