Smuggler's Dilemma (7 page)

"Anybody home?" I heard Ada’s familiar voice echo through the empty hallway.

"Down here," I answered ruefully. Of
course
she’d chosen this moment to show up.

"Oh my stars! What’s that smell?" she asked as she turned the corner and looked into the head. "Is that…?" She couldn’t finish the sentence.

"Ancient shite? Yes." I finished the sentence for her.

Save video from when I entered ship until now
, Ada instructed.

"You rat!"

"I’m not done," she giggled.
Send video to Tabitha Masters
.

"Oh, you’re dead."

"Let’s not get all worked up. She requested recordings of our lighter moments. Apparently, all she’s getting are your successes."

"But, that?"

"Frak, Cap. What’s that smell?" Marny’s voice filtered down.

"Nothing to be concerned about," I yelled back.

"How about you shut the door while you’re in there?" she responded over the comm.

"That won’t help," Ada joined the comm channel. "He’s got it all over himself."

"Yeah, yeah. Marny, could you help me out by bringing the renobot down from the bridge head?"

"Aye, aye, Cap. It spun down about ten minutes ago. That little bugger did a nice job, it’s the best looking room in the whole ship. I’ll be down in a jiffy."

"Can’t wait to see it. I’ll be in the bilge. That guy’s gonna be here in two hours," I said to Marny. "Ada, you feel like helping out with the septic field?" I was mostly joking and was surprised at her response.

"Sure. I’d like to see what this old tub’s got down there," she said. "But, are you going to scrape some of that off first?" She waved her hand, gesturing to my suit.

The good news was that I’d already removed the remaining furniture from the berth deck and it was ready for the renobot. The bed frames had come off with the merest of tugs. I’d originally been concerned the structure of the ship would be in similar decay, but Jake assured me that the skeleton's stronger alloy was still in perfect shape.

The bad news was I’d not been able to save much. In several cases, the cutting torch was the only way to free up several of the access hatches, pretty much destroying them. I was starting to wonder just how expensive it might be to purchase the little robotic wonder that had so far only transformed the smallest space on our ship. At this rate I could keep it occupied full time.

The bilge was anywhere from one and a half to two meters deep and fixed between the hull and the berth deck. Three systems occupied the space - septic, water and atmospheric. Fortunately, the ship had been designed by naval engineers and everything had originally been very neatly laid out. That said, a hundred and fifty years of patches and work-arounds and we had a mess Mary Shelley would be proud of.

It would work out okay, though. The septic field was the only system on the port side. It was so much easier to remove a bunch of crap (in this case literally) than it was to maintain it. Ada and I worked out a system. I resorted to a long-bladed cutter and started hacking off half meter chunks of the system. I’d decided to start with the slimy end first, since I was already a mess. I packed it into bags and tossed the bags up on the deck. From there Ada carried them off to the hold.

"Cap. Your bot’s in the main head. Door’s closed. Need anything else?" Marny asked over the comm.

"Thanks, Marny. That’s perfect." I was glad for her help. I remotely started the program already loaded for the main head. I think we all eagerly anticipated the sterilization that would occur.

Two hours later I finally threw the last bag up from a hatch in the aft-most bunk room. It's difficult to describe just how disgusting both Ada and I smelled. I’d originally thought she had been saved from the mess, but apparently at some point, she’d thrown a bag up onto her shoulder, mistakenly trusting the holding force of the clasp.

"Nick, you have a minute?" I asked over the comm.

"Yup."

"We may need to ask the fitter to come out another day. I can’t possibly get all this cleaned up by the time he arrives. We’ve got all of the stuff out, but it’s a mess," I said. I also knew there was no way the renobot would be able to negotiate the ribs of the hull that I’d been straddling for the last couple of hours.

"Too late. She’s here," Nick said.

"Shite. Okay. I’ll deal with it."

"
Incoming hail, Sparkles Aloft
," my AI said.

Accept hail
. "Liam Hoffen," I announced.

"Hi, Mr. Hoffen. Betty Sparkles. We’re here to refit your septic system. If you could depressurize your cargo bay and open up, we’ll bring in the fab shop."

"We might have a problem. Any chance you could come and do a quick inspection?"

"Time is money, Mr. Hoffen. And, I guarantee you don’t have anything I haven’t seen before," she said.

"Nick, you and Jake okay if I depressurize the cargo bay?"

"Yup. Marny’s here with us too. Go ahead," he answered.

"Let’s stand in the cargo bay while it depressurizes. I bet we can get rid of a bunch of this stuff that’s on us," I said to Ada. She nodded and we sealed the door behind us. I instructed the ship to depressurize the bay.

I lowered the cargo bay ramp and a small vehicle glided in and settled down on the floor. After raising the ramp and starting the pressurization sequence again, I noticed that Ada had done a pretty good job of brushing the now crystalized crap from her suit, so I did the same.

A large woman - one who would give Marny a run for her money in the size department - walked around from the front of the vehicle. I extended my hand and we shook.

"Alright, Mr. Hoffen. Let’s take a look at your emergency."

"Sorry, we need to equalize pressure with the interior," I said.

"I see. I’ll set my shop up." She pulled the back doors open on the cargo vehicle. It was a cluttered mess with boxes of fittings everywhere. "Here, you can help. Put these boxes on the floor and keep 'em out of that crap you just dropped. The faster we get this done the sooner I’m outta here."

Not a real charmer, this one. Ada and I pulled all of the boxes out and dropped them in a line. As we did, I could see that her shop had two fairly obvious replicators and at least twenty different small robots with varying appendages. I was more than glad when the bay finally completed the pressurization cycle.

"Well. That couldn’t have taken a lot longer," she grumbled. "So what’s the drama you wanted to show me?" Her mood was clearly deteriorating.

I led her through the aft door to the berth deck and pointed at the open bilge hatch. "We haven’t been able to clean up around the ribs. It’s a real mess down there."

She jumped down into the pit, "Your grav generator’s running low. Can you put it back up to .6g? Yeah, you left a right proper mess down here and that’s not in our contract."

"We ran out of time," I said.

"If I leave now, you’ll lose your fifteen hundred credit expedite fee," she said.

I was starting to get annoyed with her attitude and was surprised when Ada stepped in. "I bet you have a service for that. What’s the up-charge for cleaning, repair and paint?" she asked.

"Not sure, wasn’t in the contract. Give me a minute." She brushed past us on the way to her vehicle and returned after a few minutes with a fist sized robot and dropped it in the hole. It hovered, centering in the open space. She instructed the bot and it started traversing the bilge. "It already knows the project, but we only scanned the parts of the hull where we were going to put in the field. I need to fill in the details."

The bot returned after several minutes. Betty Sparkles gestured for several more minutes and finally appeared to have completed her assessment. "Twenty-three hundred credits and I’ll throw in disposal of all of those bags you already pulled out."

"Deal," I said. As soon as I said it a contract showed up in my comm queue. I was suspicious that this was a more common event than she was letting on.

"I’ll need you to keep clear of the aft hallway here while my boys get to work. The more you get in the way, the longer they’ll take."

"Where’s your crew?" I asked.

"You’re standing in their way." She nodded behind me and I turned to see a hovering fleet of robots that had previously been dormant in her fabrication shop. They descended into the bilge one after another. The final robot in the armada flitted between the open hatches, closing them one by one. "I’ll be back in four hours. They’ll be done by then if you stay out of the way."

"You’re not sticking around?" I asked. I was certainly not expecting her to leave, since it was illegal to leave an autonomous robot unaccompanied.

"It’s all in your contract." She brushed past me and through the open door to the cargo bay.

***

Nick had left me with a budget of eighty thousand credits to fix the septic, water and atmospheric systems and as much interior work as possible. We’d gotten off to a bad start with the septic system and the atmospheric system was nearly as bad. We just weren’t going to get everything and I needed to make some tradeoffs. I wasn’t about to skimp on primary systems, so it was going to have to be the interior.

By late Thursday the interior, while a little short on amenities, had at least been thoroughly scrubbed and repainted. In addition to that, we had a new atmo scrubber complete with a full load of O2 crystals. I was amazed at just how cheery the ship looked with the grime and rust-laden metal gone.

"How much of the furniture are you replacing on the bridge deck?" Nick asked. The five of us had ended up back at the pizzeria in University Hills. It was out of the way, but the environment was right.

"The couch on the bridge will be fine, but pilot’s chairs are shot. I’m re-using the Captain’s Quarter’s furniture from
Sterra’s Gift
. I’m also bringing over some of the galley equipment and the screens from the engine room," I answered. "What have you guys been working on? You’ve been awful busy in the tween deck."

"The batteries for the turrets are shot," Marny said.

"I thought we inspected those," I interrupted her.

"We did. They inspect okay, they just aren’t up to combat use. If we hit 'em hard, they’ll deplete and we’ll just be plinking away. Jake here thought he could get 'em repaired, but it’s not going to work."

"How much will that set us back," I asked.

Nick answered, "One hundred-fifty."

"Frak. Where’s that put us?"

"We won’t be able to afford any missiles, but we’ll be okay. We pulled the bridge holo-projectors and navigation system over from
Sterra’s Gift
, and most of the other systems are in good shape. When are you thinking it will be livable? Not that we don’t appreciate the heads working."

"Saturday morning Ada and I will be done with the interior. We’ve got it all planned out. You and Marny are in the forward bunk on berth deck. The rear bunk will be set up with stacking singles. The top bunk will fold up when it isn’t needed. All the rooms will be pretty spartan. Nothing on the floors, but the beds should be comfortable."

"Galley?" Marny asked.

"Roger that. Coffee brewer and Galley-Pro on
Sterra’s Gift
were salvaged but the refrigeration was holed, so we need a new one."

"Any progress on getting us a load yet?" Nick asked. He had a crappy grin on his face, knowing it was an unfair question.

"Yes." The boy should know better than to set me up. "It’s better than you think. Thanks to Lieutenant Belcose, we’re lined up to deliver heavy equipment to the Valhalla Platform and I’ve got a line on nearly a full load to Terrence." I said.

"Who’s Lieutenant Belcose?" Jake asked.

"Yeah, sorry. We’re talking out of turn here Jake," Nick said. "We shouldn’t be quite so free with our information until you’re crew. You understand, I’m sure. Have you given any thought to joining our little fleet?" I was pleased to hear that Nick was ready to hire him. I had a feeling Jake would fit in, but Nick was the one who'd been working with him all week.

"I’m not sure," he said. "I’ve only heard bits and pieces of your story and from what I can tell, you all get into it pretty deep. I know you’re concerned about security, but I need more details before I can answer. Ultimately I’m interested, but I want to know what I’m signing up for."

"Fair enough," Nick said, "Your word that you won’t share what we’re about to tell you?"

"You’ve got it." Jake nodded in agreement.

"Marny?" Nick asked. In normal Nick style, he’d expected to have this conversation and had pre-arranged something with Marny.

"As the security officer for our corporation, I’ve executed a public records search and looked into your background. You’ve led an interesting life, but from my perspective you pose no security threat to the company. I’ll send you the results of the research I’ve done. Please understand, that information will remain confidential between you and me," Marny said.

"Thank you," Jake looked at all of us, perplexed. "Why are you telling me this?"

"It's part of who we are and who we want to be. You need to know that we care enough to look into your background and that we don’t hide important information. It is all about trust. We get in enough scrapes that we can’t afford to be questioning each other."

"I can work with that. So what would I be signing up for?" Jake asked.

"Our primary goal is to be traders, but we’ve been mostly operating as freight haulers," Nick started. "As crew, that difference isn’t huge. As owners, the real money is in speculative runs. Secondarily, we have the designation from Mars Protectorate as Privateers. We carry a Letter of Marque that entitles us to defend ourselves and more importantly lay claim to sundered enemy assets. So far, the vast majority of our net worth has been derived from our secondary activities as Privateers."

"That’s where you got the frigate?" Jake asked.

"The frigate,
Sterra’s Gift
and even the
Adela Chen
," I added.

"So, let me get this straight. You’ve made most of your money by plundering pirates. Doesn’t that make for enemies?"