Fleet Academy

by M. Scott Cottrell

  “Affirmative we have you on tracking. Acknowledge capture complete. Be advised that the shuttle is leaving the docking bay now. You have four minutes to bingo time and the shuttle has to return.”

  “Roger four minutes.” She said, watching her thruster fuel with one eye and looking for the shuttle with the other. Finally she had to cut off the thrust, or risk not having enough fuel to stop in a shuttle bay.

  “This is shuttle three. We are clear of the bay and moving for intercept.”

  “Roger shuttle three, keep us advised.” Command responded.

  “I see you shuttle three.” Tempe called on the radio.

  “Affirmative. We have your pingers on the scope. Be advised that we are really short on time. What I need you to do is to thrust straight into the main shuttle lock. There isn’t a pod to worry about, so just get into the lock as soon as you can. We’re heading your direction and are going to flip to point the lock in your direction.”

  “Affirmative. I’m not at all sure that I have enough thrust fuel to stop, let alone reverse. Can you help me out?”

  “Um. Roger that. Hold one… Ensign Sparks thinks she can do a capture reversing thrust just as you get to us so that you don’t have to reduce to less than four hundred.”

  “Roger. I will reduce to four hundred relative to Saint Claire.”

  “Negative. You need that to be relative to us.”

  “Roger four hundred relative to you. Starting breaking now.” She rolled her suit over and put her back toward the shuttle and hit the thrusters, watching the velocity readout tick down until she was closing on the shuttle at four hundred meters per minute. “You better aim good girl, or you’re going to be nothing more than a cosmic splat.” She said to herself as she rolled over and looked at the tiny black opening she had to hit.

  “Command to shuttle. Be advised you are two minutes to Bingo.”

  “Roger command.” Tempe heard them respond. “OK Tempe. You’re seven hundred meters and closing.”

  “Affirm. Lining up on your open airlock door… How in the hell did he do this during the meteor shower?”

  “Ensign Sparks says it’s a guy thing. They’re always good at hitting holes.”

  “Roger that.” She said with a chuckle. Leave it to Lieutenant Kispan to crack jokes at a time like this. The seconds ticked by as the dark rectangle began to grow enough that she believed that she might actually fit into it. In space depth perception and size perception are often very skewed.

  “You are two hundred meters and closing. Do not slow your rate down. You will make contact with ten seconds to Bingo. There’s only one shot at this, so get it right.”

  “Affirmative.” She said with a lot more confidence than she felt. ‘Come on girl… all you gotta do is hit the hole and hang on.’ She said to herself as she tweaked her thrusters slightly to stay aligned.

  “One hundred meters.” Kispan said

  “Roger. On my mark, close the doors. Ten… nine… eight… seven… six… five… four… three… two… one… NOW!” She shouted into her radio as she slid into the air lock, nicking the edge of the door with her shoulder as it started to close, sending her spinning across the lock, still clutching Matt. On her command, the pilots hit max thrust for just two seconds, sending the shuttle accelerating to just under four hundred meters per minute, at the same time commanding the lock doors to close. The impact was brutal, the two of them hitting the far wall of the air lock just over a second after they entered it, their velocity still over a meter and a half per second faster than the shuttle. Matt was jarred loose from Tempe’s grasp, and the two of them bounced around the shuttle lock as the shuttle accelerated and maneuvered to get back into the ship before the course change had to be made. Tempe righted herself as much as she could and tried to hold the unconscious Lieutenant from getting any more injuries through is soft sided suit. “You could be a little gentler there.” She radioed to the shuttle crew.

  “Sorry Tempe. We have two minutes to get in and docked or we’re walking home.”

  “Roger. I’m not too bad, I have a hard suit on, but the Lieutenant is getting beat up pretty bad.

  “Understood. I have medical standing by. As soon as we can I’ll get him in here.”

  “Roger.” She said, placing her body between Matt and the bulkhead as they flew across the lock once again. Just as suddenly as it all started, it all stopped. The door to the air lock cycled open and three white jump suited figures floated into the lock from the cabin.

  “Let’s go! Get them in now!” Lieutenant Kispan shouted as they manhandled Matt into the cockpit. You too! Get into the cabin!” She shouted at Tempe. Grabbing hold of her and pulling her toward the door. As soon as the last of them were into the cockpit the air lock door cycled and the gravity in the cockpit was unceremoniously put back to one full g.

  “Shuttle three to command. We’re clear!”

  “Roger shuttle three, hold on its going to be rough.”

  “Roger!” Ensign Sparks responded before turning in her seat to watch Nurse Sinclair and Ensign Richard Hawks disconnecting Matt’s helmet in preparation for removing his space suit. “Better hang on. This is going to push the systems on this little bird to the limit!” She no sooner said that and the small shuttle seemed to shake and vibrate around them as the Saint Claire began a high trust maneuver to change their course toward the sun. The small shuttles acceleration dampers struggled to maintain normal gravity in only one direction while it was being accelerated off axis because of the orientation it was docked in. With quite a bit of effort, Matt’s suit was slowly being disassembled around him, while the short blond Nurse began checking over as much as she could. Tempe just stood off to one side, still fully encapsulated in her hard suit, the confines of the shuttle cockpit being much too cramped to even think about taking it off. Matt’s suit was just about off when her first alarms started to flash in her helmet.

  “Looks like my life support has about had it.” She said to no one in particular as she opened the faceplate on her helmet.

  “Well, at least it held long enough to get back in here.” Lieutenant Sinclair sympathized as she dug into her medical bag for a syringe.

  “That’s the truth Ma’am. How’s he going to be?”

  “Well, so far it doesn’t look too bad. I’m not sure why he’s still unconscious. The only thing I can find so far looks like a couple cracked ribs. We need to get him to a scanner bed to make sure he doesn’t have any other internal damage.”

  “How soon can we do that?”

  “That’s not up to me Specialist. We’re stuck in here until we go to coast mode.”

  “When will that be?”

  “The Captain said about two hours.”

  “Ok. Thanks.”

  “Not a problem Specialist. She half mumbled to Tempe, going back to concentrating on her patient.

  The two hours passed with excruciating slowness for the occupants of the shuttle. Until the ship left high acceleration, it wasn’t safe to go through the shuttle air lock. Even if they could, the shuttle bay was at zero g and vacuum, there simply hadn’t been time to dock to a lock. Given the few seconds they had left after they got into the shuttle bay, all the pilots could do was hit a set of holding clamps to keep the small shuttle from becoming a missile inside their own ship. Finally, they were cleared to release the holding clamps and maneuver into position on an air lock. As soon as the lock was opened, Dr Clark appeared with two more nurses, one of them being Jenny Sloan, to cart Matt off on a zero grav stretcher to the infirmary. Once Matt had been moved off the shuttle, Tempe finally moved from the corner where she had been standing like a statue, fearing that she would accidentally hurt someone in the bulky suit. She ducked and shuffled out the connecting tube, only to be met at the door by Master Chief Wallace.

  “OK Tempe, what’s the big idea going off after I ordered you not to?” He berated her.

  “Sorry Master Chief. I owed him.” She said almost too quietly for him to hear.


  “Well, you did a good job.” He said softly. “Now get your ass down to the suit room and get changed. The Captain wants a piece of your ass as soon as I’m done chewing on it!” he barked.

  “Aye Master Chief” she snapped out as she came to as much attention as the suit would allow her.

  “Get your ass out of here.” He half snarled at her, smiling at her receding back as she headed down the corridor in the bulky suit.

  Caitlyn made her way somewhat clumsily down the ladders to the suit locker room. She was almost to the cage room airlock before Jenkins saw her.

  “Hey girl! Aren’t you supposed to leave that stuff in the other room?” She chided as she walked out of the suit repair office.

  “Yeah, you know, it was just so comfortable and all I just forgot I had it on.”

  “Like I believe that? Do you take me for a fool?”

  “Well, you know. Gotta get my brownie points somehow.”

  “Well, that’ll do it girl” Jenkins shouted at her as the airlock door closed between them.

  It didn’t take long for her to get the hard suit off in one of the special cages, and head back into the locker room wearing only her cool suit. She didn’t bother to even stop at her locker, stripping off her cool suit as she walked toward the showers. After nearly two hours with her life support turned off to save power for the motors, she was hot and sweaty. She stepped into a tube and pressed the water control, hitting the override to get cold water instead of the pre-programmed warm water. She hit the control several times before she finally hit the dryer and stepped out, her hair still wet, but the rest of her feeling a bit more refreshed and clean. She headed for her locker, picking up her cool suit pieces from the floor as she walked. She slipped on her blue jump suit and her deck shoes, and then headed for the Captains quarters, sure to get another ass chewing there.

  “Ok let’s get as much info as we can on this thing then.” She heard the captain say as she approached her quarters. Her voice came from the bridge though, so Caitlyn walked to the bridge and stood staring at the view screen, failing to do anything other than hang her jaw open. The image on the screen was something she had never seen before. The object looked a lot like the ship that they had been investigating, but this one had eight long antennas sticking out around the front, waving around; and in the rear, instead of being round and solid, it had a lot of small streamer looking things extending out. The other thing that looked strange was the view of the sun on one side of the scanner. Whatever it was appeared to be on a similar course to the sun as the Saint Claire.

  “Specialist Tempe!” The Captain snapped.

  “Aye ma’am!” Caitlyn replied, snapping to attention.

  “I don’t know whether to court-martial you or decorate you!” The captain said hotly as she walked across the bridge to where Caitlyn was standing rigidly. “You nearly cost me two more crew members, and a shuttle and its crew. Did you even stop to consider how you were going to get back if you did make it to Lieutenant Molter?”

  “Yes ma’am.”

  “Really? Well, let’s hear it then.”

  “I expected to be able to get back on my own ma’am!” Caitlyn said crisply, not letting her eyes waver from the Captain’s, who was now standing nearly nose to nose with her.

  “I highly doubt that Specialist. I think you went off against orders without even thinking your actions through. What would possess you to put the whole ship at risk in such a stupid and ill-considered effort?”

  “Honor ma’am!”

  “Honor? You mean ‘we never leave a man behind’ honor?”

  “No ma’am.”

  “Well, just what do you mean then?”

  “I’m only alive because the Lieutenant risked his life to save mine. I wasn’t going to let him die alone out there ma’am.”

  “You realize that it may well have been both of you dying out there?”

  “Yes ma’am. I did realize that.”

  “But you were still willing to go after him, knowing that we may have had to leave you behind?”

  “Yes ma’am.”

  “Well, Specialist, you have more guts that I gave you credit for.” The Captain said, stepping back and pacing slowly across the bridge. “Your actions resulted in a successful rescue. Lieutenant Molter is injured, but it appears he will recover… Given the outcome and what appears to be a selfless act, I’m more inclined to decorate you than court-marital you.”

  “Thank you ma’am.” She said evenly

  “Dismissed Specialist!” The Captain snapped as she turned her back on Caitlyn, who wasted no time in turning on her heel and making tracks off the bridge and out of the Captains sight… before she changed her mind and decided to court-martial her after all.

  In his mind he was still floating, no particular direction up or down, completely surrounded by millions of stars, some so close he felt like he could reach out and touch them. It was a quiet pleasant place ‘This has to be some kind of dream.’ Matt thought to himself. ‘Or I’m dead… I don’t even have a space suit.’ Ever so slowly he began to move through the star field, inching slowly toward an emptiness spinning below him. The swirling blackness pulled at him, drawing him deeper and deeper into its center, crushing him and twisting him as he was drug faster and deeper into the heart of the black hole. He could feel chest being compressed by the tremendous gravity, yet his intellect told him that this much gravity should turn him into a puddle of ooze. He was pulled farther and farther down into the depths of the black hole, his vision slowly blotting out into darkness until there was nothing but the crushing pain in his chest. Just as slowly things began to lighten. His chest still felt like it was being crushed, but his vision slowly started to brighten. He could soon hear voices around him as the light slowly continued to brighten. “Matt… Matt.” He heard a female voice call to him as if from miles away. He remembered the voice. He remembered Jenny and how wonderful she looked and smelled and felt. It was sad that he wouldn’t ever see her again, but for some reason her voice still called him. He felt powerless to move, but at the same time he felt the need to stretch toward the sound of her voice. It took effort, and the pain in his chest continued to grow worse. But he wanted to, needed to, reach to her voice. He tried to reach with his arms, but they wouldn’t move. As hard as he tried, the only thing he could move was his head. He stretched toward her voice. It seemed to be pulling him. Slowly, but none the less, pulling him toward her voice. He wanted to see her again. He wanted to feel her again. He struggled against the pain in his chest to reach out to her voice. The room continued to get lighter. He felt hope. Maybe he could still touch her again, if only he could reach her voice. “Matt… I’m here.” He heard her say again. He strained to reach toward where he heard her voice. It seemed to take days, but his vision was starting to clear some. He hoped she would wait. It seemed to take so long to move toward her. Finally… Shadows in the field of white. Maybe he would make it, maybe he wasn’t dead all the way yet. He struggled to reach to her, to find some way to let her know he was here, some way to tell her he loved her. He tried to speak, but nothing came out. He tried to shout, but did little better. He took a deep breath and shouted again, the pain in his chest searing his lungs as he tried to cry out her name.

  “Doctor Clark! I think he said something!” Jenny called across the room as she sat on a stool next to Matt’s bed, holding his hand, gently stroking his hair.

  “That’s a good sign. Just keep at it; he’ll come out of it when he’s ready.”

  “Don’t worry; I’m not going anywhere until he wakes up.”

  “I know.” He said patting her back as he walked by. “It's only been a day, Give it some time. He’s a strong lad, he’ll come back.”

  “I’m not worried Doctor.” She said with a touch of a smile. “I know he’ll come back to me.”

  “Good girl. I’ll check back in a while.”

  “Ok.” She said turning back to watch Matt’s face and continue stroking his hair. “I’m right here
Matt. I’m waiting for you.”

  He could still hear her voice. He tried to reach for it, but no matter how much he tried, he couldn’t make his body move toward the sound of her voice, so he floated, now in whiteness instead of space, but no more able to reach her than before. He was frustrated and cried out to her, not to go, that he was here. He struggled to find some way to reach her. ‘I’m coming!’ He shouted to her. ‘I love you!’ Again he struggled to move his body closer, this time he felt his arm move, not much, but a little. His chest still felt like it was being crushed, and each time he called to her it seared with pain, but he called again anyway. He struggled to move his arm again, to reach for her, but it only moved a little, and the effort was wearing him out. He felt exhausted, but continued to reach for her, afraid that if he stopped to rest she would be gone. Finally he had to rest, he just couldn’t keep going.