Chapter 4
The next morning I woke to the smell of not quite bacon. I looked over to see Alysha popping meal packs out of the shuttle cooker. Meal packs were an in between type food the had a shelf life of about 10 years but still tasted better then ration bars or military ration packs and just slightly better then a frozen meal pack depending on the type not as good as real food but better then I had planned for I just had a few ration bars in my bag. “ enough for all of us?” I asked hopefully, Alysha chuckled “ men, let me guess you did what Alex did and just brought ration bars?” I nodded sheepishly “ your lucky I thought ahead yes there is enough for you two as well”
I let out a soft cheer grabbing a bottled coffee drink from my bag again, not as good as the real stuff but better then nothing. “ but this is all the fresh food we brought plus Alex and I have to go back to work tomorrow” we all sat around the table eating and discussing until Alysha said “ its two bad the Paladin isn’t in better shape” I could tell she meant more than just an oh darn its broke kind of way so I asked “ what do you mean?” Alysha quickly explained “ well I was looking at the laws last night before bed and currently the Paladin would be classified as salvage and we as the finders are entitled to twenty percent of its worth if. we bring it back then we get sixty. the government always gets twenty and the original owners also the government in this case get twenty.” Alex snorted, “ the tax man is always going to get his cut.”
Alysha nodded “that’s why it sucks if it was able to travel under its own power it would be derelict instead of salvage and by League and Paledes law any ship that’s been derelict over fifty years is property of the discoverer” we all took a moment to digest that then Emily spoke up “ darn if I had a month some help and two Class B engines to install I could do it too, but those are a few million each!”
I thought about it for a moment then pulled out my Com.d and checked my account 3,702,000 credits mostly the money left from the settlement after paying for my parents few debts and final expenses I thought about it for a few seconds then decided what the hell the fancy rock hauler I wanted was 3.5 million I was going to buy it and still have a nice cushion while I learned the trade but as I looked at the display showing the wounded Paladin I couldn’t see deciding to send her to the scrap yard. “ I’ll do it” I stated firmly not realizing I had said it out loud “do what?” Alysha asked.
“ Emily, could you tell Alex where to buy a pair of decent class B engines for 3.7?” Emily’s got wide eyed look “ yeah there was a freighter being scrapped in Consorsha last month had its side peeled from a run in with a rock hauler I did the service report when working there to pay for my Class B engineering certificate there isn’t a lot of call for Class B engines out this far other than at the joint Station and the military doesn’t use refurbs that aren’t their own but are you sure? There’s maybe two weeks of fuel in the reactor if the ships operating at full power and without the plasma generator working the shields wont work I could maybe pull enough power from the reactor to get them up to deflector strength but that’s going to make the fuel run out sooner not to mention the cost in parts for maintenance down the road and the need of a crew” she made a lot of good points but still.
“I’m sure I’ll figure out a way to pay the bills but I’m not letting the Paladin go to the scrapper.” We talked about it for a bit and decided on a plan. First we got our suits back on then docked with the ship. Yesterday on the way out of the hangar we saw great grandpa's starfighter, another with combat damage and the ship's shuttle which must have been left behind in the quick evacuation. Emily did a full tear down inspection of the shuttle and got it working within specs that took about four hours even with all of us helping because of the lack of gravity. She also test-cycled the elevator to make sure it was working.
Then when the suits registered the environment as safe and we took our helmets off. Emily went to work in engineering and the rest of us took the time to tidy up and make sure the four missiles floating around were safely strapped back into the ordinance cradle. They had the same design as modern ones but I would definitely be turning those over to station authorities for disposal. All the other ordinance onboard were railgun rounds which were just funny shaped bars of metal or pellets not a threat even if they sat for a thousand years.
Once we were sure we had a means of escape Emily and I went with Alex and Alysha to the airlock and said our goodbyes I transferred the funds to Alex they would go and take grandpas shuttle and rent a hauler to transport the engines to the our work site and leave us grandpas shuttle on the way back to return the hauler to the Paledes orbital station and we could use grandpas shuttle to go back and forth every few day until Grandpa needed his shuttle back or we got the engines fully hooked up. The shuttle undocked and they took off and after double checking everything was secured Emily powered up the shields using the reactor quite thudding noises could be heard throughout the ship for the next thirty seconds as our feet touched down.
“ Woops guess there was a lot of stuff floating in other parts of the ship. I guess people are less concerned about securing loose gear when the ship is about to crash into a planet” Emily helpfully pointed out after the fact “ yep, so how much fuel do we have?” I asked. Emily shrugged “ eh, even with the shields drawing power without the ship actually maneuvering or idling the engines I would say month to month and a half to be honest I’m not sure we can get the engines hooked up by then.” She was right this type of full service maintenance really needed a shipyard but it was too late now. “I don’t know, maybe I can sell something like the shuttle to afford to hire a work crew” Emily thought for a moment “ that might work, boss.”
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I looked at her funny “boss since when?” she looked at me like I was an idiot “since you put 3 million credits into this old girl” she said, gesturing around at the Paladin. “ I’m going to go work on the Betty which is about all I can do without access to the ships net to know what needs fixing” large vessels like this had nets of their own, a web of computer systems and sensors that would flag damage and where notices were posted. While she worked on Betty I decided to head for the bridge.
I went up to the second deck and found the bridge safely buried in the middle of the vessel I walked in feeling the history that lingered here men and women fought on this bridge in a conflict that was important if short and overshadowed by the ones that came before and after. I took a seat in the captain's chair and imagined what it must have been like. I felt less bad about doing it because I knew the Paladins crew had survived the ship's death so it didn’t feel like disturbing a tomb.
“engines all ahead full, guns target that frigate fire the main as she bares, Ops launch all fighters!” I shouted to the empty bridge “oh right I forgot” I mustered my best command voice “sound general quarters!” suddenly a voice came over the bridge speakers.” , “unable to comply “ the mechanical voice said causing me to jump out of my seat I shouted “ who’s there?” and the voice continued.
“ Abandon ship order was given and the ship went into standby full reverification of command structure required please state name and rank” I realized this must be the ship's computer not an almost A.I. like Ali but a much dumber machine but also responsible for running the net so I decided to try to work with what I had.
“ Benjamin Miles no rank wait correction Militia Ensign”, “processing Error, no Militia ensign Miles on file” what that didn’t make sense my commission went through three weeks ago. Then it dawned on me “ when was your roster last updated?” The machine paused again “ yesterday Thursday the 11th of October 3420” the Sedona incident occurred on the 12th of October 3420 nearly 76 years ago no wonder I wasn’t in the ship's records but I should be able to fix this “ Paladin verify data with Authorized source in system.”
The buoy network cress crossed League space and courier boats would make regular trips updating and maintaining them and I was betting that Sedona’s hadn’t needed replacing and I was right two minutes passed. “ local buoy accessed error data is significantly different updating records this may take a while”
ten minutes passed then twenty finally “ records updated end of hostiles verified decommissioning date of longbow class vessels verified, genetic code of one ensign Miles received please verify identity” a panel on the captains chair slid open I placed my palm on the scanner my hand tingled as a small laser burn off a small section of the top layer of my skin and analyzed it. I shook my hand and winced. I always hated when I had to do that. “ genetic profile matched. Please state your purpose for being here Ensign Miles''
I didn’t really have a good answer so I went with the truth “ to claim the Paladin as derelict salvage” “processing, checking buoy for updates to relevant laws conflict unable to resolve referring to higher authority error unable to contact higher authority conflict logged for future review” I cursed but decided to try one more time “ define conflict”, “conflict resulted from conflict of rules derelict rights are indeed awarded to Ensign Miles however the law does not specifically include military vessels where as the Military Statutes prohibit the transfer of military equipment specifically arms to civilians unless specifically authorized.”
That did seem like a problem but I vaguely recalled something from my militia training and history class it was in regards to the armed transports of the early wars and the surplus fighter that a lot of veterans bought when they retired it was a creative use of the Militia regulations and I hoped it would help me now I just had to find it I flipped to the section of the regulations saved in my com.d that my instructor had told me about there it is. “paladin please review Militia regulation 34.8.7-5”, “processing 34.8.7-5 Militia personal may at their discretion purchase or acquire available surplus supplies and equipment as available to best aid the Paledes people in times of need.”
“ Thank you Paladin now, please review the decommissioning documents for the Longbow class ships. Does it contain a line about being surplus to the needs of the navy as a reason for decommissioning?” “processing such statement is found.” I held my finger up in the air and shook it like a lawyer from some holo-drama “so in a accordance with derelict laws I claim this vessel as my own and in accordance with regulation 34.8.7-5 I claim all arms and armament both onboard and mounted to Paladin it having been deemed surplus to the navy.”
The computer paused for a long time an I thought it didn’t work and then “ justification accepted conflict resolved official transfer of command approved pending review of logic chain and official awarding by recognized Paledes courts, welcome aboard Captain Miles” then a loud whistle was played throughout the ship “ now here this, now here this, effect immediately on this 8th July common era 3496 Captain Benjamin Miles has assumed command of the light cruiser Paladin in full accord with the laws of Paledes and the League may he discharge this duty with honor. That is all.”