Coming Soon

Flight of the Titania
~ An Erotic Science-Fiction Novel ~

- Two -
Assessments

Queenie rode the howling electro-turbine glider at top speed, dodging in and out of the streams of soaring city traffic with a grin of sheer joy. The traffic-info on her com-signal pulsed in her ear with reports on collisions and crashes along all the major flight routes. It would have been far safer to take the monorail but far, far slower.

It was a beautiful and clear morning over Warren. Sunlight sparkled and gleamed in rainbow hues on the plasti-steel windows and domes of the Uppercity. The undulating miles of rust red and corrosion green, on the monstrous industrial pipes that marked the Undercity made an interesting color contrast against ultra-modern chrome and smoked glass corporate level.

She banked into a crowded tunnel setting off perimeter alarms on the other speeding vehicles.

The clear sky was unusual for this time of year. She suspected that the clouds would move in sometime before noon, and the seasonal deluge would continue. That meant flying through rain on the way home. She only hoped the glider's new inertial dampener didn't prove to be more of a problem than it was worth in the crosswinds of storm while flying through traffic.

Her glider lunged out of the tunnel into the wide dome of the military academics sector. She tilted and cut a sharp turn onto the landing deck of the Cadet Academy. At the very last second, she pulled in her wings and landed on her cycle tires, skidding to a sharp halt at the glider-parking row. Using the static antigrav to point the glider's nose up against the wall, she locked her vehicle into the parking grips, and powered down.

Queenie tossed a leg over and dropped out of the saddle, then jerked off her helmet, and checked her wrist-chrono. She had five minutes to spare. She grinned. "Damn! Looks like that booster really did the trick!" She pulled her shoulder bag from the glider's trunk and shoved her helmet in its place.

Queenie bolted to the elevator lifts and punched the code for the Cadet level. By the time the lift dropped to her floor, she had the dirty coveralls off and stuffed into her shoulder bag. When the lift doors opened she looked like every other student in her solid black cadet uniform. She dashed out of the lift and sprinted down the crowded hall to a chorus of friendly jeers.

"Late again Queenie?"

"When are you going to get a real glider?"

"Did the sunshine slow you down?"

"Good luck at assessments!"

At the classroom door, she let out a breath, and made sure her form-fitting shirt was tucked neatly into her snug flight pants, then tugged her flight jacket into place, securing all the pockets. She ran her hands through her short and ragged hair. There was no help for the way her hair looked.

Queenie walked into the room weaving through her classmates to get to her assigned chair. Every single one of her fellow cadets had the same ragged and shorn hairstyle that she sported. Last week her hair had been waist-length.

A bunch of the brass graduates stepping out into Marine Corp training had gotten the notion to chop the hair off all the silver graduate under classmen. Every one of the massive brutes had already gotten their cyborg augmentation, so they were fast and brutally strong. None of them had stood a fighting chance against the over-sized soon-to-be grunts. A rite of passage, they had called it.

Queenie called it spite. She dropped her bag on the floor by her chair. More than half of her class would likely go into officer's training, while, as confirmed Marines, they were destined to ride in the holds her classmates would someday be flying or commanding, no matter how high in rank the grunts climbed.

Instructor Jaeger strode into the classroom, polished and lean in his long, black and silver officer's coat. "Good morning class."

The student cadets leapt to their feet, at attention, and in complete silence. Disrespect, speaking out of turn, or even looking as though they weren't paying complete attention was unthinkable.

Queenie moved her foot very carefully, pushing her bag further under her chair. She had a healthy respect for Instructor Jaeger just like everyone else in the class.

Instructor Jaeger was the hand-to-hand combat instructor for their entire graduating class. Disciplinary action meant long grueling hours of physical exercise, if they were lucky. If they weren't lucky, disciplinary action meant a single hour of grueling, and painful sparring matches with the instructor, one right after the other.

Instructor Jaeger turned to face the class then leaned back against his broad glass desk.

"At ease."

The students relaxed their stance and clasped their hands behind their backs.

"Cadets, today is assessments." Instructor Jaeger looked around and smiled. "I realize you are probably nervous, but I assure you that every cadet of Roe Post Academy is carefully evaluated and assigned according to their accomplishments and natural talents. You will be placed where you can only succeed. You cannot fail assessments. You can only fail to live up to your own potential."

***

Queenie took a seat in the pilot's simulator chair in breathless anticipation. This was her last test and the one she had been waiting for all her life. She had wanted to be a pilot since her dad had let her sit in the driver's seat of his glider. Her assessment scores for atmosphere flight and interstellar navigation had been good - the tests had been absurdly simple, so she knew she stood a real chance of being the pilot she dreamed of. Flying in atmosphere was as natural as breathing, but this would determine whether or not she had the talent for piloting a starship. She looked over at her fellow students gingerly taking their places in the curved rows of chairs set up in the circular gray-walled simulation theater.

"Hey Queenie, what makes you think a dock-rat will make anything but dock-rat?"

Queenie felt her temper rise in a wave of acidic fury. Her dad may be a Dock Master but her mom had been a first class pilot. Mom had been alive to see her enter the academy, but she hadn't come home from the last war. All Queenie had left of her was her pilot's insignia.

She turned and glared at the hulking student two chairs down. They boy's orange hair had been buzzed to his scalp the day before the upper classmen had pulled their sheering stunt. She strongly suspected that he'd had something to do with their prank. She curled her lip. "Maybe because unlike you, Ox, I actually have real experience flying."

Ox bared his teeth. "You have flying experience? Since when?"

She slanted a hard look at Ox. "My daddy gave me a racing glider when I was twelve. I hear all your experience is with a simulator."

Ox sneered. "That piece of junk is supposed to be a racing glider? From what century?

And my simulator was for a fighter --"

"Students!" the instructor called out. "We are not in the quad courtyard. Squabbling is for after hours."

Queenie sat back and fumed. If they had been in the quad courtyard she would have given Ox a fat lip for his mouth. Since childhood she had gotten into a lot of trouble for fighting with him. He liked picking on the smaller students. The bully... He was huge but slow, so it was easy to keep out of reach of his hammer-fists. Kicking his fat butt had been worth all the disciplinary actions, and the petty revenge that followed.

The assistant instructor came to Queenie's chair and set the virtual reality helmet over her head, then buckled her hands into the sensor-gloves.

She drew in a calming breath. If she actually made pilot's grade, she would be scheduled for the cyber-augmentations next week. Equipped with piloting implants, she would be able to jack directly into the navigational computer of whatever she flew. The type of implants determined what she could pilot, and that depended on the assessment of her current skills plus her potential. She knew she was good, but she was hoping for a fighter-class score, like Mom's.

The cybernet activated and tingled along her nerve endings. Gravity disappeared. No up, no down, only... here. And out there...

Sight bloomed with colors, and motion in every direction. All around floated a breathing, and pulsing, layered ocean of stars. Each star was nestled in a gravity well that spread and rippled like a rumpled blanket, holding up the planets that swarmed around them. Atmospheres came in layers of colors she had never known existed, as did temperature, and composition. A grid inserted itself into her view measuring distance, speed and trajectory.

They had told her that her brain would be fed direct-input stimuli, and that her imagination would use that information to build a visual, but this was incredible! Mom had mentioned all the colors of space and the grid-lines of distance, but Queenie hadn't expected something so large and so detailed. Suddenly a lot of what her mother had told her made a whole lot of sense. Mom had also told her that a real pilot uses all their senses, not just sight, to fly.

Queenie suddenly realized that she could hear music, like a slow and harmonious symphony. It was the solar system she was looking at. The star gave off the leading melody and all the planets seemed to contribute to the concerto with their own unique voice...

Queenie's earcom gave off a small burst of jarring static.

"Student Tate. Do you have a visual?"

Queenie swallowed. "Oh yeah, sound too."

"Sound?"

"Yeah, the um, star system is giving off music, the sun and each of the planets."

There was a chuckle. "Then you should find the rest of your test quite interesting. Please appraise your hand flight controls."

Queenie flexed her hands and discovered movement. "Oh..." It was like swimming, with the blankets of gravity acting like ocean waves and strong tides. So this was why Mom had wanted her to swim in the ocean, so she would have a way to define the drifts of gravity around the stars.

"Um, I have it sir." Queenie felt herself grin. I can do this!

"Good. We will begin assessment now."

The universe became crowded with ships. There were gigantic magnetic arc warships with halo's of deadly light, swarming with tiny and blindingly fast fighters, and delicate solar sail ships with blazing ion-projection wings. Then she noticed the passenger pleasure cruisers.

Instructions came over her earcom.

***

Queenie eased her starship into a berth in the next star system over. The one she had started at had gone super-nova with incredible speed. She hadn't been able to warn more than a handful of ships that the star was going. It had happened so fast! The odd thing was that she had smelled the change in the star.

Her world went black and Queenie started.

"Simulation complete, Cadet Tate."

Queenie slumped in the chair weighted down as though she had just stepped out of a pool of water. She was exhausted. Star flight had been thrilling and wonderful in ways she hadn't been able to imagine.

The Virtual helmet was taken off of Queenie's head by the instructor leading the assessment She blinked. The whole room was empty. Not one student was left. "Hey, uh... Did I miss something?"

The instructor yawned. "No Cadet Tate. The test takes as long as it takes. It's different for each student. Yours just took longer than all the others in your class."

She looked at her wrist-chrono. "Three hours? I've been here for three hours?"

"It's been known to happen." The instructor looked over his shoulder. "You didn't hear this from me okay?"

Queenie bit her lip. "Okay..."

The instructor smiled broadly. "You were the only student in your cadet class to actually complete the simulation."

"Huh?"

The instructor shrugged. "We normally get about one to two students per graduating class that completes the simulation by spotting the supernova, then getting out of harm's way. You spotted it very early and were able to warn some of the other ships, getting yourself and some of the ships out of harms way."

Queenie felt her heart thump. "So I did good?"

The instructor snorted. "To say the least. If you don't mind my asking, how did you spot it so early? Most of the others see the color change but stick around to see what's happening."

Queenie flushed. "Uh, the sound of the star changed, so I knew something was wrong."

"The sound changed?"

"Yeah. The star went out of harmony as though the musicians were fighting with each other."

The instructor gave her a doubtful glance. "Okay..."

She shrugged. "And, then I smelled burning rubber so I knew something was about to blow. I didn't stick around to see the color change."

"Burning rubber?"

"I always smell burning rubber before my glider has a fatal lock up."

The instructor frowned. "There are no rubber parts on a glider."

Queenie gave him a lop-sided grin. "Tell that to my glider."

***

Queenie stepped out of the lift on the academic level and eyed the opaque blue data card in her hand. She wiped her other hand down her trousers, and looked up the hall. She had been told to deliver it to Counseling Director Hastings to collect her full assessment grading. She was utterly terrified. Director Hasting would tell her what she would be doing for the rest of her life.

The lift doors closed behind her. Queenie walked down the hall toward his office.

***

"A navigator class pilot?" Queenie gulped. "Are you sure? I uh, wanted to be a fighter class."

 

Director Hastings blinked his multi-layered cyborg eyes. "Fighter class? You're joking right?" He laughed and shook his head. "Short-term career there, really short term. Terminal, in fact; life expectancy is about a year and a half." He leaned back in his chair and set his massive elbows on the polished surface of his desk. "Your flight and astro-nav talents are too valuable to be wasted in a fighter." He accessed his data and streamed it to the flat monitor screen for Queenie to see.

"You'll start your nice long and lucrative, career by training to be a Lead Navigational Pilot First Class. You'll be trained to direct the dataflow to the sub-pilots and handling the in-flight navigations for a warship, with a real chance to serve on an Angel Class Destroyer." He grinned. "That means officer's school for you." He tapped the data screen. "With your scores, and the right training, the Angel Class War Captains will be fighting to get you on board their ships. In no time at all, you'll be a War Captain yourself, coordinating your own battalion."

Queenie's mouth fell open. "Me?"

"Someone has to do it, and you have the potential." Director Hastings pulled out the blue data card and slid it across his desk toward her. "You're scheduled for your first navigational and piloting implants on the second at oh-seven hundred hours."

Queenie shook her head in astonishment. "That's in four days."

Director Hasting nodded. "You'll be shipped out to Officer's Training exactly three days after graduation ceremonies. After one year at the Remington Academy, you'll be transferred to a ship for tandem linked, on-the-job flight-nav training with their Nav-Pilot. That could go one year to three depending. Your performance with them will determine the ship you serve as a Nav-pilot. I'll forward your flight itinerary and lesson syllabus to your access as soon as I have it."

"That fast?" Queenie could only stare. "What do I tell my dad?"

"How about, that his little girl is going to serve the Empire with distinction." The old cyborg leaned back in his plush chair. "You have a bright future ahead of you Cadet Tate. Congratulations."

Queenie stepped out of the office and moved down the hall toward the lifts in shock. Lead Navigational Pilot First Class? Unbelievable!

The lift doors opened and laughter poured out. Two of her fellow classmates Jak and Lore were doubled over gasping in mirth. Jak, the taller of the two, was a broad-shouldered pale, blond with snapping blue eyes. Lore was more delicately built, with golden-skin, exotically slanted black eyes and midnight dark hair. Both of them wore the same hacked and chopped hairstyle she did.

The young men spotted her standing in the hallway. "Queenie! Did you hear about Ox?"

Queenie looked from one cadet to the other. "No. What?"

"Get in! Get in!" Lore grabbed her elbow. "This -- you have got to hear!"

Queenie was dragged into the lift and Jak punched the code for the quadrangle courtyard. She could feel a smile sneaking onto her face. Ox must have failed something spectacularly...

"It was the flight simulator." Jak sucked in a breath to control his laughter, and failed.

Queenie raised her brow at Lore. "Well? What happened? Spill it!"

Lore grinned. "You know how Ox was bragging up one side of his mouth and down the other how he was going to make navigation class pilot and then become a War Captain?"

Queenie raised a brow. "Yeah, his daddy was going to fix everything..."

"All that talk of flying was just that: talk." Lore shoved at Jak. "Go on, tell her!"

Jak's voice came out in a breathless squeak. "He was first out of the chair."

Queenie's mouth fell open. "What? You are shitting me..."

Lore grinned. "He couldn't see a thing under the simulator -- no visuals at all. He crashed within minutes!"

Jak gasped. "Into the sun!" He fell against the wall, laughing and thumping his fist. "The sun! He crashed into the sun!"

"The sun? How the hell did he do that?" Queenie shook her head. "It's just an info-dump straight into the imagination..."

Lore shrugged. "The story goes that he took his assessments early, two weeks ago in fact..."

"Huh?" Queenie frowned. "Isn't that against regulations?"

Jak choked back his laughter and snorted. "Not when his dad is Governor-General Oxbridge Hastings Warren the Third, glorious leader of this whole damned planet." He nodded at Lore. "Ox was already augmented to the hairline when he sat in the chair."

Lore grinned. "I'm betting that his brand-new cyborg implants fouled the data stream for the flight assessment."

Queenie looked from Lore to Jak. "He's augmented, you mean he's already assigned?"

Lore grinned nastily. "Most definitely."

"I don't know why he even got into the pilot's simulator to begin with..." Jak wheezed for breath. "He's already assigned to..." He choked. "To..." He burst out in a fresh bout of laughter.

"Assigned to what?" Queenie shoved Jak against the lift wall. "Jak spit it out!"

"I can't, I can't..." Jak grabbed the other Cadet's elbow. "Lore, you tell her."

"Get this..." Lore grinned. "Strategic Special Forces, ground control."

Queenie gasped. "Strategic ground?" She blinked then grinned. "So that's why Ox had his head shaved..."

"Oh, yeah." Lore cleared his throat. "In preparation for his glorious career..."

"As a Marine!" Jak burst out.

Queenie took a breath to keep from laughing out loud. "Gee, I feel so bad for him."

Lore snorted. "Oh no you don't! And neither do we. He deserves his assignment."

"You're right, I don't." Her voice rose as giggles threatened. "God! He was convinced that he was going to be a Nav-Pilot!"

"Destined to be a War Captain -- my ass!" Jak exploded into laughter.

The doors opened onto the courtyard, and both boys hauled Queenie out of the lift.

Lore gave her a leer. "It's party-time!"

***

The four main dormitories framing the broad expanse of grass were built from antique stone blocks to look like old Terran castles. Pennants flew from the rooftops marking the four companies that the school was divided into. The quadrangle courtyard was used as a parade ground and for disciplines. It was also used for company-wide celebrations, such as the end of assessments. Music thumped in the distance.

Lightning flashed followed by a heavy rumble.

Queenie looked up. The tinted dome over the entire quadrangle was water smeared from the storm raging overhead. "Damn..." She'd known the sun wouldn't last the day. "It looks like I'm grounded for a bit." She gave Lore a grin. "So where's the party?"

Jak looped his arm through hers. "How do you feel about barbeque?"

Queenie choked. "Real barbeque? As in: fire and roasting meat?"

Lore hooked his elbow around her other arm. "And beer."

Queenie made a face. "Not house-brand brewed by you guys I hope."

"Hey!" Jak pouted.

Lore grinned. "Nope! Terran, imported."

Queenie blinked. "Well damn! Lead the way!"

***

Queenie wasn't quite sure how she wound up sitting on the courtyard park bench with her knees hooked over the back and her head hanging upside down over the seat. She figured that the empty bottle of Terran Dark beer in her hand had something to do with it. There were a bunch of empties in the grass, and she knew for a fact that at least two were hers. She looked over at Jak who was lounging upright, unlike her, with his knee over the arm of the bench. Lore was on her other side sitting on the grass with his ankles crossed and his head back on the bench seat, staring up.

She grinned at the night-dark dome overhead. "Good party."

Lore blinked and smiled. "Oh yeah..."

Jak snorted. "So, Tate, you never did tell us, what did Director Hastings give you?"

Queenie winced and flushed. She'd been avoiding this question for the last hour. She was having a hard time believing that she was going into training as a Nav-Pilot; she certainly didn't expect them to. Ox had bragged about getting Nav-Pilot for as long, as anyone could remember and now she, his worst enemy, was going to be one? She shook her head. Nope, better to keep her mouth shut.

"What's the big secret?" Jak jabbed her arm. "I know you made officer at least."

That seemed safe to mention. Queenie nodded. "Oh yeah, we're going to Remington."

Lore looked at her. "Remington?"

Both boys slowly sat up.

Jak leaned over her. "Did you say Remington?"

"Why? Is that bad?" Queenie struggled to get into an upright position, and failed miserably.

Lore climbed up on the bench. "What the hell did you get?"

Queenie winced. "It is bad isn't it?"

Jak helped to shove her upright. "Tate, What did you get?"

"Tell you what..." She pulled out her blue card. "If you can read this, you'll know."

Jak looked at Lore. "Did you bring it?"

Lore snatched the card from Queenie's fingers. "You know I did, especially today." He reached onto his inner jacket pocked and pulled out a tiny display with a pen-reader attached to it.

"Oh God, is that what I think it is?" Queenie grabbed for her card.

Lore pulled her card out of reach. "You gave it to us, we're going to read it."

Queenie snatched for it again. "I didn't think you actually be able to!"

Jak snorted and pulled her back down on the bench. "Oh come on, you know Lore is a tech-genius! How do you think we paid for this barbeque?"

Lore scanned the card with his pen. "I'll have it in just a sec, it's going through de-encryption."

Queenie felt like she was going to be sick. "Don't Lore, please?"

Lore gave her a wicked smile. "Too late now." He handed her the card.

Queenie snatched out of his hand and shoved it in a pocket. "Guys, I'm telling you right now, this is a bad idea. You don't want to know."

"Sure we do." Jak grinned. "It's not as if you're going to be a Marine."

Lore stared at his readout and his mouth fell open. "Holy stinking shit!" he said softly.

Jak leaned over. "What?"

"This is so perfect!" Lore burst out laughing. "I should have seen it from a mile away!" He reached behind Queenie to hand the display to Jak.

Queenie made a grab for it and missed. "Shit."

Jak climbed over the back of the bench to get the display from Lore. "Big deal, so you're a..." His mouth fell open. "A Navigator Class Pilot? Apollo's balls Tate! Why didn't you say something?"

Queenie groaned and put her face in her hands. "Would you have believed me?"

Lore shrugged. "She's got a point." He chuckled and shook his head. "I can't wait 'till Ox finds out. He is so going to blow a regulator!"

Queenie jumped up. "Guys, you can't tell him!"

Jak grinned. "Oh yes we can!"

Queenie shook her head. "No, you can't! He's augmented to the hairline remember? He's a cyborg. He'll kill me if he finds out!"

Lore frowned. "If he lays a finger on you he'll be pulled from the Corp and have his mechanics removed."

Jak smiled. "Then they'll send him to the mines for attacking an un-augmented human."

Queenie bit her lip. "Seriously guys, do you think he'll care?"

Lore frowned. "Of course he'll care. No one in their right mind would jeopardize their entire life because someone else got the career they weren't prepared for in the first place."

"Hey, this is Ox we're talking about, remember? He's never had a 'right-mind' to begin with! I'm not about to jeopardize my existence by telling a cyborg killing-machine something guaranteed to make him go nova. As far as I'm concerned, he can find out about me when he's in-flight to boot-camp!"

Lore shook his head. "You're being paranoid."

Jak gave the display back to Lore. "Be back in a sec."

Queenie looked at Jak in alarm. "Where are you going?"

Jak gave her his most innocent look. "Nowhere in particular." He began walking backwards, toward dormitory two.

Queenie backed away from the bench. "Okay, fine. I'll see you guys at graduation ceremonies." She turned and headed for the lifts.

Lore barked out a laugh. "Hey, where are you going?"

Queenie looked over her shoulder. Jak was sprinting for the building. "Home," she called out. "Right now." She bolted for the lifts.

 

Chapter One: Flight Dreams

Chapter Two: Assessments

Chapter Three: Lethal Sentiments

Chapter Four: From Death's Embrace

Flight of the Titania

Coming Soon!