![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
avevale_intelligencerThis is my first full coup without a senior shadow, so I'm really excited. I've decided to keep a log of my progress, so that I've got something to look back on when I'm older. I told Orlando and vassily (they've been my instructors) and they just smiled oddly. I wonder why.
It was my first time indenting for a smallship as well, but I'd heard all the stories, so when the computer told me to get fourteen left-handed woollen gloves, cut the middle fingers off and leave them at the junction of passage 119 and corridor 252 on level G, I wasn't too surprised. The homeship has whole rooms full of junk like this. I drafted Palinurus to help and we spent several hours clambering over piles of old organ pipes, broken chairs, coils of plastic hose, birdcages and similar items. You never know what the computers are going to ask for next.
We eventually found a dozen pairs of assorted woolly gloves and one pair of mittens, so I turned one of the mittens inside out to make two left ones and cut a hole in the ends. It took us another while to find level G, because the computers had swapped several of the levels around and we had to find out whether they'd done it before or after they asked for the gloves. We eventually tracked it down between level 3T and 3V, and left the gloves in a neat pile at the designated junction. My heart was in my mouth as I approached the smallship bay doors again and the computer asked me what name I had chosen for my ship. This is the final hurdle--if they don't like the name you've picked they can send you right back to the beginning. I recited the name. There was a long moment in which I'm fairly sure my heart stopped and started several times, and then I heard the great carousel above me groaning and grinding, and the bay doors slid open as my ship was lowered on to the pad.
The odds against getting a new smallship are quite high, so I wasn't disappointed that it was a reconditioned job. On the contrary. I mean, my first smallship? To me it was the finest ship in the octant. I started in to check it out, and realised Palinurus was still hanging about behind me. I hadn't even realised he'd followed me all the way back from level G.
"What is it?" I said.
"I was, well, wondering if you needed any more help," he said.
"I can take it from here, thanks."
"Are you sure?" he said.
I was about to tell him exactly how sure I was when I recalled something I'd heard in one of Orlando's training lectures. "Never turn down company," he'd said. It also occurred to me that Palinurus was at the same level as me, but was going to be retaking smallship navigation next year after a pretty bad prang. He was ready for a mission as well, but there was no way he could do it alone.
"All right," I said. "You can come along. As long as you don't mess anything up."
He grinned all over his face and followed me into the smallship bay.
It was at about this point that things began to go seriously wrong.
It was my first time indenting for a smallship as well, but I'd heard all the stories, so when the computer told me to get fourteen left-handed woollen gloves, cut the middle fingers off and leave them at the junction of passage 119 and corridor 252 on level G, I wasn't too surprised. The homeship has whole rooms full of junk like this. I drafted Palinurus to help and we spent several hours clambering over piles of old organ pipes, broken chairs, coils of plastic hose, birdcages and similar items. You never know what the computers are going to ask for next.
We eventually found a dozen pairs of assorted woolly gloves and one pair of mittens, so I turned one of the mittens inside out to make two left ones and cut a hole in the ends. It took us another while to find level G, because the computers had swapped several of the levels around and we had to find out whether they'd done it before or after they asked for the gloves. We eventually tracked it down between level 3T and 3V, and left the gloves in a neat pile at the designated junction. My heart was in my mouth as I approached the smallship bay doors again and the computer asked me what name I had chosen for my ship. This is the final hurdle--if they don't like the name you've picked they can send you right back to the beginning. I recited the name. There was a long moment in which I'm fairly sure my heart stopped and started several times, and then I heard the great carousel above me groaning and grinding, and the bay doors slid open as my ship was lowered on to the pad.
The odds against getting a new smallship are quite high, so I wasn't disappointed that it was a reconditioned job. On the contrary. I mean, my first smallship? To me it was the finest ship in the octant. I started in to check it out, and realised Palinurus was still hanging about behind me. I hadn't even realised he'd followed me all the way back from level G.
"What is it?" I said.
"I was, well, wondering if you needed any more help," he said.
"I can take it from here, thanks."
"Are you sure?" he said.
I was about to tell him exactly how sure I was when I recalled something I'd heard in one of Orlando's training lectures. "Never turn down company," he'd said. It also occurred to me that Palinurus was at the same level as me, but was going to be retaking smallship navigation next year after a pretty bad prang. He was ready for a mission as well, but there was no way he could do it alone.
"All right," I said. "You can come along. As long as you don't mess anything up."
He grinned all over his face and followed me into the smallship bay.
It was at about this point that things began to go seriously wrong.