Battlefield Terra -- chapter 8/?

There's no way it's going to fit on either dreamwidth or LJ -- okay, maybe DW, but god do I not want to redo the coding right now. Maybe later. In the meantime here it is:

"Locked in," John confirmed. "All green." At least all the necessary crap for shuttle-assisted flight.

"Warhammer, prepare for launch in five, four, three…"

They were skipping a dozen steps at least. No preflight check. The hangar guys had probably done one in the hangar while someone was summoning Jake; it still wasn’t supposed to be enough.

(Excalibur was giving no pilot response. Echidna and Masamune were dead in space.)

All the pilot survival stuff like oxygen and heat checked out. He would just wing the rest.

"… one, ignition.”

The rocket roared, sound muted by Warhammer’s seals, so that John knew more by vibration than noise. A half-second later he didn’t need to feel vibrations; he felt the kick in his chest, in his neck, where for a moment it seemed he had left his organs behind, down under.

He went through his instrument checkup routine, now that it was too late to stop.

chapter 8