by Chris Hechtl
There was no way she could strike out indie. No way. Her parents wouldn't back her … they definitely wouldn't sign off on her tapping her college money to do it. She'd love to go see Aunt Irena, see if she knew of any jobs in the belt, but she also knew she was too young. No one would want to hire a kid straight out of high school even with a last name like hers. And if they did she'd be stuck doing shit jobs on some very questionable ship or outpost … somewhere that paid infrequently at best and had legal issues. No. Hell fracking no.
Since she had a light homework load, she blew through it quickly, then her chores. Once they were done, or mostly done, she flopped onto the couch with her tablet and used it to control the main video screen as she searched through the schools. Mars U was nice. It was heavy on practical courses, but … she frowned thoughtfully. Most of the hands-on courses were saturated. She might get in trading on her name … she frowned thoughtfully, tapping her lips with her fingers … but she knew better. So … that meant an alternative.
A sense of adventure filled her, and it grew into an excitement of wanderlust as she explored options further afield. The colleges on L-5 and the other orbital habitats were saturated … which meant Earth. That idea seemed interesting.
She talked it over carefully with her parents over dinner later that evening. They told her it was her decision. They reminded her going to Earth would be hard; she'd have to take extra bone and muscle treatments and wear an exosuit to move around. She shrugged such considerations off. They convinced her to think about it and explore her options carefully. Her mother gave her father a worried look; Isley caught it. But she also caught her father's subtle shrug. She was getting better at reading their body language she realized. Her mom was indeed worried, but her father was letting her mother know they had to let her decide for herself. She treasured that sense of freedom … and yet dreaded any consequences it might entail.
After cleanup she texted her mom she was going out and headed to her favorite coffee shop. She met up with Cloe and Lexi, but both were chasing boys so she took a seat and watched them. Lexi hooked up right away, which was typical. She was a vamp, the school slut, even worse than Isley. Isley was no tight ass; she had no problem swinging either way. But right now she had other fish to fry. When a familiar face came into the shop, she waved to him. He grinned, stood in line for his coffee and Danish, then carried them over to her table and sat.
“You are such a pig. Don't you know what time it is?” She asked, tisk tisking. He snorted but ignored her ribbing as he ate quickly.
She talked to Marlo about the dilemma; he was one of her friends who had been with her since she could walk. He was into engineering like her, but he focused on AI and robotics while she was into ships. He tried to entice her into staying and exploring nanotechnology. She politely refused. Nanotech scared the bejeezers out of her, and she wanted to be as far away from it as possible. She admitted that, and he gave her a pitying look. “Isley, they are merely robots. They can only do what they are programmed to do. That's it. When you aren't using them, they are inert. You know that; you were with me when they covered it in class,” he explained.
“I know that,” she said, suppressing a shrug. “It's not for me, okay?” She said, fighting to keep her tone from sounding testy and annoyed.
“A weapon isn't dangerous in itself. It is how and when it is used that is dangerous. There are no dangerous weapons, only dangerous people,” he said.
“I know that too. You are mangling the quote something fierce,” she said in exasperation. He smiled at her. She shook her head. “No. Pass. I'll … figure something out. I like macro engineering anyway,” she said.
“You know it's the future. Nanotech is really starting to take off in refining and manufacturing now that they've worked the bugs out,” he said.
She grimaced and took a sip of her coffee then set the cup down. “Oh, ha ha,” she said.
“Sorry. Couldn't help it,” he said with an infectious grin. “But it's true. I bet in a couple decades they'll be growing entire cities! Whole buildings first, then cities! Maybe orbital habitats, heck, even ships! Imagine the possibilities! Isley, you'd be right there in the thick of it,” he said, voice dropping into an enticing charm.
She shook her head as she finished her coffee. “Nope. Not for me.”
“So what, get a job working on battle bots? Or for the military? You could join the military I suppose, be a wet navy engineer,” he said thoughtfully.
She shivered. “No, I'm a spacer brat born and bred. I'll stick to vacuum over water. I'm not thrilled about being anywhere near Earth, and I don't want to be there long.”
“You are seriously thinking about going to Earth? Like, for real?” he asked, staring at her. She slowly nodded. “You are nuts,” he said in disgust, sitting back in his chair.
“Why? I think it's worth a shot,” she said defensively. Her eyes flashed. “I'm willing to chance it. Even if I have to take the shots and wear the blasted exosuit. At least I'll be able to fix it.”
“Heh. Yeah, good luck with that,” he said. “Okay, you do what you want,” Marlo said, shaking his head. He finished his iced coffee and then tossed the empty container to the recycler. It made it in but only after bouncing off the rim.
“I intend to. You do the same,” she said with dignity. They shook hands as they got up and left.
When she got home she went into her room, flopped onto the bed and then pulled out her tablet and VR goggles. She checked out some of the Earth colleges virtually. She did her homework, focusing on the colleges that had the best engineering programs and highest ratio of graduates who got into space. Most colleges had moved online, but many on Earth still maintained a place for people to go and do hands-on schooling. She liked that. What really floored her were the people. Thousands of people. The sand, the beaches, the parties … she made up her mind then and there. She'd go to Earth and sow some wild oats; after all, that was what college was for right? She smiled a bit, anticipating a lot of fun in her future. She'd get her degree on Earth and then move back to orbit and beyond.
Chapter 5
For the past two decades, almost since Star Reach had announced a breakthrough in hyperdrive construction, some of the major companies and even a couple world governments had attempted to test the drive with probes.
Dozens of probes had been built at vast expense. But it was found that the AI piloted probes failed to exit on long jumps. No automated probe has survived more than a one light year jump. Half ended up off course. Those that attempted to turn about and return following their previous course either got lost or came out wildly off track. When they exited they were usually left adrift, out of fuel.
Lagroose Industries, however, was undeterred. Jack Lagroose knew and trusted his people. He knew that they'd figure out what was going on eventually. They had, and Jamey's success with Cyclops 1 and two had proven them right. Cyclops 3 had been a failure, but they'd gotten a sliver of data back before her telemetry had cut off completely so it wasn't a total loss. His successes had allowed them to continue to move forward on their manned starship plan. Two initial explorers, Daedalus and Icarus would act as prototypes and were called the Pioneer class. Prometheus was already planned to be the third ship, the first of the explorer/terraformer/colony vessels. She would be a new prototype that would take what they'd learned from the Pioneer class and apply it to improve the ship design and efficiency. From there, Nina, Pinta, Santa Maria, Drake, Cousteau, and others were waiting in the wings as follow-on ships of the second or possibly third class. The planned ship size for the second class was to be expanded on since they would be on the long end of a logistics pipeline. They were also reliant on unproven technology advances such as those in stasis tech.
Several important lessons had been learned from the probes. One thing that had been determined through careful analysis of the telemetry from the surviving probes was that constant course corrections were normal. They found that for some reason a ship had to go into hyper
far outside a star system's Oort cloud. It also had to do so away from any significant mass.
They had to date only recovered one probe. Tearing it apart almost molecule by molecule had given them tremendous mountains of data … but had caused an avalanche of new questions. One thing the recovered probe had proven though was that organic life could be sustained in hyper. Its sample case of organics had survived unscathed. It hadn't found any hyperbridges, but that was to be expected. Hyperbridges, so called shortcuts in hyperspace were few and far between. Finding them would be a boon to space travel, but so much was unknown about them, such as if they even existed! Or if a ship could be engineered to use them.
The coders were frustrated by the probe's performance. Something was causing ripples and obstructions in hyperspace. Running into one was damaging to the probe, possibly even life threatening, which brought up the point of a proper navigation and helm.
The design board was at odds on how to resolve the issue. The coders insisted they could figure out an AI that could navigate in hyper, even though it was clear their evolving AI wasn't cutting the mustard. Trey had let them wrangle back and forth for a while about it before he'd called in the team leaders to find a solution, even if it was a compromise.
Trey looked around the room and frowned thoughtfully. The problem he had with the group was none of them were experts in the field. The closest was Charlie who'd actually piloted a ship. But technically, no one had piloted a starship, so they only had the telemetry as a meter stick to go by.
The discussion between continuing to try to use an AI versus giving a pilot a shot had gone on for some time without a solution. But they had to figure something out Trey reminded himself and soon.
“The problem with an AI pilot is it doesn’t care if you live or die. An organic pilot knows its ass is on the line. They will be cautious when they need to be. Yes they'll take risks but calculated ones,” Charlie stated to the group as he laid out his case.
“But a human can't handle the 3-D nature of the piloting, Granted, not for long periods of time. We're not wired for it and I for one wouldn't want to sit on my ass for a long stretch of time, my rump would get numb. It's bad enough when I'm behind my desk or in a meeting,” Alec said. That earned a chuckle around the room. “The amount of decisions per second is even beyond intuitive piloting for humans even with computer assistance. At least I think so. And the probes prove a computer isn't enough. We may be at an impasse,” he said pessimistically. “Where nothing can go beyond a light year.”
“We can figure it out. If we have a problem without an answer change the question. Or find a work around. We've gotten this far,” Trey said.
“What about a pilot? Or ground driver? Or a shuttle pilot. They can handle extended time in the air. They did it long before autopilots took over those tasks. If they take shifts …” Levare looked around the table to the others. “Come on people, the boss is right. We can do this. Work the problem,” he said, eying Alec. The young engineer winced.
Charlie frowned thoughtfully. “That's a different story. They have autopilot. They also aren't maneuvering the ship like you have to do in hyper. In an aircraft you have a lot less to do too. You fly a set altitude, follow a course …” he shook his head.
Levare blinked then deflated. “Oh.” He had to take Charlie's word for it. Charles Dugan was their resident real world expert. Not only did he have wet navy experience, but he'd also been a spacer for the past thirty years. He'd served on several sublight ships he'd designed that had crossed the void between planets with little incident. He had a wealth of practical knowledge that grounded the design team.
Levare Saint Joy on the other hand had spent his entire adult life in front of a computer or in one meeting or another. He'd tried his hand briefly at teaching, but he much preferred design work. He was third in command of the starship design bureau and was quite proud of that achievement. He didn't resent Charlie being over him at all; the man had earned the right to be at the table many times over. Besides, he was in his sixties, he'd probably retire in another decade or so. Perhaps sooner if he didn't get his weight under control. The Lagroose medics were big on preventive medicine, they were probably all over Charlie to behave and exercise more.
He looked over to the mahogany man sitting across from him. Trey Ashton had at some point in his college years played professional basketball. He had a jersey lovingly framed with pictures in his office. He also liked to play with a basketball when he was bored or shoot hoops. He frequently dragged the design team out of the offices to play pickup games. Some said he'd missed his calling; he should have stuck to basketball and turned into another Michael Jordan. If you squinted and looked at him from a distance, he really did look like Jordan … or so his wife liked to tease him.
“Well … a hybrid? Augment? Maybe. I'm still not so sure about that. The wisdom …” the boss shook his head. “Plus that opens all sorts of cans of worms. Like buffering the brain right off the top of mine. Buffering is required, but it slows down reaction speed … plus, direct neural network linkage is limited to a couple of hours before tissue swelling and concentration factors become an issue too. So we have to take all that into account.”
“What about a Neo? You know, an uplift?” Kathy asked absently. One of her goals was to put out the idea of the Neos pulling their own weight and stepping out into modern society as humanities equals.
“Are you serious??” Levare stared at her incredulously.
“Yeah. A Neo dolphin or whale would work. They have a 3-D inner ear, in fact it's the best developed. Not even a bird can compete with a cetacean’s ear.” She shrugged and then smiled sweetly at him. Let him think about that for a change.
“You want to put a dolphin in charge of a starship?” Levare asked slowly, as if the concept was hard to consider.
“Yeah,” she said looking at him levelly. “Why not?” She frowned. “They already do a lot of stuff. Dolphins are a big part of the astronomy department,” she said indicating Doctor Night. The astronomer blinked and then nodded.
Dolphins, with their innate hearing ability, were invaluable to the astronomers mapping the vast cosmos. Thirty billion planets had been hypothesized within a star's Goldilocks zone of habitability. Another ninety billion or more exomoons were also theorized to be out there. In the hunt for exoplanets, a few critical factors had to be considered. The planet had to be in the Goldilocks zone as stated before. They also had to be the right size, and have an atmosphere. They had to have the right temperature, and finally, they had to have a magnetosphere. Finding the last had been tricky until a scientist had figured out that by listening to the radio frequencies from the star passing through the planet's atmosphere they could get a measure of how strong its magnetosphere was.
Unfortunately, all the Kepler class observatories employed could give the raw data. There were a lot of false positives caused by gas giants and other problems such as variation in the lenses. By converting the data into sound, they could listen to the sound and interpret the data easier. Dolphins proved to be a valuable asset in the program.
“My God in heaven, woman, have you even thought about the engineering involved? Let alone the logistics? Stockpiles of fish? The life support requirements?” Levare waved his hands frantically. “It's the silliest damn thing …”
“No, I'm brainstorming. It's out of the box thinking. That was off the top of my head,” Kathy snarled back, pride wounded. “Dolphins can function well in 3-D environments. They can move with half their brains if necessary. Think about it,” she said.
The boss rapped his knuckles on the table to get their attention. Kathy's glower turned his way. Trey had been glared at by worst individuals, it washed right off. After a moment she realized who she was glaring at and turned the voltage down. “All right enough. Kathy, run a sim for the various pilots and chart it. Human, AI, augment, and neo. See which works best. Plug into the eggheads over in the cyborg program, and maybe the Uplift program. Ask them to rig up a sim game f
or their people to try.”
Kathy bit her lip and then nodded. She'd been taken for her word, something she hadn't expected.
“Or maybe a combo of them if none are optimal,” Levare suggested. Kathy gave him a look. He shrugged. “The idea is growing on me,” he said. She nodded.
“We'll get it so people can use it eventually,” the boss said. “Humans have adapted to aircraft and space flight. We can figure this out with the right approach and computer support.”
“This is an interesting and novel approach to the problem. We can bio-engineer the pilots. Maybe make them smaller? Or give them legs?” A junior engineer said, partially raising a hand in excitement.
“Why? Why do they need bodies at all?” Another engineer asked excitedly.
“You're not talking about engineering them directly into the ship are you?” Levare asked, turning.
The engineer shrugged. “It would cut the logistics down immensely. Close the loop.” He made a show of a brain in a box.
“True,” Levare mused, rubbing a stylus against his right temple as if scratching an itch or trying to stimulate his brain.
Kathy gaped at them, head twisting back and forth like she was in some sort of tennis match. She was aghast that her flippant idea had been taken and mutilated. She'd met the neos; she wouldn't see them harmed or twisted. There would be no way she'd allow them to be corrupted into a corporation's slave race. Mrs. Lagroose wouldn't allow it, but she could be overruled … Her temper flared.
“The uplifted are more than animals. They are people you know,” the woman spat, eyes flashing as she found her voice. The rest of the room quieted “Living, breathing people who have emotions and rights,” she hissed. “They may be the boss's pet experiments and damn illegal down on Earth, but he made it clear they will be treated as people not slaves,” she said, hands gripping the edge of the desk as she glared.