Home Run (Smuggler's Tales From the Golden Age of the Solar Clipper Book 3)

by Nathan Lowell

  “Love one, thank you.”

  He reached into the cabinet again and came up with a carafe.

  Natalya stared at him. “You just happen to have a fresh pot of coffee handy?”

  He shook his head and grinned. “Actually, yes, but it’s more coincidence than anything. I’d just set a pot to brew when you called. That’s why it took me so long to answer.”

  Zoya accepted the cup and settled onto a lounge. “You run this by yourself?”

  He shook his head. “I have a couple of friends who help out.” He handed a cup to Natalya and filled one for himself before replacing the carafe in the cupboard and settling on the edge of another lounge chair. “You must have met Rachel Carstairs?”

  Natalya and Zoya both nodded.

  “Port Lumineux is the Carstairs family station. Thomas Carstairs runs a brilliantly organized trading company, started by his grandfather, that works the High Line while maintaining his Toe-Hold roots. He’s the current head of the corporation. Rachel’s his daughter. He has a son and a host of cousins both directly and indirectly through marriage.”

  “We met Phillip,” Natalya said.

  “Did you?” Regyri grinned. “What’d you think?”

  “He’s a bit of a character,” Natalya said. “Introduced himself with some kind of phony name and then asked what I thought of it.”

  Regyri laughed. “Sounds like Pip.”

  “Zoya thought he was creepy,” Natalya said with a sly smile angled in Zoya’s direction.

  Regyri’s eyebrows shot up. “Creepy? I’ve heard him described a lot of ways, few of them flattering, but creepy?”

  Zoya shrugged. “He and his sister came aboard the Mindanao way back in the early days. Natalya met them at the lock while I minded the helm.”

  Regyri nodded.

  “It took me some time to get to the brow. By the time I got there, Phillip and Rebecca—”

  “Rachel,” Natalya said.

  Zoya shook her head. “Sorry. I keep calling her Rebecca. Anyway. They were all having a nice chat until I stepped up and then Phillip started tripping over his tongue and kept looking at his shoes.”

  Regyri’s eyebrows rose at this. “Pip? This tall?” He held up his hand. “Medium build and a couple of extra kilos? White hair?”

  Zoya nodded. “That’s him.”

  “Tongue-tied and looking at his shoes?”

  Zoya shrugged. “I don’t know about tongue-tied. He didn’t seem to have much trouble in the wardroom.”

  Regyri looked at Natalya. “You were there?”

  Natalya nodded. “He would barely look up to see where we were walking. I was talking with Rachel while Phillip and Zoya walked ahead to the wardroom. We had a bit of a business chat.”

  “This Phillip guy sat pushed back from the table,” Zoya said. “His legs stretched out in front of him and he kept staring at his shoes. Even while he was sitting.”

  “His shoes?”

  “I assume his shoes. It might have been the deck.”

  “I think Zoya intimidated him,” Natalya said. “He avoided looking at her. Had a lot to say but never looked up.”

  “And you found that creepy?” Regyri asked, looking at Zoya.

  “It was creepy,” Zoya said.

  Regyri shook his head. “Not the Pip I know,” he said. “Anyway, what brings you two away from your little project?” He took a swig of his coffee. “The alloy tower should be up by now.”

  “Higbee’s just waiting for us to release the final construction. Anderle is doing the final inspection today. Once that’s done, we’re officially completed.”

  “How’s the staffing coming?” he asked.

  “We’ve got another busload coming from Margary sometime in the next week,” Zoya said. “Most of the key posts are full. We’re filling in support staff. Gram is sending a real doctor and a psychiatrist.”

  “So, busman’s holiday?”

  “I just wanted to see your station,” Natalya said. “We’re not likely to get another chance to fly off on our own any time soon.”

  Regyri nodded and looked at Zoya. “What are you planning?”

  “Nothing. Yet,” she said. “I’d really like to see what you’ve done with the rest of the station. What’s your goal here?”

  He drained his cup and placed it on the counter. “Let’s take a walk. I’ll show you what I’ve got so far. It’s a long way from where I thought I wanted it. Now?” He shrugged.

  Natalya and Zoya followed suit with their cups and Regyri led them back out into the wooded path.

  “I’ll show you behind the curtain down here,” he said. “I’ve worked hard to make this feel like woods. It’s a standard Barbell can, if you couldn’t tell when you came in.”

  “That’s a lot of volume,” Zoya said. “Judging from the overhead, you’ve put in a deck?”

  He nodded. “Right at the crease. Gives me two hundred meters long and forty meters wide. All the cans have the same modifications. Overhead in the middle is fifteen meters with a usable flat rectangular compartment under us that’s twenty wide and two hundred long.”

  “You use the slanted decks to run cable and pipes?” Zoya asked.

  “Some. I used it mostly for tankage. Water, some compressed gases. It’s a lot of volume and I farm my own gas from Melvin.”

  “Melvin?” Natalya asked. “Oh, the gas giant?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Why Melvin?” she asked.

  He grinned at her. “My roommate at the academy. Big guy. All muscle but he looked fat. Nobody ever made the mistake twice. He could bench press a shuttle craft.”

  “Let me guess,” Zoya said. “He had a gastric issue?”

  Regyri nodded.

  Zoya sighed but chuckled.

  Regyri let them up to a wall of trees and the end of the compartment. On their right, an arch opened on the other side of a well-spaced line of trees. The view beyond was a series of arches extending into once can after another. “Over here,” he said and lifted a hatch in the deck. He stepped down and slid out of sight. “Watch your head.” His voice sounded hollow coming up through the oblong opening.

  Natalya looked down and saw him looking up from below.

  “Come on down, but mind the combing. It’ll bite you if you’re not careful.”

  Natalya shrugged and after an awkward moment discovered that the hatch cover itself served as part of the ladder. She followed her father’s path and stepped out of the way to make room for Zoya. She looked down the length of the compartment and almost gasped.

  The lights weren’t as warm, giving the whole space a sharp-edged, sterile look. The rounded shapes of tanks took up both sides of the room, leaving a wide corridor down the middle, the overheads running in a straight line down the center of the overhead some ten meters above.

  “Maude in heaven,” Zoya said. “I knew these things were big, but being inside gives a whole new meaning to the word. What are you going to do with this much space?”

  Regyri pointed. “I installed the fusactors about halfway down. Keeps the power runs short because nothing is more than half a can either way. There’s a main power bus that runs the width of the station. From here out to the last can.” He waved his hands in the cross-ways direction toward one wall of tanks. “Any time I need power in one of the sections, I just run a line from the middle of the can out to the place I need the power.”

  “Why not put the fusactors in the center can?” Natalya asked.

  “Because I built this one first. The rest are add-ons,” he said.

  “What are you planning to do with all this volume?” Zoya asked.

  Regyri shrugged, and for the first time in her life, Natalya thought he looked uncertain. After several long moments he shrugged again. “I really don’t know. The wood’s valuable, ridiculously so. It just takes so long to grow, that it’s not exactly a viable product.”

  “It makes a great scrubber,” Natalya said. “Even down here, the air smells amazing.”


  “We’re a little oxygen rich. I’ve also adjusted the nitrogen level a little. The smell is mostly because of the moisture.”

  “You’ve done an amazing job with this,” Zoya said.

  They spent the next stan wandering from can to can, most unfinished, while Regyri talked about what he might use each one for, ideas he had for making the station safer from micro-meteors punching holes in it. He showed them the galley—“recycled from an old Manchester tanker”—and the environmental section he’d built from scratch.

  In the end, he walked them to the dock. “Sure you won’t stay for dinner?” he asked.

  “We need to jump back before Kim sends out a search party,” Zoya said. “This is the longest we’ve both been away from the station since we arrived.”

  “Well, you know where it is now. Stop by anytime.”

  As they entered the ship, Zoya stopped and looked back at him. “You did this all alone? I didn’t see any crew quarters.”

  He shook his head. “I’ve got a small crew who helps out. We didn’t get down to the last can. A couple of the gang are down there now. I sent the gas tender out to collect from the sled yesterday. They’ll be back tomorrow, probably.”

  “Gas tender?” Zoya asked.

  “Yeah. That’s what we call it. It’s basically a flexible tank on a hull. A couple of people can run it. I have to send it out every other week or so to collect the gas from the automated skimmer.”

  “We’ll have to talk about that sometime,” Zoya said.

  “We can do that. I can probably sell you as much as you need for the near term.” He held up his hand. “At a fair rate.”

  Zoya chuckled. “All right, Mr. Regyri. Thanks again.”

  The settled into their couches and ran through the pre-flight checklist while they waited for the lock signal to flash. Once away in into space, Zoya plotted the course back to Zvezda Moya and sat back. “Well, that answered my biggest question,” she said.

  “Does he know how to manage a station?” Natalya asked.

  “That would be the question,” Zoya said. “I kinda wish we’d known that from the beginning.”

  Natalya nodded, but couldn’t help wondering who was on his crew and if she had any more half-sibs she didn’t know about.

  Chapter 63

  Zvezda Moya:

  2369, April 5

  The bus docked at the residence early on the day watch. Natalya and Zoya waited at the lock along with Ahokas to greet the newest residents. When it opened, people started streaming out and filing past the impromptu welcoming committee. The three gave each a “welcome aboard” and a handshake, pointing them along the docking gantry to where a few of the housekeeping staff waited to show them to their accommodations.

  “Which one was the psychiatrist?” Ahokas asked as the flood of new crewmen shrank to a trickle before ending.

  “That would be me, young lady.” An old man strode from the lock, ducking his white-haired mane under the exit. He stood at least two meters and was whip-thin. He wore a brightly colored smocklike garment that reached from shoulders to mid-thigh over a pair of flowing white pants. Natalya thought he was barefoot for a moment but then noticed his sandals, the dark leather almost the same color as his skin. He stood at the lock with a tiny smile gracing his mouth as if he knew his appearance would cause a stir and he wanted to give everybody a chance to get a good look. He carried a walking stick in his left hand, almost as an afterthought, until he placed the tip on the deck and rested his weight on it. His dark brown eyes drew Natalya in so deeply she had to shake herself to stop staring. He held out his hand. “Dr. Mahadvitya Ashtikar, at your service.”

  Natalya shook the man’s hand, sure she could feel every bone under his parchment skin. “Dr. Ashtikar, a pleasure to meet you. I’m Natalya Regyri.”

  He smiled and nodded. “Call me Vitya, dear girl. A pleasure to meet you. Would you introduce me to your friends?”

  Natalya swallowed hard and nodded, turning to Zoya. “Vitya, this is my friend and station commander, Zoya Usoko. Zoya, may I present Dr. Mahadvitya Ashtikar.”

  Vitya smiled at Natalya. “You did that very well. I’m honored.” He held his hand to Zoya. “And the impressive Zoya Usoko. I’ve looked forward to our meeting. Your grandmother sends her regards.” He smiled at her, teeth flashing in the lights.

  “Dr. Ashtikar, welcome to Zvezda Moya. I hope we can find enough to interest you in our small corner of the universe.”

  “Vitya, my dear. I’m sure I’ll have plenty to do here.” He winked at her and turned to Ahokas.

  “Vitya,” Natalya said, “this is Kimberly Ahokas. She’s the assistant director and one of the original members of the crew here. Kim, may I present Dr. Mahadvitya Ashtikar.”

  Ahokas pressed her palms together in front of her chest and gave a small bow. “Namaste, Dr. Ashtikar. Please let me know if there’s anything you need while here on the station.”

  Vitya caught his walking stick between his two palms in a reciprocal gesture. “Namaste, Ms. Ahokas. I look forward to chatting with you soon.”

  Ahokas paled a bit but smiled and held an open-palmed hand out, ushering him along. “If you’d come this way, Doctor? I’d be pleased to show you to your quarters.”

  He gave her a small laugh. “Thank you, Ms. Ahokas, but you’ll want to stay for the main event. I see a very capable young man waiting just over there. I’m sure he knows where to find my quarters.” With a final nod all around, Dr. Ashtikar stepped off toward the housekeeping staff waiting for him. The doctor’s cane tapping on the skid proof decking.

  “Main event?” Ahokas asked looking at Zoya.

  “He’s talking about me.”

  They turned to the lock in time to see a small, roundish woman in a shipsuit stepping over the hatch combing, dragging a grav-trunk behind her. “Sorry, dearies. The trunk kept getting caught on the seats so I waited until everybody left before trying to get it out.”

  “You could have asked for assistance with that, ma’am,” Ahokas said. “Welcome to Zvezda Moya.”

  “Ha,” she said. “I’ve been dragging this around for longer that you’ve been alive. I’m slow but I can manage, thank you.” The trunk bumped a couple of times as the woman tugged the handle and dragged it over the hatch combing. “Did I hear you correctly? You’re Ahokas?” Her white hair—what there was of it—lay cropped close to her skull in a proper academy spacer buzz. Her face had more wrinkles than a walnut but her brilliant blue eyes peered out from beneath her brows, flitting everywhere and never seeming to light anywhere.

  “Yes, ma’am,” Ahokas said.

  “Doctor, actually. Dr. Emily Laskey. You can call me Doctor Laskey.”

  “Welcome, Dr. Laskey,” Ahokas said.

  Laskey looked Zoya. “You’re the Usoko girl, aren’t you,” she said.

  Zoya nodded and held out a hand.

  “You’ve got his eyes,” she said. “I can see that much. Do you have her stubbornness?”

  Zoya grinned. “I’d like to think so, but those are big shoes to fill.”

  Lasky shook her head and ignored the hand. “You’ve got his heart. That’s the better deal.” She looked at Natalya. “Who’re you?”

  “Natalya Regyri, Dr. Laskey.”

  “What do you do here?”

  “As little as possible, actually,” Natalya said. “It’s pretty easy since I don’t have a job title.”

  Laskey stared at her. “Regyri. You’re the madwoman who launches herself into space.”

  Natalya nodded. “’Fraid so.”

  Lasky nodded. “Good for you.” She turned to Zoya. “Yes, you’ve gotten the geriatric dregs from Dunsany Roads. I’m not the oldest practicing doctor in the Western Annex.” She grinned. “I let him get off first. Blowhard. So proper. Makes me crazy.” She shook her head and for one awful moment Natalya thought she might spit on the deck.

  Natalya gave Zoya a glance.

  “I have to admit I wasn’t expecting to get a doctor sent out here,
” Zoya said. “We’re not exactly a big population.”

  “I’m a trauma specialist,” she said. “You’ve got miners. You’ll have trauma. You’re running a foundry. You’ll have trauma. You’re a long way from help and time matters with trauma. Auto-doc can help but sometimes you need hands on to keep life in. Understand?”

  Zoya nodded. “I wasn’t expecting a doctor, Dr. Laskey. I’m very glad to have one.”

  The old woman grinned at her and chuckled in her chest, a dry heh-heh-heh. “Wait till you get to know me, dear. I’m living proof of the old saying.”

  Zoya glanced at Natalya.

  “Familiarity breeds contempt, my dear. I’m the proof.” She looked at Ahokas. “Now, you have a nice-looking young man for me?”

  Ahokas blinked a couple of times but nodded. “Yes, of course, Doctor. Alan here will show you to your quarters.”

  “Is my surgery next to my quarters?” she asked.

  “Right across the corridor,” Ahokas said.

  Laskey shot a glance at Zoya. “I thought you weren’t expecting a doctor?”

  “We weren’t,” Zoya said. “When we heard we were getting one, we did what we could to arrange what we could. I know you’re going to need to tell us what we can do to make it better. I thought the least we could do is put your living quarters as close to your workplace as possible.”

  “Smart,” she said. “You get that from her.” She turned and trotted away, dragging the trunk behind her. “Come on, Alan. Get me settled. I need a cup of tea in the worst way.”

  Zoya leaned over to Ahokas. “Do we have tea?”

  Ahokas smiled. “We do, in fact. Several kinds.”

  “Welcome to Zvezda Moya,” Natalya said and patted Zoya on the back.

  Zoya’s tablet bipped. She pulled it out, read the message, then thrust it back in its holster.

  “Something?” Natalya asked.