Chapter 1

Things did not change much, she thought while smiling at the monitor.  She was watching images of a starship captain give orders, the episode ending with him saying, “Engage”.  Funny, she never said such a thing.  Then again, she did not have a warp drive.  Robyn enjoyed watching these old shows, some were actually close to the way things were now, others, such as this, could not be further from the truth.  In the year 2234, they did not have transporters that digitized you or cargo and then rebuilt you thousands of miles away.  Nor did the ships have warp drive, hyper drive, or any other faster than light travel.

Her ship, Lillian�"her mother's name, an old naval transport acquired by her father nearly fifty years ago�"held only what most sci-fi shows would title sub-light drives.  Yet it was a fast old ship for its type and age, due to the many modifications by her father and his crew, as well as her in the past ten years.  It could traverse from Earth to Neptune’s moons in fourteen days, or about one-tenth the speed of light.  Newer craft could only get there sooner by a day or two.

She carried no ‘ray gun’, phaser, or blaster; instead, she was spot on with a .9mm semi-automatic pistol, not used when on the ship though.  The truth, she rarely used it at all, except at a target range.  When in space, on board the ship, her weapon of choice was a cutlass.  It resembled the old Marine Officers cutlass from centuries ago, and still used today.  Again, as of yet, she never had a call to use it.

Robyn’s father Leonard ensured she underwent training with both at a young age.  She lay back on her full size bed, remembering the days when they ‘played’ in the corridor of the ship.  She stretched out her short, but muscular legs as the catchy medley played on her computer, signifying the end of the show.  Soon the next one on would load from memory, the next in the series.

No, things really did not change that much.  Technology was not really that much further than when they created this show.  Other than space travel that is, and considering that humans had only begun true space travel around the twenty-second century, she considered that today, they had come incredibly far.

The intercom crackled quietly, its telltale sign that an announcement was forth coming.  “Captain,” her first officer spoke.  “We’re approaching the Ceres Colony.”

Her breath drew the filtered air that she had grown to love.  Captain, she enjoyed that, and she did grow accustom to it.  She was not vain, arrogant, or egotistical, well not most of the time, but the thrill of running your own ship.  Well simply, it was exhilarating.  Her father always told her he loved what he did, commanding a ship in the vastness of space.

She swung her legs off the bed, her bare feet instantly finding a home in the pair of flip-flops that sat beside the bed.  Standing, she pulled down slightly on her blue jean cutoff shorts, they were riding a bit high and uncomfortable.  After tossing on a short sleeve black denim shirt over her sports bra, she slung on the double-wrap sword and pistol belt.

Tapping on the 32” monitor, she utilized the touch screen to stop the video stream, and then pulled up the navigational charts.  Glancing quickly, Robyn noted they were only an hour out, and work needed done and sitting here watching classic shows did not accomplish that.

She stopped by the mirror in her quarters, chuckling at the sight of her.  Standing five foot four inches in cutoff shorts, an unbuttoned shirt, flip-flops, and a gun belt did not make her look imposing, but rather odd.  An odd she liked.  She puffed up her black hair that hung down to her shoulders; she smiled.  Satisfied that she would not impress anyone she walked to the intercom.

“Edwin,” she called to her first mate, he hated that.  She guessed he thought it to roguish, as if they were pirates.

“Yes Captain Bryant?”

“I’m going to the cargo hold, see if Stef and Graeme have gotten the lift fixed,” she paused, he did not reply.  “Then I’ll meet you and Katie on the bridge.”

“Yes Ma’am” he said in his own monotone military trained voice.

Hitting the button next her door, she waited as it took a second to slide open.  The mechanical noise it let out was nothing like the swish on the show she just finished, but more like a low moan as if it was protesting.  Exiting, she turned right down the dimly light metal corridor.  Only small recessed iridescent lights illuminated the hallway, the larger fluorescents need for emergencies or maintenance were currently off.

The design was not sleek, but much like that of a twenty-first century submarine.  Large metal panels hid conduits of power and water.  The air system ran between floors and in the walls.  The steel plates gave a slight clang as she walked on them, her flip-flops only adding to the music.  She enjoyed listening to this symphony, the metal, the air, the water, the electric buzz.  Hearing it relaxed her, and was an indication that all was probably running well.

Turning to her left, she stepped through an open emergency door on to the metal staircase that dropped several levels to the cargo floor.  Across from her, suspended over the cargo bay was the bridge.  She gingerly bounced down the steel staircase, her flip-flops clapping as she descended fifty-five feet to the cargo bay floor.  Suspended metal halide lamps brightly lit the largest chamber of the vessel.  Currently the massive hold, around fifty feet wide, sixty feet long, and its ceiling�"the bridge�"some forty feet from the metal plate flooring, held only a small load of food stores, medical supplies, and replacement parts for the colony.

Upon hearing the roar of the skateboard echoing throughout the bay along with hard rock music, she realized that Graeme has set up his ‘skate park’, consisting of two half-pipes and two rails of differing heights.  She chuckled as the twenty-four year old blonde mechanic moved gracefully on the board.  Even with his steel tip work boots�"though wearing knee length shorts and a tee shirt with the sleeves tore off�"he handled the obstacles with ease and agility.  Things truly don’t change, she thought, nor did people.

She stepped off the stairs and walked up to Stef, her loadmaster and weapons officer, who was reviewing the contents with the manifest one more time prior to landing.  The loadmaster ran her hand through her short black-bluish hair as she turned to meet Robyn.

“Everything’s good,” Stef said.

“Why would it not?”

“You never know with the likes of this gang,” Stefanie Walters turned back to the load.  Robyn stepped next to her, at five-four; they were both the same height, but built very different.  Where Robyn was thin, Stef was larger and one-hundred percent muscle.  “Well, we wrap up another safe run ay Robyn,” she said.

“Safe?  What you bored?”

Stef’s head shifted and her brown eyes stared back at her.  “Yes,” she said, then turned away and proceeded to continue with her work.

“The loading lift,” Robyn yelled as the woman, dressed in black leathers, moved further away.

Stefanie lifted her left hand and pointed toward Graeme, then flung both arms upward, gesturing that she did not know.  Robyn huffed; Stef was a tough woman to get to know.  She came off hard to most people, but Robyn has known her for ten years.  There was a soft spot in her; occasionally, it came to the surface.

Giving up on Stef, if she wanted to talk she would, Robyn faced the other side of the hold and headed toward the source of the music.  She was not adverse too the crew playing music, but this ‘thrash metal’ tended to give her a headache.  She stepped near a small, four-button panel that dangled near the port bulkhead.  It was an addition by Graeme to control his quarter pipes.  Again, she did not mind the fact he put them up, as long as he devised a way to get them out of the way.

She watched him, unnoticed by the skating mechanic, waiting as he hit the ramp.  As he was flying upwards, she depressed both “down” buttons, causing the skate park to lower itself below the cargo deck flooring.  Unaware that the ramps were descending he performed a perfect ‘180’.

The expression on his face once he was coming back down was priceless.  Robyn could not help but to laugh aloud, nearly doubling over.  She quickly placed her hand over her mouth when his board hit the hydraulic door that was sliding closed.  The wooden board snapped and went flying in two different directions, he went a third.  Graeme slammed hard on the metal floor, sliding and rolling almost to her before he stopped.

“Sonofabitch,” he cried out turning over on his back, and then looking up at her with a glare.

“Oops,” she said, still laughing.

“Ma’am,” he corrected, getting up fast.  He was not injured; at least he was wearing his pads.  “What the�"“

“The cargo door,” she interrupted, attempting to be serious.

“My board!”

“You have four,” she paused looking at the busted skateboard, “excuse me, three.  The lift?”

Dusting himself off Graeme began traversing the bay toward the bow of the ship, stopping where the floor sharply angled up.  “It’s fixed,” he said pointing at the port hydraulic cylinder.

“Good�"“

“But only temporary.  That cylinder cannot hold pressure much longer.  I repacked the cylinder, but frankly, boss, it needs replaced.  Three, maybe four more uses and bang, the seals will blow again.”  He turned to her.  “Captain, we need a new one.”

“What about the spare,” she asked inspecting the repaired mechanism.

“That is the spare.  Remember, a year ago when that hack loader on New Selene rammed it?  Yeah, I put this used piece of s**t in then, we ain’t got any more!”

“Then we’ll buy one here, before we leave.”

“I hope so; you said the same thing three months ago on Titan.”

He was right; she did, but that paycheck went to other needed repairs on the ships drives and damaged solar cells.  The ship had its issues, it required some work, but still it was a good home.  She hope that she could pay the crew, get water, hydraulic fluid, food, necessities, and repairs not including a new cylinder.  It was going to be close, she sighed deeply as she watched him look over the lift hydraulics one more time, there never was enough.  Times were tough, now that the McNichol's Company have begun cracking down on free-traders, calling them mere rogues and insisting that most worked for the Faction.