A short bit from the WIP, since I’ve got nothing worthwhile to say today:

Fatman shivered, her metal groaning, as Zeerid pushed her through Ord Mantell’s atmosphere. Friction turned the air to fire and Zeerid watched the orange glow through the transparisteel of the freighter’s cockpit.

He was gripping the stick too tightly, he realized, and relaxed.

He hated atmosphere entries, always had, the long forty-count when heat, speed, and ionized particles caused a temporary sensor blackout. Back when he’d carted commandos in a Republic gully jumper, he and his fellow pilots had likened the blackout to diving blind off a seaside cliff.

You always hope to hit deep water, they’d say. But sooner or later the tide goes out and you go hard into rock.

Or hard into a blistering crossfire. Didn’t matter, really. The effect would be the same.

“Coming out of the dark,” he said.

No one acknowledged the words. He flew Fatman alone, worked alone. The only thing he carted anymore were illicit goods for The Exchange. And he tried hard not to think too much about it.

He leveled the ship off, straightened, and ran a quick sweep of the surrounding sky. The sensors picked up nothing.

“Deep water and it feels fine,” he said, smiling.