Building a Space Navy In The Gentleman Abroad Series I

  Happy Monday, RocketFans! I am happy to say that we reached a major milestone this weekend:  Over 100 downloads of LAUNCH WINDOW! This was my (I thought unrealistic) goal for the entire month - and we reached it in just five days!  Thanks to everyone who got a copy of LAUNCH WINDOW Issue 0.5 for helping make this release our most popular ever.  If you like the magazine or - more importantly - have something you'd like to see in the future, please comment or email us.
     But enough about LAUNCH WINDOW.  I wanted to get into some good, old fashioned world building for my Gentleman Abroad setting and talk about some of the assumptions that are going into the design of the spacecraft and how they are funded, manned and deployed.  You know, the "Building a Space Navy" stuff we all love so much!
     For full details of the steps and considerations that go into building a Space Navy, you can read the Atomic Rockets article here.

Basic Assumptions
     What follows is fairly arbitrary world building details that are tweaked to give me the setting I want.
     In order to start working on the nuts-and-bolts of this setting without too much extra detail work, I shamelessly stole borrowed the excellent Near Space resource published by Stellagamma.  I chose this because 1) It's a Traveller style map so I don't have to convert it; 2) Its real planets with the most up-to-date data we have, 3) Being larger than a subsector but smaller than a sector puts the map in the Goldilocks Zone of utility for my needs and 4) The licensing of the product allows me to steal it shamelessly.
     Against this backdrop I wanted a tiny "empire" of worlds run by people (mostly) as well as the near-mythical god-AIs that actually make NegMat.  So I've assumed that one intrepid cruiser from one last rag-tag fleet from the last round of apocalyptic wars managed to limp via Rabbitholes to a Nexus system just before its NegMat reserve ran dry.  The system was abandoned - no one knows what happened to the AI.  The crew of this cruiser - call it Vanguard - became the rulers of a new empire as they learned the secrets of creating Janus gates and NegMat and set out to reconquer the galaxy.
     Epic backstory: Check.
     When I said "tiny" I meant it - you can count the nobles in the Vanguardian Empire easily.  For convenience and as an intellectual exercise, I'm using the numbers for the Aristocracy of England in the 13th century.  You'd be surprised at just how few their were.  Anyway, our aristocracy is as follows:

• Tejishang: The Emperor :  It is said she is a descendant of the original Captain of Vanguard. She could also be a clone for all anyone knows - it is a Nexus system, after all.  From her all NegMat in the Empire flows.  She is a mainline human, as far as anyone knows by hard choice:  A message to the Janoi and other god-like AI that mear mortals can control their own fate.
• Jiang: Dukes: Perhaps five.  All of them wealthy beyond the dreams of avarice, yet wanting more.  All of them either blood relatives of the Emperor, or decedents of the senior officers of Vanguard . Whole families have been wiped out in dynastic struggles and other intrigues.  Their fiefs include the Class B ports of the Empire.
• Xiao: Counts: No more than a dozen or so.  They either rule planets with Class C starports or command the expeditionary fleets of the Empire.  Lowest hereditary rank the Emperor recognizes, but only the most competent - or ruthless - of a Count's offspring can expect to be elevated to rank and the Admiralty.
• Wei: Baron:  This rank is often passed down in families but is actually dependent on being able to field a warship of over a thousand tons.  Anyone who can afford to build one - and has the political savvy to get one constructed for them at one of the Ducal shipyards - will almost always be elevated by the Emperor.  Better that than having rogue fleets preying on the boarders systems... Even so, there are only about twenty or thirty Lord Barons in all the Empire.
• Zhang: Baronet: A senior Knight that is elevated to command of a Patrol Cutter.  The most common military ship in the Empire by a wide margin, Patrol Cutters are produced by the Emperor and the Dukes and also provided second-hand by the Janoi.  Zhang can be commissioned by the Empire directly, or by any Noble that chooses to buy one and appoint its commander. 
• Bing: Knights:  These are mostly but always fighter pilots, the senior officers of a spacecraft, or part of a starport's administration.  Any noble can knight someone, but only those commissioned by the Emperor are Knights of the Empire. 

     So maybe fifty or so nobles and then a mess of knights.  That's it.  Not a large empire, to be sure.  This system also defines our Empire's size as a function of starports and shipping lanes.  We have one Class A port, 5 Class B ports, and maybe six or seven Class C ports.  These also define the extent of the Janus Network in the Empire as well. I'm assuming that any planet without an A, B or C port is not connected to via a Janus controlled by the Empire.  The Janoi however, created dozens of gates and some go to planets seemingly without value.  Since they're orders of magnitude more intelligent than humans are, they work in mysterious ways...

     Lots of potential for shenanigans: Check.

Pictured: Noblesse Oblige

   
Strategic Assumptions
     I've said before that one of the inspirations for The Gentleman Abroad series was the Drive system.  I've detailed the game mechanics for Negative Matter drives in the "Down the Rabbithole" article in Issue 0.5, so I won't repeat the details here except for a couple of points that pertain directly to fleet building.

• Negative Matter is the "fuel" for all space travel.  It is only consumed when travelling FTL without a Janus Gate
• Physical size of spacecraft are limited by the amount of NegMat available for propulsion and the physical size of Janus Gates
• Interstellar travel is by wormhole - distance is covered instantly and the effective distance one can travel in a single jump is limited only by navigational accuracy
• NegMat is only produced in Nexus systems (systems with class A ports) And only available for sale in Class B and C ports

     Security Environment

These few facts shape space travel in a way that is fundamentally different from the parsec divisions of Traveller and the free and open systems of most other space operas.  The most important way it shapes the setting is how the use of Rabbitholes and Janus Gates defines the frontier.  The biggest difference between the Gent setting and most space operas is that "core" and "rim' become null concepts.  With unlimited "range" and instant travel times, there is no logical reason to establish Janus Gates between systems in close proximity instead of systems with ideal conditions. This means that a polity's "Core" would not be a dense cluster of systems around the Capital, it would more resemble a branching river or web of systems connected to the Capital via Janus.  The "Rim" could include the system next to the Capital - if it lacks useful resources or habitable planets.

        What does all this mean for a Space Navy?  For one thing. The Nexus systems will probably be impregnable.  If your goal is defense of the system, you can build warships as big as you want and wait for the small fry that can fit through the Janus to come to you.  Being a production center of NegMat, you'll have plenty to pump into your monster ships, and you'll only need to fuel these monitors once.  Even better, while the spacecraft themselves are unable to carry complex computers, the Nexus systems are virtually the only places with AI and super-advanced computing.  So said AI could control warships via radio, confident that their god-like processing power will create an encryption that no computer simple enough to traverse the Janus could break.

     So no assaulting a Nexus system.  

     The best you could hope for is to isolate said Nexus by destroying the Janus gate that connect it to other systems.  But those Gates are in Ducal systems, which are only powerful as long as the supply of NegMat is maintained.  Ours is quite the hydraulic empire - and it's meant to be.  I don't want an Empire on the brink, under threat of extinction or even one about to explode into a new Renaissance.  For purposes of writing little stories about local events and providing a good game setting,  I want interesting backstory, just enough of a logical framework to make filling in details easy, and above all I want the empire static and out of the way.

     Fiscal Assumptions

     This is kind of the opposite of the Medieval system I used to design my arisocracy:  Credits are for the rabble; the Nobs don't generally use money.

      This has to do with being an industrialized society.  Those Nobles with planetary feifs will own banks and be minting their own credits, which will be used by citizens.  Among themselves, NegMat is the main currency:  It dictates how many ships you can build, how far they can travel, and how much business your spaceport can handle.  If you want to draw parallels between Dune's spice and Imperial NegMat, you can.  So among the Emperor and her Dukes, favors are exchanged for NegMat, which is exchanged with Counts for more favors and so on.  The NegMat must flow.

      As far as how this pertains to shipbuilding, the assumptions are that any planetary system that can sustain a Class A, or B starport has the resources to build ships without trouble.  Even assuming low TL computer power, having ships with unlimited Delta V in practical terms will insure the riches of the entire system can be exploited.  As for minor nobles that lack shipbuilding capacity, they're still rich enough in practical terms to buy ships.  This gives them the option of accepting noble rank, which is basically a glorified Letter of Marque, or being hunted down by any vassal of the Empire who would like their personal access to NegMat to continue.

     As for the 99%ers who are not born to nobility nor rich enough to buy their way in, you have credits, banks, mortgages and all of the lovely systems that keep traders and mercs in Traveller from earning a quiet living and forcing them to have adventures to stay in the black.

 

     

More Works in Progress (T-MINUS 5 DAYS)

    Another busy day, RocketFans, getting LAUNCH WINDOW ready for press. It's looking like we'll be finished with the issue in plenty of time, meaning I can get a jump on the rules updates for D20, OSR, and Diaspora.  Let's take a peek, shall we?


















    The Gentleman Scoundrel's  bridge complex is coming along.  The problem is, the image is huge - literally five feet by three.  Needless to say, at that size a lot of detail would be lost if I reduced it to fit a size A5 page, so this iso artwork will not be in the digest.  It will however be available for download as a separate file with  the digest, so you can enjoy it at a larger size!








     I'm really pleased with how the lay is coming as well.  I hope you are as well.  Anyway, I've got some more work to do, so until then, RocketFans, enjoy!

Big Ship for Gentleman's Errand

I don't want to spoil the story, but...

A Gentleman’s Errand

    “I still can’t believe that is a computer.”

    This was from Ipa Sam, engineer of the The Gentleman Scoundrel, a tramp plying the so-called trade on the frontier.  That, was specifically a suitcase-sized appliance sitting on the mess table of the Scoundrel’s crew lounge.  That such a thing could carry useful electronics through a wormhole and have them work on the other side was only credible to Sam because she herself had seen it.

  “This thing is amazing!”  This was Ruku Mat, Navigator.  Her normally shy and retiring demeanor was for the moment gone. Her purplish skin looked even more vivid in the blue glow from the strange computer’s screen.  “Its easily twice as powerful as our entire mainframe!”

    Also at the table was pilot and fist mate, Zag Esseru.  She smirked at the diminutive Ruku as a ripple went through her head-quills. “Facinating, uh huh.”  Bet you’ve seen faster and smaller, Kura.  Right?” This was at the ship’s steward.  Canto Kura, being from one of the Nexus systems of the Janoi, was the only one who had recognized the computer for what it was.

    “To be fair,” Kura said as he distributed the sacrament of coffee to the three officers, “It’s the smallest I’ve seen that can travel on a ship with NegMat drives.”

   How small can a computer really get though?” asked Ruku Mat.

  “Ah!  Have a look.”  Canto sat at the table and, with a little flourish, produced what was, to all apperences, a ballpoint pen.

   “Is this the one where you do math on a napkin and say it’s an analog computer?” Zag frowned.  “Because if so, I’ve heard it.”

    “No, no: Observe.”  Kura held the thin cylinder in one hand and with the other picked at the side of his pen.  A thin stave came off of the side and, as he pulled, a opalescent membrane of translucent material could be seen, like the sheet of a scroll.  The membrane caught the light strangely, showing a honeycomb of silvery threads embedded within.

    “I forgot I had my QIL in my pocket when I first shipped off Gleise.  It had my whole life on it.  Photos, video, songs and movies, books - everything. And this is a cheap model.  My last nanobiotics booster has more processing power than this entire ship.”

    “Bullshit.” Zag offered.

    “I won’t believe that was a computer.”

    “Canto,” Ruku Mat looked hurt.  “You didn’t have to make something up.”

    Kura knitted his brow and sighed. “That’s what everyone says.”

Guess Who's on Kindle Now!

Get your today!

That's right, RocketFans, The Gentleman Scoundrel, our first serial nano-fic story, is now available on Amazon Kindle for free with Kindle Unlimited! The kindle book copy is revised and expanded, correcting many of the issues and smoothing out the choppy bits and breaks that are unavoidable in serial nano-fic.

 If you get a copy, please leave a review.
I'm so excited!

Also, to all those other burgeoning writers out there:  I made this cover myself.  If you like what you see, I am available for commissions.  Contact me at bluemaxstudios@yahoo.com

Nano-Fic: A Gentleman's Duty (13)

Once the Cutter was locked into its death spiral, Ruku left the cockpit and shot down the lift tube as fast as she could.  It was hard going, as the surplus NegMat that normally compensated for accelleration was pumped into the Launch.  Clamped to the belt harness of her space suit was a cable from the lift tube’s cargo winch.  As she climbed downward, the tension on the winch compensated somewhat for the pull of inertia.

Three decks downward, just under the level that accessed the ship’s Launch, Ruku found Sagkal wedged in the tube.  His bulk blocked the tube completely.  It took Ruku but a moment to realize that with her suit on, she could not reach down and secure the massive Sloak to the cable.

“Shit!”  Ruku became more frantic. What could she do?  She couldn’t reach her friend.  She couldn’t leave Sagkal, they would both plunge into the star -

-Wait!  With a mighty effort, Ruku climbed against the suit’s weight up a few rungs on the lift tube’s emergency ladder until she was level with the door to the deck above Sagkal.  She typed in the 515 passkey from memory and fell onto the deck once she got the hatch open.  Without pause, Ruku Mat struggled to the edge of the lift tube and lowered the cable down.  It took her three desperate tries before she managed to hook Sagkal’s shoulder harness.  She got to her knees and punched the winch control next to the hatch combing.  

Sagkal’s bulk resisted the cable for a few moments, then finally gave way with a lurch.  As he slowly rose, Ruku grabbed the harness loops on the front of the Sloak’s suit and pulled him onto the deck.  Once he was safe on the floor, Ruku stumbled and lurched toward the opposite end of the deck, where the Launch was waiting.  

“Ruku, you’re in the corona!  Get out of there!”

Normally, such a stern admonishment, and from Master Vakh of all people, would freeze the diminutive woman in her tracks.  But Ruku ignored the voice in her ear and instead cycled the Launch’s airlock and grabbed its cargo winch.  She ran back through the deck, around the long corridor, and hooked Sagkal once again.

“Ruku!  You have to launch now!”

She ran back to the Launch, vision almost gone from sweat beading in her lashes.  It took two tries to hit the winch control, and then Ruku was yet again careening down the passage, bouncing off of walls, until she reached the prone Sloak.  She grabbed hold of his harness so she could guide Sagkal through the turns in the corridor and into the airlock.  Seconds continued to pass.

“Ruku!”

“Gents, Mat:  Launching now!”

From the cockpit of the Gentleman Scoundrel, Kura, Vakh and Essuru watched their respective monitors for any sign that the Cutter’s Launch, now nearly a quarter of the way around the star’s circumference, has indeed made its escape.  Canto continued to key the comm trying to raise their fellows.

“Ruku, Gents:  Come in.  Come in Ruku Mat.”

Over and over again.  For minutes.

“Ruku, Gents:  Come in.  Come in Ruku Mat.”

“Gents...Mat: ...I think I hurt myself….forgot to strap in…”

Ruku could hear cheers.

Nano-Fic: A Gentleman's Duty (12)

Apologies for the delay in a new installment.  I had a court appearance (SSI) last week and spent most of this week recovering.  I don't do well under stress - the reason for the hearing in the first place.  But things maybe improving now; we got a dog.  The change in my mood and outlook has apparently been dramatic.

Anyway, this should be the second-to-last installment.  Enjoy!

In the cockpit of the Gentleman Scoundrel, Medic Canto Kura was frantically trying to get feedback from the remote medical sensors on the missing crewman Sagkal.  The Ship’s Master, Aru Vakh, wasn’t about to let Kura work in peace, however.

“What in Hell happened, Kura?  How can the two of you lose an entire Sloak?”

The other person Vakh refered to was Navigator Ruku Mat, who was at that moment on the stricken Patrol Cutter with Sagkal, in a vac suit, desperately trying not to panic.

“Okay, okay, okay….breathe.  Just breathe.  I can do that...”  It was becoming a chore to breathe deeply for Ruku, as the urge to pant began to become irresistible.  She was sweating profusely - which was to be expected, the temperature this close to a star was in exess of sixty-five Celsius.  But for a Giru, such as Mat, sixty-five was about the noontime temperature of home in the summer.  She let her overhanging curls and bushy eyebrows soak up the moisture without thinking about it.

The important thing, Ruku knew, was not to panic.  She quickly typed in the commands needed to fuel the Patrol Cutter’s Launch.  NegMat flowed from the forward holding tanks into the tiny craft, making the gravity shift sightly in the Computer Room where Ruku Mat was working.  The forward tank was balanced against the after tanks and the mass of  the Cutter itself, keeping the spacecraft at rest reletive to its vector.  But this could not last.  The incredible amount of heat pouring into the Cutter was degrading the NegMat containment.  It would only last another hour or two before failing and turning the Cutter into a cloud of debris.  Sagkal, incommunicado, might not have an hour.  It was up to Ruku to prevent the debris, rescue Sagkal, and get out on the Launch.

Impossible.

It would take both Ruku and Sagkal to save the Cutter.  Unless the two released the forward and aft holding tanks simultaneously, the Cutter would streak off in the opposite direction of -

“-No...it can’t be that easy, can it?”

“What’s that Ruku?” Canto asked, “What’s easy?”

In spite of her fear, Ruku laughed out loud. “I can get us out!  And execute the five-one-five!”

Vakh came on the circuit “What are you on about, Mat?”

“Put the Scoundrel in a higher orbit.  We’ll be their shortly”

In the cockpit of the Merchant ship, Vakh snapped at his Medic.  “She’s gone mad!”

“Could be,” said Canto Kura, “but buggered if I can think of what she could do differently.”

    “Cockpit, Zag:” This was Zag Essuru, the Gentleman Scoundrel’s pilot, from the Quarterdeck.  “Cutter has come about Y-plus 26 degrees and increasing.  Confirm.”

    Aru Vakh found the appropriate radar scope and confirmed that the Cutter had indeed turned to its starboard and for an unknown reason.

    “Cockpit, Ipa:” This from Engineering, where the frantic Ipa Sam said, “If the Cutter turns broadside, she’ll breakup from thermal shock!”

    Canto answered, “We know Ipa!  It’s not like we can stop her!”

    “Look!”

    Aru Vakh pointed at the scope. Ruku Mat had scrammed the forward NegMat reservoir.  The energized fluid instantly converted to endlessly amplified light and radiation, and just as instantly decayed into oblivion.  The remains were a gamma ray burst, aimed not at the hapless cutter nor the dilapidated trader, but at the star itself.  It dissipated harmlessly as the Patrol Cutter shot forward at two gravities.

    “I’ll be damned,” Aru Vakh said. “She has indeed gone mad.  And it has given her courage.”

    “Her vector will take her into the sun, “ Said Kura.  “She’s scuttling the Cutter.”

“And the rest of the NegMat with it.  Where it will do not harm, while she gets Sagkal and escapes in the Launch.”  Vakh keyed the intercom.  “Sam, ready the drive.  Essuru, get up here; I need you at the helm to follow our mad Navigator.”

“Hell, yeah.”

Nano-Fic: A Gentleman's Duty (11)

The lift tube felt like a chimney to Ruku Mat, opressively tight in her vacuum suit and a blistering eighty degrees.  By comparison, the Command Deck was a relatively cool sixty-five.  In order to comply with Aru Vakh’s orders to fuel and prep the Patrol Cutter’s Launch, Ruku still had to start in the Computer Room.

The lift tube opened just off the hatch to the Navigation Bridge.  There were two gastights and a security lock between Ruku and the Bridge, but with the code five-one-five access, it was simply a matter of pushing buttons and opening hatches.

Like the rest of the Cutte’s interior, the Navigation Bridge was green and dark in the way only spacecraft can get.  The panoramic viewports that wrapped around the front of the compartment were tightly shuttered with rad-armor and the various monitors and stations were dark.  The only light was from the wan glow of tritium bulbs scattered around in strategic places. Wherever that dim light shown, Ruku could see bodies.

“They’re here, they’re dead.  Very dead - oh, so very dead…”

“Deep breaths, Ruku,” Canto Kura, the crew’s medic, commanded in his smooth voice. “Your blood pressure will thank you.  Can you take a radiation reading, please?”

Ruku attempted the prescribed deep breaths, with limited success.  She took a paper swab from her utility pouch and and wiped it on one of the consoles, carefully ignoring the corpse on station.  The rad counter, like all the tell-tale dials on her spacesuit, was mounted on the front of her chest.  She used the mirror on the inside of her left arm to read the dials.  For a moment, Ruku began to panic as none of the dials made sense.

“Deep breaths.”  

Ruku tried to calm herself.  Finally, she remembered that everything was backward - reversed in the mirror’s image.

“Uh... reading the gauge .... 0.46 Gray - DPM of 98.”

“That's on the border-line. I want you two out of there soonest.”

“ Roger that.  I’m trying to get to the Computer Room now.  Could have problems - everything is offline.”

    “Ruku, Ipa.” The Engineer came back on the comm.  “The electronics were problably wiped by an EM pulse.  See if you can find the back-up master tapes.”

    “Uh, roger…”  Guided only by the pale cone coming from her head-lamp, She used the passkey on the locked hatch to the Computer Room.

Unlike a Merchant like Gentleman Scoundrel, the military-grade computers on the patrol craft were state-of-the-art.  Instead of racks and racks of magnetic tape, there was two columns of stacked and networked servers, and a single shelf of slim, square plastic folders.  There were two stations in the compartment, and unfortunately for Ruku Mat, both were occupied.  

“I’m… not sure I can do this,”

“Sure you can,” Kura’s smooth voice was back in her ear.  “They can’t hurt you, Ruku.  I know this is unpleasant, but you can do it.”

“I - I can’t get to the consoles.”

“Then you’ll have to move the bodies.”

“Oh, oh no… no way -”

“Ruku!  Ruku listen to me.”  Hearing Canto Kura’s voice helped a little.  It was at that moment her only anchor.  “You can do this.  Concentrate on your gloves.  The feel of the inside of your gloves on your hands.  The pain in your fingernails - they’re starting to hurt, aren’t they?”

“Ye - yeah…” Ruku’s fingers did indeed hurt.  The metal thimbles on the tips of the spacesuit’s gloves were notorious for buising fingers and peeling nails.  Ruku focused her fingertips as she reached for the first body.  The pain in her fingers intenseified as she grippd the first body by its coverall.  The tiny woman used the mass of her suit to leverage the body out of it’s chair.

“Try to stay calm, Ruku.”

“I am trying!”  She took a moment to practice deep breaths again.  “Look, just - just keep talking to me, okay?”

“Of course.  Did you know that I’m a concert tenor?”

“Wait - what?  Really?”

“No, actually.  I can’t sing a note.  Well, I can but I’ve been ordered by Dioces High Command never to do so except in the face of hostile invasion.”

In spite of her rising panic, Ruku tittered a short laugh.  “That bad, huh?”

“Well, I don’t think so, but I was outvoted.  Like with the onion pie.  I made that once for a date - in retrospect, not the wisest of actions…”

Ruku continued to listen as Canto recounted the details of the ill-fated dinner.  She focused on the sound of his voice, the rich tone that certainly couldn’t belong to a bad singer, and looked forward to the puns and punchlines Canto peppered his story with. By the time he was serving dessert to his foul-breathed date, Ruku had moved the bodies into the Bridge and shut the hatch behind her.

“Remind me not to ask you to cater my wedding.” Ruku was even able to quip.

“I will.  Are you alright now, Ruku?”

“Thank you.  I need Ipa, please.”

“Right here, Ruku.”  The Engineer’s voice replaced Canto’s.  “See if you can find the master tapes.”

Ruku took one of the plastic folders out of its slot and opened it carefully. She had been expecting a thin spool of tape, but what she found confounded her.  It was a flat, plastic disk, with a gooved surface that refracted the light from her head lamps into a rainbow spray of color.

Ruku described what she had found. “I have no idea what this is…”

Ipa’s answered back, “I don’t either.  Kura?  You served with the Janoi, what the Hell is all this?”

Canto answered.  “It’s a laser-disc.  That kind of tech is right on the edge of what you can move through a Janus. I’m surprised their computer’s that advanced.  Is the back-up computer marked?”

“How could you fit a backup computer in here?  It not that big a room…”

“If they’re using laser-discs, the computers are small enough to fit a backup in there.  Try above the monitors.”

Ruku searched, thick fingered, for the impossibly small computer Canto assumed was in the compartment.  The componants of the Cutter’s data system were mostly unfamiliar to her.  She didn’t see a printer, the monitors were couriously flat, and there didn’t seem to be nearly enough hardware to run a decent sized lifeboat, much less a two kiloton-plus military starship.

 “There!” Canto startled Ruku. “The flat box with the long, shallow lid on the front?  Open that.”

The box was only a couple of centimeters deep - far too small to hold a computer. It’s corners were covered in rubberized shock-proofing and when Ruku picked the unlikely box up it was surprizingly heavy.  Even more unlikely was what she found when she opened the front lid.  The lid swung down on hinges to reveal a keyboard on the inside,  the exposed interior of the box had a small screen and a pair of thin slits mounted within.

“Slide the disc into the top slot.”

“This is a computer?  Just this?”  Despite Ruku’s disbelief, she did what she was told.  To her surprize, the screen glowed blue and a series of white characters began to scroll.

“If you type in the five-one-five code, you should be able to access the system.”

Ruku entered the passkey and brought up the main menu.  The small terminal could only perform a few functions, but Ruku was amazed enough that this briefcase was a computer at all. She managed to find the commands to fuel the Launch with a little trouble, and then readied the sequence for scraming the NegMat reservoir.

“Okay, I think that’s got it.  Sagkal, are you in position?  We need to scram both containment vessels together.”

Silence.

“Uh, Canto?  I’m not getting Sagkal. Can you raise him?”

“I can’t.” The smooth voice was now edged with intensity.  “His temperature is reading dangerously high.  I don’t think he’s even made to Engineering.”

Ruku swore to herself.  She had been so focused on he own fear, had taken up so much of Canto’s attention with her panic, that Sagkal had run into trouble without anyone knowing.  Without the help of the Sloak, Ruku couldn’t jettison the NegMat.  None of the others would be able to tolerate the heat in the Cutter better than Sagkal did, and even if they could, by the time they went through pre-breathing and suited up, time would have run out.  

         Ruku was out of options.  The Cutter was doomed.

Nano-Fic: A Genleman's Duty (10)

   

   The Cockpit of the Gentleman Scoundrel boomed with Sagkal’s laughter at Ruku Mat’s expense.  Canto Kura could hear the avalanche of noise well before reaching the hatch.  He could also hear Aru Vakh’s typically testy response.

    “That will be quite enough, Sagkal.  I want you to make a brief visual inspection of the exterior before preceding inside.  We haven’t much time.”

    “We? What’s he mean ‘we’?”

    “I heard that, Sagkal.”

    Somewhat predictably, Canto grinned at the exchange.  He moved to stand beside Master Vakh, who was sitting at the Navigation station.  The multiple monitors that covered that entire wall of the cockpit displayed several exterior views of the Scoundrel, helmet cams from both Sagkal and Ruku, and telemetry data showing the temperature, radiation and behavior of the red dwarf star hanging below them.

    “Hey, Gents?  You seein’ this Cutter’s tail feathers?” Sagkal said.  “I can’t get much closer; the ferromag plates are only around the airlock.”

    Even from Sagkal’s shallow angle of view, the damage to the Cutter’s radiators was easy to see.  The diamonoid panels ended only a few meters from the hull.  They did not look burnt or damaged in any way - they simply ended prematurely, with a faint trail of vaporized lithium pluming from the exposed ends.

“Now that is an unlikely sight.”  Vakh taped the monitor glass.  “Have you ever seen that before, Kura?”

“Only in simulations.  The Rabbithole closed prematurely, didn’t it?”

“It did Indeed.” Vakh was grim. He keyed the comm switch. “Go ahead inside, both of you.”

“Roger that.” Sagkal keyed off and turned to Ruku Mat, who had righted herself and was waiting.  “Go ahead, Mat.”

Ruku opened the outer hatch tot he DC airlock.  Normally, opening the exterior hatch on a naval ship uninvited would be impossible without excessive force, but under certain conditions, this was not the case.  The declaration of a Code 515 gave the Scoundrel an access passkey that bypassed the Cutter’s security.  Ruku had written the passkey in vacuum pencil on the back of one suit glove, and clumsily keyed the lock.  The hatch swung outward.

“Aw, its a quick-lock…”  Ruku whined as she contemplated the coffin-sized compartment.

“You go first.” Sagkal said.  “It may be a chore for me to wriggle through.”

Ruku snuggled into the tiny chamber, closed the hatch, and cycled.  In less than a minute, the pressure equalized and she was through.

“Gents, Mat: I’m in the DC vestibule.”

“Glad to hear it.” It was Canto Kura’s rich, amused voice on the other end, vastly preferable to Master Vakh.  “Can you give me a pressure reading, Ruku?”

“Uh...sure.  Just a sec…”

Sagkal voice filled her ears, startling the small woman. “Ruku!  Close the inner hatch!”

“Oh! Sorry…”

Ruku shut the inner hatch and fumbled with the barometer, trying not to get flustered.

“Okay...pressure is… one fifty-nine kilopascals. Temp is sixty-one.”

“I was afraid of that.”  Kura said over the com. “The heat’s increasing the air pressure.  I know it’s not too hot for you two, but stay in your suits.”

Sagkal, who had finally squeezed out of the quick-lock and was in the process of raising his hands to his helmet. “Really?  Come on, Kura!”

“Really.  The heat’s made the Cutter’s air mix off balance and the pressure’s nearly twice as high as standard.  You’d be in danger of isobaric counter diffusion.”

“Iso-what?”

Kura’s sigh was audible over the speakers. “The Bends, Sagkal.  Stay in the suits.”

“May we get to work now?” Aru Vakhs voice came over the com. “You’ve only about three hours left.”

“Uh, yes!  Yessir… Ipa?  What do we need to do?”

Ipa’s voice joined the conference from the Pump House. “Your first priority is the five-one-five.  One of you needs to go to the Computer Room, the other to Engineering, and scram the NegMat. That needs to be done before anything -”

“Belay that,” Vakh said, “I want the Cutter’s Launch fueled and prepared for release before you jettison the NegMat.”

There was silence over the com.  Ruku could only imagine the argument going on between The Scoundrel’s Engineer and his Master.  The voice that finally came back on the com was Cato Kura’s.

“You two should go ahead and get moving. While there’s time.”

          Sagkal and Ruku Mat exchanged a look.  After double-checking their suits and comms one more time, they parted ways - Ruku up the lift tube to the Launch and cockpit, Sagkal to the Pump House below.

Nano-Fic: A Gentleman's Duty (9)

The Type-20 Patrol Cutter was a type of spacecraft that both the massive Sagkal and diminutive Ruku had seen for most of their lives.  The Cutter’s nose was bullet shaped, with four thick, stubby fins attached at cardinal points.  Aft of the forward hull was the craft’s tubular neck, where the belly hanger held the ship’s Launch.  Opposite the hanger, on the spine of the ship, was a personnel airlock used for damage control.  It was to this airlock that the Scoundrel’s Gunner and Navigator.  

“What’s the hold up?” Sagkal pestered Mat as she adjusted a piece of equipment. “It’s hot out here.”

“Broomsticks are finniky,” Ruku Mat replied. “Gotta adjust or my extra mass...”

Spring pole EVA tools - the iconic “broomstick” were older than the current spacefaring civilizations that used them.  It was a meter-long tube, padded on one end and with a magnetic pad on the other.  There was a jump ring on the padded end of the broomstick, which Ruku attached to a ring on wrist of her vac-suit.

    “You know, I could just throw you across.” Sagkal offered. “Be faster-”

    “Hush!” Ruku centered the magnetic pad of the broomstick onto Scuondrel’s hull and switched it on from a switch on her forearm.  Another switch turned off her suit’s boots, allowing Ruku Mat to float with only the broomstick and tether holding her to the hull.  Carefully if somewhat clumsily, She maneuvered herself around until the padded end of the broomstick balanced on her stomach.  
    “Range?”

    “Still one-nine-six. And you’ve got two twenty-five of slack on the safety line.” Sagkal waved at the patrol craft in the distance.  “Quit stalling.”

    “I’m not stalling!”  Ruku said.  Nonetheless, she took a few extra moments before finally hitting the trigger on the broomstick.

    The tube on the broomstick suddenly doubled in length as the spring in side pushed out and away.  The trigger also turned off the broomstick’s magnet, letting the stick - and the squealing Ruku Mat - fly away from Sagkal and the Gentleman Scoundrel.  As she sailed through the empty space between the two ships, Ruku furiously rotated the shift of the broomstick in a circle.  She herself spun around in the opposite direction, until both broomstick an woman were facing the opposite direction, toward the Patrol Cutter.  The other ship, nearly two hundred meters away from the Mercant, looked to be no closer in the too-clear brightness of open void.  Ruku bagan to pant, then breathe as deeply and evenly as possible.  The patrol craft finally began to increase in size, then rapidly grow as Ruku’s speed finally became apparent to her eyes.  The timid woman couldn’t help but flinch.

    The broomstick hit the Cutter’s outer skin with a force that Ruku could feel through her hands and arms.  Normally, the same spring that propels a broomstick absorbs the shock upon reaching its target.  Ruku’s flinch, however, put her off center.  Instead of smoothly absorbing Ruku’s energy, the broomstick bounced her off the padded in and spun her half way around.  She hit the hull of the Patrol Cutter with enough force to knock the breath from her.  Fortunately, the broomstick’s magnet had successfully attached the Cutter. Ruku, having bounced off the ship, was dangling in open space from her wrist, still attached to end of the pole.

    “...It’s not that funny, Sagkal.”

    “Yes it is,” Sagkal’s stoney voice boomed despite the speaker’s low volume. “‘Cause you’re the Navigator!  And you can't hit the broadside -”

    “- Shut up, Sagkal…”