Delta: #1 - To Delta
Kris Me
Delta Series:
#1 - To Delta
By: Kris Me
Introduction:
In 2094, Best friends Lee Gillian and Kyle Vella have decided to go on the trip of a lifetime. They were signed aboard the Starship Fortune as crew members with ninety-eight other souls to explore the Delta Pavonis Star System.
------
Copyright:
Copyright © 2016 Kris Me - All rights are reserved
This story is the work of Kris Me. Before you copy more than one page or ten percent of the content, you must contact me as per the Copyright Act 1968, Australia.
First Published by Storiesonline World Literature Company: 01/01/2016. Last updated: 14/01/2021.
The book cover was designed in Microsoft Paint 3D using art that is my own, copyright-free or covered by creative commons license for commercial use from https://pixabay.com/. The image of the World is by OpenClipart-Vectors.
------
Declaration:
~~ Adult Themes ~~
This book is part of an erotica science fiction series. It is NOT recommended for people under the legal age to access such stories, depending on the reader's country of origin.
The books may contain what some people consider vulgar language, references to religious icons, violence, coercion, murder and-or rape scenes.
Some scenes may describe intimate heterosexual, bi-sexual, gay and-or group sexual activities. If you are homophobic, you may find some scenes in this series of book distasteful. In most cases, these scenes are integral parts of the story.
Some of the books include imaginary races capable of changing their gender and/or form into other animals. Copulation, while the characters are in their alternate animal forms, may be described.
This book DOES NOT contain descriptions of bestiality or coitus between persons closely related by blood.
------
Editing:
If you find any of my assumptions fabricated, I would like to remind you this is a fictional story and I have probably taken liberties with reality, as you know it. The humanoids in this story are not based on anyone I know or have read about.
Australian based dictionaries were used for reference, and Grammarly was used as part of the editing suite. The story was written in Microsoft Word.
If you find grammatical or spelling errors, they are not the fault of my editor or proofreaders who did try to fix my work. However, I do tend to fiddle around after the fact, so all errors are my own.
If my Australian colloquialisms or terms need clarification, or you just wish to correspond, I'm more than happy to answer your emails. You can send them to:
kris.me2@inorbit.com
------
The Wiki:
https://keltria.fandom.com/wiki/
The Wiki contains information about the Keltrian people, wizards, the Keltrian magical items, colloquialisms and adapted words that have been created for this universe. Maps, character lists and other information that may relate to this book could be found.
------
This is the first book
The series 'Delta' was the first set of books I wrote for the Keltrian Universe posted on the Storiesonline website.
The books should be read in sequence, as some references to events or information about a character may not be explained in full in the next book if they were mentioned or introduced in this one.
------
Additional Data on this book:
Due to developing the technology to build better spaceships and access to the ability to create and jump through wormholes, the people of Earth were expanding into the universe.
Humans had already built settlements on the Earth's moon, officially called Luna, Mars, Jupiter's moons - Io and Ganymede, and they had several space stations throughout the Sol System.
Now they were looking for an uninhabited world that was more like Earth to settle in a new star system to expand the reaches of mankind.
This first book starts off a little slow due to providing more background information in the first couple of chapters, which helps set the reader up for the rest of the story as the series progresses.
------
Acknowledgements:
Special thanks to J. Konietzko and all of the readers who in the past have pointed out I do make mistakes and have helped me to fix them.
And thanks, Lazeez, for your patience and assistance in helping me with my weird requests and questions.
I hope you enjoy the story.
Kris Me
--------------------------------------
List of books in the Delta Series:
Delta: #1 - To Delta
Delta: #2 - In System
Delta: #3 - Utopia
Delta: #4 - Neighbours
Delta: #5 - Harmony
Delta: #6 - Twin Problems
Delta: #7 - Family
Delta: #8 - One People
Delta: #9 - Trixy
--------------------------------------
Chapter 1
~~ 04-01-2094 ~~
Lee Gillian brushed the stray long, dark auburn curl back off her face.
She tucked the errant curl behind her right ear. She absently rubbed the ruby in the stud that was tucked under the top fold of her slightly pointed ear, as she checked for the final time that her port and the boxes were sealed and addressed.
The decision on what to take on the voyage of her life had not been easy. The number of personal possessions of each crew member had been limited. It wasn't that they didn't have space for more belongings; it was more to restrict the number of useless things one could bring.
Lee shook her head in bewilderment at some of the stuff that her friends insisted were necessities. Lee had never considered herself a girly-girl. She rarely wore cosmetics, the latest fashion clothes, or lots of jewellery.
"Stuff it," she muttered.
As long as she had her favourite books, most of the rest really didn't matter. She rationalised that she really didn't need to take much else other than a few personal items since her tools were already on the starship.
Fortune was the largest discovery starship built to date. It was expected that its maiden voyage to the Delta Pavonis Star System and back, would take two years to complete.
It was presently docked at the Armstrong Space Station that orbited Luna. It was due to leave that evening (Luna time), being Monday, the fourth day of January 2094.
The Fortune was equipped with the latest replicator-recycler technology. Necessary items such as toiletries (soaps, toothpaste, brushes, shavers, deodorants, shampoos, make-up, etc.), towels and sheets, basic clothing, uniforms, shoes, socks, and underwear could be dialled up from the replicator interfaces as required.
Since Lee mostly lived in her work jumpsuits or the regular exercise clothes when off duty. The quality of the items made by the replicator was fine by her. All other personal toiletries and clothes were not required to her way of thinking.
Dirty clothes and used items could be placed in the recycle hoppers. You could go and wash your personal clothes if you preferred not to wear recycled items, but it was faster and easier to dial up new things when you needed them.
Lee looked at the two boxes of books. She knew her books were considered obsolete, but they were her one indulgence. She could download most of the books from the extensive library that was stored electronically aboard the ship.
However, Lee's grandmother had inspired a love of books in Lee at a young age. She loved the feel of the paper and flipping the pages as she read. To her, it was an indulgence.
Lee, who was currently stationed on Luna, moved the suitcase and the two boxes outside the dorm room. They were ready for pick-up by the couriers. She flipped the courier company a message to come to collect her luggage and then keyed in the code to lock the door for the last time.
She had organised for the rest of her possessions to be collected later and placed in a long-term storage unit back on Earth until she got back. It was just as well the company was paying for half of it.
Mind you, it wasn't a lot of stuff, but they were items valuable enough for her to keep at the storage rate the company had offered. Lee checked the minder (an interactive multimedia device) on her arm for the time.
'Time to go,' she thought.
------
Walking away from her old life, without a backward glance, Lee headed towards the grav-station.
The trip on the grav-train, to the meeting for the final briefing for the voyage, was short. The grav-train station in Gamma Dome that Lee was headed towards was close to the building she required. Hence, she didn't have to walk far once she got off the train.
Upon arrival, she looked around the crowded conference room. Lee spied her new supervisor, Ben Layard and several other people from the engineering crew that had worked on the construction with her and her friend, Kyle Vella. She moved over to the group.
"Hi, guys, all packed and ready to go?" Lee asked the group in general.
"Lee! So, you decided to come after all," Ben exclaimed as he turned towards her.
Lee smiled in response to his outburst. She knew she hadn't been Ben's choice by a long shot. She was considered a last-minute addition to the engineering crew of the ship.
Her predecessor, Armid, had been involved in an incident three weeks before, during the final construction phase of the starship. He was now spending the next three months of his life in a Critical Burns Unit.
Ben had picked another Electrical Engineer to replace Armid. However, the Selection Committee had overruled his choice. Lee thought her gender, age and single status had a lot more to do with the decision.
Her expertise and the fact that she had just spent the last year working on the final fit-out of the spaceship hadn't swayed the Selection Committee the first time. It still baffled her as to why not.
"Wild horses and threatening emails couldn't keep me away," Lee replied drolly.
She watched the reactions of the surrounding men. She noted Rodger Bartlett's startled look and that his eyes had flicked towards Ben.
Rodger wasn't a bad looking bloke if you liked them pretty and slim. He was in his late twenties and about 5cm taller than Lee's own 175cm (5'9"). He had short, dirty blond hair, pale blue-grey eyes, and pallid complexion that hinted that he didn't get out in the sun much.
Lee didn't know Rodger well, although they had theoretically worked together for the last six months. The few times they had interacted, she hadn't been impressed with the quality of the man or his work.
He had a bad habit of whinging and complaining about the slightest things. He also tended to talk to Lee's breasts rather than her face, which annoyed her more than she would admit.
"You got threatening emails?" inquired Kyle, who had the nickname 'Rabbit'.
Kyle and Lee had been friends for over three years, even though she wouldn't sleep with him. Kyle's specialities were computer and robotic programming, mathematics, and astronautic navigation, but he wasn't a stereotypical nerd.
Kyle was shorter than Lee, at 170cm (5'7"). His handsome Italian looks, classic body shape, winning smile, and natural charms were hard to overlook. Lee had heard rumours that he was a popular bedfellow of both genders and that he was an energetic partner, hence the nickname.
"Yeah, apparently someone wasn't happy about my selection," Lee replied nonchalantly, while she watched for a reaction.
This time, Rodger had better control, and he simply looked down. None of the others seemed to have a negative response to her statement. Ben raised an enquiring eyebrow when Lee caught his eye.
"Don't look at me, I simply thought that Battelle was a better fit for the team," Ben responded.
Lee made a note of this mainly because he said, 'the team' and not 'the job'. She knew her credentials made the bloke Battelle look like a first-year apprentice when compared to her.
Lee had three Engineering Degrees, Astro-Electrical Systems, Mechanical and a combined Electrical and Electronics Degree. She had also completed the trade related apprenticeships for all three of her degrees, while she studied.
However, the trade time for each had been only half that of apprenticeships of a century earlier. This was due to her position with UNSEC (the United Nations Space Exploration Collaboration).
Lee decided to let her interrogation go. She felt she had made her point and knew pushing any harder would simply put the malcontent on the offensive. She listened to the team's chatter about general concerns and the latest gossip while they waited for the meeting to start.
Lee let the babble wash over her as she looked around.
------
The group had been standing around for about five minutes when the soldiers walked in.
Lee's eyes lingered on the tall, broad-shouldered, and dark-haired Lieutenant. He had lovely bronze-toned skin. She watched as he scanned the room, assessing everyone in it. While he had a no-nonsense look about him, she noticed the laugh lines around his very sexy mouth and eyes.
Lee didn't normally go for the soldier type as she generally found most of the officers were arrogant bores, except for her granddad, of course. As for the rank-n-file, they thought that they were God's gift to humanity. The female soldiers were no exception.
Lee was intrigued by the fact that the troop was from AASOER (The Australian Army Special Operations Engineer Regiment), which was currently attached to UNSEC. She wondered how it was that they had drawn the short straw. Most soldiers assigned to starship duties found it very boring.
'Grunts,' she thought. She had once pondered how they got that nickname. Her granddad had explained it was because they did the 'grunt' work. He might have sworn like one, but he explained that he wasn't a 'grunt' because he had been an officer.
Lee suddenly felt that she was being watched intently. She flicked her eyes around the room. They ended up back on the hunky Lieutenant who was watching her.
If she had kept going a little more to her left, she would have encountered the second set of eyes, which were also watching her. They were not so benign.
'God damn! Those cobalt blue eyes are compelling,' Lee thought as she looked the broad-shouldered, slim-hipped, 190cm tall, Lieutenant up and down.
Interestingly, she didn't get the feeling that he was trying to strip the clothes off her as many blokes did. Lee found that the Lieutenant was staring at her eyes and face as if he could see into her soul.
He made her shiver, but not in a bad way. He was making her feel aroused, just by the way he was looking at her. She had to smile, as this wasn't a common condition for her.
Bang... Bang... Bang...
--------------------------------------
Chapter 2
~~ 04-01-2094 ~~
Lee jumped, as did several others around her when the gavel hit the podium.
Captain Clark was calling the meeting to order. He called out to ask everyone to take a seat. Lee took a moment to collect herself before she headed towards the chairs.
She then found due to her distraction that she had ended up towards the back of the auditorium. Taking the next available position in the row, she sat. A few moments later, she felt someone sit beside her on her left.
She was in the second last seat, and they had selected the end position. She felt her skin tingle as the person brushed against her. Abruptly she looked at the person beside her. 'Oh, crap!' she thought, 'It's the hunky Lieutenant.'
Her eyes met his, and she found she was staring into the most memorable eyes she had ever seen. She felt like she was drowning. She had to blink to break the connection.
"Sorry, ma'am, they don't make these seats wide enough. I'll try not to crowd you," he drawled in a sexy baritone that shivered all the way down her spine, and then he looked forward.
Lee also snapped her eyes forward. She swallowed a couple of times as she tried to get her heart rate down to normal. She tried not to think about how aroused she felt even though her body still tingled from his touch.
'Buggar me,' she thought, a little shocked by her reaction. Lee couldn't remember a bloke having this sort of effect on her, ever, and it rattled her.
She sat through the meeting, but afterwards, she couldn't remember a bloody thing that was said. However, she had been super conscious of the Lieutenant sitting beside her and every fidgeting move he made.
Afterwards, she couldn't remember who sat on her right side.
------
In the same row of seats, but at the opposite end to Lee, sat Dr Syed Ahmad.
His American friends knew of him as Dr Syd Adams. Syd had a dark, Arabic complexion and eyes. He was 168cm tall, in his early forties with a solid body shape but he wasn't overweight.
His beard and moustache were trimmed short and not allowed to show any silver. His most notable features were his long-fingered and well-manicured hands, and the pomegranate cologne he always wore.
Syd was trying to keep a low profile. He was relieved when the sexy, green-eyed, auburn-haired woman had stopped looking his way when she found the tall Army Officer looking at her. His survival instincts warned him that she was dangerous.
The Lieutenant had also spiked his danger meter. He had watched how both of them had perused the room upon their entry, and they both moved like prowling cats.
Syd still wasn't sure that he had made the right decision to join this expedition. However, he knew his last indiscretion had attracted too much attention from the authorities.
He was grateful that his old friends, Professor William Essco and Sir John Nash, had gotten him on the manifest. Disappearing for two years, even on a spaceship, was better than being in a prison cell. He hoped by the time he got back that he would be off the authorities' radar.
They were getting too close for comfort.
------
Towards the end of the meeting, the Lieutenant got up from his seat and walked up to the podium.
He introduced himself as Lieutenant Sean Watson. He explained what responsibilities he and his team would take during this trip and how they would change if they found a suitable planet to explore.
All Lee could think of was how that sexy arse and those lovely long legs had moved, as he walked up the steps to the stage. Watching him walk back down towards her had been just as delicious.
Sean brushed against Lee again when he sat down. Lee felt a shiver run through her whole body. Sean smiled at her briefly before he crossed his legs towards the aisle and looked forward again. He then dropped an arm across his lap so that it hid his crotch from her view.
'Bummer,' Lee thought as her lascivious thoughts were getting harder to shift from her conscious mind. His smell had made her recall the Australian bush, and his accent and features were also from her home.
At the end of the meeting, Sean got up and bowed his head towards Lee. "Ma'am," he said, and then he turned and walked off.
Lee had to sit there for several minutes before she could get her legs back under her. Her reaction to the Lieutenant was unprecedented. She needed to head to the train station as she planned to go to the spaceport to catch the next shuttle to the space station and the ship.
Lee was pulled from her thoughts when she got that creepy feeling of being watched again, but she couldn't identify the source. It dissipated as the auditorium emptied, and she shook it off.
Her thoughts headed back to the hunky Lieutenant as she walked out of the room. 'Man, that was weird,' she thought.
She had sat next to the bloke for nearly an hour. Other than his initial hello and the goodbye, which she never answered, they didn't speak during the meeting. However, it had been a comfortable silence. It was like sitting and watching a movie with a date.
The sexual undertone whenever he touched her, hinted at what could come if they continued to be in each other's company. Lee shivered and wondered if just maybe, the next two years would be intriguing in more ways than one.
Deep in thought, Lee stepped through the sliding doors and headed for the train station.
------
As Lee neared the roadway, she heard the soft sound of an electric motor spinning up to a higher speed.
She spun around to see a wobbling linger veer off the designated flight path, and then it dived at speed towards her. Suddenly, she found that she was being wrapped up in a strong pair of arms, and she was heading towards the ground.
The man wrapped a hand around the back of her head and pulled it into his shoulder as they fell. Lee tucked her forehead into his shoulder and wrapped her arms around the broad chest.
She felt her breath being knocked out of her, as they hit the grass and the linger blazed over them. It was only about a metre above them when it passed.
The pressure waves that the machine produced blew over them with force and Lee tucked her head in tighter to the broad chest. The linger managed to pull up before it hit the ground and then it shot down the street. It was still wobbling as it disappeared behind a building.
The fan-driven vehicles could be a bit precarious to use in the thinner atmosphere in a habitat than they were in the air on Earth. While Gamma was one of the biggest domed habitats on Luna and it housed over forty thousand people, the linger still should not have been travelling at such speed.
Sean looked down at the woman in his arms and met Lee's exquisite, emerald green eyes. She wiggled beneath him, causing an instant reaction in return by Sean. He was lying between her lovely legs with his arms wrapped protectively around her. A place he found he liked very much.
Reluctantly, he lifted off her a little to let her breathe. The way she lay so compliantly in his arms worried him. To his surprise, when he looked down again, she was grinning at him. He looked into her eyes and found the humour of the occasion reflected in them.
"Thanks, Hunky, you can let me up now," Lee informed him calmly.
Lee had been ready to dive to the sidewalk when she caught Sean coming for her in her peripheral vision. She guessed his intentions and didn't fight against him when he grabbed her.
However, going to the ground on her back wasn't her favourite way to fall. Fortunately, Sean had used his elbows and forearms to blunt the impact for her. Still, it knocked the breath out of her momentarily.
Sean was amazed at how cool she was about the whole incident. She simply lay within his arms, waiting for him to get off her. The sexy smile was still in place on her lovely full lips. Reluctantly, Sean planted his knees and rocked back onto them as he lifted his upper body upright.
Lee pulled her knees to her chest, rolled away onto her hands and knees, and then pushed up into a standing position all in one fluid motion. Sean also stood. He was looking down at her from his 15cm advantage as she brushed herself off. He couldn't help noticing the firm arse and long, well-muscled legs.
"Are you okay?" he finally asked her, while rubbing his own forearms when the stinging sensation registered in his head.
He was grateful they had landed on the spongy fake grass and not the cement pavement. This close to the buildings the artificial gravity in the dome was close to Earth normal.
"Yeah, there are morons everywhere. Thanks again, Lieutenant, I'll catch-ya later," Lee said, quirking her sexy lopsided smile at him again. She nodded at him and then turned and walked off.
Sean watched her sexy arse in the form-fitting jumpsuit as she strolled off. He marvelled that the woman had behaved as if being run over by a linger was an everyday occurrence in her life.
He could still feel where her body had been pressed to his. He knew that being around her for the next two years would be a problem for him. Something drew him to her, like a bee to nectar.
Sean shook his head, and reluctantly moved off, deep in thought.
--------------------------------------
Chapter 3
~~ A bit of history ~~
UNSEC had been formed back in the year 2050, by the current Earth calendar.
This world-wide body was required because Dr Chin Rih and his team based in China had developed a space drive called the Rih Space Drive (RSD).
This drive used an alloy made of rare Earth elements called Rihlite to provide the core of the apparatus used to power the drive. While the engines didn't go faster than light, they did cut a considerable amount of time off the trips to other planets in our solar system.
It was estimated that the cores they had built for the Fortune had a life of 100 years before the amount of energy they could release was below a usable threshold for worthwhile propulsion.
The 25m long sections that made up the two ends of the spaceship were formed to be the Rih Core. It included the cells that held the thick rods of Rihlite, heat exchangers, massive electrical transformer coils and tonnes of piping that had for various purposes.
At one end was the attachment points for the propulsion expulsion cones. The other end had the attachment points for the piping, conduits and conductors that went to the rest of the systems and the four Rih Drives at that end.
The by-products of the Rih Core provided energy to some of the systems, but most of its output went to the Rih Drives that used the unusual plasma produced to propel the massive ship.
Once the Rih cores were built by the engineers, they were attached to either end of the ship's frame. Fortune's two Rih cores where biggest they had made so far.
Transporters or shuttles and small starships had at least one primary Rih drive at each end. They didn't have to flip in space to decelerate unless the drive on that end had been damaged.
They also had four small Ionic drives offset at ninety degrees to each other, towards each end. The cones on the Ionic engines pivoted to provide manoeuvrability and course correction.
------
Around this time, German scientists had perfected what they called GE-cells that provided the best compact power storage cells to be developed so far.
As a result, liquid fuels needed for power generation and propulsion for spaceships were significantly reduced. The use of solar-ion sails was also superb for keeping the cells charged while in a solar system.
Also, around this time, an Australian based team of metallurgists had developed a product called Ozlium. This alloy was stronger than titanium even when produced in relatively thin sheets, and it was even lighter than aluminium on a kilogram for kilogram ratio.
Ozlium had high radiation and thermal reflection capabilities and was able to withstand extreme high-velocity impacts. Due to its numerous uses other than for spaceships, it was in high demand. The production of Ozlium was a boon to the Australian economy.
The fact that all of the minerals required to make it could be mined in the country and that the metal was smelted and formed into sheets before shipment provided much-needed jobs and income for Australia's people.
When the Ozlium sheets were coated with another Aussie invention, a spray-on ceramic type material called Cermafix was perfect for the exterior of spaceships. Once set, it got harder as it aged or was heated again but it didn't become brittle.
Like the Ozlium, the Cermafix was suitable for many other applications where extreme temperatures and radiation were issues. The combination of Cermafix and Ozlium even made great compartments and even pipes for containing and transporting radioactive materials.
Another team from New Zealand, who had been working with the Australians, produced a material called Oznglass that made the best windows ever. Curved partitions of Oznglass were formed into Environmental Domes for spaceships and planetary settlements.
In low to moderate light levels, it appeared transparent. As the light radiation increased, it darkened to reflect the excess light. When designed as multiple thin convex layers, it also reflected most other undesirable forms of radiation.
Solar and heat exchange panels were built into the hulls of the spaceships. They utilised a concave variant of the Oznglass which reflected the light and heat into the panels to be converted into electricity.
However, this design still blocked excess cosmic radiation that was harmful to humans. The panels kept the banks of GE-cells topped up when the ships could absorb solar radiation.
The Solar-sails could also be deployed when the ship was orbiting a planetoid and in a close enough range of a sun.
------
Probably the most significant development as far as the crew was concerned were the GIC (Gravity and Inertia Compensator) units by a team of American scientists.
The systems were computer-controlled to react to forces exerted on the inner shells of the transporters or spaceships and in buildings and other vehicles used off of Earth.
The GIC units provided a steady downward force of 1g standard, no matter which way the transporter or spaceship faced or what speed it was doing. However, a GIC system did have limitations if the change in gravity or inertia was very sudden or fluctuated greatly.
An exotic particle shield generator (EP-shield) had been developed by India. These shields provided protection against space dust and items smaller than a basketball when the ships were travelling at high speeds. Space items that were larger than this still had to be negotiated around.
A side-effect from using the EP-shield was that it attracted any elements or molecules of cosmic dust that were in ion form or just happy to share an electron. Intern, the ions clogged up the shield, when they wanted to share the electrons that were buzzing around in the energy shield.
It was found that if they pulsed a DC charge down the shield and added scoop-chutes, they could suck in and collect the charged particles and send them to the recycler to top up the systems onboard. In system, it was surprising just how much material they collected.
Some companies even started developing scoop-ships with large energy-charged sails to gather the elements and molecules. They even managed to suck in small pieces of space junk, making the space around the Earth and Luna a lot safer for the transporters.
The resale value of these materials was more than worth it for these companies.
------
In the year 2057, the first habitat domes were built on Luna.
A new orbital docking station that was called Armstrong Space Station was completed two years later. Luna was open for free colonisation by 2064, once even larger domes had been constructed.
During this time, the Americans remodelled the GI compensators so a grid of them could be placed in the populated areas of the habitat domes on planetoids, the space-stations and even in space vehicles that had different gravitation effects to Earth.
These spaces were provided with or had sufficient opposing forces so that for all intent, the areas affected had 1g of downward pressure. This allowed correct body functions to occur for human bodies to function normally.
Over the next ten years, sufficient resources were found on Luna and by moving ice and metal asteroids to her surface, to build the first deep-space exploration ships.
These ships were not designed to enter atmospheres. The bigger vessels and most of the transporters docked on the UNSEC run Armstrong SS that orbited Luna or the Morpheus SS that orbited Earth. By 2072 humans were also visiting Mars, and its space station, the Aldrin SS.
During this period of expansion further experimentation with the Rih Drives found that a battery of four drives could get a bigger ship up to 0.4c (light speed), but it took several weeks to obtain this speed and the same again to return from it.
The space race was truly on.
------
In 2075, an extraordinary event happened.
The ship Expedition 3D, with its crew of twelve, had just spent three months exploring around Pluto. They were returning to Luna. The ship's speed was 0.01c, and she was coasting along nicely.
They planned for a slower trip back of about three weeks as they were going to track an asteroid for a while. They were due to shut down the Aft Rih Drive and start decelerating.
A Drive Engineer, Donald Brawn, had been running some routine maintenance checks on the Fore Ionic Drives. He had been in a hurry. He was on a promise for some extracurricular activities with a hotty from the helm crew.
He inadvertently ran a by-pass routine which didn't shut down the EP-shield while the four, Fore Ionic Drives (FIDs) were activated for a full-powered five-second burst. When the drives had been activated simultaneously, they had been pointing to the centre point of the EP-shield. It was in front of the nose of the ship.
The sudden reverse thrust caused the main drive to increase speed to compensate and to maintain the pace set by the computers. This propelled the ship through the small wormhole that was created by the interacting forces from the Ionic drives and the shield.
The crew felt the ship shudder. It took the GI compensators several seconds before they could react correctly. The ship's internal, artificial gravity fluctuated wildly due to the sudden changes in speed, the altered inertia, and the altered gravitational effects on the ship.
The crew was tossed around as they felt the crushing and then lightening effects. Three crew members suffered fractured bones and concussions, everyone else suffered from multiple cuts and bruises, and several people lost consciousness.
When the navigator recovered enough to check the ship's position, he found that they had overshot Luna. Fortunately, they weren't aimed at the sun or anything else. They wouldn't have been able to turn or slow sufficiently to miss a major obstacle at their speed.
The Captain immediately had the Aft Rih Drive (ARD) shut down. A full system check was required, and the engineer's mistake became known. The Captain ordered a more sedate return to Luna.
The resulting investigation of the ship's data, back on Earth determined that the ship had 'jumped', from Pluto to Luna. For the people on the ship and those on Earth, only a couple of seconds had passed, when the ship shot through the space-time tunnel and then reappeared at the other end.
Travel to other solar systems in relative time had just become a reality.
--------------------------------------
Chapter 4
~~ Destination & Crew ~~
The Galaxy Explorer class starship, Fortune, official designation GJ111, was going to the Delta Pavonis Star System.
The Delta system is approximately twenty light-years from Earth. It was discovered in 2047 to have possibly five planets. It had been mostly ignored until that time, as several closer star systems could be explored with the technology the people from Earth had.
Delta Pavonis' sun is older than Earth's and slightly larger. It has a similar luminosity to our own sun. People believed that a planetoid identified in 2048 dubbed Delta3 was in the magical terrestrial orbit. It might support carbon life, as we know it.
For the current journey, it would take the Fortune approximately four weeks to get up to the speed of 0.4c required for the first jump of four light-years. They had learned that the ship's weight and speed when it jumped would determine the time taken and the distance covered when the ship navigated the warp tunnel that was created.
The four-light-year jumps would take approximately four minutes of relative time to complete. Twenty-four Earth hours were then allocated between jumps. This was for the cartographers and astronomers to re-plot the next jump towards the Delta Pavonis star system.
After all, when they emerged after the first jump, their eyes would see how the stars were located, as if they were looking four years into the future if you were on Earth. It would be just as odd when they plotted to go back.
Initially, they would perceive the light from Sol as being from twenty years in their past. It was a mind twister to realise that you would always be jumping into the future even if you could see the past.
The navigators used the between day to make course corrections before the next jump. The ship would then make more jumps until it was within 4ly (four light-years) of their destination. They would then begin slowing down the ship to more manoeuvrable and orbital speeds.
The Fortune would then do micro jumps into the system depending on what planets and/or anomalies they found to investigate. The scientists estimated that this would take another ten to fifteen weeks before they would eventually be in orbit around Delta3.
The ship would also drop off navigation beacons on the way to and from the system, to assist with the return navigation. Eight weeks had been allocated for the more direct return trip. Observation and exploration of Delta3 and any other celestial bodies they found, would use up the rest of the time on the visit.
The scientists hoped to make several landings. They would erect the habitat dome they had in the hold to use as a base on the most hospitable planetoid they found. Their primary objective was to find a human-friendly, uninhabited planet for Earth to use as a settlement.
Should the trip turn out to be a bust, the Fortune could return to Earth sooner than the two years. A bust was that Delta3 had an unsuitable or, worse still, no atmosphere, the gravity was too extreme (without using GICs) or the unthinkable, it was already inhabited by sentient life.
Approximately every three months, the crew would send a drone back reporting on their finds.
------
One hundred people would be going to the Delta Pavonis Star System on the Starship Fortune.
The personnel boarding the Fortune consisted of fifty-five males and forty-five females. Twenty of the crew were recorded as being in committed relationships. The rest had signed on as single. No questions were asked about sexual persuasions. After all, they were not a colonisation ship.
The people were grouped as the Scientific Department, Helm, Engineering, Support and Security. Each unit had their own colours for their ship uniforms, a leader, and specific duties.
Typically, a jumpsuit had two colours. In the front, separating the two colours, an inverted 'V' pointed at their sternum and went to their waist at their sides. It then went straight across their back.
The outfits also had nameplates and coloured stripes and badges for rank and occupation on their sleeves and chest. Special gel and magnetic fastenings sealed the suit down the front from the neck to the waist. They were designed to easily stretch with the wearer, maintain body temperatures and wick sweat from the skin.
A craftily designed crotch flap allowed the wearer to take care of bodily functions without completely removing their suits. Special, adhesive and absorbent pads could also be worn to contain accidents. One did have to be careful of body hair when the underpads were used.
These suits were not designed for hard vacuum but did provide basic thermal and radiation protection. A second space-worthy suit was worn over the top of the uniform if the person had to go for a spacewalk.
The underpads had to be worn in these situations.
------
The ship's Captain was Nick Clark.
He was ultimately responsible for getting the ship to the Delta System and then home again. He had a helm crew of nine people under his direct control. They wore a dark blue with a red-topped jumpsuit.
The helm crew mostly operated in six, four-hour shifts of two or three people as required. Most of them did at least two but no more than three shift-changes in a 24hour day. They also tried not to do back to back shifts, as tired people make mistakes.
Captain Clark was also directly responsible for the Support team that was made up of twenty-four persons. This group tended to wear white with a pale green top or the reverse colours for their jumpsuits. They included the people who specialised in hospitality and horticulture, the white tops. Animal husbandry and the medical team wore the green tops.
Ben Layard, who also reported to the Captain, had nineteen personnel in his engineering crew, including his admin assistant David Smite. The engineering crew were issued dark green with fluoro-yellow topped jumpsuits.
Different coloured badges on their upper arms designated their primary qualifications and stripes indicated their secondary ones. Most of them had at least one of each.
They were divided into three teams of six so that the five primary areas assigned to maintenance were represented. The rest of the group were trades assistants (TAs).
The Security team consisted of ten crew members including their commander, Lieutenant Sean Watson and Sergeant Gary Carpenter. Because they were from AASOER, their primary job was constructing the habitat domes and military support if required once a planet was explored.
The soldiers also took care of security on the ship as required. They each had a trade or some other speciality, making them useful for other duties aboard the ship during the flight. The military crew tended to wear camouflage-patterned jumpsuits in pale green, dark green, sand, and brown.
Professor William Essco headed the Scientific Department of thirty-six people. The scientists wore pretty much whatever they wanted to on the ship. Their designated jumpsuit was black with purple, but only a few of them wore the suits with any regularity.
The scientists considered that everyone else on the ship was just there to get them to the destination.
--------------------------------------
Chapter 5
~~ The ship ~~
The Fortune looked huge docked up to the Armstrong Space Station.
She appeared to be an elongated disc. She was 550m at her longest point, 260m at the widest and 65m at the deepest excluding the dome that was 25m at its highest point above the ship's shell.
The edges of the ship's longer sides rolled over to the more squarish sides in a gentle curve. The curves continued around the fore and aft ends to mould in with the engines.
The ship's body had eight dedicated levels and a couple of mezzanine floors in the cargo area. Level-1A and 1B of the ship were in the spherical cap that was simply called the dome.
The outer walls of the dome were 60cm thick. It was approximately 150m in diameter at the base and 25m at its highest point. It appeared so clear that its thickness was only apparent where the large panels joined, and a small distortion was evident.
The dome was bisected by a central wall that ran width wise across the ship so that the two halves were isolated from each other. The front half of the dome was designated Fore, and the rear one was Aft.
Level 1A or the top central section of the dome was split into two compartments, one on either side of the dividing wall.
Both sides of Level 1B housed the bottom of the central section to a height of 10m. From it, you accessed one of the three segments that made up the inner semi-circle, and from them, you could access one of the three outer sections.
Each circle had a width of approximately 25m between the walls. The height of the external two rings was determined by the curvature of the dome. Special shutters were installed to reduce sunlight if the ship was too close to a sun for the plants and to provide nighttime.
Each of the central hubs on Level 1B contained a stairwell and access to a very large lift that could easily fit 20 people or a pallet truck. They also had several processing areas, cold and dry storage spaces with mezzanine access.
Dual entrance, pressure-locked doors gave access to the three sections that form the middle circuit. A single set of pressure locked doors gave access from a middle section to its outer segment.
The exceptions being that, in both halves, a small 1-tonne capacity lift was located in a cavity between two pressure doors between the central middle section and its outer section.
The tops of the central, 25m in radius hubs formed Level 1A. The lifts and stairs continued into these two segments that were known as the Fore and Aft Observation Lounges.
The curved top outer walls were made of Oznglass. These walls extended to the dome's height isolating the rooms from the fields in the inner ring, and they strengthened the core of the dome.
The lounges had a central section that was 6m wide in front of the stairs and lift exits, and it extended to the glass walls. The area held Chess and games tables and seats. It was dotted with dwarf fruit trees in big pots.
On either side of this area was a maze of narrow, undulating walkways created by vegetation and coloured glass walls between 50cm and 180cm in height. The mazes were used to create small private nooks with seating alcoves and patches of real grass near the glass wall.
Small herb gardens, fountains, various dwarf fruit trees, berry bushes and fruiting vines on trestles were used to give a sense of being in a secluded garden. The crew could wander around, sit, and observe the stars or just relax with friends.
The dome lounges were to become the most favourite off-duty rooms on the ship. Both areas also had a large telescope mounted on a raised deck that extended out a few metres over the air locked lift entrances and stairwell.
Open railed stairs on the sides of the lift buildings, led up to the raised platform on top. The view from up there was breath-taking. Two additional telescopes mounted fore and aft of the dome were controlled from the helm.
The telescopes provided greater magnification of what was ahead or behind the ship. Hundreds of other cameras were placed on the hull sections so that the computer could create holographic 3D projections of the space around the starship.
The other twelve segments of Level 1B had various hydroponic-grown plants or shallow-rooted grain crops in them. The crops were used to feed the crew and livestock. The plants also assisted with carbon filtering. The ecosystem of each segment was different depending on what was grown within it.
They grew genetically altered high-yield crops such as wheat, corn, rice, and soya beans. The grains were harvestable every four weeks. Staggered rotation planting of the produce ensured weekly or in some situations daily harvesting.
One segment grew a Lucerne (alfalfa) hybrid for feeding the livestock. As long as nutrients were supplied to the plants, they grew fast and tolerated being cut, once a fortnight. A specially designed dryer ensured the hay could be stored to feed the animals when required.
The nutrient-water mixtures for each segment were recycled and sterilised. This was to eliminate diseases and pests, which might have managed to come aboard despite the strict quarantine rules.
The replicators were used to produce new sterilised mixes to feed the plants.
------
The next seven levels of the ship were considered the living and working areas of the ship.
Level 2 - contained the Helm control room, the Captain's office, the main dining hall, kitchens, some of the science labs, as well as perishable storage and the sickbay.
The married couples occupied ten of the eighteen larger double-bed rooms that were located on this level. The other bedrooms were allocated to some of the higher-ranked staff.
Level 3 - had twenty double-bunk rooms and ten rooms with double-beds. All of the rooms were the same size. Several of the crew members had indicated they wouldn't share with a random bunkmate for two years. In most cases, they got a double-bed room.
The double-bed rooms had the bed across the room's width and jammed up against the back wall, it could be folded back into a futon style lounge for more space. Some of the private storage spaces were mounted over the bed.
In reality, the ship could sleep 126 people since it was also expected that some of the singles would become couples over time. Someone had been smart enough to ensure that more rooms had double-beds and extra beds were included in storage for this eventuality.
Level 3 also held a large gymnasium with plenty of exercise machines, several other recreation rooms and the rest of the labs and offices for the various scientific divisions. Most of the stores for the kitchens and general use items were also on this level.
Level 4 - held the animal enclosures, specialised labs, and small general storerooms of commonly used items. It also contained the last twelve double-bunk rooms in its centre and the odd room that Lee had been allocated.
Level 4 to Level 9A - gave access to the main engine rooms, energy storage, generators, main computer rooms, and associated control rooms. They took up the areas towards the two ends of the ship, excluding the two 25m long regions on the sealed ends.
The central zones of Level 5 and Level 6 were primary storage and the location for many of the support systems. These areas also contained various engineering workshops.
The five offices were for the supervisor, his assistant, and one for the shift foremen. They had a modest-sized crib room for the Engineering crew with a small parts replicator.
The central zones of Level 7 and Level 8 held the Engineering stores and the central pumping systems. Level 8 also had the main recycler system and the replicator system's primary control section and the largest replicator.
The largest replicator interface on the ship could produce items as big as 2.5m cubed.
------
Level 9 was, in fact, split into four main sections.
The transporter bay was centrally located and took up an area of 200m square by the full 30m high area of Level 9. The lifts took you to Level 9D to access the foyers, giving you entry to the transporter bays.
The Vehicle Storage bays were also on Level 9D and stored at either end (lengthwise) of the Transporter Bay. A large mechanical workshop was on the aft end.
The 25m long areas that took up both ends of the ship contained the non-accessible parts (from inside the ship) of the Rih drives and the mass-fuel storage. This area was not accessible by anyone due to the possible radiation levels. The equipment in the areas was designed to only be worked on when the ship was in a port.
Level 9A took up the top 9m of the rest of Level 9. It held all of the storage vessels for the elements used in the replicators. This was a very limited access area and only had narrow access tunnels both horizontally and vertically to the pipes, valves, pumps, and sensors, on the tanks.
The lower mass-storage shipping containers were stored in three open grilled mezzanine floors at either end of the ships past the areas for the vehicles. They were called Level 9B, Level 9C and Level 9D.
In each, 6m high compartment, a large central crane on each sub-floor could be used to pick up the shipping containers and deliver them to a large open area on the floor of Level 9D so the forklifts could take them to be put on a transporter or to be unpacked first.
Located on each level of the ship were energy storage rooms and liquid fuel cells. The replicator units, collection hoppers for material recycling, and other support systems, as required, were spread throughout the living areas of the ship.
Each official deck was separated by a 1m high crawl space that contained the air ducts, pipes, and cables for the level below. The inner shell that contained the liveable levels under the dome was separated from the ship's outer hull by a 6m-wide space.
These roughly 6m cubic sectors were segregated by semi-flexible bulkheads, and they held the ship's water supply. The water acted as part of the radiation shield, the primary cooling systems, ship's water, fuel for power and air generation for the ship and hydrogen and oxygen elements required by the replicator.
The transporter bay doors, the main hatches, and the areas around the Rih Drives' propulsion cones and the Ionic Drives couldn't be shielded by water. Because they linked directly to the outer hull, the hull needed to be made thicker with other shielding materials.
An interesting fact about the replicators at the time of departure was that they made horrible tasting food. Components or materials such as synthetic fabric and clothes, plastic or metallic items and liquids were easier to reproduce.
The items required were initially programmed into the replicator by entering lines of code. Very complex devices were limited by the amount of time needed to program in their chemical and physical structures.
Food items or complete meals were challenging to program using this method. A human's taste buds were also sensitive to the muddy and metallic taste any food items so far replicated, always had. (In other words, the food tasted like shit.)
Scientists were still at prototype development of a molecular scanner. It needed to be able to read the elemental chemical composition and configuration to form the article and create the code for the replicator to build it.
Hence, the crew needed real food for the voyage.
--------------------------------------
Chapter 6
~~ January - Week 1 ~~
Lee entered the transporter for the short trip up to the Space Station.
The Fortune was attached to the space station waiting for them. Lee headed down the aisle, plopped down next to Kyle and smiled at him. "Hi, Kyle, ready for the big adventure?"
"As ready as I'm going to be," he replied. "But the real question is when will you be ready for the Kyle Vella adventure?" he asked, as he wiggled his eyebrows and slid his hand up her jumpsuit encased thigh.
While gently removing his hand from her leg and enfolding it in hers, Lee leant over and kissed his cheek then whispered, "Not a chance, in this solar system."
Kyle gave her a crestfallen look. A moment later, he switched on his high wattage smile, "Hey! You said this solar system, so there is hope for me yet."
Lee laughed and punched him in the arm, "You don't miss a trick, do you, Kyle?"
Kyle shrugged, "A man's got to do, what a man's got to do."
Lee grinned at him. Kyle had once told Lee that he hailed from Arizona and was just as famous for his programming abilities as he was for his bedroom aerobics. Lee believed him on both accounts.
Lee's primary job was to maintain all the electrical systems and robots on the ship. However, her skills also allowed her to transition to drive specialist or manufacturing, and she could replace any part on the ship.
Lee was also competent at programming the ship's systems, but she left the navigation to Kyle. She had told Kyle in the past that all that maths made her head hurt.
It had only been three days since Lee had last been on the Fortune. The rest of the hundred-person crew were now making their way to the ship. The crew members, who had also been involved in the construction, were now returning after two weeks of leave. They had gone home to say goodbye to their families and to have Christmas.
Lee no longer had a home. Her grandparents, who had raised her, had passed away nearly four years before.
She had elected to stay and continue the final diagnostic tests and repairs on the ship's systems with the contractors who were staying behind. She had taken a transporter down to the surface of Luna, two days before the meeting, to pack up her small apartment.
When not on the construction docks of the space station, Lee had been based on Luna. The crews had worked a roster of two weeks on and then two weeks off during the year that the final fit-out had taken. Lee had not always taken the two weeks off.
When not on the fit-out, Lee and Kyle had elected to complete a series of courses. They thought the classes would come in handy if they ended up planet-side for a year or more. A coordinator at UNSEC had put together a training plan for them and other people wishing to train for planetfall.
They had even spent several weeks on Earth to complete some of the activities like bush orienteering, rock climbing, sailing and desert and snow survival. Kyle and Lee had a lot of fun doing the courses.
They also learnt how to fly, operate, and repair the latest vehicles called lingers. Lingers were for all intent and purpose, an all-terrain vehicle that also flew at very low altitudes.
Because cargo areas on starships and transporters were limited, a vehicle that could do a bit of everything was preferred. Since Kyle and Lee spent so much time in space on ships, they hadn't learnt how to fly them, hence the courses.
Lingers were fitted with electric drive motors. They used solar panels, inverters, and GE-cells as their power source. If the Lingers got a couple of hours of sunlight or were hooked up to a generation source every so often, they worked well.
The lingers could last for about six to eight hours between charges if the vehicle weren't overloaded, so night driving could be restrictive. In the last ten years, they had become so popular that they had replaced more than three-quarters of the cars on Earth.
Lingers had also become one of the primary transport vehicles inside the habitat domes on Luna and on the other colonised planets and moons. The drive system on the lingers could be changed over to the wheels if no atmosphere were present.
Lee didn't think the driver of the linger she had encountered earlier had been driving one very long. Either that or he was under the influences of some drug and hadn't engaged the autopilot.
She fleetingly wondered if the driver had intended to harm her. The increased whine of the engines as it suddenly sped up came to mind.
A frown creased her brow at this thought.
------
The trip up to the space station was relatively short.
The passengers of the shuttle were soon heading towards the boarding lounge to access the Fortune. For some reason, it seemed to take forever to get through the quarantine zone. The only items Lee had brought with her on the transport were her E-pad, a book containing a collection of Isaac Asimov stories and her minder.
She had to smile as several arguments broke out in front of them. She and Kyle watched the hunky Lieutenant and his people, as they had to confiscate several items from various crew members who thought, 'banned' didn't apply to them.
Alcohol seemed to be the number one item that several people had thought was unfair and argued about. Many claimed that they were parting gifts from family and friends, but it fell on deaf ears.
They had both been amused to watch as the collection of hard liquor and even tobacco products filled the crates behind the check-in point.
Kyle nudged Lee, "Looks like Luna's crews will be having a party tonight." They both smiled at each other.
When one of the soldiers called out for those with no extra baggage to move to a line in front of him, Kyle and Lee gratefully moved. After walking through the scanner and having their ID checked, they were soon walking down the familiar passage to enter the ship.
At the second airlock, a soldier scanned their IDs, checked they had the ship's schematic on their minder and directed them to where their cabins were located. At this point, Lee and Kyle had to go their separate ways.
They planned to meet up again at dinner.
------
Lee finally found her new cabin.
Lee had discovered when she boarded that she had been shifted down a deck. Her new cabin was closest to the entrance to the pig pens on Level 4. She could smell them whenever the door at the end of the short hall opened to the livestock areas.
This cabin was segregated by a bulkhead door, from the other twelve cabins on the ship's fore-end. Annoyingly, every time the bulkhead door opened, it chimed loudly. Lee noticed the name tag on the door was not all the way in the slot.
She pulled it out to find 'L4-12 VET', typed on the back. When she queried the onboard computer from her minder, she found one of the Vets, Robby Breeder, had been married to a Tina from hydroponics during the break. The couple had been moved to Level 2.
However, Lee didn't know why the other Vet was now in her old cabin on Level 3, and she was in this one. As far as Lee was concerned, the only good thing was that she had this cabin to herself. She wasn't sure yet if the animal husbandry people using the corridor all the time would be a problem for her or not. Only time would tell.
Lee found her small port and her two boxes of books were already in the cabin, so she spent some time arranging her room to her liking. Happy, she then familiarised herself with the layout of this level and accessed the replicator for clothes and toiletries. She hadn't spent much time in the cabin area on Level 4 during the fit-out.
Two hours after Lee had boarded Fortune, the transporters had dropped their final loads of passengers and the last of the equipment to be loaded. Lift-off was scheduled for 17:00 hours, so it was still another hour and a half away.
Lee was just killing time, so she decided to head down to engineering anyway.
-------
Lee found that the workshop was empty.
She guessed that the shift change had already taken place and that the afternoon crew were all busy making sure everything was ready for the launch. She checked that her tools were still in her locker.
Lee noticed that a copy of the crew roster was displayed on the crib room's work schedule screen. Lee inspected the roster and found that it hadn't changed from the last version she had received.
She didn't need to report with her crew until 00:00 hours, as she was the night shift crew's foreman and Electrician. She checked with the computer, and it reported that all of her team were aboard. So far, so good.
Lee headed to the fore lounge in the dome. She had decided she might as well go see the departure. She would get a couple of hours of sleep after dinner and before her shift started to switch her body clock over to night shift mode.
Lee found a small crowd of people had made their way to the observation lounges to watch the Fortune's launch. She recognised people from the pre-flight meeting and some who had been on construction with her, but she didn't know who most of them were.
Lee headed to the end of the lounge that faced away from the space station. She had always loved looking at the stars from space. She found that she had an excellent view.
No clouds, smog or city lighting obscured the vista. If she waited long enough, she would get a view of Earth as the Fortune curved around it and headed off to the Delta Pavonis star system.
Lee had been in the observation room for about fifteen minutes when she felt him enter. Her eyes flicked to the door to take in the vision that was Lieutenant Sean Watson.
He had stepped into the lounge just to the side of the entrance and was scanning the room. His eyes rested on her and stayed. Lee returned the gaze, wondering what he would do.
The 190cm (6'3") tall Lieutenant had a bronze-toned complexion that was common to mixed heritage Australian Aboriginals. Those gorgeous cobalt eyes and the curly dark brown with a hint of red hair obviously came from his Scottish heritage. As did his lightly flared nose and broad shoulders.
However, the complexion, long legs and tight arse definitely came from his Aboriginal heritage. Those eyes still made Lee shiver. She watched him flick back the curl that had dropped onto his forehead. 'A nervous habit?', she wondered.
Sean looked in perfect control, his bearing was military erect and yet not tense. He sauntered over to her and lowered himself down beside her on the bench seat, yet he left a respectable distance between them.
"Enjoying the view, Miss Gillian?" he asked, as his eyes flicked over her again. His expression was, however, unreadable.
"It's passable," she answered with an impish smile and a cock of her head. She wondered naughtily, which view he was referring to. She couldn't complain about either, the one in front of her or the one outside.
Sean relaxed into the bench-style seat and looked out over the front of the ship. This being the direction they would move. "Your first trip?" he asked, knowing from her resume that it wasn't.
The lady beside him intrigued him. Sean liked smart women, and she was hot to boot. It took an effort to stop his hand from reaching out to touch the gorgeous dark auburn curl, which had escaped the tightly braided hair. He sniffed gently, and a delicate odour of strawberries and liquorice tickled his scent receptors.
Lee gave a throaty laugh as she relaxed beside Sean. "Far from it," she replied.
Sean watched as she tucked the offending curl back behind her ear, only for it to escape again when she turned to look at him. He took in how the Fluro-yellow and dark moss-green jumpsuit moulded her body to perfection.
The green bottom section started as an inverted 'V' at her sternum. It crossed to her sides, to her tiny waist then across her lower back and small arse to flow down her long legs. The yellow material of the top moulded her perfect breasts, but it was padded enough to hide the full definition of her nipples.
A set of yellow and silver stripes, 3cm wide, ran down the green material in the front to her feet and from her waist to her feet on the back. The stripes were designed to reflect in low light to make the wearer more visible.
The lower half of the jumpsuit had multiple pockets for tools and equipment spaced down her legs on the front and on the sides. The suit was similar to Sean's, except that his was mottled with green, sand, and brown patches and didn't have the bright top or the reflective stripes.
Sean felt his body twitch in response to his appreciation of the figure that Lee cut. He remembered how she had felt when beneath him, only hours before. It had taken a lot of effort on his part, to get off her. Sean observed Lee sit up straighter, and she cocked her head again.
Sean then felt the subtle vibrations of the ship increase. A dull thud echoed up the hull when they released the clamps. The ship was leaving drydock on her maiden voyage.
The Ship-Captain's voice came over the main comm-system and told everyone that they were indeed leaving the space station and welcomed them all aboard for the trip of their lifetime.
Lee wasn't sad to miss the hoopla by the media that the Captain and the other team heads would have had to put up with for the ship's send-off. Lee wasn't a lover of being in the spotlight and wondered how the Lieutenant had managed to escape.
An incident earlier in her career had made her very leery of the press.
--------------------------------------
Chapter 7
~~ January - Week 1 ~~
Sean watched as Lee's eyes flicked to the entrance, and she tensed.
He must have been partially blocking her view because she leant forward and frowned. He turned to see what she was looking at. A group of scientists had walked in through the door that isolated the lifts from this room.
They didn't seem that interesting to Sean. He turned back to face Lee and watched as she scanned the room again. Whoever had distracted her, must have left as Lee shrugged it off and returned to looking out through the transparent dome.
Lee and Sean watched as the ship glided away from the station.
------
Syd had spied the Lieutenant and that woman as soon as he went to enter the lounge.
When Lee's head went to swivel in his direction, Syd had quickly stepped back through the door and out of her line of sight.
'Hmm,' Syd thought. 'She could be very dangerous to my health. I will have to find out more about her and avoid her as much as possible.'
Syd found the auburn-haired woman very disconcerting. Something about her raised the hair on the back of his neck. Very few women affected him as she did. He had learnt the hard way that not all women made good play toys.
He thought back to the lady Cop, Anna Smic that he had picked up only six weeks before. Anna had been a DEA agent undercover as a Pharmaceutical Salesperson. She was pretending to sell illegal drugs mixed in with legal sales to him.
She had thought that he was involved in the ring of criminals she was looking for. She had perfected a hard-done-by, demure and mousy look. So, at first, Anna had fooled Syd into thinking she might be a potential toy.
He had played along with her tentative suggestions that she could provide him with other items he might like to have, for a price. They had set up a time to meet outside of work, and he had invited her to come back to his place.
Once he had her inside, Syd offered to show her his lab downstairs. It wasn't until she recognised what the room was truly used for, that her real nature showed. It was when he locked eyes with her, and she tried to stare him down that he knew Anna was a predator as much as he was.
Syd knew that he was in trouble. It was more by good luck than design that he got the upper hand on her. Anna had fought like a wild thing. Syd had ended up having to kill her without getting the pleasure first. He was pretty pissed by this and even more so when he found out what she truly was.
When he had reached out, his old buddy, Sir Nash, had spirited him away to get some basic training for this trip. He'd not enjoyed that very much as he wasn't able to sate his lust while on the course and he wasn't particularly enamoured with low-G.
He realised that Lee had the same look of a predator when she was scanning the room to find him earlier. He shuddered and headed back to his room. He had no qualms with killing, but he preferred the game of chase and the fun first.
Syd liked to be the one in control.
------
Lee felt the danger dissipate.
She stood and moved over to the wall where she could see clearly through it and the huge dome curve that was stretched over them and down to the hull more than 10m below.
She wasn't happy about the disturbance she had felt, but she wasn't that surprised either. Some people just felt wrong to her, and there was often little she could do about them other than to remain vigilant and avoid them if possible.
Sean got up and followed Lee. He watched her face in the reflection of the glass as the large ship set out on her maiden voyage. Intellectually he knew that space-tugs were pushing the Fortune slowly sideways and away from the station until it was safe for her to ramp up the main engines.
The subtle vibrations changed, and the ship slowly moved away from the station. As it picked up speed, it arced gracefully to go around the Earth and gain extra propulsion.
The blue, green, and white ball that was Earth came into view and grew larger as the ship's speed increased and moved her closer to Mother Earth. It was a beautiful sight, from Lee and Sean's perspective. They stood transfixed for some time as the Earth held their fascination.
Sean was standing slightly behind Lee. He had to stop himself from hauling her into his arms, no matter how right it felt to do so. He wished to share the moment with her on a more personal level. This lady had a very strange effect on him. He hadn't felt this attracted to a woman in a very long time.
Lee reached out and touched the wall with one hand. She bowed her head to it as if she were saying goodbye to her home and wasn't expecting to return. She stayed that way for many minutes before Sean heard her soft sigh.
Lee turned to face him. She gave him a sad, little smile and then walked away from him.
A shudder went down Sean's spine, and he could only wonder what it was she knew that he didn't.
------
Everyone was busy settling in and getting used to their new rosters and routines.
The scientists were busy setting up their labs. Crew members were working through lists of last-minute things to do or finding where items, parts, or equipment that they needed had been stored. The helm crew concentrated on getting them to the first jump point.
The favourite pastime of the personnel was spending their time getting to know who else was aboard. For the unmarried, the preoccupation was on availability and approachability of the person who had caught their eye.
Those who were shy or felt they were not attractive to others spent more time with their peepers in their off-duty hours. Peepers got their names from the slang of 'eyes' or 'IES' the acronym for the Interactive Educational Shades.
The fact many adults used them for viewing pornography also contributed to the name of peepers. Primarily, playing of vids, scrolling, or reading and simple button pressing was controlled by eye movement and blinking.
Sub-vocal commands that were picked up by audio chips could also be used. They also had special gloves and even suits that could be used for sensory activities, keyboard actions, playing games or working in other document types.
Viewers of pornographic material also found other uses for the gloves, but we won't go there. Let's just say that the use of the gloves for those activities was frowned upon in public places, especially the rec-room or lounges on the ship.
Even so, they did do their primary job of education well.
-------
Lee was on Shift 3 - the night shift.
It covered the times from 00:00 hours to 08:00 hours. Although on a spaceship, there was no such thing as night. The hallway lights weren't dimmed to simulate night because spaceships ran twenty-four-seven.
Only the lights in the dome, the livestock cargo bay and outside Lee's room were dimmed for nine hours between 20:00 hours to 05:00 hours, for the animals and plants. Interestingly they did dim the lights in the dome lounges, and certain people liked to take advantage of this for trysts.
However, humans are conditioned for different times of day and night. This meant that most of the crew who were not on the night shift roster were mostly asleep when Lee was working.
Or at least they were in a cabin even if it wasn't their own, during most of Lee's shift.
------
On the first night out, Sean had to confiscate a bong.
A group of the younger element had decided to have a leaving home party and fired one up in one of the cabins. A new genetically altered cannabis had become popular in recent years. It had diminished side effects and health-related issues, you still got a good hit from it, and it was cheap and legal unless you were driving.
The problem was that this ship was smothered in smoke detectors, sprinklers, and alarms. It was a non-smoking ship. Sean, Lee, and several other members of Lee's engineering team turned up to find six, very wet people from the scientific and support teams.
The hapless victims were banging frantically on the cabin door trying to get out of the sealed room when Lee and Sean turned up to find out what the problem was. Lee had to reset the alarm and the sprinklers before they could open the doors.
The fire alarm gave the people in the room one minute to evacuate before the room was sealed. This was to contain the spread of fire. The door closed even faster if the room was decompressing for some reason.
In their altered state, the party-goers didn't react quickly enough to the alarm. Hence, they had become trapped in the room. The smoke left the cabin and filled the hallway when the door was opened.
Lee had to increase the air-conditioners' flow to clear the air of the sweet, cloying smell. Her TA, Jim Hoyle, had to collect the cleaning robots, to suck up the excess water and dry the carpets in the room. Fortunately, the sprinklers hadn't been on long enough to flood over the door lip and into the hallway.
Sean was not impressed, and he told the crew that if they needed recreational drugs, to go see the doctor for ones that didn't require burning first. He also informed them they had a meeting with the Captain in the morning, and they would be responsible for cleaning up the cabin.
The six people got their first taste of an upset Army Officer.
------
Lee's next adventure was the piglet.
On the second morning aboard when Lee entered her room after her shift, she tripped over a fourteen-weeks-old piglet in the hall. She then spent the next fifteen minutes scurrying around the corridor, trying to catch it. She then had to calm it down to stop it squealing once she had it.
Lee entered the animal hold to find out where the piglet had come from. She found that one of the movable fences that formed the pens wasn't locked down properly.
She put the piglet back into the pen with her sisters and fixed the fence. She left a note in the Vets' log to inform them why she had been in the animal enclosures.
She went to sleep with a smile on her face.