by Ryan Krauter
Loren reveled in being at the controls of his Talon again. It had been too long, and he remembered the freedom of being in charge of just his one little ship. He didn’t stay distracted for too long, though. He swept up over Avenger and took a look at the port side engine pod and whistled. It was by design that the engine pods weren’t heavily crewed, especially during combat, and that had no doubt saved many lives. The pod was gutted in the middle, and he suspected the yard would probably find it easier to remove and reattach the entire thing than to try and repair it in place.
He kept going over the top of Avenger, zigzagging around the main laser batteries and AA turrets, then shot out over her bow and ahead into space. He pushed the nose down to head under the Redemption, intending to take a quick hop around the area before landing in the hospital ship. He had filed a flight plan stating he was personally taking some medical research and biological samples from Velk over for study after surveying Avenger’s damage. He wouldn’t make it there.
He reached down and tapped some commands into the computer.
“Viper Twelve,” said the High Orbit controller aboard one of the Centurion class battle stations in orbit around Toral, “your datalink shows your engines just went offline. Please confirm.” The Drisk woman tapped a few commands onto her screen and brought up a detailed feed of Loren’s fighter.
“High Orbit, this is Viper Twelve,” Loren’s voice replied. “That is correct; I have some sort of main drive failure. Reactor’s still working and I have repulsors and thrusters, but I’m already skirting the atmosphere and the drives are offline. I’m out of range of Redemption’s tractors. Looks like I might be headed to the surface.”
“Toral is still in quarantine,” she replied. “You’re forbidden to enter the atmosphere.”
“I’ll tell that to my engines and see if that makes a difference,” he replied. “Stand by.” Seconds passed. “Sorry, it didn’t work; they’re still offline. I have some maneuvering ability and navigation. I know the planet; I’ll set it down someplace safe. Besides, they’re handing out the antidote as we speak. I’ll be ok.”
“Viper Twelve, understand you are experiencing a malfunction. I’ll mark your position, but be prepared to spend some time in quarantine down there even after the antidotes are administered. They’ll keep you for a while to make sure it took correctly.”
“I’m looking forward to it,” Loren said softly to himself without keying the mic.
Cassie was in the kitchen preparing breakfast. Nobody had gone into work the last few days, and now that there was word a cure was on the way, people were still staying home, but now it was to celebrate. She’d gotten Loren’s message earlier after having come back from her parents’ house. She’d turned her comm device off- her parents had been trying to stay upbeat, but she’d received several calls and didn’t want the interruptions. Now, she wished she’d kept it on. It sounded like Loren was coming back to the Toral system.
She had seen the news this morning that the Navy had found a cure. Shortly thereafter, Senator Dennix gave a press conference telling everyone more about it, but she’d turned it off. Maybe that meant Loren would get to come home soon. She knew it had to be killing him to be away, but she also knew that if anyone could help the Confederation, it was him.
She set her dishes on the table and was about to sit when she heard an enormous racket from outside. It sounded like a sonic boom, then a minute later she heard the shriek of powerful engines and repulsor fields. Something roared low overhead, rattling everything on the table. The sound quickly got quieter, but she could swear it was coming from outside their house.
Curiosity piqued, she walked to the front door and opened it. Her and Loren both hated the densely populated city centers, and had bought a house farther outside of town where buildings still sat at ground level and didn’t go higher than two stories; they had a yard and everything, and she hoped that someday their kids would play right outside where she was looking now.
Her heart skipped a beat as she saw something that didn’t make sense. A battered, battle-scarred military fighter was sitting on the street in front of their house, canopy raised to reveal an empty cockpit. One of their neighbors had just pulled his hovercar to a stop in front of it and seemed to be waiting for it to move. It was slightly absurd, the little hovercar going nose to nose with Loren’s Talon. She could hear the generators and coolant pumps spinning down as the metal of the fighter, hot from re-entry, cooled and ticked in the morning sunlight.
Wait, she thought. Loren’s fighter. She saw his nameplate on the side.
She walked out onto the lawn towards it in a trance, and didn’t even see the figure in the flightsuit walking up the driveway.
“Hey there,” Loren said softly.
Cassie stopped and stiffened, then turned to her left and saw Loren, now running towards her. They met on the front lawn and grabbed wrapped each other up into a tight embrace, each squeezing hard and not giving any sign of letting go.
Loren had waited so long for this, he was going to remember everything. It felt like he’d been gone for years, and it also felt like he’d never left. She fit perfectly into his arms, and they held each other close for long enough to lose track of time, neither one able to work up the ability to talk. They just held on, almost afraid to question if it was real, whether it would last.
Finally, she pulled back, tears in both of their eyes.
“How did you get here?” she managed softly.
“It took a while,” he started. “You wouldn’t believe the traffic I had to fight through,” he managed to say, then kissed her. He’d thought of all the things he wanted to say, about how he’d felt hollow at the idea of losing her, of how the thought of her was what kept him going. All of that fell away; he couldn’t use anything as crude as words to describe what he felt right now, so he just kissed her again, and she did the same.
She looked at him, suddenly very aware of his condition. She noticed his assortment of cuts and bruises, the slight limp to his walk, and the fact that he was cradling his left arm to his side. “You look terrible,” she couldn’t help but say in a concerned tone.
“You look terrific,” he said right back, with a growing smile.
“What about the virus?” Cassie asked. “I heard they figured it out. Did you have anything to do with that?”
“I did my part,” was all he said. She immediately suspected he had more to do with it than he was willing to admit, especially since he was hand-delivering a dose to her.
“Aren’t you infected now?” she asked worriedly. “You shouldn’t be here if it’s going to put you in danger as well.”
That was her, of course; more worried about him than herself. “I brought something from the ship,” he said quietly. He showed her the hypospray, then placed it on his lower forearm just before his wrist. He hit the button and gave himself a dose.
“Your turn,” he replied, and gently held her hand. She didn’t do anything, just let him guide her. He gave her a dose as well, then put the hypospray back in a pocket in his flightsuit.
“What about everyone else?” she asked.
“They have it figured out, Cassie,” he replied. “The doctors are working on a mass delivery system right now. Everybody will be fine, but the only way I’d ever rest is if I knew you were safe. I needed to see with my own eyes that you have the vaccine and would be ok. Now, I know.” Relief flooded through him, and he almost broke down as the stress of the fight, the things he’d done, and the realization that he could finally feel like she was going to be alright washed over him.
“How have you been?” he asked. It was weak, he knew, but he had to say something, especially since the neighbors were starting to venture out of their homes to see them standing there.
“Oh, keeping busy,” Cassie replied through her own tears, showing the sense of humor that meshed so well with Loren’s. “I did some gardening, thought about adding an addition, the usual.”
She smiled and Loren did as
well, and they were in each other’s arms again.
Loren ignored everything except his wife as he held her. The war still raged on, he was pretty sure Senator Dennix had tried to get Avenger killed, and he was going to have to deal with his unauthorized trip to the planet. But he was with Cassie now. Everything was going to be alright.
Ryan is a lifelong sci-fi fan and lives in Wisconsin. He has a blog at:
http://rekroom.wordpress.com/
Stop by to see what’s currently intriguing or distracting him, updates on his books, as well as photo renders of ships and weapons from the books he’s written.
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Ryan