Background:

Natalia was born on a agriculture world named Kyrgzstall in a frontier area without much interest in the area. The population was taught the basics of reading and writing and computer operation but none of the advanced training one would get on other worlds. Natalia learned how to pilot a heavy work vehicle but her role in society was mainly to bear the next generation of the planet. Officially considered equals and given voting rights, women were in most respects considered second class citizens. Schools were segregated between the sexes and there were few opportunities for women as far higher as education.

Women were expected to bear many children and, due to the lack of advanced medical care, many more women died from this than in a more advanced setting. While religion was a strong factor, in many ways the society was more similar to the Western World on Earth during the latter part of the Nineteenth Century than a religious theocracy. Punishment for most offenses against the society laws were more rejection from society and being shunned than the more brutal punishments of more religiously motivated societies. Much of the medical care which would be normal even for such a primitive world was banned due to interrupting the normal course on nature and because it would reduce population growth. One item banned was birth control medicines. As might be expected, Anti-Aging drugs were also banned although they likely would not have been available even if illegal. It was an extremely male dominated society. Girls were expected to dress modestly at all times and children were punished severely for even the smallest infraction. The young girl chaffed at the restrictions and she looked at any means of escape. She never seemed to show any skill in most of the domestic skills which he sisters did and never was interested in raising a large family like they were.

There was some trade between the planet and its neighbors, mostly carried by small tramp freighters. Dressed as a boy, Natalia snuck onto a cargo shuttle bringing grain and other food supplies to the only station orbiting the planet. Even though tiny compared to the stations servicing more populated worlds, it was the hub for virtually of the trade of the planet. Visitors were not allowed on the planet itself and everything brought to the station from ships not from the planet were incredibly carefully examined. Cargos being loaded onto ships leaving the system were not as carefully examined. Natalia carefully examined the ships docked and chose a ship about to leave and the crew was in a hurry to load the vessel and the loaders were only checking the manifests. She managed to hide in a cargo box which soon got loaded onboard without checking onboard. As soon as the ship was loaded, it undocked from the station and left the system far behind.

It was not until several days later that she was discovered. She had snuck around the ship to use the bathroom and steal a bit of food. Security was basically non-existent but a crew member saw the stowaway running through the corridors. The ship was a small tramp freighter and it did not take them long to track her down. While she was deathly afraid of being taken home, there was no way that they were going to lose the time bringing her back to her home world. While rough, there was no way that they would "space" a girl just entering her teens either or be truly brutal to her. Still, there was no way that they would have an unproductive person onboard and they put her to work at every dirty job which they could find. Even though completely untrained, she showed an aptitude for engineering systems. The chief engineer took her under her wing and the young girl was taught some of the fundamentals of starship engineering. Instead of dropping her off at the first planet which the ship docked at, the captain waited until the ship reached a more populated and more advanced planet.

On planet, she managed to find a repair shop which needed a "Wrench Turner" as they called it. She learned more about how to repair starships and basic engineering principles there. She could literally devour engineering books and even learned the more advanced engineering areas not just the basics. In many ways, she had the equivalent education of several years of university training.

Her next several years were like this, bouncing between working on ground or space station repair facilities and serving onboard starships. In some cases due to her attitudes, the captain of a ship would decide to beach her while in other cases she would simply get tired of where she was at and decide to go elsewhere. She learned the basics of how to pilot both large and small starships. She even work a stint piloting ships which were to be scrapped to their final destination. She did not really have the certifications which major lines wanted but her obvious competence was enough for most tramp freighters and smaller repair shops. One of the results was that she managed to wander over vast parts of the Three Galaxies.

At the same time, she took advantage of medical procedures available. The anti-aging drugs seemed to be a wonderful idea. As well, she had several scars from when she was a child and it was incredibly easy for them to be removed. Her face had some acne scarring and she took advantage of minor cosmetic surgery as well. At the same time, she started to take a liking in boys although she was firmly not interested in having any children and took advantage of birth control. In most ways, she completely flaunted against everything her family had stood for. It is not likely that they would recognize anyway.

Her interest in men managed to get her in trouble several times including getting kicked off a ship when she showed an interest in an officer who the captain of the ship was also interested in. Natalia has also gotten in quite a few fights over men. She does not consider men worth fighting over but they just seem to happen. She sometimes seems to have the skill to chose the wrong man. One of her lovers was a ex-Consortium marine who was serving as security onboard the ship which she was working on as the ship's engineer. He taught he the skills to defend herself. Even though she has had many lovers, she prefers to have a single partner at only one given time.

Eventually, she took the tests to show she was qualified for serving onboard a ship operated by a major line. Those lines usually payed much better than the tramp freighters. She found the tests relatively easy. Going onboard the major lines was a complete disaster. There were simply too many rules and she found herself breaking too many of them. She always knew that she would do poorly in the military but did not expect the major lines to be as bad. Natalia tried both cargo and passenger lines and she found problems on all of them. She got booted off one vessel after arguing with the chief engineer and several other ships she decided to seek new horizons before that happened. In the end, she decided to return to working in repair shops and onboard tramp freighters.

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Image by Lisa M. Mower / Colored by Kitsune.

By Kitsune (E-Mail Kitsune).

Copyright © 2007, Kitsune. All rights reserved.