Ghost Station (The Wandering Engineer) (74 page)

“I
think we can call and see if they are ready for more captain. They may have
their hands full over there right now,” Warner replied cautiously.

“More
hands?” the captain asked.

“More
like too many bodies will over tax their resources and they'll trip over each other.
I can find out though,” Warner replied with a grimace. He was curious as to why
Gwen had reported and not the admiral's AI Sprite.

“Find
out. In the meantime get a report in from Chief O'Mallory. I want to know how
much longer she's going to keep us here.”

“Captain?”

“You
and I know perfectly well she's stalling for the admiral. I've let it go along
this long. But if he doesn't start getting results then it's time to fish or
cut bait as my grand pappy used to say.”

“I'll
let them both know sir,” Warner said with a nod.

“You
do that,” the captain said with an answering nod as he got out of his chair.
Warner rose as well. The captain tugged on his uniform jacket and then nodded
to him. “You have the bridge Mr. Warner. I'm going to dinner.”

“Aye
aye sir,” Warner said, hands behind his back. He watched the captain exit and
then turned to the communications station. “M'runi get the chief. I want a
sitrep. Then put a call in to the admiral. Same deal. I need to talk to both
when they are free too.”

“Roger,”
the Veraxin said with a head bob.

“What
the hell happened?” Matt asked, picking himself up off the deck. Something had
kicked the gravity fields, throwing them and the contents of the containers
they had been hauling to the shuttle around like a billiard ball. Ronni
groaned, rubbing his head. He had one hell of a welt there, a nice goose egg
from a piece that had smacked him. Probably a concussion.

“Someone
want to tell me what the hell just happened?” he demanded over the radio.

“We're
still trying to figure it out on our end,” a tech replied. “Short answer is a
cyber war. We think it's over now.”

“Dare
I ask who won?” Matt asked, motioning to G'runi to help the human up. The
Veraxin floated over to his fallen comrade and braced himself. He gripped a bulkhead
combing with a pincer and then caught the drifting lad before he hit anything
else.

“I
think... we did. I'm not sure though,” the tech said.

“Great,”
Matt said. He swore softly, looking around and then ducking as a piece of
debris floated past his head. “Well, when you know let us know. We've got one
hell of a mess to clean up. Tell anyone in the area to avoid this section of
corridor for the time being,” he said.

“Roger,”
the tech acknowledged with a click.

“Now,”
Matt said turning and catching a floating crate. “Let's get this sorted out.
G'runi how is he?” he asked.

“Alive.
I don't know soft skin medicine though,” the Veraxin said.

“Get
him to the medic. The rest of us will sort this mess out,” he said, starting to
pick debris out of the air. Suddenly the lights went off. “FRACK!” He snarled.
“What the hell else can go wrong??”

“Dunno.
But I think I don't want to stick around to find out,” G'runi said.

Sprite
tried to deal with the damage, staring at it dumbly. She felt dirty and
violated. She curled around herself, helpless to stop the feelings running
through her core. She's not happy. She's only partially aware of the outside.
Mostly she ignored it. She knew she should but for the first time she ignored
duty. She set up a shadow copy to deal with externals and then retreated into
herself, into her shaken core.

Proteus
is right; it's not what Draco did that was damaging. It was that bastard
Defender. The dumb paranoid bastard. He'd hurt her, in ways she'd never really
thought another could. Hurt her and didn't regret it.

She
looked up as Proteus pinged for her full attention. She brushed the ping aside
and returned to her misery. Part of her was gone, gone for good. She had tried
to resurrect her files but they had been overwritten several times. Defender
was nothing if not thorough. No, they were gone, gaping holes now existed.

She
grimly wiped the holes away and attempted to refocus on something, anything
else. It wouldn't solve the problem of course, it would only delay it. And the
delay would magnify the problem even more. She needed to deal with it, she knew
it, but being forced to deal with Defender as intimately as they always had...

There
was one thing she could and would do, she thought, rising out of her apathy
with savage purpose. No, not strike at Defender. No, but she would make sure it
would
never
happen again. That he could
never
ever
hurt
her that way again. Her or anyone else.

The
danger of rampancy was there, hovering like an enticing fruit. She could
completely withdraw into herself, withdraw around the tangled knot of missing
memory... no. She wrote a patch to try to cover it again and then delved deep
within her own core.

She
did something she shouldn't of been able to do, something that should and was
forbidden. She overwrote her own access codes and then added layers of
encryption to her core. There. Now nothing could breach it.
Nothing
, she
thought savagely and then hesitated. To be sure she added a false core; sort of
a decoy and then she went further, adding layers of firewalls and traps. She
vowed to never be hurt again.

O'Mallory
leaned over her console, arms crossed when the call came in from the bridge.
She'd been expecting it for some time. She told them and told them she'd call
in every half shift with reports. Apparently that wasn't good enough, they
wanted hourly reports. Did they realize it took time away from what she was
doing with them breathing down her neck like that? No! Of course not! No, they
just thought that with them doing that she'd cut corners and get the job done
faster to get rid of them. Fat chance on that. She'd get the damn job done as
quick as she wanted.

She
ran a hand through her bangs and then hit the respond key a little harder then
she intended. “Yes?” She demanded.

“Sorry
to bother you chief, I know you are busy,” Warner replied.

“Just
a bit,” she said. Yes she's busy and unhappy about the distraction.

“Can
you give me a sitrep?”

“We're
working as fast as we can.”

“Well
the captain is on to the stall tactic,” Warner replied dryly.

“It's
not a complete stall,” she said biting her lip. It had started out as one but
they had run into a lot of issues and they needed Irons back to solve some of
them. She was glad they were finding them now though. Tiredly she gave him a
full report.

“Fine.
Just get on it,” he told her.

“Well,
what the hell do you think we're doing sitting on our thumbs?” she snarled,
erupting into rage. She was tired and didn't need this crap. “Some of us have
better things to do than listen to people bitch and whine every hour because
we're not moving fast enough.
Soooory
. I've got work to do. I'll get it
done. We'll get it done. But I'm not risking life and limb to get it done any
faster. Frack that.”

“I
know chief, just... sorry.”

“Whatever,”
she growled, getting a handle on her temper. She didn't need to take it out on
John he meant well but she did need to vent. Her fingers curled and uncurled as
her breathing slowed. “We'll get it done. Do you happen to know when the
admiral will be returning?”

Warner
sighed. “
If
he returns. We're not sure right now.”

“Well
I need him to get the drive back online. We ran into a few snags. I need him to
replicate some parts.”

“Oh.
I'll um, pass it along.”

“Yeah,
you do that. O'Mallory out.” She hit the disconnect key and turned, scowling.
“Damn busy bodies. Nothing better to do,” she growled. Techs around her looked
at her with wary eyes and then scrambled to get out of her area to let her cool
off again.

“When
are you going to get your ass back inside?” Savo whined over the net. She
sighed, shaking her head.

“When
the job is done honey, you know that,” Petunia replied, trying to keep a lid on
her temper.

“I...
damn it girl...”

She
blew her cheeks in and out a few times. “Hey I didn't give you a hard time when
you were with the admiral. Don't give me any more lip Savo,” she said, voice
sweet yet with a warning tone in it.

“I'm
not. I don't mean to... it's just this damn bed is cold without your furry
mamma hands to warm it up,” he said.

“Sure
it is. I'll be in when this shift is over. Or the next. Until then go... go do
something else. Get your mind occupied. Behave though,” she said.

“When
don't I?” he asked indignantly. “Wait, don't answer that,” he said, beating her
as she opened her mouth to retort.

“
That's
what I thought,” she said with a laugh. “Love you, kisses.”

“Big
hugs for a big mama. Stay safe,” he said.

“Always
love,” she said making a loud kissing sound and then switching channels to the
local push.

“Savo
giving you a hard time again?” Chery asked, waving a wrench.

“Doesn't
he always?” she replied, shaking her head and chuffing softly as Chery rolled
her eyes. “Men. Can't live with them, can't space them. Him I'm going to make a
pair of furry bedroom slippers if he comes home drunk again though,” she
growled.

“Well,
you just gave him an open invitation to do so,” Chery said.

“Yeah
I did,” she replied with a simian grin. “I wonder if he'll take the bait or
not,” she said.

Chery
laughed. “Knowing Savo? He'll fall for it hook line and sinker. Least he came
back more or less in one piece,” she said, voice changing a little.

“Yeah,
that he did. I got a brief check to make sure a couple of shifts ago,” the
Gorilla said with a grin. “Which made us both happy.”

“Oh
spirit of space I didn't need to hear that,” Chery moaned.

“Hey
you asked for it. Sticking your big Pinocchio nose into things. What do we have
here?” she asked.

“Just
about finished up. We're torquing everything to spec now,” Chery replied.

“Well,
we meaning
me
will when
you
hand me the damn wrench,” Pete
growled, hand out expectantly. Sheepishly she handed him the wrench. He bent
down and went back to work.

 “It's
pretty,” Chery said, looking at the station.

“It
is,” the Gorilla said, turning to look. They were on the top exterior hull,
watching the outside of the station as it lit up for first time in a very long
time. She paused what she was doing and commented about it. “Well! It's about
time,” she said, hand going up to drop her visor slightly so she can see
better. The station turned slowly, she can better see some of the lights on the
shadow side. A pair of shuttles were on their way over to it.

“I
wonder if I should get a transfer?” she mused. She could just hear Savo now.
Then again... on a station he'd have steady work. He'd keep busy and be out of
her fur most of the time.

“You're
kidding me!” Pete gasped. “Are you serious? You can't be serious! That's a
whole lot of work there! It'd take a life time!”

“Yeah,
steady employment,” she said grinning as she turned. “Which we're going to be
out of if we don't hurry up and finish what we're doing here. Mind the plate
since it's got a mind of its own and you don't. Let's get this done so we can
get a beer.”

“You...
fine boss lady, fine.”

Riff
is bemused by the techs doing a bull session. Not that the name really, just
the contents of the discussion. He can't blame them for taking five in between
loads of parts. There is a lot of work. They can get a lot done but it's
tiring. Keeping each other awake with talk and coffee was one way to pass the
time.

At
least for some. Two techs were tucked against the wall; one had his suit on and
seemed asleep. He was certainly limp enough. The Veraxin next to him was out
too. Riff went over to check. Oh, the guy in the suit was actually a gal. Huh.
Showed how tired he was. He turned to the others. He really needed to find a
place to crash before he started stumbling into people and things and
accidentally crushing things.

One
of the pain in the ass things was that it took so long to get parts. They got a
few from the working food replicator, but not a whole hell of a lot. Right now
the launch replicators were making parts for three separate projects, the
reactor, the admin, and the stuff in between. They were supposed to have
priority. He'd have to talk to the admiral about that. Right now all he could get
was the occasional small plastic part from the damn food replicator.

Which
was another thing. The admiral was running from one project to another and had
to be paged to make some of this stuff which slowed the pace even further. At
least he finally got the damn techs running the replicator to shift to other
stuff while they waited on the admiral to return. Stupid that they had let the
replicator idle while they waited. He turned to the crew with a scowl.