No. From here on. If you’ve got the first shuttle, it’s Porter. So when you’re piloting shuttle one, the call sign is Porter Tigress. Second shuttle is Sherpa. Magellan’s call sign is Navigator. Got that?
Got it.
Today you’ll be piloting Porter. They handle differently, but we ‘II start with Porter. The board’s live. You ‘ve got ten minutes before you start the prelaunch checklist. You take her through delock and stand off, and I’ll give you orders from there.
Stet.
Forced myself to run through the system specs first. Got more than a few surprises. The shuttle had an empty gross mass of fifty metric tons. Most shuttles ran less than thirty. It was also stressed to fifteen standard gravs—more like an air combat flitter. Except its exterior was barely lifting body shape, if that. Next surprise was that the AG drives weren’t shuttle drives. More like full-scale small ship AG drives. Could have piloted the shuttle from the surface of any Tellurian planet and halfway across any standard system with them. Third was the power of the photon-thrusters. Shuttle one was more like a small in-system cargo ship—an armed one stressed for atmospheric and planetary landings. Braun’s idea about a lost colony made more sense. Doubted we’d find an ancient artifact. No one had in thousands of years.
Went on to touch and check every control on the board. The armaments I didn’t know. Finally, I linked. Don’t know the armaments section.
We didn’t expect you would. We’ll do afam exercise on those this afternoon. You ready?
Ready.
Called up the checklist and started through it.
Locks… closed.
Ship-grav… off.
Fusactors… online.
Finally reached the end. Seemed to take forever. Always did.
Navigator Control, this is Porter Tigress, ready for delock and release this time.
Porter Tigress, dampers released. Cleared for delocking. Use minimal power.
Navigator Control. Porter Tigress, delocking this time. Had to rough-calc the power on the shuttle. Was used to something fifty percent the mass of the Porter shuttle. Could tell I’d overdone it and had to overbrake. Knew it was simmie, but the farscreen feeds jolted me. Simulation showed the Magellan as huge, bigger than most orbit stations, close to two kays in length, and close to half a kay in diameter—and smooth. No hull projections at all— sign of a high-speed real-space requirement.
Porter Tigress, vector two four zero, relative Magellan course line, inclination minus twenty-seven.
Navigator Control, understand vector two four zero, inclination minus twenty-seven. No objective in screens. Interrogative time to destination. Wasn’t about to go charging off without knowing where, or how fast.
Wait one, Porter Tigress.
In the simmie, abruptly, an object appeared in the long-range farscreen—a rocky asteroid. Range was a good ten thousand kays. I blinked. Ninety-eight hundred. What the frig was Morgan doing? Asteroids didn’t have that kind of relative motion. Frig! I was operating off a ship with high relative motion, not a geostationary satellite.
Porter Tigress, rendezvous with and take station on target.
Navigator Control, understand rendezvous and take station. Had scramble to get a relative motion plot and calculation. Sort of thing that can scramble your brain, because where it would be when I got the shuttle there was effectively “below” and “behind” the Magellan. Did a quick power calculation—and froze. Ran it again, quickly. Navigator Control, Porter Tigress. Power reserves insufficient for return from target. Interrogative dust density.
Dust density insufficient for photon scoops. Scrub target alpha this time.
Scrubbing alpha.
Target beta at zero five zero, inclination plus forty five. Interrogative rendezvous.
Beta was possible. With the relative motion, I wouldn’t need as much power on return.
Navigator Control, rendezvous possible, with one-half stan on station.
Porter Tigress, commence rendezvous.
Commencing rendezvous this time.
Gave the thrusters a full jolt, calibrated fine as I could. Corrections take more power than doing it right first. Shuttle was slow to respond, slower than it should have been. Didn’t match mass specs. Ran diagnostics, and found a twenty percent loss in conversion from the right fusactor. Shouldn’t happen on a new shuttle, but Morgan wanted to play games. Cross-equalized power flows.
Made rendezvous in fifteen standard minutes, after one farscreen failure and loss of internal grav. I was dripping sweat.
Went through five different kinds of track-and-rendezvous problems.
Porter Tigress, return Navigator this time.
Stet. Returning Navigator this time.
Made a low-power controlled approach. Shuttle had too much mass to risk high-power quick mass-thrust decel and brake. Like I figured, converters acted up, but I managed to lock with only an extra tenth grav impact, within damper parameters. Went through the postlock shutdown. Made sure I did it step by step. Deliberate. You have to when you’re tired, or you’ll screw up something.
That’s all for now. Morgan’s voice came through the links. Unstrap and come on out.
Back of my vest was soaked. Pulled it away from the skintights before I opened the hatch and stepped out into the training bay.
Morgan looked up from the console. “Not bad.” He nodded.
He was doing his duty. Still wanted to swat him. He couldn’t have managed what he’d done to me. Almost laughed, then. He knew it. That was why he was backup. “Just hope that we don’t have to do some of that for real.”
“So do I, but those kinds of stresses get you a better feel faster.”
Commander was right about that.
He motioned to Braun. She was talking to a tech. She nodded to the man and walked toward us. Her eyes raked me. “You look like shit.”
Didn’t want to talk about it. “How was the medical?”
“Star-class plus. Diagnostics want to know about every cell in your body, and how it got that way. They’re way too personal.”
“Always are.”
She laughed, like a low growl.
“Lieutenant Chang, off to medical, then get something to eat. Sixteen hundred and you’ve got another session.” Morgan looked up from the console again. Realized he was sweating. Glad to see that. He’d made me work hard enough.
“Yes, sir.”
He looked away from me. “Lieutenant Braun. Into the simulator.”
“Yes, sir.”
Kept the smile off my face. Braun’d learn quick enough.
11
Fitzhugh
Security agent Herrit hurried me from the orbit elevator to the Comity Diplomatic Corps courier so swiftly that all I recalled was a blur of maroon-and-blue corridors and artificial light. When I stepped into the lock, Herrit stood back and guarded it. In my judgment, that was more to remind me that, despite my background, he was the one responsible for my safety. Once the courier lock had closed, and the vessel departed the station toward a destination still occluded from my comprehension, I was more than certain I would become another anonym in his long line of assignments.