Ben walked backwards keeping and eye on the two guys as the captain and Doc pushed the pallet to the airlock. When they opened the first hatch and started going through, the two guys ran off. Ben stepped through the door backwards trying to keep an eye on the corridor in both directions. The captain opened the inner airlock door and started stacking boxes inside. "I hope this stuff is vacuum rated." After about 3 minutes, the pallet was empty. The captain said "OK, let's go!" Ben took one last look down the corridors and shut the first hatch. All three of them climbed in on top of the food and shut the inner airlock door. The captain pushed the spacesuit depressurize button and set it for 40 kPa. The air-pressure started to drop slowly.
Amelia came over the comms. "Captain! We have new contacts. They coming from the opposite direction of the Big Sis ship. They just started using their radar. It's the only way I knew they were there."
Attie in a concerned voice "Any idea of who they are? Any more detailed..." Ben hit the captain, yelled and pointed toward the inner airlock window. The captain looked. The two men were back, were armed, and were coming through the first door. They looked at the pallet and then up a them. They lifted their rifles, but then looked around at the airlock and apparently decided not to fire.
Amelia said "You cut out, Captain. What were you.." Attie interrupted "We have two armed guys that are back for us, but we're jammed in the airlock like sardines with all this food. There isn't shit we can do for...3 more minutes! Shit! They are trying to find a way to override the airlock." A gunshot rang out. "One of them is trying to use a pistol to hit the air lines or controls or something!."
She came back on "Hold on. So you guys are good in the airlock right?"
Attie said "Yeah! But I don't know how long".
She came back "Alright. Hang on. You're not going to like this."
Attie asked back "What are you going to do?"
Amelia turned off the gravity plates and turned on the gravity drives. The 30 second alarm went off, but she just hit the emergency override and they switched instantly. She heard AJ yell and she yelled back. "Hold on to something!!"
Using the grav drive plates, she swung the ship around and applied throttle. The front of the ring smashed into the airlock gantry.
Attie yelled "Holy Shit! What are you doing crazy woman!"
She confidently replied. "Saving your asses!"
Attie yelled "Good! Keep doing it! That really freaked them out!" Both men were scrambling to get to their feet and get out of the gantry-way. The airlock turned green and the captain said "Helmets!" The gantry-way swung again as Amelia rammed the ship into it. A wave went down and back from the airlock to the station. The two men finally retreated to the inner door, and as they crossed its threshold one opened fire back into the gantry-way. Bullets hit the airlock. The inner portal glass shattered and the captain, Doc and Ben's suits crushed in on them. Ben lifted his shotgun and blew out the outer portal window. The pressure dropped fast forcing the two men to close their hatch. The captain cringed. "Goddamn that was loud Ben! But good call. Amelia, they're gone, but we need to get all of us and this food over to you. She said "No problem now. I have the drives back up. I'll dock with you in a second."
The captain watched out the broken portal. He saw the mangled and crumpled front of the Discretion move past, the secondary hatch appear, and then watched it come at them. The ship and the gantry-way clamped to each other. Atticus opened the outer hatch and the three of them and all the boxes floated free. When he got across he opened the Discretion's outer door. "There won't be enough room for us and these supplies, so lets get all this in there and we'll go on the second cycle." Ben nodded.
Attie said "Amelia. We've loaded all the food. Have AJ and Helen unload it."
She said "Already told them to. Attie, about the new contacts, from what our sensors are saying, there are four large ships and they're only 500 kilometers out! We also have the high velocity Big Sis ships about to pass"
Attie asked "What are the new..."Amelia interrupted "I'm picking up gamma rays reflecting off the new contacts. They must be fighting with the Big Sis ships, although I don't see how they could really hit each other at the speed differential..wait, no! It's not them. It has to be the single Big Sis ship that slowed down after us. The doppler shift from the reflection suggests a much lower velocity.
Attie asked "Are the new contacts firing back?"
Amelia said "I don't know. Let me put the sensors on the approaching slow Big Sis ship."
Helen came over the comms. "OK, Captain everything is in the ship, you guys can come in."
The captain opened the outer door once more and all three of them stepped in and shut it again.
Attie said "OK, we are in the lock. I assume you've plotted a course to Uranus, so lets go!"
Amelia said "OK, here we go!" She released the docking clamps, the ship spun about 45 degrees and everyone was slammed against the edge of the airlock and then the floor. She continued "OK, we are set for Uranus via a slingshot past Ganymede..should give us a little boost. As for the new ships, they are firing back using infrared...lasers, I assume."
The captain looked through the inner portal and smacked the door "Come on Come on! I've had enough with damn airlocks today!" The lock turned green. Everyone started to remove their helmets and suits and the captain hit the full pressurization button. He waited impatiently, and then looked at Ben. "What the hell is that smell?"
Ben bit his lower lip as a smile grew. "My waste recycling system didn't quite do its job."
The captain said "Dammit Ben! What the hell have you been eating!? Jesus!" He banged on the inner hatch "Get me outa here!" AJ who was watching, shrugged, and started to laugh. Even Doc, who was plugging his nose, couldn't help but laugh. All the stress just let go and everyone was falling down in uncontrollable hysterics. The airlock finally reached full pressure and the captain jumped out and then Doc right behind him. The captain started to close the hatch behind him and pointed at Ben. "Hell no! You keep your stinky ass in there!" Ben pushed back, laughing. The captain said "Get yourself cleaned up and service all these suits. I am sure they need their CO2 scrubbers changed anyway and just make sure this kind of thing doesn't happen again."
Ben, still chuckling "Well, we have been using them a hell of lot and they aren't meant for this kind of continuous use."
AJ waved at his nose "Especially not your kind of continuous use!"
Attie finally made it to up to the bridge. Amelia looked at him while trying not to laugh anymore. As he sat in the co-pilot's chair, he asked "What's the situation?".
Amelia tried to straightened her mouth out to speak. "Well, I had to readjust the drives, as the new plates aren't pointed exactly where they were before, but" She paused, trying not to laugh again. "We have plenty of power. Our course takes us on such a trajectory, that it just happens that Ganymede is in a good position to give us a slingshot assist. With that, we should reach Uranus in about 90 days, running the drives at maximum power the entire way."
Attie watched her still trying not to laugh. He jumped at her and kissed her. "Thanks for saving our asses back there. I love you!" She looked at him, her smile finally fading and she kissed him back. She started to stand, but her seat straps restrained her, so she pulled him in.
From behind, Helen cleared her throat and they both looked up, lips still locked. When they saw Helen staring at them, they parted. Attie tried getting his composure. "What's up?".
Helen pointed to the galley. "Everything is stowed and put away." She then pointed to the airlock. "A few cans didn't make all the pressure changes, we will be eating those tonight." There was bean soup and other liquids on the floor around the hatch. The captain hadn't even noticed until she pointed them out.
He said "Great, Helen. Thank you."
She asked "So what's going on?"
The captain said "Well, we are on our way to Uranus and...Amelia, what about those ships?"
The four new ships, correction, the THREE new ships....I think one of them must have been destroyed! They are only 300 kilometers away now, but they will be receding from us fast as we accelerate away."
Attie said "Let's deploy my scope." About a minute later his scope emerged from the hull and turned to aim at the new mystery ships. Their image appeared on the display. The image got better as they watched while the images were statistically improved.
Amelia said "Wow, that's way better detail than we had with the other ships!"
Attie pushed a control button "Yeah, they're a hell of a lot closer. Look. That's the Oorter flag. They're Oorter ships. How the, or when did they get the capability to build their own capital ships?!"
Amelia pointed to the image "Look, that one obviously has been destroyed and look at that one sparkle!"
Attie looked closer " They must be here to protect the Io Station, but those Big Sis ships are pounding them."
Amelia spoke up "Well, not anymore. The Big Sis ship that was after us is showing up as multiple objects now."
Attie looked. "Crap! Then who's hitting the remaining ships?" Attie thought for a second "It has to be the high speed Big Sis ships. They've already passed us, right? And are receding away fast, but those are big ships and bigger targets. Maybe they can hit them."
Attie sat back in his chair "Its happening again. But, so fast!"
Amelia looked at him seriously. "What Attie? What's happening?"
Attie looked over at her. "When we fought the Blue Balls for freedom from Earth, the big three corps who took the freedom we fought so hard over, were really worried about the same thing happening to them from those that went out to the edges of the Solar System. They put up all these blockades to try to stop smuggling to the outer worlds to stop the build up of power. I always knew it was inevitable, but so quick!? I hope this isn't the start of another massive war." He shook his head. "It never ends."
Amelia touched Attie's face. "There isn't anything you could have done. We still have each other, all of us, a family. What more could you ask for than this?"
He sighed "Damn, I feel helpless sometimes." Then he sat up. "Let's take a closer at one of those plates and see if we can't figure out what the hell is so damn special that the entire solar system is willing to go to war over them."
The captain walked over to the crate that contained the 3 remaining plates and pulled one out. Doc walked in and the captain looked up at him and asked "Can you bring me the transcript of what that Duane guy was thinking?" Doc nodded and walked off. Amelia came up behind Attie and put her hand on his shoulder. He looked up at her. "What do you think?"
She took the plate from him and looked closely at it. "Let's go into the galley and put some more light on it."
As they walked into the galley, AJ was sitting there eating a sandwich. "Hey. Is that one of the drive plates?"
The captain said "Yeah. Sure is. We are going to try to figure out what it does, besides the normal grav plate function." The captain lifted the plate up onto the table. "AJ, can you move your dish?" AJ quickly grabbed his dish and set it on the counter. He turned back around and leaned over the new grav plate while taking a big bite of the sandwich. A bit of pickle fell out and onto the plate.
Amelia scolded "AJ!"
He quickly wiped the pickle bit off. "Sorry, I'll just stand back here and watch."
The captain looked at him, nodded with a bit of a smile and then looked back at the plate. "What are these wing-let looking things on the side?"
Amelia said "Not sure, but you can see they have small actuator motors here and here. They are on tiny worm drives, probably for very precise movements."
Attie looked at the motor and then more closely at the wing-lets. "They look like they are just smaller versions of the main plate. Why would you want to have smaller grav drive plates at an angle from the bigger one? Faster maneuvering?"
Doc walked in with the brain scanner and said "Here you are Captain. I sorted out the information into sections. Oorters, locations, his personal life, information specific to this smuggle, codes..." Attie interrupted "Great Doc. Let me see that. Where is the information related to this cargo? Do you have that?"
Doc pointed to the screen and pushed a few buttons "There, that's everything we picked up about this smuggle that I could tell."
The captain read through it. "There is a hell of lot here."
Doc agreed "Yes, but the device has a neural interface, so you can sort through it with your own mind. I'm not really sure how to use it, but I know it can be done."
The captain said "Yeah, we used to have something similar back in the war, albeit much more primitive. I think you pull these leads out and place them on your forehead like so. Then you click the data playback function like so....hmm....this is interesting. There are two options. I wonder what this one does."
Everyone at the table jumped. After a few seconds, Amelia said "I can see the information. Doc and AJ said "Me too."
The captain stood there for a second sorting through information. "So can we all search the information at the same time?"