“You’re angry.” Hatter concluded from the pilot seat of his Uriel fighter.
“Nope,” replied Hood shortly.
They were adrift in featureless, dead space, half way between the nebula and their destination. The rendezvous point with the Clever Dream “No, you’re pissed, I can tell.” Hatter sighed, tapping the power indicator on the instrument screen. It read seventy percent and crept up by fractions of a percentage.
“Don’t worry about it.”
Hatter looked to where Hood drifted in his own Uriel fighter only a hundred fifty-three meters away and zoomed in. He could see him rubbing his eyes with his palms. The silence didn’t last long.
“Okay, fine. You were supposed to be building a charge in your capacitors while we were in transit so you’d be ready to open a wormhole when we arrived here, in the middle of nowhere.” Hood said in a rush.
“I’m sorry, I was distracted. You could have reminded me.”
“That’s not the point, you should have a handle on the basics. I just don’t get it; you can calculate wormhole navigation in your head but setting your reactor to charge a capacitor bank slips your mind.”
“I just wasn’t thinking, I’m sorry!” Hatter replied, wishing he’d never prodded.
Silence hung heavily between the pair for several minutes before Hood finally said; “I miss her too, man.”
“She was the only one who took me seriously, you know? I mean, it didn’t look like it I guess, but when it came down to it, she knew I had the chops to be in a cockpit.”
“Buster was one of the best pilots I’ve ever seen, good leader too. Tell you what, when we get back to Triton, we’ll put her picture up in the Pilot’s Den and have a drink to her.”
“Or five.”
“Or five.”
“On you.”
“You’re pushing it.”
“Hey, what’s that?” Hatter said, bringing up new tactical information. Several ships were emerging from wormholes only a few thousand kilometres beneath them.
“That’s gotta be everything the Triton had in her hangars, with the Samson in the lead.”
“What? I didn’t think she was even space worthy,” Hatter said with heavy disbelief.
“You think I’m lying? Look.”
“I’ll be damned, three engines down and she’s still running. Uh-oh. Incoming transmission.”
“Hatter, I’ll do the-“
“Good to see you folks! For a minute I thought Regent Galactic sent an entire fleet after us.”
“This is Laura Everin, Acting Captain of the Samson. What the hell are you two doing out here? You should be just about to link up with the Clever Dream by now.”
“Uh, well, this is awkward… Hood, this one’s all yours.”
“Hood here, we had a bad power connection under one of our seats, got it fixed and we were almost at full charge, about to take the last jump. Mind if I ask what brings you and everyone else on the Triton out here, Captain?”
“Not right now. Fall into formation and prepare to take the last jump with us. We’ve got plenty Uriels with enough reserve power to take you along for the ride, that is all.”
“She sounds pissed,” Hatter commented over a private channel with Hood.
“From the looks of it, I’d say she has too much to deal with to worry about the slowest pilots in the fleet.”
“Oh, who are they?”
“Hatter…” Hood started with a chuckle. “Aw, you’ll figure it out on your own eventually.”
He didn’t bother thinking on it, concentrating on piloting his Uriel fighter into the position indicated on his navigational panel. Then it struck him. “Oh, right,” he chuckled sheepishly.