Cheesman Chronicles

“SAM, chart a course for heading 3189-47,” Aurora called out.

“Yes, Aurora,” a male sounding voice came from the speakers throughout the ship.

Aurora smiled. After years of training with the best, interning on dozens of star crafts, studying over long nights, she had finally achieved the rank of independent pilot. Just a few hours ago the academy had awarded her with flying honours as one of their best of the year, and soon after she won a commission for a trading alliance with a nearby system for important medical supplies.

She had even been able to keep her ship from training. It was a mutual agreement. She was experienced with this specific design so it would mean better flying for her. The helm had been set up to match her needs. Even SAM, the ships AI, had been designed to her exacting standards.

She couldn’t just leave it all for a shinier ship. It would feel wrong.

Making her way to the seat, she felt herself relax as they jumped at warp speed. Finally, she could sit back and breathe. She keyed in some music tracks she remembered to bring along and watched the stars whiz by in front of her.

“I’ll never get tired of that view,” she murmured to herself.

Aurora picked out a cup and poured herself some coffee. It was going to be a long flight. Nothing she couldn’t handle for herself, but not exactly a walk in the park either. The first thing they drilled into their heads at the academy was that in space you were never safe.

She was no stranger to that way of thinking. She often had her guard up for most of her life. Being an astronaut was one that needed a level of space in these things. She was never mean or aggressive, but she often found herself wanting to step away from life for a bit if she could. Being stuck in space was an easy excuse for that.

But she had made proper preparations for this flight. The ship was fully stocked with backup components and tools. A fabrication bay was set up to fix items while they wait. New sensors were installed for early warning detection. Even SAM had an upgrade for quicker response time and processing.

Which made the alert she received all the more interesting.

“Alert,” SAM’s monotone voice said through the ship. “Incoming debris.”

“Debris?” Aurora said. “What kind of debris?”

“Unknown at current time. Recommend dropping out of speed.”

Aurora nodded and took control of the helm. She was glad she did. Just as they dropped out of speed they came across the broken wreck of another ship. It must have been a mass cargo ship, able to carry millions of tons of parts and pieces to it’s destination. Compared to her, this thing was a city.

She began to fly through the wreck, narrowly avoiding the shards of broken hull around them. The sheer size of the thing was somewhat overwhelming to her. It overshadowed her tiny vessel. Just one of the containers it carried were about the same size as her entire ship.

Though she powered through. Even though she was scared, she had been trained to deal with fear. She breathed calmly as she directed the ship around the husk.

Travelling at this speed was a risky move. Yet it would be even riskier to stop and go around. The inertia dampeners on the ship had never been that great, often meaning that they would drift for much longer than was optimal. Even an experienced pilot would have issues.

But Aurora had the experience with this ship to compensate.

While narrowly dodging one of the exploded chunks of metal, a small steel sheet cut by the ship. Aurora heard the warning sound as the collision vibrated with the ship.

“Warning,” SAM said. “Fuel array damaged.”

“Damn it,” Aurora cursed. “Cut consumption to that array. Make sure nothing else leaks.”

“Affirmative.”

No one could have avoided a shot like that. But it didn’t help matters either way. She would just have to keep flying. The ship began to heave a bit more. The thrusters around them were not able to properly compensate for the loss of fuel to their systems. It would be up to Aurora to fix that.

Finally they stopped in an open field in the middle of the massive ship. It engulfed her craft in a terrifying display of size. Aurora couldn’t even tell how far it stretched. It just kept going. She took in a deep breath and collected herself.

“Ship status?” she asked.

“4% of fuel lost due to impact,” SAM informed her. “Currently stable. Recommend immediate repairs. All other systems nominal.”

“Great…” she mumbled.

If repairs were necessary, then she would have to step outside to fix it. Flying in a ship she could handle. Spacewalks were another story.

There was a comfort to the ship. Her whole world in a climate controlled, breathable space where she could just focus on the task at hand. She didn’t have to worry about whether her breathing was stable enough so her oxygen didn’t run out. Nor did she worry about getting hit by some stray piece of equipment. Her cable being cut. Flying away from her ship.

Spacewalking was the ultimate reminder of how dangerous it could be out there.

Though she couldn’t get much further without fixing the fuel. Even at a slow speed the manoeuvring required for this place would put too much strain on the ship otherwise.
She sighed and walked from the helm down to an airlock.

“SAM, prepare an analysis on the ship around us,” she said. “I want you to tell me what happened while I’m out there.”

“Affirmative,” it said.

At least that would be a distraction.

At the airlock she pulled out a space suit fit to her size. Nowadays even one person could get into one of these by themselves. It was a requirement. In an emergency there was no time to waste suiting someone else up. You just had to go.

She tightened the locks around her hands, pulled on the boots, attached the helmet, checked pressure, and confirmed all was set up correctly. Now all she needed to do was step through those doors and out into space.

Aurora shut herself in and depressurised the airlock. She saw the air leave and the artificial gravity left her body soon after, leaving her floating inside. Before it could leave she attached herself to the ship with a tether. Just as she did, the final lock released itself and the door opened.

She looked down and back to her ship. She felt if she looked out there with her own eyes, she may just go crazy. But she did catch a glimpse. And it set off her unknown megalophobia.

Now was the fun part. She pulled herself down to the ground and moved her body across the side of the ship. SAM was helpfully giving her some directions to the area it hit. It wasn’t too far from the array, but for Aurora it was the distance from home to it’s sun.

“How much further, SAM?” she asked.

“Approximately ten metres,” it replied.

“At my current speed, how long will it take me to get to it?”

“Approximately ten minutes.”

“Great,” she muttered. “Any way I can speed it up?”

“Based on knowledge of previous EVA missions you have completed and the delicateness of this operation, unlikely.”

Aurora sighed and continued moving along, focusing on her breathing and avoiding looking out to the empty expanse.

“What can you tell me about this ship so far?” she asked.

“Initial readings indicate that this is the EFA Hermes, a mass cargo transport lost approximately two weeks ago. It was carrying supplies from the planet Rindell to Godlon. Most of the supplies were -“

“Skip those details,” she interrupted it. “What happened to the ship?”

“Based on current state of the ship, the highest probability of this destruction is split between accidental rupture of a reactor or a hit and run for the supplies. There is no sign of external damage from sensor readings, however key supplies are missing from the manifest, mostly medicine and food.”

“Could they have been stolen after the ship exploded?”

“Potentially,” SAM said. “Scavenger parties are a known phenomenon in this sector. However, none are currently detected on sensors.”

“That’s a relief,” Aurora muttered, before getting back to her climbing. She was nearly at the broken fuel array.

It was cut up pretty bad. The debris that hit it was small, about the size of a single coin, but it dealt a good amount of damage either way. She put her hand in it and it easily came away. Nothing a little patch up couldn’t fix, but certainly something that needed to be done now.

Aurora pulled out a small kit and opened up a patching tool. She set down a replacement part of the pipe and began to stick it back on. She carefully waved her device over it so that it stayed in place, taking time to make sure it wouldn’t shift.

After a short while she finally managed to get it in place.

“Finally,” she grumbled. “Now to -“

“Alert,” SAM said, cutting of her thought. “Debris field incoming.”

“What?” she yelled. “Where from?”

A small pop-up appeared in her heads up display. She followed the direction of it and saw a few screws flying her way. Nothing large, but certainly moving at dangerous speeds.

Aurora quickly sealed the hatch of the hull and tried to duck for cover. They were about two hundred metres away now, giving her only a couple seconds to duck out of the way.

She made it behind a section of hull in just enough time. The shards of metal flew past her, cutting away at the ship in a terrifying hail of broken parts and tiny bullet-like nuts and bolts. The cover would work for now, though only just.

One particularly nasty section of metal cut through a weaker part of her shield, piercing her hand.

Her bones crushed under the intense force of the attack. A piercing pain streaked through her hands as she pulled it back instantly. She yelled harder than she realised she had capacity for. The glass in front of her face clouded up with the sweat and spit, fogging her already red vision from the pain. Her hand refused to move. She could already feel the black busies building up on it as she carefully massaged it.

“Alert,” SAM said. “Injury Detected.”

“I’m aware of that!” Aurora yelled.

“Administering painkillers,” SAM announced.

The burning sensation slowly dulled away. Aurora felt calm. She knew she shouldn’t. Her hand still refused to move and even with the drugs she couldn’t press down on it. Enough damage had already been done.

But it was relief enough. She coughed a bit more and looked up.

“Thanks, SAM,” she said.

“Recommending immediate return to ship for first aid.”

“No,” Aurora said. “We need to fix the fuel first.”

“Captain -“

“SAM,” Aurora stopped it. “If this happens again, and I’m inside, we’re both as good as dead. So I will fix what’s broken with the ship, then head inside.”

“… Understood,” SAM said. “Would you still like the medical room prepared?”

Aurora sighed. “Yes please.”

She turned back to her job and set the pipes in place. Thankfully, none of the piping was hit. The hull itself had a few bent pieces. The hole in the metal sheet she hid behind meant that there was no way she would be re-entering any atmosphere soon. But it would still let her travel through space. Just as long as they avoided any more debris.

Aurora carefully placed the sheet back in place and secured the hull once more. She sealed it shut and contacted SAM.

“Run a diagnostic on the piping,” she said. “Does it look good?”

“Running… no faults detected. Ship fuel now at ninety four percent efficiency, two percent down from mission start.”

“Good,” she sighed, before heading back to the airlock. “Now let’s get out of here.”

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