Free The Darkside War by Zachary Brown

floors,” Ken announced. “When my family visited Tranquility, they told us humans aren’t allowed dense attractor technology.”
    â€œAntigravity,” someone chimed in.
    â€œDense. Attractor. Technology,” Ken repeated.
    That was why the one human space station struggling in orbit still had people floating around in it. And our transport, a cheap craft used to move recruits around, had none either.
    But somewhere underfoot, Accordance engineers had laid down a grid of material that pulled us all down toward it. Immensely expensive, and done just so that they could be comfortable here on the moon.
    The cargo bay’s vaulted ceilings stretched far overhead, like a giant’s ribcage. Robotic forklifts with long, articulated, spiderlike arms scurried around the football-sized open floor, pulling square containers off five-story racks that they sometimes had to climb up to reach.
    â€œI saw a whole program about the people they flew to the moon to do the construction,” Keiko said. This part of the city had been dug out by humans helping run alien-built mining machines. The end of the cargo bay was a massive airlock designed for giants, with train tracks running through it into the bay.
    â€œOkay recruits, keep walking!”
    We trooped out of the busy cargo bay in obedient lines and snaked our way into Tranquility City’s subways and tunnels. Then up a series of escalators, everyone still making sure to keep a hand on the shoulder of the recruit in front of them.
    The familiar architecture of Accordance spires appeared when we broke street level.
    â€œFuck me,” Keiko said. “We’re on the surface of the moon.”
    â€œKeep moving!” the instructors shouted as we stumbled, looking around.
    â€œNothing like on a screen,” I said, awed and also stumbling after the recruit in front of me.
    Translucent material capped the streets between buildings, letting us look up into the black sky. Bright light dripped from luminescent globes and strips, filling shadows and crevices with a soft green light to augment the natural sunlight. Gray hills circled around the city where the streets ended, plunging back underground.
    â€œI thought I’d see stars,” someone said.
    â€œToo much light. Washes it out. Just like at a stadium.”
    â€œIt’s Earth,” Keiko whispered as we turned the gentle curve of an Accordance skyscraper’s base.
    It hung in the sky, blue and small. Everyone stopped as they looked up. The entire line bunched into a crowd. I craned my neck, ignoring the busy street.
    â€œWhat’s that?” someone else asked. A comet-like silver shape high overhead occluded the Earth briefly, casting us in a flitting shadow before moving on.
    â€œA Pcholem ship,” someone said. “They came in those ships.”
    â€œThat is a Pcholem. Not a ship. Pcholem.”
    â€œWhat?”
    â€œMove!” a struthiform instructor hissed, coming up alongside us. “Move now.”
    Carapoids moved around us on the street, and more struthi­forms bobbed past to avoid us. The streets ran thick with aliens going about their business. Several water-filled glass bubbles with Arvani inside trundled past.
    â€œIt’s just us,” Keiko said. “We’re the only humans out here.”
    Most humans on the moon worked for the Helium-3 mines, or on Accordance construction.
    We kept moving, still looking up for a last glimpse of home, until we passed under another large airlock at the city’s edges. Humans glanced at us from several small eateries that lined the edge of the oval common area.
    No shiny, green-tinged metal cleaning robots in here. Trash and dirt littered the crosswalks and graffiti filled the walls.
    Welcome to the human section.
    â€œI gotta go,” Keiko whispered.
    â€œWhat?”
    â€œBathroom. We’re in a human zone, right? I gotta go.”
    â€œThe instructors are out for my blood