Mati swallowed and looked at the plan.
The first leg of the flight plan, at her request, was to hover over the capital city so she could see it one last time. She touched the symbol on her console that raised the flight control.
“Ilika, my hands are shaking.”
“I see that, Mati. Maybe . . . if they feel the controls, they’ll remember their skill.”
Mati carefully put her left hand on the flight control, and her right hand on the console near her engine controls. After a moment, they relaxed and a slight smile replaced the frown on the brand-new pilot’s face.
“Take us up to about the height of the hills and hold position,” Ilika commanded.
The other four gripped their seats as they felt the ship become light, then leave the ground entirely. Mati would have liked to grip her seat, but didn’t dare let go of the controls.
“Good work, Mati,” Ilika assured, still standing right behind her. “Nice, smooth ascent . . . we’re almost there . . . good. Lock the position. Now you can release the flight control and Manessa will keep us in one place.”
Mati wore an excited but worried look. “Did I do it? Did I really do it?
Are we flying?”
NEBADOR Book Three: Selection 244
“Kibi, remember how to open just the upper half of the main hatch?”
She
nodded.
“Let’s go look, pilot.”
Mati extracted herself from the pilot’s chair, grabbed her crutch, and accepted Ilika’s help getting up the steps to the passenger area, then down to the main hatch. She grabbed the lower edge of the opening and looked out.
Her head immediately started swimming and her stomach threatened to revolt as she looked north over the swamp and grasslands far below.
Ilika held onto her as she alternated between looking at the floor beneath her feet, and peeking out the hatch. After a couple of minutes she announced she was okay, and took one more long look through the open hatch.
Ilika helped Mati back to the passenger area, then invited each of the others to come and look, one at a time.
Kibi felt a little queasy, but quickly got over it.
Boro immediately turned white and went crawling up the steps after viewing the dizzying scene for only a few seconds. Kibi got him a bowl from the galley.
Neither Rini nor Sata experienced any problem.
Ilika spent more time with Mati at the open hatchway, and then Boro.
“You guys are great!” Ilika announced. “I threw up the first time I looked out an open hatch at altitude.”
Boro suddenly felt much better.
NEBADOR Book Three: Selection 245
After gaining a little more altitude to clear the hills, Mati made quick work of the flight to the capital city, bringing the ship to a smooth stop high over the Traveler’s Gate.
“Can they see us?” Rini asked.
“Most people rarely look up at the sky, and we arrived silently. Also, Manessa has changed color, and is now light blue.”
Boro’s eyes became large. “Smart ship!”
Ilika nodded, then worked with Rini to get the proper angle with the ship’s visual sensors.
When the scene appeared on their screens, everyone gasped at the unexpected events below. One of the religious orders was in flames. Another crawled with people smashing and looting everything they could get their hands on. The one near the city gate had not yet been breached, but had a mob of people pounding at the gate, and more arriving with axes and logs.
Ilika was as shocked as the others as he stared at the mayhem below.
Boro swallowed. “I’m . . . um . . . sure glad we don’t need any more supplies.”
“Me too!” Kibi agreed. “Is this . . . because of us?”
Ilika was silent for a long, thoughtful minute. “In a sense,” he finally said.
“You know how the priests were stirring people up. I think . . . they stirred them up . . . a little too much.”
“I wonder why there aren’t any guards trying to stop it,” Rini pondered aloud. “They’re at the gate and all the usual places, and are just ignoring it.”
Sata scrunched her face. “I think I know. Tori told us the high priest was trying to get the king to help with the monster . . . I mean us. So now he’s letting them eat their mistake.”
Ilika nodded at Sata. “From what I understand, there’s been a power struggle between the king and the orders for many years.”
“Did we . . . do anything wrong, Ilika?” Mati asked with concern.
“No, Mati. I was asked by the head of the Transport Service to let our ship be seen. She, and her associates, can see deeply into these things. I think the events we set in motion were anticipated, and there is a purpose to them.”
Their next destination, at Kibi’s request, was the middle of the kingdom, at
NEBADOR Book Three: Selection 246
an altitude that would allow them to see everything. It took the ship several minutes to make the ascent, and Mati wore an intense expression as she held the flight control in the maximum-climb position.
“Let Manessa do the work,” Ilika coaxed. “Lock your controls, stand up and stretch. Some maneuvers just take time.”
Mati did as he asked, but kept an eagle-eye on her display as they climbed.
About a minute later, she sat back down so they wouldn’t overshoot the flight plan.
Boro wanted to look out the hatch again. Ilika glanced at Rini’s console and reported the outside air pressure and temperature, both far below anything they had ever experienced. Boro grinned and shook his head.
Rini needed no further help aiming his visual sensors.
Northward they could see the mountains, now much whiter than they remembered, and wreathed in clouds about half-way up their sides.
Eastward spread the grasslands and the prairies, and beyond that, the mysterious desert. On the farthest horizon marched rugged, barren mountains.
Southward, between scattered clouds, they glimpsed the tiny capital city and the surrounding hills. Beyond lay more green hills and forests, another realm whose name they did not know.
Finally they looked west. Past brown hills and green valleys lay the vast ocean. Sata’s heart beat faster, knowing it was, at her request, their next destination.
Mati tried to relax during the long descent, but had to keep her hands on the control to avoid wandering above or below the flight plan.
“Since you’re already half-way down,” Ilika informed her, “you need to reduce your speed. The density difference between air and water, at this speed, would be like hitting a brick wall. Manessa can handle that much inertia, but we can’t.”
Mati eased her flight control to full reverse, but soon looked troubled.
“Ilika, I can barely make us slow down at all!”
“I see that. You’re fighting gravity. What are you going to do about it, pilot?”
NEBADOR Book Three: Selection 247
“Um . . . nothing’s working!”
“You need help, but not from me. You have flight command. Use it.”
Mati took a deep breath. Her hands were shaking even while gripping the flight control. She could see the ocean getting closer and closer. “Boro, thruster power level two. No, make it three.”
Boro looked at Ilika.
“Don’t look at me, engineer. You heard the pilot. If her flight command was bad, I’d say something.”
Boro turned to his console and tapped in the higher power level. He could see the fuel flow increase.
Mati felt the additional power in her thrusters, and quickly used it. During one of the most intense minutes of her life, comparable to a certain minute in the forest near Lumber Town, she brought the Manessa Kwi to a dead stop high over the beach.
Scowling, Mati locked her controls and turned to Ilika, but when she saw his smile of pride, she took some deep breaths and relaxed. “Did you . . . know that was going to happen?”
“I was pretty sure. You and Boro just earned check marks for some very important lessons.”
Ilika stepped over to the watch station. “Rini, while Mati eases us down to the water, I’ll show you how to scan for submarine topography. Sata and Mati are going to need that information in a minute.”
Rini watched as Ilika demonstrated, then nodded and went to work.
“Kibi, switch to internal air and lock the main hatch,” Ilika instructed, going up to her station. When she had completed those items, he showed her how to run a hull diagnostic. She was happy to see the yellow symbol that meant Manessa was tight as a drum.
“Mati, how’s the approach going?”
“Good. My thrusters are actually too strong and hard to control now. Let’s try level two, Boro.”
“You’ve got it.”
“Sata, as soon as you get that underwater topographic, select a landing site, somewhere level, and modify the flight plan.”
NEBADOR Book Three: Selection 248
A moment later Sata had the map. “Here’s a nice place.”
“Approaching the water,” Mati announced.
“Nudge Manessa in . . .” Ilika started to say.
The ship hit the water with a jolt, Mati jerked on the flight control, and a moment later they were back in the air. “Sorry!”
“That’s okay,” Ilika assured. “It’s just one of those things you have to do by feel. You did better than I did my first time.”
Mati smiled sheepishly and lowered Manessa back to the water.
Ilika watched. “The top layer is usually pretty choppy.” Even as he spoke, they all felt the rising and falling motion of the waves. “Take Manessa down before we get seasick. Since we’re not much heavier than water, you’ll need very little anti-mass.”
The pilot nodded and pushed down on her flight control.
Sata touched some symbols. “Here’s the new flight plan to a level place.”
Mati looked up at her chart and noticed a jog to the right that hadn’t been there before. She followed it as they slowly moved deeper into the water, soon leaving all wave motion behind.
“I wish we could see better . . .” Rini muttered, staring at his murky visual display.
Ilika stepped to the watch station again. “We can. Here are your image processors. I think . . . this one.”
Suddenly the forward view became crystal clear. Some fish darted out of the way.
“It’s so beautiful!” Rini breathed as he touched the symbol that sent it to all stations.
Boro’s face lit up. “Nice! Now if we could just net those fish for dinner
. . .”
Ilika
laughed.
“I can see the bottom,” Sata announced.
“Dead slow to the landing site, Mati. There’s usually mud on the bottom, and the less you stir up, the better we can see. You won’t have any responsibilities at this landing site, Kibi.”
“No picnic outside the ship?” she asked with a grin.
“How about at our next stop?”
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“Yeah!”
“Landing is the most dangerous maneuver any craft can do,” Ilika explained, standing behind the pilot. “Even for a sailing ship, coming to dock is always tricky. Bring in enough anti-mass to let your descent rate approach zero, then let Manessa do the rest with her landing struts. Your strut control is right here.”
Mati concentrated, watching both the visual and the topographic. A few seconds later she touched the strut control, the symbol became blue-green, then green. They felt a very slight bump and the symbol changed to yellow.
“The Manessa Kwi has arrived at the bottom of the ocean,” Ilika announced.
Everyone clapped and cheered. Mati smiled with contentment, and Sata looked like she had just conquered another demon.
“We’re not at the bottom, as in the deepest place, are we?” Kibi asked.
“Far from it. We’re on a continental shelf, part of the land that just happens to be flooded by shallow water right now. The deep ocean basins and trenches are several miles deep.”
“Can we go there?”
“Yes, after some training in the desert.”
“I was noticing,” Boro began, “that for a while there, Mati was the only one working, and then all of a sudden we all had things to do again.”
“Life on a ship is like that. The rhythm of work can change in an instant.
That’s why it’s absolutely essential to never leave your station without the commander’s knowledge. In an emergency, there may not be time to look and see who’s there. If the pilot calls for engines, your fingers had better be moving on your console, or the ship could be in trouble.
“Most of the time it’s no problem to go to the toilet, get a snack, go check on equipment in the utility room or the engineering ring. Sometimes there’s so little to do that some of us can go off-duty, sleep, eat, play games, whatever.
But the commander has to release you, whether it’s a one minute toilet break or a one month vacation, so he or she is prepared to cover your station.
“As you have seen, Mati gets most of the work during surface flight. But when we get into space, she’ll be off-duty for long stretches, and Rini’s job
NEBADOR Book Three: Selection 250
becomes more important. Sata has the biggest part of her job before a flight begins, like today. Right now, Kibi is just doing some little things that almost seem unnecessary. When we take on passengers, she’ll wish she had a twin!”
Kibi grinned from her station.
“You, Boro, will tend to be busy during any transition, and also when the ship has landed for maintenance. But on a long flight leg, you’ll often get time off.”
They all just gazed at their visual displays, watching long strands of seaweed gently wave back and forth. Fish darted about in groups, as if one creature with one mind.
Mati had more things to learn as they made the transition from water back to air, then everyone relaxed while they floated above the hills and valleys to the place Boro had requested. On the way, he spent time at the half-open hatch trying to master his stomach.
After Kibi checked the area for people or large animals, Mati made the final descent into the geothermal area slowly and carefully, setting the Manessa Kwi down about where they camped many months before. Ilika guided Boro through his engine shut-down procedures.
They discussed the first four legs of their flight while sitting in the hot water of the colorful terraces. The steam vent hissed in the background, bringing up memories of Miko.
After drying off and dressing on that cool but pleasant autumn day, four ex-slaves, an innkeeper’s daughter, and a young captain just beginning his first command, all sat in a circle on the grass. Bread from the medieval capital city was broken, a crock of butter from Cattle Town passed, and refrigerated apples sliced. A gleaming ship from a far-distant place perched nearby, hatch open and ramp extended. Mineral-laden water trickled from pool to pool in the terraces above, while squirrels and chipmunks stood witness to this unusual gathering of humans.
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Deep Learning Notes
Some memories seem to be stored throughout the body, or at least throughout the nervous system. Most people have forgotten a telephone number, only to discover they can tap it into the keypad perfectly once holding a telephone.
Mati had done enough simulations that the feel of the flight control in her hands allowed her to get over her momentary trembling.
Most people today see pictures taken from above the ground all their lives, so the view from an aircraft is not too shocking. A medieval youth’s only experience with such a scene would be from the mountains, where they rarely went.
The near-invisibility of the ship as it hovered over the capital city is similar to the situation with UFOs. Even when sightings are verified by multiple independent witnesses and airport radar, the number of people who see them is tiny, even in a large city.
How would the mood in the capital city that morning be different if the priests had successfully destroyed the “monster” by the little lake the night before?
In a very real sense, when Mati gave her first flight command, she stepped from childhood into professional adult life. What does this tell us about Ilika’s values as the captain?
Why would arrival on the bottom of the ocean be “conquering another demon” for Sata?
Revisiting a place that meant a lot at an earlier time has great psychological value. What differences existed between the group that first visited the hot springs and steam vent, half a year before, and the group now?
