Flying Out

DATE: Year 308-B. Sol 385

LOCATION: Docking Bay 67, The Tumble

STATUS: Departure

Phoenix had to get his ship back if it was going to lead Himalaya’s pilgrimage.

-Impound fees, Phoenix explained gesturing to the blast doors of Docking Bay 94. I owe the stationmaster three thousand chits. Orbital union locked her down until I pay up.

Himalaya Market didn't blink. Who didn’t have a sob story? He tapped his wrist-comp, transferring the funds to the station account.

-Paid, Market said. Consider it a signing bonus.

Market thought he was clearing a debt to a stationmaster, but the MTC had paid him off. There was no fine against Phoenix from the Orbital Belt Union, not in the Tumble at least. The station master got to keep the chits, and had to ping Captain Delavan to let him know the asset was in play. Phoenix didn’t know how it worked. He wondered if the chits were going to Delavan.

The blast doors groaned open.

The Mighty Sparrow sat on the pad, looking ugly and beautiful. She was a mishmash of eras—a sleek, white ceramic cockpit from the old Earth era, bolted onto a massive, boxy engine block scavenged from a mining tug. She looked like a racehorse trying to pull a plow.

-A distinct ship, Market said diplomatically.

-A living ship. Market knew the Saganites had worked on such a thing, but no one knew about it and it wasn’t what Phoenix meant. For a space-bound scavenger, a ship was a codependent.

-You ever sit inside a ship? Phoenix asked Bit. The child had certainly flown in one before, chained and standing as cargo.

Bit shook his head, his eyes wide behind the drone helmet.

-Don't touch the red buttons, Phoenix said. They go boom. They didn’t, actually.

The three boarded. Inside, the ship smelled like stale coffee and ozone.

Phoenix strapped Bit into the co-pilot’s crash-webbing. The kid was so small the straps swallowed him. Phoenix slid into the pilot’s seat, he had managed real leather, cracked and comfortable, from a salvage in the Halo, and tapped the dashboard.

-Wake up, Sparrow, he muttered.

The console flickered. A soft, melodic female voice filled the cabin. It was an Old Earth speech interface, polite and unaffected and completely disconnected from reality.

-Welcome back Captain, the voice said. Ambient temperature is twenty degrees. Fusion core is missing.

Phoenix looked at Bit, mouthing the computer’s next words along with it.

-Please contact a service technician.

-Who was that? Bit asked curiously.

-The on-board computer. It’s pretty old, and pretty advanced. It’s not connected to the whole ship but it works enough, Phoenix explained as he flipped the ignition switches.

The massive MTC engines roared to life, shaking the entire frame. On the dashboard, the Orrery, a mechanical clockwork map of the solar system used for navigation, rattled. The brass planet of Mars was drifting away from Earth. The window was closing. Winter was coming.

-Radio check, Phoenix said.

-Marley Actual, this is Sparrow, Phoenix radioed to the EZM flagship.

-We read you, Mighty Sparrow. At your ready.

-Lead the way, your flock is ready, Market told Phoenix from behind his back.

-Don’t say that. It was starting to become his catch phrase. And get off my ship, he added before punching the throttle. The Mighty Sparrow blasted out of the Tumble docks, trailing a cloud of smoke behind it.

In the distance and approaching the caravan, led by The Marley, began to move. The flagship was a massive, rusted freighter. It pulled behind a chain of twenty habitat modules that looked like tin cans on a string. Around them a dozen smaller ships buzzed—tugs, shuttles, retrofitted miners, jury-rigged frankensteins.

It wasn’t an invasion force. It was a freak show.

Once they cleared the station’s gravity well, Phoenix stabilized the ship.

-Alright, Market said, unbuckling his crash webbing. Get me over to The Marley.

-You’re not staying? Phoenix asked.

-On this tiny thing? When I’m supposed to be a fleet commander? Market asked, smoothing his flight suit.

-I need to organize the rationing. Sixty shifts is a long time to go hungry. But keep a channel open, Phoenix. You’re my eyes out here. Shifts were based on beats, a decimal type system set up for MTC, but a shift also happened conveniently to be about eight hours.

Phoenix matched velocity with the massive, rusted flagship. He extended the docking tube. Market climbed out, leaving the cockpit suddenly quiet.

Bit looked at the empty seat, then at Phoenix.

-Just you and me, kid, Phoenix muttered. Just you and me.