Page 44 of Rogue Starfighter

Once we returned to base, I would convince her of my sincerity. Beg her forgiveness. I'd been an idiot, denying us both. Right now, I needed to focus on keeping us both alive.

The moon we'd come to inspect appeared as a black circle against the red planet. Our target position lay on the moon's far side, hidden from Xandrax and most of the orbital defense grid. Reaching it required crossing two sensor lanes and the outer edge of a patrol route without producing enough heat to distinguish the Wraith from drifting rock. Priya reduced power before I gave the order. The cockpit lights dimmed. Life support dropped to mission minimum. The engines went silent beneath our feet, and the temperature began to fall.

“Hold this vector,” I said. “The moon’s gravity will pull us across the first sensor lane. Do not correct unless I tell you.”

“We’re falling sideways.”

“Precisely.”

“I like it.”

“Of course you do.”

We drifted. A Xandraxian sensor sweep passed across the tactical display, a thin red line moving toward us.

“Sweep in twelve seconds,” I said.

“Heat profile?” she asked.

“Within limits.”

“Not ours. The rock off the port side.”

I checked. A fragment of the moon rotated three kilometers away, its sunward surface radiating more heat than the Wraith.

“What about it?”

“It’s going to shadow us too soon.”

“We will clear it by six hundred meters.”

“No, we won't. It's going to reflect heat off our hull and give away our position.” Her right hand moved toward the thruster control.

“Do not fire,” I warned. “Their sensor sweep will detect the ignition.”

“Then give me three percent from the attitude jets.”

“That will not alter our path enough.”

“It doesn’t have to. The moon will do the rest.”

"There is no room for the ship." I studied her projected line. The maneuver looked wrong. Then the rock completed another half rotation. Its irregular mass changed the local pull, and Priya’s line curved into the narrow space between it and the sensor drone doing the sweep. The opening for our ship appeared as if she had magically summoned it.

“Now,” she whispered and tapped the jet once. The Wraith slid behind the rock fragment as the sensor sweep passed. For five seconds, our entire ship disappeared inside the rock’s thermal signature. Then gravity drew us clear on the other side. No alarm. No weapons lock. Priya exhaled.

“You doubted me,” she said. "That drone almost caught us."

“My apologies. You were right.”

“You questioned me and put the mission, and our lives, at risk.”

“I will be sure to reprimand myself in the report.”

"You have no reason to be distracted. You made sure of that. So, don't do that again."

I looked at her hands on the controls. Perfectly steady. Her hurt hung in the air between us like a physical thing. Fuck. I'd made a bigger mistake than I'd thought. “I will not make the same mistake again.”

We crossed the second sensor lane without activating any of their killer drones and let the moon pull us into shadow. The planet vanished. Red light disappeared from the cockpit. Only the dim green of our instruments remained. Priya activated the Wraith’s passive recording array while I aligned the sensor vanes toward the shipyards.