Bridget's Peace

Bridget looked out into empty space. “This has got to be it.”

“What, Bridget?” Melody Whitman, the ship’s Captain, was checking dials around the cabin.

“Absolute peace.”

“I think lack of gravity has gotten to your head. You know the sky is full of meteors, dieing stars, space junk, and who knows what else. No peace up here.”

“Melody, when did you stop enjoying this beauty?”

“Girl, I think it was the first time I released a package of space garbage to burn up in the atmosphere. We’re simply traveling through a giant, flushing galaxy.”

“Sorry, I asked.” Bridget pushed her glasses up on her nose and turned back to her scope. “Lord, of all the people in the universe, why did I get stuck with this one?” An arc suddenly appeared on Bridget’s screen. “Hey, Mel, we have some space dust ahead of us.”

“Shields up, let’s put’er tail to the wind, er the dust.” Melody skillfully made adjustments to the orbiting ship and watched her instruments as small rockets fired to make the maneuver. “That worked well.”

“Oh, oh, look to port now.”

“Cool. Wow, Bridget, that looks peaceful for sure.” Sparks from their adjustment were showering into the lower atmosphere. “But, unfortunately, it means we lost too much altitude and I’m not ready to crash land just yet.” Melody turned back to her controls pushed a button and a gentle thrust moved their ship further away from the planet’s gravitational pull. “I think another couple of orbits will be about right, then we can make our fiery entrance.”

Bridget stood with a clipboard in hand. “Which reminds me I have to record the inventory.”

Melody shook her head. “Why? Who are we going to report to? Another couple of days and poof, we’re cosmic dust, burned up in the atmosphere.”

“You worry me. Mel, just what makes you happy? Mere destruction and violence? We’ve been on this trip for ten weeks and I haven’t figured it out.”

Melody laughed. “Does it matter? We left a perfectly good, albeit temporary, planet, for this hair-brained scheme.”

“The planet was in shambles, you know that.” Bridget frowned. “It wasn’t a scheme.”

“Oh, you think borrowing this heap was a well-thought-out effort?”

“Better than the alternative. I think we were meant to be on that supply run and away from our world. Besides, the planet imploded.”

“So, we blast into the wilderness with a couple of ancient charts, just to put off the inevitable. And you want me to be delighted?”

“Ever thought about personal peace?”

“Hey, I kept us alive for, lets see, seventy clock days, that’s not bad.”

“Seventy more than home.” A tear ran down Bridget’s pale cheek. “I think we are blessed.”

Melody shook her head and turned back to the controls.

The ship finally eased into its orbital path and the two women fell into the routine they had developed over the two months they had traveled together.

After an extended silence, Melody asked, “Old religion?”

“Faith, Mel. Faith that God will take care of us; and if something should happen, we are still in His hands, delivered into His spiritual kingdom.”

“You believe all that?”

“With my whole heart.”

“Interesting. So, lets say, we live through this landing and there’s intelligent life on that planet below us. Are you going to tell them about this God person? ”

“Not God person, our God and He would be theirs, too. And, yeah, that’s what I’ll do.” Bridget smiled.

“And I suppose you brought your bible with you?”

“I always carry my personal bible. Would you like to see it?”

“Sure, we haven’t got much else to do until I pull the plug.”

Bridget glanced out the porthole as she got up to retrieve the bible. “What is that planet?”

“I honestly don’t know, the computer just said possible life support and oxygen; one moon; third planet in a series of a dozen or so orbiting an older star.”

Bridget handed Melody the small bible. “You can keep this.”

“You’re okay, Bridget. Maybe I can pick up some of your personal peace techniques.”

“I wouldn’t doubt it.”