Ground Control to Major Thomas - Ch3

[ 3 ] - Darnell

Darnell waited in the refinery of Stratus Base, floating in place with the rest of the crew, Lexi’s hand in his, their focus fixed on the dock’s thick windows as their load was drawn out of the Peridot’s cargo bay into processing. Keelin worked a set of lifting arms as if they were her own, a pair of 3D goggles on her face and WALDO gloves slipped over the backs of her hands with open fingers. She grasped nets of ore and forced them down a mechanical chute, ten cubic meters at a time, the bulkhead vibrating with each new load.

The question hadn’t left his mind. It was even amplified after his conversation with Lexi. Had he made the wrong call? Should he have pushed Cap to let him stay and go for that extra nugget?

It had been a long time since he’d found himself praying. Sure, he’d been born of a red state where church was a major focus in the community, but out here? He just wasn’t sure. It felt sometimes as if the Almighty didn’t have any reception once you got past low Earth orbit.

A Bible verse came to mind.

...Neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God…

Repeating the words in his head grounded him. He was a man of faith, damn it. Nothing to worry about when his fate was in God’s hands.

Lexi squeezed his hand. “You okay?” she asked.

“Fine. Fine.” He shook his head. “Just got lost in thought.”

“Stratus is weighin’ it out now,” Keelin said, her tone upbeat. “I know they say get all your wishes but one, but in this moment, I don’t want much of life.”

“Come on, come on,” Captain Cho pleaded, a fist to her lips, eyes focused on the weight display beside the view port. The numbers on the screen began to climb as the rocks entered the centrifuge and were crushed into powder, the first step in heavy metals refining.

“Clock says we missed the window,” Logan reported. “Hooray for us! Maybe we should have just gone for Darnell’s hallucination. It would have made no difference.”

The Captain scowled. “I’ll talk to the station admin. It was only by fifteen minutes. Let’s see if they’ll show some grace.”

“Won’t do much good. A contract’s a contract.”

“What a positive attitude you’ve got today. Maybe I should model my own after that?”

“If we haven’t been stuck in that traffic queue,” Lexi mumbled. “We’d have docked on time.”

“If only they hadn’t captured 16 Psyche,” Atticus mused. “We wanted rich deposits of gold, sure, but not that rich.” He paused and looked around at his silent crewmates. “You know, it seems like a perfect time to tell an economics joke, too bad there just isn’t enough demand.”

“Seriously?” Lexi said, rolling her eyes.

He shrugged. “If not for that stupid event, we wouldn’t have to live and die by production window bonuses. A bonus should be a bonus, not something you depend on. I should file a complaint with the company.”

“That asteroid put a bullet in the head of the market.” Logan crossed their arms. “Raw materials commodities is a bad place to put your money. Just ask the machine that was, and I stress, was—my stock portfolio. Insert an Aston Marten in one end, get a Toyota Corolla and a smile out the other.”

Cho glared at the two of them. “How many times do we have to go over this? The price is based on local supply and demand. The majority of 16 Psyche is being shipped back to Earth and Luna. Don’t worry your pretty little heads.”

“Not like it was.” Logan raised their hand terminal and began pushing buttons. “Not anything like it was.”

“It’s an honest living,” Darnell said, leaning in. “An honest living for honest times. Serves a real need here in the outer planets. Microprocessors and a thousand other things use gold.”

“Whatever,” they said and pushed off. “I’m headed to the bar. You can break the bad news when it’s over.”

“Can’t blame them,” Keelin said, watching them go. “Whole heap of work for naught but a few pence.”

Captain Cho glowered at her. “If you have a better opportunity before you, feel free to make use of it.”

“Ain’ sayin’ a word that hasn’t already been thought,” she watched the refinery’s counter, chewing on her bottom lip as the scale did its work. “Been six months at least since we had a good run at it. Rubs like that tend to wear the fabric thin.”

“Do you all feel this way?” the captain looked to each of them in turn, her arms crossed. “Jobs aren’t paying what they should?”

Atticus scratched at the back of his head for a moment then shrugged. “Pretty obvious, isn’t it? I do wish I could be spending a bit more time on leisure. Being out in the black all the time makes it a challenge to have, shall we say, romantic entanglements that aren’t with the crew. And while you are all fine, fine people, you lack what I find—well—stimulating in that arena.”

The mood in the collection center had shifted from hopeful to defeated. At this point, none of them expected much out of the haul, just like their other recent excursions.

“Null is getting to us, Katia,” Lexi said. “If you asked Logan, they’d say the same as a medical professional. We can’t stay out here like this forever. Being outside a gravity well is killing us slowly. We’re all past the two-year safety limit. And unless you guys have options I’m not aware of, it might be too expensive to go home.”

“What about the null gravity protein?” Captain Cho said after a moment. “The science team on the Vasco Da Gama, one of the ships bound for the Foundry, I heard they almost have it solved. There’s a promising candidate at least. Certainly would give us more time up here to do what needs doing.”

“I wouldn’t bet on it,” Atticus said. “Scuttlebutt is that those in the trial were turned blind by the treatment. I’d rather keep my eyesight, even if I do have a slight stigmatism.”

“Well then, what do you want out of me?” She pounded the bulkhead beside her, face turning bright red. “I’m no magician.”

The panel beside Keelin chimed. Analysis was complete. She checked the numbers several times before reporting the final tally. “Looks like the fine folks at the station will pay us just enough to top off our reaction mass and fill up the pantry.”

“No splits?” Lexi exhaled.

“Oh, there’s splits, but it’ll be best served gettin’ you pissed than anythin’ else. Like they say, what butter and whiskey can’t cure, there’s no cure for.”

Darnell felt like a balloon whose air had been let out by a pinprick. He didn’t want to admit it, even to himself, but this was the outcome he’d expected all along. They’d done the proper surveys; found the richest location they could hit. Or had they? Had he messed up? Had he placed the charges in the wrong spot? Shaped them incorrectly and not gone deep enough into the rock?

And the nugget below the break. The nugget. It had been real. He was sure of it. Could have turned it all around.

“Let me see that,” the captain said, pouring over the data on the panel. “Shit.” She closed her eyes, took a clarifying breath and pinched the bridge of her nose. “Okay. I’ll get refit estimates and dispute this total. It’s going to cost a fortune to replace the bearings that went out on the last grab, re-stripe the seals that are going weak, not to mention the air scrubbers are up for maintenance. Our Lindvolt backup cells could use reconditioning as well. Don’t suppose any of you can go without breathing, can you? No? Okay.”

“Cap?” Keelin asked, appearing uncharacteristically sheepish in the moment. “There’s another matter at hand.”

“Yeah?”

“You see… well… as it is… the Falkor drive here… It um, has a crack in the lining of its uranium storage. Not dosing the flyer with radiation and givin’ us extra arms yet, but heavy use could cause serious problems in the near future. It’s expensive to fix, as you know. We’re grounded till it is. No kaching.”

“Dear, God.” The captain pinched the bridge of her nose. “It’s always something. Why now?”

Keelin shrugged. “Can’t say. Shielding wears out. With this haul as the tally stands now, I’d say we might need to take out a loan, if even we can get one. We’re stretched out like an old rubber band when it comes to finances.”

They were all silent for a moment. This was the kind of damage that could leave a flyer stuck at dry dock for months, if forever.

The captain growled, “I’ll meet the rest of you at the bar when I’m done. Let me see what I can figure out so I don’t have to call in too many favors from my family.”

Keelin grinned at the captain, playing off her worry. She hid her feelings well, but everyone could see she was upset.

“Drinks on you till then?” she ventured. “Ye promised me a bottle as it were.”

“Fine, fine. Put it on the account.”

Atticus took hold of the engineer’s arm, an amused expression on his face. “Would you mind escorting this gentleman to the house of ill repute? I’d rather not think upon our troubles for a while.”

“I’d be honored, good sir,” she said, resting her free hand on his arm. “Can’t have a soul that’s too bright and shiny around here.”

“Perish the thought.”

“Cracked uranium storage,” Darnell mumbled, shaking his head in disbelief. Always something. Can’t be ignored.

He replayed the job in his mind, step by step. Next time, he’d make them stay longer surveying the rock, no matter how hard Cap bitched about it. There had to be a way out of this. His mother lode was out there just as sure as his dream to start a family. It could have paid for these repairs and so much more.

Lexi took hold of Darnell’s hand. He hadn’t realized he’d balled them into fists, and so it took some effort for her to uncurl his fingers.

“Come on, beau,” she said, her tone soft. “I could use a drink. So could you.”

“Won’t change anything,” he mumbled. Never changed a damn thing except in giving you a headache and a bad night’s sleep. “We’ve come up short and now we’re dead in the water.”

“Who knows? It just might change things for a minute.”

As they were heading towards the bar, three men in blue and white UEI uniforms came shooting down the corridor with tasers in hand, a man in orange ahead of them. Someone was making a break for it, running for their life. Where he thought he’d go was hard to say. They were on a closed station and there was no exit, nowhere to hide.

The officials caught up with him at one the docks, shocking him in the ribs. His body went limp, a dribble of vomit leaking from the side of his mouth and floating out into open air.

“What happened?” Darnell asked a UEI official floating at the end of the hall, her rank patch that of a Police Sergeant.

“Got caught ferrying artifacts,” she said, tone off handed. “Two space probes left behind by the Americans. Still has to go to court and all that, but it looks like the Russians were buying.”

“Pretty serious offense, I suppose.”

“Sure as hell is.” The woman crossed her arms and watched the guards haul the man off. “I wouldn’t be caught dead doing something like that out here.”

“Cause it’s wrong?”

“No.” She thumbed her nose and fixed her hard eyes on his. “Because we don’t have the infrastructure for prisoners. UEI Charter countries come down hard on scavengers who try to sell space exploration artifacts. It’s treason, depending on the buyer. And we don’t exactly have room for a prison out here.” She gave them both a nod and narrowed her eyes. “Have a good day now,” she said, and disappeared.

“Well shit,” Lexi commented. “Did she say what I think she said?”

“Treason,” he mouthed, throat dry. From what he could remember of history, treason typically involved a rope and a short drop. And while there might not be a lot of ropes out here, a fall from an airless dock would end just as bad, an eternal journey kicked off by several seconds of intense agony and terror. “I’d never do it. Only bad folk make those choices.”

Lexi’s expression scrunched; attention focused on some place beyond the station. What was she thinking about?

“Never judge another’s path till you’ve walked it,” she whispered after a silent moment. “It’s easy to do what’s right when you have the means.”

“I stand by what I said. Stealing is stealing.”

Lexi shrugged. “Come on,” she said, leading him in the direction Keelin and Atticus had gone. “Let’s put our mind elsewhere.”

It didn’t matter to Darnell. There was no situation that would make this right. If the law deemed it a crime, it was a crime no matter how you got there. Laws were made to protect society, not the individual. Right?

“Maybe I am a bit parched,” he agreed. “We best hurry. If we take too long, Keelin will spend all the captain’s money before we even get a sip.”