Ghost Station (The Wandering Engineer)

by Hechtl, Chris

  It was a pity the ship's crew hadn't survived. She was a beautiful ship, white and gold and well cared for before her eventual derelict status. They had obviously loved the little ship.

  Her interior was a mess, something he'd expected. Life support had been shot; a bot had been tasked to patch the hole. What also interested him were the bots on the ship, there were quite a few and the ship boasted not one but three separate AI cores. All three were damaged to various degrees but they were salvageable.

  He'd set a pair of cleaner bots up to clean up the mess in the habitats and then gently bagged the bodies before transporting them to the funeral home for recycling.

  The little bots should be finished soon; after all it was a yacht not a liner. She had a couple of decks but only a few were currently useable. A majority were open to space. From the look of the ship she'd run out of fuel and then drifted somehow over the hyper line and into subspace. She'd been adrift for so long she'd taken damage from the occasional wandering rock ball. Right now she looked a little like a colander. It would take a week or two to sort out all the damage.

  “The refinery?”

  “The refinery is functioning nominal across the board. The next scheduled pick up is in a week. A tug has already been dispatched,” Sprite informed him. He'd used his own replicator to build a gas giant refinery a couple of weeks ago when Antigua Prime had refused to do so at his urging. Kiev had dropped it off for him along with a copy for their own refueling needs just before they had left. Now that he had it out there and working it was sucking hydrogen from the atmosphere, processing it into useful deuterium. Of course since it was now functional the station wanted the fuel all for themselves.

  They hadn't been happy when he'd slapped their hands but too bad. He'd offered a trade, they could get one third of the fuel in exchange for usage of a tug to go out weekly and pick it up and return all of it. The remaining fuel was his but they would store it for him free of charge as part of the deal. He'd let Sprite handle the details of the contract after that. She had later informed him that the wrangling had taken over an hour and had gotten rather heated before they'd finally agreed to his demands.

  They had immediately traded for his other two thirds in exchange for usage of the replicators. Of course that had yet to be allowed, scheduling conflicts and all that. Then again they hadn't gotten the fuel yet either so he couldn't blame them for putting him off.

  Things were definitely looking down. He didn't like it, didn't like the way things were trending against him. Sometimes he felt like he was being a little paranoid, that he needed a break. He knew he didn't have itchy feet, the urge to move, but he did have a feeling like something was about to happen, something bad.

  "More Dilgarth?" A few of the eggs tucked in hidden out of the way places had hatched with predictable results when the creeling starving young were found. Fortunately they had had only one fatality.

  She shook her head. "Nary a one."

  "Schedule hick up?" he asked.

  "You could say that," Sprite said. She didn't sound all that thrilled about admitting it. She was also getting to be a pain in the ass by drawing this out. Sometimes he swore she did this on purpose to get his BP up.

  "Well?" he asked starting to get exasperated with her little game.

  "I was going to tell you but you got into a guessing game," she said smiling. He rolled his eyes. "Okay okay, I was trying to tell you admiral that the political establishment has started weighing in on our golden goose here. Apparently what you have been telling them all along has finally sunken in. So much so that I believe it is about to come back and bite us in the ass.”

  “Oh? Don't tell me...” he sighed. He was fairly certain he was in trouble. “Okay.”

  “Bracing yourself?” Sprite snorted. “I think you can figure out what comes next. They've begun making promises to rebuild their infrastructure in exchange for votes in their upcoming elections."

  He shrugged. He'd expected it sooner. The constitutional convention had been a big hit, covered in minute detail by reporters from all over the planet. It had been held in the old capital, now a crater with a bunch of tents on it. He wasn't sure why they hadn't had it in one of the underground cities. Sure it was a neutral spot, but it was also far from any of the utilities and the logistics had been a nightmare for those who had attended.

  Still they had gotten it done; the constitution had made it through the convention in less than a month and then voted on and passed by an eighty nine percent vote yesterday.

  Even before the vote the mayors had started posturing, strutting and maneuvering to run for the high office of star system governor. Things were going to get interesting soon. The election was in a six weeks. "Oh, well, not bad, we can fit them in." He was just glad they didn't have video ground side. If they had they would be subjected to political infomercials and even more mudslinging than what was being reported by the printed press.

  Sprite shook her head. "And therein lies the rub. They want it now. As well as new appliances for everyone, a new air car in every garage, medicine, clothes... It's well, chaos."

  He scowled. "Great."

  "And we can't tell them no, we need them."

  He held up a hand then sighed, deflating a little. He wanted to protest he really did. Technically he didn't need them. Oh he did, but not as much as they thought he did.

  "Okay that really sucks," he finally said. He really really didn't want to piss off the establishment right from the beginning. "Has anyone proposed how they are going to pay for it all?"

  She shook her head, smiling bitterly. "Oh that gets better. Since it's their station anyway, they get it all for free."

  "Seriously?" he asked, eyes narrowed.

  "As a heart attack."

  "Oh hell," he sighed, closing his eyes and rubbing his temples. "They talk to anyone on our end yet?" he asked after a moment.

  "A few of the council support it. The peace and flowers faction are all for it." She sounded more than a little disgusted.

  Politics were just as complicated on the station as it was on the ground. They were still trying to get a handle on it as things settled down. So far it wasn't something he was happy about. It was something he could live with, but some of the ruling council were becoming royal pains in his ass now that things were settling down and the station was coming back to life.

  The station's ruling council was broken into three main groups. The first were the old guard. Fu, his wife, and a handful of others that were still sane and willing to participate. The love and peace group. Then there were the new guard, led by the Warners. They were from Kiev. Finally there were the new volunteers from the planet. Many were either people with medical issues or aged. A few he suspected were political appointees.

  They'd just finished integrating the last one last week actually. He was surprised that most of them had survived the procedure. The doctors had gotten good at it apparently. Or just lucky. He wasn't sure which.

  The station council had subdivisions in the factions. A few of the old guard had reached out to the new, shepherding them through the cyber process. They had also passed on some of their dislike for war apparently. He'd been getting some passive resistance lately.

  "Trying to spike the guns before they are built I bet," he grumbled bringing his mental faculties back to the situation on hand.

  "Possibly. they've already taken orders and are working on scheduling priorities now. They haven't interrupted station repairs yet..."

  He sighed. "But they probably jogged my long term plans all to hell."

  "No plan survives contact with the enemy admiral," Sprite said shaking her virtual head.

  "They aren't the enemy," he growled in response. He wiped at his face again with his left hand. At least not yet, he thought. Hopefully not. Hopefully not ever.

  "No? They sure act like it," Sprite said disgusted. "Golden euphoria, that's what it is I bet."

  "Probably," Irons said in agreement. He scowled coming to a decision h
e knew he wasn't going to like. "Book me some face time with the leaders." He needed to get some face time in with these people. Some he knew but a lot of the people from the planet he didn't know and that was a problem. He needed to know all the players.

  "You're seriously thinking of going down there admiral? We're at a delicate moment with the repairs," Sprite cautioned. She calculated a thirty percent interruption in the schedule if he did go down to the surface. However perhaps that was his intent all along? No, she calculated that the admiral's primary reason was to avoid any avoidance of the issue if he placed a transmission through to the planet. He wanted a face to face meeting. There was a ninety point five percent probability that was what he was thinking.

  The admiral smiled slightly. "We need to know the players Sprite. We need to see the big picture. Aren't you always reminding me to do that? To keep an eye on the politics along with the engineering?"

  "Throwing my words back at me admiral?" Sprite responded, clearly amused. "I've booked a seat on the red eye. You'll have to take mass transit to the Doonburg town. Calculated transit time is three point four days round trip."

  He wrinkled his nose. He wasn't sure about that. "Doonburg?" he asked amused.

  "I didn't name it. I think it's the usual name hash," she said, rolling her virtual eyes. "I can't specify a specific time since we're relying on mass transit and he can't keep the entire day open. We'll have to let his office know we're in town when we get there."

  "And no doubt cool our heels as he clears his schedule,” he said.

  “Hopefully he doesn't find some excuse to not be there,” Sprite riposted in agreement. He nodded.

  “Okay, who's he?" he asked. He hated hurry up and wait games. Half the time the entire wait was fabricated to put the recipient off balance or a show of dominance to show them who's boss.

  "You specified leaders. The lead mayor is Mayor Jeff Randall. Where he goes the others inevitably follow. Thirty six, male human. Extremely charismatic, highly sociable and very educated for his planet. His wife Sandra acts as his XO. Their town has had the most advances since he took office when he was twenty nine. He's a player. He has an extremely high probability of becoming planetary governor when elections are finally organized and held five weeks and six days from now."

  "Interesting. Anything more?"

  "Only what I can access on the public net, which isn't much. I can give you a slightly broader thumbnail bio, but I don't have a lot to go off of admiral," she said with a sniff of disgust.

  "Backward about electronic information?"

  "They were. Also about tying the networks together. Some still use antiquated methods I'm still trying to puzzle out. The Randall's have been a major component of change for that. One of their projects is a standardized planetary computer network with dedicated unrestricted servers."

  "Ah. Interesting."

  "One of the other things he's promising is free tablet computers and open access to education and historical records."

  The admiral grinned. Perhaps this wouldn't be so bad he thought. "A man after my own heart. Okay book me. We'll see how it goes when I'm ground side. Hopefully this won't take long."

  "I'm hoping it goes well," she said. "Your track record with politicians isn't pretty admiral," Sprite replied.

  "Tell me about it," he grumbled in disgust.

  The flight across the system and down to the planet's surface had been a relatively uneventful affair. The station was only a couple of AU from the planet now, no more than a couple of hours to get to it by shuttle now that the starships were gone. Fortunately Barry had been persuaded to part with his big yellow banana boat before leaving so they had two shuttles to make the run. The school bus wasn't comfortable at all, it seriously lacked leg room for someone adult size, but it had plenty of seats.

  Not of course that there were a lot of people on the return flight. Quite the contrary. He and the shuttle's crew were it. They had the ship to themselves and talked for a bit before making planetary orbit. A bit turbulent in the re-entry, but that was to be expected. He looked out across the port and stretched, glad that that leg of the transit was over.

  Already vendors were cropping up all over the place he noted. He could see smoke pouring from smoke stacks in the distance. That's right; they were still using old iron age industrial technology he thought with a mental nod. Of course there was the scent of barbeque in the air as well so not quite all that smog was industrial related. He noticed a few people coughing at the smog and fumes. He'd read that a river on the other side of the planet had caught fire again. That was ominous, that it was that polluted that it caught fire. What was also ominous was that it wasn't the first time and apparently the cities and towns around the river had opted to field a highly trained fire fighting force over stopping the pollution and cleaning the river. Hopefully when they got the industry set up properly things like that would change.

  “I believe you have to go to the mass transit system admiral,” Sprite said, sounding busy.

  “Okay,” he said, looking around. A constable dressed in a brown button down suit and a British bobby hat noted his look and pointed to where most of the crowd was heading with his billy club.

  “Better hurry gov, no lolly gagging for this lot if you want a prime seat,” the man said, touching his old fashioned bobby hat.

  “Thank you sir,” Irons said, lips puckering in amusement as he followed the directions. He caught sight of the constable checking him out. He realized it was the undress uniform that had him interested.

  “Gov?” Sprite asked amused. “British? In this time period?”

  “Some things transcend time and space Sprite,” he said, amused as well. “Sitrep?”

  “I'm setting up the banking system now admiral.” Sprite hadn't been sure about this last bit. Fortunately someone in the local banking industry had picked up some computers and was using them.

  “I meant the station.”

  “Oh that?” She sounded distracted. He frowned as he dodged a cart load of luggage. Smog was everywhere, forming a haze all over the station. “The gas giant refineries are working like clockwork. There is a load in transit now. Eta twenty nine and a half hours.” He had negotiated the building of the Kiev plant for the first two months of fuel from it. It wasn't like they were going to miss it after all; the ship was out of the system and wouldn't be back for nearly a year.

  “Do we need to be on hand for it?”

  “A little late to ask now admiral don't you think?” Sprite asked.

  “Sprite...” he sighed.

  “No, she's good. Warner's have it covered. The crews on the station are falling into routine.”

  “Good.”

  “Admiral, there, okay, it's set up I think.”

  “You think?” he asked.

  “We'll know in a minute,” she said as he slowed. The crush of bodies was stalled by a narrow turn style bottleneck. He sighed softly. This was definitely going to take some time. He was glad now he didn't have a hard appointment time.

  "Admiral what in the spirit of space is that?" Sprite demanded as they broke away from the pack a half hour later. He looked up at the whistle and smiled, turning to the iron behemoth nearby. He of course recognized it right away. Any engineer worth his salt would.

  "Checking database..." Sprite said. Images flickered in a window on his upper right.

  He grinned, eyes tracing the lines of the behemoth. "Don't bother Sprite, that is a steam locomotive," he said feeling a little like a kid again. He was grinning and couldn't help it. His practiced eyes traced the familiar yet alien lines. They'd followed the classic lines; she had a boiler, smoke stack and even a cow catcher on the bow. He took another look, studying the train tracks. She was using the original tracks as well as add ons. Smart.

  "Why would anyone use such an archaic piece of technology? That pile of scrap iron belongs in a museum!" Sprite said with some heat.

  He snorted in amusement. Sprite may think it was antiquated but he thought
it was fascinating. It also showed him that these people didn't just sit and watch, they did things. They didn't moan about not having the tools, they went back and reinvented what they could. "Maybe from where we come from, but for this time period it's what they have available. They can't replicate what they need so they bootstrapped it the hard way." He even noted a steam governor. Good he thought with a nod of approval. They thought of safety and efficiency as well.

  "A locomotive. Designed to haul goods and materials along a linear track?" she demanded.

  "Yes Sprite," he replied amused. His lips puckered in another smile at her tone.

  "It's very inefficient. And it pollutes," she finally said as he continued to look the machine over.

  The admiral nodded grudgingly. "It's extremely energy inefficient you mean. Also slow compared to modern transportation methods. but it can be readily built by the local population out of materials on hand and doesn't rely on technology they don't have."

  "Fascinating," Sprite said dryly.

  "Actually it is. If you notice the track, it's actually not the typical design." He went over to the edge of the platform and studied the track and train. The black and red train had two sets of wheels to propel it. Eight were on the outside, riding on the outer two rails. It looked like... he ducked and peeked between wheels, ignoring the puffs of escaping steam. Yes, there were another broader set of wheels running down the center of the locomotive. He wasn't sure how the linkage was done. He looked at the piston. It was solid, the cylinder coated in brass, probably to keep it from rusting from the constant contact with water and steam.

  He checked the... truck he thought to himself as he looked. Yes, the four wheeled contraption under each end of the cars was called a truck. From the looks of it they each had six wheels instead of the usual four. Four on the outside yes, but two broad inner ones connected to the axle on the inside on the middle rail. From the look of it these wrapped... ah.

  He scanned it then straightened and pulled up his recording. Ah yes, not two inner wheels, but some sort of armature that had smaller wheels. The armature hugged the inner rail, and it looked like smaller wheels were on the inside edge hugging the vertical part of the T shape. Or riding on the underside of the top bar.