Story: The Glove, VII [OBSOLETED x2]

What a Star Trek movie marathon! Yesterday the first three and today the final three, and now we're done. And so is 2013, that partly accursed year that saw much progress but a kick in the teeth for every thing that went well. So, farewell 2013. I foresee great things for next year including otters and a giant bouncy castle.

You can't beat a bit of Star Trek in the mid-Winter, enlivening events and thrusting a bit of colour, character and story into the grey dreariness of it all. Once you get past Star Trek I, that is, which has a greyness all its own. It's astonishing how every single one of those six original cast Star Trek movies meets a high minimum level of quality. Every single one, even Star Trek V which is underrated, has redeeming points at the very least. None are unwatchable, and some are great. It is utterly unprecedented. No other unplanned film series can claim that honour, none. Of course I stand open to suggestions to the contrary, so please comment below if you have any ideas.

Now, without much further ado let's settle in to the task at hand. Before ducking into the latest instalment of 'The Glove', let's pause for a moment and recap what has happened so far.

On the moon of Troos, orbiting the planet Ganymede, the colonists have been separated over time into two main regions: Edin and Burgh, representing the sciences and arts respectively. A young piper called Steffan passes his initiation exam into the Guild of Pipers with honours and is offered meritorious promotion to high rank in exchange for taking part in the Guild's apparently traditional intelligence gathering activities. Steffan turns down the opportunity and leaves, leaving his would-be benefactor Master Octavius unsettled. One night passes...

----

Story: The Glove, VII [RETCONNED OUT]
(Part I , VI , VIII)

Several days later, a figure could be seen walking happily down a dusty road to parts unknown. The dusty roads of Troos were an artefact of the colony's tendency to reserve higher technologies for the purposes that truly required them. The old Earth's eventual fate had left a major influence even hundreds of years since Last Contact.

The figure ambled along, leading a pony which it rarely rode, passing through villages and settlements and chatting with the locals as it went. One afternoon the figure entered Little Muckly and entered the pub. It pushed back its sun sheltering hood to reveal former apprentice piper Steffan, with the beginnings of a beard and an ironic countenance.

The vagabond stayed for many hours, chatting idly with the locals and their piper, before taking a room and sleeping the sleep of the innocent. Some time before dawn he left, and began to roam once more. Some days the wry fellow never encountered a village and slept in the wild with his robe for a pillow, and on others the grand sweep of events pulled him into one of the rare towns between Edin and Burgh. Every day he followed a meandering path leading away from the city of the arts toward the city of the sciences. He grew scruffier and scruffier.

A plan was forming in his mind, becoming more and more clear as he learnt from the locals and the guildsmen he subtly quizzed. That plan twisted into an entirely new shape when he met his first dissident.

To be continued...