“Oh goodie, you're finally awake!" she grinned exuberantly. "Come on, I want to show you something!" the perky teenage bubbled, her excitement contagious.

“What is it?" John asked groggily, still not quite fully awake. The beautiful young woman swung Lithely over him before pivoting gracefully and landing nimbly on her feet.

“Come and see!" she called to him over her shoulder, as she skipped out of the room.

John roused himself and followed the girl out of his cabin. He strolled into the cockpit and sat down in the pilot's chair, spinning it to face her. Alyssa suddenly seemed nervous, as though she was apprehensive about revealing her surprise now that he was there and waiting.

"I plotted a new course to the core worlds" she said, hesitantly.

“Please take a Look, and see what you think."

John nodded agreeably and turned to look at the holo-display, curious to see what his protégé had been up to. The display sprung up before him, clearly showing their current path through the upcoming star systems highlighted in blue. The computer helpfully displayed an ETA next to his blue course, the digits indicating fifteen days. Alyssa reached over and her fingers flickered, summoning up the overlay showing her proposed course highlighted in green. He Looked over at the summary for the green course, wondering how Alyssa had got on and was shocked to see the result... ten days.

“There must be some kind of mistake," John thought to himself, as he double checked the summary. No, the course was definitely plotted from their current location to his intended core world system. He began to zoom in to the system charts, Looking at the route in more detail as it wove its way from star to star.

He was able to follow the calculations for a while, before some things didn't look right. He was about to point out what he believed to be several mistakes when he suddenly remembered that the Navi-computer had confirmed the girl's course was valid. He turned to look at his young companion and saw that she was nibbling on one of her nails nervously, awaiting his verdict.

“This is absolutely incredible Alyss: he smiled at her in wonder, shaking his head in disbelief. A huge grin broke out on the beautiful young woman's face.

“I must admit I couldn't follow what you did here," John pointed to a key location on the course.

"Oh I did some research and tried something new! It's called warp tunnelling!" she answered animatedly. "You can create the effect by oscillating the hyper-wake...." Alyssa launched into a complicated explanation of Astrophysics that went way beyond his layman's understanding of the subject.

John turned and pushed a button on the console, confirming that her newly plotted course should be laid in for the ship.

"I'm in awe honey, you seem to have surpassed my navigation skills," he admitted honestly.

“I'll let you plot our course from now on."

“Yay!!" Alyssa clapped excitedly. The teenager was suddenly nervous again as she reached behind her and picked up her ID. She passed it over to him, a pensive Look on her face.

“What is it Alyssa, are you ok?" John asked, surprised by her abrupt change in mood.

“Please scan it," Alyssa requested cautiously. "Your ID? I don't understand..." John replied, somewhat confused. He turned to the console again and scanned in the girl's ID. He waited a moment for the readout to confirm her details.

“Alyssa Marant"

“Age 18"

“No outstanding warrants"

“Navigator First Class"