He sat in front of the computer screen on the bridge, calculating costs on a spreadsheet.He sat in front of the computer screen on the bridge, calculating costs on a spreadsheet. Tasha had long ago finished any navigation checks, and David preferred using the lag time between jumps to do his accounting work. Bored and tired, he hit the SAVE button and said, "Tasha, I'm going down to the galley for some coffee. Want some?" Tasha had never been much for words or for coffee; she just waved over her shoulder. Smiling, David rose and walked the tight catwalk to the door when an explosion rocked his ship and threw him to the floor. "What the hell?" he said quietly. "Pirates!" Tasha shouted, pulling hard on the manual controls. David swore that when she maneuvered like this he could feel the gravity compensators making their millions of tiny changes per second. His fur crawled with the images of hardware failure- puree of Rat as his body was forced through the grating of the catwalk. "We lost a fusion line," Denni's voice came over the intercom. "Tasha, tell Chico I want him on gun two, now!" David shouted. "He's already there," she shouted back. David picked himself up off the floor and leapt back into his chair, demanding access to gun one and launching four racks of missiles from his console. |