Lieutenant Lucy Ivers woke up groggily. At first she didn’t know where she was and had a flashback of being back at the base. She soon realized she was on the cot in the Talon. Lucy didn’t remember getting into bed herself. The other possibility made her cheeks blush. She still wasn’t used to having Gavin around and he made her nervous for some reason.

She didn’t know why she hadn’t told him her first name yet. Maybe it was just stubbornness. Lucy also blamed herself for the death of her copilot and for getting Gavin stuck in this world. It was just in her head however, as there was little she could have done. She had only known her copilot, Major Andrews, for a few weeks before the incident and he was the one controlling the descent when the accident occurred. Her copilot before that had been killed in the incident that had left her scarred and that cost her an arm and a leg. The replacement limbs worked well enough.

Gavin was probably still hopeful that she could fix the jump drive and get them home but it was impossible. With time and the parts on hand she could probably get the jump drive working but the navigational computer was destroyed. Without it and the stored coordinates, there was no way to get home. If they jumped, it would just be to a random world. It was lucky that Gavin’s world was sufficiently technological for him to be able to pilot the Talon without too much difficulty. He had mentioned it reminded him of video games but she wasn’t sure what that meant.

From what she understood it was some form of entertainment. There wasn’t much of that in her world. Her world had been dying and resources were limited. The Talon project was tasked with finding new resources or even a new world to escape to. Gavin’s world had been the first she had seen that was actually hospitable. She could only hope the other Talons had better luck. It was out of her hands now. She had no friends or family left that would miss her so there were no attachments to her desolate world.

This story has been taken without authorization. Report any sightings.

Lucy rubbed her eyes and got up. She had slept longer than she intended but was feeling a little better. While returning to her seat, she noticed that Gavin was still awake and staring out the cockpit. “Oh, you’re awake. Good morning or maybe it’s still evening. I’m not really sure.” Gavin said, smiling at her tiredly. “Why are you still awake?” She asked, confused. “I figured it was my shift so I wanted to wait until you woke up.”

She looked at him in surprise. “Thanks. You can use the cot if you want.” Lucy said softly. “Really? I appreciate it.” Gavin said, grinning happily. He did look exhausted. She had to remind herself that he was just a civilian after all, even though he looked to be a couple years older than her. He headed to the bunk room but she called out to him before he went in. “My first name is Lucy by the way but you can still call me Ivy if you want.”

Gavin paused and turned around with a stunned look on his face. “Oh, er thanks for telling me Lucy.” He said, scratching the back of his head before going to lay down. She felt better after finally telling him and sat down in her seat. The repairs were continuing, though they slowed at night. There was no way to replenish the smoke canisters but they had a few rounds of regular grenades left. With the laser working, they should be able to defend themselves fairly well. She settled down for her watch as Gavin slept soundly.