Moonboy

“Shana Nightly, you are hereby exiled from the 57th HSSE fleet under the charge of unapproved childbearing. You will be given one space suit, supplies for ten years and a temporary base for one person. You will be allowed one bag of personal possessions. Your exile will be on our next stop. Do you understand?” a cold voice echoed in the room.

“Yes” a woman's weak voice replied.

Moments later a young woman sat alone looking down at her heavily pregnant belly. Despair had filled her as she listened to her sentence knowing that she was powerless. It had been eight months since that horrid night. She still remembers the mocking voice of the man that had raped her. Being too important to the mission the men were never held responsible in such situations. Thus rape was often overlooked as a minor offence, but should the woman get pregnant she would be exiled without trial. Her fate was sealed.

She was due in just four weeks time and the next stop would be in three. This would leave little time to set up and she would be in no condition to do so. Help was never given to the exiled, they were transported to a predetermined location with their allocated supplies where they would be unloaded and then left on their own.

If they were going to a habitable location then she would have been able to manage, although less supplies would have been provided. But the next stop was a moon, a resource stop. The planet that the moon orbited was habitable but the law clearly stated that the exiled would be dropped off at the next stop without exception.

The weeks went by quickly, her only visitor came to inform her of her appointments with the ship doctor and the progress of her supplies. No one else would visit her. She had accepted this and said her goodbyes before her sentence was handed out. She didn’t want her family and friends to get in trouble. Her fate was sealed. Why take anyone down with her?

The doctor had told her that both she and her child were healthy, her labour would be at the predicted time and as long she made sufficient preparations they would both live. Both knew it was an empty assurance.

The enforcer returned to her room the day after they arrived on the moon, procedure dictated that no-one leave the ship on the first day of arrival so her departure was scheduled for the second day. Family and friends of the exiled were required to attend the departure, it was considered to be a funeral for them as the exiled would be considered dead after departure. Thus attendance was expected as a show of acceptance.

Under supervision her parents helped her into the suit, neither her nor her parents showed any emotion as it may be taken as defiance. Then under escort of the enforcer she was taken to the transport vehicle. As she got in she took one last look at her parents and friends and gave them one last sad smile. She was relieved to that none of them smiled back. Although she worried about the consequences should they react she couldn’t resist that last goodbye. She knew that once they were in the safety of their quarters they would give into their grief, the evidence from the previous night could be seen on their faces.

Three hours later the transport vehicle was on it’s way back to the ship. Shana looked at the supplies and then at her stomach. Determination filled her, she knew her chances were slim but she would not give up yet. She walked over to the boxes of supplies and searched for what she would need to set up the base.

Four hours later every muscle ached with exhaustion and she had the foundation done. She decided to get some sleep before continuing the next day. Another three days passed, she had finished the base but there was still much to do and soon she would not be able move due the coming labour. It wouldn’t be ready, but she decided to move the supplies into the base then she would just need to connect up the oxygen and power. It wasn’t all that needed to be done but it was enough to survive without her suit.

The days passed quickly and finally late on the third she finished moving everything inside. After moving everything she was ready to collapse in exhaustion but forced herself to at least get the power set up, thus it was on the morning of the next day that she went outside to connect the oxygen. She struggled through labour pains it but finally got it done after four hours, unfortunately she could not hold her self up any longer. She lacked the strength to get back into the base, thus it was just meters for the door that she had to give birth.

Hours later the baby had been born, Shana had taken the suit off and used the oxygen mask attached to the suit to survive long enough for the child to be born. She felt her life slipping away the moment the delivery was done. She wanted nothing more than for the child to survive, thus she was both relived and surprised when she saw that her child had somehow adapted to the cruel conditions in which he was born into.

Her strength now failing, she took a needle that she been carrying in the pocket of her suit and pressed it against her sons neck thus injecting the contents into him. The needle had contained a microchip which would teach her boy everything he would need to know to survive. Her father had procured it in secret before discretely giving it to her when he helped her with the suit.

Her sons first moments in life had given Shana hope in her last, that he would survive.