Fool's Gold (The Wandering Engineer) (40 page)

"Jasmine
come on, let’s go."

"Everyone's
making suggestions," Jasmine smiled a lurking smile of invitation to the
Admiral.

"Now
Jazz, be good," another prostitute said.

"I
don't do good." Jasmine gave a lazy smile. Her canines showed.

"You
got that right," the other sighed.

"I
do bad. When I'm bad, sugar I'm great," she smiled again. The tech
shuddered. Irons chuckled.

"You
have any idea how old that line is?" The other sighed groaning.

"Come
on you two! Hurry up or Snake will be pissed!"

"Hold
your horses... or something..." Jasmine smirked then gave a slow lurking
smile.

"Oh
and Jasmine?"

"Yes
Doc?"

"No
more biting this time. I mean it." She held up her finger and waggled it
back and forth. “You have no idea how much saliva infects wounds like that.”

The
prostitute gave a slight meow and mew of disappointment. "Ah, not even a
nibble?" Jasmine purred, sharp teeth bared.

"No."

"Spoil
sport." Jasmine laughed and left with her friend. The Doc was dimpling.
She turned to see Casey and Irons laughing and the tech looking fearful and

instinctively
covering his genitals.

"Oh
stop it honestly," the Doc smacked Irons on the arm." She was
dimpling. "You are as bad as they are. I swear they put up with the check
ups just to put on a show."

"That's
a matter of opinion," Sprite said from the overhead speaker. "One I
agree with." Irons laughed again.

"I
take it back. You're worse." Doc sighed and left. "I'll be in my
office. If you don't settle down in the next five minutes I'll send an orderly
in and sedate the lot of you." She shook her head. “Oh and Admiral,
Enrique said something about paging you in a bit.”

Casey
giggled. "I think she means it."

"I
know she does." Irons shook his head sobering up. The laugh had felt good.
"You two going to be okay?" he asked looking from one to the other.

"Yeah
Admiral, we can take it from here. If we have a problem we'll call you,"
Casey smiled and then shooed him out.

Irons
grimaced as he made his way down the hall to ops. He'd thought they'd get out
last shift but Betsy's drive had been horribly misaligned. They were taking the
time to fix it now. Hopefully next shift they could get out. Hopefully, his
lips writhed. They were running out of time here. He nodded to the guard at the
open hatch and stepped through.

"Enrique,
Admiral, I'd like you to meet Captain Mayweather," Smithy introduced the
squat portly female captain. She had a classic spacer's buzz cut, with a
jeweled earwig in one ear. She had a strong face, it lacked humor or empathy.
He had an instinctive disliking of the woman but put it down firmly. She was
dressed in a white uniform with gold braid. It took him a moment to realize it
was a yacht captain's uniform. A riding crop was under her right armpit. It was
totally out of place in space. She stared at Irons.

"You
are the one who came on my ship?" she asked curtly.

He
nodded. "I needed access to your files to determine the level of threat. I
apologize for not asking for permission ahead of time but things were a bit
hectic at the time." He smiled. What was done was done as far as he was
concerned. Her fingers twitched then stopped. He noticed she was wearing a side
arm sheath but it was empty. His eyes narrowed. "Captain, I thank you for
providing the data. I believe it was part of the terms for rescuing you?"
He gave her a long measuring look.

She
seemed to straighten then looked away. "Don't come near my ship again.
Only one captain on my ship. That's me." She tapped her chest.

He
nodded.  "Fair enough Captain. I will point out I am a Federation Admiral,
not a civilian captain though.” He gave her a long look. She seemed to snort
then disdainfully brush her shoulder. “I understand you wish to be underway
before your crew is released from sickbay?" he asked trying to sound
concerned.

"That's
right. No way am I risking staying here with them pirate trash coming."
She shook her head. "I've got a full ship as it is now that that fat ass
Admiral is on board."

"To
be honest Admiral, she's overloaded," Sprite informed him over his link.
“They wont make it to the nearest jump point in her current condition.”

"I
see. I hope they understand when they wake," he said studying her. She
shrugged then smiled. The smile wasn't a pleasant one.

"Their
problem. And yours." She turned and left, braided hair bobbing behind her.
"Well, that was interesting," Irons nodded.

"Did
you see her go for her gun?" a com tech said.

"You're
lucky she didn't have it," Enrique said then eyed the Admiral. "Or
should I say, she's lucky she didn't?" Irons smiled. "Right. Okay, so
what do we do with our new volunteers? There are fifteen of them. Doc had a
couple more show up an hour ago," he said in disgust.

"They
are also trained spacers. If we give them a chance, they may help," Irons
shrugged. Enrique nodded.

“Do
we have a course to Firefly yet Sprite?” Irons asked. He checked the
navigational system. Since they were still tuning the drive he had decided to
go over other things one more time.

“Well,
that's what I was going to ask you about.” The AI said cocking her avatar head.
“Captain Gutierrez wishes to do a full burn out and back. That will use up most
of the reaction in the ship and will take about three and a half weeks to get
there and back.”

Irons
winced. “No, no, I'm not up for that. The wedge is fixed.” He tapped the
controls and pulled up a map of the system.

“Exactly
admiral. I was thinking about this,” Sprite highlighted a pair of asteroids and
a rogue moon. “If we shape a course for these we can use the wedge to sling
shot around and cut our transit time out by three days and four hours Admiral.
That would mean four days and nineteen hours transit.” A red line traced itself
over the plot. “But we will have to launch soon to make the window.” A digital
clock appeared on the screen, counting down. They had just under twenty hours
to launch.

“I'm
not sure the good captain understands the wedge Admiral. To some a reactionless
drive is like witchcraft.” She sniffed disdainfully at the thought.

“Well,
you've got to give them credit Sprite. Reactionless drives are energy efficient
but have to be finely tuned and used properly. They are a pain to make and in
these fallen times...” He waved. She nodded. “I bet they think you can use it
all the time, not just near a mass.” A reactionless drive, also known as a
wedge or gravity drive used egg shaped pods filled with massive force emitters
to push and pull a craft in the mass shadow of another object.

“Exactly.
I think the captain is also new to using flight windows and flight plans as
well. From the log it looks like he went out in any direction he felt like half
the time. That is if he wasn't running cargo. Extremely inefficient Admiral.
Not to mention Energy intensive and it put unnecessary wear and tear on the
ship's systems.”

“Right.
Well time to educate him then,” Irons smiled. “You'd think as  a civilian
contractor he'd have realized by now, time is money.”

“I
thought you said we're in a hurry,” Sprite said amused. “Still this will work.
It will also cut our transit time.”

“And
time is off the essence,” Irons nodded. “Not to mention we're saving fuel we
may need later. If possible we may need to vampire the tug to jump start the
cruiser's systems.”

“We're
not even sure the ship works Admiral. I can't ping her using civilian
equipment. Regs prohibit it,” Sprite cautioned. Irons grimaced.

“Override
the regs. King under the mountain protocol. Tap the communications grid and
send a ping to the ship. Let her AI know we're coming so it won't be so trigger
happy.”

“If
we can find her sir,” Sprite cautioned. “Right now we've got an approximate
course and speed from a contact years ago. We also have no idea if the ship is
even functional and has communications.”

“If
it was going to be easy, anyone could do it,” Irons said shaking his head.
“Let's get back to work, I've got to be back on the bridge in an hour.” He
waved to the plot.

“Aye
aye sir. About the software. I am compiling the latest patch now...”

"Yacht's
leaving," Sprite informed him two hours later. "Nasty. She's
maneuvering like a wallowed pig." The AI sounded disgusted. Irons
chuckled.

"Has
Doc gone over the records for the implants?" he asked.

"Yes,
at least she's accessed the records, I am not sure how much she absorbed. Do
you want me to check?" Sprite left that as an opening but he shook his
head.

"Not
now, it's graveyard. She's probably down for the night." He grimaced again
then pulled up a feed of the yacht. The external sensors came up then expanded.
The sensor feed was much better than it had been when he had run a test the day
before. Obviously things were starting to improve. The Yacht was under power
all right, she was pulling away from the station. Two of her fusion drives were
lit. The others were off line. Unfortunately the two that were lit were off
balance, so occasionally they could see the puff of an OMS pod adjusting her
course.

"What
the hell?" he said after a moment of study. "Her lock is
opening." He looked over to a nearby tech.

"Oh
goddess is that a person?" someone said staring at the holo.

"Can't
be. Okay maybe. Maybe they’re going to work on the hull," someone else
said. A tech reached over and zoomed too far in, then out. They could see a
body gyrating away from the ship.

"Without
a suit?!" someone else said, starting to sound shrill. Pandemonium began
to erupt.

“How
can you tell they aren't wearing a skinny?” the communications tech asked
looking concerned. She darted a glance around the room.

"At
ease people. Let’s get some professionalism in here," Irons called. He
grimaced as another body went out the lock.

"Admiral,
that was the Port Admiral," Sprite said. He looked up in surprise to the
image and studied it closely.

"Are
you sure?" he said. The AI pulled up the feed then enhanced it in a
separate window. They could see the Port Admiral choking then going stiff.

"Turn
it off," Irons said with iron self control as he heard the gasps behind
him. "So much for him. Good riddance," the sensor tech muttered.

"Yeah,"
someone else said. Irons nodded grimly looking around. Clearly there was no
love lost there.

"Couldn't
have happened to a more deserving person," he muttered. "Let Knox
know. And Enrique and the command staff." He grimaced. He wasn't sure if
he should give Knox the raw feed or not. He thought about it for a second then
shrugged.

“Give
Knox the raw feed. Ask him politely to caution viewers about the content before
they watch it.”

He
turned to the watch commander. She looked nervous. "Don't worry about it.
There is nothing you could have done to prevent it even if you had wanted
to," he said softly. She nodded. "I'm going to get some rest. I'll be
back at oh six hundred." He walked out.

The
Admiral entered the hospital and turned. The dragon pointed without a word. He
smiled then nodded his thanks. He entered the main bay and grimaced at all the
beds. Most were full. Fifteen had crew from the ship. He went over to the
doctor who was firmly speaking with a woman valiantly trying to get up.

"Admiral
maybe you can knock some sense into her. She's not listening to me, and I don't
want to sedate her unless I have to. I will though if she keeps it up."
The Doc turned a glower onto the woman who growled.

"They're
gone," Irons said as the doctor departed. The woman looked at him.
"Your ship left about nine hours ago." He shrugged. She sat back with
a grimace.

"So
the bitch up and did it. Typical. Cunt." she muttered darkly.

"We're
alone?" the woman in the next bed asked looking frightened. “They left us?
They really left us alone?”

"No,
you're among friends," Irons waved.

"I
mean, the, oh, the pirates!" The woman shook her head. "I can't
believe she just left us!" She started to sound shrill.

"Believe
it Janice. You know that bitch would do that in a heartbeat," the woman
said. Irons grimaced then raised an eyebrow at the first woman. "No I
don't have a high opinion of Vanessa Kiss My Ass Mayweather. Despite her being
my sister," the woman snarled.

"Mayweather
huh?" he said. She nodded.

"Renee
Mayweather. At your service. Or at least I will be once I get out of
here," she grimaced and waved. Her IV swung with her arm. She looked at it
then laid her arm back down.