“Stow it,” Coda shouted between sets. “No one wants to hear it.”
Squawks grumbled some more but largely kept it to himself. By the time their workout was over, Coda felt more awake than he’d ever expected to, and after he’d showered and thrown on a set of clean clothes, he made for the Simulation Room.
True to Commander Coleman’s word, a second simulator had been installed on the other end of the room. Having been there late into the evening the night before, Coda had no idea how they had found the time to install it, but there it was, buttons glowing and waiting.
The commander quickly separated them into two groups based on their barracks then muttered the ten scariest words in the English language. “We’re going to do things a little bit different today.”
The commander had programmed four different training scenarios that escalated in difficulty, each one in the sequence adding a new variable. The pilots, broken into even smaller groups, took turns running through the simulation while the rest looked on. The largest variation between the day’s training and the one previous was that after the subgroup’s simulated run, they sat down with Commander Coleman or Commander Chavez to review their hop.
Coda was pleased to learn that while the commander could be a hard ass with the larger squadron, he was calm and patient with their smaller number. He went from being their CO to their instructor, and they listened to him all the more closely for it.
“Your approach vector is too shallow here,” Commander Coleman would say, pausing the simulation replay. “Tell me how you could have done it differently.”
And they would tell him—then put their words to action in their next run, redoing the scenario until the commander was pleased.
For three hours, they took turns running through the simulations, learning from their fellow squad mates and their combined mistakes. By the end of the first session, the vibe had shifted from exhausted frustration to positive excitement, and that carried over through breakfast and into their late-morning practice.
“Where is the rest of the squadron?” Uno asked during one of their evaluation periods. The Simulation Room was still filled with only forty or so members, all from the same two barracks.
“Class,” Commander Coleman said simply.
“Class?” Uno asked skeptically. Minus the CAI—which in Coda’s estimation barely counted—they hadn’t had any class. “For what?”
“You’ll find out soon enough,” Commander Coleman said. “Now tell me why you flipped nose to tail here instead of altering course with a more gradual barrel roll.”
The commander clearly wasn’t going to explain further, and Uno didn’t press the issue. He gave his explanation to the commander’s question instead.
“It’s faster, yes,” the commander said, “and might have been a good maneuver if you’d had a Baranyk fighter on your ass, but at those speeds, the g-forces are enough to cause black out. Remember, these simulations are designed to help you learn to fly an X-23 correctly. Follow the flight rules until you know where you can bend them.”
“Yes, sir.”
“But…?” Commander Coleman said, obviously hearing the unspoken question on Uno’s lips.
“But the X-23 is equipped with inertial dampeners, isn’t it, sir?”
“It is,” the commander said slowly. “Otherwise, you’d be ripped apart by even the most basic maneuver. But there are limits to every gravitic drive, even the most advanced, which I can assure you, do not come standard with the X-23.”
“Which is why you’re juicing us up with steroids and experimental growth hormones, right, sir?”
Coda and Squawks, who were in the evaluation group with Uno, shared a nervous look. That information hadn’t made it beyond their circle or been spoken about since their first dinner on the Jamestown.
“Now where would you get a crazy idea like that?” Commander Coleman asked, the tone of his voice suggesting he was genuinely dismayed. There was something in his eyes, though, a hardness that hinted at his true feelings. Uno’s question had made the commander uneasy.
Uno met Commander Coleman’s gaze, not backing down but not exactly challenging him, either. “I don’t know, sir,” he said, obviously deciding not to push the issue. “You’re right, though. It’s a crazy thought.”
Commander Coleman nodded, returning to Uno’s evaluation.
At the tail end of their session, the commander posted their evaluations on the display board. Because most of the exercises had been timed, it showed their time of completion, along with accuracy, precision, and other success metrics. Coda’s favorite was a calculated measure the commander called their “death probability,” which the commander explained as the likelihood that their flight paths, vectors, and speed would either kill them or get them killed by enemy fire. It all culminated in a final score that was measured out of one hundred. The highest score barely cracked fifty.
Before Coda could find his name on the list, Commander Coleman called their attention to a red line separating a small number of pilots at the top of the list from the bulk at the bottom.
“This,” Commander Coleman said, “is your failure line. Your training is about to get very real, ladies and gentlemen. I’m not interested in good pilots. I’m not even interested in great pilots. I need the best. The best of the best. And that means any pilots still south of this line at the end of the month will be excused from the program. Work hard, ladies and gentlemen. I’ll see you tomorrow at oh four thirty.”
Coda strolled out of the Simulation Room to a mix of hushed voices. The commander had changed the rules, upped the pressure. The real competition was about to get started, and Coda had no intention of giving up. He was having too much fun.
16
Corridor, SAS Jamestown
Alpha Centauri System, Proxima B, High Orbit
After their morning session in the simulator, an officer escorted the pilots to a part of the ship they had never seen. Unlike their private section of the ship, the corridors here were occupied with the usual shipboard activity. Coda caught more than one confused look, though in true military
