Short Story: Ghost
wow i haven't written in here in a long time! anyway. so recently i've been playing around with the idea of making a writing journal. but until i decide on that i decided to post some stuff here for people to read. this was a short story i had to write for one of my classes.
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This story was largely inspired by this image.(click to see origin, and full size)
so yes, it is a science fiction piece. though technically i was told not to do that for this class. i figure i can take creative licensing with the rules once in awhile ;)
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Ghost ran her tongue along the seam of her top lip, snagging the chapped skin and tasting something delicate akin to copper where she had bitten it raw. Her room was small, no bigger than a closet. There was barely enough space for her cot and a standard issue desk she had never used. Pictures torn from books and magazines littered the floor; remnants of an engineer’s pity when he had given them to her whole. Ghost hated books, they made her feel stupid. Their covers like gaping mouths, laughing and sticking out papery tongues to tease her. Forever mocking her inability to read them.
She sat cross legged in the center of her bed, hunched over her lap with pen in hand. The end of it like a pendulum, as the tip dug deeper and deeper into the soft, fleshy thenar space between her thumb and forefinger. Blood ran in tiny streams, dripping onto the crisp, white sheets as she pulled the tool back to admire her creation. Ghost had been working on it for over an hour, trying desperately to get the wound deep enough that it would scar perfectly. She smiled at the simple shape she had chosen. A heart, it’s edges fresh and a little swollen, but there was no mistaking what it was.
The pain was minimal, like white noise or static over the radio. Her nerves barely registering what she had done. It was a gift to herself, probably the only one she would ever get to give. She had turned fifteen two days ago, and had long ago promised herself that should she live this long, she would celebrate. No one had remembered, or congratulated her, but that wasn’t unexpected. The station was filled with hundreds of people; soldiers, scientists and their families. All milling about like angry bees, buzzing and talking. Ghost could count the number of people she knew by name on her fingers. She found that anymore would be too much, too personal.
Ghost didn’t relate well to the crew. The way they spoke, how they seemed to wait with baited breath for the next insurgence, and congratulated themselves post battle; it sat ill with her. Made her ill. She dreaded the call of the alarm, and hated when she got back. A broken body running from the hanger as cheers and celebration would erupt from the other side, where the soldiers entered. It was always the same. Throwing up in the nearest bin, stumbling into some dark, quiet place as she waited for every cell in her body to stop burning.
The girl rose to her knees, crawling over to the other side of her cot to look out the window. The station was a massive thing. A central tower with two great arms that wrapped around to cradle empty space like a lonely toddler. She pressed her forehead to the cool glass, admiring it silently.
A bell rang out over the intercom. Her brow furrowed as she closed her eyes, trying to distance herself from the sound. Her stomach clenched as she sucked in a breath. Her entire body felt tight at the prospect of leaving her room. Eat now, sleep now, fight now; bells told her everything.
Her back was straight as she entered the mess. Her eyes forward, though she saw nothing. The impassive expression she wore like armor was so well practiced she doubted she’d recognize herself in the mirror. She entered the line, grabbing a tray and attempting to ignore the banter of comrades behind her. Soldiers or perhaps scientists, it was hard for her to tell sometimes.
“I’m telling you, two more weeks and I’m out of here. Got myself a month of leave.”
“You going home for a bit?”
“Yeah, I can’t wait. First thing I’m doing is hitting the beach. Gotta remind myself what a woman looks like out of lab coats and fatigues,” the first one laughed.
“I hear you. Been up here so long even that’s looking good.”
Ghost felt the looks they were giving her. She ignored the pair, hoping the conversation would end, or by some miracle she’d become deaf to it.
“C’mon man! That’s nasty, a B-pilot? It’d be like fucking a refrigerator. Besides, she looks young enough to be your kid.”
“They all look like that. Haven’t you heard the saying? If there’s grass on the lawn…”
They broke out into a riotous fit of laughter as she tried to move on as quickly as possible. She wasn’t frightened of the men. The crew weren’t monsters that would chase her down dark alleys. They were mere people; mistaken, foolish, brilliant people that she couldn’t define or understand. The closest she had ever come, was to call them the ‘optimists in Russian Roulette.’ Celebrating each empty chamber, rather than fearing their next turn.
She sat down and stirred her soup, not feeling hungry enough to eat it. Slowly others joined her. The B’s each came with meal in hand. No one spoke until all four were present; it was a tradition of sorts. Ghost looked up, nodding to each in turn as one boy, and two other girls sat all around her. They each bore the same tense expression, dull eyes and practiced aloofness. It was all an act, just as hers was. That vain attempt at ignoring those around them to retain some form of pride. Teenage pigheadedness, that only grew as each of them aged.
Ghost teased a spoon through her soup again, setting her jaw stiffly as she tried to stop her stomach from rebelling at the very thought of taking a bite.
“What is that?” Angel asked. At seventeen, she was the oldest of them and had been aboard the station the longest. That wasn’t what made her well liked, or had earned her the empathetic nickname though. Angel wasn’t a leader, she was weak willed and cowered in the face of conflict like a mouse hiding behind thin, plaster walls. But in those moments of silent night, when all others were asleep, it was her bed that the new pilots crawled into for comfort. A kindly, mothering presence that would pat their head till the tears stopped coming, and the next morning speak not a word of it to anyone.
Ghost looked to the other girl, and then to her hand. Turning her wrist as if she wasn’t aware of what Angel spoke of. The heart glimmered under the neon lights. The fresh scabs lining the delicate shape perfectly as Ghost shrugged.
Angel held out her hand, wanting to see the mark better. There was very little hesitation before Ghost obliged her. The dark haired girl turned the other’s frail palm this way and that, possibly searching for more or a reason behind it. “You did this?”
The younger pilot nodded, unsure how to explain the act to another.
“If it was to kill yourself, you did a horrible job,” Rabbit laughed softly. She pushed the empty bottle of her supplement away, leaning in to lay her chin down on folded hands.
Ghost smiled and shook her head, taking a deep breath as she leaned back in her chair. Her brow furrowed in concentration momentarily. “People get hurt all the time, last month Bridge died…” She paused, letting a silence fall on all four of them in honor of their fallen comrade. “We all have scars. We get them in the ships, or here on the station. I wanted one that was mine. It was a promise I made to myself.”
Ghost glanced around, seeing the confusion and understanding on every face. They may not comprehend her means, but they all understood the desire to own something. To do something completely for themselves and no one else.
Angel lifted the other girl’s hand, taking a better look at the heart. “Don’t show it to the medics,” she advised softly. “They’ll put the cream on to reduce scarring.”
Ghost smiled, appreciating the unsaid acceptance more than the actual words.
The older girl grinned in return, laying her cheek in the other’s hand as Ghost turned it to cup her jaw in thanks. Her flesh was warm beneath the younger pilot’s fingertips. A heat that spoke against the assumptions of the crew, and denied their insults. The companionship of the other pilots, however brief it may be; was something she would be eternally thankful for. They weren’t the crew, they were like her. It made her fear the day she would mourn them, or they her.
The tubes of light that framed almost everything from floor to ceiling; went from a calming white to an angry red as an alarm rang out. The sound of it far more piercing than that gentle bell that had called Ghost from her room. The pilots watched as men and women scrambled from their tables and booths, heading in all directions like fleeing roaches.
Ghost rose, her legs shaky and nervous as a deep pit formed in her gut. A tremendous fear enveloped her, something she could see now in all of the others as well. Each had their own tell, that tiny movement that gave them away. Like the way Angel’s shoulders would droop and Watcher’s teeth would start grinding. Rabbit alone remained almost eerily still; her eyes wide like her namesake.
“We have to go,” Watcher mused, his voice a near whisper but they all heard it.
Ghost was the first to leave the table, doing as the bells bid once more. “Fight now,” they screamed at her. “Be happy, enjoy it! You’re important.” She had never believed a word of it. Reading and writing, simple arithmetic; it had all been deemed unimportant in her studies. Basic skills that her lack of forced those around her to claim superiority. She was stupid and foolish. She was young and immature. Her decisions were wrong. Assumptions were made about the B-pilots, about Ghost; but in the end it never mattered. Could a book save them from what was coming? Would Jenny’s two apples and Billy’s three add up to anything that would stop her from getting into that cockpit? Would all those soldiers that saw her as illiterate and dumb be any more or less dead for their knowledge?
They were questions Ghost asked herself rhetorically. They made her feel better when she had to justify helping these people she didn’t know or understand. She had no use for what the crew thought they knew. Books mocked her, and the only math she needed were the ones and zeros of digital coding.
The echo of footsteps behind her eased the anger and fear she felt. The others were following. Angel, Watcher and Rabbit were all the same. They were all stupid and unimportant until the alarm bell rang and they become something else.
Ghost paused at the door to the hanger, only brave enough to face it but not be the first to walk through. “Breathe,” she told herself.
The Mercury Three was something many people could never even imagine. From the outside, it reminded Ghost of a knife. The sharp edges and brilliant mirror finish of polished outer walls were beautiful. But the darkness that resonated from the craft was like an aura of black that made the pilot tense every time she approached. Ghost couldn’t explain her feelings towards the ship. It was fast and perfect. But at the same time she feared it and what came with it. Only weeks ago she had watched the Mercury Two veer off and torpedo through the walls of the station. Honorary dinners and funerals were held for those lost, all except Bridge. He had been kind and the most outspoken of the B-pilots. Their leader and the only person that had ever asked for Ghost’s real name. Both he and Angel had held her hand and helped her through the painful spasms after her first run in the Mercury Three. Yet no one cared for or remembered him. His body had been left in the Mercury Two as it was scrapped for parts and then melted down for its alloy. Not even the engineers could separate the pilot from cockpit after his death. She didn’t blame them. And as she and the others had met after hours and held a forbidden funeral no one was allowed to acknowledge; she silently wondered if it had really been an accident at all. Bridge had been twenty one, a B-pilot for eight years. That time span was almost unheard of. Ghost alone knew of the tremors, and his irregular heartbeat that had developed. She had never told anyone of her suspicions.
Now, as she sat in her own cockpit of the Mercury Three, she remembered him. Once he had told them that every run in the Mercury series sucked the life from them. That the key to surviving was to tell yourself it wasn’t real. She never really understood what he had meant, but the realization that he may not have been speaking figuratively was slowly dawning on all of the pilots after each battle they had suffered through since his death.
“Mercury Three, status?” The voice was deep and brought forth no memory of who it could belong to.
Ghost reached up, flicking on the red button for the comm. “Ready,” she replied. She took a deep breath and switched off the radio system, not wanting master control to hear what came next. She leaned back in the cockpit, practically laying down as her hands clenched over the lit globes of the Mercury Three’s weapons system.
“Three…. Two…” The countdown was monotonous as the same man watched the seconds tick by on his clock.
Ghost clenched her teeth as her visor came down and she felt the soft tendrils of the ship’s controls crawl over her skin like veins. The seat beneath her warmed as power levels rose. She tried to relax, but it was hard when she knew what came next.
“One.”
Tiny translucent hairs all over the veins hardened into millions of microscopic shards of glass. They pierced through her pores and sent the electric pulse of the ship straight through her body.
Ghost screamed, the sound of it enough to curdle her own blood as she involuntarily thrashed. No matter how many times she had piloted the Mercury Three, the initial shock of the link never got any easier. Volts coursed through her every cell as pain ripped through her nervous system. Eventually the agony died down, though never truly left. It became muddled enough by the painkillers pumped through the life support that she could think once more. Ghost opened her eyes, able to feel the weight of the ship bare down on her. Only then did she dare start the engines with a single thought.
The Mercury Three roared to life, lifting off from the ground and hovering. Ghost turned her comm back on to silence, but it was short lived.
“Mercury One, Three, Four and Seven all online. Await hanger doors.”
“Acknowledged,” Ghost replied. No one else spoke. Besides Angel, Ghost had been on the station the longest with two years. It had only been assumed she would take over after Bridge.
Ghost switched the comm system to the internal channel, making sure only her fellow pilots would hear. “Burst pattern, search and destroy.” The order was direct and short. It told the others to move all around the station in a grid. “Radio coordinates when you find them.”
“Understood,” Angel replied.
The hanger doors opened slowly, dragging out every unbearable second.
“Four and Seven, take the left. One with me on the right. Circle around, keep in radio contact.”
It was with that that the four ships left the hanger, each one flying off in a different direction. Rabbit and Watcher veered off to the left and out of sight. Ghost immediately took the right, higher angle, knowing Angel preferred the lower sub levels.
The Mercury Three was fluid, slicing through the sky like needled silver. Ghost scanned every nook and cranny, trying to also pay close mind to where the soldiers flew in case they were quicker to pick up coordinates. But all they did was go after the obvious. Attacking the battle ship rather than defending the station itself. She took a deep breath, continuing her search and hoping the others were alright.
“Mercury Four confirmed sighting. Calling team to coordinates axis head nine, sector three.”
“Alright Watcher, I got you,” Ghost replied. “Do not engage till Mercury Seven approaches. Everyone switch to light rounds, get them away from the station before you bring out anything bigger. Mercury One position?”
“Axis sub five, sector one oh one,” Angel replied almost instantaneously.
“I’m sector one fifteen, meet and follow me in,” Ghost ordered.
“Confirmed.”
“Mercury Seven status?” Her stomach was in her throat as she awaited the reply, each second that passed one more moment that Watcher risked being spotted without any back up.
“On approach already Ghost,” came Rabbit’s voice over the comm.
She breathed a sigh of relief as she moved her ship out towards the coordinates given. Out of the corner of her eye she saw the Mercury One move in to fly beside her. “Mercury Three and One on approach, arrival in two.”
“Confirmed, engaging now.” Watcher’s voice was calm and collected, like he wasn’t about to enter battle with an enemy that he had seen kill so many before. But such was his way. The teen was an expert at compartmentalizing. He’d be scared later.
Ghost and Angel moved quickly, their team mates coming into view as they approached the opposite side of the ship that they had been searching. Without words, each knew what they were to do. Mercury One and Three split off from their parallel path, coming around to flank the group of fighters that Watcher had discovered. Ghost’s arrival was seamless. The Mercury Three like a scalpel cutting through the folds of flesh. Her fingers tightened on the globes, the controls turning red as her ship fired on the enemy fighters, trying to herd them away from the station walls. The combat was chaotic, Ghost saw flashes of her team mates, but focused her attention more on avoiding enemy fire and not crashing. The comms were open. She heard every scream and curse the others uttered, but nothing sounded immediate.
Ghost continued to fire on the enemy ships. Crying out when one managed to get a shot in over her right wing. The ship was linked to her mind, every dent and graze she felt as her own. It reduced response time. The pain called her back, made her fly more with instinct rather than logic. The Mercury Three darted around erratically, moving with speed and grace in a pattern no one could predict.
Ghost caught sight of a fighter on her tail. She corkscrewed and darted around the others trying to rid herself of the determined ship, but it was to no avail. The enemy fighter sent out shots mid chase that Ghost was barely able to dodge. She screamed in frustration as she tried to circle around to catch the other’s back end. The enemy pilot was fast, realising her intent and burning out his own engines on full blaze to avoid the nose of the Mercury Three. Ghost felt a stabbing pain shoot up her spine as he caught one over the back of her hull. She screamed again, this time in pain as he managed to hit the same spot once more. Ghost turned the gauge of the painkillers up before letting the Mercury Three fall into a nose dive. The ship followed just as she had expected. The B-pilot waited, watching with careful eyes and hiccupping breaths before another ship made its way into her path. She didn’t have time to see what it was, only if it was ally or not, which it definitely wasn’t. She turned the Mercury Three ever so slightly, grazing past the other ship in her streamlined craft in a way she was sure the other fighter couldn’t accomplish. Ghost pulled back, bringing the front of her ship up in a sudden climb just as the enemy crashed into the ship she had flew past full on. Ghost watched as both ships exploded and burst into silent flame. Pieces from each craft forced outward like fireworks. The teen watched with a soft gasp, unable to make herself deny the beauty of it.
“Wow,” she whispered eyes wide. She raised a hand to push back her visor, getting the full effect of the impact through the windowed roof of the Mercury Three.
“Ghost?!” Angel’s worried cry cut through the younger pilot’s reverence.
“I’m fine,” Ghost replied; all childhood wonder erased from her voice. “Status?”
The comm channel switched suddenly, but no words came in over the speaker. Only a bell to tell them to head back; It was over for now.
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this is the shorter version I had to edit down due to a restriction on the number of pages. But it didn't suffer the loss of too much detail from the one i originally had. if anyone wants to read the longer version, i do still have that one as well. i like the end product, but this was kind of hell to get out. i stayed up till four last night, then skipped work today to edit it down and get some fucking sleep :P
i woke up late and realized i wouldn't have time to go get even the unedited version printed off and copied before work, and then after between work and class without sacrificing being late to a lecture.
shit sucks, but ke sera. hope you all enjoyed the read!
Chu,
Britt
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This story was largely inspired by this image.(click to see origin, and full size)
so yes, it is a science fiction piece. though technically i was told not to do that for this class. i figure i can take creative licensing with the rules once in awhile ;)
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Ghost ran her tongue along the seam of her top lip, snagging the chapped skin and tasting something delicate akin to copper where she had bitten it raw. Her room was small, no bigger than a closet. There was barely enough space for her cot and a standard issue desk she had never used. Pictures torn from books and magazines littered the floor; remnants of an engineer’s pity when he had given them to her whole. Ghost hated books, they made her feel stupid. Their covers like gaping mouths, laughing and sticking out papery tongues to tease her. Forever mocking her inability to read them.
She sat cross legged in the center of her bed, hunched over her lap with pen in hand. The end of it like a pendulum, as the tip dug deeper and deeper into the soft, fleshy thenar space between her thumb and forefinger. Blood ran in tiny streams, dripping onto the crisp, white sheets as she pulled the tool back to admire her creation. Ghost had been working on it for over an hour, trying desperately to get the wound deep enough that it would scar perfectly. She smiled at the simple shape she had chosen. A heart, it’s edges fresh and a little swollen, but there was no mistaking what it was.
The pain was minimal, like white noise or static over the radio. Her nerves barely registering what she had done. It was a gift to herself, probably the only one she would ever get to give. She had turned fifteen two days ago, and had long ago promised herself that should she live this long, she would celebrate. No one had remembered, or congratulated her, but that wasn’t unexpected. The station was filled with hundreds of people; soldiers, scientists and their families. All milling about like angry bees, buzzing and talking. Ghost could count the number of people she knew by name on her fingers. She found that anymore would be too much, too personal.
Ghost didn’t relate well to the crew. The way they spoke, how they seemed to wait with baited breath for the next insurgence, and congratulated themselves post battle; it sat ill with her. Made her ill. She dreaded the call of the alarm, and hated when she got back. A broken body running from the hanger as cheers and celebration would erupt from the other side, where the soldiers entered. It was always the same. Throwing up in the nearest bin, stumbling into some dark, quiet place as she waited for every cell in her body to stop burning.
The girl rose to her knees, crawling over to the other side of her cot to look out the window. The station was a massive thing. A central tower with two great arms that wrapped around to cradle empty space like a lonely toddler. She pressed her forehead to the cool glass, admiring it silently.
A bell rang out over the intercom. Her brow furrowed as she closed her eyes, trying to distance herself from the sound. Her stomach clenched as she sucked in a breath. Her entire body felt tight at the prospect of leaving her room. Eat now, sleep now, fight now; bells told her everything.
Her back was straight as she entered the mess. Her eyes forward, though she saw nothing. The impassive expression she wore like armor was so well practiced she doubted she’d recognize herself in the mirror. She entered the line, grabbing a tray and attempting to ignore the banter of comrades behind her. Soldiers or perhaps scientists, it was hard for her to tell sometimes.
“I’m telling you, two more weeks and I’m out of here. Got myself a month of leave.”
“You going home for a bit?”
“Yeah, I can’t wait. First thing I’m doing is hitting the beach. Gotta remind myself what a woman looks like out of lab coats and fatigues,” the first one laughed.
“I hear you. Been up here so long even that’s looking good.”
Ghost felt the looks they were giving her. She ignored the pair, hoping the conversation would end, or by some miracle she’d become deaf to it.
“C’mon man! That’s nasty, a B-pilot? It’d be like fucking a refrigerator. Besides, she looks young enough to be your kid.”
“They all look like that. Haven’t you heard the saying? If there’s grass on the lawn…”
They broke out into a riotous fit of laughter as she tried to move on as quickly as possible. She wasn’t frightened of the men. The crew weren’t monsters that would chase her down dark alleys. They were mere people; mistaken, foolish, brilliant people that she couldn’t define or understand. The closest she had ever come, was to call them the ‘optimists in Russian Roulette.’ Celebrating each empty chamber, rather than fearing their next turn.
She sat down and stirred her soup, not feeling hungry enough to eat it. Slowly others joined her. The B’s each came with meal in hand. No one spoke until all four were present; it was a tradition of sorts. Ghost looked up, nodding to each in turn as one boy, and two other girls sat all around her. They each bore the same tense expression, dull eyes and practiced aloofness. It was all an act, just as hers was. That vain attempt at ignoring those around them to retain some form of pride. Teenage pigheadedness, that only grew as each of them aged.
Ghost teased a spoon through her soup again, setting her jaw stiffly as she tried to stop her stomach from rebelling at the very thought of taking a bite.
“What is that?” Angel asked. At seventeen, she was the oldest of them and had been aboard the station the longest. That wasn’t what made her well liked, or had earned her the empathetic nickname though. Angel wasn’t a leader, she was weak willed and cowered in the face of conflict like a mouse hiding behind thin, plaster walls. But in those moments of silent night, when all others were asleep, it was her bed that the new pilots crawled into for comfort. A kindly, mothering presence that would pat their head till the tears stopped coming, and the next morning speak not a word of it to anyone.
Ghost looked to the other girl, and then to her hand. Turning her wrist as if she wasn’t aware of what Angel spoke of. The heart glimmered under the neon lights. The fresh scabs lining the delicate shape perfectly as Ghost shrugged.
Angel held out her hand, wanting to see the mark better. There was very little hesitation before Ghost obliged her. The dark haired girl turned the other’s frail palm this way and that, possibly searching for more or a reason behind it. “You did this?”
The younger pilot nodded, unsure how to explain the act to another.
“If it was to kill yourself, you did a horrible job,” Rabbit laughed softly. She pushed the empty bottle of her supplement away, leaning in to lay her chin down on folded hands.
Ghost smiled and shook her head, taking a deep breath as she leaned back in her chair. Her brow furrowed in concentration momentarily. “People get hurt all the time, last month Bridge died…” She paused, letting a silence fall on all four of them in honor of their fallen comrade. “We all have scars. We get them in the ships, or here on the station. I wanted one that was mine. It was a promise I made to myself.”
Ghost glanced around, seeing the confusion and understanding on every face. They may not comprehend her means, but they all understood the desire to own something. To do something completely for themselves and no one else.
Angel lifted the other girl’s hand, taking a better look at the heart. “Don’t show it to the medics,” she advised softly. “They’ll put the cream on to reduce scarring.”
Ghost smiled, appreciating the unsaid acceptance more than the actual words.
The older girl grinned in return, laying her cheek in the other’s hand as Ghost turned it to cup her jaw in thanks. Her flesh was warm beneath the younger pilot’s fingertips. A heat that spoke against the assumptions of the crew, and denied their insults. The companionship of the other pilots, however brief it may be; was something she would be eternally thankful for. They weren’t the crew, they were like her. It made her fear the day she would mourn them, or they her.
The tubes of light that framed almost everything from floor to ceiling; went from a calming white to an angry red as an alarm rang out. The sound of it far more piercing than that gentle bell that had called Ghost from her room. The pilots watched as men and women scrambled from their tables and booths, heading in all directions like fleeing roaches.
Ghost rose, her legs shaky and nervous as a deep pit formed in her gut. A tremendous fear enveloped her, something she could see now in all of the others as well. Each had their own tell, that tiny movement that gave them away. Like the way Angel’s shoulders would droop and Watcher’s teeth would start grinding. Rabbit alone remained almost eerily still; her eyes wide like her namesake.
“We have to go,” Watcher mused, his voice a near whisper but they all heard it.
Ghost was the first to leave the table, doing as the bells bid once more. “Fight now,” they screamed at her. “Be happy, enjoy it! You’re important.” She had never believed a word of it. Reading and writing, simple arithmetic; it had all been deemed unimportant in her studies. Basic skills that her lack of forced those around her to claim superiority. She was stupid and foolish. She was young and immature. Her decisions were wrong. Assumptions were made about the B-pilots, about Ghost; but in the end it never mattered. Could a book save them from what was coming? Would Jenny’s two apples and Billy’s three add up to anything that would stop her from getting into that cockpit? Would all those soldiers that saw her as illiterate and dumb be any more or less dead for their knowledge?
They were questions Ghost asked herself rhetorically. They made her feel better when she had to justify helping these people she didn’t know or understand. She had no use for what the crew thought they knew. Books mocked her, and the only math she needed were the ones and zeros of digital coding.
The echo of footsteps behind her eased the anger and fear she felt. The others were following. Angel, Watcher and Rabbit were all the same. They were all stupid and unimportant until the alarm bell rang and they become something else.
Ghost paused at the door to the hanger, only brave enough to face it but not be the first to walk through. “Breathe,” she told herself.
The Mercury Three was something many people could never even imagine. From the outside, it reminded Ghost of a knife. The sharp edges and brilliant mirror finish of polished outer walls were beautiful. But the darkness that resonated from the craft was like an aura of black that made the pilot tense every time she approached. Ghost couldn’t explain her feelings towards the ship. It was fast and perfect. But at the same time she feared it and what came with it. Only weeks ago she had watched the Mercury Two veer off and torpedo through the walls of the station. Honorary dinners and funerals were held for those lost, all except Bridge. He had been kind and the most outspoken of the B-pilots. Their leader and the only person that had ever asked for Ghost’s real name. Both he and Angel had held her hand and helped her through the painful spasms after her first run in the Mercury Three. Yet no one cared for or remembered him. His body had been left in the Mercury Two as it was scrapped for parts and then melted down for its alloy. Not even the engineers could separate the pilot from cockpit after his death. She didn’t blame them. And as she and the others had met after hours and held a forbidden funeral no one was allowed to acknowledge; she silently wondered if it had really been an accident at all. Bridge had been twenty one, a B-pilot for eight years. That time span was almost unheard of. Ghost alone knew of the tremors, and his irregular heartbeat that had developed. She had never told anyone of her suspicions.
Now, as she sat in her own cockpit of the Mercury Three, she remembered him. Once he had told them that every run in the Mercury series sucked the life from them. That the key to surviving was to tell yourself it wasn’t real. She never really understood what he had meant, but the realization that he may not have been speaking figuratively was slowly dawning on all of the pilots after each battle they had suffered through since his death.
“Mercury Three, status?” The voice was deep and brought forth no memory of who it could belong to.
Ghost reached up, flicking on the red button for the comm. “Ready,” she replied. She took a deep breath and switched off the radio system, not wanting master control to hear what came next. She leaned back in the cockpit, practically laying down as her hands clenched over the lit globes of the Mercury Three’s weapons system.
“Three…. Two…” The countdown was monotonous as the same man watched the seconds tick by on his clock.
Ghost clenched her teeth as her visor came down and she felt the soft tendrils of the ship’s controls crawl over her skin like veins. The seat beneath her warmed as power levels rose. She tried to relax, but it was hard when she knew what came next.
“One.”
Tiny translucent hairs all over the veins hardened into millions of microscopic shards of glass. They pierced through her pores and sent the electric pulse of the ship straight through her body.
Ghost screamed, the sound of it enough to curdle her own blood as she involuntarily thrashed. No matter how many times she had piloted the Mercury Three, the initial shock of the link never got any easier. Volts coursed through her every cell as pain ripped through her nervous system. Eventually the agony died down, though never truly left. It became muddled enough by the painkillers pumped through the life support that she could think once more. Ghost opened her eyes, able to feel the weight of the ship bare down on her. Only then did she dare start the engines with a single thought.
The Mercury Three roared to life, lifting off from the ground and hovering. Ghost turned her comm back on to silence, but it was short lived.
“Mercury One, Three, Four and Seven all online. Await hanger doors.”
“Acknowledged,” Ghost replied. No one else spoke. Besides Angel, Ghost had been on the station the longest with two years. It had only been assumed she would take over after Bridge.
Ghost switched the comm system to the internal channel, making sure only her fellow pilots would hear. “Burst pattern, search and destroy.” The order was direct and short. It told the others to move all around the station in a grid. “Radio coordinates when you find them.”
“Understood,” Angel replied.
The hanger doors opened slowly, dragging out every unbearable second.
“Four and Seven, take the left. One with me on the right. Circle around, keep in radio contact.”
It was with that that the four ships left the hanger, each one flying off in a different direction. Rabbit and Watcher veered off to the left and out of sight. Ghost immediately took the right, higher angle, knowing Angel preferred the lower sub levels.
The Mercury Three was fluid, slicing through the sky like needled silver. Ghost scanned every nook and cranny, trying to also pay close mind to where the soldiers flew in case they were quicker to pick up coordinates. But all they did was go after the obvious. Attacking the battle ship rather than defending the station itself. She took a deep breath, continuing her search and hoping the others were alright.
“Mercury Four confirmed sighting. Calling team to coordinates axis head nine, sector three.”
“Alright Watcher, I got you,” Ghost replied. “Do not engage till Mercury Seven approaches. Everyone switch to light rounds, get them away from the station before you bring out anything bigger. Mercury One position?”
“Axis sub five, sector one oh one,” Angel replied almost instantaneously.
“I’m sector one fifteen, meet and follow me in,” Ghost ordered.
“Confirmed.”
“Mercury Seven status?” Her stomach was in her throat as she awaited the reply, each second that passed one more moment that Watcher risked being spotted without any back up.
“On approach already Ghost,” came Rabbit’s voice over the comm.
She breathed a sigh of relief as she moved her ship out towards the coordinates given. Out of the corner of her eye she saw the Mercury One move in to fly beside her. “Mercury Three and One on approach, arrival in two.”
“Confirmed, engaging now.” Watcher’s voice was calm and collected, like he wasn’t about to enter battle with an enemy that he had seen kill so many before. But such was his way. The teen was an expert at compartmentalizing. He’d be scared later.
Ghost and Angel moved quickly, their team mates coming into view as they approached the opposite side of the ship that they had been searching. Without words, each knew what they were to do. Mercury One and Three split off from their parallel path, coming around to flank the group of fighters that Watcher had discovered. Ghost’s arrival was seamless. The Mercury Three like a scalpel cutting through the folds of flesh. Her fingers tightened on the globes, the controls turning red as her ship fired on the enemy fighters, trying to herd them away from the station walls. The combat was chaotic, Ghost saw flashes of her team mates, but focused her attention more on avoiding enemy fire and not crashing. The comms were open. She heard every scream and curse the others uttered, but nothing sounded immediate.
Ghost continued to fire on the enemy ships. Crying out when one managed to get a shot in over her right wing. The ship was linked to her mind, every dent and graze she felt as her own. It reduced response time. The pain called her back, made her fly more with instinct rather than logic. The Mercury Three darted around erratically, moving with speed and grace in a pattern no one could predict.
Ghost caught sight of a fighter on her tail. She corkscrewed and darted around the others trying to rid herself of the determined ship, but it was to no avail. The enemy fighter sent out shots mid chase that Ghost was barely able to dodge. She screamed in frustration as she tried to circle around to catch the other’s back end. The enemy pilot was fast, realising her intent and burning out his own engines on full blaze to avoid the nose of the Mercury Three. Ghost felt a stabbing pain shoot up her spine as he caught one over the back of her hull. She screamed again, this time in pain as he managed to hit the same spot once more. Ghost turned the gauge of the painkillers up before letting the Mercury Three fall into a nose dive. The ship followed just as she had expected. The B-pilot waited, watching with careful eyes and hiccupping breaths before another ship made its way into her path. She didn’t have time to see what it was, only if it was ally or not, which it definitely wasn’t. She turned the Mercury Three ever so slightly, grazing past the other ship in her streamlined craft in a way she was sure the other fighter couldn’t accomplish. Ghost pulled back, bringing the front of her ship up in a sudden climb just as the enemy crashed into the ship she had flew past full on. Ghost watched as both ships exploded and burst into silent flame. Pieces from each craft forced outward like fireworks. The teen watched with a soft gasp, unable to make herself deny the beauty of it.
“Wow,” she whispered eyes wide. She raised a hand to push back her visor, getting the full effect of the impact through the windowed roof of the Mercury Three.
“Ghost?!” Angel’s worried cry cut through the younger pilot’s reverence.
“I’m fine,” Ghost replied; all childhood wonder erased from her voice. “Status?”
The comm channel switched suddenly, but no words came in over the speaker. Only a bell to tell them to head back; It was over for now.
✄-----------------------------------------------------------
this is the shorter version I had to edit down due to a restriction on the number of pages. But it didn't suffer the loss of too much detail from the one i originally had. if anyone wants to read the longer version, i do still have that one as well. i like the end product, but this was kind of hell to get out. i stayed up till four last night, then skipped work today to edit it down and get some fucking sleep :P
i woke up late and realized i wouldn't have time to go get even the unedited version printed off and copied before work, and then after between work and class without sacrificing being late to a lecture.
shit sucks, but ke sera. hope you all enjoyed the read!
Chu,
Britt