The White Knight

Epilogue : Kerbol Rise

The photo session is finally over.

Instead of coming down from that perch they were shoved into, they stayed there enjoying the scenery for some more minutes.

Bill : _ Nice view.

Jeb : _ Yeah...

Bill : _ Thanks for waking me up, I was going to miss this one. And thanks for the mission, I've dreamed of this beauty since the first prototype's maiden flight, and now we have one to call our own... Can't wait to fly her, besides being pretty sure it will be a boring mission...

Jeb : _ Don't mention it. I would not pick any other Engineer as my RSO*1

And after some minutes...

Jeb : _ Uh... And since we are here... It's better for us to eat something and take a nap. We fly today before lunch, and the mission will be a double Kerbin circumnavigation. I will fill you on the Mission Briefing...

Bill : _ Hummm... On a second thought, let me guess... You haven't found any other engineer willing to go with you... said Bill laughing.

Jeb : _ Well, I don't even bother to ask anymore.... Jeb replying laughing even harder.

Bill : _ I still have some beers left from the last "landing", I will ask Val and Will to wait for us with an esky*3 full of them when we land. I have the feeling that we'll probably make good use of them today.

Jeb : _ Definitively!

They lingered there for a few more minutes, absorbing that magnificent sunrise, standing atop one of the most fantastic aircraft ever built... When they felt some pebbles being thrown on their backs.

It was Gus, furious because he had to reopen the Runway for operations 15 minutes ago and he couldn't retrieve the White Knight with them standing up there.

(They had switched the intercom to private and forgot about)

*1 RSO : Reconnaissance Systems Officer, the dude on the back seat on a SR-71 Blackbird.
*2 Gus Kerman : head of the Space Program Operations.
*3 Esky : Australian slang for cool box (or ice box). I'm learning a bit of "Aussie" lately! 😊