Distance

Provenience

                                                                                 Chapter Two

                                                                                 Provenience

"James, James."

"Dad?"

"It's alright, I've got you son."

"I couldn'tmake it."

"It's alright buddy, everyone has to start out somewhere."

"Even you?"

"Even me, big things have small beginnings."

"James, James I love you."

"Trishta?"

"James, don't be afraid."

James?

James?

"Foster! Foster, James? Oh thank god, Miranda, I found him, he's alive"Lawson said as he shifted through the flaming, mangled wreckage of the Ludok.

"Aw fuck, no. Fuck Matthews, Matthews? Miranda, Matthews he's uh, he's, he's dead Thompson. Matthews is gone."

James began attempting to undo his belt buckle. His face cut and beaten due to the violent crash into the secondary hangar bay that had claimed the life of one of his team members. He managed to get himself free of his buckle as Lawson tended to the body of Matthews, attempting in vain to get a response out of him. James stumbled to his feet, still somewhat dazed and disoriented from the crash as well as injured.

James walked over to Lawson and put his hand on his shoulder before activating his collapsible helmet which folded away into his suit and stumbled through the flaming shuttle to the entrance, Lawson following quickly behind. Dallas went back for the weapons cache, opening it and pulling out several fully-automatic, Ultima Ind. KAP-50 Directed Energy Pulse Weapons, DEPWs, or Pulse Rifles, which he handed to James.

"Think you can handle one of these...Captain?" Dallas asked him.

"Yeah,no problem. Just point and shoot right? I'm not a complete idiot."James replied, wondering in the back of his head why Dallas called him Captain.

"Seem to have problems figuring out how ships work when they're placed in space." Dallas then handed James a Technicians welding tool a Plasma Pistol, which acted really much more like a Plasma pistol. Dallas then pulled out a TAC Pistol for himself to utilize in combat.

"How do you know we're gonna need all this?" Winters asked Dallas.

"How do you know that we won't?"

Winters thought about the question and grabbed several weapons, despite her lack of experience. The rest of the team armed themselves and prepared to venture off the ship's wreckage. Dallas and the lightly-armed Marissa leading the way. "Stay close, stick together, and let's find out what the hell went wrong with this ship"Miranda ordered.

"You know, thinking about it"Dallas told Miranda. "Nobody put you in charge."

"Really?"

"Yeah."

"Is that what you think Gen-I'm sorry, former Lieutenant?"

"Oh no I'm sorry, I think you can go fuck yourself."

"Look why don't you stop fucking antagonizing everyone here, mate?" Marsh finally interrupted. "For Christ sake we wouldn't even be in this position if it wasn't you so whatever the fuck kinda messy demons you've got locked up in that fucked up skull of yours how 'bout we tell them to take some time off, huh? No more crashing ships into bigger ships, yeah?"