2035 A.D.
"We don't have a choice! We've got to do it!"
"Come on, let's get ready."
"Are you sure we can do it? All 12 of us at the same time?"
"We have done it before – not to the same location, but we have all jumped at the same time."
"No, we haven't – we always stagger our jumps. Can she handle all of us at once?"
"Help me download everything. We need to bring the data with us. We can do that, yes?"
"But we've never gone forward. What if we end up nowhere?"
Sabine listened to the voices around her as they alternated between panic and steely determination. She realized questions were being directed at her and she struggled to snap out of the numbing fog enveloping her to answer.
"Yes, we can do all of us at the same time to the same location. You can download everything onto one of the keys – just hold onto it when we jump," she took a deep breath. "And maybe we end up nowhere….but it is better than a certain death here."
Quiet conversations stopped for a moment as she stood.
"We could put it to a vote," she suggested, only half-serious.
"Is bad time for humor. We live, you be funny," mumbled Tatyana as she brushed by, carrying her few belongings to her pod.
"We don't have time for this!" Jayesh looked around pleadingly. "We have to go now or we're going to end up like Resurrections III and V."
"Alright. Everyone, to your pods." Seiji had made his decision. He looked at Sabine. "Set the coordinates."
Sabine began to move briskly, setting the dials and adjusting the knobs at the main console to prepare for the jumps. She looked over at Adjoa. "How far should we go?"
"I do not know. Perhaps 200 years?" Adjoa's calm voice soothed her frazzled nerves.
Sabine took another deep breath; her lungs felt like they couldn't get enough air. She hurriedly punched the years into the panel.
"Two hundred years it is. Now where do we go?"
"Leave that to me," John replied from the console across from her. Sabine didn't think that was the best idea but there was no time to argue. She nodded warily at him.
"Don't worry – I'll choose a good spot."
"If it will even be there when we arrive," Sabine murmured. John shot her a pained look.
"Sabs…" he groped for the right words.
"Not right now. We don't have the time. Set our location and we leave." She glanced over at him and he looked down, focusing on the panel in front of him, no doubt pulling up a map to select their destination. He avoided her gaze, keeping his eyes on his screen.
"If we survive this, there will be plenty of time to talk about it. But do not send us to Mississippi, mmm? Pretty much like jumping to nowhere." She cracked a smile even though she wanted to cry or scream or collapse. He looked up at her and shook his head, smirking.
"Just had to get one last dig about my home in, didn't ya?"
"Easy target," she said softly. She felt the tears forming and shook them off.
"Come on, everyone. We're running out of time. They'll launch on us any second." Seiji shot a pointed look towards Sabine and John, who was leaving the console to get to his pod. He turned his attention to the rest of the crew. "Let's go, let's go."
"Captain, everything is ready," Sabine called out, grabbing the tablet to take with her into her pod. Seiji nodded at her to acknowledge that he'd heard. There was a final burst of commotion as everyone grabbed whatever they could to take with them on the way to their pods. Sabine thought for a moment about what she was leaving behind. Truthfully, the station didn't hold much so there wasn't a lot for her to grab. Maybe pictures? A book or two? Most of what she wanted was either in her mind or on the tablet.
English was the common language on the station but as she strapped in, Sabine said a quiet prayer internally, in her own tongue. «Mon dieu, quoi qu'il arrive, que cela réussisse» She had stopped believing in any god a while ago and yet, she would still find herself talking to some imaginary deity in her head during particularly stressful situations. If this didn't qualify as a stressful situation, nothing would.
Sabine looked around. Everyone was strapped in. Several of her crewmates looked at her, their eyes begging for a reassurance she couldn't and wouldn't give.
"Okay," she called out. "Here we go!"
Eleven other people braced themselves as Sabine flipped her tablet on and set it on the bar in front of her. She closed her eyes and placed her palms on the tablet's surface.
The pain seared through her.
All she could see was white light and then everything went black.
