Fake. I hadn’t considered that, but now I found myself anxious. “Are you sure?”

“I’d spot any edits. Would you like to watch it?”

“Yes.”

No.

“Then climb out.”

“Climb out?”

“My holoprojector can emit a small version of the battle for you to watch.”

I heaved myself out of the cockpit, scratching Doomslug on the head—she’d moved to the nose of the ship—and dropped with a thump to the rocky floor.

A battle appeared in front of me. When Cobb watched us fly, everything was painted with bold colors—bright red and blue ships. M-Bot instead projected the ships in exacting miniature. They flew in waves before me, so real that I couldn’t stop myself from reaching out and touching them—which broke them into granular particles of something that wasn’t quite light.

The Krell appeared next, looking even more unfinished than they did now. Less regular. Wires hanging out at odd angles, wings that had rips in them, patchwork creations of metal. My little cavern became a battlefield.

I sat down and watched in silence. M-Bot’s holoprojector didn’t produce sound. Ships went up in flares of muted death. They flew like gnats without wings or buzz.

I knew the battle. I’d been taught it, memorized the tactics employed. Watching, however, I felt it. Before, I’d imagined the great maneuvers as, against the odds, forty human fighters faced down two and a half times that many enemies. I’d pictured a bold defense. Bordering on desperation, but always in control.

Now that I was a pilot though, I could feel the chaos. The haphazard pace of the battle. The tactics seemed less grand—no less heroic, but far more improvised. Which actually raised my opinion of the pilots.

It went on for quite a while—longer than any of Skyward Flight’s skirmishes had gone—and I picked him out easily. The best fighter in the bunch, the one who led the charges. It felt arrogant to think I could single out my father’s ship from the crowded mess, but there was something about the way he flew…

“Can you identify the pilots?” I asked.

Little readouts appeared above each ship, listing callsigns and designations.

HOPE SEVEN, the ship’s label read. CALLSIGN: CHASER.

Arrogant or not, I’d called it accurately. Despite myself, I tried again to touch his ship, and found tears in my eyes. Fool girl. I wiped them as my father fell in with his wingmate. Callsign: Mongrel. Cobb.

Another ship joined them. Callsign: Ironsides. Then two more I didn’t recognize. Callsigns: Rally and Antique. Those five were all that remained of my father’s initial flight of eight. The battle casualties were very high; what had begun as forty ships was now twenty-seven.

I stood up and walked after my father’s ship as it swooped through the cavern. The First Citizens fought frantically, but their bravery bore fruit as they drove the Krell back. I knew they would—yet still found myself watching breathlessly. Ships exploded as little flashes. Lives spent to found what would become the first stable society and government on Detritus since the Defiant had crashed here.