Captain Jonathan Seabourne gazed out the window in the his quarters aboard the Breezewood. The hauntingly beautiful wreck of Freeport-4 filled the view. His luxury liner catered to all sorts of passengers, from hedonists looking for forbidden pleasures outside of the laws of house space to elderly ship-spotters manning the rails and hoping to catch a glimpse of a new class of vessel they haven't seen yet. However, passengers who wanted to see the wrecks and derelicts of Sirius always gave him the creeps. There was something... macabre about visiting these places where so many had died. Those in the conventions and meeting rooms would insist they were honoring the dead by keeping the stories of the destruction of their ships and stations alive. Given the t-shirts and souvenirs they carried, Seabourne had his doubts.
And so the normally sociable captain found himself hiding in his own ship, still dressed to the nines despite being officially "off duty." He worked for years hauling luxury goods in freighters for the right to wear the formal uniform of an OS&C captain. After a decade, it felt more natural to him than his "casual" clothes. A far cry from the messy child on Pittsburgh who snuck down to his father's landing pad to watch the ships take off after school.
A chime sounded. "Enter," said Seabourne, knowing exactly who it was from the reflection in the glass. Kendra Oldham, the Breezewood's first mate entered in her own formal uniform, slightly more ruffled from having just come off active duty while another officer now had the third watch. "You wished to see me, captain?"
Her Cambridge accent had fast tracked her for promotion. Orbital officers were expected to be posh and debonair, even under emergency conditions. A younger Seabourne had spent long treks on his freighters with language tapes hiding his native accent. He still occasionally slipped a "yinz" into his speech, much to the confusion of all around him. For Kendra, the necessary diction came naturally. While proper, was not cold, just efficient. She kept a tight ship and a cordial but formal tone with the passengers for the "highly encouraged" hours that OS&C officers were officially not required to spend with their passengers. The crew respected her, but any affection they felt was probably due to viewing her an an extension of the Breezewood rather than as a human being. If you loved the ship, you loved the things that kept her going. The engines, the CO2 scrubbers, the XO.
"The money from the GRG deal just cleared, I had accounting run the numbers for WSL as a whole." Seabourne wore two hats: captain of the Breezewood and Director of White Spa Lines, a division of OS&C intended as a loss-leader to help the brand. By publishing outlandish stories of the most luxurious and dangerous routes, it was hoped that less wealthy passengers would be inspired to book the safer, and more profitable, standard cruises. Orbital's numbers were still down since the Gallic War, and the company was desperate enough to give Seabourne a budget and the freedom to do whatever it took to enhance the brand.
"Is it bad?" asked Oldham. The officer only had eyes for the Breezewood, freeing up Seabourne to focus on the broader picture. But she knew that a Liberty corporation would only tolerate so many deficits before cutting a program without notice. Seabourne slid a datapad across his minimalist glass desk towards her. Her eyes couldn't help but bulge.
"Quite the opposite," said Seabourne unnecessarily. "We now have over a billion credits in WSL accounts."
"So, I take it that you're going to up the profit sharing initiative?" asked Oldham dryly as she flipped through the report.
Seabourne smiled, "No, I have bigger things in mind. Like a legacy."
Oldham cocked an eyebrow as her eyes left the pad. "Breezewood evacuated over 100,000 souls from Leeds. We served last drinks at the Battle of New London to the allied fleet. I think we've secured a footnote in the history books."
Seabourne nodded. "I think the flagship deserves to be more than a footnote, and I think these funds might go a long way towards repairing some of the damage of the war, and getting the Independent systems back on their feet."
Oldham put the pad down and turned her head slightly, eyeing the captain suspiciously as recent events clicked into place. "The messages you sent out about the Treaty of Curacao, befriending the independent groups of Sirius, what are you up to, sir? This seems to be more involved than merely repairing Curacao's docking ring."
Seabourne smiled and turned back to face the wreck. "I'm not looking for friends, Kendra," said the captain. "I'm looking for new neighbors."
