16:00 January 8th, 1648 AC Batavian Standard Meridian Date TimeHMCS Bonaventure (DSC 013), Docked with Crestfall Asteroid Fortress “Wijtschate”
Cassandra van Ness felt as if her throat had been scraped by sandpaper as she coughed, trying to catch her breath after the food in her stomach refused to comply. Modern advances in implant technology, like the Pulse system, meant her body quickly recovered, but the initial burn in the back of the throat would always appear. She felt her body shake slightly, her heart pounding loud enough for her to hear. The feeling of losing control over her own body despite all of the control the extensive Halo implant suite provided was always awful, and even being in the small bathroom besides her stateroom didn’t help her get a grip on her rolling emotions.
She eagerly gulped down a bit of water from the sink to clear her mouth and she let out a sigh of relief. She looked at her hands: small droplets of water glittered on the hexagonal pattern on the palms of the skin-tight material of her flight suit which she wore under her uniform. She shook her head. Once, she had been a pilot, proudly serving the Republic.
Now, she is a pilot once more. The truth struck her as she slowly raised her eyes to the mirror and saw her own reflection gazing back at her.
Soft chestnut brown hair fell down to her shoulders, slightly messy from the lack of brushing and proper care in the last few stressful days. Her skin was pale, and there were bags under her dark brown eyes—they were seemingly almost black due to the blue, glowing circles of her Shine eye implants. A few streams of water dripped down from the corner of her mouth. When she splashed her face again with some more water, a few strands of her hair became loose, and she raised her hand and brushed them out of the way.
The Shine system immediately projected information her Ghost gathered, informing her about the elevated heart rate and the changes within her body, but she ignored them, brushing the alerts away with a blink and a thought. But her anger was a different beast: it rolled underneath her skin, fast and unyielding, and she was tired of it, too. The damn nightmares. Sure, the ability to recall memories in detail was a helpful part of Ghost, but the human mind still stubbornly clung to its subconscious tendencies of making things worse than they were. She felt so weak, quivering slightly. She couldn’t allow herself to be like this, she thought, gritting her teeth. She swung her hand and hit the edge of the metal sink with her fist. There was barely any sound besides a dull thud, but the pain was a different story.
It lanced up her arm, but it helped her regain her footing, and she looked upward, the sound of the air conditioning filling her ears as she organized her thoughts.
She turned off the flow of water into the sink, watching the remaining droplets disappear into the drain and then glanced at herself again, the blue circles in her eyes darting from left to right as she looked around the interior of the bathroom. It was simple, utilitarian, and functional—it didn’t need to be more. In a way it was calming to be in the familiar interior of a starship again instead of what she experienced dirtside. Most would probably prefer porcelain sinks in restaurants and their cozy households, but not her. Even though being on a starship this time also carried a more grim connotation.
There was a shadow looming over everyone with no denying it, no way to ignore it: Corlain, the beautiful globe of autumn hues and ocean blues, her home, the star and the planets around it, all of them were in danger. She read the news, and even a reservist could tell those weren’t normal pirate attacks: it was an attempt to isolate and destroy the will of her homeland. Her palm moved over her face again and the expression on her face changed.
It was a feeling she knew well.
Anxiety. She knew she was worried whether she could do this, but more importantly, she was wondering if the Battle of Cadair Idris was related to it. But it simply couldn’t be…
Her hand trembled as she slowly touched her face. She saw the contrast of her navy blue uniform and the grey and black ship-suit glove and her too-pale skin. A part of her realized that it probably wasn’t quite as terrible in reality, but to her mind she looked like a human wreck.
Cassandra hated this, she hated all of it. This was absolute madness. She was disgusted with herself for looking so weak. She had to take reservists like herself into a fight against a—most likely—superior enemy, but her own choices have never been a factor. She would have to get the best out of them, the same way she would have to get the best out of herself. She just had to do it, it simply had to work because that is what was required of her. When it was defending her home, the homes of everyone in the Commonwealth, failure simply isn’t an option.
The brown-haired woman exhaled again, feeling her lungs constrict with anxiety. Then she took a deep, long breath to steady herself and finally, for the first time in a long while, her mind felt a little bit more clear.
She was a pilot, and she wouldn't allow herself to break that easily.
16:42 January 8th, 1648 AC Batavian Standard Meridian Date TimeHMCS Bonaventure (DSC 013), Docked with Crestfall Asteroid Fortress “Wijtschate”
A frustrated sigh slipped out of Cassie’s lips as she stepped into the corridor in front of her state room, her private room aboard Bonaventure. The corridors aboard the fleet carrier looked quite different from Starlight. The corridors were brightly lit, wide enough for two people to comfortably move around without bumping into one another.
Portions of the wall were lined with filing cabinets, screens linked to the shipwide net, and the occasional maintenance panel. Most of the navy personnel didn’t need it thanks to the fleet-wide adopted OASIS implant suite, but doctrine required analog backups all over the ship. It looked the same even in the flight country, the domain of the Bonaventure’s air wing.
Clean lines on the floor indicating the way to the most important parts of the ship. Flight country itself was a bunch of passageways linking the ready room, admin office, state rooms, and berthing where pilots racked out, right alongside the rooms for their commanders, officers and berthing for other personnel of the air wing. The lines were a bit redundant to Cassandra, and most pilots and military spacers for that matter, as she didn’t need the physical indicators anymore thanks to adoption of the Halo suite. With her Ghost, she instinctively knew the way to the Green Squadron ready room, the lines on the flooring neatly overlaid by Shine information; they were an analog backup in case the ship’s network went down.
The Orion class carriers were an odd bunch. It wasn’t obvious at first, not even to Cassandra, but the ships were based on the frames of older battlecruisers. Those were decommissioned, scrapped for their frames and the Alcubierre drives which form the most expensive part of a starship. The Orions represented the largest ship her home system could build.
Despite its industrial power and prosperity, the Commonwealth of Corlain simply lacked the drydock capacity and ability to build FTL drives this large, and that situation didn’t look like it would change any time soon. Though this meant that the corridors looked much more modern than the ship she flew from before, they were still smaller than the newer Empyrean class carriers built in the more developed systems of the San Batavia Republic, being limited by the size of the drive bubble of their FTL systems.
She thought about it as she walked along, guided by the information which her Ghost gave her. It was strange: why wouldn’t they just purchase hulls from the core systems of the Republic? She knew the pirate problem had gotten worse in recent years, but surely the Navy could get a hull through to be fitted out in Corlain.
She felt another brief rush of anxiety in her core, making her lungs contract. She wondered what could have changed the local government’s opinion on this type of project. After all, what usually happened was that the drives of those old battlecruisers would be scrapped and turned into newer, more efficient drives for a variety of purposes. The bureaucrats and politicians in the Commonwealth were much like any other in the wider San Batavia Republic, pinching pennies by the dozen to focus on things which will get them a better run in the next election. Why would they prefer reusing those heavier drives for military construction?
She knew that the Commonwealth had several slips that could build a variety of cruisers, destroyers, lighter carriers, escort ships—and of course, civilian merchant ships. Capital ships like the Orions were expensive endeavours and it would be much more efficient to just build one in the core systems and then bring the unfinished hull to the Commonwealth yards for fitting out.
Cassandra turned into a stairway upwards, passing the occasional markings—hatch numbers and panels— with the air bearing the faint but familiar tang of ozone and recent use of cleaning liquid. The metal steps rose at a relatively steep incline, and were framed by reinforced metal railings. It was the same treated ferric alloy used in the interior of so many starships, minimizing the amount of maintenance needed within the many corridors of the ship.
What greeted her afterwards was another corridor lined with recessed panels that were illuminated by dim, utilitarian lighting. The bulkheads around here curved towards the ceiling, the surface broken only by several status screens flickering with diagnostics and schematics. While most navy personnel used their Halo to interact with the ship, the navy still insisted on having backups for backups, ensuring that even in catastrophic events the crew could still bring the ship home.
She passed several off duty aviators from other squadrons as they walked through the corridor. Some saluted when they noticed the rank insignia on her uniform, prompting Cassandra to salute back—just to notice the occasional strange looks when they processed who she actually was.
She felt her chest tighten again. It felt as if the ghosts from Cadair Idris were intent on pursuing her wherever she walked, be it military or civilian life.
So this is my life now, she thought.
She knew that commanding a reservist squadron aboard a carrier full of active service aviators would be a hassle… but seeing it with her own eyes and Shine was a bit of a strange feeling. She felt at home aboard a ship. By the stars and tide, she missed it more than she cared to admit, but on the other hand those stares and looks from the active servicemen of the air wing told her the unspoken thought they had. You don’t belong here.
Another part of the job, Cass. You’ll have to solve this, she thought to herself as she continued walking through the corridor, following the jade green line towards the pilot ready room positioned closest to the Green Squadron flight country.
Those active duty aviators? In the end they weren’t her problem to deal with. That was for the active duty officers to handle. The Green Squadron on the other hand was her responsibility. And to add to it, they were reservists like her that were ripped out of their normal lives to bravely ride antimatter fire through the black skies. Or well, as normal as they can be in those tense times. It felt like the galaxy went crazy within the last three years.
She heard a scoff behind her. “Seraph… So they really assigned you to Bonaventure…”
A cold,emotionless, low voice spoke to her in a commanding tone. For a second Cassandra’s blood ran cold. She didn’t even need her Ghost to recognize this voice. She forced her face to turn into an emotionless mask as she turned around to face Radish, the CAG, Commander of the Airgroup aboard the Bonaventure. Of course she knew he would be there from the personnel list of the carrier, but seeing it with her own eyes was still a shock. Another old memory that is pursuing me. She thought as she saw the angry look the black haired officer had on his face as he towered over her.
“Captain Martens... I wasn’t allowed to choose my posting,” she retorted to the black haired man in a calm tone. “... Nor did I ask for squadron command,” she added, looking straight into his black eyes illuminated with the same type of Shine she had.
The man grit his teeth, his face contorting, not even trying to hide his hate or disgust. “You and your… benchwarmers better not get in the way, Commander van Ness. It would be better if your Greens didn’t follow in your own footsteps, right, Seraph?” he sneered, spitting the words out as if he bit into something particularly bitter. The anxiety stung again, deep inside of her. Did he have to mention Cadair Idris as well?
“Give her the papers, Kato. I have better things to handle than to talk to a bunch of snowbirds,” he finally said as he turned away from Cassandra.
For a second she thought that his shadow split off from his body, as a smaller, brown eyed man that was roughly own height stepped towards her. Much like Reese, he had black hair, which he had short cropped and slicked backwards, revealing a forehead big enough to land a dropship on it. She didn’t seem to notice a Shine in his eyes… It could mean that he decided to purchase a more expensive type of OAS, she mused.
“Commander van Ness, here are the lists of aviators and air wing personnel assigned to Green Squadron. Since you are the most senior reservist officer aboard Bonaventure, you will also need to talk about other reservist forces on the ship with the Captain,” he said with a slight smirk while handing her a physical list of names and ranks, with one of the corners of his eyes turning up in amusement.
So Radish pulled strings to dump all of the reservists on me, huh? That is… quite typical for him… Cassandra thought as she rolled her eyes and glanced over the list.
She wasn’t too surprised about any of this, but it would be one hell of a mess anyways.
“Well then, Lieutenant Commander…” Cassandra said with the same tone which Kato used when addressing her. “... I’ll be taking my leave.” She said casually, giving him a salute and then just turning around, not even checking if the man who was technically a rank below her saluted back.
Much to her amusement, the shadow Radish sent at her seemed highly annoyed with her behavior.