Heritage (Under Revision)

Chapter 58: Stella

After that night with Richard it almost felt as if a switch had flipped within my mind. It feels like instead of moving forward now, I’m stuck in one place. My thoughts remind me every night of the choices I have made. And though most of the time I feel I’ve done the right things, there’s always that gnawing feeling in the back of my head asking me why.

I’ve always been so sure of myself. I’ve always had the answers no matter what, why don’t I have them now?

Lately it seems the only peace I can find is through working in the gear cage. The Captain was right in saying that it’s good to have something to keep your mind busy while you have down time.

It’s a good way for me to avoid Richard as well. I’ve been using it as an excuse often whenever he asks if we could eat together, or talk, or just spend some time with each other.

I see the hurt on his face every time I say no. I’m sure by now he understands that I’m trying to avoid him, but I don’t think he quite understands the why of me avoiding him. At the same time, I haven’t exactly given him elaboration on that front.

Today was a quiet day for me.

The usual armorer was out today attending to other duties for the Captain, which left me with the cage to myself. I can’t say that I didn’t enjoy it.

I decide to sit at the front counter today and do my work. It allowed me to know if someone was coming in with gear without having to look up from my work space every few minutes to see if I had a customer. That day I noticed we had a bit of a backup of crash pistols on the rack and it’s better to focus on knocking those out before anything else.

I sit at the desk, engrossed in the cleaning of one of them. During the work I notice a shadow block the light in front of me.

“Go ahead and set down your gear on the counter there and sign it in on the clipboard, I’ll grab it in a moment,” I say expecting it to be a customer, not looking up from my work.

“Can we talk for a moment?” A familiar voice speaks.

I look up to see Richard standing there, his eyes red and welled up as he stifles tears. I feel the empathy within me for him, but my words just don’t seem to come out that way.

“Can this wait until later? The cage is backed up today and I have a lot of work to do,”

“Did I do something wrong?”

“What? No Richard, I’ve just been really busy, that’s all,”

“Then how come since that night, you’ve been so distant from me? Did I hurt you or something?” He asks, starting to become erratic.

“Keep your voice down!” I say in a whispered yell.

I sit back in my chair and breathe a frustrated sigh.

“Look, Richard, I’m sorry I’ve been making you feel like this,”

“What’s going on then?” He asks, quickly wiping tears before anyone can see.

“I...I’m not sure how to explain it to you, okay?”

“Can you at least try?”

“I.... miss Leon,”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“It means I need some time to think about things, Richard, okay?” I say becoming frustrated.

“Why didn’t you think about him in the first place? I never did anything to push you into being with me,”

“But you didn’t hesitate when you had the chance, did you?” I snap back.

An angry hurt coats Richard’s face as he stares at me in disbelief from my words.

“Fine, Stella. Take your time to think. Just remember that you were the one who kissed me first,” He says before walking away.

I plop my head down on the desk in frustration. I lightly bump my forehead on the surface of the desk, trying to relieve the stress. I turn my head right to see the Captain standing there. With a startle I sit up straight, unable to say anything to him.

“Lover’s quarrel?” He asks plainly.

“Yo...You heard all of that?” I say, frightened that he’ll report it.

The Captain walks closer to me.

“It’s okay. I’m not going to say anything. On board relationships are a lot more common than you think. Just make sure that you don’t have an incident like that again, okay?” He says as he starts to walk away.

“Yes sir, it won’t happen again, I promise,”

The Captain gives a wave of his hand as acknowledgement. I return to my work, trying my best to sort out my feelings.

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My shift ends in the cage and I quickly make way for the one other thing that gives me peace in this crowded ship, the simulators. I go down a level or two on the large carrier and enter a door that opens to a control room with a viewing window.

The technician turns around and recognizes me.

“Hey there Stella, ready to get back in there?”

“Always,” I say as the technician unlocks the door and I step inside, quickly hopping into the simulated cockpit within.

The whole simulation device sits on multiple, fully gyroscopic rails that allow for a complete three-hundred-and-sixty-degree motion in every direction in order to entirely simulate the motions of flight.

After jumping into the cockpit, I quickly tap a few buttons and a holographic display appears, projecting in a half dome shape to simulate the canopy door.

“I got something special for you today, just to let you know. I had one of our designers take a look at your recordings and whip something up for you. Give you a real challenge,” The technician says over the loudspeaker.

I nod my head and give a thumbs up with an outstretched arm so that he can see it. A few moments of pause pass before the simulator starts up.

The whole gyroscopic ball levitates off of the stand it rests on and becomes encased in an energy field, remaining completely mobile, but stationary above the stand as well.

I’ve made sure over the course of time to come down here at least twice a week in order to stay sharp on my skills. It’s helped thus far as I’ve noticed myself become noticeably more talented inside of the cockpit. Kurosawa even complimented me on how much better I’ve become when we would do missions.

As the simulation starts my mind goes completely blank and focuses solely on the task at hand. I’ve always felt calmness to this. Even when Kurosawa and I have energy bolts bouncing off of our fighter. There’s certain simplicity to flying and dog-fighting that’s almost addicting to me. Sometimes I wonder if this is how Dante felt when he was behind the stick of a fighter.

Like a flash I run through the simulation, rotating all around in the simulator and before I know it, I’ve completed it. By the time I’m finished, sweat pours from my face and coats my body, making my clothes stick to me as I move out of the cockpit and exit the simulator.

“I can’t believe you beat that one. My friend said it would be almost impossible,” The technician says.

I give a shrug and a confident grin, leaving the control room. I take the time to go back to my room and shower. The maintenance workers were able to work something up for me, using spare water pipes and diverting water off from the main line and placing it over a utility sink that’s mounted on the floor to be used as a makeshift shower drain. I was able to rig up a shower curtain out of some canvas I found and some zip ties and attaching it to the pipes.

Today is one of those days that I’m grateful for the military making it a point to give everyone their own showers. After cleaning up and getting dressed into fresh clothing I hear a sudden knock at the door.

I go to the door and open it.

Kurosawa is standing there, seriousness in his demeanor.

“What’s up Kurosawa?” I ask with a raised eyebrow.

I notice that he’s dressed in his dress blues “They want us in the briefing room. It’s something big. Put on your blues, top brass gonna be there,”

I nod my head and close the door and quickly scramble to get my dress blues on. After I finish, I exit my room and immediately start walking with Kurosawa.

“So, what’s going on?” I ask.

“I don’t know yet. They’re having all the officers go to the briefing though. They’re allowing us to bring our wingmen so long as the wingman is a permanent assignment. And you are, so I decided to have you come,”

“I appreciate it,”

“Mmhm,” Kurosawa says giving a nod.

We silently walk to the briefing hall after that. By the time we arrive, there’s a crowd of silver pinned uniforms funneling in. Kurosawa and I get in line and slowly make our way into the hall. As we find our seats, I notice a high-ranked individual make way for the microphone set on the stage, attached to a podium.

“Hello everyone, I’m General Douglas Hewitt. I’m sure many of you are wondering why you’ve all been gathered into a room with some of the highest-ranking people in UEDF military. This meeting is more than just a simple briefing. This briefing is to discuss two very important missions in which every branch of our military will be taking place in. During the course of these missions, we will be going to a defensive minimum. For those of you who have not been around long enough to know when our last one was, I’ll explain. A defensive minimum is an executive order given by the President. This order states that all UEDF colonized planets will go to a minimum defense perimeter of two ships. All other capable ships will be rerouted to the specified mission. Now, to explain what that mission is, I will direct the mic to General Eisenhower,”

General Hewitt steps away from the mic as General Eisenhower steps up. This man stands prouder than perhaps any I have ever seen in the military. I don’t know much about the man. Only that he claims his name comes from very old origins dating back to when the world was still prospering.

“Thank you everyone for being here,”

Before speaking any further, General Eisenhower presses a button on the podium, causing a large hologram of an orange planet to appear.

“This...is planet Hyperion. It is located about five hundred light years from planet Argalia. Now, I see on many of your faces that you’re wondering what that has to do with Argalia, in particular. Well, deep in our archives, we managed to find that Hyperion here, used to be a planet colonized by the UEDF and that the Sekrid now occupy it in order to hide a closely-guarded secret. This secret is this,”

The General presses another button and the image of a game-changing cosmic construct comes into view.

“There is a wormhole not too far off from planet Hyperion. We also found charts about this wormhole and found that our early space travelers used this wormhole to fly directly to Argalia in order to preserve fuel supplies. Ladies and Gentlemen...this...is the key to bring down Sekrid High Command. This...is the key to ending the war in this galaxy. What you are looking at is the Trojan horse that will bring us to the Sekrid doorstep,”

Murmurs permeate the room as everyone talks in disbelief and wonder. General Eisenhower puts a hand up and everyone quickly falls silent. He waits for total silence before speaking again.

“On to the meat of the matter: This mission, dubbed Operation Doros, will take place in two successive phases given the time constraint,”

General Eisenhower presses a few more buttons on his panel that then shows holograms of various ships performing maneuvers over the planet Hyperion.

“The first phase involves the assault on Hyperion. This will occur in multiple, successive stages. The first stage, which will happen before the full assault will in involve a team led by Pilot’s Lieutenant Grade Three Kurosawa, will fly our new fast strike jets and eliminate the enemy’s communications. Now, this is mostly for the Lieutenant, but it’ll be good for everyone else to hear as well. These new jets have short range light speed capabilities. This advancement is thanks to a joint effort between the Jinkor and Earth. The drive will allow you to jump for about five light years before it runs out of charge. This means that if your team fails in their objective, you will have no way to get back to the fleet,”

I see Kurosawa give a serious nod towards the General.

“These jets also come with a new precision phase technology that will cause your energy pulses to come out more volatile and hotter than we’ve ever had before. It will allow for extremely accurate shots that will do more damage. The final addition to these fighters is that they will have heavy stealth capabilities. If you play your cards right, the enemy won’t see you until you’re on top of them. Before your team goes out, I want you to make sure every member has read a portion of the manual on the systems,”

“Yes sir. It’ll be done,”

“The fleet will stop about a half light year within your stealth fighters’ effective jump range. Your team will deploy from here. Your mission once you reach Hyperion is twofold. Your team will split at this point. One piece will breach the atmosphere and destroy the communications hub on the surface while the other piece will fast strike the focusing satellites that are orbiting the planet, of which there are twelve small and one large sitting stationary on one side of the planet, facing Argalia. For the large one your fighters will be equipped with Jackhammer rockets. Be sure to aim for the center of the dish or at the connection point where the dish meets the base for maximum effectiveness. Before these things are destroyed, there is to be absolutely no radio chatter except between you. The Sekrid have technology in place that will detect our communications if you’re sending them to the fleet. To ensure that doesn’t happen when speaking to your teammates, your fighters have been equipped with quantum links that are only synced to your team. Once your task is done, switch to open fleet channels and let the fleet know. Once you’ve sent the message, the fleet will be there in mere moments. This will start the next stage of the assault on Hyperion. Stage two will be to begin the naval assault on any carriers they may have. At the same time, stage three will commence. This involves using troop transports to hastily and strategically drop troops on the ground old school, shock trooper style. These ground forces will be responsible for capturing and holding key points on the planet here, here, and here,” Eisenhower says pointing at various places on the planet with a laser, causing them to blink with a red dot.

“At this time, Lieutenant, you and your crew will return to your carrier and swap your stealth fighters for combat ones. This leads me into stage four of the assault. Stage four involves the deployment of combat fighters to both assist with carrier assaults and to perform strafing runs on the planet’s surface. After we have cleared a significant amount of resistance from the planet, we will move on to the wormhole jump that will take us to planet Argalia. For that portion, I will turn you over to General Turner,” General Eisenhower says, stepping to the side of the podium to stand with Hewitt.

To my surprise, a woman steps to the podium next, more stoic than the men before her.

“Hello...I’m the one who will be giving you the bad news now. By the time we reach Argalia, they will likely be ready for us. Unfortunately, the wormhole will take us roughly twenty minutes to pass through. Our scout ships also found devices outside of their orbit that match the technology needed to track movements within such a cosmic construct. It will not be immediate, but it will be in enough time to prepare. What we will be entering into will not be the full force of the Sekrid military, but it will be a formidable defense. The Sekrid have taken cannons from the Pulvan’s in order to strengthen their invasion defenses. They also have many mines in place, meaning that with as close as the wormhole is going to pop us out, our fleet is going to take some preliminary damage. However, we think it will be a necessary sacrifice for the opportunity to secure the Sekrid home world. Once arriving, the plan is essentially the same as Hyperion. Destroy large ships, deploy ground troops, and scramble combat fighters to assist on the ground and in outer orbit. The hope is that we can have a semblance of a planet to occupy. This plan is optional, however. If it is deemed not possible, your mission is to direct all bombs and fighters to raze the planet uninhabitable. Now, some of you may be wondering about a rather high value POW on the planet, Leon Blake, son of General Ethan Blake. It will be unfortunate if he is killed during this process, but we feel that he will survive the assault given the skills he has learned. We will also deploy ground forces to his location in order to recover him,”

In hearing her words about Leon my stomach sinks and a nauseous feeling comes over me. I had completely forgotten that Leon was being held on Argalia. And my only thoughts for a few minutes are solely on him.

“Now--,”

I involuntarily raise a hand, cutting the General off.

She stops and stares at my one lonely arm stretched into the air.

“Can I help you?”

Realizing my mistake, I retract my hand and slump down.

“Stand up for me please,” Turner commands and passing the point of no return, I obey.

I slowly rise from my seat, looking around at all of the judgmental faces surrounding me.

“Now, what is it you wanted to ask?” She says, commanding my answer through a question.

I nervously place my right hand on my left forearm and sway back and forth.

“Well general...I just wanted to ask...will there be any air support provided for the forces dispatched to Leon Blake’s location?” I ask squeamishly.

I can see the General give me a ponderous look as I continue to stand in position, embarrassed.

“Pilot, what’s your name?” She asks me.

“St...Stella Lancaster, ma’am,”

“Lancaster? I know your mother child. I hear you’re becoming quite the flyer. Why is it you’re so concerned about Leon Blake?”

“Well ma’am...if you know my mother...she must have told you that I went to the military academy on the Poseidon. Leon Blake was one of my peers their ma’am. We were...close,”

“You were with them after the collision with the planet, weren’t you?”

“Yes ma’am,”

General Turner gives a slow, dot-connecting nod.

“I understand, Ms. Lancaster. However, I’m still curious as to why you suggested air support for his recovery,”

“I only suggest it because Sekrid ground forces are unmatched compared to our own. That is a statistical fact ma’am. Sekrid are faster and stronger than humans. On top of this, our ground forces will be placed in a position of overwhelming force considering the fact that they will be assaulting the Sekrid home world. I assume that Leon’s recovery team will be a strike force of about five to seven men. I’ve also taken into consideration the other mission priorities and assumed that any specialized forces will be diverted to more important roles leaving the only soldiers to recover Leon Blake to be ones with only standard training. Diverting at least one or two fighters for air support should provide supplementation that the soldiers need in order to accomplish their mission,”

“Those are a lot of assumptions Lancaster, but not incorrect ones to make. You’ve convinced me. When the time comes, I’ll be sure to send support fighters to those forces,”

“Thank you, ma’am,” The General gives me a quick nod and I sit down.

“To finish up this briefing I would just like to say what an honor it is to be collaborating with all of you. I know that all of you realize how much sacrifice is going to be made during this operation. My wish is that not a single man will be lost, but this is not a perfect world. Many of you will pass on from this world. To stand here in front of all of you who realize this and are willing to give everything for the cause of peace...it reminds me why I joined this brotherhood in the first place. Thank you,” The General finishes and the hall applauds her.

I can’t help but have a sinking feeling as I sit there. I don’t feel like this operation is going to go as planned.