Galen
The stay in New Holm was longer than Galen or anyone had expected. The System-lord, and minor lords throughout the System had been greatful for the gifts and spent days trying to out do one another with feast after feast.
The Lord General had been wary and kept the fleet on high alert in case of ambush from arriving enemies, but none had come and most the crew enjoyed the feasts throughout the system, and the fleet spent more than was normal for ships passing through with what little trade flowed in and out of the system.
Half way between there jumps from New Holm to their next target of Hornbreaker would place them in Highpass Space. Galen was finally looking forward to returning home.
XXXXX Jumps from New Holm to Hornbreaker, XXXXX jumps of training and drills, and fighting, and getting beat down by a man old enough to be his great grandfather. Galen wasn’t looking forward to that. Vanir was looking forward to it, he knew though. The Techno-Mage may have warmed to Galen, but he enjoyed dealing out punishment to him a little too much.
The command deck was quiet as Galen stood next to the command table console. The Lord General had taken her seat just beyond the table, ser head peered down on her own small display built into the seat itself.
“It will be good to enter Highpass Space,” Galen said finally.
“Ha,” Vanir laughed, but said little else before the jump drive engines of the ‘Long Serpent’ came to life, and the Lord General gave them the command to jump.
In a flash the world Galen knew disappeared. His vision blurred and he saw nothing but blue as though he were no longer on the ‘Long Serpent’, and then it was over. The giant starship had moved more than half a light year, and the ships A.I. and navigation department under High Commander Uber began to plot the next jump which would take place in several hours after the Jump Drives had time to cool.
The Star charts had been updated in New Holm, as they were with each jump, and every system they went through, but things changed. Space drifted, asteroids moved, and the wrong jump could land them in the middle of a world or large asteroid. That was unlikely Glen knew. The ship, like all over was equipped with safe guards, and would be pulled out of it’s jump if they came within a gravity field, but failures were known to happen.
The A.I. ‘Long Serpent’ would likely already have a jump calculated, but it would be double checked and checked again to ensure it was good. It was a blind resort to jump blindly based on nothing more than the A.I.’s own calculations, but more often than not they were the correct ones to take, and the crew had time to kill until the Jump Drives were back online. They wouldn’t use the backup jump drive without an emergency