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Final First : 4th Account of Max

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Final First

4th Account of Max



“Airlock connected.” The audiocom told the six elevator passengers as they clearly heard a clunking sound coming from the other side of the bulkhead. “Opening. Welcome to USEA Geo-Synchronous station.”

The bulkhead lifted outward and revealed the short, hollow tube now connecting them to the station. They floated in lightly, one by one, and ended up waiting about another minute afterward before the opposite end began to open for them as well. The instant the second bulkhead was up, cheers and yells erupted from the huge gathering of station crewmembers who were waiting for them just inside.

Max recoiled his head at the sudden assault of noise. Bird just looked around to present an appearance of confusion. The three other passengers seemed confused for a second but then just let the evident, upbeat air infect them. And the Director became the first person to actually speak out of any of them.

“I don’t suppose any of this is for me?” Director Johns asked the small crowd.

The entire gathering looked confused themselves for a moment, and then each glanced around at one another before they all re-erupted into a set of new, forced cheers.

“Yeah! Director!” “Whoohoo!” “Yeah . . .”

The Director nodded with a genuine smile as if he were actually approving of something real. All the while the odd mixture of notably forced cheers died down.

“Good enough. I don’t exactly have that long of a list of people who could do your jobs anyways.” The Director said to everyone. “Well,” he added only to Max, “sorry for stealing your spotlight for my few seconds of vanity.”

“You can have it!” Max protested.

The Director just laughed off the comment and actually corrected him. “Don’t worry. Actually, no one’s going to get any more of it,” he said, then looked straight at the gathered station crew again, “because I’m pretty sure some of your jobs are at least remotely important.”

Silence held for a moment as a perceptive transition took place. The crew went from assuming that he was just joking completely to realizing after about four seconds of silence that he was actually being serious to some extent. And within just a few more seconds they all began to leave either by giving themselves a pull along one of the walls or kicking off at an angle. Only one person was still floating in front of the former elevator passengers after the welcoming crew assembly dispersed: the station commander, whom both Max and obviously the Director knew quite well.

“Good morning sir, everyone.” The station Commander finally greeted them all.

“You know, I’m not all that surprised that you allowed this.” The Director jumped straight to saying.

To even the Director’s surprise, somewhat, the Commander didn’t respond to him at all. He just resumed from where he would have had the Director either said nothing or simply not been there at all. “I’m Station Commander Austin, and I’d like to welcome everyone aboard the USEA Geo-Synchronous station; welcoming Orbital Elevator riders since 2128—“

The Director still remained confused for another moment while Austin went on, but then everyone could see his face shift over a few seconds. His expression fell from an initial display of confusion down to something a sly acknowledgment, almost. He knew what his friend was doing, and so did Max after another few seconds. There’d always been interesting similarities between the two of them: the Director and Commander Austin. But they were still not exactly the same. Director Johns liked to screw around, at least as often as he permitted himself to, but Commander Austin just straight out enjoyed screwing with people.

“The station is manned by twenty-four crewmembers in alternating shifts, and any given time may also temporarily house waiting crew of space vessels coming up upon their departure—“ The Station Commander just kept going.

“Alright,” The Director said, turning around to initially look at everybody but quickly focus on the three other passengers who’d come up with them, “he’s putting on a show. The only way to stop this is to take away his audience. I know you have,” he said to the STC officer, then quickly turned his head to the two other former passengers, “but I’m assuming you two have been up here before also? Or else he wouldn’t be doing this.”

“Yes sir.” “Yes sir.” They both somewhat nervously said at once, just a minor bit out of synch.

The Director nodded, looking over his shoulder once just to see Commander Austin’s mouth still running before he twisted back to them again. “Alright then, so all three of you at least have places you need be that you can disappear to. Get lost.” He gave practically a friendly-sounding order, though it still carried his clear impatience embedded in it.

Max didn’t outwardly laugh, but found the Director’s ever so slight agitation pretty hilarious. It was unmistakably obvious the Director really wanted Austin to shut up. And Commander Austin, for his part, was definitely enjoying every second of this.

The other three left the group, as ordered, with at least the STC officer smiling a bit as he got farther away.

“There’s an important difference you’ll all have to take quick notice of between here and things on the ground,” Commander Austin was still going, though he’d apparently waited until the Director was facing him again to begin that particular sentence, “and it’s not the transition to microgravity. The primary difference between operations up here and those on the ground is that here, I’m in charge.”

“On technical station matters only,” the Director cut him off before he got any further, “I can still terminate your position right here on the spot.”

“I’m happy to welcome you all on board for your short stay with us until your mission’s departure.” Commander Austin still didn’t stop.

“Derek, your audience is gone,” the Director finally began to get just a little bit intense, even resort to first-name calling, “the only one you’re entertaining anymore is yourself. Cut the crap.”

“Actually we have pretty large audience.” Commander Austin finally broke the act, smirking in his own comment as he half-turned to indicate the few situated observation cameras that could be seen. While the Director, Max and Bird made the observation, Austin pulled out his own little com device, much the same as the Director’s. He brought up a quick display for a second and then canceled it out again, looking somewhat disappointed. “Actually only two hundred-thousand, about.” He said, sounding as mildly let down as his face suggested.

“Cause there’s no antimatter annihilation to shine their eyes blind yet.” Max commented, leaving Commander Austin to consider it for second and then nod in agreement a couple times.

“I’m assuming you are done then?” The Director asked Commander Austin, who just absolutely threw his own expression back at him.

“I’m assuming you’re just going to keep being rude and assertive?” Austin asked with the same tone, and quickly picked up again just before the Director was going to respond, “Oooo, fire me! Do you actually have a replacement lined up? Or would just pull someone from Mars again?” He asked with tangible condescension.

“I can send you back if you want,” the Director offered in all seriousness, “there’s always someone there who wants to come home.” He reminded him.

The Commander pressed his lips together for a few seconds and shook his head. “Naw, this still isn’t home,” he said, “may only be thirty-thousand kilometers away, but it’s still not the surface.”

“So that’s you asking to be fired then?” The Director begged his question.

“No that’s just me trying to protecting whoever would replace me from you taunting them with home just to come back and forced to stay up in this donut.” Austin responded while he twisted to his side and suddenly kicked off, leaving the three of them with little option but to follow him. “Actually Max,” Austin spoke up again as they began to follow him, “what about for you? You really resolute about this?” He asked without really trying to hide his concern about it. After all, nothing like this had ever been done, not on this scale.

“About what? Leaving the Earth behind in the blackness never to return?” Max asked.

“Uh yeah, leaving your home, forever,” Austin responded with something that was almost a snap, although he took a second afterward to return himself to being docile, “The part about never seeing anything familiar again . . . dying two-hundred-trillion kilometers away from home under whatever circumstances we can’t imagine.”

“This isn’t home, here, not anymore,” Max answered back as they all stopped themselves against the wall they’d been coming to, “I thought about the rest. We all have an innate psychological mechanism that makes us disregard dangers that are far in the future; it makes us literally categorize them with the same amount of reality as stories in our minds. Whenever any of the darker concepts of what could happen actually start feeling they might affect my decision . . . I just let that old, innate mechanism take care of it.”

Commander Austin’s unnerving wasn’t exactly hidden, particularly when he turned his head to question Director Johns about Max instead. “That’s psychologically sound?” It was almost as if he were feeling the uneasiness Max should have, like in some way he was experiencing it for him.

“Well what exactly is supposed to be considered psychologically sound in this situation or preparation of this?” The Director just countered with a challenge of his own. “It’s not like we honestly have any basis to go off of since this has never been done before. Even the first gas giant and Kuiper Belt missions were always less than ten years, and none of them were ever intentionally one-way rides.”

That much was true. In the earlier days, manned missions to the outer planets were long flights, back when propulsion was still a mix of chemical and nuclear. But, none of them as long as this would be, were this actually a round-trip. And none of them had been missions of no return . . . with the exception of tragic accidents.

Austin didn’t say anything back. He just held the Director’s gaze while his own went on giving away the unease that wasn’t likely to leave any time soon. After a moment he finally looked away, back to Max for a few seconds until he returned to facing the wall completely. He hit the small button to open the inter-compartment door in the center of the wall they’d arrived in front of.

The new, narrow opening led them into an equally narrow hallway, or what would seem like one to someone from the surface. It ran perpendicular to the direction the door faced, meant to connect the station’s inner ring to its outer ring. There were other ovoid halls just like it at every break between segments, as both rings were equivocally divided into different compartments even though a massive outer shielding hull meant to serve as a radiation shield encased both rings, leaving the station appearing as on single structure. Still, the inner and outer rings’ segments were aligned so that each of their gaps matched up and a hall that was all but a tube granted access from one to the other.

They all entered into interspace between rings and compartments one after the other, with Austin obviously still leading. There was another immediately across from the one they’d just opened, but Commander Austin ignored it and took them left, down the passage to the outer ring. “So what about you?” He finally spoke again, specifically looking back at Bird. “You’ve been awfully quiet.”

“I have nothing to say.” Bird replied simply, speaking now for the first time since they’d arrived.

Austin appeared surprised for a second at the strength of the accent, though it was more so her monotone that he ended up focusing on. “Nah, you come close,” he told her, “but I still think that audiocom voice has you beat.”

Bird easily mimicked a face of confusion, as she actually was. “USEA audicoms are not accented, and they speak quite often.” She stated things as she thought she knew them.
Sentiment, attitude and emotional stat were easy for a droid to determine from voices, faces and body language; but the given meaning behind something that hadn’t had its meaning explicitly stated required was beyond them, at least at first. After they’d had enough interaction with the person, just enough to learn how they worked psychologically, then you practically never confuse them again.

Commander Austin himself then was left confused as to her response, until his memory apparently ceased failing him. “Oh, yeah, Droid. Sorry, I forgot.” He admitted to the memory lapse, and then explained himself just as Bird looked to speak again. “I was talking the whole monotone thing, before.”

“I have reasoning behind it.” Bird responded, as they all practically clumped on one another at the outer ring’s end of the access hallway.

Commander Austin hit another button, opening another door which they all eagerly went through to get out of the confined tube they’d just traversed. The size difference between the inner and outer rings of the Geo-Synchronous station were most fully felt when one made the transition from a compartment of one to the other. Compared to the receiving segment they’d entered from the elevator airlock, the room Austin had taken them to now was huge. Though it was small in actuality, but in comparison it was more than a doubling. It was the crew sleeping quarters; Max recognized immediately. Single-sleeper “beds” filled the open space inside, some bound to the section’s “floor” and most others jutting out from the walls. Normally a bed in space was all but a sleeping bag secured to any surface available, but because of this station’s geo-synchronisity, every one of them was still oriented with the bed’s underside facing the floor, or namely facing the Earth. In geosynchronisity the Earth’s gravity could actually still be felt, but only under two circumstances: either when someone was laying or sitting still for an extended period, or when anyone simply had the patience to wait through the two minutes or more it would take to actually fall just a few feet to the nearest Earth-facing surface.

“Well we flipped the few spare beds down at the far end for you,” Austin told them while pointing away toward the other end of the ring section, “the two of who actually need it should already know the exercise equipment’s in the next compartment over, in the ricochet room.”

The Director just gave him a look. “I’ll pass on the comment, but I really would love to know what you all’ve done up here to call something the ricochet room?”

“Oh I don’t think deductive reasoning is all that beyond you.” Commander Austin replied with a light grin in place of an answer. “But anyways,” he quickly shifted his focus over to Max before the Director said anything else, “we’ve already got the name put on for you.” He told Max and pointed this time to one of the small windows on the outer wall. “She’s right out there. We’re holding her five kilometers away just to be safe, but obviously she’s still pretty impossible to miss.”

Max took what he assumed to half be a dismissal willingly, more so, actually. He tapped his feet at angle against the floor, sending him off to nearby circle of glass. He looked out once he had a grip on the two little handholds on either side of it, there for astronauts to hold themselves in place.

There it was, five kilometers across the vacuum on the window’s other side. And  there the letters were, massive and black on the side of a silver hull: L A I K A. She was goning to be remembered now . . . the first real astronaut.

The Laika itself was massive. It wasn’t tremendous, like one might imagine something like a mountain to be. No, but it was huge in its own right: eleven-hundred meters long, bulking metal, and with those excessively large tanks secured near its aft reach . . . just in front of a single, massive engine nozzle. For all it appeared to the eyes to be, though, Max knew by instinct that the ship was incredibly light. He doubted it even weighed more than a metric kiloton. Actually he made a reasonable guess that was probably closer to just five or six hundred metric tons. Every kilogram counted. Ever milligram weigh you down, when you were trying to ram yourself across space at over three quarters of the speed of light. And that’s just what they were doing.

“Eighty-seven percent.” Max breathed aloud, without realizing Bird was drifting up beside him.

“Eighty-six.” She corrected him.

He twisted himself about in time to see her coming in. He let go of one of the window’s stability grips accordingly, and she took it in his place. “Luminal velocity.” He just said plainly.

Bird only added on to spontaneous sting of simplistic comments. “Time dilation experienced will be a factor of two.”

“And the amount of Phenobarbital I.V.-ed into my cold body is going to be a constant.” Max had to make that remark after the reminder of the flight duration came.

“Not necessarily.” Bird contended, although without including an actual correction. That was a first, as far as Max was aware. Her conversation style was ever so slightly changing. Droids gaged behavior and attitudes, and even things such as introversion or extroversion pretty fast, but their conversation style always changed. It took actual conversation to identify the patterns whoever they were speaking to would be prone to, and respond best to, so it took them a little bit of time to adjust. And then of course, people never stayed the same, so they always changed with them.
For now though, they both just looked out through the dense pane of glass in front of them, staring across the five thousand meters of open void that separated them from the mass of metal they would be getting into in a matter of days . . . and then not coming out of for a decade. A dozen years, actually, for them, while it would be almost twenty-five for everyone else. Not that Max would be awake for any of it, but time would still pass regardless. Eighty-six percent of the Speed of Light, a year to accelerate up to speed and another year to slow back down, twenty-five year flight in total to the outside world . . . it wasn’t even a journey, they were being shot twenty light years across nothing . . . to Gliese.

People had dreamed of this for centuries, always hoping it to be within their lifetime, and for the longest stretch always being disappointed. But, this was the end of that, assuming they succeeded. Though this wasn’t how things had been imagined in earlier times. Their ship, their thing they were being shot across interstellar space in didn’t really resemble any but a few ideas people of the past had. There was no streamlining, no glistening, smooth white surfaces, no particle beam cannons, and no warping mechanism. No, the energy requirements for that last one were all but impossible, outside of physicists’ equations. There was just antimatter, and of course the matter that accompanied it. The ship itself was literally nothing but a clunky metal shaft attached to a gigantic antimatter annihilator. This was all there was. This was it.

“This is how we do-it.” Max let the ancient song verse escape from him, feeling the past calling out.
4th chapter. Our characters are now up at the Geo-Synchronous station, waiting to board the Laika.

Make sure to read the first 3 chapters first . . . or afterwards, if you already read this before getting down here.

You'll also find these on my Patreon, along with (soon) chapters of other stories I'm working on. Feel free to support if you like anything well enough. 

www.patreon.com/Maxojir
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