Trillion Dollar Sky by David Colello

Author:David Colello [Colello, David]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2019-05-16T16:00:00+00:00

Chapter 3

The launch went smoothly, with the corporate rocket lifting them quickly out of Earth's grip, turning early morning back into blackness. If all went to plan, that would be the last time Pia saw blue sky for quite some time, and she missed it already. As the Earth receded behind them, the electric web in her mind fell away as well, leaving only the ship’s computer filling the void.

Pia had been in orbit a handful of times before on consultation cases. Bumpy ride up, few days to tweak a malfunctioning life support system, then back down to the dirt. She hadn't been up in nearly four years, and this was no ordinary orbit jumper. Natocorps was a superpower, and its fleet of launch vehicles performed accordingly. Max G nets, aerogel padding, full nanocarbon skin, the ship was downright sexy.

Enormous two stage rockets lifted their small crew vehicle easily into orbit in a massive display of wasteful luxury, first class tickets to space if there ever was such a thing. Pia wasn't sure what she expected to see in orbit, but what lay in front of the viewport most certainly was not it.

They appeared to be approaching an old station from the early days of spaceflight, a clunky monstrosity nearly two hundred meters long and fifty meters wide with simple solar arrays stretching out like branches from both sides.

“Are we refueling here?” asked Pia.

Miller smiled and began maneuvering to dock with the clunky station while Zee talked with its computer through his pendant holo.

Then she felt a pulse of electricity buzz at her senses and realized what was happening. Multispectrum and intense, the information that flooded her mind was not a product of the rudimentary station, but rather that of what was hiding inside.

Their transport locked onto the station and Miller led the three of them in unharnessing from their G-nets. Pia may not have spent a great deal of time in space, but moved like she was born there. As Miller and Zee grasped around for handholds, she pushed off her netting and performed what looked like a pike dive as she flipped in one smooth motion and landed lightly against the airlock door.

“Well aren't we the little acrobat,” Miller quipped as he and Zee joined her, “out of the way now, Pia.” He typed in a secure code and the airlocks hissed in compliance.

Once the room pressurized, they could hear periodic clanking from the far hatch. Voices on the other side got louder for a moment, then ceased as the hatch swung open wide. A giant young man with dark hair and kind blue eyes held the hatch with one arm while his partner jumped through the door. A stocky little man in glasses and a black Cerex jumpsuit, he was sweating slightly after rushing to greet them and then struggling with the ancient outer hull airlock doors.

“Adam!” Pia gasped, and in her excitement forgot about the low gravity. She meant to rush forward, but ended up jumping towards him him instead.

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