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I was in deep trouble. Once again my big mouth had fired off and this time, only a miracle could save me. I only had to wait two days. In two days I would have graduate, Prephaps not with honours, but enough to get to the front. My best friend, Joan had warned me about Bisselmann. Did I listen? Of course not.
Prephaps I figured by the year twenty-two forty-seven we would have educators that knew what they were teaching. I didn't sign up. I was drafted. Minding my own business and in comes an email to show up for basic training in a month.
Basic training lasts six months, then the testing. I really hate tests, especially stupid ones where all you have to do is use a little common sense, or 'uncommon' sense as my mother used to say. That is, when she was still speaking to me.
Republic Academy was next. Apparently one of my instructors thought I liked being hooked up to a teaching machine for ten hours a day. The connection point to my skull grew so inflamed that it started to become infectious, so they drilled another one on the other side and began to trade off.
After a year of that came the application of the knowledge. That I found enjoyable; real education, other classmates, field trips, once they even took us out of system to view a captured phyerxian man o' war.
More tests, then specialised training, which brings me to this point. Captain Bisselmann had dragged us through what was left of the RSS Adventure. A Battlecruiser of the older variety, its' serial number was BAT-one, two, ninety. Series twelve-hundred, ship ninety, probably produced sometime prior to the turn of the century.
A once-proud vessel, now quite close to ruin. It was my understanding that she was going to be refitted and shipped out within six months and I knew Bisselmann wouldn't be on her. He was going to keep his teaching assignment, so he said,
"Sometimes a good man can do more teaching than fighting." As a matter of fact, he concocted a simulation of the very scenario that took down the RSS Adventure.
My studying took me well into the night, and led me to a fact.
My instructor made a very stupid mistake.
He neglected to use all of the resources at his command.
Not only did my resolution to the situation completely decimate my opponent, my vessel remained virtually unscathed. I didn't stop there.
I created two additional simulations, both of which generated the same result; either one had a fraction of the casualties and damage.
The class of ten drew lots as to whose simulations were played first. I was last. No-one else got away unslaughtered although two of my classmates offered multiple solutions.
At the end of the class, my fellow students gave me a standing ovation.
The green light lit up outside Commandant Kolos' office, distracting my reverie'.
I stood at attention, and entered silently. The Commandant was sitting at his desk, he watched me enter. He gestured his hand to a rather uncomfortable-looking chair.
"Sit."
I sat.
"Does educator Bisselmann generally permit multiple answers to an assignment?"
"Yes sir. I was not the only cadet to offer multiple solutions."
"Correction. You were the only cadet to offer any solution." He continued with a question.
"Did educator Bisselmann tell you was remaining in a teaching position?"
"Yes sir." I said.
"Did he give you additional commentary regarding that matter."
I thought hard.
"I believe he said something along the lines of, `Sometimes a man can do more good teaching than fighting.' I can't remember precisely."
"Do you know who might have told him that?"
"No sir." I replied, but I was beginning to get an idea.
"I did. Either he took the teaching position or he retired early."
Fleetingly I looked at the commandant's rank. Six squares on a field of black. Commodore with extensive battlefield experience. Kolos knew, and had retired him from combat. I'd just made Bisselmann's humiliation public.
"You're not stupid cadet."
I didn't respond.
"I'm going to ask this question once. Please reply honestly." He cleared his throat and continued. "Did you deliberately generate these responses so that you might intentionally humiliate your educator publicly?"
My response was immediate, and honest.
"No sir."
A long pause. What the heck, I was already in the hot seat.
"Permission to speak freely, sir."
A long, hard look from the commandant.
"Granted."
"Sir, while educator Bisselmann and I clashed, I did not, nor do I want to hurt or embarrass him." My voice quavered. I looked toward the floor. "I was trying to pass my class. I was concerned that prephaps since the educator and I had clashed he would be inclined to, well, lower my leadership score."
Kolos looked at me. For a half-second; just a flash, a corner of his lip turned upward.
"He never told you, did he?"
"Sir?" Now I was quite confused.
"You can't lower a score. Once a rating has been achieved it cannot be lowered. You are the only one of two people that scored perfectly on the leadership test. The Republic couldn't keep you out of the command chair if it tried. Neither can Bisselmann. This explains a great deal. Still..."
He paused, and looked directly into my eyes.
"Stand and be judged."
I stood, my would be Republic career fleetingly flashing in front of my eyes.
"Do you understand the consequences of your action?"
"I do, sir."
"Very well. Technically, I could charge you with conduct unbecoming and whatever nonsense I could conjure up. Bisselmann wants you discharged for insurrection of some kind. It's my understanding you are estranged from your family."
"My father died in the war, and my mother doesn't care for some of my choices in the way I live my life."
"I know. I've spoken with her, interviewed your friends, classmates and other instructors. They all back you."
My pulse raced.
"You are formally released from your studies, and may consider yourself successfully graduated with your class. You have seventy-two hours leave as of now, and may participate in graduation exercises if you so wish."
Whew.
"In seventy-two hours time you will report to shuttle bay fourteen where you will ride aboard the RSS Tibetan to the moon of Cerebus, it will leave at precisely twenty-seven fifty hours Republic Time. You will arrive on Cerebus in precisely four hours, and the next morning, you will report for duty at oh-seven fifty Republic Time to a Captain Richards. Six months after your flight training with Captain Richards you will report back to me, here on Luna. Note that your future placement will be severly influenced by this, your first active duty assignment. Do you accept my judgement?"
"Yes sir."
"Do you understand your command instructions?"
"Yes sir." I replied again. I'm wasn't sure whether or not I was breathing!
"Dismissed."
"Yes sir. Thank you sir." I turned on one heel towad my left, and smartly marched out from the office. No-one else was waiting for the Commondant.
Chapter Two
Exiting the outer office, I left the elevated tier which allowed the Commondant direct view over the physcial fitness training area. I can remember doing drills out here, walking around to stretch my legs, from time to time, I'd look up, and ocasionally see Kolos looking out.
That was the first time I'd personally met him, although he did teach class on days when other teachers took time off. He seemed well versed in just about everything, although from his looks I couldn't put him past fifty, assuming that he was human, of course.
I ducked into a side corridor, wandered down a hallway, and slipped through a series of double doors. The cafiteria was open all hours of the day or night, and in fact there were a few people inside. They quickly glanced up as I entered. I looked back, and knew none of them, probably newbies. Luna training grounds worked on a cyclitic basis, new students in, old out, a graduation every month. A big deal to some, not a whole lot to me.
Part of the wall was a series of squares inset into the wall. I walked toward one of these ducts and smacked a credit card in to a small slot above the . The door slid up, and a round apiture folded down from the top of the duct. I needed food, and I needed it now.
"Pad thai, with shrimp and tofu. Thai iced tea, made with skim almond milk."
"Order accepted. Fifteen minutes." the voice from the round apiture said.
"Thank you." I said. I never have figured out whether of not it was a system of food ducts that led to a central kitchen or a food synthesizer. Whatever it was, it worked, and right at the moment, that's all I cared for.
While consuming the hot rice noodles, I was unsurprised to see a helmeted grav-ball player walk in. The player made a stop at the food ducts, ordering something.
When I looked up again he was holding a small black box in front of me.
"I'm sorry to interrupt your meal, but I had forgotten to give you these."
She took the box quizically as Commondant Kolos took off his helmet. He gestured toward my clumsy efforts to stand at attention and salute.
"Open it."
Lietutanent's bars, embossed in gold. Rank of Lieutenant with a gold patina indicates OIC or Officer In Command. I'd be in the command line, wherever I went.
"Educator Bisselmann is now running Stardock Twelve."
She looked toward him.
"Thank you sir." She felt as if she was going to cry with joy.
"Can't stay. The Gray Ghost has to play."
"You're the Gray Ghost?" I quired.
"Yes." He smiled.
The gray ghost was an old adversary of hers on the gravball field. Currently she was leading him five to two. In gravball, everyone used a handle, because you had to wear a helmet, no-one knew who you really were. Her nom-de-plume was, `The Artic Fox' A kudos to a field marshall in the mid-twientieth century.
"Have we met on the court?" He inquired.
"A time or two." she replied.
"Prephaps we'll meet again." he said.
"Maybe so. I need to relax."
"Indeed. Will I see you at the graduating excercises?"
"No, I've decided not to go."
"Well then." He reached down, and took off the cadet's bars she wore, and deftly attached the Lieutanant's bars to her collar. He tapped into his wrist comlink, and gave the computer a few select commands. Her comlink, inactive until now, lit up with a green status light that indicated she was now linked to the primary computer network.
He smiled.
"Good luck, Lt. Jacobs."
"Thank you. Enjoy your game."
He left. She consumed the chilling meal quickly. The cadets who had taken no notice of her before now saluted her as she went. She was now an officer at the tender Earth age of sixteen.
Chapter Three
The dorm room door slid open, and I walked in. I must have looked liked I had taken some kind of pounding, because my best friend, Joan, lept from her bed and wrapped her arms around me.
"Hey, what happened." Her commotion had alerted the rest of my friends in the dorm that I had arrived.
"Well it's a bit of a story. I have my next assignment, and I am considered graduated." I replied
"Thank goodness. We were all worried that Bissellman was going to have you expelled." She said.
"Commendant Kolos was quite cordial. Apparently he spoke with some of you."
"SOME of us? He made us line up at attention while he interrogated each one of us one-by-one." She squalled.
"He even spoke with my mother." I replied
"Now that's daring." Joan said.
"I suppose I'll have to call her, and thank her for the kind words." I said.
"Don't be too quick. I overheard part if it, and it wasn't pretty." Mike Seagers, the dorm warden said. "He used my terminal over here. The discussion was short and anything but sweet."
I closed my eyes and shook my head. Was there anything that I could do right?
Joan held me for a minute.
"I'm okay." I said, breaking the hold. I wasn't going to cry again. Maybe. What the heck.
Twenty minutes later, the dorm was empty, save for Joan. I was finished crying, for the most part. My eyes were still red, and puffy, and most of the sniffling was gone. Joan held me still. I began to toss some of my effects into a space trunk when I ran across my grav-ball suit. Joan had a class in ten minutes, and I had leave time. Maybe, just maybe The Gray Ghost would still be up for a game.
Quickling stripping down to my skivvies, Joan gave me a quizzical look, and then I started to put on the Grav Ball armour. She helped me strap on the null-gravity shoes and when I'd finished putting the rest of the armour, she strapped the externals down.
"Go kick some tail. You're lucky, in a way," she said, folding my tunic, "atleast you still don't have to, hey! You didn't tell me you got your bars! Gold, too! Wow!" She pointed toward the gold bars on the uniform top. In my excitement, and frustraition, I hadn't said anything to anyone, although I'd seriously considered ordering the lot of them to attention while walking toward the dorm room.
"You're sure you won't come to the graduation?" She asked. She'd been dodgeing me to go ever since she found out that I had no intention of doing so.
"We've been through it a dozen times, I don't do well in social situations, and I have absolutly no idea why they should have a graduation every month." I said good-naturedly, grabbing my helmet, and tying my hair into a roll.
"It's the Republic's way, it's a good way." Joan was definatly going to be a good by-the-book officer, but she certainly lacked my laxed attitude. It would be interesting to see how each of us progressed. Without doubt, she would achieve the same gold bars, and probably be shipped off to a command ship, with dozens of other lieutanents to compete against and probably show up.
Turning toward the mirror, the vanity yielded a brush which quickly went through my chestnut mane. For sixteen, I'd been told I looked eighteen, and I could see a single gray hair at the front of my hairline. I had high cheekbones, worn thin by daily excercise and a strict diet. I loved to eat, and would be quite heavy were it not for the extensive amount of exercise that kept me trim. The bulky armour was form-fitting, covering my small breasts and long, slender legs. My upper torso was fairly muscular for a female, I had to do some weight-lifting so that I could meet the lifting requirements.
"Well I have to go to class." Joan said, softly. I turned a slight shade of red, it was not my habit to stare at myself in the mirror.
Joan smiled softly at my embarassement, with a barely audible chuckle.
"Well, Lieutenant, I'll leave you to your grav-ball game." I could see in the mirror she was saluteing me with a grin. I waved it back.
"Cadet. Do well, and try not to get into any trouble." I said.
"Why not? It seemed to serve you well." She shot back as she scampered out the door. I rolled my eyes in response, and turned back toward the mirror.
Releasing the faceplate of the helmet, it slid gently onto the back of my head, and framed my features, in silvery-gray plasteel. A tendril of hair slipped out, which I tucked underneath my left ear. My blue eyes went well with the helmet, and the touch of red in my cheeks was not washed out by the bland non-color of the helmet. The helmet clicked down, and I could feel the internal air supply kick in. I tapped a red switch on the side of the helmet, and I heard a beeping sound as the HUD or Head's - Up - Display booted its' software sequence.
To the left of the display was a menu which the cross-hairs activated by simply looking at it. If I were to wait long enough, the menu would drop and I could activate options. Patience was not my particular virture so I made a clicking sound and the menu dropped.
I selected voice, and under that, distorted. The voice that would come from the helmet would be unrecognizable yet understandable. I valued the anonymity of the game, and this furthered it. Most people didn't quite go that far, and didn't realize that their voices were easily recognizable underneath the helmet. I closed that menu and went back up a level to games.
While walking toward the grav-ball courts I linked to the coordinating computer. This was convenient, not being a cadet anymore, I no longer had to sit at a terminal, arrange my match, go play, then go back to a terminal, arrange another match. Rank, apparently had its' privlidges. I linked first to practice court, and reserved one to warm up for a few minutes. This would tell other players that I would be ready for a game in just a few minutes.
Tapping the entry panel, I found the Grav-Ball itself, waiting for me in the center of the room, the traditional starting point. The point of Grav-Ball was quite simple, avoid getting struck in the torso. A hit to any limb was invalid, and you could use your extremeties to speed up, or slow down the ball. Clicking my heels together turned engaged a null-gravity generator and I began to float as if I were in space.
My arm swung hard, hitting the ball, and as it did, Newtonian physics applied, so that when the ball began to move, so did I, reacting in equal, but opposite force. Thus began a series of excercises, I bounced around the court, manovering in all three directions, while avoiding the ball. As the ball arced in my direction, the palm of my hand guided the ball in a different direction. As it hit each wall, the ball accelerated, faster and faster until it was nothing but a blinding gray sphere. After a point, I could not avoid the sphere because it moved faster than my ability to dodge. It struck my upper thigh and bounced me back, for its' inertia was vast.
Were it not for the armour that I wore, my leg would have be shattered by the speed of the metallic sphere. According to the HUD, it was travelling at over three-hundred kilometers per hour. In the top right hand corner of the HUD, a red dot appeared. I directed the cross-hair to it, and dropped down the `listen vmail' option that appeared.
"When you're finished warming up, I could use a workout. Crimson Dynamo in room seven." said the voice. It was male, and unfamiliar to me, probably a first-month cadet a day or two early. I stated aloud, "reply" and the computer prompted back to me, "begin"
"On my way, The Artic Fox is here to play." I paused for a second, until the send indicator appeared, stared at it for a second and my message was sent. While I walked toward room seven, I sent a vmail to `The Gray Ghost' who was in a match already asking him to vmail me when he was done playing if he'd care to play.
The match was to twenty-one, and while `Crimson Dynamo' no doubt had played before, I beat him the first two matches with a comfortable point spread. After we'd finished, the intercom clicked on, and we could talk in real time.
"Been a long time since I've had a trouncing like that. Just passing through waiting for my shuttle, and thought I'd catch a couple of games."
"You're a pretty good player." I said. Some of his moves were very clever, and I can remember one particular maneover which landed the ball squarely in the middle of my back, which was the most indefensible place to be able to land a shot.
I heard a grunting sound come through the intercom. Wonderful, I'd just bruised this guy's ego. Good thing he didn't know I was a woman, men always seemed to take it harder when I beat them. Older men especially. A perverse thought came through my mind that it could be Bissellmann, and that was positivly amusing. It didn't sound like him, but who knows? The red indicator lit up again, and I used the HUD to bring down the menu while I continued the conversation.
The topic drifted from the game to general chatting about the war, and I found the message to be from The Gray Ghost saying that he was ready when I was.
"Need to run, my next victim is calling." I said through the comlink.
"Okay, catch you again." the Dynamo replied.
Walking over to the Ghost's room, I felt comfortable in the fact that this opponent would be civial, win our lose.
"I'm afraid I've a bit of bad news." I could hear the Ghost's echoing voice over the link.
"Oh?" I replied.
"This may well be our last match. My supervisor has asked that I take a transfer to the front, and I've accepted it."
"Ah. Well I myself am going to leave in a few days time."
"Well now, that puts things in a different light." The Ghost said.
"Really?" I replied.
"How about a little wager?" The Ghost asked.
"Such as?" I said.
"ID's" I smiled. To play for an opponent's ID was a high wager. Someone had been practicing, and I was warmed up.
"Deal. Best four of seven?" I asked.
"Long match. Why not?" He replied.
"Tournament rules, of course." I said.
"Of course." He said, almost chidingly. All of the top players would play nothing but tournament standard games so that when they entered into a league or tournament they would be well versed in the moves.
He clapped his hand and the Grav-Ball dropped into the middle of the field. We stood faceing each other, bowed deeply, and dropped into stance
Chapter Four
I feigned low, and struck upward towad the ball, the object was to strike the ball so that it might bounce from the ceiling down, toward my opponent that would probably be lungeing forward to push it directly into my chest. As my hand struck, the ball went up, I went down, and the Ghost simply pushed the ball forward once it left my hand, forceing me into the defensive position, and thus our hotly contested long match began.
My strategy was a simply one, in all reality, I stayed toward the edges of the playfield, this way I could bounce the ball into the wall under my control. The Ghost's method was quite similar, but he would stay toward a corner, giving him maximum control over multiple vectors. I'd seen him move so very fast before I thought he wasn't human, and was still not sure.
Twice, during our first game, he used a multiple-angle trick which landed the ball squarely on my tailbone, and although it did no physical damage, it was mildy humiliating to be hit in the butt by a three-hundred kilometer an hour sphere. On occasion it made me frustraited enough to put a hard spin on the ball, bouncing it vertically so fast I was unable to track it. A dangerous move if your opponenet had superiour reflexes and could see in greater detail.
The Gray Ghost merely stuck his foot out and deflected it straight to the wall I was floating in front of, smacking me squarely in the chest. Game one to him.
Games two and three were equally nauseating - after number three, we took a break.
"Are you familiar with the human term, `sandbagging'" I asked.
"Yes, and yes, to assume your next question. I was assumeing you weren't human, however. The way you sent that ball spinning, I thought you might have been Centauran. Your stature certainly would indicate that." I smiled inside. Keeping your precise specie type was a matter of mystery. It was part of the psychology of the game. As for his comment that I might have been Centaurian, I took it as a compliment. The race as a whole was one of the most attractive in the known universe.
"The way you're going, you'll definatly find out." He said.
"You happen to be one of the finest Grav-Ball players that I've ever played." He said.
"Thank you." I replied.
"Ready?" He said.
"Yes." I nodded, and set the ball spinning on a backward slant that went between his legs, slammed off a corner of the room and smacked him straight in the back. It was the maneover that the Crimson Dynamo had used on me, and caught the Ghost as unaware as it had caught me. The head of his helmet turned and stared at me for a moment. We fought for each and every point, whomever got the serve won the point. Finally, it was tied at twenty to twenty. As he served, from the corner of my eye, I noted the observation dome was filled. I always worked better with an audience, but in that instant, my vanity played against me.
While I should have been paying attention to the game, for that second, that single second, he had no idea I was looking upward. First rule of the game, you pay attention to the ball. It hit me squarely in the head, bounced upward. I knew what was going to happen, and my foot pushed up, off of the floor, but mis-gauged the bounce. The ball struck me squarely in the chest. The match indicator went off.
"That stung." I said.
"I'll bet." He replied.
Useing the cross-hairs on the menu bar, I altered the properties of the room, selecting the opaque setting so that no-one else could see. He'd beaten me four games straight, definately the match, but was still one game trailing in the overall. I tapped the sealing button on the helmet.
"You really don't have to, if you don't want to." I heard over the headphones.
"A wager is a wager. I'd kill to see the look on your face, though." I smiled, turned, lifted the faceplate upright, and let my hair loose. I shook it out of the roll, and spun on a heel.
"Kolos" I said simply. The use of rank was not permitted on the Grav-Ball field.
"Jacobs" I heard over through the speaker. "You had me fooled. I had no idea you were human." I smiled, and replaced my helmet.
"You're still short a game." I replied, removing the opaque display, and seeing no spectators remaining.
"Indeed." He replied. It seemed to be some kind of catch phrase with him.
I walked toward him and bowed deeply, this was customary to the winner of a match. He bowed the lesser bow to me, a courtesy and I watched him watch me through the reflection of the plasteel doors as I walked out.
Chapter Five
The remainer of the evening I spent doing some writing, I even Emailed my mother, not that she would reply. The packing took considerably less time than I expected, and I left a couple of outfits in the closet to be worm.
In the morning, after I'd stayed up way farther than I usually do, I slept blissfully through the general class call, although the dorm leader woke me, I grabbed the collar from my tunic and instructed the cadet to simply, `go away' with no small smile on my face. Joan had been thoughtful enough not to tell anyone else of my impromptu promotion.
I arose quite late in the day, six seventy-five. I noted that Joan would be back in a quarter-hour. Republic time was bizarre, and according to my clock, back home in Spokane it would be one-ten in the morning.
Republic time was seperated into a decimal system that held no consistancy with any planetary body. Ten hours of one-hundred minutes of one-hundred seconds a day, ten days in a week, and ten weeks in a month. A Republic year was one-thousand Republic days. The theory was somewhat interesting, since there was no ambient daylight, who needs to have a planetary-based timescale? The history made sense, as no planet in the forming union could ever decide on whose time frame to use, one was created at the precise moment of the siging of the documentation that formed the Republic. In Earth-time, it was in the eighteen-eighties. We haden't even discovered space travel and a star-faring allience that has lasted over six-hundred Earth years and was still going strong.
The war had started about fifty or so years ago. A invasive group of insectoid invaders had broken a long-standing treaty. They began by anniahlating two seperate worlds which were high industrial complexes. From there they worked their way inward, back toward their own space, destroying various military installations. The Republic demanded retribution, and they had trapsed over and took twice the amount, declaring a war since then. Earth had not yet joined the Republic, and when a badly damaged Republic freighter drifted into Terran space, they were drawn into the fracas.
Pluto had just been colonized, and once Terra has been assumulated into the Republic, it was revealed that the Catilians, a founding member of The Republic, had had a base on Cerebus for over one-hundred years. The Terran government had a small fit over that, but The Catilians never paid them much attention. Roughly ten years later, a majority of those same Catilians gave their lives defending the Sol system against the Nizeral intrusion.
It would be to this Cerebus outpost that I would travel, and be apparently training. I carefully read Captain Richards' profile and found that he was fairly by-the-book, and known for his fighter tactics. I did the preliminary information gathering, always a good thing to do when you're going to be transferred, and didn't hear the door open.
"BOO!" I jumped. Joan laughed perversely.
"CADET!" I yelled jokeingly back to her.
"Yes, Loo-ten-ant." She grinned back.
"For cryin' out loud, Sharon, you're graduated, and you are still cracking the books!" She looked past me at the monitor.
"Just a little research about my next assignment."
"Hey, yeah, what is it."
"Fighter training."
"Nice. Going to buck for a squadron command?"
"I'm not sure. To be honest, I've always pictured myself in the big chair, not necessarily leading wings out."
"Y'know," Joan pointed out, "promotion in the wings is about three to four times as fast. A quick way up."
"True." I replied, "But they aren't likely to transfer me from one to another. I think it's a test posisition to see which I'm best suited to."
"Direct combat, I'm not sure that's something I'm quite ready for." Joan said honestly. She'd never had a stomach for killing, and to be completely honest I haden't scored well in the concepts of the `final' decision. This was war, pure and simple, kill or be killed. Just to push that button, end another living being's life.
We talked amiably for a time, and the mess hall chime sounded.
"Mess or Cafeteria?" Joan asked.
"Cafeteria." I looked at her, like she needed to ask.
"Fine, you're paying." She said.
"Me?"
"You got the promotion, you're actually making REAL money." She shot back.
"I suppose. I hardly call lieutenant junior grade third class a real officer position."
"Look at it this way, you could end up an ensign and have to work through the chief's positions." She pointed out.
"If that were the case, I'd definatley go for the fighter wings." I replied. Most of the other cadets that were graduating would either get an Ensign's pip or somewhere along the road through the chief grades. Only the top ten percent would receive an OIC or Officer In Command ranking, the ranking which I held. Of the four-hundred students, the majority of them would be well under me.
...work in progress...!