Author: Iain Macleod

Orbital mechanics was never my thing but this’ll be the last time I ever have to do the math so it’s all good. Unnamed asteroid floating in the belt around dwarf planet Estera is traveling at X velocity and ill be traveling at top speed once I pass the station at Esperia LaGrange one which means I’ll have to start my death playlist when I’m 138000km out so that I hit that mother fucker during the high point of Wild One by Suzi Quatro and leave this fuckin’ world behind for good. It was a toss-up between that or Jawbreaker by Cruel Intentions. Both fuckin ace songs.

Sweet. Coords plotted, autopilot programmed and whiskey poured.

What most people don’t know about this particular asteroid is that it’s loaded with the highly profitable and very extremely unstable substance Lithiterium, known to you and me as cold gold or to the soulless bloodsucking corp that took over this system as cash fucking money.

Engines firing full blast feels like being pushed back into the seat hard and is still a hell of a thrill after all these years. Guess I never grew up. G forces ease up as we reach max velocity and I hit play. Monster by Reckless love. Volume up volume up volume up. Knock back the whiskey and pour another.

Picture of Kate, my kid, above the main control panel. She died about two years ago after the corp refused our insurance. Twenty-three fucking years I worked for those bastards. A pre-existing condition they said, as if the lung condition she and half the population had wasn’t directly related to the pollution they pumped into the atmosphere. I tried taking it to court. They fired me then sued me and won. I tried appealing, they bought the court and it went nowhere. I tried to kill some executives but I couldn’t even get near them. Guess I can’t hit them directly but I can cost them a fuck lot of money and go out with a bang. ZZ Top blares out of the speakers, fuckin’ legends.

The emergency override light starts blinking. I disconnected the actual overrides from the nav circuits before I even left orbit, but the light coming on is a nice reassurance that my math ain’t wrong.

Knock back the last whiskey. Picture of Kate in my hand. Suzi Q fucking blasting out of the speakers.

I’m the wild one, motherfuckers.