Personal Log 46: 31st August - 6th September, 3301
24 Sep 2016Jemine Caesar
31st August - 6th September, 3301Sam got up early the following day, and stalked out of the apartment without a word. He was equally silent when he returned, nearly three hours later. I didn't have to ask where he'd been. Part of his reason for coming to Beta Hydri was to visit Black Mausoleum starport. It was the place where his brother, James, was interred. I wasn't surprised when, after another wordless hour had passed, Sam announced he was going bounty hunting, and left. Sam's ghosts still haunted him.
I decided to check the station bulletin board for jobs, and was soon busily ferrying bertrandite, biowaste and billifish to Delta Pavonis, Epsilon Indi and EZ Aquarii respectively. All this activity had increased my Trader rating to Dealer 84%. As I docked at Magnus Gateway in EZ Aquarii, my comms beeped to signal an incoming call from Sam.
"Sorry for the exit earlier," he said. "I'm bounty hunting in Wolf 751. I'll be back at Stevenson Base later." I assured him he had no need to apologise, and said I'd return to Beta Hydri after making my final delivery at Tau Ceti.
Unfortunately, when I reached Tau Ceti's Gilmour Orbiter I was once more feeling unwell, so I called Sam to explain that I would be stopping over. I asked him if he had recalled the name of the ex-navy officer who had attacked him the day before.
"Yes," he replied. "His name's Alec Russell."
That night I had an awful dream. I dreamt I was pregnant, with a ridiculously huge bump. I mean enormous. It started to make a horribly loud buzzing noise, and a fully-grown Thargoid burst out of my stomach, looked at me and said, "Are you my mummy?" Then it floated up to the ceiling and transformed into a lightbulb. The buzzing noise got louder and louder, and then... I woke up. When I described my dream to Sam later, he briefly felt faint at the controls of his ship!
The buzzing which had woken me had actually come from my dataslate, alerting me to a message from Dr Standish-Lang at the Summer Bay medical facility. He wanted me to arrange a check-up appointment sometime over the next few days. I suggested to Sam that we could combine this with the Sol Grand Tour that I still hadn't done. Sam told me he had also learned from Admiral Remi that some of the clones were being kept alive by the Empire. How I hate the Empire!
I made my way to Sol, and met up with Sam at Vostok's bar on Gorbachev starport. For some reason I asked for a tomato juice, which I actually detest, so Sam swapped it for a pineapple juice.
The 2nd of September was a red letter day, of sorts. It was the day I made my first million credits. Jobs ferrying hydrogen fuel, liquor and assorted metals took me to Duamta, Groombridge 1618, Wolf 359 and Barnard's Star. A run-in with a Novice pilot in an Eagle terrorising ships around Duamta's Davis Terminal only served to net me a 200CR fine for using weapons in the no-fire zone.
An interdiction at Wolf 359 by a Viper, piloted by Mostly Harmless Kevin Saunders, proved frustratingly fruitless as my attacker chose to escape the certain defeat I was about to inflict on him. It was made up for later, however, as an interdiction at Sol by a Cobra rewarded me with a bounty of 11,750CR (with a little help from Sol system security).
A rather curious comms message came through as I was crossing the Barnard's Star system.
"Their's or ours?" said a voice which I instantly recognised as belonging to Rudolphus. I replied, asking for clarification. Rudolphus admitted that his transmission had been intended for someone else; it had been part of the chatter between pilots engaged in an action he called 'Operation Z-Day'. Rudolphus was clearly involved in something very sinister for his Imperial mistress, Zemina Torval.
*****
On September 4th I took the shuttle down to Australia for my appointment at the Summer Bay clinic. After a thorough examination, Dr Standish-Lang declared himself very pleased with my progress, and said he would send me confirmation of the test results in a few days time.
More jobs followed over the next few days: shipping biowaste, hydrogen fuel, scrap, wine, algae, tea and fruit to Duamta, Wolf 359, Procyon and Groombridge 1618 netted in excess of 100,000CR and, perhaps more satisfyingly, raised my Trader rating to Merchant.
A lucrative mercy mission, taking medical supplies from Luyten's Star to Lung, almost ended in disaster when I was interdicted by a Viper on my approach to Hopkin's Landing. The attack was preceeded by an ominous message over my comms from the Competent-rated Viper pilot.
"So the rumours were true. Good job I found you," he said, before opening fire. Soon we were locked into a desperate turning-battle, but the arrival of system security Vipers quickly tipped the odds in my favour. Unfortunately I was unable to deliver the final telling shot, and lost out on the bounty.
September the 6th is my grandparents' wedding anniversary. My attempts at contacting them directly were to no avail, but that was more than likely due to grandpapa's habit of switching off the comms system whenever he wanted total peace and quiet. I sent a recorded hologreeting instead, to offer my sincere congratulations on their 56 years of marriage.
One of my delivery jobs was to take tea to Duamta. Upon unloading at Polyakov Station, a notification came in from the Pilot's Federation to inform me that my reputation with the Federation had been upgraded to 'Friendly'. Which was nice.
Sam hailed me from Wolf 751, where he had spent a profitable few hours bounty hunting. Back at Sol, we met for drinks in Vostok's bar. Now that my medication was complete, I was able to treat myself to a Toolfa Gin & Tonic, while Sam had a brandy.
I hadn't realised how much I'd missed the hallucinogenic effects of the Toolfa gin! The sound of a voice, whispering my name; the feel of a hand on my knee; and, yes, the smell of rotting fish. But later, in the privacy of our own room, it was most definitely Sam's hand I felt on my knee.
And not only on my knee...