Session 8: Returning to Flammarion
Oct. 9th, 2023 04:25 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
janestarzOctober 4, 2023 / 045-1104
One evening on the trip from Bowman to Asteltine the crew was huddled around the air raft bay. There weren't any chairs for anyone to strap into, but with the jump drive engaged the ride was smooth anyway. The ship was sorely lacking any kind of mess hall or table, and eating military rations wasn't a fun activity. The companionship made the experience at least bearable and the hum and drone of the engines was kind of soothing.
During the jump the days were long and full of training and sparring even with the limited space, and the air raft bay was the only place big enough to all gather in while the cargo bay was full of crates of mail. Most of their social gatherings automatically gravitated to the same place.
Now that their honeymoon of getting to know one another was no longer so juicy and fresh, the topics they discussed changed. They all knew a bit about each other, and their chat had moved towards more serious topics.
"I got into Law Enforcement after university because I wanted to make a difference." Qupar said. "In the end it felt like a never-ending story. And I always thought my boss would have my back."
Dendr smiled wryly. He probably had a couple of stories along the same lines he could share.
"I finally realised that the establishment was taking just as much advantage of the people that were working for them as the big corpos did." Qupar continued. "It's always the little man that gets screwed over, even by the police. Even by institutions that were supposed to help them. Never mind government, they're the worst of the bunch. And I got out, because I realised I couldn't do what I wanted to do even as a lieutenant."
He chewed his ration for a moment. "I'd like to help people, the little people. Those under the boots of criminals, the large corporations or the government. Those that nobody gives a damn about."
"Well, I want to get paid." Hasta said. "But there are limits. We shouldn't be enslaving people. I hate pirates, they're the scum of the skies. I do like guns, but I'm not here to kill people." He shrugged. "Extreme prejudice...I'm okay with that. But I will use applicable force where needed."
Qupar nodded. He could see the reason behind that. Obviously, being a moral freedom fighter for the people would mean some force might be necessary.
"I've got a soft heart for people that have it tough." Moira confessed. "I won't go out of my way to make people's lives horrible. You steal from the rich, not from the poor. Not from people that don't have anything." She thought about Evie, Brin and Gareth. She'd given them a fair amount of credits with the salvage back on Walston because that was exactly the kind of person she was. She blinked the memory away. "Smuggling is okay, but it's not my main thing. Sometimes you just need to break the rules a bit to make ends meet. But in the end, I'm a pacifist."
She looked at Myles. It had almost started to become a proper Anonymous Addicts group chat. Myles took the cue.
"Well I have a moral compass, for sure, but it depends on the situation. Sometimes you can use force." He scratched his beard thoughtfully. "What is murder, really? I'm not talking about offing people for no reason. It all depends on the person and the situation." He paused for a second, collecting his thoughts. "Honour is quite an important thing in the navy."
Myles trailed off, and didn't continue speaking. Parappa looked too uncomfortable to speak, and waved a hand at Dendr to take a turn, who nodded.
"The ah, diplomatic slash violent spectrum." Dendr said. "I believe very strongly that people should be able to say whatever the hell they want without being punished for it."
They arrived in the Asteltine system on 046/1104. The oceanic planet was known to contain no water, instead its fluids were mostly ammonia, methane, hydrocarbons and other exotic liquids. The spaceport above the planet floated serenely above the viscous fluids, and they had no business down on the surface.
While Parappa and Kimbley stayed with the ship to deliver the cargo and oversee the unloading, Hasta went off in search of some software, trailing Moira, Myles, Dendr and Qupar because they quite literally had nothing better to do. Another dingy shop this time run by a well-groomed shopkeeper that wore nerdy glasses and a plaid button-down shirt.
"I'm always after a ceramic blade and hacking software." Hasta greeted the shopkeeper. He approached the shopkeeper who was only slightly smaller than him. The bespectacled man seemed tiny in comparison only because he was built like a rake and Hasta was a big chunk of muscle and almost three times as wide in the chest.
"I have hacking software for you." the man smiled. "It's not cheap. Two thousand credits."
Hasta sucked his teeth loudly. "That's a lot of money. But I could also do with a bit of decryption software."
The man behind the counter pulled up a product on his screen to show Hasta. "Decrypter." he rattled off the stats almost too quick to follow. "This one's 5000 credits. Allows intercepting of comms and messages. And it decrypts in real time. You might also want a database to go with that, for a mere 10.000 credits."
Hasta continued to spar with the shopkeep, picking out a build that would suit his needs. Some intrusion software, decrypter, translator. The shopkeeper was tallying up the total happily. "7515 credits please."
This time it was Qupar who whistled. "Do you realise that you could pay off more than half of my medical debt with that?"
"Do you need me to pay it off?" Hasta asked Qupar. They left the shop and the nosey looks from the salesman behind and were making their way back to the High and Dry.
"No."
"It's no trouble;" Hasta insisted. "I can lend you the money and you pay me back whenever."
"No."
"Take it out of the kitty." Moira suggested.
"No." Qupar replied with a finality, then realised he would need to explain himself a bit more. "I don't want to run the risk that Moira loses her ship. And they're not breathing down my neck, so they can bloody well wait for their money." he grumbled. It was clear he wasn't in the mood to discuss it further.
Back at the ship Parappa asked Moira to look at the options for new cargo to take on the next leg of their journey. Flammarion was the next port of call but the mail that was waiting to get shipped there wouldn't fit into the cargo bay. Instead, they decided on 6 tons of aircraft components and 6 tons of locally produced machine lubricants.
"No wrestling in the lube, Myles." Moira warned.
"Ganash has just hosed down the cargo bay, can we please keep it clean?" Qupar asked as he ducked into his sleeping quarters to get a dirty shirt.
"Hasta's probably going to dip his guns into it." Myles replied drily.
"Guns aren't always the answer." Hasta said philosophically. "Sometimes violence isn't even the answer."
He was setting up his new toys and went quiet. He didn't elaborate on the statement any further and started tinkering with setting up the software.
"Dendr, is it worth checking into if they have information here on LSP?" Qupar asked while pulling the dirty shirt over his head.
"Yes, could be. I'll go check out the bar, have a few drinks. You?"
"Docks for me." Qupar smoothed the shirt into his brown trousers. There were stains from an earlier meal on it and grease stains from minor jobs around the ship. He might still stand out, but at least he wouldn't look like a corporate trying to schmooze with the locals.
The dockworkers were happy to chat with him, but the information they had was very limited. Everybody knew Ling Standard Products, but the only thing they could tell Qupar was that LSP was mining. They seemed to be focusing more and more on mining, increasing their production. Nobody could tell him why, though.
Dendr had returned from the bar after a few drinks and decided on a different approach. "I'll contact Trenton Dewitt. Even if he doesn't know the answer, he will know someone who does."
He sat down at a comms station and started recording. "You're going to be SO jealous. I'm on an adventure. I can't tell you anything about it right now, but you'll read about it in my memoirs. Which will only be released when I'm dead, so you're going to have to wait a while. We're saving worlds, etcetera. Talking to the locals. LSP comes up a lot. Can you do some digging? Names of CEOs and what activities they might be up to. Maybe you can cast a wider net in the stars. Are they buying stock, and what stock? Look into what they're doing and if anything is worth pursuing. If anyone can do it, you can."
He stopped the recording and sent it off. It would take weeks for it to reach Dewitt, but at least it was on its way.
With cargo on board, the ship refuelled and the message sent, there was nothing left for them to do on Asteltine, so they undocked and set a course for Flammarion, ignoring some of the warning lights popping up on the dash. The High and Dry was jury-rigged and would need proper servicing soon, but it would get them to Flammarion. None of the warnings were urgent, Parappa judged.
They settled in for the jump with Hasta spending most of his time on the intrusion software he had bought. The encrypted logs they copied from the High and Dry rebuked his efforts at first, but the software would churn away at the layers of encryption. The program managed to break through some of these layers, showing ship logs of the High and Dry's previous destinations. The personal logs would take more time to decrypt, though. Hasta shared what info he had found with the rest of the crew.
The High and Dry had spent a lot of time in neutral space outside the Imperium and only jumping back occasionally. In District 268 it visited Collace and Pavabid. But a peculiar detail had jumped out at Hasta: someone had changed transponder codes slightly while in those systems.
"How about we check it out now?" Hasta suggested. "We get free fuel anyway."
"Not true." Qupar said. "We can refuel for free only on Bowman and Asteltine. And I suppose Major Casarii will want his ship back."
According to the ship's computer, Pavabid was an odd one. It was a world run by the Church of Stellar Divinity and the High and Dry had records of the world's extensive deposits of platinum and iridium, the latter being a key component to create jump drives allowing for faster interstellar travel. The people on Pavabid weren't known to be keen on externals.
"Outsiders are shitbags." Dendr said. "I'm not a fan of any religion but especially the ones which fall on the extreme end. They are all the same. They find an 'other' and direct as much hate towards them as they can, in an attempt to elevate themselves. 'There's no such thing as an evil man, just an ignorant one'" he quoted; "Being too ignorant is an evil in itself."
The next system over from Pavabid was Trexalon, a rival of Collace. While Collace wanted to join the Imperium, Trexalon did not and the two were rivals stuck in a cold war. Pavabid was caught between the two and had its Church. Their belief was that all stars are evil gods, only their own star was a benevolent god and it was good as it protected their world from all the evil stars in the sky.
"What a bunch of fruitcakes." Moira sighed.
Qupar grimaced. "That sounds like a war waiting to happen. Collace and Trexalon both eyeing Pavabid, probably ready to start a coup."
"And the Imperium has an interest in these deposits." Dendr mused.
"It would be interesting to read the rest of the logs." Qupar said. "If the Imperium is supporting Collace in the hopes of gaining access to the ore on Pavabid..."
"Changing transponder codes would help keep them hidden while in Pavabid." Myles pointed out.
"That's when you want to pretend to be from another planet?" Dendr asked. He knew that the scout ship would be very capable of scanning the deposits and determining their yield if they were masking their transponder signature to not raise too much suspicion.
"Changing transponder codes is highly illegal." Myles said. "Turning your transponder off altogether means you're a pirate."
"It's six jumps to Collace." Moira had looked up the fastest course there on a screen. "But Scout Services will get suspicious why we're not returning the ship. It's only one week to Flammarion and then we'll have a Real Ship." She smiled warmly at the thought of setting foot on the Penelope again. "And if we want a gun we'll just tape Hasta on the roof in a vacc suit."
Hasta kept the software churning away at the encryption in the logs, but still joined Qupar in the air raft bay to continue his unarmed training. He seemed agitated and less in control of his limbs than usual, probably distracted by the idea that the software might have come up with something. His mind elsewhere, he accidentally clocked Qupar in the face with a mighty punch instead of deflecting his attack, and downed him. Hasta expected Qupar to have a broken nose at the very least, but Qupar just shook his head and nursed a split lip. "No more training for today." Qupar said as he was getting up from the deck. "I'm seeing stars."
056-1104 Arrival at Flammarion
Arriving in system, Moira messaged ahead to the spaceport to announce their arrival and a berth was assigned quickly. This time they could move through customs without handcuffs, and were soon welcomed in the offices of Major Casarii. He was seated in a tall chair behind a desk strewn with datapads, and he got up to welcome them in an attempt to surreptitiously stretch his back a bit.
"Well done on returning the High and Dry, guys. Any problems?" The major welcomed them as they took a seat. Dendr and Qupar remained standing in the back while Hasta stretched his legs under the major's desk.
"It's got some new scorch marks." Moira replied.
Major Casarii blinked in surprise. "Did someone shoot at you?"
Qupar smiled. "Only a volcano."
The major's eyebrows rose a fraction more and his jaw dropped a bit before he caught himself. Hasta switched into full report mode and barked a short summary of what happened, occasionally helped, if not corrected, by Parappa.
"You've done the job, that's the important part." Major Casarii said.
"Is there any news about Captain Jameson?" Moira inquired.
Casarii shook his head, and straightened a datapad on his desk. "Sadly, no news. Still missing, presumed KIA." He took his hand off the desk and raised it, palm up, at the crew. "On a more positive note, I owe you money..."
Hasta jumped on the opportunity. "It was four thousand each." he lied, not batting an eye.
"No it wasn't." Casarii looked stern. "You were paid a thousand up front and would get a thousand after the job, so that is now."
Taking a stack of credits from a small box in a locked drawer, he counted six one thousand credit notes on the table. Myles took them and handed them to each of the crew in turn.
"And we agreed on some work being done on the Penelope." Major Casarii continued and checked his computer. "Severe hull damage, that has been fixed, courtesy of the Imperial Scout Services." He smiled. "It gives the engineers something other to do than slapping anti-corrosive paint on hulls. I'm sure that gets dull."
Moira cleared her throat. "Is Jameson's disappearance linked to the High and Dry? I believe this was the mission he wanted to give us in the first place."
"I'll investigate the logs." Casarii said, evading. "I've some experts who will go over them in detail. Will you be in port for a couple of days?"
"We'll need to get some new cargo loaded up on the Penelope." Moira said. She was anxious to get back to her home, but also for the state she would find it in.
"Stick around for a couple of days and I'll let you know what they find." Casarii said. He seemed happy to have his 36 million credit ship back, and indicated the meeting was over for now.
The crew filed into a bar as per their usual routine. Dendr waved a waitress over and they ordered.
"Do we stick around this area, or do we go where the cargo takes us? Myles might want to stay relatively close to Bowman for his family, after all." Moira said.
"We can see what jobs are available." Myles replied.
"Well I don't mind where we go." Hasta said. "I have a, ah, unique set of skills, and it's better than being a postman. What else can we do to get paid?"
"We can make money flying from place to place. If we see something that you fancy doing, well then, you take the job." Parappa said simply.
Hasta toasted his drink. "It's an old story, roving people for hire. I'm not above a bit of that as long as we get paid. There's more to life after all."
"I think Major Casarii will have another job for us;" Qupar mused; "I wouldn't mind."
"But what about after that?" Moira asked. She still hadn't got a straight answer, and it was important for her to know. "Most of you come from around here."
Hasta put his drink down. "I don't have a home to go back to."
"Same." Qupar said. He'd cancelled the lease on his apartment on Iderati months ago when he left, and he found that he didn't miss the place at all.
"Let's do something to make some money!" Hasta waved at the waitress to bring another round of drinks.
"The High and Dry made us 74 thousand credits." Moira pointed out.
Hasta calculated quickly. "That's 13 thousand each. Or...the Penelope doesn't have a gun yet, does it?"
"Can we take mail if we don't have a gun?" Myles asked.
"We can. We have people of high standing;" Moira indicated Hasta, their War Hero, and nodded to Parappa; "and your years of experience in the postal service."
"At some point I will have to pay that bill." Qupar sighed.
"So how much do you owe?" Moira immediately asked.
"Ten thousand five hundred credits." Qupar said. "I got hurt on the job and my boss only picked up half the bill."
"You can pay it now." Moira pointed out again. She had just told the crew their current collective funds, which would boil down to 13 thousand a head. That would more than pay off Qupar's debt.
"No." Qupar said stubbornly. "Let's not deplete our funds completely. We'd be starting to save up from zero."
"Right. So we go where the jobs go." Moira decided. She took a sip of her drink.
"I'd like to see a bit of this universe. I hardly ever left Iderati." Qupar said. He looked at the others, and finally at Moira. "And I'd like to make this craft my home."
This was something Moira had been considering. Several weeks ago she'd been in a similar bar on Flammarion with Dendr and Parappa, discussing how they'd need more help on board. The people that had shown up had stuck with them through a volcano eruption and worked hard for a common goal. It was a promising start, at least.
"The state rooms on deck 2, we can keep those for passengers. Offer people passage for a price. The rooms around the cockpit will be for us, but we'd have to double bunk, two to a room. I'll bunk with Parappa.” Moira said.
"I'll bunk with Myles." Hasta quickly said. "We're both navy men."
Qupar forced a smile. "That leaves you and me, D."
Read the next entry in this campaign
Read the first entry in this campaign.
One evening on the trip from Bowman to Asteltine the crew was huddled around the air raft bay. There weren't any chairs for anyone to strap into, but with the jump drive engaged the ride was smooth anyway. The ship was sorely lacking any kind of mess hall or table, and eating military rations wasn't a fun activity. The companionship made the experience at least bearable and the hum and drone of the engines was kind of soothing.
During the jump the days were long and full of training and sparring even with the limited space, and the air raft bay was the only place big enough to all gather in while the cargo bay was full of crates of mail. Most of their social gatherings automatically gravitated to the same place.
Now that their honeymoon of getting to know one another was no longer so juicy and fresh, the topics they discussed changed. They all knew a bit about each other, and their chat had moved towards more serious topics.
"I got into Law Enforcement after university because I wanted to make a difference." Qupar said. "In the end it felt like a never-ending story. And I always thought my boss would have my back."
Dendr smiled wryly. He probably had a couple of stories along the same lines he could share.
"I finally realised that the establishment was taking just as much advantage of the people that were working for them as the big corpos did." Qupar continued. "It's always the little man that gets screwed over, even by the police. Even by institutions that were supposed to help them. Never mind government, they're the worst of the bunch. And I got out, because I realised I couldn't do what I wanted to do even as a lieutenant."
He chewed his ration for a moment. "I'd like to help people, the little people. Those under the boots of criminals, the large corporations or the government. Those that nobody gives a damn about."
"Well, I want to get paid." Hasta said. "But there are limits. We shouldn't be enslaving people. I hate pirates, they're the scum of the skies. I do like guns, but I'm not here to kill people." He shrugged. "Extreme prejudice...I'm okay with that. But I will use applicable force where needed."
Qupar nodded. He could see the reason behind that. Obviously, being a moral freedom fighter for the people would mean some force might be necessary.
"I've got a soft heart for people that have it tough." Moira confessed. "I won't go out of my way to make people's lives horrible. You steal from the rich, not from the poor. Not from people that don't have anything." She thought about Evie, Brin and Gareth. She'd given them a fair amount of credits with the salvage back on Walston because that was exactly the kind of person she was. She blinked the memory away. "Smuggling is okay, but it's not my main thing. Sometimes you just need to break the rules a bit to make ends meet. But in the end, I'm a pacifist."
She looked at Myles. It had almost started to become a proper Anonymous Addicts group chat. Myles took the cue.
"Well I have a moral compass, for sure, but it depends on the situation. Sometimes you can use force." He scratched his beard thoughtfully. "What is murder, really? I'm not talking about offing people for no reason. It all depends on the person and the situation." He paused for a second, collecting his thoughts. "Honour is quite an important thing in the navy."
Myles trailed off, and didn't continue speaking. Parappa looked too uncomfortable to speak, and waved a hand at Dendr to take a turn, who nodded.
"The ah, diplomatic slash violent spectrum." Dendr said. "I believe very strongly that people should be able to say whatever the hell they want without being punished for it."
They arrived in the Asteltine system on 046/1104. The oceanic planet was known to contain no water, instead its fluids were mostly ammonia, methane, hydrocarbons and other exotic liquids. The spaceport above the planet floated serenely above the viscous fluids, and they had no business down on the surface.
While Parappa and Kimbley stayed with the ship to deliver the cargo and oversee the unloading, Hasta went off in search of some software, trailing Moira, Myles, Dendr and Qupar because they quite literally had nothing better to do. Another dingy shop this time run by a well-groomed shopkeeper that wore nerdy glasses and a plaid button-down shirt.
"I'm always after a ceramic blade and hacking software." Hasta greeted the shopkeeper. He approached the shopkeeper who was only slightly smaller than him. The bespectacled man seemed tiny in comparison only because he was built like a rake and Hasta was a big chunk of muscle and almost three times as wide in the chest.
"I have hacking software for you." the man smiled. "It's not cheap. Two thousand credits."
Hasta sucked his teeth loudly. "That's a lot of money. But I could also do with a bit of decryption software."
The man behind the counter pulled up a product on his screen to show Hasta. "Decrypter." he rattled off the stats almost too quick to follow. "This one's 5000 credits. Allows intercepting of comms and messages. And it decrypts in real time. You might also want a database to go with that, for a mere 10.000 credits."
Hasta continued to spar with the shopkeep, picking out a build that would suit his needs. Some intrusion software, decrypter, translator. The shopkeeper was tallying up the total happily. "7515 credits please."
This time it was Qupar who whistled. "Do you realise that you could pay off more than half of my medical debt with that?"
"Do you need me to pay it off?" Hasta asked Qupar. They left the shop and the nosey looks from the salesman behind and were making their way back to the High and Dry.
"No."
"It's no trouble;" Hasta insisted. "I can lend you the money and you pay me back whenever."
"No."
"Take it out of the kitty." Moira suggested.
"No." Qupar replied with a finality, then realised he would need to explain himself a bit more. "I don't want to run the risk that Moira loses her ship. And they're not breathing down my neck, so they can bloody well wait for their money." he grumbled. It was clear he wasn't in the mood to discuss it further.
Back at the ship Parappa asked Moira to look at the options for new cargo to take on the next leg of their journey. Flammarion was the next port of call but the mail that was waiting to get shipped there wouldn't fit into the cargo bay. Instead, they decided on 6 tons of aircraft components and 6 tons of locally produced machine lubricants.
"No wrestling in the lube, Myles." Moira warned.
"Ganash has just hosed down the cargo bay, can we please keep it clean?" Qupar asked as he ducked into his sleeping quarters to get a dirty shirt.
"Hasta's probably going to dip his guns into it." Myles replied drily.
"Guns aren't always the answer." Hasta said philosophically. "Sometimes violence isn't even the answer."
He was setting up his new toys and went quiet. He didn't elaborate on the statement any further and started tinkering with setting up the software.
"Dendr, is it worth checking into if they have information here on LSP?" Qupar asked while pulling the dirty shirt over his head.
"Yes, could be. I'll go check out the bar, have a few drinks. You?"
"Docks for me." Qupar smoothed the shirt into his brown trousers. There were stains from an earlier meal on it and grease stains from minor jobs around the ship. He might still stand out, but at least he wouldn't look like a corporate trying to schmooze with the locals.
The dockworkers were happy to chat with him, but the information they had was very limited. Everybody knew Ling Standard Products, but the only thing they could tell Qupar was that LSP was mining. They seemed to be focusing more and more on mining, increasing their production. Nobody could tell him why, though.
Dendr had returned from the bar after a few drinks and decided on a different approach. "I'll contact Trenton Dewitt. Even if he doesn't know the answer, he will know someone who does."
He sat down at a comms station and started recording. "You're going to be SO jealous. I'm on an adventure. I can't tell you anything about it right now, but you'll read about it in my memoirs. Which will only be released when I'm dead, so you're going to have to wait a while. We're saving worlds, etcetera. Talking to the locals. LSP comes up a lot. Can you do some digging? Names of CEOs and what activities they might be up to. Maybe you can cast a wider net in the stars. Are they buying stock, and what stock? Look into what they're doing and if anything is worth pursuing. If anyone can do it, you can."
He stopped the recording and sent it off. It would take weeks for it to reach Dewitt, but at least it was on its way.
With cargo on board, the ship refuelled and the message sent, there was nothing left for them to do on Asteltine, so they undocked and set a course for Flammarion, ignoring some of the warning lights popping up on the dash. The High and Dry was jury-rigged and would need proper servicing soon, but it would get them to Flammarion. None of the warnings were urgent, Parappa judged.
They settled in for the jump with Hasta spending most of his time on the intrusion software he had bought. The encrypted logs they copied from the High and Dry rebuked his efforts at first, but the software would churn away at the layers of encryption. The program managed to break through some of these layers, showing ship logs of the High and Dry's previous destinations. The personal logs would take more time to decrypt, though. Hasta shared what info he had found with the rest of the crew.
The High and Dry had spent a lot of time in neutral space outside the Imperium and only jumping back occasionally. In District 268 it visited Collace and Pavabid. But a peculiar detail had jumped out at Hasta: someone had changed transponder codes slightly while in those systems.
"How about we check it out now?" Hasta suggested. "We get free fuel anyway."
"Not true." Qupar said. "We can refuel for free only on Bowman and Asteltine. And I suppose Major Casarii will want his ship back."
According to the ship's computer, Pavabid was an odd one. It was a world run by the Church of Stellar Divinity and the High and Dry had records of the world's extensive deposits of platinum and iridium, the latter being a key component to create jump drives allowing for faster interstellar travel. The people on Pavabid weren't known to be keen on externals.
"Outsiders are shitbags." Dendr said. "I'm not a fan of any religion but especially the ones which fall on the extreme end. They are all the same. They find an 'other' and direct as much hate towards them as they can, in an attempt to elevate themselves. 'There's no such thing as an evil man, just an ignorant one'" he quoted; "Being too ignorant is an evil in itself."
The next system over from Pavabid was Trexalon, a rival of Collace. While Collace wanted to join the Imperium, Trexalon did not and the two were rivals stuck in a cold war. Pavabid was caught between the two and had its Church. Their belief was that all stars are evil gods, only their own star was a benevolent god and it was good as it protected their world from all the evil stars in the sky.
"What a bunch of fruitcakes." Moira sighed.
Qupar grimaced. "That sounds like a war waiting to happen. Collace and Trexalon both eyeing Pavabid, probably ready to start a coup."
"And the Imperium has an interest in these deposits." Dendr mused.
"It would be interesting to read the rest of the logs." Qupar said. "If the Imperium is supporting Collace in the hopes of gaining access to the ore on Pavabid..."
"Changing transponder codes would help keep them hidden while in Pavabid." Myles pointed out.
"That's when you want to pretend to be from another planet?" Dendr asked. He knew that the scout ship would be very capable of scanning the deposits and determining their yield if they were masking their transponder signature to not raise too much suspicion.
"Changing transponder codes is highly illegal." Myles said. "Turning your transponder off altogether means you're a pirate."
"It's six jumps to Collace." Moira had looked up the fastest course there on a screen. "But Scout Services will get suspicious why we're not returning the ship. It's only one week to Flammarion and then we'll have a Real Ship." She smiled warmly at the thought of setting foot on the Penelope again. "And if we want a gun we'll just tape Hasta on the roof in a vacc suit."
Hasta kept the software churning away at the encryption in the logs, but still joined Qupar in the air raft bay to continue his unarmed training. He seemed agitated and less in control of his limbs than usual, probably distracted by the idea that the software might have come up with something. His mind elsewhere, he accidentally clocked Qupar in the face with a mighty punch instead of deflecting his attack, and downed him. Hasta expected Qupar to have a broken nose at the very least, but Qupar just shook his head and nursed a split lip. "No more training for today." Qupar said as he was getting up from the deck. "I'm seeing stars."
056-1104 Arrival at Flammarion
Arriving in system, Moira messaged ahead to the spaceport to announce their arrival and a berth was assigned quickly. This time they could move through customs without handcuffs, and were soon welcomed in the offices of Major Casarii. He was seated in a tall chair behind a desk strewn with datapads, and he got up to welcome them in an attempt to surreptitiously stretch his back a bit.
"Well done on returning the High and Dry, guys. Any problems?" The major welcomed them as they took a seat. Dendr and Qupar remained standing in the back while Hasta stretched his legs under the major's desk.
"It's got some new scorch marks." Moira replied.
Major Casarii blinked in surprise. "Did someone shoot at you?"
Qupar smiled. "Only a volcano."
The major's eyebrows rose a fraction more and his jaw dropped a bit before he caught himself. Hasta switched into full report mode and barked a short summary of what happened, occasionally helped, if not corrected, by Parappa.
"You've done the job, that's the important part." Major Casarii said.
"Is there any news about Captain Jameson?" Moira inquired.
Casarii shook his head, and straightened a datapad on his desk. "Sadly, no news. Still missing, presumed KIA." He took his hand off the desk and raised it, palm up, at the crew. "On a more positive note, I owe you money..."
Hasta jumped on the opportunity. "It was four thousand each." he lied, not batting an eye.
"No it wasn't." Casarii looked stern. "You were paid a thousand up front and would get a thousand after the job, so that is now."
Taking a stack of credits from a small box in a locked drawer, he counted six one thousand credit notes on the table. Myles took them and handed them to each of the crew in turn.
"And we agreed on some work being done on the Penelope." Major Casarii continued and checked his computer. "Severe hull damage, that has been fixed, courtesy of the Imperial Scout Services." He smiled. "It gives the engineers something other to do than slapping anti-corrosive paint on hulls. I'm sure that gets dull."
Moira cleared her throat. "Is Jameson's disappearance linked to the High and Dry? I believe this was the mission he wanted to give us in the first place."
"I'll investigate the logs." Casarii said, evading. "I've some experts who will go over them in detail. Will you be in port for a couple of days?"
"We'll need to get some new cargo loaded up on the Penelope." Moira said. She was anxious to get back to her home, but also for the state she would find it in.
"Stick around for a couple of days and I'll let you know what they find." Casarii said. He seemed happy to have his 36 million credit ship back, and indicated the meeting was over for now.
The crew filed into a bar as per their usual routine. Dendr waved a waitress over and they ordered.
"Do we stick around this area, or do we go where the cargo takes us? Myles might want to stay relatively close to Bowman for his family, after all." Moira said.
"We can see what jobs are available." Myles replied.
"Well I don't mind where we go." Hasta said. "I have a, ah, unique set of skills, and it's better than being a postman. What else can we do to get paid?"
"We can make money flying from place to place. If we see something that you fancy doing, well then, you take the job." Parappa said simply.
Hasta toasted his drink. "It's an old story, roving people for hire. I'm not above a bit of that as long as we get paid. There's more to life after all."
"I think Major Casarii will have another job for us;" Qupar mused; "I wouldn't mind."
"But what about after that?" Moira asked. She still hadn't got a straight answer, and it was important for her to know. "Most of you come from around here."
Hasta put his drink down. "I don't have a home to go back to."
"Same." Qupar said. He'd cancelled the lease on his apartment on Iderati months ago when he left, and he found that he didn't miss the place at all.
"Let's do something to make some money!" Hasta waved at the waitress to bring another round of drinks.
"The High and Dry made us 74 thousand credits." Moira pointed out.
Hasta calculated quickly. "That's 13 thousand each. Or...the Penelope doesn't have a gun yet, does it?"
"Can we take mail if we don't have a gun?" Myles asked.
"We can. We have people of high standing;" Moira indicated Hasta, their War Hero, and nodded to Parappa; "and your years of experience in the postal service."
"At some point I will have to pay that bill." Qupar sighed.
"So how much do you owe?" Moira immediately asked.
"Ten thousand five hundred credits." Qupar said. "I got hurt on the job and my boss only picked up half the bill."
"You can pay it now." Moira pointed out again. She had just told the crew their current collective funds, which would boil down to 13 thousand a head. That would more than pay off Qupar's debt.
"No." Qupar said stubbornly. "Let's not deplete our funds completely. We'd be starting to save up from zero."
"Right. So we go where the jobs go." Moira decided. She took a sip of her drink.
"I'd like to see a bit of this universe. I hardly ever left Iderati." Qupar said. He looked at the others, and finally at Moira. "And I'd like to make this craft my home."
This was something Moira had been considering. Several weeks ago she'd been in a similar bar on Flammarion with Dendr and Parappa, discussing how they'd need more help on board. The people that had shown up had stuck with them through a volcano eruption and worked hard for a common goal. It was a promising start, at least.
"The state rooms on deck 2, we can keep those for passengers. Offer people passage for a price. The rooms around the cockpit will be for us, but we'd have to double bunk, two to a room. I'll bunk with Parappa.” Moira said.
"I'll bunk with Myles." Hasta quickly said. "We're both navy men."
Qupar forced a smile. "That leaves you and me, D."
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