Chapter 9: Going to Work

~~ Delta - July/02 - (Earth - Jan/2095) ~~

Come the Monday, Justin, Stella and Stanley found themselves going off to work.

The rest of the kids were taken to a testing centre with the other new Earth kids and some other new arrivals to Futura from the local populations. This was so the school system could decide where they fit in and what they wanted to do.

The kids told Justin of the weird tests they did over that next three school days. They, in fact, did very few written tests. Most of the tests involved doing some activity or going on some excursion and then discussing it with the teachers or occasionally writing down their experience.

The kids actually had a fun time. After the first day, they didn’t even think of the exercises as tests at all. The got the next two school days off while the teachers decided on what to do with them. On the Friday, they were called in to do interviews with their parents and to decide their curriculum for the rest of the year.

Gloria had described to humans on the ship the strange way they taught here. Lee had adopted a version of the Genteli school system. Here your age was irrelevant. It was all about what you could do, what you couldn’t, and what you wanted to do. These were strange concepts to most of the Earth families.

At the interviews, some of the parents expressed concern about their younger child, being bullied by older kids in their classes. But the teachers just smiled and said that so far, they hadn’t had any problems. The kids were generally too busy having fun, to make trouble. This worried some parents even more. School wasn’t supposed to be fun.

Some of the new teachers from Earth also had to rethink how they taught, in order to fit into this new system. If anything, they had a harder time adjusting than the kids did. While the kids were being tested, the teachers were being re-educated.

The twins had been doing some basic business courses at university before they left. Not knowing what they really wanted to do, more to keep Justin happy. Neither could settle on what she wanted to do, and they still tied to Justin because of the younger kids. Not that either of them thought of moving out.

The school had recommended Jennie changed to teaching, particularly the lower level education stream that covered the first thirty terms (our grades one to five). She found she really liked this idea, as she loved kids. She happily agreed.

They recommended that Jamie should be put in their version of the Police Force and for her to study Law. Several of the teachers deduced she was possibly shield material as well and sent this recommendation to Lee, who also agreed. Justin and Jamie both agreed that Law was a good choice for her.

Brad they decided was destined for Engineering. They recommended Drive Specialist and Mechanical degrees. Brad was more than happy with their choice for him. He’d been trying to get an apprenticeship before they left but had only found part-time work.

He had been considering going to a training college this year or applying at UNSEC until the family decided to move. He had spent a lot more time than his sibling realised, hanging out with Ivan and Iran just so he could learn about starships.

Adison was approved to continue studying to be a vet to her relief. Lyndsay, they had a bit more trouble with but ended up suggesting she do Hospitality and specialise towards being a Chef. To her parents’ surprise, she agreed it was a good choice. Not realising like her teachers did that she planned for her true occupation to be a Mum.

She had told one of them, all good mothers should be able to cook and manage a household, and she liked looking after and feeding people. In spite of her other habits, she had been the main cook at home for a while.

She might even look for part-time work in a restaurant or bar until she got married. So that was why they made the recommendation they did. She was amused to learn later that there were a lot of female Prols, in her classes.

The five youngest kids were placed in different levels of Upper and Middle school. Some classes they shared some they didn’t. Tyson and Kim were in the same term in Upper School. They had recommended Geography for Kim, History for Tyson and Manual Arts for both, as their specialised subjects.

Ariel and Willow were six terms behind them in Middle school. No one was surprised when the teachers recommended Culture and Languages for Ariel. Biology and Chemistry were suggested for Willow, and she was happy with this.

Barbie was nine terms behind the other girls. Barbie hadn’t really liked school in the past and had only done enough to keep Justin off her back. Her new teachers here told her if put in a little more effort, she could jump a term or two as the years progressed.

They also recommended her classes included Multi-media and The Arts, particularly music and dance. While initially not happy, as she was now three years behind Kim, who was only six months older than she was. Barbie soon got over her disappointment when she found that she definitely enjoyed going to her new school.

Her siblings also found they were happy to get up and go to school each morning. They had worked out a term was simply nine weeks of study with the tenth week off. At first, they thought they would be spending a lot of time at school.

They soon realised with only four days of a six-day week at school and there being sixty weeks in a year, it wasn’t that much different from Earth. Even the eight-hour day wasn’t that long as they found they had plenty of work and activities packed into a day.

It didn’t really matter what term you were in as kids left and arrived in all different terms and even studied at different term levels, depending on what they planned on doing next or had difficulties with.

When they got home after the interviews, they sat and read through the curriculum, the subjects that were planed and their class schedules. “This is a fascinating school system,” Justin said.

“Why’s that?” asked Kim looking up from her material.

“I was just looking at these report cards; I suppose they would call them. See how they have different level numbers beside them. Yours have Term level 66 against most of the subjects.”

“I calculate that to mean you’re at an equivalent level of a kid back home that’s just started grade 12. You were going to start grade 11 this year. Barbie’s indicate she is about halfway through grade 8 when she should be starting grade 9.”

Kim nodded, “Sounds about right, Barbie can be a slacker.”

“Hey, that’s not nice,” Barbie exclaimed. “I can’t help it if school sucks.”

Justin grinned and continued, “The only three subjects she is close to her grade 9 levels are Art Music and Multi-media. This is a cool system.”

Tyson looking at his said, “Hmm, looks like I have to pump up the physics a bit. I’m a level behind and that Professor Ian Christian, dude said I have to gain all my minimum levels in the primary eight subjects.”

“If I do that, I can get an apprenticeship at the end of the year. I had a crappy teacher last year, but I think I’m going to like having him for a teacher this year.”

Ariel piped up, “Yeah, I liked that little faerie chick. She said she was going to teach me some of the languages of her people. That would be rad.”

They also found out; they didn’t do final term exams as such. But they did get project completion dates. Everything they did was examined. It may sound daunting, but this was progression-based education. If they didn’t work and refused to learn, then you didn’t progress in the subjects affected.

“Hey, guys if they test us like those tests, we did earlier it’s going to be hard to cheat this system. We are going to have to learn something,” Kim said with glee.

She soaked up material like Justin. She hoped that in this system, she would actually get to use what she learnt. Not just, regurgitate it. The kids were starting to learn, that school here wasn’t just a place to go hang out with their friend. They had objectives to achieve.

This system wouldn’t let them just slide by or slack off.

While his siblings were being tested, Justin got his first taste of working with Prols.

Gavin turned up on his first day to pick him up. His first lesson was how to drive a linger. Justin took to it like a duck to water. He had to buy the older standard of vehicle to fit them all in, so didn’t bother doing the extra driving courses for the lingers.

He also learnt that lingers were public property here. If he needed one and the light over the door was green, he just had to flash his minder over it, and the linger was his. If he wished, he could organise a lease for one.

Most people found it wasn’t worth the cost when it wasn’t hard to find one and use it as you were only charged a pittance for its use. Gavin also gave him the times the airship turned up, and he could use it, to get to and from work in the future. Justin decided this was the way to go.

His next lesson was how to get along with surly Prols. Since he had studied Gemmology, Gavin put him with his gang of gem finders to see what he did.

Lee had also informed Gavin of Justin’s new status as one of her first rookies but would be appreciative if he didn’t advertise it unless Justin talked about it.

Justin was soon introduced to Aegeus Gelia. Aegeus wasn’t pleased he had to train the pup, but he would do his best, he told Gavin. He told Justin to call him Gus, as that’s what the humans had nicknamed him because they can’t say his real name properly.

Gus also told Justin, he had better not expect royal treatment just because of who his dad was. Justin actually found this was a novel experience being judged by whom his dad was, rather than what he could do.

He was soon introduced to the ponies. He was taught how to harness them to the small floating short-sided platforms they towed behind themselves. They told him if they were looking for general minerals, the ponies were used to shift overburden, rocks and material to the big recycler.

For gems, they could use the special washer on the side of the recycler or the smaller portable ones. The over-burden was then shipped off as required. He was given some basic rock chipping gear and a belt, and a miner’s helmet.

Gavin had taken a bit of time to convince the Prols to wear them when inside the tunnels. He wasn’t surprised it took a busted head to convince them safety was best. They even used the gloves and boots he provided and the nice thick suits with reflective strips from the replicators.

Gus walked him down to where some of the Prols were currently working. “Well boy, where do you suggest we dig?” Gus said to him, opening his arms wide to take in the hill in front of them.

Justin walked up and down the slope a little and then climbed up about 4m above where they were currently working. He then walked another 20m to the south. He circled the area before going down diagonally for another couple of metres.

Gus had trailed along behind him, watching what he was doing. At first, he thought the boy was walking around aimlessly until he released the boy would stop and cock his head as if listening for something. He would also sniff the air.

“Would you prefer just sapphires or some rubies too?” Justin asked Gus.

“Some nice rubies wouldn’t go astray. The Genteli like them and they fetch a good price even uncut,” Gus informed him.

“Well I reckon that you will find a reasonable haul about here, but we need to clear about five metres of overburden off first, this section of the hill has slipped into the old wash,” Justin said.

“Five metres, you reckon? Well young man, when you get to them, you call me,” said Gus. He then turned and walked off.

Justin just shrugged. He banged in the four short pickets Gus handed him to mark the entrance area of his mine. He had another look at the visible rock formation and then went to find some better digging tools. He had noticed a small platform that had a machine attached to the top that looked like a digger with a bucket about 1.5m wide.

“Hey guys, can I borrow this machine for a couple of hours?” The men grunted at him and went back to digging with picks, so he assumed that was a yes. He jumped on and realised a lot of the controls were the same as for the linger, except for the three levers for the bucket.

He got it lifted off the ground and drove over to his site. He soon realised it had a height limitation due to its weight. So, he started digging a 3m wide cut out of the hill until he ran out height.

He then steered the machine over his new ‘road’ and kept digging out the side of the hill. He had learnt, as long the ground didn’t slope more than fifteen to twenty degrees the machine could climb up the road, be it slowly.

It took him an hour to build his rough road to his site using the loose rubble to stabilise it and fill in gaps. The side of the hill was loose and easy to move around. He found himself thinking of the road as being packed tighter, and when he shifted material to where he wanted it, it stayed there.

He then started chiselling out his tunnel entrance. Since he had the machine, he made it 220cm high and the same wide, so the digger could keep working into where he wanted to go. He would chop out a section of wall with the teeth and then reverse the bucket to pick up the rock.

He was surprised how easily the rock broke away for him, but the wall was still compact, and the roof stayed in place as he dug. He had to do a bit of fancy manoeuvring until he had built the platform in front of his tunnel out to roughly 4m square and then it got easier.

The bucket could be turned a full 180 degrees. He could turn it 90 degrees one way to chip out the sides with the teeth. He could use the blade to dig back up to maintain the height, or he would bang it into the wall to help fracture the rock. He could go the other way using the blade on the top.

Justin used the rocks he dug out to extend his platform and shore up his road. He also started to notice when he went back into the sunshine, he felt an energy burst and realised that somehow, he was using magic, but he knew he hadn’t said any of the spells he had learnt so far. He would have to talk to Lee or his dad about it.