John Ringo - East of the Sun, West of the Moon

“Fine,” Herzer replied, putting a hand on her arm. “There’s a nice docking bay not far from here. We can sit in that while you do… whatever you’re doing.”

“Wait,” Megan said distantly. “Look.”

Herzer realized that the… shape of the fluorescence had changed. Where before it had been a cigar shape extending out from the ship about seventy meters, now, along the “bottom” and “top” it had flattened and extended out to either side. It now formed…

“Are those wings?” Herzer asked, blinking rapidly at the ghostly halo shapes.

“Yes,” Megan said, standing up carefully and holding out her hand. “I need the shield, anyway, to keep the ship from disintegrating. But with the wings I can reduce our speed by atmospheric skipping. At least, that’s what Mother says.”

“Maybe we should just let it disintegrate,” Herzer pointed out. “If it broke up in the upper atmosphere, it wouldn’t destroy the Earth.”

“I’d much prefer to live to see home again,” Megan pointed out. “I think I can get it, and us, to the ground intact. You didn’t know that?”

“No,” Herzer admitted.

“Then what in the hell are you doing here?” Megan asked, angrily.

“Whither thou goest,” Herzer repeated. “If you were going to commit suicide bringing this thing down, I was going to be right there by you. Besides, I figured you might have a survivable plan. I figured it was a low-order probability, though.”

“Well, Mother does,” Megan said, sighing. “I think. It’s going to take some work, though. We’re going to be orbiting for about ten hours.”

“Our suits won’t last that long,” Herzer pointed out.

“There are spare air bottles in Engineering,” Megan said. “When the ship’s not on a close fly-by I can drop some of my concentration. Then it’s just a matter of light steering and drive.”

Herzer settled her into the docking ring, which had a lip that made for a comfortable seat, and settled down beside her.

“Nice view,” he said as the Earth slid by.

“Looks like a hurricane in the Po’ele,” Megan said, pointing.

“They call them typhoons for some reason,” Herzer replied. “How you doing?”

“Fine,” Megan said. “We’re outbound, now. We’ll swing out, beyond geosynchronous orbit, then back down. We’re going to do that about a half a dozen times before we’re in a close orbit. When we get down there, I’m going to be busy.”

“And you really want to do it all from out here?” Herzer asked.

“Yes,” was all Megan said.

“So you’re telling me I’ve been a servant of the Dark for the last three years?” Sildoniel asked.

“Yeah,” Tur-uck replied.

“And we’re in a fueling shuttle, which is about to crash into the Earth?”

“Yeah,” Tur-uck said. He was holding a sword on the one-armed elf but the damned thing was recovering so fast he wasn’t sure it was worth it.

“And all the reentry shuttles are disabled,” the elf continued.

“That’s the case,” Tur-uck said. “The rest of those Durgar fisks were out on the hull when we went through the outer atmosphere. I think they all got fried.”

“Good,” Sildoniel said, stretching. “Is there any food in this thing?”

“Replicators,” Gomblick said. “The food’s bland but it’s hot.”

“And water, of course,” the elf said. “So, we can crash with the ship, or battle to the death, or we can take this ship, which is more than capable of interplanetary distances, and try to find a habitat that survives.”

“Yeah,” Tur-uck said.

“Find a reentry capable ship would be nice,” the kobold added.

“You are a Change,” Sildoniel said, cocking his head to the side. “You must obey the orders of your Masters.”

“I’ve been known to ignore them,” Tur-uck replied, tapping his head. “Celine, she’s the one that Changed you by the way, she said that I’m a bad product. I’ve got a plate in my head. It gives me a headache sometime but I don’t have the same binding as most orcs. Yours are, what, gone?”

“As is much else,” Sildoniel said with a sigh.

“Your arm was crisped,” Tur-uck said. “We had to take it off.”

“I was not speaking of my arm,” the elf replied, softly. “There is… brain damage. I presume it was from the… Change that Celine forced upon me. It would be very hard for me to even speak Elvish at the moment. Very well. A truce, servant of the Dark. We shall go in search of a reentry capable ship. And when we return to Earth, I shall permit you and these to go, unmolested.”

“Nice of you to say that,” Tur-uck said, dryly. “Seeing as I’m the one holding the sword.”

Sildoniel cocked his head to the side and his left hand blurred out, snatching the sword out of the orc’s hand and flipping it around to grasp it.

“And now I am,” Sildoniel said. “Goblin. Detach from the ship now that we are out of the atmospheric effects. Let us go try to find a habitat that survives.”

“I think I can control from in here,” Megan said. She was lying on the deck of the maintenance bay, her eyes closed. “But when we get in the atmosphere, we’re going to want to be on the outside.”

“Why?” Herzer asked. He’d figured out how to bring up the navigation plot and was watching the little ship figure move through the degrading orbit. It was hypnotic. And, okay, terrifying.

“I’m going to aim for a water landing,” Megan replied distantly. The ship was currently on its closest approach to the atmosphere and Herzer could feel a deep rumbling through the structure. Part of that was the fusion generators running at max, but the rest was a touch of the atmosphere hitting the shields. “We’re not going to want to be inside.”

“Gotcha,” Herzer said. “We going to be able to breathe? Out of the suits, that is, since we don’t want to hit the water in them. Armor and all that.”

“We’ll have to find out,” Megan replied. She paused and winced.

“You okay?”

“Gravitational loading,” Megan said and took a deep breath. “The ship’s not designed to handle gravities like this so I’m having to use some of the power for structural integrity fields. It just tried to break in half.”

“Nice image,” Herzer said. “And if it breaks in half?”

“We’ll try to ride the rear portion down,” Megan replied. “Give me a second here, honey.”

“You go, girl,” Herzer said, softly, so as not to disturb her. He clicked his prosthetic slowly in thought, watching the blinking cursor.

“Herzer,” Megan said, after a moment, “could you please quit that?”

They’d taken the time to get a bite of ship’s replicator food, which was awful, recharged their air bottles, emptied their catheter gaskets and filled their water bottles. Megan from time to time would have to stop and concentrate as the ship made close approach. But as the last orbit began, they exited the airlock for, hopefully, the last time, and made their way to the docking bay.

The Earth was noticeably closer as they approached. Herzer clamped his prosthetic on a projection and wrapped his arm around Megan’s waist as he watched the rapidly approaching ball of blue and white. He could see that Ropasa was coming over the horizon. They’d pass over it, and Hind and all the rest, finally crossing the Po’ele and then, hopefully, Norau for a landing somewhere near Bimi Island.

If the ship held together.

“You comfortable?” Herzer asked as the void around them began to burn.

“I’m in your lap, aren’t I?” Megan asked coyly.

“So you are,” Herzer replied. The previous touches with the atmosphere had been light, but this one was much brighter and hotter. The atmosphere was actually being blown into plasma along the leading edge of the field-wings, flaring like a pale sun.