Sam's last dream involved a limping rodent with a squeaky wheel supporting one foot. What had so rudely interrupted dream time was a syncopated rattle that sounded like a faulty exhaust fan. Eyes closed, she reached up and put her fist through the offending appliance. It was quiet--now that she was awake. Her neck felt like Gordion's knot. Too many hours in the harness. A hot shower would help that.
Pink sheets. Nice. She'd slept in a creeper's bunk. Creepers followed all the rules and hid from attention whenever they could. The strategy was supposed to shorten their time in the program, but all it did was earn bonus points to spend on little luxuries like pink sheets. Besides being incompetent, half her former crew had been creepers. Pooling points had earned them their coveted galley upgrade--two cookers and a chill box. It seemed like a silly choice; one cooker was plenty and there was nothing to refrigerate.
Sam wrung out her hair as best as possible and tied it into a knot. No amount of dry time helped manage the thick, blonde hair, so she never bothered. She dressed in a clean jumper from the clothes locker. It was an odd shade of blue, but it fit well enough. Once clean and dressed, she went to the desk console to check in.
The backlight didn't work. The display surface was dull and slow to respond. It felt like dried protein gel. She scraped bits of petrified yellow-gray curd off the panels with her nails. The cabin's former occupant belonged with Sam's former crew. Filth made one lazy and weak. She grabbed a spare jumper, wet it and scrubbed the displays, then the desk, then the walls. The cabin wasn't immaculate, but at least it wasn't sticky.
After the minor cleaning frenzy, the display was considerably brighter, but it still showed nothing more than show basic ship stats. Long-term reserves were low, the scrubbers needed maintenance, nothing appeared to be broken. She touched info menu, dragged her fingers across the panel to create new display regions, pounded on the stupid imaging area claiming that the console was functioning properly.
"Display control panel," she said.
The monitor opened a control panel with an electric pink background with bright blue grapics.
"Colors standard. Demote voice activation."
The control panel changed to a neutral gray scheme. Now it was possible to touch the station link and drag it to an empty area of the display. Why anyone preferred voice commands to tactile control was a mystery. Talking just to be heard by a stupid monitor was a waste of oxygen.
Checking in was a depressing business. The information wasn't good. Now that the full damage had been assessed and the salvageable cargos logged and stacked, crews were being assembled from the survivors with reconstructed cargo clusters and ordered off the station. Despite hating Solocor, it was sad to see so much destruction and loss of life.
On the outside, all cargo containers were identically sized and shaped. They were boxes; thirty meters wide and tall, sixty meters deep. For security reasons, few had external markings. Only station control knew what was inside the boxes.
Few cargo containers were fitted with maneuvering units to mate and link with other containers under their own power. Most required a pod to move them into place in the cluster. During the rest period Sam's cargo block had been completed. It was a small one: 3,784 containers, four engine pods, six security stations and eighteen substations. Most were smaller. She had forty-seven minutes to scavenge breakfast, climb into the harness and disengage from the space station. It was a generous amount of time. It was atypical since the counter started after checking in. Thinking more about it, it was very unusual because there had been no wake-up call. Solocor's timetables were never flexible. There was no time to ponder it now. Moving a cluster out of port required a pilot's full attention. After breakfast and an hour in the harness, the scheduling anomalies were forgotten.
###
Once the cluster was away from the station and pointed in the right direction, there wasn't much for a pilot to do. Pilots weren't automatically made flight captain. They could assume any crew position: engineering, maintenance, watch. Sam figured that she was made captain because she was big enough and strong enough to pulverize everyone else and she didn't mind doing reports. Since she was sleeping in the captain's cabin, it was clear that she was in charge of this cluster. It was time to meet the crew.
Before meeting anyone, Sam reviewed the personnel records in her cabin. None had served together before, so she had to choose first and second officer. They were a skeleton crew of eight, plus the captain. It had better be a trip without incident. No newbies, so that was a plus. Half were sleeping, the others were exploring. It was 22:38 now. 06:00 seemed like a good time to schedule a general meeting in the mess. That gave almost eight hours to do a physical inspection and conduct interviews.
There was nothing to inspect on the bridge. The control systems were outdated, but the techs could take care of that enroute. The next areas to inspect were the engine room and environmental. On the way were the galley and mess.
Sam liked to do one-on-one interviews before addressing everyone as a group. It was easier to intimidate one than eight or fifteen, which was the common crew size. The first victim was Nickle Overs, certified in general systems, although the records didn't specify whether that was as a tech or an engineer. Listed as a secondary skill was cook. She found him sipping a mug of steaming blue juice in the mess.
"Care to join me?" he asked. His hair was shaved to a black fuzz and dusted with red glitter that coordinated with red painted ears. His beard was a shaggy affair that should either be trimmed or tied with a red ribbon. His body language said, be nice to me and I might bed you. Sam thought, be nice to me or I'll stuff your cock down your throat. Instead, she smiled and got to business.
"I go by Sam. I'm captain and pilot. What do you go by?" She already knew, but it was considered polite to ask.
"Hal." That was a pretentious title. Either he was very good with ship systems, or liked to think that he was.
"Your records don't indicate whether you're a tech or an engineer." If he had tech implants, they were concealed by the jumper's sleeves.
"Neither, I suppose. Or maybe a little of both. Before Solocor, I specialized in procurement. What about you?"
She had been captain and pilot in her family's transport business. Bad luck landed her with Solocor. It was none of Hal's business to know that. Procurement usually meant theft. His systems qualifications were probably limited to security systems.
"I also noticed that you were a cook."
"It's a hobby, really. Although I have come up with some interesting combinations using standard rations. I assume you're looking for officers. With my relatively low crew qualifications, I have ample time to perform the extra duties required of a first or second." He winked and grinned. His teeth were gold plated with embedded rubies.
"Thanks, I'll keep that in mind," she said. I have higher standards, she thought.
Pip, Penith Yo was in the engine room performing checks on anything that moved, blinked or beeped. Her certs were in mechanicals and she was qualified as engineer and troubleshooter. She was tiny, which was an advantage when crawling behind panels and through access tunnels. She was doing real work without being told, which gained points in the captain's eyes. When Pip noticed that someone was watching, she jerked and dropped her diagnostic monitor.
"Oh, excuse me. I did not see you enter. I go by Pip." She bowed. Her gray hair was elaborately braided and decorated with threads of blue wire bent into tiny flowers. It looked like she would stay bowed until released.
"Relax. Carry on. Stand or sit." There was nothing in her personnel record to explain this protocol. "I go by Sam." Pip relaxed and looked up. She'd have to stand on a chair to look Sam straight in the eye.
"It is good to meet you, Captain. It seems that you worked this engine over-hard during the clean-up. It will take some time to get it to one hundred per cent." She was good. She knew who was captain. She had an assessment of one of the ship's critical systems to report.
"Please do not consider me for officer. There are too many things to do and no one will take me seriously."
"You have my respect," Sam said. "Please walk me through what you've seen so far."
"This pod is very old. First generation. I do not think it has been used independently or as a lead engine in many years. If this is the best of our four engines, it is going to be a long trip."
No one was in environmental. A quick inspection confirmed Pip's assessment of the pod. It was ancient. Getting it up to standard looked unlikely. The scrubbers were barely keeping up to the demands of a minimal crew. It was further confirmation that the pod was on its last legs, even as a drone.
Jiel Fier, who went by Fear, was in the exercise room. His jumper was draped over a kinetic toner. As Sam did some warm-up stretches, she watched him do a few reps with the gravity machine then check his physique in the mirror. He had implants like most techs. Tattoos of Celtic knots covered his limbs. His torso gleamed with oil, not sweat. His shoulder length hair was brilliant yellow with orange stripes over each ear. He might have been a fighter sometime in his youth, but his body was past prime now.
His qualifications were in mechanicals and power. He should be in the engine room working alongside Pip. He kept to his routine of exercise and self inspection. He waited for Sam to make the first move. She could play the game too, but she had five more interviews to go. After completing her stretches, she leisurely made her way to the gravity machine and dialed it up twenty per cent. After the bar slammed into his chest, Sam picked it up and returned it to the safety position.
"You're needed in engineering," she said.
"Not my shift." A typical tech response. A ship had to be on fire for them to move on their own. And then it would only be to an escape pod.
"I'll let you know when it's not your shift." She threw his jumper over his crotch. "Move."
He took as long as possible to dress and leave. No officer material here, she decided.
Samsel Jon was fussing over a control panel behind the bridge. As the second of her three techs, he was something of an anomaly. He carried a tool kit. He had the filed teeth that seemed to be the preference among techs. He used them to strip the protective wrapping from a logic cube before licking and sticking it to a backboard.
"Hello, Captain," he said. "I heard about the problems with the control panels on your last run, so I thought I'd check these over. I'm surprised that you were able to accomplish as much as you did during the clean-up. You're one hell of a jockey." Civil. Self starter. Playing up to the captain. Qualified in environmental, watch and maintenance. Not the best judgment with respect to establishing priorities. Still, high marks for a tech.
"Thank you. I'd like to see what you can do in environmental."
He closed the panel and picked up his tool kit.
"On it, captain."
Merri Engish was awake and going over the communication and watch stations on the bridge. Her gray-green hair was neatly shaped into spiky tufts.
"I met Pip in the engine room. Since there's so much to do, I'm working from this end while she does the other. We hope to meet somewhere in the middle by the end of the run. I go by Doc, Captain." She was qualified in communications and as a medic. According to the files, neither an engineer nor a tech.
"I'm cross qualified in systems. I haven't had time to take the test, so it's not in my record yet."
Sam was feeling more comfortable with this minimal crew. Most had multiple qualifications and more skills that were undocumented. So far, no one was experimenting with minimalist hygiene. It looked like Sam was the only one onboard that couldn't be bothered with elaborate hair dressing, though.
Roberta Green, who went by Bob, was in her cabin reading. A tech, she was qualified in systems, power and trouble shooting.
"Did you know that the engineering diagrams for this pod haven't been updated in over a hundred years?"
"Lazy engineers?"
"No, I don't think so," the tech said. "I think it's been that long since anyone used this pod."
"It's been in storage?"
"More like it's been scavenged for spare parts. There's a lot of stuff that we should have that isn't here. We should be ok, but I always see the worst possibilities when I'm hungry, and I couldn't stand being in the mess with that creep leering at me."
"Hal?"
"Is that what he calls himself? What an ego!"
Donni Ali, Com, was studying system reports on container status in his cabin. He was cross trained in communications and watch, a good combination for an officer.
"I hope you don't mind me doing the watch reports from my cabin. Doc was working on the watch station on the bridge and I thought it best to stay out of her way."
His wet hair was twisted into curls tied with bits of string. He wore a floral patterned bathrobe.
"I found it in the locker. I hope you don't mind if I wear it in my cabin. My hair will be dry for the meeting so no one will see me in curlers. Did you notice that our jumpers are the wrong shade of blue?"
Ev, short for Evan Deek was an engineer in both environmental and power. Sam found him working with Eyes in environmental. They sniffed sludge and discussed ways to make the scrubbers work better. Sam watched the two work together from the balcony above. For having just met, they were quickly developing an easy working relationship. She left after fifteen minutes to review her first impressions and prepare for her first official meeting.