Harlan Ranson looked at the message on his screen. He frowned. Herd and Anderson wanted to meet with him on the other side of the dock. Was he hauling the modules for them?

He had not been able to find any work in the Mars system. He was on his second day on the ground. The next day he was headed back out to the Belt to look for work there.

Hauling a module train from Mars to Titan would be a good paying job. He might be able to gouge the University without wrecking Herd's plans. It depended on what they expected to pay him for the contract.

He expected to drop them off on Titan, work another contract, then come back and pick them up. That should be an easy contract to carry out. He doubted they would want to share the salvage rights with him.

It might be the only way for them to pay the University back after working so hard on finding whatever was under the ice.

Luckily he was just a pilot and didn't have to do any heavy lifting.

Ranson pulled on a sweater as he went to the door of his tug. He made sure everything was buttoned up before stepping outside. He locked things down and headed across the field. He tried to keep the speculation down so he wouldn't be disappointed by reality.

Hiring him to drop a module train seemed to be the most likeliest reason for Herd to send him a note. He started figuring out mass and how much he could drag back to Titan. He figured he could put the modules in orbit before syncing them up to the tug and hauling them across the system.

Once he was done with that, he could sit back and collect his money. It would be up to Herd and Anderson to finish salvaging the thing.

Ranson followed the signs across the dock. He noted some rigs that belonged in museums instead of flying. He smiled. His own tug wasn't that far from being an antique.

He found the dock and frowned. An old cargo vessel sat on the pad. He noted a fuel truck next to it. It looked like he wouldn't have the flying contract after all. He made a shrug and pressed on.

Why had Herd called him to a meeting if he wasn't going to fly for her? He idly wondered who their pilot was going to be for this bigger ship. Was it someone he knew?

Herd came down the ramp to the cargo hold. She smiled when she saw Ranson at the edge of the slip. She wore a lander's dress and jacket. The flowers on the dress reflected the light as she moved.

“Doctor Herd,” said Ranson. “So I'm not flying for you. This is a lot bigger than my old boat.”

“That's why I called,” said Herd. She ran her hand through her short hair. “We still need a pilot. Tom and I thought that since you found the Argo, you should have the chance to go up with us.”

“You want me to fly this?,” said Ranson. He indicated the big cargo lifter with both arms spread wide.

“Yes,” said Herd. “We already have most of the cargo stowed away. All we need is a couple of things my friend is bringing, then we'll be ready to lift off.”

“I'll be glad to take you up,” said Ranson. “What about my boat? The dock fees will be heinous if I leave it behind.”

“The university will cover it,” said Herd. “When Tom and I got back with our findings, they found someone who wants the Argo lifted out of the ice. He donated most of the funds for this.”

“And he will pay my docking fees?,” said Ranson. That seemed too good to be true.

“If you sign up, I will go down and talk to the harbor master to bill our backer until we get back,” said Herd.

“I have to look at the controls before I can agree to sign up,” said Ranson. “I'm interested.”

“Come aboard,” said Herd. “I'll show you around and you can meet the others that signed up for the expedition.”

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“I'll be glad to do it,” said Ranson. “You were able to get some help?”

“A couple of engineers and a robot handler,” said Herd. “We're going to need them to get through that ice.”

“So there's a chance we can raise the Argo after all,” said Ranson.

“We're going to at least dive and see what's down there,” said Herd. She started across the hold. “If it is the Argo, we'll see what we can do when we examine it.”

Ranson nodded. He wasn't sure he would commit to a hunt if he didn't know what he was chasing. Whatever was down there had to be valuable in its own right just for the historical value.

He hadn't thought the university would approve an expedition on such short notice. Had the paperwork been in the works when he was flying Herd and Anderson around? He decided that wasn't his business as long as he got paid.

“We want to use a drone to look the silhouette over,” said Herd. “Most of these boxes are for that. Some of it is supplies so we don't have to come back to Mars, or use one of the asteroids, or stations, to load up. Some of the boxes hold modules so we can work on the ice instead of spending most of our time dropping down out of orbit and then heading back up.”

Ranson thought that sounded reasonable. If a storm came up, they could evacuate then if they had to. He planned to keep an eye on the local weather for just that reason. He didn't want to try to fly out under bad conditions.

Herd escorted him to a central room set up for data collection. Two people argued about some kind of physics problem. A third checked over controls on a tablet. Anderson was not in sight.

None of them them looked up when Herd and Ranson entered the room.

“Captain Ranson, this is Frasier Hall and Thea River. They'll be assessing the wreckage for us. This is Cory Marner. He will be running the drone for us so we can take pictures before we commit to trying to raise what we saw.” Herd pointed at each person as she talked.

Hall was an older man with the hint of Earth about him. Ranson wasn't sure why he felt that way. He was carrying more weight than you usually saw in space, the pilot supposed. His eyes were bright, and his round face resembled a chipmunk's.

River was younger, wore a belt full of tools, and thick glasses that magnified her eyes. She smiled when she saw Ranson for the first time.

Marner was thin, losing his hair early, and hunched over his tablet. He waved at Ranson, but didn't look up from what he was doing.

“Captain Ranson is going to be taking us to Titan,” said Herd.

“On this old tub?,” said River. “This thing isn't nearly ready to fly.”

“She's right,” said Hall. “The Cordinger has seen better days. The engine has to be gone over with a comb.”

“We're going to taking off in two days,” said Herd. “You might need to get to work if we want to make our deadline.”

“Come on, Thea,” said Hall. “Let's see what we can do with the mess they left us.”

The two of them left the room. River waved as she walked away. Ranson smiled.

“There's nothing wrong with the Cordinger,” said Marner. “Those two just want to make themselves more valuable by saying their baby needs them.”

“How do you know that, Cory?,” asked Herd.

“I did a computer check when we boarded,” said Marner. “It was part of the checklist Tom gave us. The diagnostics didn't flag anything.”

“There still might be something the computer didn't catch,” said Ranson. “Usually, that's because the engineers pulled something loose that was supposed to trigger something, and now it doesn't.”

“Why would someone do that?,” asked Marner. “Sounds unsafe.”

“Sometimes you need the engine to work, but one of the parts is down,” said Ranson. “So you pull the part, and then the indicator so the board will still act like the part is there when it isn't, or so the alarm won't sound and the computer shuts everything down.”

“Sounds dangerous,” said Marner.

“It is,” said Ranson. “It's only something you do if you are stranded and that's the only way to get the engine started. You don't want to run the engine like that for long. That's asking for your engine to break down for good.”

“Let's go up to the control room,” said Herd. “That will give you a chance to look at the controls before we lift off.”

“That will be great,” said Ranson. “I doubt they will be that much different from the ones I'm used to.”

“There's only room enough for you and a co-pilot,” said Herd. She walked out of the meeting room, using a small ladder to get up to the next deck. “We have bunk rooms for us on this deck.”

She kept climbing. She stepped off the ladder at the edge of a cockpit built for two helmsmen working side by side. A major screen allowed a view of the outside when the scanners were live. She sat down in the co-pilot's chair and pushed it out of the way so the pilot could sit in his chair.

Ranson sat down at the controls. Actual piloting was done like his own tug. You typed in a heading and told it to go. A second screen ran everything else. If you needed to answer an emergency light, that was the screen you did it on. A third screen showed navigation data.

“I can handle this,” said Ranson. “It isn't that much different than my tug from the looks of things.”

"There is a set of manual controls that folds out of the helm,” said Herd. “You pull the lever, and a stick and throttle control will flip out for you to use.”

She pointed at the lever at the base of the helm table. Ranson nodded. A secondary control was good in case the digital controls blew out for some reason.

He hoped their trip didn't have anything to make it come to that.