Or was that wishful thinking? Given the stupidity displayed by people in power, why should I believe secret wisdom was at work? More likely, the Explorer Corps resulted from age-old hatreds against those who looked different, disguised as a branch of the navy because the League didn’t allow the outright slaughter of pariahs.
Or perhaps it was the ultimate deterrent to discourage bioengineering: don’t gene-splice your children, or we’ll force them to become Explorers.
CHAPTER 2
Klesha [Sanskrit]: Poison. Used to describe any mental attitude that leads to disruptive fixations.
I graduated from the Explorer Academy four days after I turned nineteen. A week later, I was assigned to the frigate Pistachio. The name made me laugh when I heard it; but tradition dictated that all vessels in the Outward Fleet be named after Old Earth trees, and only big ships got majestic titles like Iron-wood or Sequoia. Little ships like ours (a crew of thirty-five plus a handful of cadets-in-training) had to settle for names of less grandeur… and just be thankful we weren’t Sassafras, Kumquat, or Gum.
For two months after my arrival, I did nothing except "button-polishing" — the mundane chores required to keep my equipment in top condition. Pistachio didn’t have anything else for me to do. Explorers on a starship filled the same niche as marines on old seagoing boats: while the regular crew ran the ship, we did whatever else was necessary. Landing on hostile planets. Boarding civilian craft suspected of breaking safety regulations. Helping to evacuate vessels in distress.
But Pistachio never had any such missions. We were just a utility ship, running straightforward errands in the tamest regions of space — mostly transporting personnel and materials.