Chapter 11: 11. En Route

"It was a salvage job," Piper explained as her hands moved over the controls. "About thirty years ago now, not long after we arrived in this sector. The client looked like an academic type. Older guy, he knew his stuff and he had the cash to back him up. He knew roughly where to find the wreck, and he knew exactly where on the wreck that thing was located."

"He said we'd be recovering an advanced medical system, he called it an auto-doc. Said it was like a whole self-contained hospital, that it could cure or fix damn near anything. It sounded too good to be true, but he had the money so we took the job."

The three of us were strapped into our seats in the cockpit, and our captain was going through the final preparations before engaging the jump drive. My attention was evenly divided between the story she was telling us and what she was actually doing to pilot the ship. And maybe a little bit on the joy of my new tail-friendly seat.

Yesterday had been another fairly quiet day for me, while Piper and Sarah were out doing more salvage work. We had the Hammersmith's computer core in the secondary hold, the main hold now held two large pulse laser turrets and a missile rack, complete with missiles. There were also a dozen large shipping containers they'd salvaged from the Hammersmith's hold. We hadn't inventoried that stuff yet, but Piper assumed the contents would be valuable or useful.

After dinner last night Sarah spent an hour in the cockpit, swapping out the old co-pilot seat for my new one. Now I was comfortable, my tail could hang out the back and move around freely while the rest of me remained securely strapped in place. On the other hand I was still very aware of the fact that the only article of clothing on board I could wear was that black nightshirt. I really hoped we could remedy that when we reached port.

With the salvage work completed we were getting ready to use Jump-1 so we'd make Piper's next delivery on time. And while our captain was preparing to take the ship into jump-space Sarah asked about the Re/Gen unit. She wanted to know where it came from, since it was obviously incredibly advanced technology.

Piper had her right hand on the flight controls, manually piloting the ship to get us well clear of the Hammersmith and its debris. At the same time her outstretched left hand was moving over the navigation controls on my side of the cockpit. A simplified 2d representation of the local sector came up on a display in front of me, and I watched closely as the captain demonstrated how to plot a level-one jump.

It left me a little awed to watch her manually fly the ship, plot a course, and continue her story all at the same time.

"It took a while to find the wreck. The client's information was good, but not exact and we had to hunt around for it. Once we found it though, the rest of his intel was bang on. The ship itself was... Well she was in about the same shape as the Hammersmith, except a lot older. I'm pretty sure she was lost in that war a few centuries back. Still, it looked like nobody else had been there ahead of us. No other salvars anyways."

She paused as she checked the navigation display to verify her jump calculations, then continued talking.

"That big black cylinder was right where the client said it'd be. It wasn't easy getting the damn thing out of the wreck, it took us two twelve-hour shifts in e-suits working in zero gravity to disconnect it and cut it free. Once we got it secure in the hold, we set course for the rendezvous coordinates and waited. And waited."

She sighed, "He never showed up, we never heard from him again. It happens now and then, clients skip out. Or they run into trouble, or they get themselves killed. We got a quarter of the pay up front so we weren't completely out of pocket on the job. And we figured if he was right about it being some kind of self-contained hospital, it might be worth our while to hang on to it. Life can be treacherous out here, and sometimes we'll take dangerous work, if the pay's right."

Finally she added with a grimace, "When the guy told us what it was, he never mentioned any of the limitations. Maybe he didn't know about them? Or maybe he didn't think we needed to know about that. Either way, all we knew was it would supposedly cure us or patch us up if we got injured. So we figured out the power feeds and wired it into the ship's power bus, and for the next year or so that was that."

"Then something happened?" I asked. "You got injured?"

"Exactly," she nodded. She grimaced again as she continued, "A job went south, instead of a strongbox full of cash I wound up with a bunch of new holes in my hide. I barely got out of that mess, ended up back on the ship and we got the hell out of there. It didn't take long to figure out I wasn't going to last long enough to get me anywhere that could help, that tube was my only chance. So in I went, and found out first-hand what it really was and how it really worked."

That all led me to another question I wanted to ask, but I was sure it would be impolite. Fortunately Sarah spoke up and asked it for me.

"I'm guessing you had to make the same sort of choice as me?" our attractive blonde engineer asked quietly.

Piper went silent and her attention was fixed forward as she stared out the windows. After a few seconds she finally responded, "Whoever I was before, that was almost thirty years ago. It's well in the past. This is who I am now, that's what matters. Maybe someday I'll share a few more of those details, but it's not relevant now."

"Ok boss," Sarah responded. "Sorry, I didn't mean to pry."

The captain shook her head, "It's fine. And here we go."

I'd been through jump-space dozens of times, but I'd never been in a position to see it first-hand. I'd never had a window seat on a ship before.

Piper's left hand flipped open a safety cover, then turned the red toggle underneath and initiated the level-one jump.

There was a shudder through the deck as the powerful reality-bending engine rumbled to life. A moment later I felt that shudder through every cell of my body as the ship tore a hole through the fabric of normal-space and we surged forward into jump-space.

The stars momentarily got brighter, then they all seemed to blur and melt together while taking on a distinctly blue tone. In under a second everything outside blended into a swirling mass of light, in various shades of blue and violet.

It was fascinating to see, the way it turned and twisted as we moved through it was almost hypnotic. After a few seconds I had to pull my eyes off it as I realized it was giving me motion-sickness.

The captain had one more look over the displays then she unbuckled her seat restraints. "Everything looks good. It's just a quick hop, we'll drop back to normal space in about an hour. It'll shave a few days off the trip though, and make up for the time spent at the Hammersmith."

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"What happens when we come out of jump?" I asked her. "What's our destination?"

Piper got up from her chair as she replied, "It's a mining colony on Regulon-4. That's an airless ball of rock, but it's packed with enough valuable minerals that someone decided it was worth-while building a colony there."

Sarah and I unbuckled as well, then followed our captain aft out of the cockpit.

The engineer asked, "I hope this isn't a sensitive question but you said you were doing regular deliveries? Your holds were both almost empty, now they're packed with salvage. You're obviously not delivering bulk goods, and I got the impression you're planning to sell the salvage elsewhere so you aren't going to be taking on a load of mineral ore at this mining colony."

The boss glanced over her shoulder at the two of us, then shook her head "My regular routine has me transporting a small shipment between three ports of call. For now I'm going to keep the details to myself. Not that I don't trust you but it's safer for all of us if you don't know too much. I need to make sure my client won't get twitchy when he finds out I've taken on some crew."

"And if he does get twitchy?" I asked nervously. The whole thing sounded dangerous, and possibly illegal. Small high-value cargo could well mean smuggling. The space tug salvage ship might just be a convenient cover.

Piper got herself a drink then sat down at the table in the mess. She looked thoughtful as she finally replied, "I'll try and convince him that there's nothing to worry about. If that doesn't work, maybe we'll go find some new customers."

She added, "If we get a good rate for everything we've salvaged we'll be sitting pretty for a while anyways, we won't be desperate for work. And we could always return to the Hammersmith again, there's more gear there we could sell."

Sarah and I helped ourselves to some drinks as well, and the three of us sat around the table as we talked. None of us were drinking the hard stuff, the other two had chilled soft drinks and I just had water.

"We probably should have asked this before," the blonde engineer said, "But now's as good a time as any. How does pay work? In the Navy we were all on salary. Based on rank, experience, function, years served, and with some bonuses for dangerous deployments."

The captain didn't have to stop and think about it, she had an answer ready.

"The pay standard for the sort of work we do is based on a share of the profits. There's always various fees we have to pay as we travel around? Like port fees, docking fees, fuel costs. If the ship was damaged we'd have to pay for parts or repairs, and any other supplies we need to replenish, such as food. So whatever we make on a given job, first thing is all those expenses get paid. Whatever's left over after that gets divided. Eighty percent goes to the ship, that's there to cover long-term expenses like overhauls, refits, and other emergency or unexpected costs. Ten percent goes to the captain. And the last ten percent gets divided among the crew. So whatever money we make on that salvage, after the expenses are deducted you two get five percent each."

I had no idea if that was a little or a lot, but I figured I'd find out when it was sold and I got my share. I did feel a little guilty that I'd be getting the same pay as Sarah, when it seemed like she did all the work while I loitered on the ship. All I really did was cook and clean. She didn't seem bothered by it though, and I figured the captain knew what she was doing.

"Last question," Sarah announced after a sip of her drink. "Our next stop, you said it's a mining colony? So probably not a good choice for a bit of shore-leave?"

Piper shook her head, "Not this time. Next time our schedule brings us back this way I'll give you two a tour of the place. I'm going to try and keep my visit short, and I don't want either of you leaving the ship. Partially for your own safety, the folks there can be a little rough around the edges."

"Our next stop after this," she added. "We'll try to arrange some shore leave there. I'll show you around, and you'll have your first pay so you can pick up whatever you need or want."

The first thing on my mind was new clothes, and I was pretty sure Sarah was thinking the same. At least her coveralls did what they were supposed to and covered all. Neither of us had any underwear, and we both really needed bras. Not to mention wearing the same thing every single day wasn't very nice.

Since we'd only be in jump-space for about an hour, there wasn't time to do much other than relax and talk in the mess. Being social with my crew-mates was a relatively new experience for me, so I tended to let the others drive the conversation while I mostly listened.

Sarah was still interested in the Re/Gen pod. She brought up her idea of linking its AI to the ship's data bus, so Jenny could assist the ship's computer and speed up any difficult computational problems.

I was a little surprised our captain seemed to be actually considering the suggestion. I still had a lot of concerns about AI, but I had to admit my fears were based on Imperium propaganda. And of the three of us, I was the least-knowledgable about the subject. In the end Piper didn't make any decisions yet, but she promised to think it over.

With about ten minutes to go before we were due to drop out of jump-space, our captain excused herself and stepped into her cabin to get changed. Apparently the 'baggy coveralls' look wasn't her normal attire. Or at least, it wasn't how she dressed when she was doing business.

She joined us in the cockpit with two minutes to spare, and both Sarah and I stared for a few moments at what Piper considered 'work attire'.

Her pants looked like the sort of combat fatigues I saw marines wearing on the Hammersmith. They were loose but not baggy, dark grey, and had extra pockets on the thighs. On top she was wearing a tight form-fitting black blouse. It had a deep scoop-neck that was a lot more revealing than I ever expected to see an on-duty officer wear. On top of that she had a small tight black leather jacket that was left hanging open.

She had the same black military-style boots as before, and finally she was wearing a wide black belt, from which hung a handgun at her right hip and a combat-style knife at her left hip. There were two utility pouches at the back, and two small pouches that obviously held spare magazines for the pistol.