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

by Nathan Lowell

  “Can you find it again?”

  She shook her head. “I’m an engineer. I know about where it was but finding it would be like tossing darts blindfolded.”

  “All the cues are pointing back to The Junkyard.”

  “Yeah. I thought I’d add one more stick to the fire. That’s probably where we need to look.”

  “Why there?”

  “Say you’ve got a station full of engineering and logistics types. They’ve all signed NDAs but you don’t really want them out spreading stories.”

  “That sounds ... distressing.”

  “It does. How do you keep them corralled?”

  “Let them take short vacations?”

  “The Junkyard is the only station of any size in that end of the Annex,” she said. “And getting in and out isn’t as easy as it might be from—say—Odin’s.”

  Chapter 33

  Mel’s Place: 2375, October 7

  It took us a bit of time to get maneuvered into the docking gallery at Mel’s. Traffic control directed us to the main gallery instead of the quarantine dock. The number of ships there made even the busiest orbital look like a vacant lot.

  Al caught me gazing out at the ships and cargo handlers and barges and shuttles like I’d never seen them before, all moving in organized streams around the station. “Something, isn’t it?” she asked, stepping up beside me.

  “I feel like I’ve missed half the story,” I said.

  “The Confederated Planets doesn’t like to acknowledge this.”

  I looked at her. “And yet, they don’t do anything to discourage it.”

  She shrugged, the surgical steel in her arms glinting in the lights on the bridge. “What can they do? They do their best to sweep it under a rug. Most people never learn. Even if they’re told, they don’t believe it.”

  I looked back out on the shoals of ships moving around the station. “I see it and I don’t believe it.”

  “To be fair, the CPJCT has a hundred times more orbitals controlling the most advantageous planet-borne resources.”

  “But only a fraction of the population,” I said.

  “If you count all the people on the corporate planets, it’s probably about equal, but yeah. Mel’s Place is probably home to more people than live on the whole planet of Diurnia, and that’s some multiple of the number who live on the orbital proper.”

  “How many stations just in the Viceroy cluster?”

  She shrugged. “Probably a hundred minor platforms and stations. Miners have small places set up out in the belts. The bigger operations have refinery platforms scattered out there, too. They refine the ore before they even bring it back. I know of at least three zero-gee factories out there. Then each of the systems in Viceroy has a station that’s bigger than an orbital.”

  I stood there for a few more ticks. “What are you looking for, Al?” I asked.

  She gave me a sharp glance before looking back out at the station. “What makes you think I’m looking for something?”

  “Seems like everybody on this ship is looking for something or other. Wondered if you were one of them.”

  She stood there facing the armorglass but her eyes seemed to be focused somewhere else. After a very long time, I’d about given up on getting an answer when she started to speak. “I don’t want to be a captain,” she said. She looked at me. “I appreciate you think I’d make a good one, but...” She sighed and shook her head. “I’m about ready to retire. Get out of the game altogether.”

  If she’d slugged me, I probably would have been less surprised. I closed my mouth with a snap. “I don’t know what to say.”

  She gave me a sad, little grin. “Nothing to say.” She looked back out over the ships. “It’s beautiful out here.”

  I just stood beside her and looked out. Al was a part of the spacer life for me. She had been even while I’d been at the academy and all the stanyers since. As much as Alys Giggone and even Pip. To have her show up on the mess deck and apply for a first mate’s slot felt a bit like a homecoming.

  “I’m getting too old,” she said, apropos of nothing.

  “Can you retire?” I asked. “I mean, financially and all?”

  She nodded. “Yeah. I think so. I’ve got my art. Even out here I don’t get a lot of time to practice.” She paused for a moment. “Thank you, by the way.”

  “You’re welcome. Can I see your work sometime?”

  She shrugged. “Sometime. When I’ve a piece I’m ready to share.”

  “That’s why Christine knew you.”

  Al nodded. “I didn’t know she knew me that well.” She rubbed a beefy hand across the back of her neck. “That’s been kinda weighing on me this whole trip.”

  “What? That she knew you?”

  “Christine Maloney is one of the beautiful people. Rich. Smart. Connected. Believes in herself.”

  “Beautiful,” I said.

  Al sighed and smiled at me. “So beautiful it hurts to look at her sometimes.”

  “She knows who you are,” I said.

  “I didn’t realize,” Al said.

  I took a deep breath and let it out slowly through my nose, admiring an older container clipper easing across the traffic with the help of a pair of tugs. “Now you do,” I said. I clapped her on the shoulder and left her on the bridge, staring out into the hurly-burly around an active station. As I dropped down the ladder, I wondered what she saw.

  Chapter 34

  Mel’s Place: 2375, October 9

  There’s something uncanny about a docked ship. The lack of crew is one thing. Stripping down to a third of our normal complement means there are a lot of unoccupied spaces. There’s a certain amount of day work that happens. We still serve meals. We take on supplies. We have to monitor our environment, and we never shut down the fusactors that provide shipboard power.

  It’s also quieter. I’m more likely to notice the blowers that keep fresh air circulating. They never shut off. A silent ship is a dying ship. I don’t know if it’s because there are fewer people aboard making noise—chattering, walking up and down the passages, opening and closing doors and hatches—or if it’s because we have less ambient engineering noise. The fusactor is all but silent and the Burleson drives only operate for microseconds at a time. The sail generators hum a low-pitched song that barely registers. Everything that makes a noise vibrates the hull, and the sound carries along her structure. Even some things that don’t make a noise carry vibrations.

  I pondered that while I wandered down the spine toward engineering. It seemed like it had to be the absence of crew rather than a change in engineering that made me think the ship was so much quieter, almost abandoned.

  The chief’s office door stood latched open but she wasn’t in there. I nodded to the watchstanders in Engineering Central who smiled in return before straightening up and examining their consoles. I ducked out of their line of sight while I choked back a laugh. I’d never seen so clear an example of “It’s the boss! Look busy!” in my life.

  Honestly, I was probably just as guilty of doing it but the larger crew, the dispersed management team, offered more opportunities for me to watch people.

  I found the chief with her head in a scrubber cabinet while Spec One Penna leaned over her shoulder.

  “Any idea what’s causing that buildup?” Penna asked. “It’s been doing that for the last few months.”

  “Have you checked the trap for blockage?” The chief’s voice echoed inside the metal box.

  “Yes, sar. Outflows are all slick and clean. Even changed the slime filters out just before we left Siren.”

  I heard her sigh before she backed out. “That was what? Six weeks ago?”

  They noticed me standing there when they turned. Penna jumped and even the chief started.

  “Gah!” she said. “Don’t sneak up on people like that, Skipper.”

  “Sorry. I didn’t want to interrupt.” I nodded at the scrubber. “Problem?”

  The chief pulled a rag out o
f her pocket and began scrubbing her hands with it. “Mr. Penna here noticed we’ve been getting an algae buildup on the outflows in this cabinet.”

  “I didn’t think they’d grow outside the filter matrix,” I said.

  The chief nodded to Penna. “They shouldn’t be able to. The cartridges hold the matrix in isolation. There shouldn’t be any bleed,” he said.

  The chief nodded at the case. “I’m certainly not an expert on these cartridges, but it has me beat, too.”

  I pointed to the cabinet. “May I?”

  The chief stepped aside with a grin. “Be my guest.”

  I looked at the bottom of the case where a slurry of slimy water vibrated. “So is the problem the water or the slime?” I asked.

  “Both, sar,” Penna said. “The outlet is on the back right corner. It’s being plugged by a buildup of algae.”

  A small mound of icky red and brown slime covered any outlet that might have been there. The smell triggered an idea and I stepped back.

  “Are those the right algae?” I asked.

  The chief and Penna shared a confused glance. “The right algae?” the chief asked.

  “Yeah. They don’t smell right. Too much iodine. Not enough green.”

  They shared another glance.

  “I don’t follow, sar,” Penna said.

  “You ever smell a cartridge that’s way overdue for changing?” I asked.

  He grimaced. “No, sar. That would be a bad sign.”

  “I have,” the chief said. “It’s disgusting, but he’s right. It’s a bad sign.”

  I nodded. “You’re both right. They stink because the algae inside get overwhelmed and die off. When they start rotting, they give off a very unpleasant smell.”

  The chief swallowed hard and even Penna looked a little put off by just the imaged aroma.

  “So those algae in the bottom there. Only a few of them are dead, just based on the smell.”

  “You mean it doesn’t smell bad enough?” Penna asked.

  “Right. Those are mostly living algae. A few of them have gone to the great matrix in the sky, but most of them are still alive and they’re the wrong kind of algae.”

  “You can tell that from the smell?” Penna asked.

  I shrugged. “Can you tell beef from chicken by the smell?”

  “Of course, sar.”

  “Same difference, although it might be a bit more subtle with the algae. We used the same cartridges on the Tinker. The smell’s distinctive and this isn’t it. It might be the decomposing algae are confusing my nose but these don’t smell right to me.”

  I glanced up at the case again and the glare from the overheads highlighted odd, circular discolorations on the inside of the door. “What’s that?” I asked, pointing out the circles.

  The chief looked up and frowned. She stepped closer and then looked from the back of the door to the array of scrubber cartridges. She swung the door almost closed, peeking into the case through the crack. “Scrubber cartridges line up with them.”

  “Do we have the wrong cartridges?” Penna asked. “I’ve just been buying what they gave us in the yard.”

  “Somebody’s not screwing the cartridges on tight,” the chief said. “There’s not much clearance and if you don’t get that last turn on when you screw them in, the cartridges hit the door.” She pointed to a dried streak running down the length of the door. “There’s the leakage, but it doesn’t explain the variation in algae.”

  She stepped back and tapped a finger against her chin. After a few heartbeats she looked at me. “Random mutation?”

  “Possible. Could also just be simple contamination. If the spores were in the yard, the case might have been cross-contaminated with another strain from a different scrubber.”

  “Or both,” Penna said.

  “Or both,” the chief said, nodding in agreement. “Clean this gunk out. Make sure the other cabinets aren’t contaminated.”

  Penna nodded. “It’s only this cabinet,” he said. “I’ve been keeping an eye on all of them since this started.”

  “Good. Did you notice this on any of the other doors?” She pointed to the marks.

  “I haven’t, but it’s an easy check.”

  “We need to have a bit of remedial training in scrubber filter maintenance, regardless,” the chief said. “But when you’ve got this cleaned up good, give it a good washdown with bleach, particularly along this bottom tray.”

  “Aye, aye, sar. We’ll get that done this watch,” Penna said.

  “Thank you, Mr. Penna,” the chief said.

  Penna nodded and scurried off, presumably to find cleaning gear and a hapless rating.

  “Good eye, Skipper,” the chief said, closing the scrubber door and latching it. “Good nose.”

  “Good training. I worked environmental on the Lois. We had our share of scrubber malfunctions.”

  She headed for the ladder up toward main engineering. “She still had those old frame and stretched matrix scrubbers, didn’t she?”

  “Yeah. Messy job changing them out.”

  “Tedious as well,” she said. “I remember those, but I didn’t pick up the smell in this cabinet.” She glanced up at me.

  “Maybe we had more than our share of scrubber malfunctions,” I said.

  “Whatever. I’m glad you happened along when you did. I doubt that I’d have picked up on it.” She grimaced and shook her head. “I should have spotted the marks on the inside of the cabinet door, though. Or Penna should have.”

  “It was just the light where I was standing.”

  She snorted. “Skipper, you can’t keep blaming luck.”

  I shrugged. “I’m just trying to get out and around the ship more.”

  We stopped at her office door. “Keep doing it,” she said.

  “I plan to.”

  I left her settling into her console, and I wandered back up the spine toward officer country and the bridge. I felt the need to look out at the stars.

  Chapter 35

  Viceroy System: 2375, October 12

  Pip scored a can of machine parts for Bar None and we pulled out of Mel’s after giving the crew a full four-day liberty rotation. Pip and I had partaken of a few rounds of beef and brew but as soon as he got the can, he seemed anxious to get underway.

  I looked Bar None up in the travel guide and learned why.

  “A ranch in space?” I asked.

  He started to put his feet on my desk but the sour look I shot him dissuaded him and he merely crossed his legs at the knee. “A ranch in space,” he said. “And a meat processing plant. And one of the best hydroponic operations going. If you want good, fresh food outside of a planetary gravity well, Bar None is the place.”

  “Doesn’t it take a lot of space for cattle?”

  “And a lot of feed,” he said. “That’s why they started the hydroponic operation, I think. I can’t imagine what it must have cost to ship grain out there to feed the beef. Once they mastered that, it was easy to expand it to include more fresh produce. Wait till you taste their watermelon.”

  “What’s with the machine parts?” I asked.

  “Stations run on machinery. Same as ships.” He shrugged.

  “And we’re going to Bar None because it’s the biggest food production operation in the Western Annex?”

  He shook his head. “Biggest in Toe-Hold space. When you have a whole planet, like St. Cloud or Umber, you can produce a lot more food. Enough food that economies of scale make it possible to lift it out of the gravity well for shipment. Not many places out here have that kind of real estate to exploit, let alone the ecological infrastructure to farm or fish.”

  “So if I were looking to feed a whole new station, I’d probably arrange with Bar None?”

  He smiled. “I’m trying to think of all the things an outfit like this would need to support itself in Toe-Hold space.”

  “Have you missed any?”

  He paused and started counting off on his fingers. “Food, water, envi
ronment, raw materials, personnel.” He looked up at me. “What am I missing?”

  “You’re proposing that three companies, each with a different specialty, have been working in almost complete secrecy for two decades.”

  He frowned but nodded. “Yeah. Basically.”

  “Security,” I said.

  “What about it? It’s Toe-Hold space. Even knowing which corner of Toe-Hold space it’s likely to be in, the probability of finding it without a survey vessel and three bushels of luck is practically zero.”

  “I’m not talking about people getting in.”

  His eyes went wide.

  “How can you keep that secret this long?” I asked.

  “There have to be thousands of people who know,” he said.

  “Just keeping it quiet at the highest levels of those three companies would be a monumental effort.”

  “If three people know a secret, it only stays a secret if all of them are dead,” he said.

  “I thought it was two,” I said.

  “Eventually that one will tell it and it’s no longer secret.”

  I shrugged. “I don’t know if I’d go that far. But once you get in, you can’t get out until and unless the project is released to the universe.”

  “NDAs only go so far,” Pip said. “You’re thinking what? Slaves?” He practically whispered that last word.

  “It’s a possibility,” I said, not wanting to think about Brill as a slave. “More likely they’re just keeping them busy, keeping them fed and paid and entertained so they don’t actually realize they can’t quit.”

  Pip grinned. “So? Like the CPJCT?”

  I felt like he’d punched me in the head. I sat back in my chair, staring at him as the words rang true in my mind.

  He chuckled. “Gotcha. The CPJCT isn’t that bad, but there’s a lot to think about there. No, these people have to keep a tighter rein in order to keep the secret. Personally, I think it’s wasted effort because—eventually—they’re going to have to release the information when they roll out the new product line, or they’re going to have to kill the thousands of people there to keep them from going forth and spreading the news.”