Chapter 10: Life and Lifelessness

The snub-nosed transport docked at one of the Royal Homeworld's many over-crowded landing stations. Passengers poured out onto the walkways. Asylum-seekers and tourists, mostly. There was an over-abundance of baggage.

The moment Pampaa stepped off the ship and onto the platform, he kicked his sandals away and proceeded barefoot.

Following after, Benja scrambled to retrieve Pampaa’s sandals. "What are you doing?"

"I like to keep in touch with the ground," said Pampaa.

"I'm pretty sure every building here has a strict shoes-on policy."

"News to me," said Pampaa. “Hm.”

Benja focused on grabbing the sandals without getting knocked over by a high tide of debarking passengers. Ducking in and out of the crowd, he finally managed to snatch them up.

As he straightened, Benja's gaze traveled up the wall of a massive building. It went up, and up... and kept on going.