Osdal (Harmony War Series Book 3)

by Michael Chatfield

  Yu went up to the cock pit and Bobbie checked the hold, confirming that no one had gotten in.

  “Looks like they’re trying to find out where our asteroid is,” Yu said over their implants.

  “How do you know?”

  “They tried to hack our systems; they were looking for location data. Unless they know we’re EMF already, I’d say someone is trying to break in on our find. Oh, we’ve got company. Looks like station staff.”

  “I’ll go deal with them,” Bobbie said, heaving himself to his feet and waiting for his head to stop spinning. “Thought my augments would have this hangover gone by now.”

  “They probably would, but unless we’re in combat they’re in sleep mode. That was part of the whole implant experience,” Yu said.

  “Ah fuck, those pricks,” Bobbie said, stepping out of the airlock.

  Four station staff were approaching. “Good morning, my name is Alec, I’m the station’s docking master. I was hoping to talk to your cargo master.”

  “Found him, name’s Bobbie, what can I do you for?” Bobbie said, letting the hangover color his words.

  “It seems that there is a discrepancy in your paperwork. We are sorry for the inconvenience, but credit in the form of tokens for unrefined materials has gone up.”

  He was good, Bobbie thought, he actually sounded sorry.

  “It’s a thousand tokens for a hundred kilos of pre-refined materials,” the man said, and Bobbie could see the smile on the man’s face and the dark looks of the others.

  “Let’s take this in to the station.” Bobbie muted the channel and sighed.

  A thousand tokens for a hundred kilos. We took out a hundred and fifty thousand, making that fifteen thousand kilos, and I’m guessing he’ll pick it over, probably going right for the platinum, which is worth hundreds of thousands, maybe even a few mil, Fucking pricks.

  “Certainly,” the docking master said.

  Bobbie pulled out his surface, sending a message on his implants while opening up the docking fees and pay back rates of loans on the surface. There wasn’t a mention of unrefined material against a loan. The freighter had been put up as collateral, with its estimated worth set at 1.5 million.

  These pricks were just trying to pull one over on someone with a killer hangover.

  Bobbie took his helmet off, rubbing his forehead. Making a show of his hangover and making amenable noises as he looked through the information. Stalling for time.

  The docking master’s helpfulness lessened as Bobbie found less things to ask questions about.

  Bobbie could have kissed Moretti when he finally showed up.

  He must have been running ever since he got the message.

  “Hey Bobbie thought you were doing checks?” Moretti asked. Tyler and Jerome were rubbing sleep from their eyes, but Bobbie sensed that their act was more for the benefit of the docking master and his people than themselves.

  “These people say that our agreement is all messed up,” Bobbie said, sitting on some pallets ready to watch Moretti at work.

  “That’s correct, the rate of unrefined materials for docking charges and loan against it is one hundred kilos to a thousand tokens,” Alec said again, looking well fed and accommodating.

  Fucking con artist.

  “Bobbie, what have you got on you?” Moretti sighed, holding out a hand to Bobbie.

  Bobbie pulled the stacks of tokens from his pockets.

  Tyler looked pleased with himself, but Alec looked confused.

  “Jerome count that would you?” Moretti tossed a stack to Jerome and held one himself. They went through slowly, making it look like they were counting, but using their implants to do the real work.

  Then Moretti pulled out his surface, and Bobbie could see that he went to a banking interface and was sending a large deposit to someone. “I’ve deposited one hundred and six grand back to the docking authority, and I’ve got thirteen grand here. Jerome, how much do you have?”

  “Twenty-two and change.” Jerome pulled off a few bills and pocketed them.

  “So, with that, we then owe you 29 grand including docking fees, which we can get to you in a number of hours,” Moretti said, taking the bundle of cash from Jerome and holding it out to Alec.

  The 29 still needs to be covered by retainer, coming out to 2900 kilos,” Alec said, his smile slipping as the docking toughs made themselves look mean.

  Tyler and Jerome looked bored and tired, not a good sign for the toughs.

  Moretti looked thoughtful. “See, I would agree, but we’re from Elekt Sector, and we give Harmony 20 percent of our materials for no tokens, in a measure of good faith. I wouldn’t want to take that tithe from them, I already promised it to them last night over beers,” Moretti said.

  Alec’s demeanour changed. Moretti was basically paying the Chosen to make sure no one fucked about with small bullshit like this. Alec had obviously thought that with them being new to the station, they wouldn’t have protection, or know how things worked. They had a big haul and he’d thought they were easy pickings.

  Moretti also mentioned they were having beers; Chosen didn’t like to drink with anyone but the hardiest Harmony supporters. Fanatics were scary, no matter if you were fighting them or doing a deal with them.

  Alec’s affable smile returned. “Well, I hope you have a good stay and continue the patronage of our docks,”

  “Ah, with the deposits we’ll be bringing in, we’re probably going to have to use the refinery’s direct docks,” Moretti said. This would cut out the docking authority completely.

  Alec smiled to them, turned and left.

  “Prick,” Jerome said as they disappeared through the airlock to the walkways.

  “Let’s get on the freighter and go by the refinery. We can get our credits and move the ship before Alec and his buddies get any ideas,” Moretti said.

  Bobbie sighed and got to his feet, heading for the freighter where Yu was already powering up the engines.

  Onboard, the noise canceller was turned on as Tyler and Moretti talked about inactive implants and the weaponry in Osdal.

  “Sealed and good to go,” Bobbie said, climbing up into the cockpit.

  “Moving to refinery,” Yu said.

  Bobbie slumped into what was usually Young’s seat usually and plotted a simple route, but Yu was already going in the right general direction.

  There wasn’t much traffic, as most people were still nursing the aftereffects of the night before.

  “I can’t believe that they do that every night,” Yu said.

  “I can, I’m looking forward to doing it again,” Bobbie said.

  “Sure you are, with that hangover.”

  “Just need some water and to get my augments working to clear this crap out.”

  “Alright, let’s go and see what the refinery has for us,” Yu said, powering down the freighter, bleeding heat and checking the locking mechanisms on the landing struts.

  Bobbie grunted, getting up and heading into the cargo hold. The implant channel didn’t sound fuzzy any more as Jerome, Tyler and Moretti were up and walking through the open airlocks.

  Bobbie followed them and looked around the craft making sure that it was good.

  “Moretti see if you can wrangle up some fuel,” Yu said over the implants net.

  The station had been built around the refinery to keep the workers who kept the refinery going close by. It was mostly operated with a few thousand people keeping up on maintenance and making sure the robots didn’t fuck up, which pretty much only happened due to human error.

  Bobbie focused on going through his mental checklist, but being commando in his space suit was starting to rub his body weird. He needed a shower, a gallon of orange juice and probably a few hours with Carly under the sheets.

  ***

  Jerome’s head wasn’t doing the best. Dashtund and Dominguez had been on a shot binge, taking any kind of liquor they could put into their glasses.

  His breath tasted like alcohol a
nd battery acid.

  Tyler was looking better, he’d only had some casual beers, and pick pocketed half the population of the station.

  “What the hell is this place called?” Jerome asked Tyler.

  “I dunno. Hey, Moretti, what’s the station called?”

  “Oort Cloud Refinery Seventy-Seven.”

  “Hmm, thought it would be something cool. Companies take all the fun out of naming shit,” Jerome said as they entered the airlock into the refinery.

  They were greeted by a thin man who seemed to be brimming with excitement. “Moretti!” He squealed. “You, my good friend, are a boon to Seventy-Seven! That’s the best load I’ve seen in three years! You Elekt Sector people sure do have luck on your side!”

  “Thank you, Johnny,” Moretti said. “These are my friends, Tyler and Jerome.”

  Johnny pumped their hands with enthusiasm. “Procurement officer and boss of this here refinery, Johnny Walker,” the man beamed.

  “Shit, I think I had enough of that last night,” Jerome sub-vocalized to Tyler.

  “It’s very good to meet you,” Tyler said with a too-wide smile.

  “And manners too! I’m already half way to Elekt now!” Johnny smiled, and the man’s energy was infectious. “Now, we’re not just here to chinwag, let’s get down to numbers and business.” He pulled out a surface.

  “We totaled everything up, then retained 20 percent as per your donation to Harmony’s cause. The brings you to 7.3 million. An incredible haul indeed, and enough to get you four more freighters like the one you have out there,” Johnny said, pointing to the freighter where Bobbie and Yu were completing their final checks.

  “So, I was wondering what your rate was for fuel?” Moretti asked.

  “Well, we don’t have fuel here but my cousin Ping owns a fueling rig,” Johnny said.

  “Would you be able to get me in contact with him? We hope to be running for a while and we’d be interested in getting our contractors sorted out,” Moretti said.

  “Right away. He’s usually an early riser, so I’ll see if he can meet you this morning,”

  “What about the docking fees?”

  Johnny waved his hand and the docking fees disappeared.

  “Waived. I am so sorry that the docking authority were being troublesome.” Johnny looked pretty displeased but hid it quickly.

  Moretti pulled out his surface, checking on Ping’s contact information and bringing up the freighter’s accounts.

  “We might need parts and a few more ships to haul our loads… could we also rent a dock so we don’t have to keep jumping around?” Moretti asked. Johnny rattled off names and promises.

  “Thank you Johnny, you’ve helped us out a lot,” Moretti said, sending something on his surface.

  “Oh, wow, thank you Moretti, I appreciate it, but I didn’t do it for the tickets. I’m actually sorry about the Dockers, they’ve been getting worse.”

  “Take it, you’ve saved us that and then some,” Moretti said with a smile.

  Watching an intelligence master at work, Tyler thought. Even this simple gesture and conversation was telling them about how Osdal was functioning.

  “Well, thank you very much. I will get back to you about those other queries.” Johnny’s surface made a noise. “Oh, Ping is coming right over, if you like he can meet you on the landing pad and go over fueling numbers and such. So let me know if you need anything, and have a good day fellas! Keep bringing in those rare metal loads!”

  “Tyler, Jerome, you can head back to the hotel, might be an idea to move to a place closer than that one. The money is already in the shared account. Bobbie, Yu, I think we should talk to Ping about our fuel situation,” Moretti said.

  “Uggh, I just wanna go back to bed,” Bobbie complained, making up for a good night.

  Tyler, taking mercy on the man, pulled out an electrolyte drink and tossed it to him.

  “You are a God among men, Tyler,” Bobbie pronounced.

  “Just get some of that in you, should feel better. We’ll see you at the old hotel, or message you the new hotel info.”

  Tyler and Jerome were having breakfast when Tyler saw the thug that he had swiped the sub-machine gun from. He didn’t bother trying to hide, it would only make things more suspicious. Instead he ate his breakfast bar as if he didn’t have a clue about anything going on. He most certainly did not make eye contact or keep glancing at the goon. From the way he held himself Tyler pegged him as Chosen, the weaponry had already pointed to that.

  He was just thankful he wasn’t just a street thug, if the street thugs were getting that kind of hardware then the Chosen’s weaponry would be a lot worse.

  “We need a place closer to the refinery,” Jerome said, and Tyler agreed; it was a good 15 minute walk between their hotel and the refinery, not the best if they needed to make a quick getaway.

  A furious Carly was waiting for them in the hotel room.

  “Where the fuck is he?” she demanded.

  “Bobbie?”

  “No, my fucking doorman. Yes, Bobbie!”

  “He’s with the freighter,” Tyler said cautiously.

  “Well tell him to go fuck himself, and tell Moretti the same. The docking master is all bent out of shape because he’s made only 20,000 tokens off you guys. Since his scam didn’t work he fired me for obeying the fucking rules,” she growled. “Apparently people saw us living it up last night and they’re saying that I gave you a lower rate because Bobbie and I were flirting.” Her angry resolve crumbled away; not having a job on a station was like not having water in the Sahara. If you weren’t paying your fees, then you’d get kicked out.

  Companies would re-task you; a person was another worker looking for the right job fit. Here, they’d just kick you out into space and someone would probably pull your corpse in, take anything useful and chuck you back out.

  She rushed past them, and Tyler’s stomach dropped - and not from the previous night’s liquor - as she disappeared into Seventy-Seven’s morning crowd.

  “I feel like shit.”

  “Yeah, maybe we can get Moretti to find her a new job. The Victor Corporation is always in need of resourceful people,” Jerome said.

  “Why are you talking about that now?”

  “Cause Madeline Costa’s plans call for a shit load of specialist materials. If we have someone here running supplies after the war is all done, we’ve got a foot in the door. This war will end one way or another, and we need to prepare for when it is over. Even if we’re not here, the corp keeps 30,000 people employed. Getting them any help we can will not only give these people a future, but those back home, too.”

  “You and Mark have been talking again,” Tyler observed.

  “Yep. We need to talk to Moretti and probably bring him in on the Corporation, but it would be a good nest egg for all of us,” Jerome said.

  “One minute you’re all blow this up, shoot that, the next you’re all numbers, long term planning and business,” Tyler sighed.

  “Blame your brother, he’s filled my head with Corporation stuff. After Nerva’s talk about always having a backup plan, he’s looked into ways to secure a good retirement for us all. I think he even has a plan to pay for us to get out if it comes to that.”

  Tyler couldn’t even start to think of how much that would cost, but he knew that Mark wouldn’t care. If someone in their platoon decided that they couldn’t be a Trooper anymore, Tyler knew that Mark would help them to get out of their contract, no matter what. He looked after his people, money, time, his life, but he would lay it all down for others.

  Chapter 14

  Mining City Twenty-One

  Osdal Actual, Osdal System

  2/3267

  You’ve got this, just a quick run in, grab the rocks, and right back out, easy, Caroline lied to herself as she took her truck in to one of the deep mines that headed right to where rare metals had been detected.

  Harmony didn’t want to have a crane blocking the mine as supports were
put into place, so people with large forklifts pushed the metal bars and bolted them into position as trucks rushed past. More than one person had fallen under a truck’s wheels while connecting the supports together.

  Truck drivers would get a hellish beating for stopping, as it would back up the entire line of trucks rushing in and out. There was a reason that truck drivers and shaft miners lived in different areas of lean-to city.

  Metal dust was everywhere, shining in her lights as she followed the truck in front of her.

  The shaft was seven kilometers long, with six shafts breaking off at different intervals, and she was to go to the third to last shaft on the left.

  The truck ahead of her peeled off into the first shaft to the right, but she continued on, trucks passing her, fleeing the shaft mine and its unstable walls and ceiling.

  Her truck rumbled, bouncing over the uneven ground, and she finally got to her tunnel and swung around in the larger area made just for trucks to turn.

  “Shit,” she said, seeing the end of the tunnel. There were only so many drills in operation and the Harmony loyal crews that still worked on the planet used them, and hell, they even had proper supports in place and air circulation! Earthers, however, were nothing more than cattle.

  The crew in the tunnel were using picks and sonic blasters to tear into the wall. It was slow going, but there were hundreds working, all of them breathing the same air.

  Caroline could see the signs of oxygen depravation in many.

  The Chosen wearing air packs whipped them, as if that would do anything to help.

  Caroline turned her truck. A person with flags guided her back to the large conveyor belt where all of the cuttings from the wall had been pooled.

  Caroline looked at the air canisters beside her. She had a filtration system, and it worked, sort of, but she was in a truck, not doing labor intensive work.

  She waved the flag person up, and they climbed up the ladder to her door as the conveyor belt ran, starting to fill her truck bed.

  The flag person grunted, using the railing of the truck to keep themselves up. Caroline looked around and then stealthily passed them two air canisters.