Prologue: Dorothy

PROLOGUE: DOROTHY

Solar date: Year 3679, month 31, day 12
I get up, stretch until I can feel my bones crackle, sluggishly march over to the washroom to brush my teeth and wash my face and shower, as always. The water's always just the right temperature on The Judgement, that's the ship I live on, it's big, but nobody ever notices it, our ship's special that way.
Just as I'm lathering up the speaker in my cabin fizzles and starts spouting some audio, it's hard to hear from the shower though.
I thought about getting out of the shower early to hear the announcement but just snorted a little laugh, like anything important has been going on lately anyway. After I'm done showering I make sure to head out to the small kitchen I have in my cabin to make some breakfast.
Maybe just toast for today, I put the bread in the toaster and rush off to see if I can get dressed before the toaster finishes, I almost trip trying to shove the pants onto my legs though. I carefully slip into my green shirt with my codename "Theta" in big letters across the chest. It's policy, but because crew members wanted their names to identify them too the higher-ups allowed everyone's name to be labelled above their door in their cabin. I look to my plaque and it reads "Dorothy Ophelia Gneiss" and man do I think it looks pretty, speaking of which, I gaze into the mirror to see how my outfit looks.
I still think I should reorder a new uniform. I've grown out of this one so the jeans are now ending before they reach my ankles. For a white girl with silver-black long hair who's almost 6 feet tall, this outfit looks pretty alright on me in my opinion. So I'll hold on the reordering until it really bothers me. The toaster pops so loudly it snaps me out of my daze, I jump and tumble against my bed. Oww, my head stings, but I guess that's what I get.
Time for some breakfast, I climb out of submission and slap the toast onto a plate, then spread some preserved butter onto the slice, hold it with my mouth and make my way to my work station. On the way I see my friend, Katya, she's shy and super dangerous for being a field agent on The Judgement, but I love her to death, the somewhat muffled words "HEY PAL" instinctively explode from my mouth but she doesn't reply, she just looks super stressed out and rushes past me.
So I follow her, obviously. I put my hand on her shoulder to try and slow her down but she just turns around and backhands me so hard my toast hits the wall from my face getting hit so hard. Why does everything like to hit my face this morning? Will I ever figure out why I just got smacked by my best friend? Let's find out as soon as my face stops hurting! Which it doesn't do for a while, I quickly hold my hand to my face as I hear Katya apologizing like a machine which is immediately heard as background noise until I come to a little more, I look up and ask, "WHY?"
The 5 foot 7 mocha skinned girl with emerald eyes and medium length choppy jet black hair who I've come to love apologetically replies with "I'm sorry I've just been kind of having a panic attack since the Regulus announced that Operation Homeland is now in full gear, I have to organize all the people in my troop and I have to get everything working for the constant missions that we'll be pumping out and I have to be very strict with the schedules or else the entire operation could be in jeopardy and oh crap this is happening," she takes a deep breath.
I'm stunned. Seriously, I'm stunned, my face hurts like hell. But I'm also stunned from what she just said, Operation Homeland is in full gear? But that's the one that the Regulus has been working on PERSONALLY for several months now, I didn't think it would be happening today. Of all days, it just feels so. Routine.
Well, I guess I have to do my part too, even if I just work in inventory. Which is a seriously boring job, I wish I could do Katya's job, I think I would be an awesome field agent sometimes. Plus I really miss solid ground. After a while of getting lost in thought I finally manage to respond to my friend with, "It's okay, I know you get stressed pretty easily, don't worry about it, go do your job so you can rest easy tonight," she nods and runs off, as she does that I just shake my head a little more.
I stand up and walk over to the nearest viewing window, through the small square of reinforced glass I look down on the bustling city-planet of Vergak, the place where our organization originated. I guess I'm looking forward to this, but at the same time I'm nervous. Considering our mission is to invade the planet from the inside and free the people of their problems. I don't think I would be worried if it were expected that everyone would welcome us with open arms, but we know they aren't going to.