A Spacer Apprentice I

The sky over Syria Planum was clear, and above the transparent dome that enclosed the small city of Paradise a million stars seemed to sparkle like tiny diamonds. But despite the tranquillity of the scene, Carly Campbell's heart was pounding as she stood on the flat roof of her mother's house beside her mother and Uncle Jon. For the hundredth time that evening she rubbed the palms of her hands against her pants. Time was running out. She had spent the entire three days of her uncle's visit dropping hints, but somehow she just hadn't been able to get up the nerve to ask him outright for what she wanted. Tonight was her last chance; tomorrow he would be going back up to his ship, and she might not see him again for months. She wiped her hands on her jeans again and took a deep breath. "Take me with you tomorrow Uncle Jon," she said, trying to keep her voice from trembling.

Her uncle looked up. "You mean on the ship? I'd like to, but the Lady Jane doesn't really have very much room. And I'll be running with a full passenger load on this trip."

"I don't mean as a passenger," Carly said with a nervous giggle. "I meant take me along as part of the crew. I want to learn to be a spacer."

Carly's Uncle Jon was a short, wiry man, clean shaven, with dark brown hair that he kept cropped short. For many years he had been the owner and captain of a small independent transport named the Lady Jane. He leaned back now against the railing that ran around the edge of the roof, rubbed his chin, and frowned thoughtfully. "An apprentice spacer," he said slowly, "that's a pretty big step."

"I know that," Carly replied, "but I'm old enough now. I looked up the guild regulations, and they said you have to be at least fifteen standard years old to become an apprentice. A Martian year is six hundred and sixty-eight days long, with a day that's thirty-seven and a half minutes longer than Earth's, so that works out to just a little under eight years in local time. And I turned eight almost six weeks ago." She wiped her palms on her legs yet again, then sat down on a narrow stone bench that faced her uncle. Tall for her age, and slender, with long, coltish legs and tawny hair cut boyishly short, Carly still moved with the awkwardness of adolescence. As she looked up expectantly at her uncle she pulled her feet up under her and sat cross-legged. "Please Uncle Jon?"

Her mother was looking at her nervously. "Honey, I'm not sure that your uncle..."

Uncle Jon raised his hand, cutting her off. "No, it's all right Lisa," he said. He turned back to Carly. "I know that you're old enough, but are you sure you know what you'd be getting yourself into? It's not the glamorous life you see in the holos. You'd mostly be waiting on passengers, helping to load cargo, and doing basic housekeeping chores. It would be at least two years before you got a chance to even start learning one of the other positions. There's no pay beyond room and board, and the occasional tip which you would have to share with the rest of the crew. Everybody on board would be giving you orders. And as an apprentice you would find yourself rather frequently under the strap."

Carly's mother raised her eyebrows at that. "The strap?" she asked.

Uncle Jon nodded. "We can't afford carelessness in space," he told her. "So any time an apprentice make a mistake, even a seemingly trivial one, the lesson is brought home to them by means of corporal punishment."

"Oh," Lisa Campbell replied. "You whip them."

"It's very effective," Carly's uncle continued, "every captain I've ever heard of uses it." He paused and smiled. "Not everyone uses a strap though, that's just an expression."

Carly squirmed in her seat a bit. She'd known that apprentices often got spanked, but she didn't really like thinking about it very much. "I'm not afraid," she said bravely.

"You should be," her uncle replied, "at least a little bit. Everybody makes mistakes when they're learning. That's only human. But when an apprentice spacer makes a mistake, the consequences are rather painful. And don't think you'd be getting any special treatment because you're my niece, either!"

"I know Uncle Jon," Carly replied carefully, "and I wouldn't want any." She paused long enough to take a deep breath before continuing. "I understand that I will be subject to corporal punishment if..."

"When," her uncle corrected her.

Carly looked up at him for a second, then nodded. "I understand I will receive corporal punishment when I make a mistake. I can accept that. Going into space is something I've been dreaming about and preparing for my whole life. Getting my butt whipped every now and then when I mess up is a small price to pay, especially since it's something that every other spacer has had to go through too."

"Well, I must say that's a good attitude," her uncle said. He leaned forward. "You said you've been preparing. Preparing how?"

Carly let her breath out and relaxed a bit, glad to be back on more comfortable ground. "I'm at the top of my class in math and science," she said with a smile, "and third in physical fitness. Oh, and I'm in a special masters program in computer studies."

"Honey, don't you think you should wait until you're a little bit older?" her mother asked gently. "Space will still be there, and..."

"Mom, I'm old enough now," Carly said, interrupting her. "I checked the spaceflight regs myself. I can become an apprentice right now, and a journeyman spacer in three standard years."

"That's if you can pass the test," her uncle put in. "Very few people do the first time they take it. But I think there's something you're overlooking. You're old enough to become an apprentice under guild regulations, that's true, but by Martian law you still won't be an adult for another three years."

"But you could still take me if mom gave her permission, right?"

Carly and her uncle both looked at Carly's mother. "What do you think?" Jon asked her. "I'd want to review her school record, but if everything checks out the way Carly represented it, and if she passes a spaceflight physical, I've got no objection to taking her."

Carly's mother sighed and looked down. "I don't know," she said thoughtfully.

"Please mom?" Carly begged, "I've been working for this my whole life."

"I know you have sweetheart, and I'm very proud of how much you've done. It's just..." she sighed again, and then frowned. "I just don't think you're quite ready yet. Why don't we put it off for one more year, and then if you still want to go off shooting through space with your uncle, I promise I won't stand in your way."

"A year! Mom that's not fair!"

"Please Carly," her mother said. "It'll go by before you know it. And besides," she smiled, "weren't you the one who spent two hours on your seventh birthday convincing me you were too old to get spanked anymore? I wouldn't think you'd be too eager to go back to it."

"I just didn't think I should be treated like a child," Carly protested. "This isn't about that, it's just something that happens to every apprentice as part of going into space. It's totally different." She looked over at her uncle. "Uncle Jon, can't you say something to her?"

He shook his head. "I'm sorry Carly. She's still your mother, and I'm not going to try and overstep that. But a year's not so long. And you know I come here fairly often, so if you can be ready before that, and your mother gives you permission, I'll be happy to take you on."

Carly fought to contain her tears as she turned back toward her mother. "You're not being fair," she accused, pouting. "You never let me do anything I want to do, and now you're trying to take away the one thing I've been dreaming about my whole life." She slumped down in her chair, crossing her arms defiantly. "You hate me."

"Carly!" her uncle exclaimed.

"Young lady, you know that's not true," her mother replied, " I love you, but pouting and getting an attitude isn't going to change my mind."

"Look," Uncle Jon said, "why don't we put this discussion on hold for right now, and give everybody a chance to cool down a bit. I'm not leaving until tomorrow afternoon, so we'll still have time to talk about this again before I go."

Carly's mother took a deep breath, and then nodded. "That's a good idea Jon," she said. "Maybe we can discuss this in the morning after breakfast, when we're not so tired."

"I don't believe this," Carly said, shaking her head. "This is my life we're talking about!"

"And we can still talk about your life in the morning," her mother replied. "Now I think maybe it's time for all of us to go to bed. I'm tired myself, and I know you've had a busy couple of days with your uncle."

"So now you're going to send me off to bed like I'm two? Unbelievable. Just unbelievable."

"Carly!" her mother snapped. Uncle Jon was looking distinctly uncomfortable.

"Fine!" Carly said, throwing up her hands in resignation. "I'm going." She stood up and began to stamp off toward the stairs. "We certainly wouldn't want to interrupt bedtime for something as trivial as my future, would we?"

"Good night Carly," her mother called after her.

"Yeah, good night, whatever," Carly replied without turning around.

Storming down the stairs and all the way into her bedroom, Carly flung herself down onto her bed and rolled over to stare up at the ceiling, her eyes blurry with tears. It wasn't fair. All her life she'd dreamed of this. She'd busted her butt at school to study science and math, and managed to become damn near the best computer jockey on Mars. All just so she could be told to wait. Always wait. Waiting was all she did; all she had ever done. When was it going to be time for her to stop waiting and start moving?

That thought made Carly pause. Her heart began to beat faster as she realized that there might be a way to do just that after all. She rolled over onto her stomach as she considered the idea. She would have to wait until she was sure her mother and uncle had gone to bed, so she used the time to try and plan out each step, pinpointing all the possible ways it could go wrong. By the time she finally made up her mind that she really could pull it off nearly two hours had passed. She took a deep breath, then quietly got up and went to the door. A quick trip to the bathroom allowed her to check that her mother and uncle had retired, so when she returned to her bedroom she quickly locked the door and set to work.

Forcing herself to ignore any second thoughts, Carly dug her backpack out of the closet and laid it on the bed, reviewing in her head what she would need to pack. She'd take her portacomp of course; this little adventure would be over before it began without that. Some extra clothes. No skirts; if this worked out she'd be spending too much time in freefall to make them worth bringing along. Her toothbrush, an extra towel, a few toiletries. That was about all she could fit.

She started laying clothes on the bed, and immediately Mr. Hobbs, the little stuffed bear she'd had since she was small, began picking them up and rearranging them; the closest thing to helping that it's limited processor could manage. Carly smiled for a few seconds as she watched, then on an impulse picked it up and hugged it to herself. "I'm sorry Mr. Hobbs," she said softly. "I wish I could take you with me, but there's just no place to put you." She let the little toy hug her back for a moment, then carefully switched it off and placed it back down on her pillow.

Carly finished stuffing everything into her backpack, leaving the portacomp easily accessible on top, then sat down on the edge of her bed and recorded a message on the house computer. She told her mother she'd left early to go swimming with her friend Anya, and might not be back until dinnertime. She added a good-bye for Uncle Jon, "in case I'm not home before he leaves," and adjusted the time signature to make it look as though it had been recorded in the morning instead of late at night. When she was finished she recorded a second message explaining where she was really going and programmed it to be delivered tomorrow just before dinner. That done, she took a deep breath and glanced quickly around the room to make sure she hadn't forgotten anything. Then she picked up her backpack and crept quietly out of the house.

It was a little over four kilometers across town to the train depot. Moving quickly but quietly, Carly was able to make it in under an hour. From there she took the maglev directly to the Pavonis spaceport, seven hundred and fifty kilometers to the northwest.

The spaceport was nearly deserted when Carly stepped off the train and rode the slidewalk up to the first concourse. Much of it was dark, and the few areas that were lit contained only a handful of people. Carly licked her lips and looked around, not quite sure where to go now. Across the way a youngish man with long red hair sat half dozing behind the counter of an otherwise empty cafeteria. She headed over toward it, happy that at least something was still open, despite the late hour. A quick glance at the glowing holographic prices hovering over each item of food convinced her to settle for just a cup of hot cocoa. The attendant barely noticed as she slid her cash card through the scanner, then took her drink to an empty booth in a back corner of the cafeteria.

As she sat down she squirmed just a bit on the hard seat, remembering what her uncle had said about corporal punishment. Her stomach felt like there was a rock in it, and she took a sip of cocoa to try and settle it. She was gambling everything on just one roll of the dice. If this didn't work, she would probably have ruined her chances of ever getting Uncle Jon, or anyone else, to take her on as an apprentice. And even if it did work, her uncle wasn't exactly going to be thrilled with the way she had accomplished it. So even with the best possible outcome she was still most likely going to end up, well, end up. Carly closed her eyes for a second and took a deep breath. This line of thinking wasn't helpful right now. She took another sip of cocoa, then opened her backpack and retrieved her portacomp, telling herself that the consequences didn't matter. She'd known before she ever set out that getting spanked was part of the price of becoming a spacer. Knowing what the first spanking of her apprenticeship was probably going to be for didn't change anything.

She switched on the portacomp and forced herself to focus on the task at hand. She knew that Uncle Jon's ship wasn't designed for planetary landings; a small space plane was carried aboard for that. So it stood to reason that there should be a space plane sitting in one of the spaceport's hangers registered to her uncle--Jon Campbell. Carly took one more sip of cocoa, then used her portacomp to query the spaceport's central information system.

She discovered almost immediately that the list of vehicles present just showed registration numbers and locations, not the owners' names. But ten minutes work hunched over the portacomp was sufficient for her to gain access to a restricted database that held the information she needed. She took a second to download a copy of the spaceport map, tagging the plane's location, then set to work on the real problem; getting inside.

She held her breath as she used the spaceport's systems to link her portacomp with the space plane and very carefully began to probe it's security programming. A single mistake here would likely trigger an alarm and make any further progress impossible. She crossed her fingers and gulped down the last of her cocoa, then focused her attention on the portacomp's tiny screen, allowing the rest of the cafeteria to fade into the background of her perception.

She worked carefully, dispatching dozens of data probes to test the security response and using the information she gained to build a model of the security program itself. As the pattern began to come clear she rubbed her forehead and gave a sigh of relief. From the responses she was getting, this looked to be nothing more than just a basic level one protector from General Data Systems. She'd cracked a system almost exactly like it once before, not long ago, to win a bet with a boy at school who thought she couldn't. Smiling broadly now, Carly called up the B and E program she'd used on her previous success, made a couple of minor adjustments based on the model she'd built, and sent it off. Half a second later she was in. The security program turned itself off and the space plane sent her a greeting, calling her by her uncle's name.

Trying to appear casual, Carly slid out of her booth. As she left the cafeteria she called up the map she'd downloaded earlier and let it guide her down the elevator and through a maze of tunnels to the pressurized hanger where the computer indicated her uncle's space plane should be. She kept a close eye out for security patrols as she made her way cautiously past rows of parked spacecraft. She was fairly sure she could fool a robot sentry into thinking she belonged there, but a human guard would be a different story. Her luck held however, and she managed to avoid running into either type of security guard. The space plane was exactly where the map showed it; a shiny narrow sliver seventeen meters long, its wings retracted back into the fuselage. As she approached she used her portacomp to open the outer airlock door, then took one last quick look around to be sure no one was watching her and slipped inside.

She kept the lights low as she searched for a hiding place. This was the one part of her plan that she hadn't been able to figure out beforehand, never previously having been inside any spacecraft, much less this particular one. But there had to be some place she could wait, undiscovered, until the space plane had rendezvoused with the Lady Jane in orbit. From there the rest would be easy.

A quick glance into the cockpit ruled that out; there was barely enough room for the two crew members, and nothing at all big enough to conceal a person. The main passenger cabin didn't offer much more: just eight seats that were too low to hide under, and an equal number of luggage compartments that were too small to crawl inside. At the rear of the cabin was a tiny restroom which would be perfect, but only so long as Uncle Jon didn't have to go to the bathroom at any point on the way up. She frowned and decided she would try it only if she couldn't find anything better.

Across from the restroom was another sliding door. Carly opened it, then stopped and blinked. It was a cold sleep chamber, equipped to hold four people in suspended animation, with a single acceleration couch fitted into the space left over for one person to be carried awake. Life pods usually carried chambers like this to reduce the amount of life support they needed. Carly had no idea why Uncle Jon had one on his space plane--not that it mattered. Barring some sort of disaster, there would be no reason for him to even look inside it during the flight up. It would make a perfect hiding place. With a feeling of triumph mixed with relief she quickly stepped inside and shut the door, then used her portacomp to lock up the space plane and turn off the lights.

For a while she amused herself by playing a game on her portacomp, eventually dozing off in the acceleration couch sometime after dawn. She was awakened by noises in the plane. Someone was moving around out there! Carly's heart felt like it was about to pound its way through her chest, but she forced herself to remain completely still. The noises stopped, and for a long time there was nothing. Then she jumped as the engine started with a loud roar. This was it! Carly quickly groped for the seatbelt and strapped herself in. The engine noise remained steady. Carly waited, trying to keep her breathing under control. There was still no sensation of movement. How long did it take Uncle Jon to run all the pre-flight checks? They should be moving any second now. Then, without warning, the door to the cold sleep chamber slid open and Uncle Jon was staring at her. His forehead wrinkled in puzzlement when he saw her. "Hunh? What are you doing here Carly?" he asked.