A Return to (In)sanity
Posted: Wed Apr 13, 2011 10:50 pm
2353 hours.
Soladies High Orbital station, Inbound Traffic Control.
Kabden slumped down in the chair next to his shift partner, Orvide. The birdman glanced at the human briefly, his amber eyes still and impassive. Kabden took a long slug from his can of Red Bill and shuddered as the concentrated caffeine thundered into his system. He really hated the late watch. The only traffic was local shuttles ferrying spacers back and forth from the pleasures 'dirt-side' and the rare heavy transport ship or Quirium transporter ponderously returning to the station to offload its cargo. Nothing ever happened on the late shift.
Except for tonight. As Kabden shuffled his backside into the purposely-uncomfortable seat, the long range scanners detected an incoming contact. At first glance at the scan diagnostic, Kabden thought it was just a rogue asteroid, destined to scud through space until it struck a planet, moon or sun. If it was very unlucky, it might even end up filling up a miner's cargo hold. But there was something about its course, an erratic, shaky trajectory more akin to a ship in distress than an unpowered celestial object. On a whim, Kabden fired up the active scanning array and pinged the unidentified object. The scan would take a while, since the array would have to send out a signal then wait for it to return. He waited, ten minutes, twenty. All the time, the object drew closer. Then the array returned a result. The object massed far less than its dimensions, indicating a hollow structure. The mass spectrometer suggested a high quantity of duralium alloy and the high precision EM scans showed minimal energy signatures. That confirmed it. It was a ship, possibly a derelict 'ghost ship', that had finally found a system to rest in. Kabden tapped in the code to dispatch a Hognose recovery ship when the comms system bleeped.
+++Incoming Transmission+++
Szzzzzzz—ead me, this is—it, Regis—ine. Requ—emergen—ing bay clear—peat, emergency do—in—bay clearance.
+++Transmission Lost+++
Kabden sighed and cancelled the recovery ship, no salvage today. Instead, he put the emergency docking bay crews on yellow alert and cleared the docking and launch queues, such as they were, to allow the incoming vessel an easy docking. With this done, he took another sip of Red Bill and watched the scanner with more interest.
The ship took nearly forty minutes to reach the station. A full hour of travel from the first time it appeared on long range. Kabden could tell from the silhouette it was a Python and a mighty old one with it. It moved with a deceptive grace, a sign that an experienced pilot was at the helm, but it showed its age most disgracefully. The external cameras showed a hull rusted and pitted by planetary atmospheres, scarred by laser fire and missile strikes. The nose, oddly enough, was free of any detritus, shining silver in the corona of the planet. An old faded decal defied the rust and filth on the ship's wings and Kabden was shocked to see that there were great gaping holes in the hull. Not just in the hull, through the whole ship. He stared at the screen as he watched the ship turn to match the station's orientation. He was positive there was a hole on the upper port quadrant, four meters down from the cockpit area that travelled through the ship to exit in the lower starboard quadrant. He could see the starfield beyond the Python through the hole. The ship stopped the fine adjustments and started to limp agonisingly slowly toward the docking port. At forty meters, the pilot started matching rotation and Kabden started to relax, they were home and dry. At this point, Orvide started to thumb the magnification of the camera up and focussed on the ship's hull. He was looking for the ship's identification plate, his beak fixed in a concerned expression. He found what he was looking for and gasped.
“DP-099! Oh, crap! Get them to peel off, now! Close the docking port!”, the birdman squawked, getting into a flap, “Don't let them into the docking port!”
Too late, the Python nosed into the broad port and suddenly veered wildly. It slammed into the bottom of the port, and the sound of the impact rang through the station's reinforced hull. Then it ground along the port floor, sending a shower of sparks cascading into space. All of a sudden, it veered again, this time striking the roof of the port. More grinding, more sparks and then, the ship cleared the dock and slammed into the emergency docking bay, where the crashbots doused it with fire-retardant foam and the medbots hurried over to search for survivors. As the droids reached the hull, the gangplank ground slowly open a few feet, before the hydraulics gave up and the entire stairway crashed down onto the deckplates. It was followed, moments later by a rope and a scrawny grey-furred felinoid clad in a grubby flight suit and rebreather mask clambered down it.
The felinoid was followed by a large blue lizard, a chubby ginger felinoid, an insectoid who flew down and a birdoid in a blue lamé evening gown and a hot pink feather boa. The final person to exit the ship was another lithe felinoid who didn't so much climb down the rope as she flowed down it, her claws gripping the course fibers as she descended. Six feet above the deck, she released the rope and landed neatly on all fours, before daintily skipping across the mounds of anti-flame foam to join the rest of the crew. A maintenance droid cruised over to the group, its hover-plate thrumming in the reduced gravity of the docking bay.
“Good morning, Commander. Welcome to Soladies High Orbital station. Will you be making use of the station's award-winning ship maintenance facilities?”, it spoke in a synthesised upper-crust voice, pointedly looking past the crew at the smoking, battered hull of the ship.
The grey cat tugged off his rebreather, tried to comb some semblance of order into his fur, failed, then said, “Well, we're kinda on a budget so could we get the super-ultra-mega-low rate service?”
He flashed a winning smile that stayed welded to his face, even as the burly reptile picked him up one-handed.
“We will be taking the standard service, at the very least. Unless you wish to continue flying while wearing a rebreather, sleeping in the cargo bay, docking by means of a controlled crash landing and eating reclaimed waste.”, the blue-skinned creature growled.
The grey feline turned to the maintenance droid, while still held in the lizard's fist and said, “I think, on consultation with my chief engineer, that the standard maintenance package would be most acceptable.”
“Very good, Commander. All I need is your name, the ship's name and the details of your credit account.”
The feline grimaced at the title, but replied valiantly, “It's Captain Hesperus and the ship's the Dubious Profit, registry DP-099.”
With a degree of cajoling, which included suspending Hesperus over the edge of the docking bay by his ankles, the chief engineer, Rus, was able to extract the details of his employer's credit account and the crew moved into the station proper to find somewhere to get a good drink, or at least one that had not been through a waste recycler....
He's baaack.......
Captain Hesperus
Soladies High Orbital station, Inbound Traffic Control.
Kabden slumped down in the chair next to his shift partner, Orvide. The birdman glanced at the human briefly, his amber eyes still and impassive. Kabden took a long slug from his can of Red Bill and shuddered as the concentrated caffeine thundered into his system. He really hated the late watch. The only traffic was local shuttles ferrying spacers back and forth from the pleasures 'dirt-side' and the rare heavy transport ship or Quirium transporter ponderously returning to the station to offload its cargo. Nothing ever happened on the late shift.
Except for tonight. As Kabden shuffled his backside into the purposely-uncomfortable seat, the long range scanners detected an incoming contact. At first glance at the scan diagnostic, Kabden thought it was just a rogue asteroid, destined to scud through space until it struck a planet, moon or sun. If it was very unlucky, it might even end up filling up a miner's cargo hold. But there was something about its course, an erratic, shaky trajectory more akin to a ship in distress than an unpowered celestial object. On a whim, Kabden fired up the active scanning array and pinged the unidentified object. The scan would take a while, since the array would have to send out a signal then wait for it to return. He waited, ten minutes, twenty. All the time, the object drew closer. Then the array returned a result. The object massed far less than its dimensions, indicating a hollow structure. The mass spectrometer suggested a high quantity of duralium alloy and the high precision EM scans showed minimal energy signatures. That confirmed it. It was a ship, possibly a derelict 'ghost ship', that had finally found a system to rest in. Kabden tapped in the code to dispatch a Hognose recovery ship when the comms system bleeped.
+++Incoming Transmission+++
Szzzzzzz—ead me, this is—it, Regis—ine. Requ—emergen—ing bay clear—peat, emergency do—in—bay clearance.
+++Transmission Lost+++
Kabden sighed and cancelled the recovery ship, no salvage today. Instead, he put the emergency docking bay crews on yellow alert and cleared the docking and launch queues, such as they were, to allow the incoming vessel an easy docking. With this done, he took another sip of Red Bill and watched the scanner with more interest.
The ship took nearly forty minutes to reach the station. A full hour of travel from the first time it appeared on long range. Kabden could tell from the silhouette it was a Python and a mighty old one with it. It moved with a deceptive grace, a sign that an experienced pilot was at the helm, but it showed its age most disgracefully. The external cameras showed a hull rusted and pitted by planetary atmospheres, scarred by laser fire and missile strikes. The nose, oddly enough, was free of any detritus, shining silver in the corona of the planet. An old faded decal defied the rust and filth on the ship's wings and Kabden was shocked to see that there were great gaping holes in the hull. Not just in the hull, through the whole ship. He stared at the screen as he watched the ship turn to match the station's orientation. He was positive there was a hole on the upper port quadrant, four meters down from the cockpit area that travelled through the ship to exit in the lower starboard quadrant. He could see the starfield beyond the Python through the hole. The ship stopped the fine adjustments and started to limp agonisingly slowly toward the docking port. At forty meters, the pilot started matching rotation and Kabden started to relax, they were home and dry. At this point, Orvide started to thumb the magnification of the camera up and focussed on the ship's hull. He was looking for the ship's identification plate, his beak fixed in a concerned expression. He found what he was looking for and gasped.
“DP-099! Oh, crap! Get them to peel off, now! Close the docking port!”, the birdman squawked, getting into a flap, “Don't let them into the docking port!”
Too late, the Python nosed into the broad port and suddenly veered wildly. It slammed into the bottom of the port, and the sound of the impact rang through the station's reinforced hull. Then it ground along the port floor, sending a shower of sparks cascading into space. All of a sudden, it veered again, this time striking the roof of the port. More grinding, more sparks and then, the ship cleared the dock and slammed into the emergency docking bay, where the crashbots doused it with fire-retardant foam and the medbots hurried over to search for survivors. As the droids reached the hull, the gangplank ground slowly open a few feet, before the hydraulics gave up and the entire stairway crashed down onto the deckplates. It was followed, moments later by a rope and a scrawny grey-furred felinoid clad in a grubby flight suit and rebreather mask clambered down it.
The felinoid was followed by a large blue lizard, a chubby ginger felinoid, an insectoid who flew down and a birdoid in a blue lamé evening gown and a hot pink feather boa. The final person to exit the ship was another lithe felinoid who didn't so much climb down the rope as she flowed down it, her claws gripping the course fibers as she descended. Six feet above the deck, she released the rope and landed neatly on all fours, before daintily skipping across the mounds of anti-flame foam to join the rest of the crew. A maintenance droid cruised over to the group, its hover-plate thrumming in the reduced gravity of the docking bay.
“Good morning, Commander. Welcome to Soladies High Orbital station. Will you be making use of the station's award-winning ship maintenance facilities?”, it spoke in a synthesised upper-crust voice, pointedly looking past the crew at the smoking, battered hull of the ship.
The grey cat tugged off his rebreather, tried to comb some semblance of order into his fur, failed, then said, “Well, we're kinda on a budget so could we get the super-ultra-mega-low rate service?”
He flashed a winning smile that stayed welded to his face, even as the burly reptile picked him up one-handed.
“We will be taking the standard service, at the very least. Unless you wish to continue flying while wearing a rebreather, sleeping in the cargo bay, docking by means of a controlled crash landing and eating reclaimed waste.”, the blue-skinned creature growled.
The grey feline turned to the maintenance droid, while still held in the lizard's fist and said, “I think, on consultation with my chief engineer, that the standard maintenance package would be most acceptable.”
“Very good, Commander. All I need is your name, the ship's name and the details of your credit account.”
The feline grimaced at the title, but replied valiantly, “It's Captain Hesperus and the ship's the Dubious Profit, registry DP-099.”
With a degree of cajoling, which included suspending Hesperus over the edge of the docking bay by his ankles, the chief engineer, Rus, was able to extract the details of his employer's credit account and the crew moved into the station proper to find somewhere to get a good drink, or at least one that had not been through a waste recycler....
He's baaack.......
Captain Hesperus
is back and they are going to be for sale everywhere now. Jellybaby market is going to collapse and the Trumbles are going to eat all the Jellybabies. 
