Jillian O'Keefe as Fisher Lincoln

Promising.

That’s the word they had kept using. Promising.

Prom-miss-sing.

Well, now I’m a broken promise.

~*~

“Fisher?”

The voice was woven into the pain. She tried to open her eyes. Couldn’t. She tried to open her mouth. That worked. Figured. “Hnnh,” was all she could manage.

“Fisher, it’s Dr. Barnes. You don’t need to talk, and don’t try to move just yet. I wanted to let you know that everything is all right. You’re going to be fine. Ok?”

Liar. A lie was another word for a broken promise, and this guy was lying. Everything was not going to be all right. Because she was a broken promise. Even if she lived, her future was dead. Present arms, twenty-one gun salute for the death of the Most Promising Pilot the GAF had ever seen.

She didn’t try to talk again. She didn’t want to talk again.

She was a broken promise.

~*~

It was so stupid. So silly. A silly, cruel, awful thing that had happened. One minute she was getting ready to board the Baxley for a routine patrol, the next she was screaming and there was blood and crunching and claxons. The ramp had collapsed, catching the entire right side of her body under it. Boom. Squish. So much squish. And that was all she knew until the voice of Dr. Barnes had come drifting into her consciousness, with its lies. There was no recovery from this kind of trauma. It’d even crushed her face, the right side of her skull. Her arm was certainly gone, her leg too. Hip pulverized. Ribs in splinters. Career done. And she had been so good, too. An up-and-comer, with none off the bitterness and baggage that was standard for the older pilots, the ones who had endured the emergence of the GAF and were left confused and angry. Those were two words you could never ascribe to Fisher Lincoln. She was sure, she was young, she was gifted, and she was gleaming. Already she’d made Lieutenant, after just two years. It was a rare boast. Her flying talent was undeniable. Everyone said she was going places, and fast.

Then this. This.

Ah, well. Maybe they’d mess up her pain dosage and she’d be put out of her misery.

~*~

“Do you understand everything I’ve told you, Fisher?” Dr. Barnes asked.

“All I understand is that I’m fixed, fixed with tech the general populace doesn’t even know exists yet, and you won’t let me get back to work.” Her voice was clipped, terse. She sat in the propped-up bed, glaring at the doctor.

“It’s because the tech is so new that they don’t want you back at your post just yet,” explained Barnes with a sigh. “They need time to make sure it’s going to work as designed. And you need time to adjust.”

“I’ve adjusted!” protested Fisher. “I have total mobility back, no pain...I don’t even have so much as a scar. It’s not that don’t appreciate what Isely’s done - they’ve given me my life back. I just want to get back to my life.”

The door slid open, and a slender, dark-haired man entered the room. “Lieutenant Lincoln, it’s good to see you looking so healthy.”

“Fisher, this is Cary Tyler. He’s the CCO of Isely,” Dr. Barnes introduced.

Tyler nodded. “Pleasure to meet you at last, Lieutenant.”

“Mr. Tyler, thank you for everything Isely’s done for me. It’s a miracle. It really is,” said Fisher earnestly. “Even if I don’t fully understand how it happened.”

“You were on your way out,” Tyler said, settling down in a chair near the bed, “so we took the liberty of running a trial with the new bionics we’ve been working on. Nanotech, demal-mimic polymers, a lot of science we’ve been designing for medical purposes. Normally, we’d never experiment on someone without their consent but, as you might’ve guessed, time was of the essence.”

“I guess I’ll forego the lawsuit this time,” Fisher said with a wry smile. “But Dr. Barnes says the GAF doesn’t want me back now.”

“I never said that,” protested Barnes. “I said that they want you to take an extended leave to recuperate.”

“That was our request as well,” said Tyler. “Fisher, no one has the corrective technology you do. No one ever has. Until we’ve had time to observe you, and until you’ve spent time gently easing back into routine, you’re just going to have to put your career on hold. Don’t worry - your progress so far isn’t in any danger, and you’ll still be on track for a meteoric rise through the ranks.”

“How long?” grumbled Fisher.

“Two years,” stated Tyler bluntly.

“What!?” Fisher all but shrieked.

Tyler held up a hand. “In the interim, I have a proposition. Isely has need of a crew to head to the Norma Arm of the galaxy and investigate something for us. We’d need a highly-trained, yet covert group of people. We’d like you to pilot the ship.”

“Is the whole crew GAF?” Fished asked.

“No. It’s actually going to be a mix of civilians and military. The captain is Ori Alon.”

Fisher frowned in thought. “I’ve heard of her. She had some sort of massive explosion when the Royal Air Force became part of the GAF, and was discharged.” Her eyes narrowed. “Dishonorably discharged.”

Tyler chuckled. “There’s more to it than the rumors go into but, I promise you, she’s not only competent, she’s a brilliant captain.”

“Who else?” asked Fisher with suspicion.

“That’s proprietary, but you’ll meet them all in two weeks when you board the Fairburn at Port Alhambra.”

That was surprising. “A Georgian-class ship? A little old, isn’t she?”

“She doesn’t have the bells and whistles of, say, the Tokyo-class fleet, but the Georgians were built for endurance and efficiency, and the Fairburn has been extensively refurbished and restored. You’ll like her. Besides, didn’t you cut your teeth on a Georgian ship?”

“The Valdosta,” answered Fisher with a nod. “After she’d left service when the Campaign ended, she was used to train a lot of us.” Her smile was faint, but fond. “A damn good ship.”

“There you are, then.” Tyler rose. “Rest up. Get to Alhambra in two weeks, and keep busy so you can be back in formation before you know it.”

Fisher watched him leave with only a faint pang of skepticism. She needed to be on a ship. She needed to fly. How and why and where were only afterthoughts. As was her new, mysterious body.