Rolling Jade

The Rolling Jade banked sharply around the mangled rubble of asteroids fighting diligently to smash her into tiny bits. The crew lazily manned their stations scanning and watching for the money deposits to show themselves. The crew of the Rolling Jade under Captain Cosrow ventured out into the void for months at a time to conduct mining ops and survey operations for the Co-op they were a part of. The Dervin Alliance Co-op allowed a smaller fleet of ships to operate more efficiently and without the grind that the larger corporations demanded of their fleets and captains.

Captain Jake Cosrow treated his crew fairly and provided them with a solid paying job. Many of the crew in the past had changed out regularly. Always seeing the dollar signs afforded to them by the Corporations. Jake however, always stayed true to his word. His motto was always honest day, honest pay. Some of the jobs they had to do were a little tougher than others, but when the opportunity arose, the crew was always well fed and rested. Jake felt that having a sharp crew was better than grinding them into dirt and having someone get killed for something that was avoidable.

Space mining was already dangerous. Someone who wasn’t alert wasn’t just a danger to themselves, but a danger to all around them and Jake did not tolerate that. Commander Samantha Oslow kept a watchful eye on the crew. The ground rules for employment on the Rolling Jade were simple. Do not disrespect the captain. Do not disrespect the commander. Do not consider any sort of intimacy or relationship with the captain or the commander. Do not fraternize with other crew mates unless you can do so without disrupting the flow of work on the ship. Work hard. Get plenty of rest. Listen to orders. Always be safe.

Many people would think that these rules are somewhat odd, but they have served well on the Rolling Jade for 20 years. Jake received the commission of the ship from his father Arden. He had opted to retire with his family on Earth after 15 years. The Rolling Jade was a big gamble for Jakes family. They had banked everything they had to acquire her from a ship dealer in Earth Orbit. Jakes Father had been a miner for the Laspet Mining Consortium for nearly 30 years. In that time, he had worked barges, miners, hand rigs, pod rigs and flown cargo frigates. His hand had been on a flight stick since he was only 15. So after marrying Sherry and having their first child Jake, Arden decided it was time to build a legacy.

For several years Sherry and Arden scoured the dealerships looking for the perfect ship. It had to be nimble. It had to be just barely medium sized (about 300 feet) to fit in some close contact asteroid situations. It had to have bunk pods for crew and two or three staterooms. It had to have a full galley, small fitness area, bathrooms, plenty of water storage and reclamation. It had to have a tough skin and a host of other minor things. One of the major concerns was having an attached tender pod for hauling and keeping containers at station.

The Rolling Jade had a series of cargo clamps on the exterior. She also had a retractable assembly mid ship that would extend the thruster assembly out to accommodate more containers. The overall length of the ship would go from 300 feet to 720 feet. The twin haulers would be attached over the port and starboard container sections to add additional maneuvering and thrust while heading to the staging site and returning from the project. Larger ships had actual cargo bays with a half dozen support ships hauling in cargo. The Rolling Jade could go out to a site, unload the cargo pods and keep them at station with one or both of the tenders. The tenders would provide maneuvering capability to the containers making them almost a second ship or even third if they both managed pod bundles. Typically, Captain Cosrow would keep one tender aboard ship while in mining configuration. This would allow the second tender to either be crewed by two personnel or operate under remote guidance from the Jade. Most of the time they could keep the containers stationed on remote. However, there are the times when the density of the field or the material density could obscure the communication signal. While the tenders could remain at a safe point and maneuver, when necessary, Jake preferred to crew the tender when the circumstance could occur.

The ship itself was a mottled tan, brown, grey and black from decades of repairs and maintenance. The boxy looking ship had curves in the front for better viewing from the cockpit. Additional small recesses along the hull housed viewing windows for bunks, rooms and observation areas. The hull was mostly devoid of any protrusions. Any protrusions from the hull were able to be laid down or retracted. This was to prevent any unnecessary damage or scraping points while maneuvering through the clusters. Another reason Arden had wanted the ship so badly, was because it could go where the larger corporate vessels couldn’t. This usually meant slightly more danger, but typically it also meant a better payout for the crew. Larger ships would focus on scooping as much as they could from the perimeter and handling rough processing on the ship. This was an arduous task for the rock rollers. These people would operate for 8 to 10 hours a day breaking down asteroids in the holds and sorting them out by rubbish and money material. The rubbish was often jettisoned wherever they happened to be, creating a debris cloud around the ship. These debris clouds had claimed many smaller light skinned ships in the past.

The Rolling Jade could take direct shots from this type of debris field at a slower velocity, but still it was not recommended to do so. Much investment had been made over the years to increase sensor resolution and area defense screens to prevent unwanted damage to the ship. In a nutshell, the Rolling Jade was a highly functional yet homely looking ship. For the crew of 10 plus 2, she was home.

Aboard ship, the engineer and assistant had sleeping pods in the rear of the ship as well as a small galley and bathroom. This arrangement was primarily used for sleeping and bathroom use. But also, for coffee. The team of two were seldom isolated from the rest of the crew during transits, but when they hit a large payout and required the additional storage for the zip out bags, the transit tunnel from the engine room to the front of the ship had to be retracted and stored. The zip out bags were used for small, easily packable ores and minerals. They used a large hose to feed each bag system from the tender. It was not a particularly pleasant system since there were so many bags, but the crew never complained when the captain orders their deployment. It meant college debt and fancy toys we're going to be paid for. It was not something the Rolling Jade did lightly though. There were large risks using the bags. They had the ability to shrink the interior liner around the load, but the bags had to be checked thoroughly and when used, they needed to be full. If there was a shift in midflight, the bag could rupture and send debris into any number of unpleasant places. The captain and commander both visually inspected each back as they were filled. There were some occasions where the captain would enter the bag and ensure the cargo was being filled properly.

Much like the hard-shell storage pods, the bags implemented a gravity plate. The gravity plate would allow the cargo to enter and settle in an efficient way. However, the bags had a ramping gravity plate. This would increase and decrease gravity as the cargo was entering the bag. The hard-shell storage pods could use a dedicated gravity plate since the plate side was heavily armored and designed to house large debris and cargo at Earth gravity. This was because the pods would be sent down the elevator on Earth to be processed there. The bags would have to be carefully undocked and placed into specialized hard-shell containers upon arrival at the co-op, otherwise the bags could tear or become unstable entering Earth atmosphere.

The forward part of the Jade had all the business. The cockpit had sensor operators and communications. Usually, one of each. If they were hard attached on an asteroid, which happened occasionally. Both stations were manned until the ship released from the asteroid. If they were hard attached to the asteroid and a random bouncer came at them, they needed to be able to release quick. On a rare occasion they could roll the asteroid to act as a shield, but the fuel cost was ridiculous so not the preferred method. Two things. First, a bouncer is an asteroid that manages to sneak through the sensors predictions and rapidly alters course in a new direction after bouncing off another asteroid. Second, hard attached is a clamp and drilling system in the landing gear of the ship that pulls and anchors the ship to the asteroid. This makes surface mining easier and lower risk. It also allows for the ship to relocate smaller high-density asteroids that are high in profitable materials. This practice is called tugging. It is only used when processing is going to produce little to no waste and only when too big to move with a single tender.

The Rolling Jade also has modular maneuvering plates that can be fired from the ship and anchored at various points on an asteroid. This allows the asteroid to be remotely piloted and removed from the debris field. It also allows the asteroid to be attitude adjusted if the spin is too high for the crew to land on. Asteroid impacts on other asteroids cause all kinds of havoc. This includes spinning equipment off the asteroid when it gets clipped and begins to spin rapidly. It is also a good way to lose a grew member. Typically, when teams are mining or placing charges, on an uncertain asteroid, the maneuvering plates are placed first.

The other six members of the crew are comprised of pilots, operators, demolitions, medical, and rock jockey. The entire crew rotates on rock jockey duty at one point or another. Depending on the job site. Sometimes a four-person team does all the physical labor on the asteroids. It really depends on the job. Typically, the captain stays aboard ship. Sensors and comms will assist with other projects when the captain and commander take those positions. Engineering always has one engineer in it. There are always two people in engineering, so if the alternate engineer is in the rack or out of engineering, one of the crew will man the secondary post. Without engines and life support, the ship and all the people inside die. So, there is always two people in engineering. Every potentially dangerous job is crewed by two, so all jobs basically.

Asteroid assignments are four-person teams always, sometimes more. Examples of asteroid assignments are, hand pick, suit ops, survey, anchor and tether, tender drop and charge assignments. Hand pick is when the team uses manually operated tools to scratch the asteroid and determine composition. Suit ops are when a team is assisting with any project where suits are required. Anchor and tether are two different ops. Anchor is typically applied to the ship when it hard mounts the asteroid. But anchor can also mean manually attaching a particular piece of equipment. Various drills and probes require anchoring. Tether is probably the most dangerous operation the Rolling Jade does. It is how it got its name. The Rolling Jade used to be registered as the Jade. A co-op ship saw Arden performing the most interesting maneuver in the Jade. The crew had tethered 12 asteroids to the grab hook on the Jade. During the maneuver, a couple minor impacts had caused instability on the tether. Arden began rolling the ship and goosed the throttle in stages and kept the asteroids from getting everyone killed or entangled in another cluster. When the captain of the other co-op ship saw the jade shooting out of the cluster like a bullet at some point the two captains began calling the Jade the Rolling Jade after the Arden maneuver.

Tender drop is a clever way to word suit ops being delivered to the asteroid. The tender often acts as a shuttle for crew to get to an asteroid. Charge assignments are drill and crack. The team will drill strategically placed holes and insert appropriate explosives. This is dangerous, but also a very efficient way to separate off high concentration profitable materials from low concentration garbage.

A day in the life on the Rolling Jade. Don’t die.