Deliverance; Teaser

Captain Alexei Hon was lying in his bunk aboard the transport ship Deliverance. He had tried to sleep but he was haunted by memories of the war. Beneath his closed eyelids the fires of Shadow raged, never to die. He opened his eyes and gazed over the small cabin. The place was fairly well furnished. He had his own desk, a comfy armchair where he had often leaned back and enjoyed a good cigar. One of the walls was adorned with several old medals, ID-tags and other war memorabilia but also several crucifixes and other Christian symbols.

Alexei got out of his bunk and started to dress. After strapping on his combat boots he started to walk down the short corridor that separated his private room from the cockpit. As he entered the cramped pilot area Farah Hsu spinned around the pilots chair and faced him.

”Morning ´Cap”

Alexei stared at the single most defining trait of her looks, a deep white scar running down her cheek, he had given her that scar the day he had saved her life.

Farah spinned around again and started to check the control panel.

“You had good sleep tonight ´Cap?”

Farah was wearing a worn out coat, which supposedly had once been brown but now was more of a grayish-tan color. She had served during the war for the Independents as a code breaker. Alexei suddenly realized that he had stood still for several minutes without uttering a single phrase.

”Not really Farah, anythin up on the cortex?”

”Pretty quiet, got some Alliance traffic in the system but otherwise we seem to be pretty alone out here” she responded.

Alexei nodded, and then leaned on one of the consoles.

“You should get some sleep, I ain´t likely to get any so I might as well pilot this thing instead”.

The two looked at each other for awhile before changing places. Alexei ran his hands down the console, he loved flying, and it took his mind of everything else and let him feel simple again. Farah turned around to walk away but paused for a while.

“The ghosts will let go sooner or later ´Cap, it wasn’t