Winterborn

[Blighter]

[font=Palatino Linotype][color=#999999]I[color=#99AA99]t came, later. Repeatedly. But always with some boundaries which I wasn't to cross, lest I wanted to risk pissing-off my superiors and be barred from flying. But I progressed further and the little trips went to become longer ones, to the point of that the next year, on my birthday, my instructor had managed to arrange for something special. Given my, as he would later say, natural talent and outstanding grades, it was the reward for all the hard work I had invested, all the countless times I had kept my temper in check against my nature.

My first inter-system flight. From New Berlin to Stuttgart. To Baden-Baden. Home.

It was just as wonderful as the first time I had left Berlin and gazed into space, albeit obviously different. With my instructor flying lead, we took the trade-lanes, we passed the stations, the people busily wandering from A to B, the Rheinland Military and Federal Police patrols, we even got to see some of the Military's mightiest and biggest ships maneuver around Stuttgart as we were waiting for our spot in the cue to Baden-Baden.

Can you imagine the look on my parents' faces as we finally arrived so unexpected?

It was shocking, unexpected like I said, and a really big surprise to them. Of course during my by-then three years on Berlin there had been visits, vacations, times I had seen them, but the last thing they had expected was their daughter come visit them as a real pilot, not like their little girl. I remember my father just staring at me in a combination of shock and awe while my mother could barely keep herself from quietly laughing as she stood behind him. But they were happy to see me nonetheless of course.