“I scan,” Ethan said, nodding. It made sense when he looked at it from that perspective.
“We’re working through the candidates now,” she said. “Are you going to want to have final approval, or do you want us to just roster the best ones when we get the list carved down?”
“I’ll want to meet them, but I trust you to make the offers,” he said.
Ethan realized that he’d been at his desk all day and hadn’t eaten since firstmeal. He needed something from the galley before he racked out for the evening, so he stood up thinking they’d take the hint. “So, was that all you needed to talk to me about?”
“Actually, no,” Angel said.
Neither she nor Quinn moved, and even if he wanted, he couldn’t have pushed past them without walking across their laps. Perching on the corner of his desk, he waited as the two of them appeared to debate silently about who would go first.
“Boss, I think we’re attracting some extra eyeballs,” Quinn said. “The kind we don’t want to have, maybe.”
“Whyso?”
“I caught someone on the concourse sightseeing us with intent,” he said. “I was on my way back from the Steward’s office when I caught a piece of riffscum scanning the ships.”
“Scanning the ships?” That was not too far out of bounds, but not something you’d expect.
“He was wagging an optic through the observation windows.” He shifted in his seat and it creaked again. “When I tapped him, he said he was just admiring the view, but he made feet fast when I asked him why he thought a freighter was a pretty view.”
Ethan didn’t know whether to be insulted or laugh. The Dawn was a pretty ship, in a ‘form follows purpose’ sort of way. Of course, anything was prettier than Phrygian Center, even from the top of a mooring stanchion. “Are you sure you didn’t intimidate him with your friendly smile?”
“I’m pretty sure he was being a snake. I was standing less than two meters from him and I’d been watching what he was doing for almost a minute before he realized I’d made him. He was definitely thinking something bigger than his brain looked, and not just looking in our direction.”
Ethan glanced at Angel to see if she thought Quinn was right, and she nodded. “What do you think he was after?”
He shrugged. “Who knows? But things don’t add up square no matter what column you put them in.”
Ethan settled back into his chair and chewed on his lower lip while he sorted out the possibilities. “Is it maybe because of the oddness of our posting? You aren’t telling people where we’re headed are you?”
Angel shook her head. “Only that it will be a long-leg run.”
“Maybe someone else let it out of the box?”
“That’s possible, but I don’t think any of the rest of the crew has been off the ships since we docked,” she said.
The Captain nodded. “Kaycee’s puckered up so tight since we tied off, that I doubt she’ll need a recycler for weeks. She says the air in Phrygian Center stinks.”
“Nojo,” Quinn said, wrinkling his nose in disgust. “But other than us doing interviews at the Union offices, only Nuko and you have business in the station.”
“Elias and Rene have been in the shipyard office a couple times,” Ethan added, running through the list of where else they might have attracted attention. “Nuko hired a copilot yesterday, and Kaycee landed us a medtech for the Sun, but she did the offer over deep comm and he’s coming in from E-Eridani Four. He won’t be here for another day or two.”
“That’s a long way to get a medtech,” Angel said.
“She’s got a high bar but says he’s extra tooled for it.” He shrugged and drummed his fingers on the table as he thought it over. “Other than that, I don’t think we’ve got any exposure.”
“If we’ve all been tight, then somebody else has to have pointed those eyeballs in our direction,” she said.
“That’s what bothers me,” Quinn added, nodding.
“What bothers me more is that, even if word is out, what difference does it make?” Ethan leaned back and laced his fingers behind his head. “Nothing we’re doing should attract attention beyond the docks.”
“Apparently that’s not true,” Angel said.
That much is obvious.
Chapter Eight
Ethan would have been alone except that they’d seen the person back at the window recording again. They hadn’t caught him, but when they reported it to Phrygian Center Security, the officer told them it wasn’t a crime to look at ships. Even with an optic. The captain issued orders that none of the crew were to leave the ship without an escort.
When the Shipyard Master had asked to meet with Ethan to take care of payment for services rendered, Quinn had reminded him that his orders applied even to the captain.
He would have resisted except that the handler mentioned that he and Angel had discovered this diner on the Commons that served real food and he suggested they could stop to eat on the way back.
When Quinn said it was real food, it was quite the endorsement.
“What the hell is a plowboy?” Ethan asked as walked up to the blinking pink neon sign above the entrance.
“It’s an old term for a boy raised on a farm,” he said.
“Like you?”
“Yah.” He looked down and paused. “It’s also a euphemism for someone of my orientation.”
“I never heard that one before,” he said, opening the door and walking in.
“It wasn’t used much in polite company,” he said, following Ethan across the room toward a booth in the back corner.
“Then I’m surprised I’ve never run into it.” He grinned sidewise and winked.
A human waiter dropped in behind them and arrived at the table even before they sat. “Special is the beefsteak with shitake wine-sauce and roasted new potatoes with sweet carrots. Cherry pie for dessert.”
Ethan glanced at Quinn. “And you said they serve real food here?”
The waiter looked insulted.
“It’s all good,” the handler said. “I think Cap’n Walker is just surprised that you could get this kind of eats this far out in the asteroids.”
“We get shipments every day, sir,” the waiter said. He looked only a little mollified as he sized up Ethan. “Our food is all grown on Earth and the Lunar colonies. It is 100% real.”
“It sounds wonderful,” he said, sitting down. “I think we’ll both have the special, yes?”
Quinn nodded, adding, “We’ll take two of your house brews, too. I had that the other night, and it would be perfect with beef. I think it was a bit strong for the salmon though.”
“Oh, you are so right!” the waiter said, reaching out and putting his hand on Quinn’s chest. At least that is what he tried to do. He missed his chest and landed his fingers closer to the handler’s belly button. He would have had to climb on a box to reach his chest comfortably. “They never should have let you have the house brew with the fish. What were they thinking?”
“Be sweet and run along now. We’ve got a powerful thirst for those beers,” he said. “The Cap’n and I might be renting the table a bit.” He dismissed the waiter with a wave of his hand.
“I think he’s got his eye set for you,” Ethan said as he watched the waiter head for the kitchen.
“He’s not my type. I prefer the strong, quiet ones.” He shrugged. “He’s cute, but he’d break too easy.”
“I can see where that might be a problem.” He wasn’t sure if he should laugh or be mortified at the thought. Either way it wasn’t somewhere he was entirely comfortable going.
The waiter returned with the beer and tried again to connect with Quinn. Finally, he gave up and shuffled away with his head hanging like a lost puppy.
“You are a heartbreaker, aren’t you?” Ethan whispered and was surprised when Quinn almost blushed.
“Have you decided whether I’m with you, or Nuko?” he asked.
“Nothing personal but she’s more my type than you a
re.” The captain waited for the confusion to transform to shock on Quinn’s face and realized it was possible for the handler to turn crimson. “I think I’ll keep you on the Dawn and send Angel over to the Elysium Sun.
“It’s my cooking isn’t it?” he stammered.
“That too.” He nodded. “But the truth is Angel knows Elias, and I want her on that ship to help keep an eye on him.”
“If you don’t trust him, why did you roster him on the Sun?”
“It’s not that I don’t trust him to do his job, in fact he’s overqualified in everything he needs. I’ve just got history there.”
“Yah I know. Angel feels the same way about him. Probably for the same reasons.”
Ethan took a big swallow of his beer. “So, she’s doing an orientation for the new handlers on the Sun today isn’t she?”
“And tomorrow at 0600 on the Dawn. She and I will walk the second four through the procedures so you can whiff it unless you want to intimidate the grunts before we pull out.”
“You managed to get 800 postings down to eight… in two days? Did either of you sleep?”
“Sleep is for wimps.” He laughed then stifled a yawn. “When we looked over the list, it wasn’t that bad. There were a lot of names that Marti killed before we wasted air on them. Most because of past criminal records. Of those that made it over that shelf, we looked for ones we either recognized by name, or recognized the names of their references. That took the list down to closer to thirty we face-timed.”
“That’s not so bad.”
“We got Marti to sit in on the interviews. Her Humanform sensors were good at catching when they were slinging biscuits. The three of us came to a consensus from there.”
“You all three like the ones you picked?”
“I don’t know as I’d go that far,” he said, “but I expect that they won’t steal the silverware and crap on the carpet. And they’ll be good if it gets ugly.”
“Let’s hope it doesn’t come to that.”
“Our biggest issue will be keeping them from eating each other on a six-month long run.”
“Cannibalism would be a new adventure,” Ethan said.
The waiter picked that instant to return to the table. Blinking several times, he appeared to decide it was the wrong moment to show up with their meal. “This is beef. Honest.”
“It looks tasty too,” Quinn said, taking his plate and setting it on the table in front of him.
“We were talking about our new crew,” the captain said, winking as he watched the waiter set his plate down. “You don’t have to worry the beef will keep you safe. For now.”
He took a step back and nodded. Pointing at the empty glasses on the table he asked, “Another round?”
Ethan glanced at the chrono above the door and shook his head. The waiter backed away as quickly as he could and turned only once he was far enough away to have sufficient range to feel safe.
Quinn snickered. “You’re so mean.”
“You’d think he felt like we were talking about eating him.”
“I think that was on his mind,” he said, cutting a slice off his steak and moaning with pleasure.
Ethan took a bite and nodded as the beef almost melted in his mouth. “With food like this it might be worth staying here for a few more days.”
Quinn glanced around the room and shook his head. “Not really. I have this gut burn that says we’re a little long on their air supply.”
“Well, the work’s almost done on the Dawn. The new repelling guns only need splicing into Marti’s control grid.”
“What about that monster in the landing bay?”
“It’s done too,” Ethan confirmed. “We won’t be able to take a look at it until we’re away from Cybele though. They asked that we keep it in our pants until we’re out of here. For now, it stays swung up against the upper bulkhead and out of sight.”
“It looks like a slick mount,”
“Yah it is. Unfortunately, it’s giving their engineers a fit sticking it into the Sun,” he said.
“The bulkhead mounts are different?”
He shook his head. “It’s the power couplers in engineering. The newer version of the Percheron Class design uses dual reactors and a single antimatter feed control, so it is a lot more complex. So far, they haven’t ironed it all out. Rene told the shipyard master off and told him to get his club fingered… well you get the idea.”
“Ouch. I guess that explains why you came in to pay the bill.”
He snorted. “The thing is, I don’t care how they have to cobble it into place since I don’t plan to leave the big gun on the Sun, anyway. I’m not thinking I want to hand a gigawatt cannon to a lease captain. I trust Nuko not to shoot herself, or me for that matter, but it will take a lot to convince me to give a gun like that to a stranger.”
Quinn leaned back and pushed his empty plate toward the center of the table. “Is that why you want her to master the Sun?”
“I know. I have trust issues.” The captain shrugged.
“She thinks it’s because you want to keep things simpler between you two.” The handler looked down at his hands like he realized he was speaking out of place and was wishing he’d kept his mouth shut.
Ethan pulled in a long deep breath and let it out. “Well, maybe that factors into it a bit, but I’m surprised she told you that.”
“I guess I’m just not the threatening type... to women. They confide in me, even when it might be better if they didn’t.”
Ethan’s collarcomm chirped, and he tapped into the link. “Yah, go.”
“Boss, where are you?” It was Ammo.
“Eating lunch with Quinn on the Commons.” He glanced at the chrono. “You must have finished your loose capture test?” She was qualifying for her Dropship Loader Pilot license and had another supervised flight this morning.
“Yah. Aced it, and was looking to put down a couple drinks, but only one left on the ship is Rene. He’s swearing about problems with the sensor calibration work, so I don’t think he’s interested in celebrating with me.”
“We’re almost done here,” he said, looking at his plate and shrugging.
“Where are you? I’m sure you can sit for another round. I’ll even buy.”
He was about to give her the name of the place when Quinn shook his head and whispered, “Nobody unescorted. I’ll go get her and bring her back.”
“I’ll send Quinn. He’ll bring you back and we can help you float a couple.” He clicked off the comm.
“This means I have to leave you alone,” the handler said, standing up.
“I’ll be alright it’s only a few minutes and I don’t think our waiter wants me to eat him.”
Quinn glanced over at where he was standing behind the bar watching them. “I might bet against that Cap’n.”
With a grin, he headed for the door.
Chapter Nine
The power was off in the airlock. The lights were out. Even the emergency strips in the floor were dark. The one small observation port in the inner airlock door was the only illumination.
Tapping into his collarcom Quinn asked, “Is there a problem with the station power grid in the docking stanchion?”
“None of which I am aware,” Marti said.
“There are no lights and the inner lock hatch is partially open. It doesn’t look like it’s operating,” he reported. It was an old station, but something sent the hair on the back of his neck to twitching.
“Stand by while I contact Phrygian Center maintenance.”
The handler leaned a shoulder into the open door and shoved it sidewise with a grunt. It was one of the older mechanical assist hatches and it swung just enough for him to squeeze past.
“Maintenance says there is no reported problem with the grid,” Marti said. “They are saying the lock shows as green on their system boards.”
“Well, their boards are lying to them. It’s dead in here,” he said.
“I will report that to them,
” it said.
Stepping forward into the dark, he focused on the light coming through the window to keep his bearings. The lock was large enough to be barely more than pitch black with what illumination was filtering in. The inner lock of the Dawn didn’t turn its lights on until someone opened the hatch, so he was lucky there was any illumination at all. Three steps into the airlock his shin smashed against something and he stumbled forward in pain. “Frak me!”
Whatever it was, it was a deeper shade of black in the darkness.
“A problem?”
He bent down and ran his hand across the lid of what felt like a standard medium shipping crate.
Pulling out his thinpad he tapped the screen and used the light from the display to scan the lock. There were several more crates stacked near the inner bulkhead. There wasn’t enough light to be sure of what else was in the lock, but it looked like some lazy delivery courier had just dropped them and made feet.
“Somebody’s dumped a bunch of crates in here,” he said. He slid his hand along the edge of the one he’d smacked into until he located the identi-pad and thumbed it. It lit up, and he looked over the screen. “There’s a delivery manifest. Want me to bring them in?”
“Negative on that,” Marti said. “We have no parts outstanding.”
“Well there are a bunch of big ass crates stacked outside the door.”
“What’s in them?” Rene asked, cutting in on the comm.
“The screen says engine control parts.” He scrolled down the list. “A bunch of numbers that mean nothing to me.”
“I don’t have anything on order,” the engineer said. “Can you open them up and take a look?”
“They weren’t in the lock when I came in about forty minutes ago,” Ammo said. “Lights were on too.”
“Well it’s dark in here now. I can barely see my hand in front of my face.”
Kneeling he ran his finger up under the rim of the crate and felt for the release latch. It popped open, and the lid sprung up with a hiss. A set of small colored diodes lit up the interior of the box and an instant later a sharp tang bit into his nostrils and his eyes watered up like they were on fire.
Wings of Earth- Season One Page 67