Birds of a Feather

Captain Fletch knew she was walking into a trap, but she couldn’t help herself. She and her Engineering Officer, Paola, and Weapons Officer, Jenkins, stood on the bridge of the Starling Sunstrider waiting for the ship’s scanners to verify the distress call they’d received. Fletch was quite familiar with the supposedly derelict ship that floated aimlessly nearby. The distress call from the Bittern Blight said the crew had abandoned the vessel and stole the two escape pods, but not before removing the antimatter synthesizer, rendering the ship unable to fly and taking life support offline. Supposedly, Captain Quill was the only soul to remain aboard and she was gravely injured.

The monitor flashed as the scanners completed their check. “Life support is down and both pods have been deployed,” Fletch confirmed. “Onboard temperatures have dropped significantly. My guess is that they’ve got an hour at most before the remaining oxygen is gone.”

“Your orders?” Jenkins asked.

Fletch chewed her lip. It certainly had to be a trap. She’d not been warring against Quill for the last decade for it all to be over because her crew mutinied. Quill was too smart, too calculated. She guessed that Quill’s crew were in their spacesuits, the Mechanical Officer lingering in the engine room ready to turn on life support the moment after they’d lured Fletch onboard. Surely they all laid in wait, plasma pistols charged and ready to go. Fletch had to give Quill some credit for the brilliance of her strategy. Who could resist the siren’s song of an enemy’s distress beacon?

But just as Fletch was about to issue the order to leave the Bittern and jump to hyperspace, the comm screen lit up and a chime indicated an incoming call. It was Quill. Fletch rolled her eyes and cleared her throat. “This ought to be good.” She tapped the button to answer the call and crossed her arms.

The screen illuminated with Quill’s face, though the bridge of the Bittern was darker than usual and she was difficult to make out. “I hardly believed it when I saw it was you,” she said, her voice hoarse and weak. She was not wearing a spacesuit nor had any supplemental oxygen.

“I’m not falling for it, Quill,” Fletch glowered. “Pack up your little ruse and I’ll consider not blowing you out of the sky.”

“I’m surprised you’re even here,” Quill said, groaning and shifting her weight in her chair. “Last I heard you were in the Daxalon Nebula. You were the only ship to respond to my distress call.”

Fletch squinted her eyes at the image of Quill on the monitor. She’d spoken with her many times through the comms, yet she’d never seen Quill so disheveled. She seemed to actually be in pain.

“Look,” Quill continued, “I’ve been shot. Life support is down. My crew abandoned me. Ship’s disabled. If you’re going to blow me out of the sky, do it.” Fletch exchanged glances with Paola and Jenkins. “I know you hate me. I’d hate me too. But like I said, you were the only one to respond to my distress call. Is this really how you want our war to end? Me dying at the hands of a crew that hadn’t been paid in months? If you won’t help me, at least come over here and deal the final blow yourself. I surrender. You win.”

The comm went dark as Quill ended the call. A strange and uncomfortable sensation welled up within Fletch. There was something sincere in Quill’s tone and facial expression. Though the captain’s instincts urged her to leave the Bittern in the dust, she was thoroughly tempted by Quill’s offer to look her in the eye and kill her. A rivalry that began in flight school and had escalated to a decade of deep space battles, subterfuge, and endless mocking calls on the comms might finally come to an end. And Fletch wanted it to be a poetic, epic ending. She’d spent too much time thinking of nothing but besting Quill. Even though it might be a trap, Fletch couldn’t resist.

“I’m getting suited up,” she said with a long-suffering sigh. “Paola, I want an escort of no less than ten. Jenkins, I want every gun trained on that ship.”

“Aye,” Paola and Jenkins said in unison. Fletch knew they did not approve of this plan. Yet they’d stood by her through many years of back-and-forth battles with Quill and accepted that being part of her crew meant obliging the captain’s thirst for victory.

Fletch retreated to her private quarters to don her spacesuit. She needed a moment alone. On the off chance that this wasn’t a trap and that her war with Quill had reached its end, she tried to imagine what life would be like without her mortal enemy lingering in the shadows, waiting for her to misstep. What would she do if she wasn’t exacting revenge on the woman who’d wiped out half the colony on Everron 7 where she’d grown up? Though that was the most grievous of Quill’s offenses, their war didn’t start there.

It started in flight school, not the one on the central planets, but the one on Jupiter’s moon Europa. Though the star system that contained the First Earth had largely been abandoned, a few older outposts remained. The Europa flight school cost much less than the one on Haversol, a draw for both Fletch and Quill who grew up on newly colonized frontier planets. Both girls were smart, oversaturated with aptitude and an insatiable desire for success. They fought fiercely against one another for the best grades, placements with the top instructors, and internships on the biggest battlecruisers.

What began as an academic rivalry became much higher stakes when the pair of them graduated with honors and immediately found work on opposing sides of a squabble in the Hyperion Galaxy. They rose through the ranks until they were able to afford their own spaceships and free themselves from fighting other people’s wars. Across their time on Europa and in Hyperion, they’d become obsessed with outdoing the other. It became their purpose, their life’s mission. They chased each other through the cosmos firing their guns at one another, blowing up sentimental places the other cherished, and taunting each other endlessly through the comms.

And now, a decade later, it might be coming to an end.

Fletch bundled her curly hair at the nape of her neck and tucked it into the collar of her spacesuit. She glanced at herself in the mirror, noticing the bags under her eyes and the wrinkles on her forehead. She was only in her thirties, but she looked much older. The war with Quill had exhausted her.

She put two fresh charge packs into her pistol and holstered the weapon at her side. She pressed the button to extend the spacesuit’s helmet over her head. The dome clicked into place with a hiss of air and she was ready.

Leaving her quarters, Fletch met her ten armed crew members at the airlock. Their orders were simple– the crew would secure the Bittern while Fletch went to the bridge to find Quill. Shoot on sight. Take no prisoners. This was a war, after all.

Fletch opened the airlock and a gust of wind flushed from the Starling into the Bittern. She wondered how long the crew of the Bittern had been shivering without life support, waiting for the trap to be sprung.

The automated voice of the Bittern echoed through the tunnel connecting the two ships: “Life support failure.” Fletch heard the repeating warning faintly in the background during her comm call with Quill, but she didn’t expect to feel so unnerved when they finally boarded the ship. The warning was one no star-farer ever wanted to hear, even if it was a farce.

They stepped through the opening and onto the Bittern’s main deck. The emergency lights were flickering and everything was quiet aside from the repeating message that life support was down. Fletch examined the monitor at her wrist, checking the oxygen levels and determining them to still be habitable, particularly with an open connection to the Starling.

“Keep your wits about you,” she said as the crew dispersed.

It was surreal to be on Quill’s turf. Their battles always took place in the vacuum of space or on various planets or moons. They never boarded one another’s vessel. It was more intimate than Fletch thought it would be. How many times had Quill walked these hallways? What conversations had she entertained in these rooms? She passed through the mess hall, noticing dirty dishes still lingering on the tables. She glanced at one of the plates, wondering what Quill and her crew ate when they weren’t planet-side. Spaghetti and meatballs by the looks of it. An old comfort dish from the First Earth. So simple, so plain. So human.

Fletch’s earbud crackled as one of her crew checked in. “The cargo hull is clear.” Then not long after, another message came through. “The engine room is clear. Confirming a missing antimatter synthesizer.” Fletch’s eyebrows shot up in surprise. Maybe it wasn’t a trap after all. Maybe Quill had told them the truth. She’d find out soon enough.

Fletch tightened her grip on her pistol as she opened the door to the bridge. It was empty save for the captain’s seat at the helm. All she could see of Quill was the high bun she coiled her hair into, just peeking up from the back of the chair. There was a puddle of blood on the floor below her.

“The crew quarters and med bay are clear,” her crew reported through the earbud.

“So you really did come to see me one last time,” Quill said, her back to Fletch. “At least look me in the eye when you do it. Shooting me in the back of the head is hardly worth the effort of coming over here. Make it a good story at least.”

Fletch saw that the med kit by the door had been opened and a trail of blood led back to the captain’s chair. The emergency spacesuit on the rack against one of the walls had bloody handprints on it. Quill had tried to don the spacesuit but was too injured to do so. A pistol lay abandoned on the floor, indicating that Quill was unarmed.

Fletch’s earbud chirped again. “The ship is clear. No crew aboard. Both escape pods deployed. Your orders, Captain?”

“By now I’m sure your people have informed you that this isn’t a trap,” Quill said, as if she’d been able to sense the communication Fletch had just received.

Fletch was speechless, both to her crew asking for orders and to her rival bleeding out. She gripped her pistol and approached Quill’s chair, wondering what it would be like to finally meet her face-to-face again after all these years. She noticed a hand-knit blanket lying on the floor and a heavily worn copy of The Hobbit next to it. Print books were rare and difficult to find, especially ones originating from the First Earth. She passed around the side of Quill’s seat and faced her.

Quill was wearing gray sweatpants and a black tank top, her hair thrown up into the messiest topknot Fletch had ever seen. She clutched a wad of gauze to her belly, blood dripping from it and onto her sweats. She was shivering, her gooseflesh skin sallow where it wasn’t crimson.

Quill started down the barrel of Fletch’s gun defiantly. Yet, Fletch did not shoot. The voice on the other end of Fletch’s earbud once again asked for orders. She ignored it. Then, of all things, she lowered her gun and tapped the button to retract the helmet of her spacesuit. It had been years since she’d seen Quill through anything but a comm display and she felt she owed her rival one last look at her face.

“Do you remember the atmospheric physics class we took in our second year?” Quill asked. “The one taught by Professor Walen?”

“Yes. What about it?”

“Do you remember when she promised a letter of commendation to the student who could earn the highest mark and our whole study group turned on one another?”

Fletch stifled a laugh. “I remember Arne dumping a protein shake onto my keyboard. They just gave me a new one.”

“It was so dumb,” Quill bantered. Then she shifted uncomfortably in her chair and shivered.

Fletch wondered why Quill wasn’t wrapped in the blanket lying on the floor. She thought for a moment about picking it up and handing it to her, but then realized it was pointless given the circumstances.

“Do you regret it? Any of this?” Quill asked. Fletch wasn’t sure how to answer. “I do,” Quill continued in the silence. “How embarrassing to have made it as far as I have, only to have my crew mutiny and abandon me. I guess that’s what happens when you put all your focus onto an end goal with no consideration for how to get there.”

“You didn’t pay your crew, what did you expect would happen?” Fletch scoffed.

“I know. I flew too close to the sun.”

“That’s a terrible metaphor given that you’re freezing on a ship that can’t fly.”

“If you could get a do-over, one do-over, what would you fix?” Quill asked, ignoring the jab. Fletch shrugged. Quill gazed at her and then sighed. “It doesn’t matter now. Thank you, I suppose, for visiting me one last time and giving me the dignity of seeing your face before you kill me. It’s been an honor, Captain Fletch.” She sat up as best she could and saluted her rival. “Good war. I am ready for it to be done.”

“Captain, your orders?” Fletch’s earbud buzzed for a third time. 

Fletch was uneasy, a pain in her stomach filling her with dread and sour bile. There was something so wrong about all of this. This wasn’t the victory she wanted. This was just sad. But beyond that, as she pictured a life going forward, one in which Quill was not there, it felt surprisingly empty. What would she do without someone to chase through the galaxies? Her entire life revolved around Quill and she wasn’t sure what she’d do without her. Her purpose had been to destroy Quill, but now that the moment had arrived, she didn’t want it.

Fletch tapped her computer cuff, finally responding to her crew’s inquiries. “Return to the Starling. Prep the OR for surgery and notify Dr. Hammond. Plasma gun wound to the abdomen, major blood loss.”

“Are you injured, Captain?” somebody asked through the earbud. “Shall we send a stretcher?”

“No and no. I’ll bring her myself.”

“Excuse me?” Paola interjected. “Are you bringing Captain Quill onboard?”

“Yes,” Fletch replied, taking a deep breath and studying Quill’s face. “This war is over.”

“No, no,” Quill protested as Fletch holstered her gun and walked over to the knit blanket on the floor. “You don’t have to do this.”

“Yes, I do,” Fletch retorted. She picked up the blanket and approached Quill. “Can you stand?”

“No,” Quill whispered.

Fletch nodded, her eyes soft and face calm. She bundled Quill in the blanket and then lifted her up and cradled the woman in her arms. Quill gave up the fight and accepted rescue.

“Wait,” Quill mumbled as they began to leave the bridge. “My book. It’s rare, I spent forever trying to find it.”

Fletch understood. This was the last time Quill would see her ship. Once they were evacuated, it would be scavenged and scrapped by brigands. A ship without its captain or crew was easy pickings. Fletch lowered Quill just enough for the injured woman to grab The Hobbit off the floor. Quill clutched the book to her chest.

Then Fletch carried Quill out of the Bittern. They moved through the passageways and the mess hall, Quill peering around at her ship for the last time. Fletch looked down at the woman in her arms. It was perhaps the closest they’d been to each other since that one night back in the dorms on Europa. Quill rested her head against her rescuer’s collarbone. How had their rivalry begun? They had been friends before they were enemies. It was more than just competitive classwork that ruined their connection. Then Fletch remembered, gazing at Quill’s face so close that she could lean down and kiss her.

Fletch had broken Quill’s heart, rejected her after they’d shared one single night of intimacy. She wasn’t ready for a relationship with another woman. She cared a great deal for Quill, but she was scared. Quill had been in love and did not take the rejection well, seeking out revenge in its wake. That’s where it all started. And though Fletch thought she hated Quill, she reminded herself that hate and love often feel the same.

The opposite of love is indifference. Even a galaxy away, she bolted to the Bittern the moment Quill’s distress call went out. She was the only one to come to Quill’s aid. And here she was, personally carrying Quill to safety. They’d been obsessed with each other for a decade and Fletch’s world revolved around Quill. Wasn’t it obvious why? Sometimes it’s easier to hate than it is to love.

Fletch squeezed Quill in her arms as they crossed back onto her ship, the nearest thing to a hug either had shared in quite some time. She felt Quill’s body relax, comforted by the closeness. Though Quill’s time with the Bittern had come to an end, a fresh beginning was blossoming on the Starling. Fletch was finally ready to try something new.

“You’re going to be okay,” Fletch whispered. “We’re going to be okay.”

“I know,” Quill breathed, her expression of pain melting away. “I know.”