Chapter 01

Beginnings

Morgan Henry Kesselring and Lorna Wilson Austin are born onboard a ship in transit between planets in a way Morgan is the child of three planets and Lorna is a child of two planets; with the planets having very different cultures. The spaceship Bright Future of the Rainbow Kingdom is in transit from the Federation planet of Admiralty to the planet of Acadia in the Acadian realm when Morgan is born two weeks early and Lorna is born a week early on the sixteenth day of the journey. At the time of their births the space-liner is in unclaimed open space outside of the control of any realm, which is a very important aspect of their births. Under the laws of all three planets involved if they’re born on-board ship in claimed space they’re seen as being born within that realm, as per the interstellar laws and conventions. However, in the very rare case of a birth being in unclaimed space other laws apply to the births. The home port of the liner is on the planet Blue in the Rainbow Kingdom and their laws have both children as being born on Blue as Rainbow Kingdom citizens. So the ship’s Captain issues both Morgan and Lorna with a birth certificate in their full names with their family name being the same as the mother’s name and the father’s name as a middle name, which is the custom of both of the Rainbow Kingdom and Acadia realms.

When they reach Acadia Morgan’s mother, Maria Owen Kesselring, registers the birth of her son, Morgan Henry Kesselring, with the Acadia authorities as an Acadian citizen due to him being the child of an Acadian citizen as he was born in unclaimed space. Len Henry, Morgan’s father, lodges documents at the Federation Embassy to be sent to his home planet of Admiralty to have his son registered as a citizen of the Federation of Human Worlds due to his father’s citizenship, and lists him as Morgan Henry. Because no planet of birth is listed in the documents Morgan is entered into both of those systems as being born on the home planets of his parents. Thus the official records show the three planets of his birth as Blue, Acadia, and Admiralty. The authorities of all three of the planets send Morgan legal documents registering his birth.

Lara Davis Austin registers Lorna’s birth in Acadia, so Lorna Wilson Austin has two planets of birth because her father, Ben Wilson, is an Acadian citizen as well as her mother. So Lorna’s records have her being born on Blue in the Rainbow Kingdom and on Acadia. Thus she is sent two sets of legal birth registration documents.

Due to them being born within twenty minutes of each other, Morgan is first and slightly older, and the long-term friendship of their mothers the two children spend a lot of time together while growing up. They also go to the same schools and are in the same classes until their studies differ as part of their chosen course subjects at university.

Naturally, this constant close association has them becoming great friends at a young age, and the friendship is a factor in their studies as they grow older. When their parents have work contracts that do not let them take their children with them Lorna and Morgan usually stay with the family of the other couple, or whoever is looking after the other child at that time. Thus both children are very well known to, and familiar with, all of the members of both families and their friends.

While growing up Lorna and Morgan have periods when they are cared for by anywhere between one to four of their parents or their grandparents. During their first fifteen years of life they live on a number of different planets with the most time being on Acadia, Admiralty, and University - the main tertiary education and research planet of Acadia.

Lorna and Morgan always celebrate their birthdays together, and that makes the parties easier for their parents to organise as they just have the one party for all of the two children’s mutual friends. It also means the disruption of routines and the overall costs are lower for the families.

Education

The lives and education of Morgan and Lorna are as convoluted and as mixed up as the registration of their births, or maybe more so.

The education system they access is an integrated multi-level system where all the school age children and youths attend physical classrooms for some subjects and social interactions while the bulk of the knowledge is given to them by computer controlled devices to feed knowledge to their brains then educators teach them how to access and make use of the knowledge they receive via the computers. The amount of information they learn in this way increases with their proven capacity to integrate it with their prior knowledge. Also, the bulk of the teaching which is done in physically present classes are subjects that are not dependent on where the students are in their general studies, this allows students of varying knowledge levels to interact with their age group peers in those classes where they’re together. This system allows students to add other subjects while still participating with their age peer group in the joint classes.

Everyone has access to the basic level systems, but there are newer and more expensive systems that are better at imparting knowledge than the basic systems. Also, parents can hire private tutors to assist their children to understand any of the subjects they’re learning.

Maria, Len, Lara, and Ben are all highly intelligent and well paid people with access to the very latest in teaching aids who also have an interest in giving their children the best and most varied education they can arrange for them. This results in Lorna, Morgan, and their younger siblings having available the most advanced educational methods and equipment in existence that their parents can obtain for their use. Thus they learn more than many of their peers and at a faster rate. They’re also exposed to the advanced aspects of the fields of study their parents and other caretakers are in. All of the adults involved in the upbringing and education of Lorna and Morgan pass on their own knowledge, skills, and approaches to life to the two youngsters. Thus, when they enter their mid-teens they’re a lot more knowledgeable and skilled than any of their age group peers. This is due to the training from their many carers and the access to the advanced levels of the subjects they study over the years, especially their studies in the fields of work of their desired careers.

During the years they live on University both Lorna and Morgan learn a lot about basic physics through the research Maria does while they also learn a lot about the biological science work Lara does as well as the way Ben uses his mechanical, electrical, and electronic engineering knowledge to create working physical devices from the theoretical research of Maria and Lara. Len’s computers and programming knowledge is also passed along to the two youngsters. Naturally, Lorna and Morgan do not learn the same amount of information of each subject due to the differences in their interests and natures. Thus Lorna has a higher focus on medical and biological matters than Morgan who is more focussed on physics and the construction of devices. These differences also flow into their advanced studies in the later stages of high school and their university studies.

In the four years Lorna and Morgan live with his paternal grandfather on Admiralty they learn a lot about military and naval operations plus the art of warfare from Admiral Ken Henry, retired, a guest lecturer at the Federation Military Academy on tactics and strategy. Ken also has a top teacher in unarmed combat train both of the youths to a high level of unarmed combat as well as how to use many other weapons; including beam, projectile, and thrown weapons.

Lost in the depths of time are the reasons why the education systems on all of the human worlds use the same divisions of Grade School for the children five to eleven years of age followed by High School for the twelve to eighteen year old students then University for those nineteen years-old and up. The shortest University degree is three years, so the earliest the students can usually graduate with a degree is twenty-one years of age. Thus, the legal age for adulthood becomes set at twenty-one years of age.

However, the universities offer four and five year graduate courses on many subjects plus a range of post graduate studies. Students can also do multiple degrees either at the same time or after each other. If someone has done the required prerequisite courses they can also do university courses while in high school; they’re just harder for the students to do the compulsory in class activities in person and sometimes they have to do them by one of the many subject remote access process options available.

While each of the realms have very similar laws and requirements on education and the requirements of schools the whole system is operated as privately owned businesses, even in the realms where the schools are fully owned by government agencies. This means the parents can choose where their children go to school. However, the school closest to their home is where the students usually go, even those living with guardians. Even when they’re ready to attend university many students attend the university nearest to their residence, and those who go to a university away from their family home live in approved residences with guardians that are close to the university they’re going to.

The system works well as parents can easily arrange for extra courses, special courses, and advanced courses for their children by the computer system that provides sixty percent of basic education courses. Thus the more advanced students do their advanced work at home or with tutors.

Education Costs

The parents are required to send their children to an approved school for all of their schooling, and they’re also required to pay the schools. For some people this is a serious financial burden. However, this burden can be lightened in many ways. One is for parents on very low incomes to apply for government education funding assistance and the government pays up to seventy-five percent of the school costs direct to the school if the parents qualify for the assistance. Another way to get assistance is to apply for a scholarship from various businesses and schools. Most of the scholarships are for university studies, but some do include high school studies as well. The scholarship contracts are signed by the parents and the students as they require the students to work for the provider of the scholarship for a year of each year of funding assistance they get, but the time is proportional to the percentage of funding provided. For example: a scholarship providing only seventy-five percent of the funds to attend a four year university course has a three year work requirement while a full funding scholarship has a four year work requirement. There are also philanthropic organisations that provide No Return Scholarships for free.

Apprenticeships and Traineeships

Two other educational oddities lost in the dark past relating to the school funding by a business are the employment contracts known as an apprenticeship and a traineeship. In both cases non-adults can be employed outside of the usual Child Labour Laws in situations where they are to do work for their employer while the employer also pays their education costs and can choose the courses of study the students do. Such contracts can be entered into from fifteen years of age with parental approval. Also lost in time is why the apprenticeships usually start at fifteen or sixteen years of age and focus on the more manual type of work careers while the traineeships tend to start at eighteen years of age to focus on research, or management, or administration work careers. In both cases they usually provide part-time work as well as attending school to obtain the various certifications or degrees, and the work time is set at fifty percent of a full-time worker while it fits in around their school schedules. There is one other unusual option in both of these schemes where a non-adult who already has a university degree can work part-time for a business as up to seventy-five percent of the time of a full-time worker where the contract is signed by the student, their parents, a child welfare officer, and an officer of the judicial system. Usually non-adults on such contracts are nineteen or twenty years of age.

Non-adults employed under such contracts also have some extra legal rights and responsibilities that are usually only given to adults. This is so they can go about their daily lives, especially those relating to their work.

Special Celebration

The sixteenth birthday celebrations for Lorna and Morgan are special as they’re both also celebrating having just completed a university degree and they already have their joint thesis for their Master’s Degree done. They started the thesis work while completing their degrees and all of the work has been approved and signed off. However, the final approval has to wait until a week after their graduate degrees are issued today. The day after the thesis is presented they can officially patent their work and earn a good income from their thesis work as well.

Purple Games

Six months after their sixteenth birthdays Lorna Austin and Morgan Kesselring are walking along the hall from the Customs Section of the Arrivals Hall toward the Luggage Retrieval Area beside the Purple City Spaceport exit when something out on the field catches Morgan’s eye and he turns left for a better view.

The two youths are walking beside the Travel Slide everyone else is using as they prefer the exercise. Thus they’re on the two metre wide bit of concrete between the slide’s side barrier and the Lexan wall giving a view of the large spaceport and its facilities. All of the spaceports have large Lexan walls where they can as they’re much cheaper to put in than the concrete walls, but they claim it’s to allow people in the spaceports better views of the port activities and more natural light during the day.

In this case the better view is a critical component of the events and actions to happen. On seeing two large company size combat shuttles as they make fast combat landings on the field Morgan shouts as loud as he can, “Down. Security alert. Contact.” As he starts to shout his right hand is pushing Lorna to the ground while his left is slipping under his shirt for the special ancient weapon his grandfather gave him two years ago. All of the modern weapons use power cells and electronics so the detectors are set to look for the power cells and electrical components of modern weapons while this uses an ancient propellant and mechanical actions to send an explosive shell at the target. Thus it’s not detected by sensors at the many security check points of a modern world.

Morgan is pulling open an emergency exit to go out on to the field at the same time as Lorna hits the floor and his hand comes out of his shirt. He also starts to hear the wail of the security alarms. Exiting the door he runs to his left toward the only cover he can see out here, some sort of vehicle used to move things on the port is parked there with no one in sight. In the several seconds this has taken the scene has changed a lot.

Numerous doors are open on both shuttles with armoured troops pouring out of them. The rear ramp is down on both to let out the large heavy mobile field artillery. The second shuttle is on the left of the first shuttle with a mobile artillery driving down the ramp while the artillery from the front shuttle is down and turned to be driving along the side of the shuttle as the troops are moving out in combat teams.

Due to the training from his grandfather Morgan knows the artillery are armoured and the weakest spot in the armour of these models is the back of the power cell on the rear of them. He has only six rounds in his weapon, but they’re thirty millimetre armour piercing explosive rounds so they should do some real damage. To ensure he does the most damage he can he fires what he was taught is a ’double tap’ - two rounds as fast as he can fire at the target then change target. It takes a few seconds for him to aim and fire at the power cell of the second shuttle’s field artillery, then two rounds inside the rear of the front shuttle to damage it, and two rounds at the back of the power cell on the field artillery from the front shuttle. At the same time as Morgan fires his last two rounds a trooper fires at Morgan and hits him just after the last round leaves his weapon.

The shuttles and artillery are a fair distance away from where Morgan is, so it takes a few seconds for his projectiles to reach their targets. The energy beam from the trooper hits Morgan and destroys the light armour his clothes are made of, another gift from his grandfather, as the impact throws him toward the vehicle he’d been running to. The armour is destroyed, but it keeps Morgan alive, although badly wounded. Morgan is still in the air when his first two shells arrive and do their job of punching a hole in the power cell then setting it off in one huge explosion which sets off the shuttle’s drive fuel. The shots at the other shuttle damages it with the important damage being the breaching of the fuel tank so when the explosion of the fuel cell on the other field artillery piece creates a huge fireball the fuel in this shuttle adds to the explosion.

An unintended outcome is a third shuttle is only metres above the first two shuttles as it comes into land when the twin explosions blow it out of the sky to crash beside the others, then it explodes too. The fourth and fifth shuttles are outside of the fireballs caused by the first three shuttles. However, they are both lightly damaged by the shock waves, and on seeing the loss of sixty percent of the attack force the officer now in charge calls a mission abort and the shuttles go to full power as they head for space. On hearing the abort at the main spaceport the forces on their way to attack and control other places around the planet also abort as they know without control of the main spaceport they won’t be able to take control of the air long enough to complete their missions.

Morgan is just starting to fall behind the vehicle he wanted as cover when the explosions of the shuttles send a series of fireballs across the field of the spaceport. All of the attacking troopers around the shuttles are fried in the fireballs, as are some of the spaceport’s security people who are close to the explosions. However, most of them are behind cover to fight the attackers and are protected from the worst of the fireballs.

The undamaged parts of the armour Morgan is wearing give him a lot of protection from the fireballs as well, and so does the vehicle when he falls into its shadow. However, for a very brief period of time Morgan’s right arm, right chest, and the right side of his head are exposed to the first fireball and are seriously damaged as his right arm and chest is where the trooper’s beam destroyed his armour. Morgan gives a short scream of pain then he passes out as he hits the ground.

Only seconds later the fireball expires from the lack of fuel so soldiers and medics of the spaceport security forces move out onto the field to check on the damage and survivors. Morgan is one of the first people found, given emergency treatment, and rushed to hospital.

Inside the Arrivals Hall

When Morgan shouts his warning many people just stand and look around them. Luckily, enough people react to the shout by pushing everyone around them to the floor then they also get down on the floor.

By the time the shuttles explode everyone is lying on the floor so all but a few are protected when the pressure waves and fireballs pound the Lexan walls and shatter them. Due to all but a few people being on the Travel Slide and having the extra protection of its thicker side barrier they’re not hurt by the flying debris. However, Lorna receives a few cuts when shards hit her where she isn’t protected by the light body armour Ken Henry provided for her. Lorna is the only civilian inside the port buildings hurt in the explosions as all of the others injured are spaceport security staff or people on the field.

By the time the debris stops falling and Lorna can stand up security people are on the field and medics are already treating Morgan. Lorna walks over to the medics and gets treatment for her minor injuries, thus she also travels to the hospital with Morgan and is able to help them in processing him through their administration system paperwork and get him the proper medical help he needs. She also takes possession of his personal effects.

Note: The planet Purple is the lead planet of the Rainbow Kingdom with Purple City being the capital city of the realm. The King lives on the edge of the city. The Purple City Spaceport is also the centre of operations for the Rainbow Fighter Force as it’s the main protection against raiders for the planet.

The Rainbow Kingdom has fifteen planets in its ten solar systems where each of its planets and systems chose a colour as its name, which is where the name of the kingdom is derived from. The realm’s economy is very focussed on biological sciences and shipping. The Kingdom deals with several nearby realms and dozens of other single solar system governments with their two major trading partners being its closest neighbours of the Federation and Acadia, who are also the kingdom’s closest political allies.

Modern documents and authorities are electronic records, but are called papers in the same way as they have since ancient times.

At The Hospital

Due to Lorna knowing Morgan’s details for the administration staff and his ’smart wallet’ allows her to take it from Morgan without its alarm being activated they know she’s very closely connected to him. Thus she’s allowed to stay with him as they go through the various medical checks they need to perform to evaluate his injuries. This is a small hospital close to the spaceport and its staff aren’t used to such serious injuries, thus the doctors are still discussing the possible treatments for what they can identify of his injuries when several soldiers enter the treatment room and spread out around Morgan with sensors aimed at him.

The lead soldier wears no insignia Lorna recognises, but the rest have the universally recognised medical insignia as one of the several on their uniforms. The lead soldier says, “Right, Major, find out what the damage is. The security records show this man just saved thousands of lives by eliminating the initial attack force and causing the main force to abort. We owe him and need to see he’s made well again.” The order isn’t really needed because the medical team splits up as they enter the room and are all near Morgan while they scan him with the many sensors they carry before their leader can start giving orders.

Within a minute three of the medical team are examining the results of their scans while talking too low for Lorna to hear them. Then the man their leader called Major turns and says, “Sir, he was hit with a neural whip in the right shoulder and chest area as well as the burns from the fireball. I don’t know why he wasn’t killed by the neural charge, but the hit has caused a cascade of damage to most of his neural system which is still happening. None of the usual treatments will help him before the neural damage kills him in a few hours.”

The leader frown, looks around the room, points at Lorna, and says, “You stay, Miss. The rest of you civilians leave the room.” The hospital staff seem only too happy to leave the room and the soldiers. The leader addresses the Major, “Will the Conversion save him?” He gets a nod yes in reply. The man turns to Lorna, “You appear to be his closest relative here and I need approval to apply a very intrusive treatment that will save his life. Do you approve this action and allow us to treat him?”

Lorna turns to look at Morgan and notices the fingers of his left hand are moving in the signal for attention so she says, “I see you, Morgan.” All of the other in the room look at her with odd expressions while she focuses on Morgan’s left hand as the fingers move in set patterns. The lead soldier notices her focus and turns his head to look at what she’s staring at, thus he also sees the fingers moving in controlled movements. So he simply smiles when Lorna says, “Morgan gives his approval for whatever it is you plan to do as he knows he’ll die without it.”

The man nods to Lorna as he gets out a communicator and enters a code to make a call. When the person called answers the man says, “Sir, I’m at the hospital with the man who saved the city. He’s dying from a hit by a neural whip and the only way to save his life is to Convert him. Do I have your approval to apply the treatments to this young man?” He listens for a moment then he looks at the Major and nods while making a few hand signs before going back to his talk on the communicator.

With the nod and hand signs the medical team scrambles around the table and start to remove the remains of Morgan’s clothes while the Major gets out his communicator and starts issuing orders to someone. While they remove Morgan’s clothes a couple of them examine them closely and say something to the Major who then talks to their leader when he finishes talking on his communicator.

The lead soldier turns to Lorna and asks, “Why is he wearing light body armour?”

“When Morgan’s grandfather got it for us he told us to always wear it as it will save our lives if we’re attacked. Is it a problem?” Is her reply.

“No, we just wondered why he had it on. It did save his life as it absorbed a lot of the charge before the armour was destroyed. Now, do you know what Morgan destroyed them with as we know he had just passed through the sensor system without triggering it, and that is a big worry for us.”

“Yes, I do. It’s an ancient projectile weapon with only six shots. It’s a lot slower than a modern beam weapon, but it has no power for sensors to detect. It’s good for only light armour at close range. I have one too.”

Lorna saying she has a weapon they can’t detect has all of the soldiers in the room going to a high alert level, so she slowly opens the lower part of her blouse to show the weapon in it’s holster strapped to her body. The lead soldier looks at her with his head tilted to the side, she nods to his non-verbal question, and he removes the weapon from the holster. The others all relax a lot once he has the weapon. Lorna tells him about it as he examines it, “It uses mechanical actions to set off a chemical reaction that sends a thirty millimetre light armour piercing explosive round of a chemical explosive at a much slower speed than a beam weapon, but still a fast speed, as your security records will show. There’s no power cell and none of the electronics normally used in weapons. Also, none of the materials used are the same as those used in modern weapons. This is a very ancient design that hasn’t been used by any military for centuries.”

“An interesting weapon. Who made it for you?”

“Morgan’s grandfather, Admiral Ken Henry of the Federation Fleet, had them made for us. We also have some extra rounds in our luggage. I’d appreciate it if you can find Morgan’s where he dropped it on the field and return it to us. Also, in case you’re wondering, this weapon is not on any of the lists of proscribed devices for liners or any of the realms we usually travel in. Thus it’s legal for us to own and carry them.”

The man smiles as he says, “I hope you don’t mind if I keep this right now as my staff don’t like any strangers having any sort of weapon in my presence.” He gets out his communicator to pass orders for someone to look for Morgan’s weapon on the spaceport field near where he fell.

While they’re talking the medical team is preparing Morgan for the treatments in ways Lorna doesn’t understand, beyond recognising them taking blood samples and placing them in analysers. At one point the Major shows some results to the leader and they both smile.

Some more soldiers with medical insignia arrive and they pass many things to the team around Morgan. As their leader says to Lorna, “We owe your Morgan a lot and the King is going to have a serious fight with the Parliament for approving this treatment to Morgan as it’s usually only provided to citizens of the Rainbow Kingdom.”

Lorna grins when she turns to look at him as she says, “No he won’t. Yes, both Morgan and I travel on Acadian passports as our mothers are from Acadia and we’re Acadian citizens. However, we’re both also citizens of the Rainbow Kingdom with birth certificates from Blue due to being born on the space-liner Bright Future in unclaimed space. So I have dual citizenship while Morgan has triple citizenship as his father is from Admiralty in the Federation.” This results in her being asked for, and giving, their full names and identity details, which are quickly checked.