Chapter 26

The pirates had surrendered in early evening, and the teleporter was quite busy for the rest of the evening, and into the night.

First there was a steady stream of people visiting the hospital, then leaving again once they got fixed up.

Them the crew of the HMS Agamemnon wanted to come back to the ship, where things were reasonably safe and sane. Everywhere they went on this crazy world - even an island several hundred miles from any other humans - they got attacked and they had had enough of it. They'd sleep in the Agamemnon tonight and go home to Mars Colony the next morning, and for some that wasn't nearly soon enough.

The French and Italian chefs who had contributed so much to the party also wanted to go home, with their share of the food - both the prepared meals and the fruit and fish they'd harvested, as well as a few pigs they'd hunted.

That operation had a puzzling moment for Boz, when he realized that no matter how many loads of fruit - especially coconuts - he sent back with the chefs, the pile to be sent back never seemed to shrink. The issue got resolved when Ron asked Boz why he was giving away Ron's coconuts.

It turned out that Ron had had extra robots out collecting coconuts - the GP robots were good at it, but the repair robots were even better, since they could pick coconuts from high in the trees using telekinesis. Ron knew they were going to be sending food back to Mars Colony and he'd wanted to take the opportunity to do his part and collect more.

That being a good idea, they had then Replicated 150 more repair robots and sent them to nearly 50 nearby islands to collect more fruit, especially coconuts.

They also had to do something with the pirate crew.

First, all of them got scanned and analyzed using the Detect Hostile Intent, Detect Danger, and especially the Detect Affinity for Hurting Others Consoles.

And Beth joined in, using her skill at the Detect Mind Console looking for emotions like anger.

Then, using what they learned, the pirates got separated into several groups.

Some, with no affinity for hurting others, just wanted to go home and resume the lives they'd had before Captain Firebeard had mind-controlled them.

These got sent home - mostly to various places within Florida.

Some pirates liked hurting others, and they got exiled to Cuba, in Dimension 211. While it was possible they could work together, build a ship, retain the super-powers built into their pirate costumes, stumble across Saint Helena in the same dimension, and try to unite the super-powered exiles there, it was extremely unlikely.

Tinker-tech needed constant maintenance from its original Tinker, or it broke down sooner or later. And their super-powered pirate costumes were Tinker-Tech, made and maintained by a costumes Tinker calling himself Zoot, who had been among the first of those mind-controlled by Captain Firebeard.

In addition, even if their costumes retained their super-powers for a while before breaking down, they didn't contain any super-powers that'd help the pirates dimensionally travel, nor even control other capes. So even if they got to Saint Helena and still had their costumes' powers, if they tried to make the exiles there work together, they'd just end up provoking a massive fight.

But that left a group of former pirates who disliked hurting others, had no former life they wanted to go back to, and kinda liked sailing around on adventures where they had personal super-powers.

This group included Zoot, the Tinker specializing in costumes .

Boz had called Lisa about them, figuring she wanted to hire capes, so maybe this group would interest her.

They did, and their ship did even more so.

"It's like this, Boz honey," Lisa started, standing on the tilted deck of the beached pirate ship, with a small group of people from her new company, which she was calling CAPES, for Capes Association for Protection and Export Speculation.

"Even the big dirigibles of the Hindenburg class didn't carry a lot of cargo. All I can find says they carried 'passengers, 11 tons of mail, and some cargo'. This wooden ship can obviously carry a lot more cargo than that, and evidence suggests they have been using it regularly. Since it has not been destroyed by Leviathan, that means Leviathan is ignoring it, which is a big deal."

"You're right, as usual," Boz replied. "Fifth-rate ships like this were listed as having '280 tons burden', meaning they could carry 280 tons of cargo. Of course that varied depending on what you carried and how hard you tried to cram it into nooks and crannies. And yes, in talking to the crew, they said they have regularly been sailing out of Miami to various distant places, and have never been bothered by Leviathan. They suppose that is because they have no engine, and make no machinery or electrical sounds, so they sound natural to Leviathan and he ignores them."

"Looking at it, I'd say we could probably cram in 20 tons more than that." Lisa speculated. "Just think of the profit potential! Here we have 36 sailors who know how to crew a sailing ship of this type. And what's more, they want to keep sailing and facing occasional 'adventure. I'll bring down a similar number of my people to 'learn the ropes', and they'll all sail it together back to Miami with a full cargo of those lovely coconuts you've been gathering for us..."

At the look on Boz's face Lisa corrected herself, "OK, fine, you keep all these coconuts. We'll have to spend a day getting ready and repaired anyway, so you send us some repair robots here, and some more to a few islands along our route back, and we'll get those coconuts instead of the ones you've already gathered. It will cost you nothing - you'll be gone by them anyway - and I'll make it up to you by ordering some more food to be shipped to Brockton Bay for you. It will be trivial for you to come back and get it."

She looked at his face, read his reaction there, and nodded firmly. "OK, we have a deal. So, what else did the pirates say that you wanted to tell me?"

Boz grimaced at what her know-it-all approach did to conversations, but replied, "Their costumes, built and maintained by Zoot the costume Tinker, give them several minor super-powers. The parrots stop the first attack on them, The puffy shirts effectively stop the second by making it a visually-striking yet trivial fleshwound. Their pants give them some acrobatic skills. Their cutlasses give them sill with those as if trained in their use. They never run out of loaded pistols, as long as they carry at least 6 of them. The eye-patches - which can be worn over healthy eyes - spot danger and give them a big accuracy boost when shooting. Their peg-legs - which can be worn by anybody just be kneeling a good leg on it and strapping it on - extend and can be used as ladders, Pogo-sticks, pole-vaults and so on. And the prosthetic hooks - which also can be worn by folks with two hands - have a fear effect on those who see them. Their headgear - whether hat or scarf - lets them sing sea-shanties to get favorable winds. And they are partial to 'hoist up the thing' by The Longest Johns."

He snickered.

"But their last captain wouldn't let them sing that one?" Lisa checked.

"Right. The words: 'Hoist up the thing, batten down the whatsit. What's that thing spinning, somebody should stop it. Trust me I'm in control' sounded insubordinate to him. So you'll probably hear it a lot on the way to Miami." Boz grinned. "Anyway, the ship also has some powers from its 'costume', including being as tough as 6-inch thick steel, fireproof, its yard-arms and ropes can extend like the peg-legs, and its guns hit harder and are more accurate. There's probably more, but that's what I remember. I wanted you to know, since Zoot emphasizes that he can do other costumes too, not just pirate costumes. He sounds like he'll be a handful."

"He will, but in a good way - we'll manage it. Thanks for letting me know all that. And no, I'm not going to Miami - some of my subordinates are, and they'll get to listen to that song a lot, I'm sure. But you're sending me to the countries we already agreed on - plus a few more now that I'll be expanding into shipping via sailing ships - so I and my team can set up local offices and begin getting ready for the first dirigible or sailing ship to arrive there with cargo. I have a schedule for you," she raised a hand and one of her subordinates put a sheet of paper into it, which she passed to Boz.

Boz opened his mouth to say their teleporter was already busy, but she cut him off, saying, "I know you're busy, but you'll fit us in because of who you are. You want to punish evil and encourage good things and make the world a better place. Yet you almost despair of actually being able to make a difference in the dumpster fire that is this planet in this dimension. It seems like everything is corrupt, bad, or rotten in some way, and so it seems to you like trying to clean up this place is like trying to clean up a turd - if you keep trying to clean it you'll end up with nothing left. And all that is more or less true. But you will soon realize that my new shipping and trading company can change that - it can be a seed from which something good can sprout, even in this cesspit. You won't be able to help yourself - who you are will demand you support us." She finished with a smug grin.

Boz had a thoughtful look. "Yes, you're building a trading empire. You have the smarts to make it work, and your people have the oomph to defend it - not perfectly, but well enough. And trading empires can be huge. The Dutch and the Venetians both built huge powerful empires which had significant impact on the world, despite their home countries being neither large nor powerful. And they both did it with wooden sailing ships like these. And even if you're in it for purely selfish reasons, circumstances will demand you help civilize this chaos so you can trade. And the fact of that trading will make all involved more prosperous. Sure, I'll help." He grinned and stuck out his hand.

Lisa shook it and asked "out of curiosity, why did the pirates come here?"

Boz snorted, "They do actually know that, but only because Captain Firebeard talked in his sleep. It seems he owed Cauldron a favor, so when Contessa showed up and gave a certain code phrase, he went along to repay that favor. From what they say, nobody crosses Cauldron and gets away with it, so their Captain never even considered crossing them by saying no, though he was grumpy until it started sounding like he'd get both loot and slaves here."

"Yep, nobody crosses Cauldron - except you," Lisa beamed, "And that's just part of why I'm glad you'll be helping us!"

-0-0-0-

Through the night, Boz's robots collected 207 one-ton bales of coconuts.

They made these bales by using their Shape Matter power on the fibrous outer husks of the coconuts themselves. That fiber is called Coir, and is good for rope, fishing nets - due to its resistance to salt water - sacking, brushes, doormats, rugs, mattresses, insulation panels and packaging.

The robots made it into nets, and took little time to do so. They shaped it easily, without having to go through any cleaning, separating and weaving processes.

So by morning the battleship had coconut bales tied to, and dangling from, all of the ship's railings. And there were more coconut bales in some of the ships former coal storage, now used as cargo spaces - not in all of them because they needed to keep some clear to hold the food shipments they were expecting that day.

They had some other fruits too, but mangoes, bananas and such didn't last long without going through a preservation process. Coconuts, on the other hand, lasted pretty well, even without any effort spent on that.

And all parts of it could be used by Mars Colony. They had brought to Mars the things necessary to survive and expand - so mostly tools and practical things. They had a few thin mattresses for the hospital, but mostly used hammocks. They had no floor mats or similar things.

So mats and mattresses shaped from Coir would be a welcome addition, and probably aid in general mental health by making the place feel more like home.

Similarly, the coconut shells could be shaped, by the Shape Matter power, into basically anything made of wood. It could be paneling, shelves, chairs or desks - whatever the colonists wanted for making the place feel more like home.

Such stuff was not a high enough priority as to warrant shipping it there for it's own sake. Reserves of food to handle emergencies was such a priority. And it was a bonus that the food came with the other useful stuff too.

-0-0-0-

It was early in the morning, and still quite chilly, when Bas-Oon teleported to the Brockton Bay railyard.

The four GP robots that came with him spread out a bit, to get good fields of fire in case that ended up being necessary.

Bas-Oon waited a moment for them to do so, then knocked on the door of the little building that served as the railyard's office.

A voice came from behind him, saying "aint planning on taking nothing over, are ya?"

He turned and saw a wiry older man in stained coveralls, holding a big wrench, stand up from where he'd been working on the wheels of a flat-car.

"No sir," Boz smiled, "But I'm learning you can't be too careful in this town."

"Aint that so!" the man spat, "Name's Ed. What can I do for you?"

"Hi Ed, My names Basil, but call me Boz. I'm here to pick up three freight cars of food - mostly grain - that I ordered 2 days ago and they said would arrive today."

"That un's yers over thar," Ed gestured to a nearby beat-up looking boxcar, "such as it is. Only the one boxcar there, not three like ya ordered. That 'un is full 'o wheat, but the 2 others, with beans, oats, rice and other stuff had to be left behind. A connector broke and only half the train made it here. They're fixing it now an' tha rest should be here in 2 more days."

"Rats!" Boz grumped.

"Heh heh, mebbe that too. Sure will have rats if you wait long enough. Not when that freight car was new - no sir. But it's old and cracked, dented and even has some bullet-holes in it. Rats can get in through that kinda stuff. Yep, best you pick it up right away. Where's yer trucks?"

"Trucks?" Boz sighed "I thought I could just take the whole freight car with me?"

"No sir! not on your life. Beat up and cracked as it is, that thar is one of my best freight cars. Aint nothin significant bent, warped, or missing on it, and that makes it a prize car. I've got too few as it is."

Boz looked at the ancient, rusted, dented graffiti-covered boxcar and said, "if that's one of your best, what's the worst?"

Ed cackled and pointed to the edge of the railyard, where a twisted pile of scrap lay, saying "Thar they are. Anything we can't fix we shove to the edge of the yard, where they spend their time falling apart. Nothin over there is good for anything but to be melted down as scrap. But we can't even do that - aint no foundries here and we haven't got the shipping capacity to send it to one."

Ed spat again, "And that ain't all that's crumblin to nothin. everything else is too. Rail freight used to make a lot 'o money, then got sidelined by faster methods like air freight, or trucks since they could deliver anywhere. So rail got ignored. 'Deferred Maintenance' they called it, but ignoring it is what it was. So nothin' got maintained, things crumbled, and, by the time the Endbringers and fuel shortages more or less shut down other shipping methods, trains would just barely run. We got problems with the tracks, bridges, cars, locomotives - everything."

"So," Boz asked, "if I could fix up, to like-new condition, a couple, say three, of your old busted junk freight cars, then could I take the one that has my wheat in it?"

"Deal!" Ed enthused, sticking out his hand to shake on it. "And what's more, if you can do that, then you and I are going in to business together. I know all about trains and if you can repair things that well, then we can make tons 'o money. Trains are a lot more efficient than trucks. But trucks is what folks mostly use 'cause they still work even when the roads are full 'o potholes an such. An don't even get me started about planes - only rich fools are so impatient as to use those for freight anymore. They carry very little for the fuel they burn. And fuel is the key. There ain't much, and trains use it the best, when everything is maintained that is. As it is, we can't ship enough stuff to make enough money to make repairs, so we're stuck limpin' along. But go ahead Mr Hotshot - show me what you can do!"

"Interesting... but not me - I expect you'll be going into business with a friend of mine who is from here, named Lisa. Here's her number," Boz said, fishing out one of the business cards Lisa had given him and handing it to Ed. "Just tell her I sent you, then tell her what you told me. While you do that, I'm going to get busy fixing freight cars."

Boz got a dozen repair robots sent to him, then provided them, through Ed's aid, with a repair manual complete with schematics and diagrams.

Ten minutes later, he had three freight cars - each apparently brand-new - assembled from the junk pile. The repair robots mostly only had to use their Shape Matter power, to make the bent, twisted, cracked, torn metal flow together into the shapes it was supposed to be, as if it had just come out of a mold in a foundry. Damage, from great big tears in the metal down to micro-fractures, fused together seamlessly. Rust de-oxidized. Paint from graffiti fell off, then was instead re-applied as a seamless, nice new coat of paint on some of the cars.

While they worked, Boz supervised for a minute, then, seeing they were doing just fine on their own, went to look over his freight car foll of wheat.

By the time Boz looked up from that, Ed was just about incoherent with joy at seeing the promised repairs actually happen.

Feeling unable to just finalize the deal, take his boxcar and go - at least until Ed could talk again and OK it - Boz then busied himself and his robots repairing other things.

He had one fix up his own freight car - the thought of rats getting into it bothered him, so he wanted it fixed regardless.

But while at that, he noticed the rails themselves were missing little bits here and there - probably from microfractures accumulating over time until a small chunk broke off here and there under the stress of use. The missing chunks were usually right there on the ground by the spot they'd broken off from - or at worst, a few feet distant.

It was trivial for a repair robot to fix that, so he started a few walking along rail lines, in pairs - one to fix each of the pair of rails. They also fixed rust, straightened out any bends, dents, or warping, and leveled things out where needed.

After observing that, Boz added a third robot to each team, to fix the railroad ties - the thick buried beams, mostly wooden but sometimes concrete - to which the rails were held by spikes. Many of these had the accumulated damage from age that you'd expect - cracks, their own equivalent of rust, etc - which the robots could also fix.

Some of the robots, he directed to keep working on the junk pile, and a few he put onto repairing various railroad cars that were still more-or-less working, yet looked like they could use some repair.

He was startled by the question "what have you done to poor Ed?"

He turned suddenly, concern all over his face, and Lisa, who had been standing behind him, burst out laughing.

"Oh perfect! Perfect! That is stereotypical look of surprised concern! I love it." She smiled, then continued, "Oh, don't be like that - I was just kidding: making a harmless joke. You haven't hurt him. Poor Ed is just overcome with emotion at seeing his beloved trains come back to life. He'll be back with us soon enough. And come to think of it, I'm getting pretty emotional too, thinking about all the money we can make by adding this form of shipping to our portfolio! There's a hundred tons of wheat just in your one freight car - just think about whole trains pulling dozens of cars each!"

"I'm not staying around to fix your rail system for you. My crew are sick of this place and want to go home - well, most of them anyway." Boz replied.

"Of course not my dear Boz. I'd never ask them to stay. Just leave us some repair robots for as long as you can. We'll just have them do as you're doing now - repair train cars and track, plus add in repairing some other necessary things like bridges and locomotives. Even just a few days will make the proposition viable, and the more time you can leave them here, the better!"

"Steam!" wheezed Ed emphatically, from where he was on the ground, trying to catch his breath after having it taken away by the situation. "I can get a couple steam locomotives if you can repair 'em. With them we can use coal as fuel. The country still has lots 'o coal. That way we don't have to compete for what little diesel fuel gets produced. With steam and coal, we have no limits on expansion!"

For the next several minutes, Boz couldn't get a word in edgewise, as Lisa and Ed excitedly planned.

In the end, Boz fixed up some very small flat railroad cars powered by two men alternately working a central hand-crank like a see-saw. Then they sent out these 'hand-cars' with crews of robots to repair the tracks.

Two GP robots would pump the hand-crank to move the hand-car full of robots along the track. They would also provide security at need.

And three repair robots would repair the rails and ties as they went.

They sent hand-cars loaded with robots like that in several directions.

One went West towards Chicago, which used to be a major railroad hub for several good reasons, and so would be again.

One went South-West towards Houston.

Two, by different routes, went South towards Florida, intending to turn West at different points and head to Houston, and Kansas City.

After that, they'd link Houston to Chicago through Kansas City, and have, what Lisa termed "a good running start at it."

Lisa had figured up how long that would take, and gotten Boz to promise to leave the repair robots at least that long.

Anything they managed to repair after that, was "gravy".

But they didn't send out the hand-carts until Lisa and Ed had made arrangements. First they wrote and signed a contract between them. Then Ed added the hand-carts to the train schedules, so no trains would run them over or other traffic problems ensue.

While he was doing that, Lisa was buying up the things they intended to repair - track, cars, locomotives, stations, bridges etc. They were all cheap while in their current broken condition, and she had money from Coil, from looting the shattered remains of The Teeth gang on the highway north of Brockton Bay, and from what Boz had captured from the ABB gang.

It was a lot of money, but it wasn't enough for her ambitions, so she ended up also getting - from Boz - several tanker cars repaired and filled with diesel fuel for use as barter.

She even got Boz to give back the freight car he'd earned, by pointing out that he had no need for a train car & really wanted something more like a shipping container, many of which were available for free down near the docks. They needed a little repair, but that was no problem.

Boz eventually got to leave with his wheat - now in four twenty-foot shipping containers he'd fixed up.

It felt like it had taken days but really just a couple hours had passed, since Lisa and her team could work amazingly quickly.

During that time, Ron had had more robots bringing in even more coconuts.

Finally back on HMS Agamemnon, with the shipping containers - now shrunk to 20 inches long - stored next to the shrunken truck full of food, and more bags of coconuts secured to the deck, plus a fresh headcount assuring that nobody was left behind, Boz let out a sigh and gave the command, "Prepare to lift the ship, we're going home."

The crew cheered.