The Final Exam

The spaceship trembled slightly, and cadet Simone Raven opened her eyes. She was always anxious about everything that happened to the shuttle, especially now. The first independent flight into deep space was also the final exam. Two cadets without an instructor: the situation is no joke. It made her nervous, despite of her significant number of flying hours.

Was it real or not — this strange vibration? Or was it just a result of the unrest of recent days? This was their first time jump to another stellar system, and she was still going through the entire sequence in her mind, every step of the way, even though she was only the co-pilot. Everything was done correctly, everything was fine. Was it?

She listened anxiously but did not detect anything else unusual. There were two hours left before her shift started. Simone closed her eyes and attempted to envision the upcoming graduation parade, and herself in a new uniform… No, there was definitely something wrong with the ship. Acceleration? A feeling of gravity emerged: it first pulled slightly to one side, then to the stern. It was weak, barely noticeable... Nausea flashed for a split second. Then, it all disappeared. There couldn’t be any acceleration—the shuttle must maintain a uniform speed. It was headed to Satyr, the last planet of the Eade stellar system, where a new station was under construction in orbit, to which they were transporting food and equipment. Two more months of flight, then another four on the return journey. And the coveted pilot's certificates… If all goes well…

Simone wanted to call the cockpit but thought that Tess would be offended and perceive it as patronizing. Cadet Tess Tenner, possessing only top grades, had been appointed as the senior member of their pair, and she responded sharply to anything that appeared to her as insubordination, which seemed to be almost everything.

Simone closed her eyes but couldn’t fall asleep. She unstrapped herself from the hanging bed, pulled on her jumpsuit, and slowly floated out into the aisle.

From afar, she could already hear lighthearted banter. Of course, the door to the flight deck was wide open—against regulations—but Tess disliked small, enclosed spaces. And of course, she was flirting. Given that the object of her affection was now traveling to another planet within the Eade system, communications were delayed. The intervals between messages stretched to tens of minutes. This didn’t deter Tess; she happily engaged in monologue mode. Reclining in the commander's seat and propping her feet on the console, she was narrating some adventure. To her right was the hologram of her navigator friend, who was immersed in the spectacle—he was observing Tess, who, from his perspective, was also represented as a hologram.

Feet on the control console?! Simone’s breath hitched, though she already realized there were no buttons on the edge of the console, let alone any that could induce such an effect. But, what was the effect? Nothing could be felt now. However, the starry sky visible through the flight deck's observation window sent a chill down her spine. When they navigated to their current course, Simone had identified several main landmarks, constellations, which were now absent from the view in the observation window.

Simone floated into the flight deck and activated the chronolog, where vector alterations were noted minute by minute.

“Why have we deviated from the course?!” she exclaimed.

“Are you supervising me?!” Tess responded with expected indignation.

“Why did we deviate?” Simone inquired more calmly.

“We didn’t!”

“Are you monitoring the instruments?” Simone interrupted a new attempt at indignation.

“Everything is nominal…” Tess began and fell silent, as the data displayed indicated that the shuttle had not only veered significantly to the left of the intended vector but was also accelerating. “What? This must be a system anomaly!”

“And the stars have also shifted due to the anomaly?” Simone gestured to the scene beyond the observation window.

“Well… this… yes, it seems like… we’ve drifted slightly…” Tess shrugged, her demeanor a mix of coquettish and conciliatory.

And, as though she had only just noticed the navigator, who continued to gaze admiringly at the spot where Tess had been seated a minute ago, she rushed to the controls and severed the connection. The navigator vanished.

“Now…” she reseated herself and began adjusting the course. “Now…”

The shuttle remained unresponsive. The hefty vessel, laden with equipment and segments of the new station, resisted a return to the intended trajectory, and its velocity continued to escalate.

“But this is unfeasible!” Tess was irate. “It must be a system anomaly! After all, if there were acceleration, we would experience it! We would feel like gravity! Right? But we don’t sense anything!”

It was profoundly odd, but after a moment, Simone understood:

“We’re accelerating in the direction of the attracting object. Envision a plane plummeting to Earth; it accelerates, but the occupants in the cabin experience weightlessness. It’s the same with us. We’re being pulled... But by what?!”

She activated the long-range telescope monitor, searching for any hint or clue! But there was nothing!

“What is this?” Tess murmured, “Are we falling? Toward what?”

“Good question,” Simone stammered, also taken aback by this realization. A chill began to prickle at her skin. “Falling toward what?”

“Is there a black hole?” Tess whispered; her voice tinged with fear.

Black hole? The image of plummeting into an abyss wreaked havoc in Simone’s mind, leaving her momentarily incapacitated. Human bodies, so fragile, intricate amalgamations of finely tuned and sophisticated biological matter, would be crushed by unbearable gravity, elongated into spaghetti, torn to pieces, incinerated by a sudden, ferocious flux of light...

No! Simone shook herself. What one must not do in such a situation is give up to panic.

“If it were a black hole,” she attempted to speak with conviction, intending to dispel the lingering horror in Tess’s words, “then we would observe an accretion disk! Such disks emit intense light, you know. We would see at least something surrounding…”

“As you know,” Tess whispered, “that some black holes exist without accretion disks... It could be practically invisible! Anything can happen…”

“Yes, anything can,” Simone endeavored to reassure herself, “but what are the odds?!”

“Listen, what are we supposed to do?” Tess muttered, inputting the same sequence of commands for the fourth time. “It won’t respond!”

Simone remained silent, several suggestions lingering on her tongue, but she could see that Tess was already executing the entire sequence accurately. And all to no avail! The ship was utterly uncontrollable and did not heed any commands.

“Can you transfer control to me?” Simone eventually asked. “I want to try…”

“Try what?!” Despair was edging into Tess’s voice, nearing hysteria. “I’ve already done everything by the book…”

“So what now?!” Simone exclaimed. “Do we just sit and await for our fate?!”

Tess froze, her hands poised above the control panel, paralyzed with uncertainty. Eventually, she shook her head and, with a voice command, transferred control to the co-pilot.

Yet, the condition remained unchanged. After repeating all the actions two times, Simone concluded that the ship was unmanageable. It was like... like what?

Her mind conjured the image of two ants on an autumn leaf, swept away by the wind. No, not on a leaf, but more like on a magnetic needle that... yes, a colossal magnetic needle that refused to turn across the magnetic field lines, regardless of the futile efforts of the tiny ants. The ship, resembling a huge, segmented caterpillar with a cockpit at the fore and a pusher tug at the aft, obstinately adhered to its newfound, mysterious trajectory.

“What are you doing?” Tess asked with a sense of doom. “I tried…”

“Yes, I see…” Simone muttered, concentrating on the task. “It’s futile. The ship is too lengthy and heavy… We need to drop some mass.”

“What? What mass?” Tess was almost lost for words.

But Simone had already decisively issued a command into the speaker:

“Robots Seven, Eight, and Nine, activate and release scientific telescope probes into space.”

“Confirmed,” came the robotic responses.

“Robots Four, Five, and Six, relocate the emergency food supply to the towing section. Robots One, Two, and Three, transport twenty fuel capsules to the towing section.”

“Confirmed.”

“And now…” Simone’s voice wavered. The decision was daunting, but to wait would be worse. “Let’s move! Before it’s too late!”

They flied fast to the aft through the entire ship.

“What are you planning to do?” Tess asked timidly, struggling to keep pace.

Simone darted into the pusher tug, accessed the control compartment, and secured herself into the pilot’s seat. She waited until Tess was secured in the co-pilot’s seat and commanded:

“Seal the internal bulkheads between sections one to five! Detach section one!” Then she activated the deceleration sequence, though it barely worked.

The displays showed the ship's first cargo section, along with the fore control module, detaching and drifting slightly forward and to the left. However, the remainder of the spaceship continued on its new mysterious trajectory, unaltered. No attempts to change the course of the remaining shuttle bore any success.

"Detach the section two!" Simone ordered and tried to push the break again.

And they watched as the second cargo section was disconnecting and slowly floating to the left of the shuttle's main body. But the outcome remained the same; the ship persisted in its steadfast course. Dropping two more sections proved equally futile. Simone was breathless, hesitant to execute the last and seemingly only available recourse.

That moment, the robots reported that they had successfully transferred containers laden with water, food, and fuel into their tug. The instant the entry hatch sealed shut, she commanded:

"Seal the internal bulkheads between all the sections. Release the tug!" simultaneously initiating the braking sequence.

The hull vibrated intensely, and the massive structure of the ship slowly began to drift away from them. Three probes detached from the main body and started to distance themselves, deploying and aligning their telescopes.

“Now let’s attempt to maneuver...” Simone uttered clenching her teeth.

The task proved somewhat simpler as the tug’s nearly spherical body allowed for more manageable control. Nonetheless, reverting it to the previous trajectory was unattainable. They still veered to the left, although less drastically.

“You’ll burn everything!” Tess exclaimed, observing Simone increase the engine to maximum thrust, consuming tons of invaluable fuel.

“If we’re ensnared, fuel will be the least of our concerns,” Simone retorted, wrestling with her escalating tension.

“What are you doing?!” Tess snapped. “Can you explain?!”

“Isn’t it clear?!” Simone shot back and hit the emergency channel:

“Anyone who can hear me, all stations in the Eade system, this is Cadet Raven from shuttle Aspen-Tier-150-X12. Looks like we’re caught in some gravitational trap. I mean… we’re not exactly in it, but we’re pulled by its field. Could be a black hole, or a neutron star, or something else we’ve never seen around here.”

Her voice shook, but she steadied herself:

“We can’t see the object, but… we had three telescope probes meant for the Satyr. I released them; we need info. This thing could be dangerous to the Satyr station too and anyone near this area.”

Simone took a breath and continued: “I’ve hit emergency code 202. We've dumped the load, first bit by bit trying to get back on course. No good. So finally, we dropped it all. We’re not diving anymore; we’re in orbit, I think, around the object. We've slowed the fall... no, I think, stopped the fall. I hope we’re stable. Burned a lot of fuel. Now we're speeding up, using centrifugal force only. Hoping it will be enough to break free from this field and get out of orbit. It’s going to take some time… don’t know how long. Yet. We don’t know anything about this object or how far it is…”

The speakers were silent, and the message was still in transit. It will be seen later whether her action was justified or was it a colossal, disastrous, gigantic error costing her career and her dreams, her future life.

Simone, realizing she was nearly hyperventilating from the stress, took a moment to steady her breath and quell her trembling before continuing, her voice steadier:

“I would’ve asked for permission, but I couldn’t wait too long for a reply. That’s why I decided… acted on my own… Data from the probes are available to all in the Eade system. Review the data and analyze the situation, please. For now, we’re stable, but we're low on fuel… not enough to accelerate… If we can exit orbit at the right angle, maybe we can make it to Ariadne station. It depends on the curve… Don't know the parameters yet… We need few days to get full analysis. We would appreciate your intel and advice on when to make the move.”

She fell silent, her body exhausted; the quiet hum of the speakers the only sound piercing the silence. Her hands were still trembling. It all felt like a nightmarish dream, and she hoped she would wake up…

*

“This is amazing!” the bald scientist on the screen beamed with excitement. “A rogue neutron star! It’s the iron core of a former three-solar-mass star, compressed into a seven-mile object. Almost black, practically invisible and moving at an astonishing speed. I can barely comprehend the cataclysm that set it adrift! We’ve named it Raven, in honor of its discoverer.”

“Well, um…” Simone was at a loss for words.

“And your idea to deploy the telescopes is much appreciated,” the scientist continued, his voice tinged with excitement. “They likely won’t last long, but the data they provide is priceless!”

He looked as though he would continue, but he was interrupted by Colonel Stork, the mission commander.

“Cadet Raven, we’ve reviewed the circumstances and analyzed your actions, deeming them competent and justified. Regrettably, the same cannot be said for Cadet Tanner. We’ve reviewed the footage…”

“What footage?” Tess whispered, momentarily forgetting her question would not be immediately heard.

“Your actions,” the commander resumed, oblivious to the interruption. “I had clarified pre-flight that all happenings within the ship during the examination flight would be documented. I trust you remember. Upon activation of the emergency protocols, we received the logs from the black boxes, encapsulating every occurrence during the mission.”

Tess get white pale, and she seemed to deflate in her chair.

“Her actions, given that she was on duty and in command, jeopardized both the vessel and its crew,” the commander pressed on. “The object was on a collision course with the spacecraft, and catastrophe would have been imminent had Cadet Raven not intervened promptly.”

He paused for a moment, seemingly immersing himself in the event as though he were reliving it from their perspective. Then, he added:

“Cadet Tanner, you have been deemed unfit for solo flights. You are to return to the academy for an additional year of flight training, followed by a re-examination."

Simone attempted to voice a defense, but words escaped her, and Tess appeared to be petrified in her chair, unmovable like to a statue.

Colonel Stork continued, “Satyr station is currently being evacuated. Our projections suggest it might be at risk soon. Fortunately, there’s still time.” He paused for a moment before adding, “For the time being, maintain your present orbit; it’s been determined to be stable, and you are no longer in immediate danger. You'll receive instructions shortly on how to exit this orbit. Based on our initial estimates, you’ll spend approximately two months in this orbit, and then about four months en route to Ariadne Station. Do you have sufficient supplies?”

“Yes... Enough... We’ll manage…” Simone responded, her tone wavering with uncertainty. She had been anticipating a graduation parade. However, her disappointment would reach the commander only after thirty minutes. Nevertheless, like by miracle he seemed to sense her unease and added:

“By the way, Raven, you've passed the exam. You've been assigned a rank and placed in a squad, ranking first in the course. And now, you are the commanding officer of the crew. Congratulations, Pilot Raven.”