Zinovia Gagarin

Zinya squinted her eyes against the sun as she lifted her shades to get a better look at the ship. Really, though, the squinting was more her own fault than the sun's: last night's liaison had been a little more...enthusiastic than anticipated, and she'd gotten just about two hours of sleep the previous night. Military training a few years in the war meant that she was firing on all turbines despite the lack, but even with the help of four cups of coffee, she still couldn't get her goddamn pupils to contract like they should.

The ship herself was a real beauty. New, well maintained: any pilot's dream. And if she didn't exactly look graceful, well, no freighter really did, and Zinya's practiced eyes could spot the poise and elegance that lay under the bulky, practical exterior.

Zinya chastised herself, Look at me, poring over the ship as though I had some kind of choice. While there was, strictly speaking, a choice, it wasn't any sort of real one: Zinya had been planet bound for nearly a month following a disagreement with her previous employer involving employee "perks", and even though she was good on credits, she was desperate to get her feet of the filth ground-pounders called the earth and back on some proper deck plating, with nothing between her and the Black but a few feet of metal.

She approached the apparent captain and introduced herself before setting down to fill out his paperwork.