"Report."
"Captain, The planet below us is Eden 4, classified as a Half-Waterworld. It is naturally very humid, the surface is about 80% water with the rest being rough land. Most of the land consists of mountains, only few valleys and extended beaches, which are all well inhabited. It seems that everything is in order, though I do not know this colony, so I cannot judge on that."
"Understood. Sensors, navigation, do you agree with the Prime Cadet's summary?" After their affirmatives, the captain continued: "Navigation, engines, set us down in the main barracks for the courtesy call."
This was easy so far! Keeping my senses open, I thoroughly enjoyed our approach and landing and imprinted Eden 4 into my navigation range.
After landing the captain had us remain in the Brick and reported to the local commodore. When she returned, she informed us that everything was in order and that we would directly continue on to Eden 3-1.
"Stone, take us into orbit. 200 kilometers if you please."
"Yes, Ma'am." Taking a deep breath, I emptied my head of everything and focused on the sub-light engine runes. Nudging them most gently, I felt a crisp but weak response from the Brick. We were slowly rising!
Giving the sub-light runes a tad bit of a stronger nudge I accelerated us upward as well as forward, to get the needed height as well as the correct horizontal speed relative to the planet's surface to stay in orbit and not fall back down once we got there. That would have been embarrassing!
It worked nicely, and was much easier than I had feared. "We are in orbit, ma'am."
"Engines, can you confirm?"
"Yes, the orbit is perfectly circular and exactly 200 kilometers."
"Good. Now, Stone, plot us a course to Eden 3-1 but do not yet engage the engines."
"Yes, ma'am." Focusing on navigation magic, I noticed that in my head there was now some sort of a nice, 3-D overview map of parts of the Eden system. It showed Eden 3-1, Eden 6-1 and Eden 4 in what seemed to me to be their present positions. The corridor we zipped through on our way here was nowhere to be found, so I guessed that I should either have scanned on our way here or only fixable targets would be added to that map.
Focusing on Eden 3-1, I imprinted its position into the Brick's short-term memory core.
Wait, memory core? Neat! I had had no idea that that even existed. It could save a bit of data, accessible to everyone. so THAT was how the different colors could work together! Navigation imprinted a destination, engines read that data, adjusted the Brick's roll, pitch and yaw accordingly and gunned the engine runes.
"Well?"
Oh, right. "Um, destination is set."
The Commander chuckled. "Don't look so guilty. We are already ahead of schedule, you are doing very well."
"Navigation, can you confirm?"
"Yes, ma'am. One thing, though: We are aimed at the moon's center, which will make getting into orbit less efficient than it could be."
"Stone?"
"Yes, ma'am. Correcting." I shifted our point of arrival slightly, so that we should come out just right so that the engine would only have to slow us down to get us into a rough orbit. "Now it should be better."
"Navigation?"
"Yes, ma'am, now it looks good."
"Very well. Stone, this trip will not include faster than light training for you - there are specialized Training Bricks for that. Engines, get us there if you please."
"Yes, ma'am." At the same time as my automatic engines-shield went up I focused on our surroundings with navigation magic to see if I could imprint the corridor into my range as well.
The voyage was so fast that I only got a few fleeting images of small objects that we passed by and through. It seemed that the rail drive wrapped us into some sort of a bubble and then moved that bubble to the destination, kind of "bending" space all around us and thereby passing without so much as to cause a ripple. Even solid objects bent all around us and then snapped back into their original shape. I made a mental note to ask about that in the faster than light training in the advanced training.
On an afterthought I got the impression that one of the objects had been changing direction when we were passing by it, but I could not be certain. Probably something I interpreted wrongly.
Still, I mentioned it to the Captain, just to be sure. "Imprint it into the Brick's long-term memory and mark it to be shared with other Bricks when possible, just to be on the safe side." I did that.
"Good. Now land us at the main barracks."
Scanning the moon below with navigation and sensor magic, I moved us to a good point to enter the moon's atmosphere above the main barracks. The rest was easy, gravity did most of my job. The landing itself was less smooth than I would have liked, but it seemed to have been good enough.
"Stone, you have proven that you have all the basics of operating a Brick down, ending your active part in this trip. Stay at your station and observe, while the other cadets get their share of the work."
I could do that. "Yes, ma'am, thank you."
Our stay here was only short, but I did not mind. Even though this was my home colony, we were almost on the other side of the moon from my parent's place. After all, I would return here many more times, and after my retirement of course.
The captain came back, and an engines cadet was tasked to get us into orbit. He sounded confident when he acknowledged the order, and the lift-off was not all that bad honestly. The problems started when he accelerated us way too fast and in a way too shallow curve out of the atmosphere. I noticed that the hull of the Brick was getting rather hot, sensors magic told me that we were in fact having a slight trail of smoke and a couple of embers from the partially glowing hull. "Captain, we're too fast. We're beginning to burn up." I reported.
"Engines, slow us down. We're burning up at the moment." There had been no hesitation, no seeking confirmation from a higher ranked officer. Higher ranked than me, that is. That made me immensely proud and I redoubled my scanning.
Fortunately. Because I noticed that the front of our hull was getting worse very quickly. More than half of its thickness had already been burned away, in fact. In a couple of seconds. Acting on instinct, I raised a shield around the Brick and reported that we should slow down hard right now. Or rather, I tried. Because, as the immense pressure of our speed through the atmosphere slammed directly into my brain, all I was able to say was "AAAAAAHHH!"
"SLOW US DOWN NOW!" The captain yelled. She was even louder than me, not out of panic but because her orders would have been drowned by my screaming. The Brick stopped so quickly that, as I was connected with it through the shield, I clearly felt the creaking in the engine room as the engine runes tried to rip themselves out of the floor. That would have been bad. But it did not happen, and we did stop. The pressure on my mind went away almost instantly and I slumped against the Control Rod and to the floor. Then I passed out.
Waking up was, as usual (I was getting experienced in this), slow and painful. The first thing I felt was that we were back in the barracks on Eden 3-1. Literally, because I was lying in the barrack's infirmary. An elderly, comforting, female voice floated into my consciousness. "Easy, son. Don't move, you've been hurt badly, but you'll survive. What you pulled up there was nothing short of a miracle, the kind of shield you raised takes at least 5 or 6 pips from 2 or 3 officers normally. You really are inconclusive in shield magic. I don't have to tell you that you've gotten a Broken Leg."
I raised my hand, shakily. "How is the crew?"
"We're good, thanks to you." That was Commander Priin. "The Captain says 'thank you', as do we all. The engines cadet who almost burned us up was discharged, by the way."
"Was that needed? We all make mistakes."
The Commander chuckled. "Yeah, he would have gotten away with it on exactly this ground, but he stated that he had felt you influencing the ascent and had tried and failed, against, your overwhelming power, to stop your suicide attempt."
Now I chuckled. "Yeah, right." The Commander laughed
loudly. "That's what the Captain said. You know what we found out? He was a friend of the other Omni-Wizard in your academy and... what?"
I could not suppress an annoyed moan. "Hector Johnson. Omni-Wizard, but only an Adept Weapons Wizard and nothing else. He thinks of himself as the greatest, so do his cronies." I chuckled. "I know, I should not judge him - after all, I am a rather hefty disappointment as a weapon myself."
The Commander did not get the humor in that. "You're not serious, Prime Cadet. 25 pips and... oh." Then he laughed as well, as did the healer.
During all this time I had been healing my last injuries that the healer, a Master Healing Wizard, had overlooked, and now got up and straightened my crumpled uniform. "Is there a place where I can freshen up a little?"
"Sure, we're grounded for a week or so while the Brick regrows. So we've been assigned temporary quarters. The Captain tells me that you're on medical leave until we are ready to go. I understand that this is your home colony?"
"Yes, sir. My parents have a farm on the other side of this moon."
"Good. I suggest you go visit them, they'll be happy to see you. We'll take off next Sunday at noon." With that, he left.
The week at home was wonderful. In retrospect, I am eternally grateful to Commander Priin for giving me this opportunity. My folks threw a rather large party the night I arrived and I had to tell what little stories I already could tell over and over again. That was a bit tedious, but heh - proud parents are like that sometimes. Of course I also healed many injuries, the farm was a ways away from the next barracks and farmers are, as I might have mentioned before, a sturdy folk who do not let themselves be hindered by minorities like broken fingers and such.
Returning was also wonderful. All the attention I received, all that special-person treatment was wonderful but also a bit tiring. Normal duty felt nice, the simple structure of the naval day was something I liked a lot.
The Brick was a sight to behold though. When I walked up to it, I was happy that I was half an hour early so I could walk around it and study the newly grown wood in contrast to the old wood. The older a Brick got, the darker it got and all that new wood looked a bit unreal, being so much brighter than the rest. I did risk cracking a joke when I got back on the bridge: "We got a tan-line!" The laughter was proof that I had not overstepped anything.
During the ascent the Captain said: "Navigation, set a course for Eden 2. Stone, do we have to fly around the star or can we go through it?"
"Ma'am, as I understand it, we are going to be engulfed by a small sphere of our own little space, or reality, and are moving kinda on the side-lines of greater reality or something like that. So now, I don't think that we need to fly around the star but can pass through it." I was frowning because I really did not understand how the physics of that might ever work. But it seemed that they did, much like magic for that matter. How that worked I had no idea, just that it did. Evidently.
"Correct, we do not need to concern ourselves with physical obstacles."
"Course set, ma'am." Navigation was ready.
"Engines, Rail Drive if you please."
I was happy that my reflexes had not dulled at all during the week of luxury and pampering, so my engines shield was up when the Rail Drive zipped us forward. I kept my navigation open, and by pure chance got a glimpse of the inside of our star, enough to imprint it on my internal navigation map. Not overly useful, but nifty!
Eden 2 was rather alien to me. My scan showed it to be dry, rocky, barren with the occasional copse of gnarly tree-like plants and small, sturdy, leathery, surprisingly ugly animals that moved so slow that they might not have moved at all. The air was bone dry and hot. I wondered how the few colonists who did live on the planet managed to survive, even with all their magical help.
We landed at the main barracks for the courtesy call, from which the captain returned sweaty. She only had to walk a couple of steps in the open air, but that was enough. And she had a surprise for us cadets.
"Navigation, Engines, take us to the usual spot." Usual spot? I did not like the sound of that.
We flew a couple of minutes along the surface and landed in the middle of - nothing. a vast, hot, dry, dead desert, the closest drop of water likely hundreds of kilometers away from us. "Cadets, this is the captain speaking." This was something new, her voice came from everywhere at once. It seemed that the captain had some way to address the entire Brick at once. "As we have practiced on Eden 3-1, you will now equip your personal shield-armbands and exit the Brick through the front airlock."
I licked my lips. What had I missed? While I heard the other cadets shuffle to the airlock and outside, I turned around. "That means you also, Prime Cadet." Swallowing, I nodded. "Aye, ma'am." Shooting a glance at the Commander whose face was stony and did not betray anything I turned and marched to the airlock with steps that looked much surer than they were.
The others were outside, I was the last to leave the Brick. As soon as I stepped on the planet two things happened: First, I was hit by the incredible heat that threatened to bake me alive and second the Brick rose, flew exactly 2 and a half kilometers to the planet's north and landed again. The others started walking to it while I was busy dying.
Or at least it felt that way. There must be some sort of test behind this, so there must be a way for me to overcome this obstacle. When I tried to take a step the heat hit me with redoubled force and I reflexively raised my arms against it, making it go away. A couple of steps later I realized that the heat had really gone away and that I felt it still being present outside of the - SHIELD! I had been an IDIOT! Of course!
The shield stopped the heat from the star to hit me, and it was so weak that I only felt its presence when I focused on it. Grinning, I stuck my tongue out at the star and looked into it in the process. That was a mistake, I got blinded and actually had to heal my eyes. Okay, there must be something I could do about that as well, I was a Wizard after all. Following my fellow cadets I focused inwards and analyzed the shield I had raised reflexively. It was basic, only held off the heat. Focusing on also holding off the light, everything got pitch black and I stumbled over a small rock before me.
I fell flat on my face. My hands got stung by a multitude of small, sharp rocks and burned by their heat, so did my nose and forehead. Grunting in surprise and pain, I tried to get up too quickly, lost my equilibrium again and fell on my hands and knees burning and stinging my hands further and ramming my left knee into a rock that was a bit bigger than the rest. Ouch!
This time I took my painful time to get up, still seeing nothing in the pitch black. A couple of deep breaths got my pulse into a more reasonable rhythm and myself calm enough to analyze my situation properly. Using sensor magic I realized that the light had not gone out, but my shield was matte black and did not let any light through. It was a sphere of about 2 meters diameter and I saw that most of the other cadets were watching me, while some shuffled slowly on. Healing my injuries slowly I took the time to scan them and learned that their shields came from the armbands they were wearing. Those sported some shield runes, activated by the magic of the wielder and the shield was rather basic. They were shielded from most of the heat, but none of the light and had therefore trouble seeing.
While small stones fell out of my hands and clinked to the floor I focused on allowing some of the light through and my shield became just dark tinted, much like sun glasses. I lightened it more, until the light coming through was just a bit uncomfortable and expanded it to engulf all of us. That got a lot of relieved sighs and all the cadets came to me quickly. In a dense group, my shield well big enough to engulf us all, we started walking to the Brick which lifted off and flew a couple of meters away from us.
Frowning, I wondered aloud: "Huh?"
"Stop, everyone." That was a weapons cadet. "The captain told us that we need to make this march only with what we have to help ourselves." "Yeah." A sensor agreed. "Maybe Stone's shield is kinda cheating?" I entered the discussion: "Let's try and if the
y hop back another couple of meters I'll pull my shield back, then we try again and see what happens." That was answered by some moaning and a navigator speaking up: "We are part of the best 60. It is an honor that we may do this, and we might be happy for this experience in the future. You never know, so get your acts together and let's do this."
So we walked a couple of steps as a group, which the Brick replied to by hopping back again. "Sorry, guys." I lightened the tint of my shield and pulled it back to surround only myself, imitating the size of the shields the others had. As we started walking again, the Brick now staying where it was, the navigator of before approached me: "No problem, not your fault. Why do you not tint your own shield, though?"
Xandrian Stone 4: The Academy Part 3 Page 2
