Captain Severas watched the particle blasts deflected away by the front shields. Enemy fighters swooped in for a frontal attack, cut short by plasma cannon fire from a defense turret. The Hand of Misery seemed invulnerable.
A communications officer signaled to the Captain "The Lord's Eagle has taken off. ETA 4 minutes." Would four minutes be enough time thought Severas.
The Emperor's shuttle craft would travel for only a few seconds before warning lights flashed across the main viewing screen. A surface to orbit missile fired from a hidden bunker intercepted the Lord's Eagle. It spun back towards the the surface of Optima, the pilot unable to control the damaged craft.
Captain Severas turned to the technical officer seated to his right. "I need a full damage report. Get the readouts online and calculate the remote alignment check." Technical Officer Hawkins looked at his control console. Glowing screens, colored buttons, dials, and rows of blinking lights. His focus swept across the panel.
"I...I don't..." Hawkins ran his fingers through his hair and pulled at his scalp. Panicked, he yelled "I don't know how to do any of those things!"
The Captain turned to his left. "Officer McClure, I need you to realign the stabilizer beams. Calculate the orbital decay and adjust the polarity generators to compensate."
"Yes, sir!" Officer McClure saluted. He then went back to surfing Facebook.
Captain Severas stood up an leaned on the railing overlooking the crew pit. He turned to his right again.
"So many buttons..."Hawkins was brushing his hand across the console. "None labeled..."
Yelling into the pit, Severas pointed at a random crew member. "What's our 4th degree heading?" Ensign Maryweather looked up.
"Oh..I don't know. I just turn these knobs when people are looking at me. You want to speak to Ensign Johnson".
The Captain didn't know who to direct his attention to, not knowing any crew members by name. Or by their rank. In fact, he was certain that at least half were stowaways who found the officer's coat closet.
"Johnson!" He pointed towards no one in particular in the crew pit. "What's our 4th degree heading relative to the impact vector of the Lord's Eagle?"
It was silent for a bit. Ensign Johnson looked up when he realized that everyone was staring at him. "Oh...the what?"
Captain Severas sighed. "Are you serious? You don't know what the impact vector is?"
"Oh, yeah I know what that is. It's the...Lord's Eagle...what's that?"
Severas' mouth hung open. He seemed dismayed. "You don't know the name of the Emperor's shuttle?"
A pause while it sank in. "Oh...you mean the Lord's Eagle. Sorry. You didn't italicize it."
The Captain took a deep breath while the rest of the crew became interested in something outside the front window. Except for Hawkins, still staring at his console. "The red ones flash, but the green ones stay on..."
Johnson relaxed. "Yeah, all spacecraft names need to be in italics.."
There was a sudden gasp of panic from crew as the Hand of Misery crashed through the third wall.
As the author of this story, I'd like to apologize if there's a giant spacecraft in your living room.