As most of her companions slept in their bunks, Alice wandered the Lincoln's systems all by her lonesome. Her body stayed in the R&D lab, so she didn’t have the comfort of being in it. While others were allowed to rest, she had to remain awake, in a way, separated from her own body. Even though she had unlimited access to the Lincoln’s computers, and had put numerous files of an embarrassing nature on Dr. Beil’s computer, sometimes she wanted to experience what sleep was like. So with nothing else to do while her friends slept, Alice found herself spending her time singing.
Since no one would be awake and around to listen and she had several hours to herself, Alice would simply sing to herself. Rather than words, she would sing through abstract vocalizations, gentle with calm melodies, the vocal quirk of her voice accenting her songs as it echoed and flanged with changes in pitch.
Suddenly, her song was interrupted by a tremble. Then another. She transported herself to the engineering deck just in time to see a hook pierced through the hull before the entire ship was instantly ripped out of hyperspace. The immediate transition disrupted Alice, leaving her unable to compute what had just happened for a few moments. When she recovered and realized the ship had literally been yanked from hyperspace, she was overtaken with curiosity.
Hyperdrives worked by shifting a ship into a contiguous dimension where the ship would be able to exceed the speed of light, then shift back to the original space at the desired destination. A ship outside of hyperspace shouldn’t be able to recognize where a ship was in hyperspace and where it was going, but here, the Coalition had not only launched grapples into hyperspace while still linked to their ship, but managed to hit their target in the dark, and yank it back into regular space! This would be even more incredible if it wasn’t so bad for the UEE.
While her mind raced about the possible tech the Coalition could be developing if they were able to create such a ship, a call for battle rang throughout the ship, and Alice had to race to her body. Quickly, she downloaded herself into her body and just as fast, met up with the rest of the 7th as they ran to the hangar. There, her White Rabbit stayed, though it’s repairs had not been finished. The most major damages to the hull had been rectified, but the rest of the scars from the previous battle spoiled the ivory armor, and only one of the shoulder launchers remained operable. Nevertheless, she climbed into thecockpit and transferred from her body to her MAS, booting up its systems before being launched into battle.
“Alice: Online and combat ready!”
In formation with the rest of the 7th, Alice examined the environment. “This is Jehan, a Coalition research colony! If they have technologies that can pull ships from hyperspace, there’s no telling what else they have!” She couldn’t help sounding more excited than she should have about the Coalition tech, especially the new MAS Gerard pointed out. “It must be experimental, like my Eagle.”
There’s only one way to find out.