CatH Page 1

Template:PagePage 1 of Clear and the Hopeless is part of the spin-off series Clear and the Hopeless and starts off the entire series. Page 1 introduces many of the major Characters of the chapter, including Clear, the protagonist, herself and her ship, The Hopeful, often nicknamed "The Hopeless" by Clear and her friends. Used to her miserable life gathering salvage from her own dead and conquered planet, Mars, Clear is unhappy with the sudden change of circumstance when Note, the ship's artificial intelligence, suddenly makes a jump across space and into the Perseus Arm. She's joined initially by humans from Earth, Hebedee and Green, but Hebedee is accidentally killed during a confrontation with a transvestite man named The Boss. She then become embroiled in the politics of warring factions in the Perseus Arm, More TBA

History

Post 1

_{Main article: CatH Post 1}

The opening post to the Page is a Non-Story Post explaining the existence of the thread and the intentions of the writer, Britt the Writer in its future. Opening threads with such a disclaimer is commonly done to allow potential readers and writers to understand what the thread will be about and, therefore, if they should invest time in it.

Posts 2 - 5

_{Main articles: CatH Post 2 | CatH Post 3 | CatH Post 4}

The Hopeful, a massive derelict ship orbiting Mars, has been home to a young salmitton woman named Clear for most of her life. The ship isn't ideal as it's in constant need of repairs and is in a pitiful state. To ensure the continued functionality of basic systems, Clear makes trips down to the planet to scavenge through the abandoned towns and cities of her people for anything salvageable. Some she sells to people on the human spacestation Saffron 5, the rest she gives to Note, the ship's A.I., to be used in the repairs _{(citation needed)}. To make trips away from the ship, she uses a battered old transport ship she named The Bug and in the Bug is ALEX, a robot specially designed for salvaging. After one such salvage mission Clear returns to the ship to talk to Icer, the former captain of the ship who has been frozen in time within the Command Deck. Her real name is unknown but some burnt letters can be seen on her jacket that seem to spell out "Icer", owing to her nickname. However Note suddenly forces the ship to jump through space, something he's never done while Clear has been aboard and something she didn't even think could be done with so few resources. Hebedee, another crew member and active mechanic, believes that the Earth has disappeared from the Sol System and that Note must required the planet in his sights to maintain a presence around Mars. Soon Note does run out of fuel and requires Clear to salvage some. However they're in an inhabited system and instead Clear decides she'll have to try to trade for fuel at a spacestation. While Hebedee looks more into Earth's disappearance, Clear goes to find the third, and newest, crew member named Green. Green, who has magical powers over plant life, has filled an entire portion of the ship with magical plant life that Clear must navigate to find the small, unusual human. Green is unable to communicate normally and so she creates small plants to create vibrations into a communicator that will create the illusion of speech through Clear's comm. She is very enthusiastic at the opportunity to accompany Clear on her trade mission and is eager to get to know the last salmitton.

Narrative exposition reveals that after humanity conquered Mars, disease was what finally wiped out the last of the Martian races. The human conquerors kept Martians on reservations where they couldn't grow decent food and couldn't get the medicines needed to fight off the alien diseases. Clear was likely spared this horror because she lived on The Hopeful with her father. After wiping out Martian life, the humans turned several derelict Martian spacecraft into museums, which is where Clear admits she learnt most of this information. Humans then settled Mars with sporadic, often lawless, towns and one huge monument to their success - Saffron 5. Business of Saffron 5 had declined, however, since the destruction of Jupiter.

Faced with the alien and vibrant spacestation, Green seeks comfort from Clear and holds her hand, which Clear reluctantly allows. When Green tries to get closer, Clear backs away aggressively. Clear leads them through the bars until they find darkest and most dirty, where she expects to be able to get fuel for very cheap via illicit channels. After asking the robot bartender for possible buyers, she's directed to a group of humans. The leader of the, however, appears little more than a skeleton in traditional Earth-type pirate garb. He introduces himself as Kaptin Kwanza but when Clear offers to trade him rare Martian goods, one of his crew realises she's a Martian herself and, therefore, worth a lot of money to someone. The pirates decide to kidnap her instead of trade with her. Clear and Green run through the spaceports bars and eventually hide in one of the cellars until everything seems quiet. When they emerge they see two of the humans looking for them and before Clear could stop her, Green rushes out to use her power against them. Hundreds of vines spring from the metal floor and lift up the two men, wrapping them in vine-cocoons. The two women then head back to The Bug and take-off, only to find Kaptin Kwanza has his own ship, The Jolly Wanker, and the chase continues through space. Clear demands that Note ready the jump drive and the A.I. does so, despite lacking further salvage. Kwanza makes a warning shot at the Bug but they fly into the hangar of The Hopeful and escape with a hyperjump.

Posts 6 - 10

Clear is distraught that she should be reduced to a commodity, her life now having a literal value for what she is. Clear resorts, as usual, to drink. Having amassed quite a pile of empties, Hebedee comes to her door and asks why she shut off her comm link with Note. She doesn't want to collect salvage, she wants to be left alone. When Hebedee points out they do still need the salvage, she shouts at his voice through the door and throws her bottle at it. Hebedee leaves her alone and she weeps blue-staining tears. After a while she sobers up a little and takes a steam-wash before heading to Hebedee's Workshop to apologise to him. Note, however, informs her that he and Green left the ship after being invited to a strange, crystalline vessel where they hoped to get the salvage required.

Notes

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