Windjammer: The Tradership Saga Book 1

by M J Gauntlet

  On the left side of the sphere, there was an equally massive, oblong, bottle shaped, container. Attached to the squat bottle was a network of thin fiber optic wires, which radiated outward like reeds from a pond. Some these wires vanished into the far ceiling overhead, while others joined the conduits emanating from the icosahedron and into the control module, in front of Zax. One thick wrapped coil of optic wires led from the bottle to the rear of the icosahedron pentagon covered sphere.

  “Heh…bet you’ve never seen these before, have you lad?” Abrams said. “Those two generators are the heart of the entire ship. The one on the right, ‘Alice’, is the hot fission reactor, and ‘Matilda’ there on the left,” he instructed, pointing to the oblong bottle shaped object, “is the cold fusion reactor. Since cold fusion is a chemical reaction, it does not provide enough power to initiate and maintain the transitional drive field. That’s Alice’s main function. Matilda ‘jump starts’ Alice and simultaneously, provides power for the A.I., the ion engine collectors and the weapons.

  “She is responsible for much of Windjammer’s internal power needs. It is Alice that sends the ship into ‘wonderland’, she provides the power of the transitional jump.” The engineer pointed to a rack of radiation and thermal insulated suits. “See those? Both me and Irene must periodically climb into those suits and fine-tune each generator by hand, while they are still active and hot, mind you! I know some engineers who only use those Waldos over there,” he indicated, pointing to the gloved extensions of the mechanical hands slung above each generator, “but not me. There is nothing like the human touch. I wouldn’t trust any ship that had a Waldo engineer. As for Alice and Matilda here, you won’t find a better-tuned pair of generators in all of space. And that includes the snots in the military!” Abrams’s finished saying, as his massive chest expanded out in pride.

  “Weapons? I’ve seen many traderships in dry dock, but I don’t remember ever seeing any weapons,” Zax said, in perplexity.

  “That’s because they are always locked down in port and behind shielded panels. Every out-system tradership goes into the void armed, it would be suicide not to. Only in-system planetary and rock miner ships are unarmed, usually.

  “Our armament consists mainly of beam weapons, there’s not enough crew to man missile launchers. We mount a brace of autoload twelve salvo missile pods, but those things are damn expensive, not to mention that each time you fire a missile you are flushing twenty thousand eunits worth of missile out the tube. That’s money you don’t get back.”

  “It’s just that…well, I thought that the Unity navy took care of policing the space between planets,” Zax said, hesitatingly.

  Abrams snorted derisively, “HA! ...Yeah, sure young fella.” Look the UN does an alright job around systems like Plato, Newton, New Vegas and the like. Systems in and near the core are heavily patrolled and ringed with sensor platforms, but out here in the rim it is pretty much every planet for themselves. Pity the tradership caught out system with its weapons cold at the wrong time.”

  “But Bright is on the fringes and we haven’t had a pirate attack in decades!” Zax exclaimed.

  “Of course not, lad. What is there in that system worth a pirate’s fuel to want to steal? Sunlight? No, it’s the worlds that have trader goods and cargo worth taking that draws the skimmers and the renegades. And it’s not only pirates you gotta watch out for, you don’t want to get too close to the Nubian and Marcosian boarders, if you know what is good for you. They may not be in a shooting war, but their ‘boarder disputes’ are a fair facsimile of one. Those two will shoot first and then ask the debris who you were. Marcosians have been known to dabble in a bit of piracy when it suits them, despite their so-called code of ‘high honor’.

  “As for the Nubians, they tend to stay to themselves, but I’ve heard rumors of them boarding vessels, performing a bio-scan on both crew and passengers, and if they happen to find something that they think is unique or rare, they might just take tissue samples of the individuals, whether the person likes it or not. So, the ‘Jammer’ always goes in and out of a system with its weapons on standby,” Abrams finished saying.

  “Wow, I never knew. All this time I thought traderships were…well…just sorta very large cargo carries, I had no idea,” Zax stammered, overwhelmed by what Abrams just told him.

  “Christ Son, don’t ever let Captain Ahosi hear you say that! She just might toss you out the nearest airlock, without a suit!” Abrams said laughing.

  Zax wandered over to the missile control fire station and noted that all the lights were lit amber. Abrams wasn’t kidding about keeping the weapons hot while traveling between the system’s ‘T’ boundary and the inner planets.

  “Do you have trans-phase missiles in those pods?” Zax asked.

  “Gods Zax, whatcha think we are, a Unity Dreadnought? Besides being totally forbidden for an imperial civilian vessel to even have on board, do you have any idea how expensive one of those things are? I’ve heard of them being available on the grey market, but it’s immediate mindwipe to be in possession of that kind of artillery. Besides the Windjammer has a great set of legs on her, she can outrun just about anything out there, including some of the military frigates. Yep, the old gal can really shake a leg when she has to,” Abrams said fondly, as he patted a nearby bulkhead.

  “Well, that was the short tour. Now before I run a ship-wide diagnostic, what was it you wanted to show me?”

  Zax snapped his fingers, as he was reminded of what it was he wanted to see the chief engineer about in the first place. Reaching into his coat pocket, he brought out the odd mechanism he had been carrying with him ever since he emptied out his father’s safety deposit box, back on Bright. Holding it in his right hand, he showed it to Abrams and was unprepared for the response he received.

  “By…the…Gods!” the engineer gasped as his eyes flew wide open and his mouth gaped in astonishment.

  “Do…do…you know what this is?” Zax said, taken aback at the normally easy- going man’s reaction.

  Abrams moved his head closer to the strange device and stared at it as though it was a bar of palladium. “You mean you don’t know what that is?” Shaking his head in the negative, Zax offered it to Abrams, who gingerly reached out his own paw like hand and took the object, holding it as though it was a thin-shelled Pequot egg.

  Abrams took a moment to compose himself, then wrenched his eyes away from the item in his hands and looked back at Zax.

  “This is a very ancient weapon. It dates all the way back to pre-space Earth. It must be at least two or three thousand years old,” he said excitedly, turning the thing over and over in his hands. “Where did you get this? How did you keep it so clean? It should have rusted away centuries ago.”

  “It was left to me, among other things, by my father. He was an ex-Unity naval deep probe space scout. Are you saying that this is some sort of weapon? I don’t see how. There is no energy storage container, or field rings. I didn’t find anything like a condenser coil or a needler chamber. It is just a hunk of metal,” Zax said exasperated.

  Abrams looked a Zax for a moment, then shook his head sadly. “Zax you have a lot to learn about what can be a weapon and what can’t, and it is mainly this…anything that can kill you can be a weapon! If someone kills you with a rock, you’d be just as dead as if they had shot you with a needler. We ran across some primitives on GotCha that used this blow pipe thing that…oh never mind, but trust me this is a weapon, and a pretty formidable one at that.

  “Lucky for you that I am an ancient armaments buff, which also would make me a kinda historian of sorts, at least when it comes to weapons. Not that I could get a teaching job down on Plato, but I know a thing or two about antique Terran firepower. This…” he instructed, turning the old weapon over in his right hand, “is what was called a ‘firearm’ back in the pre-space days of Terra. From what I can remember, it got its name because actual fire used to shoot out of this pointed end when it was operated.”


  “You mean it was some type of incendiary projector?” Zax asked.

  “No, no, and stop interrupting will ya, we don’t have a lot of time here,” Abrams admonished. “Anyway… the flame was a by-product of its activation. This here is a genuine ‘slug thrower’. It propelled a pellet-sized projectile, through this tube here, at high velocity towards its target. When it hit its target, the transference of the kinetic energy of the pellet back into potential energy, would release a disruptive force into said target by moving parts of the said target out of the way of the pellet’s projected path. This disruption is what would either destroy vital parts of the target, thus killing it or severely disable the target. The amount of damage was dependent on both the size of the projectile and the velocity it had when it encountered the obstacle.

  “This here is what was known as a ‘revolving’ pistol or gun.” Abrams took the ‘revolving pistol’ in his right hand and deftly manipulated a small toggle on its side. There was a tiny click and the smaller cylinder disengaged from the main body of the ‘pistol’, then hung out to the side on a metal stem, Zax hadn’t noticed before. I like the name pistol better. Zax thought. Taking his left hand, Abrams flicked the cylinder and it spun smoothly around on the metal spindle, without the ‘clicking’ sound it made when it was back in place, with the longer tube. Zax leaned in closer and was able to see the six smooth hollow chambers, that circled the inner portion of the smaller cylinder.

  “Those are where you put the metal casings that held the pellets. This pistol held six explosive pellets and because of that, I believe, was called a ‘six shooting guns’ or something like that. You wouldn’t have one of the pellets on you, would you? I would love to have seen one…but…no…that wouldn’t work. Even if you did have one, it would be thousands of years old, and all of its propellant would be useless.” At word propellant, Zax raised an eyebrow. “Yep,” Abrams said, noticing the reaction, “the pellets were expelled by a chemical reaction, not electromagnetic like a rail rifle. It was the simple expansion of gases that pushed the pellet through this longer tube here. The more amount of chemical used, the larger the pellet that could be fired.

  Holding the pistol by its stock, Abrams made a quick deft jerk of his hand and the small round cylinder snapped back into the main body of the device with a soft click. Abrams then took his left hand and flicked the cylinder, which then spun around with a series of clicks, as it came to rest with one of the chambers aligned with the long tube.

  “Yep, this is a unique example of ancient weapon technology that has been kept in pristine condition. I suggest that you sonically sweep this weapon periodically, to avoid it rusting or sticking. As a matter of fact, I think you might want to consider buying a light oil, from one of the vendors on Plato and rubbing its moving parts with the oil, on a cloth. Don’t use plasticine sheets, that will scratch the metal.

  “Sometimes, I would like to show you my collection of ancient weapons. Although, mine only go back just a century or so,” Abrams said wistfully.

  At the look in his eyes, Zach took the weapon from his hands and presented to the kind-hearted engineer. “Here…If you want, you can add this one to your collection. Hell, I didn’t even know what the damn thing was until you told me. I don’t see any need for it now.”

  Abram’s eyes widened, and he sucked in a lungful of air that Zax swore, lowered the atmospheric pressure in the room by several millibars. His huge hands twitched a bit, but then he let out that massive breath and handed the antique pistol back to Zax.

  “No son, I appreciate the offer, I really do, but I couldn’t take it. First,” he said, holding up a paw to forestall Zax’s insistence, “from what you revealed to us earlier, that there was left to you by your father and whether you need it, from what I understand, it is one of the few things of his that you have. Second, that little item will fetch a small fortune if you find the right collector, especially on Plato. If you find yourself short of funds, you might want to consider selling it. You will get a great deal more than I could offer. Lastly, if I took it, every time I saw it, I would feel guilty that I had taken advantage of you, even though you want to make it a gift. We spacers are funny that way.”

  With a larger sigh of regret, Abrams shook his head in a final ‘no’. “Look, I do have other duties before my shift ends and I better get to them or I will have to listen to second engineer Irene, grouse about me leaving all the grunt work for her to do. Besides don’t you have to see the captain in a few minutes? Listen, I’ll tell you what I will do. During my free time, I think I will go down to the machine shop and see if I cannot come up with some type of ammunition for that cannon you have there. I don’t know if I can duplicate the original ammo, but I bet I can come up with a darn good substitute. If I can come up with ammo, I will make you a few rounds and we can set up an impromptu firing range and fire them off in one of the empty cargoes holds. Anyway, I got to get to work and you gotta see the captain, see you later fella me lad.”

  Without another word, Abrams pressed the hatch release then abruptly turned his attention to the Alice’s console display. Zax walked to the hatch and turned to wave goodbye, but the burly engineer was already cursing under his breath at one of the displayed readouts. Shrugging, Zax walked down the corridor, and without asking Windy’s help once, found his way back to his room just in time to meet Pilar, who was approaching his cabin from the other end of the passageway. Zax stopped dead in his tracks, his mouth agape at the figure approaching him down the corridor.

  Walking towards him, was an ethereal vision wrapped in flame. It was Pilar alright, but not in any way was she the woman Zax had known. Around her swirled a misty fog of fabric that seemed to both conceal and reveal the body beneath it. Orange and red wisps of color danced around Pilar’s lithe frame with the constant movement of muted layers of changing hues and textures. Zax found himself staring bug eyed, as this walking hallucination glided towards him.

  “Whoa Zax, is it that revealing? You looked like someone had just pole axed you!” Pilar exclaimed with a giggle, as she sidled up next to him. Reaching up, she pushed his hanging chin up, closing his mouth with a muted ‘click’. “You should close your mouth now, before bugs fly into it.”

  “I…I…” Zax stammered, blinking his eyes to clear them, but the after image remained on his inner eyelids. “I have never, ever seen anything like that dress Pilar! Where did you get it?”

  Pilar laughed out loud this time, as she tilted her head back to look up into Zax’s eyes. “Silly man! Don’t you recognize your own gift? This is made from part of the Krillian fabric you gave me back at the colony ship.”

  “What? But I don’t remember it looking like that! Sure, it looked kinda exotic, but this…it is electrifying!”

  “True enough, but it seems that when Krillian weave is subjected to the electromagnetic field that surrounds a human body, it undergoes a rather dynamic transformation,” Pilar explained, as she stepped back and gave a little twirl causing the gown to flair out away from her body in a display of vibrant colors. “The only drawback is that the material is decidedly hard to work with. I had to use one of the laser cutters from the workshop to be able to cut it cleanly. Use anything else and it starts to unravel…fast!”

  “Wow! It doesn’t even look this good on the Krillians! No wonder you said that people would pay a fortune to get their hands on the cloth,” he said, in awe.

  “Enough talk out here in the corridors, let’s get inside before someone else sees this,” Pilar urged, pushing Zax towards his stateroom door, a duffle bag in her right hand. I’m sorta saving it for a later special time, but I wanted you to see it first. After all, it was your gift to me and the other girls of the crew, so you might as well get the first glimpse.”

  Zax turned and keyed open the portal, as he found himself being hustled into his own cabin. He had seen little of the supercargo, since the Windjammer’s departure from the Krillian colony’s massive cargo docks two standard days ago. But he knew that the entire
crew was busy with shipboard duties in preparation for translation out of the system. Although there was a decidedly warming of the crews’ attitudes towards him compared to his first day’s aboard ship, it still made him wonder where he fit in as a temporary member of the tradership’s crew.

  “Zax,” Pilar said, breaking into his reverie, “Do you mind if I ask you a personal question? You don’t have to answer it if you don’t want to.”

  “Sure Pilar, ask away.”

  “Well…I know that we both have had some intense… er…personal time together and I appreciate that you haven’t gone and gotten all possessive on me but…” Pilar hesitated for a moment and Zax realized that she was actually looking embarrassed about what she wanted to say. He became a little uneasy, as he couldn’t think of anything that could disconcert a seasoned spacer like her.

  “Go on Pilar don’t stop now! You’ve definitely gotten my attention,” he responded anxiously.

  “It’s just that…well…how come you haven’t tried to get to know the other girls on the ship, shall we say, a little better? I mean,you had to have noticed that the other women have been showing increased interest in you. Hell, this morning at mess that hussy Branda kept pushing her giant tits in your face, while Trina did everything but sit in your lap at the table.”

  This time it was Zax who felt uncomfortable. He felt himself blushing two shades darker beneath his brown skin and hoped that Pilar wouldn’t notice.

  “Ahem…” Zax coughed, loudly clearing his throat. “Well, I did sorta notice that they both were a lot friendlier of late, but I didn’t want to jump to any wrong conclusions. Besides, I didn’t want them to get the impression that I expected anything in return for the gifts the Krillians bestowed upon them. That’s not why I asked for them.”