Chapter 13: 13. Training

"Can you hand me the ultrasonic welder again?" Sarah asked, as her hand reached out from under the pod. "It's the..."

Her voice trailed off as I placed the tool in her hand, then both her hand and the tool disappeared back out of sight.

"That's the one, thanks Amanda!" She added a moment later, "You weren't kidding when you said you were a quick study."

I grinned, not that she could see it. "This isn't the first surgery I've assisted on."

Somewhere around four hours had passed since we last saw our captain, and I figured she might be back in the next hour or so. And at first I'd been content to just watch and talk with Sarah, but it didn't take long before I found myself offering to help her. Partially because I felt guilty sitting around doing nothing while she worked, and partially from a desire to get more involved in this project of hers.

Sarah was currently on her back, wedged behind and beneath the cylinder and the wall. There was a new length of cable snaking underneath there with her, and that pack of hers was open on the floor next to my feet. I was sitting on one of the boxes of ammunition I'd placed on the floor next to the tube, acting as her assistant while she patched the cable into the pod's data interface.

It wasn't as easy as just plugging it in, the cute engineer basically had to figure out the interface's signalling and protocols first. That involved a lot of testing and probing with one of her intricate home-made engineering tools. And after seeing that bodged-up device I finally understood her reaction to the Demeter's cockpit. Apparently bodging together mismatched hardware was a hobby both the captain and engineer had in common.

After another minute or two Sarah's hand re-emerged from beneath the pod. She was holding the welder out for me to take as she asked, "Can you hand me the..."

I took the welder from her hand and replaced it with her home-made signal analyzer before she could finish the sentence.

"Yeah that!" she laughed as she pulled the tool out of view. "Keep this up and I'll be fighting Piper over whether you're assigned to the cockpit or the engine room."

"Trust me, I have no idea what I'm doing," I giggled. "I'm just following the pattern. Every time you use the welder you use the analyzer immediately afterwards. I assume you're testing the connections you just made?"

From where she was wedged under the pod she replied, "You joke, but you have no idea how many kids fresh out of the Navy's engineering training program don't get that. I mean, they don't get the idea of checking their work, and they don't even pick up the pattern when I'm doing it in front of them."

"Or worse," she added a moment later. "They get it, but they think it's a waste of time."

I grimaced, "I'm sure you set them straight."

"Damn right," Sarah stated. "They learn, or they don't last long in my engine room."

A minute later she handed the analyzer back without asking for anything else. I knew that meant the connection was good and she'd moved on to the next one. She already had some other tools under there with her to prepare the next filament in the cable and the next connector on the back of the pod.

As expected, that process took a few minutes. Then she reached out for the welder, and I had it ready before she could even say a word.

She worked in silence for the next little while, and I quietly handed her the tools and took back the other ones as required. Since we both knew the routine it seemed like there wasn't any need to talk for now.

After two or three more connections were welded and tested, Sarah finally spoke up again. She wasn't asking for a different tool or discussing the work she was doing though.

"Hey Amanda?" she asked in a slightly uneasy tone. "I know I've been teasing you quite a bit since we both joined the Demeter. I hope I haven't upset you with that? I like to kid around sometimes, and ah, sometimes I kind of do that to help me cope with things...but I don't always know when to rein it in. And I know some people don't appreciate that kind of thing. I'm sorry if I've upset you at all."

I felt my cheeks colouring and I was glad she couldn't see me from down there behind the pod as I replied, "It's ok Sarah. You haven't done or said anything to upset me, and when you do it I can tell you're not trying to be cruel or mean. And I uh. I actually kind of enjoy it?"

That led to another silence, except this time it felt awkward. My blush grew brighter as I started wondering if I should say something else, or change the subject, or perhaps just run and hide in the laundry room for a while.

Before I could do or say anything to embarrass myself further we were both distracted as the secondary cargo doors suddenly unsealed and opened part-way. I immediately got to my feet as my heart rate jumped slightly. I was worried some of the dangerous locals had come on board the ship and were planning on stealing the salvage.

Fortunately it was only Piper. She had a couple packages held under her left arm, each was about twelve inches square and a couple inches thick. They were enclosed in vacu-sealed plastic, with no clue as to what was contained inside.

She stepped through the gap in the doors then had them seal again behind her as she asked, "How's it going? Are you two almost finished down here?"

"I'll be another half hour," Sarah replied from beneath the cylinder. "Amanda's been a great help, this would have taken twice as long without her."

Our captain didn't remark on that, instead she stated "Well I'm going to take your assistant up to the cockpit. Join us up there when you're finished here."

"This is for you," Piper added as she set one of the packages on the floor next to Sarah's gear. She handed the other one to me, "And that's yours."

Without waiting for a reply she started walking aft towards the lift in the engine room.

"Thanks!" I said as I accepted the package, though I had no idea what it was. "I hope everything went ok with the delivery?"

"It went fine," she stated. "The ship's fuelled up, business is complete, and we're just about ready to go."

On our way to the cockpit I left my package on the table in the mess, then hurried after her.

As we took our seats in the cockpit I commented, "It feels like we only just got here. Is it usually like this? Days and days in space, then only a few hours at each port?"

"No," she shook her head. "Normally I'd spend a day here before setting out again. And next time we'll do that. Right now I want to go over our course options with you. You said you scored high on navigation so let's see how you do."

That made me grimace, it was almost five years ago when I took those tests.

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Piper pulled up that 2d map of the sector on the navigation screen, then gave me a quick run-down of our options.

"We're here, Regulon-4. My next scheduled stop is there, Ecclestone's World. I'm due there in about nine days, that's about how long it takes the Demeter to get there from here at Jump-0. It's only three hours away if we use Jump-1. To offload all that salvage, we want to go down there, to Rolandan-2. That's six days away by Jump-0, or two hours by Jump-1. And finally, from Rolandan-2 to Ecclestone's World would be fifteen days the slow way, five hours with a level-one jump."

She glanced at me and asked, "So what do you think is the best option?"

My initial thought was to use a level-one jump to the first destination and offload the salvage immediately, then we could get to the scheduled stop with some combination of Jump-0 and Jump-1. Or just get there early and enjoy a bunch of shore leave.

I didn't say that though, I figured there had to be a catch somewhere. Instead I took a little longer to think it all through. Rather than just focusing on travel time, I tried to take all the other factors I could think of into consideration.

Anything over Jump-0 was exponentially more expensive in terms of fuel, and it also got progressively more dangerous too. So you never wanted to use that if it wasn't necessary. Plus I remembered we still needed to inventory the contents of those shipping containers Piper and Sarah salvaged from the Hammersmith's hold. The captain also said she wanted to have a closer look at the crates that came from the ship's armoury.

After a half minute or so I finally gave her my answer, "If we use Jump-0 from here to Rolandan-2, that gives us six days to inventory everything you and Sarah salvaged from the Hammersmith. So we'll have a proper manifest of all the salvage, and I assume that means you'll have a better idea of what it's worth when it comes time to try and sell it. That also gives us time for you to decide if you want to keep any of it. We'll need a level-one jump from there to your next delivery, but that leaves us more than two and a half days to spare."

I added, "I don't know anything about selling salvage but I assume there'll be some negotiating, plus time required to offload everything once it's been sold. So those two and a half days will probably be spent at Rolandan-2. And perhaps somewhere in there we'll find time for a bit of shore leave. At least a couple hours anyways, so me and Sarah can do some shopping? I think we'd both appreciate some more clothes, and a few other necessities."

Piper listened quietly to my answer, and my reasoning for what I picked. Then she spent a few seconds staring at the map with a thoughtful look on her face, before her expression finally shifted to a smile.

"Pretty much a perfect score," she stated. "That's exactly what I'd do, and for the same reasons."

My cheeks coloured slightly again as I pointed out, "It was the only option that made sense, all things considered. And I'm sure you don't need me to tell you the obvious stuff you already figured out yourself."

The attractive redhead shrugged as she settled back in her seat, "No, but you have to start somewhere. We'll get under way as soon as Sarah's done, then I'll walk you through how to plot a course for a level-zero trip, and how to set the ship's automated systems."

"All right," I nodded. I was actually looking forward to that, it sounded like another opportunity to do something more useful than cooking or cleaning.

While we waited for Sarah, Piper started teaching me what the various controls and displays in front of me did. In addition to the navigation stuff we'd just looked at and the comm suite to my left, there were the secondary flight controls that would allow me to take manual control of the ship. Then there was a whole section of my console dedicated to the ship's sensors.

By the time she finished, I had a pretty good idea what everything did apart from three areas. There was one complex-looking set of controls surrounding a display to my left, then to my right directly between my console and Piper's were two more. One was up on the main panel, the other was bolted on beneath it, where either of us could reach it.

I pointed out all three and asked, "How about these?"

"For now I don't want you messing with any of them," she responded. She pointed at the complicated one on my left, "That controls the ship's tractor-repulser beams and it takes a fair bit of practice to get good at that. The Demeter's got enough power in her engines and the tractor beams, if you're heavy-handed with that stuff you could seriously damage something just trying to take it under tow."

Then she gestured at the other two and added, "This one up here is the ship's defences. The Demeter's a tugboat, she's not a warship but she does have some modest defensive kit. And this one down here is the ship's armaments. Again, she's not meant for combat but this can be a dangerous sector so over the years the old girl's been fitted out with some offensive hardware."

That reminded me once again of the relative lawlessness of the frontier, that an interstellar tugboat would be equipped with armaments. It also reminded me that she had her own fighter stowed in the port-side shuttle bay. And for that matter, Piper strapped that pistol on her hip, and a knife, and a few spare magazines on her belt, all to conduct a business meeting with a regular customer.

It left me slightly uneasy, wondering if I'd ever really adjust to this sort of life.

Not that life was spectacular in the Imperium. At least, not out in the boondocks where I grew up. But you could go about your daily business without having to carry a weapon. Folks didn't even own weapons like that, it was prohibited. Life was safe, but maybe it was a little boring and predictable. And there weren't a lot of opportunities, outside of working for the military.

I was left thinking about that for a few minutes, until Sarah joined us.

She slipped into her seat behind me and reported, "I finished what I was doing, my tools and equipment are stowed. What are we doing next?"

"Leaving," Piper replied.

Departing the mining colony was pretty much the opposite of arriving. Our captain contacted the port controllers on the comm, they transmitted a departure vector and gave us clearance to leave. When we were ready, the landing bay was depressurized then the doors opened up.

Meanwhile Piper and Sarah got the engines warmed up, and when it was time we carefully backed out of the landing bay and into that huge crevasse. Landing gear were retracted, then our captain turned the ship around and angled it upwards. She was following the assigned course on her display again, but she manually flew the ship as we headed up away from the mining colony.

At one point Piper had me engage the artificial gravity, and I felt that little shudder in my gut as it took over. The ship handled the whole departure fairly well, there were only a few worrying shudders and groans as we broke free of the planet's gravity and set off for open space.

And when we were far enough away that we could navigate freely, Piper started walking me through that process. We had that 2d image of the sector on the nav screen, she showed me how to bring up different overlays on the screen so I could see what hazards there might be, where the traditional shipping lanes were.

I had a feeling she could do all this in a matter of minutes, but it took nearly fifteen minutes for her to explain it all to me. Then she watched me do it, and once I had the course plotted she showed me how to implement it with the ship's automated systems.

Accelerating to Jump-0 was nothing like a full-fledged level-one jump. We didn't need to transition into jump-space which meant the engines didn't need to rip a ship-sized hole in reality, so we could avoid all the hazards that entailed. Instead the engines just created a little bubble of unspace around the ship.

There were highly technical terms to explain how it worked but I liked the simple explanation best. The unspace bubble partially hid our ship from the rest of the universe, so we could go ahead and break some laws of physics without getting caught. And since we never truly left normal-space, both our sensors and comms still worked.

With the ship under way, a count-down clock on my console indicated we were six days, two hours, forty-five minutes from our destination.

Finally Piper showed me how to activate a few automated routines in the ship's sensor suite. There were proximity alerts based on different levels of detection, so if anything came within a certain range of the ship a warning would sound over the intercom.

That was pretty much it in terms of cockpit work for the next six days.