"It ain't much, but it's honest work" aka "The freelancer's woes"

[Demonic]

Finnean MacRory
On board Ol'Reliable
10/16/833

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“…so the mole’s been dealt with. He was just some rather low ranking distributor. Got sloppy, battons nabbed him and he sang like a bird. He didn’t know much but he was rather nosey and figured out someone important will be in Ye Olde Dame so he came up with a story about cardamine. Figured out battons will search the whole place and find whatever was happening there. Why he thought that would help him is beyond me.”

Lachlan’s image sighed from the screen, then continued.

“We cut him off of course and changed the routes and signals, so the situation is contained, but I’ll have to re-evaluate how we bring people in. Someone like him shouldn’t have slipped through the cracks. We got lucky this time, might not be the next. Otherwise, business is going just fine, though we really could use more supplies. I know, I know, that’s not going to happen unless we find more pilots, but one can dream, right Safe flight, Brother.”

The recording froze. Finn pondered his brother’s words for a while. He had a distinct impression Lachlan is keeping something from him and that troubled him. Lachlan did that several times in the past, always when trying to protect his brother, so Finn couldn’t help but wonder what Lachlan was not telling him now. But there was nothing he could do about it now, so he closed the message. He briefly checked the other encrypted channels, but there was nothing new in them. Deterrence was silent so far, but they were always an elusive bunch so he didn’t have high hopes about that channel. He closed the terminal, stretched out a bit and checked the clock. It was about the right time for dinner so he got up and headed to the mess hall.

Much to his surprise, he found Sheena there, munching on something unfamiliar to him. She waved when she noticed him, so he picked a pre-packed meal, heated it up and joined her at the table.

“Aren’t you supposed to be on the bridge?” he asked her, while struggling with the packaging of his dinner.

She shrugged. “Yeah, but Collin wanted to take the watch so I swapped with him.”

“Collin? Why would he want a graveyard shift, he hates those?”

“Sure does, but it’s this time of year.”

Finn gave her a puzzled look at first, but then he remembered. “Right, the Tau-31 incident, how could I forget?”

Sheena hesitated for a moment. “Well, given what happened soon after, it’s not that surprising.”

The conversation went silent. What happened “after” was not something people from bretonia liked to speak about. Glassing of Leeds was a heavy topic.

Sheena finally broke the silence. “Sorry, didn’t want to kill the mood, it’s just…” she trailed off.

“Yeah, I know. How about a different topic?”

She smiled and nodded. “Absolutely. I’m dying to hear about your little adventure down on the planet.”

Finn rolled his eyes in a theatrical fashion. “Gossip really travels faster than light, huh. How do you know ‘anything’ happened at all?”

“Oh please,” she chuckled, “you just confirmed it. I didn’t know anything, but you returned sooner than you said you would and you had that serious expression on your face.”

Finn winced. “Damn it. You baited me and I fell for it, hook, line and sinker.”

Sheena just smiled and patiently waited. Finn gave it a quick though an then he shrugged and pushed away the now empty packageing from his dinner.

“All right, I’ll tell you. But you'll be disappointed. Someone tipped off battons about my and Lachlan’s meeting, so we got the hell out. Turns out it was just some low ranking mook who happened to guess something’s happening at the place. When he got nabbed by the law, he tried to use the information as a bargaining chip.”

“You’re right, I am dissapointed. I was hoping for something more… I don’t know, action packed. Oh well, I guess life isn’t like in the movies.”

Finn grinned. “Can’t say I didn’t warn you. But you…”

Sharp buzz from the intercom interrupted him.

“Boss? You there boss?”

Finn pushed the receiving button. “I am, Collin, is everything alright?”

“I don’t know, boss. I mean, no one is shooting at us, so no worries there, but we’re almost at Barker’s and their quartermaster tells me they can’t take the sake.”

“Did he say why?”

“Afraid not, boss. He says it’s nice of us to bring it, but he unfortunately can’t take it off our hands. Something about not having the space allocated for it or something.”

“Ok, I’ll be there in a minute. Ask him if they at least let us dock, I don’t want to hover in the middle of an ice cloud.”

“Will do, boss.”

Fin turned back to Sheena and stood up. “Well, looks like our conversation is over, got another crisis to solve.”

She grinned and shooed him away with her favourite gesture. “No worries, boss. I’ve still got some things to do anyway, might as well get to it. You go hande your crisis."

Finn just laughed, tossed the package to the recycling bin and left the mess hall.