User blog:Bardurwashome/Episode workshop

The second year's course project was centered around creating a void-droid. The probes would be giving simulated tests, where they would need to overcome various obstacles whilst still achieving their mission. The probes would be expected to not only surpass any programming hurtles presented but must also maintain near perfect functioning mechanical integrity. Grades would be based on these criteria, total duration time, and economic performance.

Ekeu traveled with the whole class and their projects, to a nearby Alsara Spaceport. The same location where the previous graded demonstration on rocketry had taken place. Ekeu looked out the window as he rode the overpass as the vehicle barreled towards the receiving station. He saw the field where his rocket had earned the top spot last year. Remembering the demonstration well giving him a sense of dé ja vue, except this time, he thought, there were not four hundred of them. Last time their projects had simply to orbit the world in thirty minutes and return intact. It was also graded by a score of 0 - 14, with scores of four and over failing the course. This time around would have additional challenges but the same bar.

When the class arrived they were filed into the monitoring station, located a kilometer or so away. The class was divided into groups of nines and tens. One member from each group took turns escorting their project out into the field and inspecting their vehicle one last time before giving the go ahead and returning to the monitoring station. The coursemates were seeded according to last year's graded demonstration. Ekeu was a part of the first group along with the tenth, twenty-fifth, fortieth, fifty-fifth seed and so on, along with the 127th. Ekeu watched Karal and Arnin go with the second and third groups respectively, and waved farewell to Alpe as she followed Karal with the second group, she cast an anxious smile before moving out of view. Each group was given a room, a set of monitors watched each group's project and a small control panel would allow each coursemate to interact with their project vehicle. Several orbiting spacecraft watched the launch site from sixty kilometers above the Alsere surface. Ekeu could see it all, watching the 121st - 134th group all go out into the field from the room's monitors.

It was a spectacle as he viewed one rocket takeoff, followed by another, every thirty seconds or so and the camera's followed the engines one by one as they entered low Alsara orbit. Each spacecraft took a separate trajectory, communicating with orbital-traffic control as they went. He followed 127s craft entering the middle of seemingly nowhere, As the rocket set it's course as it ejected it's void-droid in the opposite direction. The void-droid began to steadily align it's velocity and spin with that of the simulated craft's, and begin repairs. Ekeu looked between the project camera and the other monitors, seeing the simulated craft in the project's vision and what was little more than a paper mâché in the other.

After a minute the droid made a mistake with one of it's arms making contact with the craft. The group watched and interest grew as a small explosion popped from the side of the droid. Ekeu glanced over, seeing the disappointment and pain on 127s face. During the next ten minutes one or two of the other craft performed similarly but not quite as bad as 127s. As the rockets began to return, most rendezvoused with their droids. The droids would then dock with or otherwise rejoin their parent engines for the return landing. After the last of each group's returned, the next group readied their project to rinse and repeat.

In each of the early sets, at least one vehicle had problems with ejection, the simulated repair, droid docking, and/or the re-entry. Surviving craft were looked after by their creator and one of the evaluator staff and saved for later inspection. While waiting, Ekeu quickly got bored and even a little angry, after two hours what he considered people just screwing up. When Alpe's set came up he watched as she took her vehicle out into the field and went over, what he thought was probably one too many times. She then headed uneasily back into the monitoring station. He watched her craft as twenty-second's and downwards went off, he counted off each from twenty-first's to twelfth's, after twelfth's it was hers and his eyes were glued to the screen as her craft took off masterfully into the sky. After a minute or so it ejected the void-droid which merged flawlessly into the simulation's vector, grappled onto the craft and began making repairs, he held his breath, hoping that her worries were unmerited.

He was relieved to see the droid disengage without incident and rendezvous back with the returning rocket after only twenty minutes. He held his breath again as the droid attached itself to the rocket and re-entered it's vault. He stepped back excited, going over what he'd say to her. Before he noticed something that would haunt him. The rocket veered off balance right before landing hitting the ground hard at an angle before recovering. He knew this entailed a score of one at least and hoped that the craft hadn't suffered any damage. He watched the field cams after the last of the set's landed, and watched Alpe slowly walk out onto the field, dragging herself along, clearly shaken after witnessing the landing. One of the evaluation staff tapped Ekeu on the shoulder and he realized it was now his turn.

Ekeu told himself that he'd talk with Alpe later before rushing down to the project bays. He saw Arnin and Karal along with the other five. Karal called to him across the bay "Ready to get wrecked, buzzer!". "Unless you mean shrill, I'm not sure who you think is going to do it!" said Ekeu. Karal grinned wide at the response, shaking his head, before replying "We'll hear what tune your talking in, in a half!". Ekeu took his turn to grin as he came up to his vehicle, he heard #7 join in, but he didn't pay him any attention as he led his craft out onto the field. Arnin watched the number seven than Ekeu before turning to his own vehicle. The sun glared in Ekeu's eyes as he exited the hangar bays leading the hovercraft carrying his project. He climbed inside the craft and looked it over for the last time before nodding to the Staff member there. The hovercraft opened up, gently setting the vehicle onto the unused launch pad. Ekeu looked back at it a few times as he headed back inside. He then made his way down to the control panel and readied. After watching the first five, he watched Arnin's craft take off. He shook his head as he did so, then turned his attention to Karal's. He admitted to himself Karal's superb design and takeoff, before turning his attention to his own pride.

Launch was counted down from twenty-eight in half second intervals, coming to zero before flames spewed out the back of his craft and the monitors flashed with various little programming symbols. He glanced along his craft's fuel monitoring. Smiling to himself as he finally got to see it in action. It was beautiful to see the droid deploy just as he had designed it to, that detail in particular had been his pet project, then looking over every traffic and dare he say (again) "Flawless" execution. He scanned the droid's view cam and the simulation cam as the droid approached the semi-virtual simulation. He looked over the simulation damage and felt a surge of assurance when he selected programming file one, as his droid's course of action. It quickly made repairs and communicated with the rocket now requesting permission, and when approved, began accelerating, on track to finish in sixteen minutes. The droid cleared itself from the now "perfectly" conditioned simulated craft and was retrieved by the rocket. While his own rocket landed perfectly, his mind briefly traveled momentarily to Alpe's. Drawn back now to his own craft land, he threw his hands up in triumph. But when he glanced over the rest of the field, he was a little shocked to see that Arnin's and Karal's craft already returned.

He asked himself "What'd happened? What went wrong? Who'd won?".

Ideas: Name some of the craft