The Caussade Project (Completed)

[moondust]

Brigitte was stepping out of her small vessel.
She was irritated, not for the first time, the reason for this was that she had to wait for a long time to dock. “Damned construction workers, don’t they ever rest”, she thought.
Before she made the request to dock she pushed on a digital chronometer to start measuring the time for how long the docking procedure would take. Too long, much too long. So, now she was docked, the next thing what she had to do was searching for the cargo master.
“Cargo master!” she yelled, “Mon Dieu, cargo master, où es-tu, where are you? Can’t you see that I am in a hurry, vite, vite!
A middle aged man with a beard came to Brigitte and gave her a sign that she had to be very, very careful now. With a hissing voice he said, “Être silencieux, be quiet! Don’t think that you will get any priority here. Can’t you see that there are more vessels waiting to be unloaded?”
Brigitte’s left eye started to blink and wanted to say something. She knew it, she was a hot tempered woman, “Do what you have to do. I shall wait”, she snapped.
Time for a cigarette. From the inside of her jacket she took a small blue package of Gauloise cigarettes and fired one. Directly after the first inhaling she calmed down.

She knew from other members of the Maquis that there were already plans send for the making of a bigger docking station, a dry dock, that could even supply and repair vessels like gunboats or even bigger.
“But how can we get everything here in a reasonably time? And if I am right, the capacity to unload vessels take weeks. Certainly when he is doing it, looking at the middle aged man with the beard.
We don’t have any recourses to do it.”
And even if we had, the flight is long and full of danger. Nothing protect us, there aren’t even signal jammers or devices which slow down enemy fleets here and the minefield isn’t any more how it was before. The sun is eating the armor all the time.

She looked at the middle aged man with the beard again.
“Ay, careful with that! Can’t you read? There is very explosive stuff inside this crate, mon ami.” She pointed with her hand which hold the cigarette to the sign at the crate. “You know what this mean, don’t you?”
The middle aged man with the beard dropped the crate and was at the point to hit Brigitte but she was faster and draw some kind of a side arm which was hanging on her hips.
“Non, non, non, mon ami”. This was the last crate and I shall leave you now. I hope we will met each other in better times when your working place is bigger.”
She was already climbing into the cockpit and after the last inhale of the small cigarette she threw it into the direction of the explosive crate.
“Le sot, fool”, she though, “doesn’t he know that the crate was protected against heat?”

Brigitte asked for clearance of the dock so she could start the engine of her beloved rotten vessel.
“Ouvrez le port s'il vous plait, open the port please”.
A few moments later the air lock went open and she pushed the joystick from her so that the vessel started to move slowly toward the opening.
At last she was outside again, alone in the dark, feared in the dark and afraid to shoot strangers. But not afraid to shoot Gallics.
Her left eye started to blink again and her temper raises too.

“Here Brigitte”, she spoke trough the mic, “thanks for everything and see you next time.”
“Let you have only bright stars in front of you, my dear” the other side responded.