A ship crashed

I was leaning back in the pilot's chair of this one man transport trying not to think about why I was traveling alone. I looked at the bottle of pills with no label.

I sighed suppressing the urge to drink again as I stuffed the old school bottle into my pack. I had gotten from a definitely grey job I had been asked to do. No idea what they were, but I still remember exactly how it went down.

I was a teacher in one of the kingdom's schools, my job? It was to convince the young people to join the navy by just telling of my glorious stories.

It was the last job I wanted but it was my punishment. After an order I refused to follow; The bombardment from orbit with our fighters. It would have killed me and every other pilot that would have done it as the fighters were not meant for atmospheric flight.

So I took the blame for disobeying orders saving the lives of every one of the other pilots.

Consequently one of those very same pilots came to me years later with a secret mission.

"Come on Captain, I chose you because I know I can trust you. This was the queens command to me, to find the most trustworthy person to take on this task; And that is you." My old Second. He had followed me helping keep the rest of the pilots in line for my entire time in the navy.

"I'm not your Captain anymore, don't go dragging up old nostalgia trying to get me to do this. It's ****."

He sighs. "It's not ****. I promise. The guy is on board a ship slated for decommission and wont resist."

That caused me to pause. Decommission? I knew what that meant.

How does one ensure that the weapons on an old battleship don't end up in the hands of pirates scrappers or the other likes. Well it was to put the ship in a system by itself and let it fall into the sun.

Now what was this guy the government wanted dead already on a ship destined to die. They knew this but they were sending someone anyways just to ensure this guy dies?

I sighed. "Fine, I'll do it."

I didn't want to, but the benefits were great. I didn't have to brainwash the kids into joining the navy anymore. They even gave me a free ship that I'd be able to use to travel the stars.

He passed me a hard case. "Just put his brain in here, I'll meet you after it's done and you'll be free to go."

A simple task it was. Made even more simple by the fact the guy was in the brig of the ship. He even looked to be expecting me.

He didn't say anything until after I opened the case. "So, what do you see here?"

"I'm not here to talk to you." I said back simply.

He chuckled in good humor despite his impending **** either by me or by the star in a few days.

"I see an empty room. What do you see?"

I humored him, he wasn't actually resisting. Even sticking his head between the bars so I might as well. "I see a man behind bars waiting for me."

Then I saw his smile. It was a familiar smile. The one I gave myself many times in the mirror as I tried to cheer myself up. "Ah, yeah. But me? These bars don't exist."

I looked pointedly at his hand gripping the 'non-existent' bars.

He noticed my gaze and chuckled. "Hey, humor me. Take off your glove and try and grab the bar."

I shouldn't have listened to this crazy man but I did.

Only when my bare hand passed through the bar did I start to question why I was here. A man kept in an illusionary prison destined to be crashed into the sun... And I was here to ensure he was dead. Not only that but this ship... It was a perfectly functioning ship, could definitely have been used for a few more decades at least.

"Ya, see? It's not real. But I am trapped all the same." Experimentally I put my glove back on and found I could grab these metal bars.

"Your suit, it has sensors inside it. Convincing you of the illusion by making it solid." I am definitely ditching this flight suit next chance I get.

He whispered as I brought out the tool for extracting the brain.

"Hey, I know you won't question me. But can you do me a favor?" He held out a paper towards me. Not the tablet electronic things that were common now. But an actual paper. "Don't look at it now. Later, after you leave."

That wasn't all though he was also holding out to me a small bottle with no label.

I pocketed the paper as I looked into the bottle spotting countless pale red disk shaped pills. "Think of it like my last words." The smile on his face changed to a sad one but he didn't say anything about the pills.

I quietly held up the bottle. But he shoot his head and tapped his ear indicating that people were listening. So I just stuffed it into another pocket.

Not a moment outside of the star's gravity I was intercepted by a giant ship. Absolutely massive. Definitely a state of the art destroyer.

He really was waiting for me.

I hated seeing my old friend right then. I had just killed a man for him and he was acting like it was just fine when he met me in the hanger.

Luckily passing off the hard case was simple. Even if it was filled with heavy weight of emotions.

"Don't ask me for anything again." I told him as we turned away from each other.

That man on the ship... He was black ops. The kind of people that they drop on a planet before a landing so they can clear a safe landing zone. And they do it all by themselves.

They were more myth than anything. As a captain in the navy I only ever heard rumors of them. A super soldier who could slaughter an entire station by themselves.

Back on my ship I shuddered. I hated the navy even more now. They weren't decommissioning the ship, they were decommissioning him and using the ship as the cover for it.

But now that I was on my way and flying I pulled out the paper he gave me.

Then I choked, on it was a picture of some cute twins. The two girls were cute and the photo was taken a while ago so they looked young but they should be older now. The words on the bottom made me realize it was his daughters.

"Emmy and Emma - My cute daughters."

That was how I got back into drinking.

There were no 'last words' like he said. But I felt like I owed it to the girls to at least let them know about their old man.

So I had set a course for them in my new ship.

I was taking the scenic route by a blue ball of water for a planet when it happened.

The massive shaking then the red lights and the buzzing alarm.

It was a bit fuzzy from the blow to the head I took but I saw through the cracked monitor to the external camera a second flaming fireball following me down as I crashed to the planet below.