The robot's lights move around, looking off into the distance. I've gotten pretty good at reading him, but sometimes I wish he could communicate like normal, that his vocabulary could expand beyond the words of "Danger," "no," "friend," and "Will Robinson." Don't get me wrong, he's the most loyal friend I've ever had. There's just some limitations in our robot-human relationship.
"We're obviously way off course if the only radar signature we could pick up is from the Fortuna," Vijay says from across the garage, sitting on a stack of crates. "So how are we ever gonna get to Alpha Centauri?"
I turn to him and say what I know we're both thinking, "We're officially lost in space."
Back on the ice planet, we knew we were lost. Of course we knew. An imperfect goldilocks planet wasn't on the list of pitstops in the Alpha Centauri brochure; in fact, there were no pitstops. The difference between then and now is that there were other people, other Jupiters, out there that gave us hope for survival. Now, there's no one else to depend on, no other ships --
"That's it!" I exclaim, making Vijay jump in his seat.
"W-what's it?" he asks.
"The Fortuna! It could be our ticket out of here. even if it doesn't have a lot of fuel, it might have oxygen, or rations, or maybe even a map of where we are."
"No, Will Robinson," the robot butts in.
My face scrunches up in confusion.
"Danger, Will Robinson."
"He's right," Vijay adds, "how are we gonna get over to the Fortuna without putting the Jupiter in a highway of debris?"
I never thought of Vijay to be smart. I mean, obviously he's smart enough to make it into the colony program, but I never thought of him being smart enough to think his way through a problem. No offense, but he's friends with Penny. I was expecting a sarcastic remark before a logical contribution to my solution.
He looks at me from across the garage, bouncing his leg up and down. "Sorry, was that the wrong thing to say?"
"No, no, you're right," I shake my head, moving towards the ladder up to the ground level, "But I'm not giving up on The Fortuna. We just need to put our heads together with my sisters. They'd never let the guys come up with everything," I joke.
Vijay smirks at my attempt at saying something funny for once before looking down at his com.
"Judy, what do you think you're doing?" Penny's voice comes through in a panic.
Me and Vijay exchange a confused look
"I'm getting off my ass." Judy replies, out of breath.
"Shit," Penny mutters under her breath, "that is not what I meant."
"Guys, what is going on up there?" I ask through my com.
"Judy is outside the cockpit window," Penny says.
YOU ARE READING
Hidden By Shadows - The Untold Stories of Penny Robinson
Science FictionPenny Robinson has spent her entire life trying to live up to the world renowned legacies her family members have made for themselves. Her mother, an aerospace engineer that built spaceships to travel across an entire galaxy. Her father, a military...
