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Stories from the Verse
In Verse Proportion
Chapter 124: Brown 235
Table of Contents
Previous chapter: Slade 207
Derek and Vashti ran through the entire simulation, twenty hours and twenty minutes, one time that day. It was mostly boredom, watching the descent and making sure it was on schedule, then with the frantic moments from reentry to touchdown in which Derek had to make the ship do something it had never done before, and Vashti had to monitor everything to ensure that it was doing it properly. The touchdown was a bit rougher than Derek would have liked, but he wasn’t about to run through the entire twenty hours again.
But as he stood and stretched, he had a thought.
“Vash, why don’t you go order some dinner for us. Give me about an hour, and I’ll catch up.”
She nodded and left the simulator, and he reset the system to begin five minutes before reentry and run from there. This gave him enough time to get oriented to what was happening, and to be ready for the reentry. This landing was better, but he rewound the simulation and did it once more. He was not entirely happy with it, but he was exhausted and did not expect to do better.
He joined Vashti for dinner, shower, and bed.
He reported to the bridge early and informed the Captain that he had worked a triple shift learning to land the ship, and would be working a triple shift actually doing so, so today he was going to rest and recuperate, so he could start the landing tomorrow. The Captain accepted this, and dismissed him for the day.
They spent the day relaxing together, ate their meals, and got to bed early. Together they reported to the bridge the next morning.
“If you are ready, Captain, we will begin.”
“Make it so, Commander Derek, Commander Vashti.” And with a confirming nod between them, Vashti entered the course and Derek began decelerating the ship.
There is a behind-the-writings look at the thoughts, influences, and ideas of this chapter, along with twenty other sequential chapters of this novel, in mark Joseph "young" web log entry #452: Versers Ready. Given a moment, this link should take you directly to the section relevant to this chapter. It may contain spoilers of upcoming chapters.
As to the old stories that have long been here:
