The Lady - Part Two

“Well, Lady, it’s been a month on this journey and you’ve been a damn good, if ornate, craft.” Ioana smiled as they came up on the dead space area she was hoping for. She really needed some sleep. Thankfully it had been a routine and even boring trip. So far no other ships within sensor distance. Although, that was why they picked this route in the first place, it had no major shipping lanes so there was no real danger of running into curious travelers. There was no reason to go into more populated areas since The Lady had more than enough fuel and supplies.

She had kept herself busy in the slow times by working out in the gym or thumbing through the books in the library. She’d brought some things to occupy her time, but there were some very interesting books that she couldn’t resist taking a look at. The most recent one that caught her attention was one called The Three Musketeers. It was an ancient Earth book with a lot of curious customs, but the story was engaging and a good distraction. She had attempted to bowl, but gave up quickly out of frustration. Same with the electronic games, they just weren’t enough to hold her interest.

Ioana found herself  using the swimming pool as often as she could fit it into her schedule. She didn’t have a swimsuit, but there was no one here to see her swim nude. If the owner had cameras, well, she hoped he enjoyed the show. There really was no point in being paranoid about it, they had no rights to distribute and her company would come down on anyone who distributed anything like that illegally. Maybe she’d even get a nice tip; like the time she used the sunning room in another ship and the owner sent her several credits and a thank you letter for doing it in the nude. Every little bit helped, her own salary mostly went back to the company for her housing, food, and clothes. What she saved every month wasn’t much, but one day she was going to use it to get her own ship. Nothing really fancy like she was delivering, but a ship she could use as a delivery system. Something practical, yet fast.

Her thoughts were interrupted by the distinctive warning claxon. She jogged to the bridge, confused at the alarm. What could possibly be out here in dead space?! She checked the sensors. It was debris from some sort of spacecraft by the looks of it. She took the helm again, changed course and did a quick scan for life signs. There were none to be found and she was glad of it. The last thing she needed on this trip was a passenger. The debris was fairly spread out but not enough to fly through it safely. She kept scanning. If she hadn’t been on assignment she’d be salvaging all that. Half the stuff could be recycled by her company; the finder rights alone would have been fantastic. But salvage was not an emergency, and she knew better than to call in and make anyone aware of her position. She was tempted to put a beacon on it, but when she checked the ship’s array, there wasn’t one to be found. She sighed with regret as she passed the wreck and gave it one last look to see if it was identifiable. Nothing. Whatever destroyed it had done a good job. She did a farther distance scan around the area, just in case the perpetrator was still in the area, but came up empty. Probably an old wreck or accident that had occurred a while ago. This area did have wandering asteroids from time to time and if you didn’t have the proper equipment to track them (which she did) you could be taken by surprise easily. ‘Probably were using some old Government star chart and didn’t take rogues into consideration.’ She thought.

In less than an hour she was finally clear of the wreckage and continued on her way, noting the coordinates down on her tablet. Who knows, maybe it would still be in the area and she could call Auberon and let him know about it when she’d finished her delivery. There wasn’t anything nearby that would pull on it hard enough gravitationally to move it too far. Her wake probably moved it more than it had in a while.

******

“What? You mean to tell me that junky looking piece of space trash actually passed by an opportunity to salvage?!” Captain Sybil fumed. Either the crew of that vessel was completely stupid or there was something else going on. That was the first time one of their traps hadn’t worked, and it galled her.

“Aye Captain. Just scanned and passed. The ship did change course to avoid the wreck but nothing else.”

“Well, it’s a good thing our shields work so well that they didn’t see us.” She grinned. “But now I’m curious, why would an obviously working ship pass by such a sweet opportunity? It doesn’t make a lick of sense. I think we need to do a little investigation m’boyo. Something smells rotten in the airlock.”

The Captain’s mate chuckled, “You really want to chase that piece of junk down? If their crew is stupid enough to pass up all that booty I don’t know if I want to get too close, the stupid might be contagious.”

The Captain waggled her finger at him, “Ahhhh, I don’t think they’re stupid, I think there’s something else going on here. That ship is headed somewhere and isn’t being distracted by anything. They didn’t even communicate to anyone that the wreckage was there. If they were simply full, or understaffed, they would have passed the message to someone. But there were no transmissions, were there?” She looked over at her communication officer.

“Nay, Captain, not a single beep out of the ship. Not in the whole time we’ve been tracking it. It’s downright unnatural.”

She smirked, “Well, there you go. Even Darby thinks it’s unnatural. I say we trail just behind it and see if we can find a good place for an ambush. I mean to find out what that mystery ship is up too.” She grinned and ordered her ship into stealth mode to follow the curiously silent but unremarkable looking ship.

******

Ioana was just about to retire again when The Lady beeped urgently. She looked at the view screen and made a frustrated noise. A ship. She must have scanned too quickly. The ship was using some sort of stealth shield, but The Lady had some amazing sensors. The ship was probably the one responsible for the wreckage. Well, Ioana was used to dealing with pirates and had quite a few tricks up her sleeve. First, best let them know she knew they were there. She didn’t want to be ambushed, and the best way to keep them from attempting it would be to tell them she was aware of their presence. She grinned and adjusted the communicator so that only her voice could be heard, but tweaking it a bit so that her voice sounded a little off as well. She cleared her throat and spoke to the hidden ship on her tail in an accent she picked up from one of her coworkers.

“Eh there. Whatcha doing lurkin’ in me wake? I aint got nothing o’no interest to nobody. I’m jus tryin’ t’git this ol’hulk home t’me fambly afore I run outta supplies.” She waited for the response, wondering if her stage one pirate deterrent was going to work. She usually didn’t have to go beyond stage one, but there were occasions where the pirates were either too curious or too determined to be thwarted by the idea of an old woman limping her ship back home.

*********

The communication officer jumped, “Damn, she knows we’re here Captain.”

“What? How is it possible that that hunk of junk has a sensor that can detect us?” The Captain’s eyes narrowed. “What did she say?”

Darby replayed the message he received and commented, “She sounds fairly old, and the accent is consistent with a couple of close planets . . .”

“I don’t believe it for a second. No way a back-water planet runner would be able to see through our stealth shield. There’s something going on here and I’m going to find out what. Open a channel, I’m going to have a chat with this supposed planet hopper.”

Darby did as requested and watched his captain pull herself up to her full height and speak, “Well, I’m surprised you could see us, but since you can I’ll give you a sporting chance. Give us whatever cargo you can spare and we’ll let you go.”

***********

Ioana slapped her forehead in annoyance. She should have waited until they got closer, she’d let slip that The Lady had good sensors. Oh well, might as well continue the charade and see where it got her. “Spare? I ain’t got nothin’ I tol’ you that afore. Jus’ enough rations to git me home. Dropped m’cargo off already and headin’ home empty.”

The female pirate snorted, “I’m afraid I don’t believe you. Why don’t you let us aboard to see this empty ship of yours?”

Ioana cursed under her breath. Okay then, phase two. She turned the ship around to face the one behind her and prayed The Lady was as fast as she thought. She should have enough fuel for a full speed sprint and still make it to the Hub. She checked the weapons array. There were an impressive amount of things available but she needed something just big enough to do crippling damage but not destroy the other ship completely. Destruction of ships was against company policy, it looked bad if a delivery pilot went around using up a client’s ammo. Disabling shots, however, were allowed if the delivery was under threat. This definitely counted as being under threat. She found what she was looking for and hoped the pirates had enough to keep them alive until they found a planet they could land on to repair. She really didn’t like destroying ships, even if they were pirates.

Captain Sybil raised an eyebrow, wondering if the ship was about surrender or something else. “Be ready for anything, mates. Shields up.”

*********

Ioana saw the shields go up on the opposing ship and grinned, You have no idea who’s tail you just knotted m’dear. She sped the ship at full speed toward her opponent, as if she were going to ram them nose to nose. Then, at the very last second, just as the other ship was taking evasive measures, she shot off the photon torpedo and made a hard turn speeding off at full speed. She knew it went through the shield, that was the whole point of that weapon. Probably made a nice hole in the hull. Ideally it hit something vital, but Ioana didn’t have the time or inclination to stick around to see if it hit or not. Either way, she was jetting off toward her rendezvous and was not about to be stopped again. She highly doubted they’d be able to catch The Lady; she was simply too fast at full speed.

She kept at full speed until she couldn’t see any trace of being followed for a good five hours. She sighed with relief and slowed back down, checking the fuel and smiling that her calculations had been correct. Still more than enough to get to the Hub. “All right, M’Lady, let me know if anyone else tries to take us, hmm? For now, I need to get some sleep.”

Perhaps she was more exhausted than she thought, but she could have sworn that the console blinked and looked like it was responding with an affirmative. She shook her head to clear it, “Yeah, I need some sleep for sure.” She reset the course, adjusting it due to their run, and then headed to her bedroom with a yawn.

******
Captain Sybil was furious. What the hell did that blaggard just hit them with?! How did it go through their shield?! She hollered at her crew to get things clamped down and repaired as fast as possible, but it was looking like they were going to be dead in space for a while. The old bitch had hit their major navigation engine; they couldn’t do anything but go in a circle until it was repaired. She growled, she’d get her revenge on that sneaky garbage scow and find out what that pilot was hiding. That was not the behavior of someone with innocent motives. That was someone who did not want them to know what they had on that ship. Given the weaponry, the captain was betting it was booty like they’d never gone after before. She wanted it; and what she wanted she normally got.

*****

Ioana stretched out in the swimming pool. A month and a half gone now, soon they would be at the Hub. She’d be seeing Earth for the first time and she wondered if she’d have time to check anything out before going home. She was really excited about that, more than she’d like to admit. She was going to the legendary home world; she’d daydreamed about what it might look like. She knew it was probably greener and wetter than the planet she was born on, with blue skies instead of the brownish red she was accustomed to, with one moon and one sun. She wondered what it would be like to see something like that. She turned in the water and headed toward the side of the pool to get out and dry off. Her brother would certainly be jealous if he knew she was headed to Earth. He’d always dreamed of going there someday, even now that he had four kids and a farm of his own he still talked about saving enough money to go to Earth. She wondered if she should tell him when the assignment was over or just keep it to herself. She wasn’t the type to deliberately make anyone jealous, it seemed petty and a waste of time. Perhaps she could find something there that she could afford that she could give to him as a souvenir. That might be a nice gesture.

“Well, M’Lady, those pirates seem to have been the only issue we’ve had to deal with.” She smiled at the console in the pool area, and it seemed to twinkle at her in response. Ioana shook her head, she’d been alone on this ship too long; she was finding responses where there were none. She actually found herself wishing for a voice now, at least then there would be something that would respond to her comments, even if it was a simple query as to what she meant. Normally there would be two pilots but the client had specified only one. Ioana wondered how much of a fight Auberon had put up about that. Obviously, the client had won the fight.

She went to the console and turned on the music system, picking out something that would make a good background for reading. “I’d hate to think what those pirates would have done to you if they’d found out what you were really like.” It was funny, there was definitely a character to this ship, she felt more protective of it than she’d ever felt about any other delivery. She thought about the face of the angel on the prow of the ship and how determined it looked whenever she spoke to the ship. The thought of it being destroyed actually made Ioana’s heart sink. No, The Lady was something that she’d do anything to protect until she was safely in the hands of her owner, no question.

Ioana smiled up at the now familiar décor and carvings around the sky window. “Well, I’ll get you to your new owner safe and sound, that’s a promise M’Lady.” She didn’t know when she’d started calling the ship “M’Lady”, but it just seemed to fit somehow. She believed that it likely started after she read The Three Musketeers, but only as a title and not really thinking of The Lady as being anything like Milady in the book. Though, technically she wasn’t “her” lady, unless it was more in the terms of Ioana being a servant to the ship. Which she was in a sense; she could define herself as a bodyguard if The Lady were a person. She laughed at the twist of fancy, making The Lady into a person. Her mind was going into strange places on this long, lonely trip.

Ioana looked around as she dried off; her eyes had finally become accustomed to the colors and designs in the ship. She wondered what it was going to be like coming to the Hub after being in such an ornate environment for so long. The stark industrial walls and utilitarian devices of the Hub would probably take some getting used to. Here she could stare at a room for hours and still find new things in the décor, like the small fish she discovered decorating the bottom of the pool just the other day. The pool was tiled and when she dived down to take a closer look she found that each small tile was either solid or had a small but beautiful fish on it. She’d nearly drowned herself trying to look at all of them in one go. It was like playing a game of I Spy, but without any hints of what you had to find.  She’d done a little research and discovered that the thin four winged insects were called dragonflies, which amused her since they didn’t look anything like the dragons she was used to. It was nice to have a name for them since they seemed to be prominent around the ship.

She wrapped the towel around her and headed to her room. Being dressed was not necessary, really, but she did like to have something on. It didn’t seem right to just lounge around naked on someone else’s furniture. The carpet felt soft under her feet as she padded along the hallways. She wondered how the owner was going to keep the carpets clean if he had a party or something. There were cleaner bots that came out every day to make sure things were tidy, but they really would have to put in a lot of work to clean anything sticky or wet out of those carpets. “I hope your new owner treats you well, M’Lady; I would hate to see all of this get trashed.” People with money were curious; some of them were very protective of their belongings and treated them carefully, and others saw belongings as completely replaceable and therefore not really important enough to keep in good shape. If it broke you just got a new one. She really hoped that The Lady’s owner was more like the former and not the latter, although the fact that her owner spent so much to put so much detail and design into her showed he was at least a person who treasured details and beauty. “If it were in my power, I’d make sure to hurt anyone that did you damage.” She meant it too, the idea that someone would scratch a single carving made her irrationally angry.

Ioana herself had been very careful, she felt like she was living in a museum and treated everything like it was fragile. Even the furniture, which was easy since all of the furniture, including the utilitarian stuff, was as elegant and beautiful as the rest of the ship. She was coming to love this ship, giving her up was going to be a tough thing to do. But, she’d do it; it was her job. She did foresee a bit of mourning occurring after delivery, but she was determined to be on Earth by that point and hoped the experience would distract her. It was always a bit of a downer when a job was done, after spending a length of time on the ship and getting used to all the quirks you start to take a little bit of mental ownership. She absently patted a console as she passed it, “I’m going to miss you, M’Lady, when the time comes to give you up. But we’ll have a good time while we can.” The console gave a slight, almost slow blink, like it was agreeing with the sentiment, but Ioana just ignored it as a quirk of the power supply.

She walked into her room to dress, putting the towel into the laundry chute. It was really nice of the owner to let her have access to all of the cleaning areas and cleaner bots. She could do her own cleaning but it made it a nicer trip not to have to. She headed back out to the bridge. They were coming into more populated space, so she was determined to spend more time on the bridge than she did when in dead space. She grabbed the current book that she borrowed from the library. This time it was Treasure Island; the owner had an appreciation for classic adventure stories and she was enjoying them as well. It was a nice change of pace from the trendy pioneer/western romance types of stories that could be found on the data streams.  She returned to the bridge, set the book down, and started her routine.