The Defenders’ staff recommended a route for our approach that avoided air traffic from both O’Hare and Midway. Following their advice, I brought the jet in. Hal, an AI that specialized in predicting how best to win battles between fleets of starships, probably could have worked out a more direct route through Chicago’s many flight paths, but we weren’t in that much of a hurry.
Besides, it was best not to annoy people unless you needed to. Continue reading From Far Away: Part 4
In that moment, I realized that Kals wasn’t speaking whatever they spoke in the Human Ascendancy. She spoke English and her accent sounded like the one out of old movies—somewhere between the US and British. I could only guess that wherever her implant downloaded it from had updated its language files in the 1950s.
I hoped that it automatically adjusted with exposure to new variants in the language. If not, she might be able to pass for someone from India who’d studied in the US and the UK. Hopefully, it wouldn’t come to that.
Katuk wouldn’t be able to pass for a human at all. Continue reading From Far Away: Part 3
Haley nodded, “Will it be a problem if I keep the weapons console active? Someone might be out here.”
She wasn’t wrong. The first time we’d flown out to the gate it had been partly to take the jet into space and partly because we could make out without worrying about being interrupted. That did not work out as planned. We’d been interrupted by an alien AI that wanted to piggyback on our ship to get out of the system, supers monitoring the area, and a small but multiple ship battle near the gate.
“It’s probably a good idea. It’s not weird at all to find local ships with their weapons active near a gate. You never know who’s going to come through.” Continue reading From Far Away: Part 2
It wasn’t much different from picking someone up from the airport, provided the airport orbited at Lagrange point 4 and you had to pick them up in the Heroes’ League’s “jet”—which only resembled a jet in its shape.
You might see stars in the sky while you pick someone up from the airport, but you don’t see them in all directions including below you.
Also, when you go to the airport, you’re usually going to pick up family or friends. You’re not generally going with your girlfriend to pick up someone who once told you that you were “the one who got away.” Continue reading From Far Away: Part 1