Two in one day I know! Even I'm shocked…I doubt there will be another update till at least next Friday so hopefully this will tie you over
Harper paced back and forth and scratching his arm absently.
"Harper, if you don't make a decision soon I'm going to have to leave. I'm supposed to meet with Beka and Tyr to organize some off-world research in fifteen minutes."
Harper stopped his fervent pacing to look up at her. "I know, it just… I want to talk to her but I don't know what to say. What if she doesn't even remember me? What if what I say sounds stupid."
Rommie sighed and wrinkled her knows in frustration, a very human characteristic that he couldn't help admire. He was suddenly hit with a pain that reminded him of his lost friend Hohne. Hohne was the first one to show him how the Andromeda worked; Hohne's friendship and teaching had enabled him to now become her engineer. Hohne had said Harper was a genius and no one had ever called him that before.
Rommie must have noticed the change in him. "What's wrong?"
"Nothing, I just miss having friends that I can relate to, you know?"
Rommie reached forward resting her hand on his shoulder. "I know things are tough for you sometimes, but if you ever need someone to talk to I'm here."
He smiled weakly. "I know Rommie, thanks, I appreciate that. I really do."
"So do you want to send this message?"
"Yeah, okay I think I'm ready now." Harper sat on a stool that Rommie had found for him and he looked in to the camera she held. He cleared his throat and ran a hand through his hair one final time, sending his spiky hair even more askew. "Okay, hit record Rommie." He sat up a little straighter and started his message. "Erm, okay. Hi. This is Harper. I don't know if you remember me or not but we met the other night at the bar. Anyway I just thought," Harper shifted in his seat nervously. "Well I thought you might want to talk sometime or something. So if you want to contact me you can do that here. Okay thanks. Harper out." Harper looked Rommie expectantly as she stopped the camera. She had a weird grin on her face. "What? That was okay wasn't it?"
"It was smooth Harper, very smooth."
Beka was looking over some flexies Tyr had handed her. "And you think this Torquay person is reliable?"
Tyr shrugged. "I trust no one, but his story checks out. I've have cross-referenced some of the places and dates of terrorist events that he has supplied. I believe he is right, that the main faction of Ogami supporters are on the planet Sukanen."
Beka set the flexies on the conference table. "That may be true but we still don't have a clear motive."
Rommie took that moment to enter. "Sorry I'm late; I was helping Harper with a project."
Beka stared at the Android for a moment as Rommie erased the smirk from her face to composed herself to the appropriate decorum. "What…" Beka started to ask, then thought better of it. "No, never mind. The way he's been lately I don't want to know."
Rommie's grin returned. "Don't worry Beka I'm pretty sure it's harmless and besides I'm monitoring the situation."
"It's a situation?" Tyr's eyebrow's shot up and Beka's forehead creased with worry.
"Shall we focus on the problem at hand? You were wondering about motive?" Rommie seemingly ignored their concern and redirected their attention.
Tyr nodded back to business. "The one common antecedent is the need to free the trade route from pirates. Helping the Ogami would appear to be counteractive to that cause. But what if there was a faction that did not want the trade routes opened up?"
"These trade routes are essential to the Sedley System's livelihood. It is their only means of commerce and they rely on it to import and export raw materials for such items and food and medicine." Rommie replied factually as always.
Beka thought back to her days as a cargo hauler. "All commerce comes down to money. Who has it and who doesn't. It's supply and demand. If a certain type of product is rare its price goes up."
Tyr rubbed his chin in thought. "You're saying some of the companies that supply items for trade want to keep the prices high by ensuring their products are scarce and difficult to obtain? That doesn't seem logical."
A part of Rommie's consciousness flipped through her data archives. She found one article particularly interesting. "I think we're looking at this from the slightly wrong perspective. Back before the fall there was a problem called 'Price Gouging.' Basically if people think a product is hard to acquire or will be at some time completely unattainable a panic can occur, especially if it a commodity that is considered essential. People panic and buy as much as they can with little concern for the price."
It all became suddenly clear. "So we need to find out what is being exported and by whom and who's getting rich off the process." Beka met Tyr's eyes. "Then find out if this terrorist faction on Sukanen connects back to them."
"There is one more thing we need to determine; as of right now, little to no trade is taking place due to the fear of terrorism down on the planets and the Ogami's uncommon insight into trade routes and schedules. If these companies are compromising the trade routes, how are they getting their own products off world?"
Rommie nodded her head. "Is it possible they are using Tesseracts to help create private trade routes?"
"Sneaky son of a…" Beka allowed her swearing to trail off. "Wait a minute I thought we decided tesseracts were a myth?"
"Not a myth," corrected Rommie. "Only that the use of them by the Ogami is highly improbable. But research funded by a large export company could possibly employ the use of tesseracts."
Beka ran her hand over her face with frustration. "We have a lot of theories and not a lot of facts."
Tyr straightened himself up. "We should go talk to Torquay. He might be able to give us names and more facts with a littler persuasion." Tyr cracked his knuckles menacingly and Beka winced at the sound.
"Let's go," she concurred. "Because I really just don't need to hear that noise again!"
Tyr offered her a wolfish smile and followed her out of the conference room.
Harper thudded and hammered away at a thin pipe wedged into a vise clamped to the workbench. He wore thick gloves and goggles as he attempted to bend the super heated piece of metal to his will. The piping glowed orange and disembodied sparks flew up until he was finally able to shape in to a right angle. Sweet dribbled down his forehead and was only stopped by the goggles from flowing in to his eyes. His clothes were streaked with grease and burn marks but a happy grin lit up his face as he flipped up his goggles to inspect his work...
Satisfied, he set the small rod aside and picked up a smallish piece of sheet metal and was about to fire up his Nanowelder again when the lights in the machine shop started to blink off and on. "What the heck?" He spun his head around quickly looking for a source that might have caused a power flux.
Holo-Rommie appeared beside him startling him. "Gads Rommie! Give me a heart attack!"
She put her hands on her hips. "I've been calling you for ten minutes! Trance wants to see you. It's time for your check up."
The smile was instantly gone from his face. "Aww Rommie, I'm busy."
"You didn't hear me did you? Have you been taking your medicine as prescribed?"
Harper looked away, not wanting to met her face. "Yeah, sure of course I have."
"Harper," She started but he backed away from her.
"Look I got to go; Trance is looking for me."
TBC
thanks for reading!
paris
