Prologue
Finders keepers, losers weepers. It seems like a silly thing to base an actual law on but it’s pretty accurate, (as far as Planetary Ownership goes with us humans). When we outgrew Earth, it was the corporations that started looking up and they were the ones who reached the stars first. That, of course, started the arguments over how you could own an entire planet or moon (or whatever they landed on). But hey - finders keepers. I remember hearing my Dad say that was one of the stupidest things he’d ever heard, but it worked. I was five when the laws got passed and asked Dad why I got in trouble for doing that at school, but the adults on TV could do it for a whole planet.
“Because politicians like money.”
My brother and I both remember that. Once they started colonizing them, I’d look up at the stars and wonder what it’d be like to actually go to one. How much different from Earth would it be? It sucked balls when I found out that you either had to be working for the corporations or have a ton of money to get to go to the colonies, but that’s how things work. I told my Mom that I wanted to go to the stars too.
“If you want it badly enough, you’ll find a way.”
That’s one of the last memories I have of Mom. We lost her and Dad a month later in a car accident. My brother was fifteen and I was nine. He pretty much raised me after that, looking out for me in the orphanage, and then becoming my guardian once he turned eighteen. It was hard. He went without a lot of the time, so I could have the things I needed. But we stuck together through it all. Those two things our parents had told us stayed in my head for some reason. I even amended them a little as I got older. Politicians, and pretty much everyone else, likes money and will do some crazy shit to get it. More importantly though, if we want something badly enough you’d better not stand in our way. Our family name is Thorne for a reason, and you really don’t want the two of us aiming for your side...
