Past the pink-trees, we splashed across Little Stream and a little while after that Little Big Stream. We gave a wide berth to Deadly Hollow—long before the First Hundred landed, it had been a deep crater from a meteor strike, but now it was just a wide hole that filled up with water every rainy season and then turned into a dangerous mudhole when it dried out in the long summer.
Down inside, Deadly Hollow had a whole other ecosystem, shifting with the seasons. Raingrass, springblooms, mud-ivy, drygrass, and eventually autumn spracklies. Some of the scientists believed that these were different expressions of the same species, or maybe several symbiotic ones. Like I said, nobody knows. We just don’t have enough people yet to study everything. There’s just too much here.
A few klicks further and the savannah stretched away in a long slope down and then a longer slope up toward a horizon so far away that it doesn’t make visual sense. Even the electronic range finders sometimes get confused. The land is an endless plain of yellow and pink. Even the slightest whisper of wind sends ripples of color shimmering across the land.
This far out on the plain, the clusters of trees and tree-things occur less frequently because this is a major part of the migration path. Either the tree-things don’t want to be trampled or the ones that grew here all got eaten. We’re not sure yet. Instead, the summer stiffgrass gets higher and thicker on the plain, maybe because it gets better fertilization from the way the herds stir up the earth, leaving a swampy wake of dung and urine behind them, so the grass gets thick enough to be a real problem for even the biggest vehicles. But we would have traveled slowly anyway.
Sometimes the ground is deceptive and a truck can sink halfway into soft dirt. So we go slow and test everything ahead. The lead vehicle always has a huge water-filled roller in front, flattening a path through the sea of yellow so the trucks behind can follow. Sometimes all the trucks have rollers and sometimes all the trucks are linked by strong chains in case one of them has to be pulled out of a hole or up a hill. Some people say this is an unnecessary precaution, that we’ve never had a single truck get stuck, but Captain Skyler just says, “Let’s keep it that way.” We can’t afford to lose a Rollagon. Especially not this close to migration.
The bridge of the truck sticks out forward. It has a slanted window, so the bridge crew can look straight down at the ground in front of the vehicle. The bridge is wide enough to seat twenty people across, although usually there’s only four in front. Just behind, there’s a galley, sleeping bays, life-support services, and a complete communications deck. On each side of the Rollagon is a six-person airlock opening out to a big platform where all kinds of different equipment can be anchored, construction equipment, cranes, even heavy gauge weapons. The official designation is HellaCruiser and you can carry as many as sixty people on journey, if you have to. If they’re friendly, you can carry even more. If you replace half the cargo bays with living quarters, like we do with migrations, you can carry a few hundred. And it’s possible to triple or quadruple stack additional life support modules in case of emergency evacuation.
Just above the bridge are two lookout turrets with 360-degree coverage. The turrets can focus all kinds of sensors, but they also control industrial lasers, plasma beams, flamethrowers, railguns, and missile launchers, enough weaponry to fight a small war. Because that’s how bad some of the predators can be. It doesn’t happen very often, but after the first time, the First Hundred decided there wouldn’t be a second time.
I rode in the port side turret, just above and behind Captain Skyler. It was a great view, more than six stories up—high enough that I could see distant furrows in the grass where previous vehicles had cut wide swaths and the grass still hadn’t recovered. At least, I hoped those channels had been made by Rollagons. The grass recovers fast, so most lines begin to disappear within a few days, and these looked fairly recent. Whatever had cut those paths, I still wouldn’t want to be down in that grass alone. Even a startled hopper can be dangerous. I would rather be up here, where it’s safer.
The cabin is pressurized and filtered and temp-controlled, so I didn’t need to wear my helmet or rebreather, and my suit could keep itself plugged in and charged and monitored. The displays in front of me echoed all the ones on the bridge, so I could see everything that Captain Skyler saw. In an emergency one person could control the entire vehicle from any turret. I was just thinking about that when Captain Skyler called up, “Yo, newboy? You want to drive?”
“Sir?”
“You want to drive?”
“Uh. Yes, sir.”
“Take the controls then.”
“Taking control.” My display flashed green, and I reviewed all the controls in order: speed, terrain, location, orientation, path, and environment both internal and external. We were already on autopilot, so there really wasn’t anything for me to do except watch the displays. They were all green. Confidence was high.
The lead truck would automatically locate and steer around any hidden obstacles. All we had to do was follow. Still, I was now responsible for the vehicle and if I felt bold enough, I could even have gone off autopilot and steered myself. I didn’t feel that bold.
I could see my reflection in one of the screens in front of me. I was smiling, something I don’t do very often. Jamie would have noticed though. I noticed it from the inside too. Not just a smile, a big grin. If the folks at home could see me now—then I realized that they could, they would be watching on the mission monitors and the mission simulators. Marley must be steaming. Not that it mattered what she thought. In addition to the Certification, this qualified me for the next grade of Field Service.
After a bit, I realized that Captain Skyler had done this on purpose. He was making a point. Not just to me, but to other people as well. Maybe Mom would explain when we got back. Otherwise, I’d have to listen to Jubilee’s version.
The first half hour, there wasn’t much for me to do except stare at the monitors and the billowing grass, so Captain Skyler ran readiness checks and drills. It didn’t matter that the ground crew had already certified the cruisers. Every good commander does his own system checks. And sometimes drills.
I suppose that all the continual maintenance and checking looks boring to anyone watching from behind the fence—at least, until you realize how important it is to have everything green-boarded at the highest confidence. Maybe in the story videos, adventure is always kicking in the front door, but in the real world you do everything you can to keep that door locked. Adventures don’t always have happy endings. Jamie says that if people don’t get hurt or die, it isn’t an adventure.
When we reached Big Nothing, Captain Skyler passed control to Sergeant Jackle and acknowledged me with a simple, “Well done. You didn’t drive us into a ditch.” That was a weird kind of compliment. I never had personal control of the vehicle, but I guess knowing when to keep your hands to yourself is just as important as knowing when to get hands-on, so I took it as the right kind of compliment.