Glimpse

“Hoban Washburn!”

“Present!”

The flight instructor walked along the line of students, his heavy boots clacking on the metal grating of the cargo bay.

Wash didn’t hear the other names, didn’t hear anything at all but the beating of his own heart. He was far too excited. Today it was happening, the first time he would go up and out. He would finally leave the atmosphere, leave the smog and the grit and the grime of his homeworld behind. Space was waiting for him. And Wash didn’t like making things wait. It was rude.

This was not a training run through the clouds, a test to see if you had the temperament and the reflexes required to fly a ship. There would be no clouds, Wash had been told, no sky. Just space and stars. He had seen the holo-vids, spent hours on the Cortex catching every glimpse he could. Everyone who had been up said the same thing. There was no comparison at all. Seeing space on the Cortex was like a memory of a shadow compared with the real thing. So they said.

The flight instructor waved his arm and his eager students followed him inside the cargo ship. With a hiss and a slam of metal the doors shut. If Wash had wanted to go back now he couldn’t have. But that thought wasn’t anywhere in his head. It was all about up and out. Into the black.

The engines began their spinning, Wash’s heartbeat rising in speed along with them. Following the flight instructor the students walked in a tight, excited bunch toward the port observation bay. Each alone in their own little worlds the students filed, one-by-one, onto the little cushioned bench’s that had been set up precisely for this purpose. They watched as the colors of the atmosphere sped by, the grey smog fading to the brown haze of the upper atmosphere. There was a second of pull as gravity fought to maintain its hold on the ship, like the fingertips of a man grasping at a moth, then they broke away, up and out.

There was a collective gasp from the students. Wash felt his heartbeat slow, as if reflecting the wonderment he felt. Here w