"Come to the "Black Sun" for coffee if you get this," the message read.
Alan had just stepped out of the shower and was about to head for bed when the slate chimed. He frowned, knowing Emma's plans for the night, and pulled on jeans instead of pajamas.
It was nearly midnight when he entered the cafeteria. The room was deserted and the lights dimmed. A counter held a coffee pot and mugs as well as a few snacks for those wanting late night food. He poured a cup of coffee and looked across the room at Emma who hadn't stirred when he walked in.
She looked completely different from her normal workday appearance. Usually she kept her hair severely pulled away from her face in a bun or french braid and wore baggy flight suits. This evening she wore her hair pulled away from her face by a head band, the curls tumbling down her back. Her dress was short, fastening at the back of her neck leaving shoulders and back bare. Her long legs were stretched out in front of her as she sat facing the window looking out at the stars. She looked a good deal more than her sixteen and a half years.
Alan pulled a chair from the next table and sat beside her. The view was as constantly beautiful as always. "I thought you had a date."
"I ditched him." She said shortly without looking away from the window. She took a slow sip of coffee before saying, "We'll have to ground Ed won't we."
He thought that was the problem. "It won't be your decision, or mine. There'll be a board of inquiry. It's standard procedure."
She didn't acknowledge that. It had been part of her training. She knew the procedure as well as he did. "Have you talked to Mama?"
"Yeah. He had a physical two months ago and the symptoms didn't show up then. She's afraid they might not have been looking for the right things. We haven't had a case of Alzheimer's before."
"Flying is his life. It'll kill him."
Alan's stomach twisted. Emma knew nothing about Alzheimer's. "Soon he won't know the difference."
Emma turned and gave Alan a pained look. He could tell that she knew. Suddenly she was no longer a child, or even a teen. They both knew she was now an adult who would inherit his job, and part of that job-a large part-would be grounding the pilots who had taught her to fly, one by one. Including him.
"No, Em. Not me. I'll ground myself before I'll be a danger to anyone."
She looked back out the window. "Ed didn't even know-maybe never will."
"Em. This wasn't your fault. You were fantastic today."
"I was careless," she snapped angrily. "If I'd been paying attention I could have prevented it."
"You don't know that."
Emma closed her eyes. "I can see
it all, every time I close my eyes, Alan. Over and over again."
Her name had come up on the pilot roster that morning. As much as she loved to fly, she was annoyed when Bill had called her and said that she had drawn a co-pilot's slot on a short run to the plastics plant. The plastics plant had a large delivery that would take more than the regularly scheduled Eagle. It was a quick, simple run but she was working on a design that required her full concentration and she had not wanted to leave the drafting table. She had downloaded the info she needed to her slate and stormed onto the Eagle in a horrible mood.
The flight to the plastics plant had been uneventful, as she expected. Ed was a quiet man with two teenage daughters of his own and was used to moody teens. He had piloted without comment, allowing Emma to absorb herself in her slate.
They dropped off the cargo container, picked up another. It was customary for the co-pilot to fly back even on the short runs. Emma remained absorbed in her slate and Ed quietly lifted off. Emma didn't consider it a problem. When she felt an unusual jolt she looked up to see Ed randomly pushing buttons in front of him, a slightly puzzled look on his face. A second jolt occurred and she realized they were accelerating, toward the surface! When she had called out to him he didn't respond at all, as if she weren't speaking a language he understood. She tried to take the controls, but with him randomly changing settings, she couldn't keep control. She managed to get part of a distress signal out before he cut communications. Then she managed to pull and cut their speed enough to keep from slamming into the surface with deadly impact.
Once they were on the ground, she turned to find Ed sobbing. He was terrified. He said that suddenly he hadn't known where he was or what he was doing. Emma called Alpha and they sent a medical team, recommending a sedative for Ed which Emma administered quickly.
The rescue Eagle arrived quickly. Emma had made a hard landing, but the craft was upright and capable of docking. Emma met them at the doorway and the medical team bustled past her. Alan rushed in behind them and held her close. "Thank god you're all right."
She clung to him tightly. "I don't think I've ever been so scared. Ed..."
"They'll take good care of him."
Emma nodded and pushed back from Alan, gripping his shoulders. She held on tight but he could tell she was marshalling all her energy to rein in her emotions.
"You did a great job, Em," he spoke softly and reassuringly. "Just like the sims."
She nodded, but her mind was already on something else. "We need to get the Eagle ready to be towed."
"I've got a team on the way. You're going back to the base to be checked out."
"I'm okay-"
"Em, you're grounded until Helena clears you. Standard procedure," he said as gently as he could.
She cast around the cargo section
making sure everything was secure and nodded reluctantly. Alan led her
on board the rescue Eagle and back to Alpha.
Emma stared out at the stars again and took another sip of coffee. For a while they sat together in companionable silence. It had been her first crash and he had no words to comfort her. He had been as scared as she was, watching her transmission on the screen in his office, feeling completely helpless as she struggled to gain control of the Eagle.
"Do you believe in God, Alan?" She asked the question quietly, almost distractedly.
Alan hesitated. As close as he had always been to Emma's family he couldn't remember John or Helena ever mentioning religion or giving their children any sort of religious instruction. "Isn't that something you should be asking your parents?"
"They have never expressed an opinion on the subject. I'll make up my own mind." She gave a small smile. "Besides, I think that if Daddy does believe in God, he's mad at him about something."
Alan glanced at her. It was an odd thing to say, but Alan thought she might just be right.
Emma shook her head slightly. "As much as he obviously adores Mama, I think it may have something to do with his first wife."
"He loved her very much," Alan said quietly.
"You haven't answered my question," Emma returned the conversation to her original question. "When you saw me, your first words were, 'thank God you're all right'. Do you believe in God?"
He thought about it. He had said that. He had been frantic when the Eagle had gone down. The Rescue Eagle was already scrambled by the time Emma's Eagle had hit the ground, and he'd insisted on being aboard. It had been Emma he had been thinking of, not Ed. The thought of losing Emma had been more than he could handle. He hadn't been flying, but riding in the back with the medical team, and all he could do was repeat to himself over and over, 'please, God let her be all right."
Most of his life he'd lived in remote places and going to church wasn't an option. When they had lived in a city his mother had always insisted they at least attend special services at a nearby Anglican church, but it had never been a significant portion of his life. Lately, about the only church activities he'd attended were funerals. But when it came right down to it, there was only one way to answer the question. "Yeah, I believe in God."
"I tried to talk to Davey about today and he got all preachy on me. It made me really uncomfortable."
"What did he say?"
Emma leaned forward and rubbed the rim of her coffee cup with her finger. He watched her carefully. She had long elegant fingers, nails cut close so they didn't interfere with her work. Alan watched her expressive fingers with fascination. "When I was in that Eagle," she began hesitantly. "Alan, there was no possible way for me to land that ship. Ed was changing the settings faster than I could keep up. I couldn't possibly have landed that Eagle on my own."
"Emma, how-"
"I don't know, I don't know," she cried with frustration. "I did what I could, but I was certain we would crash, then suddenly I was on the ground." She looked at him with tortured eyes. "When I told Davey that, he started talking about destiny and how it wasn't my time to die, and that there must be some special purpose for me to still be here. Alan, I think he scared me more than the crash did. I don't want some kind of special purpose."
Alan leaned toward her, "Emma, just because Davey said that, doesn't make it so."
"Then why am I alive?"
Alan grasped her hand. "God exists. God sometimes helps-not necessarily in the way we think should happen, but with some kind of purpose we can't even see."
She clung tightly to his hand. "I didn't want to die, but I don't want to be controlled by some outside force either."
"You aren't necessarily controlled by something. That's only one theory. Not everyone believes that."
"How do you know what to believe?"
Alan sighed. He wished she was having this conversation with John or Helena. "I don't know, Em. Most of the time I just don't think about it much."
"Davey thinks about that a lot. He seems so sure of what he says."
"That's just faith. Belief in something makes you sound certain. It doesn't mean the answers he has are right."
Emma let go of his hand and set her mug on the table. She stood and leaned against the window frame, watching out the window and the unchanging gray landscape. "Alan, I was so scared. I was sure I was going to die."
He stood pulled her into his arms. She was trembling, and her arms went around him and she clung to him tightly as she had in the Eagle this morning. She leaned her head against his shoulder and he rubbed her back, the bare skin smooth under his hands. He wasn't sure how long they stood there, but he became aware that her breathing had slowed, her trembling had stopped, and he was thoroughly enjoying the feel of her bare skin against his hand and the fresh clean scent of her curls. He was enjoying it very much-too much.
His hands moved to her shoulders and he pushed himself gently away from her. He looked deeply into her green eyes, suddenly very unsure of what he should say, but knowing he needed to put some distance between the two of them. He glanced away. "You're alive, and that's all that really matters. I don't want to lose you."
To his surprise, she burst into tears. Emma wasn't the crying type and never had been. Given the way he had been reacting to her presence, he was suddenly hesitant to hold her again. He felt that the tears were probably a good thing. She couldn't hold back her emotions about the day's events forever, but right now, he felt she should be with Helena or John, not him. He put his arm around her shoulder and steered her to the door. "Come on, let's get you home."
She nodded and came willingly.
To his surprise and relief, the door opened and John entered. He met the two of them and pulled his sobbing daughter into his arms. "Davey called a little while ago and asked if she was all right. She seemed pretty upset when she left him and wasn't answering her slate," John explained to Alan.
"I turned it off," came her muffled reply from her father's chest.
"We've been talking a bit," Alan explained. "I was just bringing her home."
John nodded. "Thanks, Alan."
John and Emma exited, leaving Alan alone in the cafeteria. He went back to the window and gazed out at the stars. What had he been feeling for Emma today? It certainly had little to do with the child she had been, and a lot to do with the woman she was becoming. His thoughts were jumbled. The look she had given him-if he hadn't looked away, what would that have led to? Tomorrow she would be back in his office, their office, working closely with him, and he loved that. But her presence would certainly be... distracting.
How could he possibly be having these feelings for Emma? How could he not? She was beautiful woman. He worked with her every day. She understood him better than any woman he had ever known. Their teamwork had created a number of useful designs for Alpha and Loki, and they were making plans for a new Eagle among other things. He was happiest when they were designing something together. She was sixteen and a half and her father was his best friend.
He wished he had someone to talk
this over with. He spotted Loki just above the horizon. Perhaps it would
be a good idea to talk to Tony. He could go to Loki for a few days. He
nodded to the stars and turned to leave the cafeteria, pleased to have
a plan, and something to do.
Ellen Lindow
November, 1999
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