Chapter 4 – Never Judge a Book

Priloe hadn’t thought he’d be able to sleep, but no sooner had he closed his eyes, his alarm rang, dragging him awake.

“Time to get up, Mouse.” He sprang from the bunk and sat back next to his sister, rolling her over gently. “I’ve a big day.”

Twenty minutes later, after juice and meal bars, they made their way to the bridge, where Silver was already up. Priloe slid into the engineering station he’d occupied most of the trip.

“Front and center today, Priloe,” Silver corrected as Milenette ran up to greet her. She accepted a hug with a smile and brushed the back of her hand along the little girl’s cheek. “If you’re going to sail, you need to be in a pilot’s chair.”

Priloe didn’t need any prompting and leapt out of his seat to make his way into the port-side pilot’s chair. The seat adjusted to his smaller body by raising the seat pan and squeezing the sides in.

Initiate ore-sled training simulation, Silver requested. The ship’s AI processed the command and promptly projected holographic images around his seat to provide a close approximation of an ore-sled. His own AI utilized the HUD on his suit to further the depth of the experience.

Priloe looked around the cockpit of the General Astral T120 ore-sled. Twin blue vid-screens glowed against the forward bulkhead. Beneath his left hand a T-Handled lever emerged from his chair’s armrest. The vid screens jumped to life, displaying his hand grasping the virtual lever and moving it back and forth on the port-side screen. On the starboard screen, an ore-sled surged ahead and slowed down as it flew in the middle of a group of similar sleds.

“Stay with your squadron,” the AI instructed.

The small group of sleds accelerated forward, virtual red arrows stretched backwards from each sled, growing in size. Priloe pushed forward on the handle shrinking the red arrows as they disappeared into the tails of the sleds. As he continued forward, green arrows pointing in the opposite direction grew from the sleds. He initially ignored the information and caught up. Unfortunately, he had such a head of steam he ran over the top of the sled in front of him. As he pulled back on the handle he feathered the control, forward and back, until the arrows disappeared entirely.

For several minutes, Priloe chased the squadron.  He quickly realized the length and direction of the arrows were relative to his speed and direction when compared to his target’s. It didn’t take him long to develop a feel for the differences.

“That’s good, Priloe.” Silver stepped into his field of view, standing atop one of the sled’s doors. He’d become so engrossed in the exercise that her presence was jarring. “Would you like to guess what the arrows represent?”

“How much faster the other ships are going?”

“That’s your delta-v. To fly in formation, you need to achieve zero delta-v. It becomes more difficult when you’re controlling multiple vectors, but you’ll discover that soon enough. Any questions so far?” she asked.

Priloe thought about what she’d explained and wrinkled his forehead. “How can there only be one delta-v if there are multiple vectors.”

“At any one point in time, without any additional acceleration, you are moving on a single vector. Same is true with every other single object that exists. The delta-v is that perfect acceleration in exactly the right direction that causes you to head exactly the same direction at the same speed,” Silver explained.

“Sounds hard.”

“It’s a skill you’ve been practicing your entire life, Priloe.”

“No way.”

Pause simulation, Silver requested. “Millie, would you be a dear? Would you run from your brother? Now Priloe, I’d like you to gently tag your sister and then come back and talk to me.”

Milenette looked at Priloe and a mischievous grin popped onto her face as she screamed and ran from her chair, sprinting as fast as her chubby little legs would carry her. Priloe allowed her a few seconds and took off after her, catching her in the hallway. He gently lifted her from the ground, then tickled her all the way back, finally presenting his prize to Silver.

“I guess I never thought of it that way,” Priloe said. “Did you tell my AI to display the red and green delta-v tell-tales behind Milenette?”

“Wouldn’t be much of a teacher if I missed an opportunity like that. Now get back to work. We’re only six hours from Descartes and if you keep at it, I might let you sail Sterra’s Gift.”

Priloe didn’t need to be prompted further. As he worked, the simulations became steadily more difficult, first adding the flight stick and finally the variations on the sticks. As the hours quickly ticked away, he realized that while he could certainly maneuver an ore-sled, it would take him hundreds of hours to gain any level of mastery with the machine.

It was well into the second part of the day when Sterra’s Gift’s engines spooled down, a clunky shifting of gravity that caused his stomach to lurch as they finally dropped from hard burn. The simulation he’d been working on cut off. Gracefully, Sterra’s Gift tumbled one hundred eighty degrees.

“Feels funny, no more backwards,” Milenette complained. Priloe knew what she was saying was merely the effect of having spent the last ninety or so hours decelerating, which, after all is just accelerating in the opposite direction of your initial heading.

“We’re actually going forward, mouse,” Priloe explained pointing at the slowly growing field of rocks that stretched as far as his eye could make out.

“This will help,” Silver said and pressed her throttle control forward, gently pushing them back into their seats for a few seconds. “You’re right, of course, Priloe, but try telling that to your body when you don’t have many hours in space.”

He agreed. He had been feeling the same thing Milenette was, but wanted to make sure Silver knew he knew better.

“No matter where you live, Priloe, there’s no better feeling than coming home. Welcome to Descartes,” she said. “Would you like to run us in?”

“Yes.” Priloe jumped at the idea. “How? Where?” He had no idea where they were going.

Display navigation path to Descartes Co-Op. Silver requested. A blue line stretched out in front of the ship, obviously a projection of his HUD.

“Do what you’ve been doing all day and we’ll make it just fine,” Silver said. Her voice was calm and reassuring. Priloe felt that she might be displaying more serenity than she felt, but he was so thrilled to have the opportunity, he wasn’t about to question it.

A physical throttle handle and flight stick emerged from his pilot’s chair and the palms of his hands broke into a sweat as he grabbed on. He gently adjusted the throttle and was surprised by the large ship’s immediate response.

He held himself rigid in the pilot’s chair, unable to believe she was actually giving him controls. One wrong move could kill them all. It was nuts. He’d certainly wrecked the ore-sleds enough times, but now he was playing for keeps.

“Nice and easy,” Silver soothed as they approached the first in a series of turns. “You’re tense, you need to relax, no different than the sled simulation. You need to have faith in your training.”

Priloe over-adjusted as he entered the turn and then pushed it back too hard. The big ship was nowhere near as responsive as the ore-sled. He’d have to make smaller adjustments and wait for the ship to respond and even predict the adjustments. By the third maneuver, he’d smoothed out the turn, only over-shooting slightly and bringing it back into line. He’d purposefully bled off much of his speed so he’d have more time to adjust. He dared a glance at Silver who seemed to be letting him figure things out.

“Almost there,” she said. “Can you see the Co-Op?”

“Uh,” Priloe’s eyes followed the navigation path to its terminus. “Yes. I see it!”

“Bring us in, nice and slow.”

As he continued, his tunnel vision diminished and he recognized the red and green tell-tales on the multitude of objects in his visual range. As he focused on an object, the tell-tales became more prominent, disappearing as he looked away.

At the end of the road, a miniscule docking bay appeared in the side of the shoe-shaped rock. “We’ll never fit!” he exclaimed as he pulled back, slowing the ship to what felt like a crawl.

“Perhaps for another day, then?” Silver asked.

“Yes. Please.”

Silver re-took control of the ship and throttled up, pressing Priloe back into his seat. The speed at which she approached seemed insanity. The asteroid grew in the armored-glass and just as he thought it couldn’t get any worse, she swung the bow of the ship around and slid into the docking bay, with thrusters alight. Priloe had hands on his head as he watched the tell-tales on the station grow and shrink irrationally. At the last moment, they all zeroed out and he looked around, fully expecting to hear the sound of the ship crunching into the rock they’d insanely approached.

“And, we’re down,” Silver said, still holding Milenette in her lap.

“Again, again,” Milenette clapped.

“You’re crazy,” Priloe whispered.

“Final lesson for the day. Never judge a book…”