Chapter 9: A New Gig
In the Past Maru's bridge the crew (except Harper who's in the engine room) cheers as Beka pilots the ship through slipstream. They exit slipstream and are shocked when the only thing they bring out with them is the Maru's cargo pod (which had previously been in one of Andromeda's docking bays). "Where's the Andromeda?" shouts Beka, worried that they somehow left it in the Septentrional System. Trance calmly tells the crew that her golden counterpart brought the Andromeda back to the future while they were travelling through slipstream. "At least they remembered to return our real cargo pod," says Beka, flying the Maru around to hook up to the pod (Rev had already released the bucky-cables).
Harper walks up to the cockpit from the engine room and jokes, "but they owe us one for saving them, they could've at least stayed around and help us erase the Maru's records and all."
"Actually Harper, we owe ourselves one for saving us," corrects Trance.
"Huh?" says Harper, looking mildly confused.
Trance takes no notice and continues speaking, "and besides, I can erase everything myself."
"Fine, how can we help?" asks Beka.
Trance tells the crew that they can help her by going back to their stations. So Harper rolls his eyes and goes back to the engine room, Rev stays in his station and Beka once again, sits in the pilot's chair. "Now what?" asks Beka.
"Now this," says Trance, starting to glow gold. Rev's eyes widen in wonder as his face is illuminated by the glow; Beka sees the light and turns around in her seat to see what's happening.
Beka gasps in amazement at Trance and is about to ask her what's happening when a wave of light flashes across the cockpit. Rev' s head drops onto his station and Beka slumps back in her chair, both of them are unconscious (Harper's also unconscious, but we don't see him).
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Beka groggily awakes a couple hours later as Trance calls her name. "Trance?" says Beka, Trance nods and asks Beka what the last thing she remembered was. Beka says the last thing she remembered was entering slipstream after they broke out of Calembour Drift. Beka asks Trance what happened, Trance says they went to the Septentrional System, made repairs and were attacked by 'mean people'.
Beka asks why they were in the Sept. System, Trance tells her that she had heard of lots of ships being destroyed in the system, and she knew that debris is good for making repairs with. Beka asks about who attacked them. "Well," explains Trance, "there were these two big ships and their crews both wanted this thing, and we were sorta in the middle of the fight, it was very frightening. Then one of the ships fired a Nova Bomb in order to prevent the other ship from getting the thing."
"What was important enough to do that for?" gasps Beka, Trance shrugs and explains that the Maru got out of the system before the explosion destroyed the little ship, but after they exited slipstream the crew went unconscious and she was the only one who didn't loose her memory.
"Lucky you," says Beka, she asks if there any other side-effects of the Nova Bomb-generated radiation other than the memory loss. Trance shakes her head and Beka gets out of the pilot's chair yawning. She calls Rev's name but he continues to sleep. Beka tells Trance to wake him up as she goes looking for Harper. After Beka leaves, Trance smiles to herself, technically Trance didn't lie to Beka about what happened over the past 4 days. She just left out most of the details and let Beka assume that the events that seem most obvious (using the debris for the repairs and loosing their memory because of the radiation).
Beka walks into the engine room and sees Harper sleeping on the floor. She walks over to Harper, crouches down, screams his name and shakes him awake. He wakes with a start and Beka explains that they lost memory due to radiation poisoning, and retells the story Trance told her. "Huh," says Harper, looking around at the repaired engines, "all I know is that I had the strangest dream."
"Yeah, me too," says Beka, "I can't remember what happened, but I do remember having blonde hair." Harper chuckles at the thought of Beka as a blonde, Beka grins and shakes her head, her hair instantly turns from red to blonde.
"Oh yeah," says Harper, "the nano-bots your dad gave you that let you change your hair colour whenever you want."
Beka nods and asks about Harper's dream, he says the only thing he can remember is a hot babe falling from the sky, and him having to save her from some evil guys. "That was definitely a dream!" scoffs Beka. Rev calls the engine room and asks Harper and Beka to come up to the cockpit. The two crewmates tell him they're coming as they stand up and walk out of the room together.
Beka and Harper walk onto the cockpit and Rev looks up from his station. "Beka!" he exclaims, "I see you are trying out a new hair colour."
"Oh, I was just telling Harper about the dream I had. I was blonde in the dream and I wanted to try it out in real life," says Beka. Trance smiles and tells Beka that she looks good as a blonde.
"Yeah, just like me," says Harper grinning. Beka snorts and Rev speaks up about his dream.
"I don't recall what happened in the dream, but it has left me wondering about my current opinions on life verses death," says Rev, "especially when it applies to androids."
"Hmm," says Beka before asking why Rev called Harper and her to the cockpit. Rev happily announces that the corrupted Calembour Drift Judge has disappeared and her replacement has lifted the majority of the charges against the Maru Crew. However they are being charged for breaking out of custody and injuring a few officers on Calembour Drift.
"Not another fine," moans Beka, but she's glad the crew's no longer wanted for murder. Rev optimistically points out they have three months to pay the fine. Beka still wants to find a job ASAP and Trance suggests they go work for the Nightsider named Gerentex. (Nightsiders are rat-faced aliens who love making money). Trance is holding a flexi (a sheet of plastic that displays information, videos etc.) and reading about Gerentex's goal of finding old High Guard ships left over from The Fall. Harper snatches the flexi and reads out part of Gerentex's list of possible scores.
"The Pax Magellanic, the Balance of Judgement, the Andromeda Ascendant! This guy's crazy!" exclaims Harper.
"Yeah, but he's rich," says Beka taking the flexi from Harper, "thousands of Thrones for all of us, even if we don't salvage any ships, more then enough to pay the fine."
"And if we do find a ship, imagine the profits!" says Harper, daydreaming about the possibilities. Beka smiles and turns to Trance, asking her how she got all the inside information on Gerentex.
"I dunno," shrugs Trance, "just lucky I guess."
"I'll say," says Beka, "with you around I bet we'll find plenty of High Guard ships."
"Who knows?" says Trance, smiling as she sits at her station.
"Well, we better get a move on," says Beka walking down to the pilot's chair, "we wouldn't want some mediocre salvage crew taking our gig."
"Yeah, right," scoffs Harper, "even a near-sighted Nightsider could clearly see that the crew of the Eureka Maru far surpasses all of the competition." (Nightsiders have bad eyesight).
Beka chuckles as Harper trots off to the engine room. She sits in the pilot's chair and tells the crew to check the Maru's systems, "ES and Life Support systems are fine," says Trance in the cockpit.
"Sensors and Communication systems are functioning," says Rev across from Trance.
"The power generators, engines and slipstream drive are all A-Okay," says Harper in the engine room.
Back in the cockpit Beka opens a slip portal and says, "Eureka Maru good to go." We then clip to the exterior of the Maru as it disappears into slipstream.
