There are special men who come along once a generation to make their mark on an uncaring universe.

This man, though, left more than his mark. He became a legend in his own lifetime.

And after his lifetime?

Well, this is that story.

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"Is that an asteroid field?" the captain yelled.

"Sure looks like one!" the pilot called back without taking his eyes off the forward viewscreen."There's no rocks on the charts and.....NONE on the scope. So, it ain't there!"

"What? A hologram? A big gorram hologram made to look like asteroids?"

"That'd be my first guess!" the pilot shouted, still committed to a straight line that would either plow through a hologram or get cataclysmically dinged by the curious mass of floating, spinning rocks.

"Can't you slow 'er down?" asked the captain."Just to take a look?"

"We get caught with what we're hauling, asteroid crash'd be a mercy by comparison," the pilot mumbled. "Besides, this AIN'T real!"

BUMP!

"Okay. That one was real," the pilot said as he banked away from the noisy rock that had just substantiated the idea of floating, spinning rocks of death blocking his escape from a motivated pursuer.

Then, the pilot did something strange. He flew in close to one of the larger rocks. Close enough to reach out and touch it if not for the need to keep the windows closed in outer space. Without slowing very much, he ran the ship over the leading edge of the space mountain and.....

Nothing.

"That's what I thought!" he shouted and looked back at the captain. Looking forward again, he increased the ship's speed and ran her directly into the center of the swarm of giant space gravel without regard for mass or volume.

There were hull impacts, to be sure. Small ones. Little holo-projectors that the Alliance had set up as a sort of electronic fence to slow down ships who were doing what