Emissary

Stel settled herself into the seat of the Emissary, the crash harness keeping her in place and letting her focus on the suit's calibration sequence.

The asteroid field was providing a fun playground to maneuver around and as the suit paired itself to her mental processes, the responses became sharper and faster, the limbs of the mech suit moving where they thought they should go rather than where she told them to go. Getting the thrusters to operate just right was still a little bit of a stretch and she found the whole thing mentally exhausting, but she kept practicing as the Motherwill floated gently behind her, keeping the Emissary in sight as Stel raced around the asteroid field and used smaller rocks as target practice.

"Doing better, kid. Suit startin' to like ya?"

Ryn's voice came over the communicator and Stel flipped on the microphone with a thought. "Much better than before. I can just... think and things happen. Is it always like this?"

"Mhm, supposed to be anyway. The first generations didn't have great neural uplinks, so they could be a little sluggish, but they were still far above anything else on any battlefield. With a good pilot." He answered almost casually, but Stel could catch a hint of longing or remorse in his voice.

"And now the Emissary has a good pilot, right?" She asked with a hint of mirth in her tone, hoping to cheer him up a little.

Ryn scoffed, "Sure, sure. So, good pilot, why don't you outrace me then? I'm in a big, lumbering freighter and you've got a nimble third-gen mech suit. Shouldn't be a problem to beat me to the exit point of the system. Marking it on your tac-map."

Stel felt her heartbeat quicken; a challenge. The point appeared on her area tactical-map as Ryn promised and she looked over to see the Motherwill drifting in beside her.

"Last one there scrubs the galley."

The Motherwill lurched forward, the thrusters sending the freighter into a fast forward dash that was easily matched by the much smaller and nimbler Emissary. Stel did what she could to keep him in sight but as they entered an area of the asteroid belt with larger rocks. The Motherwill moved fast but was forced to go the longer way around the rocks while the Emissary could nimbly find smaller gaps to slip through, ultimately making it a fair race.

Stel broke free of the asteroids and could see the distance counter on her tac-map counting down to the finish point when the Motherwill raced overhead, nearly at entry speed to slipspace.

"Hey! That's cheating! You can't use the run-up drive!" Stel shouted into the communicator as Ryn raced away to the finish line, spinning in place once he'd reached the coordinates well ahead of her.

"Your enemies won't play fair either, kid. Now come on in, you got a galley to clean."

Stel sighed in frustration but knew he was probably right. "Yeah, but still, that wasn't fair."

Ryn's voice came through in a laugh and the bay doors of the Motherwill slid open, guidance lights flashing on to direct Stel in. With her improved control of the mech suit, Stel slowed down and glided into the bay, hitting her crash harness hard as the mag-locks grabbed the Emissary and spun it in place, putting the hatch to the access door. As the bay doors slid shut, Stel sagged in her seat.

This does make me tired... maybe a nap would help. After the galley, I guess...

The hatch behind her opened and Ryn was already there, leaning in to offer her a hand. "Did good, kid. Come on, I'll help ya with the cleaning. Bit of a mess back there anyway."

Stel reached up and took his offered hand, his strong arm pulling her up and out of the cockpit. Stel stood on shaky legs and Ryn chuckled again.

"You'll get used to that. The slight daze after the disconnect. It passes faster with practice." He started the small elevator and carried the two up to the hall between the bunks and the gallery before guiding Stel to the galley, the kitchen. He reached into a cabinet and grabbed two pairs of rubber gloves, tossing a pair at Stel.

"Reprocessor can get gunked up so we need to clear that out. Half-grill is for when we get real food in here, but needs cleaning. Floor is grimy, utensils need work... ready to spend the rest of the day getting the ship a little cleaner?" Ryn's furry foxy face was locked in a grin towards Stel.

Stel sighed and pulled the gloves on. "I guess I'm very ready. We not moving while we do though? Could be in slipspace."

Ryn raised an eyebrow at her. "Already in it. Didn't feel the movement and pulse while you were in the bay? Huh, mag-locks might be more comfortable than my chair. Noted." Ryn turned and began to clean the nearest dirty surface with a rag, Stel turning to do the same and collect utensils and indestructible dishware in the sink.

"But... I did do better, right?" Stel asked quietly as the two cleaned the kitchen surfaces.

Ryn looked over his shoulder to see Stel looking right back, a faint need for approval written all over her face. He turned back and kept cleaning. "You did fine, kid. Next time we might break a whole siege instead of just one ship."

Stel turned back to her task and suppressed a gleeful squeal. Sure, he might be a jerk at times and she didn't really think she wanted approval, but it sure felt nice to be appreciated and praised once in a while.

A couple hours later and Stel flops into her bunk tired as can be, her jumpsuit abandoned and her post-shower towel wrapped around her torso. Gods it's nice to have running water on demand. Even if it is recycled.

The ship did have three separate water recycling circuits, one for sewage, one for cleanliness, and one potable circuit. Each one filtered out contaminants before sending the water back through for use, but what that meant was it only needed to be restocked every few weeks, instead of daily. Helpful in the vastness of space.

A knock on her door caused Stel to shoot up, blushing that she was nearly undressed and stammered out, "D-don't come in. Not decent!"

Ryn audibly scoffed through the door. "Humans and your vanity. Just wanted to tell you we'll be arriving at our next stop in about nine hours. Get some sleep, you're on watch in four hours."

Stel heard the footsteps depart and flops back in her bunk. "Four hours? Guess I'm used to limited sleep anyway..."

Stel rolled over, touched the wall-mounted alarm clock system and keyed in an alarm for 4 hours from then, then rolled over and promptly fell asleep.

Ryn walked back to the bridge of the Motherwill, a light grin on his face. He sat in his command chair and keyed up some old recordings on his computer's storage, watching with idle interest until a scene from the Motherwill's bow camera came on. Lasers flashed every which way, mech suits raced against death as Nalesh'ka fighter craft pursued them or were being pursued. Explosions were rampant though the Nalesh'ka ships were the ones to explode more often. The camera was steady but the ship was not as it weaved through the fight, guns blazing and blaster shots skipping off its shields and hull.

Ryn watched with vested interest as the Motherwill raced for a disabled mech suit and scooped it up with its forward bow launch bay, racing out of combat to drop off the damaged suit with the rear fleet for repair and recovery of the pilot. Then the Motherwill turned and ran back towards the fight, ready to recover another pilot. And another. Ryn watched as a brilliant amethyst mech came into view and choked up, trying to look away but being unable to tear his eyes from the screen.

The door slid open behind him and Ryn jumped, pausing the monitor and turning to see Stel with tired eyes and a half-zipped jumpsuit on.

"Hey. Here for my shift. Just... sit here and make sure nothing bad happens? Wake you if it does? What's that?"

Stel pointed at the paused view of the angular purple mech and Ryn switched off the viewscreen. "An old friend. And yeah, get me if anything goes wrong."

Ryn stuffs his hands into his pockets and brushes past Stel, his tail static behind him all the way back to his bunkroom, his bed, and his dreams.