pilots were expected to be a little eccentric. Chief helm officers of the Confederation’s flagship were most certainly not permitted the same indulgence. He was just happy that he wasn’t a Marine; a buzz cut would probably have killed him.
The missing hair wasn’t the source of the itch, however. Rather, he was missing the connection with the ship that his NICS allowed. All the helm officers on the Heroics had to be NICS qualified, at least for the Earth Alliance ships. He didn’t think that the Priminae did the same, but then he hadn’t been on their Heroics yet.
A NICS, or neural interface connection system, qualification allowed for a link between a human and a machine that went beyond most human interface systems. In his Archangel, the interface had allowed for maneuvering precision beyond belief, and on the Heroic Class Odysseus it did much the same.
The new system made use of Priminae computer systems, however, which were impossibly powerful.
Too bad they can’t code for crap. Steph snorted softly as he walked the corridors.
The Priminae were, in so many ways, a truly bizarre people. They had access to technology that made Earth’s tech base look decidedly quaint , yet seemed to have very little understanding of the potential within their systems. Once human coders got ahold of Priminae computers, well, the systems really started to purr.
Of course, they had to learn Priminae code first, which meant that even now there were odd bugs in the ship’s core. But most of those were getting hammered out.
The end results, though, were breathtaking. Especially for a NICS pilot like himself. The Odysseus computer had the bandwidth to actually overwhelm the human nervous system, something his fighter computer couldn’t have done in a thousand years. That meant that when he plugged into the Odysseus , Steph practically became the ship. The experience was heady, almost addictive.
That worried him sometimes, but he figured that as long as he was concerned about it, then he was probably in a decent mental space.
Steph hung a left, passing through the giant open blast doors that separated the Odysseus ’ large open gym from the rest of the ship, and paused to see who was in residence at the moment. He recognized a few of the faces instantly but had to think about many more.
The Odysseus wasn’t quite as lucky as the Odyssey , taking into account a certain definition of luck. Since the official commissioning of the ship into the Confederation ranks, there had been a large influx of new faces. Certainly none of them were hopeless, but they weren’t the cream of the crop that the Odyssey had enjoyed.
Too many Marines for that, for one. Steph smirked to himself at the thought.
He and his ofttimes mentor, Eric, had a long-standing exchange on that subject. Being a former Marine himself, Eric wasn’t amused with the jarhead and leatherneck jokes Steph was likely to toss his way with regularity. Steph hadn’t actually been a member of any particular military branch, having fallen between the cracks as things got desperate during the latter half of the Block War. The war had reached a point at which the hastily-tossed-together Confederation between the United States, Canada, and Mexico really didn’t care about what uniform you wore, or even if you wore one, as long as you were willing to step up for the cause.
When the war ended, as a member of the Archangels, Steph had actually managed to avoid any official enlistment in any of the various military branches, because none of them wanted to let another claim the Archangel squadron.
And now here I am, wearing a Black Navy uniform. How the mighty have fallen. Steph’s lips twitched at that thought.
The Black Navy uniforms were nice enough, dress whites for special occasions and space black with gold and silver trim for the rest. No hats, thank the gods. Steph had followed those proposals intently and seriously considered sending death threats to the morons who
The missing hair wasn’t the source of the itch, however. Rather, he was missing the connection with the ship that his NICS allowed. All the helm officers on the Heroics had to be NICS qualified, at least for the Earth Alliance ships. He didn’t think that the Priminae did the same, but then he hadn’t been on their Heroics yet.
A NICS, or neural interface connection system, qualification allowed for a link between a human and a machine that went beyond most human interface systems. In his Archangel, the interface had allowed for maneuvering precision beyond belief, and on the Heroic Class Odysseus it did much the same.
The new system made use of Priminae computer systems, however, which were impossibly powerful.
Too bad they can’t code for crap. Steph snorted softly as he walked the corridors.
The Priminae were, in so many ways, a truly bizarre people. They had access to technology that made Earth’s tech base look decidedly quaint , yet seemed to have very little understanding of the potential within their systems. Once human coders got ahold of Priminae computers, well, the systems really started to purr.
Of course, they had to learn Priminae code first, which meant that even now there were odd bugs in the ship’s core. But most of those were getting hammered out.
The end results, though, were breathtaking. Especially for a NICS pilot like himself. The Odysseus computer had the bandwidth to actually overwhelm the human nervous system, something his fighter computer couldn’t have done in a thousand years. That meant that when he plugged into the Odysseus , Steph practically became the ship. The experience was heady, almost addictive.
That worried him sometimes, but he figured that as long as he was concerned about it, then he was probably in a decent mental space.
Steph hung a left, passing through the giant open blast doors that separated the Odysseus ’ large open gym from the rest of the ship, and paused to see who was in residence at the moment. He recognized a few of the faces instantly but had to think about many more.
The Odysseus wasn’t quite as lucky as the Odyssey , taking into account a certain definition of luck. Since the official commissioning of the ship into the Confederation ranks, there had been a large influx of new faces. Certainly none of them were hopeless, but they weren’t the cream of the crop that the Odyssey had enjoyed.
Too many Marines for that, for one. Steph smirked to himself at the thought.
He and his ofttimes mentor, Eric, had a long-standing exchange on that subject. Being a former Marine himself, Eric wasn’t amused with the jarhead and leatherneck jokes Steph was likely to toss his way with regularity. Steph hadn’t actually been a member of any particular military branch, having fallen between the cracks as things got desperate during the latter half of the Block War. The war had reached a point at which the hastily-tossed-together Confederation between the United States, Canada, and Mexico really didn’t care about what uniform you wore, or even if you wore one, as long as you were willing to step up for the cause.
When the war ended, as a member of the Archangels, Steph had actually managed to avoid any official enlistment in any of the various military branches, because none of them wanted to let another claim the Archangel squadron.
And now here I am, wearing a Black Navy uniform. How the mighty have fallen. Steph’s lips twitched at that thought.
The Black Navy uniforms were nice enough, dress whites for special occasions and space black with gold and silver trim for the rest. No hats, thank the gods. Steph had followed those proposals intently and seriously considered sending death threats to the morons who
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