Summer's End, page 24
Chuck came over and I shook hands with him.
“Sorry about taking your old job,” he said with a shrug.
“That’s okay; I’m starting a new business with Chaz’s sister.”
“That’s right, Chaz mentioned that. You’re going to salvage the Iowa Hill and start a small cargo line,” Dot said.
I nodded. “I asked the folks at Damascus Freight if they wanted the orbital data, but they said they weren’t interested. They just let it go for whoever wants to claim it.”
“Probably because it’s ten years from needing new reactors.” She looked over at Captain Roy. “That sound about right to you, Steve?”
Captain Roy nodded. “Yup, had that discussion with them when we got back here. I’ll send you all the master passwords for the systems before we head back out. Should make your life easier. Now this is Ken, our new exec and first mate.” I shook hands with him. “And this is Jamaal, Pam’s replacement.” I shook hands with him next.
“Now, as I’m sure you’ve all heard from Chaz . . . ” I said, looking at them all as Kacey came over to join me. All of Chaz’s family had come to welcome him and Hank back. “I’m engaged to his sister, Kacey, and yes, we’ve actually already started a business and we’re going to go get the Iowa Hill back and put her back into service. Before any of you ask, yes, we’ll give you your stuff back when we clean out the cabins.”
They all cheered when they heard that, but I wasn’t sure if they were cheering my engagement or getting their stuff back. I figured I was better off not asking.
After that we mostly broke into groups and talked. Captain Roy told me to stop calling him “Captain,” seeing as I wasn’t on his crew anymore, and he had a lot of advice about running the Iowa Hill. As he’d been the captain on it for almost ten years, it was worth listening to.
Eventually, Dot got me alone and gave me a look.
“Are you really sure you don’t want me to take care of Parks?” she asked. “I mean, that was pretty bad what he did to you and Pam.”
“Honestly?” I said with a sigh. “Yeah, just leave it. Pam lost it really bad when we heard them docking with us. She’d been taken by pirates once before and until the Mars Navy had saved her she’d had it pretty rough. I honestly had no idea someone who seemed as together as she was could lose it that badly. Parks probably has something like that in his past as well. Besides, I doubt he’ll ever get another job as a mate, or even a deckhand.”
“Oh that’s most definitely the truth. Captain was pissed and put the word out on him when we got back to port.”
“Oh? Did he help with that beating?”
“No, he wanted to, though; I think that’s why he was mad when he found out about it,” Dot said with a big grin. “So, found a crew yet?”
I shook my head. “We’ve only just figured out what we’ll need. I got the chance to inspect the damage before I left, so I know how bad it is.”
“I hope you weren’t planning on me leaving Damascus. I don’t think you could match the pay and I’d rather not leave Steve high and dry having to replace me on such short notice.”
“I understand. As it is, I suspect Chaz might want to leave and join us, seeing as it’s the family business.”
“It is?”
I nodded, “Yeah, we’ve even named it Doyle Shipping.”
Dot laughed, “Well that does sound better than Walker Shipping —people would think you weren’t in a rush!”
I had to laugh at that too, as that connotation hadn’t even occurred to me.
“Actually, the Doyles here have a lot of connections. We didn’t even have to go outside the family for the startup funds, and one of the big-name lawyers and her husband, who’s a judge, are investors.”
“That can’t hurt. I better warn Steve that he might be looking for another deckhand before we leave.”
“You think Hank’ll follow Chaz if he goes?”
“Let’s just say that I don’t think Chaz will go if Hank says no. In fact, if you’re considering Chaz, you might want to consider Hank as well. He was a Marsie Navy guy —if you ever have to repel boarders, he’s definitely your man. Hell, he wanted to fight off that last bunch, but the captain told him no.”
I thought about that, then I remembered just who I wanted to do business with! Yeah, I definitely needed to have a conversation with Hank.
“So, how was Pam?” Dot asked.
“Huh?”
She gave me a sly grin. “You were locked up for six months with an Adonis who you’d just told everyone was your girl, and you’d kill anybody who touched her! I know you ain’t a saint there, Dave.”
I tried not to blush too much. “It was every young man’s fantasy,” I admitted to her in a soft voice. “She really put me through my paces.”
“I’m surprised you didn’t keep her. I mean, after something like that, she was probably still all sorts of grateful.”
I smiled and shook my head. “We had a discussion about it, albeit a short one. She knew I didn’t love her, and after she said it, I knew it too. Also, to be totally honest? The next time something bad happened, I don’t think I could have trusted her not to go to pieces on me again. Not like Kacey,” I said, and nodded in her direction. She was chatting with Chaz and Hank.
“Must be a bit rough for her, having to follow after Pam.”
“Actually, Pam was a hell of a lot of fun and all that, but there’s something to be said for actually loving the person you’re in bed with. Pam never made me forget about Kacey, but now? Unless someone brings her up, I’ve already forgotten about Pam. Hell, I’ve already shuffled her off to ‘old friend’ status in my head, not even ‘old lover.’”
Dot got a thoughtful look on her face and nodded, “Good for you, and good for Kacey too.”
“Well, I better go corral Hank and see if I’m going to end up looking for deckhands or not,” I said.
“Too bad you didn’t offer Pam a job, then you wouldn’t need to find someone to fly the ship for you,” Dot said as I grabbed my beer.
“Nah, even if she wasn’t planning on going home, I’d already decided on Kacey, and that probably would have been all sorts of uncomfortable.”
I went over and gave Kacey a hug and joined her, Chaz, and Hank. They were talking about our plans for the company, of course. I set my beer down and caught Hank’s eye.
“I’ll be back in a couple, need to hit the head.”
I ran into Hank just as I was leaving the bathroom.
“What’s up?” he asked.
“Let’s take a short walk,” I told him.
Hank nodded and followed me out the back of the bar.
“So, what’s the problem?” he asked when we got “outside.”
“I want to know if I should tell Chaz no if he decides he wants to sign on and you decide you don’t,” I told him. “I’m guessing you two are still pretty much in love, seeing the way you both are with each other.”
Hank smiled. “Yeah, I think we’ve gotten pretty close. If I tell him we can’t take the job, I don’t think he’ll like it, but I don’t think there’ll be too big of a fight over it.
“Now, why do you think I don’t want the job?”
“Those ‘pirates’ I worked for, for the last six months?”
“Yeah, what about them?”
“I’m thinking of going back there, after we get the ship fixed, offering to take the stuff they’ve been mining that they can’t sell, and sell it for them. See if I can’t set up a clandestine trade route with them.”
“Why?” Hank asked, looking at me a little concerned.
“’Cause they got screwed?” I said with a shrug. “They’re nice people, just in a bad situation. So why not help them out and make some money in the process?”
“They’re Venusians, aren’t they?”
“What makes you say that?”
“I got a look at that frigate that landed on us when the lifeboat was jettisoned. It’s a Venusian one, and the only people, other then the folks living on Venus, who have them are the ones who fled their new ‘government’ and got slaughtered by the hundreds of thousands for having the gall to not want to prostate themselves before the Venusian Moral Collective and their ‘New Way of Life.’”
“Yeah, that’s them. They said they had to steal the load because they desperately needed the hab gear to finish setting everything up. They don’t like being pirates. But it’s that or die. So why not help them make the money they need so they can buy it instead of stealing it?”
“I’m not all that convinced that they ‘stole’ that shipment we were carrying.”
“Huh? What makes you say that?”
“Go ask Chaz’s mom how often they send that equipment out on a small cargo ship without an escort.”
“Huh?”
Hank gave me one of those “patient” looks that I guess he learned to use on new recruits in the navy. “That gear is worth tens of millions of credits. That whole shipment was probably worth over a hundred million. Do you really think they’re going to send stuff like that out in a small cargo ship run by the lowest bidder? And without an escort?
“Hell, even the ‘Let-Be’s’ showed up with at least one frigate. Odds are they had another one there as well, to run off anybody who might have gotten ideas.”
I scowled back at him as I thought about that. “So you’re saying it was a setup?”
“Sure looks like one to me. Tell me, you saw the damage that took out the grav drive, did that come from a ship’s weapon?”
“Huh? No, it was from a shaped charge. It was sabotage.”
“Which explains why no one came out to try and rescue the ship. Look, if anybody asks, that motor was taken out by some sort of weapon. Weld a big patch over the hole, replace the section of grating above it, maybe even the one above that, and put another patch on the ceiling.”
“Do you think Captain Roy knew?”
Hank shook his head. “I doubt it. Though I wouldn’t be surprised if the folks at Damascus Freight Lines were encouraged not to try and salvage the wreck.”
“Think I’ll have any trouble?”
“Nah, just as long as you play along, I don’t think anyone will care. It’s been half a year, the press has moved on, the insurance payments have all been made, the case has been closed.”
“So who do you think was behind it?”
Hank shrugged. “Might have just been the manufacturer, though I doubt it. I’m sure a couple of governments, Ceres’s at the very least, were backing it and helping to set it up.”
“Why?” I asked.
“Because the folks on Venus have made it clear they don’t want anyone helping ‘the renegades,’ and they’ll do something if anyone does. They’ve gone after a few of the smaller habs, I think they even blew a couple up. All the Let-Be’s ever wanted was to be left alone and so they left, leaving the rest of the world to the new order. So it’s either folks got tired of seeing them getting screwed, or they figured they’d help them solve their problem and find a place that the righteous back on Venus won’t find.
“Who knows? Maybe they owed somebody a favor. I do know a lot of governments are looking at the Venusian Moral Collective and making sure they stay on their own damn planet. They sunk two of their own cloud cities and killed God only knows how many tens of millions, just because they wouldn’t say the right things. Right now I think they’re all hoping that their ‘enlightened and most glorious leader’ dies before he can start exporting his little revolutionary enlightenment. Otherwise you’re going to see all of those cloud cities sunk and the place turned into a pure company planet.”
“I’m surprised that they haven’t done that already.”
“Because nobody wants that. Well, least not on our side.”
I nodded and started heading back inside the bar. “So does that mean you don’t have any issues with my working with them?”
“Nah, I’m good.”
“Thanks, because I suspect Chaz is going to want to sail with us.”
“And you need somebody to keep all of you out of trouble.”
“That too,” I said as I went back to the party with a few more things to think about. If someone in the Ceres government was helping out Marcus’s people —the Let-Be’s as Hank was calling them —that meant we might have some help when it came time to sell and trade for them.
I just needed to make sure that, if there were, I didn’t give their involvement away.
EIGHTEEN
Ships Docks and Space
It turned out that the hardest part of all of this was finding us a captain and pilot. We needed somebody I felt I could trust to keep their mouth shut if I should decide to go on to Eris. They also had to be licensed to fly a ship as big as the Iowa Hill.
Because it was a salvage, we probably could have gotten away with making the first trip with just anyone who knew basic ship handling, then just park it a couple hundred kilometers away and have a local pilot come out and take us into the dock.
I actually gave that a lot of thought, because I might just be able to pick up a pilot at Eris from Marcus. From a security point of view, it would definitely guarantee that their secret would stay secret. But I didn’t want any divided loyalties up on the bridge. As one of the ship owners —Kacey and I would own fifty-one percent, our shipping company the other forty-nine —I wanted someone who would listen to me or Kacey, first and foremost. The company next, and any customers, secret or otherwise, last.
Kacey did have a few cousins who were qualified, the problem was just figuring out which one we thought would be the best fit and convincing them to quit their job and come work for us.
In the end we resorted to bribery. One of Kacey’s close friends, Emiliana, was apparently interested in Kacey’s cousin Chris —who, I got the impression, was equally interested in her. However, nothing is ever as it seems when it comes to serious dating, I guess. Either Chris felt she was out of his league, or maybe he was just interested in playing the field. Guys who could captain the larger ships made a good living, and I guess Kacey’s friend was maybe a bit too proud to go throwing herself at him. Whatever their problem was, Kacey understood what was going on, because I sure didn’t.
As Emiliana, or Emil, was a good cook, as well as rated as a cargo master for reasons that I decided weren’t my business, Kacey signed her onto our crew, then dropped the bug in Chris’s ear that maybe he’d like a month or two all alone on a ship with Emil and no one else chasing her.
What made this work was Emil was definitely worth chasing.
And, of course, Kacey was quite sure that Chris was interested in Emil in the same ways that Emil was interested in Chris.
“You know, if this doesn’t work out, I’m holding you responsible for the inevitable murder/suicide,” I told Kacey with a grin.
“Emil’s hot for him, no idea why, but she’s been so ever since she met him. Trust me, we get them alone together and she’ll reel him in like a floundering spacer. Just like I did you!” she said with a wink.
“Oh, I wasn’t floundering; I knew exactly what I was getting myself into. Speaking of which, how do we make sure no one else interferes in this little plan of yours?”
“Simple, Chaz and Hank are pretty much not interested in anyone else and I don’t think Chris is into guys at all. I seem to recall you saying that you wanted to have the wedding before we left?”
I nodded. I figured if we did go to Eris, it would be for the best to be already married when I ran into Marcus and Pam. There would definitely be a lot fewer issues. Plus I wanted Kacey to come. If it delayed her getting her degree by a few months, it wasn’t really that big of a deal, seeing as she was part owner of the ship and the company, along with me.
“What about the crew of the ship taking us out there?”
“Well, until we pick a ship, that’s up in the air. And speaking of ships, I’ve been going over what’s available out on the docks right now and I’ve got, like, five possibles. I thought we could go down to the docks and talk to the captains, see what they can do and find out what it’s going to cost us.”
I looked up at the clock on the kitchen wall. We hadn’t signed any leases yet, as until we came back with the Iowa Hill, there really wasn’t any point. So our “office” was her parents’ kitchen. “Why don’t we go run down to the charter docks and start talking to them now? I definitely want to inspect their ships, if we’re going to be onboard for almost a month.”
“Yeah, probably a good idea,” she said, standing up. “Let’s go.”
I followed her out of the house and down to the station, where we got a tram to the charter docks, which was where all of the local operations worked out of. I was finally starting to figure out just how the transit system here worked. There wasn’t really a set route. Every car could go anywhere, but its destinations depended on the passengers onboard. Now while there was a certain preference for cars in certain areas to stop at certain places, the computer that ran the system looked at where you were going when you got on board and then figured out your route. Depending on where everyone who’d already gotten on was going, you might simply stay on the car and it’d take you there. Or it might tell you that you had to transfer at a particular station, onto another car to get where you needed to go.
To me it sounded like pure chaos theory. But the computer managing the system did quite well. Apparently it was some sort of “expert learning system” and had gotten quite good at its job, though Kacey told me that about once every few months a car would stop and kick everyone off, because it needed to reset the logic stream for each car every so often, and could only do so when a car was empty.
That didn’t happen to us today and we got to the docks without having to change at all, but then again, they were a popular destination with all of the warehouses and repair shops. There were actually a number of different docks on Ceres, but this one was closest and wasn’t private, like the military’s docks or some of the private corporations’ docks.
“Who’s first?” I asked Kacey as we entered the charter docks complex, which had its own moving sidewalks and in some cases even tramways to sections too far for most people to walk. This was different from the normal dock complex as there were offices across from each access way for the company that owned the ship. Some of the larger concerns took up entire segments.
