The herd of grey uniforms shuffled slowly forward and moved reluctantly up the ramp onto the ship that was taking them to Botany Bay.  Convicts all, they were being transported for life and each knew there was no hope of return, no chance of ever seeing again wives, mothers, children left behind.  These were men literally without hope, sunk in dull despair.

Roger Gower, too weary and apathetic to notice the chains he stumbled over, stepped down into the convict hold and joined the crowd of men already there.  Their heads, as was his, were shaven against infection.  The hold was a long room, dimly lit, with tiers of hard looking narrow bunks ranged along the walls, and a long table flanked by wooden benches ran down the centre of the room.  There was a locker beside each bunk, and all the furniture was fastened to either deck or bulkhead.  There was no concession to comfort, for after all, they were merely convicts, and as such, considered no better than cattle.

Gower's dull, lacklustre appraisal of the hold was interrupted by the appearance of a hard-bitten sergeant who bawled at them to pay attention.

'Now then, this place will be the only home you'll know until we get to Botany Bay, so you'd better get used to it!'  He gave a harsh sadistic laugh.  'And there'll be no going outside for a breath of fresh air, either!'  Again he laughed, and they were soon to realise that most of his remarks were punctuated by that laugh.  By the time the trip was over, they would come to hate the sound of it, lacking as it did, any trace of humour.

'There will be one bunk to every two of you.  I won't tolerate fights, fairies, or filthy floors.  You'll be responsible for keeping this place spotless, and if you have any complaints, keep them to yourselves.  This isn't a holiday cruise.'

That night, Gower lay in his bunk and cursed the bony knees of Murphy, his bed partner, against his back.  He pushed him roughly away and shifted his body so that he could see through the only port.  His large size and uncompromising manner had won him the privilege of that bunk.  The stars were bright outside, and he wondered if he would ever see them again under normal circumstances.

The voyage passed slowly, with each day merging almost imperceptibly with the next, broken only by bouts of travel sickness, great tearing convulsions that left a man too weak to eat or stand, even had he had the desire to do either.

Finally the ship docked at Botany Bay, and as strange vehicles transported them away from the ship, Gower realised that he had never learned its name.  He also realised that he didn't much care.

The prisoners - by now he knew that there were three hundred of them - were herded into large barracks, fifty men to each.  He shrugged to notice that his bed partner Murphy was in his batch.  So what?  At least he didn't snore.  He was neither pleased nor displeased to see that he was there with him.  He simply had lost the capacity to care.  The all-pervading misery of the voyage here had discouraged even the most optimistic of them from making friendly overtures to anyone.  Maybe later he could use a friend, but for now he didn't give a damn.

As they filed into their barracks room, a tough looking man in a uniform greeted them.

'Welcome to Botany Bay,' he barked.  'My name's Lieutenant Morgan, this is B block, and it's going to be your home for as long as you're needed here.  Then you'll be moved on to somewhere else.  You'll be doing construction work mostly, and a bit of maintenance.  Some of you weedy ones will be detailed as cooks and cleaners and other such jobs, but don't get the idea it's going to be a bed of roses.

'Obviously, your periods of work outside will be fairly short, because as you've all noticed, the climate outside is a bit different to what you're used to, but there'll be enough work so you won't have any energy left to make trouble.  Also, I don't have to remind you that it's useless to try to escape.

'Those of you who will be working outside will be issued with protective clothing,' a little snigger here.  'And you'll only be allowed outside under strict supervision.  Now I'll hand you over to Mr Brandt, who'll assign you to your jobs, and remember, when you speak to us it's Mr Morton Sir and Mr Brandt Sir, and you ask permission to speak.'

During the long rigmarole of assigning each prisoner to the appropriate work teams, Gower thought with despair of the long days and the lonely nights ahead.  He pondered how it must feel to have a mind as warped as that of the man who had named this first Lunar penal colony after the old convict settlement on the shores of Australia, back on dear old Earth.