Trader Vyx

by DePrima, Thomas

  It took most of the first watch period just to walk through the base and perform a cursory examination. Jenetta didn't even get to the housing section, but she knew what she'd find after Major Visconti's report. A call on her CT prompted her to wrap up her tour and return to the main level. The Marines had reported back for duty after eight hours off, and Major Visconti wanted to know which warehouses to empty.

  Jenetta found hundreds of Marines sitting in the main cargo area, eating breakfast. All six ships in the task force had docked at the habitat airlocks once the station had been cleared of holdouts. Food had been brought over from the Prometheus and Thor. The delectable aroma of piping hot eggs, pancakes, sausages, toast, and other breakfast items reminded Jenetta that she hadn't eaten in half a day, so she fixed a heaping tray and joined the officers at the packing crates they were using for a table. There were no chairs, so they stood as they ate.

  After draining the last of the coffee from her cup and popping the last piece of biscuit into her mouth, Jenetta handed a portable viewpad to the Major. "I've listed the nine warehouses to be cleared in order of priority. If any are found unsuitable for confinement, use the designated alternates. Since this facility appears to be fairly new, that shouldn't be necessary. I don't know what the warehouses contain so I don't have any specific place for putting the contents. I'll leave it up to you. On this level the three main roadways run the full length of the habitat. That gives us nine kilometers of road, with warehouses on both sides, plus this cargo area. I'm sure that you can find space."

  "No problem, Commander. We should have your nine warehouses empty by the end of the second watch. The base's loader equipment appears to be in good shape, and we can borrow additional 'oh-gee' blocks and bot loaders from the task force ships."

  "Very good, Major. The engineers are prefabricating shower and toilet facilities for us, and they'll move in to begin installation as soon as you've cleared some space. I'd like to start moving prisoners in by tomorrow. I'll need your people to function as guards, until Space Command makes other arrangements to move them to a regular prison colony."

  "Understood, ma'am."

  Jenetta received a message through her CT that she was wanted in her office. "Thanks for breakfast, Major. I'll check back with you later. Call me if you run into any insurmountable obstacles."

  Arriving at her office, Jenetta found the personnel officers from each of the ships, waiting for her. Each was carrying a holo-tube that contained the complete files on all of their ship's personnel. Jenetta led the way to a conference room and invited everyone to sit down.

  "We have a massive task ahead of us here. I've been led to understand that some ships may be leaving as soon as two weeks from now. Before I start losing available resources, we have to get this new base established and functioning. We have about six-thousand five-hundred prisoners to feed, and control. That means that my task is doubly as difficult as it was on Dixon. I need both immediate temporary help, and reassigned personnel who will remain until replacements can arrive from Space Command. To be fair, I'll take an almost equal percentage from each ship. The two battleships will provide most of the Marines needed for prison guards, and we can worry about the personnel reassignments after we get my immediate need for temporary help taken care of. Right now I need engineers, computer experts, cooks, clerks, laundry, and support personnel. This station is a mess and we need to get it in order, fast."

  Over the next two hours, an entire personnel infrastructure was created. Temporary personnel would live on their ships and report ashore at the start of their shift each day. Reassigned personnel would be quartered on the base.

  The engineers were beginning to install the shower and toilet facilities by the start of the third watch. The nine designated warehouses had been cleared; the boxes and crates stacked in eight-meter-wide piles that ran the length of the habitat on two of the roadways. A warehouse located between each two dormitory warehouses would function as an exercise 'yard.' They would be available to one dormitory warehouse at a time, on an alternating basis.

  Having learned a valuable lesson from the computer restoration effort at Dixon, and not wishing to spend weeks waiting for the base's computer system to become operational, Jenetta had the computer experts swap the core with a replacement unit instead of trying to retrieve information now. The core would then be sent to Intelligence, and they could take their time trying to retrieve any data. The lead engineer estimated that the center would be operational within two days.

  In the mess hall, bots were hard at work scrubbing floors, dining room tables and chairs, and cooking equipment, while cooks planned menus and familiarized themselves with the facilities. Mess attendants were busy itemizing and organizing food stores in the numerous freezers and food warehouses.

  Laundry equipment was also being checked and prepared. The laundry would soon have to start cleaning clothes for eight-thousand, along with bed clothing and towels. It's fully automated so it will only require a small staff to operate. Bots would take care of pickup and delivery.

  A small army of clerks were at work inventorying the contents of the kilometers of warehouses, and another army was at work renovating the living quarters. The latter force was mostly composed of robots. Skilled operators supervised the bots as they patched, cleaned, scrubbed, and painted. A good operator could keep three teams of robots busy at once. A pair of robots removed furniture so that another, larger team of robots could strip, patch, clean, and paint the four walls and ceiling of each bedroom and bath. A third group of bots followed behind, deep-cleaning the carpets, before the first team returned to replace the removed furniture. A suite could be completed every hour by an effective operator with his or her team of bots, and there were twenty teams working. If the robots were kept busy during all three watches, they should be able to refinish all ten thousand suites within twenty-one days. Jenetta hoped that she would have twenty-one days before the ships started to leave.

  It was after 0300 when Jenetta stopped at her office just long enough to retrieve her pets and then went looking for her quarters. It was fortunate that she had left her cats in her office, because her new quarters had been renovated sometime during the day. Although they had gotten used to the laundry and housekeeping bots on the ships, Jenetta wasn't sure how her cats would have reacted to having their quarters invaded by the teams of renovation bots.

  Her new apartment was the most spacious that she had ever seen on a base, and easily twice the size of her quarters on Dixon. She decided that one of the previous base commandants, perhaps Arneu, had consolidated the space intended for two top Raider officials. The late hour diminished any desire to look around, so Jenetta just located a bedroom and fell onto the bed after removing her uniform.

  Sleeping until 0900 hours, Jenetta hurried to shower and dress. She walked to the main mess hall to see if she could scrounge something for breakfast, and was pleasantly surprised to find it in full operation. Fresh baked goods were available, and cooks were supervising the preparation of items such as eggs and pancakes by the automated machinery. People coming off third watch were eating dinner entrees. Jenetta grabbed a quick breakfast and headed for her office.

  As she entered the outer office, she found three officers waiting. They immediately stood and came to attention.

  "At ease," Jenetta said. Confronting the most senior officer, a lieutenant commander, she said, "What can I do for you, Commander?"

  "Lieutenant Commander Novotny from the Thor, ma'am. I've been ordered to report to you for temporary reassignment."

  "Very well. Welcome Commander. I'll be with you shortly." Turning to the second officer, a lieutenant, she said, "Good morning, Lieutenant Ashraf."

  "Good morning, Commander. I'm here for temporary reassignment also."

  "Welcome, Lieutenant. Have a seat." Turning to the third officer, another lieutenant, she said, "Good morning, Lieutenant."

  "Good morning, Commander. Lieutenant Graham from the Ottawa reporting for temporary reass
ignment."

  "Welcome, Lieutenant. Please be seated." Turning to the lieutenant commander she said, "Commander, come into my office."

  Jenetta moved behind her desk and sat down after they were in her office. "Have a seat, Commander, and tell me about yourself."

  After twenty minutes of discussing Commander Novotny's previous duties, Jenetta said, "I have a very important and difficult assignment for you Commander. I'd like you to be my warden."

  "Warden, Commander?"

  "Yes. We have sixty-five hundred prisoners to guard until they can be transported to proper facilities. They'll be housed in six large warehouses that are being converted for prison use. We expect to begin moving them in today, as soon as the warehouses are outfitted with the new shower and toilet facilities. The most difficult prisoners, those that decided to fight, are being housed in the detention center. The next most obstinate group will be fitted with Raider restraint bands that can disable them in a second if they get out of control, but we won't have enough for everyone. Marines will guard the prisoners twenty-four hours a day, from catwalk positions in the warehouses. Stun rifles will be used on those prisoners not equipped with restraint bands. You'll have the unenviable task of keeping a potential powder keg from blowing. Are you up to it?"

  "I believe so, Commander, although I don't have any prison management experience. I'm a line officer."

  "As am I. We're all being called upon to do things that are new to us. The Space Marines will handle the prisoners. You just have to supervise and make sure that the Marines get whatever they need to do their job effectively. You'll also supervise the detention center but you shouldn't have any trouble there. The warehouses are the potential problem."

  "Aye, Commander."

  "Good. Why don't you track down Major Visconti and introduce yourself. Your office will be in suite 903, just down the hall. Welcome aboard, Commander."

  "Thank you, Commander," he said as he stood up.

  "Send Lieutenant Ashraf in please."

  "Aye, Commander."

  A few seconds after he left, Lieutenant Ashraf came in.

  "Have a seat, Lori."

  "Thank you, Commander," she said, taking her seat.

  "I'm surprised to see you here. As third officer aboard the Song you should have been exempt from reassignment."

  "I was, but I requested to be considered for a position on your staff."

  Jenetta paused for a few seconds. "You realize that these reassignments will last from six months to two years?"

  "Yes, ma'am. That was explained to me."

  "Okay, Lieutenant. Lt. Commander Novotny is our new prison warden, leaving three main jobs open. I need a Port Officer, a Food Services Officer, and an Adjutant. Do any of those positions interest you?"

  "I'll serve where ever I'm assigned, ma'am."

  "Of course, but do you have a preference?"

  "I suppose that Adjutant would be my first choice."

  "Good. You're now my Adjutant. You'll set my appointments, coordinate all functions for this office, and supervise the office staff. I'll go over the station floor plans with you later, and show you how we assigned quarters on Dixon, then you can assign quarters to yourself and the other new officers. You're also the Housing Officer until it becomes a full time position and we have someone to fill it."

  "Aye, Commander."

  Jenetta smiled. "Let's get to work, Lieutenant. Send Lieutenant Graham in, please."

  "Aye, Commander," Lieutenant Ashraf said as she stood and left the room. Having functioned as Jenetta's acting first officer on the Song following the Battle of Vauzlee, she knew Jenetta well and was delighted to again occupy a post that would have them working closely again.

  Lieutenant Graham entered Jenetta's office a few minutes later and came to attention.

  "At ease, Lieutenant. Have a seat and tell me about yourself."

  Fifteen minutes later, the new Port Officer/Warehouse Operations Officer left Jenetta's office in the form of Lieutenant Graham. His first job was to coordinate with the clerks doing the inventory work to get the computer database established.

  Jenetta reviewed the work in the warehouses after lunch. Five of the six dormitory warehouses were equipped with showers and toilets, and four were already set up with gravity shielding pads that would serve as beds. The pads, about the length and width of a bunk mattress, blocked gravity from the deck plating and caused the sleeper to float as much as a quarter of a meter above the deck, depending upon their weight. Jenetta approved moving the male prisoners from the Song and Geneva into the new facilities.

  The Raiders were brought off the ships in groups of twenty, under heavy guard. Their IDs were checked and they were assigned to one of the available warehouses. There wasn't any opportunity for them to attempt an escape with two platoons of armed Marines watching their every move and they were, in fact, relieved to get off the ships. They hadn't showered since entering the ships, the toilet facilities consisted of plastic tubs, they hadn't been given clean clothes, and they were sleeping on hard decks with just a thin blanket. Wherever they were being put now, had to be better than where they'd been.

  By the time the prisoners from the Song and Geneva were transported and settled, the rest of the warehouses were set up and ready, so the Space Marines began to transport the prisoners from the Prometheus and Thor. It was almost midnight when the move was complete.

  When she arrived at her quarters that evening, Jenetta received a warm and friendly welcome from her cats. They weren't used to being away from her so much during the day. She decided that from now on she would take them to the office with her, as she had done on Dixon.

  * * *

  Chapter Twelve

  ~ January 6th, 2274 ~

  Despite the condition of the habitat when Jenetta assumed command of the new base, she was able to turn it into the semblance of a real base within a week. It still needed a tremendous amount of work, though. More than half of the living quarters still needed to be refinished, most of the common areas and offices hadn't been touched yet, and the main computer still wasn't able to link with Space Command, although it was fully functional for internal base use.

  The lower half of the habitat, reserved by Jenetta for Space Command and Space Marine use only, was being equipped with security entrances requiring implanted CTs or IDs, handprint, retinal identification, and even voice recognition. While all officers had CTs implanted, NCOs and crewmen only had implanted ID chips. Lacking two-way communication capability, the ID chips were in all other respects like CTs in that they could receive com messages, could be used to locate an individual, and permitted identification and access for authorized areas and equipment. The initial inventory work in all the warehouses had been completed, and work was progressing well on inventorying the contents of cargo containers in the cavern, albeit more slowly because of the zero atmosphere.

  Captain Gavin waited a full seven days to come ashore for the tour required for his report to Space Command. They had already toured the warehouses used for the prisoners, and they were touring the main level using one of the small 'oh-gee' vehicles common around the base when he said, "Great job, Jen. You've done wonders in just seven days. I saw the early assessment vids and didn't think that things would look this good for months."

  "I've had to use the resources while they're available, Captain. You said that ships might begin leaving after two weeks so it was imperative that we get as much done as possible before then. I've pushed my people really hard, but by the end of the two-week schedule that I've established, we should be in good shape. We'll be able to function moderately well after that while we continue the renovation work and slowly gear up to function as a normal base."

  "I filed a lengthy report on the habitat takeover after you left the ship to take command of the base. It's a little over six days each way so Supreme HQ should have the report by now. We should have updated orders and information in another week."

  "I hope they have something in mind for our
prisoners. We can't keep a population like this penned up in warehouses for an indefinite period. Eventually, even the threat of being stunned won't hold them back. They'll revolt and we might be forced to use deadly force to stop them, if we even can."

  "Where did you put the Commandant?"

  "I gave him private, deluxe accommodations."

  "Private, deluxe accommodations?"

  "Nothing like his former quarters, of course. He's got a private cell in the detention center."

  Gavin nodded and chuckled.

  "It really is a privilege when you consider that otherwise you're sharing a single bedroom with about seven hundred other prisoners. Also, it keeps him from fomenting rebellion. All the top habitat officials are down there, in addition to the Raiders that decided to fight to the death. The latter are being held three to a cell so they're not nearly as comfortable, although they do have their own bathroom in each cell. All prisoners in the detention center have been fitted with Raider restraint bands, and we're doing the same with all prisoners that start trouble in the warehouses. Trouble makers are being segregated into one warehouse where we have triple the number of guards on duty at all times."

  "Your latest report states that you aren't able to receive Space Command asynchronous computer updates."

  "That's correct, sir. We're still getting our updates through the Prometheus' system while the computer people work on the problem. There's some sort of difficulty in the decryption process that's preventing us from disassembling the data stream. We'll find the problem soon. I'm sure that it's not a major one."

  The cart had reached the elevator to the lower floors, and after passing retinal scans they descended into the Space Command section and continued the tour of the base's power systems and life support systems areas. Entire floors, each with three square kilometers of empty space, would support whatever functions and activities Space Command assigned to the base. At present, the only space being utilized was dedicated to the detention center, computer facility, power and life support functions, Station Control Center, and the base's new Combat Information Center.