Filled with the love of all who lie so deep
04 Jul 2020Lowbee
Cripes it’s been a long time since my last log entry. Like I said before my ADHD gets the better of me sometimes but I might as well be honest, I’m just a lazy girl at heart. As things happen to me I mentally make a note to log it then something else comes along and off I go, never getting around to it after all. If there were any shrines to Saint Expedite (the old Sol saint of procrastinators) in a nearby system I’d gladly leave a pound cake at his feet for any help he could give me.So anyway I went back to flight school. Took my last lover’s advice and dropped in on his friend’s fledgling academy in Ansuz to learn basic combat skills, my Achilles’ heel since setting out into the Dark. I’m not a bad pilot now by any stretch but I was damn nervous about the whole thing. Those of you who’ve read my older logs know that I hate fighting, well, the idea of fighting. I’ve run from every interdiction, fled from any whiff of piracy or conflict. But as I got my wings running data, cargo, and the like I realized that the skills I honed while exploring and trading weren’t going to save me if I ever ran into someone I couldn’t avoid who decided to lock hardpoints on me. They wouldn’t know or care that I was just a shy, mostly sweet ponytailed pilot who just wanted to be left alone with her books and cigars. Over the years I’ve lost more friends than I care to count to this uncaring galaxy. I’ve heard “wrong place, wrong time” whispered at too many wakes or under the breath at too many watering holes and I didn’t want to potentially be the subject of such sympathy (or derision, take your pick) any more. I realized that so far I’ve just been lucky and there was no way of knowing when that luck would run out. If I didn’t do something about it soon then it would be entirely my own fault and I’d at least deserve the derision.
_________________________________
Gustav Rook is an intimidating guy when you first meet him. It’s not that he’s tall (he is) or that he’s mean (he isn’t). In fact he looked very ordinary turning to greet me as I approached the doorway to his shop bay, strong Terran Nordic features, standard green instructor suit, all that.
But, by the Flame, his eyes.
I’ve seen the Stare before. His friend had it briefly during our last whiskey night, recalling some messed up operation on some airless world. Some pilots I knew slipped into it now and then without realizing it. But in Gustav’s case it was so deep you just fell in. And it didn’t go away, at all, ever. Whatever he went through with the Feds seemed to have filled his head to bursting with darkness like the Coal Sack never to leave, spilling out through his otherwise achingly beautiful steel blue eyes. It was like feeling the sudden swirl of escaping air as your canopy disintegrates and everything goes grey. I was shaken and, after a few seconds fighting back a sudden rush of tears, finally tore my gaze away apologizing awkwardly for being rude. He just chuckled softly and stuck out his hand.
“Gustav Rook.” His voice was not what I expected. He knew. He understood. I reached out and shook his hand slowly.
“Druun Massi. *sniff* Sorry again.”
“No need to apologize. You are exactly as Brent described you.” He recovered his datapad from a nearby crate and motioned to the inner hangar doorway. “Shall we? You are the only one on deck today.”
And with that introduction four months flew by, literally, as he taught me everything about combat flying that he thought I could handle. The school’s Diamondbacks (mine was the Calypso, his, Dorah) slowly became a part of me. I drilled until struggles became instinct. Marconi Hangar became my second home as I ate, slept, and breathed combat mechanics. I learned the finer points of working within mass lock, distributor management, bought a better flight suit from him for G-control and discipline. I worked out at the outpost gym like mad and limped back to my bunk in agony; I had had no idea what it took to simply survive my own maneuvers, much less to function while doing them. I was a mess for weeks.
But by the end of those four months I was a different pilot, a different person. I thought I was ready. We were at the Derelict, a nice little pimple on the butt of the station, grabbing a drink before calling it quits for the cycle when I told Gustav that I was thinking of heading back to Jameson and then going out again to hopefully test some of my newly minted skills.
“I keep hearing about offers to do Fed work out in Canopus. Maybe I should check it out.”
Gustav snorted into his glass, spraying beer over both of us. He set it down, sliding it to rest against the creamer jug and looked straight at me. This time instead of darkness I saw the twinkling of amusement. Strangely, it was not a pretty sight.
“Huh. Girl, you are not ready for that shit. Not by a long shot.” I still couldn’t tell if it was mirth or cynicism I saw in his eyes. I tried to hide my surprise with a handful of the Derelict’s awful roasted peanuts.
“No?”
“No.” Gustav said. The light, whatever it was, had disappeared. “Søren klype. No wonder you were so terrible in the sim lately. Is that what was worming your brain these past few?” He jabbed the button on the table’s coffee dispenser and I watched the disposable cup drop and fill slowly with . . . ew.
“Well, I’d like to see if I can get my hands on a Fed ship, try it out, see what the deal is. Been told they’re more combat ready than even the Imperials, maybe give myself an edge.”
“First of all you are crazy.” He jabbed the air in front of my face with a stirrer. “You can barely handle the Explorers. If you were in a Gunship right now I could ruin you with Dorah faster than you can take a shit. You would be wiping your ass in the ejector pod. Right now for you the ship does not matter.”
“Oh.”
“Yes. Second, you know they are not exactly friendly to Imps in Canopus, right?”
“I’m not an Imp.” I bristled at the insult. “Not anymore. And in any case, I was just a transport pilot, not a soldier.”
“That is just another reason you will die in an eyeblink,” he said, grimacing as he set the coffee down and added another sugar. “Do not be foolish. You will have wasted all of the effort you spent here and worse, you will have wasted a lot of my time.”
“Shit, Gustav,” I said, feeling my face growing hot. “It’s not like I totally suck. I’ve done everything you showed me, a hundred times, a thousand times. I even got you in the sim runs lately. I feel like I can do this. At least I feel I should give it a shot.” I felt immediate regret at my irritation.
“You will only GET shot,” he replied, His hands were on the table now; I knew him well enough to know to shut up. “And the simulator runs are nothing, a toy, a game we use to save money fixing ships. You told me when you first arrived about derision. You will have it if you insist on going now.”
The Derelict’s doors slammed open and a group of pad workers stumbled in, clearly in the middle of their evening crawl. We both fell silent as they wedged themselves into an adjoining booth, whistling at the server as she sidled up to take their orders. The smell of heavy oil and burned electrical insulation was everywhere now, and I shimmied to the end of the booth cushion, having lost my appetite, even for the damn peanuts. Gustav took another sip and pushed the coffee, or whatever it was, to the side, giving it the same look he had given to me four months ago. We sat for a while, listening to the drunken banter next to us. Then he leaned in across the table and his eyes were softer now, just the tiniest bit.
“Look,” he said carefully. “I teach all kinds of stupid fucks with money who want to learn how to squeeze their asses out of a station slot without going to a government academy. It is ridiculous but that is what keeps me open. I do not really care what happens to anyone after they leave here. But I like you and I trust you.” He lowered his voice even more as the first round of libations hit the table next to us.
“I have shown you how to fly a ship for combat and you are good at it, I admit, but that is not killing. You said you wanted to learn how to kill and you think you are ready. Very well.” Gustav fished into his shoulder pockets, produced a bright orange keycard and slid it across the table to me. “I will get the ship stores ready tonight. Tomorrow use this to boot Calypso instead of your usual key. We will head out to the Ansuz B belt.”
“Okayyy.” I slipped the card into my breast pocket, unsure of what to say. Then the butterflies in my feet and stomach started. The darkness in the steely blue gaze was blacker than I’d ever seen it.
“The Blue Mob keeps patrols out there. I will show you how to do surveillance the right way. Then give me three weeks. You will either be a killer by then or you will be dead. No more lessons. Time for doing.”
_________________________________