CatastrophicFailure

Just curious, how will this new update mesh with RealPlume? I added the latter back when there was that bad no-plume bug, so now I have a grab bag of engines that need ullage & ignitions and engines that don't. It's quite odd.

Now I would counter this advice a bit, even with "expendable" characters, the more development you give them, the more connection the reader will have to them. That alone can make your bad guys seem badder. Nothing toys with the reader's emotions like making a character they like then doing something perfectly awful to them. Stephen King is a bit of an expert on this. Yes, accents are very tricky to get right. If you google "how to write in xxx accent" there's alot of material to give you some input.

That would be Spain:D Hmm, and I see the RatSquirrelFish seem to be expanding their territory.

Well this looks like an interesting read to keep subbed. Tho I appear to be the odd man out in not having written anything about Jeb

Chapter 9: Reclining at Table "...And so she says... she says... she says..." Director Kermanev fought through bales of laughter, then shifted his deep voice up a few octaves, "but honey, this one's eating my golubtsy!" Valentina joined in now, the pair of them howling with laughter across the small table. Director Kermanev slapped his hand on the table, making the half-empty plates clink and knocking over the empty bottle in the middle. "But seriously," he said, coughing and chortling, "vile, vile creatures. If ever you find yourself there, never sleep by water. They say the taste lingers for days." More laughter erupted. "Days?" Valentina asked, wiping away a tear. "So I am told. And speaking of taste, you really must try the okroshka, the chef has truly outdone himself this time." The chef chose this moment to appear with fresh plates and a full bottle. The look on his face seemed like he took the compliment as a personal insult. He roughly exchanged plates then returned to the kitchen. "Oh, no, thank you," Valentina said, still giggling, "I never did gain the taste for soured milk. In Kerberia, milk never sours, it just freezes." All expression suddenly left the Director's face. "DД," he said, staring intently at something very far away, "DД." Sensing the awkwardness, Valentina took a mouthful from another plate, "but the humidity is excellent, and so early in the season, too." Director Kermanev shook himself, "er, yes, from a collective farm outside Kermangrad. They're expecting a bumper crop so I was able to pull some strings. Hard to come by this time of year." The dinner had been quite pleasant so far. The Director's residence was typical of buildings on the facility: simple, stout, and hastily constructed. He had few decorations, but good, solid wood furniture that showed the scars of years of use. As one of the Four, Valentina always ate well, but this had been a veritable feast! Borscht, of course, and shchi, and pelmeni and pirogi. Black bread, and stuffed roasted this-and-that, with plenty of kvass to wash it all down, and of course, being Kerbals, the two knew how to eat. It was all a welcome relief. As she had expected, it had been days of debriefings and reports and questioning. The Imperium, the Academy of Sciences, the design bureaus, even the Ministry of the Interior, who weren't happy about several kilos of hydrazine dumped in a critical fishery. The pair of officers from the NKOTB were actually the most agreeable. The Director, as it turned out, was wonderful company was filled with amusing stories that sent them roaring with laughter until he broke into another coughing fit. He sighed and sat back for a moment, "it is a great thing you have done. You've single-handedly saved the crewed space program. If you'd wound up like that Foreigner- what was his name, Edmund?" he shook his head, "the Imperium wouldn't tolerate a propaganda loss like that. Even the Academy couldn't turn that around." "I almost didn't," she said with a touch of irritation, "if I hadn't got past the control lockout--" "Hah-haah!" The Director clapped his hands and shook a finger at her with a smile, "I knew you would figure it out!" Valentina blinked, then took a long quaff of kvass. "The Kommissar insisted that there be a code, but he didn't say it had to be a good one! So I picked something simple, easily guessed. The same one I use on my luggage, and-- my dear, are you quite all right?" Valentina was gagging and choking on inhaled kvass. "--Fine," she croaked. "Swallowed wrong," she coughed. The Director pinched his eye... bulges, "oh... well... At any rate, that formality has been done away with. There will be no control lock on Dibella's flight. The abort system has been configured to automatically trigger if gee-force exceeds expected levels as well." Valentina was still choking, "the flight is going ahead? After what happened?" "It is. The Kommissar was quite insistent. Learn what we can from failures but keep forging ahead," he glanced around the room, then lowered his voice, "someone in the Imperium is breathing down his neck. They're anxious to use this... lull... to gain parity with the Foreigners." Politics again. She brushed it aside, "but Dibella... sir, what happened?" He sighed again, and put his hands on the table, "I wish I knew. Right away, I had the upper stage from her rocket pulled and test fired, the next three in storage too." He paused, and lurched into another bout of dry, hacking coughs. "Izvinitye, izvinitye, too many years breathing rocket fumes," he thumped a fist against his chest, then shook his head slowly, "every firing was perfect. Exactly on the numbers. Zero anomalies. I've read your report, it just doesn't make any sense." He raised a hand before she could protest, "I believe every word of it. I just don't understand." "But... what could cause something like that?" Asked Valentina. "The only thing I could surmise would be a flaw in the engine casing," he absently twirled a hand in the air as he spoke, "the flaw allows the casing to buckle and balloon, the expanded casing allows more propellant to be exposed to the flame front, more burning propellant raises the internal pressure and thrust and the casing balloons more, exposing more propellant to the flame front... and so on until the motor either burns out or ruptures." Another round of coughing. "It's possible I suppose, but the RT-10 is one of our oldest and most reliable engines, and I've personally inspected every one that comes in and never found a defect. It's very simple to manufacture." "So there's no way to know?" She asked. He gave her a pained look, "not unless more debris is recovered. I have teams out searching but it's spread over a wide area, most of it taiga, so any debris that survived reentry will be difficult to find, if it hasn't already been eaten by something." He cough-sighed, "so without something more concrete, Dibella's flight goes forward. But I don't think you should be worried. This is rocket science, after all. Failure is how we learn, and I did learn from this incident, and made what corrections I can." "You are sure?" Valentina asked. "As sure as I can be. Listen, many things are about to change. I can't go into much detail, but... very shortly any problems with the Strannik series will become irrelevant. We march ever onward. But there are still two unassigned orbiters left. Flight-worthy test articles, leftovers. Since we have them anyway, I'm going to lobby the Academy for two more long-duration orbital flights before the close of the series. You and Dibella will each get your time in orbit. I just don't know how your rocket could have malfunctioned in that way unless something was tam--" he stopped, wide eyed, and looked furtively around the room again. Valentina blinked, many questions in her eyes. Director Kermanev laughed. It sounded forced. "But, that's just the paranoid ramblings of an old man! Whatever happened on your launch was surely just a fluke." "Well, I suppose you are right," Valentina said uneasily, "if there was a defect, that inspection the night before would have caught it." "What?" "Sir?" "What did you just say?" "The prelaunch inspection... I saw a scaffolding around the upper stage the night before the launch. I assumed it was another inspection." "I did not authorize..." he said, mostly to himself, "are you sure?" "Well, no, it had been a long day and I was very tired and--" "Are you sure?" He looked at her with an intensity she had not seen in him before. "Yes." "Troubling... most troubling," he said to the table, and coughed, eyes wandering this way and that, then produced a little black book and thumbed through the pages, "no, no work was authorized on the rocket. The area should have been secured, sealed off. This means..." He looked around the room again, laughing awkwardly. "But, there I go rambling again! Just a misunderstanding I'm sure, perhaps I did not get the memo. Certainly some simple explanation." He rose, "I am very sorry to cut our evening short, my dear, but I really must speak to the Kommissar at--" He coughed. But the timbre... something was different. He coughed again, and again, followed by horrible gurgling sounds. "Comrade?" Valentina said, "are you all right?" The Director coughed and retched, bending low over the table. Something black and unpleasant splattered on a half-finished plate. The tablecloth bunched in his balled fists. "Comrade?!" He coughed, and coughed, hideous, wet, ripping sounds, his entire body convulsing. Then gasping for breath he looked up and his eyes, what's happened to his eyes?! In the distance, she heard horrible screaming. His eyes! He took a long, rasping breath, dark veins standing out on his face. The screaming drew nearer. "D'yavol," he said in a rasp, then fell to the table with a clattering of plates, and was still. Valentina stared, uncomprehending, and realized the screaming was coming from her own mouth. "Help," she said weakly. Where was that damn cook?! "Someone please help." But she knew it was pointless. Director Kermanev's last word hung in the air like smoke from a pyre. D'yavol The devil.

Could someone by chance help me with figuring out launch windows? I'm launching from a space center at about 42 degrees latitude, so I can only launch into 42 degree orbits or higher. This makes getting to the Mun (or Minmus) quite a bit more brain-aching, well at least doing so efficiently. I need to plan my launch so that I'm in the right plane where after the TMI burn the Mun intercepts my AN/DN about the same time I reach it. So, how do I go about figuring the right time to launch so I don't end up sitting in orbit for days with my fuel boiling off? Equatorial DN after launch is usually right about over stock KSC if that halps.

Your level of detail, as always, is staggering. What did you ever settle on for thermal settings? I did my first high-orbit reentry recently and it wasn't nearly as toasty as it should have been, I need a reference lol.

Chapter 8: Starry Night Valentina Kerman sat on an old driftwood log, on an empty gravel beach, before a roaring fire, kilometers from anywhere, with the stars spread out overhead like diamonds on the black felt of the sky, picking mosquito out of her teeth. They really weren't bad if you just knew how to cook them. Bit stringy though. She had prepared it with some wild onions and fresh kelp. The kelp was a nice surprise, she'd never had it before. Its salty fishiness complemented the mosquitoiness of the mosquito. Her pressure suit and flight clothes were hung up to dry next to the fire, and she could feel the chill in the air as the frost crept in. She didn't mind, the cold never bothered her anyway. You didn't last long in Kerberia if you didn't tolerate the cold. Kerberia. Could she really be home? Well, not home home. That must be hundreds of kilometers to the east still. She wondered if it was even there anymore. It would have been abandoned and empty for years now. Ever since she left to join the Air Force. The cold crept in a little more. So did something in the underbrush behind her. She tossed it a bit of mosquito. It chittered happily and scurried off. Until something else found it, chittered happily, and scurried off. Until something else found it, garrumphed loudly, and crashed off back into the forest. Such was life in the taiga. Eat or be eaten. Do what you must to survive, and never make noise. Her deda had always been emphatic about that. Valentina sighed softly, and looked up at the stars spread out overhead. In the taiga, it always seemed that the colder it was, the clearer it was. Unless it was snowing. Or freezing fog. Or freezing rain. Or a blizzard. It was on nights like this back when she was just a kerbling, that she would sit with her deda on the sod roof of their little cabin, wrapped in layers of warm fur and his wiry, old arms, his perpetual old-kerb stubble scratching at her cheek, and he would name the stars for her. "...that one is Harry, and that's Dave, and Bob, and that blinky one is Jeb..." He could be a little senile at times. They would sit like that, sometimes for hours, until long after their faces had gone numb and that old scar over his eye had turned as white as the snow. She missed him now. Never make noise noise, that's what he'd always said. Well, she had made plenty of noise today. The first of her people in space. However briefly. And it had been a disaster. Kerbin, from space, was the most beautiful thing she had ever seen. She'd never felt closer to home, like she belonged. She had to get back up there, she had to. And yet... Valentina looked up at the pale, bright disc of the Mün. It seemed to be silently mocking her. Why had it terrified her so? Like a child. A child, afraid of the dark. She wasn't one to give in to such childishness. But for that one awful moment, she could have sworn that the Mün was... looking at her. Like the creatures in the forest were looking at her now. On cue, some unpleasant hairy thing with huge teeth and tiny eyes crept out of the underbrush towards her. It gnashed its terrible teeth and rolled its beady eyes and showed its terrible claws. Valentina gave it a look. It quickly retreated back towards the underbrush. Until some other unpleasant hairy thing with smaller teeth but bigger eyes found it. The Mün. She supposed that would be the new goal, now that the Foreigners' lead had been narrowed. Today's flight was a major accomplishment, after all. Just had a minor mechanical defect, that's all. The Strannik series was the Union's most reliable launch vehicle, this must have been just a fluke. Dibella wouldn't be in any real danger... would she? The scaffolding Valentina saw the night before the launch must have knocked something loose. Just a simple mistake, nothing to be concerned about. In fact-- She blinked. She was doing it again. She closed her tired eyes and rubbed the wide, flat spot between them. Fatigue? Exhaustion? Nerves? No. It was like there were competing whispers in her head, all vying for attention at once. And at the back of it all, formless and indistinct just below the murky surface, was a memory she couldn't grasp. Valentina sighed again, and laid down on a pile of fresh spruce boughs nestled between the fire and the log. It blocked her view of the Mün, thankfully. She stared up at the stars. Growing up in the taiga, you learned to see the things just out of sight, hear the things just beyond hearing. To recognize the patterns. She could sense... something. But couldn't focus on it. That wasn't like her, and that, she realized, terrified her. Never make noise, her deda had always said, do what you must to survive. And never, ever take sides. He would never talk about it. Only a word here or there when groggy with tea and asked just so. But over the years, she'd pieced enough of it together. Her parents had done something awful. And one day Kerbs from the Imperium had come and taken them away. With that thought lingering, Valentina drifted off into a troubled and restless sleep beneath the light of the full Mün. Occasionally through the night, strange furry things crept out out of the forest, but none of them dared come near. *** She was awoken by a familiar low, rumbling whine in the distance. She quickly stoked the smoldering fire and threw some fresh spruce branches on, sending a thin pall of grey smoke into the clear morning sky. It wasn't long before the drone began getting louder. Ki-24 VTOL transports, called "Converters" for their unparalleled ability to convert fuel into noise. Sounded like half a dozen, standard search pattern. The hellacious noise sound grew and grew, drowning out the morning cacophony of the taiga and sending waves of terrified furry things scurrying and leaping, occasionally right into the mouth of some other furry thing, which was quite a surprise for both. Whoever the pilot was, he was flying extremely low. Finally the airborne leviathan lumbered into sight over the treetops and then out over the water, perhaps a hundred meters up the beach from where Valentina was standing. Its wide tandem wings and stout, bumpy form gave it a bizarrely organic look that was unique among typically utilitarian Ussari aircraft. She waved. A red flare fired from a dorsal turret indicated she'd been spotted. The aircraft continued to circle, the others joining up one by one or flying low passes over the beach. Until yesterday the noise would have been staggering, but now Valentina thought nothing (sound) could compare to (the world became sound) that rocket blast. The lead aircraft broke off, rounded back towards the beach, and then grew even louder as its weight transferred from the wings to its straining engines. In a bold maneuver, the pilot nosed in directly at the tree line, deftly setting down on the narrow strip of beach between the trees and surf while avoiding the scattered driftwood. Before the engines had even spooled down several figures were running towards her. The largest one quickly outpaced the others and in an instant Igor had scooped her up and was turning her over roughly in his huge hands. "Are you well are you hurt where is wound I bring bandage have you eaten I bring food--?" "Igor! Igor," Valentina protested, "I am fine! Put me down." He gently set her on he ground, looking slightly abashed. She smiled, "there is leftover mosquito by the fire." Igor's eyes lit up as he set off. She had only a moment's respite, though. "TIIIIIIIIAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!" Dibella glomped into her, nearly knocking her down, the dangling oxium mask from the other's pilot helmet smacking her in the face and offering a teasing promise of breath as her lungs were squeezed, "I knew you were ok! IknewitIknewitIknewit!" Dibella bounced up and down to a percussive symphony of popping joints. Just when Valentina thought she would black out again, Tercella showed up and peeled the other Kerbal off. "You scared the PЦTIЙ out of us," ("Language!") she said, her own hug enthusiastic but without the messy dislocations and crushed vertebrae, "when we lost the telemetry feed, we feared the worst." "How did you find me so soon?" Valentina asked. "Emergency beacon in the pod," said Dibella, "when we lost that signal too, the panic really started." "Valentina." PЦTIЙ. "Sergei." He wore his typical smug look, "so it seems you have survived after all." He looked around at the simple campsite and once-deserted beach, now swarming with more and more security and recovery crews fast-roping down from the other hovering Converters. Shockingly, he held out his left hand, "nicely done." Valentina shook it awkwardly, the other one did indeed look like an eggplant. "Comrade Pilot!" The four turned and quickly saluted the Political Officer, "or shall I say, Comrade Kerbonaut," then he held out a hand with a vice-like grip, "the Kommissar sends his regrets that he could not be here personally, but he is a busy Kerb. Yet it is a wondrous day! A glorious day! You have reclaimed our pride by being the first Ussari in space!" "So... I did make it to space, then?" He grinned widely beneath his huge mustache, "Indeed! You were tracked on radar to an altitude of just over 140 kilometers. Of course, we weren't sure at the time if you were actually alive or not or which track was you, but since you are here now, you must have survived, DД?" "Now, where is the pod?" He asked, scanning around the area. Valentina sheepishly pointed to the sea. His grin faded, "oh... well, then... I shall have to modify my report..." he scratched his chin and mumbled to himself. Then he noticed the others staring at him, and clapped Valentina roughly on the shoulders. "This is a great day, a Great day!" He leaned in and whispered to her, "never speak of it again." "AIIIIIIIIIEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!!!!!" A security Kerb suddenly burst from the tree line nearby with his arms flailing wildly. Something that looked rather like a hairpiece with feet was making little barking noises and trying with surprising success to eat his rucksack, "get it off me, get it off meeeeeee!" Dibella took a step closer to Valentina, eyes wide. The Political Officer sighed and put a hand to his face, "ah, a Political Officer's work is never done. Tonight, we celebrate, Comrades! Glory to Arstotzka" and he set off towards the screams. The four Kerbals stared. "Why does he say that?" Asked Valentina. "You there, furry thing, papers, please!" "I haven't the slightest..." Said Dibella. "I can feel it chewing! Aaaaaaahhhhh!" "What is an Arzotska anyway?" Asked Tercella. "Quite the grip it has!" "Perhaps a kind of cheese, DД?" Said Sergei. "No that's my hair!" "DД, definitely some sort of cheese." Rustling in the brush drew their attention. They watched, silently, as a headless mosquito blundered past, feeling its way along the ground. Dibella edged closer still. "Such strange things here..." Mused Sergei. Chittering drew his attention the other way, and there, sitting on the end of a branch, was yet another small, furry thing. This one was tiny, covered in fur that looked luxuriously soft, with a long, bushy tail, oversized, bright, beady eyes, short, floppy ears, puffy cheeks, and long whiskers that gave it a perpetual welcoming smile. It circled the end of the branch one way, then the other, then chittered some more and waved its whiskers at Sergei. He approached. "Ah, Sergei..." "What an endearing little creature..." He poked a stubby finger at it. It stretched its nose out at him. "I would not do that if I were you..." "Pfft," he turned to Valentina, "you can't possibly expect me to believe this adorable little thing is dangerous." "Well, no, not really him," she said, looking up, "but his kin on the branches above you could strip you to the bone in less than a minute." Dibella hid behind her. Sergei looked up into dozens of pairs of bright, beady eyes. One of them chittered. "I... think... I'llbegoingnow--" he bolted for the nearest Converter, going up the dangling rope with impressive speed considering he had to climb over the two Kerbals climbing down. "Is... is that true?" Said Dibella from behind Valentina, "to the bone?" Valentina rolled her eyes, "well, they mostly hunt at night. Mostly." Dibella's huge eyes darted nervously back and forth. Tercella wrapped her arms around both their necks, "bah, enough with the scary-scary! Let's go home, before I actually start to miss the smell of yak." She led them off towards the waiting Converter. Valentina noticed she was actually starting to feel normal again. Had all this craziness really been less than twenty-four hours? She knew there would be days of debriefings and questions and interrogations ahead, but such was the way of things. She was beginning to look forward to that dinner with Director Kermanev. Yet in the back of her mind, something still whispered.

After finishing this next chapter, I've come to realize, you may be on to something there.

In Shadows, Chadvey mentions they even impressed him. Now just imagine the polar bears

I've got the big shiny collector's edition of the manga... but for some reason I just couldn't really get into it. But, I'm also so old that "Warriors of the Wind" will always be the original story for me even though I know what a horribly act of butchery it was (heresy, I know). I s'pose the design does have some potential, it did get off the ground after all. I think it's mostly stock with a couple of procedural parts, lemme see if I can figure a way to post the craft file. Maybe someone with more skill and less dislike for Kerbal aircraft could do it justice

heh, you even used the same render I did. Yours came out much better, tho. Forgot the engines were in the wing stub things like that. Need to watch it again.

Apparently one part riding inside another part has an extremely low coefficient of friction:

So I made this hideous copy of a thing... and reminded myself I really don't have the patience for making hideous copies of things, I'd best stick to hideous not-copies of things. Reps to anyone who can guess what it is. With FAR, it flies about as good as it looks. But it DOES fly. Mostly. Preferably upside-down.

Valentina will not be going to space today. Or air. But wherever she IS going, she's going there very very quickly. Mach 1 on the ground, with FAR no less. This was surprisingly stable over bumps... Until it wasn't.

dayum that is pretty BadS right there!

Ah, this isn't dead yet! May have to resort to OpenGL but there's hope!

Ok getting a little closer from that, but still mostly guessing. My space center view is still skyless & buggy as hell, but the flight scene seems ok... For about ten seconds till I get an out of memory crash.

I'm trying to get a custom launch site set up here and just having no luck. For starters, when the game loads the sky is black at KSC. Going into the flight scene, memory usage shoots way up, the buildings show up for a fraction of a second, then disappear and whatever's on the launchpad drops. I'm guessing this is a combo of wrong setup + something else causing problems. Here's the MM config I'm using: @KSCSWITCHER { @LaunchSites { Site { name = kermangrad displayName = UU - Kermangrad description = Kermangrad PQSCity { KEYname = KSC latitude = 42.5 longitude = -162.5 repositionToSphereSurface = true repositionRadiusOffset = 0 lodvisibleRangeMult = 6 reorientFinalAngle = -153 } PQSMod_MapDecalTangent { radius = 1 heightMapDeformity = 80 absoluteOffset = 0 absolute = true latitude = 42.5 longitude = -162.5 } } } } Lat & lon are obvious enough, but I really don't have much idea what the other settings do. Just guessing and plugging in numbers seems to be getting me close, but then there's the memory hog+no sky thing. Here's the logfile if that helps. Yes, I'm aware MechJeb is throwing a bunch of stuff, think it's restricted to the VAB with a bad window field. https://www.dropbox.com/s/onwn5ns7yihakr2/KSPswitcher.log?dl=0

Chapter 7: Into the Light Darkness. Nothing but darkness. Thick, crushing, suffocating. Valentina started awake, consumed by a darkness so deep it stung her eyes. Where am I? What happened?! Confusion. Muddled thoughts. Here eyes were burning. I can't see! The pod... the pod sank and I can't see! I'm blind! I can't-- I can't-- Panic burst forth out of the shadows and into the forefront of her mind. Simpering, gibbering, growling, mad. A wild animal, all claws and fur and fangs. And she was paralyzed before it. Panic lunged... Tinka! Calm yourself! Her Deda's voice suddenly cut through the darkness like a beacon. Panic was upon her. She kicked it in the head. Breath. Think. Then act, he whispered in her mind. She could breath. Thick, humid, unfilling breaths. There was air in her suit. She was pinned against the wall of the pod by the bubble of air in her suit! Slowly, cautiously, she felt around... the auxiliary oxium valve was there... Panic leapt at her again. She parried, caught it by the throat, and slammed it behind a Door. ...door... She knew she was weakened, whatever happens that Door must not open. ...door must not open... Confusion. Memories wandered, drifted, blinked in and out like dim stars. ...must not open... ...you must not open this door...! Hypercapnia. Carbon dioxium poisoning. The thought jockeyed for attention in her muddied mind. She'd been rebreathing the air in her suit. Each breath driving the ratio of the toxic gas a little higher. Confusion, hallucinations, difficulty concentrating, sweat... sweat in her eyes, stinging them! She had to get out. She had to get out now! The auxiliary oxium valve was there, the breaker panel was there, the supply locker was there. She was against the right side of the pod! It must be on its side. Panic scrabbled and scratched at the Door. ...must not open... ...no matter what you hear... ...must not open... Fighting for focus, she felt around... the hatch must be... there! Her she could feel along the edge of it. She wrapped her fingers and slowly pulled herself toward the opening. Her foot was caught. Panic slammed hard against the Door, giggling like a lunatic. ...you must not open... ...help! They're in here...! ...whatever happens... Valentina reached down, muscles screaming, felt the strap around her foot... pulled... Stuck. She pulled again. Still stuck. Panic snarled, cackled, scratched. She felt along the strap... felt the edge... pushed and... there! Her foot was free! Gingerly, she felt around the capsule, found the edge of the hatch again, grasped it, pulled. Expelled into nothingness. Panic slammed its self against the Door again and again. ...in here...! ...you must not open... ...no!... Nothing. Nothing anywhere. Such complete darkness her eyes wailed for something... anything... anything but nothing. Focus... must stay focused... She felt along her chest, found the ring, pulled, felt the life vest inflate. Now nothing. Wait. Breathe. Don't move. All around her crushing pressure, empty darkness. But not empty... Panic whispered from the other side of the Door as it dragged its claws along the wood, you know what lives in these waters... No, not empty. Clicks. Whistles. Shrieks. Coming from everywhere and nowhere. Helpless in the darkness. Panic hit the Door again, and the wood started to crack. ...they're in here... ...must not open... Valentina floated. Tired... so tired... am I even awake...? Am I even alive...? Is this oblivion? Focus... Scratching... whispering... laughing... Shouting... crashing... screams... ...must not open... ...no matter what you hear... ...must not open... Madness... this is what madness feels like... darkness... darkness forever... inky green darkness.... Green...? She blinked. The darkness.... changed. She blinked again. There was a difference. The darkness outside was tinged with green. Panic roared and howled in her mind. Her lungs begged for breath. A hallucination? No, no the darkness was getting greener... getting lighter. Focus... a little more, just a little more... Panic thrashed and raged behind the Door. Another impact, a splinter flew off, wood crackled. ....must not open... ....must not open... And then, as the green grew lighter and lighter, enormous shapes materialized out of the gloom. They shifted, and turned, like living mountains. The strange noises grew louder. Crack! The Door split down the middle. ...you must not... ...you must not... The water grew ever greener, ever lighter. The huge forms moved, circled. Points of light reflected on waves. Her lungs burned, her muscles shrieked, her head throbbed. Darkness, like an old wound, began to close in at the edge of sight. ...in here! They're in here...! ...you must not open...! ...come quickly...! The Door shattered into a thousand shards. Panic burst through, all claws and teeth. It charged at her, jaws wide as an open tomb. She burst through the surface of the water into unimaginable brightness. Into the Light. ...help! They're in here...! ...quickly...! ...no matter what you hear, you must not open this door...! ...but papa... Panic was upon her. She shoved her fist down its throat. Panic gagged. "Not today," she said into its wild, rolling eyes, "today, I live." She grabbed its spine from the inside, and broke its neck. Flailing, Valentina hung in the air for just a moment before splashing back into the water. She foundered, found the knob that inflated her neck dam, grabbed the catch and threw open her visor-- And got a facefull of frigid seawater for her troubles. She floated there, gagging, coughing, heaving, but she was breathing. She was alive. She took a moment to just breath, bobbing amidst the rolling swells, but only a moment. She looked around... land! There, not far, just a few hundred meters-- The water in front of her exploded upwards in a jet of mist, then a monstrous, triangular fin broke the surface, easily four times her height and black as night. Another explosion to her right, followed by another huge fin. Then another, and another, dozens of them, swarming her, surrounding her. Bizarre sounds now filled the air, and an awful, low rumbling she could feel in her spine. The water broke again, and a new form rose above the surface barely a meter away... and kept rising, and rising. Teeth. Cruel, serrated, blade-like teeth, each as big as her head filed past in a jagged line as the form kept rising, smooth black skin glistening in the failing sunlight. Then it stopped. Valentina blinked. A tiny eye, no bigger than her own, winked back. The colossal, conical head loomed over her like a building, like a planet. The eye stared. "Well?" She yelled at it, "come get me!" The eye stared impassively. "Do you have any idea what I have been though today? I have been blown up, shot into space, crushed, battered, burned, shaken, and nearly drowned! And I. Have had. Enough! So come at me, fish! I break you!" The eye stared, with the patience of aeons. The water lapped quietly against the enormous flank. Valentina pinched her eye... bulges. Then she reached out a hesitant hand. All over the skin were circular, grey scars. Her fingers brushed the smooth, rubbery hide. She felt it tremble at her touch. The eye blinked. The calm was broken by that deafening, vibrating rumble she felt more than heard. The head then swiftly sank back below the waves, the rows of giant teeth sliding past at a horrifying pace. And then it was gone, and Valentina was alone among the rolling swells as the sun sank towards the horizon. With nothing else for it, she set off in the direction of shore. *** Some time later, the sun now touching the waves, she took her first shaky steps up the beach, exhausted. For just a moment, she thought it was over, before a large wave slammed into her from behind and drove her face into the gravel. She crawled the rest of the way up the beach, coughing and gagging and shivering as the water swirled around her hands and knees. She finally reached an old, bleached log at the high tide line. She pulled herself up it onto her elbows, and looked beyond. A dense forest of spruce and pine spread out before her, here and there the last stubborn patches of winter's snow clung to the shadows. Small furry things also clung to the shadows, eyeing her suspiciously and wondering if she was edible. Beyond the forest, a snow-covered mountain towered, lit up yellow and gold by the fading sun. "I'm... home?" Valentina said incredulously. Weariness was beginning to set it. With effort, she pulled herself up onto the log and looked out over the ocean. To the southwest, the sun was at last dipping below the sea, painting the horizon and clouds in brilliant red and crimson, while the deeper sky drifted from sapphire to indigo and into violet. It was truly-- An ominous, low buzzing just to her left drew her attention. She slowly turned her head, and looked into the thousand eyes eyes of the biggest mosquito she had ever seen. Its head was bigger than hers, ending in a half-meter long proboscis tipped by drooling, razor-sharp barbs. It rubbed its forelegs together in anticipation of its next succulent meal. Valentina grunted in annoyance, grabbed the proboscis, twisted till it was pointed at the sky, and pulled. The head popped cleanly off. The body felt at its neck-stump for a moment, as if not quite grasping what had just happened. Eventually it wandered off, seeming very confused. Valentina sighed and looked down at the horrible insectoid visage in her hands. It was going to be a long, cold, weary night. Oh well, at least now she had dinner.

Chapter 6: Into Darkness Valentina Kerman was bathed in brilliant, warm, penetrating light. She could hear... something. All around, faces... familiar faces... soft and indistinct. She felt like she was floating. Am... am I... dead? Bright... so bright... She raised a hand against the blinding brilliance. And blinked. Pure, unfiltered sunlight streamed in through the hole in the cabin where the window had been. A steel washer floated weightlessly by. Slowly, the sun drifted past the edge, and the capsule was plunged back into darkness. No, I am... I am in space! Disoriented, she checked her suit display... still holding pressure, backup power on. The nosecone must have decoupled! What on Kerbin had just happened? Light from the window drew her attention again... Then all... conscious... thought... ceased. The curve of Kerbin passed into view as the ship slowly tumbled. The fuzzy line of the atmosphere gently gave way to the patchwork of vivid blues, greens, and whites spread out below like a map. Valentina could see the ocean. She had never seen the ocean before. Deep blue faded to rich turquoise dusted by frail white clouds. She could see sunlight glinting off of individual waves. As the pod turned, here and there were criss-crossing trails of white within the thinner clouds, converging at the land. She realized these were ship tracks from the busy port city of Kerbelsk. The city now came into view, and Valentina could see the maze of roads... the long, thin, black smudges of smoke from the factories... the port its self... even individual ships, all with incredible clarity and detail. She saw the railroad tracks, snaking throughout the city and then concentrating beyond the city to the east, merging into the Great Trans-Kerberian Rail Road. She could see the scar it made for leagues and leagues as it cut through the dense taiga forest, and huge, kilometer-long trains headed by more smudges of smoke as they went along. To the north, the green of the forest diffused into the white of the tundra like a line of battle. The pod tumbled on, and the entire great breadth of Ussari spread out before her further east, taking up the entire horizon as the opposite curve of Kerbin drifted into view, with the stark blackness of space beyond. Then the Mün wandered into view, and suddenly filled her with an inexpressible terror that jolted her back to reality. She shouldn't be seeing this. She shouldn't be seeing any of this. She was much too far north! Instinct came roaring back, and Valentina desperately tried to restore power. Main buss A, dead. Main buss B, undervolt. Cross feed from aux batteries, switch the breaker, and... there! A single bulb flickered weakly to life, casting a dim yellow in the cabin. Debris floated everywhere. Quickly, cautiously, she reset the circuit breakers for the most important systems. The map gauge confirmed she was far off course to the north, heading towards the frigid North Yaltik Sea. She had to fire the retro rocket pack and land before she reached it. The pod could land in the water, but the nearly freezing water would kill her in minutes if she landed there. With that gaping hole, the capsule would sink like a stone. "Control, this is Kedr, do you read?" Nothing. "Control, Kedr, do you copy?" Not a sound. She couldn't be sure if the ship was even capable of transmitting. Or receiving. Or if the rest of it, and the retro pack, was there at all. She reached for the manual controls and-- PЦTIЙ! The lockout. She couldn't fire the rockets, jettison the service module, or set attitude for reentry. Even if the automatic system still worked, without buss A there was no way to power it. In frustration, she slammed her fist against the plastic cover. It shattered, sending cascading about the cabin. But as she knew, the controls still wouldn't work without the override code. Deep in the back of her mind, something leered and snickered in the shadows. She was done for now, there was nothing-- A small, colorful paper bird drifted past her faceplate. Mouth agape, she gently reached out and plucked it from the airless vacuum. Gingerly, awkward with her thick gloves, she unfolded it. The words "override code" in a certain heavy, deliberate script appeared. "Igor, I could kiss you!" Valentina squealed to the instrument panel. She flipped the paper over, and stopped. 12345. Unbelieving, she entered the code into the panel. The red light changed to green. "Unbelievable, that is the kind of thing an idiot puts on his luggage!" She said aloud as she manually powered up the controls. Quickly, must act quickly. Need retrograde attitude first, 34 degrees nose down. She hit the button to fire an attitude control thruster. Nothing happened. She hit it again. Nothing. Deep in her mind, something snickered again and eyes pierced out of the shadows. She pressed it and held. Still nothing. Had she set the power correctly? Were the right valves on? Maybe-- She felt the ship move. She tried another button, pressed, held... after an eternity, the ship moved the other way. The firing is delayed! It wasn't like this in the simulator! With agonizing lethargy, she brought the capsule around to the right attitude and stabilized it. She wasted no time hitting the sequence of switches to fire the engine. After a heartbeat of eons, she finally felt the push as it fired. She hoped it would be enough. If the altimeter was working, she was already dipping back into the atmosphere. The tiny engine fired on and on. She willed it to go faster. This wasn't the right attitude for reentry. With the service module in place, the capsule would eventually flip around nose-first, even with the attitude thrusters, pointing the parachute pack directly into the fiery plasma. "Come on, come on, faster!" Valentina yelled at the ship. Finally she felt the push cease, and saw the light on the console go from yellow to red. Slowly, ever so slowly, she brought the ship to the proper reentry attitude. She switched off the safeties and fired the decoupler. A slight bump, and the console lights changed again. There, now the ship should be stable, just have to hope the heat shield-- There was a tremendous jolt, and the craft started oscillating wildly. The view in the window began rushing around, the push of acceleration returned, and the Thing in the back of her mind cackled with glee. PЦTIЙ! STДLIИ! ЬЯЗZHЙЭV! In her haste she'd mixed up the procedure. The module should have been detached before changing attitude! Now it must be jammed against the bottom of the capsule by the force of air rushing against it. She looked at her horizon gauge, spinning around and around. It was canted off to the side, too, the pod made unstable by the mass pressed against it. Gee force pushed her deeper and deeper into her couch as the pod plunged into the thickening atmosphere. Shuddering and shaking now returned as well, Valentina could see a dull orange glow through the hole in the hull. It grew brighter, whisps of superheated plasma and glowing bits of... something streaking past. Then in an instant, the capsule shifted, and now the plasma was inside, flailing and searching like a thing alive, incinerating anything it touched. The edges of the window-hole incandesced in red and orange. She was paralyzed by the crushing gee force as the Thing in the back of her mind paced rapidly back and forth like an anxious animal, giggling all the time. But as quickly as the tempest had begun, it faded. The glow dissipated, the acceleration dwindled, and soon the pod was simply falling. Not willing to trust the altimeter any farther, Valentina hit the manual parachute release, and was relieved as the pod bucked back and forth beneath it. Eventually she felt the reassuring push as the canopies fully opened, the capsule slowed, and gently rocked on its lines. A loud bang, as the heat shield decoupled and fell away, then she hit the switch for the landing airbags. Nothing. No indicator light either way, no sound or motion. For all she knew they might not even be there anymore. It would be a hard landing. She strained, trying to see anything useful through the charred and blackened window-hole, but could see nothing but sky and clouds from this angle. She had no idea if she was even over land or-- The pod slammed into the water, only theoretically softer than solid ground. The impact knocked her senseless for a moment, water pouring in through the hole as the capsule bobbed and rolled in the waves. PЦTIЙ! This, at least, Valentina had trained for. Not much time. She knew the parachute would quickly drag the pod under the water, even if it hadn't been flooding. Her timing must be perfect. Just before it did, it would roll over with the hatch pointing to the sky. She had to blow it then, up and out of the water and away from the ship, then climb out before the sea poured in. She had to move quickly. The Thing in her mind bounded back and forth, slobbering and whimpering, still not daring to leave the shadows. Faceplate still down and locked, good. She closed her suit valves, unhooked the umbilicals, then unfastened her harness. The survival kit was under the couch, she would need the medical kit out of locker A3-- The hatch blew out. She had just enough time to recognize that fact before the incoming torrent of water smashed her face into the instrument panel, and again darkness took her.

Chapter 5: Poyekhali "All personnel clear the launchpad! All personnel clear the launchpad!" It became eerily silent inside the cramped pod once the scrabbling and banging and muffled voices departed. The distant hum of the instrument gyroscopes, the soft whir of the air handlers, but to Valentina, by far the loudest sound was her own steady breathing. "Kedr, control, set launch abort to master arm." "Master arm, set." She pulled the pin that disengaged the final safeties inhibiting the launch abort tower high above, and stowed them. "Set launch abort to flight arm." "Flight arm, set." She removed the small metal cage protecting the big, red abort handle on the instrument panel in front of her. One pull would send her pod shooting away from a failing rocket. In theory. With no way to shut down the five huge solid rocket engines below once they were lit, she had her doubts about the abort system's ability to out-run them. Sure, she'd been over all the test data, been heavily involved in the test program, even, but-- She stopped. Am... am I nervous? She thought, that is ridiculous, I do not get nervous. I have landed half an airplane on a damp sponge before, why would I be-- She stopped again. Not nervous, just nerves. Nerves, that's all. Nothing to do now but listen to the mission control chatter and flick the occasional switch. She looked over the expansive instrument panel before her, covered in an obscene amount of switches, knobs, and lights. She knew each one by heart, by feel, by simple spacial awareness. Then she looked to the control panel to her left. All the important things, covered by a piece of plastic locked by an override code she wasn't trusted with. Valentina frowned. There was a tool kit under her couch. The plastic was pretty flimsy, maybe she could pry it up. There was a screwdriver in the kit. But that would hardly be professional. Still probably wouldn't work without the code. Maybe she could-- She snapped her head to the right and looked straight into the horrible face of... the breaker panel? Valentina realized she'd been holding her breath. For a moment... just a moment... she could have sworn she heard-- "Say again, Kedr, did not copy that." Had she said something? "Ah... disregard, control.... must have jostled the mic..." "Understood, Kedr, countdown is proceeding normally, thirty minutes to launch." "Kedr copies." Just her mind playing tricks, that's all. Still, that was unusual. Growing up in the taiga, you never let your mind play tricks on you. There were plenty of hungry things trying to do that already. Her deda had taught her that when she was very little, one of the very first things she remembered. Everything before that was... fuzzy. She sighed and looked out of the small window in front of her, seeing nothing but the inside of the protective nosecone covering her capsule. Soon, through that window, she would be the first of her people to see her planet from above the atmosphere... and only the second person ever. She should be brimming with excitement. Why on Kerbin did she feel like-- Valentina snapped her head left, seeing only more indicators. She'd been holding her breath again. She knew she'd heard-- "Say again, Kedr, did not copy. Your heart rate's up, are you all right?" "Must have bumped the mic again. I am well, just excitement building," she lied. "Copy that. Final clearance has been received, ten minutes to launch." Ten minutes? The thirty minute call was only moments ago, wasn't it? Had she been in a fog that long? For a moment, Valentina thought of calling a scrub to the launch right there... but no, not when they were so close, not over some little preflight jitters. This will be a Great Day, and only the first of many. She grabbed a checklist and went through it once more. *** "Kedr, control, five minutes to launch. Terminal countdown has commenced." "Kedr copies, final gyro synch complete." As Valentina had hoped, the nerves began to abate as the clock ticked down. Just well-practiced, automatic actions now. No room for thought. "Four minutes, beginning startup sequence, pre-ignition heaters running." It all came down to this. All the hours of training, the exhaustion, even the damn politics. "Three minutes, close your visor, verify bleed valve status, Kedr." Valentina closed and locked her helmet visor, sealing out the last of the sound from the cabin. Nothing but her own breathing, now amplified off the thin plexiglass. It was time. "Down and locked, cabin bleed valve to flight dump, safeties locked." "Two minutes to launch, Kedr now running on internal power, clear umbilicals." She threw the final few switches, and again looked out the window at the featureless nosecone wall. Nothing left to do but wait. "One minute, launch key in, all systems go!" She crossed her arms over her narrow chest and grabbed the straps on her harness, scrunching into her launch couch, and fixed her eyes on the gauges. Finally, this was it. Everything would be different now. The fulfillment of a dream, but more importantly, honor and respect for her family, so long departed. And perhaps... even atonement. Then why did she feel-- "Dvenádtstat..." "Odínnadstat..." "Désyat..." "Dévyat..." "Vósem..." "Sem..." "Shest..." "Pyat..." "Chetíreh..." "Tree..." "Dva..." "Odéen..." Wait, what was-- "Ignition!" The whole world became Sound. It was everywhere, everything. Sound filled reality with empyrean ubiquity. She could feel it, smell it, PЦTIЙ, she could taste it! It was far beyond pain or pressure, it was like sentience from her very bones. A memory drifted up, but was quickly scattered by the sheer power. For a moment, she thought the rocket had simply exploded, then acceleration slammed her deep into her couch and the gauges came alive. "Kedr has cleared the tower!" There were cheers and whoops in the background. "Poyekhali!" Valentina squealed, completely overwhelmed by the moment. "Control reads Strannik-Б˜ is stabilizing, how do you read Kedr?" "I am receiving you, I am well," she tried to drag her focus back to the mission, "the noise is truly incredible." Acceleration and vibration were already rising. The 2.6 gees at ignition soon climbed past three as the rocket slowly pitched over with gravity. Three large, sudden jolts caused a hurried scan of the instruments. "Kedr is on course... deviation within limits... getting bumpy up here..." "We copy that, Kedr, confirm telemetry is good, you are still on course." Acceleration rose past four gees now, edging into the unpleasant. The tiny cabin was shaking so much Valentina could barely see the gauges, with the worst still yet to come. She gritted her teeth and shifted in the couch. "Kedr, check your indicator, we read your course drifting northward." "DД, I see it," the vector was wandering off its target, slowly pulling the rocket's trajectory away from the intended landing zone. "Guidance is suggesting you abort. It doesn't appear to be improving." Valentina eyed the large, red abort handle on the panel. Three more sharp jolts rocked the capsule. Then she looked at the map ball and did a quick mental calculation. "It's still within the secondary landing zone. We've come too far to panic over a mild course deviation, I say we continue. Maybe it will settle out after booster separation." There was an agonizingly long pause while she waited for a response from mission control. Gee force was now edging over the five mark on the gauge. "Control concurs," came Dibella's relieved voice. We will monitor, and respond as needed. Thirty seconds to booster sep." "Kedr copies." Valentina knew they would be the longest thirty seconds of the short flight. As the engines grew ever more powerful in the rapidly thinning air and the ship grew ever ever lighter as the propellant was burned away, it accelerated faster and faster. Valentina could no longer make out the instruments from the violent shaking. But she knew the feeling well enough from centrifuge training. Five and a half gees... now six... Three more jolts. Then a fourth. Something went red on the warning panel. She couldn't tell what it was. Seven gees... instinctively, she started grunt-breathing, desperately trying to keep oxygenated blood in her brain. Seven and a half... Eight... Eight and a half... Darkness began closing in at the edges of her vision. The ship was coming apart. A ragged shimmy back and forth... and the punishing acceleration died away. The sound and shaking dropped to a low rumble. Valentina blinked back into reality. "Kedr, respond, do you copy? Kedr, do you copy?" "Control, Kedr, I am here. Staging is good, core stage has ignited." "Control copies staging. Thought we'd lost you for a moment there. You had a bunch of people about turn blue, we're breathing again." Had she actually blacked out? She hadn't thought so. "Core stage is much smoother. More of a push now. Course has stabilized, still off to the north. All systems are green." "Control concurs. That should have been the worst of it, two minutes to core staging." The rocket clawed higher and higher, though its course was now more horizontal than vertical. Valentina again wished for some sort of window in the nosecone. All she had were instruments to know the outside world. And they were now telling her she was already traveling higher and faster than anyone before. Well, anyone but him. At least the flight had smoothed out. The next two minutes passed uneventfully, the core solid motor performing exactly as expected. The final stage would be milder still, specially de-tuned for a slow, easy push out of the atmosphere and into space. "Approaching final staging, Kedr, set comm array to mode three." "Kedr copies, mode three." "Relay acquisition is good, staging in tree... dva... odéen... mark." Just a thump this time. The mounting acceleration dropped once more, sound dying to a distant rush. "Staging is good... final stage reads nominal." "Control concurs, Kedr, standby to switch... ah Kedr check your vector we read your course deviating." Valentina checked the gauge. The vector was drifting northwards again. The dull rumble seemed to be rising quickly. "I read the same." "This isn't looking good. Telemetry is showing multiple channels off spec. Try resetting... channel... buss... sxkkvvzz" She checked the breaker panel. Why was it getting hard to move? "Say again control, did not copy." "Telem... set... cxkgyzzz" "Say again, did not copy, say again." She reset the comm switch, tried a different antenna, then noticed the gee meter. Four gees, rising faster than ever before. Far beyond what this motor should be producing. PЦTIЙ! The course vector was deflecting farther and farther, pushing the craft off to the north. "Control, Kedr, do you read? Control?!" Nothing this time, not even static. Standard procedure was clear, here. Abort the mission. Valentina steeled herself and strained for the abort handle on the panel before her. Her gloved fingers stopped a centimeter away. She pushed again, struggling against the acceleration making her arm feel heavier and heavier. It was just out of reach! Gritting her teeth and snarling she surged at it once more, her fingers just brushing the edge, then with her last ounce of strength... Lowered her arm with as much control as she could muster, knowing if she just let it drop her bones would shatter. Too late, the abort motor couldn't pull against this kind of acceleration anyway. Six... seven... eight gees... One by one red lights blinked on all over the warning panel, then something exploded in a hail of sparks. Nine gees... now ten... now eleven... Even grunt breathing couldn't help now. This shouldn't be possible! Darkness danced at the edge of her vision once more, she could feel her bones pressing through her flesh, her eyeballs distorting and blurring. Twelve... thirteen... The capsule creaked and groaned. Something else exploded. The tiny window cracked and shattered, the air rushing out in an instant. Darkness closed in, narrowing her vision to a point. Fourteen... fifteen... then the gauge exploded. Sparks cascaded across the panels, the cabin lights flickered and burst, and the darkness took her.

Just getting THAT far is a huge accomplishment. Moho sucks. Delta-v, that is.