“Attention, cadets!” called the commander. “Today you will begin your inaugural flight into the void. As you have already been told, you will take various roles as we travel around the system. Shifts will last two hours, and over the next forty-eight hours, you will have the chance to experience a wide variety of shipboard duties. The information about your assignments has been sent to your tablet—it includes your bunk assignment as well as your duty schedule. It will take about an hour to reach the ship, then you will have nearly an hour to get settled and find your first duty station. Duties begin at 0900 sharp.

  “Our ship today is the ISL Didactic, a retired freighter that has been converted into a learning ship. Now, get to the shuttle and find a seat.”

  We filed into the shuttle in an orderly fashion, though there was a palpable excitement in the air. For most of us, this would be our first time leaving the atmosphere, and that was exciting.

  Less than ten minutes later, the shuttle lifted up and moved, though with the inertial dampeners, the only sign that we had moved was from the holoscreens embedded in the walls like windows.

  I had taken aerial shuttles before, so seeing things from high up wasn’t new to me, but it was clear that many of the students had never been this high. Excited murmurs filled the shuttle, and I was glad to see that the commander let it happen.

  As time passed, the curvature of the planet started to become visible, and I joined the others in awe. By the time we were on approach to the ship, the blackness of the void was visible. It simultaneously made me feel small while also feeling proud. There was so much to the universe besides me, but at the same time, we were overcoming the natural challenges of the void.

  Soon enough, the Didactic came into view. Like most starships, it resembled a slightly bulbous cylinder with a rounded end. I could see the various bays across its surface, including those for weapons, shuttles, and people.

  A few minutes later and we were moving into one of the shuttle bays. Shortly after we docked, the commander stood up and instructed us to file off the ship and find our berths, reminding us that our tablets held a map of the ship.

  I made my way to the enlisted crew quarters where each of us was staying. When I arrived, I found my bunk, the middle right one in a small room just big enough for six bunks and small individual storage lockers. Tossing my small bag in the appropriate locker, I decided to explore the ship a bit and find my first couple duty stations.

  My first duty was as a missile tech, a position normally filled by enlisted. I knew that the weapons on this ship were fake, but they were still simulated enough to practice on. I found my way to the appropriate location with fifteen minutes to spare, so I pulled out my tablet to refresh my memory on the topic.

  Right at 0900, the commander’s voice rang out over the ship through the speakers embedded everywhere. “Welcome, everyone, to the ISL Didactic. Each of you should by now be at your duty station. I will now hand over control of the ship to our currently assigned captain. Do us proud.”

  I put away my tablet and waited. It didn’t take long before the person assigned to my missiles bay checked in with me, and I reported my presence. He gave me instructions that I already knew, though he had to give them anyway, and I got to work checking the missiles.

  That took about twenty minutes, then after each one reported itself as okay, I had nothing else to do for the rest of my duty but wait. This was the most boring part of being in the navy—the waiting. To pass the time, I pulled up class material on my tablet for review. Fortunately, everything I needed was stored locally, since the network was unavailable—normal communications required access to a planet’s mana bubble, and while starships carried an ansible for communications across the void, the limited bandwidth, mana requirements, and point-to-point nature of the device meant that it wasn’t practical for everyday communications. Of course, the ship also had a radio transmitter for ship-to-ship and ship-to-station communications, but, again, not practical for anything else.

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  Eventually, my shift ended, and since I had the next block off, I headed to the gym for a short workout. After finishing that, I washed up and headed to the bridge.

  Right at 1500, I relieved the communications officer of her position and sat down.

  “Comms, status?” the acting XO asked.

  “All good, sir,” I replied and settled in to wait again. Communications was vitally important and yet also mostly consisted of downtime. When it mattered, though, it could be frantic.

  About an hour in, a message came in on the ansible. “Captain, we have a message from command.”

  “Summary?”

  “New orders, sir,” I replied. “We are to proceed to Calavor and enter orbit.”

  “Navigation, plot a course to Calavor.”

  “Aye, captain. Plotting a course.”

  Two minutes later, the navigator informed the captain that the course was plotted.

  “Pilot, adjust course for Calavor.”

  “Aye, captain. Heading for Calavor.”

  Calavor was a gas giant in a further orbit from Eryth. I suspected that this course change was merely to give some of us experience doing our job and was entirely pre-planned.

  The rest of my shift passed uneventfully, and then I handed over the duty station to the next cadet. After that was my long, eight hour break, so I grabbed some food and headed to my bunk to try to get some sleep. It took me a while, but I eventually dosed off.

  I woke to my alarm, feeling well-rested. The slightly lowered sleep requirements from being Tier 2 definitely helped with that. I got up, changed my uniform, then sighed as I saw my next duty station—facilities. Specifically, I was assigned to clean the hallways with a large dust mop. I figured it could have been worse, but it still wasn’t going to be my favorite duty.

  After my shift ended, I grabbed some food and found Yuli, who was also off that shift. We discussed our impressions of the ship, and I was glad to learn she wasn’t one of the ones who found out quickly that they couldn’t handle the void.

  Soon enough, I was back on duty, this time as the lead officer for the fighter squad. I oversaw the maintenance lead and the various assigned fighter pilots, making sure each of them was doing their job, as minimal as they were. I also had to file a report on my tablet. Overall, it was a nice change of pace, actually getting to do something. I was sure that over time, filling out paperwork would eventually get to be annoying, but at that moment, I enjoyed actually having a task.

  I had another break and met up with Yuli briefly, though she was heading to sleep so it didn’t last long. Instead, I focused back on studying until my next shift as the bosun.

  As the bosun, I was the point of contact for the enlisted crew. While each enlisted ultimately reported to an officer for their department, the bosun handled any matters not directly related to their jobs. As such, I didn’t really have a fixed task list. Instead, I wandered the ship, speaking to the various people assigned as enlisted for the shift and noting down any issues, at least in theory. At that point, though, the only issue that came up was that I noticed one of the cadets seemed to be feeling stressed. After digging into it a bit, I discovered that they were having a hard time adjusting to the knowledge that there was nothing outside the walls of the ship.

  I noted down the issue—there was a form for it—and spoke with the cadet about it, hoping to help them work through it. Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to help, which I noted in my report. That left me with a strong suspicion that said cadet would likely end up in a land-bound position, such as the people working at the academy.

  I had some food during my next break, then got ready for my next shift, this time as a gunner. This was probably the most interesting shift so far, as I spent the time practicing firing my weapon in a simulated target shooting game. Judging by the results, I still wasn’t the greatest at aiming shipboard weaponry, but since I doubted I’d ever need to, I wasn’t too worried about it.

  My rest period was next, and I got plenty of sleep. I knew I’d be annoyed when I had to adjust my sleep schedule again back at the academy, but again, being Tier 2 helped a bit.

  After sleep, I woke up with enough time to grab some food before my shift as the XO. The executive officer was second-in-command after the captain and functioned similarly to the bosun but for the officers. As such, I tried to interact with as many officers as I could during that time while also fulfilling my duties on the bridge. It was challenging, but I loved it, reinforcing that I was on the right track.

  I rested again, then took my last shift on navigation. Everything went fine for the first forty-five minutes—I spent my time checking that we were on course and occasionally adjusting it to account for the constantly-shifting aether flows.

  Out of nowhere, though, something changed, and the sensors officer gasped.

  “Cadet Dimmer, what is it?” asked the cadet acting as captain.

  “I—I don’t know!” The sensors officer was clearly starting to panic.

  “Cadet!” called the captain. “Take a deep breath and analyze the signal.”

  The cadet listened and seemed to calm down slightly. “It’s a ship, but it’s not broadcasting any codes.”

  The captain stayed calm as they activated general quarters, calling everyone to battlestations.

  My heart rated increased, my mind focused, and I was ready.