' shouted Launch Control.
At that instant, a black Huey roared directly in front of our forward windows. It fired all its missiles at once.
But not at us.
'
,' radioed a familiar voice, '
'
'Corbin?' I managed to mutter as the cabin began to shake like a giant attempting to dislodge us.
'Blastoff,' a disembodied voice said, just as the giant started squeezing my chest.
'
,' echoed a voice a few million light-years away. '
'
The giant sat on my heart and lungs and other organs for daysmaybe years. I couldn't answer our rescuer. I couldn't hear another word. My senses collapsed into a red-black throbbing mass of dizzying discomfort. I could only think about an amusement park ride I'd been on years before that supposedly shoved riders forward at four times the acceleration of gravity. It lasted a few seconds and made me giddy. This was lasting forever. I was far beyond giddy.
A couple of millennia later, the pounding faded from my ears. A distant voice heralded my salvation.
'
'
A sudden feeling of unease washed over me. A feeling of being dropped from a great height. And falling, falling, falling.
Weightlessness.
They didn't call it
for nothing. My first instinct was to grip the chair arms and try to hang on. No good. Everything was fallingthat's what it meant to be in orbit. My stomach, though, refused to listen to reason.
Something buzzed on the pilot's side of the control panel. Canfield did nothing. He seemed to be taking it as badly as the rest of us, which didn't make sense.
'
, Starfinder?
'
The pilot still made no move. A small hand reached forward from behind us to punch a flashing button on the console. Explosive bolts sheared with a sound that vibrated through the shuttle's hull.
'
, Starfinder.'
The figure in the pilot's seat remained silent.
