The Scrapper, Ch. 9

Jaima put a hand on my shoulder and walked me behind one of the pivot thrusters, concealing our bodies from the main dock ramp, but not from the multitude of other cameras that were watching every inch of the platform itself. 

“Rumor has it,” Jaima began slowly, looking around nervously, licking dry lips, “they was testin’ a new kinda collar out there. S’posed to make the uh… the working folks more amenable to… suggestions and what not.”

I was flicking through an order app on my tablet, looking for the materials I needed for repairs: some generic panels to weld together, a couple rolls of glasstic insulation, a new PlasSaw… “Yeah, Mirt mentioned something about a prototype out there. What’s that got to do with ghosts though?”

“Ah, see we been hearing chirps over the radio for months now. Weird stuff, commands, ideas, sometimes it just sounded like someone ranting for a few minutes about nothing in particular.”

I looked up from my order sheet, “What kind of weird stuff? Like… people having one-sided conversations?”

He nodded, “Yeah, kinda. Most of it sounded more like uh… like how they’d do a station announcement, ya know? ‘Make sure to pick up your messes or rations will be halved’ kinda stuff.”

“Hm…” I paused to look off in the distance, some dock security and another shuttle were having an argument. “So the collars work off radio or something like it? You’d think they would’ve figured out a secure channel for all that stuff.”

“Heh, you’d think that, but why invest in extra security measures when you can just threaten everyone?”

“Right? What do shavers care about security when fear is cheaper?” 

We shared a laugh and I tapped in the last couple things that I immediately needed. “Can you go source me these parts and get them delivered down here? Pick up anything you might need along the way and tell them to put it on my contractor tab.”

Jaima looked at his own tablet, a beaten up little thing (not that mine looked much better) and grinned a gappy smile, “Oh I think I can find these all pretty easy. Should be able to include some extras to make it worth my while too, heheh.”

I nodded, walking over towards my pivot thruster that had been acting up, “Sure thing, just make it reasonable. Neither of us needs to get audited, eh?”

“Right, right,” he gave me that same dismissive wave Jaima did. It made me think maybe that was just a common gesture here on the MCJ. I watched him for the first few seconds as he sauntered away, a limp in his right leg from some old injury. It made me wonder how Tak was doing with his fresh disability but I shook the thought from my head. Tak had always been resourceful and adaptive. I’m sure it won’t be an easy transition for him but… well, maybe I just need to do well out here so I can make sure he’s taken care of when I get back. I should send him a mailer once I’m back on the galactic network.

Pointing myself back to my work, I propped open the maintenance hatch on my left pivot thruster and started digging around. When I was coming into port this thing was sputtering a bunch… that’s usually the fuel line freezing up as it comes out of vacuum or a clog/bend/pinch somewhere in the line. I traced everything from the tank to the actual thruster housing before I found it: a chunk of debris (something metallic but I couldn’t tell what exactly, maybe part of the rear thruster housing?) had made it through the air intakes and was crimping the line down right before the ignition. I managed to remove the piece percussively, but the line itself looked scuffed to the point that I worried putting any actual fuel through would blow it out. 

“One more thing for the shopping list I suppose.” I punched the extra parts into my order and shipped it along to Jaima. I tapped my earpiece, “Hey Din, any luck with finding that freighter signal yet?”

“Still Searching, Kal!”

“QUERY: Why are there so many different signals for a vessel with a singular duty?”

I considered the implications before answering, “Hm… it’s probably because of these collars they have on all the convicts, Palletbot. Sounds like that’s how they send status updates around to the actual StationAdmin and guards, keep tabs on everyone as it were.”

“ACK: That seems inefficient.”

“Agreed. I think it’s going to make finding our freighter all the more difficult.”

“ACK”

Having the pivot mostly sorted out, I decided to fuel up while I waited for Jaima and my delivery. The fuel dispenser on the docking pad was a pop-up model. As I approached it rose up from the floor and gave me a happy jingle to indicate it was ready to dispense. I waited for the boot-up process to finish and punched in the contractor ID they had given me. The selections lit up with the prices listed in a much smaller font next to the fuel type.

“ PLEASE MAKE YOUR SELECTION “ flashed on the screen along with the usual options: Chalox, LOX for older engines, some solid fuel alternatives if you had some planetary engines that needed it, and some kind of additive package that was supposed to improve your AU efficiency. I punched the button for Chalox and grabbed the nozzle from it’s spool and started walking back to OLGa. They must have expected larger ships to dock here because the line ran out about three quarters of the way to my fuel port. Good thing most ships come with an extension and adapter, but it was still annoying.

I dropped the hose where it ended and walked to the panel where my extension was rolled up. I keyed in the code and was met with flashing lights. I tried it again, a green light like it was going to work, and then blinking red. “What fresh hell…” I muttered. 

Gripping the panel I gave it a wiggle to find it was partially open but something seemed to have jammed in there too. “Din, could I get you to cut power to…” I peered around the immediate area looking for the identifier, “the… rear port auxiliary hatch E-12?” 

“Cutting… done!”

The panel dimmed in front of me, “Thanks, Din!” I got a small *ding* back as a reply. Must be intense work sifting through those radio signals.

Wrestling with the latch without any power proved to be its own struggle. The panel was only partially secured down, so it acted like it had some give, but the second you tried to pull it the rest would hook on whatever internal mechanism and prevent it from moving. After some gentle (read: angry) percussive maintenance, I managed to bash the latch away from the hook and the whole thing finally popped open. Too much rust and metal dust blocking up the mechanism was the root cause of this nonsense. I wiped away as much as I cared to with my fingers and smacked the latch itself a few times to make sure it was moving freely again. Good enough.

“Din, go ahead and turn that back on when you get a moment.” Another *ding* for a reply.

I pulled my extension hose out and got to work screwing it down to my fuel port and then walking it back to the loose hose sitting on the deck. Connecting both ends via an adapter went smoothly, thankfully none of that was too rusted. I hiked back to the dispenser terminal and punched in my selection. I watched as the hose whipped around, filling with Chalox and stiffening up as it started flowing from dock to ship. It’ll be nice to have a full tank for a change. After a couple of minutes a loud CLACK from the ship indicated it was full and had closed the valve automatically, the hose itself deflated as the remaining fuel inside the line was suctioned back to the dispenser. I unhooked, rolled up, and placed my extension back into it’s hatch. To make sure I wasn’t going to run into this same issue again, I punched the code and the door opened without any complaints. 

One less thing to worry about next time.

Jaima sent a message saying he had found all of the various pieces of scrap and hull fittings I had requested, including the rolls of glasstic to reinforce my hull where the old black foam was now missing. ETA 2 hours for all of it to make it down to the dock. Plenty of time for me to go do some supply shopping of my own. 

“Hey, Palletbot, care to go for a walk?”

“QUERY: Are there magrails?”

“It looks like they have a few that lead to the edge of the docks at least.”

“ACK: Inform me when you are headed back and I will meet you there.”

Okay… First they want to go back to BRK, now they don’t want to get off the ship… how did I get stuck with the most stubborn cargo bot ever created? After I thought about it for a second I realized it had a valid point, they can’t make it very far without magrails to actually ride on. 

“I’ll have to find some repulsor pads for you so you can actually come see the sights one of these days.”

“ERR: I do not see the value in navigating without purpose.”

“One of these days, Palletbot, one of these days. Anywho, keep the ship locked up, I’ll be back in a few.”

“ACK”
“Bye, Kal!”

I hiked up the ramps leading out of the docks and back into the crowds that I felt more comfortable blending into. There were lots of familiar sights and sounds to take in, some of the food being cooked smelled like repstrips plus some of the spice mixes you’d find topside (and that sometimes made their way to the sublevels for special occasions). I guess it made sense that Admin on this station would have those mixes freely available, at least to people coming and going from the port areas. Clearly they were more willing to cook fancier food when they didn’t have nondex trying to steal from them. More likely they just knew the convict work force wouldn’t try anything.

I ducked into one of the nearby stores, it looked like it had provisions generally as well as a grill in front where some guards were camped out, chatting with one another while the exasperated cook flipped another patty of… what did Mirt call it, meatsoy? My stomach made some interesting noises recalling my experience with it and I worried for what my bathroom trip might look like later. It reminded me that my toilet was functional, but the shower was down, the sink was down, and all of the lines in there could stand to be refreshed. I pulled out my tablet as I crossed the threshold into the little shop, sending along some plumbing parts to Jaima who sent back a thumbs-up sigil in response.

“What’cha lookin’ for?” came a gruff but light voice to my left, behind the counter. I looked up to see a woman in her mid-30’s I’d guess, wearing the same orange jumpsuit as all the other indentured servants around the station, her glossy black collar sitting snug against her neck. 

“Well, some food for starters,” I said, crossing the few steps towards her, “and information otherwise, if you’re able of course.” I nodded down towards her collar.

“What, this old thing?” she pointed an incredulous finger at it, “Why, it only records everything I say and all of my vitals constantly, it’s no bother to me.” The scowl on her face told me otherwise.

I gave her a small chuckle, looking down at the ordering app on my tablet as I punched in a few crates of food, some water, and a few flavors of repstrips to keep me going. “That’s all it does? No shocks or anything if you act up?”

Her eyes darkened, “Who’s askin’?”

“Just a contractor, headed out to look into some missing folks.”

She snorted at me, “Good luck. Hope you disappear with the rest of the guards that went to “look into things.”” Her voice carried a practiced sarcasm with it, I bet she’d be fun to hang out with.

“Don’t suppose you know anything about what happened with this freighter that went dark?”

“Pssh, I’m either in my cell or here working the fuckin’ till for lawboys like you. I don’t hear shit.”

I punched in a few extra bits, some luxuries for myself (soap mostly), then turned the tablet around towards her, “Well, this lawboy has a contractor tab open right now, and I’m more than willing to argue for some extra items that I might ‘accidentally’ send back.” My smile came easy, it’s funny how much easier it was interacting with her than it was Mirt. Something about social standings, or just feeling like it was someone from back home I was talking to.

She raised an eyebrow and looked down at the tablet. My order was still sitting there and she skimmed through. She backed out and tapped away with a knowing hand before pushing it back towards me.

I looked down intent on completing the order but couldn’t help noticing what she had added: a medkit and a blanket. “That’s all?” I looked at her and she gave me a small shrug.

I scrolled up a few lines, added another pack of repstrips and another medkit before I hit send. “Okay, done. What’s your name?”

“My ID is S-EP478,” she responded robotically.

“No no, not your ID, what is your name?”

Her face pinched as she scowled at me, something wasn’t clicking.

“What’s your actual name?”

“I have an ID? That’s what they called me when I was born.”

“… your parents were both convicts?”

“Yeah.”

“So… what did you do?”

“Whaddya mean?”

“Well, they put a collar on you, did you steal or something?”

“My crime was being born I guess.”

“That’s… that’s it? You didn’t like, attack someone? Steal food? Piss off the wrong suit?”

“What are you talking about? I grew up here, I’ve always had this stupid necklace, just like all the other kids that get born here.”

That hit me like a directed charge. “All the other… Okay um... Ess. What do you know about this missing freighter?”

She busied herself, processing my order down from her terminal while she spoke, “Not a lot, just what comes through the rumor mill. Ghosts, demons, that sort of thing.”

“You don’t really believe in that stuff though, do you?”

“No more than I believe in the good intentions of the people that run this station. My maw always said ghosts were just people that couldn’t move on, and demons don’t exist.”

“So what do you think is happening?”

“I think that whole freighter is gone for a reason, and folks should let it stay gone.” She looked up to stare me in the eyes, “there ain’t nothin’ good left on that ship.”

My head cocked to the side, “What do you mean left?”

She shook her head in response, “Where you want this delivered?”

“Just… down to dock 14. I’ve got a bot waiting to load up.”

She nodded, “And the extras?”

“I’ll make sure they get marked as received.”

She nodded again. “You just be careful if you’re headed that way, mister.”

“Yeah, I will. Thanks.”

I turned around to leave and saw a little drone going about the various shelves, snatching up all the small items I had ordered and packing them into crates. As I left I saw the guards that had been eating earlier had cleared out and the cook was already gone. Must be getting close to shift change here on the MCJ. I wonder how often the trawlers came back into port to offload everything they’d scooped up. The crowds along the concourse had thinned out too. 

Still another hour before Jaima thought he’d be back.

I returned to the dock, having called Palletbot on the way to meet me at the threshold where the magrails ended. I messaged Jaima who sent me back a quick reply: “Almost found everything, looking for some extras.” Hopefully that meant he was grabbing his share of stuff and nothing weird.

Palletbot dropped slowly from the cargo port, the door mechanism on OLGa was having some issues due to the broken foot, everything was a bit cockeyed. Eventually, it must have detected the floor was close enough to detach and sent the all clear to the ship controls, disengaging the electromagnet it used to keep itself stuck to surfaces, it fell to the floor with a clang. 

“You good over there?”

“ACK: Please fix that landing foot.”

“Parts are on the way, no worries.”

“ACK: Worries equal zero.”

I chuckled to myself, Palletbot had a different way of talking but it certainly had it’s own personality. Another blip on my tablet signaled the supplies were headed my way. I took a moment to take in the atmosphere. A quiet roar of life came from behind me, people talking, walking, some shouts, the sounds of metal on metal, an eerie rhythm emerging from it all, the music of life, the next shift cycling in.

Ahead of me the port was moving slowly. Behemoth transports loomed outside, casting shadows through the viewports high up on the rocky asteroid walls the dock was built into. Meanwhile smaller ships loitered in port, a couple hovering as though they were going to land soon, or maybe take off. I wasn’t sure if they just didn’t have clearance or what the deal was. OLGa sat amidst the bevy of vessels looking like a beaten ship fresh to the scrapyards. In a lot of ways she was, but soon I’d have to parts to get everything back to working order, and after this contract we’d have even more to work with.

Commotion from behind made me turn around to see a flurry of people in the distance. Some shouts, some pushing and shoving from a group too far away to make out. Closer to me a small walker bot was following it’s programmed path, the rough shape and amount of things in the basket on it’s back made me think it was my order. I pulled up the app on my tablet and sure enough, the food supplies said “en route”. The shouting drew closer and my confusion grew.

The little walker stopped near where I was waiting for Palletbot, who was still riding the magrail up the dock ramp. Repulsors or maybe some treads for them eventually would really help improve mobility, I think. I started removing my delivery from the basket, a few boxes of repstrips, a couple jugs of water (I remembered this time, shut up), another O2 canister to replace what I’d worked through, the medkits and blanket I needed to send back.

I left the extras inside the basket and turned to start loading up Palletbot who had just crested the hill and was holding position as far as the rail would let them.

I pointed down to the little walker, “How do you feel about getting legs like that at some point?”

“ERR: Those tiny legs would break.”

“Well not THOSE legs, but properly sized ones. Or maybe treads?”

“QUERY: Why?”

“So you can move around easier, not be stuck to the magrails exclusively.”

“QUERY REPEATS: Why?”

I sighed, “Nevermind, lets get you loaded up.”

The crates were fairly light, so moving them wasn’t hard, though I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t still sore from all the excitement of getting here. I was securing the O2 tank down when I realized the commotion had made its way to me, shouting, the voices of guards demanding compliance. Old muscle memory made me flinch even as I resisted the urge to put my hands up or duck into cover.

I made myself look to see what was happening, after all I was supposed to be some kind of big tough guy in the “business”, I should try and look the part right?

The crowds nearest to me parted and the shopkeeper, Ess, stumbled out from them. She nearly hit the ground but managed to stay upright and keep running- directly towards me, panic in her eyes. Guards emerged from the parted crowd, shouting, pointing weapons at us. A few meters from me, Ess opened her mouth to speak but her breath was stolen by the sound of weapons discharging. Staccato blasts pierced my ears as the front of her shirt blossomed red, then splattered directly into my face. 

My eyes widened, my overworked adrenaline gland doing it’s best to keep me focused. I worried about bullets continuing through her, about being hit by shrapnel or something else, but all I felt was a soft push from a force round, and the warm splash of her blood.

She seemed to fall in slow motion, landing with a sickening bounce and splat as the guards rallied behind her, weapons still drawn like they hadn’t just evacuated her chest in front of me. “RALLY RALLY” one of them was shouting, “SUSPECT NEUTRALIZED”.

One of the officers came over, pulling out a cloth and handing it to me. “Are you alright, sir? This lifer was trying to steal supplies that were lawfully purchased by you, according to the AutoSec report. Good thing we got them collars watching, eh?”

I could feel my eye twitching, trying to process what had happened. I took the cloth from the officer and absently wiped my face off, the blood was starting to seep into my tear ducts and it burned. “I-I’m fine… what… what did you say she did?”

“We caught her marking supplies as missing, and then replayed your conversation with her. Nice work getting her to talk for just a blanket!” he chuckled, “Anywho, we see this pretty often, lifers trying to mark things as missing so they can snatch it back for themselves. We got ‘er though!” the other officers stood around her corpse, prodding it like she would rise back up so they could shoot her more.

“So you just… killed her?”

“Yessir! That’s how we take care of business down here, no one’s gonna miss a lifer like that anyway,” he spit into the pool of blood. The collar on the corpse’s neck vibrated slightly and something unhooked in the back. A nearby officer reached down and tugged the collar off roughly, the body rolled and exposed the gaping chest wounds again. They let it splash back down into the blood, the floppy, listless quality of her head and neck made my stomach roll.

I swallowed loudly and turned back towards Palletbot, my mind was racing, heart pounding. “Don’t you worry, sir. We’ll get this all cleaned up. Pretty sure records said she didn’t have no diseases or nothin’ so you’ll just wanna get warshed up before you go about your day.” He patted my shoulder and chuckled again, I felt rage flare inside my chest the moment he touched me, a memory of Odie flashed through my head.

I stepped over to the walker bot and scooped out the medkit and blanket I had promised her, “Will you tell her family?” I asked the officer, not daring to look at him, or the corpse that I had just been a person a few moments ago.

“What family?” another officer scoffed. They finished up whatever they were typing on their tablet, put it away and knelt down to the body. “This is just a lost resource.” He and the officer that had been speaking to me grabbed under the corpse’s arms and hoisted it roughly into the basket of the walker bot. It sank under the weight and gave an unhappy chirp before turning around and beginning it’s trek back into the crowds, back into the noise, with the officers following along. “You take it easy now, Mister!” one of the waved that same dismissive hand towards me. Ess’ arm dangled from the side of the basket, drops of blood leading back into the hell that was MCJ.

I retreated into the static of my own mind as I clutched the blanket to my chest. 

“C’mon, Palletbot. Lets get back to Din and OLGa.”

“Kal? Are you okay in there?” Din on the overheads, my earpiece was sitting on the edge of the sink, near my hand that gripped the edge. My other hand was on the wall, slowly slipping down and leaving a thin trail of blood and sweat. Inside the sink itself was more blood, and my vomit. I couldn’t look myself in the eyes, just the general area of my face. I looked tired. Haunted. I hadn’t managed to clean all of the blood off of my face. Or my coveralls. Or my hands.

“No, Din. I don’t think I am.”

“OBSERVATION: Kal may be in shock.”

“What happened?”

“RESPONSE: Kal witnessed someone die.”

My chest felt heavy, I was lost in fog. I turned to Palletbot, “Wait.. How did you get back up here? I didn’t fix the leg yet, I’m sorry, I can do that now…” I stumbled out of the bathroom, my face still wet from trying to wash it off with toilet water, my undershirt stained a subtle pink. The top of my overalls had a crust of red forming where the sticky blood was exposed to air.

“RESPONSE: Irrelevant for now, Kal. It can wait until you are feeling better.”

“But… Jaima will be here soon, we gotta get ready to…”

“Jaima has already deposited the items you ordered and went on his way. He seemed happy at least.”

“Oh, that’s good.” I felt wobbly, my legs weren’t supporting me how I expected them to. “Then… I need to get out there and start repairing stuff so we can…” I stumbled, gave up, and fully sat down on the floor. How much time had already passed?

“Kal?”

“Keeper… they just fuckin’… shot her, right there. I was like, a meter away and they just blew her chest open,” my voice quaked, lost somewhere between despair and horror. “They called her a lifer… it sounded like her parents were here and then she was born and they just enslaved her on the spot! She said her crime was being BORN. Then they killed her like it was nothing…” I kept muttering to myself, I barely understood what I was saying anymore. All I felt was the welling in my chest as the tears started to flow. “They just KILLED her,” my head fell into my knees as I pulled my legs in close, deep sobs wracking my body.

The only noise on Our Lady’s Gambit was the sound of one soul being crushed, even the usual electronic whirs and fans seemed to fall silent.

Eventually Din broke the quiet, asking, “What was her name?”

I shook my head, wiping my eyes and my face, “S.. And then some numbers. She didn’t even have a real name.” I sniffled, my face was on fire.

“OBSERVATION: The officers that performed the act admitted they were not interested in conveying the loss of life to any living relatives.”

“Oh, Kal… That sounds awful.”

Another sniffle, the anger had started to claw it’s way back up through the grief, “Yeah, well, I guess I better get used to this shit, because apparently that’s what life is all about.” I threw a hand up. “Just gotta pretend to be someone else and watch innocent people get shot and just have to ignore how fucked up that is and just accept that.” The sadness was winning out again.

“Well… you gave me a name, Kal.”

“You already had a name, I gave you a nickname.”

“ACK: You also gave me a name, Kal.”

“Your name sucked, I had to call you something else.”

“So… maybe you can give her a nickname?”

“Why, what’s the point? She’ll never hear it. She didn’t know me.”

“RESPONSE: I think I would prefer to be remembered, rather than forgotten.”

I looked up from my spot on deck at Palletbot, confused, “What?”

“RESPONSE: If my systems ceased functionality, I would prefer if you, or Din, or whomever, remembered that I existed.”

“Why? What difference does it make?”

“ACK: It would perhaps mean you were taking comfort in that memory.”

I blinked a few times, felt some more tears fight their way from my eyes. “Um…” I stood up, looking around the deck. Palletbot still had our supply haul on it’s back, apparently I had tossed the blanket back there whenever we had gotten back on-board. I spread the blanket open; it was a simple thing, a brown patchwork with strands of teal colored plastic thread showing intermittently through it. I winced when I saw the bloodstain surrounding the edges of it. It looked like pairs of hands laid on top of one another, circling the perimeter of the blanket. Hands reaching out one last time for safety, comfort, protection. 

I swallowed again, “I don’t know… I was just calling her Ess in my head… ” I took the blanket and found an open spot on the deck walls, away from lights and other access panels, and tacked it down with a couple of small magnets I had used for hanging my clothing up. It was an eerie, but meaningful, addition to the deck. The first memorial on the ship and they weren’t even an official crewmember. 

“Very good, I am sure Ess would appreciate it.”

“I don’t know if this is a very good memorial for her… I don’t even know if this is the right thing to do, but… Welcome to Our Lady’s Gambit, Ess. I hope your life here is better than what you had aboard the MCJ.”

“ACK”

“That was sweet, Kal.”

I sniffled in response.

After I had cleaned myself up, as well as the sink, the mirror, and the wall, I finally made my way back outside to see the large containers of plate steel I had asked Jaima to source, alongside the multiple small containers with the various parts, pieces, and tooling I would need to actually make the repairs for OLGa.

The first thing I did was finish removing the docking tunnel from my airlock so I didn’t have to keep walking over and around all of that. The new PlasSaw I had ordered made quick work of the remaining three arms that had been clanking around and digging fresh scratches on the outer hull the entire trip here. 

After that, I got to work grinding off the bolt heads that kept the airlock screw in place and cutting the ring into two pieces so I could actually remove it. I should have rented a crane or some kind of overhead mag to lift those pieces away. They fell heavily to the dock and were a pain to maneuver, but Palletbot didn’t seem too concerned while it was hauling those off to the recycler.

Eventually I was left with just the door and the exposed panels that the airlock was meant to be sealing. With Palletbot’s help we half-hauled, half-pushed the new airlock ring roughly into place and I hooked up some of my surviving magblocks so I could winch the whole thing down. The assembly went together pretty fast, after all of the heavy lifting, much to my surprise. Fresh screw ring (no boot resin) and a functional forward docking port, Check!

I thought about repairing the landing foot next, but realized I had no way to jack the ship up. That would have to wait until I was back in vacuum and I’d have to repair it while I was suited up. It was definitely an option, I’d made riskier repairs before (see: my trip here). Then again, maybe I should just rent the damn overhead.

In any case, it meant next up was the thruster housing, arguably the biggest project. I asked for mostly small plates so I could manage them on my own, but I still had Palletbot loaded up and staying nearby with them so I didn’t have to haul them back and forth. Additionally I got a wired beamwelder so I wouldn’t have to rely on constantly recharging my handheld. I found a nearby power socket, plugged in and tested the larger model on a few pieces of scrap I had from replacing the docking ring. This could pump out a lot more power in theory, but it kind of depended on the power source. Thankfully it was way stronger than I expected, burning a hole through the old hull material in a matter of seconds. Glad I took the time to test it before frying a few pieces of my new stuff!

There’s no way I had enough tools or experience to make this rebuild look like a Mitsner, maybe some angled pieces around the thruster body, but certainly no curves, nothing sleek. I had a sudden wave of inspiration and I pulled my tablet out to place another order, after taking some measurements between the thrusters to make sure I could actually pull it off.

I got to work assembling each 3x3 panel, one by one, building a wall at a time, standing on frame pieces, hooking onto the maintenance rails, straddling the thrusters a few times, whatever got me the best angle to attach and weld things down. Each panel brought me closer to having this room safe to exist in again. 

The glasstic roll I bought also went up with ease. I bet back in the day that nasty spray foam went on super easy, but this was like putting a really long sticker on a wall. You just had to lay the sheet on down, apply some external heat (thank you low power mode on the beamwelder) and the glasstic would self-adhere. Sometimes you got bubbles, and that was always where you knew the first holes would show up. The panels I bought were extremely susceptible to that due to how many fasteners were used to build them, bulky screw heads stuck out from the joins going on either side. Frankly I would be happy just to have seal back even if it wouldn’t last forever.

By the time I had the walls on each side finished, Jaima had shown up with my latest order. 

“‘Ere ya go, boss. Another roll of glasstic and an exterior door.”

“Ah, perfect! Thank you! Did you get your credits worth while you were out and about?”

He gave me a wicked smile and a quick wink, “Oohh, you bet I did. Anything else you can think of? I’m happy to go shopping on someone else’s dime!”

I paused and scratched the stubble on my chin, “Hmmm, I still haven’t diagnosed this thruster over here, so I’ll probably have another order at some point. This will take a second to get installed though. Hey actually, are there any overhead cranes or portable maglifts I can rent?”

“Oh sure! I’ll go get ya one of the overheads.” He turned before I could ask anything else and hobbled away.

I kept welding, the last panel finishing the ceiling, and applied the glasstic. Prep for the new door took some effort. Excess metal needed to be cut out, old damaged bits needed grinding, I needed to make sure ingress and egress was smooth in order for this to be maintainable in the long term. I ran some fresh wiring for the door under the floor panels, right alongside the coolant lines. Didn’t need those melting when I’d be using the whole area as an engine bay (known for being warm) and as an airlock (known for being cold).

Jaima came back with a tall bot that looked like a pair of ladders on stilts with a thick oval of a central unit that maintained the center of gravity. I thanked him and turned the power on, maneuvering it behind the thrusters and the new housing I had just finished. I pushed the “lift” button and watched it work.

In an instant, the four telescoping legs shifted outwards, then angled in, and rose simultaneously. Near the ceiling the heavy oval extended and a familiar THUNK of electromagnets secured the it to the roof. I grabbed one of the arms, now dangling free, and hooked it to the top of the door before pressing the retract button to raise it into place. Unlike the airlock ring, this door was difficult to position, made more difficult by the fact that I was attempting to retrofit an entire door between two thrusters in a section of the shuttle that was never intended to be an airlock.

Eventually it settled into position and welding it into place was simple thanks to my earlier prep. Afterwards I placed the remaining glasstic I had along the inside of the hull to make sure there weren’t any holes. Some custom cuts for appearances, and then a couple of test signals through the wiring confirmed it: I was the proud owner of a secondary airlock!

I had been taking breaks during the entire time, completing the thruster housing felt like a milestone. My dinner was a bland butter-wheat flavor of repstrip, and I stared for a bit too long at Ess’ blanket and the overlapping, fractal patterns it had made. Later I responded to an angry message from StationAdmin about how I wasn’t out looking for this lost freighter yet, and finally laid down on my stiff cot. My sleep was fitful and dreamless.