:: 29/12/2000 ::
"That," said Napalm, "is a real bootlick over there." This comment was directed to a tall man standing near the table where Captain Naabal, Commander Paktu, and Lt. Commander Liir Hra were sitting. They were about ten meters away from the bar, but we could tell from this far that they wanted Jude Soran to leave. Badly.
We could pick up some of the conversation, which went along the lines of:
"I filed those reports you wanted, Commander."
"That's great, Lieutenant."
"Also, I decalcified the water purifiers and alphabetised the spare parts in Cargo Bay 4. Will that be all?"
"No, that's all right. Good work, soldier."
"Are you sure? Because I've got a loot of time on my hands (at this, Alia Paktu pointed out, "That's because nobody wants him around."); I'd be glad to help out."
"No, no. You've done quite enough."
"Really, because I could-"
"R&R;, at least six hours worth. That's an order."
Jude didn't seem very satisfied, but he snapped to attention. "Sir, yes, sir!" He walked off, and the commanders seemed very relieved by his absence, except for Liir Hra, who seemed to keep his silence.
Napalm took a long drag of his cigar, and blew it in the air above him, creating a proto-atmosphere of nicotine smoke. He repeated this, shooting out small puffs of the vile stuff. I tried not to cough, since that would probably be considered rude. Alia seemed positively mesmerized by this. He sat for a while, and then started talking. "You know, Fighters are a lost cause. Angel squadron is supposed to be made up of elite pilots; so then they should be trained to fly Corvettes. They are more or less as small as fast as most fighters, but can stand a fight against starships." Alia spoke up, who had just been staring at him this whole time. "Maybe they're trying to teach us to be able to work with less, so we could be unstoppable with stronger vessels."
He stared drunkenly at her. She had short blond hair, and she was quite attractive, but when someone like Nolan "Napalm" Hiilar gets drunk, everything is about debate. "Then they should have put us in Light Corvettes." He turned to his glass of Hiigaran whiskey, (he was right; it was damn good,) took a long swig, and wiped his mouth clean. "The hell with this. I'm going to get myself set up in my room. I'm boarding with Jude, so if he's following orders he should be asleep by now."
He pushed back his stool, jumped off, and staggered out of the Hyper Gate, the mess hall of the Angel Base. I didn't mention what it was like before, so I will now. The Hyper Gate, true to its name, was decorated in the light blues of a Kushan hyperspace field (no one knows why different ships, like the Bentusi with yellow gates, create different color warp gates, but it wasn't looked into very much.) The walls were also coated with some sort of thin display, which created swirling waves characteristic of this form of travel. It was clearly able to fit the forty odd crew of the ship, but it was also a bit cramped. The entire room fit in one hundred square meters of space, and the bar wasn't free from these constraints.
Alia turned to me, her hair bouncing. "Say, have you heard about the three pilots that no one has seen?" I nodded. "Who are they?" She looked over my shoulder. "Wrong question. Not who." I turned to the door and saw what she meant. Standing there were the three missing pilots. They captured the eyes of all the patrons in the bar, and I understood what she had meant be "not who."
They were robots. Three of them. They were painted a shiny gray; they were more or less humanoid; their mouths looked like the bottom parts were attached with hinges; and when they moved their whole body seemed to lift with the one leg. It is hard to describe if you hadn't actually seen it.
They moved towards the commanders' table, spoke in low, metallic tones to Commander Paktu, and got her to rise. I said to Alia, "I didn't know that we had perfected AI." She shook her head. "No, but I guess we were wrong." The commander walked the new "pilots" to our stools. When they reached us, we could smell the disinfectant on these things; they were brand new.
We got up to salute her. We both said, "Commander Paktu," in unison. She nodded to both of us, which got her auburn ponytail to bounce up and down. "Cadet Paktu, Cadet Sjet. At ease." We didn't sit down. "These are your new wing mates, 1RD, 1RE, and 1RF. They are going to hold the positions of Angels 5, 6, and 7, respectively." All the robots nodded in unison, and all replied "Affirmative." We said nothing for a moment, but then Alia spoke up.
"So, can we call you D, E, and F?" 1RD replied. "Our designations are 1R, 1RE, and 1RF." She looked down and didn't say anything more. They were all identical, and the only way I could distinguish them was that D had his lower "jaw" painted an opaque red, E's was painted blue, and F's was painted green. Attempting a joke, I said, "So, who's bunking with who?" Of course, they didn't get it, so Commander Paktu interjected, "They will be set up on recharge pods in the power core. That means that you, Cadet Paktu, are getting a room to yourself, since we don't have any other female pilots (Alia took this both with pride and bitter contempt,) and the other room will be used as a room for the simulators; we were debating about where to put them.
"Anyway, get to know each other, and try to get some rest. We launch in fifteen hours." She turned an exact 180 degrees, very militarily, and marched back to her table. The two of us stared at the three of them. We became quite uncomfortable, but the robots had no sense of that, and just stared back.
Eventually I decided to go to my room. I got up, but the robots just sat there and blocked my path. I tried to squeeze my way through the bar and them, but they were too close to me. "Uh, could you just…" They didn't budge. "Um, move, please!" No reaction. I caught the attention of Captain Naabal. He got up from his table and moved towards us. He stated in a loud voice, "1RD, 1RE, and 1RF, make way for Cadet Sjet." Immediately, they took one step backwards. I got up slowly; bewildered by what just happened.
"Now set off to regenerate. Report back at 0730 hours. They filed out of the bar, moving with a mechanical likeness. When they were gone, the captain explained, "You see, those three are state-of-the-art war machines, but they aren't perfect. They haven't had their initiative circuitry, so they are prone to remain dormant after they performed their primary tasks until someone with a high enough rank orders them to do something else."
This was too much for me, so I decided to head to my room. I saluted both the Paktus and headed off, not knowing what I would find.
Jacyn Naabal, my new (shudder) wing mate/roommate had already established himself in the dorm. It was a small room with a sink, lockers for both of us (with our names stencilled on in black ink), a view of the stars outside, and a bunk bed positioned just to my left when I walked in. He had chosen the bottom bunk (because he liked the darkness, I thought,) and had also adorned the room with less-than-pleasing décor.
Just next to his bed, there was a poster of Kharak, floating in space. This brought me a pang of nostalgia, as I still remembered our old home. Surrounding the planet was a large fleet of Kushan battleships, and the slogan "WE SHOULD NEVER HAVE LEFT," was stamped in angry red letters along the bottom. He had also placed several pictures of ship schematics and, slouched on his bed, he was reading a large manuscript of some sort. No, correction. He was writing a manuscript; I now noticed that he was burning in new text with a hand laser.
He looked at me, and I noticed that his slicked black hair, his sunken eyes, and his seemingly dark face made him appear more intimidating. He nodded at me and went back to his work. The silence was really getting to me, so I tossed my duffel bag onto my bunk and moved closer towards my roomie. "What're you writing?" He stared at me, then closed the manuscript so that I could read the title. "The Invisibles' Guide to piloting a Cloaked Fighter." He closed it, and concluded, "My manifesto."
I remembered something from pilot training, which was about CF pilots. Due to the nebulous energies created by cloaking fields, these pilots harbor strange behaviours, and tend to stick in secluded groups commonly known as the "Invisibles." No wonder he seemed alienated from everyone. Willing to strike up more conversation, I said, "So, I saw that you brought along your old Fighter with you." He replied, "Yes," without looking up. "Those fragile ships we're flying will allow me to cause pain for those treacherous Taiidan, but you just can't beat the personal touch of one's own vessel." I was tired, so I jumped on my bed and felt myself drifting away.
"Is it custom-made?"
"More powerful cannons and extra speed added to it."
"Does it have a name?"
"The Bloody Dagger."
I was surprised I slept that night at all until the briefing the next day.
