Jaunts of the Mantis

by Jim Henderson

  Ximon said, “OK, what do you think?”

  Iday said, “We should make some attempt to find that escape pod, perhaps that nearby dwarf planet.”

  “True, though there’s no way they could still be alive if they weren’t picked up.”

  Elsbeth said, “Yeah, but if they did get picked up why are we the first to find this?”

  “Good question and very important to us as I see it. If that crew member is alive, they may have some claim to salvage. If not, we can definitely claim this.”

  Iday, “I can’t imagine why they wouldn’t have filed before now if they made it, but I guess we’ll see.”

  Elsbeth, “So, what’s our play?”

  Ximon, “Well, first thing is to gather the logs and catalog things.”

  Elsbeth, “Then, I’d like to spend some time taking some parts and tools.”

  Ximon, “Right, we’ll also need to collect the bodies and some personal effects, and we might as well see if any of the cargo is salvageable and I’d like to try to take the weapons from the mounts. Oh, and I want to take at least a few of those cryo chambers if they look workable. They’re real useful to have when you’re flying about on the edge of things.”

  “That’ll all take some time --- at least a day. Should I steal engine parts too or are you thinking salvage?”

  Ximon, “Well that depends. In a while here, I’ll send a salvage claim. Then we can start doing all that. It’ll take a while to hear back. If it’s denied, then I vote we take engine parts and that launch. If our claim is validated, then we can leave them and hope to make up the money in salvage. Thoughts?”

  Iday, “Sounds reasonable. Unless we can find a way to make some sections airtight and fill them with air, we’re going to have to watch our air carefully and make frequent trips back to Mantis. Though we can reduce that by bringing every spare air tank we have over here.”

  Elsbeth, “I’ll look to see if we can mate our cargo door with one of theirs. If so, we may want to reconnect after we get some of the stuff from this deck. Recommend we bring a couple carts and you all start loading them up from here.”

  Ximon, “OK, Elsbeth, you go check the door and oxygen options. Iday and Raiza, please gather the bodies from the upper deck and put them all in the first cabin by the air lock, and those from the lower by the cargo door. Then, go through the cabins and look for stuff to put in two piles: 1) Significant personal affects matching those bodies, 2) Stuff that can be of use, value, or interest to us. I’ll hit the bridge and get all the flight logs so I can get those to Mantis and have her start analyzing.”

  They went about their respective chores. Elsbeth said they could match cargo doors. Ximon sent the logs to Mantis and then helped Iday and Raiza. Then they all brought the odds and ends to Mantis. They had a sizable, catalogued pile of personal effects and personal comm units and tablets. They also had a pile of stuff of interest including a few weapons, a couple sets of personal armor, 6 vacc suits (without bodies in them), and electronics. They unloaded it and then rested in Mantis for a while and recharged their air.

  Then Ximon sent a salvage claim to Zulea Prima Station, claiming the ship as salvage since it had been abandoned for an extended period of time. He also had Mantis search for towing tug options.

  Mantis had already gotten some info from their logs.

  “The ship is the Peregrine Galley. It operated out of the Qai system, approximately 97 light years away. The manifest shows 8 crew and 4 passengers. I’ve sent you the names to match to the bodies and possessions. I’ve also sent you the cargo manifest.”

  “The ship mis-jumped here on day 128 and sensor logs indicate they emerged from jump surrounded by a substantial meteor swarm. The immediately took multiple hits. The captain and second mate were on the bridge and tried in vain to save the ship. They sent distress calls, but the primary comms array was damaged. The messages probably had short range and limited arc. Logs do show one escape pod getting away with someone on board, but then multiple system failures prevented further launches. The captain tried to modify the ship’s course by using maneuvering jets until those ran out of power or gas. After 20 hours 32 minutes the ship shows the captain unresponsive.”

  Ximon, “Thank you, Mantis. Please start putting together a draft lost vessel report. Please also analyze the data from the recovered personal comms devices to see if anything there can add to the account. Let me know when you hear anything back on that salvage claim.”

  “I will captain, but at our distance round trip time is almost 9 hours.”

  Ximon, “Oh, and did the logs give a trajectory or other information on that pod?”

  “Only an initial vector. It was heading in the general direction of Zulea Sub 1, which was passing through that area at that time. If nothing changed the vector, the pod would have gotten fairly close to Zulea Sub 1’s moon.”

  They took a bit of a rest and Ximon and Iday examined the cargo manifest.

  “Roger. Everyone, have a seat. Now I’m going to maneuver to connect our cargo hatch to theirs.”

  Once joined, they suited back up, worked through that airlock, and brought a few carts.

  Ximon, “Elsbeth, gather up tools and spares. Do you need a hand?”

  “It’d go faster.”

  “Ok, Raiza please assist. Iday, you’re with me. We’ll examine the stuff in the secure cargo area and forward cargo bay first. We’ll reposition the interesting stuff back here and then take it all at once.”

  They reconvened in about 90 minutes and moved the interesting stuff across. In addition to quite a few tools and spare parts, they had recovered some interesting cargo items. This included: 2 crates of personal weapons and ammo, 2 crates of physical mail, a crate of luxury clothes, a crate of personal electronics, and 2 crates of small manufactured goods. They also wheeled across 2 of the 4 cryo chambers.

  They all unsuited and had a good meal then discussed next steps.

  Ximon, “Elsbeth, you’ll need to do a spacewalk to investigate the ship’s weapons and recover what’s salvageable. I assume you’ll want a hand?”

  Elsbeth, “Yes. In zero G they’re light, but they’re still big an awkward. Iday, can you help? You know ship’s weapons better than me.”

  Iday, “Of course.”

  Ximon, “OK. Get on it. Raiza and I will move bodies to their cargo bay. We won’t move them to Mantis until we’re ready to leave – they won’t all fit in the fridge or the cryo chambers.”

  Suited back up again, Ximon and Raiza went to the other ship and carefully lowered the upper deck bodies down the access hatch from the top deck to the lower deck. Then they laid them out neatly on a pallet near the cargo door.

  As they were doing so, Elsbeth reported, “OK, Ximon, here’s what we’ve got. There’s a double turret with 2 light laser cannons that don’t appear significantly damaged, a fixed chaff thrower that looks damaged and we don’t need, and a mounted light laser cannon that looks damaged but fixable. I propose we just get the entire turret at this time, all right?”

  “That sounds good. I’ll try to open one of the side cargo doors and clear space.”

  About 2 hours later they’d gotten the turret into the ship and then hauled it over to the Mantis. Then they returned to the Mantis and rested.

  Mantis informed Ximon, “I received an acknowledgement of the salvage claim. It indicated that no immediate counter-claim was indicated.”

  “Woot woot! It’s only a start, but that’s great!”

  Mantis, “I’ve also sent you a list of potential tugs for hire. Would you like me to request one of them?”

  “Yes, request the one that can get here the fastest and has good ratings for reliability and skill.”

  “Yes, Captain.”

  Elsbeth said, “Ximon, we’ll need that tug, but I have an idea that might help. I think I can recharge their maneuver jets and we could use them to adjust the course, so it’s headed a bit more sunward. I’d guess we could get about 10-12 degrees change per fill. That wo
uld lessen the recovery time a bit and start building toward a fallback option.”

  “OK, we’ve got quite a wait anyway. Give it a try and let’s see how it goes after the first fill.”

  Ximon, “I think we’ve got to check near Zulea Sub 1 for any sign of that pod. I can’t think of any way they could be alive unless they were recovered, but it would be nice to know whether or not they are alive. Per the manifest the guy that escaped, Arend Daling, was the navigator. Without knowing their contract, we don’t know whether he might have a right to claim salvage as a surviving ship’s officer.”

  Iday, “But if he was going to do that, one would think he would already have done so and would have filed it in this system.”

  “I agree, but who knows.”

  “Anyway, we need to at least look. It would only be a 5 hour round trip to Zulea Sub 1. Would y’all agree we should go after Elsbeth tries the jets a time or two?”

  Iday, “That sounds reasonable. We don’t have an ETA for the tug, but it will certainly be at least 60-80 hours.”

  Elsbeth said, “That sounds good, but we could instead just leave me here. I’d have plenty of air and several spare tanks, even a spare suit or two. I could do the maneuver jets several times and could also check a few more things in engineering.”

  Ximon, “I don’t like the idea of leaving someone here.”

  Elsbeth, “I’ll be OK and you can leave Raiza to protect me and to ensure you don’t forget me. It goes without saying that if you leave me my ghost will kill you in your sleep.”

  Ximon smiled at that, “That’s not a bad idea if you’re sure you’re comfortable with that.”

  “Sure. I was needing some ‘girl time’.”

  Ximon, “Raiza, what do you think?”

  “Whatever will best serve you and the ship, captain.”

  “Ok then. Let’s get the gear you need to do the jets a few times. Then, I’ll plot that course at a quick burn.”

  When the others left, he grabbed Raiza’s hand to stop her. He held her close, kissed her, and said, “You’re a valuable member of this crew and one hell of a woman.”

  “Ximon, I’m not actually a woman, nor technically a member of your crew.”

  “Raiza, you’re the only woman for me and the captain gets to say who is and isn’t in the crew.”

  “Thank you Ximon.”

  “Be careful over there.”

  This all went smoothly and soon Ximon and Iday were burning at 2.5G for Zulea Sub 1 to shorten the time.

  Ximon, “We’ll do an orbit of each of the moons. Get all the scans you can, both for the pod and general planetary stuff. Then, we’ll do one equatorial orbit and one longitudinal orbit of the planet. The planet is small, and the moons are tiny, so it won’t take long.”

  Moon one yielded nothing interesting and was little more than a big rock shaped like potato. Moon two was quite a bit larger and had more potential, but they saw nothing. The planet was geologically interesting and Iday almost immediately thought he’d found something. However, it turned out to be a probe that had been sent there years before. But as they came around the other side of the planet, they found the pod tracing a slow orbit.

  They plotted a matching course and speed and examined it at close range. The pod was severely damaged, and they noted no life signs. It appeared the guy had escaped his ship only to be killed by the same meteors that had done it in.

  Ximon had Iday maneuver just slightly in front of the pod’s arc while he tried to retrieve it with the cargo arm. This proved quite difficult, but Ximon got it after several attempts and dragged it into the cargo bay.

  Then he radioed ‘the girls,’ “We’ve found the pod and are on our way back. How are y’all doing?”

  Raiza answered, “We are well. Elsbeth is currently wrestling a hose.”

  “I see. We’ll be back in about 80-90 minutes. Stay safe.”

  A few minutes later Elsbeth came on, “I got that under control, we’re using the jets for the 3rd time. We’re getting about 9 degrees course mod each time. That’s actually pretty good. Anyway, you can’t leave us hanging – is the guy alive?”

  “No, looks like the meteor swarm killed him right after he escaped the ship. I feel sorry for him, but it should improve our claim. We were able to retrieve the pod though that was no small feat.”

  “No doubt. You’re hopeless on that arm.”

  “Well, we got the pod. See you soon.”

  Mantis informed them, “The tug Cesar Muros is schedule to leave Zulea 5 in 5 hours and should meet us in approximately 90 hours. We’ll need to send an updated path for the salvage when we finish with the jets.”

  So, then they waited. They did the jets a few more times but were getting diminishing returns. They just weren’t used to such sustained use and some had died. Elsbeth spent some time working on the launch. She was able to get it mostly put back together and did some diagnostics on it, but something was wrong with its maneuvering drive. It would take more time than they had and would be infinitely easier without a space suit. While she messed with that everyone else did another pass of the ship to ensure they didn’t miss anything. They moved the bodies to the Mantis shortly before the tug arrived.

  The tug arrived at the updated intercept point about an hour later than expected, but soon got to work getting the Peregrine Galley under tow. It would take them almost 80 hours to get to a dry dock at Zulea Prima, so the Mantis went on a little ahead.

  On the way to Zulea Prima, they encountered a couple intra-system cargo shuttles, a passenger shuttle, a small yacht, and a Zulean system defense boat (SDB). The SDB captain, in particular, was quite friendly. He was glad to see a KSF ship and interested in the data Mantis has collected since they jumped in. He was also quite interested in their story of pirates in Cruna Sigma (lest they decide to try things here). He gave Ximon a link to another job source that might not be readily available and told Ximon he could say, “Capt Grayson sent you.”

  Ximon also arranged for a slot in the dry dock, a ship inspector, and a cargo broker to come inspect the cargo and sell what he could. Saddest of all, Ximon (regretfully) hired a lawyer to monitor their salvage claim since it might take longer than they were willing to hang out in Zulea. Finally, he finished and sent the Lost Ship report to Station Security and filed a copy with their salvage claim.

  They had already landed and turned the bodies and personal effects over to security before the tug laboriously put the ship in the dry dock. Ximon sent the Cesar Muros the (seemingly exorbitant) fee and thanked them. Then he had Iday work with the cargo broker, while Elsbeth had the launch moved to a dock where she could work on it and searched for some necessary parts or repairs for the Mantis.

  He took Raiza with him to go see the lawyer. They laid out the situation and provided him a summary of all the logs, plus their imagery. He seemed to think they had a fairly solid case but had to investigate what the owners of the ship had done when it went missing. Interstellar communication being what it was, he thought they’d have an answer in about 2 months. Ximon said they’d be in system for at least a week in case any questions came up before then.

  Ximon invited everyone to meet them for dinner at a nice restaurant and they all summarized what they’d found. Iday reported that the cargo buyer should have an estimate the next day. Ximon summarized the lawyer’s views. Elsbeth reported on her search for jump coil options.

  “Ok, Ximon, their part options are NOT great, and the prices are not exactly cheap. I can get individual components that should … SHOULD … allow me to repair the coil. They’re about 4K, it would take me about 8 hours in port to do that, and there’s little guarantee how long it would last. Alternately, I’ve got a line on a refurbished coil that should work. That’s about 12K and would take me about 4 hours to replace. Which one should I try?”

  “See if you can get the refurbished one. Do you need a hand?”

  “Will do, but I’m keeping the bad one and I’m going to want to get those component parts
when we get back home so we have an actual working spare. I could use an extra set of hands while doing the repair – you, Raiza, or some hot young stud, preferably the latter.”

  “Spares – novel idea. I’ll help you tomorrow or the next day. Other than that, everyone, take a few days off. We’ll target a launch at 0700 in 4 days. I’ll start checking on possible jobs in-system and enroute back home and will update you on timing.”

  Jaunt 5: On the Mantis Express

  Ximon, “Mantis, please check the job feeds. Gather data on any potential jobs for us. If there are any, I’d like to do a couple jobs within the system. Then look for any jobs -- cargo, passengers, survey, etc. that takes us – Tixaya, Thade X, or Cepheo systems.”

  “Yes, Captain, I will consolidate and prioritize that data. Please note that the primary station for interstellar trade is in orbit of Zulea Prima, there are also substantial mining and agricultural colonies on planet, as well as 2 based on Zulea Prima’s primary moon and 1 on her secondary. There are also several smaller bases on other planets or moons in the system. Would you like me to check all sites?”

  “Yes, please.”

  Then he asked Raiza, “Raiza, please, come sit with me.” She came and sat on his lap. Though her frame and many components were metal, they were high-tech alloys so she weighed very similar to a human female of her size and she was fairly petite. He wasn’t sure, but he thought that she could lock her tendons in such a way that only a portion of her weight was actually resting on him. So, she was entirely comfortable to have sit there (when the crew wasn’t around). She hummed happily because she knew Ximon liked that if he didn’t have to concentrate too much on something.