2193 - Medium-class Freighter

THE HOLOGRAPHIC CONSOLE cast a soft glow on a completely unremarkable face framed by short-cropped straight black hair. The navigator never considered whether she was pretty, since her features were so similar to every other cohabitant in the Education Center where she spent her childhood. Her dark, almond-shaped eyes scanned the console looking for clues to the ship’s slight misbehavior.

She tugged at a neon yellow shock on the right side of her head that stood out in stark contrast to the rest of her hair. On completing her second trip around the sun since her first breath, almost four standard Earth years, she was identified as a candidate to join the ranks of jìshúyuán. After another orbit, 687 days of continuous observation, the selection committee confirmed the choice and marked her for skilled labor. Along with a third of her birthgroup, she was allowed to choose her name and favorite color. To separate them from the common workers, gōngrén, Jakki and the other jìshúyuán received a genetic tattoo on their scalp that created a permanent indicator of their status by changing the hair color growing from the spot. Jakki had chosen her mark after reading that the sun looked large and yellow in the Earth sky. The thought distracted for a moment from her immediate task. She promised herself she’d see it with her own eyes one day.

A product of the Martian colony, Jakki had spent her entire childhood underground. The diurnal cycle was completely artificial, so there wasn’t a good reason to adopt the slightly longer Martian day. The original colonists had chosen to discount the additional thirty-seven minutes and maintain Earth timekeeping standards. She supposed they held out hope for an eventual return to Earth, but the Histories indicated none of the first wave ever left the surface again. Jakki was fortunate enough to have been born long after Mars society stabilized, eventually producing eighteen new citizens each Martian year. In the first few generations, every child became jìshúyuán, since maintaining the colony required everyone to be trained in a technical skill. However, once the mining corporation discovered the colony had survived, the need for unskilled labor in the main asteroid belt dominated the market and gōngrén were birthed to meet the demand.

Jakki stopped tugging on her golden lock and looked up from the console she had been studying. This was her first long-haul run, and she was still in the habit of second-guessing herself, but after a dozen simulations there was little chance for error now. "That ore we picked up must be heavier than we thought," she said to the empty chair next to her. "Captain?" she called over her shoulder, realizing she was alone at the bridge.

"Just making sure everything is tied down before we start the docking checklist." There was a shuffling sound from the crew compartment behind her, and Jakki looked over to see the mission commander drifting toward her. "Jakk, we’ve been on this ship together for months. Please, call me Karen."

"But you are dúlì," Jakki said, frowning in disapproval. "It would not be proper."

"If it helps, consider it a standing order from a superior officer. Besides, you know how I feel about that social status crap."

"I will try." Jakki felt an icy shiver form just between her shoulder blades as she considered her options. Either disobey a direct order, or neglect generations of culture designed to preserve social order. No, Captain, that was not helpful.

Karen made her way over to the nav console using hand grips molded into the ceiling. She tucked an errant copper curl behind her right ear and looked over Jakki’s shoulder, her bright green eyes focused on the glowing screen. "What did you find?"

"Well," Jakk began hesitantly, "it looks like our trajectory is okay. See, we’re coming up on Lagrange Station 2." She pointed at a display with complex geometric figures on it. Most of the indicators were green, which Karen took as a good sign. Fuel was a little low, but they still had more than enough to get home.

"So, what is it?"

"I’ve run a simulation, and I’m pretty sure my analysis is good." She paused.

"Spit it out, Jakk. If there’s a problem, I need to know about it."

"It looks like we’re heavy. Over the maneuver safety limits."

Karen took a moment to let everything sink in. She studied the navigation display and did some quick math in her head. "We can match the station’s velocity, right?"

"Yes. But stopping isn’t the problem." Of course. Mass and inertia limits ensured the ship could be safely docked using the automated maneuvering system. Over the maximum on either, and the control system couldn’t ensure proper alignment for docking. "We can override the safety," Jakk continued, "but we’re likely to burn out the reaction thrusters or wreck into the station if things go bad."

Great. Not a deadly mistake, but certainly an embarrassing one. If the maneuver system failed during docking, they would be left drifting with no attitude control. Too close to the station and it could be dangerous, but more than likely it just meant calling for a tug to bring them in the last few hundred meters. She’d never hear the end of it around the hangar, and it would probably cost her a few referrals. Karen knew she had to maintain her reputation if she ever hoped to make it out of the Corporate Service trap.

"How much longer until we break the bubble?" she asked, studying the navigation screen over Jakki’s shoulder.

"Retro burn starts in..." she began, pausing to switch displays, "...three hours, sixteen minutes. Another half-hour after that we’ll begin ten-klick ops."

Almost four hours—plenty of time to set up a few practice runs. The station had a perimeter, or "bubble", with specific flight rules to ensure safe rendezvous and docking operations. Within ten kilometers in any direction, maximum speed relative to the station was capped at ten meters per second and the ship had to be on autopilot or hands-on manual control at all times. Inbound ships performed a retro burn to match velocity with the station, then it took another fifteen minutes or so once inside the bubble to begin docking procedures. Karen sometimes thought the ten-klick rule was overly conservative, but with deep space navigation error typically on the order of a few kilometers she supposed it made sense to prevent ships from coming in hot too close to the station.

Whereas most pilots just kicked back to enjoy the ride, Karen preferred flying the ship in manually to keep her skills sharp. Besides, she figured there was always a chance having her hand on the ball might just save her life one day.

Next Chapter: Chapter 2