The Whorls of Jupiter

Chapter 10 Manifest

July 29th 2521 Waxing 1

"Welcome aboard Yari Station. My name is Golan, station manager. It's a pleasure."

Captain La Trois feigned a smile and shook his hand, "Pleasure's all mine Golan. When can we be underway?"

"Bridgemoor has forwarded all clearances and underlined the importance of getting the Prominent Rage to space as quickly as possible. Unfortunately..." Golan sighed, "Workers are on strike and some of the Jovian kids have sabotaged the railgun. Without it-"

"We can't leave." La Trois finished.

"We want to get you underway quickly. Until then you and your crew are now classified as Bridgemoor VIPs. You are all welcome to explore and refresh yourselves in the upper sector of the station. But I must inform you that due to the riots, it's not safe below the docks."

"Thank you for your counsel Golan," La Trois said as he signaled Keun and Jorge to follow him. They carried Oddie on a stretcher.

"Good heavens! What happened to him?"

"Fell down some stairs..." Jorge muttered.

La Trois shrugged. "Since we're VIPs I trust you'll spare a little of your coveted biofoam to get our man back in fighting shape?"

"Oh... Uh... Certainly. Upper deck, hospital ward. They'll sort you out."

"Thank you kindly," Keun said in a parody cowboy accent and pushed past. Oddie smiled painfully with a single hand locked in a thumbs up. Golan looked perturbed as they went to the elevator.

La Trois swiped his phone and the upper district unlocked on the touchpad. He keyed in the hospital ward and they ascended.

"What was that about Cap?" Keun asked.

"I don't know what you're talking about."

"That 'Golan' guy. Seemed weird. Also seemed like you knew him. You got some kinda history?"

"I had a life before the Prominent Rage you know. I used to work these docks another life ago."

Jorge looked up from Oddie's stretcher, "I don't think he recognized you."

"It's for the best. Can you imagine if an officer had mistreated a grunt and had to answer to that grunt one day?"

Keun leaned back against the walls and crossed his arms, "If I were that grunt I'd make that officer eat shit."

La Trois let out a rare sincere smile, "The day is still young Sargent."

***

Oddie was rushed through the sleek halls of the hospital ward as doctors barked orders. It was rare a VIP was hurt and there would be hell to pay in their performance reviews if he didn't make a full recovery.

"Mr. Velvar's vertebrae is broken in three places. Get that biofoam ready."

"We can confirm that the patient's nerves received minimal damage."

"Alright. Inject him with the biofoam."

"Mr. Velvar, you're gonna feel a sudden insertion in your collar. It's gonna be cold and numbing but you're gonna be just fine."

Being held down by nurses was nothing less than exciting for him, "Heh heh. Do your worst madames!" he said faintly as the cold dilating nozzle burrowed under his collar and he felt cool, wet, numbness blooming within.

***

Sanon dropped from a scaffold onto the Prominent Rage. She moved to the circular upper loading door. She entered in the default factory set administrator codes and ran a diagnostic on the Rage's security. Her eyes darted about but nobody seemed interested in the ship at the moment. A lot of the dockworkers were allies but still, these were Bridgemoor VIPs. Station chatter had never seen a ship get rubber stamped through customs so quickly. A Free Trader at heart, the insurrectionist saboteur thought for a moment. I've never seen so much custom security on a ship like this. Every Bridgemoor code is set to raise an alarm. Usually our allies run this kind of setup. What the hell is in there? She held down a sequence of keys tied to the factory settings of the long discontinued ship and the hatch slid open without resistance.