Immonen was about as good at physical intimacy as Anya, which is to say, not very. She had been hamstrung by insecurity and looming familial disapproval to be too outgoing or adventurous. Immonen had been thoroughly consumed by his studies and then his work. The result was a somewhat awkward but sincere time spent in Immonen’s bed, until he paused above her, one hand caressing her cheek.

“Would you like me to use my skill?” Immonen asked.

“What do you mean?” Anya asked, a little breathless. Despite their relative inexperience, they were both plenty enthusiastic about their efforts.

“I could just adjust your sensitivity slightly, for a few minutes, something like that,” Immonen said.

“It won’t hurt? And you’re…you, right?” Anya realized even as she asked that if Immonen was still compromised then he wouldn’t exactly admit to it.

“No and yes,” he said and chuckled.

“Give it a shot,” Anya said. And then every pleasurable nerve in her body lit up like it had a lightning storm going through it in the best possible way. She didn’t remember details after that, just pure, liquid bliss.

And then it was morning.

“Anya! You gotta get up!” Felix said. At some point between Immonen’s door and his bed, she’d told Felix to alert her at 6:00 AM. She didn’t really require sleep anymore unless she’d spent herself in battle. While it hadn’t been battle, she’d certainly spent herself last night and woke with a reluctant groan for the first time in weeks. Immonen lay beside her, blond hair falling in loose cascades over his face and pillow as he breathed low and slow.

Anya allowed herself a few long seconds to take the moment in, then rose out of bed with a sigh. She put on the clothes Immonen had thrown around the room in their haste, and he awoke just as she was pulling her shoes on.

“Anya?” he asked, his voice thick with slumber and his eyes barely cracking open.

“Yeah, I gotta go,” she said. “I’m sorry.”

“You have nothing to apologize for,” Immonen said as he rose. The sheet fell off him and Anya paused again to take the sight in.

“You need to get dressed or I’m going to be late,” she said. Immonen smirked as he slipped into his clothes, yawned, and then walked out into the hallway with her. They almost ran into Pan and Brody just outside.

“Oh! Hello!” Pan said and waved at them and his nose twitched.

“G’day yo—” Brody started to say and then his pointed snout wrinkled. “Fuckin’ hell. What’ve you been doing in there?”

“What? What is it?” Anya asked.

“There’s a funny smell in your room,” Pan said as his little nose twitched and waggled towards the room. He sneezed and made a face and backed away.

“Ah. Well, both of your noses are naturally sensitive,” Immonen said and blushed.

“Smells like Cooper’s room after he has a woman over,” Brody said, then he grinned at them, “Aaaah. You been screwing.”

“Screwing what? I thought Gary finished building everything,” Pan said. Brody and Immonen both laughed while Anya put her hands over her face.

“I mean, they—” Brody started to say.

“Don’t!” Anya snapped. “Just let him be sweet and oblivious.”

“Ah, fine,” Brody said and shrugged his huge shoulders.

“What’s going on?” Pan asked.

“Nothing,” Anya said.

“We were just saying good-bye,” Immonen said.

“Mm-Hmmm,” Brody said and his grin widened.

“We were on our way to Anya’s room but now you’re here!” Pan said and hugged Anya’s leg. “So now we can get to the hangar with Gary.”

“Lead the way,” Anya said, and fell back with Immonen as they strolled down the hallway. “Do I smell? We showered right after.”

“Sharks have incredible senses of smell, from what I understand. And we already know Pan sees more with his nose than his eyes,” Immonen whispered.

“Geez,” Anya said and sighed. Any lingering embarrassment at Brody grinning knowingly at her and the doctor vanished when they reached the hangar.

The Zordenn Interplanetary Striker gleamed with a fresh coat of glossy paint, a bright fire-engine red with yellow highlights. Dozens of construction drones hovered around it, welding guns sparking as they finished attaching a series of missile platforms on the sides and large guns, as well as a truly monstrous cannon integrated into the prow of the ship. The engines were only slightly larger, but they also appeared sleeker than before, more in-line with the ship’s contours than the originals had been, somehow.

Gary stood with Tori and Samaira, the former who looked like she hadn’t slept in a week or more and still had some puffiness around her eyes. She looked up as Anya and the others entered the hangar and ran over to hug her friend.

“Good night, I’m guessing?” Tori asked in a low voice as she glanced at Immonen and Anya hugged her back.

“Yeah, it was pretty good I guess,” she replied.

“Good. Cause getting laid is the only excuse I was gonna take for not getting a drink with me,” Tori said and winked at her as she gave her a thumbs up.

“Gary was just filling me in on the improvements he made,” Samaira said. She glanced between Anya and Immonen and smiled, perhaps a bit too widely.

“Souped up the engines, nearly doubled their output, quadrupled the damage output and efficiency, adjusted the power drain on the shields and reinforced the hull, got you some self-repair drones on-board, and a complete auto-pilot suite and everything else you need to fly it around,” Gary said.

“Thank you Gary. I know you must be crazy busy, but…” Anya said.

“It helps you, it helps us, it’s a no-brainer, kid,” Gary said.

“What do we have left to do prior to take-off?” Immonen asked.

“Doing the final checks and finishing up the redundancy systems now,” Gary said. “After that, it’s just a matter of giving you and Renn the basic once-over, but there’s guided tutorials on-board that you two can go over en route. We’ve got about five hours before you two actually need to be in the ship.”

Renn emerged from a side-hall as if summoned, Mona clinging to his arm, and the tall crimson specter of Kan close behind. On every occasion that Anya had ever seen Mona, whether relaxing in her robe or in the middle of battle, she had been enthused about whatever she had been doing. Even in the battle of London there had been a sort of gleeful intensity as she had commanded her army of the dead. Now she looked as lifeless as her skeletons. She was paler than usual, and her clothes hung on her as her posture drooped. Renn had one of his white-gloved hands over her gauntleted one, his helmet down as he leaned near her and whispered softly.

“…need you here in case they make it past us. Your armies will be key in pushing back against their numbers or evacuating impact sites. I promise I will do my best to return to you,” Renn said to her. Mona gave a barely perceptible nod but didn’t look up at him.

“If you are not back, our agreement is void,” Kan said.

“I know,” Renn replied. “Though I still think it’s foolish, long-term. It will only breed resentment.”

“Better than breeding criminals,” Kan said. Renn merely shrugged and then turned to face the others.

“So, this is the ship? The ship that will take humans further into space than any other?” Renn asked.

“That’s the one,” Gary said. “Though she could easily take you outside of the solar system. Maybe get you to the nearest star if I had time to input some cryosleep systems and better engines. But she’ll do for local stuff.”

“Does she have a name?”

“Not yet. Anya’s RAC, her call,” Gary said. “Got a name yet, kid?”

“No, sorry, still thinking,” Anya replied.

“Well, think about it while I give you and Renn the tour,” Gary said and led them toward the ship. Three powerful struts acted as landing gear that elevated the vessel almost twenty feet off the ground. The belly of the ship hissed as a long ramp lowered and led up into the belly. Anya felt as if she were experiencing Christmas and her birthday a dozen times over in a single moment.

My spaceship, she thought and almost squealed. It was easy to forget that it might as well be her tomb as well, and in a day or two she would be squaring off against terrors from the infinite darkness of space but…

But for now, she was just a happy kid checking out the coolest toy ever. Anya and Renn followed Gary up the ramp while the others stayed behind. They first entered what looked like a cargo bay. It was full of steel containers stacked up alongside the walls of the hold, all of them unmarked.

“What’s in those?” Anya asked.

“Repair drones, back-up fuel, spare parts, whatever. The ship’s auto-pilot and maintenance suite will take care of it. Normally I’d say this much prep is absurd for such a quick haul, but I’m not taking a single chance at something going wrong. C’mon, better stuff to see up the elevator.”

All of them stepped into a wide, cylindrical elevator.

“Hey kid, say ‘Bridge,’” Gary said.

“Bridge,” Anya said, her smile growing. The elevator glided upward and stopped with a ding. Its doors slid open o reveal a sleek but utilitarian hallway. It was all brushed metal and recessed lighting. It was dim, but lightened as they exited the lift and made their way down the short hall to a pair of double doors.

“There was a big chunk of the ship given over to crew beds and quarters, but since it’s just you two, I filled it up with engine redundancies and back-ups and such so you’ll be better at shooting and not getting shot. You’ve each got your own small quarters, though you won’t need them for very long one way or another. It’s only a four-day round trip.”

Nobody said anything in response.

“Anyway, I suspect you’ll be spending most of your time in here,” Gary said after clearing his throat and the double doors slid open to reveal the bridge.

I was a wide half-circle that bowed outward toward the sharp front of the ship. Triangular cut windows twice as tall as Anya looked down the long red prow that bristled with small guns and the gentle bumps of missile tubes. The cockpit, like the hallway, was dim, but it was a warm, orange light. Two arching chairs that hovered over gentle indents in the floor sat in front of sleek, glossy black control panels the started to glow with their own warm sunset luminance as Anya approached. The black control panels displayed basic data on the ship, all in English: fuel levels, hull integrity, ammo supplies, and so on, with helpful indication bars, charts, and icons to help.

More glossy black displays were set in the side walls, and a number of notifications popped up on all of them as the light in the bridge grew brighter. More notifications appeared on the windows themselves, highlighting each of the guns and missile tubes on the ship, and tracking other movement throughout the hangar. It was like a giant HUD.

The only other thing of note on the bridge was a column in between and slightly in front of the two chairs and control panels. It was the same brushed metallic as the rest of the floor and ceiling, but was topped with a gleaming back orb.

“Pilot, scan ship’s captain,” Gary said. The black orb emitted an orange light that scanned Anya up-and-down.

“Captain, confirmed,” a neutral, monotone voice said throughout the room.

“Scan crew member number 1,” Gary said and stood next to Renn. The light came out again and traced Renn up-and-down before vanishing.

“I don’t get a rank?” Renn asked.

Gary grunted and said, “That’s up to the captain.”

Anya snorted and smirked at Renn. “Executive Officer.”

“That will do nicely,” Renn said and wandered forward to look out the forward windows. Anya stood next to Gary and leaned back to whisper so only he could hear.

“Does being captain mean the ship will protect me? In case Renn tries anything?” she asked.

“Yup. It’s scanning you and him right now. I used some of the psychic data I got from Chell and and the alien attack on London to give the computer something to use as a reference. If it picks up any funny business from him or senses your brainwaves going haywire, there’s some on-board defenses that will kick in,” Gary whispered back.

“Thank you,” Anya said. The old man gave her a wink.

“Those aren’t actually glass. It’s reinforced armor plating with a liquid crystal display over it that’ll show you the view outside by default, but you can program different sections of it to act like rearview mirrors if you want,” Gary said.

“Very handy,” Renn said.

“Why don’t you two sit here and I’ll explain the rest?” Gary said. Anya and Renn both too their seats, Anya on the right, Renn on the left, and Anya listened to Gary explain the basics of how to fly her spaceship. It mostly consisted of how to turn the autopilot on, selecting a destination from the holographic map that would pop up from the black orb. The orb itself was a kind of manual steering device as well, or would become one in the event of an emergency or Anya demanded manual control, though Gary recommended against this.

Most of the ship’s armaments were connected to the auto-pilot as well, but Anya and Renn could manually take over if need be with their control panels, specifically the anti-matter cannon that ran the length of the ship, and was a Gary special.

“It has some elements of the Mori-Cannon,” Gary explained, “but it’s mostly meant for scattering anything it hits into non-existence. And that’s about it. Escape pods in the back, EVA suits that’ll adjust to your sizes in recessed wall panels in just about every room and hall in case of hull breach. Though I suspect both of you could survive at least a little while in a vacuum if need be.

“And that’s pretty much it. You should be good to go out there…and back, if you can. So, think of a name?” Gary asked.

Anya looked around the bridge, then out the front “window” down the long, sharp prow of the ship. It was like staring down the blade of a bloody sword. And she would drive it right into the alien horde, for everybody on Earth.

“Yeah,” Anya said, “Gaia’s Saber.”