NOVEL NEXT 19. Flying Burdens
The hum of the auxiliary power generator was comforting as I flipped the interior power on. Working the debris field had gotten old, to be sure, but the simple joy of preparing my ship for me to fly was untainted. I was reminded of just how far I had actually come from my days crawling around the docks of Macnair Gateway. I had a lot further I wanted to go, to be sure, but I had to give myself credit for what I had already accomplished.
Only a decade previous, the child I had once been would have never imagined that she would actually be flying her own ship and on the brink of so much more. As a child, I constantly felt I was staring into a black hole, just waiting for the oblivion to pull me in. Now, It felt like I was standing on the event horizon, ready to dive through a wormhole to the great beyond.
Having dressed in civvies to meet with the Ericksons, I stepped into the aft compartment and sealed the door. In the now private space, I stripped and changed into the spare flight suit I kept in my personal storage locker. Deciding not to waste the effort of putting shoes on, I left them in the locker in favour of staying in my comfortable socks. Similarly to the back room of my workshop, I was always careful to keep the Oxide’s deck clear of debris.
The dock workers had cleared the cargo hold out from my previous haul and hadn’t left anything inside. The bulkhead door and my personal locker were always locked if I wasn’t aboard, so I never had to fear them getting into anything they shouldn’t. Even if they did, the interior security would have alerted Vox of the intrusion and I would very quickly be in the docks, knocking heads.
Nobody messed with my ship without permission.
By the time I finished pulling up the zipper of my suit, I heard a knock on the exterior hatch. I peeked out of the cargo hold and saw the dockworker from before, a hose already laid out behind him.
“Hey, Soren! I saw that the hatch was open, so I figured you were already aboard. Just letting you know that I’m getting you fueled up. Anything else you need while I’m here?”
I disguised a sigh at the use of my old name with a yawn. “Nah, you’re good. Thanks for the fill up.”
“Well, it is my job after all. Fly safe out there today, alright?”
“As best I can, as always.” I listened as the technician clamped the hose onto the fueling port of my ship. Once I heard the process start, I walked into the small chamber between the cockpit and cargo bay to close the exterior hatch. The transfer was always a bit noisy, and tended to grate on my ears because of the loud dysrhythmic pulsing magnetic containment fields needed to safely move the antimatter components of the fuel.
The pilot’s seat conformed perfectly to my form as I sat down. Long hours of use with me as the only occupant had left the padded seat semi moulded to my body. It was comfortable to me, though it could make it difficult to shift positions at times.
With light fingers, I began working through my checklists. Despite the thorough digitalization of nearly everything these days, the list itself was actually hand written by myself in a bound paper folder. My original flight instructor had been old fashioned like that and always demanded that his students keep hard copy checklists and emergency procedures just in case. The habit had stuck with me. During the construction of the Oxide
, I had used the galactic net to find archived copies of the checklists for both the construction bee and the transport shuttle. Then, much like the ship itself, I took what I needed from both and created something that was distinctly my own.The words of Captain Erickson echoing my head still, I paused towards the end of the list. A section that I had recorded faithfully, but never actually used stared me in the face and made me grin. I ran a thumb over the carefully printed script.
‘Class II Gravimetric Displacement Field Generator preflight checklist.’
“Almost there,” I again repeated to myself.
Out of the corner of my eye, I caught the tech waving at me, his hose disconnected and spooled back on its cart. I waved back and he walked away. The bill would be forwarded to the Torgal office where it would be tallied against my income by the workers therein according to my contract.
Another few strokes on the panel in front of me and I felt and heard the reactor spool up. After another couple minutes, I contacted space control and filed my flight plan. Soon enough, I was instructed to brace for pad transfer. A heavy clunk echoed through the bay and the berthing pad slid its way onto the elevator before ascending to the exterior hull of the station.
Over comms while I waited for final launch clearance, I caught a familiar voice talking to control as well. It seemed that the Ratatosk had departed and was heading towards the slipspace gate. I watched as the large cargo ship accelerated away. Despite my heart aching slightly, I was also glad that they were safely underway. As long as all went well, I would be seeing them again soon.
As soon as my lane was free, final launch clearance came through from control. Magnetic clamps released and I engaged my thrusters, once more flying into the black.
Knowing that my time around D’reth station was coming to a close, I saw no reason to continue piecemealing my hidden little goldmine. Having taken the usual measures to conceal my route, I soon arrived at the hidden asteroid base. My luck seemed to have held, as nothing had been disturbed since my last visit.
Once parked at net zero velocity at the mouth of the hanger, I pressurised and then stepped into the aft hold of the Oxide and changed into my EVA suit. I made sure that my tool kit was clipped to my utility belt and cycled down the aft cargo hatch.
I mused that it was somewhat humorous that I was having to do salvage work like nearly every other pilot. The manipulator arms were an uncommon feature of salvage ships that generally only mounted stubby magnetic grapplers. They relied on the pilots to get out to make any needed cuts or open access panels and to move the material to the craft rather than the other way around.
Quickly getting to work, I used my personal thrust pack to push into the control room of the station and began dismantling the few computers still present after my previous visits. Many of the components were degraded after so many years exposed to the vacuum of space, but they still had enough value compared to their relative volume and mass that it was worth it to me, especially considering the other big ticket items I planned on snagging as well this trip.
First on my mental docket was to rip out what remained of the base’s computer arrays. Though they were old, they were still of high grade. The equipment was often still valuable to certain individuals, mostly technicians working on outdated stations like D’reth. The gold and platinum innards along with the nuclear magnetic resonance plates would be worth a decent scrap price regardless. It took significant time but only because it was tedious work rather than difficult.
Next on my list was to tear apart the clamps that held one of the two semi intact fighter craft in place. It was the one furthest from the bay doors and was the one I had left most intact. The other had been stripped of its sensor suite along with the weapons and micro reactor I had taken during my last trip and the engines were completely gone before I found the base. The clamps were essentially worthless except for scrap value, but I had a much larger prize in mind.
After a quick break on board my ship to get a drink of water and a snack, I powered down some of the auxiliary systems and removed one of the reserve power cells from under the cargo hold’s deck plates. I had high hopes for my plan and put it into motion immediately.
Power cell in tow, I made my way back to the remaining fighter and began pulling access panels off. Once I located its power core, I used some of my hard earned knowledge from the Forge and spliced in the power cell I had cannibalised from my own ship. Much to my delight, low level systems of the fighter began blinking on. It took another hour of work, but I managed to bypass safety protocols and restored power to the maneuvering thrusters.
Not bothering to even seal the cockpit, I climbed into the tight seat and muddled my way through the controls until I was able to nudge the craft out of the base’s deployment bay on only a handful of functioning thrusters. It was awkward, but I didn’t need full functionality to serve my purposes.
I spent another few minutes plugging a computer interface into the craft’s computer and establishing short range communications with my own craft.
“Alright Vox, hack into this thing’s flight computer, please.”
“Please standby.”
The AI, having originally been instanced from Jay’s own engineering assistant AI of mysterious origin, was certainly capable of breaking through the old fighter’s ICE suite (Intrusion Countermeasures Electronics). Especially so since I had jacked her interface directly into the craft. Sure enough, Vox piped up after only a minute.
“Security protocols successfully breached. Root access established.”
I grinned from behind my visored helmet. “Nicely done, Vox, now hold it steady. I’m going to grab it with the Oxide’s arms.”
“Compliance.”
I shifted myself back into the ship’s hold. Not bothering to strip the EVA suit, I ignored the temporary discomfort and planted myself in the pilot’s seat.
With careful precision, I activated the manipulator arms and brought them full forward on their tracks. Puffs from the reaction control thrusters of both ships, controlled by Vox and myself, kept the two vessels in place relative to each other. The manipulator arms extended and I individually adjusted each ‘hand’ before locking the clamps onto a pair of lifting lugs situated to either side of the still open cockpit bubble. I experienced a strange pleasure as the arms pulled the craft snug against the ventral surface of the Oxide.
Despite being within the original design specs of the construction bee and its arms, I had never actually grappled an entire craft before. Even though it was only a fighter that I was grabbing, the other craft’s space frame was nearly as long as the Oxide and wider by a fair margin. My own ship certainly outweighed it significantly, but it was incredibly satisfying to be metaphorically manhandling another craft entirely by myself. The fighter was well within the capacity of my ship and I had hauled larger masses, but that was always just large panels. This was an entire ship.
Once the other craft was secure, I locked the arms in place. Before I set off again though, I cycled out of the airlock again and retrieved the power cell and the interface module I had installed on the fighter. Not only did I not want to fly without all of the Oxide’s auxiliary systems active, I also didn’t want to lose my interface to the scrappers.
The cell back in its place and myself back in the pilot seat, I sealed the rear hatch and confirmed systems green before taking the controls again. With the ship under load, I had to be easy on the acceleration. Gently, I backed away from the asteroid base. The ship came about and I eased the throttle forward, setting course for the station. My force limitations made for a slow trip, but I asked Vox to hold the controls so I could relax for a few minutes and use the commode.
A sigh of relief came out unbidden when I finally peeled the EVA suit off and cool air met my skin. That relief was short-lived though. I had to fight back a sudden wave of revulsion as I stood in only my undershirt and boxers. It all felt so wrong, I couldn’t even stand to look at it. Standing in the head, trying to wash my hands, I caught sight of the bare wall where the commode mirror once hung. I had ripped the thing off the wall about a year back in a fit of dysphoria induced rage.
Even so, the ghostly image of my reflection haunted my mind. The bulk of my shoulders, the size of my hands, the bulge down below, it all pulled at my sanity. People knew about me now. I was trying to present as myself. I wanted to be seen as me, after all these years. My body though… It held none of the fine lines I wished for. It couldn’t match up with my vision of my truest self. If I couldn’t see past my physical form, how could anyone else?
A second image, this one bearing the face of my former caretaker, coalesced in my mind’s eye.
“Unnatural!” Came the woman’s words. The memory was of when the social worker had discovered that one of her older wards had made a visit to an esthetician to get some annamilian body mods, including tall wolfish ears. “You have defiled your own body in a foolish attempt to become something you will never be!”
She had kicked that poor boy out and sent him off to a colonial work camp. People like her were among the biggest reasons I hadn’t transitioned yet. The memory struck hard and unwanted questions swarmed my mind.
“Miss Adresta, we are approaching controlled space. I have taken the liberty of reducing the ship’s velocity to increase the time before we cross the threshold. Are there any further actions you would wish me to complete?”
Vox’s calming voice broke through the ichor clouding my mind and I was able to clamp it down and regain control. At some point during my fit, I had sunk to the deck against the bulkhead. It occurred to me that several minutes had passed by. I took several deep breaths and forced the tension out of my muscles before responding.
“Thank you, Vox. No further actions needed.” I clambered to my feet and sluggishly moved to the cockpit, glad that my AI could exhibit such care. A hand rubbed at my eyes to clear my blurred vision. With one last shake of my head, I shoved down the dark thoughts and pushed myself back into pilot mode.
“I have the controls.”
“Acknowledged. You have the controls.”