Uma watched as Captain Olghan Fransk completed a slow, contemplative circuit of his office, his footsteps clicking over the purple tiled floor. Fransk was a tall, broad man, made even taller by the thick-heeled black boots of his dress-uniform. He usually carried himself with the kind of determined set to his wide shoulders that came with years of responsibility. But today there was a slump in his posture, and that made Uma almost as uneasy as the latest round of engine core diagnostics.
“Sorry, no engine fix yet. We’re still trying,” she said. “We’ll have to run more diagnostics on the cores, more tests on this energy field. I need you to give me another overtime override.”“Gods.” Fransk’s voice was hoarse with exhaustion. “How could this happen? We’re supposed to have state-of-the-art monitoring systems, aren’t we? That’s what our adverts say.”
“I guess I had some gods-damned sense back then,” Fransk said bitterly. “They pressured me into taking this job, and you know it! A great career opportunity, they said. Just put in some time in space, make a few rotations with a flagship captaincy, and you’ll be in line for a ZeyCorp chancellorship!” He sighed. “Just think... next year, I could’ve been sitting in a nice office at Central, planet-side, with an ocean view.”“And you still will,” Uma said. “Come on.
“Look, we’ll solve this, Olghan. We’ll get through it.” She leaned across the desk to rest her hand on his purple sleeve. “But it might take a bit more time.”“Time is the one thing we haven’t got.” He twirled open a virtual console on his desk and keyed in two passcodes, looking pained. “There. You have your overtime override, Director Ozakka. Take a short break, and you can get back on the system in one hour.” His gaze met hers. “This is the last override the system will let me give you, so...
There were her half-dozen fragile old books, their faded spines facing out, each book enclosed in an airtight clear container to preserve the delicate pages. Beside those stood the miniature model spaceship that she’d built long ago—a scale model of the Fortunate Five’s famous ship, the. And next to that was the last gift her father had given her before he died, a rare bottle of Etraxan agnathe on a gold-brushed stand.She touched each of the items in turn, running her fingers over them.
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