Theobald Franklin hit the send button and stared at the screen unblinking for seconds. Then he closed his eyes. It was done. His ship might get just the help she needed. All he had today now was to wait until the Junker Congress people arrived.
He stood up from behind the desk in his lodgings and turned to the big window in the back. It was so unsettling for him to be on a space station, watching the ships speeding by from one trade lane to the other, while not being on his ship himself. Of course he often stayed at space stations like Freeport 1 for some extended time, but never in a situation like this. And he liked planets more. If he had to leave the Reverie to stretch his legs on something different, he wanted soil beneath his boots and a sky over his head, not more bulkheads.
Turning away from the beautiful sight of the Burgess Ice Field outside, he walked over to the desk again. He took up his datapad, put it inside his pocket and walked outside of his rented quarters. His destination was the mooring points where all large ships are anchored. A walkbridge connected them with the main docking hub. There were only a few such points available and the Administrator of Freeport 1 has not been too happy to give one of these to a severely damaged Liner. But it would not be Orbital Spa and Cruise if not a few credits helped here. Normally Franklin would suggest parking Reverie outside and ferrying everything by shuttles. However due to the ships current state, Franklins chief engineer, who has survived, advised against it.
Franklin stopped at the entrance of the walkbridge and looked out of the window next to it. He sighed again as he always does when seeing his beloved ship.
"I know, Theo," a male voice tried to calm him. Theobald turned to Stevan Jester, his chief engineer, who continued: "she looks inside as bad as outside."
"How bad is it? Any luck with restoring energy, or anything?" Theobald asked.
"No, nothing," Stevan said, "Main power is still offline; half of the decks have hull breaches and are uninhabitable. The docking bays are unaccessible, and so on and so on. You know the damage report."
"I know, I know, Stev," Theobald confirmed, "but, there is a bright side. I have word from the Junker Congress, from Commandant Howler. They are on their way here to fix her"
"The Junkers? Are you mad?" Stevan sounded shocked, "first they try to kill us and now you want them to help us?"
"Now slow down, Stev," Theobald interrupted him firmly, "not all Junkers are like that Silver Chariot idiot. Just think of Caitlyn, she is a Junker too. And what did she do, when she heard of what happened?"
"Yeah, you are right, sorry Captain."
"So," Theobald turned to the window again. He crossed his arms in front of him and said: "try to continue as best as you can Stev until the Junkers arrive."
"Will do Theo," he clapped Theobald on the shoulder and mentioned: "you know captain, if anything is true what everybody says about Junkers, then our Lady here will be as good as new, if not better. And this nightmare is then hopefully over." And with these words Stevan walked into the walkbridge towards the Liner.
Theobald sighed and nodded looking at his chief engineers back: "I hope you are right, I really hope so." And he turned around and walked the other way.
