Conflagration

Ready to Fly

Lyssa and Feld had just finished attaching 788NC's wings and empennage, and they now stood in the cockpits of their mechs atop the plane's fuselage. From their respective mech cockpits, the mechanics watched the loading of the single shipping container the plane would carry. This container held all the parts Lyssa would need to repair the broken-down plane when they got wherever they were going. The container hung from a ceiling crane via cables. Lyssa and Feld stayed out of the way and watched as Loadmaster Serpico guided the container's gentle lowering to waiting plane's hardpoints.

Lyssa loved airplanes as beautiful and interesting machines, but she didn't really like flying in them. The pilot was somebody she knew only by reputation, and not a good reputation at that.

"Fucking Roscoe has it in for me," Lyssa complained to Feld over her mech's communicator. "Sending me on this scum-sucking shit show of a job with a crazy-ass plane burner."

"That he does. He don't like you because you're Estrellan. He don't like you because you're a woman. Mostly he don't like you because you're late to work all the time. No doubt he's hoping you'll fuck something up on this job and he can finally fire you."

"Roscoe can go blow a pig! And for the record, I'm a Gonian citizen now. Estrella doesn't exist anymore."

Feld's tone turned conspiratory. "Well, if it's any consolation, there is one good thing about this plane burner..."

"What's that?" Lyssa asked trepidatiously.

"She's hot at least."

Lyssa rolled her eyes. "You're a pig."

"Well, maybe we can get Roscoe to blow me, then." Laughter erupted from Lyssa's communicator as Feld cracked himself up at his own joke.

Down below, Serpico finished checking the cargo locking pins and the emergency release mechanism on the shipping container. He gave Lyssa a thumbs up, indicating that he was ready to start the process of securing her mech to the plane. They were taking the maintenance mech with them. She would need it to do the repair on the grounded plane when they got wherever they were going. Following Serpico's hand signals, Lyssa walked her mech over to the particular set of hardpoints to which he wanted the heavy piece of machinery secured. Within fifteen minutes, the mech, which approximated a hulking human shape while standing erect, was folded down into its streamlined transport configuration and secured to the top of the freighter.

* * *

Lyssa waved goodbye to Feld and Serpico from the top of the crew stairs as each man left to begin whatever task he had been assigned to next. They were good guys. In fact, Lyssa liked most of the people she worked with on the ramp. When she'd first started this job two years ago, she'd faced a lot of racism. Since then, people had gotten used to working beside an Estrellan refugee. The fact that she was a top-notch airplane mechanic and that she was just alcoholic enough to knock 'em back with the boys didn't hurt. These days, only a few people on the ramp still had a problem with her. Unfortunately, one of those was her supervisor, Terry Roscoe. Why Roscoe hadn't fired her already was a mystery to Lyssa.

Lyssa turned from the cacophony of the hanger and stepped through the crew door into the plane. To her left, the door to the cockpit hung open. Through this door, she caught frequent, fleeting glimpses of the pilot's right arm as it moved deftly about the switches and control panels readying the plane for flight. It would be courteous for her to go introduce herself to the pilot, this Erin Something-or-other, but Lyssa had heard too many things about how crazy this particular pilot was. As a general thing, Lyssa found pilots annoying at best. They always broke her airplanes and then got impatient with her about the repairs. No, she would settle in first.