"Not at all. I believe we'd appreciate being able to offload this material as soon as possible," I said.
"Frieda, would you have Jans meet them on Level-23 with an eradicator? I'm afraid our new friends may have had more than one unexpected companion," she said.
"Yes, Madame," Frieda replied.
"Eradicator?" Tabby asked.
"Of course, I can't believe I forgot," Marny said. Her face had lost most of its color. "This much material will have snakes, lizards and other creepy crawly stuff in it."
"I'm afraid it is part of the business," Yolande agreed. "Fortunately, you have a positive seal between your living quarters and the hold."
"I don't think so," Tabby said. "We only run a pressure barrier when not in combat."
Yolande pinched something from her HUD and flicked it at me. "You'll want to call this man. He will help you rid your ship of its unwanted passengers."
I shook my head. It was always something unforeseen that got us.
We finished with Yolande and traipsed back into the ship. Tabby made a big show of pulling the hard doors closed between the hold and the Berth Deck. When we arrived on the bridge, I was surprised to see Ada perched on the back of her pilot's chair. Pinned to the console by a dozen flechette rounds was a very colorful, meter long snake.
"I don't like snakes," Ada said through clenched teeth.
"Nick, you want to give him a call?" I asked, tossing him the contact for Thomas Ulrich. His business name was long, but descriptive – 'Thomas, Remover of Unpleasant Beasts and Things That Go Bump in the Night.'
"Yup. And, I vote we sleep on station tonight," he said.
"I'll second that," Marny agreed.
Upon landing in our docking bay on Level-23, we hastily gathered our items and exited the ship. Ulrich had already agreed to clean the ship once we'd offloaded the pallets. Jans arrived with a small bot we set up at the back of the hold, which upon turning on, fired three small blaster rounds, its specially tuned sensors locating things I chose not to inspect further.
"That was officially disgusting," Tabby said to Ada as we got on the lift to our warehouse on Level-24.
"You don't get that with ore," Ada agreed.
"Drinks?" I asked. "First round's on me."
It was late and Celina's Diner was closed as we walked by, but Startron Lounge was open for business. The lights were low and there were half a dozen patrons seated at tables and a couple at the bar. I didn't recognize the bartender and didn't see Jake, so we just grabbed a table large enough for the five of us.
"What's our next move?" Ada asked after we'd been served our drinks.
I didn't immediately answer. I had several ideas, but hadn't formed a complete plan.
Nick finally answered, "We need to get back to Descartes. Big Pete says things have cooled down and they haven't seen the cruisers. I think we know why that is. Hopefully Jake was able to get a pattern so we can disarm the explosives Kiirilov planted on Pete and Silver's claim," he said.
"It's true. If Dad can get the refinery going, we could haul ingots instead of ore. And if we could find a buyer, we could afford a new tug in four or five loads," I said.
"Better find a space station to deliver that to," Ada said. "You'll tear up Hotspur if you land her with a full load of iron ingots on Grünholz very often."
"Meerkat had some interest in sheet, even more so if we had nano-crystalized," Nick said.
"We won't be set up for nano for a long time," I said. "Maybe we should skip the pig iron ingots and go straight to sheet material."
"We need to take out Kiirilov and trade his ship for a decent tug," Tabby said.
"We got lucky with the Stenka. We're not an even match for even one of those small cruisers," I said. "We can't think about what we lost. We have to think about what we have and how best to use it."
"Geez, don't jump down my throat," she said.
I leaned over, tried to kiss her and she gave me her cheek. I'd need to figure out how to be more circumspect in my answers in the future. I wasn't going to let her pout, though, so I climbed onto her lap, facing her and lightly kissed her until she gave in.
"Okay, get off," she said, laughing.
"She's got a point, Cap. Petar's Karelia is the linchpin to this entire problem. Without it, we'll never be able to prove their involvement in the Cape's destruction," Marny said.
"What's going on over here?" Jake Berandor's deep baritone voice cut through the quiet of the bar.
He grabbed a chair and pulled it around to the table, smiling broadly.
"Delivery," I said.
"Word is, you brought a nice load of crawlies with you too," he said.
"Seriously? How did you hear that?" I asked.
"Not many secrets in a small city," he said. "You should try the blue ale. It's from Curie and it's delicious. Jerico, bring us a round of Curie's Blue."
"How's business?" I asked.
"I've got to say, I love these people. And actually, that's why I'm here. I have updates for you and I think you're going to like it."
"Do tell," I said.
He set a small device on the table and my ears popped. I'd seen a similar device deployed before and knew it was designed to keep our conversation private.
"Never can be too careful," Jake acknowledged. "First, I sent the data you had on the explosives at Big Pete's claim to Professor Coffman. She sent a pattern for a small bot that should have a better than seventy percent chance of disarming the charges."
"That sounds good. How about the other question regarding who was on the Cape of Good Hope?" I asked.
"It's different than what we were thinking, but just as damning," he said. "And before I tell you, you need to know this was expensive to get. I do think you'll find it worthwhile."
"We'll pay," Nick said.
"They had an audit crew on board. Apparently, Emre's reports haven't been adding up," he said.
"Why wouldn't Belirand just send a heavy cruiser through the gate and remove Emre?" I asked.
"According to my source, Belirand didn't have enough information to isolate the problem. By destroying the ship, Emre stopped movement through Terminal Six for the time being. His engineers reported that a flaw in the TransLoc gate is what caused it to fail. At a minimum, he bought six months to cover up whatever he's been doing," Jake said.
"That's motive enough," I said. "We just need to prove it now and that's on us. What do we owe you?"
Jake slid a pad over to me. Twenty-two thousand credits. I whistled when I saw the number. "Do I want to know how you got this information?"
"You do not," he said.
I signed the transfer of credits.
The next morning, I awoke in the apartment that had been furnished with our warehouse. It wasn't elegant, but we had enough beds for everyone to sleep in. It wasn't like any of us would be sleeping on Hotspur until it had been cleared of bugs and reptiles.
Marny and I quietly exited the apartment and took a lift down to the loading bay where we'd left Hotspur. Both Frieda and a man I didn't recognize were already there.
"Thomas Ulrich," the man introduced himself. "I understand you have a pest problem."
"We do. First time hauling from Nannandry and we weren't careful with the doors," I said.
"A mistake you won't make twice, I'd be willing to bet," he said with a chuckle. "I'll assemble my crew and once you're unloaded we'll get it all cleaned up."
"Great. My pilot took this one out, any idea what it is?" I pinched the picture of the snake Ada had shot and flicked it to him.
"Call that a King Coral. Less deadly than it sounds, but if you don't get its bite treated within the first fifteen minutes or so, you're a goner," he said.
"That's not deadly?" I asked.
"Not compared to the chimera beetle. That little bugger will kill you in less than three minutes," he said.
"And you can get it all out?" I asked.
"We're very thorough, but just to be safe, I can sell you a critter
gitter. It'll patrol your ship and look for pests," he said.
"How much for that?" I asked.
"Twelve hundred," he said. "But, since we're doing a full treatment today, I'll sell it to you for eight hundred."
He was probably getting the better end of the deal, but I wasn't going to argue. We needed to feel secure.
"I'm in," I said.
When we opened the ramp, the smell of Grünholz hit us in a heavy wave. On the floor of the hold, there were no less than twenty lizards, snakes and miscellaneous things I couldn't quickly identify in front of Yolande's bot.
"How hard is it to get the pattern for one of those?" I asked.
"They're not expensive," Frieda answered. "I'd be happy to forward you a reference."
"Please do," I said.
"Cap, are you sure this is a good business for us?" Marny asked.
"I'll tell you after I square with Frieda," I said.
Frieda flashed a smile and held out her reading pad for me to bump. The offloading process proceeded smoothly, only occasionally interrupted by the flash of the small blaster from the tiny pest sentinel that stood guard.
After Frieda disappeared with her final load, I checked out numbers. We'd grossed twenty five thousand credits. Thomas would take three thousand and we'd burned another two thousand in fuel. As disgusting as it was, it had been a very profitable run.
"Ready?" Thomas asked.
"For what?"
"Just open your hatches, and you'll see," he said, standing with his hand on the edge of a crate that he'd brought up on a small grav-sled.
I dropped the pressure barriers and opened the hatches. "All yours," I said.
With a flourish he opened his crate and a swarm of small, autonomous bots flew, jumped and slithered out.
"Give 'em an hour and you'll be one hundred percent critter uncluttered," he said. "I also offer a cleaning service. Looks like your hold could use a good scrubbing."
"Sign me up," I said as I chuckled and shook my head.
TOUCHING BASE
Two hours later, we bade Thomas Ulrich farewell. He represented an unexpected cash outlay, but he'd been good to his word. The hold was spotless and the invasion had been stemmed. He left behind a small, mechanical centipede that was the length of my hand stretched out. Its only objective was to crawl around the ship and look for and disinvite unwelcome guests.
"Nick, Tabby and Ada are having breakfast at Celina's," Marny said. "You want something?"
"Sure, whatever they're eating is fine," I said. "I'll be along in a second."
"I can wait," she said.
I ran up to my quarters for the bag of Hapet's carved statuettes.
"Any thoughts on how we deal with two cruisers?" I asked Marny as we took the private lift into our warehouse.
"I know that we don't take them on at the same time," she said. "We took a heck of a pummeling with just a single pass from them."
"The foundry and forge will make dealing with them less critical for us, but what about the other claim holders? How will they survive if Terminal Seven isn't a safe place to deliver their ore?" I asked.
"One step at a time," she said as we rounded the corner to Celina's Diner.
The restaurant wasn't overly busy and we joined the rest of the crew at the largest table in the back after greeting Celina with a hug.
"Where are Jack and Jenny?" I asked.
"Not sure. They're cooking up trouble somewhere, though. They went tearing out of here just after breakfast rush," she said. "Coffee?"
"Please," I fished out a bone carving of a rodent. "Hold on a sec before you go. Do you have any interest in these?"
She picked it up and inspected it. "What's it made of?"
"That's hand-carved lizard bone," I said.
"What do you want for it?"
"I don't know. I bought fifty for nearly nothing," I said.
"I could probably sell them for ten credits apiece," she said. "How about we split the profit and I'll see how they do?"
"I'm keeping one, but you've got a deal."
"Are you ever not working?" Tabby asked.
"That isn't work. That's just having fun," I said.
"I finished replicating that bot pattern Jake got for us," Nick said. "I'd like to get back to Descartes and drop off fuel, food and the machinery. It sounds like Pete and Muir have everything all laid out for the refinery."
"Fine by me," I said. "The ship's all cleaned up."
"Are you sure?" Ada asked.
"Not a hundred percent, but Thomas did leave a guardian behind. He unleashed quite the little army of killer robots. I'll spare you on how much they actually pulled out. Suffice it to say, we need to keep that hold locked down when we have biological material on board."
"What about the eradicator robot that Yolande put in the hold?" Tabby asked.
I nodded. "We should probably replicate that before we go back to Nannandry."
"Are we taking the industrial replicator out with us?" Ada asked.
"We'll have to," Nick said. "We need to manufacture a lot of parts for the refinery. We don't have enough steel to do it here."
"We should advertise that we have it on station. I was talking to Selig last night and they've broken some equipment," she said.
"Aren't they concerned about repercussions from Petar?" I asked.
"They are, but keeping Petar happy doesn't do them any good if they can't actually mine," she said.
"I'm looking at a departure of tomorrow morning," I said. "Anyone opposed?"
"Why not take off now?" Ada asked.
"Does someone miss Selig?" Tabby asked, with a lilt in her voice.
"You be good, Tabitha Masters," Ada said.
"I'd like to contact as many of the claim holders as possible and see if any are in need of supplies. They've been out a long time and I don't imagine that Petar cares much for how they're surviving," I said.
"I'd be willing to organize that," Ada said. "How will they pay, though?"
"We can trade for ore, fuel or extra equipment. Let them know we'll be discreet," I said.
"And the co-op will extend credit for O2 or food," Nick said.
I nodded my agreement
"We can split up the list," Tabby said, "I'll help. You want Lichts?" I smiled at her inability to let it go.
"That's fine," Ada said.
"We need to reload ship stores," Marny said, "I'll get to that."
We all went our separate ways until late in the afternoon when I met up with Tabby and Ada. They had a list ten kilometers long of supplies requested by the claim holders. Most of them had little to trade other than ore. Nick and I decided that if we ever wanted the co-op to be successful we'd have to make that work.
We gathered on the bridge, mentally exhausted from making deals and arranging deliveries.
"We're out of cash," Nick pronounced after making his final order from his workstation.
"Ugh," I said.
I knew we were getting close. We'd be betting the business by running our cash down to zero. But we were the best shot most of the Descartes claim holders had at survival. If we turned our backs on them now, they would go flat broke, sitting on a pile of ore they couldn't move.
"You suppose that's part of Petar's plan? Let them mine all that ore, wait until they leave, then take it from their abandoned claims?" Ada asked.
"I'd bet that crossed his mind," Nick said.
"Ada would you send a comm to the claim holders. Anyone who's nervous about staying on their claim can take up residence on top of the Co-Op. They'll have to bring their own hab-domes, but we'll even give them work mining out the station," I said. "You okay with that, Nick?"
"With everything that's owed us, sure. It's a good idea," he said. "Marny, what about security on something like that?"
"I need a security door on the control room. Otherwise, I think between Big Pete, Silver and Muir, we can keep things moving along. I suppose it depends on how many people take you up on it," she said.
<
br /> "Any chance you can get a security door pattern with Mars credits or free?" I asked.
"Shouldn't be a problem, the idea is straightforward enough," she said. "I'll ask Pete to give me some measurements and I'll get something designed."
"I'm going to give the Ambassador a call. Let me know if anyone thinks we can't make it out by 1000 tomorrow," I said.
"Copy that, Cap," Marny said.
Tabby followed me back to the small office next to our quarters and took one of the two seats. She clearly wanted to hear what Turnigy had to say. I didn't blame her.
Open comm, Ambassador Turnigy, I said.
"Young Captain Hoffen. I was wondering when you'd be calling," he said.
"We're prepared to set sail in two days," I said. Tabby lifted an eyebrow at my obvious untruth. "We're headed for Nuage Gros. You'd asked for a heads up."
"Right you are and I thank you for your courtesy," he said. "My presence has been requested by King Kostov. He suggested that he would like to meet you. Would you be interested in accompanying me?"
"That's a problem," I said. "We've nearly a full hold of goods that won't keep. Is there any possibility of pushing this off for a week?"
"If that means you'd accompany me, a week is quite acceptable," he said.
"Will the king guarantee our safety? I'm under the impression that we're not exactly welcome by many of the lords," Tabby asked.
"Ah, Ms. Masters, a perceptive question. King Kostov has granted your company temporary immunity for the duration of your trip. Any faction within Oberrhein that attacks this diplomatic mission will be acting against the crown. It is not a guarantee, but it is also a death sentence to any who might violate it," he said.
"We'll be in touch," I said and closed the comm.
"You really don't trust him, do you?" Tabby asked.
"I don't know who to trust. We could certainly use his help though," I said.
"When did life get so complex?" she asked.
"No kidding."
We all worked well into the night, receiving loads from the different vendors of Lèger. I found it ironic that I ended up purchasing back some of the bio material, albeit processed, from Yolande for our medical and food grade replicator. Fortunately, the neat little dry packages she provided no longer carried little crawly passengers.
Buccaneers (Privateer Tales Book 8) Page 28