Freelance On The Galactic Tunnel Network

by E. M. Foner

  “Two for fifty,” she agreed. “How was your trip in?”

  “It’s just an hour and a half by floater on auto-pilot. I belong to AirShare so it’s cheaper than renting. You said that you’re scouting freelancers for the Galactic Free Press?”

  “Yes, in part. I’ve been contacting all of your colleagues who used to work for the news syndicates and had articles picked up by my paper. If you have anything you’re working on right now, I can put you in touch with the head of the freelance department, but my real job here is to convince you to organize a new syndicate. My bosses would rather work with one group than manage hundreds of new freelancers.”

  “A number of us have been discussing setting up our own syndicate, but we’re still trying to work out how to finance the office and support staff with enough left over to make a living,” Bryan told her. “Most of us do some work for the local rags, primarily sports reporting or politics, but aside from the main daily in a few of the big city-states, none of the papers have the readership to pay for investigative journalism.”

  “That’s what my boss figured. I don’t want you to think that I’m here handing out candy, but if you can put together a convincing business plan, the Galactic Free Press may be willing to help subsidize your launch,” Ellen told him.

  “Just like that?” the journalist replied skeptically. “If we set up as a new syndicate, that means we’ll be selling the same stories to your potential competitors.”

  “I’m just a freelancer they tapped for this job, not management.”

  “You know, I wouldn’t have agreed to see you if I hadn’t read your story about the longevity scam. That was a fine piece of reporting.”

  “And I really appreciate that you’re here,” Ellen said. “I hate talking over that cell phone, and none of the other journalists from your old syndicate were willing to come, even though I’m pretty sure some of them lived closer than you.”

  “They delegated me,” Bryan said. “Everybody is scrambling to make a living, and there was no point in all of us coming if you were really here to pitch us some scheme where we pay you to get our stories published.”

  “Is that even a thing?”

  “It is on Earth. Some of the papers that used to buy our syndication feed replaced us with vanity news.”

  “People writing about themselves?”

  “Pretty much. A chunk of what goes in the local papers was always press releases from businesses or stories rewritten from the student teacher-bot news. But lately there are more and more people who write articles about themselves or something they’re involved in, and then pay to get the stories published. Vanity news.”

  “But who would want to read that?”

  “The papers don’t care because they make their money upfront.”

  “I guess the press on Earth must be pretty desperate,” Ellen said. “I suppose the free version of the Galactic Free Press isn’t helping.”

  “No, but people here who care about the news mainly watch the Children’s News Network or read the student papers on teacher bots. It’s hard to compete with a billion connected kids who are reporting on the spot. The truth is, most people on Earth choose to watch the Grenouthian news with all the immersive content of things blowing up around the galaxy.”

  “Well, at least that explains why you’re the only person from the defunct North American news syndicate who agreed to my invitation. I’ve got meetings with three more journalists scheduled, but they’re all coming in from different continents later on sub-orbital flights.”

  “Maybe I could get together with them after you make your pitch,” Bryan said. “First I should find a little privacy somewhere and conference with my colleagues to see how they want me to respond to your offer. We pretty much assumed that you were just here looking for a cheap source of Earth content, but your proposition deserves serious discussion. How long will you be around?”

  “I’m on the planet for another three weeks, and then I’m heading to Rendezvous. If there’s a reason to come back after that, I will, as long as I can come to terms with my boss. I’m freelance too, you know.”

  Bryan paid for the two stunners, slipped them into his shoulder bag, and headed off to find a place to sit down and contact the other journalists he was representing. Ellen settled cross-legged on the blanket to hawk her wares and wait for her next meeting. A number of shoppers stopped by, and she sold two more stunners at a loss, but nobody was biting on an eighty-cred tablecloth, and she was unwilling to go any lower on what she still considered prime merchandise.

  “If I wasn’t getting paid by the Galactic Free Press to be here, I’d be in the red myself,” she admitted to Marshall during a long lull. “I checked the Advantage platform before I left Union Station, and it said that those disposable stunners and tablecloths were a sure thing.”

  “I’ve never heard of Advantage, but maybe it’s why there are so many traders here selling the same merchandise,” her neighbor pointed out. “If you look now, it could be saying the opposite.”

  “Advantage is a trading conditions platform I joined, but I don’t know how to access it without a Stryxnet connection,” Ellen said. “I wish Earth had modern communications infrastructure.”

  “Give your phone here and I’ll see if I can bring it up and set a ringtone for you at the same time,” Marshall said. “Do you have a favorite song?”

  “Anything is fine,” she replied, unlocking the cell phone and handing it over. The older man confidently worked his way through the byzantine menus and eventually managed to bring up the Advantage portal.

  “You have to enter your account information and password,” he said, handing the phone back.

  “It better still be my name and my ship registration number or I’m not going to know it,” Ellen said, filling in the required fields. “Hey, it worked. Let me see if I can find—I can’t believe it.”

  “What?”

  “The screen came up on the Earth market right away, I guess since it’s the last one I looked at. They’re still showing disposable Dollnick stunners as the top recommendation for trade stock.”

  “Can’t you post a correction?”

  “It doesn’t work that way. I can only edit the cargo in my own profile, and they have an algorithm that sorts everything and presents the most profitable cargo suggestions based on the wisdom of crowds.”

  “Maybe they’re using the wisdom of clowns.”

  “Very funny. Look,” she said, brandishing the phone in front of Marshall’s nose. “They’re still recommending Frunge tablecloths in the top-ten list as well.”

  “Are you sure they aren’t making recommendations to you based on what you’ve reported in your inventory?”

  “No, I bought the stunners and the tablecloths after seeing the recommendation. It’s part of the research I’m doing for a story. Wait a second, I’m going to try something.” Ellen input a search term and surveyed the result grimly. “Not recommended,” she reported. “Apparently there’s an oversupply of Farling medicine for sale on Earth.”

  “I wouldn’t put much faith in their suggestions if I was you.” Marshall cast a quick look around to see if anybody was nearby before continuing. “I don’t normally go around spreading rumors, but it seems to me that I’m hearing about more young traders who have been running into financial problems lately. Maybe there’s a relationship there.”

  The phone suddenly played the opening bars to the first movement of Beethoven’s Fifth symphony. She closed the portal and accepted the call. “Ellen here.”

  “Maria Cortez. I’m at the fairgrounds. Could you push me your location?”

  “Just a sec,” she responded, and passed the phone back to Marshall. This time he made sure she was watching as he invoked the homing signal. “She’s practically on top of us,” Ellen said, lifting her head and scanning the area. “That must be her looking down at the phone.”

  A minute later, a woman with a travel bag slung over one shoulder approached and asked, “Are y
ou Ellen?”

  “And you’re Maria. Pleased to meet you,” Ellen said, and the two women exchanged a polite handshake.

  “Do I have permission to step on your blanket?”

  “Please. I’m not one of those old-fashioned traders who takes it so seriously.”

  “I’ve come a long way so I hope this isn’t some trick to sell me expensive tablecloths,” the journalist said. “A bunch of us who are in the same shoes pooled the money for my ticket.”

  “Funny, the reporter I just met was also representing a group. Saves work for me, I guess.”

  “So, the Galactic Free Press is taking an interest in our little revolution in the Southern Hemisphere?”

  “I didn’t know you were having one, but if it’s not a weekly occurrence, I’m sure you can sell the story to the freelance desk. Do you really have so many people left down there that they’re still fighting over natural resources?”

  “Do you count greed as a natural resource?”

  “Point taken.”

  Eight

  “Is it me, or is it warmer in here than it was during our last trip?”

  “I visit Verlock open worlds whenever I get the chance so I guess I’m pretty insensitive to temperature,” Larry said. “Controller, run the environmental diagnostic check.”

  “Test failed,” the artificial voice came back almost immediately. “Problem detected in the secondary cooling system.”

  “Is that bad?” Georgia asked.

  “It’s not good,” Larry replied, and began unbuckling the complicated harness that made working out on the rock climbing machine feel somewhat realistic.

  “Your controller did say that it was the secondary system so we still have the primary. Right?”

  “The primary system cools the thrusters and the equipment. The secondary system cools us.”

  “I would have thought that heat would be more important. Isn’t it absolute zero in space?”

  “We’re not in space, we’re in my ship,” Larry said, and launched himself towards the hatch that led to the cargo deck. “Coming?”

  “I don’t get it,” she said, pushing off gently to follow. “I just assumed all this time that we weren’t freezing because the ship was keeping us warm.”

  “Do you know the three ways that heat is transferred?”

  “When something hot touches something cold, the heat flows to the cold until they’re the same temperature.”

  “That’s conduction, and the controlling factor is mass. The reason the hull of the ship isn’t at absolute zero is because space is a vacuum. Other than a few gas atoms, there’s no mass to conduct the heat away. The second type of heat transfer is convection, which means an actual flow and mixing of material, like cold air blown into a room filled with warm air.”

  “I guess we wouldn’t want to open a window.”

  “You guessed right. The final type of heat transfer is radiation, like sunshine. If we turned off all of the equipment on board, including ourselves, the heat left in the ship would eventually radiate away, but it takes a long time. Since we can’t turn ourselves off without dying in the process, fixing the secondary cooling system is now my top priority.” He shuffled from the ladder to a large grey locker and removed a belt with a number of tools attached to small spring-loaded reels. “This is the tool locker, by the way.”

  “Can I do anything to help?” she asked.

  “The technical deck on these Sharf traders is below the cargo hold, and it’s pretty cramped because it’s not intended for in-flight service. I’m going to have to wedge myself in there so I’d appreciate if you could be my outside hands. Got your magnetic cleats on?”

  “Yeah, I learned my lesson there.” Georgia clicked her heels to activate the cleats and then shuffled after her captain

  “The best access to the technical deck is right by the main hatch since that’s the last place anybody would store cargo. Some traders go nuts carrying bulk commodities and they have to climb over their own load just to get to the bridge, but I like to keep the area clear for emergencies.”

  Larry bent over and turned a small handle recessed into the deck. Then he shuffled a few paces further and bent again to release another manual lockout. Finally, he moved to the midpoint of the access panel and felt around the edge for a small depression. When he pulled up, a steel sheet almost as large as the main display screen came free, and he carefully maneuvered it into position against the inside of the hatch.

  “Aren’t you worried that will fall on you?” Georgia asked, after Larry turned his back on the removed access panel and reached for the edge of the opening.

  “No gravity,” he reminded her. “It’s not going anywhere.” He pulled a flashlight from his belt and shined the beam in the narrow space under the decking. “I don’t smell anything. Do you?”

  “Just us,” Georgia said. “Do they add something stinky to make it easy to locate leaks?”

  “Yes, but it’s only stinky to the Sharf, though those dogs Joe has back on Union Station can sniff out a leak from across the hold. That’s what I don’t get about this. It was fine last week.”

  “Wasn’t the hold more crowded when we started?”

  “You finally noticed,” Larry said, letting go of the flashlight, which was pulled back to his belt by the reel. “While you were drinking in bars or whatever it is investigative journalists do, I got rid of all of those salad containers I’ve been trying to unload.”

  “What did you trade them for?” Georgia asked, having caught on from his conversation that the captain was a fan of barter.

  “Cash, but I needed it to cover the mortgage anyway. Controller, turn on the technical deck emergency lights.” A blue glow came from the opening, and he grabbed the edges and began to pull himself under the decking.

  “Why blue?”

  “Original Sharf lights. It takes getting used to but the color actually makes it easier to—what the?!”

  “What?”

  “Somebody sabotaged me,” Larry said angrily, and although his upper body was now hidden from her, Georgia could just imagine the look on his face. “A chewer has been at the hoses in here.”

  “You mean like a rat?”

  “A mechanical chewer, basically a small bot. It wouldn’t be able to get through any of the alloys the Sharf use for the critical systems, but the secondary cooling unit uses flexible hoses, and something has been at them.”

  “Can you fix it?”

  “Sure, but the damn chewer will just be at it again as soon as I replace the access panel, and I only carry enough refrigerant for one full recharge.” Larry squirmed back into open space and sat up. “Did anybody give you a package to deliver to a friend or anything like that?”

  “What? No. And even if somebody had smuggled a thing like that on board, how would it get down there?”

  “A chewer is small enough to fit through the vents. Maybe it got mixed in with the cargo somehow,” he added. “I do trade for household goods, and it’s not like I have enemies lined up around the galaxy waiting for a chance to do me in.”

  “Somebody could be trying to stop me from writing about Colony One.”

  “Have you been going around announcing that you think it’s a scam?”

  “I’m not that stupid. So what are we going to do?”

  “Genie,” Larry called for the cargo handling bot.

  Georgia turned to watch as the Sharf bot emerged from its charging bay and floated over to where Larry was still sitting in the opening to the technical deck.

  “You’re going to set a bot to catch a bot?”

  “First we’ve got to find it,” Larry said. “Genie, there’s an invasive bot onboard that’s already damaged the secondary cooling system. Can you detect any motion?”

  The boxy alien bot turned slowly through three hundred and sixty degrees. “There is an unidentified power source moving beneath the deck plating behind the primary thruster. Correction. The device is identified as a maintenance chewer for residentia
l drain cleaning. Corrective action should be taken immediately.”

  “I want you to continually track the chewer’s location starting now, so if it shuts down to hide, we’ll know it’s still at the last location you detected,” Larry instructed. He turned to his passenger. “Were you serious about not being claustrophobic?”

  “Yes. I was always hiding in small spaces and reading books my parents didn’t approve of when I was a child.”

  “I can’t work my way under the deck to where the chewer is without disassembling half of the ductwork. If need be, we can shift the cargo and start removing more access panels, but if the chewer keeps moving, I’ll end up having to take half of the hold apart.”

  “So you’re asking me if I can go under there and catch it?”

  “Only if you’re completely comfortable,” Larry said. “If there’s any chance you’re going to freak out and get stuck, it’s better not to try.”

  “No, I’ll do it, but what about the chewer? Is it dangerous?”

  “Chewers are pretty common on worlds where aggressive roots grow out of the sewer system and work their way into household drains. They’re small enough that you can put them down the sink, and they’ll chew their way until the drain is clear, or they start running out of juice and have to return. I suppose it makes sense that it went after the hoses.”

  “So it’s, like, smaller than my fist?”

  “Much smaller, and it doesn’t have a mouth, just a rotating bit like you’d see on a rig for drilling wells, only miniature. Picture a metal cockroach with three tiny rotating spiky balls for a head.”

  “That doesn’t sound so bad,” Georgia said. “Can I have your flashlight?”

  “Sure.” Larry detached the reel from his belt and passed the whole unit to her, then moved to one end of the opening. “I’ll stay down here so I can watch you, and if there’s any problem at all, you—”

  “Don’t worry, I’m not the heroic type,” she told him, clipping the reel to her sleeve and pulling herself into the opening. “Which way?”

  “Do you see that little funnel cloud of black dust?”

  “What is it?”