Cavalier

Liez’s Bubble was waiting in the spaceport of an adjacent settlement-hub, only a few minutes walk along the network of roads that interconnected the various scratchy hamlets.

It was nearing the time when most shift changes between the day-cycle and night-cycle happened, soon the worn roads would bear the usual repetitive load of sleep-deprived laborers and begrudged early-starters.

He would recognize many of them, not individually of course, but as the kind of personal category they fell into. The bleary-eyed Hekshanian in overalls would be diligent, quiet and reserved until among friends…

The grey-skinned Andonian would indifferently drudge through the day and look forward to collecting the pay after each month.

It took all kinds, basically. Auger took a voyeuristic interest on seeing a person’s character played across their face, in their body language… It was better then counting heads to pass the time, which usually owing to the special cigarettes became an all-consuming recreational activity.

Auger looked over to his now partner-in-crime, It was strange. He thought, allowing himself to stride ahead of his companion’s gait. He hadn’t seen Liez in 12 months and yet the cream-furred Chuian seemed to have changed… A gesture, a glance, even his build seemed to be skewed from the skittish and scatterbrained person he’d known.

Then again, it was a Spy’s prerogative, to change their mannerisms and personality to suit the job at hand…

“Quit walkin’ so fast, we got lots of time.” Liez called foreword, dropping onto all-fours for a few moments to catch up.

“Yeah, sorry, ‘m Kinda pre-occupied.” The human replied, it was a dangerous line of thinking… Not knowing what was real or fake, it was probably best to take everything with a pinch of salt and hope for the best.

Before long the seemingly random smattering of rented housing and low-profile storehouses marked out one of the better-equipped plane terminals. Liez took the lead this time, following some previously memorized route through the concrete jungle of buildings, eventually reaching an open space with hangars surrounding it that must have been the taxiing area.

“The bubble’s over here.” Liez said, pointing over to one of the hangars.

The outside of the hangar looked like it was from the original settlement on the IM, all corrugated sheet metals and concrete. It didn’t look like it had weathered that time particularly well either, Auger struggled to slide back the seized doors.

Inside the hangar was the Bubble Liez had talked about, it didn’t look like a normal Bubble…or anything meant to haul cargo. It was chrome red, clearly modified from the everyday “Butt-ugly Bubble”, it looked sporty.

“I don’t believe it; you stole some guy’s pride and joy!” Auger said, his laughter echoing in the old hangar.

“Well, if ya gonna quit your job and jump system…Ya might as well do it in style!” The Chuian chuckled, walking up a rickety stepladder to open the hatch on the masterpiece of astronomical engineering.

“Can’t say the hangar does it much justice…You cheaped out.” Auger said, taking care to dodge some falling roof insulation.

The Bubble’s hatch popped open with a tiny hiss of equalizing air pressure, Liez motioning Auger to follow him shortly before disappearing inside.

Taking one last look at the dilapidated hangar interior, he slid through the hatch feet-first to find the small cabin, instinctively closing the entryway and taking up the passenger seat. Liez was already fiddling with several dials and switches on an overhead cockpit console whose meaning was lost on Auger.

From the inside, it didn’t look all too different from the norm. Though it certainly showed that Liez had been forced to live in the confined space during his journey from the Thresh captain’s Plane.

“We won’t be leavin’ yet, gotta make sure everything is just right. Then I’ll explain what we’ll be doing that’s gonna keep us from being mine-dust.” Liez said, looking over a small task checklist.

Auger simply made an agreeing sound, taking in the details. It had been a long time since he’d thought of what to do next, living in the present helped make problems seem less overbearing.

He hoped it would still turn out to be a dream, to wake up and go to work without having to care about any of the problems of tomorrow.

Liez, seemingly content with his checklist, moved to the back of the cabin and pulled a parachute & harness from one of the small and cluttered cargo nets.

“Do you remember how to put these on?” The Chuian said, in an unusually serious tone as he threw the larger harness to Auger.

“Sure, that good old basic training never leaves you. I remember when they gave us a lecture from a borderline-suicidal pilot on how to survive intra-atmosphere collisions. Yeah, we had a lot of fun that day…” Auger said, being as flippant as possible.

“Do ya or don’t ya?” Liez said, getting impatient.

“Yeah, no problem.” He said. As they donned their parachutes, Auger swore Liez was following his lead and copying him.

“Okay, we’re scheduled with the traffic controllers to leave a few hours from now… So it’d be a good idea to seem desperate and request to go now. That way when the Old Man checks up on things here it’ll support the idea that we panicked and made a mistake on approach, right?” Liez said, running the idea past Auger.

“Sure, there’s no reason to stay here now anyway…” Auger said sadly.

With few words, both fugitives strapped themselves into their seats, trying to ignore the bulk of the parachute harnesses strapped to their back.

“Right, we gotta pick a place to bail out at. I told the controllers we’ll be headed to North Tek, but we can bail out anywhere on the continent while on approach.” Liez said, pulling a map from under his seat.

“Well, the mine-racers like to practice around the Red Mountains...It’s to the east of North Tek, There’s a few racer-deaths there each year…though I doubt we’d want to spent too much time there or we’d freeze.

Oh, there’s Arekesk. That’s to the East of the Red Mountains on the coast…Apparently it’s nice and warm, if a little deserted.” Auger said, rattling off as many places as he could remember from radio broadcasts.

Eventually they decided on Yeka, at the western foot of the Red Mountains. It gave them a comfortable margin of error for the parachute drop-zone and was inconspicuous enough to not attract attention.

The Bubble would enter the atmosphere from the Northeast, flying over Murans and the Red mountains. Then Auger & Liez would bail out, allowing the mines to destroy the Bubble. If all went well they would meet outside of Yeka before attempting to find a safe place to hide.

“You okay ta’ do this? It’s not too late.” Liez enquired, rummaging around in the crammed space below his seat.

“Yeah, let’s just try not to get blown up please…” the Human said, idly checking his safety restraints.

Liez responded by pulling on a headset and starting up the Bubble’s engine, beginning to taxi out into the open air towards the stubby runway.

“This is Ship 42 requesting permission for early departure.” He said, changing the way he spoke perceivably.

There were sounds of muffled protest from the headset, eventually giving in and allowing them to leave.

“We’re all set, lets get outta here!” The Chuian said, sounding chipper and grinning malevolently as he threw the Bubble into full-speed, pushing them both back into their seats as it left the ground with a dull roar from the engine.