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Deck.
    He held his RFID hand to the panel and the doors slid rapidly aside.
    The huge hangar-like deck looked similar in area to the level with Reichs’s shelter except with no stored gear, only shuttles and support equipment. We passed through the doors onto a small, sunken landing surrounded by a transparent blast wall extending above head height. The short flight of metal steps turned right, onto the port side of the flight deck. Running alongside the port bulkhead of Module 6 ran the runway. It wasn’t parallel to the edge of the module, rather it pointed outward, intersecting the side of the module at the aft end, toward the launch tube. Although it was closed during operations, the tube would extend outward, toward the stern as a continuation of the straight runway. The shuttle could then line up along the runway and maneuver through the tube into space. I turned my head full left and saw the front part of huge bore tube retracted into the module. The rest of it sat behind us, flush to the outside of Module 6. Powerful rams installed inside the rear of the module could push the tube into its operational position. Another launchway ran along the starboard side with the same two-tube arrangement for landings on the deck above. One shuttle stood at the end of the launchway as if waiting for an order that never came. In the center fifty-percent of the deck, more than a dozen shuttles—both personnel and cargo—waited in a neat double chevron pattern. Above them hung a lightbulb-shaped control hub looking down on it all. A narrow suspended walkway connected the control bulb to the fore and aft stairwells.
    “You still have the battery?” he said.
    I tried to answer without being rude.
    “Err yeah ... that’s what I’m holding.”
    “Alright then! Let’s go slot it in and give her a spin, cowboy!”
    The shuttle looked close due to its size but didn’t feel like it lugging the battery while listening to Reichs’s ramblings. It was about a three hundred feet, in reality.
    “So this is the one that worked before, the partial startup sequence before the battery failed?”
    “This is the one.”
    The nosecone lay on the deck in front of the shuttle and Reichs already had a stepladder folded on the ground nearby.
    “Guess you’d better take the old one out first, peasant.”
    I half chuckled, half-sighed at his audacity as I placed down the battery.
    “ Sure , let me get this one since you asked so nicely.”
    “You might need to get inside. It just unclips—no need for tools.”
    I climbed the ladder, reached into the dark recess and felt around. After using the flashlight, I managed it no problem, retrieving the battery and taking the new one from Reichs to slot it in. Given he thought me a peasant, I was surprised he didn’t leave me to get it myself. He tested my patience more than anyone I’ve ever met and I had to constantly fight the urge to do unpleasant things to him. But for all his faults, he had something of a plan and knew his way around.
    “So how do we start this thing up and see if it works?” I said.
    “There are two ways,” he said, half-whispering as if it was some kind of secret. “From inside the shuttle or ...” he pointed up to the control bulb, “... from the terminal that’s still working up there. You probably noticed, this shuttle has no cockpit —it’s unpiloted and can be controlled from the Juno Ark . That’s the ship we’re on, you know …”
    “Okay, well how about we save our legs and just do it from inside the shuttle?”
    “I will surely consent to that, my dear peasant. Lead the way.”
    So we climbed the shuttle’s built-in steps and took a left into the tiny control alcove in the nose. Not really a cockpit, but the closest thing to one on an unpiloted shuttle. There was barely enough room for us both in the dingy space. Giving the flashlight to Reichs, he opened a panel door concealing an array of hardware switches and buttons as well as a dead