The Ice Mines of Chana, Part 6
22 Nov 2016TheDarkLord
Chana 6, Chana. Faulcon deLacey Anaconda “TDL Agamemnon”.June 3302.
Part 1 - Part 2 - Part 3 - Part 4 - Part 5
Agamemnon continued to trot away from the ice rings of Chana 6 at two hundred metres per second in normal space. A normal pirate incursion had provoked a short but vicious battle in which an Eagle had been destroyed by Agamemnon’s pulse lasers, and the wing leader, in a Cobra, had also perished. The pilot of the Cobra had not managed to eject, and his ship had been destroyed by Agamemnon’s most powerful weapon: its own 1,330 tonne hull mass travelling at 280m/s.
The problem was that my passenger, mission commissioner, and lover for the past two days had positively identified the Cobra pilot as being her boss, in spite of his Wanted status in this system, and his IFF showing him as a member of a rival faction. She had left the bridge, and was somewhere aft, probably in the officers’ lounge.
Part of me thought that I should go and see if she was alright, try to talk her into understanding the reality of what just happened. The rest of me, well…
“Frame Shift Drive charging,” intoned the ship's computer.
Agamemnon leapt into supercruise, destination Kooi Hub. I had minerals to sell and limpets to buy. I completed the transactions with almost indecent haste, chivvying along the dock hands. I was back in the ice ring within 40 minutes.
Claudia was still somewhere else in the ship, so I slaved all of the refinery controls back to my seat. The collection of methanol monohydrate resumed. For hours the prospecting, lasing, collecting, venting and storing continued. My fingers and hands worked the controls, Agamemnon moving smoothly through the ice field. I ran out of limpets again, and did another shuttle run back to Kooi. I was up to 87 tonnes of methanol monohydrate on board. Just 25 more tonnes to go.
Despite the atypical sleep pattern that had resulted from having Claudia on board, I knew it was late from the way my eyes and joints ached. It was time to get some sleep. I steered the Anaconda clear of the ice field, boosted and switched off Flight Assist, so we’d drift out into space. I shut down as many of the other non-essential systems as possible, essentially putting the big ship to sleep and ensuring that our electronic and heat signatures were minimised. I had a look around the ship to see if I could find Claudia, but she was nowhere to be seen. I headed aft to my quarters, finding her sleeping form in my bed. I climbed in to bed as well, my mind only on getting some sleep. She was fully clothed, and it smelled as if she’d been resolving her problems with alcohol. Before settling, I locked out all of the Anaconda’s flight and subsystem controls, restricting them to my biometrics only. I guessed I still didn’t trust her.
I woke five hours later. A quick shower and a snack, then back to work. Claudia was still sleeping. I sat in the Captain’s chair on the bridge and unlocked Agamemnon’s systems. We were over 3,500km from the belt, so I jumped back into supercruise and approached the ice ring afresh.
After an hour or so, Claudia came through. She looked dishevelled, as if she’d woken and come straight to the bridge. She sat to my right. It was probably time to broach the subject of her deconstructed boss. As the mining lasers depleted the current asteroid, I took my hands off the controls, and turned to face her.
“How are you doing?” I asked.
“I’m a bit shocked, and I drank too much last night. Everything happened so fast. I can’t believe my boss is dead. He was an asshole – a really vile man – but he’s dead.”
“I’m sorry. We were under attack, and he was squawking another faction. Do you know why he was doing that?”
“I don’t. Although I always thought he was untrustworthy, I thought that was a personal thing. I never thought he would be working for someone else. I’ve heard about battles in space, and I’ve seen Security Services shooting at criminals, but I’ve never been in one.”
“It’s a different thing to live through, isn’t it? I probably should have warned you before allowing you to come along. Do you need to get in touch with anyone at work?”
“I guess I’m in charge of this operation now. How much more do we need?”
I checked the inventory. “9 tonnes.”
“Right, let’s get this done and go back to face the music.” She got up and left the bridge, and I went back to mining. It took only another 40 minutes to gather the remaining quota of Methanol Monohydrate. I filled the hold with anything of any value at all, and then headed back to Kooi. This was an assignment I was going to be happy to get away from.
TDL Agamemnon settled onto its landing gear as I powered down the thrusters in Kooi Gateway. I found Claudia waiting by the doorway, bag packed, as soon as the landing was complete. Her mind was clearly work-focussed, and as I opened the door she practically bolted, tossing a “Bye then” over her shoulder as she speed-walked across the jetway. I mooched about on the station for a bit, selling off the mining gear and rebuying cargo racks to fill Agamemnon’s giant hold. I also collected my bounties, and sold off my non-mission cargo.
I tried to complete the mission as well, but the option was not available. I headed back to Agamemnon and busied myself with some tasks, assuming that the mission timer would activate the claim process sometime soon. If it was related to the mess Claudia was having to sort out, then… well, she still needed the crystals. Or at least I assumed she did. I cycled through the other faction boards, and there was plenty demand, so I’d not be out of pocket if she flaked on me.
I’d dozed off when Agamemnon’s computer barked at me.
“Incoming mission critical message.” I never understood why this voice was so much louder than the computer’s regular voice. I took my feet off the console and leaned forward to open my inbox. The message was from Claudia’s company.
Our need for this cargo is pressing. Please deliver within the next 0h00m. We’ll make it worth your while.
I recalled the mission board, found my mission, and tapped “Claim reward.” The credits were transferred, and I accepted the cargo processing request from the automated dock hands. A wave of emotion washed over me. It was all sorts of things. Regret, shame, anxiety, desire, confusion. A fast-forward highlights reel of my time with Claudia. Things seemed reasonably clear from a rational perspective. Mission cargo delivered, pirates fought off. But the identity of the pirate leader had definitely been a problem, and Claudia hadn’t known how to handle it. I shouldn’t have brought her on the mission. After the battle, she’d holed up in the officers’ quarters, and we’d barely spoken, much less enjoyed each other’s company in the same mould as at the start.
Every facet of the battle had upset her. From the unprovoked attack on the ship she was in, through the visceral energy of the writhing ships and their weapons, to the brutal end where Agamemnon’s mass had simply broken up the Cobra’s hull. And to top it all off, she knew the pilot of the Cobra. If she’d planned on hiding out for a few days amongst ice asteroids, she certainly was not expecting a firefight with her boss.
I turned this over in my head as I planned my next move. I was probably heading back to Rusasaei to help with 9th Legion political efforts there. Certainly the Legion’s message board chatter was quite vocal on the system. I called up the galaxy map, and was about to mark Rusasaei as the destination system, when a message popped up in my comms panel.
[DIRECT] Claudia Elliott: Glad to catch you before you left. Dinner?