Return of the VCS-Nightmare

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It had been a hell of a day for Billy. Between navigating the waters of contracts with the Junker Congress and the funeral ceremony onboard a rented luxury yacht, Billy was beat. As he scanned his ID badge at the hatch to the More Than Enough, he thought about the men and women that had been friends with him over the years. He could see the faces of each one of them, and every name that he read from the book during the memorial service reflected in his mind.

The Service had gone off without any problems. A few Natio Octavarium personnel had showed up, old Vagrant Raider pilots and assorted individuals, some of which Billy recognized. They had grown older, some bore scars Billy couldn't discern. Certainly the Natio Octavarium had their fair share of enemies, even in their new not-as-unlawful role. The Memorial had been simple, as the fallen crew member's name was read out, the ship automatically jettisoned the ashes. Afterwords there was a small reception with snacks and drinks, some of which where a bit more alcoholic than others. Finally, before the end of the reception, a small bouy with a plaque was launched into space. Inscribed in it where the names of all the crewmembers who had died, and an inscription of the Nightmare's unofficial motto "ut semper belli", roughly translated to "Always Keep Fighting".

A copy of the plaque was in Billy's Stateroom aboard the More Than Enough, with the intent to weld the plaque to the Nightmare once the ship was completed its long reconstruction process. As he walked down a corridor to the small bridge of the More Than Enough, pausing when he heard a small thud, and the pulsing warble of an alarm went off. Walking to the bridge, he killed the audible alarm and pulled up the damage control status page on a console. Billy sighed as he looked at the list of malfunctions. It appeared that one of the ships four drive pods had blown a seal, and violently shook itself apart. Billy assumed this was due to the non-standard engines that where mounted on the ship, and shook his head. Pulling up the Barrier Gate Station infoboard, he started browsing for an independent repair crew. Finding one, he typed out a quick message asking for a quote to repair the ship.

An hour later, he heard a buzz at the hatch, and let in a engineer wearing a exoskeleton rig and very stylized welders glasses. "The Name is Evan Baldwin. I hear you have a bent bird?" Billy paused for a second, nodding. "Yeah, the automatic damage control subroutine reported a failed seal blasted the engine clear off". Billy walked towards the bridge, motioning for Evan to follow him. As they walked, Billy could barely hear the exoskeleton articulating as Evan walked behind him. On the bridge, Billy motioned for Evan to sit at the console and look at the flashing alarm. Evan sat down, and started keying through the pages.

"Yup, exactly like I thought. These ships, as rugged as they are have a very common problem with the engine mount bolts. Whoever the genius was that designed it, made the bolt to weak. During long duration flights the vibration from the engine loosens the nut, and if a seal pops the entire engine mount is liable to pop off like a god-dang roman candle. You'll never hear about this problem cuz' the Bretonians need any industry they can get their hands on post war. That said, me and my crew have found a few fixes and such to make the whole boat a bit less tickin-time-bomb if you get my drift. You can get it done the by-the-book way or the Baldwin way."

Smiling, Billy sat down in a adjacent console. In the back of his mind, he realized that he would need crew eventually for the Nightmare, and a good competent Engineer and his employees would be a good start. He pulled up the Nightmare's detailed scans, and sent it over to Evan's console.

"Fair enough. What about this ship, can she be saved?"

Evan looked at his screen, and the data cycling through. Looking closer, he swiped between the pages, zooming in on certain parts and making mental notes. After about 5 minutes of paging through screens and thinking, he finally spoke.

"Y'know, I've been hearing some rumors. Rumors about a dead cruiser floating around the Barrier Cloud. This of course wouldn't happen to be said ship could it? But if it where, I think she's salvageable. Going to need a lot of work, and some out of the box thinkin' I bet. I've never dealt with a destroyer before, but I'm sure me and my crew could handle it."

Billy thought for a minute, and decided.

"Out of the Box Thinking is exactly what I'm looking for Mr. Baldwin. I have a meeting at Vieques to look at some tech the Junkers are cooking up, and would like you to join me. Have your crew work on the More Than Enough, and we can discuss more...long term employment for you and your boys en-route. How does that sound? "

Evan stood up, and shook Billy's hand. "Sounds Mighty fine to me. Let me get my crew started on your repairs, and I'll grab a few things. In fact, I even got a ship we can use to get to Vieques."