He chuckled. “I know that feeling,” he said. “It doesn’t get any better as you climb the ladder.” He bit his lip and squinted at his desktop for a few heartbeats. “Can the chandlery help?”
Natalya thought about that. “They know all the parts but getting a database we could use isn’t exactly trivial since they supply the parts for everybody.” She shook her head. “No, the chandlery probably couldn’t but …” Her voice trailed off and she looked across the desk at him.
“But?”
“TIC might.”
Trask blinked and then laughed. “TIC? How? All this time we’ve been trying to keep them at arm’s length.”
“Yeah, but think about it. TIC inspection teams have to know what every ship needs for spares. How do they know that if they don’t know themselves?”
“So you just waltz into the TIC inspection office and ask for a copy of the spares database for a Barbell?”
“Not exactly. We’d need to know the precise model. Unwin’s been making Barbells for decades and they’re not all identical.”
Trask frowned at her. “Tell me what I don’t know, kid,” he growled, but he started hammering on his keyboard. “Model 2345.4,” he said. “Fourth flight in 2345.”
“So the ship’s almost twenty stanyers old?”
Trask frowned again. “Maybe. Kondur must have gotten it practically new.”
“So, TIC has to have a list, if not the exact database,” Natalya said.
“You think they’ll give it to you for asking?”
“What can they say? No?” Natalya asked.
“They could ask what happened to the old one.” Trask’s mouth turned down at the corners. “I can’t really see telling them somebody broke into it and changed all the values.”
Natalya saw his point. “Lemme go ask Zoya. She’s the real systems expert.”
“If Charlie were here, we could ask him.”
Natalya froze, halfway out of her chair. “Charlie.”
Trask looked at her. “What about him?”
“That’s the answer.”
“Charlie is the answer?”
“Something Mr. Blanchard said a couple weeks back while we were coming in from Moe’s. The ship’s systems get infected when everybody upgrades their tablets here and they start plugging in new chips.”
Trask nodded. “Half of them are infected. Doesn’t matter how many times you tell them—” His voice cut off and a smile spread slowly across his face. “Of course.”
“Permission to leave the ship, Captain?” Natalya stood.
“Go, go.” Trask waved a hand.
She went.
Chapter 41
Siren Orbital: 2363, August 1
Natalya made her way off the ship and made a beeline for the lifts. She thanked her Orbital Maintenance rotations for having taught her exactly where she needed to go. It was already closing in on 2000 hours, but all the ship services offices on the oh-one deck ran around the clock.
She made it to the lift just as the doors opened and disgorged a rowdy troop of spacers in civvies. She stepped aside as they passed and slipped into the lift behind them. The doors closed before she could press the button. She cursed to herself but pushed the oh-one button anyway. The deck sank out from under her, but her hopes were dashed when the car went past oh-one and opened on the oh-two deck.
She sighed and stepped back. With any luck she’d catch the oh-one on the way back up.
Two med-techs got on, followed by a pair of beefy individuals wearing orbital security jumpsuits and flashes. They all nodded at Natalya and one of the techs punched the door-close. They rode up in silence and everybody got off on the oh-one. The security people followed the techs around to starboard while Natalya consulted the office directory on the bulkhead opposite the lift. TIC Inspection and Certification lay just three doors to port on the outboard side.
She stopped outside the door and smoothed her tunic down, checking her gig line and taking a deep breath. She reached for the door handle but stopped. She purposely twisted the waistband of her slacks and ruffled both hands through her cropped hair. It was too short to muss up much, but it gave her the feeling of being mussed up. She took another deep breath, blew it out, and breezed into the office, opening her eyes wide and rushing up to the counter.
The agent behind the counter stood up quickly as she rushed toward him. “Can I help you?”
“Oh, I hope so. I need help and you’re the only people I can think of that can.”
She watched him check out her name tag and collar pips. “Ms. Regyri. What is it you need?”
“Well, this is embarrassing but somebody plugged in some fool virus-laden chip into the ship’s system.”
She saw his eyes widen. “Direct?”
“Watch stander. You know how port-side watches can be.”
“And?”
“She decided she would just watch a little holo while waiting for the next VSI.”
He frowned. “That shouldn’t have affected the ship’s operational systems.”
Natalya sighed. “No. It’s not the ship’s main systems. That would be easy. Flush it out and restart everything.”
“Then what?”
“Spares inventory.”
“What about it?”
Natalya clenched her jaw and bit out. “It renamed every damn item to something different.”
“Different?”
“Obscene, all right? Obscene.”
She saw him bite his lips together but his eyes gave away the laughter he tried to suppress. “It renamed every item in your spares database?”
She closed her eyes and nodded. “Every. Damn. One.”
He did well and she heard only one slightly choked laugh. “Can’t you recover it from backup?”
“Normally, yes,” she said. “We keep two versions of backup for all the systems in the ship’s safe and another at our office on Newmar Orbital.”
“So the problem?”
“We discovered it as we were rotating the backups and I spotted it on the logs.”
“And …?” he asked. His eyes grew wide. “Wait. You backed up the obscene database.”
“Twice.”
The man’s expression lay somewhere between stifled laughter and sympathetic horror. He might have shown a little gratitude, too. “How can we help?” he asked.
“I just need a list of what we’re supposed to have in spares. A fresh database with the items and recommended stores levels would be ideal. Failing that, just a list of what we’re supposed to have. I’ve got a massive replenishment order coming in tomorrow and I’ve got no database to receive them into.”
The man clapped the palm of one hand against his mouth and drew a deep breath through his nose before blowing it out again. Natalya didn’t blame him. The picture must have been hysterical. It was all she could do to keep a straight face herself. If he started laughing, she’d probably join him.
“What ship?” He crossed back to his desk and started hitting keys on his console.
“Unwin Barbell.”
“Model?”
“2345.4.”
He looked up at her, eyebrows raised. “You just happen to know that?”
Natalya weighed her options and shook her head, biting the inside of her cheek. “I had to ask the captain.”
She watched his eyes drift upward and his lips twitch as he must have pictured that meeting in his mind. He shook himself and addressed the keyboard again. The smile kept trying to break out around his lips. Natalya had to put her head down on the counter so she wouldn’t lose it herself.
“How do you want it?” he asked.
“You’ve got it?” She lifted her head and beamed at him.
“Oh, yes.”
“Hallelujah.” She pulled out her tablet and placed it on the counter. “Can you send it to my tablet?”
He flipped a couple of screens and tapped. “I’m pinging you.”
The ping showed up and Natalya accepted it.
; “You’re not afraid of getting your tablet infected?” he asked, a small smirk on his face.
She laughed. “Honestly, if I get infected from Inspections and Certifications, then there’s no hope for us.”
He appeared to recognize the compliment. “Sending now.”
The database file slithered through the connection and dropped into her tablet’s storage.
“Thank you. You’ve saved my ass.”
He gave her a bigger smirk. “We’re here to help.” He crossed to the counter and leaned forward. “Is there anything else I can help you with?”
Natalya shook her head and turned for the door. “No, you’ve been great. I need to get this back and get it all integrated before that replenishment order hits tomorrow.” She rolled her eyes and flounced out of the office. When the door latched behind her, she heard the peal of laughter from inside.
She chuckled all the way back to the ship.
Chapter 42
Siren Orbital: 2363, August 1
Natalya bounded up the ladder to officer country and knocked on the cabin door. Trask opened it and peered out. She held up her tablet. “Got it. We’ll have it done by tomorrow.”
“What about the current one?” he asked.
“What about it?”
“Can you make a copy before you overlay it with that?” He nodded at her tablet.
His meaning became clear. “Yes. Of course.” She wanted to believe she’d have done that anyway. “I’ll get Zoya to flash it to nonvolatile media.”
“Nonvolatile?”
“Glass. Once it’s down, nobody will be able to change it.”
“It won’t have to stand up in a court of law,” Trask said, lowering his voice and glancing down the passage.
“No, but it has to survive the trip back so we can give it to Kondur.”
He grinned. “Excellent point. Carry on. Let me know if you need anything.”
She paused. “Has Mr. Lyons come back yet?”
The captain frowned and shook his head. “Neither has Charlie.”
“Think they’re related?”
He shrugged. “Not like either of them, but I’ve got no reason to think there’s trouble. Charlie has OD in the morning. If he misses that, then we have a problem.”
Natalya nodded and waved the tablet. “If you’ll excuse me, Skipper, I need to get this moving.”
He grinned and waved her away. “Go, go.”
Natalya strode down the passage and knocked on Zoya’s door.
“Who is it?”
“Nats, Zee. Got a tick?”
Natalya heard the lock thrown before Zoya opened the door. “Sure, come on in.”
Natalya scooted in past Zoya and waited while she rebolted the door. “You having problems?”
Zoya shook her head. “Not as such, no. Mr. Pritchard seems to be a regular in the passageway. It makes me a little nervous.”
Natalya shrugged. “Can’t blame you there. I spend so little time in my stateroom, I’m not sure I’ve noticed.” She held up her tablet. “I got a blank spares list from TIC.”
Zoya tilted her head to port a few degrees. “You what?”
“I got a blank spares list from TIC.” Natalya paused. “How much do you know about the spares problem?”
“You’ve got a lot of junk instead of the spares you need.”
“Right. We pushed a replenishment order to the chandlery from Moe’s.”
“I remember that. The skipper initialed it and it went through Moe’s relay.”
“Right. Then it gets weird.”
Zoya’s laugh carried more than a hint of desperation. “Really? I’m shocked. Shocked.” She sat on her bunk and nodded at the fold-out chair. “Fill me in.”
Natalya took the seat and perched on the edge of it. “I got the faulty emitter bus coupling out of the bus array in the spine. Checked the part number on it and it’s different from the one we ordered.”
“Uh oh. What did you order?”
“An emitter bus coupling rated for the new Burleson Kyoryokuna drives.”
Zoya sat up at that and her eyes all but bugged out of her head. “A Zeta? They’re real? I thought they were just academy scuttlebutt.”
“Nobody’s seen one yet, but the spares are already in circulation, apparently.”
“Manchester must be close to shipping one of the new megas.”
“Or already has,” Natalya said.
Zoya grinned. “That’s not possible. If they had, it would have been on every newsie in Confederation space.”
Natalya pursed her lips and waited for Zoya.
“What?” Zoya asked.
Natalya waited.
Zoya’s eyes got even bigger. “No.”
Natalya shrugged. “Makes an odd kind of sense.”
“Somebody in Toe-Hold space has a mega?”
“Somebody in Toe-Hold space has had a mega for rather a long time. Months, maybe.”
Zoya frowned. “No, that makes zero sense. Why?”
“Prototype? They needed someplace to shake out the bugs in the design before they rolled it out to the big guns?”
“Why would they do that? I’d think the PR they got from putting a few of them out in the public eye would be huge.”
“What if the design’s not solid?” Natalya asked. “This is new stuff. The Kyoryokunas are completely new technology. Manchester’s been trying to beat that five-hundred-metric-kiloton threshold for decades. They develop a new tech that does it but they keep the lid on it.”
“Not a very tight lid.”
Natalya shook her head. “We don’t know that. We don’t know when they might have developed it and if there’s a working prototype out there? That kind of work takes a lot of time and a massive yard. Manchester’s yards are all very public. Where would you build these?”
Zoya started to shake her head but stopped and stared at Natalya. “Toe-Hold.”
“Right, and you’d have to keep it quiet there. You’d almost need a new Toe-Hold to do it in to keep the chatter down.”
“You think that’s where those clowns that kept stinking up Odin’s Outpost came from?”
“I don’t know. That’s certainly a possibility. You’d think an outfit like Manchester wouldn’t be flying faulty ships around running errands.”
“Cobbler’s children?” Zoya asked.
“That’s possible. Even probable, now that I think of it.”
“But why issue the parts if the ships aren’t available yet?”
“I’d bet they’re trying to roll one out in the next few months. Much fanfare. Many oohs. Lots of noise.”
“So they’re seeding the spares early for a ship they’re confident will be sailing in Dunsany Roads?”
“That would be my guess. Can’t fly without spares. Uncle TIC gets all fussy over it.”
Zoya shook her head. “I never really thought about what it would take for a completely new class of vessel.”
“We also don’t know they’d actually fill the order for us, but that’s beside the point,” Natalya said. “When I started comparing parts, a lot of them were not for a Barbell. Like the emitter bus coupling. I pulled it out of the spares database and checked inventory when I found the nearly toasted unit.”
“Right. That’s how you found the junk.”
“So, Lyons and I did the inventory.”
“Good job on him, by the way.”
“He’s missing at the moment, but thanks.”
“Missing?”
“Focus. We did the inventory and placed a replenishment order based on the stock numbers in the spares inventory.”
Zoya’s eyes blinked several times. “Wait.”
Natalya nodded. “Yes. Our spares inventory lists the Kyoryokuna emitter bus couplers, and Kyoryokuna emitter arrays and a ton of other stuff for equipment we don’t even have aboard.”
“Would that coupling even fit?”
Natalya shook her head. “I don’t think it’ll even go through the inspection hatch.
”
Zoya stared at Natalya’s tablet for several long moments. “So you got a corrected parts database from TIC. Inspections and Certifications office?”
“Right. Told them we’d gotten corrupted by a stray virus from an entertainment chip that got plugged directly into the console in engineering.”
“They bought it?”
Natalya held up the tablet.
Zoya lifted a hand and laughed behind it. “You amaze me.”
“I need you. I need to get this database installed, but I’m afraid it’ll obscure the existing installation.”
Zoya nodded, her lips pursed. “Probably would.”
“I want to save that database in its current state to see if we can figure out who modified it.”
“Be kinda dumb to leave digital fingerprints, wouldn’t it?” Zoya asked.
“Most engineering officers aren’t really conversant on the inner workings of ships’ systems.” Natalya shook her head. “Doesn’t matter. Maybe we’ll find something. Maybe we won’t. If we don’t safeguard it now, we’ll never know.”
Zoya nodded. “Sold. You want this on glass?”
“Yes. I assume we can burn glass?”
“Of course. Most of the official ship’s logs go directly to glass but we’ve got a couple of spare drives for stuff we want to preserve as read-only.” She grinned. “Even Peregrine had a couple.”
“Yes, I know Peregrine had some, but I thought it was just because my father is a paranoid, anti-social psychopath.”
“I thought you liked him.”
“Love him. Those are his good qualities.”
Zoya laughed behind her hand again.
“How soon can you get the current database burned?”
Zoya pulled out her tablet and began flipping through screens with her index finger. “We have a full system backup at Dark Knight,” she said. “You only need the spares inventory data?”
“And any related maintenance logs.”
Zoya nodded, flipping down through the system menus while Natalya watched. She isolated one section of the system and routed it to a backup drive in the systems’ closet. “Lemme run up and toss a fresh chip in.” She unbolted the door and left the stateroom.
Milk Run (Smuggler's Tales From The Golden Age Of The Solar Clipper Book 1) Page 28