St Brendan is a young colony world.  Like many of the second and third generation colonies, its remoteness is a feature, not a bug.  These worlds do not have strategic locations along the Main Line, nor do they have any great resource of note.**  What it is a good environment for a specific social system to operate- the Roman Catholic Church.

It's slightly lighter than Earth, and drier and cooler, with all of the land in the Northern Hemisphere, much of which is the great Perdos Desert, a broad, dry stretch bigger than all of Earth's desert's put together.  It has native life, but this is at a very simple level.  It's visible from space as splatterings of blue-green in the wetter environments, but those aren't forests, just a microbial sludge.  Not a single plant or animal rises above the lumps and rolls of slime.

The native life of St Brendan is doomed, of course.  The arrival of Earth life, and Earth crops, means all the rest that goes with it:  Earth microbes and even some Earth insects.  There will be trillions of microscopic battles but inch by inch St. Brendan is being conquered by Earth life.  Right now, it's just a few spots around key colony areas, in an equatorial belt, where crops are being raised.

Like virtually every world St. Brendan has an orbital station.  St Brendan Highport is oversized for the planet's small population- perhaps they are optimistic.  But despite the room it has, at the moment it is pretty busy.  Ships on their way to LDMLT-01 have stopped here, including a few of the small traders.



**Not many worlds do, really.  Space is so big and so full of everything that mankind barely scratches the surface of the resources available in the Hundred Worlds.  New worlds are settled more for ideological reasons than a need for anything that planet has.

As in most settled worlds, there is a space station which handles passenger and freight transfers for those not actually landing on the planet- which includes most of the ships larger than the Albatross.  Like most stations, it has a name- this is the Our Lady of Loreto Orbital Terminal.*  Like most stations, its name is often ignored and it is simply called by the name of the planet it serves:  St. Brendan Highport.

Or sometimes, "Port Loretta".

It's in shadow now.  Our Lady of Loreto is in geostationary orbit above the principal settlement area, an equatorial peninsula where St Brendan's unruly climate is somewhat tempered by ocean.  This half of the planet is in night, and on St. Brendan that lasts a long time.  From space you can see the lights from the Port Grace urban area.  The destination of the Albatross, San Lorenzo, is in daylight on the far side.

They pass a large close to the station, being visited by a cargo shuttle.  The Sorraia is a ship of a type that was once more common- a sleeper ship, carrying two thousand colonists at a time in hibernation.  Such travel isn't dangerous as long as it's done under competent medical control, but the preparation and recovery time is such that people don't use it except when they really need low cost very long distance travel.  St. Brendan is still a young colony and it still gets fresh settlers recruited from Earth.

Such large ships don't often, because it's risky maneuvering such a big ship so close, and the hibernating passengers don't mind being handled as cargo. Maybe they would, if they knew.  The Albatross passes by and connects to one of the long docking connectors stretching out from the Highport.

It's hard to judge Marlo's reactions to departing- the alien's face is, by Human standards, unreadable.  Perhaps he wishes he could go on to his rendezvous on his own private ship like this.  The fact that the Alabtross took on no other passengers has baffled him all the way.

With his luggage packed, he does have a final bit of helpful observation to pass on the crew:

"Your species and mine do some things in the same way, that is why Crossers like me are unafraid to travel alone on your ships.  Your culture is not always like ours, but some things are familiar.  If you want to have a trade ship, you must seek out contact and friendship.  I have seen that this is what both our traders and your traders do.  It is the same.  Some of these friendships are not deep.  They are created only for the purpose of gaining trade opportunities.  But they are made all the same.  So I advise you to seek this out when you can, and remember, that for a trader, no good comes from angering a journalist.  That too is the same, in your species and mine."



*The Patron Saint of Aviation since, unofficially and altogether unexpectedly, the 13th century.  It was finally made official in the 20th, when aviation actually existed.

The news Marlo had shared with her regarding Carinans' activities had worried Florence a bit. The fleet knew of it - according to him anyway - but still. She wasn't so sure about the "winning" part though: propaganda and simple ignorance certainly played a big part in making that claim. Sure, Carinans had been pushed back, but defeated? She seriously doubted it'd be possible unless they were exterminated…and the galaxy was vast. More likely, they had temporarily shifted their focus to other areas easier to control while they rebuilt their forces.

Worse… How long would it take for some humans to try to take advantage of that situation and negotiate something with the machines, thinking themselves too smart to get in troubles? That didn't make for a cheery thought at all. Not that she could do much of anything about it of course. And it was far from being her primary problem at the moment.

Florence seemed a bit melancholic towards the end, particularly as they docked at Port Loretta. It was probably because Marlo was leaving: despite the two of them not being of the same species, he was the only person she gone out of her way to talk to when off-duty. Oh, she had still done everything she had been supposed to but she hadn't gone much beyond that. It seemed she had lost hope or the desire to show anything to the crew. Despite that, she had taken care to prepare all the papers for custom's inspections and to make sure the delivery of the cargo would take care as smoothly as possible. As far as bureaucracy was concerned anyway.

"Thank you for taking care of the legal forms Florence, you sure I can't talk you into staying? I'd love to keep you around."

Florence seemed to consider the question for a moment. After a few seconds, she shook her head. “I don't think you can.” She seemed to hesitate before finally adding. “There are too many things that I consider wrong with the ship for me to be comfortable here. Things that, as it has been made clear, I can't even begin to change.”

She sighed. “Which is a bit sad really, but…” She snorted. “Well, since no one wants to hear my opinion… Hell, no one considers I can have one, or assumes I can't do anything right to the point that the last time I talked I was accused of betraying a secret that wasn't even one. For the record and in case it matters in the future, even young people, even someone who never served aboard a ship has things to offer and can be someone you can count on. Automatically assuming the opposite isn't a great strategy.”

After a slight pause, she shrugged. “Not that what I say now matters all that much I guess.” She looked around, obviously melancholic. “And I hope I'm wrong, but…” She shook her head.

"Hmmmm, too bad, you would have been a real asset, that I know. I never had a problem listening to an opinion by the way, doesn't mean I have to agree with you on everything. We'll see how the captain does, he may not have long to prove himself."

“The problem wasn't that you didn't listen. And I didn't expect everyone to agree to whatever I say.” Florence shrugged. “Not that I like it, but it's pretty normal. That's not the problem.”

She frowned. “Maybe it was indeed too soon.”

Horace frowned, "Too soon to try it? I think you're doing fine, as is Nique. I've learned plenty from both of you already."

The pause at the station is brief, enough to settle things with Marlo. Their destination is Mission San Lorenzo, a small town on the "Rain Coast" of St. Brendan.  From here, it is the far side of the planet.

St. Brendan is drier than Earth, with almost all of its land being in the great continent that covers most of the Northern Hemisphere.  Much of it is very dry, very harsh desert.  But planets are enormous, diverse places.  Along one stretch of the continent, the coast runs east-west, south of the equator.  There is a current in the ocean to the south that brings cold water up from the south pole.  North of this coast is the planet's highest mountain range.  The arrangement brings cold moist air up from the south, and traps it against these equatorial mountains.  The result is rain, and a very wet climate, with rain almost daily, despite the planet being dry overall.

If it was a planet with a well developed biosphere it would be thick forest, but here there is only mile after mile of slimy blue green muck.  The rain has carved into the land where it can, and after many years of this, the blue green carpet is actually a forest of a sort- but made of pillow like lumps of slippery squish sitting atop little mounds of stone, some as big as cars, separated by the rivulets and streamlets of rainwater.

Where the rain fed streams meet they form rivers, and these form larger river.  San Lorenzo lies close to one which joins four others in a large bay, like fingers on a glove.  The little town here has no navigational equipment of its own, and of course it's cloudy, it usually is, so the pilot will have to land using the radar image of the terrain, and then visual when closer in. But not to worry, that's how Neil Armstrong set down on the moon.  Pilots have been doing this for a long time now.

This wouldn't work where the water was more crowded, such as near a more populated area.  But human settlement is thin, here.  There is plenty of room in the bay in which to set down a starship.

You wouldn't be able to see the town of San Lorenzo itself until on final approach, down out of the cloud deck.

“To soon in the formation of the crew for me to come.” Florence shook her head. “It's not a problem of learning or not, but of both you and Einar not having the time to learn your new roles and settle down, before someone who didn't fit nicely like me came along.” The girl lifted a shoulder. “Maybe that way you'll have the time for it, and make the mistakes that come with it, without someone getting pissed off.”

As the ship flew to San Lorenzo, Florence appeared absorbed by what she saw on the screens, not paying attention to anything else. Or maybe she was simply staring blindly while puzzling over something else. Though since there wasn't anything she was supposed to be doing at that point, it probably didn't matter which it was.

 As usual, Regie seemed to come out of thin air,as was his habit on the ship. He leaned against the bulkhead,as he listened to the conversation." I think you should leave the crew Florence. If you are that thin skinned, then I don't think you could handle certain situations that might crop up, on board."

Florence turned towards Reginald. "Thin-skinned." She seemed to taste the word, or maybe wanted to be sure she had heard right. She didn't bother answering with more than a "Woh." though.

What would be the point? One, nothing had changed her mind, and two if not wanting to be involved in the way things were handled on the Albatros was being "thin-skinned", she was fine with it. Plus, she didnt know what other situations Reginald was thinking about, but she was pretty sure she didn't want to.

And if he still thought her problem was that they hadn't agreed with her, there was even less of a point: she had already said that multiple times. If he didn't believe her, she didn't need to repeat herself once again. Assuming he even tried to understand what she was saying, which she didn't believe. From Horace, sure. The others, not so much.

So instead, she simply shook her head and turned back to the screens.

   Dominiq kept herself busy during the voyage to St. Brendan - there was more than enough to do aboard the ship to keep a girl occupied, after all. Whether it was watching screens on the bridge, taking notes as Horace explained some of the rules of how to be a good broker, or even keeping the workspaces clean and neat, Shabazz kept busy regardless. As a result, most of the first evenings were spent recovering from the day's events and reviewing notes before falling into bed and sleeping like a rock.

   On their journey, she'd also taken time to note the interactions between her fellow crew members. One thing that she'd learned as a musician was to read people past their first impressions in order to get a sense of who she could deal with and who needed to be kept at a distance. She'd met all kinds in the years that she'd been a part of the music scene and considered herself a reasonable judge of character, but she could sense that there was tension in the air around Pearce, Gain, and Captain Karvonen. She didn't understand the dynamics of what was going on between them all, but she kept out of any interaction between the trio when it arose. She might be crew, but there were just some things that one didn't get involved with.

   The only thing she kept a wide berth away from was the Crosser, Marlo. Everyone else seemed to have no difficulty with the alien, and Pearce had gone so far as to spend most of her time with it, but Dominiq did no such thing. She was polite, kept her answers and speech as neutral as she could, but outside of her official duties, she kept herself as far away as possible.

   While at the Station, she did take the time to have a look at the place where they were headed - Mission San Lorenzo. She'd frowned at the mention of the place is on the "Rain Coast", and thought she'd have to break out her wet-weather gear when they arrived there. With her chin resting on a platform made by her closed fists, she winced at the mention of the local terrain and wildlife. "Slimy little things ... and some not so little." had been her only comment about it all.

   "So when we're about to land," she asked Horace as they were about to leave the station and make their way to the planet, "How am I going to fit in all of this? If I'm supposed to be crew, there should be a spot where I'm going  to fit into the puzzle."

"Take comms on the bridge and deal with landing with the pilot. It'll keep you busy."

This is the sparsely settled back side of the planet.  There are a number of small towns and settlements, but the nearest town of any size is Fidelis, capital of the Rain Coast District, 2000 miles away to the west.  2500 miles past that is Caritas, capital of the West Coast district.  Planets like St. Brendan with one ocean and one landmass often have ambiguous geographical terms, “West Coast” here means that it is on the western side of the continent, it is the eastern shore of the sea.  The main settled area is across that sea… or across a dry and forbidding and very large continent, going in the other direction.

Global communications is handled by a satellites, but they are of the lower power type and communications cuts out as the ship passes through the upper atmosphere.  This is normal here- communications comes back on as the ship gets lower.

Florence looks up information on local transport here.  It’s not well developed.  The planet has a single airline with exactly four long range aircraft, Skyline St. Brendan, but it doesn’t get to Mission San Lorenzo.  Skyline connects the main city of Port Grace with Fidelis, but that’s it.  Shorter range aircraft can’t get here from Fidelis.  Florence learns that there are high speed ocean ferries, but the trip to Fidelis takes two days, with stops along the way.

Out here there is no one controlling flights.  They are too rare.  Once the orbital station gives clearance for a ship, if they are not headed for one of the larger settlements they are on their own.  Scrolling through the communications stations in the area as the ship re-enters the communications zone, you can see that there is a local security and safety office in Mission San Lorenzo that is continuously manned.  You could contact them and notify them that you are arriving, though it is not actually required.

 Reggie did nothing more then raise an eyebrow.  But then looked out of the view screen to enjoy the landing.

While the situation wasn't as good as she would have hoped, it was also far from what she was afraid of so Florence was mostly satisfied. Plus, two days on a ferry could be fun, right?

Satisfied, she finished preparing the documents to remove herself from the crew and give Horace his share back: she had never felt too good about it, so she was certainly not going to hold to it now that she was leaving, one million or not. All that remained was for her to send everything to Einar and Horace which she was going to do as soon as the cargo was delivered. Well, unless they wanted to get rid of her even before that of course but she wasn't going to do less than she had said she would.

Then, as soon as everything was wrapped up - and she had her month's salary - she'd be out of the ship and out of their way which would be to everyone's relief. Thinking about that she smirked: that was at least something everyone was going to agree about!

When the ship touched down on the water Horace was strapped in tight, if they were going to be landing in water all the time, he needed to learn to swim.

   Dominiq settled into her chair at the communications console and worked things as best she could. She was more comfortable with a sound mixer than a linguistic translator, but she attempted to manage as best she could. After she'd settled herself into her seat and followed Horace's lead in securing herself, she'd thanked the Port Loretta terminal after they'd been given clearance, then turned her attention to where they'd be landing - Mission San Lorenzo.

   The lack of stations and aerospace control assets in the region made Shabazz shake her head. "Be largely on our own once we land," she muttered to no one in particular and glanced in the direction of Reggie, who seemed to be enjoying the view from where he was.

   After she'd found the frequency for the Mission's security office, she stabbed a finger on the button to open communications. "Mission San Lorenzo, this is the Free Trader Albatross," She called, using a firm and even tone. "We're on approach vector to your position. If there is a designated landing point, please advise and instruct us on how to reach it."

San Lorenzo bay did look like a hand, sort of, extending northward from the sea.  Mission San Lorenzo was positioned along the index favor.  Less than eight thousand people lived in the town, though if one included all the smaller settlements around the bay the total coming under Mission San Lorenzo's watch was over 20,000.  By Human standards a nearly inconsequential town.  There were buildings with more people.

Most of Mission San Lorenzo was built along a single road paralleling the shore.  In the approximate middle was the Security and Safety office, sharing a building with administrative offices and a communications center.  The tower was the most prominent structure in the town. Someone was always listening there, mostly, for any calls for help.  Aircraft landings were rare.  Spacecraft...  Dominique's hail caught them quite by surprise.

After an initial excited confirmation greetings, the young voice on the radio was replaced by an older one.

There's a quick check to make sure there are no boats where the Albatross will set down, and then the ship is directed in, and directed up to the Mission San Lorenzo docks, which are simple sand and block quays. Once again the ship touches down, and there is the feeling of gentle rocking afterwards, something spacers who are used to other kinds of landings might have to get used to.

The voices at the Mission San Lorenzo Safety and Security office certainly sound excited about the ships's arrival.  Apparently, they do not keep it a secret, because even as the ship heads for the dock, you can see ahead that people are quickly gathering.   It seems the arrival of a starship is something of an Event.

Florence grumbled under her breath. Given the way the cargo had been prepared, unloading wouldn't be all that hard - it would mostly be about getting the vehicles out of the hold - but making sure that everything went to the right place would be a bit harder. Thankfully, that wasn't her problem to deal with.

Pretty much all she'd have to do would be to hand over the documents to security and those who came to claim the cargo and answer any questions they might have. Or at least be there to answer questions if needed, but Einar would probably want to do it himself. Not that it mattered too much anyway.

   At the excited greetings from the young voice, Dominiq smiled softly to herself. It reminded her of when she toured post-release, and her music started making 'bank', as she'd heard it called. Parties, schmoozing with the local movers and shakers, and publicity events had always left her drained at the end. From a quick dark-eyed scan outside, she noted the people gathering around the front of the ship.

   "The locals are looking forward to meeting us, at least," she remarked after she'd closed the channel with the Safety & Security office. After a brief glance in the direction of where the crowd was gathering, she added, "Not as flashy as some of the places I've been to, but looks like we'll be a popular bunch once I meet them."

   She turned in her chair slightly and addressed the rest of the crew gathered on the Bridge. "Any plans on what we should do about the locals?"

"Give them their cargo is my suggestion, then ask if anyone wants to leave."

  "I'll leave the cargo details to you, Mr Wymp," she nodded in his direction and spoke semi-formally, in respect to the man's position. At his mention of asking if anyone wished to leave, brown eyes darted to the airlock door. Briefly reminded of the redheaded Pearce and her vocal wish to depart the Albatross, she also remembered the woman spending most of her time with the alien, Marlo until de-boarding at Port Loretta. Dominiq wondered a moment why Pearce hadn't departed along with - spending more time together could give her more time to interact and study its ways - but she'd stayed aboard until the ship had landed here at San Lorenzo ...

   "Sorry, momentarily distracted," Shabazz's lips thinned as she took in a long breath and let it out slowly. She returned her attention to the window and took another look towards the gathering throng. "Considering how much different 'spacer' life is from working a farm or fishing off a boat, doan' be surprised if more than a few ask to leave. Do we have any way of vetting anyone who comes aboard?"

"Hmmm, how thick is their wallet?" he said with a smile.

He readied to offload the cargo, Florence had the paperwork.

Florence didn't really believe they'd have a lot of takers as far as passengers went, but didn't share her opinion: what happened to the ship past this delivery wasn't her problem anymore. As she had promised, she'd stay until the job here was done, but that was all.

To that effect, she shared some of the documents she had prepared: one was for local security and was a custom's form declaring everything in the cargohold - and the crew - but omitting any personal details. The other was a much more detailed list, aimed at whoever was to receive something from the cargohold so that they could come fetch their possessions.

She considered for a moment mentioning that getting some security around to insure a safe delivery wouldn't go amiss, but that not being her job, she kept her mouth shut. She didn't want to get into another arguments mere moments before she left the ship.

"Miss Pearce, are you ready to deliver the cargo to the proper people? I assume you are because you're always prepared. Check their credentials good so whoever that is supposed to receive gets their cargo."

Colonies can be classified in many ways- by age, or environment, or economy.  Or by by how the population answers the question "why are you here?"  This last one is bound to produce interesting answers in the less desirable colonies, where the colonist is certain to miss out on so many of the pleasures of life one could find in modern cities, even of the less prosperous kind.  No one had to go to Mission San Lorenzo.  And it's such a young place, everyone coming here knew they would be at the very beginning, doing the hardest work of taming a planet.

Who does something like that?  Especially now, with so many planets tamed.  Earth isn't crowded anymore.  No place is crowded.  And aliens aren't insisting that Humans move into space, like they did once.  That job is done.

Three kinds of people, really.

There are those that see it as an investment.  Get in at the very start, get some land, get a business going when a colony is tiny.  One day, if it has grown large, you might be rich.

There are those that love the adventure.  It is something of a rush, to build and create where no one has ever built or created.

And there are the believers, driven by the promise of the place.

Mission San Lorenzo is young, and harsh, and the people here are mostly in the Believer category.  Here because the they think a small, remote, tightly knit, and religiously observant settlement is the place they ought to be.

Possibly because it is so remote, the arrival of the Albatross is a really big deal.  The crowd assembles so quickly and so spontaneously you'd think the crew was giving away prizes.  And it is growing by the minute.  Apparently, "a starship landed in the water" is enough of an excuse to leave almost any job.

According to the documentation you have, the cargo is to be delivered to the Works Director at Mission San Lorenzo, one Mr. Kurtiss Ferro.

But there are a lot of people swarming around the dock.  No one is holding an I am Kurtiss Ferro sign.  It seems the excited rush got here ahead of the formal welcome.

Looking at the screens, Florence grimaced. “Everything goes to the same person: Kurtis Ferro, Works Director.”

After a second, the girl added. “We should probably call him and ask how he wants to proceed. He'll need to come in person to sign the documents anyway. And get him, or someone, to send some security people: someone could get hurt in that crowd…” Not that this was her job at all, but at this point… “And maybe don't finish the approach to the dock until security is here…”
This message was last edited by the player at 02:37, Fri 21 Feb 2020.

 Reggie was already wearing his jacket for when they went dirtside. It concealed a couple of matters best left unspoken.

" Want to go go first Captain? I can pave the way for the rest, as it where. Or I can try and find out to whom we speak about the cargo." Offered Reggie

Kurtiss Ferro, Works Director, was one of those young but so eager and driven individuals that everyone above him knew he had to be given something, anything, in which to quench his energy.  Most young people end up with small jobs in big places, but someone like Kurtiss Ferro is wasted there, and can only be given a big job in a small place.

A small place, comfortably out of everyone's immediate proximity.  Overachievers tend to be unwanted.  They set bad examples.  So the young man, quite soon out of school, was given his own small colony site to manage, the furthest from the main cities on St. Brendan.  He's been here since close to the start.

As works director, he is not the legal authority here.  St. Brendan has one Governate for the whole planet, with the leaders in Port Grace.  The Governate has one representative here, the Magistrate, who acts as judge and mayor, and there is a Sheriff, in charge of security and emergency response.  But Kurtiss is the representative of the settlement's sponsors- he is entrusted with the money, and it is up to him to plan and execute the physical development of Mission San Lorenzo.  His budget is bigger than the Magistrates, so in a way.. maybe he is the leading official.

He made his way to the docks as soon as he learned of what was going on... indirectly, through the crowd, the way almost everyone else did. He was far from the first, and hundreds of people are already there, with more arriving, as he shows up.

Kurtiss doesn't look "official", he's young, lean, and long haired, hardly the person one might picture in this role.  His eyes are wide with expectation, though, and of all the people here he looks the most excited.  He's very excited, in fact, and between that and the crowd he can't hear any call on his communicator.

He shouts at the people around him, first, as he tries to get nearer.

"Let me through, I think they are here for me!"

As he gets closer he starts shouting towards the ship.

"Are you here for me?  Did the Monsignor Saniez send you?"

With nothing better to do, Florence was simply watching the gathering crowd get closer to the ship. She wasn't particularly worried for herself, but she was concerned: things could go pear-shaped in a hurry in situations like that. At some point though, she noticed something different, someone who seemed to want to get closer for more than simple curiosity. She hadn't thought to switch the sound on - there hadn't been anything to listen to before after all - so she was unable to hear him, but the way he tried to progress was telling.

“There's one guy here who seems to know more than the rest.”

"Yeah Florence, that appears to be our guy. Confirm his credentials and we can get busy."

Florence blinked, surprised: with Dominique on the coms, Reginald in charge of security and Einar doing Einar things, she obviously hadn't expected to be the one tasked to do anything about the man they supposed to be Kurtiss. She considered asking how she was supposed to verify anything in this crowd, much less get heard but thought better of it, predicting there'd be little point.

So instead she stood. “Okay.” She turned away and walked out of the bridge to do what she be been asked to… with no idea of how exactly she was going to be able to. After a brief hesitation, she went to pick up her laptop: if she turned the sound to the maximum, hopefully the first few rows would hear her.

She then went to the airlock, careful to not step out. She had her laptop relay her question. “Hello. We're looking for a Mr. Kurtiss Ferro to deliver some cargo. Could you please let him through if he's around or warn him if he isn't please? And please step back a little, it would make things much easier for everyone and we don't want anyone to get hurt. You'll have at least a few hours to get close if you want to, there's no hurry.”

Alwin tensed a little when he learned of the crowd that had shown up.  Probably nothing to worry about, he thought to himself.  There could be any number of reasons why such a gathering gad amassed so quickly.  The most likely explanation being that they didn't get much traffic on St Brendan, and that their arrival was something of a novelty.  Still, he probably wouldn't relax until the crowd had dispersed.

One of the nice things about a tiny settlement: everyone knows who everybody is.  Florence's request has the gathered crowd looking around.  It is sensible enough.  After all, Kurtiss is the one who's been getting supplies and equipment delivered.  Usually not by starship, though.

People start passing the call for Kurtiss Ferro back through the crowd even as the Works Director, now flanked by one of the town's security officers, moves forward, and somewhere about midway the request reaches him.  After that, as people turn and recognize, the crowd parts, forming a tight lane for Kurtiss and the security officer to move forward.

The security officer is an older looking man, maybe somewhere in his fifties.  He pulls out his portacomp and starts scrolling through communications options.  The Albatross, naturally, isn't in his directory and there doesn't seem to be a "contact random starship" choice.  It isn't made to link to standard navigation channels, but the office back in town is connected, and so he requests to talk to the Albatross through them.

But meanwhile, not slowing down for such details, an excited Works Director jogs forward.

"Yes, yes that's me!  Are you here for me?  From Monsignor Saniez??"

The people around him seem to agree, and there is at least one "Yes, this is him!"

Florence eyed the crowd a bit warily as she waited for an answer to her request. She noted that no one was stepping back, but at least it didn't look like there was a real danger for the time being. That was something at least. Finally when Kurtiss stepped close, she turned in his direction. “I'll need to check your ID please.” Glancing at the people around, she added. “Not that I doubt you, but…” She shrugged, as if it was as much an inconvenience to her as to everyone else. “Procedures…”

Once she had confirmation that the man she was talking to was indeed the one she was looking for, she nodded. “Thank you. Come in so that we can decide how to proceed.” Looking at the security officer at his side, she added. “We'll need to open the cargohold, which means among other things that we have to lower a ramp. Can you make sure we can do that safely please?” After a brief hesitation, she added. “I'll close the hatch for now, I'm sure you can contact Mr. Ferro if needed, alright?”

After that, she invited Kurtiss to follow her inside and closed the hatch, not wanting anyone to wander in. Once done, she led Kurtiss inside. “The shipment comes from Monsignor Saniez indeed. If you can give me a comcode, I'll send the manifest to you.” As soon as she got his number, she sent the documents and continued. “As you can see, there's quite a lot but we shipped in a hurry and I'm afraid most of it is stored in the vehicles. We tried to sort it out a bit, but we simply lacked the containers to do more than that.” After a brief pause, she continued. “I suggest we get the vehicles out of the cargohold and onto the quay, where your people can then take over and drive them wherever you want them to. You're of course welcome to check the vehicles and whatever's on them in the meantime maybe with a couple of your people if you need to, but I'll need you to sign the delivery note before you take anything over. Does that work for you? Do you have any question?”

   Dominiq gave Wymp a half-sincere smirk as she watched him make his way to the airlock and head downstairs towards the Cargo Bay. She kept herself busy by keeping watch over both the comm channels, as well as an occasional glance through the window down at the gathered crowd outside of the ship. The throng outside reminded her briefly of the times she'd stepped off of a passenger shuttle and into the waiting crowd of people that inevitably showed up when she arrived. Those crowds had been there to see her; carrying placards and shouting to get her attention, while 2 and 3-D cameras recorded her every move ...

   From what she could tell, the gathered throng didn't appear to be the sort who enjoyed her slow rhythmic style and jazz-flavoured beat, but Shabazz knew that you couldn't judge your clientele by how they looked; she had fans from almost every walk of life and age range, so it rarely surprised her when she found someone that didn't 'fit the mould', as some called it.

   The only thing that she worried about was the size of the crowd and the fact that it was growing quickly. This group seemed easy-going enough, but that could easily change in an instant. Mob mentality was something she was familiar with  - not every crowd she'd met had been happy to see her, after all. Especially on the more conservative-minded worlds. She wasn't sure about St. Brendan, but it was always better to be more safe than sorry.

   She watched the crowd as the Works Director, Kurtiss Ferro, stepped forward. Doesn't look like much, she thought when she saw him. But considering the way the man looked and dressed, compared to the way the others were deferring to him, it was another case of the old mantra - Never judge a book by its cover.

   More people were joining the ones who'd already arrived. She stabbed a comm-link stud, then spoke calmly. "Looks like quite a welcoming committee. Careful, the crowd's nearing critical mass."

After checking, confirming, identifying...

They finally manage to get Kurtiss Ferro and security officer over to the ship, and they can meet.

Kurtiss looks very impressed with the Albatross.  There are boats tied up here as well, and the Albatross bigger than any of them.  Even the cross bay ferry.

He doesn't have documents describing exactly what he's getting, of course- a lot of it was fairly randomly collected donations, so he'd have no way of knowing what was coming in detail.  And the documentation at Lyonesse was sort of weak- they were more interested in getting it moving than doing a perfect inventory.  Still, the Monseigneur had made it clear that it was all listed as going to him.

"This really does make a difference," he says.  "You know, a place like this, we're still a very early stage colony site.  There aren't any known critical resources here yet, so we're dependent on fundraising.  We're trying to develop, and this will help.  We have donors who have been insisting we get some road building done."

"I hope you don't mind the crowd outside," the security officer says.  "We don't get visits like this often.  Most ships coming to St Brendan land elsewhere, and people use air and sea transport to get here.  We didn't know they were sending a ship that could do this."

"We're not poor," Kurtiss emphasizes.  "We're starting.  We don't have much, but we're working on it.  How long are you here for?  Do you want to see the settlement, see what we do here?"

“We were wondering why a colony of already several years needed what seemed like basic equipment.” Florence paused, then added. “It's no worries that you don't know exactly what you're supposed to get. The important thing is that you sign for everything you do get: it's more for us than for you, that way if anyone asks we can prove we delivered everything we were given.”

The girl led both men to the cargo-hold, quietly listening and nodding here and there. She reassured the security officer. “For now the crowd is not a problem, as long as they don't try to get in the ship.” She paused. “But when we're going to get the vehicles out of the hold... They take a lot of place. As for the ship, it was a matter of convenience both here and in Lyonesse really.”

“The ship will probably leave as soon as the cargo is delivered. I'm not sure to be honest.” Florence shrugged, apparently unconcerned. “But I will spend a few days here myself. I don't know exactly for long as I haven't decided yet, but I need a bit of time for myself.”

Horace saw the captain slip off of the ship after they landed, but didn't know where he was headed. He headed for the cargo hold to make sure everything went smoothly for the delivery. He knew Florence had the paperwork side set and ready, maybe Nique could fill in and replace Florence and help with the admin side of the operation. Unless he can get things worked out between Reggie and Florence. Florence might stay then.
This message was last edited by the player at 18:49, Sat 29 Feb 2020.

**********************************

The Commonwealth has been stable for centuries.  The Governates are allowed a wide range of individual social, economic and legal styles, and this is part of the strength of the system.  People who do not like their Government have the right to leave.  The discontented are interviewed by Commonwealth specialists, to determine if the cause is a genuine incompatibility with the charter of their Governate.  Generally, reasons for wanting to leave are personal, or economic, but when there is a fundamental mismatch of ideology, the Governate must pay relocation costs, and the Commonwealth selects a more appropriate Governate.

This has had the effect of suppressing political activism throughout the Commonwealth.  Rather than arouse the citizens of a government to demand something different, activists are sent away to a Governate more in line with their beliefs.

*************************************

The two men from the colony know the crowd isn’t going to swarm onto the starship… well, maybe a few children, out of curiosity.

“Don’t worry,” Kurtiss says. “We have one of the lowest rate of Resettlement cases on the planet.. outgoing, at least.”

“A credit to our colonist, and out donors, and especially Mr. Ferro,” the security officer says.

“A place like this wouldn’t make it without donors, and ours have been very supporting… very eager to see us develop,” Kurtiss Ferro explains.  “One of them funded these machines you’ve brought.  Yes, we already have a few pieces of construction equipment, we wouldn’t have built anything without them, but he’s been...well.. impatient with the progress on certain things.  Roads, especially.  This is a difficult landscape to build roads on, and we’d like to connect all the settlements in the region.”

“There’s been a lot of discussion about construction priorities,” the security officer says.  “We don’t always agree but the donors are the donors, right?  Kurtiss is spending their money, after all.”

"I am," Kurtiss concedes.  "It's true, we have to weigh priorities here.  So, can we unload?  And then, you can enjoy the hospitality of our little home."

"Not that there's much," the security officer says.  "There really aren't many visitors, and social life here is, you probably know, very much church, community and family oriented.  It's not the starports you must visit.  But we'd be happy to show you around.  Even getting here the way you did, you know, you are our celebrities of the day."

“I don't doubt it.” Florence nodded. And she didn't, not really. Such things were rare after all, especially on young colonies. She was pretty sure it would pick up at some point, but that wasn't a problem. Especially not now.

“It sounds like you have plenty of work to look to then. You can unload yes.” Florence added after a slight hesitation. “I'm pretty sure the Captain and XO will want us - as in the crew - to move the vehicles out of the hold and have your drivers take over once outside though. Just a matter of responsibility.” She wondered what they were waiting for in fact. Was she supposed to deal with everything by herself now? “But that should give you the time to call whatever drivers you need and make sure the crowd outside knows what's going to happen.”

“I wouldn't mind being shown around and I think I'd like to spend some time out there to see how it is,” She waved beyond the town. “But I'm sure you have a lot of more pressing things to do.” The girl grimaced slightly, not particularly eager to be treated as a celebrity. “As long as you tell me where I'll be able to spend a few nights, it'll be good enough for now.”

Horace stood just withing earshot was glad she handled it so well. He hoped she'd change her mind and stay. For that to happen she had to get along with Reggie and the captain. He wondered where the captain went?

The Captain had retreated to the ship's engineering spaces.

He had realized something:  in a small ship, there really wasn't that much daylight between "captaining" and "owning".  This was no superliner, with a hundred junior stewards to keep in line, nor was this a warship with a military crew to command.  With such a small crew, and shared ownership, captaining without broker skills was more like being Chief Engineer.  His job was to attend to the ship and make sure things got done.  In reality, Horace was better suited to the real decision making:  he was the one with the brokerage and marketing talents, and those were the things that really guided a little frontier transport.  Einar was better suited to driving the bus and keeping the tires filled than choosing the route.

Although...

That being said, there were other issues that did involve his expertise.  The ship, right out of the re-sale yard and still benefiting from its last servicing, was in good shape. But all ships need steady maintenance.  Normally, a crew can only do so much, and ships get their regular checks and services in star ports.  That was the real danger in stopping at places like Mission San Lorenzo, and that was why few ships would dare such a thing.  An equipment failure here would mean the ship was stuck, until it could be properly serviced, and since it didn't look like there were any facilities here...  that would mean waiting for a surface ship to tow the Albatross across the sea to a starport.  That could be a while.  So the mission of the Captain, now, was to make sure absolutely nothing was wrong, or even leaning slightly in the direction of wrong.  This was a lot of work.  So many systems on a ship!

Einar added to the ship's "to buy" list:  at least one vacc suit, and maybe an exterior repair drone.

Things like this needed attention.  Einar decided to let Horace do the decision making.

Comms << "Mister Gain, are you free at the moment? This is the XO speaking.">>

This message was deleted by the player at 05:59, Tue 03 Mar 2020.

   Dominiq played at the console while the others left the bridge and went about their duties. Occasional furtive glances outside showed the growing crowds near the ship, along with her growing unease about the situation. From what she could tell, most of the people gathered there looked like substance farmers and hardscrabble colonists who might pose little threat, but she knew that one could never trust people on face value - too many had soured that idea for her in the past.

   Her eyes caught sight of the redheaded Pierce talking with the Work Boss, Kurtiss Ferro. She couldn't hear what the two were talking about, but she guessed that it had to do with the cargo they were carrying. Shabazz looked at first to Pierce, then Ferro and noted the difference between them; compared with the redhead's utilitarian look and colourful silk scarf, Ferro looked more like a filthy, dishevelled farmhand than a leader ...

   She continued her work on the console and tried to keep herself busy while everyone else was attending to ship's business, and kept tossing a glance in the direction of the gathering throng. "Hopefully, this doesn't take long ..."

Florence's question surprises the two locals.

They had assumed, naturally, that she'd be staying on the ship.  Sure, space crews often disembark and move into hotel rooms, but that's generally resorts, to unwind and enjoy themselves.

Mission San Lorenzo isn't exactly on the tourist maps.

People don't stay here for the heck of it.  It has its accommodations, of course.  There are always visitors, such as temporary workers, traveling students, and visiting family.  But no one comes without good reason.

They stay in one of several places.  Longer term visitors often rent one of the "Box Cottages".  These are small prefab homes left over from the first colonization effort when dozens were imported.  Many of the original residents used them as temporary lodgings while they built permanent homes, and an enterprising entrepreneur bought a few dozen to make "Box Cottage Village Rentals".  The university here has "Academic Housing" available for students, staff and visitors.  And there are two genuine hotels in town, the Angel Arms (brand new and actually quite a nice place with an excellent Traveller's Aid Society rating) and the somewhat cheaper San Lorenzo Pod Hostel, where you get a private pod, pretty much big enough for a bed.

Kurtiss and the Security Officer explain all this as the cargo is unloaded.  As they see it, if Florence or anyone is looking to stay a few days to shake off the tight confines of shipboard living, definitely avoid the Pod Hostel- you want the Angel Arms.

It takes only about an hour to move everything off the ship, and count it all up.  Already is being trucked up the road to the diocese warehouse.

If anyone ventures closer to town, they would see that the road from the docks leads right into the heart of the little town, becoming the main street.  It's paved with fine gravel.  Like many startup colonies in remote locations it is a mix of modern and ancient.  It's easy to import some things, but on the other hand, building materials are bulky and heavy so colonies build with what they can produce available- here it is grayish and tanish bricks.  And there are... donkeys?  Quite a few of them, being used as pack animals.  The little animals can pick their way between the great humps of rock and native life, and they don't need expensive imported parts for upkeep.  They do a lot of the work that simple robots due elsewhere.

“The Angel Arms will work perfectly.” Florence smiled gratefully. As she listened to Kurtiss and the Security Officer explaining all that, she still paid attention to the unloading process, making sure every item delivered was marked as such on the delivery note. Once everything was done, she had all parties sign it - meaning Kurtiss and Horace here - then sent copies to the both of them.

After that, her job done, Florence went to see Einar to officially complete her resignation and get what she was owed. At the same time, she sent over the papers confirming that she gave Horace's share back to him, as she had always intended to do.

A minute later, she stepped out of the ship pulling the suitcase containing most of her stuff, the remaining of it in a messenger bag. She turned back to the ship for a moment, and said a few last words to Horace. “Thanks for the lessons. And good luck, no matter where you go from here.” She seemed to hesitate for a brief moment, but simply added, “Take care.”

With a small wave and a sad smile, the girl turned around and walked towards the town. Quickly, she became fascinated by the donkeys. She hadn't had many opportunities to see living animals and it showed: she was fine as long as they stayed a reasonable distance from her, but any that approached a bit too close was met with a yelp and a quick shuffle away.

As such, it delayed her arrival to the hotel quite a bit, but she finally got there and asked for a room for a couple of days. She'd likely need more, but since she didn't know yet, she thought that two would do for the time being.

Before she left, Horace gave Florence a big hug and a kiss on the cheek. "Good luck, sorry I couldn't do more for you, but you did get to serve on your father's ship and you did a good job. Thank you."

On the bridge of Albatross, the computer call up various options for a next destination, now that the ship's first assignment has been completed.

Of course, leaving immediately is certainly not required.  You can certainly stay a little, visit, see what turns up, what can you learn.  Even though this rustic little frontier settlement doesn't seem like it would have much opportunity for a merchant... you never know.

But if you leave:  A quick stop at the orbital station is recommended, to top off the fuel tanks again.  Out on the frontier the stops can be far apart.

The Albatross could do a "hop" over to Port Grace on the other side of the planet first, and look for cargo and/or passengers, before going up to the orbital station- or just go straight there.  Despite St Brendan being "frontier" there are millions of people there, and there is always traffic, even exports.  Several business have grown up trying to make trade-worthy exports out of the green mush that is most of the life on this planet, and they've had some success, unexpectedly, in the skin care and cosmetics market.  And there are always people looking for travel.  The merchant shipping industry makes much more money off passengers than freight, due to the sheer numbers of people looking for transport.

After that, there is the coreward outpost at LDMLT01 and the Crosser Home Ship there.

Or you could turn spinward, and head for the thinly settled Mu Velorum sector via St. Herman, and see what's going on in those very backwater planets.

Or turn "trailing" and head for Meditrina, and the worlds of the Trans-Merlin Coreward sector.  Also thinly settled frontier, but with Merlin, an exotic colony world known for bioluminescent life, and a friendly, pacifist culture with a reputation for turning out skilled therapists and counselors.

Or turn back towards the Main Line- Deseret, and then Lyonesse and other worlds beyond, where humanity, and cargo, is somewhat thicker, but business is much busier.

***************************************
But meanwhile, Florence discovers the Angel Arms...
***************************************

There are even donkeys here at the hotel.  Not inside, of course.  They are outside, and they belong to people making deliveries.  Easier, here, than having a van.  Or a robot- on the more advanced planets, dropping off routine delivery packages is definitely robot work.
 But here, people, and donkeys, seem to be doing a lot of what robots do elsewhere.

The Angel Arms even has a reception desk with a real human, not just an automated kiosk to check in and out.  But then, hotels will usually have a human up front even in advanced cities, because a person out front is also security, adviser, greeter, native guide... robots just aren't that flexible.  All the best hotels have humans at the front desk.

There are a couple of wall screens in the lobby- one helpfully reminds people that the next ferry visit: 22 hours.

There's a very elderly woman who seems more interested in watching some entertainment on the other screen, even though her name tag identifies her as someone who supposedly works here. But there's also a mature looking man, with a weathered look that says "frontier colonist" and he's attentive and helpful.  He tells Florence that he'd be happy to answer any questions, but his only question is a routine, friendly, "what brings you here?".  Not in a probing way, just the friendly way of a hotel desk worker.
Just like the donkeys carrying loads around the town

Horace saw Einar slip back on the ship so he knew he was about. He went looking for the captain to find out the next destination from here, Port Grace followed by the High Port were logical. but that was the question.

“Hello.” Florence greeted the man with a nod, then answered his question. “Oh, I came with the ship you probably heard about and since my contract ended I decided to take a few days for myself. So here I am.”

The girl rubbed her chin for a second. “I'm not sure how long I'll stay. In fact, I'm not sure what I'm going to do exactly while I'm here but I'll probably want to spend a few days outside the city to see how it is. It should be interesting, and it's not like there are dangerous beasts around here after all, right?” She seemed to hesitate. “Though I'd have to rent a donkey to carry stuff I suppose?” She obviously didn't seem to know what to feel about that. “Would you be able to tell me who could help me see about… Well, preparing to spend a few days out there by myself?” Her eyes sparkling, she added. “It will be an adventure! I've never really been away from civilization and since it's safe here…”

Einar had made his way to the bridge. He was staring rather intently at a com screen, probably more intently than the blank screen really deserved. His mind obviously was somewhere else thinking. When Horace found him, he blinked a couple of times to clear his thoughts and turned to the other man. "Everything off-loaded, Horace? I'm thinking everything went pretty smooth for our first run. Anything really stuck in your craw about how we did the first time out?"

He listened attentively to what the XO had to say and then sighed. "What'd ya think about Ms. Pearce?"

"I think she did well and will miss her. Total shame things got off on the wrong foot. Live and learn. Miss Shabazz is also doing well, she had a problem with the Crosser, but she dealt with it. Must have been the teeth, kind of creepy looking at something that might eat you."
This message was last edited by the player at 16:50, Mon 09 Mar 2020.

"Yeah, I'm thinkin' she brings something to the table and I might have been a right dumbass for being so hard-nosed." Einar spoke softly so that his voice didn't carry. He looks around the bridge to see if anyone else is in earshot. "You know where she's stayin? Might go see if I can make amends. A Cap'n needs to know when he's screwed the pooch and make it right. Eh, XO?"

"The big hotel in town I guess, staying for a day or two?"

"Hopefully not. Sittin' here dead in the water don't pay no bills. While I'm gone, take a look at our options.  Need to go somewhere we can get a good job, which probably means no backwater, bumpkin planets." Einar pats Horace on the shoulder as he heads for the door. "Let me go eat some crow and chase it with a good bit of my pride. Maybe we can get Ms Pearce back on board and mollified, if not exactly happy. Try to have a profitable destination for us when I get back."

Horace goes to check the board to see if there are passengers or cargo to be had here. If not, Port Grace or the High Port of the planet for out of system. They would need to top off their fuel tanks on the way out of system too.

14:45, Today: Horace Wymp rolled 10 using 2d6+4.  broker.
This message was last edited by the player at 18:46, Mon 09 Mar 2020.

The woman who approached the ship was tall and slender, very attractive with long black hair and green eyes. She moved with an easy grace and confidence that spoke to training and experience. She had a few bags over her shoulders and one in her hand as she approached the docking area for the Nellie Bly. She hated not having met the crew on Lyonesse when she was supposed to but she was often called upon given her reputation and experience.

She was here now and that's what counted. She set her bags down and looked for a speaker or intercom she could use to ring the ship and announce herself which she did, depending on whatever was on hand.

"Hello, Albatross? Apologies for not being where I was supposed to, when I was supposed to. This is Heather MacKenzie."
This message was last edited by the player at 00:36, Tue 10 Mar 2020.

   Dominiq remained at her place and continued to monitor communications. Nothing much was happening at the moment and it continued to give her more chances to glance out of the bridge's transpex window and take in the surrounding area. It wasn't much to look at - most beginning colonies were a lot like building a house; most of the materials were either settled in piles, or strewn about while construction was ongoing, but nothing actually looked like a house until the frame was finished. Here it seemed the same; she guessed the colony wasn't much more than a handful of weeks to months old. "Guess you've got to start somewhere," she mused.

   When the pressure door to the Albatrosses' bridge slid open, Shabazz's dark eyes noted the arrival of the Captain, Einar Karvonen. She straightened immediately in her chair, not wishing to show herself as anything less than a productive member of the ship's crew. A slight nod in Karvonen's direction was her only response to his arrival but she noted the man's intense look in the direction of the screen. He seemed intent on something, but she wasn't about to ask - if something was troubling him, she'd likely hear about it, in short order.

   When the Albatrosses' Executive stepped onto the Bridge, Shabazz noted his arrival with another nod. But along with it came a small curl of her lip on the side facing away from the two men. Whereas Karvonen had been abrasive at times, she'd found Wymp more easy-going. It made for an interesting interaction, to say the least. When she'd worked with the brown-haired XO, he was good enough to explain things she hadn't gotten the grasp of and had been willing to answer questions as they arose - something the former entertainer appreciated.

   She listened silently to the conversation between them and noted the pitching/catching going on. The Captain sounded less ... intense ... when he spoke; whatever he'd done after he'd stepped off, then returned to the Bridge had lifted whatever dark cloud had hung around him. Shabazz mentally braced after the Captain's question about Pierce, as she'd expected another fiery damnation. His use of the word dumbass when he spoke about how he'd treated Pierce in the past made both of her pencil-thin brows rise significantly, and she'd caught herself before she'd almost made a surprised sound. To hear the Captain backpedalling about the redhead was ... different ... to say the least.

   Wymp's mention of her and her interaction (or lack thereof) with the Crosser gave Dominiq's chocolate cheeks a mild strawberry colouration. It wasn't the first time she'd been referred to in the third person, but it was mildly jarring, nevertheless. A brief memory of the alien caused her to tap a duo of buttons with her polished nails, rather than skin, which caused a soft pair of tics against the console. After the Captain had clapped the Exec on the shoulder and she heard the hiss of the door close, she half-turned her chair towards Wymp and asked with a slightly raised brow this time; "Anything I might be able to help you with, then?"

"Hello, Albatross? Apologies for not being where I was supposed to, when I was supposed to. This is Heather MacKenzie."

   Shabazz paused a moment as she heard a voice in her ear. "This is the Albatross, Ms MacKenzie," she replied in a neutral tone while she shot a glance in the Executive's direction. A mix of both curiosity and concern showed in the black woman's features silently asking the man if the ship was expecting visitors. "I'm signalling for someone to meet you at the ramp."
This message was last edited by the player at 01:11, Tue 10 Mar 2020.

Einar made his way to The Angel Arms and searched around for Florence. He found her talking to someone working for the hotel.  Taking a deep breath and screwing up his courage he approached the young lady. "Ms. Pearce...", he cleared his throat. "Could I have a minute of your time? I know I probably ain't anyone you're wantin' to see but I'd be right grateful if you would.  I'd start the conversation off by apologizin' for my previous words and follow it up by seein' if we might be able to come to amiable terms. Could you spare a moment to hear me out?"

Horace went to the ramp, "Ms. McKenzie? I'm Horace Wymp, the XO. Can I help you? Weren't you supposed to be on the crew? You got here AHEAD of us?"
This message was last edited by the player at 14:16, Tue 10 Mar 2020.

“Yes sir. Before I could meet the ship in Lyonesse I was called away for emergency negotiations. Once they concluded I had to take a Crosser ship to get here.” She gave him a rueful smile. “The downside to a long and, according to others, ‘especially distinguished career’ as a diplomat, ambassador, negotiator, etc.”

She gave a small sigh. “I’m here now and ready to jump in with both feet, sir.”

Horace extends his hand and holds up his communicator to get a copy of her resume and UPP. "Glad to meet you. send your resume to my comp  and we'll take a look. What position you looking for? The Crossers were here and gone already?"

This message was last edited by the player at 14:48, Tue 10 Mar 2020.

Florence seemed surprised to see Einar, and even more to hear what he had to say. She hesitated for a moment, then turned to the man she had been talking to. “Could you make sure that my stuff gets to my room please?” She smiled. “Thank you.”

After that, she led Einar to a small lounge where she sat in one of the chairs, her legs crossed at the knees and her hands on her lap, looking like a proper lady. Well, except for the clothes of course. “I can hear you out.” She lifted a hand. “But just so you know, I have plans that imply I cannot leave this place in the coming week, plans that I can't really change. After that…” She shrugged. “It'll depend a lot on what the results of those plans are.”

Heather held up her communicator, opened up her CV and flicked it in the direction of his pad. "The Crossers may still be here. I can't say with a certainty. As for my position: I have 20 years experience with the Ambassadorial Corps so I'm a very skilled diplomat, mediator, negotiator with experience in crisis management and mitigation. I'm not overstating my credentials when I say I have friends and allies in every race not hostile to humanity and am owed more favours than can be easily enumerated."

She put her comm away. "I can get you deals on parts, repairs, upgrades, and the kind of high paying jobs most ship crews would kill to get. I can get you out of trouble in damn near every system you might have occasion to visit and that, sir, is not at all hyperbole."

Einar took a seat as well but didn't lean back.  Instead he leaned forward, elbows on his knees. "I'll start the way I promised. I'm sorry 'bout the way I behaved before.  It was right unworthy of me and I ain't got no excuses except I'm new at this Captain'n gig.  Sometimes people do dumb stuff when they're tryin' to figure something new out.  That don't excuse it none and whether you see your way to joinin' us again or not you still deserve the apology."

He grinned a bit after getting that part out. "Now that is said, I was rightly impressed by your competence and professionalism durin' the trip here. Especially given my provocation. XO was impressed too.  We'd very much like you to come back.  Understand if you don't want to but would like you to none the less.  I think you'll find me a bit less persnickety about things this time around.  Probably won't turn into one of them high class, well heeled captains you see in the holos any time soon... a well behaved pig is still a pig, after all... but I can promise I won't make the same mistake twice.  I ain't overly educated but I ain't stupid, either.  I can generally learn something after just one screw up."

In reply to Heather MacKenzie (msg # 68):

"You're hired. You a broker too? I think we're going to have plenty of skill at getting cargo and selling it."

Heather nodded and smiled. “I’ve brokered interplanetary trade deals worth trillions so I think I can get you top dollar on cargo and salvage,” Heather replied. “If you have anything going on now needing my skills and experience I’m happy to help and eager to start.”

"Look for passengers and cargo going into populated space. As soon as possible so we can get out of here."

Florence listened quietly while Einar talked. She didn't say anything as soon as he stopped, her face not showing much of anything. Finally, she nodded. “I must say, I wasn't really expecting this. I'm not sure it deserved an apology like that but I appreciate it nonetheless.”

“Part of the problem as you said is that you're trying to figure things out and I think it was too soon for me, who you cannot put in a nice category you're familiar with, to join.” She seemed to hesitate for a moment. A handful of seconds later, she added, “The problem wasn't that you're not a 'high-class, well heeled' captain. It probably wouldn't hurt if you could at least pretend to be one of those when necessary, but that's another problem. As long as you're clean and decently clothed…” She cocked an eyebrow at that but didn't elaborate.

The girl shook her head. “The problem, as I see it, is that neither Horace nor you have any experience at your current positions, which led to quite a few errors. Those related to me were more of a symptom than the real sickness. I would bet that neither you nor Horace were in the past in a position to interact often with the officers of your ships, which led to misconceptions on what a captain or an XO is supposed to be, to do. The role of the captain is to achieve the mission. The role of the XO is to make sure the ship can achieve the mission. And by ship I mean the ship itself of course, but also the crew, etc.”

“It seems pretty simple said like that, but there are a lot of consequences about that. For example, the captain's goal is the mission. It doesn't mean he decides what the mission is. Which in our case, meant that it would have been a perfectly reasonable solution if the shareholders decided on what the mission was supposed to be and hired someone else to captain the ship. Having more shares doesn't make you a good captain, XO or whatever. It merely says that you're good at whatever allowed you to get the money to buy the shares.”

“In my opinion, that was the first mistake.” She grimaced slightly. “And probably one that led me to have a not so good opinion of you in the first place. I'm not saying you shouldn't have been made captain, but that it should have been done based on other criterion.”

“Other than that, it means that if the XO thinks someone is ready for something, the captain trusts him. It is the XO's role to assign everyone in the right position, to form them for whatever positions are needed. As such, he's supposed to know exactly everything the crew can, and cannot do. So if he thinks someone is ready for something… 'Trust but verify' is pretty close to the basics as far as leadership is concerned. Which is something you utterly failed to demonstrate where I'm concerned.” She didn't sound accusatory as she said that, it sounded more as a lecture…one she might have heard before. “You're not the only one in that though, so…” She shrugged.

“The second problem, is a problem of behaviour, and there, both Horace and you made a huge mistake: except in time-critical situations you never contradict your XO - or any of your officers for that matter - in front of anyone else. Never, ever, do that. If you don't agree, talk to that officer, and tell him to change whatever decision has been taken. After you've let him explain why that decision was taken in the first place. And have that officer announce the change. Otherwise, it's pretty much a slap in the face, it shows a lack of trust in that officers skills or decsions and it completely kills his credibility in front of the crew.”

“As for Horace, he shouldn't have let you do it like that. It is critically important that the XO be able to confront a captain about whatever decision has been made. And he can do it in public, depending his concerns. In some cases, it is the only thing to do, for example if those concerns are shared by the crew: the captain shouldn't explain every decision to everyone, but explaining it to the XO… Well, if others hear it… Here, he should have fought for me, and tried to explain why he agreed before you killed my suggestion. Maybe he would have changed your mind, maybe not. The result is not that important. What matters is that the crew knows the XO is there and will fight for them, making them willing to go the extra mile. And it is important for the captain to know that the XO is not a parrot, but someone he can count on to point possible mistakes, to make sure that decisions are taken for the right reason. An XO who can't oppose a captain is worse than useless, long term he's a danger to the ship. It's vital that Horace learns to do that, and be forceful about it - without being antagonist of course.”

She lifted a shoulder with a slight moue. “Granted, all of that is much more important in a military ship, but it's a matter of level, not of principles.” She paused longer this time, leaving time for Einar to digest all of that. “As for how to do fix that… Well… At this point I'd say the best option could be to hire someone with captain experience for a few month. Have him be the captain for a while with you as XO first, then with you as captain, Horace as XO and him as a coach of sorts. On a small ship like that, I'm not sure what it'd give if the captain wasn't a shareholder. Or more precisely, if the shareholders are simple members of the crew so I'm not sure it would be a good idea. She seemed to think about that for a while, obviously quite interested by the idea. “It could work if everyone's responsibilities were clear I suppose, but it could be dangerous.”

She shook her head after a moment. “Other than that, try to find some sort of uniform for the crew. Simple ones, could be just a jacket with an albatross on the breast for example. It promotes unity, and gives an identity to the ship that the traders you talk to will be glad to see. Maybe as importantly, yes, a ship at port doesn't get money. But you must see those times as an investment: one where you talk to the shops that could work to upgrade or fix the ship, go to the bars traders and crews frequent. You need to know the people, the places, in your sector of trade. You need to create a network of people you know but more importantly, who know you. A lot of deals could come your way with that. And if it's not deals, it will be tips or news. Oh and of course, don't leave a place with open berths, that was stupid.”

"In that case, permission to board the ship, get to my quarters and stow my gear? Adter that I'll start checking local listing for cargo or passenger runs. I'll run them by you and, if you wish, negotiate the price we can charge. I guarantee I'll get you a better rate than you're used to, sir."

Heather stood and waited for the XO to invite her aboard. Until then she stood very still, demonstrating an uncommon patience. Not that she figured she would have long to wait.

"Permission granted."

"Thank you. If you wouldn't mind showing me my quarters or berthing space I shall set my belongings down and start checking local postings for jobs," she said as she walked up the ramp and into the ship.

  Reggie would assist with the unloading of the cargo, and anything else that he could help with regarding ship’s business. He would then request a short shore leave from the captain, so he might attend to personal business.

 If Reggie was given permission, he would seek out a church, so he might take confession, and attend mass. After that, he might hang around the church to see if he might pick up any interesting tidbits of gossip, news, etc. He would also just happen to  pass on the fact he was with a ship in need of cargo and or passengers.
This message was last edited by the player at 01:01, Fri 13 Mar 2020.

In reply to Heather MacKenzie (msg # 76):

Horace leads Heather to her quarters, "here you go!". He carries any bags she has with her.

Einar gave a small smile and shrugged. "Fair enough.  Can't say as I blame you and you make some good points.  I'll be give'n them some serious thought." He rose and extended his hand to the young lady. "In any case, the offer to join us is a standing one, should we cross paths again some day.  At the very least I hope we can part on amicable terms. I wish you luck in whatever you decide to do.  I'd stay and chat more but I'm on a time table.  Empty ships in port don't generate any revenue.  I left the XO figure'n out possible destinations from here, hopefully with an eye to transportin' something along the way. St Brendan is slim pickins for exports but I hold out hope."

Alwin will help Reggie with the cargo, and any other minor duties needed about the ship.  After doing so, he will try to discreetly find out if there are any unusual medical situations on St Brendan, above and beyond what can normally be found on any colony world.

Once he learns that the new crewmember is onboard, he will at some point approach Mackenzie to get the relevant medical file she no doubt has handed to various doctors and medics on numerous starships in the past as part of her previous journeys.  He would be surprised if a person with her resume wasn't in good shape with no particular maladies to worry about... but as always he wanted to know what he might have to deal with in case trouble ever did arise.

Florence smiled lightly. “I probably talk too much, and since what I know is theoretical knowledge without experience to back it up, I suppose it rubs people like you the wrong way…” She shook the offered hand and added. “I'll keep that in mind. And you have my code if you need it, so… Like I said Horace,” she concluded, “Good luck, wherever you go. And it's not so small pickings here, lots of interesting to fill the cargo-hold with I'm sure.” She had had quite a few ideas when she had developed her side trade idea anyway.

After Einar left, Florence stayed where she was for a couple of minutes, ruminating. Finally, she shook herself went to her room to make sure everything was in order, then went back down to the reception: she wanted to find a restaurant where she'd be able to eat and talk to the locals. And possibly begin to plan her little expedition outside the city.

"Thank you," Heather says as she takes a look around the quarters to get an idea of where everything is located and where things can be stored.

Said activity is what she happens to be in the middle of when Alwin comes calling to get her medical records which constitute not even one sheet of information. She is in quite excellent health, has all of the requisite immunisations and has no history of illness to speak of.

In their own ways, direct personal contact in the church, and by the St. Brendan computer network, Reginald and Heather look out for passenger and freight opportunities from the planet.
They already know that odds are against them in the freight department.  St. Brendan is known to have very few exports.  Being a recent and small colony they are a net importer of most things.   But that being said, there are over 16 million people on this planet, Port Grace does have a few industrial areas of importance and people being people, they are naturally trying to come up with ways to earn some money.  So there are already exports of:
Soap, Personal Hygiene and Cosmetics Products
Air Filters and Filter Components
Cleaning Supplies
Dyes and Inks
Some of the local industries make use of material collected from the squishy green life found on the planet, it has excellent natural gelling properties.

It turns out, this is actually a good time for the Albatross to pick up freight, as long as they are NOT headed for the Crosser Home Ship.  That is where the other ships have gone, mostly  So shippers have freight going in other directions.  If the Albatross stops in Port Grace, you can pick up freight for shipping.  This isn’t for purchase- this is shippers looking to send cargo to clients.  The current rate for shipping is 200 credits per light year per container, 20 for a separate pallet.

The current backlog is:
To Deseret:  13 Containers.
To Lyonesse:  6 Containers, 5 Pallets
To Poseidon:  6 Conainers, 3 Pallets
To Freyja:       Nothing
To Epona:  3 Containers, 3 Pallets
To Kuripan:  Nothing
To Hengest:  2 Containers, 5 Pallets
To Merlin:    6 Pallets

Then there is some freight for sale at good prices.  The question is, of course, where do you sell it?  Some things work better for resale than others- machinery and parts, for example, tend to work only where those machines and parts are specifically needed.  But, if you want to play the game, available are:

Skin Care lotions:  5,000 CR per pallet   Full 40 pallet container:  231,000
Household cleaning supplies:  1,100 per pallet  Full 40 pallet container:  36,300
Pepper n’ Oat Spicy Granola:  1,000 per pallet  (only 20 pallets available)
Assorted Leather belts and bags:  2.600 per pallet.  (only 6 pallets available)

Passenger Demand

To Deseret:  30 Regular, 10 first class.
To Lyonesse:  10 Regular, 5 first class
To Poseidon:  None
To Freyja:       21 Regular, 6 first class
To Epona:  None
To Kuripan:  None
To Hengest:  8 Regular  2 First Class
To Merlin:    16 Regular


Meanwhile, Florence's ideas about exploring the areas outside the "city" meet with looks of surprise in the Angel Arms.

It finally motivates the older woman to speak.

"Child, there's not much to see, outside.  That's why we come to these places, to look inwards, not outwards.  Outwards is rocks and green muck for miles and miles.  A few other settlements, the Quarry and Kilns where they make all the bricks... Abraham Prollit's camp when he's in.  Test sites, and Mister Ferro's scientific trees.  People don't come for that, because none of that is important.  People here find what's important inside, and in the people around them.  People connect with the holy side of themselves."

Einar leaves the Angel Arms and makes his way back to the ship and to the bridge. "XO, we found any options for cargo to haul?  Hangin' about in port don't generate any revenue."  He smiles at Horace. "Ms. Pearce won't be joinin' us but I do think fences have been mended.  Perhaps our paths'll cross another day."

"We're looking into it. We've found some! Deseret looks good. Thirteen containers and 30 passengers, good pay. Plus there is speculative cargo we can buy too."
This message was last edited by the player at 16:19, Mon 16 Mar 2020.

Just a reminder-
The Albatross can fit 12 containers, and it has 12 staterooms, five of which are currently the crew's home.  The demand for travel to Deseret actually exceeds the current capacity!  This is a result of the sudden diversion towards the Crosser ship.  Deseret is in the opposite direction.  Z

Freight for shipping is "safe" income, but of course every container taken means less room for speculative cargo.  So it becomes risk vs security.  On the third hand, well chosen speculative cargo generally increases with value with distance.  St. Brendan products are common at next door Deseret, rarer as you go further.

Once she was settled Heather pulled up local networks for shipping and passenger requests. She was looking for something that was already high value that she might be able to negotiate into even higher pay for the crew of the Albatross. This was what she was good at and it was time to put those skills to use in the private sector for the first time.

Heather tries to gather what information she can on the cargo and passengers available  (See message 83 above)

Florence smiled. “Maybe, but…” She shook her head. “I'm not like you. I'm not saying that with any ill intent, it's just that I don't intend to stay. This world is maybe the right one for, at least I hope for you that it is, but it's not for me and there are things that I need to do, and can only accomplish if I leave. Still,” She shrugged. “That doesn't mean there's nothing I can find here, maybe a new path. Or a different way to proceed, I don't know.” After a slight pause, she mumbled. “Maybe in more ways than one.”

She paused longer, then continued. “I don't know what I'll find, but I know I'll only be able to find it outside of the city, and that I need to do this.” She shrugged. “As you said, there's nothing there, but to me that means no danger and no distraction, just the horizon and sky.” She looked through the window for a moment. “To be honest, I'm really eager to see that… I don't know where you're from, but let me tell you, on some planet it's simply not possible. To say nothing of a ship of course. And space is… Well, it's not the same things…”

She smiled happily, obviously excited. “And I hope I'll find the help I need to do that, even if I'm not planning on going particularly far, some help wouldn't hurt. To make sure I have everything and all that.” She then became serious once again. “Anyway, that's not the only thing I was hoping to accomplish here. I have to write a report for my school about the Commonwealth's situation in general and the Governors' position specifically. Is there a place where I could ask questions about that kind of stuff without bothering anyone or creating a mess? Like, I don't know… A cafe, a club or something?”

Einar ponders the question of what cargo to take and where to go. "XO, I'm inclined to take the safe bet and grab up as many passengers as we can.  I reckon that if there's that many people tryin' ta get off this rock that they won't mind squeezin' in tight for the trip.  We got 7 free berths. Might want to see if we can get 14 people. They can share berths.  If they wanna pay extra, they can get a berth to themselves.  Either way, we get as much profit as we can out of it.  Then we take 12 containers of freight along as well."  He looks to Wymp to see if the man agrees. "I'm willin' to be dissuaded if you and the crew got a better idea.  My job's to make sure the ship can keep on flyin' and safe and easy eases my jitters. I want ta make money for the crew and stakeholders too though, so I'm willin' to take a reasonable gamble if you got a good plan."

"I say Heather is on it, give her a chance to negotiate what we can, maybe talk to her about double berthing passengers. I'll help or do it if she fails. I have every confidence though."

"You can handle it." Einar smiles. "I've just been reminded that the XO is supposed to be the one makin' sure the crew does their jobs.  Best if I don't interfere unless there's a problem.  Just let me know what y'all come up with.  I'll just go over here to this nice, comfy captain's chair and look properly important."

With that, he puts his words into action and goes to the captain's station to begin looking over system checks and reports.

Horace goes to the sensors where he reads and studies about the station, trying to improve his skill with the sensors and computer.
This message was last edited by the player at 18:10, Thu 19 Mar 2020.

In the Angel Arms...

"You can ask questions here," the older woman says to Florence.  "We're supposed to take care of guests, that's what we do.  There's not a lot here but we do get visitors, otherwise, we wouldn't stay open.  If you want to look around outside the city we can arrange that too.  There have been science expeditions, surveys.  We have a university here, you know.  Fordham University St Brendan Campus, San Lorenzo Branch."

She also recommends that as a place where Florence might meet people her own age.  Near the Fordham branch is a series of low buildings connected by large tent-like structure that looks like a big white caterpillar.  This is San Lorenzo's "college town", complete with shops, restaurants, and big enclosed meeting area/performance space.

This being a small town, everything is within walking space.

And aboard the Albatross...

They've done their research, each in their own way, and pooled the results.

A few things stand out.

First, the freight:

To Deseret:  13 Containers.  Enough to fill the ship to capacity.  This is the Safe Option.  You would certainly make money.  Not a get rich run, since Deseret is the next inhabited system rimward from here.  Shippers know that if they can't get a ship today, one will be along soon, so they won't be pressured to pay higher prices.

To Merlin:    6 Pallets  This is goods going with the passengers to Merlin, and that is the interesting point, see below. If you take the passengers, you take this cargo.  You'll have plenty of cargo room left over, which you can fill with speculative cargo.

Freight for sale:
These three have the best resale options, but NOT if you aim for a central or semi-central nearby planet, like Deseret, Lyonesse, Poseidon, Freyja, or Epona.  To make cargo more special and exotic, distance is your friend.

Skin Care lotions:  5,000 CR per pallet   Full 40 pallet container:  231,000
Pepper n’ Oat Spicy Granola:  1,000 per pallet  (only 20 pallets available)
Assorted Leather belts and bags:  2.600 per pallet.  (only 6 pallets available)

And Passenger Demand

To Deseret:  30 Regular, 10 first class.
To Lyonesse:  10 Regular, 5 first class
To Freyja:       21 Regular, 6 first class

All of these would be as much or more than the ship can handle, but because they are central and semi central worlds, they won't pay above standard- especially as Albatross has not earned a reputation, and has no special luxury features or services (yet?)  But, as noted above, you can never really go wrong with a full ship!

To Merlin:    16 Regular   If you make this run, you must take all, and the ship will be a little crowded.  With seven staterooms available, 2 rooms will be set up with 3 beds instead of the normal 2.  Merlin is further out on the frontier, and there is a "backroad" route that does not follow the Main Line.  Little frontier ships often take these routes, but even so the traffic is very low compared to the Main Line (red line on the maps)  The entire group is travelling together and includes families, they are returning to Merlin after a long work assignment on St. Brendan.  Because the Albatross can offer direct "backroad" service on a quick ship, you might be able to negotiate extra money.

To negotiate a better deal on cargo costs, or to get a better price from passengers headed to Merlin, it's a skill check roll.  2d6 + appropriate skill/attribute modifier.  Only one player may negotiate a deal.

Einer calls Mr. Wymp and Ms. MacKenzie to him for a quick meeting after seeing the options presented.

"Fine bit of work, XO and Ms. MacKenzie."  He mulls over the read out a bit. "What's your preference, Ms. MacKenzie. You're the newest face on the Albatross. Be interested in hearin' your thoughts."  He stops reading the screen and gives the young woman his full attention.

“Thank you. I don't want to be a bother.” Florence considered the question, then nodded. “I'll go see the university people to get their recommendations for going outside for a while then.”

The girl noted what she was told about the Fordham branch, “That seems promising, thanks. I'll go look there in the evening. My question is relatively simple and concerns the Governors: I'm interested in learning what you think of the system, and how you would change it to both address the concerns of those asking to have a say in the decisions taken, and avoid falling back to old systems we know lead to all sorts of abuse. Anything you - or others - can tell me on the subject would help.”

Horace listened intently for Heather to wow them.

Heather set her PAD down and pulled up a holo image of the available jobs. "People always need passage but they tend to set their price and not want to negotiate. Now, we aren't in the most heavily traveled system so I might have had some luck if not for the Crosser ship. Shipping cargo to Deseret is pretty much a locked in price given our proximity. They'll not let themselves get into a bidding situation when all they need to do is wait for someone else to come along."

She stopped for a moment and waited for any questions. If none were forthcoming she presses on. "My suggestion is we take the people headed for Merlin as well as the cargo. That is something I can work with and get us a better deal on. Even better is we can purchase some of the speculative cargo and take that with us to out of the way places that don't see much in the way of supply runs. The issue, of course, is the upfront cost. If we go that route I suggest we take the entire container of skin care lotion and sell it somewhere where they need it and don't have access to it. I can drive a hard enough bargain that I might be able to double our investment on it. So - we get the cargo and passenger payment and then we sell the speculative items and I do my damnedest to double our investment, at least. Either way we are going to see profits with this particular run."

"That seems like a right reasonable plan, Ms. MacKenzie." Einar said while thinking about what the woman had said. "You got anything to add, XO? It seems pretty straight forward.  If you ain't got anything to add to it, I'm thinkin' we'll go with it.  Ms. MacKenzie, you and the XO work out the details.  We need to get our cargo and passengers on board.  A ship sittin' in port ain't making a profit. Don't get rich floatin' around in a nice bay."

"Sounds good to me."

"Make it so Miss MacKenzie, arrange cargo and passengers as you will to make a profit."
This message was last edited by the player at 18:33, Tue 24 Mar 2020.

   Dominiq finished with her shift at the Albatross' Communications station and made her way back to her room. Partway through her walk, the headache that had begun a half-hour ago began to intensify, and she found herself rubbing at her temples to try and massage away the pain. They didn't come often, fortunately, but a throbbing near - migraine was a reminder of the days she'd spent on tour. Stress and travel are never a good combo at the best of times, she thought, But getting these headaches now isn't what I need. Maybe a short rest might keep this down to a dull roar.

   She palmed the lock pad next to the door and entered just shortly after the portal hissed opening. She took a moment to kick off her shoes just inside the door, then locked it before moving to the bed and easing herself to a sitting position. Hands moved back to her temples and she rubbed them in slow circles for a moment, then eased herself onto the bed to try and get some rest.

---

   She awoke to the sound of voices and rose back into a sitting position before the pain returned, only mildly dulled now compared to what it had been before. She concentrated for a moment, catching the sound of someone's voice falling away; the person must have been close to the door for the sound to have carried past the hatch. She couldn't recognize the voice - it might have been anyone - but assumed it was one of the other members of the crew and quickly put it out of her mind.

   She took a moment and used her hands to tug down the blue top she wore, then ran her palms over the front of the black knee-length skirt she wore. It was no uniform, but enough of a balance of casual and professional that portrayed her as what some might call business-casual. Another moment spent on her appearance brushed her dusky brown hair back into place and added a bit of gloss to her dusky lips. A once-over in a mirror completed the inspection, and Dominiq quickly reached down and slipped a pair of matching blue flat pumps before she unlocked the door and left, and went looking for the Executive, Mr Wymp ...

The Albatross is now fully booked with passengers!  In fact, it will be just a bit crowded.

On the other hand, the cargo hold has room.  They buy an entire container of skin care products and it costs a good portion of their cash available- it costs over twice what they took in from the run to San Lorenzo- but hopefully they can sell it somewhere.

But... once there is a route planned in to Merlin, there is a little more interest in shipping cargo by St. Brendan companies.  The ship will be taking the "back road".  This is what little frontier ships often do, avoiding the crowds of the Main Line.  Both St. Brendan and Merlin are Coreward of the Main Line, so it works well, they will save almost 50 light years distance!

This is what enables them to make a good deal with the passengers, and the express service also gives them two containers to ship.

They still have plenty of room, which can be used a a big zero g recreation space when they are in flight.  Maybe with so many passengers it might be nice.

Along the way they will have to refuel twice.  It's a long trip, with navigation saying 22-23 days with refueling stops.    The destination is Merlin, and they check the standard references about the planet.

Merlin is a habitable oceanic moon of the gas giant Nimue, and is tidally locked to Nimue- if you are on the portion of the planet "under" Nimue, Nimue is always overhead, a giant striped pinkish brownish ball in the sky.

Planets were settled using different selection processes for colonists, and a different social systems.  Merlin developed a calm, "soft" society with a certain "new age Zen" style.  They pride themselves on pacifism, and the Commonwealth maintains a school for Governors there, where they study Conflict Resolution.  With Merlin's reputation for introspection, it is not surprising that the Institute for Consciousness Studies is located there.  One of Merlin's "exports" is its people, often found working as therapists, counselors, and coaches.  This includes the passengers the Albatross is now carrying, who work as Occupational Counselors- helping colonists transition from their old jobs to the things they will have to do in a new colony.

 Merlin's exports include living specimens of its unique and bio-luminescent sea and land life. These are prized by aquarium aficionados throughout the 100 worlds.  They produce a wide variety of other goods, including advanced metals and many types of food, but their life forms and the products they derive from these are unique.  The bioluminescent compounds extracted from Merlin's equivalent to flowers can be used to produce a dye that gives off a slight glow when supplied with energy- typically from body heat.

*****************************
*******************************

Meanwhile.... Florence will soon have St. Brendan to herself!

The old woman frowns, she has no desire to talk about the commonwealth, and politics, and all those annoying things.  She came to Mission San Lorenzo to get away from that!

"Not to get away from the Commonwealth, we're not Freelanders**, no. I mean, just to get to a place where it was nicely in the background.  Like a potted plant you just have to water from time to time."

 But, yes, there are plenty of people around who do like to talk about those things.  There are always some young people who just love to talk about the future of the galaxy and how their ideas will make things better, if only the older folk would listen to them.  Of course, they can be found around the Fordam branch.

The woman's younger assistant is willing to provide more details on how things are here:  Mission San Lorenzo, and most of the Rain Coast settlements, were established specifically because people wanted to live a remote, isolated lifestyle where the social leadership of the church was the only game in town.  There is one Governor representative in the town, the Magistrate, who acts as judge and mayor, but as the people see it, the less the Magistrate has to do, the better.  It's not that they dislike the commonwealth, but in general, that's for "other people" who run corporations and fly spaceships and do civilization things.  Out here, the parish priests give advice and people follow it, and everyone attends Mass.  Of course, one of the universal laws of the Commonwealth is that people who are poorly matched to the social system of a Governate must be free to leave it and resettle in a more suitable one, so every year a few people who just don't want to live like this leave.  But on the whole the population has been increasing.  A simple, uncomplicated life where everyone knows their place appeals to a lot of people back in the big cities of Earth.


**Freelanders:  People who create settlements without Commonwealth authorization.  The Commonwealth greatly discourages this, but is reluctant to forcefully evict them.  How to handle this is a big issue for the Governors.

 Reggie would be on stand by, awaiting orders. But he would have his hands full, with searching passengers, luggage and cargo. He wanted a raise.

Florence chuckled, not at all surprised that not everyone wanted to answer her questions. “Don't worry, I understand.” And at any rate, there were plenty of people who didn't mind answer for it to still be worthwhile. Plus, it wasn't like she expected anyone to have the perfect solution to the problem: there were lots of people working on the problem already after all. No, all it could probably achieve was get a better understanding of the problem and determine which of the possible solutions could work best.

So she spent the rest of the day outside, talking to people around her age or slightly older about the current political situation and getting their ideas. One thing she also asked about was for advice on who to go see to be able to spend some time out of the city and out in the wild for a couple days.

In the morning of the next day, she went to the university to see about that little trip of her and organize getting what she needed.

Horace helped Heather get the cargo arranged and the passengers set up for travel. She was good he had to admit. She did a better job than he could have.

As they were getting things arranged for the trip Heather checked her PAD and made a note. "You know, XO--we might be able to get some exports from Merlin. If they have some big orders going to the more core worlds that may turn a tidy profit."

 Reggie went up to Wymp" what can I do to help, Mr. Wymp?"

"Keep us safe for now, I don't trust that all is well."

Alwin will help get the passengers settled in, and check to see regarding any special medical needs any of them may possess.

If he witnesses Dominiq massaging her temples, he will offer to prescribe a mild analgesic to help with her headaches.

Florence finds “College Town” after settling in.   Not surprisingly, Mission San Lorenzo is well adapted for rain.  Canopies extend out over sidewalks, which are raised off the gravel streets.  The gravel streets are not well adapted, and the donkeys seem annoyed by the rain, but they have little choice.  Everyone has umbrellas, and a lucky few have umbrella-drones hovering above them, imported from some more industrial world.   The town is small enough to walk, and after passing some shops and official buildings, she finds the big canopied "College Town".

It is a like a very large white tent, attaching to a row of shops on one side, the entrance to the college lobby area on another, and containing seating, a stage, some "socializing areas", and some large potted plants.  It is well lit and well inhabited, because on rainy days (there are a lot of those) there aren't that many places one can go.

There aren't that many places one can go when it's sunny, either, but that's another issue.

Florence is less *different* here.  She is still younger than most, but not that much younger, and she actually fits in.  There is a young woman painting, and she is about Florence's age.  A cluster of students cooperating on writing history papers.  A few others playing a holographic table tennis game, with quite a few watching an laughing.

******************************
Meanwhile, the Albatross...


Alwin and Reginald quickly accomplish their tasks.  The group is going home, that means they have all experienced space flight before, so they know the routine.  Besides, as Alwin and Reginald quickly learn, they are Merliners, and Merliners have a reputation to uphold: the calmest, most relaxed people in the 100 Worlds.  They are taught calming techniques almost from birth, it is part of every school curriculum.  They meditate, they listen to soothing music, wear pastel colors.   It’s more than just a cultural value, it is part of their economy.  As a planet that “exports” the services of its people, considering their specialties, this reputation is a great help.  Reginald has never seen such a group of easy going people.  They seem to be troubled by nothing. Alwin has heard of the phenomenon before, but… it was just exaggeration, right?  Apparently, not.  These are the sort of the people that, in the event of a catastrophe, you could tell them to walk calmly to the escape pods, and they would.


Passenger ships traveling the Main Line offer all sorts of amenities to attract the highest paying passengers.   Running a Back Road between frontier worlds, it’s not so necessary.  Just the fact that the ship is there is enough.   But spacers know, having a good reputation with passengers is always a good thing.

You have a new thread, since it will be cumbersome with different plot lines sharing threads:
Journey to Merlin
This message was last edited by the GM at 01:01, Mon 30 Mar 2020.

   Dominiq kept busy during her time aboard the Albatross; a number of things that needed to be done while the ship remained at their improvised landing spot. After her shipboard duties were done, she spent most of her time doing two things; first was to don her workout gear - a pair of tangerine leggings, white sneakers, and a dark grey hoodie that mostly covered her combo orange-and-yellow crop top underneath - and spent some time walking around the ship to get some exercise. She didn't know the area past the landing site, so she kept her steps close and power-walked while she listened to her perscomp playlist. The rest of the time, usually after she'd finished exercising and grabbing a quick shower, she exercised the mental side and spent her time reading and studying some of the materials X.O. Wymp recommended. A little knowledge was never a bad thing, after all. she'd thought while she read. And it never hurt to have an edge on your competition, either ...

   She noted the arrival of Ms MacKenzie, noting the confidence in her voice as she spoke about her 20 years experience in the Ambassadorial Service, along with her business experience. Part of her was mildly surprised with the thought that a woman with that much experience would bother signing onto a merchant freighter like the Albatross. The other part of her was discouraged, knowing that all of the study she'd been doing to learn 'the ropes' felt like a waste of time.  Inwardly, she sighed and let out a slow breath. </smallcaps> No, she's here to help out, and we probably need all the help we can get. Good as Horace is, another body with the experience will help make us some more money, both now and later. Guess I'll have to find something ... else, then.</smallcaps>

   Her headaches still came and went and try as she might keep it all out of sight, the Ship's Doctor had noticed and had offered her some painkillers at one point. She'd smiled as she looked up slightly and caught Brandle's blue eyes with her own. "Appreciate the offer, Doctor." she'd replied as she'd brought up a hand and flattened her pale palm. "But I've had these headaches off and on since I was a teenager. It's nothing serious, but when they come, I know what to reach for. Modern medicine's good for a lot of things, but not *everything*. But thanks for looking out for me. I'd just thought I'd kept a lid on it a little better than I did."

---

   The news that the Albatross was expecting passengers proved to be a mixed blessing for Dominiq. When she'd learned their passengers hailed from Merlin, Shabazz looked into the planet's entries on culture and Moraes, just so she wouldn't accidentally overstep her bounds when it came to interacting with them. Articles on Merlinian ecology and it's shimmering bioluminescent aquatic life were fascinating, and she found the people and their 'New Age' thinking ... interesting. She'd watched as they interacted with Reggie and the Doctor, answered their questions calmly and efficiently when asked, and followed instructions almost to the letter. It made her think of an Old Terra fauna called a 'lemming'; something that would follow the directions of a leader, even if that leader leads them over a cliff.

   Without realising it, Dominiq found herself knowing more than she suspected about taking care of other people. She'd watched as others had carried out whatever wish she'd desired at the time, and now realised that she'd picked up the basics of how to deal with higher-class patrons. While Merlinians were not exactly nobility, she understood well enough how they carried themselves, and how best to deal with their needs. Sweet Lord ... I'm going to wind up being the Albatross's Purser!

   At least the Merlinians, with their easy-going nature, made the young Purser's work a little easier. With all of the people that had been brought aboard, it was cramped and felt like they were packed in like sardines; Dominiq had little doubt that some members of her (former) entertainment community - including herself, once upon a time - might not have been pleased about how things were. She worked as best she could to make sure that everyone was settled and as comfortable as she could make them.

   With the stress of keeping the passengers comfortable on the journey, Dominiq did find some solace with her music. From humming some gospel "spiritual" she'd learned as a child, to the occaisional lapsing into her own hip-hop fusions from one of her albums, she found some of the Merlinians enjoyed her singing enough to ask her about performing for a small group of them. She'd briefly thought about turning them down, but something inside of her bucked at the idea. It had been a long time since she'd sung publically like this, and she remembered the crowds seemed a lot larger - but she'd missed performing. She'd accepted the invitation for that night, and spend the rest of the afternoon preparing for the evening.

   The evening itself was a more intimate gathering than ones she was used to. Dressed as she was in a floor-length blue-green dress that she'd worn on tour a handful of times, and it momentarily reminded her of a concert she'd done on Lyonesse, in front of a small gathering of their aristocrats. The passengers who'd chosen to attend weren't anything like the Noble Landowners, something that worked in their favour. She sang for an hour, keeping her songs light, pleasant and well within what was expected. She took a short break to refresh her beverage, knowing that some of the others might have to answer the call of nature or freshen their own drinks before she spent the second-hour answering requests from her audience. Some songs she knew and performed well, others she didn't and needed help from some of the crowd to bring to life. The evening ended quickly enough and Shabazz thanked them all for coming and hoped that they enjoyed her songs ...
This message was last edited by the player at 02:50, Tue 31 Mar 2020.

Horace attended the concert and enjoyed himself for two hours. Nique had a powerful voice and sang quite well. After the concert he stood watch on the bridge for four hours before the captain took over.

"Understood," Alwin responded, with a nod.  So many people were all too eager to try to find some pill for any given minor malady, he appreciated when someone didn't automatically demand medicine for whatever was bothering them.  Of course, some people took that attitude a bit too far, either out of stubbornness or some other misguided attitude, but Dominique didn't strike him as falling in that category.  "If it persists, especially if it interferes with you getting enough rest, let me know.  If you would rather avoid medicine, I can always prescribe some exercises that, depending on the specific nature of the headache or migraine, can help with blood flow and muscle tension to give some relief.  Though if you've been dealing with this for a while now, you may well have already worked out something of a similar nature already," he acknowledged.

"Just for clarification, I'm not a doctor, just a medic," he added.  "Mr. Wymp has similar training to myself in that regard, but given his duties as XO, broker, and ship's admin, I have a bit more free time to handle any medical needs that might arise for either passengers or crew, since my duties as pilot only really require my attention while we're in-system for any given world."

"Go for it, we'll try it!"

Heather smiled and wrote herself a note. “Consider it done.”

The Albatross crew should jump over to Journey to Merlin thread at this point.  It is for them.

Here, we have Florence, in the big indoor tent-like "College Town".

The local young adult population naturally assumes she is a newly arrived student.  Strange, odd timing, but... why else?

Of course that means she arrived on that amphibious ship that pulled up at the harbor.  Everyone knows about that.  So a few of the bolder students approach her with questions.

Florence walked in the "College Town", looking around curiously. The place was...well, weird, compared to what she was used to of course. Then again, her own school was not exactly standard, and this one deviated even more from the standard than her own did. Despite that, it didn't look unpleasant. Maybe a bit limited in terms of options, but if everyone wanted more or less the same things she supposed it didn't matter all that much for the time being. And t the very least, she was pretty sure they'd come out of there with practical skills matching the needs of the city. How many college students in the Commonwealth could say as much?

To those who asked, she confirmed that she had arrived on the ship they were thinking about, but not as a future student, though it was related to her studies. No, she had needed to stay on the ground for a bit to perform parts of a study mandated by her own school. She didn't mind answering the questions she was asked, for the most part anyway as she tried to avoid mentioning the crew, then she asked questions of her own, starting with the two students working on their history paper.

It was the same question as before: what they thoughts about the state of the Commonwealth, and how they thought the Governors should answer to the pleas of increased popular representation without falling in the same traps political systems of old led to.

People from the big, busy, cosmopolitan places often think those from the most remote and backwater places must be out of touch with the Important Questions of the Day.
More often than not, this is deliberate.
But among college students, even college students out here, there is always time for the Important Questions of the Day.


St. Brendan isn't that detached.

Besides, there is the Let's Talk to the New Girl angle.  Okay, just a visiting student of some kind, but still a new student, sort of.

It's true, the vast amount of people on St. Brendan don't see Commonwealth issues as "their problem".  The Commonwealth leaves them alone, largely.  They set relatively few rules, the same rules every Governate lives with.

Some are good, really, the majority opinion here holds.  The rules requiring resettlement of those who are morally and conscientiously opposed to the social system of the Governate- the Charter.

"It's like this," someone explains.  "In the old days, when people really didn't like the system, they had to struggle.  Now you can go somewhere to find a system with a better fit.  Everyone knows the Church organizes things here, if they don't like it there are 99 other worlds."

This elicits some disagreement, from the young woman who was painting before and has now joined the discussion.

"What if it means breaking up a family?"

Various murmurs from the group... and some indicating, yet, that has happened.

There is another consensus that emerges:  The opposite to "Commonwealth" rule is not necessarily "Democracy".  If the Commonwealth wasn't around to impose some universals, St Brendan would be even more of a theocracy.  That would be okay with some, not so much for others.

Florence has opened up something of a can of worms here.

She senses that it is hard for some of them to talk about.  How do you say "I don't think the Church should have all the power" in an environment where people are expected to be supportive of the church?  She can tell it makes some people very uncomfortable... they peel off quietly.

Florence listened to everything said following her questions, even when it didn't really answer those it was still interesting to know. Before anyone left because they didn't feel comfortable talking about the whole thing in public, she mentioned that she was staying at the Angels Arms and welcomed anyone who wanted to talk more about that. “I'm not here to judge anything you say, and there are no right or wrong answer. More than that, anything you say to me I'll keep for myself, so you'd have nothing to worry about.”

After that, at a point where the discussion on that topic faded, Florence asked another question, but on a completely different topic. “I'd like to spend a few days outside of the city, out there, by myself. A sort of retreat if you want. Can you guys point me to someone who could help me organize that?”

They are a little surprised at the thought of a "retreat" from Mission San Lorenzo.  Mission San Lorenzo IS a retreat, from the rest of humanity.  No one's ever gone on a solitary retreat from the town before.  It just isn't done.

But people do wander the wilderness, for other reasons.  They explore, they document, they study, they visit natural landmarks, and they practice survival skills because, you never know.

"It's best done with donkeys," one of the young men explains, in a young-man-explainy kind of way.  "They can carry your things, you don't have to worry about fuel or repairs and you don't have to worry about getting stuck somewhere.  They never get stuck.  We use them for camping, or for studies in the wilderness.  You can rent them at the Birni Stock Farm.  If you're going for more than a day or two you'll want a donkey just to carry the food for the other donkeys, though.  They don't like eating the green sludge though it doesn't poison them."

"It's not nutrition for them," the painter girl says.  "The native life here doesn't the same proteins so there's no vitamin content.  It does have some simple sugars though.  But Ross is right, they don't like it.  If you have no gear you can also get that at the stock farm, if you don't want to buy at the Mercado General.  Get good rain gear, get a personal shelter, and get a shelter for your animals so you don't have to leave them in the rain.  Are you really going alone?  The canyons are nice, you can get to some good places with a day's walk."

Florence thanked everyone for the help. Truth be told, she didn't much care if a "retreat" in the wilderness wasn't really done: what she had in mind was nothing of the sort anyway. As long as it was believable and allowed her to reach her objective without drawing any suspicion, she didn't care all that much if she was thought of as weird or anything.

Not that she was eager to have to deal with donkeys of course. They looked pretty harmless, but still... They were huge! Alright, maybe not huge, but if they wanted to make a fuss, she'd have nothing to allow her to deal with them. Hopefully the people at the Birni Stock Farm would be able to help her learn what to do...and what not to do.

At the last question of the painter girl, Florence nodded, “I'd like to at least try it once. I'm not sure if I'll go far, and certainly not for that long, but...” After a few seconds, she grinned, “Worst case scenario, you'll have a nice story about that silly girl who wanted to go in the wild alone and ended needing help.”

After a few more words and jokes, as well as the promise to come back later - and a reminder that she was always willing to hear anyone's take on the Governors' issue at anytime - Florence went to the Birni Stock Farm to learn - and acquire - what she needed for her planned trip in the middle of nowhere.

It's one of the larger retail services in Mission San Lorenzo.  It's been here, growing along with the town, since the first settlers, since Marta Birni began selling her excess livestock and equipment to newcomers who underestimated what they would need.  But it's all still new, only seven years have passed.  The Birni stock farm is a series of prefab shelters and converted shipping containers, with one Office/Retail shop up front, facing the main street.  The rest sprawls behind.

There are the usual questions, of course.  There's nothing wrong with what Florence is asking for, but it is a little unusual, especially as she is alone, and young.  She can get everything she needs here, though.  Donkeys, gear for them and for herself, portable shelters, rain ponchos.. and of course some instructions on how to use them.

Donkeys are remarkably simple animals, which is why they are so popular here.  The average local child can load and lead one, and if you lead one, the others will follow placidly behind, as long as they are fed and comfortable and not frightened or distracted by anything.  There are no predators here, life is primitive, so there's not much out there for them to be frightened of. Still, the storekeepers here recommend a mature, quiet, calm animal to be her lead donkey.  How many she needs really is dependent on how long she plans to be out.  A week is the limit, though.  At eight days, the donkeys will be entirely burdened with carrying their own food.  The native green mush won't support them.

To the questions, Florence gave the usual answers. More importantly, she listened attentively to everything, especially regarding the donkeys: not only because it was probably the thing she was the less used to deal with, but also because if she had any problem with them, it'll be pretty bad. Not dangerous, but she'd have to call for help, and that was something she really didn't wan to have to do.

As such, Florence was all for mature and calm specimens. Probably two of them, though she of course listened to advice and on that particular aspect, did nothing else but what she was advised to do. She was planning for four days for the first time: hopefully long enough to be able to do what she wanted, and not too much that she'd take too many risks.

Since there was no time like the present, she planned to leave soon. Maybe not the next morning - she wanted to be sure everything was done right before she left - but the one after that. If nothing else, it would give her enough time to talk with more people about the Commonwealth, or simply to visit the city.

Florence makes her plans and buys her gear, and food for herself and the donkeys.  With two donkeys, she'll be able to travel up to four days.

She passes a few of the students she met, (San Lorenzo is small, one main street!) and they suggest going together.  Florence can tell that it's not pure altruism, they are very curious.  Florence is, to them, quite unusual.  They walk with Florence back to the Angel Arms, asking questions.

Back at the Angel Arms, the news is on, as it always is. Recent news of Earth- the increasingly worrisome situation in Bangladesh, as democratic rule supporters have organized in many parts of the Dacca and Chitagong Governates (None of the students here even know where those places are... minor outback regions on a planet far far away, why would they) and in Chittagong, actually control the city now.  The Governors are trying to talk them down and avoid a confrontation, but they have supporters across the Earth.

"That's where the strongest movement to end the Commonwealth really is," one of the students comments.  "It's not us looking to break free, it's them looking to cut us loose.  They think we're a burden."

When the report cuts to an interview of a democracy supporter in Chittagong, that's exactly the point made:  the Commonwealth subsidizes needless colonies across space, and ignores needs on Earth, and Bengals are tired of it.

Florence laughed, amused, but declined all invitations to go with other people. Not just because she wants to reach her destination alone and have some time to assess the situation, but simply because... Well, as she thought of it, she decided that it would truly be nice to do something like that just by herself. Though of course, if the people at home - or worse, at her school - knew, she'd probably hear them from where she was.

Regarding the news from Earth, she could only shake her head. "They are like most people, they only see the downside, and don't care about the upside if it doesn't impact them directly in a 'in your face' sort of way. Worse, in a lot of cases, the ones complaining the most are those who provide the least. I mean, Bangladesh? The problem is not so much the taxes than the region being poor, and having been poor for... well, forever or so it seems. They can't afford all the things produced in the colonies, so they feel it might as well not exist for them, they don't see that it makes humanity as whole better. The Commonwealth is just something convenient to blame, it'd be India or Pakistan or who knows what if there was no Commonwealth." Florence snorted.

She looked pensive for a moment as she thought a bit more about that, and added. "In this case specifically though, I wouldn't be surprised if it was someone instigating the unrest to test the waters and see how the Commonwealth - and not just the Governors - is going to react in order to adjust their own strategies for somewhere a bit more important than a piece of land no one has cared about in a long while."

Florence surprises them.  Not many people out here are capable of discussing the politics and societies of distant regions back on Earth.  Even the ones who came from Earth, though maybe they know more than the average.  And the college students... other than a few who are studying it, most of them didn't even know a place called "Bangladesh" existed until it came out on the news.

They realize that Florence has been well educated on these things.

But maybe not on traveling in the wilderness of their planet.

They repeat the offer to travel with her.

"You know, Just In Case".

After many hesitations, Florence finally relented and agreed to let someone else come with her. It wouldn't be without causing any problems that was fore sure, but it might still be for the best and no matter what, she had to think about security before anything else. As for how she'd deal with it once she reached her destination... Well, she'd decide then and there. It would mostly depend on what she found anyway.

Though not wanting to make a whole circus out of it, she limited it to one, maybe two others girls, adding that she still wanted to leave the next morning.

It is the morning of Florence's departure into the wilderness, and she is packed and ready to go, along with her trusty native guide Chloe, the painter girl from the "College Town" the other day.  Chloe packs a sketch pad and camera.

She asks Florence where she wants to go, and lays out some of the local geography.  South is the sea- the long neck of land the town is on breaks up into "fingers",  and there are some sandy beaches though most of the shore is rocks and mud.. .and rocks with green slime on top.  Sometimes, mile after mile of that.  The danger to watch out for is the tide, which is more extreme than Earth's, and can submerge a beach faster than one might expect.

East is also sea, but there is a dirt road that wraps northeast and leads past farms and outlying settlements, and then runs along a small river to the Kiln, where bricks are made and shipped to the town.  Almost everything here that isn't prefab is made of these local bricks.

North is wilderness, and though Florence recalls something a little different, Chloe knows it is home to some survey and sampling sites, currently not active.  Just mile after mile of wilderness.

West is also wilderness and much hillier.  There is a ridge with some good views, after that, the small settlement of River Notch, where they are trying to raise Earth fish in a pond.  People normally get there by boat, a far more roundabout route, but actually easier as there is no road.

Florence wasnt particularly enthused by the camera, but didn't say anything about it. Not only it would have sounded suspicious, it might come in handy, who knew. Asked where she wanted to go, she pretended to consider the question then answered, “Let's go north then. We won't step on anyone's toes that way.” She smiled, amused, “Who knows, maybe we'll find something the survey teams missed. Or forgot there...”

North is the dullest of directions, from Chloe's point of view, but then she is only here to keep a visitor out of serious trouble.  North it is.

Life hasn't had so much time to work over St. Brendan.  The green mush hasn't evolved root systems.  Without root systems any small pieces of rock, dust, and organic matter which might become soil get washed away in the rain, instead, or backed into hard clays.  Either way it's not dirt beneath their feet, it's rock or gravel- Chloe steers Florence around some areas that look like flat clay because, as she says, sometimes those are actually deep mud pools with a thin dry surface.

"When people come out... sometimes they bring probes with them, long poles to test out.  I didn't think of that, I haven't done this often and never so far in this direction.  It won't suck you under, that's a myth, but you can get seriously stuck and half to call for help.  I think.  At least I heard it's a myth.  I don't want to find out."

Because of the constant possibility of rain, and to get a little better view when it's not raining, they keep to higher ground when possible.  Towards the end of their first day, Florence thinks she can see something.  Shapes ahead in the distance, a cluster of them, too regular to be natural features.

If all of that had really been about a "retreat" or worse, looking for some excitement, Florence would have been quite disappointed. The place seemed as exciting as an accounting office. Since she was here for something else however, Florence simply listened to what Chloe had to say, readily following her lead.

The least she could say was that for someone coming from Earth, this place was... Well, strange. In fact, as she mentioned to Chloe, it was a bit depressing: had it been merely rocks without any life, it would have been fine. A plain with grass, or abundant - and varied - local life, it would have been fine too. But here, it was in-between both worlds and worse, the local life was destined to disappear. Something that had taken billions of years to reach that point, with who knew what kind of potential, only to disappear in a few decades after humans settling in.

She wasn't accusing the settlers of anything of course - after all, the local life could very well have never evolved past that moss thing even with a few more billion years - it was more a sort of philosophical question about humanity's place among the stars and the impact it had, both on other sentient species and on life in general.

When she noticed the possible structures, Florence pointed them at Chloe, “Is it me, or there's something over there that's not natural?”

Chloe looks at the shapes in the distance.  They are the sort of thing someone might miss from a distance, were that someone not looking for them.  As Florence was.

"It does look like something," she says.  "It's a bit far to go tonight, but we can get there in the morning.   Maybe its a camp explorers left behind, or a test site, or something."

She ponders a while, trying to think of someone mentioning a place off the distance like this.

"There's a small starship that came in a few times, smaller than yours.  They talked about landing outside of town, but I didn't think... well no one thought it was this far out.  Why would they do that?  If this is their's, they picked a pretty far off spot!"

Chloe thinks this would be a good place to stop.  "High ground is good because if it rains we won't get flooded.  If we go further... well we could make it, but it would be getting dark by the time we get there and that would be spooky, and there might not be a good spot to stop in the middle.  It rains a lot at night, when the air chills."

She gives Florence a certain look that also explains, "And I'm tired, we've been walking a lot and I need a rest."

Florence grinned, amused, when Chloe pretty much admitted that she wanted to stop where they were more because she was tired than anything else. Still, she didn't make things difficult for the other girl. “Sure, here works for me, I don't mind if we get there tomorrow. Plus, you're the expert after all.” Florence put her backpack on the ground, apparently not that tired by the walk. Oh, it had been a decent workout for sure, but she seemed to be in a good enough shape that she didn't feel too tired herself.

As her gaze paused on the distance, she considered what was waiting there. “Well... I can imagine two possible answers for a ship coming this far out repeatedly. First, the ship belongs to explorers and they found something over there that they don't want to share. And there could be a lot of possibilities about what it could be.” She paused for some time before adding, “The second possibility I can imagine someone landing there repeatedly, is for some less than legal business, like contraband for example. Maybe a drop point or something? But who knows, I'm no expert at those kinds of things.”

The mention of Contraband gets a shocked look from Chloe.  The "What? Here?" kind of look.
Of course maybe there is smuggling going on... but that look says Chloe wouldn't believe it's possible.

"I think it's just a research station.  Maybe for mining or planting.  We'll see."

She was right about the night bringing rains, at least.  It's a common phenomenon here- the air cools, and cooler air can't hold as much water vapor... and down it comes.

Not a stormy kind of rain.  Just the annoyingly steady and very wet kind.  The donkeys have their shelter next to the two young women, and the snuffle and snort and settle in to rest, fairly unbothered.  Donkeys have a high tolerance for just about everything, compared to horses.  One reason they are popular here.

Night is also long here.  On St. Brendan it's not just time to sleep.  It's dinner.  Sleep.  Long leisurely breakfast. And then finally, finally watch dawn come up over the east, the start of another long day.

Chloe assures Florence that she will adapt to it.  Everyone does, sooner or later.

Florence hadn't insisted on the topic of contraband: she didn't think it would be worth it. Sure, the place was pretty much as far away from anything as you could think, but that also meant there was no market. And since it wasn't even situated on the way between two heavily populated world... No, she didn't really think it was contraband. And the worse options she could think of were even more unlikely so she wasn't particularly worried.

As the sun rose, Florence finished her Tai Chi exercises, having been used to wake up early since a long time ago. She grinned when Chloe mentioned how everyone got used to the local rhythm, but couldn't help but comment, “Oh, it's not the rhythm I'm worried about, it's the lack of shower. I didn't think of that...” The girl wrinkled her nose for a second, then shrugged, “I guess we'll survive. Plus, worst case scenario, the weather will provide.” As long as it didn't get cold anyway. With no one around but Chloe, she didn't mind standing naked under the rain for a bit after all.

With the tents stored on the donkeys and the beasts fed and ready, Florence turned towards their destination “Alright, let's go see what's over there then!”

They have a long pre-dawn morning.  Chloe says nothing about Florence's "rain shower", though she herself just washes with a wet towel.  Even though San Lorenzo is only seven years old, Chloe came to St. Brendan five years before that, as a young child, and has been raised to believe that Good girls don't do things like that even if no one else is around.

Offworlders and their strange ways...

They walk towards their destination.

As they get closer, they can see, quite clearly, these are structures.  Small prefabs, and a small expandable hangar tent.  There are awnings above them.

A little closer and they can see... the prefabs are on one side of a flat... runway?  It is a runway, but the strange thing is the way its painted.  It's camouflaged, so that someone flying overhead, looking down, might see just more rocks and green muck.

With all that effort made to hide the place from above, though, there hasn't been effort to hide the place from someone just walking up to it.  Maybe that just doesn't happen around here.

Florence observed the compound for a moment. “Uh...” For pretty much a whole minute, that was all she said until she finally added, “Well, I don't know what this is used for... Or was used for, but it doesn't look like a simple explorers' camp...”

The girl took her communicator out, activated the video function and zoomed in, to try and see if she could find something, anything, that would tell her what the compound was for or if there was any obvious dangers. Or people. Distractedly, she added, “Well, unless that's the find of the century and they really don't want to share...”

After a minute, she rubbed her lips pensive, then looking at Chloe she asked, “Sooo... Do you want to wait here or go see what's inside?”

Chloe weighs following along with Florence, or waiting out here in the middle of... nowhere.

"We should take the donkeys too," she says, making up her mind quickly.  "It looks more innocent.  I mean, we are innocent, right?"

Chloe may not have the broad background and specialized education Florence does, but she's smart enough to recognize that maybe the fact that they are here is not accidental.  Florence set off directly into untraveled wilderness, after all, and came straight here.  Was it luck?

"Do you know anything about this place?" she asks.  "If we're going to get in trouble, can you at least tell me why?"

Florence didn't hesitate for long before saying, “They have a nav' buoy active over there, probably to guide whatever ships are supposed to come. It's programmed in such a way that ship sensors ignore it unless you know what you're looking for... Or are curious and can look at the stuff a ship's systems are programmed to ignore.”

“So yes, I was pretty sure there was something here, I just didn't know what and I didn't want to say anything for fear of being thought of as a fool. Well, even more of a fool.” Florence smiled ruefully and after a second spent looking at the compound, she added, “Truth be told, I was thinking that I'd find a wreck or something like that.” Something she'd have been able to claim for herself in fact, but it was probably best to not say anything about this.

After that, she nodded, “Anyway, sure, let's take the donkeys. If nothing else we don't want them getting lost.” After a brief pause, she added, “And can you program your communicator to contact someone and explain where we are and what we're doing if you don't cancel that order periodically?”

Packed up, and accompanied by their donkeys who embrace the "whatever, as long as we're fed" spirit of their breed, Florence and Chloe walk towards the assemblage of prefab shelters, now clearly belonging to a small remote airstrip.

Chloe processes the fact that Florence *knew* about this.  It takes her train of thought in some disturbing directions.  She has to ignore the instinct to run off screaming.  That's probably more dangerous than anything else right now.

"A wreck?  Why would there be a wreck, we'd have heard about a wreck."

Then Chloe's face scrunches up, as she realizes they'd have heard about a nearby port as well.

"They have to know," Chloe says as they get closer.  "There's no way this would be here without the people in charge knowing.  But they didn't tell anyone."

There a dozen prefab modules here.  A few are of the expandable type, and they are all expanded, roofs and walls pushed up and out, flexible accordion wall stretching in the gaps.  A few are not.  About half of them are connected up in one large structure, the others are on their own, although cables connect them.  Each has an awning screening it above.  Now that they are closer, they can see that the awnings are solar panels, but... they are all upside down, with the solar panel down and the wrong side up.

"I lived in prefabs for a few years when we first got to St. Brendan," Chloe says.  "Things like this were home. But not here, in Campo Savana outside of Port Grace, on the other side of the planet.  Ours were... homier."

It does look... shut down.  The lights are off, at least... but there is a quiet hum they can hear when the air is still.  Something is still on, in the big cluster of prefabs.

There is something else that is a little unusual.  Next to that cluster is a row of  unkempt looking shrubs.  Thick, ropy branches.

“Hmm.” Florence considered Chloe's opinion about the 'people in charge' having to know about this place. “It's likely, but not assured. I mean, if there's indeed no one coming around here and considering how the field is likely invisible from the air all it'd take would be for traffic control to ignore ships coming to the surface around here. That could be achieved either by someone working there or simply a digital virus in their systems.” Granted, it would work even better if traffic control was told to not ask questions and not report whatever ships were coming here. “Right now there's no way to know though.”

As the two girls walked in, Florence kept her communicator out to film everything they were seeing. “This feels abandoned but... It has to be reasonably recent. If it had existed before the town had been established, the explorers would have found out about it, right?” She cocked her head to the side, “Maybe it's a temporary base someone set up here and it's not used often. I don't know who would need that kind of things though.” Maybe it was some kind of training grounds for the military? Why place it so close to the town though?

As she noticed the hum, Florence cocked her head to the side. “Do you hear that? There's something on somewhere over there.” As she walked in that direction though, she noticed the branches and stopped, puzzled. “What's this? It doesn't look like it's local...”

It seems quiet other than the one mechanical hum.  The two walk among the prefabs and stop near the plants.

"Nothing's native here, nothing at all," Chloe says.  "It wouldn't be possible, the evolution hasn't got that far.  I've seen these plants before though.  We have a lot of imported plants, in test plots.  They're trying to see what can grow, and what help it might need.  I don't know what this is, but there is a small test plot with it.  I wonder why they decided to plant some here, too.  That's strange."

On a sudden whim, Chloe takes a small green twig from a bush.

"When we get back we can identify it," she says.

She looks around at the prefabs, especially the large cluster, with the sound.  There is a louver with a steady flow of air coming out.

"The ventilation is on.  Florence, maybe there's no one here, but this place is still used.  Should we be here?  What if we're doing something wrong?"

Florence nodded, silently agreeing to Chloe taking a sample. She didn't know if it would lead to anything, but better that than ignoring something that could explain everything. “Maybe it's not a standard variety or something. This place doesn't really look like what I imagine a test farm to be though... Why would you only grow one type of plant only, and like that?” On the other hand, the whole thing was baffling Florence, so at that point...


“Wrong?” Florence shook her head. “Why would it be wrong? We're not trespassing, we didn't go over any fence, there are no signs anywhere... The girl smiled, amused “Are we doing something someone would rather we did not? Almost certainly, but for all we know, they are in the wrong.” After a small pause she added, “In fact, it's the most likely right now.”

She didn't hesitate to continue then, looking around and heading to the large cluster where the noise was coming from.

The two girls explore the camp.  Some of the prefabs they check are locked.  The big, important looking complex is locked.  It might be possible to break in anyway, but Chloe would advise against it- it definitely crosses the line between innocent exploration and burglary.

They come across one prefab which is unlocked.

Chloe says it's typical that a camp would always leave at least one shelter unlocked.  In case of emergency, you don't want to be locked out of everything.

They simply must peek inside.

Sure enough, there is emergency survival and first aid equipment here.  All the things you might need if truly stuck.

There are rolls of cloth on shipping pallets.  And more boxes, all of which come from a place on the distant planet Kayon, out towards the end of the Main Line, according to the shipping labels. Also, boxes of... soil?  These come from the same place on Kayon.   And a cargo handling robot.

Shipping information on the boxes indicate that these came via two different ships.  They must both be small freighters, because nothing else could land here.

There's a map on the wall, which shows a future road, coming out to this place from the town.  One would need trucks and maybe a bulldozer to make something like that.

And then... there is the sound of the approaching aircraft.

Florence grumbled a bit about most of the buildings being closed - and Chloe's insistence that they don't touch. Not that she had any nefarious goals, she was just displeased that anything would prevent her from satisfying her curiosity...and the only building they could enter didn't do much for that.

Oh, she scanned the rolls, pallets and shipping information - maybe she'd be able to find something about it later - and the map. At least that was a bit interesting. Though when she thought about it, a bit depressing. Well, sort of. “If they - whoever they are - plan on building a road between here and the town, it's probably not something illegal. Maybe just a private lab doing some research and who didn't want to advertise it? Though... I'd have expected to find logos all over the place.”

Her thoughts however were drawn away from that particular mystery when she heard the aircraft's noise. “Do you hear that?” Once sure that there was indeed something coming, she walked outside to look at what was coming. As she did so though, she looked around: had they tripped some kind of alarm?

"I didn't hear an alarm," Chloe admits.  "But no one ever thought to come out here, so maybe it was only a sensor of some kind?"

The aircraft noise gets closer, and when they look outside they can see that it is one of Mission Saint Lorenzo's municipal aircraft.  According to Chloe, they have a few, mostly for quick official visits and rescues.

But of course this means...

"They know about this place," she says quietly.  "But they don't mention it.  Please don't get us in trouble!"

It is a small advanced tilt-rotor: relatively inexpensive, as it doesn't dabble in any costly "gravitic" technology.  But with a carrying capacity no more than a typical sedan.  And it is landing at the field.

“Well... At least this explains why no one in town said anything about the ships coming here...” Florence commented about the arriving vehicle. She cocked an eyebrow at Chloe's admonition to avoid trouble. “They'll probably just ask you to keep quiet and me to leave yesterday, don't worry.”

Her head tilted to the side, she added, “In fact, if this is a legitimate entreprise, but one they'd rather kept quiet for the time being, they may ask for you to work on it.” The only thing she could think of though was that things hadn't gone exactly as planned about the establishment of the colony - or maybe just the city - and someone was trying to fix it before panic settled in. Now that she thought about it... Could the stuff they had brought here from Lyonesse fit in that particular equation?

Shaking her head, she just decided to wait and see. “Come, let's go meet them near the field. And you're welcome to blame me if you want.” It wasn't like they could do much to her after all, so if it could help Chloe...

The aircraft lands on the field.   There is a pilot, whom Chloe recognizes but Florence does not, and a passenger they both recognize:  Kurtiss Ferro, Works Director of Mission San Lorenzo.

Not a law enforcement official... Kurtiss Ferro the Works Director.  The guy in charge of building things.

Mission San Lorenzo is a small enough town for mutual recognition of any two random people is a good possibility.  The pilot is an older man.  He and Chloe exchange looks.

"Chloe, do your parents know you're here?"

"Well not this place specifically," she says.  "I didn't know we'd find it.  She wanted to see the wilderness, so we went in a direction nothing else was.  What is it?"

"It belongs to our benefactor," Kurtiss says.  "For whatever reasons he has, he's asked that we don't officially list this place.  And with all the good he's done us, unless there's a reason to suspect something wrong is going on here, we're going to keep it that way while we can."

And then his eyes go to Florence.

"Well?"

“Hello Mr. Ferro.” Florence smiled. For a moment, it seemed that she wasn't going to answer, but in the end she simply shrugged, “You'll have to tell your 'benefactor' that they should turn off the beacon they have in there. Anyone paying attention can see it's there.” Granted, pretty much no one was going to bother looking at it. “I was curious and decided to come have a look while I was around.”

She paused then, considering if she wanted to say more: she didn't know what that benefactor wanted, but you didn't go to all that trouble if you didn't fear the consequences of what someone learning about it would say or do. And this, whatever this was, taking place within the territory controlled by the town, made them responsible for it too. At the very least Kurtiss should have demanded to know what was going on here: as things were, if something went wrong, he would be held responsible. In fact, it was even likely that he would be the only one responsible if the benefactor denied everything.

But she couldn't really come out and say that: she was just a nineteen years old girl, who had disembarked from a ship just the day before... So instead, she asked, “You know, I've heard a lot about that 'benefactor' of yours but I don't think I've ever heard its name... Who is it exactly?”

The two people from the aircraft look at each other with a slightly exasperated look, and a look is also exchanged with Chloe.

"You don't know?" the pilot asked.  "You came with a ship load of stuff he bought for us.  Henry Flynn."

Kurtiss explains.  Henry Flynn is a small frontier freighter owner with a big dream- build an alliance and network of small ship owners so they can cooperate, and pursue their mutual interests collectively.  Part of his plan:  Each ship owner must own a landing site somewhere, build it up, and make it available to the others in the alliance.

No one really knows why Captain Flynn chose this place- he says he likes it, he likes the people, and he likes the idea behind it.  But he was supportive of San Lorenzo from the start, and his funding has supplied a lot of the town's resources.

"Everyone knows we wouldn't have come so far without him," Kurtiss Ferro says.

Kurtiss and the pilot both insist the two girls return home, and not come out here.  Florence sees a barely noticeable dynamic here:  they might be much angrier, but it's Chloe, and it's a small town, and while Florence is a stranger, Chloe's presence creates some breathing space.  It may be that the real challenge ahead for Kurtiss isn't what Florence might have found, but "guess where I found your daughter".

“Oh.” Florence seemed disappointed: she had expected something a lot more exciting than this even if it had been perfectly legal. Instead, all she found was the result of an eccentric's actions. Not that it was stupid, far from it: it could very well give huge dividends at some point in the future, assuming everyone played ball of course. Maybe it would in fact be quite interesting to talk to him, who knew: she was looking for unconventional answers maybe that Henry Flynn would have one for her?

Florence readily agreed to return to San Lorenzo, “Oh sure, don't worry about it, we'll take the donkeys and be on our way. We should be back by noon tomorrow. I was curious, nothing more. Could you tell me how to contact Mr. Henry Flynn though? I would like to ask him a few questions if possible.”

Henry Flynn can normally be found with his ship, the Razzle Dazzle, which is small but seems to do pretty well.  They run a "coreward side" route, generally staying off the Main Line.

Clearly they are not here now, something evident by the lack of starship on the landing field.

"It's been a while, so he might be back any time," Kurtiss says.  "Or not, you never know."

As part of the alliance he's working on, other ships are permitted to use this place too, but so far there has been a lack of interest.  Maybe once a year or so.  That is why the Albatross's visit was such a big deal.

With things settled out and Chloe giving her word that they won't poke around the private property of Mr. Flynn, it is time to return back to San Lorenzo and return the donkeys.

“Alright, thank you.” After that, Florence didn't make things complicated for anyone, she was perfectly content to go back to San Lorenzo. Her goals had been reached anyway, and maybe more importantly, she didn't want to miss an opportunity to accompany Marlo to his ship.

---

A few days later back in Port Loretta after a nice two days boat trip, Florence sat in a small restaurant with Marlo. She had inquired about any news about the last leg of his trip, then started talking with him about her experiences on the ground - though she didn't talk about the hidden compound - while continuing to learn his language.

Inevitably, Florence and, for the moment Marlo, both find the Nellie Bly's Help Wanted Call.  The computer networks, even on St. Brendan, have their ways of matching people with what they are looking for.

Marlo thinks it is a wonderful opportunity for both of them.

"I need a ship to take me to my Home Ship, and that is exactly where they are going,"  Marlo says.  "Very good luck.  You need to trade your services for money.  Did you know that of the known intelligences, only approximately half developed the concept of money?  To us it is so basic and so essential, yet the Mimosans never created it, and it is completely alien to the Ecosentiences.  Please understand my good intentions, I have already requested an interview to explore this.  I have specified that you are my partner.  I believe it strengthens both our positions.  I have observed that Humans of your young age are not given preferential treatment in these negotiations."


Florence goes from here to the Nellie Bly Job Interview thread.