Year 7, Day 42
Rhukidalf Ruins, Rhukidalf / Amorris / Glythe Sector

One of the Galaxy's independent holoreports picked up a review I wrote while I was killing time on Rhukidalf!

Galactic Hotel Report - Rhukidalf
This quaint backwater may be short on cosmopolitan amenities, but it lacks nothing in frosty panoramas.

Lurking within only one light-minute of the Amorris sun, Rhukidalf has a split personality: one hemisphere deadly hot, the other deadly cold. However, Rhukidalf's rotation is such that one hemisphere constantly faces the sun, creating a barely hospitable twilight zone that encircles the globe. Most lifeforms will quickly find themselves dead, should they venture more than a few kilometers into the light or into the cold. It was in this narrow band of inhabitable tundra that I paid a visit to the Ruins Bed & Breakfast with my good chums Anto and Liran in tow.

Visitors to Amorris are rare enough, but visitors to Rhukidalf are as rare as blonde hair on a Trandoshan. The staff of the RB&B competed with each other to serve us, snatching our luggage from each other, and racing to the console to assign us rooms. The inn had recently been acquired by the Corporate Alliance (full disclosure: Riley Moonrigger is a transport pilot with the Corporate Alliance), and the staff's eagerness and expert training were impeccable. At first it was an impressive sight, but as the tips starting ticking out of my creditpad I began to wish just one employee would see to our needs. Nonetheless, I have to say I prefer too much service to too little.

Our rooms were neatly appointed, and the attention to guest comfort was apparent. The room even featured windows made of the same triply-insulated glasteel that is used on some deep-sublight freighters. There was no worry of going cold, no matter how hard to wind lashed the outside of the building. The bedspread, though synthetic and very crinkly-sounding, was extraordinarily warm, soft, and plush.

Anto, being some exotic insect race that feeds infrequently, declined dinner, but Liran and I were famished after the obstacle course of hotel staff. We easily found our way to the central dining room, which was small in the fashion of all Bed & Breakfast establishments. Though it was small by restaurant standards, the dining area was more than big enough for Liran and myself, as the only diners in attendance. We were given the Presidential Table, which is theoretically reserved for visiting members of the Senate. We faced an enormous vista window, through which were visible thin slices of both the sunlit surface to the west, and the eastern deep shadows (which locals refer to as "the Allcold").

There were only two courses, due to the scarcity of fresh stock and our unexpected arrival. I began with a tossed salad of Glythan greens seasoned with a local mineral salt, while Liran dove straight into a double order of the Valrare steak entrée. He committed a slight faux pas by ordering the meat "well-done and over easy", contrary to the custom of getting it cooked rare. I suppose a simple Toydarian builder can't be expected to be up-to-date on every system's dietary quirks!

We retired to our rooms with a promise that the chef would prepare a special breakfast before our departure in the morning, as well as some desserts to take with us in apology for the lack of sweets with dinner. Well sated, we tuned into a local rebroadcast of the syndicated holodrama Behind the Black Masque until turning in for the night. While I can't honestly recommend Rhukidalf as a holiday destination, if you really, really want to get away from it all, the Ruins Bed & Breakfast is the place to do it comfortably.

No comments:

Post a Comment