An orbit away, the Aerie was as silent as Cantimine was loud. Down to a single pilot, there truthfully wasn’t much for most of the staff to do; those whose job it was to monitor for singularities were, of course, working around the clock, and every brain in PR was hard at work spinning Quinn’s absence into positive news, but otherwise…

Well, Dahlia had a lot of time to train. And she had, extensively—excessively, according to Besca—but she knew there was no such thing as being [i]too[/i] prepared. Frankly, sometimes she doubted she was prepared at all. Complacency was poison to pilots, but so too was doubt, and for a time Dahlia thought she had found a comfortable balance between them. But then the attack had happened, and whenever she stepped into a sim, or connected to [i]Dragon[/i], all she could think about were the six Modir who had come to kill Quinn. 

She thought of it now, too, when she heard her voice. Always when she heard her voice. Panic, as sharp as the first time she’d stepped into the cockpit, squeezing her heart like a fist. It pushed her, gave her the drive she needed to rebuild, but sometimes it made her dull, made her glaze over details she shouldn’t miss. Like the tremble in Quinn’s voice. The relief was too much, mingled too excitedly with the fear, that she barely even heard the [i]words[/i].

“[color=skyblue]Great![/color]” she said, the response automatic as the rest of her caught up. “[color=skyblue]I wasn’t expecting you to call—I mean, I’m glad, I just didn’t know you could. Things are great here! Not because you’re gone or anything. Actually I guess in that way they’re kinda awful, but other than that we’re good! We’re great. We miss you a lot. Besca’s still working all the time but she misses you. She’s in a meeting right now, I think, but I can message her if you want, I know she’d…[/color]”

It hit her hard, suddenly, that Quinn was calling her. She was alive, yes, but Quinn had proven so far that she was pretty good at staying alive. It was the [i]living[/i] part that gave her trouble. There was a big festival happening in Cantimine, and Quinn was calling her. And there was, if she thought hard, a definite hitch in her voice. Something was wrong, and Dahlia could feel the brief moment of relief wither inside her throat. She sat down against the sim pod.

“[color=skyblue]How…[/color]” she started, coughed, tried again. “[color=skyblue]How, uhm, how are you?[/color]”