SHIP'S LOG: USCS FREE ENTERPRISE TSV-101701
ENTRY FIVE: EARTH DATE 27 MAY 2225
REPORTING: RORY BUCHANAN, CAPTAIN
The Company has a new mission for us, one that is in line with the purpose of this crew and vessel. We are to pick up raw material from a production world and deliver it to a colony that is in dire need of it. The specifics will be transmitted before we leave Kappa Ceti.
AFTER-ACTION REPORT
SUBMITTED: 13 JUL 2225
Our assignment was to pick up a load of water ice from an oceanic world in the Extraction Zones, and deliver it to a desert colony in the New Concessions Zone. The surface area of Arajona is 94% water. Harvesting facilities on the polar icecaps mine pure water ice that is shipped to other colonies as drinking water. The destination was Telluride, in the Mu Ceti system. Telluride is a "super-Earth" wth a 72 hour rotation. During the 36-hour day, the surface heats up to over 50 degrees, and during the equally long night, it plummets to -70 C. The extremes of temperature create ferocious wind storms. It has almost no surface water, so the colonists rely on imports of water for drinking and other daily purposes.
The Arajona system was 12 parsecs away from Kappa Ceti, so it would take 3 weeks of hyperspace travel to reach it. From there, it was an 8 parsec journey to Telluride. We were expected to deliver by July 8th.
When we made ready to leave orbit of Congress, the ship's computer refused to respond. Security lockouts prevented us from operating any of the ship's systems or carrying out commands. Most likely, someone in the Company failed to update the systems to reflect the access permissions of the new crew. It took Garvey an hour just to deduce what the issue was, and then ten more hours for him and Aldel to override the lockouts in the software. Once that was done, Knight spent an hour setting up security overrides in case something like this happened again.
Half a day was already wasted before we were finally under way. Leah continued to train Glen in the ins and outs of maintaining the Enterprise. Navigator Chun located the hyperspace point about 120 Mkm from Congress. This was an extreme case; rarely did one need to travel that far to find a jump point. We arrived there on May 30th and prepared for a 3-week hyper-nap.
The ship dropped out of hyperspace in the Arjona system on June 20th, and Desh revived us. Evans was sick and needed a few hours to recover, but Garvey was up and about before any of us (Natural 12). It almost seemed as if the hypersleep was restorative and energizing for him. For my part, I was too groggy and grumpy to appreciate his exuberance. I hadn't even had my coffee yet, and the sports drink that Desh typically administered when we were revived tasted like sweat and brine. But it got the job done.
Aldel did a fantastic job obtaining a fix on our position (Natural 12), and this allowed Chun to plot a more efficient course to the planet. We were 50 Mkm out, a trip that would take about 30 hours. While en route, we were hailed by a heavy lift shuttle, requesting assistance with repairs. Their grav plates had failed and the crew was having difficulty operating the craft in zero-G. Fortunately, both of my engineers are EVA rated, so I sent them over. It took about five hours to diagnose and repair the issue, and then we and they went on our respective ways.
We found them in the seediest Startown bar there could possibly be - they were drinking moss whiskey distilled through a cooling manifold and bragging to one another about how much they'd made from shaking down travellers. I picked out the leader and gave him the opportunity to lay off on the extortion. He didn't seem to comprehend what I was saying - so we had to start talking with our hands. (Scene Challenge: Solid, Dangerous: 8+. Roll 10).
When the dust settled, the three of us stood amid a room full of broken furniture, broken glass, and battered miners. Evans learned to fend for himself in prison, and did I mention how big Garvey is? Having solved the problem, we were able to get a service crew to fuel up the ship, but nearly a full day had elapsed already, and it would take another day for the onboard processors to purify the unrefined fuel. In the meantime, several large refrigerated containers were brought aboard, each containing tons of water ice.
We lifted off on the morning of the 23rd, and made the 18 hour trip to the hyperspace point. Chun had found us a close one. But around the halfway point, there was a thunk and we were tossed about on the deck. Below us there was a loud crashing sound, as if something heavy had been dropped.
"Compensator's down!" called Knight from Engineering. A message from Evans informed me that our cargo had shifted as a result. We would not be able to safely proceed until it was stabilized and secured. While Knight worked on the inertial compensator, Garvey and Evans worked to stack and secure the shifting containers. About two hours later, we were able to proceed.
We arrived at the jump point in the very early morning of June 25th, and slept until our arrival at Mu Ceti on July 9th. Lewis was feeling ill, but Desh got him back to duty without any delay (Natural 12). I, on the other hand, was violently ill (Natural 2) and spent the entire day in Sickbay.
While we were inbound, we encountered a resource exploration vessel. Its crew, an unsavory looking bunch if ever we saw one, demanded that we come to and prepare for boarding. They were clearly on the run and needed a new ship to make a clean getaway. Lewis carried out evasive maneuvers, preventing the enemy ship from docking. Then, we heard the sound of boots moving along the outer hull toward the main airlock. They were trying to cut their way in! Thankfully we had some guns, and a crew trained in anti-piracy tactics.
(Scene Challenge: Firefight! Solid, Dangerous: 8+. +DM for weapons and training. Success! Complication: Damage to equipment)
The damage to the outer airlock took several hours to repair, and by the time I felt well enough to leave Sickbay, we had arrived at Telluride. We arrived on the morning of July 10th, only two days past the deadline. Our cargo was unloaded, but due to some administrative oversight, it was stored in the wrong warehouse and the port was not able to locate it for the recipient. It took me 12 hours to untangle all the red tape and track down our ice, but I was able to do so and complete the transfer before the end of the day.
Our bonus payout was $39,200, after a small late penalty. That meant $5600 per share, plus our nominal mission pay. Given the duration of the mission, we had earned a bit more per day than we ever did on a run in the Dawn Treader.
Aman came to see me in my office. She had something on her mind that Desh would not be able to help with. We had been on Earth during the Hajj, and it would have meant a lot to her if she had been able to make the pilgrimage to Mecca. But because of her sect, and her orientation, she felt unwelcome in the sacred places of her faith. It was what had driven her from her home in Lebanon. I assured her that she could take the time needed to observe her faith during missions, as much as possible.
Telluride was a miserable place to spend a shore leave. The morning after we landed, demonstrators had gathered in the public spaces, protesting the trade policies that left them dependent upon water shipments from Erebus. The riots disrupted travel and trade, and posed a serious hazard to security.
On the second day, we were approached by an individual who offered a considerable sum of money to smuggle him off-world, providing there were no legal entanglements. After what we had been through, I was not about to help a criminal escape justice, so I refused. He promised me that it would not be the last we would see of him or his allegedly powerful friends.
The following morning, we were approached by a Colonial Defense patrol. They demanded our credentials, and informed me that they were looking for a number of suspects behind a series of murders in the area. I recounted our experience with the hijackers on our inbound flight, and advised them of the smuggler who had approached us the previous day.
Wen Chun told me that in China, "may you live in interesting times" is a curse. I began to understand what they had meant by that. I began to long for less interesting, uneventful times, and looked forward to a nice quiet hypersleep back to Hamilton, or whatever our next destination might be.
- Buchanan, out.