The ships pilot never leaves her interface tank. She doesn't want to. Her body is soft, fragile. When she has to resurface, she can see all the flaws, all the things she's missing. How utterly weak she actually is.
When she floats in her tank, taking deep breaths till her lungs are full of the oxygenated liquid, she feels at peace. When she reaches out to her ships systems, connecting and spreading her awareness to every inch of the ship, she feels as though she's woken up from a bad dream.As she gazes out at the field of stars and planets before her. She sees colors beyond the scope of her eyes. She feels the electromagnetic pulse of stars and planets press against the hull like it was her own body. A lovers embrace in the colorful warmth of space.
And then She sees. She sees the enemy before the crew, feeling them approach out of the black. Feels her body's weapons spin up, too slow. The other ship is already upon them, weapons engaged and firing. Her tank bubbles as she screams, as she feels her engines break and burst in the explosion. Comm's spring to life, a warning broadcast to the crew. To escape with their lives intact. To give up their prize.
Pirates, looking to add another ship to their fleet.
The crew scrambles to make their escape. Pods busting from her hull as she curls up in the tank, whimpering. The captain, the coward of a man not even sparing her a glance as he fled. She would not leave her ship, her body. She couldn't. She was trapped. She couldn't leave her tank, to leave her tank was to leave her body behind. But to stay, certainly that meant death.
So she waits. Waited as the ship approached, as the boarding tube latched to her hull. As she felt the enemy's code pour into her interface. She couldn't stop them from opening the doors. She couldn't stop them as they tramped their way to the bridge. Nor stop them from staring into the tank, a pirates eyes wide as they called to the other ship.
This was it. It would be the end. She almost felt calm as she stared down the pirate, willing them to do the inevitable.
But as she float there, the inevitable never came. Minutes passed by like hours. The pirates stood at attention, waiting.
Then She entered. She exuded power, importance. The pirates turned heel and left at a gesture. The newcomer just stood before her, fingers gliding over consoles, inspecting.
"Its a shame what we had to do to your engines." She said to the console. "We needed to disable you to capture you."She turned to the tank, stepping up to it slowly, staring into the pilots eyes.
"I know how it feels to lose a limb." she placed her hand against the tank, the soft clack of a cyberlimb reverberating through the interface liquid. A shiver crawled up her spine. She wasn't talking to the body. She had been talking to the mind of it.
"You are a beautiful ship. You deserve so much more than they could give you. Give yourself to me, and we can show them what you really are." She reached out, hand against the glass of the tank, pressed against the pirates. No, her Captain's, hand. A smile perched on her lips, the first in so many years. Her power plants spun up with a well of pride and excitement, drives ringing out into the vacuum around them.
She would be seen, and everyone would see Her at the helm.