Lana, however, he did care about impressing. Maybe because as a Blank Slate she wouldn't have any prejudices or other baggage, so if she ended up not liking him it would be pretty much an indictment of his character. Proof he might not be as good a person as he thought he was.
And if he messed up with her, she wouldn't be so quick to forgive as Ali.
Luckily, before the silence could stretch too long his companion showed up, and he distracted himself chatting with her as she got to work plotting rift jumps. Ali gracefully invited Lana into the conversation, and before long she and Aiden were explaining some of the intricacies of day to day ship operations to the young woman.
A few hours before noon, Ali excused herself to check on Fix's efforts in the galley. “It'll probably need help with the finer details that make a dining area worth eating in,” she said. “I'll bring you both back something for lunch.”
Aiden nodded distractedly, opening up his logs to begin another treatise on the Deconstructionist Movement's prevalent use of mind scrubbing and brainwashing techniques, as a way to avoid the expense of detaining prisoners of war and criminals by turning them into useful assets instead.
Without his companion there he began to feel awkward around Lana again, and wasn't sure whether to keep up the conversation or let it die out, so he aimed for looking busy instead. To his relief the young woman simply focused on her own terminal, turning her full attention to her studies.
Or so he thought; after a few minutes of quiet work Ali, who'd been working rift jump calculations with the ship's computer as she attended her other tasks, called in a minor course correction that took them through the edge of an asteroid field. Aiden took the controls to manually steer through the hazards, enjoying a more relaxed opportunity to fly than the stress of an actual battle.
Halfway through the field, he was forced to maneuver more sharply to avoid an asteroid hidden behind another asteroid that abruptly flew out into their path. As the inertial compensators strained to keep them all from getting tossed sideways he glanced towards Lana, only to see her quickly looking away.
But when he turned back to his display and resumed flying, out of the corner of his eye he noticed that she was still peeking at him, looking somewhere between hopeful and unsure of herself.
“Was there something you needed?” he finally asked, uncertain whether to be amused or annoyed.
“Nothing,” she replied hastily, voice slightly higher pitched than usual. “Just that it's interesting to see you flying the ship. I've been learning some of the other systems, and . . .”
Realization finally sank in, and he sighed. “You want to try flying, too.”
The young woman visibly brightened, nodding eagerly. Aiden couldn't help but smile back; after spending so long around jaded Ishivi or automatons he'd almost forgotten what it was like to have young crew, eager to learn and try new things. It was hard to say no to that sort of enthusiasm.
So after guiding them safely into open space again, he made a few adjustments to the controls, then solemnly stood and stepped aside, proffering her the pilot's chair. Lana made her way over and settled down on it, looking equal parts nervous and excited as he showed her what the controls did and how to operate them.
“I've capped the controls to keep the ship at barely more than a crawl,” he warned, “so our maximum speed and maneuvering capability will be more sluggish than most planets. It takes an experienced pilot to know what maneuvers aren't going to overload the inertial dampeners and send us and all our stuff flying everywhere, and our fellow crew mates tend to get pissed off when that happens.”
He took up a position behind her shoulder. “Go ahead and take control now.”
“What should I do?” Lana asked, tentatively resting her hands on the controls.
“Whatever you want.” You won't be flying us into any planets at this speed.
Smiling wide enough to reveal even white teeth, the young woman began flying. It was anticlimactic, to say the least, since no matter how she yanked the controls around the ship barely responded. With the inertial dampeners, there was no sensation of feedback as they flew, and the display showed the maneuvers as minute changes in position.
Lana didn't seem to care. “I'm doing it, then?” she asked eagerly. “I'm flying?”
At a couple hundred miles per hour, sure. “Unless you think I'm just spoofing the display so it looks that way,” he replied wryly, then laughed at her suspicious look. “Which I'm not. We can save training simulations for later.”
She jumped on that, eyes lighting up. “Training? As in, you'll really teach me to fly?”
“Well, I don't know. Show me you've got what it takes.”
The young woman did her best, although no amount of enthusiasm could last forever with this sort of boring flying, the equivalent of driving a magcar at a walk. Aiden let her keep going for ten minutes or so, until she looked more familiar with the controls, then cleared his throat. “Having fun?” he asked wryly, moving around to where he could see her face as she focused on the display.
She gave him a considering look, as if wondering if he'd stop teaching her if she told the truth. “It's like nothing I've ever done before,” she finally said, to his amusement. Yeah, definitely bored.
He snorted at her deflection. “Then how about we try something else you've never done before . . . combat maneuvers. Would you like to learn how to corkscrew?”
“Okay, but only if Ali doesn't mind.”
Aiden shot the young woman a startled look, wondering if he'd misheard or she'd
