To Fire Called (A Seeker's Tale From The Golden Age Of The Solar Clipper Book 2)

by Nathan Lowell

  I pulled out my own tablet and accessed the ship’s intercom system. “This is the captain speaking. Crew meeting on the mess deck for all hands not on duty in ten ticks. That is all.”

  “Anything I should know about, Captain?” Ms. Cheuvront asked.

  I looked at Pip who shook his head. “Normal watch, Ms. Cheuvront. Nobody in who’s not crew. Anybody wants in, call for the OOD,” I said.

  “So basic port duty protocols, sar?”

  “Until we find something that needs to change, yes,” I said.

  “Aye, aye, sar. Can do.” She smiled and took her seat behind the desk.

  “Would you have Mr. Reed and your messenger meet us on the mess deck?”

  “Aye, aye, sar.” Ms. Cheuvront bent to the task while Pip and I headed into the ship.

  When we got to the mess deck, Ms. Sharps already had the lunch mess almost ready to serve and the crew had assembled. I nodded to Mr. Reed and went to the port side where I could talk to everybody at once. A few crew slinked in after us and I did my best not to notice.

  “We’ll declare liberty after lunch mess. This isn’t a CPJCT port. The normal rules don’t apply. How many have been to Mel’s Place before?”

  A few hands went up.

  “Mr. Carstairs has some updates.” I looked at Pip and leaned back against the bulkhead.

  Pip stepped forward. “So, station net has visitors’ access with the local rules and regs. Unless you know what you’re doing is allowed, assume it’s not. Just because one guy jumps off the top deck, doesn’t mean you can. Blades under twenty-five centimeters. I’d avoid all other weapons. You’re unlikely to need them, anyway. If you’re not sure of your hand-to-hand, travel in a group. While some of you are probably now thinking about staying aboard, this is no more dangerous than Diurnia and I’d give you the same advice there. Questions?”

  A wiper in the back raised his hand.

  “Mr. Schulteis?”

  “What’s our visa, sar?” he asked.

  “Unlimited,” Pip said. “I’ve been here before and vouched for the ship so don’t make me make the captain make you walk home.”

  I heard a few chuckles.

  “Anybody else?”

  An engineman raised her hand.

  “Ms. Moore?”

  “Anything we should do here, sar? Like something we’d kick ourselves for missing?”

  He grinned. “There’s a restaurant here that has a beef and brew to die for. You’ll find it in the station services on your tablet. The various bars and pubs aren’t what you’re used to seeing. Some of the watering holes aren’t exactly welcoming to crews, but you’ll be fine near the docks. Check the station services menu if you’re looking for anything special. Chances are you’ll find it here but you’re likely to pay more for things you’re used to and less for things that are local.” He paused and looked around the room. “As far as the station is concerned, we’re all tourists. Don’t be jerks, but if there’s something going on you don’t understand, ask.”

  Bentley raised his hand.

  “Mr. Bentley?” Pip asked.

  “Uniform of the day for liberty, sar?”

  “Whatever you’d wear to the oh-two deck at Diurnia,” Pip said. “Or was that a subtle suggestion we have lunch and declare liberty?”

  “Both, sar.”

  Pip looked at me as the crew laughed.

  “Thank you, everyone. We’ll get out of here so Ms. Sharps can get lunch going. If you go ashore, remember we’re guests here. Don’t put your feet on the furniture.”

  I left the mess deck followed by Pip and Mr. Reed. We went around the passageway to the wardroom and found Chief Stevens, Ms. Fortuner, and Al waiting.

  “You didn’t want to hear the announcement?” Pip asked.

  “What announcement?” Ms. Fortuner asked.

  “About visiting Mel’s Place.” I took up a plate and started down the lunch buffet.

  “I’ve been here before,” the chief said.

  “Anything we need to know about?” Al asked.

  “We have unlimited visas, so we can go anywhere not restricted to station personnel. We’re better off staying close to the docking galleries but there’s plenty to keep us busy here.” The chief followed me down the serving line. “Other than that, not really. Pay your bills and don’t start fights.”

  “How did you know about the visa?” I asked.

  “It’s on my tablet along with the station net information about restaurants, bars, and other entertainment for the visiting spacer.”

  “You really need to pay attention to the details, Captain,” Pip said. “Half the things you need to know you could look up yourself.”

  I snorted and took a seat. Mr. Franklin appeared with a carafe and poured coffee, left the carafe on the table, and retreated to the pantry.

  When everybody found a seat, I looked at the chief. “How are we on tankage?”

  “No problems. Price is good. No restrictions on quantities. They’ve got everything we need for keeping the ship going.”

  “How are we on the delivery?” I looked at Pip.

  He took a sip of coffee. “The cargo handlers will have the can off by 1800. We’ll need another one before we can leave.”

  “Any leads?”

  “Several. The station produces massive amounts of refined metals. We’ll have a new can of something by this time tomorrow.”

  “How long do you want to stay docked, Skipper?” Al asked.

  “Chief? How much time to fill the tanks?” I asked.

  “We’ll be full by 0600.”

  “We need any spares?” I asked.

  “We can always use consumables. Scrubber cartridges and the like. I’ve filed a replenishment order with the locals. Should be here this afternoon. We didn’t use that many.”

  I looked at Pip. “After lunch mess, would you get with Ms. Sharps and see what we need for stores?”

  “We’re getting our heads together around 1400,” he said. “I want to see about getting some of the fresh vegetables and local meat.”

  “Anything I’m missing?” I asked, looking around the table.

  Head shakes and shrugs were all the answer I got, so we settled down to lunch. After the big build-up about traveling to Toe-Hold space, it worried me that it felt so anticlimactic.

  Chapter 20

  Mel’s Place: 2375, May 9

  Pip collected me just before 1800. “Come on. We’re going to a steak house I know. You’ll love it. Put some civvies on.”

  “How civvie?”

  “There’s no dress code here. Something with pockets.”

  “With pockets?”

  “Do you own anything without pockets?”

  “Only underwear.”

  “You’ll probably want to wear that, too. Back in five.” He left me standing in the cabin, staring at the closed door.

  I sighed and rummaged up a pair of jeans, a long-sleeved pullover, and a jacket. I picked a comfy pair of ship boots. With no way of knowing how far astray he planned to lead me, I figured I better have good footwear.

  Within a few ticks we walked out of the ship and down the docking gallery. The warm, moist air still felt weird. Docks were supposed to be cold. My brain just couldn’t keep up.

  “They must have some monster scrubbers here,” I said.

  He shook his head. “Multiple redundancy. They’ve got small scrubbers scattered everywhere. If any one of them fails, the station doesn’t die. No reason to have one big one when small ones are just as cost effective.”

  Pip and I were the only ones in the gallery. “Where is everybody?” I asked.

  “Hold your jets. We’re the only house on a dead-end street. If we see anybody here, it’s going to be station security or our crew.”

  “Where are we on the can?”

  “They took it half a stan ago. Our accounts have been credited, in case you wondered.”

  “New one?”

  “We have some choices. Where do you want to go?”


  “I’m just the bus driver. What’s the most advantageous?”

  “Can of frozen foods going to Dark Knight Station. A dozen Burleson Units up toward Port Newmar.” He pursed his lips and blew a breath out of his nose. “Good for a quarter million credits. We’d need to haul ore back, probably.”

  “Back to here?” I asked. “Don’t they have plenty of ore?”

  “Lots of places have surplus smelting capacity. Ice Rock always needs metal ore and they’ve got the capacity to smelt it.”

  We made it to the end of the gallery and Pip pushed through an airtight door into a short, wide passageway opening onto an broad plaza. The place wasn’t exactly crowded but I think that was more a factor of the size than the number of people in it. I hadn’t seen a space that big since I left the parade ground at Port Newmar. The overhead soared thirty or forty meters above us. Globe lights hung to within five meters of the deck while tiny points of light flickered randomly on the ceiling.

  Pip took a couple of steps past me and stopped, looking back. “What?”

  “This is huge.”

  “You were expecting shoe boxes?”

  “I didn’t exactly get a good feel for the scale from the bridge.” We resumed our stroll, Pip leading the way diagonally across the plaza.

  “These are old shipping cans. They welded them together and slapped vac-seal on the inside,” he said.

  “Barbell cans?” I asked.

  He shook his head. “Older but about the same idea. Remember the old ‘space trains’ they talked about at the academy?”

  “Precursor to the tractor designs?”

  “Yeah. They took six cans at a time. Jumped them where they needed them and left them.” He lifted his chin toward the overhead. “They collected the empties here. Used the goods and then salvaged them for housing.”

  “Weren’t those the ships that only jumped like half a BU at a time?”

  “Yeah. Took forever to get out of the gravity wells and even then, a rocking horse had more legs.”

  “So, what’s this place we’re going to?”

  “It’s just across the plaza. Local beef. Local beer.”

  “And we’re meeting somebody here to do a deal with?”

  Pip drew himself up and placed a hand on his chest with a dramatic flair.

  “Yeah. I wound you. I know,” I said. “Are we?”

  He shrugged and started off across the plaza again. “Not this time. No.”

  “When are we going where you really want to go?” I asked.

  “I’ll let you know,” he said. “We need to make a little more noise out here first. You ever been to Iron Mountain?”

  I looked at him.

  “Oh, sorry.” He shrugged again. “You didn’t get out much.”

  “When were you here at Mel’s?”

  “We graduated in what? ’58?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Came out here the next year. Good credits. Nobody bothers you.”

  “I thought you were bored with the cargo picking game, small ship stuff,” I said.

  “Who told you that?”

  “You did. Back at Port Newmar.”

  “Yeah. Well, I sometime embroider the truth a little.”

  “Embroider? I’ve seen less needlework on twelfth-century tapestries.”

  He stopped and stared at me. “Really? You’ve seen twelfth-century tapestries?”

  “Well, not in person. I’ve seen pictures.”

  “Where?”

  I stared at him. “Art history? The academy? Second term? You sat next to me?”

  “I sat next to you in every class. It was the only way I could pass.”

  “The nudes.”

  His eyes brightened. “Ah, yes. Now I remember.” He nodded at a steel-clad door. “Here we are.”

  “You sure? Looks like a closet.”

  “I’m sure,” he said and pulled the door handle. It didn’t budge and his hand slipped off.

  I had to catch his shoulder to keep him from falling backward. “Maybe they’re closed for repairs,” I said.

  He scowled at me and pulled out his tablet. After a few ticks of flipping through the various screens he looked up at the panel above the door and back at his tablet. “Odd.” He looked around and walked over to a couple of maintenance workers in station coveralls. After a short conversation he came back to the door. “Forgot something,” he said. He rapped a knuckle on the metal in an odd pattern, paused, then rapped again.

  A narrow panel opened at the door at head height. The hidden person behind the slot said, “Yeah?”

  Pip said, “Mel sent me.”

  “Mel’s dead.”

  “Your point?”

  The slot closed and the door swung inward. “Welcome to the Speakeasy, gentlemen.” The person behind the door turned out to be a rather small, wiry man in some outlandish garb consisting of a dark coat with a long split tail over a ruffled white shirt and a tie in the shape of a bow. He wore a wide, shiny belt around his waist and black pants with what looked like a velvet strip down the outside of the leg.

  As a uniform, it was obvious why he wanted to keep it behind a locked door.

  “Two for dinner, please,” Pip said. “Reservation under Carstairs.”

  The man paused for just a heartbeat and nodded. “Of course, sir. Right this way.”

  He led the way through an amazing room trimmed in what appeared to be dark wood and some kind of red brick. I caught the aroma of grilled meat on the air. My mouth exploded in saliva.

  The maître d’ led us to a nook along one of the bulkheads and we slid into the booth. “Martine will be with you shortly, gentlemen. Please enjoy.” With that he slipped away, the odd tails at the back of his coat fluttering in his passage.

  I looked at Pip and found him grinning at me from across the narrow table. “Fun, huh?”

  “I don’t even know what this is.”

  “It’s the best beef and brew house in the Western Annex. All locally sourced beef. They brew their own beer.”

  A young woman in a black gown swished up to the table and smiled. “Good evening, gentlemen. My name is Martine. I’ll be taking care of you this evening. Today’s special is prime rib. Today’s tap is a full-bodied porter with just a touch of fruit. Would you like menus?”

  Pip glanced at me and shook his head. “That sounds lovely. We’ll have the special and the tap. Medium rare. Mashed. Green salad with a vinaigrette.”

  Her lips twitched as if suppressing a smile. She glanced at me.

  “I’ll have the same.”

  “Of course, sir.”

  After she swished away, I raised an eyebrow at Pip. “I feel a little under-dressed.”

  “It’s all part of the show.”

  “What is this place?”

  “It’s a replica of an old-Earth restaurant thing.” He shrugged. “We won’t be bothered here and the food is great. Relax.”

  “Who’d bother us anyway?”

  “Well, you? Probably nobody. I’d just as soon keep a low profile for a while longer.”

  “You have any unpaid debts here?” I asked.

  “No. Nothing like that.”

  Martine returned and placed two tankards of a dark beer, a pair of green salads, and a basket full of fresh yeast rolls on the table. “Your meals will be right up,” she said and wandered off again.

  The salads crunched under our forks, and the tang of the vinaigrette lent just the right counterpoint. The porter, I had to admit, rolled smoothly over my tongue.

  “If the beef is as good as this, I’m in heaven,” I said.

  Pip grinned but didn’t speak.

  As I speared the last leaf from my salad, Martine returned to swap out the empty plates for full ones. The dark aroma of the beef with the tang from a small globe of horseradish went straight to my head, and I dug in. It took me a few ticks to get myself under control enough to speak. “You say they raise this beef here?”

  Pip nodded. “It’s a relatively small
operation compared to the big growers like Bar None, but they make up in quality what they may lack in quantity.”

  We finished the meal in near silence and I refused a refill on the porter.

  Pip thumbed the tab and we left. “You’ve been quiet,” he said as we exited through the metal door. A line of people lounged against the front of the building, apparently waiting for their turn in heaven.

  “Wondering how much longer we’re going to tip-toe around out here.” I glanced around. “I’m not sure how much I can say or even what I shouldn’t say here.”

  He clapped me on the shoulder. “Nobody’s paying us any attention. What’s on your mind?”

  “Herring. Patterson. Whatever his name is. If I’m covering you by supposedly looking for this guy, shouldn’t we be—I don’t know. Looking for him?”

  “We are.”

  “Really?” I glanced over at him.

  “I’m looking for a can going to where he is.”

  “You know where he is?”

  Pip shrugged. “Of course.”

  I raised a skeptical eyebrow in his general direction.

  “All right,” he said. “Not exactly, and he may be moving around.”

  “Where was he last?”

  “Last positive location was Iron Mountain.”

  “You think he’s still there?”

  “I haven’t heard that he’s left nor have I heard that he’s shown up anywhere else.”

  “So?”

  “Most people here don’t deal with Iron Mountain. They don’t ship to them. They don’t buy from them.”

  “What are they? Pariah?”

  “Basically,” Pip said, glancing at the store fronts as we passed.

  “Really?”

  He shrugged. “Yeah. They’ve a reputation as being a bit less than neighborly.”

  “How so?”

  “Hijacking the odd mining barge. Extortion on some of their smaller neighbors. The usual bully kind of stuff.”

  “Piracy?” I asked.

  He looked at me like I’d finally lost my mind. “How would that work?”

  “No idea.”

  “Neither does anybody else. Easier to steal the cargo once it’s on a station.”

  “That happens?”

  “It can. It’s frowned on.”

  “Frowned on?” I asked. Passersby probably heard the note of incredulity in my voice.