Leaving Mother Earth

"Lucy, Honey!" Kamal rushed to meet his wife and children.

Lucy burst into tears with a smile and embraced her husband. Luka and Miska were the same, they hugged their parents.

"Are you all right?" Kamal asked his children.

"We're fine, honey," said Lucy.

Yuan Xi and Xian smiled looking at Kamal and his family. For both of them, knowing that Dharma was fine, even if it was just from his voice over the intercom, was already something good.

Two snow leopard cubs get special treatment. Even though Ely had protested, two men still took the cubs to a booth on the backside. These two cubs were placed separately in a special glass cage.

"Fraya, Guntur!"

Both, Fraya who was on the steps of the upper engine room, and Guntur who was in the lower engine room stopped their steps, followed by several fellow technicians.

"Make sure there are no tools and robots that will jeopardize our flight through Earth orbit."

In a hurry, Fraya and Guntur invited their colleagues to check the condition of the two engine rooms.

Time crawled very slowly in those fifteen minutes. There were no more shouts of joy, not even mere whispers of fear.

Nothing.

Every head now contains a million speculations, as well as fears about what they don't know. The tension in each other, even in the five people in the cockpit—including for Captain Dharma himself.

None of them have ever stepped into outer space. Those who were crew members only had experience with the simulations they often went through at Pangandaran castle. So, what kind of life would be waiting in the vast expanse above, they couldn't think of.

Dharma stands with his hands on his waist, face upturned, eyes closed. The next second, he patted Hyker on the shoulder who was silent looking at the FMGC monitor, a sign that they were ready to leave Mother Earth.

Five people in the cockpit are sitting on standby in their seats wearing oxygen masks.

"Life or death—" Dharma said quietly.

Hyker glanced briefly at the captain sitting to his right.

"—Will be at stake from here on." Dharma glanced at Hyker. The other three were equally silent at the captain's words. "I entrust our lives in your hands, Hyker."

Perhaps, this was the first time for the captain to see the twenty-six-year-old man showing such a serious expression.

Dharma touches the bar with the speaker logo on his screen. "If there's a time when you still believe in God—"

All the people in the passenger cabin were silent. Fraya and her colleagues, as well as Guntur and his colleagues, were already sitting in the room. They bowed their heads, either praying or suppressing the anxiety within.

"—Perhaps, it's time for you to pray for your safety and that of all of us."

The atmosphere inside the number 45 spacecraft was very quiet.

"Entering the Hypersonic System, in..." Hyker gave the signal, which meant that there was no longer a second to let his guard down. Not to Dharma as captain, not to the other three in there. Not until planes can take them out of Earth's atmosphere. "Five, four—"

"Aircraft muzzle shield, active!" said Pical who was sitting on the left behind Hyker, in between the main pilot's countdown. "Airframe shield, active!"

"—Three, two, here we go, one!"

The loud thud forced all of the spacecraft 45 passengers to hold their breath as the massive plane sped through the air, leaving a trail of loud buzzing sounds far behind.

"Entering the mesosphere!" said Quinn—23 years old, who was sitting right behind Captain Dharma. "Speed ​​increased by two percent!"

Upon entering the third layer of Earth's atmosphere, with an increase in the speed of the spacecraft, it produces an air explosion which is characterized by the formation of white vapor along the trail left by the spacecraft.

The vibrations in the fuselage became more intense. Even Boris and Cinnong shouted to dispel each other's tensions. Two or three of them, in the passenger cabin, could not withstand the vibrations. Dizziness and nausea, until they can not prevent vomiting.

Hyker didn't even move from watching the large FMGC monitor in front of him. The more so on the PFD panel. The moving record of the VSI became another serious concern for Hyker as the plane was moving vertically at high speed as they left the Earth.

"Three percent!" Quinn reported an increase in the plane's speed. "Five percent. Approaching the mesopause field!"

The two main GEU engines in the fuselage and four GEU engines—one at the bottom of the plane muzzle, under the wings, and at the rear side by side with the aft doors—are ten times smaller, firing more energy for a spacecraft speed higher.

"Ten percent!" Quinn said, keeping an eye on the monitor in front of her. "Entering the thermosphere zone!"

Another burst of airwaves occurred when the plane reached a hypersonic ten percent increase.

The higher they go through the thermosphere, the redder the plane's muzzle gets, as if they were breaking through a thick layer of fire. The same thing also happened on each side of the outer fuselage.

"Keep up at this speed, Hyker!" Dharma is quite satisfied with the speed of the plane.

There was nothing for Dharma to enjoy through the thick bulletproof glass that supported the front wall of the cockpit. It all seems blurry at this speed, he thought.

Dharma shifts his focus to the screen in front of him and hopes that not a single foreign object will interfere with their flight instead of the meteor rocks that can kill them all.

***

The fat lord was still standing where he was, in front of Captain Dharma's house. Dust and sand-covered part of his face and body. But he didn't care about it. Anger that is difficult to measure is still overshadowing him. His eyes that flashed like two very sharp swords watched the black dot in the red bandage above. Until he could no longer see the spaceship hijacked by Dharma, only then did he leave the area.

During his journey back to his castle, the ruler was silent. The veins in his eyes reddened. But he won't give up yet. At least, the Lord of Pangandaran had acquaintances of one or two important people in the Federation.

"You will receive the recompense for your betrayal, Dharma!" he muttered half inaudibly.

The chameleon, which is controlled by a robot, glides quickly over the surface of the sea along with two other chameleons that accompany it, also controlled by a robot each.

"You think you can just run away, huh? Bastard…!" the ruler even shouted while hitting the front of his chair hard.

TO BE CONTINUED ...