Dragonweyr Station

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A long backstory post of Caylin Trell's life prior to arrival on Pern

Growing up on the planet Gaia was an idyllic and delightful childhood full of play and fun with friends and all the latest and greatest toys and entertainments... If you were one of the insanely rich ruling class. For everyone else, such as the Trell family, life on Gaia meant work, hard and long hours of it maintaining the estates and toys of the wealthy.

Caylin Trell worked along side one or the other of her parents from practically the time she was old enough to walk. She helped with menial and frankly disgusting household chores with her mother. She carried tools and water and got into tight places working on potentially dangerous equipment with her father.

Caylin was 8 years old when her father had a rather nasty accident, resulting in a broken leg. She listened as her parents fretted about what to do, since if he wasn't working, they would have to pay for all his medical expenses with her mother's tiny salary and the very small amount they had been able to save over the years. Even at her young age, Caylin was a determined little thing. So she came up with a plan all on her own.

The next day, when the shift manager was checking that all who were scheduled were actually present and working, he was confused and a bit angry to see Carter Trell's name listed as being “Present and on time” when he knew for a fact that the man would be bedridden for at least a month if not more. He stormed over to Carter's station, thinking one of his buddies must have clocked him in and intended to try and cover for him, likely ending up shirking his own work. He stopped his stomping in shock when he saw not a man, but a scrawny girl with safety-goggles covering practically her whole face and over-sized coveralls.

He had of course seen the girl there with her father on previous occasions, but always before she had been with her father. The overseer watched and was again surprised at how competently and efficiently the girl worked. After a few more minutes of stern observation, he turned and left without a word. Caylin continued to fill in for her father the whole time he was recovering. Her parents worried she might be hurt, but she wanted to do her part, and so long as the overseer was willing to turn a blind eye to exactly which Trell was doing the work, they were hardly in a position to object.

From then on, her position as a mechanic was pretty much set for the rest of her life. Their fellow workers would trade what they could in exchange for Caylin bringing their battered and broken machines back to life. Over many years, her parents saved what they could from this and their own wages (pittance that they were) and managed to get just enough to send their daughter to a small school for mechanical engineering.

It was not of course, one of the schools of the wealthy elite, but it was a step or two above the Trell's own social class, a fact made plain to young Caylin repeatedly by some of her fellow students during her time there. She ignored them as well as she could, choosing to focus on her studies. She was stronger than most of them from a lifetime of hard work and more skilled than they at fighting dirty. Those who tried to pull anything physical on her soon discovered this, much to their displeasure.

One of the first of these was another young woman, from a family only a little bit wealthier than Caylin's own. If the truly wealthy were snobbish about class, those under them were ten times worse. They clung to the rank they had and insisted on it being honored since they often had very little else they could be proud of, and that rank was all that separated them from the drudges and factory laborers. So Caylin was not surprised when the young woman and her cronies cornered her outside the workshop one evening to “put her in her place”.
While she did not come away from the encounter unscathed, a childhood spent fighting for every scrap among others who were just as desperate for them as she was had hardened her for this sort of unfair brawl as the softer, less desperate teens before her had not been. She might have had a few bruises, but most of hers she could hide and continue with her classes as though nothing had happened. Her opponents had to plead that they had “fallen down,” or call in sick for a few days while they recovered. Caylin continued to treat them with the exact same deference as she had before, but was always more careful after that to avoid places where she could be trapped. Next time, they might want to do more than merely beat her up.

It was during her schooling that Caylin discovered the love of her life, flying. One of her favorite teachers brought in an old model “wing” shuttle. More of a light scouting craft than a true shuttle, that had been turned into a very fancy and potentially deadly racing machine for the elite. This one was years behind the models in competition races of course, and it was in rather bad repair.

This particular teacher also managed to get them an old sim flight trainer for the little wing ship. He then issued a challenge. The one who scored best on the next exam, and best in the flight simulator, and who made the most significant contribution to getting the wing airworthy again, would get first turn taking it out for a test flight once repairs were finished.

Fascinated by the machine and the idea of getting to actually fly it, Caylin practically lived in the workshop after that, whenever she wasn't in her other classes. She spent long hours working on the little ship and just as long hours in the sim and pouring over her homework. She even got permission to sleep in a little disused closet just off the workshop so she wouldn't have to lose time working or studying so she could make the long walk home to sleep at night. It came as no surprise to anyone when Caylin was the one to win the treat of the test flight.

The day she flew the wing ship, under the strict guidance of a more trained pilot, was forever branded in her memory after that as the best day of her life to that point and for some time after. The freedom of the skies was better than anything she had ever even hoped to experience. She wished fervently that it didn't have to end and only landed with extreme reluctance once her time was up.

After that, any sort of flying contraption that came through the classroom workshops she was the first to dig into and get to know every part of it she could. Any chance that came along to test fly these (with a pilot trainer or in sims), Caylin was always at the front of the line. In atmosphere or out of it, anything that would give her that sense of freedom that came with flight, she absolutely and wholeheartedly loved and craved almost like a drug.

Full of hope and an optimism, Caylin attempted to gain entry into a piloting academy. She knew she aced the exam portion, having practically memorized the manuals from cover to cover. She waited, and waited, and waited... Months passed before she finally received a response. She was told simply that she had no patron and thus no place trying to get above herself by trying to get into the prestigious aeronautics and piloting academy and not to waste their valuable time.

Her dream crushed, the young mechanic grew bitter and cynical, at least on the outside. She threw herself into her studies as a mechanical engineer with only one goal now. She was going to do whatever it took to get off Gaia.

That was what brought her to the hiring fair, where skilled workers were bought and sold. She carried with her a tiny pack with all her worldly possessions. Over the right breast pocket of her coveralls she had a small patch, embroidered simply by her mother with her name on it 'TRELL C.' in block letters. Carried in that same pocket was a tiny picture of her parents with their well-wishes for her written on the back. Above her as she stood in the line of others waiting to be hired, was a big sign with her qualifications and the sort of job she was seeking, 'Interstellar Engineering and Mechanic's Assistant'.

Had she been of a slightly higher class, her qualifications and skills would have meant she could easily get the job of a Cheif Engineer. However, with her lowborn state and lack of any patron, getting the assistant 'grease monkey' position she was asking for might be a bit of a challenge. She looked down the line a bit nervously at the other young mechanics, somewhat heartened to see there were very few looking for shipboard work. Maybe she would stand a chance, assuming anyone was hiring.

About noon, the 'early risers' of the wealthy classes began trickling into the fair. Most headed straight for the entertainments and food areas, leaving their stewards and such to handle the actual hiring. These underlings then paced sternly down the rows of hopefuls, looking for those with the best qualifications at the lowest price. They would then offer them perhaps half of the wages they were asking for. There might be a little bit of bargaining, depending on the social rank and qualifications of the potential hire and how badly the one hiring needed them. Then contracts would be signed and the new hire would follow their new master off to get started.

Caylin spent the whole day standing in the line, grateful that her parents had sent her with food and drink so she wouldn't have to give up her place to go get something to stave off hunger and thirst. She watched as others in her line were chosen to join the ranks of household mechanics, waiting and clinging to her last hope that she might be able to have the chance to escape Gaia and get to fly. Even if she would never get to be a pilot herself.

The day wore on slowly, the crowd of people hiring grew thinner, even though there were still many people waiting in their lines in hopes of getting work. Most would be headed to factory jobs if they couldn't find work in a household, and those who worked in the factories rarely had long or healthy lives. As the night wore on and most were starting to listlessly plod away from the line, Caylin held her spot in stubborn desperation. She would leave either with a new job, or when the organizers kicked her out, not before.

Just as the clean up and tear-down crews were getting started and some of those organizers were starting to give those last few remaining hopefuls some pointed looks, A rather drunk man emerged from one of the tents. He wore the smart club jacket and smarmy demeanor of one of the scions of the wealthy families who fancied themselves as ace captains of their luxurious space yachts. He looked around blearily as if seeking one of his personal assistants. With none immediately in the area, he frowned and looked over at the lines of people hoping for hire. ...Then he spotted Caylin.

“You there!” He pointed at her, wobbly, his speech slurred. “Gemme t' my ship an' you got a job. I'll give you...” He considered and smiled as if conferring a great favor, then offered barely a quarter of the salary she had been asking for, with no benefits other than room and board and a new uniform each year.

Caylin swallowed hard. It was a horrible offer of course... But what choice did she have? She picked up her bag and nodded, holding out the contract. “Yes sir. Which ship sir?” She asked as politely and demurely as she could as he signed the contract with a grumble. He gave the name of his yacht and the young mechanic took note of it as she acted as his support on the way to the docks. She endured his clumsy groping the whole way there in silence.
Time passed and Caylin settled into her new position as the very lowest person on board the ship. She didn't even have her own sleeping chamber, just a sleep-sack she could strap down in one corner of engineering and was expected to have cleared away and packed into a cupboard each morning before the 'real' engineers arrived.

Life wasn't all bad though. Since she nearly never left engineering, she practically never saw the captain. This captain was a bit of an oddity in that he hired a crew of nearly all women. Though this was less surprising when one considered what he liked to do with his crew when out on the long voyages, if he was unable to secure someone 'professional' to bring along. Most of the crew were fine with this, as those who did the extra 'duties' were given bonuses and promotions.

Caylin was glad enough to avoid the captain's eye and thus avoided competition with the other members of the crew over those bonuses. She actually made tentative friendships with a few of them, though nothing that ever extended beyond polite greetings and occasionally going sightseeing on shore leave together as a group.

Those sightseeing trips almost made all the humiliations of her position worth it. She got to see worlds she had only known of as the names of places exotic goods came from. She even managed to collect a few small, cheap souvenirs. Some she kept, others she sent home to her parents, who always seemed thrilled to receive her gifts and letters.

One day though, she stopped receiving responses to her letters and packages. Worried, she sent messages to some of her parent's friends. It was only then that she learned about the illness that had been working its way through the estate where her family worked. A great many had become ill. Some had died quickly. Her parents, with the help of the money she had sent she was told, had been comfortable and able to last longer than most. But in the end, they had been too old and too tried from their life of toil to beat the sickness.

A kind neighbor sent her all the family photos and the few small heirlooms that they had been able to hide from the creditors who took everything of value her parents had owned to pay for their last expenses. Caylin found she couldn't bear to look at these for quite some time and left them in their neat little package, stashed among her other belongings. When the ship stopped for a visit at Gaia later that year, Caylin volunteered to remain aboard. Now there was nothing at all left to tie her to that place. She was never going back there again as long as she lived.

More time went by and the pleasure yacht cruised from place to place rather aimlessly. Rumor among the crew was that their captain had a falling out with his parents and was avoiding home. This was fine with Caylin, as it meant she got to stay away from Gaia and see even more new worlds.

Then she noticed they were slowly losing crew members. It was only one or two at a time, and usually the most high ranking and least essential to the daily running of the ship. So at first she didn't notice a thing. Even when she did, she didn't quite realize the significance until after one stop, the chief engineer had been replaced by their assistant. Even then, it was only when they took on an actual cargo that she finally put all the rumors and mutterings and disappearance of nonessential or highly paid crew together. Their captain's falling out with his parents had been more severe that she had realized and he had been cut off from his usual allowance.

When, after the first cargo run, their pay was 'delayed' without explanation, all crew who had any choice jumped ship, leaving only a skeleton crew to run things. In the days that followed, Caylin fervently wished she had left with them as the journey went on and her pay never came. They continued to carry small cargoes, most of which she was quite sure were illegal or at the very least skipping out on paying the tariffs on imported goods to various places.

Then they got a rather odd cargo, not so much odd in what it contained as its destination. They were headed to a place Caylin had never even heard of before. Some planet with the rather odd name of 'Pern'. Curious and hoping to find a distraction from the growing troubles aboard ship, Caylin sought out what information she could find about this place.

She became intrigued by its strange history and only recent return to contact with the rest of civilization. Most of all though, she was fascinated by the tantalizing mention of these 'dragon' creatures the locals there relied on for aerial transport and for fighting some strange and only cryptically mentioned threat to the environment.

As the captain became more and more unreasonable and prone to abuse on this trip, the mechanic came to a decision. If she did not receive her pay when they arrived at the station they were delivering this cargo to, she was going to try her luck at getting a job there. She knew it was risky, and likely doomed to failure, given that she had no recommendations or official papers aside from her certificate of graduation from the engineering school. Still, if she didn't leave soon, there was a high likelihood that the captain's eye would fall on her. The thought of his hands on her again, especially having seen the bruises he had been leaving on the others lately, made her skin crawl and her stomach churn.

No, she would take her chances at this Dragonhold Station and hope she could find some way to get permission to stay and work there. Maybe she would even get lucky and actually see one of these dragons they had. At the least, it would be somewhere new, and at best, she might be able to really make a new life for herself there, far away from Gaia and the society that had held her firmly smashed beneath its heel all her life.

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