In a massive push, the shuttle exploded in instant thrust and the doors banged wide open, knocking the hovering drones back to crash into the concrete. In seconds, we were nose up to the sky and pulling hard from the ground. A loud roar of the engines behind us and the thrust had us anchored to our seats. The whole craft shook but not violently, and the sky was lightening.

“Reducing thrust in three, two, one, mark,” Mayan called out and her hand eased on the joystick to slow us from full take-off.

Star Hunter’s nose came down and leveled out with the horizon. At the exact moment of dawn, all I could see was a wide band of multi-coloured light on the slight curvature of the earth.

“I’m going to fly high for a while. Plasma engines do better in thinner air,” she said over the sound of the engines and turbulence. It was quieter than I expected, but it was still a machine and I understood we were moving incredibly fast.

I didn’t have words. On the one hand, I was flying. That was amazing and exhilarating and the biggest thrill of my life. On the other hand, I doubted we had onboard radar and had no idea how fast or manoeuvrable we could be against military hunters. But the view…

“Pretty, right?” Mayan asked, and I dipped my head to grin at her. She reached a hand across the short gap and I took it. “I’ve seen it. We get amazing, weird sunrises in Sky. But you never tire of flying.” I squeezed her hand, but looked back to the windows.

She let go, and we got to work.

“Get on the radios. I need you to find the frequency they’re using. Let’s see if we can figure out their deployment plans,” she instructed.

I agreed, grateful to have something to do that was useful. I got to work, slipping on a headset and working the dials.

While Mayan stayed on top of our battery life and fuel situation, she reported we were doing better with the sun up. The shuttle’s skin was a giant solar panel, meant to charge so long as we exposed it to the sunlight. “Another lift-off burn like that, we might have one left to us. But after that, we’ll need to find a fuel depot. Or a very long charge,” she reported over her shoulder.

I agreed and watched her pull her backpack to retrieve her vid. She tapped it open and started studying maps.

After a few minutes, I found the chatter. I held my hand up and Mayan looked over, but waited for me.

“They’ve scrambled jets, two,” I said and looked at her, alarmed.

Mayan managed to look annoyed. She leaned back and tapped in a few things on one of the five screens.

“Five minutes to intercept,” I added, repeating the squawking voice in my ear.

“It’ll cost us, but if they’re using terrestrial jets, they're outmatched,” she said evenly. She tapped in a new command and retook the joystick. The shuttle tipped and then smoothly once again began to climb. The blue out of the window seemed to thin, waning in intensity. And then I saw it darken.

“Whaaat is happening?”

“This is a lunar shuttle,” she laughed, but her eyes remained trained on the instruments. “I’m flying high enough to be uncomfortable to them.”

“Don’t they have the same engines?” I asked, trying to not stutter.

“Sort of, but not the same airframes.”

“Two minutes to intercept,” I repeated from the radio transmission.

“One minute.”

“One hundred thousand feet. And, bonus points are we’ll get there faster. They don’t have the range either, so all we have to do is wait them out.”

“They have weapons, Mayan,” I reminded her dryly.

“Oh. Right,” she replied, and I saw the disappointment settle.

“They are firing, Mayan!” I yelled with my ear still bent to the headset.

“Fuck it,” she said suddenly and in a flurry of new commands to the console, she pulled back even further. The nose lifted again and the light blue faded to dark. “Angle, pitch and roll in three, two, one… mark.”

The shuttle rolled like it was on a soft bed of luxurious pillows. The light in the sky faded, but instead of black, it lit up in fiery oranges and red. Turbulence shook the craft again, stronger than before, and the roar outside overcame almost everything else. Mayan wasn’t wearing her headset, but I was. The noise was intense for me, even muffled by the headset. A tinny voice crackled through the radio.

“Atmo breach! Repeat, shuttle craft has left the atmosphere! No debris! I repeat, no debris. Shuttle is clear and out of range.”

Like a switch, the noise, light and shaking stopped all at once. The blood in my veins lifted and all my organs with it. Mayan’s hair glided around her face and her backpack floated past. She laughed.

“We’re in space?” I asked.

She nodded, laughing in relief. I couldn’t help but join.

“Shit, Mayan. We’re in space!”

Mayan set the controls, and the shuttle flew smoothly, better conditioned for this environment than the heavy gravity and pressure of the earth’s sea level. She released her belts and floated free, inviting me to do the same.

In absolute euphoria, I floated around the passenger cabin with her, gliding in zero gravity like a kid on his first hover ride. We laughed and twirled, bumped into things, pushed random objects around and floated things back and forth to each other. It was fun and the view outside, well, spectacular.

“Thanks for this, Mayan,” I said finally. We squished together to see out of a port-side passenger window. She turned to look at me. “I mean it. This is amazing.”

“There are few things that can beat seeing her like this, but I want you to promise me something,” she replied.

“Sure.” I couldn’t exactly disagree. She’d given me all this, including a reason to hope for it.

“Promise me you’ll try to solve the Heaven’s Gate map with me. No more excuses.”

It was crazy, but so was floating around my old lunar shuttle. “I don’t know if Star Hunter is up for all the flying around down there, but if we’re free of the company, I don’t see why not.”

She stuck out her pinky finger, and I took it in mine. “Deal.” We stared back at the giant blue marble. “I set the coordinates for the Mexican site, so we should be there soon.”

“Of course you did.”

But I couldn’t be mad. We were free to do whatever now and this seemed as good a path as any.