Female laughter followed. I paused a few yards from the shuttle and crouched, pretending to adjust the Velcro straps of my new EDA sneakers so that I could continue to eavesdrop.
“People assume RedJive is a guy because Red Five was a guy,” a male voice replied. He had some sort of East Coast accent that sounded equally thick to my Pacific-Northwestern ears. “Hate to tell ya, but the Red Baron was a dude, too—just like Maverick, Goose, Iceman, and every other ace fighter pilot in history.”
“You’re aware that those are all fictional characters, right?” the younger woman asked, talking over the man’s chuckling. “For your information, there have been female fighter pilots for over a hundred years now. I wrote a report about it for school. A woman named Marie Marvingt flew combat missions over France way back in World War I, and the Russians used female fighter pilots in World War II. And the US military has had women fighter pilots since the seventies.”
After a pregnant pause, the male voice responded with an annoyed, “Yeah, whatever.”
This was followed by another round of high-pitched laughter and some scattered applause. I took it as my cue and stood up, then mounted the shuttle’s small retractable staircase.
The laughter died out as soon as the cabin’s four occupants saw me appear in the open hatchway and turned to face me. I stood there for an awkward beat, letting them size me up, while I did the same to them.
They were all dressed in newly pressed EDA flight officer uniforms like mine. To my immediate left sat a pretty middle-aged woman with tanned skin and dark hair, and the name lt. winn stitched onto her uniform. There was an empty seat to her right while on her left sat a heavyset guy with an unruly beard who seemed to be eying me suspiciously. Seated across from him was a teenaged African-American girl who looked like she probably wasn’t old enough to drive yet. A young Asian man sat beside her. He looked like he was in his early twenties, and there was a small Chinese flag beneath the EDA emblem on his uniform, instead of the tiny embroidered version of Old Glory that adorned everyone else’s uniform, and instead of the words Earth Defense Alliance there was a string of characters in Chinese.
After the five of us had stared at each other in silence for what I felt was a sufficient length of time, I stowed my pack in the overhead compartment and took the empty seat next to the older woman, because she was the only one who had smiled at me.
“Hi,” I said, offering her my hand. “I’m Zack Lightman. From Portland, Oregon.” As dazed as I was, I still remembered to say I was from Portland instead of Beaverton, to avoid sounding like a hick—or having to endure any Beaver-related attempts at humor.
“Welcome aboard, Zack,” she said, squeezing my hand between both of her own. “I’m Debbie Winn.” Something about her demeanor and tone made me guess that she was a schoolteacher.
“It’s nice to meet you, Debbie.”
“It’s nice to meet you—even under such terrifying circumstances.” She laughed and gave me an anxious smile. I returned it with one of my own.
“That’s Milo,” she said, gesturing to the bear-like man to her left, who was still staring at me with open hostility. The name patch on his uniform identified him as lt. dobson.
“Hi there, Milo,” I said, reaching over to offer him my hand. “How goes it?”
He just stared at my hand without replying, until I finally shrugged and lowered it.
“Oh, ignore him—he’s from Philly,” Debbie said, as if that explained his rude behavior. Then she nodded at the young woman across from her. “Zack, that’s Lila. Lila, meet Zack.”
“Nobody actually calls me that,” the girl said. “Everyone calls me by my nickname, Whoadie. That’s my Armada call sign, too.”
We shook hands, and I was about to tell her that I recognized her call sign, but then the young man beside her cleared his throat. The name lt. chén was stitched onto his uniform.
“This is Jiang Chén—better known as CrazyJi,” Whoadie said. “He’s Chinese, and doesn’t speak much English.”
Chén smiled and shook my hand. He had spiky red hair that obscured the right half of his face, but the look seemed to work for him. Chén glanced down at the QComm strapped to his right wrist, where a string of Mandarin characters were appearing on his display. It must’ve been translating what Whoadie had said, because after Chén read over them, he looked up and gave me an exhausted smile.
“Hell-oh,” he said with a thick accent. “It goo to mee you.”
“It’s good to meet you, too,” I replied slowly. “I know your call sign well, CrazyJi. Yours too, Whoadie. We’ve flown lots of missions together. It’s an honor to finally meet you in person.” I stood up and held out my hand. “I’m Zack—also known as IronBeagle.”