9/21/2007

Table of Contents

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter One

False Starts

Article 1, First Paragraph, the 1967 U.N. "Outer Space Treaty"

The exploration and use of outer space, including the moon and other celestial bodies, shall be carried out for the benefit and in the interests of all countries, irrespective of their degree of economic or scientific development, and shall be the province of all mankind.

December 11, 2008

"… with thirty-one Nays, one-hundred and fifty Ayes and eleven abstentions, the resolution is approved."

"There you have it. On this historic date of December 11th, 2008, the eleventh anniversary of the signing of the Kyoto Accord, the United Nations has approved the plan to build solar power stations in Low Earth Orbit." The CNN news announcer turned slightly, "We go now to our Science and Technology reporter, Paul Howard. Paul, what do you make of this?" The monitor screen split to show a second reporter standing in front of U.N. headquarters, the collar of his coat dancing in the wind, brilliant flakes of white clinging briefly to the somber gray of the cloth, sparkling in the glare of the lights which gave a washed-out look to his face against the darkened skies reflecting in the building's windows behind him.

"Wolf, it's clear the member nations of the United Nations have chosen to face the growing crisis of Global Warming head on." His expression serious, Howard continued to expound, using simple terms which his target audience could grasp. "What's surprising is the United States agreeing to support this project. Still, without US support, the Orbital Space Power (OSP) project could not succeed. No other nation has the resources to launch the sheer volume of men and material to build the system."

The display switched to an aerial view of the Kennedy Space Center, zooming in on a view of the massive Vehicle Assembly Building (VAB). As the scene panned out to include a shot of the Discovery STS moving towards the launch pad, the reporter continued, "Even so, our space facilities are beginning to show their age and it may be necessary to build newer launch sites to handle the traffic. Several NASA white papers have proposed constructing new installations in either western Texas or southeastern New Mexico. The advantages are that these regions are sparsely populated and are closer to the locations where current launch vehicles are constructed. Las Cruces, New Mexico, is next to White Sands National Monument and the White Sands Missile Range. It is also less than 25 miles from El Paso, Texas." The display switched to show a panorama of desert sand, sky and dusky mountains shimmering in the heat.

Dermot growled as he mashed the "Off" button on his TV remote. "Great," he muttered, "yet another massive bureaucracy trying to engineer a mouse. We'll be lucky if they don't manage to 'plan' us back into the stone age!" He pushed himself out of the naugahyde couch and stalked to the kitchen. "Did you hear that?" he asked Mary Campbell, his housemate, currently sitting at the cramped table shoved against the wall furthest from the window.

"What?" she said, "Oh, you mean the yammering you were watching? Dermot, you know I can't stand all that nonsense about spaceships and aliens and other nonsense. I can't see why any grown man gets involved in such stuff." Her mouth formed a moue in disgusted resignation. Dermot turned away and busied himself with preparing breakfast. Better to ignore her words when she was spoiling for a fight. Shortly, she rose and carried her dishes to the sink and left the room. He heard her gathering her things for the day and then the apartment door opening and closing. Once again she left without saying goodbye; that had become the norm. He'd avoided trying to find out why, hoping the problem would solve itself without effort on his part; the 'silent treatment' and snide comments had only gotten worse. Dermot resolved to confront her and discuss the issue when he got home, or not.

* * *

May 28, 2009

“… Congratulations and farewell, Class of 2009!”

With those words from the Dean, Dora’s classmates sprang to their feet, letting loose with cheers, catcalls and, yes, she heard correctly, even a few Rebel War Yells. She felt… she didn’t know how she felt, but excessive exuberance or joy weren’t it. Yes, she’d graduated from college, the first in her family to do so; her mother and father were a dozen or so rows back, waiting to congratulate her. Why wasn’t she happy, Dora pondered?

A sharp jab in her side shocked her back to the pandemonium surrounding her. “Hey dummy! There’ll be enough time to sit and mope after the celebration. Drag your sorry tail out of that chair and cheer with the rest of us” Monique Rogers watched as Dora stood. “Okay, that’s a good start. Now toss your cap into the air and scream like this.” She snatched off Dora’s graduation cap, tossing it high above, bellowing, “Yeeeeee Haaaaaaaa!”

“Oh, all right! Woo-hoo. There. I’ve cheered.” Dora said, “I’ve fulfilled my graduation duties and so have you. Can we go now? I’m sure Dad wants nothing better than to get us snapshotted, packed and on the road back to San Antonio.” She paused, “He’s missed two entire days from the store for this.”

“Girlfriend, you are plumb stubborn when it comes to holding onto your snits, aren’t you?” Catching the look in Dora’s face, Monique sighed, “All right. Let’s find our caps and get out of here.” With that she pressed down the line of fellow graduates; Dora tagged close behind, thinking, for the dozenth time, Monique’s height made her an excellent Moses, capable of parting any sea of humanity.

After retrieving their caps, Dora and Moniqe pushed through the crowd of students and parents, meeting with Mr. and Mrs. Rodriguez. Mr. Rodriguez glanced at his watch, not noticing the frown that passed across his wife's face.

"Girls," he said, looking up and smiling, "How does it feel to be graduates? Does all that knowledge weigh down upon you? Are you eager to be about the business of work?"

"Dom," his wife said, "Cut the girls some slack. This is a big day for both of them. And after eight years of elementary, four years of high school and four more years of college, I'm sure all they really want this moment is to enjoy life a bit. Right, girls?"

"Sure thing Mrs. R.," Monique grinned. "I'm looking forward to days of lazing around your pool, sipping cool Margueritas and admiring the young men who'll no doubt come a-courtin'" She fanned her face with dainty waves of her hand. "Lawsey, lawsey. I do believe the young gentlemen might have a genuine fondness for such sweet young belles as ourselves." Dora tried, and failed, to smother a snort of disbelief. Monique was her best friend, had become her friend during the first week when they were shoved together into a shockingly small dorm room by an impersonal college; no doubt remained in Dora's mind that her friend would do just what she said, notwithstanding her complete lesbian orientation. Poor young gentlemen.

Her mother knew the score as well. "Don't give me that guff! I've seen you in action, young lady. You'll be dancing 'til dawn and working all day long at whatever job you get. How you girls can pack so much into one short day, I'll never understand."

"Dear, I'm sure Dora and Monique want to get going. It will be a long drive back home and I'd like to get some pictures of them before they change out of their gowns."

"Dad! You shot something like two dozen photos before the ceremony. And I'm sure you snapped at least a hundred of us when we paraded across the stage."

"You're wrong, daughter mine," her mother interrupted, "I snapped about a hundred pictures. Your father was busy videoing both of you."

"And you keep telling me your mom and dad don't handle technology well. What do you always say… That's it, they're old dogs trying to learn new tricks."

"Monique!"

"That's all right, dear," her father said, his voice oozing avuncular indulgence, "Your mother and I have known for some time you feel we're rather old-fashioned. Still, I should think you'd guess I could learn how to master a digital camera - I've been a photography nut for more years than you've been alive. Now how about those pictures?"

* * *

The drive home had been long and hot. even with the air-conditioning running full bore. Her mother's Pacifica, her father had been a fan of Chrysler products for years, ever since the time he worked in the company's Auburn Hills complex, was showing it's years, more than a few dings and dents marked it's outside and the leather had gained the sheen of long wear, buffed from hundreds of times she and her family had slid into them. The only reason they weren't riding in the new Chrysler 300M was because they were hauling away the stuffed animals, books, clothes and other items she and Monique had collected over their four years - at least those items they hadn't given away to friends or sold back to the campus bookstore.

They were just left Las Cruces for the short dash down to El Paso, Texas, where US Route 10 would once again turn east towards San Antonio. They would have made better time from Phoenix, but getting all the boxes packed had eaten up much of the previous morning. Last night she'd broken out her XM portable radio from the box in which it had been stored, and she was listening to a classics station, currently playing Green Day's "American Idiot". Monique had her iPod running as she sat on the opposite side. Both of them were staring at the passing scenery when Mr. Rodriguez stuck his right hand back and waved to gather their attention.

"Look," he said, pointing at a truck heading northwest, back to Las Cruces, "We're bidding on a contract to supply uniforms for their people." The truck had a massive "globe and spaceship" logo with the letters "U", "N" and "O", "P", "S" wrapped around it. "They're building the new heavy-lifter lauch site out at the old White Sands Missile Range. If all goes well, we should be supplying them with about 5,000 uniforms over the next year.”

"Mr. R, I thought you didn't like the space program?" Monique asked.

"I don't. But I don't like losing business to my competitors even more. Someone will provide needed services, products and supplies for the project," Dora's father replied. "I have people who depend upon me to find the customers who'll keep them employed. I don't think any of this 'orbital power system' will work; at least not in my lifetime. But until it fails, my company, my employees and their families will have a decent living from providing the uniforms."

Dora's mother broke in. "You girls want to hear the strangest part of the deal? Your father, Dora, is also bidding on the spacesuit contract. Hmph! What does he know from spacesuits?"

"Is that true, Dad? Do you have a design for a spacesuit?"

"I thought spacesuits were all made out of layers of kevlar, plastic, aluminum and some sort of tubing they run coolant through, Mr. R? How are you going to do that? Most of your stuff is that Gore-whatchamacallit or Spandex."

"And you'd be right. However, this is a new generation suit just for station work. The basic suit is a bodystocking; it's designed solely to keep the wearer's skin from expanding too much. The helmet, tanks and controls all fit on top of the collar of the bodysuit. I don't really understand much of how the thing works, but it does work."

"What about heat, cold and meteorites? Isn't that why those other spacesuits Monique mentioned were made out of the other material?"

"Sure, but this design incorporates a separate shell of woven kevlar for extended exposure. It slips right over the basic suit and snaps onto the back-and-breast collar. Both of you should drop by the offices and I'll show the design to you."

Chapter Two

Flying with Turkeys!

Our greatest glory is not in never falling, but in rising every time we fall.

-Confucius

May 19, 2011

"… and so it is incumbent upon each member of this team to ensure total quality of the project by using this empowerment to focus upon eliminating all defects in each module prior to including the module in the project." droned Benjamin Davidson, manager of QC. Ellen Connoly had a hard time staying awake during QC meetings. Even with two cups of Rashid's extra-strong coffee in her, Ellen felt her eyes slowly closing. "…Furthermore… Ms. Connoly! If you find this subject not to your liking, perhaps you'd rather come up here and take up a new one!" Ellen, eyes now wide open, bolted upright in the chair, looking around at all her co-workers. Some were even stifling laughter! By the heat on her cheeks, she knew she was clearly blushing.

"Um… No Mr. Davidson. I'm sorry." Ellen temporized, "I just didn't get a good night's sleep last night. Please, excuse me." 'I need this job, she thought, bitterly, and here I am looking like I don't care about it. What a perfect way to blow it.' She reached over to the nearest pitcher and poured the remainder of the lukewarm coffee into her mug and took a deep swallow. 'Ugh. Well, the taste alone should keep me awake through the rest of the meeting.'

* * *

“Ellen? Ellen! Wake up, Ellen! We’d appreciate it if you would be so kind as to attend the meeting mentally as well as physically. Since it’s YOUR project we are discussing, you MIGHT want to pay attention. You may even have something of value to input.”

She groaned silently, hearing the snickers from her fellow project workers as she opened her eyes and shifted in the chair to look at her boss, Benjamin Hamilton Davidson, although ‘Sir’ or ‘Mr. Davidson’ was the approved mode of address. Mr. Davidson stared back at her, eyes glaring with the red glint of an angry boar. ‘Ellen, girl, you’ve gone and put your foot right square in it, this time,’ she thought!

* * *

The QC meeting finally ended. Ellen stood, stretched and began to file out of the room along with the other workers. As she reached the door, she was brought to a halt as Davidson said, "Ellen. Could you please stay here for a minute?" Ellen let Barb Serman and Rashid Kumaj should past her, heading out the door.

"You wanted to talk about something, Mr. Hawkens," Ellen asked?

"Close the door, please, Ellen," Hawkens replied. He waited until Ellen turned back to the table before saying anything more. "Please, sit down. I'd like to discuss some issues with you that have recently come to my attention."

* * *

Ellen struggled up the staircase leading to her apartment, the box containing her personal possessions fighting to slip from her hands and the day’s mail threatening to fall from her purse. When she reached the door she chose to put both down, needing a respite to still her shakey hand before she could unlock the door.

Once inside, she abandoned the box by the door and flopped onto the couch with such force the frame groaned. ‘Stupid furniture,’ she thought. ‘I’ve had enough bad news today. I don’t need to deal with reporting a broken couch to the complex manager.’

Sighing, she leaned into the corner and pulled one leg up, not quite laying down, yet not sitting upright.

“I might as well deal with the rest of it now,” she muttered to the empty room and pulled out the mass of bills and junk mail. “I’ll need to know just how long my savings will stretch. Gawd! What if I can’t find work before it runs out! I’m NOT moving back in with Mom and Dad!” She sorted out the junk mail from the bills, making two neat piles, yet one envelope, nine by twelve inches and feeling stiff as if it contained a brochure, gave no clue as to which pile it belonged. The return address stated it came from something called “UN-OPS”, based out of Las Cruces, New Mexico; that was no help. And the way it was stated, her address made her feel they’d gained her address from the mailing list from the Association for Computing Machinery. She hadn’t been an active member for almost a year now, ever since she went to work on her current assignment, well, last assignment after today.

“Whoever sent this just wasted their money, but I never could resist a mystery,” she told the room as she opened the envelope. The expected brochure slid out, pulling a form letter out with it. She put the brochure aside and concentrated on the letter. It opened average enough.

“Dear Ms. Connoly,

It has come to our attention that you are an eager young programming professional. We’d like to invite you to consider applying for an opportunity of a lifetime!”

‘Hmmm…’ she thought, ‘it’s a head-hunting letter. Still, just who is UN-OPS and what do they mean by ‘opportunity of a lifetime’? I think I might just apply. After all, it’s not as if I’m tied to a current project.’

She scanned further down… “That’s strange,” she said, “There’s no clue just who UN-OPS is. Wait a minute. I can apply online. Thank goodness for the Internet. Who knows, I might be called for an interview; I wouldn’t mind blowing out of Minneapolis for New Mexico. Minnesota’s so dreary this time of year.”

She headed for her home office which she’d set up in the second bedroom.

May 20, 2011

J'Shawn Williams cruised down K Street, heading for work at the mall. It was a boring job, but it paid for the car and his schooling. Sometimes he wondered if he should have gone after the Master's degree; so many of the courses were bogus, taught by professors who still hadn't figured out that Socialism didn't work. Ah well, he'd finished the last exam of his last semester, it was a sunny day and the radio was tuned to a new all-Rap station. He cranked the volume and dropped the windows to let some of the Bass rhythm blast out to the street. Pounding the wheel to the beat of the music, he slipped into the turn lane, waited for the oncoming traffic to thin and darted into the vast expanse of the mall parking lot. He headed around to the back where the employees had their parking spaces.

Bwoop! Bwoop! J'Shawn's eyes darted to the rearview in dismay. Damn, he thought, It's Carruthers! He's gonna bust my ass for playing too real. This is the third time this week! He cut the radio, pulled over and waited. Sure enough, the rearview showed Gene Carruthers getting out of the mall security truck. J'Shawn watched as he stepped out, hitched up his gun belt, reached in for his nightstick and shoved it in the proper loop, placed his billed cap squarely on his head, seated it, and then tilted it slightly forward and grabbed his ticket case. Closing the door, Carruthers reached up with one hand, tilted his head and radioed in to the guard office. Only Gene Carruthers could make such a production out of exiting a car, thought J'Shawn, and watching him makes it all the more believable that Carruthers was a cop wannabe. By this time, Carruthers had reached J'Shawn's door. J'Shawn looked out and up at the security guard, pasting a bored but somewhat innocent look on his face.

"If it isn't Mr. Williams," drawled Carruthers. "Y'know, GEE-SHAWN, we have rules against noise pollution on mall property. You can't just go around spilling all that crap out the window at such a high volume, pretty as you please. Besides, no honest-to-God, hard-working real American would listen to such noise. I'm afraid I'm going to have to give you a ticket." He smirked down at J'Shawn as he said the last line.

"No, Gene, you can't," J'Shawn snapped. "You haven't shown me any evidence that my music exceeded the limits set in mall regulations and you know as well as I do that I've gone to the expense of installing a system that specifically won't reach or exceed those limits. So just stuff that ticket right back in it's case." He glared up at the guard in defiance. However, Carruthers continued to smirk down at him. Uh-Oh! J'Shawn thought, Something's changed or he'd be flipping me off and waving me on my way, by now.

"You should keep up on the mall's rules and regulations. Several regulations were changed in today's Mall Council meeting."

"That's today! It was scheduled for next week!"

"Seems that several of the council members will be going out of town next week. It's vacation time, don't you know… It is now a mall regulation that the measured sound from a vehicle's music system cannot reach higher than 80 decibels when measured from ten feet away from the vehicle. An' I just measured you at 82 db! I gotcha! Here's your ticket!”

As J'Shawn started to drive away, he heard Carruthers call after him, “Oh. Yeah. I forgot! Have a nice day, Gee-Shawn!”

“Crap,” muttered J'Shawn, “This is my third violation in less than a month. That means I’ve got to go before the mall’s Disciplinary Committee. They could take away my parking permit, which means I’d have to take a bus to work!” He pulled into an available parking slot and got out of his car, locking it, and hurried into the mall.

* * *

"Afternoon, Ms. Dennehey," he called, "Sorry I'm running a bit behind schedule, but Carruthers pulled me over on my way in." J'Shawn donned his apron and hat and began pulling chilled dough and fresh vegetables from the cooler. This was the best part of the shift, prepping the toppings for the assembly line.

"J'Shawn? Oh good. You're here," Alison Dennehey replied. "Before you get deep into work, there's some things we need to go over. That can wait."

"Okay." he said, and stepped into the tiny office behind her. She waved him to the small chair as she sat in her own behind the desk.

"J'Shawn. This is hard for me, so I'll just come right out with it." Ms. Dennehey glanced down, shuffled some papers and looked back up. "I'm afraid Sunrise Pie by the Slice has hit a rough spot and I'm forced to make some cuts in staffing. I had thought to reduce some hours but upon review there's just no way I can make it work, save cutting personnel. As Assistant Manager, your wages are the highest of all employees; by cutting you, I can meet my goals with just one elimination."

"Hunh?" his stomach hollowed. "You're firing me? You can't be firing me; I'm the hardest worker you have. Besides, none of the others can work the early shifts. This just doesn't make sense," J'Shawn pleaded.

She hung her head. "Look, I realize times are tight…"

J'Shawn interrupted her, "No. Don't lie to me. I also do your books and make the daily deposits. And at the last mall meeting, they said that this place, Sunrise Pie by the Slice, was one of the most profitable eateries in the food court. There's got to be another reason." He saw her flush. "I'm right, aren't I?"

"Yes," she admitted, "I knew I couldn't hide it from you. It's the other store owners. I've had complaints. No, nothing in writing, but if I don't let you go, things will get worse. The association is already talking about raising my fees… perhaps even force me to take all deliveries only during a narrow window of time. J'Shawn, I can't afford to keep you."

"So what about me? I've put in five years here and I've always been a hard worker. I need this job, Ms. Dennehey! I've got bills that must be paid!"

Alison dropped her eyes and shuffled the papers once again. "I can help there, somewhat. Yes, they're forcing me into a corner, but it's still my business, all mine." She met his eyes again. "It's not much, but I can pay you for the rest of this month, all your accrued vacation and sick pay and I've even managed to scrape together one month's severance. I've got the check right here."

"So that's it? I'm supposed to just walk away from the job I've worked for over the last five years? Man! Ms. Dennehey, this isn't right! And what am I supposed to tell other employers? They're gonna ask, you know they will!" he stormed.

"I've written you an excellent reference letter. It's in the envelope with your check. And I seem to recall you've just wrapped up your Master's program." she said. "It's not as if you were planning to stay here forever."

"Yeah. You're right. But I was planning on working the summer while sending out resumes and applications."

"J'Shawn, I like you. You know I do. And it's with that in mind, I feel I must point this out. You're clearly a hard worker, intelligent, dedicated and competent. And you're a nice guy. However," and here she paused, "you make people uncomfortable. I've seen it in the eyes of customers and other store owners. It's the way you dress, the appearance you put forward; you look like a gang member, what with your tats, your doo-rag, your piercings and your off-shift clothes scream Blood."

"I'm not…"

"Yes, I know you're not a member." Alison interrupted. "But you look like a member. And we've been having gang-related problems these last few months. Which means that many people are going to be suspicious of anyone who dresses a certain way or who displays what could be mistaken for gang colors. I remember hearing you talk about just this reaction in one of your classes."

J'Shawn felt the anger rising within him as the memory of the events of that day flashed through his mind. His mouth tightened, his chest constricted and his hands balled without conscious intent. He inhaled sharply and released his tension on the exhale. "Okay, you're right. And when I'm honest with myself, I agree that I've been seeing the same thing. It just makes me mad, is all."

"You should remember that much of this is local to our city. If you look for work elsewhere, you should have less of a problem. Most other cities haven't had quite the spike of gang violence over the last year that we've experienced. Besides, wouldn't you need to move just to find work in your field? There isn't much demand around here for people who hold degrees in Anthropology and Sociology. Look, you've got a decent amount of money, nearly three month's worth of pay; why not focus on finding the career you've dreamed of?"

He nodded. It was a plan, he thought. Maybe he'd gotten too complacent having a job. Maybe he'd lost sight of his dream, his career plans, his desire to live his life, not the life everyone back in the neighborhood presumed he should settle for.

"You're right," he said. "I'm not saying I'm happy to lose this job, and I'll miss the income. Still, I do have goals and aspirations, goals I won't achieve working here. No offense, but I don't see myself ever buying a Sunrise Pie by the Slice franchise and if I don't, I've gone as high up the ladder as I can."

* * *

J'Shawn had finished up turning in his employee ID card, parking permit and keys for the store. Still somewhat upset, he strolled down the mall, taking one last turn around the strip that had been the out-of-school focus of his life for the past five years, stopping at a few locations to say goodbye to those other clerks and store owners with whom he'd made friends. Then he headed for the parking garage. Time to clear out and head home, he thought, and put into action the words he'd spoken.

As he reached his car, he heard a vehicle slow behind him. He turned just as "Bwoop! Bwoop!" shattered the air, causing him to jerk to the side. Yes, he thought, as his heart rate spiked, Carruthers strikes again.

"Well. Well. Well." Carruthers said as he pulled himself from out behind the wheel. "Look who we have here. If it isn't Mr. Gee-Shawn! Thought you might be crawling out here with your tail between your legs."

"What could you possibly want now, Gene?"

"I heard a rumor that you've been shit-canned. Could that rumor be true?" Gene's face split wide with the snide grin he used when delivering tickets. "So Ms. Dennehey finally caught you messing up. Musta been quite a shock to be discovered, eh?"

"Shove it, Gene! I was let go because of pressure from mall management." J'Shawn retorted. "Why do I get the feeling you're part of the problem, spreading lies and twisting everything each time you open your mouth."

"Watch your tongue, boy! I'm a duly appointed authority of the mall. I don't have to take any backtalk from the likes of you when I'm doin' my duty." Carruthers sneered, "And that's just what I'm doin', making sure 'disgruntled' ex-employees don't hang around causing trouble and breaking the law. I got the duty to see you off!" With that he pointed at J'Shawn's car.

"That there heap o'junk is in violation of mall rules. No vehicle not owned by a registered employee shall park in this here garage. I'm gonna have to give you a ticket."

"What the… You can't give me a ticket! I was an employee when I parked it. I had the right to park there!" J'Shawn shouted.

"Not n'more." Carruthers ripped off the ticket he'd written and stuffed it, with clear contempt, in J'Shawn's shirt pocket. "Now you're just a waste of flesh what don't have any reason to be in this here garage. You better get in that heap and pull out of here before I call the tow company. I hear that it takes thirty or more days to get a car released from impound and it costs around $1,500 bucks. You that flush? Oh wait. I forgot. You've got tons of that there drug money don'cha! Mebbe I better just call the cops and have you arrested on suspicion of dealing."

His fist moved of it's own accord, slamming into Carruthers' jaw and sending the security guard crashing into the security truck. The security guard slid to the pavement, fear beginning to show in his stunned face. J'Shawn stepped forward.

"You ever try to spread lies like that again and you will regret it," he growled. "I've taken the bullshit and bigoted crap from you for five years. No longer! You're an ignorant cracker who's bullied his victim for the last time. Do you hear me?" He stared down, holding the other man's eyes. For a long instant, Carruthers stared back, then, hesitantly, he nodded.

"Good. And you can take this ticket back. I've had it up to here," J'Shawn said, cutting the edge of his hand across his neck, "with your pushing and bullying. I'm not paying this. Don't bother filing it."

With that, he got into his car and drove off.

* * *

Taking care of his bills had been depressing. J'Shawn decided to relax a bit by browsing through his favorite online forums. There had been days the past six years when the only thing keeping him sane had been talking with the other participants about cheesemaking, brewing beer and baking artisnal breads. It had started simply enough with a class assignment to experience the life of an 1800's colonist in California. He'd seen the blacksmith hammering away and watched the other re-enactors plying their trades, but none of it had resonated with him, his experiences growing up in the Oak Park neighborhood of Sacramento did not run to long, hard labor for small rewards. And much of his time had been spent mashing buttons on his game system controllers.

Then he'd stumbled, quite literally, over a bag of wheat flour inside the dim room where the docent was holding a class on baking and bread-making. The scent of flour, yeast, sugar and dough brought back memories of the days when the wind would shift, early in the morning, and he'd smell the Wonder bread factory producing it's daily output. He'd stopped, watched, and finally he'd allowed himself to be cajoled into plunging his hands into the dough. The process of kneading the dough had given him a sense of place, of grounding. He'd taken the baguette he had made home at the end of the day. And he had nibbled on it for the rest of the week. By the end of the month he had bought a set of new baking pans, a stand mixer capable of handling large quantities of dough - he'd had to buy that one used online - and five books on the art of baking and bread-making. One of the books contained the URL for a bread-making forum.

It was there he heard about making cheese and brewing beer. Learning about these crafts had introduced him to a life outside study. As he got better, he had even gone to several local Renaissance fairs, where he had peddled the results of his hobbies. He'd never quite gotten into the hang of wearing all the costumes or staying in character, but he had learned from some of the best bakers, brewers and cheese-makers.

Before he started reading the new posts, he scanned his service provider's news page. One headline caught his eyes, 'New launch site nears completion'. Space, and the thought of being able to go there, was one of his most cherished dreams.

"I wonder what this is about," he spoke out loud, clicking on the link for the rest of the story. "Guess I have the time to waste checking it out, this of all days."

The story was interesting enough, although he didn't agree with the UN getting involved, he was all for building orbital power stations. Still, amortized over the life of the project, all the figures showed the per-kilowatt cost would be about half that of even the most efficient coal, oil or bio-mass power plant. The article went on to claim that the new system would not produce any of the ozone-damaging discharges found in most current generating plants. Always a good thing as far as he was concerned. He'd opted to buy one of the newer 'hybrid fuel' vehicles half-way through his Bachelor's degree, partially because of the saved fuel expenses and partly because he wanted to be as environment-friendly as he could. Not that he would give up his electronic toys and gadgets, nor his fine clothes, he thought.

At the end of the article he noticed a link, UN-OPS was taking applications. According to the personnel application page, they were looking for people who had degrees in Anthropology or Sociology as well as the more expected engineering backgrounds. It was a matter of minutes to complete the online application and attach his most current resume.

* * *

Later that evening, he found a response from the UN-OPS project. It contained an acknowledgment of receipt for his application. It also had a link to another page, where he found instructions for a skills and knowledge test. Some of the questions surprised him, like why did he favor red? He'd expected to be asked if he favored a specific color, but not to answer why. He persevered, feeling at first as if he were on a lark; eventually he grew weary of page after page of questions educational and questions experiential.

Finishing the last page of questions, he glanced up at the ornate nerligig clock hanging on the wall above his computer. It read two fifteen in the morning! He had spent nearly four hours answering the test! After such an intensive grilling they'd better damn well pay well!

Chapter Three

Arrivals

Only those who attempt the absurd will achieve the impossible. I think it’s in my basement… let me go upstairs and check.

-M. C. Escher

May 17, 2011

Dermot Hardin just wanted to get home. Mark Turner had gone past criticizing Dermot’s work and swept into a verbal thrashing of Dermot’s personality, dress and even his taste in friends. And only THEN had he announced Dermot was being terminated. Having to be escorted to the door by two hulking security guards while a third brought up the rear with all his cubicle possessions in a box had almost completed the humiliating process. The coup de grace was when Turner had demanded the company parking pass and snatched the photo ID from Dermot’s neck, only to cut them into tiny pieces in front of the gaggle of his friends and co-workers who’d trailed along behind. At least Mary would be there by the time he got home.

* * *

Struggling to maintain his grip on the box, Dermot grabbed the doorknob and twisted. To his surprise, the knob wouldn’t turn. He couldn’t very well knock with the box in his hands, so he punched the doorbell with his elbow. Waiting a minute, he thought back. He remembered seeing Mary's car in it’s stall. No answer. He pushed the buzzer again. As he was shifting the box so he could pull out his keys, the door flew open. Mary was standing there. Dermot pushed inside and dropped the box by the hallway wall. Turning, he was about to ask her what took so long when she spoke.

"It’s about time! I’ve been waiting for you to drag your sorry ass back here!" Mary's expression told Dermot she was once again disgusted with some failing on his part. ‘It never rains…’ he thought.

"Honey, I tried getting home earlier, but it just wasn’t possible. And, no matter what’s happened, I’ve already had a bad day," Dermot said. He was about to go on when a flicker of motion caught his attention. He looked in it’s direction, noticing that Mary glanced that way as well. For a moment, she looked almost worried. Then his brain made sense of the image his eyes were viewing. A man stood in the kitchen doorway, a man whom Dermot had never before seen.

"Mare, Is everything OK," the man asked. ‘Mare,’ Dermot wondered, ‘Since when had Mary allowed someone to call her Mare?’ Dermot rounded on the stranger.

"Just who are you," he asked, "And what are you doing here?"

"Dermot," Mary said, grabbing his arm and twisting him back to face her, "This is Carl. Come into the living room. We need to talk."

She led him into the room, Carl trailing a short distance behind. Once again Dermot was surprised. Tucked neatly against the wall, just inside the entry, were their suitcases. Confused, he let himself be led to his recliner and he sat down. Mary dropped onto the sofa, facing him, and Carl perched on it’s arm, next to Mary. Both watched Dermot carefully.

"Dermot, I need to tell you this and I’m not sure I can do so if you interrupt. So just sit there and listen," she said, "Dermot, I’m not happy. I haven’t been happy for quite some time. And the only solution I can think of is for you to leave. I’ve packed your bags. Carl and I have moved the rest of your stuff into a storage unit." She passed an envelope to Carl, who handed it to Dermot. "Here’s the keys and gate code for the storage unit." Dermot stared at the envelope and then looked up at Mary. His stomach shrank and his skin chilled. His hand started shaking and he felt the envelope slip to the floor. He swallowed twice, trying desperately to clear the painful dryness in his throat.

"But this is so sudden." he replied. "Why couldn't you have told me sooner? Why didn't you let me know you were unhappy?"

"Why?" she interrupted, reaching to the side table next to her, snatching up an envelope from the pile of mail and throwing it at him. "Why? You want to know why? That's why! I've put up with all your nonsense about 'space this' and 'space that'. I tried to make it clear I had no interest being as obsessed over 'space' as you are. Not only that, I put up with all your 'balcony' gardening; all that weeding, watering, cutting and fertilizing! You're a programmer for God's sake! Why do you constantly waste your time with plants?" By this time he could see Mare's chest heaving with tension and anger.

"And then you applied for work at that crummy UN power project. There! That's why! You've been accepted for further testing and training!"

Shocked by her outburst, Dermot looked down at the letter in his hands. At first, he couldn't make out the words, his mind reeling from her accusations. But as he kept staring, the blurriness left his vision, the message became apparent. "I was accepted?" he asked, almost inaudible.

"Yes, you were 'accepted'. That was the last straw! I've even thrown away your precious 'garden'! So you have no excuse for staying here. Now get out!"

* * *

May 19, 2011

"… And in national news, Congress has decided to shut down the International Space Station for the duration," droned the anchorperson on the local news. "Senator Kevin Baucus was quoted as saying, 'Hell! Until and unless we can get a safe version of the Space Shuttle built, there's no way to justify taking the risk of sending more Astronauts up when we cannot reasonably deliver supplies, experiments or further expansion modules. Best thing we can do is send it into higher orbit until such time as we get a real space program back under way.' Senator Baucus' Committee has also proposed slashing NASA's current budget by almost 80%, or about as much as the cost of a single,.new B-4A stealth bomber."

‹CLICK›

"… Given the current state of unrest in Cuba over the occupation by US anti-terrorism forces, it behooves us to tighten our belts and cut out any Federal program that continues to waste taxpayers’ money with no measurable return in value. And, since it is a well known fact that terrorists do not live in space, continuing to fund an unnecessary and unproductive space program keeps us from fully supporting our troops with the equipment and benefits they deserve," said Representative Justin Delay (R), son of ex-Senator Tom Delay, speaking during a meeting of the House Select Committee on Technology. "With just half the budget sucked up by NASA during one year, we could fund faith-based schools in every district in the country! What we need to do is de-fund NASA and empower good, Christian families with more school vouchers as well as relieve the tax burden by which the NASA programs have, for so long, punished honest American taxpayers!"

‹CLICK›

"In local news, OPS announced plans to construct an additional launch vehicle and three more orbital vehicles. The additional capacity should allow OPS to decrease passenger and payload costs by as much as 30%."

‹CLICK›

Sighing, Dermot turned off the radio. It had become a total waste to listen any more. He'd felt the need to have some form of 'company' for the last few hours as he drove through the night, cruising down US 25 from Albuquerque to Las Cruces. It was nearly dawn now and the road didn't seem so lonely, the fences, plants and occasional buildings started to lose their ghostly appearance, taking on color, depth and solidity. Lookin out his passenger side window he caught sight of the gibbous Moon setting to the Southwest, just as he passed the sign for the first turnoff into Las Cruces.

Ever since Dermot could remember, he’d wanted to go into space. He’d been just old enough for his parents to let him stay up to watch more of the first moon walk. After that, he forgot all his other dream jobs. No longer did firefighter, policeman or cowboy appeal. And what had he been doing? Holding down a boring job, running quality control for a bunch of other bored-stiff programmers, developing yet another version of an accounting application which had been ancient when he first started.

And he'd settled for that because it kept him from having to take a chance, to risk anything which might set Mary off. Look where that had gotten him, three - make that four - years stuck in a relationship withering as badly as his garden had that summer of the big heat wave.

Perhaps Mary was right. He'd gotten into a rut and had given up on his dreams. But he'd done so to create stability for them. Well, it was just him, now. He glanced in the rear-view mirror, seeing his bag of gardening tools on the back seat. And on the front passenger seat, on top of his notebook computer, lay his planner, open to his To-Do list of the tasks he'd need to accomplish once he arrived at the OPS site at White Sands Launch Complex.

Up ahead, traffic began to build; no doubt workers starting their day. He slowed a bit so he could safely drive and look for the sign indicating the exit which would take him to White Sands and his dream.

* * *

May 23, 2011

Given time, Ellen might have noticed the lights just peeking over the hills in front of her. Given time, she might even have commented on the beauty of the green, blue, red and amber lights that shone, blinked and moved in front of her as she drove towards the White Sands Launch Complex. But it was late in the day, evening darkness had closed in around and she was tired from the drive… BOOM! Ellen's drooping eyelids snapped wide open; heart stuttered and then raced; her hands spun the steering wheel even as her foot mashed on the brake pedal in a panic stop! As the sky around her lit up with a wierd orange-yellow light, she managed to pull off to the shoulder, her hands shaking. Even before she had rolled to a stop, a pillar of fire streaked heavenward, rising above the low ridge to her left. At the same time, a wave of crackling and rumbling smote her, striking against her head and chest through the open window. For the first seconds she only felt the pressure, then she began to notice a slight whistling change of tone as the rocket, for that was what it had to be, raced up and away from her. A minute passed. Then another. Finally, she realized she couldn't see the glowing dot of it's engines, that her car was parked on the edge of the road, that other drivers were looking at her as they passed by.

She began driving again and within two miles found herself at the front gate of the complex. When she pulled forward towards the booth, her way was blocked by a dropped barrier pole. A guard came out of the booth and leaned down to her window.

"Excuse me, miss," he said, "but you need to have a valid sticker to enter the grounds."

"I do?" she replied. "I didn't know that. It didn't mention that in the letter. All it said was I needed to go to Building C, Orientation?"

"Ah. Okay, then you must pull over to that building right there," he pointed to a slightly larger shack just off to the right, "and they'll give you your 30-day temporary sticker. You'll also get a photo ID card which you should show whenever you come back onto the site. If you get hired, you'll come back there to get a permanent sticker for your car."

"What about the ID? Do I get another ID card there if I get hired?"

"No Miss. Each division issues it's own ID cards for their employees." He waved a signal to someone she couldn't see and the barrier rose. As she pulled away, she heard him say, "Good luck."

* * *

Getting her vehicle pass, photo ID card, finding the Orientation building and then finding her assigned dorm room had taken most of the evening. She had been grateful to simply collapse on her mattress, sans sheets - they were sitting in a pile on her tiny desk - without even bothering to change into her PJs. The three hours of sleep and hot shower had helped blow some of the cobwebs out, but she seriously needed coffee to jump-start her mental engine for the day ahead.

As she wended her way through the lines in the cafeteria, she scanned the room, trying to see where she might sit; she didn't want to bury herself in a back corner, nor did she wish to cram into one of the few seats at the crowded tables in the center of the room. Clearly she didn't know any of the people and she'd not be able to hold her end of any conversation. Along the northern windows were several tables with just a few people. Perfect, she thought, as she paid the cashier. And she'd be able to see more of the complex from there while she, well not 'enjoyed', consumed (that was a better word) her breakfast. However the coffee smelled divine.

She slid into a chair across from a man about her age; she couldn't tell how tall he was, but the rest of him was… dreamy, that was the word. Dark brown hair, cut just long enough to run fingers through, eyes catching the blue of the sky outside in their silvery grayness, clear, yet holding a hint of… somberness, experience? She wasn't quite sure. Still, he hadn't let himself run to fat, nor was he so slender as to be too bony; he had just enough muscle to define his outline beneath the pale blue shirt without showing the hard lines of a serious muscle-builder.

"Hi," she said, capturing his attention from whatever thoughts he'd been having. "I'm Ellen Connoly. I just got here."

"I'm Dermot Hardin." he replied. "And I must tell you that I got here only a few days ago as well."

"Oh. Then I guess you've already been through orientation?"

"No, they like to do everything in classes, all well-organized and group-think. I'm waiting for my orientation classes to begin. However, I start today with group MA-15."

"That's my group!" she burst out. "We'll be doing this together!"

His eyes brightened. "I guess we're a team."

They finished their meal talking about where they came from; while walking to the meeting room, they wondered just what orientation required and speculated the nature of the further test mentioned in the invitation letters they'd received.

* * *

May 12, 2011

"Dora. Clarissa. PRISCILLA. MELINDA. BARBARA. CELINDA. ANNE. Rodriguez! Get in here, RIGHT NOW!" Mark Rodriguez's voice thundered from the intercom speaker to echo ominously throughout the outlet store. All the customers stopped shopping to glance fearfully towards the counter. As Dora glumly turned from the register to comply, her father roared, "I'm WAITING!"

"Go!" Her mother urged, "I'll watch the register. You know how he is at bill time…"

Dora dashed from the store, through the factory floor and up to the office, wondering 'What is it this time. I've been pushing all the sales items and have actually managed to sell the last of the junky shorts that Dad ordered two years ago…'

As she entered the office she composed herself to appear calm. "Yes, Father?"

"Close. The. Door." 'Uh-oh. This is going to be bad!' She thought as she closed the door gently. Her father continued, "Sit. Down." Taking the chair opposite him she complied.an eternal two minutes her father stared at her. Then, he turned his gaze to the papers on his desk. The clutter of desk lamp, phone, computer terminal and other supplies conspired to hide the exact nature of these papers from her.

Swallowing to moisten her dry mouth, she said, "Father, if I might…" only to skid to a halt as he raised a finger to silence her.

"I believe that you have completed public school, have you not," he asked?

"Yes, Father. If I could…" she said, only to be stopped once again by his raised finger.

"No. Yes. Or even Yes, Father, are all I need to hear right now," he instructed. "We'll save excuses and comments for later, if ever."

"Yes… Father."

"And you have even completed a Bachelor's Degree in Electrical Engineering, with a minor in Business," he continued.

"Yes, Father," she replied thinking, 'Oh. My. This is going to be bad…'

"Did you not also complete a Master's in Business Administration?"

"Yes," she said, 'Real Bad!'

"And since then, you have had the tuition of my and your mother's wisdom gained through long experience running this business," he questioned, "Along with all the other advice we have learned at trade shows and seminars or which you might have read about in the various business journals?"

"Yes, Father," she mumbled, 'I am dead. I am *so* dead! Whatever it is, I cannot even begin to hope for a positive resolution. He might even toss me out of the business!'

"Good," her father purred, "So, perhaps you can explain this problem to me more fully… Make it clear to me so that I might better understand how this came to be." He stood and walked over to the window overlooking the strip mall's side parking lot. He paused there for a while and then turned back to her, his face a picture of confusion and question, his hands raised as if expecting to receive a package at any moment.

Glancing over his shoulder at the dusty parking lot to gain some time, she gathered her wits. "Father," she said, "If I could see what is troubling you, I might better know how to answer?" She glanced towards the mostly obscured paperwork sitting on his desk.her gaze, he turned back to his desk.

Reaching down he grabbed the papers and thrust them to her, his face once again purpling in rage. "This! Dora! Explain this," he shouted! "Tell me how you could possibly think to do this! Where did you get the idea that you had the right to do this! What possible madness possessed you…?"

Dora quickly scanned the invoice. 'Yes! My order.' she thought. She almost smiled but remembered where she was. Composing herself, she looked up and replied, "I thought that we had agreed to try new fashions. These 'skinsuits' are all the rage right now. Yes, I bought three full skinsuits from manufacturing, but only for display purposes. And I had to do so in order to keep our bookkeeping records straight. The rest of the outfits are strictly for fashion wear and don't come with the equipment necessary to complete the suit, Father."

"Still, we're not running a spacesuit supply store. The store isn't supposed to be a source of supplies for space travel," her father growled. "You know how I feel about all this space travel nonsense. I don't want to encourage people to abandon Earth."

"But, DAD… We live in San Antonio. Our company supplies these skinsuits directly to the staff and construction workers working on the UN-OPS project. This is a hot, new style. Also, we have a great margin on these outfits; we don't have to pay shipping or flooring fees because our storefront is part of our manufacturing plant. We'd be crazy to not sell them!" she pleaded. "Furthermore, it was your idea to bid to manufacture and supply the skinsuits in the first place, three years ago!"

"Don't remind me! I don't care! You know how I feel. I will not cater to anyone who thinks to run away from their problems by leaving Earth. Besides, as Reverend Schulter says, 'If God had wanted us in space, he wouldn't have given us the Earth upon which we live.' I regret ever having done so." her father quoted. He paused and looked over the invoice again. "Well, you've already purchased them, so, we'll go ahead and sell them off to make back our money. But you are not to use the complete outfits to make a display. You will use just the skinsuit portions so that people only see a new fashion. I won't be giving ideas to children and wastrels."

"No. I won't agree to this. You said the store would be my venture, my responsibility. You promised I would have complete control over what is sold and how I run it, so long as I can show a profit. You promised this!" she shouted.

"Not when it involves egging people to go to space! And if you can't obey, then you prove my point!" He paused. "I'm changing my mind; you will not sell any of the skinsuit line. It's either that or you no longer run the store."

Dora blanched. She'd had disagreements with her father before and some had been, heated. Still, she had found a way to compromise, to be flexible, to bide her time and marshall her arguments, working to convince him to accept her ideas. But this… this time, no matter how much she feared his anger, she couldn't give in. This time she knew the root cause of his anger; it was sitting at home, informing her that her dream was within her reach.

"No, Dad. I won't put up with the pressure. I've tried to compromise. I've tried to reason and explain. I've shown you facts, figures and hard work, not just from me, but from the others in the store," she said, a coolness and dispassion leeching all emotion from her voice. "You want to hold the store - and your approval - over my head as a bludgeon. And this time I'm not going to let you. You want me to cave on this? I won't. In fact, I'm choosing the other option. I quit."

She heard a stifled gasp behind her and whirled around to see Evangelina, her mother, standing in the doorway, pale, eyes wide with shock.

"No! Dora, you can't mean that!" her mother cried. "Dom, tell her no. Tell her you're wrong, that she wins. Don't let her go!"

"'Lina. I can't. She's got to let this obsession go." he said from behind Dora. "Either she does this or she's no longer part of this family." The words grated through Dora, shaking her, making her bones ache. Her mother paled even further, shrinking, almost aging before her eyes. Almost she turned… almost. But she drew strength from the letter sitting on the desk in her home office.

Without looking behind her, she said, "Fine. So be it. I'll draw up my letter of resignation and clean out my office." Then, head held rigid, she walked from the office.

* * *

Dora strode to her car with her last bag, the special one for carrying a skinsuit and helmet/breather pack. As she neared, her mother darted from the shadows along the side of her house - no, not her house, not any longer. Evangelina intercepted her at the car door.

"Don't go," her mother pleaded. "Not like this. Make peace with him. You're young; you'll always have other opportunities. But you won't always have your father around."

"I know that, Mom. But if I dont' go, I'll never go. I'll never have the courage to break free, to try it on my own. And you know as well as I do that the younger you are, the better you adapt to new situations. It is time and past time I moved out and made it on my own."

"And this, going into space has been a dream of mine for years, since they first came out with the Sally Ride Barbie doll. Mom, I'll never as good an opportunity as this so I'm going to take it. Maybe, some day, Dad can accept that, can be proud of me for who I am and what I have and will accomplish. But right now there's nothing I can do that will help. So I'm going to remove myself from the picture."

"But what if something goes wrong? You can't promise you won't get hurt…" Dora could see the fear in her mother's eyes.

"Mom, I could get killed just driving to work on the freeway. I could get jumped some night coming out of the theater and raped. Hell, I could catch the damned Bird Flu, if it ever really happens. You know that. And you know there's really nothing you or Dad could do to prevent it. I'll take precautions. I'll follow all the rules; you know me, I'm good at following rules." That pulled a slight smile from her mother, matching the one that peeked out of Dora's face. "I promise I'll do my best to be careful and to make you both proud of me. Plus, I'll write you every week, and call when I can afford it." She got into her car and lowered the window, looking out and up into her mother's face.

"Take care, baby. I love you - and so does your father, even if he's too stubborn too admit it."

"I love you both, too. Tell Dad I said so." With that, she pulled out of the driveway, starting for Las Cruces.

* * *

"Yes, I understand that my group doesn't start until June 1st. But I'm here now. Is there any way to get into an earlier orientation group?" she asked the check-in co-ordinator.

"If it were a matter of just two or three days, there wouldn't be any problem. We'd just stick you in your assigned dorm room and have you wait. However, the wait is too long. Also, we don't have a spare room for you. Everyone who's going through with this group is here and there have been no washouts or drop outs. I'm very sorry, but you're just going to have to wait off-grounds." He turned away, then back. "Look, it's only a week. If I might make a suggestion…"

"Anything would be appreciated."

"Then go back into Las Cruces and check into one of the executive motels. Several of them have kitchenettes which rent for a reasonable amount. Here's one that's very reasonable," he said, writing a name and directions on a notepad. He handed it to her and continued, "Unless you have a serious medical problem, they'll probably keep you on, we've a strong demand for engineers right now. And this will give you time to decide what to store and what to sell."

"Sell?" That caught her attention. "Why would I want to sell anything? I've already weeded out everything I didn't want to keep."

"Really? Then I take it you took the bus here?"

"No, I drove. You know that; you just had to sign the paperwork authorizing an extended pass for my car."

"Listen, it's none of my business, but let me give you a bit of advice. If you pass the rest of your examinations and training, you're going to be spending a lot of time in orbit, months at a stretch, with few and short breaks between. Once you get past orientation and training, you won't need a car and you'll be spending a great deal of money storing it. Unless you have someone who can come and pick it up, I'd recommend you sell it."

"Since you put it that way… But I won't sell my car. I'll assign title of it to my friend. She needs a newer one. Thanks for the advice." Then she asked, "Do I have to do this right now, or can I do this later during training?"

"I suppose it wouldn't hurt to keep it around for the three months you'll be groundside. And if you need a notary for any of your paperwork, I can handle it."

* * *

May 24, 2011

J'Shawn managed to squeak into the lecture hall one minute before the meeting started. Looking around, he saw exactly two seats open. The closest one was in the very back row, too far away to see or hear anything. So he took the second seat, squeezing down the row past the others already there. He wasn't a particularly small person - he prided himself on his muscular physique - the seat arms fit snug against his ribs.

"Damn," he muttered, "I hope these chairs aren't a sign of things to come."

"I don't think so," replied the woman beside him. "I think they got these from a school supply firm run by one of my father's friends. By the way, I'm Dora, Dora Rodriguez."

"I'm J'Shawn Williams, but all my friends call me J'Shawn," he said with a smile.

"Glad to meet you. The two on your right," she said, pointing them out, "are Ellen Connoly and Dermot Hardin. Did I get the names right?" she directed at the other two.

"Yes. But my friends call me 'Elle'" she said, sticking her hand out to J'Shawn.

"And most of my friends call me Patrick. That's my middle name," Dermot added, reaching his hand past Ellen.

At that point, a door opened along the right wall, near the front, and a woman entered, closing the door softly behind her. She strode to the desk centered along the wall and perched upon the front edge.

"Class." she spoke, a microphone broadcasting her voice through the hall. "My name is Roseanne Sittler. My task is to guide you through the basic orientation process. For the most part, I will be providing informational lectures and scheduling your examinations and training sessions. I will also be available for questions and to help counsel you on which path inside the UN Orbital Power Station project is best suited for our needs, and yours."

"Today will be spent reviewing the types of work assignments available as well as the testing and training schedules of each. Also, we will be reviewing all forms that must be completed in order to generate your employee profile. I ask that you save your questions, of which I am sure there will be many, until after the we complete the first hour."

Chapter Four

Learning the Ropes

This is going to be a good place for kids like him to learn the ropes. And there's going to be a lot of them out here.”

-David Bailey

"… you've got to remember to check the seals on the gloves. If you don't, you could have a glove slipping off just enough to allow your skin to balloon out, making it darned hard to get the glove back on and causing a massive bruise on your hand as dozens of capillaries burst from the expansion. It will be painful and you won't be able to work for several days."

"Won't you die?" one person in the back of the group asked, a worried tone in her voice.

"No. Your skin is sturdy enough to keep the blood from leaching out, and your hand is small enough you won't suffer nitrogen bubbles. Now if your abdomen or a large portion of your thigh were to be exposed, no longer restrained from expanding in the vacuum, the ballooning would probably give you the bends. I've seen it happen." The instructor looked off into the distance, his face settling into a grim expression.

He snapped back to the present. "So don't make me go through it again! Practice what I teach you and remember; don't let your guard or your teammates down," he glanced up at the clock, "Okay, we're done for the day. I expect you all to practice getting into your skinsuits so you'll be ready. Tomorrow you get a treat. We get to practice everything I've been teaching you in the 'can'. If you have been paying attention, you'll have a lot of fun. If not, well, pain is a great teacher. Class dismissed."

With that, they all stood and headed to the locker room to strip and change into their baby-blue jumpsuits. The coveralls weren't really uniforms, they didn't have name tags, the photo ID cards hung on cords around each person's neck sufficed for that, or rank insignia. Rather they were indicators of their status within the project. Newbies, trainees, 'fresh meat', that was all shown to the rest of the trainers and other staff members with a single glance at their clothing.

Dora and Ellen met up with J'Shawn and Dermot in the hallway. This had been their last training session for the day; they were free to pursue other activities. From experience, they knew the cafeteria would be crowded and noisy, swamped with their fellow trainees as well as the minority of other employees and visitors who chose to eat 'on campus'. However, for those who had private transportation - the buses running to and from Las Cruces made their last round trips at 9:00 P.M. - another option was available, leaving the grounds and going to Las Cruces for dinner or other activities. And while they were only receiving a 'minimum' wage during their training, all trainees also received basic meals, housing and clothing free of charge. This left many trainees with a surplus of cash.

Both Dora and J'Shawn had chosen to keep their cars. J'Shawn did so because he'd invested much into creating a powerful, tricked-out street racer with a top-shelf audio system. Until he could find a buyer in the area willing to pay what the car was worth, he was not letting it go. Unfortunately for the friends, his street-racing modifications and high-end audio gear took up much of the rear seats, allowing him to only carry one other passenger. On the other hand, Dora's car, a sensible four-door sedan, had plenty of room. She was willing to part with it when training was finished, and she'd already made arrangments with her friend, Monique, to come and pick it up the day after 'graduation'.

"So," she said, as they piled in, "where do we want to go?"

"I"m up for anything but turkey tetrazzini," Dermot replied. "That's too close to the turkey lasagna they used to foist off on us in college." He shuddered. "Sure, it was healthy, nutritious and filling, but it was bland. Oh so bland!" He shuddered again.

"Stop shakin' the car, fool!" J'Shawn begged. "You're fakin' it so hard, Dora can't get her keys in the ignition. But I'm with you. We had the same stuff, but I think ours came from military surplus meal kits, it was so old."

"Get out of here," Ellen said. "It wasn't that bad. Mystery Meat was the meal of choice for weeding out 'undesirables' at our school. I swear the local gull population experienced a noticeable drop whenever they served it. I vote for that new Thai place."

"Milady has many refined qualities, forsooth." Dermot mugged. "Yet, I wonder if she might be taken by an evil spirit which doth delight in tormenting mortal folk with the consumption of evilly spiced foods. Assuredly, she wouldst rather spare your kith and kin the pain of yon fare? Perhaps she might consider making her way to the Olde English Chop House for a repast worthy of a lady?" He grinned and waved his hand out, palm up.

"If a 'brother' can take the heat, surely a scrawny white dude, even if he's from white-bread Colorado, can stand it. I vote with Elle." his roommate said.

"And I make it three to one. Sorry Patrick, your poor stomach is just going to have to endure thai food tonite," Dora said, starting up and heading for the main gate.

* * *

"OOoohhh…" Dora moaned. Then she thought better of it and raced her own vomit to the oversized trough before her. The vomit won, splattering down the front and onto the floor before her, spilling against her knees. That set a chain reaction off amongst her neighbors kneeling left and right of her. Some succeeded in hitting the trough, most didn't.

"That's it." the man next to her said. "I can't take this. I don't want to take this, not any more. My wife is right. If man were meant to be in space, he'd not have to go through this." Shaking, he staggered up and away, heading to one of the instructors. Dora sat back on her heels, more to get away from the stench rising from the trough than anything else, and watched as he talked with the person, alternately pleading and demanding. After a bit, the instructor pulled out a clipboard and had the man sign a form. He then waved the trainee over to a pair of other employees, who walked him from the hall.

"Who was that?" Dermot asked, from her other side.

"I don't know. He was from that other group they brought in.”

“Even with their group, there aren’t as many of us as there were on the first day of orientation. At this rate, I don’t think more than 30 of us will make it through.”

“Oh God. Don’t say that! At least the four of us are still here.”

“Well, the two of us are here. J’Shawn and Elle’s group haven’t been let out yet.” he looked over to the massive, sealed chamber perched on a set of gimballed stilts. They had seemed interesting before he’d gone inside. Now they just brought forth urges to throw up.

“If you don’t think about it, you won’t get nauseous.” Dora said, startling him.

“How’d you know what I was feeling?”

“Wasn’t hard. You moaned and looked a bit green around the gills for a moment.”

Before he could respond, the chamber ceased it’s gyrations and whistling rush of air could be heard flooding the inside. In less than one minute the noise stopped and the door swung open, far faster than it had when their turn in the machine had ended. Even before the door completed it’s travel, four instructors wearing Red Cross patches and carrying equipment cases ran up the ramp and into the opening. Dermot’s eyes met Dora’s and they started to rise, mimicking the actions of the other trainees.

“Stop! Hold it right there!” the nearest instructor shouted. “You don’t know enough to help. You’ll all just get in the way.” He waved them all back, away from the hulking device. Already, many of the group that had been inside were being hustled out and down the ramp; those who could walk encouraged to walk faster, the others being dragged from the chamber by instructors.

Dora took a sharp breathe when she saw J’Shawn was one of those walking under his own power. Well, really more of a stagger, but unassisted nonetheless. He managed to make it to the trough before dropping his helmet and upchucking. She knelt beside him and placed a light hand upon his hair, holding a cleansing towelette package in her other one.

She heard a soft gasp to her left and looked up and back just in time to see Dermot race forward to catch the other arm of Ellen, who’d finally reached the bottom of the ramp with the aid of one of the staffers. Ellen was pale, and her suit showed that she had not been able to control her stomach. As they approached Dora and J’Shawn, she shrugged loose of their grips, dropping down to kneel beside Dora.

“I’m all right,” she said, although her reassurance sounded weak in Dora’s ears. But she took the proffered towelette package from the instructor with steady hands. “It just caught me off-guard. I mean, he was just sitting there across from me, holding on as tight as I was to the bars. Why he pulled off…” Ellen stopped, looking back and forth between Dora and Dermot, face going even paler. Then she collapsed backward.

Both Dermot and the instructor knelt beside her, Dermot grabbing her hand and the instructor breaking open an astringence stick and waving it under her nose. She coughed and tried to sit up.

“Take it easy,” the woman said. “It’s not every day someone sees that kind of thing. Let yourself regain your balance.” She paused. “You did well in there. I’ve seen others panic after an accident like that.”

"Accident?" Dora asked. J'Shawn looked at her and mouthed, 'Later', but Ellen flinched at Dora's words. Behind her, the instructor's gaze swiveled from Dermot to Dora, gathering them in. She shook her head.

"I'm sure it will be discussed in your classroom tomorrow, but we're…" She was interrupted by the clatter of a gurney being wheeled down the ramp. The person strapped on was not totally covered by the sheet, and he had a tank of oxygen on his chest with a hose leading to a mask over his nose and mouth. "He's made it this far," she continued. "Let's hope he fully recovers. Even if he does, I don't believe he'll be staying."

"What do you mean?" Dermot asked. "Why wouldn't he stay? If he gets better, what would stop him?"

"Listen, despite all the training you're receiving from us, we're not here to expand your horizons or help you achieve personal growth. We desperately need more workers topside; we can't coddle someone for months until he or she is mentally recovered from such a traumatic event. Sure, our medical coverage will afford him the best psychologists and psychiatrists he can find, but he'll no longer be an employee, even as a groundhog. Learn from this. Yes, shocking things can happen, but the worst accidents happen because someone panics when there was no reason to."

* * *

Each of them had been unwilling to discuss what had happened during dinner. And none of them felt willing to eat much more than a bowl of broth and a few crackers. They remained quiet and withdrawn even after they reached Dora and Ellen's dorm room. But the pressure grew until Dora had to speak.

"What exactly happened in there? I mean, it's clear something went wrong. But what?" she asked, not directing the question at Ellen, rather she focused on J'Shawn. "Did you see everything?"

"Naw, I hardly saw any of it," he replied. They put me all the way at the other end from Elle. What's worse, I was on the same side as that guy."

"Be thankful," Ellen whispered, not raising her head, or moving her eyes up from the spot on the floor where she stared. "Be very thankful you didn't witness it."

Dermot moved closer to Ellen. "Do you feel up to talking about it? If you don't, we'll understand. However, I think it might be better to discuss it, let it out, so to speak." At that, Ellen started, then she met their eyes. They each nodded to her, encouraging her.

"All right. I guess that's all right. But I'm going to need some water."

"I'll get you some," said Dora, bouncing up, snatching a water bottle and heading for the water fountain in the hall. The others waited in silence until she returned.

"Here you go," Dermot said, taking the bottle from her and handing it past J'Shawn to Ellen. She took a swallow, sat back against the wall and paused.

"At first, well, you all know what the first minutes were like, just like practice in the classroom. We all pulled our packs and gloves on, then our helmets. The woman next to me and I checked each other's seals and signal lights. Then we did the radio checks. Everything worked fine, so when the instructors gave us the order, we sat down and strapped ourselves in. I thought I'd pulled them tight enough, but when the instructor came by to verify, she yanked them in at least another inch, or so it felt." She looked at J'Shawn, as if seeking confirmation.

"Yeah, I would have sworn my harness was tight enough, but my instructor pulled another two inches more. And he gave me a look that asked me if I was a wimp or something." he said into the pause.

Ellen then took back the thread of her story. "Unh-hunh. And then, we all felt our skin getting all bloated and we could all hear the air being pulled out. Of course, it didn't matter because my gear was on right. The woman next to me didn't have her gloves quite secure, so when they'd dropped the pressure down to one-half atmosphere and the instructors came by to check again, my instructor pulled one of her gloves off, almost without trying. She told me, I think her name was Pam, Pam Poggiani, if I remember right, she'd never felt so embarrassed."

"Then they dropped us down to vacuum and started bouncing us around, swooping and jerking the capsule. I've always liked roller coasters and the other tumbling rides at the fair, so this didn't really bother me all that much. I could tell Pam was having a hard time of it, she kept reaching up to hold her helmet with both hands, but she refused to signal the instructors."

"All of a sudden we could hear the guy screaming over the radio, 'Make it stop! Make it stop! I got to get out of here! Make it stop!' And then he unbuckled himself, punched the quick-release, just as we'd been shown. Of course, we were still tumbling like mad and he fell out of his seat and into me. I could see his face…" she stopped.

"But he was still suited, right?" J'Shawn asked. "I mean, from where I was sitting, it looked like he was still suited up."

"Yeah…" her voice came out as iron, as if it were being dragged across rough stone. "He had his helmet on and everything. That's when they cut the radio circuits, because his voice stopped coming out of the speakers. But I could still see him screaming. That's when he did it."

The quiet grew, and stretched out even longer.

Finally, Dermot asked, "Did what?"

"I think he thought the instructors couldn't hear him. That must have been why. I mean, nothing else makes sense. Why else would he have ripped off his faceplate?" She fixed on us, the horror of the memory graven on her face.

"He what?" Dora managed to get out. "No! This wasn't while you were still in vacuum, was it?"

"It was," J'Shawn replied. "From what I saw and felt, they must have slammed open the air pumps just as they saw him reach for his helmet."

"Oh my God!" Dermot's eyes grew huge. "He didn't, like, start bulging out the way they did in Total Recall, did he?"

"That is just SICK! He was on the floor right in front of me! I couldn't help seeing him, lying there, trying to suck in air that wasn't there!" Ellen screamed as them. "Oh my God. He almost died. And I didn't do anything; I just sat there…"

"Elle," Dora said, "you're being too hard on yourself. What could you have done to help him? J'Shawn just told us he ripped his faceplate off, completely. Did you have a spare helmet? Did you have a sheet of plastic? Did you have the controls to shut down the machine and bring the air back in?" With each question, Ellen shook her head, the first time barely noticeable, but stronger with each response. "Then given the training we've had and the resources at hand, what could you have done? What could any of us have done?"

"But I felt so helpless. I know I couldn't do anything, but that doesn't make me feel any better. Maybe I'm not cut out for this."

"Maybe you're not," Dermot said. "Maybe none of us are. Still, I think coming to that conclusion right now, when we haven't had time to deal with the shock, when we don't know if he'll be all right or if we're imagining the worst, that's not the best time to make a decision."

"He's right, girlfriend. You've invested too much effort and too much time in this to make a snap decision. So have Dora, Patrick, and myself. The best thing we can do is go do something fun. I think we should watch a movie, eat some popcorn and when we're good and tired, get some rest. They're going to want to discuss this tomorrow, and I'll bet they even offer counseling for those who want it."

"You know, that's a good idea. I could stand a good comedy right now." Ellen stood. "Thanks, guys. I don't know what I'll decide, but I'm not going to sit here and mope around feeling sorry for myself. C'mon, let's find that movie."

* * *

"Everyone here knows something of what happened yesterday." the group's instructor said. "However, no one has quite the complete picture. In order to fight rumors and exaggerations, we've made available a transcript of the event in each person's e-mailbox. You may read through it after this session. Even so, we felt we should pass along the news that the trainee involved, a Joseph O. Buckley, is making a full recovery and is adamant he wishes to remain in training. Assuming he can pass the psychologist's examination and he get's a clean upcheck from the doctors, he will be resuming training tomorrow."

"You mean he wasn't kicked out?" asked one of the women from the second group. "I would have thought doing something that dumb qualifies for being kicked out."

"No, at this point in your schedule, we've invested too much time and resources to waste someone without strong evidence of mental instability or physical problems." The instructor paused and made eye contact with every member of both groups. "I want to stress that you can choose to quit the program at any time prior to completion of your training, without incurring any commitment to the project. Once you've completed this educational process, you will, of course, as it was explained to you before it began, owe us at least one year of basic service, most likely in groundside support. Each additional level of training incurs yet another year of service, but those positions will probably be in orbit. If you have any doubts as to whether you want to work in space, now is the time to exit the program."

Dora, Dermot and J'Shawn glanced at Ellen. While she had remained silent during the lecture, she met their questioning looks with a calm face. She shook her head and turned back to the front.

"All right. We're through here, you can proceed to your next class."

With that, the groups began filtering out. Ellen folded her notebook and headed out the door ahead of her friends.

"Ellen!" J'Shawn called, "Wait up, girl!" He and the others rushed to catch up with her.

"What? Why are you guys dawdling? If we don't hurry, we'll be late for the next session," she responded. Then she recognized the question in their eyes. "I'm not dropping out. I thought about it last night and I realized something. I want to go into space. I've always wanted to go into space. I've known for years that doing so could be dangerous. Okay, so what happened yesterday wasn't pretty. Frankly, it scared me. But I got over letting my fear control what I do." Drawing closer to them, she began to poke her finger into each of their chests. "You. Don't. Get. Rid. Of. Me. That. Easy."

"Thank goodness." Dermot replied. "I was beginning to think it was my breath."

"Nope. It's my rugged good looks. I told you she likes her men with muscle." J'Shawn flexed his left arm, rippling the biceps and the tribal tattoo on it.

"Get real! I'm the one who likes bulgy, mindless mucle-bound, steroid-pumping freaks. Elle prefers pale, geeky types with thick glasses like Patrick won't admit to wearing."

* * *

"So," Dermot asked as they left their last class, "are we a team? I mean, according to every one of our instructors, we are almost through the basic training program. And if they're telling us truth, they're encouraging teams to form."

"I was wondering about that myself. I mean, you and J'Shawn are big and strong enough, but Dora and I are small and flexible. That means we can maneuver around better. Plus, we can do finer work with our hands." Ellen waved her fingers in a complex arpeggio. "A definite plus when trying to fish out a nut or washer lost by those hams you guys call hands."

"Speak for Patrick, my hands are virtuoso instruments, of work and of loooove."

"Yeah right! Elle," Dora replied, "back me up here, wasn't J'Shawn the one who dropped a milk-carton just walking to the table last week?"

"All right. All right." Dermot sighed in embarrassment as they entered the cafeteria. "Maybe we are giant hulks, but the question still remains on the table."

"Ah don't see no question. Not on any of the tables. All Ah see are mounds of Mystery Meat with heapin' helpin's of Mom's Home Slop! Ah done told y'all we shoulda made a break for some soul food. A brother cain't help but starve to death on this… whatever it is. It ain't food, that's for sure."

"Give us girls a break. If we ate even one soul food meal a week, they'd kick us out for terminal butt-itis!"

"That's fine by me. Patrick might like 'em skinny, but I looooove meat on a girl."

"Just answer my question and stop pestering the ladies."

"How come Patrick calls us ladies and you call us girls? Aren't we ladies to you?"

"Yeah, you corner him, Dora. I'll help. Us 'ladies' have to stick together."

"First, both of you know you are special ladies to me." J'Shawn swept into a low bow and waved them forward to the line. "Second, to answer the question, I'm for it. I believe we'll make a good team. If you two fine women agree, I'm signing on."

The two women looked at each other. Ellen nodded.

"Elle agrees. You, Patrick, her and I are a team."

"Now, you feed them, Patrick."

They all laughed and proceeded to take their meals.

Chapter Five

First Hand Experience

Experience is a good teacher, but she sends in terrific bills.

-Minna Antrim

November 13, 2011

"Listen up, Peas!" the copilot's voice boomed out of their helmet speakers, overriding private-channel conversations. The passengers all felt their bodies drift slightly away from the acceleration seats, snugging against the restraint webbing that secured each into place. "We're almost docked with the Hub so the Cap'n and I will soon be rid of your stink. But before you go, I've got a few items to bring up."

"First, some of you, and you all know who you are, forgot to mention to me that you were weak-livered pukers and you didn't get the dramamine pills we asked you to take. The Cap'n runs a tight, CLEAN ship. That means before you get to leave our comfy tour bus, you get to clean up the mess you made. I'm going to make it easy for you and hand out hand-vacs. And, I will be flushing the cabin to hard vacuum when you're done to suck out any remaining bits. Of course, if I do so and you haven't secured your helmets and sealed your faceplates, some of you might experience shortness of breath - that means YOU, Tyler! Get yourself sealed in! Singhman, help your teammate!"

Startled, Mohinder Singhman turned to his right and slammed Jessica Tyler's faceplate shut as he shouted, "Yes, Ma'am! Tyler is sealed in, Ma'am!"

"In case you haven't been told this yet, Singhman, this isn't the military and I'm not your mother. So can the Ma'am. Copilot or Wei will do." A deep, yet soft clang rumbled through the craft. "And… we're docked. Jorgensen, Militas, Ngu, Hartman, you all entertained us with your post-prandial display of projectile vomiting. Now it's your turn to display your skills at wielding hand-held appliances. Unstrap and come up to the front bulkhead. You'll find the dirtbusters clipped inside the two compartments with the blue triangles on the doors. The rest of you Peas stay webbed in."

"Copilot?" Dora asked over the public circuit, "Why do you keep calling us 'Peas'?"

"Because until you new people get used to working up here," the pilot, Captain Johannes Seitzer, replied to her query, "that's all you are, freeze-dried peas waiting to be packaged up and shipped home. Probationers who haven't learned the difference between training and real life in space. There are countless ways to lose air and get yourself freeze-dried, so don't go strutting around as if you know it all. If your supervisor or a co-worker with more time in orbit tells you to do something in a manner not authorized in the manuals, chances are very good that it's working it's way through the change process for the next manuals update."

"Also, every time you screw up, you increase the chance we'll be hauling you home all wrapped up in a body bag. We're hauling two down on this trip, and we don't like hauling bags of freeze-dried Peas. So don't screw up!" Wei added.

The four workers who'd been assigned cleanup duty had stopped performing their task, listening along with the others to the lecture. Worried expressions showed on most of the faces, including Ellen's and Dermot's. The rest managed to keep a solemn yet serene look.

"Didn't Wei tell you to clean up?" Seitzer reminded the four. "What are you waiting for, an engraved invitation? We don't unload until you're done."

The whine of motors resumed as the perpetrators finished cleaning up the residue of their food disaster. Most had already been caught up into barf bags by the other passengers, who did so in self defense, not wanting to spend the remainder of the voyage covered in the slimy, stinking mixture. Those who held the bags handed them over to the four as they floated back up the aisle upon completing the job. As the dejected victims of the punishment detail approached the front bulkhead, the hatch leading to the command deck opened, letting Captain Seitzer and Pilot Wei enter the main cabin. Seitzer pointed to a panel on the port side of the bulkhead.

"All of you Peas, listen up." he commanded. "Any panel marked with this red trefoil design is an access point for bio-hazardous waste disposal." He paused, watching the four. "Well, go ahead, dump your trash. You're holding us up." At his urging, they pulled forward and unloaded their 'cargo' into the receptacle. Then they waited for him to continue.

"My goodness, the people they let through training these days," he said to his copilot. Then he snapped, "Do you have to be told what to do next? Put the dirtbusters away and strap in again!"

The four complied, every move screaming they had been cowed by the lesson. The rest of the group's snickers echoed over the public channel. Finally, when all the passengers were again secured, Wei reached out and keyed a code into the keypad set in the bulkhead.

As the atmosphere screamed out of the craft, Seitzer said, "I'm telling you, Sarah, the recruits get dumber and dumber with every load."

"It's not that bad, Sir. They managed to not kill each other."

"So true, but not for want of trying, I think. Not for want of trying." By then the cabin was depressurized. "Pay attention, Peas. What little remains of our four adventurers meals has now been, for the most part, sucked out into the void. The miniscule remainder is stuck to a few of you. It will remain there until you clean it off. We're not going to bother with that right now. It can wait until you get on-station. The main reason is I'm tired of waiting for you to get your act together. However, doing so would require me to re-pressurize the ship. That would be a waste of time and atmosphere."

"Instead, you are going to form two squads and file out of my ship and onto the station. By this time, a station worker has attached a pull line next to the exit hatch and you will practice your skills at transhipment."

"Dora Rodriguez!" Wei barked. "You and Ellen Connoly will be squad leaders. Everyone count off by ones and twos. Dora, you will be leader of squad one. Ellen, you will lead squad two. Count off!" She motioned the two women out of their seats and to her. Over a private channel, she said, "It will be easy, but neither of you have done this before, so pay attention. Rodriguez, you'll go first. Take station at the exit hatch and I'll have your squad line up behind you. When the hatch opens, you are to stand in the opening and grab the line the station worker gives you. There's a clip on the end, attach it to your suit. He will then hand you a second line which you will clip to the striped red-and-white attachment point on the inside of the hatch frame. He will then pull you out of the way. You will count off each person coming out of the ship, using channel 5, that's the one used by the other station worker manning the module hatch. We won't send out another person until that worker reports the current person has arrived by repeating your count back to you. You will then verify by saying 'next person'. Got all that? Repeat it back to me."

"Go to the hatch, hook the first line to my suit, hook the second line to the attachment point on the hatch frame, let myself be pulled outside, count my squadmate coming out of the ship, when the station counts that person has arrived, say 'next person', repeat until done." Dora rushed to get out. "I think I've got it."

"And you, Connoly?"

"Hatch, hook my suit, hook hatch, count, wait for repeat of count, say 'next person'." Ellen replied, sounding a bit nervous.

"Connoly, I want you to stand on the other side of the hatch and watch how it goes." Wei decided. "Can you do that?"

Ellen took a deep breath. "Yes. I can do that, Copilot"

"Relax, Pea. We've been doing this for some time and haven't lost a Pea yet. Okay you two, move to the hatch." Wei switched to the public circuit. "All right, you Peas, listen to me. Everyone who is in squad one, unweb, stand up and file to the hatch behind Rodriguez, who's on the left of the hatch. The rest of you, stay webbed in."

The opening of the hatch loomed ahead of Dora, and it had the appearance of a black hole in the cabin wall from the angle she could see. The filter on her helmet reduced glare to the point where, she knew from the experience of the one suborbital trip they had all taken, most stars could not be seen. Surprising her, a line drifted in just as a man's voice said, "Head's up!" She grabbed for the line and missed it, but Ellen snagged it for her. As soon as she had it clipped on, she gave it a sharp tug, as they had taught her to do back on Earth. This time she saw the line coming and was not caught off guard by the same voice saying, "Second line." As soon as she had it firmly hooked to the hatch frame, she felt herself being pulled outside.

Once out of the ship, she could see the station looming over her, or was she stranded high above it, about to fall. For a moment, her mind couldn't decide. Then an instructor's voice called from her memory, 'If you start to feel disoriented, find a horizon line. Fix on that horizon line and ignore all else until you get settled'.

"Find a horizon. Find a horizon. Find a horizon." she repeated as she sought out the length of the ship.

"All right, already." the man broke into her concentration. "Find the damned horizon and let's get on with this. Management hates paying me overtime."

Dora flushed with embarrassment. Once again she was glad no one could see her face behind the glare shield. She calmed herself before responding, "I'm okay. Send out the next person."

As that person came into view, a safety line hooked onto the suit and looped over the cable running between the ship and the station, she said, "One". After what seemed to her to be an eternity, she heard 'One' repeated by a woman's voice. She then said, "Next Person," followed by "Two" as another suit drifted into view on it's journey to the station.

Just as it became routine, the man floating next to her tapped her shoulder and said, "You're all done." He pointed to her line which he'd clipped to the cable. "Go ahead and pull yourself across. I've got to herd the next group."

"Okay." Turning, she said, "Twenty-five, heading across," and grasping the cable, she pulled herself along.

* * *

"I know each and every one of you new Peas are ready, no, eager to jump right to work and get OPS-1 up and generating power by 1200 Zulu time tomorrow." their guide told them, as he pulled himself along the corridor. "However, we prefer to follow the plan. And if you entertain any hopes of staying here, you too will follow the plan. You will come to love the plan, is that clear?"

A ragged chorus of assent rose, from the recent arrivals as they struggled to keep up with him. Several had lost grip on the pull bars and floated in the middle of the passage. Two, including Dermot, were attempting to 'swim' close enough to either a wall or another group member to grab on. He and the other new crewperson had just about reached their goal when the guide, also known as Assistant Third Shift Supervisor Robert Mitchell, realized that part of the group had fallen behind.

"Hold up! Everyone stop right here." he commanded, his voice carrying contempt in it. As they worked to cease their forward motion he continued, "Did anyone notice that some of your fellow Peas came loose and drifted out of range of the pull bars? Well? Did anyone?"

"I did" said Nancy Smith, popping into his view about half-way down the line.

"Any others."

Choruses of, "Me. I did, too. And me." floated out along with the hands and faces of those who spoke.

"That's wonderful." He spoke with a slight smile pasted on his lips, a smile that didn't make the journey to his eyes. "So each of you, each one of you, who saw your mates were having problems chose to ignore their plight and continue onward. Do I have that right?"

"No." one man replied.

"No? Can you point out which person you helped. Is it the person right in front of you or the one right behind you?"

"I didn't mean it that way. I didn't abandon anyone. We're in a hall. It's not as if they're in any danger here," the man responded. "And it's not as if…"

"Stop right there!" Mitchell thundered. "We're in a passageway, surrounded along it's length by space. Look at that 'wall' and look at it closely; it's a mere half-inch thick. Sure, it's the toughest layered composite structure we could make for it's weight, but a simple 3 inch nail could puncture it." With each sentence he pounded the skin of the corridor, causing it to flex outward. By the end of his statements, the entire length of the tube was flexing, forming a standing wave. More of the group lost hold and floated to the middle of the tube, including the target of his anger. As the vibrations stopped two moved as if to help the floaters.

"Don't move!" he shouted. "Do not help them. Now, Mister…" he read the name tag on the skinsuit as he pulled to just far enough away to be out of the man's flailing reach, "Duggins. Could you tell me the lesson you've just learned from all this?"

"Uhhh… Don't let go?" Duggins asked, hope and fear warring in his eyes.

"Wrong. Would you care to try again?" Mitchell floated less than an arm's length from the wall. "I have all shift, so take your time," he taunted.

"I don't know, all right! I don't know."

"Then you get to hang there until you or one of your fellows gets it right. Since Mr. Duggins doesn't know the answer, anyone else who wants to can have a go at it." He twisted around, looking at all of them. "Anyone? Anyone at all? C'mon, someone better answer or Mr. Duggins is going to soil himself right here and now. He's already worked up quite a sweat."

Ellen spoke up. "Sir? Is it not to abandon a team mate?"

"Yes! Exactly right! We never abandon a team mate." With that, he reached out and hauled Duggins to the passage wall. "Do you get the lesson, Duggins? Do you all get the lesson?"

He made another slow 360-degree spin, searching for confirmation they had heard. "You never abandon a team mate. Not out here; it's too dangerous. Just working on a huge construction project would be dangerous enough, but we're working in an environment that will kill a man in less than a minute. That means you're working in a twice-deadly zone. You don't add to that by being careless of your friend, co-workers and team mates."

"There's an unwritten rule for everyone working up here. Leave it down below. If you find out the guy next to you is cheating at cards and stealing your money, you stop playing cards with him and you deal with it down below. If your boyfriend cheats on you with your roommate, deal with it down below. If you and a co-worker both want the last dessert, and she takes it right out of your reach for the fifth time in a row, handle it when you get down below!" At that last statement, one of the women tried, without success, to stifle a snort of laughter.

He whirled around to her. "You don't believe me? You don't think you'd start a fight over the last butterscotch pudding cup? What's your name?"

"Rachael Montgomery." she answered, still smiling. "And no, I'm not that desperate to fight over a pudding cup." Her look dared him to prove her wrong.

He reached up to a large pin on his collar, tapping it twice. "Rachael Montgomery has chosen to give Assistant Shift Supervisor Robert Mitchell her evening dessert rations until further notice." He tapped it twice again. "When you decide I'm right, you can have your desserts back."

"You can't just take my desserts away, arbitrarily!" she shouted, launching herself at him. Several of her fellow workers tried to stop her, but she slid right past them - into his reach.

He engulfed her wrists in one of his hands, jerked her arms up and whirled her around, wrapping his legs around her waist.

"Now what are you going to do, Montgomery?" he said, his mouth next to her left ear. "You're trapped, floating, no source of leverage and you've just attempted to strike your supervisor. If I put this in your employee file, you'll be spending four years down below working off your commitment, with no chance of ever getting back in space. Are the desserts worth all that? More important, do you really want to start a fight here and now?" He looked at the rest of them. "Well? Your team mate is in trouble. You have two, no, three choices. One, you can try to attack me, get written up and be grounded for life. Two, you can walk away, abandon her to whatever I want to do. Or three, you can try to convince her of the truth behind my words, as well as promise me to do your best to teach her to be a solid team mate."

"I'll do it." J'Shawn said. "I'll take responsibility for her."

"So will I," added Tom Duggins.

"Me too." said Xiu Lin Chiang.

"We all will. She's worked too hard, and so have we, to get here." Dora said. "Point taken. Lesson learned."

"Do you agree, Montgomery? Your mates are willing to stick their necks out for you." Mitchell asked. "Will you work with them, or will you let them down?"

"Yes." she growled. "I'll do it. You can let me go. But you're unfair. What you just did was rotten."

Swinging her to the bar, he released her. "It was unfair. However, life can be unfair. And you just had a lesson in how unfair life can be. Pray you never have to face a tougher one." He tapped his communicator again. "Rachael Montgomery loses dessert for only one week." he said and tapped it off.

"I thought you said I would lose them indefinitely?"

"That was just to help the lesson along."

"Then why do I still lose desserts for a week?"

"Would you rather I took official notice of your attack? If I must write you up, you pay a heavy cost, so decide, which would you rather have, instant, and off-the-books or an official punishment?"

"Oh. The lost desserts," she pouted. "I'm not stupid."

"Look alive, Peas!" he turned and shouted at the rest of them. "You've got mates hanging in the middle of the passage who can't reach the walls. Are you just going to float there, or are you going to help them?"

Those who weren't floating free, moved and stretched out to those still stranded, pulling them to the bars.

* * *

After the cramped warren of dorm rooms, cafeteria, briefing rooms and corridors, Ante-Orbital Egress and Docking Bay, called 'A Dock' by everyone except the specifications manuals and the planners back on Earth - Post Orbital Egress and Docking Bay was known as 'P Dock' - was unsettling in it's expanse. It measured a full 45 meters wide by 60 meters long, it's ceiling never getting closer to the deck than 12 meters. Most of it jammed with positioning jigs, frame parts and bustling workers, a tiny corner held about one third of the group of new workers that had just arrived on-station; the rest of the group had been split evenly between first shift and third shift.

As they had requested to be a team, Dora, Dermot, Ellen and J'Shawn had been assigned together on second shift. All four were sealed in their suits, trying to stay close to the rest in order to stay out of the way of the more experienced workers as they listened to the leader assigned to bring them up to speed on the day's assigned task. Some of their group had chosen to float somewhat higher in order to see over the helmets of their friends.

"Has everyone switched to Channel 17?" asked Second Shift Tow Pilot Etienne, their mentor for the day. "Shove up a hand if you can hear me. And look left and right to your team mates to see if they've done the same. If they haven't, get their attention, switch back to Channel 15 and tell them to get on with it."

Only two failed to raise their hands and had to be told what to do. When everyone found the right radio channel, their instructor continued. "Today, we're going to take a walk outside. Now I know you've all done a walkabout while in initial training, but that was a kiddie day trip compared to this. We will cable together in pairs. Then two pairs will join me and my fellow tow pilots on these handsome tow boats for a ride out to an empty stretch of space - where we won't be in the way. There we will debark from the tow boats and learn to handle the tools and components used to assemble the solar array frames. You've all got fresh tanks which are good for eight hours and this little class won't last more than two hours, out and back."

"The frames and parts are already at the site, so clip together and jump on the boats. Let's hustle people, we're wasting daylight!"

* * *

"J'Shawn, can you hand me that tape gun?" Dora asked. "I've got the spreader in place and I need to tack it."

"I gave you the gun just three minutes ago."

"That's right. I forgot." She tried to find it but couldn't. "Did you see where it went? I can't find it."

"Ms. Rodriguez," the voice of Bethany M'Butu, one of the instructors, broked into their conversation, startling both of them. "Did you lose something?"

"Ummm… I don't think so. I mean, the tape gun was right here by me." She scanned with frantic haste around her. The tape gun was gone!

"Perhaps you might try looking up."

Doing so, she and J'Shawn saw a black shape framed by the sunlight. One outstretched hand held the missing dispenser. She started to reach for it, but was pulled up short by her line to her team mate. The instructor hadn't moved.

"There's a reason why each and every tool you use has a small, self-storing lanyard and clip. It was designed that way so no worker would lose valuable tools and even more valuable time," M'Butu lectured. "Had I not noticed this drifting away, and retrieved it, you would have been unable to complete today's training and OPS would have incurred the expense - not a minor one I might add - of shipping a new dispenser up from the surface. While the dispenser only costs $30, the shipping expense would have added $700 to that cost. On top of that, you're carelessness would have delayed your training and that of Mr. Williams by a full day, delaying productivity and adding more than $28,000 to the final cost of this project."

Handing Dora the tape gun, she finished, "Try to be more aware of what's happening around you and less careless of your tools." She drifted away to the next trouble spot.

"Whew! I never knew we were that valuable," Dermot commented. "Fourteen thousand a day? I know I'm not getting paid that much."

"I heard that Mr. Hardin. That figure includes your food, your air, the supplies and power you use up during one day as well as the transportation cost of getting all that up here." M'Butu paused, minus, of course, the $1,000 they pay you per shift. If we could use robotics we would. But they need somewhat more supervision than you do."

She drifted out of sight, using small bursts from her SMU-2, skinsuit mobility unit, the same unit each of the trainee workers had affixed to their breather packs. However, despite having been trained on the SMUs the prior day, their units were not active at this point. Their training today was focused upon moving and working without relying upon the SMUs. Also, if they managed to successfully assemble the framework components into a solar power segment. Each double team of four workers had been assigned one frame segment; theoretically, the student teams could build four complete segments for the current section of the ante-orbit array. Another class was practicing on the other side of the OPS and each completed segment would be added to the post-orbital array. One wag from the original construction crew, had noted that the proposed design looked very much like Mickey Mouse ears. Naturally, the crews nick-named the power arrays 'Mickeys'. Dora and her class were assigned to 'Mickey-One'.

Most of the difficulty involved with assembling the segments was man-handling the pieces into position. Yes, in a micro-gravity environment, each length of framework 'weighed' practically nothing, and could be swung and shoved by even the lightest person in the work crews. However, getting a frame piece moving wasn't the problem; that came when it was time to stop the movement as each section had a mass that would 'weigh' 1,200 pounds on the Earth's surface. To move the frames around required two people pushing and pulling in tiny increments, never letting the frames stay moving for too long. Also, while a frame 'could' be swung in an arc with one end as the hinge-point, that would create a huge moment on the other end, with energy far beyond what one person could stop by simple bracing and pushing.

Dora and J'Shawn had practiced a bit on Earth in the 'micro-gravity' simulation pools, but the simulation wasn't the same as the water added a resistance that kept the movement from getting out of control. They had learned the basic techniques but were gaining experience from the difference that the space environment introduced. Further, the assembly tools didn't work as well under water, especially the construction tape. A cross between duct tape and the kind of plastic-film packaging tape, it had a layer of aramid fiber 'cloth' sandwiched between two layers of mylar film, with a layer of adhesive on one side. The adhesive bonded exceptionally well to the metal and plastic used in the frames and the adhesive did not 'boil off' in vacuum for several years. Unfortunate for the workers, it would stick just as well to the breather-pack cases and the skinsuit cloth, requiring an application of a special liquid to break down the adhesive bond. The de-sealant could only be applied in an atmosphere, which meant any tape that snagged on a worker had to be snipped free from the roll in the dispenser. And if the tape had already been applied to the frame, the worker found him or herself 'bonded' to the workpiece until his or her partner could cut the worker loose. Already, Dora had adorned herself with five shiny patches of tape and J'Shawn had four.

However, the record was seventeen, held by Joe Buckley. Over the secondary group channel, all had heard his partner and their monitor berating him for his inordinate clumsiness during the first hour.

"J'Shawn," Dora said, "do you think we'll get our segment done? It looks to me as if we don't have that much left to assemble."

"Yeah," he replied, "I think you're right. But that all depends if Patrick and Elle can pull their weight. I've been monitoring the test circuits and I'm still not reading any signal from panels eight through fifteen."

"Don't you worry your knappy little head about us, big guy." Dermot responded. "We're just about… there. Now test the circuit."

"Okay, I'm showing positive current flow. Baby-cakes, I do think Patrick and Elle have finally got their act together."

"Girl, I wouldn't take any of that 'Baby-cakes' guff off him. So give him Hell."

"I don't mind it, Elle In fact, it's rather nice. Better, for example, than him going all 'Connoly' this and 'Connoly' that the way whatshername did back down below. Do you all remember who I mean?"

"Oh yeah." said Dermot, disgust dripping from his voice. "Miss Ice Queen. Penelope Faith Burdette, Miss Atlanta of 2010. I remember her."

"She heard me playin' some DJ Mr. Z on my iPod and she damn near flipped out! Said that it wasn't music, that it was the tool of the Devil and how could I claim to be God-fearin' and still listen to such violence-provoking trash. Then she bitched about my corn-rows. That girl was a trip! Made this brother feel real 'accepted' - not!" He paused. "Okay, guys. I'm getting a full set of happy green lights from each of the solar panels and the control CPUs. I think we have a winner. Are you two all tightened down at that end?"

"Yes," Dermot and Ellen said almost simultaneously. "Jinx!" Dermot added. "You owe me a coke."

"I do not! And it's called a soda."

"Hey you guys," Dora entered the conversation, "Everyone knows it's a pop."

"Naw girl, every brother knows 'pop' is just another name for your old man. Now be cool my brothers and sisters, I got to get our mentor over here so he can check out our work."

In moments M'Butu had rejoined the team and verified they had successfully completed the solar array segment.

"Good work. All your connection points are secure; you've left no excess tape dangling or adhesive extruded and you've accounted for every connector piece other than the ones you used," she said. "I'm getting decent output from the solar panels even at this angle from the Sun; all your electronic modules are reporting no problems on their diagnostics." She switched to the main radio channel for the class. "We have the winner right here. Team Alpha-Three has finished their segment."

Shouts of dismay and disappointed groans met her words, the betting pool had favored Alpha-One. As the winners, their team would be exempt from cafeteria clean-up duties for their next two assigned shifts. The race was on to see which team finished last and had to take those duties.

* * *

"Alpha and Papa classes," Second Shift Supervisor Jean Tilmanson called, "gather 'round. It's payday."

In moments, he was surrounded by thirty-two excited workers, each vying with the others to be closest to him.

"Make a line, Peas! I'm not going to hand out any pay to you if you insist upon being an unruly mob. Show some semblance of dignity!" He gestured where he wanted the line to form and the mass soon formed a line, wending out from the desk he drifted behind and stretched three-fourths the way around the cafeteria. "That's better. Now before I hand out pay records and debit cards, I want to remind you of a few minor details. First, every dime you earn up here is considered to be earned in a foreign country. So you don't have any income taxes withheld. However, for those of you who come from countries which have a government-mandated retirement system, all premiums and taxes owed to those programs have been deducted from your pay. Second, you are getting a debit card today as this is the first time you're getting paid up here. You will keep your debit card and bring it back with you on subsequent paydays. You must have the debit card to get paid. Losing a debit card will cost you twenty-five dollars the first time and fifty dollars each time thereafter. This fee is stated in dollars, but if you choose to receive your pay in Euros or other currency, the equivalent amount will be deducted. Third, each and every one of you has two bank accounts. One account is your primary account and that is the account we deposit your pay into. The second account is your debit card account. Because we don't want to encourage you to buy too many possession to be hauled up here, we limit the amount of money which you can transfer into this account. That limit is one hundred dollars. If you use up all the money in that account, you can go online and transfer an additional one hundred dollars, or the equivalent in your home country's currency, into the debit card account. Any questions?" Tilmanson ignored the raised hands. "For those of you who have questions, that was rhetorical. If you have any serious questions, come see me after we get done with disbursing the pay. There's a game on tonight and I don't want to waste time on this."

Within a half hour, all of the new workers had their pay stubs and debit cards. Team Alpha-Three headed back to Dora and Ellen's room. Once inside, the perched on the lower bunk and the two fold-out chairs.

"Brother and Sisters, will you look at that! Real money, and none of it goes to dear old Uncle Sam." J'Shawn slobbered a kiss onto his record stub.

"Ewww! Gross! And to think you expect to put that mouth anywhere near my lips!"

"Dora, tell me you're not swapping body fluids with him, girl." Ellen said. "You don't know where he's been. He might have touched Ice Queen." She shuddered.

"Now don't you go dissin' me, girl. I never, I repeat, never touched that bi-atch. Why… I'd rather eat a Domino's pizza!"

"Oh here we go again. Ladies, you don't know how lucky you are that he's not your roomie. Always with the negative comments about Domino's pizza. I paid my way through college delivering Domino's."

"You did not! You told me you worked for some landscape and gardening firm. I know you've said the same thing to J'Shawn and Dora. So don't feed us a line about Domino's."

"I said I worked doing gardening and landscaping during the summer months. During the school year, I was a loyal Domino's delivery person. I still have one of the hats in my gear."

"I want to know what you guys plan to do with your money," Dora asked. "I mean, this is the first paycheck of our future."

Each of the others paused, J'Shawn, somewhat stunned, Dermot's face going thoughtful, Ellen beginning to pout.

"We're not going to get all serious today, right this minute, are we?" she asked. "I was hoping to celebrate!"

"I never quite thought about what to do." said J'Shawn. "I suppose I was planning to just save up what I could so I'd have a little something when this ended. Not," he hurried on, "that I expect it to end soon."

"It's okay to want to celebrate. I want to celebrate. But before we blow all our hard-earned money, I'd like to run an idea past you guys."

"What idea is that?" Dermot finally joined the discussion.

"I'm planning on investing most of my pay. After all, we don't owe any taxes other than what Social Security and Medicare take out. Plus, they deduct right off the top for our meals and they provide our jumpsuits and skinsuits free of charge. And they don't charge us for our rooms," she said. "When you add in that there's not much to buy up here, nor is there much room to collect things, that leaves a lot of money just sitting there in the banks. What I'm proposing is we invest the money and have it earn even more."

"You're not talking risking every dime on some fly-by-night investment scheme are you?" Ellen asked. "Dad did that and went broke trying to make money off some stupid invention."

"Nothing like that. I was planning on putting my money in several mutual funds, not the ultra-risky ones, but funds which have reasonably high yields. I'd also like to consider ploughing some of the money back into OPS bonds. After all, this project will succeed and demand for power is always increasing. I wouldn't ask that you put every dime of your pay into the investments with me, but I would ask that you match me an equal amount, That way, we all have the same share coming to us out of the earnings."

"Didn't you do something like this for your father? I think I remember you telling me so," Dermot said.

"Yep. And in three years, I doubled his money. I can't say we'll see that kind of increase right off the bat, but we should be able to, over the time we're up here, earn almost half again from investment dividends and interest, what we earn in net pay."

"I'm in!" said J'Shawn. "I want a hefty nest egg."

"So am I." They all looked at Ellen.

"Oh, all right. It's not as if I have anywhere to shop. And this just means that I can have more money to go shopping when I do get near a mall. I'm in."

"Good. What I'm going to do is open an account with one of the online trading firms with our money. But before I do, we need to settle how much we'll invest each payday. We're all clearing over $7,000 per pay cycle. Does anyone want to buy an item that costs more than $2,000, including having it shipped up here?" J'Shawn and Ellen shook their heads, but Dermot just raised his eyebrows.

"What," she asked. "You do have something you want? Something that can fit in up here and costs more than two grand? What is it?"

"You're all going to think I'm crazy."

"Brother, for a white man, you are crazy. Tell her… Hell, tell all of us what it is you want."

"It's already up here, so there's no real shipping. No, wait. That's not true. It has to be moved into orbit near us - but it comes with a tow boat. And it will take about two months to ease it into the proper orbit, they're using a low-Isp ion drive."

"Patrick," Ellen said. "Are you telling us you want to buy a spaceship?"

"Not a space-ship. Rather a space habitat module. Bigelow Aerospace has about twenty Sundancer III habitats left over from their upgrade to the new Exodus I habitats at their orbital hotel. They're selling them rather cheap, $4,500 including transport to a new orbit. And all of these have the modifications that added a 'garage' module at one end." He saw their disbelief and he hurried to get the rest of his argument out, "They're all quite spaceworthy; the only reason Bigelow is replacing them is they want to triple the rooms in their hotel. And, I've got $2,000 of my own money saved up. So I only need about $2,500. That would still allow, if we set aside $500 for personal money for the next two weeks, about $4,000 from each of us to invest."

"Day-um, Bro! You sure don't think small!" J'Shawn paused in thought. "Say, do you know if they're offering a price-break for buying more than one?"

"As a matter of fact, they're discounting a purchase of two to five to $4,000 each. And if someone wanted to buy more than five, the price would drop to $3,500 each. But there's no way I could afford to buy five."

"Wait a minute." Dora said. "We can buy these, as individuals? And use them? I thought all habitats and stations had to be owned by OPS, a country or the UN?"

"No. For the larger stations, only a corporation can get the licensing. But small habitats of this size, if they're already in orbit, can be owned and operated by individuals as part of the 'salvage' effort designed to clean up orbital space. We have to maintain them and we have to get approval to keep them in a particular orbit, but that's what I plan to do."

"My grandfather always told us the best thing to do is to buy property," Ellen added. "This is property, real estate, right? And if we don't buy it, someone else will. Eventually someone will want to make use of it, so even if we don't, if we own it, we can sell at a later time and make a profit, right?"

"Right. This changes everything. I don't know what we can do with all of them, but we could probably make use of four of them." Dora didn't even have to run the numbers through her notepad's calculator function. "Okay, we can all chip in $4,000 to buy four of the habitats. That still leaves us, if we set aside $1,000 for personal money, $2,000 each to invest in mutual funds and the like. Are we all agreed on this?"

"Yes."

"For sure."

"If you and the guys are willing, I'm in."

"Then we have a plan." Dora said, writing everything into her notepad.

Chapter Six

Working for a Living

Don’t go around saying that the world owes you a living. The world owes you nothing. It was here first.

-Mark Twain

September 27, 2011

Earth hung below Dermot, glistening green to the North shading to medium tan closer to the Equator, the oceans a sapphire blue counterpoint. Not that he had much time to enjoy the view this last month. Once he had passed certification for outside assembly crew, he had spent six day work weeks hauling framing pieces, assembling array modules, testing circuits; while it had been rewarding getting the extra pay, he felt so exhausted at the end of his shifts, he barely managed to eat his meals and collapse in bed. And his relationship skills had taken a nose-dive. Prior to arriving at OPS-1, he and Ellen were close, and getting closer. Now, with his energy sapped, he snarled and snapped when he should have been sweet-talking.

This very moment, she hung opposite him, connector-bolt ready to place through the holes in the frame pieces for this section of the array module. Yet, except for an occasional curt 'Are you ready', she hadn't said anything to him all shift. It was time to do the unthinkable.

"Elle," he started, fumbling for the right words, "we have to talk."

"No one's stopping you. Go ahead, talk." Her words froze his ears and his tongue. He bent closer tugging the overlapping pieces in line, slapped a glue ball over the hole and she slammed the connector in place, bursting the ball and smearing glue along the rod - joint made. "I'm waiting," she added.

"Um… Yeah." He rushed out the rest. "Look, I'm sorry I've been such a jerk lately. It's nothing you've done. I've just been,"

"Bent out of shape? Nose out of joint? A real asshole?" she filled in for him. "I'm thinking All-of-the-above fits perfect." She moved down the edge of the frames to the next connection point. He drifted after her, burning with shame and not a little desire to justify his actions.

"Yes. Some of the above. Maybe even all the above, although I would hope you're exaggerating a bit." He turned away to stare at the globe beneath him.

"Earth to Patrick. Come in Patrick. We have a schedule to beat and just floating there staring down isn't beating it." Her words brought him back.

Turning he said, "Sure is beautiful, isn't it?" He focused upon her, not the frame. "I mean, part of why we came up here was to be able to take in the view, that view. Or at least that was one of my reasons."

"Sure, but we're on the clock. We have all off-shift and our break day to sight-see." She flipped up her glare shield and looked at him, a safe enough action as the Sun was far off to their right. "Are you… Okay, apology accepted. But if you want to talk about this further, I'll listen. Just not right now; save it for when we come off shift. We've only got another half hour."

"Is that okay? Because I'd really like to talk about this." He began to tug the holes into alignment, then looked up. "Don't forget to lower your shield."

With that, they continued, finishing the current array section almost five minutes before shift end. After their Assistant Shift Module Assembly Supervisor cleared their work, they caught the first tow back to the hangar bay. On the way in, Ellen nudged him and pointed to their left, down-orbit from the station. At first, he couldn't see what she was pointing to. Then recognition flooded through him; the four points of light just coming above the horizon were moving. That meant they were approaching OPS-1. They were the Sundancer III habitat modules voyaging to rendezvous with OPS-1! In less than a month they would be in orbit just six kilometers behind the power station.

Once inside and out of their breather packs and helmets, Dermot and Ellen snagged bag meals, heading for Dermot's room. J'Shawn and Dora had been reassigned to Third Shift for the remainder of the week as a pair of workers had come down with the flu and were currently sitting the disease out in isolation in the on-site Medical Module. By this time Dermot's room would be empty. Naturally, he opened the hatch and waved her in first.

"Have a seat." he said, pulling down one of the fold-out chairs for himself and giving her the bunk. He opened his sack, examined the meal and glanced up. "I got grilled tuna melt and fresh fruit. How about you?"

"Give me that. Here's your sliced turkey sandwich and macaroni salad." She pushed her bag into his hands and snagged her own. "How you can eat that macaroni is beyond me."

For the few minutes it took to eat their meals and finish their drink boxes, they ate in silence. After catching the last drifting scraps with the hand-vac, he put the refuse in the garbage slot. Unable to avoid the conversation any longer, he turned and found her watching him, not showing encouragement or rejection.

"Picking up where I left off," he said into the silence, "I'm sorry. I didn't mean to get so withdrawn. Nor did I want to behave as if I was mad at you. I'm… not mad so much as frustrated. But not with you."

"Then what or who is causing all this frustration?"

"Good question. And I'm not sure of the answer. I do know that part of it comes from work. I feel as if I'm on a treadmill and not getting anywhere, but I'm doing so very fast. Does that make sense?"

"I don't know. Do you think there's something you're not doing? Or is it more that you don't get along well with our supervisor?"

"I think it has to do more with not accomplishing something. I mean, you saw our habitat modules are on their way, yet it's as if we're in a holding pattern until they get here. That's part of it; I want to have things ready to go when they arrive, but I don't know exactly what I want to have ready." He sighed. "I'm sorry; I've been a jerk. I just don't know…"

Ellen shifted down to one end, patting one hand beside her on the bunk. "Come over here," She reached out and tugged him out of the chair, guiding him over and turning him, as he sat, so he faced away from her. She began to knead his shoulders as she continued.

"You are not the only one who is feeling disappointment about our jobs. You should hear Dora. She has a Master's in Business Administration; do you remember her telling us? Yet here she is hauling around girders and dispensing tape." Dermot leaned into Ellen's ministrations, staring out the viewport and listening to her words. Finding out he wasn't alone in his feelings worked with the massage, bringing a release of tension. Half his mind listened to her while the rest pondered how he could use those habitat modules they now owned. He wondered why he hadn't done this sooner.

Her words snapped him back to the reality of her room.

"What did you just say?"

"I said you've received all the back rubs you're gonna get from me." tartness dripped in her every word. "It's my turn to be pampered."

"No, not that. You said something else…"

"I"m going to say something else if you don't turn around and give me a massage. My back is killing me." She eeled past him, stretching out full-length along his bunk, teasing him with, "I'm ready for my close-up, Mr. Hardin."

"Not before you tell me what you said at the last."

She rolled over to face him showing her irritation, "This better be important. After all the work I just put into your…"

"I promise to pay extra attention. Now what were you saying," he interrupted.

"I said, it's too bad we can't just drop over to the cafeteria and get a pizza. That's the one big thing I miss about being up here instead of ground-side. I guess they can't figure out how to make a good pizza up here."

"That's it! You're a genius!" He pulled her up and wrapped his hands around her skull, sliding a slobbery kiss across her lips.

"Ewww! You know I hate goopy, dripping kisses!" She tried to disengage but was just able to wipe off the beads of moisture before he planted a deeper kiss on her, sliding his hands down and pulling her close. His warmth heated her and she felt her heart skip a beat as her body matched his heartbeat. Abandoning any attempt for conversation, she gave in and molded herself to him, returning cuddle for cuddle, tightening her own embrace of him.

"Mmphph!" she attempted to say, an interminable time later. She found the strength to pull away from his mouth, his lips, his face. "Wonderful. It's about time you remembered how to do that. Now was there a particular reason for it or were you just telling me how much you loved me?"

"Um," he stalled. "Damned if I know. After a kiss like that, does it really matter? Oh wait! You complained about pizza."

"Man. If I complain about broccoli, do I get a full makeout session?" She batted her eyes and smiled, invitation written broad upon her face.

He pulled back feigning disgust. "Yuck! You'd actually expect to make out after eating broccoli? That's it, I want our progeny to not have a broccoli-loving gene."

She sat up, pushing both of them off the bunk and toward the ceiling. He grabbed her with one hand and the safety bar near the head of the bunk with his other, pulling them back down.

"You want to have kids?" she demanded. "With me?"

He took his time answering, trying to read her mood from her expression. Finally, he said, "Sure I do. You and I click, far better than Mary." At her name, Ellen frowned, but kept her silence. "I… Well what I mean is… Look, it's probably too early to make plans, and I didn't really want to push, but I'd like us to be, eventually, an 'us', not just short-term friends."

"I accept!" At his horrified look, she relented. "Oh, keep your booties on. I'm not trying to trap you into an instant marriage; we've got months and months to think about it - at least two years. Dad's somewhat of a traditionalist, he doesn't believe in short romances and quick engagements." Dermot relaxed, somewhat. She ploughed onward, "Tell me again about pizza."

"Oh. That." He gathered his thoughts, allowing her to pull him back down beside her. "I was thinking we could make one of the habitats into a pizzeria. Maybe hook up a mirror array to heat a fire-brick lined oven hanging off one side of the 'garage' module; that module would be our kitchen. Since the garage modules are metal, we wouldn't have the risk of burn-through if the mirror came out of alignment - at least not as fast as on the fabric module. And there'd be plenty of room to fit out some game stations and tables. If we set it to spinning, we could generate enough force to keep butt and pizzas on the chairs and tables." He stopped when he caught her expression. "What? You don't think it's a good idea?"

"NO! It's a great idea! You're a flipping genius!" This time she initiated the mandibular docking maneuver, taking sufficient time to seal the netting over them. Minutes passed, and the room became noisy with the sounds of their passion. Later, spent from their lovemaking, she curled close, snuggled between his body and the cabin wall.

"Patrick?" she said. "If we can run a pizza parlor, could we also do salvage work? We'll have three other habitats out there, close by. And all of them have cargo bays. Plus each of them comes with it's own tow boat."

"Salvage? Salvage as in 'we go sweep up the garbage', or do you mean something else," he murmured, already drifting off. She elbowed him. "Ow! What did you do that for?"

"Wake up! I'm serious. Can we start a salvage operation?"

"Sure thing. They're very serious about cleaning up the junk out of the orbit paths. These solar arrays aren't cheap. The more junk removed, the lower the chance a piece is going to hit one of the panels and have to be replaced before maintenance has scheduled it."

"What about refurbishing some of the smaller satellites? Could we do that? Could we go out, capture them, bring them in, fix them up and put them back out, ready for their owners to put them to use?"

"In general, we could." He thought for a moment. "I see several issues we'd have to deal with. We'd have to get permission to move them from their current orbits to our shop. We'd have to have diagnostic tools and manuals, as well as either chip-level or board-level replacement parts, and we'd have to have a source of fuel. That would be our biggest expense, and our biggest headache. Because we'd have to either buy fuel in small quantities, or build a storage tank 'farm' and buy in bulk. Plus we'd have to have a way to advertise our services."

"So it's feasible?"

"Yep. We could do it. I don't know if we could handle it right away, but we could do it. Maybe in a few months. Remember, we'd have to use those tow boats to go out and retrieve the satellites. Some of them are rather big - and far out in other orbits."

"So let's say we start with the small ones in the closer orbits. And let's make the assumption we'd start out on just those which are still sending signals, but have lost maneuvering thrusters. How many do you think we're looking at? Five? Ten?"

"More like several hundred. They've been sending these things up for years."

She noticed his hands performing a slow caress up and down her spine, making it difficult to focus on the train of her thoughts. Yet she fought to maintain her concentration, not quite willing to give in to the demands he, and her body, were making on her. Even so, she couldn't quite resist her impulse to run her own hands over his sleek hips and along the curve of his ribs.

"Mmmm… And I thought you were tired and wanted to go to sleep," she said. "We'll start by offering to do the first four or five 'on spec'. No charge to them if we can't handle the job. And… And I'll just have to write all this down later."

With that, she let herself go, wrapping herself around him, pulling him close as she molded her body to his.

In response, he cupped one hand around ass and squeezed it, grinding against her hips and belly. His neck bent down and around, his mouth found the hollow of her neck, just below her earlobe. He began to alternate between light kisses and soft breaths, tickling her in one of her most sensitive areas.

She rolled slightly to one side, exposing her breast, giving him the opportunity to move further down and he took it. Stopping every inch to kiss her skin, he followed the curve of her neck, moving closer and closer, edging onto the cleft between her breasts. There, he paused, exhaled soft air over her flesh, raising goosebumps. Then he stroked around the base of the mounded skin with his tongue, once, twice, three times. Each time his mouth came closer to the center and it's treasure. By the time he reached the aureola, her nipple had hardened and extended nearly a half inch above the rest of her breast. He took it between his teeth, nibbling an pulling up, the most gentle of tugs. She felt her breasts firming under his ministrations. Further, a tingling heat had started to grow in her belly, working it's way down This caused her to grind with more strength against his loins.

Moaning, ever so softly, he moved his other hand along her back and down her thighs with increasing fervor. His sex swelled against her abdomen, rising again. She groaned and captured one of his hands, pushing down, down between her thighs, guiding it to her quivering valley, still slick from their first lovemaking. He needed no further hint and began to stroke along it's outer edges, playing with the button of firmer flesh, stroking it, teasing it, even gently flicking it. As she grew even more moist, he started to slip a finger inside, but she couldn't wait; she grabbed his hand and held three of his fingers together, using them, plunging them slow but deep inside her. Then as he continued to stroke, she gathered more of her wetness in her own hands and washed them over his own member, laving the shaft top to bottom three, then four times. Keeping her hands on him, she shifted herself away from his hands and guided him inside.

The warmth of his flesh, throbbing against her was nearly too much. Four strokes and she was already building to a climax, but he sensed this and held back, slowing his motion, drawing her vibrations and convulsions to a finer edge, sending her higher and higher. With each stroke she gave small cry, the cries coming closer together, her hands pulling him closer and deeper within her, fingernails clawing his back and sides, until she could no longer tell one cry from another, her whole body throbbing to a single, massive high. Then, and only then, he gave one final push, striving further than he'd reach on any of the previous strokes, his arms tightening around her as he cried out in release.

"Oh God!" she cried and buried her head in his chest.

* * *

"Would you believe the smell of this place!" Dora's voice echoed into Ellen's dreams. "You'd think a whole herd of wild hogs had mad, passionate sex in here! And look here, J'Shawn, here are the wild hogs on the bottom bunk!"

"Man, oh man. I've heard of funky sex, crazy sex, even kinky sex, but I've never, ever heard of stinky sex! Bro', just what were you and her thinking!" Ellen was having the most peculiar dream, it sounded so real, so life-like, so… She shot upright, tangling in the security netting and exposing herself, and Dermot, to two sets of very amused eyes.

"Oh… My God! You're back already! You can't be! Your shift isn't over yet!" She tried, without success to snag her clothing. Failing that, she burrowed back down and wrapped the cloth of the netting over her and Dermot, who, by now had woken enough to gaze at her, with sleep-fogged eyes.

With an almost zombie-like motion, he rolled over and said, "Hey… what are you guys doing back so soon? Shouldn't you two still be hauling things around?" He rolled back to Ellen, a stupid smile on his face. "Lookie, Elle, They're home early."

"You nitwit!" Ellen grabbed his wadded clothing and stuffed them in his face. Then, pulling the sheet up and around her, she turned to the others, striving for as much dignity as the situation would allow. "Could you please give us a few moments to get decent?"

"Sure thing." J'Shawn replied, making no move to leave the room, although Dora tried to slide past him and through the door. "You two go ahead and do what you have to do. Dora and I will watch."

"C'mon big guy. You don't need a peek show to get you turned on. I swear I'm going to tell the cafeteria staff to put saltpeter in your meals." Dora said, finally managing to pry his hand loose from the grab bar by the door. "We'll leave you two some privacy; come over to our room when you're ready." With that, she pushed J'Shawn into the corridor, shutting the hatch behind her.

"Damn. Another opportunity to start a promising career as a porn star blown by the morality squad." Dermot said, shoving the clothes off his face and pulling Ellen back down to his level. "Now that we have privacy, what say we practice those docking procedures again?" He stroked his hand along her belly and breasts, warming her skin, tickling the fine hairs of her mound.

"Patrick!" she protested, raising herself away from him, "they're going to be waiting for us."

"Yeah, they are. And you heard J'Shawn, he's not going to mind at all if they have to wait a bit longer. And I don't think Dora will thank you for interrupting them in five or ten minutes." He bent forward and kissed the hollow of her throat and felt her shudder beneath his caresses. "We have time…"

"Do you think?" she managed to force the words out past her thickening tongue, holding off by force of will her desire to melt into him. "Or should we give them a full hour?"

"An hour should do," he murmured against her.

* * *

"So…" J'Shawn asked, as he and Dora entered her room, "one hour or two?"

"What are you blathering about now?" She floated down to her bunk and he followed, perching on the edge. "And what was that business about watching? Don't get comfortable, big guy. They're going to be here any minute now."

"That's what I'm talking about. Those two won't get here for at least another hour. If I know my dawg Patrick, they didn't even get out of the bunk. He wants seconds on dessert."

"Oh! You're disgusting!" She punched him in the shoulder, hard, which pushed him to the end of the bunk while she slid into the bulkhead at the head of her bunk. "Ow! See what you made me do!" she pouted.

"Babe," he said, using his rebound from the bunk post to slide closer to her, "you need some of J's special healing magic." He reached up and brushed her hair back from her eyes, letting his fingers stop at the back of her neck, where they began to massage, straying down to her upper shoulders and back.

"That feels so good," she responded, her eyes closed. Then she opened them and asked, "You really think they're not going to be here right away?"

"Yep. He had that look, and she didn't appear all that eager to bounce out and get on with her day, if you know what I mean."

"In that case," she rolled over onto her stomach, "give me one of your patented back rubs. I want the full treatment. Pushing aluminum all day isn't easy; I feel the need to be pampered."

"Your wish is my command, babe." Hooking one leg around the frame of the bunk, he bent forward to fulfill his promise.

Starting with her shoulders, he moved his fingers along her muscles, probing with a light pressure, seeking out knots and other tightness.

"Wait a moment," she said. Then she stripped out of her skinsuit, leaving on just her panties. She placed the clothing on her desk and retrieved scented oil from inside. "I like the feeling this gives," she said, handing him the squeeze bottle and stretching out again.

For a while, he worked his hands over her body, kneading, stroking, caressing and pummeling, into which her body softened. He ignored no area in his ministrations, letting the oil warm in his hands and sink into her skin as he smoothed and rolled her underlying muscles. Her breathing first softened, then quickened it's pace as she spread her limbs, opening herself to him. Eventually, at his slightest touch, she allowed herself to be turned over, giving her front to his questing hands.

As his fingers stroked her belly, it quivered and she arched her back, urging him to move up to her breasts, to give them the attention they sought. When he complied, she moaned, "Ooohhh… Please, touch them, stroke them, make them warm and loved."

"Them and you, babe. Them and you." he breathed. Continuing his slow strokes, he teased her, alternately pulling and caressing, feeling her flesh firm under his touch. Every so often, he let one hand wander down, further along her body, gently tapping and massaging her flanks, pressing in along her thighs and pulling up with just his fingertips on the insides of her loins. He let his fingers of that hand gentle the lips of her crevice, sliding them just inside, touching her moisture. Then he would draw them up the crease formed by her thigh and groin, meandering up to her belly button, playing with it for a bit and then continuing back down the crease on her other side, reaching yet again for her heat.

On the third such voyage, she bucked her hips upward, causing his fingers to plunge deeper into her warm moistness. "Yessss…" she groaned. "do that some more." And she grabbed his hand with hers, directing his now-glistening fingers over her swollen knob. At the same time, she used her other hand to pull his head forward and down to her rigid and lengthened nipples. He gave in and sucked the closest one into his mouth, nibbling the length of it's sides and pulling it outward. Almost releasing it, he spread his lips further out around the mound of her breast and tasted her flesh, rolling his tongue over its velvety expanse.

While he did so, she continued to use his fingers as a bundle of rods, plunging them deep within her, withdrawing their wet length and rubbing her hard button of sex with them, faster and faster, moving his hand in time with the bucking of her hips. Her other hand left his head, and pressed against her belly, pushing up and down its length, while his other hand pressed against her back, urging her body closer to his.

Suddenly, he felt her pull away from his one hand, leaving it inside her. Then she fumbled for the seals to his suit. Opening it, she pulled it away from his shoulders and down his sweat-dampened body. He lifted slightly and she continued to push, rolling his clothes down until he could kick loose from them, suit and shorts. With that done, she lifted her own hips and he pulled off her remaining garment, even as she moved her own hands down, seeking his swelling maleness. With a few swift strokes along its purple shaft, she had coated it with her own juices, then she helped position him to enter her and she guided his length as he pushed far inside, accepting it all within her. His throbbing threatened to send her over the edge of climax even as he drove deeper. When he pulled it back, she felt the vacuum inside her start a standing wave of contractions, racing up and down the length of her being. On his next downstroke, she grabbed his cheeks with both hands and pulled him to her, grinding his mound against hers, once, twice, thrice, four times. Joy exploded within her, rumbling outward, tightening her limbs even as her moist tunnel went into an overload of sensation, waves reverberating up and down it's length, squeezing him, bonding to him, feeling his own wetness explode deep within her.

"Damn, woman." he managed to get out. "Warn a man before you get that intense." Then he dropped down to lay full-length against her, his rigidity draining. He made no move to withdraw from within her, content to stay joined body and soul, reveling in the closeness of having her wrapped around him. He lifted his face and with a sensual gentleness, he placed his lips on hers, wrapping his arms around her as he shared the touch, the taste, the warmth of her mouth and his, lips, teeth and tongue. At the same time, without pulling from inside her, he wrapped his lower legs out and around hers, locking her within his tender embrace. She allowed this and her own arms moved to complete the embrace, molding herself to him, sharing his warmth.

For uncounted moments they nestled together, kissing and stroking each other along their flanks, buttocks and backs, basking in the afterglow of their lovemaking. But the languorous movements re-kindled the flames of their passion. Within her tunnel, she felt his flaccid length expand, hardening as it grew. It throbbed upward along the roof, tickling her womb with it's heart-beat insistence. Not yet making a conscious decision, her own body eagerly matched his movements, forming a matching rhythm that enticed his body to push deeper again inside her.

In her ear, he whispered, "Woman, I believe you have managed to stir my passion."

She chortled, "And mine, O Wondrous Man of mine." She kissed him and continued, "Since you're so willing, I thought I'd let you know I'm eager." She kissed him again, this time pushing her tongue alongside his in time with the thrusting of her hips. He joined her motion, taking it slow, the need for a fast release spent during their first passion.

Holding her with a firm embrace, he rolled over, pulling her on top of him. Once there, he slid his hands along her flanks, pushing down and forward on her hips. In reaction she arched her upper body, breaking from their kiss. She writhed and moaned, grinding herself against him as she scratched her fingers into his chest. Her vaginal muscles rippled, demanding, grasping him and bringing him deeper inside her.

"More… Harder…" she pled. "I want all of you. I need every bit of you. Fill me. Don't stop." With every plea she clamped her thighs harder around him, willing herself to stroke his shaft, forcing it to plough against her inner wall, milking it, demanding he release himself into her. As she did so, she ran her hands over her breasts, rough and hard. She squeezed them together as her whole body convulsed in an unending wave of orgasms, the thrumming of her sex breaking through his own concentration and ripping loose his own climax. Even as she felt his seed shooting into her, merging his warmth with her own moistness, she flushed and bucked, each of her movements, even the slightest starting yet another shuddering climax.

Finally, she collapsed onto his chest, heart racing, her gasps and his thundering in her ears. Her very skin felt on fire from the flush of blood raised to its surface. Spent, his staff slowly softened, yet every stage of his collapse triggered further mini-orgasms within her. She felt her vision begin to fade, as her body responded to his continued strokes and kisses, quivering and jerking slightly as it separated from her control. So this is what it's like, she thought, to literally faint from orgasms, as she gave herself over to the final peak.

An immeasurable time later, she felt him withdraw, taking his sweet warmth from her.

"Baby, it's been almost an hour and a half." he breathed into her ear, "If we don't want them doing to us what we did to them, we have to get up and get clean." His voice sounded near, yet so distant, almost unreal.

"Do we have to? Couldn't we just keep going as we were?" she begged, her limbs unable to move even at the languorous pace his hands took over her tingling body. She rolled in the direction of his voice and opened her eyes, staring into the brown depths of his, her desire so plain to see mirrored in his own. "Why don't we lock the door and give them an excuse to go back to their own pleasure? You know I can never get enough of you."

"I would love that, but I can hear them in the next room and they've definitely gotten up. And I think Ellen wanted to tell us something." He paused and grinned. "Besides, this will give me time to eat and build up my strength! But if you need something to tide you over, I'm happy to oblige." He slid down out of sight, and with a gentle push, laid her on her back. She could follow his motion by the feathery kisses trailing down her front, meandering a bit to take in each breast - which side trips caused her to experience two separate mini-orgasms - and then his lips moved further south, taking in her belly button and finally sliding over her mound and onto her hot, swollen folds. Flicking between her fleshy lips and her rapidly firming clitoris, he hummed, licked, sucked and nibbled until she convulsed and clamped her thighs, forcing his head against her dripping opening as her latest orgasm racked her.

When she finally relaxed, he slid forward, scooping her in his arms and wrapping her in his embrace. "That will have to hold you until we hear what they have to say. Then I want a rematch," he promised.

* * *

"Are you back together," Dermot teased. "No hair out of place? No smeared lipstick? Nothing to give our little secret away to the neighbors?"

"Tease!" She slapped his shoulder, not enough to set him adrift, but enough to get her point across. "As if J'Shawn and Dora haven't figured out what we were doing. I just hope they had enough time for their own needs."

"If I heard correctly, although I'll admit the bulkhead is a reasonable sound deadener, I think they had time and more." He smirked at her. "No, I meant our 'other' neighbors."

She halted her hand inches before it contacted the buzzer set alongside Dora's hatch, spinning to face him. "Are you joking? You are joking, right? We didn't make that much noise… did we?" She paled. "Patrick, I have to work alongside these people. What will they think?"

"Funny, I thought you'd be more upset about Dora finding out."

"I am! She probably thinks I'm some kind of slut. I didn't even try to get back to our room last night." She moaned. "I am a slut."

"First, do you really want to be saying things like this in a public corridor when anyone could happen along." He reached out and pulled her to him. "Second, what we shared is something beautiful, something no slut could possibly experience or understand. Third, Dora's the last person who'd criticize her best friend and roommate for having feelings…" He couldn't finish because her lips found his for a moment. "What was that for?"

"For loving me." She turned and pushed the buzzer. The hatch swung open, revealing J'Shawn standing next to it. Behind him they saw Dora closing her skinsuit.

"Come on in guys. We've been expecting you. What took you so long?" J'Shawn asked, a smile on his face.

"J'Shawn!" Dora said, flushing almost in concert with Ellen, "Do you have to?"

"Have to, what, girl. I'm just saying 'Hello'. Can't a man say 'Hello' to his friends? What's the matter, Elle?" he teased Ellen, winking over her head at Dermot, "You got the same fever as Dora?"

"She does," Dermot replied, "Stigmatus Orgasmus Multiplex combined with a sudden onset of Feverus Embarrassus. It's obviously quite contagious. I hear that much bed rest and stimulation of the nerve endings is a sure fire cure." He high-fived J'Shawn as he stepped past the hatch and closed it.

"Can you believe these guys?" Dora said. "It's as if they have to tell the whole world they're doing it with us!"

"Hey, you can't lay that claim on me. It was Ellen who wanted to discuss our love life in the passage. I'm a gentleman, and a gentleman never kisses and tells." His statement caused Ellen to blush even deeper.

"Is this true?" J'Shawn asked. "Were you talking about it out in the hallway? Damn, man," he turned to Dermot, "you done made her proud with your skills if she's willing to talk about it in public. Way to go!"

"All right. Enough! You two have proven a woman can die of terminal embarrassment." Ellen moved over to Dora's bunk, pulling Dora with her. "Can we move on to something else?"

"What she said, guys. Let's hear what Ellen wanted to say."

Dermot and J'Shawn folded out the chairs and sat.

"It's really Patrick's idea," Ellen said, "Or rather, the first one is, and I think he should be the one to tell you."

"M'man. You couldn't ask for a better intro than that," said J'Shawn. "Take it away. She's got my interest piqued."

"You all know that we've got those four habitat modules arriving in our orbit in about a month." At his words, they nodded.

There had been delays in completing all the necessary paperwork and getting approval for the orbits they'd selected, but after about a three month delay, the Sundancer III hotel/garage modules started their two month trip to match the new orbits. By this time, they could, if the conditions were right, see a diamond pattern of moving objects just above the Earth's horizon. Already the four modules were swinging around to begin the braking burn. If all went well, about the last week in November the modules should assume a position about 25,000 feet behind the main part of OPS-1, or a little less than four miles from the trailing edge of the Post-Orbital Array.

Bringing the modules so close to OPS-1 had almost been a deal-breaker. While the orbital position was outside the restricted zone, bureaucrats on Earth has demanded each module be equipped with a booster package mounted on the end facing the power arrays - a booster package powerful enough to force the modules out of orbit within 120 seconds. Those boosters had not come cheap.

"What's the one thing you miss most about being groundside?" he continued. "The crowds? The constant ID-checking? Maybe it's the air?"

"No, I miss the food," said Dora, her eyes tearing up and wistfulness thickening her voice. "I really do. Look at me, I'm tearing up over the idea of a cheeseburger or a pizza and a salad."

"Me too. I'm a hard-working man. Mama always told me a strong man needs his food. I'd give my right arm for some fried chicken, although I'll not say no to Mongolian Barbecue or, yes, even a slice of hot, fresh pizza; make mine with plenty of mushrooms, onions, some of that linguica sausage and canadian bacon."

"Exactly! We miss the food. And while each of us has our favorite dishes, there isn't a one of us up here who hasn't eaten pizza and loved it."

"So? Bro', I don't know if anyone told you, but it's a long way for the pizza guy to come and make a delivery."

"What if we made our own pizza?" Dermot asked. "What if we turned one of our modules into a pizzeria, complete with brick oven, tables and even some game systems?" All we have to do is figure out how to heat the oven. The rest can be ordered up. Onions, peppers, tomatoes, they can all be grown up here. The cheese we'll have to ship up, but like the meat, we can order it in bulk form and slice and shred it up here. That leaves the flour, seasonings, oil and water. Again, we can order in bulk - even the cartons of egg substitute. Sure, we're going to have to charge more than what they'd pay down there, but it will still be cheaper than trying to have whole pizzas shipped up here."

"I like the idea," Dora said, "Everyone complains that there's nothing to do, no place to go except to the break rooms and the cafeteria. This would give them another place to go, some place different. And it would not be OPS property."

"I don't know… It could work, but it might be a bit more than we can chew, right now. We need to get some experience with the habitats, clean them out, bring in some other money."

"For that, we have Ellen's idea." Dermot nodded to her.

"What's that, girl? You can tell me; I won't bite."

"As if!" she said. "Now Dora, Dora I would trust not to bite."

"You wound me! I have her bite marks right here, and there ain't none on her."

"Just kill me now, J'Shawn. And I have a few you forgot about." Dora turned to Ellen, smiling. "Go on, ignore the brute. Tell Mama Dora your idea."

"I had the same concerns as J'Shawn, about the pizzeria, I mean. We would have to take a lot of time, finding suppliers, coming up with a working brick oven, learning how to make pizza. That's time we're not recouping our costs by bringing in an income from our habitat modules."

"My idea is to use one of the modules as a repair shop for crippled satellites. We could go out, retrieve them, swap out old and failing boards and recharge their maneuvering tanks, then place them back in orbit. Obviously, we'd have to do the first few 'on spec' and we'd have to choose ones which are small enough for the scooters, the ones included with the habitats, to handle. But as our reputation grows, we could upgrade to larger craft and start charging an up-front fee for each one 'recovered' and 'repaired'."

"I get it. And we can plough part of our profits back into our other idea - ideas, I should say, because I'm sure we'll have more. I can get behind this. And with this one working I can even get behind the pizzeria." He stopped and waggled his eyebrows at them, "But we better hurry 'cause when everybody sees us working on a pizza oven, they're gonna start a stampede our way."

"Do you have any other ideas for those modules? Because each habitat is something like eighty feet long and forty feet wide. That's a lot of cubage to use. If we rotated them around their long axis, say even five rotations per minute, we could simulate about 0.1g at the rim. Enough to keep things in place from centripedal force. Among other things, we could maybe build a truck garden in one, complete with veggies, fruit and maybe even a honeybee hive."

"Do you like to garden?" Dermot asked, wondering how he'd not discovered this about J'Shawn.

"Not me. But given the number of people up here, I'll lay odds several do. And some of those may know about raising fruit bushes and trees as well as all sorts of vegetable crops. Wouldn't you want to have fresh fruit and maybe veggies that haven't been either frozen or dried to the point of flavorlessness?"

Through all of this, Dora had taken notes, but with the latest turn in the discussion, she added, "Guys! Please! No mention of fresh fruit. I'd just about kill to have a fresh grapefruit; I'd eat it like you would an orange and skip the sugar just to have one in front of me"

"Me too! Not the grapefruit, but some honeydew melon or cantaloupe would do the trick. And I think Dora and I are a pretty good representation of what all the women up here crave. Yes, we get nutritious, wholesome, well-balanced meals, but none of it is fresh!"

"Those are actually good ideas. We could ask someone to send us a mix of fresh, whole fruit picked from dwarf fruit trees. Then we could save the seeds." Dermot turned to Ellen, "Didn't you say your mother loved to give out fruit from her trees to people in her neighborhood? Could you ask her to send some up, we'd all chip in on the cost of shipping. Is that okay?"

"Okay, that accounts for three of the four habitat modules. Do we know what we want to use the fourth one for? Or are we going to wait a bit until a good idea comes along?" asked Dora.

"We could put in eight levels of office space and rent some of it out to others who want to put people up here." J'Shawn suggested. "I'd want to keep at least one office for our own operations. In fact, given the size of these things, there's really no reason we can't make about half of the pizzeria module into freezer space and storage lockers for rent."

"Great idea!" She entered more notes into her notepad. "Okay, these ideas give us something to think about. We don't need to rush into any of them until we feel confident we can either get the supplies and equipment, but we can start setting up the skeleton of a business plan and timeline for each of them."

In the pause that followed, J'Shawn rubbed the back of his neck, clearly fumbling for words that seemed to fix in his throat. Finally, he spoke, looking down and not meeting their eyes.

"I've been meaning to bring this up, but Singhman had me into his office just before shift today. He's asking me to consider advanced pilot training."

"You mean the shuttles? He wants to send you to flight school?" Dora was stunned, she thought they had plans, plans including each other.

"No. No, not full flight school, but advance orbit-to-orbit training. Seem's my football reflexes are still good. It won't mean going back down, but the school runs nearly two months. So I won't be working the regular assembly shift. I'll stay right where I am, I just won't be working in our group for a couple of months, that's all." He watched Dora's face, trying to gauge her reaction to the news. At first, she had seemed appalled, but apparently the rest of his statement had calmed her down.

" I was meaning to tell you, Dora, but I just thought it would be better if all of you heard it in one go-round. That's why I didn't say anything earlier." He paused. "Well, that and I wasn't sure I wanted to take the training. But if we are going to do this, the pizza shop, the garden, offices and repair shop. I think one of us had better get as much flight training as possible on their dime. Is that okay, by you?"

Dermot caught the small negative shake of Ellen's head and refrained from letting J'Shawn know he supported the idea. Instead, all three waited to see what Dora would say.

"I… guess that's… Hell! I'm pissed you could not say a word through the whole shift, nor even afterwords, when we got back here! You were quick enough to have sex with me, but you couldn't let me know you were going to split up the group?"

"Baby. No. It wasn't like that. Until Patrick and Ellen came in here to talk about these ideas they had, I was gonna turn him down. And I was gonna do that because I don't want to split up our team. You know I love you, Babe. I figured since I was gonna turn him down there wasn't any reason to even bring it up."

"If you love me, you should have talked to me about it, even so!" she shouted.

"You're right. I should have. And I won't forget that. I promise you, I won't forget that." He shrugged, helpless, "I've never really had to share things like this with anyone before. So I don't always know how to handle them. Can you forgive me for being stupid?"

Anger fought a losing battle with acceptance across her face. "You big dope. You're forgiven. And don't go calling yourself stupid. Ignorant, ill-advise, un-trained, but never stupid." She pushed off and floated into his waiting arms. "As if I could keep up an angry snit against you for a decent length of time."

Chapter Seven

It ain’t Much to Look At

It's dependable and not much to look at but it's mine, it's paid for and it's the only way I can get to work!

-Sanchovilla

December 23, 2011

Points of hard light scattered across his vision, as if a careless jeweler had tossed a bucket of diamond dust on a jet floor. Random specks of red, orange and even blue brightness lent a variety to the image. A white, puffy cylinder drifted into his view. Despite being only eighty-feet by forty feet in size, he couldn't shake the feeling he was staring up at a giant Sta-Puff marshmallow ever so slowly falling down to crush him as he would an ant.

Unlike working out on the OPS power arrays, which were so large as to stretch from one edge of his vision to the other, as J'Shawn approached the closest of the four Sundancer III orbital habitats he and his friends had purchased so many months ago. Out here, he had discovered during O2O flight school, where nothing could block the vastness of space, he felt the loneliness so many of the writers, poets and the older astronauts spoke of. This is where he most felt displaced, unsure, as if he didn't belong. He had been raised in apartments, had been crammed into a dorm room for years. Even on his own, he'd found a single bedroom apartment. Small quarters and tight spaces had defined all of his life, walking or driving outside, he had rarely left the canyons of the city in which he'd been born.

Here, the emptiness, the magnitude ripped from the depths of his mind a fear, and a drive for self-examination he'd never quite known before. The fear came from seeing and understanding the total lack of anything within range of his orbital transfer vehicle. At times, he felt a desperate need to talk to whoever was listening on his assigned channel; he'd even experienced an occasional inability to engage the OTV's engines, to leave the docking bay. Each time, he had managed to calm down by re-doing his voyage checklist, focusing completely upon the task, not hesitating to run the 'execute' command.

Once he was moving, the fear disappeared. But the nature of orbit-to-orbit transfers was such as to ensure plenty of time for introspection. With the sheer simplicity of the OTV design, it could be handled by a single operator/pilot. And UN-OPS chose to specify all but the longest trips be conducted by one pilot, unless the cargo required special handling, in which case a technician rode 'shotgun' in the fold-out jumpseat.

On this trip he was the 'mission specialist', the technician hitching a ride. Along with the four habitats and their attached booster units and storage/garage modules, the sale price had included four older, but quite serviceable crew towboats and two OTVs. According to the manifest transmitted by the sales agents, this habitat held one OTV inside, complete with two grappling arm units. The OTV bringing him out here also carried fuel for his OTV. They would unload the fuel tanks and their shade screen, haul out the OTV and do whatever else was necessary to bring it online. They would also check the habitat's environmental systems.

"Coming up on your new home." Ryk Spoor's voice crackled through his helmet speakers. "Sure is pretty. Say, what do you guys plan on doing with these things? Weren't they part of that orbital hotel that Bigelow Aerospace runs?"

"They were. But Bigelow stripped all the furnishings and most of the room dividers out of these before they let us have them." He paused, wondering just what else he could safely say. Dora had cautioned him against letting people know their plans. "We haven't really decided what we're going to use them for. We've got a few wild ideas, but until we get a better look-see inside, we don't really know."

"Well, if it involves doing a little orbit-to-orbit work, I wouldn't mind picking up a few hours on the side," his fellow OTV pilot said, "strictly cash, if you can afford that."

"Is that you talking… or your bookie?" Ryk was well known for his habit of betting on any professional sports event - and losing so regularly as to leave him borrowing money from any fellow worker who he could badger into it. He had even bet on the outcome of a curling match.

"My bookie, of course." For all his abysmal judgment of sports teams, he was a skilled OTV pilot. They docked at the storage module docking port with the barest of jars. "All out for space habitat G-III 384. Please fold your chairs into the stored position and take all personal luggage with you. Thank you for flying OPS Space Lines."

"Dude, you must have been saving that one for years. If you happen to have any more, please remember, they're not helping your chances of moonlighting for us."

"Duly noted and logged." Spoor completed his shutdown and followed J'Shawn through the top-mounted hatch. "Do you want to check everything out on the hab first, or do you want to pull the fuel tanks and get them stored?"

"Let's get them stored. We'll want them offloaded before I fuel up my OTV, so it makes sense to move them into position now."

"You're the customer." With that, they floated over to the open-frame cargo bay and hooked the pallet containing the fuel canisters out with the articulated arm. Working slow to minimize the probability of damaging the canisters, OTV or habitat, they finished moving and shading the fuel can in a little more than forty-five minutes.

By then, both their air tanks had dropped to less than half of rated capacity. It had been a major design change, but the first work crews had demanded, and got an external connector and an internal pressurized air canister on the later model OTVs. Both Ryk and J'Shawn topped off their breather pack tanks before moving to the individual-entry hatch mounted in the cargo bay hatch. It was a matter of minutes for each to pass through into the bay.

"Wow. This is dark squared." J'Shawn whistled softly as his external helmet lamp painted a small circle of light on the bay's far wall. The rest of the bay, except for the wandering circle formed by Spoor's lamp, remained black, sucking the photons from their lights into the pitch darkness.

"I hope you remember where they put the light switch, because I don't see one."

"Yeah. It's over here, about two feet to the left of the hatch we just crawled through." He turned, scanning the cargo bay's hatch frame. "Here it is, one standard keypad and environment control panel. Lights are now…" he keyed in the correct code, flooding the chamber in harsh brilliance, "on!"

"Geez! You could warn a guy before doing that! I'll be seeing spots for the rest of the trip ho… holy crap!" At that, J'Shawn whirled around. And stopped, facing the object which had caused such eloquence from Ryk.

"Man. Punch me, quick! I'm not seeing what I think I'm seeing am I?"

"If you aren't, J'Shawn old man, you must be delusional, because I'm looking at a Mitsubishi Heavy Industries OCV 800, Series B, I think."

UN-OPS had chosen to accept the bid from Renault for the construction of the two generations of OTVs. Renault had created a very basic orbital transfer vehicle, capable of hauling approximately 1 metric ton of cargo in the open rear bay, room for a pilot and mission specialist in the unpressurized cabin and having two bow attach points for articulated arms and tow claws. Pushing a five metric ton object, it could thrust for 240 minutes at it's max Isp.

The Mitsubishi OCV 800 resting before them had room for three times the cargo in it's rear bay and had four attach points on the bow. It also featured a command and passenger cabin capable of being pressurized and carrying four passengers plus the pilot and mission specialist. Further, the cargo bay could hold a separate-environment passenger cabin with life-support for 72 hours for eight passengers. And it could boost at max Isp for up to 960 minutes. Looking past the OCV, which held the closed-environment cargo insert, J'Shawn could see one of the passenger modules.

"I don't think you asked for enough fuel."

"No, I didn't, did I?" J'Shawn floated over and ran his gloved hand along it's flank. "I'm going to need a new paint job."

"Paint job? Why in Hell would you want to mar that pristine beauty with a different color?"

"Not color. Colors. I want flames. And an eagle's beak." He rounded on Spoor. "You're not looking at OCV 800 - 1875B."

"I'm not?"

"Of course you're not. You're looking at Screaming Eagle One." J'Shawn turned back to the craft. "And you're mine, all mine. Aren't you baby?"

Ryk's cough brought him back to the present. "That's all well and good, but we've got to get it out of the bay, fueled and we've got to check out the habitat. And we don't have that much time before we both have to return to OPS-1. Are you still planning to fly that one back to the station?"

"Yes, so we better get started."

Opening the cargo bay's main hatch took far less time than they anticipated as the main power system had been in sleep rather than completely powered down. The power meters on the batteries read 143 hours capacity at full load. Which was good because that meant J'Shawn could expect over ten weeks of capacity in sleep mode, plenty of time to install and fuel the fuel cells they had purchased.

Once outside, the two of them drained all the fuel from the canisters into the OCV's tanks.

"Can I watch as you work through the power-up checklist? I've never seen the inside of one of these babies."

"Sure. In fact, I was planning to ask you for help. I figure if you do end up working for us, it would be better if you were checked out on our orbital craft." He opened the hatch and pulled himself inside, saying, "Welcome aboard Screaming Eagle One."

"Thanks."

J'Shawn was relieved to see the control panels layout was the same as the OTV's. He'd heard Mitsubishi had submitted a bid for the OTV contract, but now he had confirmation.

"I wonder why UN-OPS didn't go for this vehicle? It clearly meets the needs of the OPS crew."

"J'Shawn, you haven't lived in Europe, so I can understand why you've never experienced this. The UN doesn't like giving contracts to the 'big boys' based in Japan, the US or England. And the only other serious bidder was from France. France is a big deal in the UN, despite everything it does to frustrate the UN's basic goals."

"Then they're stupid."

"How long have you worked for UN-OPS? And you're just now realizing that the UN is stupid?" J'Shawn heard the humor in Ryk's voice. "But there's hope for you. You have me to explain everything."

"Good thing. Because I've never understood the European mind."

"And I've never understood how you Americans can drink American beer. I guess we all have our personal ideosyncracies."

"Go ahead and keep complaining. Keep complaining. Need I point out you guys drink your beer warm?" He kept working his way through the startup checklist. So far all the indicators had come up green, The cabin interior glowed with the emerald light, rendering the reds and magentas of their suit controls a darker gray against the pale blue of their breather packs.

"Beats all Hell out of chilling down near zero just to disguise the lack of character. A real beer doesn't need to freeze the taste buds, it has a character pleasing to the bloody palate. Something you colonials never figured out. Say, could you go back a step?"

J'Shawn reversed his last step, which brought the main display to one of several nested menu screens. "What did you see?"

"There, that last option. Do you see it?" The choice read 'Defensive Systems'.

"I see it, but I don't believe it. Why would anyone put a defensive system on an OCV?" He selected the menu choice. Another screen of options appeared. "Electro-static Discharge Anti-theft System? Kinetic Energy Anti-Intrusion System? Thermal-Optical Collision Elimination System? Automatic Collision Avoidance System? Just what did Mitsubishi expect this thing to have to deal with?"

"Did you notice all but the anti-theft and collision-avoidance systems are listed as 'inoperative/not installed'? Those two are showing up as 'disengaged'. Old chum, I think that means you could turn them on. I'd dearly love to see what that Electro-static Discharge Anti-theft System does, but I'm volunteering you to test it. As for the anti-collision system, it probably acts the same way as the avoidance systems on airliners, or so I would presume."

"You may be right. But I'm not going to turn either on until I've had a chance to read the manuals - thoroughly!" He resumed working through the startup checklist. "I think for now it will be better to get this puppy ready to fly and get some time behind the controls bringing back to OPS-1. You have to admit this is a much nicer crew cabin than on your bird."

"No doubt," the other pilot replied, "but do you think it's wise to bring this close to the station? We don't know what the systems are capable of."

"Yeah, but I have no plans to install either of the two 'inoperative' systems. And I'm not going to turn on the others anywhere near the station. They may be nice options, but have you noticed the rest of the controls and programs are what we have on the OTVs and use the same switches, joysticks and execution commands? This shouldn't be that hard to fly. What do you say to a short flight around the habitats? I'll even let you have some stick time."

He could hear Spoor's breath in his earphones. Long seconds passed. "I'm less worried about rules and regs than many of the other pilots, but we've a bit of a long hike back if anything goes wrong. Still, everything checked out green, and by the gauges we've got enough fuel, even with the paltry bit we dumped in, to go to OPS and back twice. I'm game."

"Great! Then let's do it!" J'Shawn reached for the control yoke.

"Hold on. You didn't let me finish. You colonials are always in a bloody hurry."

At that comment J'Shawn stopped. "What now?"

"How much time do you have flying these crates? The OTVs, I mean?"

"You know I've only the 100 hours they allowed in flight training."

"And have you ever flown aircraft?" Spoor continued. "I'm not trying to be insulting; my questions are relevant."

"No. I wasn't rich enough to afford to pay for lessons," he said, not quite able to hide his resentment at the direction the conversation was taking.

"Well I have. I've got my ticket punched for rotary, single and multi-engine craft and I'm both visual and instrument flight rules certified. The last I looked, I've logged over 2,000 hours down below, in several different types of aircraft. And that's on top of my 1,600 hours of OTV flight time."

"Look, I'm not trying to spoil your fun. But I'd really rather be the one to take us away from your big marshmallow over there. While neither of us has flown one of these crates, I'm the only one who's had real experience in flying different craft. I promise, once we're clear, I'll gladly relinquish the controls to you."

J'Shawn listened through the pulse of his anger. This was, after all, his craft. Still, what Spoor said made sense. And the others would not be happy if he damaged their property the very day they received it.

"Okay. You're right. So why don't you take us out a few hundred meters and get us a bit of elbow room to practice in?" He removed his hands from the controls and watched Ryk ready himself to take control.

* * *

The OCV slowed its tumble, ending the skew-flip maneuver with the engine bells facing along its path, the vibration of the thunderous deceleration burn reaching through the control yoke into J'Shawn's hands. Before he could react to the zero-count flashing onto the main screen, by mashing the cutoff switch, the engines went silent. The sudden cessation of deceleration threw him against the safety harness."

"YEOW! What a blast!" he shouted, staring out the cabin's pilot-side port at the nearby inflatable habitat, now hanging motionless 100 meters from the OCV. "What a rush! This thing can stop on a dime! Did you feel the deceleration? We were pulling almost three-tenths of a G!"

"Do tell. Good thing I wasn't taking a sip of tea, now, wasn't it? Two things. First, I believe you have the hang of flying this beast. Second, I strongly recommend you not attempt any of these high-delta-v hijinks near OPS-1. They'd surely take your ticket away from you. And fire you. And ship your arse back groundside. Now please allow me to catch my breath, slow my heart rate. I'd like a calm, genteel trip back to my ship, if you will."

"One slow, gentle, calming trip coming up. You know, you didn't do so bad yourself. If you decide you still want to moonlight for us, and if any opportunities come up that we can offer you, I am willing to convince the others to hire you. Are you still up for that?" J'Shawn turned to watch his passenger. Once again, the seconds ticked by. While he waited, he set up a course back to the OTV.

"Did you know a group of tow-boat and OTV pilots have been agitating for better working conditions?" Spoor asked. "They're trying to form, of all things, an Orbital Pilots Guild. More emphasis on safety, fewer 12 to 14 hour shifts, better monitoring of flight paths, certain training courses not currently being taught, that kind of thing."

"No. I hadn't heard about this. But then, I just finished flight training two weeks ago and I haven't really gotten to know my fellow pilots. You, on the other hand, have been flying those tow boats and the OTVs for months. If you're not involved with it, I'd still bet you know all about it." While talking, J'Shawn initiated the trip instructions stored in the flight computer. With a soft push, Screaming Eagle One began it's voyage back to the first habitat and the OTV.

"I do. And I support the basic concept. The problem is, management doesn't want it to happen. Which means it won't happen. Or I should say, it won't happen without some sort of fight."

"I'm not one of the organizers, and I haven't formally signed on, but I'm friendly enough with those who are part of the movement that management may well decide I'm not worth keeping around. After all, they know about my wee gambling issue."

"Yeah, but from what I've seen, you keep it under control. You may be a bit short at times, but it's not like you're dropping tens of thousands beyond what you make."

"But I do occasionally drop several hundred beyond my income." Ryk sighed. "And that will be enough. I made the mistake of telling Singhman, in front of about a dozen others, that he was a bloody, hypocritical prick for his judgmental attitude about my gambling. Which means that when, not if, this Orbital Pilots Guild nonsense comes to a head, I'll be run off with them. He's done this to others."

"But that's a side issue to the point I was going to make. You, Dora, Dermot and Ellen are the sole legal owners of those puffy orbital marshmallows and the attached vehicles. You are a licensed orbital pilot, duly certified. And as one of the owners of this bloody wonderful ship, you're the Chief Pilot of your concern."

"So?" J'Shawn couldn't see where this was leading. "Big deal. I'm still a rookie orbital pilot. Machs nichts."

"There's where you're wrong. As owner and Chief Pilot, you have the authority to license other pilots - including myself. Which means you can certify me on this OCV and issue a license, independent of the one I hold through UN-OPS. I rather like the idea of having an orbital pilot's license that can't be pulled by OPS management."

"The Hell you say! It can't be that easy! And you are forgetting I'm not an instructor-pilot."

"But I am. And I just gave you a check flight on an orbit-to-orbit transfer vehicle. Oh sure. It's a bit hincky, but if you and your fellow owners accept the validity of it, your company can issue a license based upon my certification."

Silence descended in the cabin. For the remainder of the journey, each man pondered the words spoken.

As they neared their destination, Spoor spoke up again. "One other pertinent fact. As a duly registered corporation, with offices, personnel and vehicles in orbit, you could also hire yourselves out to OPS. Look it up, it's in the regulations. That puts the onus of meeting safety and training requirements on you, but it also means you can, if things go the way I believe they will, charge whatever the market will bear for services rendered. If possible, I'd like to complete a transfer from employment under UN-OPS to you before the pilots guild idiots get OPS management all stirred up."

After easing to a stop, J'Shawn unbuckled and followed Spoor to the hatch. There, his passenger stopped, hand on the hatch release handle. "Just think about it," he said.

"I will, and if we decide to follow your advice, you'll be the first one we call."

With that, Spoor exited the craft and shot over to his own ship. Once inside, he called out to J'Shawn, "I'm in. Would you hang around a bit until I get this bloody crate fired up?"

"Sure thing. I figured it would be less surprising to flight control if I followed you back home."

"Like some bloody great puppy, you mean?"

"Exactly. And I expect you to go all gushy and wide-eyed-innocent-child on them. Remember, you're trying to win a job with us."

"Right. One sodding innocent waif act coming up. May I assume you're not going to tell them your ship's new name? I do believe 'Screaming Eagle One' has a rather, violent, connotation to it. Not that it's any of my business, of course, but that might make the gushiness sound somewhat… contrived, wouldn't you agree? How about I call it 'Fluffy'?"

"Fluffy?" J'Shawn couldn't restrain a guffaw. "Fluffy! I like it. No. Wait. Call her 'Vuffie'!"

"Vuffy? What the bugger is a 'Vuffy'!" Outraged curiousity echoed in Spoors voice. J'Shawn made his way to the pilot's seat and strapped in as he laughed.

"You mean you've never read the classics?"

"Classics? I've read every single one of Shakespeare's plays, all of Dickinson's works and even Mary Shelly's writings. Nowhere have I ever heard of 'Vuffy'."

"Wrong classics. You need to have read from L. Neil Smith's stories. Specifically, you have to find a copy of "Their Majesties' Bucketeers". And it's spelled 'Vuffie'. That's 'V', 'u', 'f', 'f', 'i' and 'e'."

"Effing colonials. They'll always suprised you. Are you ready? I'm all warmed up and set to go."

"Just finishing setting up my flight plans. There. You can proceed at any time."

"Before we proceed, you might want to check out the reserve channels, make sure they're working. How about we test Reserve Channel Two?"

"Sure." J'Shawn hadn't thought of testing the reserve radio channel. It was most often used by the pilots to chat between themselves during multi-ship operations to relieve the traffic on both the main station-to-ship channels and the standard ship-to-ship channels. "Switching to Reserve Channel Two, now." He activated that radio and set it to channel two. "Can you hear me, Ryk?"

"Loud and clear. Say, while we're hanging out here with no one listening, how about you keep your ship's special features quiet? No need bragging on them, what?"

"You're coming through five by five. Vuffie out."

* * *

The trip back to OPS-1 was uneventful. However, after the powerful acceleration they had put his OCV through during the shakedown flight, the sedate initial push and slow drift to home mandated by UN-OPS regulations left him frustrated. Still, the snail's pace as well as the hint from Ryk to not discuss what he had shared left J'Shawn a great deal of time to review what he had heard, and to make plans.

It took them forty-five minutes to accelerate up to maximum prescribed velocity, travel the five miles to OPS-1 and decelerate down to one-half meter per second, the allowed velocity for close-in maneuvering, that being any maneuver performed within 200 meters of the station. After another six and a half minutes, J'Shawn successfully docked the OCV at his assigned mooring clamp. Before he shut the bird down, he recharged his air supply from the on-board tanks. Then he fished the technical manuals out of the locked cabinet where they had been stored, placing them in a net shoulder bag, called the 'purse' by one and all. Damned if it didn't look like a shoulder purse, he thought, not for the last time.

As he exited the locker room where he had stripped off his helmet and breather pack, he was hailed from behind.

"Williams. J'Shawn Williams." He recognized the voice; it belonged to his shift supervisor, Aaron Solomon.

Turning he replied, "Yes, Aaron? Do you need me?" He hoped this wasn't about an off-schedule flight. The excursion had left him tired and hungry. Solomon pulled even with him.

"I was wondering if you could explain, Williams, that craft you have hanging off the mooring clamp. You stated in your request you would be bringing over an OTV. From the chatter I overheard, it's an OCV. Where did you get it?"

"To tell the truth, Aaron finding it was as big a shock to me as it was to you. The receipts we received stated two orbital transfer vehicles, one of which bore the hull number 1875B. And when I opened up the cargo bay, there she was, an orbital craft, a Mitsubishi OCV class, Series B ship, Orbital Cargo Vessel 1875B. I scanned back through all our records and she's definitely ours."

"We'll have to revise our agreement with you as this is a much more massive vessel than we agreed upon. We may have to change your docking point."

"I'm good with that, even if it means a slightly higher docking fee." He watched Solomon stare at him, expecting a reaction which J'Shawn couldn't begin to guess at. Finally he asked the man, "Is that all? I've only got ten hours until my shift starts and I'd like to catch a meal before I go to sleep."

"Yes. But stop by my office this week so we can make other arrangements."

"Sure thing." He turned and walked away, heading straight for the cafeteria. According to his watch, he had five minutes left to scrounge up his meal.

Later, as he showered in preparation for sleep, he thought back on how Solomon had acted. It was almost as if Solomon expected him to pull a 'better-than-thou' act, simply because he now owned his own ship. And there may have been a bit of fear in the man's eyes. Like he expected J'Shawn to refuse to move to a new docking point or pay higher fees.

The more he pondered, the more he wondered just how bad the feelings between the Orbital Pilots Guild agitators and management had become. Could Ryk be correct? Were the guild people ready to push for greater power?

On the one hand, it could present a wonderful opportunity to hire out his orbital ships to OPS. And that meant better money for all four of them. On the other hand, he sympathized with the pilots. Even with what time he'd spent these past two weeks, he could agree that some of their ideas - they really weren't 'demands' yet, were they? - made sense. And they'd resent him if he 'took' their jobs away by doing 'work-for-hire' for OPS. Still, they would probably already have been fired if OPS decided to throw contract work his way.

The only thing he knew for sure was that either way, he needed to get Dermot, Ellen or Dora up to speed on the OCVs, and he didn't have enough experience to teach them. Which meant they might well take Ryk Spoor up on his plan to be licensed as one of their OCV pilots, an instructor-pilot. Ryk could probably handle the job.

"Damn." he said out loud. "'Vuffie'! That's gonna spread all over the station! May as well make it official." He called up the flight control office on the com line built into his notebook.

"Flight Ops."

"I need to register my ship."

"Your ship? What do you mean? They aren't private property. All ships are owned by UN-OPS. Thus, they're already registered."

"Not this one. It's owned by me and my friends. And it's not one of the OTVs. Look in your records for an OCV, Series B vessel, hull number 1875B."

"I heard rumors about it." the woman continued. "Let me see… Nope, you're already registered. Don't need to do a thing."

"What name does it show?"

"Name? Why would it need a name?"

"Because we own it, not UN-OPS or one of the big multi-national corporations. And I like the idea of it having a name."

"Well, we usually don't, but it appears there is a place on the form for a name. What do you want to call it?"

"Vuffie. That's spelled 'V', 'u', 'f', 'f', 'i' and 'e', Vuffie." He heard a sharp laugh from the other end.

"Are you sure you want to call it that? And not something more noble, like Mighty Emerald Dragon of the Eastern Dawn?"

"Nope. My mind's made up."

"Then 'Vuffie' it is." The woman paused. "Um… Could I take a look sometime at this ship you felt inspired to call 'Vuffie'?"

"Sure thing. Just not tonight. Good night." And he cut the connection.

Chapter Eight

A little Paint, Some new Furniture

“Science is a first-rate piece of furniture for a man's upper chamber, if he has common sense on the ground floor.”

-Oliver Wendell Holmes

December 25, 2011

"Merry Christmas!" Dermot bowled through the hatch, followed by J'Shawn, who closed the door as he passed by. Ellen, coming out of the shared bathroom, had to stop to avoid their charge.

"And a Merry Christmas back at you guys." she said. "Now could you cease this thundering around our cabin and sit down! Some of us are still trying to dress!" She snatched her suit from the hook by the bathroom door with one hand, the other keeping firm grip on the towel surrounding her, backed from where she came. "Talk to Dora, while I get…" the closing hatch cut off the rest of her words.

"Yes," Dora took up the conversation, waving her friends to the chairs, "please take a seat. But before you do, I want to see those hands, boys. Empty hands mean empty seats. Come on,” she said when neither man brought his hands into view, “this is Christmas. You know… the day when person is supposed to shower gifts upon his favorite female?”

“Ummm…” Dermot temporized.

“Well, you see…” J’Shawn followed suit. “It’s not really a gift I could just bring to you. You’re going to have to come to where it is.”

“Unh Hunh. I’m not buying what you’re selling, my man.” She transferred her tinder-dry gaze to Dermot. “And I know Ellen feels the same way. Especially after you both bailed on us. We had a date-night, dinner and a movie, last night… all four of us.”

“Honest. He’s telling the truth. And we just couldn’t tell you why we missed the date; it would have spoiled a surprise.” He sputtered to a stop, as Ellen re-entered the room.

“Surprise? Did someone mention surprise?” She turned to face Dora. “I don’t know, Dora. It better be a great surprise to get back into our good graces, don’t you think?”

“Oh absolutely. I was counting on bling, around my neck, dangling from my ears, clasping my wrist; I’d even settle for a tiny piece fit on my finger.” Here she waggled her left ring finger at J’Shawn. “But I don’t see any bling. So this better be a spectacular surprise.”

“Baby, you can have all the bling you want. But first I want to show you our surprise.” He continued, his voice mirroring the smugness written on his face, “And then I don’t believe you’ll want any bling this Christmas.”

“Hush. Dora, don’t cry. He’s a man and can’t possibly understand. And don’t even think of agreeing with him, Patrick, or you’ll lose something near and dear to yourself - for at least a week.”

“What? Me put my foot in it that badly? Sweetie, if you say the moon is hot pink, I’ll agree.” Dermot turned to his friend, “You’re on your own on this one. I’m not about to jump in and help you dig that grave you’re so eager to finish. But before you do, may I remind you we have people to go, places to do, things to be?”

“Pax.” pleaded J’Shawn. “Baby, I will never again even hint you don’t need bling for either Christmas or your glorious birthday.”

“See that you don’t. I’m a woman of refinement and discriminating taste. I need to be pampered. Now come over here and give me a kiss.” J’Shawn complied.

As he did so, Ellen sank into Dermot’s lap, draped her arms around him and asked, “Would my strong, handsome man happen to have a stocking stuffer for me?” She snuggled close, molding herself to his hips.

“Um…” Dermot tried to focus on her words, rather than the warmth of her body. “Stocking stuffer?”

“Yes,” She reached one arm behind her and trailed her fingers up his inner thigh, leaning closer and whispering, “Stocking stuffer.”

Unable to form words, he took the only option available and, diverting her hand from further passes, he wrapped his arms around her, his lips met hers in a passion-filled kiss. Once again, he experienced the time-dilation physicists stated could only be noticed in objects whose velocity exceeded a significant fraction of the speed of light. Without warning the wave-front collapsed and he found himself back in the cabin.

“That stocking stuffer,” he managed to force out. “What were we talking about?”

“You said you two had a surprise for us. What is it? And if you didn’t bring it with you, where is it?”

He shook his head to clear it. In the background, at a low volume, he could, with difficulty, make out the broadcast over the main communications channel.

“… Insofar as I may be heard by anything, which may or may not care what I say, I ask, if it matters, that you be forgiven for anything you may have done or failed to do which requires forgiveness. Conversely, if not forgiveness but something else may be required to insure any possible benefit for which you may be eligible after the destruction of your body, I ask that this, whatever it may be, be granted or withheld, as the case may be, in such a manner as to insure your receiving said benefit. I ask this in my capacity as your elected intermediary between yourself and that which may not be yourself, but which may have an interest in the matter of your receiving as much as it is possible for you to receive of this thing, and which may in some way be influenced by this ceremony. Amen.

And that concludes the non-denominational service on this scheduled holiday.”

“Did I just hear them give the Agnostic’s Prayer as part of the Christmas Service?”

“Yep.” he responded. “And it’s nice to have you two back with us. Elle wants to know where we are going. She even wants us to spoil the surprise.”

“Not likely. Not likely at all. For once we have the advantage; you ladies are going to have to wait. I will tell you we have to get suited up.”

“That reminds me. J’Shawn, girls, I asked for a special set of box lunches for us. They should be ready and waiting in the cafeteria.”

It took them a little more than fifteen minutes to gather their meals and don their breather packs, the helmets hanging from the neckline of the packs. Then Dermot and J'Shawn led the others to another access hatch closer to the post-orbital power array.

"We'll have to suit up here because there's no access tube on the other side of the outer hatch," Dermot said. "But J'Shawn and I laid on a line to the ship."

"Ugh!" said Dora. "Not an OTV! Those things are so cramped, even if we are in a micro-g environment."

"Wait and see." With that said, J'Shawn waved the two women ahead of him into the airlock. After Dermot had entered and closed the inner hatch, the four of them donned their helmets and checked for suit integrity. Once each suit's status lights flashed green, J'Shawn held up three fingers followed by two, indicating he wanted them to set the reserve radio to it's second channel.

"Got it." said Dermot

"I heard that."

"Me too."

"Good," he replied. "Dora, could you dump the air?"

She reached out and punched the code sequence to initiate the process. They heard the thump of the pumps and the steady whistle of air for a short while until the chamber neared a vacuum. When the red lights on all eight corners flashed, they knew the dump was complete and they could open the outer hatch.

Pulling herself outside, Ellen went first, her sealed meal tucked into her shoulder bag which was secured to the shoulder of her suit. At first, she couldn't make out the dim shape in front of her. Then her eyes adjusted to the lower light levels. She paused, blocking Dora from following.

"What is that?" she asked. "It's not an OTV, but I've never seen a ship like that before."

"Move out of the way and let me see," Dora protested behind her. She grabbed the safety line and pulled forward, assisted by a push from behind. "C'mon, girlfriend. I still can't see… Whoa! That's new." Dora followed as Ellen pulled farther out, heading for the ship's hatch.

"Dora! Look over there!"

"Over where?" Dora first glanced at the hatch, then when she couldn't see anything that caught her attention, she shifted back to Ellen and realized her friend pointed at the bow of the craft. "I can't make it out, that module box is blocking part of my view. Is that 'ffie'?"

"No, it's 'Vuffie'," Ellen snorted. "Who in the world came up with 'Vuffie'?"

"Now who do you think! Only one man I know has read the complete works of L. Neil Smith. Am I right big guy?"

"Girl. You wound me. I would never just read L Neil's stories; I have them burned into my computer's permanent memory - and I have them in old-style book format." He came out of the hatch and snagged the line. "Could you move forward? Patrick's still stuck in the lock."

"Yes I am. And it is rather boring in here."

As the last person to exit, Dermot closed the airlock's outer hatch and unclipped the safety line, rolling up as he followed his friends. Within minutes they had reached the OCV and entered the main cabin. Once the four found seats and strapped in, J'Shawn taking the pilot's position and Dermot the copilot's chair, J'Shawn started the power-up checklist.

"Wait a bit," said Dermot, "and we'll bring up cabin pressure."

"This thing has a pressurized cabin?" asked Ellen.

"Sure does."

"You never got around to telling Ellen and me what kind of ship this is? I mean, we both saw the name, but what type is it, and where did it come from?"

J'Shawn paused his power-up activity. "It's an Orbital Cargo Vessel, Series B, hull number 1875B. Mitsubishi made them. They're up to Series D now, and I hear they're about to release Series E. Where it came from… It's ours, Babe. We bought it; we own it."

"When did we buy this!" Dora said, shock and worry evident in her voice. "I know I didn't place an order for one!"

"You sure did. And you paid for it, along with it's identical sister ship. hull number 1876B. Remember the line item for two orbital transfer vehicles?" He kept working, bringing more of the OCV's systems on line. Soon the bloated feeling, caused by their skin ballooning out against the tension of their skinsuits when in vacuum, began to fade as the cabin pressurized.

"I remember, but those were OTVs, not this OCV!"

"Wrong. The receipt clearly stated they were 'orbital transfer vehicles', not OTVs. And these are, generically speaking, orbital transfer vehicles. And they're all ours. Vuffie and Muffie."

"But if you have these, does that mean…?" curious, Ellen asked what Dora wished to know.

"Yep, they're here! Four massive marshmallows of inflated, kevlar goodness. We thought you ladies would like to see our new property." He reached up and released his helmet, saying, "We're under pressure, everyone. You can remove your helmets."

As the cabin had filled with air, the shadows softened. Finally, he turned on the main cabin lights, allowing them to see more of the inside of the OCV.

Unlike the smaller OTV, the interior of the OCV presented a finished appearance. Most of that came from smooth walls with flush-mounted locker doors, so different from the webbing and wire-frame bins that crammed an OTV's cabin. And the OCV seats spread out for three rows, including the pilot and copilot stations, with a central aisle separating the seats; the OTV craft used a single fixed seat frame for the pilot with a fold-out jump seat built into the hatch on the rear wall. Then there were the viewing ports; Renault's design used a single flat plate for the front port and placed three, much smaller, round ports above, and on either side of the pilot, putting a severe limit on the pilot's visibility. Combined with the minimal radar and video imaging available on the OTV's main piloting display, the OTV took careful attention and concentration to operate.

Mitsubishi had chosen a different approach.

While the OCV had a divided front port as well as side and top ports aligned with the pilot and copilot stations, it also had cameras mounted along the lower edge of each of the ports - and between the upper ports. It also had cameras mounted facing to the rear and along the bottom of the craft. The operators wore a monocle over the dominant eye which showed a virtual external 'windowless' image in any direction, as if the ship were transparent. A separate display panel to the right of the two main panels, one for each pilot's station, could be set, with the flip of a switch to either repeat the current 'view' the pilot saw, or it would slowly cycle through the images from the individual cameras.

The craft had four other viewports along the sides of the craft at each passenger station. Thus each person in the main cabin could see outside the craft. According to the documentation provided with the OCV, this helped alleviate the tendency to claustrophobia, something which the passenger in the Renault OTV cabin could experience.

Ellen did not know the reason behind the design of the Mitsubishi OCV, she only knew it felt more comfortable to her than the Renault OTV.

"I don't know about you, but I am glad for our luck," she said. "I hated riding in those OTVs. If it flies as well as it looks, I think I could get used to this ship."

"Yeah," added Dora, "Riding in a Cadillac instead of a Smartcar. That reminds me, did we get the basic tow boats, or are those different as well?"

Dermot answered. "Sorry, but we're stuck with the standard tow boats. However, these OCVs are even more of a blessing than you may think. J'Shawn showed me the figures on it's performance envelope."

"Envelope?" Ellen interrupted. "What's that?"

"How it handles under different conditions, what stresses it can take, what it's top acceleration, velocity and engine burn time on a full tank of fuel. Also, what accessories can be attached to it and how much it can haul."

"He's got it right. Baby, this bird can sustain three times the acceleration of the OTV. It has enough fuel capacity for four times the total main engine burn time. It's twice as agile; that means this ship will roll, yaw and pitch faster. In old-fashioned terms, our ship will fly rings around the competition."

"But we're just using this to make trips back and forth to the station? Do we need all that capability?" asked Ellen.

"You're forgetting our idea to go out and retrieve those worn out and broken satellites." J'Shawn said.

"Yeah, I remember, but don't we just boost to get started and then coast the rest of the way?"

"Sure do. However, the power in this means we can boost to speed faster. And if we boost at the higher acceleration for the same time as we would in an OTV, we'll make the trip faster. You have to figure that as soon as we start doing this, someone else will try the same thing. But our better ships means we'll be able to do the job faster - or we'll be able to go farther on the same consumable supplies. That means we'll be able to reach more satellites and be able to do the job for more customers."

"And that translates to more income, which I can support." added Dora. "Okay. So this OCV is a good thing for us. Will we need special equipment to fully utilize them? If we will, getting them up here will drain our bank account."

"Yet another surprise gift. We got the whole expansion package for each of them. That means we will be able to handle larger cargo loads. And we got the rear-cargo-bay passenger module - for each of them. So we can shuttle up to eight people around in a pressurized environment, above and beyond the four passengers we can stuff in this cabin. I'm thinking either a taxi service, a backup ambulance service or even a tour shuttle service for VIPs who come up to check out OPS-1."

Dora pondered Dermot's words. "Wow. You've given some thought to the whole 'taxi service' idea. Would UN-OPS management hire us? And how are we going to do this if J'Shawn's out picking up a satellite to repair? Neither Ellen, you or myself are certified to pilot one of these."

"J'Shawn has some ideas about that. His fellow OTV pilot, Ryk Spoor, is certified as an OCV pilot and he has experience in training people to fly. Furthermore, he's willing to hire on with us even after he trains one of us on the OCV."

"Why would he do that?" Ellen asked. "If he's a pilot and instructor, he's got to be making some good money working for UN-OPS. So why dump out and go with a small start-up."

"There are reasons, good ones, for him to find another home." J'Shawn answered. "This stays between us, but some of the pilots, both tow boat and OTV, are agitating for better working conditions - not money - it's about safety. And to gain those concessions, they're trying to form a guild, an Orbital Pilots Guild. Management has heard about it and there will be a confrontation soon, with the probable likelihood that all those involved will lose their licenses and their jobs. Spoor's not part of that group, but he's got plenty of friends in the thick of it. When you add in that he's got a mild case of gambling addiction, he's most likely looking at being fired right along with the rest."

"So? Where do we fit in? We can't hire him. We don't have ships for him to… Oh! We do have ships, don't we."

"Okay, I get what you're saying, but Elle forgot one thing. He's going to have his license pulled. Without a license, he can't fly. How do you propose to get around that obstacle?"

"May I?" Dermot asked. Without waiting for J'Shawn's permission, he responded, "But we are a valid corporation, licensed to own and operate a fleet of orbital vessels. And we have a Chief Pilot. J'Shawn said Spoor pointed it out, so I took the time to research the regulations. What it boils down to is this: we have the authority to issue a pilot's license to any qualified pilots for the operation of vehicles in our possession. What Spoor is asking is we license him on the OCV and the tow boat. Then, as Chief Pilot, J'Shawn can assign him the position of instructor-pilot. As instructor-pilot, Spoor can then train us and any others as pilots for the OCVs and tow boats."

"That sounds way too complicated!" Dora protested. "I'm not going to agree to this until I can review those regulations. And which one of us gets the training?"

"I think all of us should be trained on the tow boats, Dora. Then maybe Patrick can train on the OCV and both our men can run them. That would leave the tow boats for us to use as scooters if we needed to make a run to the station."

"Fine. Assuming the laws will allow it, I'll give my tentative support. Say? When are we going to start up and get going to those habitats you wanted to show us?"

"We're already on the way. Stop talking and look out your viewport. Off to the starboard side, you will see the glory of the Post-Orbital Power Array. Notice the beautiful rainbow of color as the Sun reflects from the solar panels already installed." J'Shawn said, intoning the words with a deeper vibrancy of a tour guide. "And off to port you will see stars. Many stars."

"We're moving? Already? J'Shawn, honey, I want you to drive all the time. Doesn't matter what Dora says."

"Girl, you already have a man. Now how long until we get to our property?"

"About fifteen minutes. We have to take it slow until we get past the work zone. And since we don't have that far to go, I decided, as pilot and captain of this fine vessel, to make the entire trip at this velocity."

"And as chief cook and bottle washer, I support my Captain. You ladies sit back and enjoy the ride."

For the remainder of the trip, they pointed out constellations to each other.

* * *

One final burst from the forward maneuvering thruster ceased their motion, leaving OCV 'Vuffie' drifting alongside Sundancer III unit 384, with a mere ten meters separating the ship from the habitat. Inside, Dermot followed along as J'Shawn completed the shut-down of the OCV. After de-pressurizing the cabin, J'Shawn and the others unbuckled from their seats and made their way to the port side hatch.

"Remember, I'll go first and take the line with me." J'Shawn said, "And someone make a note that we need to pick up three more hand-thrusters. Once the line is secure, I'l give it a double tug and call you over the radio."

"Aye, aye, Captain!"

"Good one, Dora. Just remember to wait 'til I give the signal."

With that said, he clipped one end of the safety line to the hull of 'Vuffie' and gave himself a light push with his legs, drifting to the habitat. He used short bursts from his thruster to pull himself to the main personnel airlock and he then clipped that end in place. After he double-checked the connection and tightened the line, he gave two sharp tugs.

"Okay, you can come on over."

He didn't wait to see if they started. Instead, he turned to the control panel set next to the airlock's hatch and keyed in the Open Outer Hatch command. Inside, the warning lights flashed red, and he felt the hatch pop open under his hand.

Before he could turn around, one of them tapped him on the shoulder, startling him. He hadn't thought they would come over so fast.

"Boo!" Ellen's voice came through his speakers. "Did I scare you?"

"Naw, girl. But you did startle about two months off my life. I figured you three to still be pulling across." He pushed back against her, pulling the hatch out. "Back up a bit so I can get this open all the way."

"You got it Bossman. But you better hurry. They weren't that far behind me."

"No, we're not. Say, can you hurry up? I'm starving here. And I can't imagine the girls are any better off."

They crowded into the airlock by Dora and J'Shawn orienting to one floor while Ellen and Dermot moved to the other end, their helmets almost overlapping. J'Shawn managed to pull the outer hatch shut and secured it. Then Dora, facing the inner hatch, initiated airlock pressurization. The red lights continued to strobe until the lock's air pressure reached Earth-normal, at which time they switched to green. On that confirmation, Dora opened the inner hatch and they moved into the main cargo bay.

"Wow! Dora, look at this place! I can't believe how huge it is. We could put four of our cabins inside this place."

"You got that right. Say, Patrick, what are those things in the corner over there?"

"Those are the various attachment arms. We mount them on the bow of 'Vuffie' so she can grab onto objects too big to shove into her cargo bay. If we know the object is small, we can use one or two of the arms. Or all four if it's very big. And we can switch between five different clamps, claws or hooks, depending on what attach points the item has." J'Shawn replied. "But that's not the big surprise." He pointed to the opposite wall. "That is."

"What? The wall? And why is it so lumpy?" asked Dora. "Aren't bay walls supposed to be smooth?"

"That's not a wall. That's the passenger module for 'Vuffie'."

"Oh my god. You're kidding! Tell me you're kidding."

"Dora, I don't think he's kidding. That's a top hatch." Ellen drifted over to the detachable cabin and inspected its exterior. "But why does it have two sections?"

"J'Shawn explained that to me yesterday. When the original specifications were made, they asked for the ability to transport people in quarantine, because some of the downside officials were afraid we might discover bacteria or viruses up here which could infect us. Renault just made it impossible for the people inside their passenger transport module to move into the OTV cabin without exiting the module into space. Mitsubishi decided to add the ability to seal two people into the rear quarantine section, flush the chamber to space and hook them up to an independent air supply."

"What a scary and depressing thought. Not something I wanted as a surprise on Christmas Day. How about you, Dora?"

"Me neither. And while this is all well and good, it remains a cargo bay. I've seen plenty of those over at OPS-1. I want to see the rest of our new habitat."

She turned back to Dermot and J'Shawn. "Can we see inside? Is the power up and is the environment good?"

"More important," Ellen added, "can we take off our helmets? As Patrick said earlier, I'm getting hungry. You guys didn't feed us breakfast, remember."

"There's air in here and the rest of our new home." With that, J'Shawn unlocked his helmet and let it drop down his back, hanging on its retaining strap. The others followed suit.

"C'mon." He moved to the more distant of the two inner hatches. "We want to go this way."

As they entered the hallway beyond, Ellen noticed their breath didn't fog. She nudged Dora and demonstrated.

"It's warm in here." Dermot said, noticing Ellen's action. "That's one of the things we did yesterday, bring its environmental controls fully on line. And we brought over extra air and propane tanks. We topped off our reserves and filled the fuel cells. We have enough to power this module for about five months."

"Don't forget. We also replaced several worn-out light bars and changed out the CO2 scrubbers. But Patrick wants to bounce an idea off you gals." As they went down the corridor, J'Shawn pointed out various other features, including the emergency oxygen supplies and the power switching modules. After moving up two levels, he led them into a darkened chamber.

"Surprise!" he and Dermot shouted, as he flipped on the lights. The two women found themselves facing an elongated table behind which a series of round-cornered trapezoidal viewports looked out on the nearby orbital power station. Around the solar power arrays, skinsuited workers crawled, looking more like miniature aphids on rose petals than humans, while tow boats and personnel scooters flitted like mayflies. The nearer power array shone with reflected sunlight, throwing out a rainbow off it's panels.

"Oh my god! This is wonderful! You guys made a great gift!" Ellen threw herself at Dermot, crushing him in her embrace.

Dora followed close behind, wrapping herself around J'Shawn. "My Big Guy! Thank you! You sure know how to give a girl a gift worth keeping." She laid a passionate kiss upon him.

"Don't I get a kiss? I helped." Dermot pouted.

Ellen did not reply, save to pull his head to hers, relying upon her own wet and noisy lips to show her feelings.

After some time, the two couples came up for air and separated enough to move to the table. There, Dermot pulled up the bags containing his burden and opened them, spilling the contents to drift across the table's surface.

"Patrick!" Dora said, diving across the table to snatch two thermal packs before they had a chance to bounce off the far wall and ricochet under the table. "Those two are hot! That means they might bust open if they hit too hard!" As she moved past the rest of the items, she used one hand to push the other hot pack boxes towards Ellen. She barely had time to snag the errant boxes before her other arm touched the wall. She let her elbow bend slightly to absorb the recoil, tumbled to face back the other way and grabbed the edge of the table and pulled herself to the other three, frowning at Dermot.

"I managed to prevent a food disaster. The least you could do is say you're sorry."

"Yeah." Ellen agreed, elbowing him. "Say you're sorry. Or no goodies for you."

"Ouch! Okay. Okay. I'm sorry Dora. That was careless of me. Please chalk it up to exuberance and hunger." He grinned. "Now can we eat? I'm still starving."

"And you'd be even more starving had you wasted the food. I'm okay with eating; can we agree to discuss our plans while we do so?" Ellen waited for everyone's approval, then she helped Dermot set forth the meal. Dermot had sweet-talked the kitchen staff to prepare several containers filled with generous amounts of stuffing, gravy, candied sweet potatoes and jellied cranberries as well as rolls - all taken from what was being prepared for the special 'holiday' meal. On top of that, he convinced them to make eight large sandwiches, filled to overflowing with turkey, lettuce, mayonnaise and more jellied cranberries - and four slices of pumpkin pie. All the ingredients had been shipped skyward, at great expense, to provide the work crews with a taste of home as most of them had not visited Earth in more than six months - missing most of the groundside holiday celebrations.

As they laid the feast out in front of the others, Dora exclaimed, "How did you two manage this! Did you bribe one of the kitchen staff? J'Shawn? Answer me, I have got to know your secret! I've never been able to wheedle more than an extra ration bar or meal pack."

"Girl, don't go snoopin' for my secrets. A man has to have some tricks up his sleeve."

"He bought a couple of bottles of sipping bourbon for the head cook. The woman told him she wants to fix something special for an upcoming birthday." Dermot revealed.

"Damn, Bro'. You weren't supposed to tell anyone that. At least you said it over here, not back on the station."

"You're smuggling booze?" asked Ellen. "You can get in serious trouble smuggling booze. Singhman is death on alcoholic beverages up on station." She turned to Dermot. "You didn't help him did you? No. I don't want to know!"

"It's okay. If these two bums get caught and fired, we'll just find a smarter pair." Dora's smile at the two men held wicked promise. "Now let's enjoy this fine repast."

"Only if I get dibs on Patrick's slice of pie." Ellen snagged a second piece, pulling out of Dermot's reach. Dora mirrored her example, snatching J'Shawn's away from him before he could pull it to safety.

"Aw, Babe. Now that's just cruel. I'm a growing man; how do you expect me to maintain my fine-tuned physique if you go stealing all my food? Besides, you know I don't want you spoiling that beautiful figure of yours." He turned to Dermot. "Aren't you going to help me here?"

"Not me. I've learned my lesson; what say we enjoy what they left us?"

For a few minutes they tucked in and ate in silence. the only sounds that of hungry people savoring rich food. Finally, nothing remained but the desserts. Dora examined the two slices of pie in front of her, then glanced at Ellen.

"Can you really eat both slices of pie?" she asked.

"Not on my life. And my man has behaved himself during dinner." She slid her second slice to J'Shawn. "Here. I wouldn't want my sexy guy to get too weak on me. You need to build your strength." Dora placed hers in front of Dermot as well, motioning him to eat as she bit into her own.

As they ate their desserts, the men wolfing their down, Ellen asked, "Now what were you hoping to do with the OCVs? You mentioned providing 'taxi' services?"

"That's exactly my idea." J'Shawn replied. "Ryk Spoor was talking to me these last few days about how management has been getting requests to schedule in time and guest quarters for visitors - VIP visitors to start, but even some business types might come up."

"I've been hearing similar rumors," said Dermot. "The first groundside receiving rectenna is complete and they're going to have a ceremony when the power grid distribution substation comes on line. Supposed to have one of the bigwigs up here 'throwing the switch' - all captured on video, of course - at the same time as one of them cuts a ribbon down below."

"Okay," said Dora, "I've read about the groundside ceremony - it's all over the news sites - but I didn't know about the upper-level management person or the camera crew coming topside."

"That's great! All of you have heard about this and I didn't have a clue. I have to listen more to the chatter around me. You guys must think I'm not pulling my weight."

The other three gaped at her.

"Not pulling your weight?" Dermot responded. "Where did that come from? We all have seen how much work you put into learning about and then straightening out the legal aspects of our purchase. You're doing what you're good at, just as we do what we know."

"Still, I want to do more. I want to do something that gives me hands-on work, not just all the legal mumbo-jumbo. Yes, I know I work right alongside you guys assembling the power arrays, but that gets so mind-numbing after a while."

"Whereas I'm perfectly happy putting tab A into slot B all day. And I think Dora is as well. I guess you're a bit like J'Shawn."

"If you are, girl, maybe you should let Ryk teach you how to fly one of our OCVs. We need to have another one of us trained on them. Of course, that brings up the issue of finding time to train all of you on the tow boats. When can we do that? It will only take two days to do if you can schedule the whole class at once. If we have to break it down, there's about an extra four hours you'll have to do as a refresh of the first half, before you get into the heavy stuff in the second half."

Dora asked, "Are the bigwigs coming up within the next two weeks? Or do we have time to get one of us trained on the OCV? Because if we can't get OCV training, we have to decide whether we hire Spoor as our second pilot, even for a short-term contract, or accept we will not have use of the OCV for trips out here while J'Shawn is running them around."

"Good point, Babe. Patrick, are you hearing the same timeline as I am?"

"I'm hearing they should be up here in two to three weeks. It won't be sooner because while the camera crew has passed skinsuit training, the VIPs haven't. Plus, one of the VIPs has to have a custom suit made - something about girth. Or so I hear." He grinned as he told them.

"Which one is he?" Ellen asked.

"She. Definitely she. And I'm hearing she's Deputy Undersecretary for Space Affairs, Ekatarina Mishkova." he added. "She would have been fine with the regular suits, but she's about forty pounds over weight for a woman who only stands four feet, eleven inches."

"Ouch! How did she manage to pass the physical? I had a hard time and I was only five pounds over their chart weight." Ellen sleeked her hands down her sides. "Not that I have a problem any more."

"Elle, sweetheart. You were never overweight. They simply wanted to give you a hard time."

"Patrick, you are so forgiven for the booze."

"Thank you. No, Ms. Mishkova's problem is that she was a weightlifter, champion in in the Olympics in 2008. They never proved anything, but she's got the massive chest and abdomen of all serious heavy lifters, and I understand her chest augmented after she had and nursed four children."

"Bro'. Why am I visualizing a battleship?"

"You wouldn't be far off the mark, " Dora said. "I have read a lot of her public comments and position statements when I was working for my dad on the skinsuit development and marketing. She's a real hard-case. And if she's as vocal in private as she is in public, she's going to be a problem for everyone.

"That might work as an advantage for us. If we get J'Shawn hired as an outside contractor to ferry her and her entourage around, we will allow on-station management to distance themselves from any of her complaints, and management will find it easier to keep the dissident pilots away from her.

"When you put it that way, Patrick, you may have a point. J'Shawn, baby, can you keep your mouth shut about their issues?"

"I can. None of the pilots who are actually involved have talked to me about the guild. I can play dumb and happy. Ryk might have a problem doing so, because he just loves shooting off his trap whenever he gets a chance."

"Then we hire him to ferry the camera crews or other VIPs around and to train us to fly the rest of our wonderful new ships. That keeps him out of the way of management and gets us the training we need." said Ellen. "And I want first crack at OCV training. Do you two mind?"

"No sweetheart. I want to learn, but as long as we get me up to speed on the tow boats, I can wait."

"And I really need to dig into more of our paperwork and bookkeeping for the next few weeks. Go for it roomie. What about pay for Spoor? How much does he get from OPS?"

"Same as I do, plus ten percent additional for being a qualified instructor. And he's already told me that if he gets the same basic pay for any flight time, he'll waive other bennies. He already gets them on his UN-OPS contract, same as we do."

"But we will have to figure those in to our fee estimate to OPS management. They will expect the additional charges." said Dora.

"You know what's best."

"Is there anything else we need to discuss?" Ellen asked. "If not, I'd like a more complete tour of our habitat."

"I have a request." Dermot said. "We need to find more furnishings. Chairs, desks, other equipment, maybe even some extra computers. I know we haven't examined the other three habitats. Still, as we've already brought the environmental controls full-active on this one, I think we should make it our 'office'. Is that all right with everyone?" He could see agreement from everyone. "That's all I have to say."

The business meeting broke up on that note.

* * *

"We're home. Everyone awake and shake a leg." J'Shawn's voice woke Dermot from the nap he'd been taking.

"People." Spoor's voice broke into their conversation, "could I have a moment of your time?" His tension came through very clear.

"Ryk, my man. Could it wait? I just got done shuttling Patrick and our two fine ladies out to our new offices for a Christmas surprise. We're all stuffed and tuckered out."

"This won't take but a moment. Please, I'm just outside the airlock. May I come aboard?"

J'Shawn and Dermot twisted around to look at Dora and Ellen. The two women shrugged approval.

"Sure, come on over. Patrick will meet you at the hatch."

Once inside, Spoor said, "Hi everyone. I had to know, quick-quick whether you people had a good time." At the same time he held up his finger to where his mouth was behind his helmet, in the time-honored signal for quiet. Then he pointed at his radio antenna and indicated they switch to channel four on the reserve radio. After they did so, he continued. "Okay, sorry for the spot of bother, but I needed to let you know. If you're going to bid on providing those taxi services we discussed, do so quickly. I've overheard from my friends that the OPG instigators are planning to brace our Very Special Visitor about the Orbital Pilots Guild and their request for changes in the working conditions when she gets up here."

"No! We were just discussing that, and we think it would be crazy even if she weren't here. She's known for taking harsh action against those she considers troublemakers," Dora said.

"That may be, but they will do it. They've voted unanimously in favor. I tried to explain to my friends it wasn't the right move or the right time, but they wouldn't listen. And I have no doubt that Singhman will lump me with the sods for quick dismissal."

"That won't be a problem." she replied. "We're going to hire you as one of our pilots. If that meets with your approval?"

"Bloody Hell! That's the best possible news for Christmas Day! You'll never regret this."

Chapter Nine

Power! My Kingdom for some Power!

There are powers inside of you which, if you could discover and use, would make of you everything you ever dreamed or imagined you could become.

-Orison Swett Marden

Within a few days, facts started dribbling out to the OPS workers. First, and most important, the event date was delayed for two reasons, the distribution station needed more work before it could be brought online, and the Deputy Undersecretary required more training and acclimation in weightlessness. Rumors still bounced around claiming the groundside people were having difficulty making her skinsuit. As a result, the four partners and friends, and their company, Homebrew, Inc., had eight more weeks to train on their tow boats and OCVs as well as make a formal bid to provide intra-project transportation services to OPS-1.

They needed every extra day.

The first stumbling block they ran into was finding time for Dermot, Ellen and Dora to train on tow boat operation. They had requested to be trained together, however, the work crews were facing overtime work on scheduled break days in order to finish the first extended power array modules for the dedication ceremony. And after learning the size of the staff and media groups that would be arriving for the event, management chose to attach and activate three new habitat modules to accommodate them - tasks which had not been planned for when the dedication ceremony was added to the schedule. The three could not be spared, en masse, from their shift work.

It turned out Ellen took to piloting as if she had been a bird in an earlier life. Scheduled for training by the end of the first week after they made their plans, she finished the class in one long day. She went on to OTV training on the recommendation of her tow boat instructors, which recommendation meant UN-OPS would cover the cost of her training, rather than charging Homebrew, Inc. As she literally flew through OTV training, Dermot and Dora worked hard to make it through tow boat school.

A second roadblock popped up when they submitted their bid to provide transportation services. While UN-OPS regulations allowed for the bid, each person licensed by Homebrew to pilot OTV/OCV class orbital craft had to have a background check performed on behalf of Homebrew, Inc. before the bid could be submitted. They were not allowed to reference the background check performed on each of them by UN-OPS. It took three weeks to find and hire an investigation firm, have the check performed, receive the reports and re-submit the bid with the attached documentation. And, a friendly clerk in the procurement offices informed Dora, before she submitted the revised bid, that the licenses issued by Homebrew had to be tamper-resistant, RFID-embedded, 'smart' ID cards - the OPS offices could provide the ID cards as long as Homebrew provided the artwork for them. Yet another expense as well as a scheduling challenge. Both J'Shawn and Ryk could drop into the station management offices any time they could fit into their very busy schedules. However, Ellen's license could not be issued her license until she completed OTV training.

Even as they worked at their OPS jobs, the four had to find time to go to the habitat modules and prep them for use. With the time constraints as well as the need to maintain a 'buddy system', they chose to fully activate only habitat 384. With eight floors divided into four to seven chambers, they were faced with checking the controls of forty-three rooms. However, they concentrated on finding collapsible desk and chair modules for the five chambers they chose for the Homebrew, Inc., main offices. The only thing that went smooth during the entire process was unloading and installing the furniture into the selected offices. Seventeen rooms had environmental controls that either experienced software faults or had sustained physical damage to the control panels. The hatches to twelve chambers, including two of they wished to use as offices, had jammed hatchs - one of which held a crack across it's lower right quadrant as well as a severe dent. That hatch needed to be replaced, the others just had to be re-aligned - by trained maintenance workers working 'under the table' for untaxed pay.

As the weeks blurred by, none of the four friends, now two couples, spent more than a few minutes in the intimate privacy such relationships required.

"Big Guy," Dora sighed, leaning against him as they sat on her bunk in her cabin, "I"m bushed. All I want right now is a goodnight kiss and you beating feet to your room. Are you okay with that?"

"No Babe. I'm not. However, I don't think I can give much more than that and I hate to make promises I can't keep." J'Shawn reached up and lifted her face to his for a tender kiss that ended far too soon for either of them. He lifted off the bunk, stretching. "They are shooting Madame Deputy Undersecretary for Space Affairs up to us tomorrow. So the pace will slow a bit for the next five or six days. Maybe we can have some 'us' time in a couple of days."

"Sure, Big Guy," she yawned and stretched out on her bunk, pulling the security netting over her. "Could you turn the main light off as you leave?"

As he exited, he looked back in time to see her eyes had already closed.

The hatch to his cabin opened before he finished keying in the entry command and he stumbled back as Ellen stormed out.

"Elle!" Dermot's voice preceded him out the hatch. "Wait. I didn't mean it that way." He slammed into his roommate heading into the room. "Oof! I gotta get around you. Could you move?"

J'Shawn planted a hand on Dermot's chest and pushed him back into the room, closing the hatch behind them. He shoved Dermot hard, hard enough to send him flailing to the bunks.

"Bro. You have to wait. Stormin' down the corridor, shouting at her and finding yourself standing outside her closed door and making a fool out of yourself is not the way you want this to go down." As he spoke the words, he could see Dermot slump in a lump of hurt and anger.

"She doesn't understand." Dermot finally got out. "I'm not trying to tell her what to do, I just don't want her taking the risk-"

"In other words, you're telling her what to do." J'Shawn could see the bitter realization wash across his friend's face. "Look, you may be right. Perhaps whatever she wants to do might not be a good idea. But having a fight about it right now, when you're both angry and tired… well, I've seen stupider ways of hashing things over. And every time I've done it that way, I've ended up losing the respect of the person I tried to convince, and their friendship. Calm down, catch some z's and give yourself, and her, time to calm down."

Dermot stared at his roommate. "You don't want to know what we talked about?"

"It can wait. You're tire, I'm tired. Hell, the girls are tired. Right now I just want to get a good night's sleep. We finally are far enough ahead of schedule here that management is giving us full off-shifts, and tomorrow is ours. We can talk about it, whatever it is, tomorrow. Go to sleep. Or stay up. I don't really care. Just… do whatever you want to do but do it with the lights off." During the entire conversation, J'Shawn had stripped down and pulled himself up to his bunk. With his last words he stretched out and drew the sheet and safety netting over himself, reaching above his head to thumb the light switch to the off position.

Dermot also laid down, trying to follow J’Shawn’s advice. However, sleep evaded him. Instead, his argument with Ellen replayed again and again. On the face of it, her plan made sense, if she took the assignment to haul completed panel assemblies from the assembly areas to the panel arrays, she’s soon log sufficient hours to be acceptable by OPS rules to be one of the pilots ferrying the soon-to-arrive visitors. However, flying an OTV with a cargo in the rear bay was not the same as pushing around a large, thin, awkward-shaped solar panel assembly by grasping onto one edge with a manipulator arm attached to the nose of the OTV. Accidents had happened - all too often the accidents happened to the less-experienced pilots, those with fewer than one hundred hours of piloting time. He and Dora had been inside the main docking bay, waiting for a ride out to their assigned assembly area one shift when the red alarm lights had started strobing. In less that a minute, an OTV, one with it’s rear cargo bay filled with a passenger module, swooped in, thrusters blasting to slow it before it collided with the rear bulkhead. All the while, the Bay Safety Officer’s voice had chivvied the occupants to the side walls, away from the bay’s outer hatches. As he and Dora had watched, the main doors closed and the bay began to pressurize. Within seconds, as their skin collapsed under the increasing air pressure, two paramedics rushed forward and entered the passenger hatch, one carrying an equipment case, the other a stretcher board and an emergency pressure suit package - little more than a clear plastic baggie shaped much like a thick gingerbread man when inflated.

Before the bay finished pressurizing, they were out again, hauling the stretcher between them. Strapped on it, encased in the emergency suit, lay another worker. Dermot still remembered the frozen purple-red icicles of blood standing out along the shattered stump of her leg. The woman’s pale face, almost bluish white in the light, flashed into his mind.

She had survived the emergency surgery. He remembered hearing she had been rushed down to a groundside hospital where they operated to clean up and close her stump. Even now she was undergoing intense rehabilitation therapy to get her used to her new prosthetic leg. However, she would never be allowed to rejoin the crew working at OPS-1.

It had been a stupid accident, from all the stories he had heard. The OTV pilot pushing the panel in place saw a tow boat appear from one side, coming from his blind spot. He had twitched in surprise, snapping his craft’s joystick in the opposite direction. The woman who had been injured was at the wrong place at the wrong time, waiting with her partner for the panel to be nudged into position, talking to her partner rather than watching the panel. In one instant, the panel, instead of moving down into the proper position, slammed into her leg, crushing it, in truth, severing it against the frames already in position.

And the OTV pilot required counseling just to be able to suit up to go outside. He could not endure the though of Ellen experiencing either trauma. He had to find a way to convince her…

He woke to the room lights glaring into his eyes. "Oooohh… What time is it?" he moaned, his head aching and his muscles stiff with soreness. "And kill the lights. My head isn’t ready for them."

"Time for you to get up and face your doom," Ellen responded. "You've got ten minutes to drag your sorry butt out of there and meet us where 'Muffie's' parked. If you are late, you'll have to hitch a ride with one of the tow boats. You're in for a treat. I'm driving." She spun around and left the cabin before he could do much more than gape at her retreating form.

He made it to the airlock closest to 'Muffie' with seconds to spare. The others were already entering the lock as he came into view. "Wait up! I'm here!" he cried as he hooked his arm on the hatch rim using the leverage to slide inside. He caught J'Shawn's look of sympathy and Dora's smothered laugh as he tried to not bend over and put his hands on his knees in exhaustion. Ellen stayed facing away from him, focused on the outer hatch, her helmet already on and secured.

"Bro, what took you so long?" his roommate teased. "You must have had, what, eight, maybe ten whole minutes? And you sure were dead to the world this morning. I called your name at least five times and you wouldn't wake up. Not even when I poked you."

"He's telling the truth. You were snoring loud enough to wake people two cabins over when we got to your room. I wanted to put my helmet on right then and there. But I forgive you for the noise. I already got my payment just watching Big Guy trying to get you to wake up."

Through this banter, J'Shawn, he and Dora completed their suit-up and checked each other out. He pointed at Ellen, but Dora, concern in her eyes, shook her head. As soon as their status lights shone green, Dora said, "We're all suited up and ready to go when you are."

Once the airlock depressurized, they exited and moved over to 'Muffie', which Ellen had claimed as her own, leaving 'Vuffie' to J'Shawn - at the request of OPS management, 'Vuffie' docked on the other side of the station. Surprising Dermot, the conversation between them was limited to the minimum necessary for the task at hand.

Further surprising him, J'Shawn took the copilot's station, allowing Ellen to take command; she wasn't just flying 'Muffie' from the copilot's chair under J'Shawn's watchful eye. Dermot stifled a groan. If she was flying command, then she already had approval from both J'Shawn and Ryk Spoor. No wonder she had been so upset the previous night.

He attempted to open a dialog. "About last night…"

"You'll have to wait," she interrupted, "I'm going to be very busy." He saw Dora's wave out of the corner of his eye. When he looked her way, she held up five fingers indicating he should switch to channel five on his reserve radio.

Upon switching he heard, "… you trying to really piss her off or did you take stupid pills before you went to bed last night?"

"Um… Neither. But I need to tell her I'm sorry. See, I…"

"Not another word." For the second time in under five minutes he was interrupted. "Look. No, not at me. At her. Do you see what she's doing? She's flying this crate. And doing a good job at it, compared to how some of the pilots up here handle their ships."

"I know. She was right and I'm wrong. I can see that."

"But she's not ready to hear you. After you sit back and stay quiet for the whole flight, not commenting, not twitching, not doing anything but sitting back in your seat and relaxing, then, when we get to Homebrew headquarters, you can apologize all you want. And throw in some groveling and sniveling your abject stature. That's the frame of mind she's in."

"I did bad last night, didn't I."

"You could say that." Dora grouched at him. "And I had to listen to her tell me about it for three hours." She sniffed. "I almost didn't get my beauty rest. A girl needs her beauty rest, what with all this micro-gravity puffing out the face. I wouldn't be surprised if I find bags under my eyes next time I go downside. And you, Dermot Patrick Hardin, deprived me of three hours of my beauty sleep! Now sit back and enjoy the ride in silence, blessed silence."

"Yes Ma'am." he replied, trying to only allow meekness to color his voice. She snorted at his efforts.

With her chastisement ringing in his ears, he forced himself to relax. As the minutes passed, he noticed that J'Shawn made no move to take over control, nor even to challenge any of her decisions. He also realized her flying was very smooth, with no hesitation or constant adjustment of velocity or thrust vector. In fact, the closer they approached the habitat they had set up as headquarters for Homebrew, the more he realized just how much better Ellen flew compared to most of the OPS orbital pilots. He kept revising his grovel-meter higher. He might even have to fall back on the standby excuse that he was a man, and therefore fraught with emotionalism.

By the time they reached the habitat, he decided to admit he had judged without any factual basis for it and throw himself on the mercy of her court. Not once during the entire flight had she spoken to him outside of strict professional need.

As they left 'Muffie' and entered the habitat, he signaled J'Shawn to switch to channel three. Once J'Shawn nodded, he said, "Could you divert Elle into the small break-room? I've got plenty to apologize for and I'd rather not do so in front of you guys."

"Sure thing. But she's in a towering state right now. Are you sure you don't want us around to keep the peace?"

"No. She's right to be mad. And I'm just going to have to take my lumps." He sighed. "But thanks for offering."

"No sweat, Bro. That's what friends and roomies are for."

As they approached the conference room, J'Shawn keyed open the hatch to the break-room and blocked Ellen's path. She started to speak, but then sighed and went into the smaller room. Dermot scooted in behind her and flashed a smile of gratitude to his friend, then closed the hatch behind him.

When he turned around he saw Ellen in the center of the room, arms barricaded across her chest.

"Whatever you have to say, say it." she stated. "And I don't want to hear a bunch of excuses or rationale about how I can't handle the work."

"You won't get that from me." He spread his hands in surrender. "First, I knew I was wrong even before I came on board 'Muffie'. Not because I had seen your flying, but because I've seen all the other things you've done. I know how hard you work. I know you always do the very best you can. What I said last night was wrong. Stupid and wrong. And then I saw you just now, flying 'Muffie' and…" He paused, holding up one hand, searching for the right words, "Look, what I said last night, I said it because I don't want to lose you. All I could think of was that woman I saw being pulled out of the passenger pod, with the blood forming icicles… I didn't, and I don't, want that to happen to you. But what happened to her was an accident. It could just as easily have happened to you, or me, while we work securing the panels to the power array. That I don't want to see you injured like that isn't a reason to jump down your throat over you work. It's just fear.

"And after seeing you handle 'Muffie', I can't say as how I've seen many orbital pilots who could do better." He shut up. And he waited for her reply. And waited.

"All right then," she said, biting the words out past her lips, "Apology accepted." Then she swam into his arms. "Now kiss me, because I need to know."

Some time later, the wounds bandaged and the healing begun, they entered the conference room.

"Glad to see you could finally make it," Dora said as Dermot and Ellen joined them at the table. "Are you two okay now?" she asked. When Ellen nodded, she continued. "We've got a problem, right here in Homebrew city."

"What kind of problem?"

"A power problem," J'Shawn answered. "Something you and I forgot about, Bro. Seems that we're already soaking up more power than the system can handle. It's old and it's not as efficient as it once was."

"So what do we do about it?" Ellen asked.

"We're good for a while as we can always shut down the lights and other non-essentials in most of the office spaces. But we will need much more power if we start renting out office space to customers. And therein lies the problem." His grimace told them it was a difficult one.

"Are you saying we won't be able to simply add a few fuel cells? I mean, if we do, can't we just keep on adding as many as we need?"

"Yes and no. We can add enough fuel cells to power the projected needs of all the equipment on this habitat three times over, if we want. However, to do so, we'd have to use up almost a quarter of our rentable office space." He looked at the others. "Anyone want to throw away twenty-five percent of our possible revenue?"

"Goodness no!"

"I thought not. And there's another problem with fuel cells, they're expensive to ship up here. Oh sure, they last dang near forever, but we'd end up paying about twice what we paid for all four habitats just to get this one fully-powered."

"Why not use solar panels?" Dora asked. "After all, that's what OPS-1 is doing."

"We can do that. However, to meet our needs we'd have to put out about five times as many solar panels as we already have hanging out there. They take up room and they tend to catch the solar wind. That means we will need more fuel for the positioning thrusters. And we get similar problems with a combination approach using more solar panels and more fuel cells."

"This is beginning to sound like a Catch-22 situation. Please tell me you have another, cheaper, smaller solution in mind." Dermot said.

"I do. A Bussard-Farnsworth sonoluminescence reactor. It's small - measures about three feet by three feet by three feet. It's lightweight. And it's not too expensive. Plus each load of fuel is pretty cheap and lasts a long time." The other stared at him.

"Did you say 'reactor'? As in 'nuclear' reactor?" Ellen asked. "No way. We're not putting a radioactive pile on board this habitat! I'm not about to share my home with a bunch of plutonium or uranium! There's got to be another way!"

"Calm down." he replied. "This doesn't take plutonium or uranium. It's not a fission reactor, it's a fusion reactor. And it puts out light and heat, not tons of unstable radioactive particles. Plus, as it's not trying to blow up the atoms, we don't have to worry about it turning into a bomb. This design can't blow up."

"Can we just 'buy' one of these?" asked Dermot. "Off the shelf? I'm asking because I haven't heard of a portable reactor that small."

"If you searched for a fission reactor of that size, you'd have to add in the ton or so of shielding the unit would require. And if you went looking for one of the Bussard-Farnsworth reactors more than a year ago, you'd only find their outdoor-placement home units. Those were about the size of a small shed. They've done a lot of work these past two years getting the size and weight down. The model I've read up on is about the size of a dorm room refrigerator, and it's about as complex to operate." He brought up a website on his notebook, "Smart Power Solutions", and navigated to the product page for the package he wanted them to consider. Twirling it around so they could see, he said, "This is the one. It's the Smart Power Systems SPS 6000-H. It will put out enough power to meet the needs of eight 1,700 square foot homes. And this habitat uses the electricity of about six such homes. That means we'll have about thirty-three percent more capacity than we need. As for fuel, it takes deuterium. And we can get a big enough tank to run the reactor for a year shipped up here. I won't lie to you, the tank of deuterium is about two-thirds of the entire expense of this generator."

The reactor in question rotated on the screen as they examined it's technical specifications.

"But what about hooking it up to our habitat?" asked Dora. "Can we interface it as-is, or will we need special equipment?"

"And where would we put it?" Ellen added. "I don't want to be too near this thing. I'm a woman and I'd like to have children some day - healthy, normal children."

"Our office is at the opposite end of the habitat from the main power distribution junction for the current fuel-cell/solar-array system. I figured we could install this in the chamber next to that one and drop a line from the reactor's output to the distribution center."

"I thought you said our power sources can't handle the load? If that's true, then won't we have the problem of too much power and not enough capacity in the power lines and junction boxes?"

"No. I've checked. The whole habitat is wired to support the current load. The habitat's internal grid can handle twice this generator's maximum power output. However, we should consider setting up additional circuit breakers and load balancing systems. We can even get what we need in parts and equipment rated for use up here, without adding significantly to the total cost." J'Shawn paused, then asked, "Are you all willing to sign off on this?"

Ellen spoke up immediately. "If we can put this down at the other end, I agree. Otherwise, I want us to find another solution."

"I like the idea of having a solid power source," said Dermot. "We need to know we won't be shut down by recurring power outages. I'm all for it."

"We need to have this if we are to have any hope of getting customers to rent office space from us. Big Guy, I think you're right. This is a good choice for us," said Dora. "However, have any of these units been used in orbit?"

"I don't know. But I would think they would have mentioned that in their literature or on the website."

"So do I," she replied. "And that is one thing we have to verify, that it's space-worthy. However, that's not my main point. If we are the first, we should be able to get a hefty discount if we agree to let them use us as a test case and for publicity purposes. I'm thinking if we pitch this right, we might save enough per unit to get two of our habitats equipped with these reactors."

"Wow! I hadn't thought of it, but you may be right," Dermot said. "And that means we can move our schedule for activating our other operations up a bit. J'Shawn, Dora, could you give them a big push to accept such an idea? With two, no three, licensed OTV pilots, we could start asking for jobs repairing satellites."

"My thoughts exactly."

Chapter Ten

Fusing Cold

Why is everybody waiting for America when it comes to research?

-Martin Fleischmann

The paperwork to bring the shiny, new device up from Earth had been enormous. It filled nineteen 3-ring binders (mandated by the UN, as it refused to accept the 'permanence' of optical storage media) and weighed more than the reactor itself. And completing the paperwork had taken another month - a month in which the four partners chafed under the boredom of waiting for the VIP guests to show. Once again, problems had arisen groundside and the initiation ceremony delayed. Even now, rumors circulated that yet another delay would be announced.

On the one hand this gave the workers at OPS-1 a chance to finish the entire basic array, not the minimum necessary to deliver power to the receiving rectenna array. Only five work days, six at the outside, and the basic power arrays would be complete.

It also meant the group of pilots agitating for a guild had a month more time to convince their fellow pilots to organize and demand changes. Management knew about the lobbying efforts, but had not yet found cause to fire the agitators. They issued new regulations every day, trying to force the troublemakers to make an actionable mistake.

But these efforts, from both sides, had caused another problem. The regulations and petty rules changes also began to wear on the other workers. Some had started to discuss creating another guild or union for beam-walkers and sub-module assembly workers. Others were agitating to form a union for the clerical, medical and support workers. And the food preparation workers were talking about bringing up a representative of the Hotel Employees and Restaurant Employees International Union.

Dermot had been approached by other workers from three of the groups, each wanting to feel him out, trying to find out if he would support their efforts to unionize. And he wasn't alone, Ellen was cornered by people from all four groups, although neither of them could figure why the food prep staff felt she would want to join HERE. Dora was the most fortunate, only the beam-walkers had approached her for support, although she felt slighted she had been denied the opportunity to heap her scorn upon the representatives of the other three groups. He smiled as he remembered the breadth and inventiveness she had demonstrated as she flayed the proposal and the people making it.

He shook himself. Daydreaming about past events was no way to get the present work done. His task for today was to help J'Shawn install this generator in Bigelow Aerospace Sundancer, hull number 392-B. And then fire it up and test out the power generation and the circuit breakers.

"Hey, J'Shawn," he called. "Are you ready yet? I've got this baby up and humming. The meters are pegging at six megawatts of available power and the viewport is giving me a great light show."

"Keep your pants on." his friend replied. "I'm just about to dump the air in this chamber. Don't want to have a spark start a fire. How about you? Is your room at no atmosphere still?"

"You bet. And before you ask, I've got my suit on, or I wouldn't be having this wonderful conversation with you."

"All right, smart-ass. I get the message. Hey, I'm down to vacuum. Hold on a bit…" Dermot waited through the silence.

"There. That's got it. Okay, on the count of three, I'm going to throw the switch. You copy?"

"Is that on 'One, Two, Three and throw the switch' or 'One, Two, throw the switch, Three'?"

"Very funny. One. Two. Three." At three, Dermot saw the 'in use' light on the circuit breaker box mounted next to the reactor begin to glow a steady green.

"I'm showing power being pulled from the system at this end. How about you?" He waited for a response. "J'Shawn? Are you all right?"

Just as he turned to rush to the other room he heard, "Bojemoi," whisper from his speakers. Then, "Patrick, you must see this."

Dermot slowed his rush to the other chamber. At the hatch he stopped, stunned by what he saw. The magenta-purple glow danced across his helmet's faceplate, broken only by the silhouette of his roommate's outline.

"Where did you get that?"

"It's my Dad's old plasma ball. I had him ship it up when we decided to install these reactors. It's a real power hog for what little it does, but I figured with the amount of juice we have available, what would it hurt?"

"It's beautiful. I think I want one. Does it come in other colors?"

"I think so, but we might have to shop around. And I think it came in other shapes as well, if you dont' want a ball."

"No, no. The ball is fine. If we could get it in green or blue, I'd prefer one of those, but I like the ball shape. Imagine how impressive one of those would look on a shelf by my desk."

"Now you're thinking. Always impress the clients, Dora says."

"Hah. She's going to have you thinking like a marketing guru any day now."

"Not me. I'd rather work with my hands. And fly. Flying is great." J'Shawn turned and looked at him. "What about you? Are you going to be happy working a desk?"

Dermot thought about it. Finally he answered. "No. I'd rather grow plants or raise animals. And if not that, I'd rather brew beer."

"Brewing? Do you mean that?" The vehemence in J'Shawn's voice startled him. "Would you brew beer up here? Hell, could you brew beer up here?"

"Of course you could. They're operating a vodka still up here aren't they?"

"Yeah, but that's not the same as brewing beer. Don't you have to use yeast and some kind of grain? And, and… what's it called? Oh yeah, hops! Don't you need hops?"

"Of course, but you don't need that much hops. So that could be shipped up, as could the yeast. That leaves water and the grain. Most of the cheap commercial beers use rice, but the original brews called for barley or oats, both of which have been successfully grown in space. I suppose with the right planting mixture and lighting, it would be possible to even grow hops up here." He became silent as thoughts whirled inside him.

"That would be awesome! If we brewed it ourselves we wouldn't have to have it shipped up here." said J'Shawn.

"If you just brewed it here, you'd have to pay to have the grain, yeast and hops sent up. Better to grow everything here. However, the first batches would have to use purchased ingredients as it would take too long to harvest what you needed." He grinned at his friend, "How much do you think we could charge for a space-brewed beer?"

"They're charging ten bucks a bottle for the cheap stuff we can get sent up, so I wouldn't pay more than that."

"No, that's not what I meant. Or rather, it is, but I also want to know what you think a groundhog would pay to for a bottle of beer brewed in space?"

"Whoa! You mean market it down below? How would you do that? And where would you grow the supplies?"

"We've got two additional habitats, don't we?" Dermot's mind reeled with potential opportunity. He wasted no time whipping out his notebook, where he jotted down the ideas he and J'Shawn had discussed. When he was done, he asked his friend, "Do you think you could come up with a catchy name for it?"

"We've got to use 'Homebrew' in the name, but we could do something which ties into space, such as Low Earth Orbit Lager, or Aphelion Ale, stuff like that."

"Low Earth Orbit, or LEO, Lager sounds good. I don't know about Aphelion Ale. Keep thinking and I'll do the same."

"We should get Ellen and Dora in on the name, 'cause they'd know what would appeal to women. Dora was telling me that women form fifty-one percent of the consumer market Earth-side. We don't want to alienate half our market."

"Good idea." Dermot added the information to his notes. Then he had another idea. "Could we raise bees? Bees would do well for pollinating the grains and hops. And if we added clover or some of those miniature citrus trees, we could, maybe, collect honey."

"Honey? Why honey? I don't seem to remember any honey shortage in the cafeteria."

"Yeah, but they have to ship it up. And I was thinking that if we fit out one of the habitats as a truck farm, produce fresh vegetables and fruit that doesn't cost as much because it's grown in orbit, then we're going to need to pollinate those plants. And bees are natural pollinators. And since we'd have the bees up here for that job, why not also harvest the honey? Sort of a multiple streams of income approach." He could see J'Shawn considering the possibilities.

"Man, that's crazy enough it might work. Of course, we'd probably have to pollinate the first generation by hand." He continued, "And getting the seeds wouldn't cost near as much to bring up here, they're so small and light. However, I think we'd be better off buying already-started trees for the miniature citrus. I suppose we could even try our hands at raising grapes."

"Why grapes?"

"Because if we brew beer, we might as well try our hands at making wine. Give some class to the operation. The idea is growing on me. We'll have to run it by the girls, see if they can improve on it."

"I was thinking the same thing. And we could serve the beer and wine at that pizzeria you were talking about. Do you think we could get enough customers to make it worthwhile? After all, once the arrays are completely finished and running, most of our workers disappear, on to the next station."

"That's not as much of a problem as you think." J'Shawn stopped for a moment. "Patrick? How far would you travel for a decent meal? Would you take an hour or two, if it was good food?"

"Sure. I've traveled for three hours, over two hundred miles, to try out a fancy restaurant. But we're going to be halfway around the world from OPS-2. Will people come that far?"

"It's not that far. Not for an OTV or OCV. It's about a four-hour journey, but that's well within the range of one of those craft. And making the trip is far less expensive than dropping down groundside. Don't forget that OPS-1 is going to be the main orbital office for the entire UN-OPS program. That means we'll be getting all sorts of visitors up here; remember how they were talking about putting up an orbital hotel up here to house visitors? They'll want something different than what OPS will serve them. And let's not forget all the guests making the trip up to Bigelow's LEO Hotel. We're the same distance from them as we are from OPS-2. It would be quite a treat for their guests to say they ate at a private restaurant and drank beer and wine made right up here in orbit. Right now," he said, turning back to the glowing plasma ball, "we need to get this reactor checked out. If we don't have power for these habitats, we don't get any business."

"And no business means no money," Dermot finished the sentence. "It was funny the first time Dora said it. Now I have nightmares about not getting business, nightmares where people keep saying this to me as I stand helpless under a spotlight. Do you think we can talk Dora into using another comment?"

"Naw. And you better not tell her about your nightmare. I guess this is one of those things she learned at Daddy's knee. I get nightmares a lot like yours and I mentioned it just once. No sir! Not gonna talk about it to her again." He followed Dermot back to the chamber containing the SPS 6000-H. Together they finished testing the rest of the circuit connections and brought more of the habitat's environmental systems online using the new reactor instead of the built-in fuel-cells and solar-arrays. In another three hours they were back in 'Vuffie' and on their way to OPS-1.

"Say, roomie, besides tomato sauce, dough, veggies and herbs, what else do you need to make a decent pizza?"

"Obviously, you need cheese. And unless you're feeding only vegans, you're going to need meat. Those will be expensive. Meat and cheese are dense items, they'll cost a lot to send up here; I don't see a way around the expense though, it's not as if we can raise our own animals or make our own cheese." J'Shawn waited for a reply. As the silence dragged out, he began to worry. "You're NOT planning to raise animals are you? Patrick! Tell me you're not getting a crazy idea! There's no way to raise animals up here!"

"Why not? Oh, we probably can't raise pigs or cows, they're too land intensive, but a few goats would give us milk to make cheese, and chickens would let us add our own meat toppings. We could even farm shrimp, clams, lobsters and crawfish in tanks. They've done it Earth-side."

"Damn! When you think big, you think big, don't you?" He went on. "Are you totally bug nuts! Goats? Chickens? Lobsters? Who would buy them? Even more important, who's going to take care of them? I don't know anything about raising animals. Hell! I don't even know if lobsters, chickens, shrimp or goats can handle being in space!"

"We will find out." Dermot said, striving to be calm. His friend's outrage puzzled and angered him. Weren't they taking risks with all the other plans? Still, he was right about one thing to the best of Dermot's knowledge, no one had studied whether shellfish, poultry or goats could adapt to living in a micro-gravity environment, although he thought he remembered of several studies using bees - and if his memory was working right, they were successful.

"Okay. You have a point. We don't know how most animals would react in a micro-gravity environment. I'm pretty sure bees will do fine, maybe other insects, which means we should be able to raise perennial plants. Looks like we will just have to experiment." He grinned. "And maybe we can get a grant to help defray the costs. Are you willing to give it a try if someone else pays for it?"

"Now you're talking my language. I'll do just about anything if it's legal and someone else is willing to pay me."

Chapter Eleven

I’ve had it up to Here!

Enough is enough! I've had it with these m*****f***ing snakes on this m*****f***ing plane!

-Samuel L. Jackson in "Snakes on a Plane"

The object glistened white where sunlight painted it's surface, where not, it appeared more a near invisible dark gray ghost. Along the darker region, small lights twinkled, marking views into its interior. Drifting silent beyond or trailing behind, as it traveled its endless voyage, three others held formation. One other gave forth the same friendly lights upon its darkened flanks. The remaining two did not.

A smaller object, shiny silver where illuminated by the Sun's rays struck, swam closer, circling as might a shark studying a much larger whale it had chosen as prey. It slowed as it moved closer, slowing as it approached one end of the larger object. As it came closer it took on the appearance of a calf seeking to nurse from its mother. At last, it made contact with the larger, and the lights shining from within it shut down.

"Yee-Haw!" the cry bounced off the corridor walls, echoing around the bend and far down three other passageways. "Mommy, I'm home!"

One of the two people sharing a workroom glanced at her co-worker, "Oh good. Our wandering fly-boy has found his way back to us."

"Now, now. Jealousy does not become you. I'm sure Patrick will get over here as soon as he can get away from the station. Let's just hope that my man remembered to pick up dinner. I'm starving!"

"Grumble, grumble. It's not so much I'm jealous as I resent management sucking up so much of his time as they make ready for Madame Mishkova. You'd think she was God coming to smite the wicked." Ellen replied, then, teasing, she added. "And I suppose I'm worried that J'Shawn's bellowing will be heard as far away as Bigelow's LEO Hotel. Damn, your man has a set of pipes in him. He should try out for town crier."

"I does at that," the object of their conversation said as he flung himself into the room, "Momma kept begging me to join the church choir, but alas, my bold voice could not hold a tune well enough to please our preacher. A sad day for music, I tell you."

He came to rest with his hip bracing against his lover's desk. With a bold sweep of one hand, he shoved their notebooks and papers to the far side of each desk and plopped a large carry-pack in the now-empty space. "Ladies, you work too hard. That message comes straight from my fearless roommate, and your light o'love, Patrick. I'm just the messenger so please refrain from killing me. I also come bearing wondrous gifts, unimaginable delights, all designed to tempt you from the battlefield." As he uttered the words, he snapped open the case and proceeded to lay down over a dozen hot-pack containers, platters and eating utensils. Last, he removed and placed before them two bottles and a half-dozen drink bulbs. When Dora attempted to take one of the drink containers, he slapped her hand, but gently.

"Unh, unh, unh. They're not filled yet. Didn't you listen, Babe? I come bearing wondrous gifts."

"They better. Or you get payback for that slap." Her eyes twinkled, daring him to protest. She continued, "If you've got liquid refreshment to pour, then pour. Your love, that would be me, is thirsty."

"So am I," Ellen added. "So am I. Completing the paperwork for all your crazy projects is hard, tedious work. I hope you brought more for yourself, because this might be sufficient for the two of us girls."

"Ladies. Ladies." he said, reaching for and opening the first bottle and snapping in a pour spout, "It's not the quantity of food which will please you, but the delicacy and richness found within." He filled three drink bulbs from the bottle and re-capped it, handing two of the bulbs to the women. "Methinks you will be satiated before you sample even half my wares."

"But first, a toast." He held his bulb high and waited for them to raise theirs. "To Homebrew Tour Agency and Taxi Service!"

The women sat back, stunned, failing to even take one sip. Finally, Dora spoke. "We got it? It's official? UN-OPS got off their collective hind ends and issued a contract to us?"

"Yep. Now is that worth toasting? Or are you two fine ladies gonna make me drink all this brandy all by myself?" Once again he held up his bulb. This time his partners joined him, tapping the bulbs together before tasting their drinks.

"Whoa! What is this stuff!" Ellen gasped. As she did so, Dora coughed, pounding her chest.

"Yeah, Big Guy… This is way stronger than any brandy I've ever had - not that I have tasted brandy all that often, Mom and Dad were beer and tequila types." She coughed again, and waved J'Shawn away. "Not that I'm complaining. This is smooth stuff, but far stronger than I expected."

"I told you, this is the good stuff. Spoor has a friend who can get all sorts of quality liquor up to the station. If I understand correctly, this one from South Africa, called Oude Molen VOV; it's 14 years old."

"South Africa? I didn't know they made brandy in South Africa." Dora looked off into the distance. "I wonder. If Patrick makes his farm and brewery idea work, would there be a market for his brews down below?"

"That's what he wants to know." he replied. "Sure, he and I both figure our main base of customers will be the people up here in orbit, but he thinks some groundside customers would pay the premium for a beer brewed and bottled in space." He glanced back at Ellen who had finally stopped coughing; she continued to drink from the bulb, taking much smaller sips. She flashed him a thumbs-up.

"I don't know, but that seems like a lot of work before we start making any money. And what about bottles? We would have to have bottles shipped up here; we'd have to find a way to ship them down without breakage; then there's the cost - bottles are heavy."

"So we don't go with bottles. We give them zero-g drink bulbs."

"And we can package them in an 'egg-crate' just like we do up here. Foam's cheap!" Dora added, excitement tinging her voice.

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Date:

9/21/2007