rear
doors. David did not answer her; he was dead. The
man ’ s eyes were
closed and he was slumped forward, quite still.
Natalia
felt her heart rate increase, her breath coming quick. She was
alone. Wasting no further time she hurried to the front of the pod
and began working through the instructions on the plate one by one,
pressing buttons and activating systems in the specified order.
Behind her the rear doors closed and locked. As she continued
various instruments sprang into life, screens and monitors lit up
and started to tail system logs, statuses of essential parts and
other texts. The final instructions on the engraved plate
read,
Press ‘ Release ’ to
release locking clasps
Press ‘ Launch ’ to
fire engines
Ensure
autopilot is engaged 100m from host vessel
Looking
down the launch chute Natalia realised what she had to do and
pressed the release button whilst studying the spinning scene
outside. The now tiny jump point was coming into her view from
bottom to top. The vessel was not spinning very fast, but her
inexperience with starships had hit her confidence. She swore as
she missed the second spin… and the third. On the fourth pass of
the jump point, when it was more or less central in her view,
Natalia pressed the launch button. She felt the engines engage and
the pod shot forward. The jump point was now smaller than ever and
she prayed that by the time she reached it, it would not have
closed completely.
Looking
behind her to the tiny rear door window, she caught a glimpse of
what remained of the ship she had been travelling on. Compulsion
overtook her and she moved over to the small viewport.
As David
had said, her old ship was coming apart, small pieces breaking off
all the time, severing the links between the larger sections.
Around the vessel, Natalia could make out Imperial starfighters
weaving between other stricken craft, explosions ripping across
their hulls.
Her
ships, her allies, her friends. She would never see them again. The
tears came afresh and through her blurred vision she caught sight
of an Imperial frigate reigning over the carnage. As she watched,
she saw a starfighter deviate from its current course and move
towards her pod. Her tears of sorrow became ones of fear and she
gave a loud gasp. The starfighter approached and Natalia found she
was unable to tear her eyes away from it.
Two
green bolts of plasma issued from beneath its wings. Her pod was
bathed in a brilliant light. Moments later, the exploding, stricken
vessels, the frigate, and the fighter were gone, to be replaced by
the blue haze of jump space.
* * *
“ I think the Red Devils must have cheated. You
saw the way Andrea was sucking up during that presentation. She was
probably doing stuff like that the whole way through the
evaluation,” Estelle continued to chew on the bone of the Knights’ exit from the
ATAF project.
The others said nothing, having since taken to just ignoring
her. Enrique was slouched in his chair asleep; Chaz was back to his
book; Kelly was taking the time to write in her journal; and Dodds
was back to his favourite activity of staring out the window. The
view was quite uninspiring, with nothing to see aside from jump
space ’ s blue
haze.
Estelle ’ s
misery was further compounded by the fact that the transport the
five now occupied was likely the last luxury they would be afforded
before arriving at Spirit. It could comfortably hold twelve
passengers, and was often used by high-ranking officials and
members of senior command. With no-one having acknowledged her,
Estelle slipped back into her own thoughts and went back over
everything that they had done in the past few weeks at the research
facility.
She could not think where they had gone wrong: her team had
been up to scratch on the TAF simulators; even Dodds, following his
lengthy absence from the cockpit, had performed well. There was no
weak link anywhere as far as she could determine. The ATAF
evaluations in the
doors. David did not answer her; he was dead. The
man ’ s eyes were
closed and he was slumped forward, quite still.
Natalia
felt her heart rate increase, her breath coming quick. She was
alone. Wasting no further time she hurried to the front of the pod
and began working through the instructions on the plate one by one,
pressing buttons and activating systems in the specified order.
Behind her the rear doors closed and locked. As she continued
various instruments sprang into life, screens and monitors lit up
and started to tail system logs, statuses of essential parts and
other texts. The final instructions on the engraved plate
read,
Press ‘ Release ’ to
release locking clasps
Press ‘ Launch ’ to
fire engines
Ensure
autopilot is engaged 100m from host vessel
Looking
down the launch chute Natalia realised what she had to do and
pressed the release button whilst studying the spinning scene
outside. The now tiny jump point was coming into her view from
bottom to top. The vessel was not spinning very fast, but her
inexperience with starships had hit her confidence. She swore as
she missed the second spin… and the third. On the fourth pass of
the jump point, when it was more or less central in her view,
Natalia pressed the launch button. She felt the engines engage and
the pod shot forward. The jump point was now smaller than ever and
she prayed that by the time she reached it, it would not have
closed completely.
Looking
behind her to the tiny rear door window, she caught a glimpse of
what remained of the ship she had been travelling on. Compulsion
overtook her and she moved over to the small viewport.
As David
had said, her old ship was coming apart, small pieces breaking off
all the time, severing the links between the larger sections.
Around the vessel, Natalia could make out Imperial starfighters
weaving between other stricken craft, explosions ripping across
their hulls.
Her
ships, her allies, her friends. She would never see them again. The
tears came afresh and through her blurred vision she caught sight
of an Imperial frigate reigning over the carnage. As she watched,
she saw a starfighter deviate from its current course and move
towards her pod. Her tears of sorrow became ones of fear and she
gave a loud gasp. The starfighter approached and Natalia found she
was unable to tear her eyes away from it.
Two
green bolts of plasma issued from beneath its wings. Her pod was
bathed in a brilliant light. Moments later, the exploding, stricken
vessels, the frigate, and the fighter were gone, to be replaced by
the blue haze of jump space.
* * *
“ I think the Red Devils must have cheated. You
saw the way Andrea was sucking up during that presentation. She was
probably doing stuff like that the whole way through the
evaluation,” Estelle continued to chew on the bone of the Knights’ exit from the
ATAF project.
The others said nothing, having since taken to just ignoring
her. Enrique was slouched in his chair asleep; Chaz was back to his
book; Kelly was taking the time to write in her journal; and Dodds
was back to his favourite activity of staring out the window. The
view was quite uninspiring, with nothing to see aside from jump
space ’ s blue
haze.
Estelle ’ s
misery was further compounded by the fact that the transport the
five now occupied was likely the last luxury they would be afforded
before arriving at Spirit. It could comfortably hold twelve
passengers, and was often used by high-ranking officials and
members of senior command. With no-one having acknowledged her,
Estelle slipped back into her own thoughts and went back over
everything that they had done in the past few weeks at the research
facility.
She could not think where they had gone wrong: her team had
been up to scratch on the TAF simulators; even Dodds, following his
lengthy absence from the cockpit, had performed well. There was no
weak link anywhere as far as she could determine. The ATAF
evaluations in the
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