Pip made me an omelet and I poured coffee for everybody. I still had a few minutes before the mess deck opened officially so I settled down with my breakfast. It would probably be a while before I would have another chance to eat.
By the time I’d finished a few of the crew had lined up at Pip’s station so I took my plate and cup out to the dishwasher and stacked them there.
Cookie called to me as I was leaving, “Best of luck.”
Pip looked over his shoulder and saluted with his spatula. “Keep me posted.”
I was still chuckling as I reached the berthing area and changed into my civvies. My clothes were getting-not worn exactly-but certainly tired. My good boots weren’t anything compared to some of the footwear I’d seen in the last six months. My jacket was little more than an outdated windbreaker. My pants weren’t special either, what my mother called, “good, solid trousers.”
I put them on because that’s all I had, but I started to realize why people dressed up when changing into their own civvies. As nicely made and practical as shipsuits were, months of wearing them on a daily basis made putting on anything else kinda special. If I got new clothes I’d have to get rid of these, or take a hit to my mass allotment. I understood now why so many people did exactly that.
I saw the boy toy belt hanging in the back of the locker and, with a sudden burst of daring, stripped off my old, perfectly adequate belt and buckled on the supple leather with its gold metal and black dragon. I looked at myself in the mirror, and if I were being perfectly honest, the new belt looked out of place. It didn’t go with the rest of the outfit at all. It did, however, go with me. So I kept it on.
I scooped up the duffel, slammed my locker, and headed for the cargo lock. I got there just after 07:00 and found a crowd had gathered. I walked up to see what they were looking at and burst out laughing.
When we first received the grav-pallet from Mr. Cotton, I could see why it had been slated for salvage. It had been pretty torn up and would only lift about half its rated capacity. Not that it would matter for our purposes, since its normal load was measured in kilotons and we only needed it to carry a few dozen kilos. Freshly painted a rich, matte black, the pallet looked almost new. A uniform layer of pristine, gray skid-grid covered the top, which had been scarred by dropped loads and untold cargo calamities. It was the same nubby, rubbery matting used in cargo entries and engineering spaces where good footing was important. Along the skirting on all four sides, somebody had stenciled McKendrick Mercantile Cooperative in gray paint that matched the skid-grid. Judging from the smudges on Biddy Murphy’s cheek, I knew who’d done that. The black told me where Pip had found wet paint the day before. A stack of gear already waited on the pallet, including a basket with the banner and table coverings. I added my duffel to the pile and we all stood there looking at it for a few ticks before Rhon, the morning’s booth manager, took the tow handle and pushed the pallet out the lock.
I stood there watching them go and really didn’t know what I felt. This crazy group of people headed out on an adventure that was no more exotic than a yard sale. The gray-haired members of our merry band seemed to be having as much fun as the younger ones. The scene felt all the more surreal when I considered that in their real life, when not selling trinkets at a flea market, they sailed a deep space leviathan between the stars. It sounded romantic, but it wasn’t exciting because that was just their job.
“You’d better hurry, Ishmael, or they’ll leave you behind.”
I turned to see the captain standing there watching the parade streaming out of her ship and across the orbital’s dock. “Aye, aye, Captain. By your leave?” I saluted for what might have been my first time since signing The Articles.
The captain grinned and returned the salute. “Carry on, Mr. Wang. Carry on.”
As I stepped through the lock, I swore I heard Lois laughing.
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Document ID: fbd-203417-8341-5240-168b-ecc3-4498-b4a66c
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Document creation date: 01.08.2011
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