Mech Pilot who always falls asleep pulling and adjusting the oxygen mask that isn't there.
You have a distressing experience during your early years, and it marks you for the rest of your life. Sometimes in interesting ways, but usually in less than great ones. Still, you survived it. You have a life left to live. Some people aren't so lucky.
At least she'd gotten rescued after those horrific nine days in her disabled escape pod. The one she wasn't supposed to be in. Had been holding a tea party in anyway when it happened, because the ship's stewards weren't her parents, and couldn't tell her what to do.
The hatch'd shut with a sudden finality, and before she'd processed what was happening, she'd been spinning out into space. Banging her little fists against the viewport. Screaming. Flying away from the catastrophic, explosive death throes of the starliner Olympic, and her viciously sharp shrapnel that pinged off the small lifeboat. Mostly.
Nobody else aboard had made it to the pods in time.
Nine days of drifting out of control.
Way outside the shipping lane.
All alone, out in the Black.
No way to call for help.
Nothing to hold on to.
To comfort her, except Miss Kitty, her best friend.
To fix the damaged air purifiers, and the acrid air.
To do for 211 hours, 37 minutes and 43 seconds but try to sleep and pray.
Pray that the emergency air tank would stretch enough for one tiny, terrified child.
Pray that her parents had made it to an escape pod on the other side of the ship.
Pray that someone would find her.
Anyone at all.
The radio hissed and crackled, shaking Nessa out of her memories. "Starchild, come back. We're not going to find anyone. It's been a week. They're gone. Captain's calling it. It's over."
She was already way out on the edge of her sanctioned search grid. Past it, if she was honest. She took a deep breath. Looked at a much older, more ragged Miss Kitty, lovingly repaired, sitting in her pride of place on top of her console. Nodded in agreement. "Negative, control. One more sweep. I know I can find them."
A deep sigh, or was that just static on the line. "Starchild. Ness. You're almost out of power. You'll be dead in the water. Come back to the ship." A pregnant pause. "Don't make me order you."
Quick mental calculations told Nessa she had enough for one last sweep before she had to turn back. Especially the way she flew her search and rescue rig. She looked deep into Miss Kitty's single remaining original glass eye. Saw herself reflected there. Made a decision. "Almost isn't totally." she shot back, boosting towards a new grid center. Away from the ship, deft fingers already turning off systems she wouldn't be needing. "You'll just have to come pick me up if I don't make it back. Starchild out." The radio lost power, cutting off an angry squawk from home base. She'd probably have to pay for that later.
Click click click
There went the life support. Nessa pulled on and secured her mask as the hum of various other vital systems changed pitch, slowed, then stopped completely. Patted the emergency air tank she kept next to her chair. Changed her breathing pattern, the way she'd learned long ago. Paused. Cocked her head, as she listened. "You're right. Looks like it's just you and me again, old girl. Like old times." Winked at the stuffie.
Drifting in the Black didn't scare her. Not these days. What scared her was leaving someone else out here. She had to do everything in her power to try and find the people that'd sent out that SOS. That's what the woman who'd rescued her, who'd raised her, had taught her, so many years ago. You never give up, unless you're putting yourself in mortal danger.
If she didn't, she wouldn't be able to sleep tonight.
