Ten
Six weeks later – Denver, Colorado, Earth
“And you say these came off an abandoned ship?”
“All but abandoned,” Jean Barrett told the Off-World Mining & Exploration buyer. “There were two bodies in the sick bay. Looked like plague.”
“Plague? What happened to the ship?”
“Blown up,” Barrett said evenly. “It’s the law.”
“Sure enough.”
Barrett looked at the buyer closely, but he didn’t seem particularly interested in the fate of the Orlando. Not with the cargo he had opened before him.
“These are good quality,” the buyer said, running a scanner over one of the two cargo containers of diamonds. “First-rate Type IV and V industrial diamonds. Some boron content. Good for electronics and half a dozen other applications.” He snapped his scanner shut, pulled a data pad from his pocket, tapped away for a moment. “Looks like, wholesale rate, six point two five million Confederate dollars. Not a bad bit of salvage, Captain.”
“Should keep my ship operating for a while.”
“Here,” the buyer handed Barrett a mini-terminal with a retinal scanner. “Put in your bank’s code and your account code, look into the scanner, and we’re done.”
Jean Barrett tapped at the keys on the scanner, looked into the eye port for a moment, and handed the device back when it beeped.
“Money will be in your account in two to three weeks, depending on hyperphone traffic to Tarbos,” the OWME buyer informed her.
“Pleasure doing business with you,” Barrett said. She shook the man’s hand and left.
***
Halifax
Judge Olivia Worsham was known as a ‘hanging judge’ on Halifax, an archaic term that once applied to judges with a predilection for sending convicts to the gallows, but now applied to pitiless jurists with a liking for harsh punishment. It was the final piece of Philemon Baxter’s bad luck to have his case come before Judge Worsham.
“You have been found guilty of thirty-five counts of attempted murder by biological agent; one count of attempt to solicit piracy; and one count of conspiracy to violate interstellar treaties. Do you have anything to say before I pass sentence?”
Baxter looked helplessly at his impassive trio of lawyers – none of the three had been optimistic after reviewing Baxter’s comm records that had somehow found their way into the hands of the Confederate Bureau of Investigation. He looked back at the judge and shrugged. “No, Your Honor.”
“You are sentenced to forty years in maximum security confinement in the Halifax penal facility,” Worsham said. “Sentence to begin immediately.”
She banged her polymer gavel down with a sharp note of finality.
***
Adamstown
Adam Bolin reclined in his office chair, his hands dangling and his jaw slack. Overhead, a few kilometers from the station in a very obvious low orbit, was the unmistakable gunmetal-gray shape of a Confederate navy escort carrier.
The comm panel on his desk buzzed. He looked at it for a moment, and then tapped a contact with a resigned look on his face. “Bolin,” he said.
“This is the Confederate Navy escort carrier Toronto,” the panel replied. “Are you the chief executive of this station?”
“I am,” Bolin admitted.
“This is Captain Angela Ramirez, Confederate Navy, commanding Task Group 103.1,” the voice went on. “One of my ships, the frigate Kidd, has intercepted two freighters registered to this facility returning from Grugell space with an illegal load of volatiles. You are ordered to prepare to receive an investigation and data retrieval team, and to make all records available for inspection.”
It had been a while since Bolin had felt claustrophobic in the huge pressure dome of Adamstown’s central kraal, but it was plain now that he had nowhere to run to. “Very well,” he replied, “Stand by for landing clearance.”
***
The Shade Tree
Jean Barrett strode onto her ship’s Bridge with an expansive smile on her face. The main screen still showed the inside of Pier Nineteen of Earth’s massive spacedock, but Barrett was ready to see stars on the screen again.
She looked to see Indira Krishnavarna grinning at her from the Exec’s station. “Gomp and McNeal back yet?”
“They got back an hour ago,” the Exec said. “No issues converting Grugell gold to cash – they scattered it out through several jewelry wholesalers and a couple of industrial buyers. Total take was about four and a half million.”
“Not a bad day’s work,” Barrett said. “A bit over ten million dollars out of this debacle; that pays off the lien I took out to get the drive upgraded, pays and feeds everyone for a good six months, and should even spring us all a nice bonus.”
“I like the sound of that,” Hector Gomp said as he walked onto the Bridge. “Crew’s all on board, Cap’n. “
The Captain tapped a contact on the arm of her bridge chair that paged the Engineering compartment. “BJ? How are we looking?”
“Star drive is healthy and happy,” the Chief Engineer replied through the comm panel. “Water and O2 tanks are full. Reserve batteries at full charge. Converters primed and ready. Ship is ready for space, Captain.”
“Signals?” Barrett said.
“We have clearance to leave port, Captain,” Helmsman Paolo Guerra said.
“Cast off the docking umbilical. Clear all moorings. Maneuvering thrusters all back one-third.” On the screen, the spacedock started to back away.
“Where we going now, Cap’n?” Gomp wanted to know.
“Away from here,” Barrett said. “How about Avalon? I’ve never been to Avalon, but I hear they’ve had a bumper crop of inspirationweed there this year. Let’s go see if we can pick up a load on speculation.”
“Good market for that stuff on some of the developed planets,” Gomp noted.
“That’s what I hear.”
“Clear of spacedock,” Helm reported. “Free to maneuver.”
“Come about to new course one-eighty by ten. Navigation, plot trajectory for Avalon.”
“Plotted and marked, Captain. Plot sent to Helm.”
“Ahead full,” Barrett ordered. She smiled again.
“Let’s go see what else is out there.”
To see more of Animal’s writing, visit his page at Crimson Dragon Publishing or Amazon.
Links, in case you need them:
https://crimsondragonpublishing.com/anderson-gentry/
https://www.amazon.com/stores/Anderson-Gentry/author/B00CK1AWMI
Roll credits.
Credits for the Roll go to Almond House Baking, suppliers of non-brand specific baked goods for a hundred and forty years.
Satisfying ending. 🙂
Inspired by what?
This evocation of my interest seemed paramount, a means of Trojan Horsing a connection to electric vehicles to a generation (or two, or three) of automotive aficionados who are decidedly not powertrain agnostic.
“If you think about EVs, it’s not a matter of if everything goes to electric. It’s a matter of when. And so how do you still invoke an emotion and still get people excited about something so different,” Hammoud said. “With cars like R3, maybe we’ll be able to convince guys like us that have been around, and are petrol-heads, to give it a try.”
I must not be squinting hard enough. It looks like a Bronco to me.
Not “if”, “when”? Keep telling yourself that.
I see that was penned by Brett Berk – he was the beginning of my end as a Car and Driver subscriber. He penned some sort of apology to Ralph Nader in their pages. It was basically them saying they were no longer an enthusiast magazine. This article confirms his status as a non-enthusiast.
Did working on cars remove some of the attraction? I gave up on C&D long before. His bio is, shall we say, interesting.
Great story, Animal.
I thought Bolin might get away with it.
Oh, this is the end, my friend?
Paging Not Adahn…
https://www.thefirearmblog.com/blog/2024/03/09/high-end-german-cz-75-carbine-norlite-usk/
I saw a video on that. Apparently lots of people have decided that the S2 is the gun to use as the new basis for everything. Even Luxe variants: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q5boszFEZUY
Also, I ended last SCSA season 0.1% away from B class, so the first match of this season finally bumped it over. Heck, my Smoke and Hope is only 0.2% away from A, but it uniquely rewards sloppy shooting (my specialty!) Seriously. I only get two sight pictures on that stage, the third and fifth shots.
Uhm…the design sure is…uh…swoopy?
I think he’s going for a Bugatti look.
Good story, Animal. I enjoyed it immensely.
I see that was penned by Brett Berk – he was the beginning of my end as a Car and Driver subscriber.
I considered including that idiot’s author bio. Very impressive. Maybe he can do a story about F1 even dumber than the bicycle race chick.
I wonder if he has a pink Barbie Jeep in his fleet.
“Consumers”
Consumers increasingly doubt the Federal Reserve can achieve its inflation goals anytime soon, according to a survey Monday from the New York Federal Reserve.
While the outlook over the next year was unchanged at 3%, that wasn’t the case for the longer term. At the three-year range, expectations rose 0.3 percentage point to 2.7%, while the five-year outlook jumped even more, up 0.4 percentage point to 2.9%.
Who the blazes are they surveying? Those numbers are suspiciously specific, for a man-in-the-street poll.
Anything to the right of a decimal point means the “forecaster” is either a stat-geek or a jokester (or both).
Headline inflation as judged by personal consumption expenditures prices, the Fed’s preferred gauge, rose 2.4% in January — or 2.8% at the core level when excluding food and energy. Those readings represented progress in the Fed’s battle, though some economists have warned the “last mile” back to 2% would be the most difficult.
I looked yesterday, just out of morbid curiosity; a pair of Levis 501 jeans (list price) is is up by a third (from $75 to $100) in about a year. I got a pair on sale for $50, and that seemed ridiculously expensive.
A hundred bucks for a pair of Levis. Fuckin hell. I guess stadium naming rights don’t come cheap.
Tag them on Amazon. They’ll go on sale.
Top result shows under $50 right now.
I bought a pair of 511s under $40 in October.