A few weeks pass. My departure is rather uneventful. Sera can’t even be bothered to wake up to see me off. Sunny hasn’t come around either at all lately. He is always rather fickle about coming and going. Most days Sunny is off somewhere doing who knows what.

  I take my one suitcase and make my way back to Faraway, hopefully for the last time. I can’t say I care much for the long drive back and forth. Sure, it is nice to see the ocean, but if my life had turned out the way I wanted I would have never had to go to Faraway in the first place.

  I arrive in Faraway and go to the docks. When I arrive, it is early in the morning and there is a bit of foot traffic scattered about. None of it is related to the operation of ships or the docks, however. Most of the bustle is from people taking a morning stroll or run. The lack of activity is unnerving. None of it seemed operational: the docks or any of the ships it harbored."

  I walk around a bit and it doesn’t take long for me to happen upon the ship that Ralan mentioned. There aren’t many ships there to begin with and, as Ralan had said, one stands out more than the others: a ship of non-human design with ‘Emerald’ painted across its side.

  I come alongside the ship and see two dolse workers loading cargo onto the ship. Ralan is sitting on a crate nearby. He notices me approaching, hides a flask into his coat, and jumps to his feet. "Well, look who it is. I was beginning to think you weren’t coming. It has been a few weeks."

  "Sorry, this was the earliest I could request a vacation from my work.” I answer. “I would have called ahead if I could’ve. Do you need time to prepare? I can wait in town if you need me to."

  Ralan waves his hand for me to follow. "I said we could leave whenever you’re ready, didn’t I? I'll take you aboard." I follow Ralan up a boarding ramp onto the deck of the Emerald. As we walk, Ralan says, "We’re just finishing loading some foodstuffs. There's not much left. After it's all put away, we can set out."

  I look around the deck. I’d never been on any kind of ship before, so I don’t really have a point of reference to compare it to. There's not as much open space on the deck as I expected. There are a bunch of different guns mounted around the deck. This ship seems somewhat different from ordinary human ships, but I don't know enough about ships to know how. I mean, I've never even been on a normal ship before.

  Ralan stops, turns, and faces me. "Anyway, this is it. My ship. So, what do you think?"

  "You have a nice ship. It’s much bigger than I imagined."

  "Bigger? Did you think we’d be sailing out into the maelstrom on a dingy?"

  "No, it just seems quite spacious, that’s all." I answer.

  "Really? This is nothing compared to other ships.” Ralan says. “If anything, this ship is pretty cramped. Especially with a full crew."

  "So, where is your crew?" I ask.

  "What crew? It's just me and my two dolse workers."

  "Oh..."

  Ralan seems to sense my growing sense of uncertainty. "What's with that dubious look? You want to go round some people up? I'm sure you'll find plenty of enthusiastic sailors who will jump at the opportunity to join us."

  He has a point. I had enough trouble finding just one person to agree to help me. Still, I could do without his sarcasm. "No, that's alright." I reply.

  "I'm retired.” Ralan says. “I haven't had a crew in decades. Don't you worry though, modern ships like this can easily be controlled by one person."

  "If you say so."

  "I do say so." Ralan says. "Listen, just let me do my job. You paid me; I'll get you to the center of the maelstrom. Wherever it is you need to go."

  "Okay, sorry."

  Ralan let out a heavy sigh. "Anyway, that there behind you is the command tower. It’ll take you inside and pretty much anywhere else on the ship. Take the stairs down one level to reach the crew cabins. I left the first door by the stairs open for you to use. It ain’t much. It was originally designed to be shared by several people and save as much space as possible, but I fixed it up a bit for you. Go ahead and drop off your things. It'll still be a bit before we set out."

  I take my luggage into the ship. The ship looked more spacious from the outside. The hallways are narrow, dark, and cold. All the doors look to be made of a thick heavy metal and hadn’t been opened or used in a long time. Only one door, the one closest to the stairs, is open. I suppose that door is meant to be hers and enter inside. Inside is a quaint little room. Nothing fancy, but honestly, I thought it'd be worse. I put my stuff down and decide to unpack later. For now, I'll go back and see if Ralan needs any help. I return to the main deck.

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  Ralan sees me. He doesn’t look enthused. "Oh, you’re back. Did you finish unpacking already?"

  "I don’t have that much so there’s really not that much to unpack. I just wanted to thank you again for your help."

  "Save your thanks for if we come back alive.” He turns away and faces the sea. “Not that I need your thanks. I got paid, that’s all I care about."

  I say, "I thought I’d express my gratitude at least once. Is there anything I can help with around the ship? Anything you’d like me to do?"

  "What did you have in mind? Mopping the deck?"

  I think he’s making fun of me, but I go along with it anyway. "If you need me to. I can help load cargo too."

  "I was joking." Ralan says. "I don't need much of anything more from you. Maybe help with monsters later on but that's it. I have dolse workers who do all the tedious stuff for me." Ralan looks over the railing and blows a sharp whistle. "Hey! You two! Come over here quickly and introduce yourselves." The two dolse workers I saw earlier came aboard. Ralan waves his hand toward them. “These two dolse units are Cal and Ben. The weird looking one with one eye is Ben. It got damaged before I acquired it so it can’t speak correctly. No idea what it's ever saying, but Cal can translate so it’s not a big issue. Ben's not quite as useful as Cal but it still gets work done so I don’t complain. Anyway, back to work you two." The two dolse returned to moving cargo as they were. "I purchased the three of them from an arakar merchant a couple of years ago. They’re first generation dolse, an obsolete series, and they were going to be scrapped so I got a good deal on them. Helpful for an old fish like me who lives alone on a big ship like this."

  "Three of them? You mean two?" I correct him.

  "Oh... there’s a third one, Ace, but it stopped working not long after I brought it aboard." Ralan says.

  "Maybe I could look at it for you? I’m pretty handy with machines."

  Ralan raises his eyebrow. "Are you now? You some kind of dolse mechanic or something?"

  "No, I just tinker with stuff as a hobby, mostly vehicles. I’ve never worked on a dolse before, but I’ve read a few books."

  "Well, it’s not like you could bust it up any worse than it already is. The thing already doesn’t work. I keep it down in the cargo hold – just take the stairs all the way down. There should be some spare tools lying around down there for you to use. Feel free to take or use whatever you need."

  "I’ll see what I can do." I say.

  "Just be careful down there. I store spare munitions down there so don't go throwing matches around or opening up random containers. I don't need you setting off an explosion and killing us before we even get to our destination." Ralan returns his gaze once more to the sea. “Anyway, if you need anything I'm usually on the bridge. Just take the stairs in the command tower up. The dolse are always wandering around too so you can also ask them. This ship ain’t too big so it’s not like you can get lost or anything."

  I return to the inside of the ship and take the stairs all the way down to the cargo hold at the very bottom of the ship. It feels like the lower she went down the darker and quieter it got. I reach a chamber at the bottom - the cargo hold. As expected there are a ton of crates and barrels all over the place. It seems well organized though. They're all covered and secured to the walls. It looks like ammunition for the ship's guns are stored down here too. I definitely don't want to accidently set anything off. I had better not go snooping around unnecessarily.

  The two dolse are bringing in containers from the dock via a cargo elevator near the back of the deck. There isn't much light in here at all. A couple of dim lights spread far apart across the ceiling, but that's it. There isn't much of interest otherwise. A small submersible craft is suspended above a hatch on the floor. I'd call it a submarine, but it is so small it could hardly be called such. It looks like it could fit two people, maybe three, at most. I see a dolse unit slumped up against a barrel on the ground nearby. It must be the broken dolse Ralan mentioned, Ace. It looks pretty similar to the other two. Then again, most all dolse look pretty much the same to me. Ralan mentioned these were older models. It seems like they have a more humanoid frame than the ones used by the military. I've always wanted to work on a dolse, but they aren’t cheap commodities. I'm glad I have the opportunity to finally crack one open. Just like Ralan said, there's a box full of tools right here. Nothing special, but it has all the essentials.

  "Ms. Vells." One of the dolse manages to sneak up on me lost in thought.

  I jump up to my feet and whirl around. I take a few steps back from the large humanoid machine. "Ah! Uhm... Cal, right?"

  "Affirmative." The dolse, Cal, stands over me with a fixed posture. It looks like a knight of old adorned in rusted bronze armor from head-to-toe. Its head looks more like a biker’s helmet though, a bit at odds with the rest of its body, with two little circular glowing lights for eyes - or ocular lenses as they are called for dolse. Most only have one these days. Despite how human it may appear, under all that metal is nothing but machinery.

  "What’s up?" I ask.

  "These units have finished loading cargo onto the ship. This ship will depart shortly. This unit computed it would be prudent to bring this to your attention."

  "Ah, okay.” I say. “Thanks. I’ll probably be down here for a while."

  "These units would like to express gratitude for your attempt to fix unit Ace. These three units have been together since the production line. Ship operations are suboptimal with one unit incapacitated."

  "Oh, so you're like brothers?" I ask.

  "Negative, but that understanding suffices as a parallel for an organic being to comprehend."

  "Ah, okay. Well, I can't promise anything, but I'll do my best. Any idea what's wrong with him?"

  "Negative. Unit Ace ceased to function for unknown reasons shortly after being purchased and brought aboard by the captain. It is relatively common for dolse to malfunction in such a manner if regular maintenance is neglected. This unit has no specific insight into what exactly could cause a complete system failure, however. These units are not configured with dolse repair functionalities. A system diagnostic scan of unit Ace indicates: mild shell damage, local network link failure, system power output at zero percent due to non-functional core. Significant core damage. Processor status: unknown - currently inactive. Was this diagnostic helpful?"

  "Uh... I'll try and keep those things in mind." I say.

  "While these units may not be able to offer much direct help, these units may be able to offer insight into dolse operations should such information become beneficial to you."

  "Okay, thanks."

  "These units shall take leave now." Cal walks away.

  The other dolse, Ben, is lurking in the shadows nearby. I almost didn’t notice it. It gurgles something to me in an unknown language. Something about Ben makes me uncomfortable. All its parts are mismatched and it looks far worse for wear even than the derelict Ace laying on the floor. Most of all, ever since I came aboard, it’s single ocular lens tracks me whenever I’m within the space of its vision.

  I’m not sure how to respond to it. "Uhm... yeah. You’re welcome."

  Ben follows Cal out of the cargo hold.

  Within a few minutes the ship starts up and sets out into the open sea. I feel like maybe I should have been on the main deck for their departure but I want to suppress any sentimental thoughts that creep into my mind. If I went up and still saw land before it faded into the horizon, it is as though I could still change my mind, not that I would. I force myself to stay in the cargo hold until I know for sure there would be no turning back.