by Kevin Groh
Since there was still nobody there to give them orders after the change, Carter decided to simply sit in a fighter to get a feeling for the cockpit. As soon as he started, the others followed his example one by one. The moment he sat down, seat belts automatically extended and fastened crosswise. Carter just said frightened: »Okay ...«
To his horror, there was an answer: »Okay.«
He cautiously asked: »Hello?«
The reaction was: »Hello.«
Carter tried differently: »Who’s talking?«
The answer was: »I’m Jenny, the onboard instance of the military’s operational VI. My job is to navigate, control all of this fighter’s systems, and communicate and interact with the pilot and the command center.«
After a short moment, his bracelet beeped.
»Connection established with minitool, hello Carter. Nice to meet you! Today is your first flight, that’s great! I’ll help you learn the controls of this Typhon fighter, and soon you’ll be a great pilot.«
»Uh ... thank you?«
»It is my pleasure! How about you close the cockpit and turn on the ignition so we can get started? Just pull the yellow lever to the right of you, then press the green button right next to it.«
Carter did what he was told and the cockpit closed. He heard the small servo motors tightening the lid and sealing it airtight. Then followed the green button that breathed life into the fighter. Everything began to glow orange and a large HUD appeared on the windshield. »Systems activated. Very nice, Carter! Most of the fighter’s functions can only be tested in space, so why don’t we take off and leave the hangar? I’ll show you how it works and help you.«
The switches Carter was supposed to operate lit up conveniently and he also followed Jenny’s verbal tips. He grabbed the controls and released the landing stabilizers. The fighter left the ground and floated lightly, whereupon Jenny retracted the landing pads. There were actually two control levers. One was for tilt and control and the other for controlled speed and weapons. Very slowly Carter slipped out of the bay into the transfer room. As soon as the others also floated behind him, the airlock closed and pumped out the air. The outer hatch opened and Jenny helped him steer the fighter out of the ship and into free space. As an experienced gamer, Carter had good hand-eye coordination and quickly got the hang of it. He slowly flew out into the open and the sight chased a comforting shiver through his body. Never before had he felt such freedom. The infinity lay before him and he was free to explore it. Theoretically. Practically Jenny explained some of the switches in the cockpit to him.
After she had finished, he asked: »Say, Jenny, can I talk to the other recruits? We must have some kind of team channel.«
»I’m sorry, Carter. During certain practice flights, such as this first test flight, communication between the fighters is forbidden. Your attention should remain focused.«, she said.
Carter flew around a little and tested some buttons she suggested to him. After about an hour of practicing, it was time for a challenge.
Jenny asked: »Are you ready for a training flight? It’s a simulation that’s often used later on. The flight training program includes a series of different practice flights and combat situations to be completed. You are ready for the first exercise. Do you feel like it?
»Sounds interesting, let’s try it!«
She briefly took the wheel and put the fighter in a straight position. Then the list of simulations appeared on the screen and Jenny chose the first one. It was called ›Ringflight 1‹. The HUD projected a flight route in the form of yellow rings in space. In truth there was nothing, but on the HUD they were visible. It was like a flight simulator in a real space fighter. It reminded Carter of his video games. A timer counted down and then he rocketed off. He had underestimated the speed of the ship and dashed past the rings with full throttle. Jenny reset the exercise and he tried again. At the fourth attempt, he got the hang of it and flew curves, slopes, turns, and strange figures to pass all the ring as fast as possible. Flying was a lot of fun for him. He could see another fighter jerking and buzzing around in a rather wobbly manner. Something told him it was Leena. He asked Jenny to repeat the exercise and she restarted it. On the second attempt, he managed to get to the record within a few seconds. He wanted to keep trying, but she explained that the flying hour was over and they had to return to the hangar. So he flew back towards the ship, but with unnecessarily many rolls and twists. The landing wasn’t very difficult, especially because she helped him.
»It’s been a pleasure flying with you, Carter. See you in the next lesson.«, Jenny said and his bracelet beeped. He got out of the fighter and saw Willis and the pilot waiting at the edge of the bay. He hurried to them and as soon as everyone gathered, he asked:
»How was the first flight experience? You don’t want to stop, do you?«
He laughed and rejoiced when Carter and Rod told him how great they thought it was. But not everyone showed as much enthusiasm as the two of them. Especially Leena and Jimbo didn’t enjoy it at all and were happy to have ground under their feet again. »Not everyone is born to fly. But when it comes to the worst, you should at least be able to evacuate a ship with a fighter.«, Willis said at their sight. They had slightly green faces.
On the flight back, they talked about what they had experienced. Rod said: »I want to become a pilot! That was so awesome, dude!«
Carter said: »Fuck yeah! I found the feeling so unbelievable! This freedom! This power in my hands ... that was epic. Just epic.«
Kelly asked Leena: »Do we really have to do this again? I really don’t need that ... Floating alone in space. The slightest malfunction and you’re screwed. Completely helpless in space.«
»Jenny is the first VI I was allowed to interact with. She sounds so natural, not cut or chopped off at all. That’s so cool!«, Henry praised. Jimbo hurled and had a paper bag in his hand with which he sat silently at the window. Jane kept him company, but he didn’t open his mouth just to be on the safe side. »Are there any concrete exercises?«, Urma asked Nambur, but he didn’t know.
»I thought we had all flown the first course. In any case, I flew an exercise. Rod?«, Carter wanted to know.
He nodded and they realized that Jenny analyzed their behavior and only suggested the simulations when they were ready. In his bracelet, he found the practice courses and next to ›Ringflight 1‹ there was a checkmark with the note ›Completed‹.
In the meantime, they had been through more than two months of the second year. The training became harder and harder, but more and more subjects were dropped. Normal sport decreased and there was hardly any theory. But something new and bad came along. Whenever a lesson was unpleasant, it would certainly be led by Banes. It was exactly the same this time. He stood in front of them grinning broadly.
»Time for my favorite subject. It’s called resistance training and just to be clear, we’re talking about physical resistance here. We have to prepare you to endure anything. Cold, heat, long time without sleep, physical exertion, high gravity, pain ... everything you can encounter on foreign worlds or in war. Next week there will be survival training. Until then we will prepare you.«
This preparation consisted of one hour in a hot sauna, three more in thin clothes in a cold chamber, a night mission without sleep, an asteroid exercise with double gravity and nerve simulations. This was a helmet that simulated pain signals to the brain. They had to wear these devices throughout the week and the simulated injury changed several times a day. There were cuts, bruises, broken bones, headaches, gnawing hunger, torn skin, abrasions, gunshot wounds, and burns. Between these more severe pains there were little things like sore throats or blisters in the mouth for long periods of time, which didn’t really hurt much, but in the long run, really affected the psyche.
After six days of suffering, they were completely devastated. Sometimes they had to abort in the middle of a lesson and squirm on the ground in pain. The instructors knew that this was bordering on torture, but
this hardening was incredibly important for later injuries. »A soldier who has never been shot can’t think clearly at the moment it actually happens. The shock paralyzes him and he will be killed. If you’ve already felt this pain, then the shock is absent and you can still react. This is a vital experience.«, Banes told them the morning before the survival training.
They’ve been gathering, as so often lately, at the transport ship. The relief at the end of the simulated pain was too great to worry about the next exercise. The ship started and left Utopia. They saw the stars turn into elongated streaks as it accelerated to the speed of light. »Where are we going?«, Jane wondered.
Their destination was Kunaz, the Salvani homeworld, or more precisely, one of the moons. Its name was Punikah and it was a jungle moon with very unpredictable weather. Once they arrived there, they were all dropped off individually. Carter was one of the first. Banes went out with him. It was a brooding heat. He wore his military clothes with jacket and cap and he immediately started sweating. The major handed him two small pieces of metal, a water bottle, and a knife. »The purpose of this exercise is to survive until tomorrow morning. Usually, such training would take several days, but Punikah is so dangerous that one day is enough. You can give up, of course, but we’ll use this test to see how much you can withstand. This decides at the end of the training for which tasks you are suitable. So be tough, Sanders! Now we’ll see if you really have a soldier in you.«
With these words in his ears, he saw the ship flying away. He breathed out slowly and looked around. He was standing by a small stream on an open meadow right at the edge of a wood. It was a jungle, so he felt little desire to go in there. He had seen a documentary about survival in the wilderness before and had a few things in his head. For example, water attracted both prey and hunter. Where he stood now, he would meet predators. For this reason, he filled the bottle and started to move. He took off his jacket because it was terribly hot. If he wanted to spend the night there, he had to build something for himself. First, he needed a suitable place.
On the open surface, it would get too cold and he would be widely visible. He didn’t like it, but in the forest, the chances were better, even if he had to pay more attention there. So he marched into the jungle. Already after a few minutes, he was itching everywhere. Small bloodsucking mosquitoes sat on his arms. He scared them away and put the jacket on again. He thought he’d rather sweat than be sucked dry. He moved as quietly as possible, but it was clear to him that he would hardly have a chance against a predator if he did not have a larger weapon. He picked a fairly straight thin tree and sawed it off with the back of the knife. Then he removed leaves and branches and carved a stable tip. With this simple spear, he felt a little more secure. He stomped through the high leafage and looked out for insects that could sit on it. Soon he discovered a rock with a small cavity. It was on the ground, but he could hardly find better protection.
Next, he had to gather everything for the night, because he could look for food later and if necessary hunger until he was picked up. He had enough water and the stream was not far away. He went out and collected large, broad leaves and a few climbing plants. He had to avoid strange crab lizards several times, the blue color of which worried him. From the collected things and some long sticks, he built himself a kind of roof sail. It even looked quite stable. Not far from the campsite old leaves and moss were lying around. He took it and freed it from the big insects that fled in panic. He sincerely hoped that none of them was poisonous and visited him at night. From the softer material, he made himself a small nest in the cavity. He took a step back and looked at his simple dwelling.
»Not bad for a few hours‹ work.«, he had to admit. He sawed the remaining sticks into shorter lengths and rammed them into the ground like a low palisade fence. He hoped that this would scare off the smaller animals. His water was rapidly reduced due to the heat and he would have to get more. Looking up, he noticed some dark clouds brewing. The air became clammy and unpleasant. He hurried to collect as much dry wood as possible and put it under his small roof. He knew that rain would cause a drop in temperature and also that he needed a fire at night if he wanted to keep predators and other animals away. Gradually hunger bored into his stomach. He was wondering if he could hunt something when a creature that looked like a giant cockroach discovered him. The beast immediately crawled towards him and he knew his wooden spear was useless here.
He ran through the branches and heard the rustling of the leaves as the creature pursued him. He reached the river and scared away some strange flying beings and some scaled deer, at least they reminded him of it when he jumped headfirst into the creek. He hoped the beetle thing didn’t like water. He emerged and gasped for air, seeing the cockroach standing at the edge of the water and waving its big antennae. Something grazed his leg and he grabbed it and tore it out of the river. It seemed to be a kind of eel, with little pointed teeth and it wriggled like crazy to get out of his grip. So he wasn’t safe swimming either. He had a desperate idea. He threw the eel at the cockroach, which caught it from the air and disappeared into the forest. He hurried out of the water and filled his bottle. That had to last until morning because he didn’t want to come back again.
When he let his eyes wander, he saw one of the scaled deer lying wounded on the ground. It had gray scales, five horns, big ears, and very strong legs. Apparently, they lived in the nearby mountains. It still gasped quietly, but one of these cockroaches had pulled out a leg and taken it with it. Carter quickly fetched a few broad leaves and hurried towards the animal. He pulled his knife and stabbed its throat to end its suffering.
»Rest.«, he said in a calm tone to relax the dying animal.
As soon as it was dead, he cut off a few pieces of meat from the flank and wrapped them in the leaves so as not to spread too much blood and smell. He hurried to the edge of the forest with his prey and secretly hoped that he would not encounter any of these giant insects again. He discovered a kind of hive on the ground that was probably abandoned. At least he didn’t see anything that indicated small flying insects.
At that moment it suddenly began to rain heavily. The rain was incredibly loud and splashed down on him. His clothes were soaked within minutes and it flashed and thundered. Carter broke two branches of a dead tree and took off his undershirt. This planet was openly hostile to him, he thought. The jacket would probably have to do, even if he was already cold now. He tore the shirt in half and wrapped the fabric around the wood. Then he dipped it into the brown, sticky substance that adhered to the edge of the insect hive. He rolled both improvised torches around for a while hoping the stuff was burning. The storm clouds had made it dark in the meantime. He noticed a small rodent rushing into a hole to protect itself from the rain. Carter wanted to be safe and rammed his spear into the den. When he pulled it out, the impaled rodent hung dead on it. The hunt was normally harder, but he seemed to be lucky, which he greatly appreciated.
With the two pieces of metal, he could strike sparks and after some cursing attempts under a tree where the rain did not go, he lit his torch. With the meat in his arm, the dead rodent on the spear and two torches in his hand, he was quite loaded. An encounter with a giant cockroach would not have been good. But these creatures didn’t seem to like rain either and he made it to his dwelling without any problems. There, with the help of the torch, he immediately set out to light a campfire. Except for a few places, his canopy was leak-proof and due to the slight angle, the rain just splashed down in front of the camp. Carter froze quite a bit, but the fire made it bearable. He sharpened the other side of his spear and used it to grill the meat. Besides, he tried to gut and skin the rodent. It was disgusting and Carter was glad he hadn’t eaten yet. Cutting meat off the flank of one of these deer creatures was bloody but doable. However, taking intestines from a carcass was disgusting and he resisted nausea with difficulty.
In the end, he had simply cut away large pieces because he couldn’t stand further skinning and cutting aro
und. It was enough to eat it together with the other meat so that he could be reasonably satisfied. He was glad that he didn’t have to look for berries, because in a strange world plants were always an extreme gamble. With a full belly, a big sip of water and sitting at the warming campfire he could endure it. The rain seemed to ease, but not completely. After a while, he put on another load of wood and decided to get some sleep. The splashing and the fire would keep the animals away. As his mind slowly drifted away, he thought of how Kelly, Rod, and Leena might have performed.
Early in the morning, he was startled because he heard noises. The rain had stopped and his fire had burned down to a faint glow. The rodent’s intestines had attracted one of the cockroaches and it seemed to be snooping around. »Fuck!«, Carter hissed. He grabbed his spear and a climbing plant and tied the knife to it. So the weapon could hopefully hurt the beast. The thing would surround him in the corner, so he had to get out. As soon as he had walked even two steps, the beetle thing hissed and squeaked and crawled towards him. He hurried around the rock where there was a small open space. There he took a crouched thrust position with the spear. The animal slowed down because it noticed that he wanted to defend himself.
It shot at him and he hit it first against the leg, then against the backplate. Both were ineffective and even angered it. It continued hissing and straightened up a bit. The fidgeting that followed was apparently a kind of demonstration of strength. Carter swung his weapon and chopped off an antenna. The squeaking got louder and it wriggled even more. Then he pushed the spear forward and rammed the knife into its body. The creeper tore and the blade came loose and got stuck. The shaft broke off and was thrown away. The creature was now really angry and attacked. With its pointed gripping arms, it carved a wound into Carter’s chest and another into his calf. The jacket was shredded. With the cut on his leg, he couldn’t walk that well anymore, but when the creature wanted to attack again, he threw himself at the monster and it landed on his back. He grabbed the stuck knife and tore it from belly to head through the beetle’s body. That seemed to work and it was dead at once. He stood there trembling with cold, pain and adrenaline, thinking.