Drabble: Masquerade

Masquerade

I look around the bar. It’s crowded, creatures of every possible description, reptiles and birds and amorphous blobs like nothing earthly – you imagine it, you got it. It’s like looking at a cross-section of the countless races of the galaxy, except–

Except, aren’t any. When we finally got out of our solar system, reached the stars with expensive spacetime-warping gate engines, we found nobody, nothing worth the expense.

So we stayed home, and the more disilllusioned of the youth turned to drastic cosmetic surgery, became the exciting universe we were all promised. It’s cold comfort, but it’s something.