Tenser said the tensor…
…but for now I’m not parodying Alfred Bester. Who do you think this one might be meant to be?
Angelica sat on the metal seat. Outside, Piotr paced back and forth as he negotiated the terms of their release, but it was unlikely that the orbiting forces were their true enemy now. A white flash near the horizon confirmed it, and Piotr came through the door at a run as the light faded through green and yellow to the purple of agonised, squirming space-time.
“They’re gone, Angelica.”
She looked at him, his skeletal figure in black, and the brutal prosthetics that he used for eyes. However terrible his experiences had been in the past, she knew that telling him the truth about what had just happened above the atmosphere would drive him further than he could bear. “I know. They didn’t stand a chance.”
“We have to get off-planet, but if they see us we won’t even make orbit.”
“They will have seen us already. Their instruments will have spotted the transponder from this system’s Oort Cloud.”
“Copacetic. So what now?”
“We hide in the ruins. If we’re lucky, they’ll just nuke us from orbit.”
Phew - that was a tough one. Any guesses?