'Firefly meets Battlestar Galactica'.
A merchant's daughter is captured and sold into slavery.
A genetically modified survivor of an alien attack scours the galaxy for her taken brother before he is 'disassembled'.
An alien scientist u...
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Macbeth did not learn the identity of the green eyed woman for a long time.
The next morning began the routine of her new life. The other female slaves woke her, the mute Lia leading her to the bathing room. The Fey even took the time to pin back the dark blond hanks of hair hanging in her eyes. Macbeth's hair had grown past her ear lobes since her captivity. She thanked the woman, in Fey thanks to the translator, causing the silent slave's eyes to soften.
The kitchens were already crawling with activity. Macbeth was shocked by the labor intensive preparation each meal required. The Chrysostem House brought in few ingredients from the market. The estate boasted numerous crops, harvested and refined by hand.
She was no stranger to farm work, but the simplicity of it threw her. Farming tech was common place on the Pembrook farm, she repaired it enough, and the crops consisted of plants used for medicinal and production purposes. Most of their income came from fibrous crops used to make cloth. Consumption crops were grown in controlled conditions in New Tokyo genetically modified with nutritional absorption enzymes easily copied into household replicators.
The crops here reminded her of the rumors she heard of Jamestown. Ariel insisted they grew crops without any modifications, and used ancient farming tech. Though she doubted Pathosians shared the ideals of the backwoods territory, whose dedication to the purity of the human spirit meant they practiced archaic traditions, were notoriously poor, and scraped the land to survive. She suspected the Pathosians used their slaves to farm and cook because it was a sign of their wealth. To possess enough man power so each meal was a hand crafted elegant feast spoke of power, the riches of ownership. The Chrysostem's were obscenely rich.
Macbeth and the other women worked the fields first, harvesting baskets of ingredients in Anaon's pre-dawn chill. The plants were like nothing on New Earth, beautiful and dangerous, large purple fruits nestled among poisonous red thorns, slender blue shoots, the color of New Earth's sky, required precise extraction. The sap was corrosive enough to burn through skin. Each plant required a new technique to harvest without injuring the harvester.
Macbeth's teacher was an older female, another parbreed like Anthony. Clio walked with a pronounced limp; scars peaked from the collar of her shift but her speech was patient and precise. She made certain Macbeth knew exactly how to work on each crop and reinforced the lesson until it stuck in her memory.
With the first shimmering wave of heat from the planet's blood orange sun, the slaves headed into the kitchens to clean and prepare everything. Macbeth was placed on a grinding wheel, a primitive but efficient tool. Her task was to grind the blue stalks, called cusur, to a powder used like sugar. The slaves took up all number of tasks around her, from peeling and dissecting various fruits, to making dough for the elaborately folded pastries served every morning.
Julius lorded over them, present when they came in from the fields. He stood between the ovens, smoking a hash that filled the air with the scents of honey and something close to vanilla, his tattooed arms crossed over his chest. He inspected everything produced with a critical eye, throwing out an entire sheet of food that did not meet his demanding expectations. The sight of so much wasted food made her cringe. No one ate before the Masters; it was all she could do not to salivate on the pastries.
