Once again my thanks to Archer for his wonderfully quick and insightful beta read.

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CHAPTER 6—The Katana Maru

Chinese Glossary

Dong ma [Understand] go-se [dog crap]

PRESENT DAY

Fortunately for Mal’s peace of mind, once the Rose of Absalom was underway the first thing Tanaka did was to pull three heavy tomes out of his duffle. He handed them to Mal, saying “We got four days until we make landfall on Verbena. Might as well make the most of it. I’m loaning you these. When we get back to Persephone you’ll want to get copies for yourself.”

Mal took the well thumbed books and read the titles from their spines, Lee’s Handbook of Space Navigation and Ship Management; Economies and Cultures of the Settled Worlds; and Alliance Code of Regulations for the Transportation, Import and Export of Goods

“Well this is powerful lot of reading to do in four days.” He said with an inquiring look.

“I don’t expect you’ll be able to get through any of them, but you need to start getting familiar with them. Treat these here like Holy Writ. I’ve been carrying Lee’s Ship Management since flight school. It the best book ever written on the basics. It’s clear, readable and well indexed. Start with Chapter Five, the first four are on navigation, you’ll be hiring a pilot so you can come back to those later.”

“Chapter Five. Okay, and the others?” “The Alliance Code ya gotta know, it’ll tell you what to avoid, what to refuse outright, and what you need to hide when you can’t avoid or refuse it. It’ll tell you how risky the cargo is and lets you figure your prices accordingly.” He smiled wolfishly. Mal got the distinct impression that Mike Tanaka didn’t refuse much. “The good news is that one’s free, just gotta go into any customs office for the latest edition. This one’s a mite out of date, I figure to stop in to get a new edition when we make landfall on Persephone again, can get you one then, too.”

“Free’s good. Especially since it don’t seem we’ll be spending a lot of time following the rules. And Economies?

“This one is also a tad out of date, if I can find a later edition I’ll give you this one. It’s a listing of all the settled worlds. Tells you the basic economy. What’s available for export what they need in the way of off-world imports and what they have to pay for it with. Also, it’ll keep you from ending up doing something really offensive to the locals and getting burned at the stake on some jerkwater moon you never heard of. Dong ma?

“Not getting burned, also good.” Mal said with a smile.

After that he spent the rest of the voyage immersed in the books. Never a great student, he nevertheless had an uncanny ability to devour books on subjects that interested him. He’d read most of the great military works, Caesar, Sun Tzu, Antoine Jimini, von Clauswitz, Mao Tse Tung, and others over the course of the nine years he’d been under arms. It turned out he was equally fascinated with space flight. He’d come up for air at meals and eat with the text still swirling around in his head.

Tanaka laughed at him but said he’d been much the same his first months, Rafe said it was the same with him. They’d both been ready and willing to answer any questions. He didn’t ask many since he realized it would have more meaning for him once he was on a real transport and had the real thing before him.

They broke atmo a little after midday on Verbena. Verbena was barely more than a piece of barren rock, with little to offer and scarcely surviving. It had not been worth fighting for during the war and had been a wise choice to mothball a space ship. Still, Tanaka had been no fool. He’d left it in charge of an old friend, a crewman unable to enlist because of a leg lost in a terraforming accident on an Alliance press gang. It had given him a lifelong enmity for the Alliance and an equally strong loyalty to Mike Tanaka who had taken him on as a cargo handler and assistant mechanic when no one else would have him.

Pete Hansen had stayed with the Katana Maru. He lived aboard her and worked as a mechanic, did small jobs fixing tractors, mechanical mules and farming combines which was all the powered machinery this rock supported. It was enough to keep body and soul together. He had been expecting them and met them as they came down the ramp. In his early thirties, a red-head, he was speckled like a trout with freckles. He welcomed them with a huge grin, acknowledged introduction to Mal with a nod as he pumped Rafe’s hand and pounded Tanaka on the on the back hard enough to leave a bruise.

They walked back to the Katana dumped their duffels in their berths and immediately got stuck in. Rafe took Mal to the engine room and started breaking down the engines as if for a complete refit. In truth, Pete had kept them a treat, but Rafe wanted to see for himself and it gave him a way to take Mal through the basics.

"You might trust a man with your daughter, but never trust nobody with your engines," he said with his arms buried to the elbows in the Katy’s engine and the look of a contented man.

After a day and a half of that, over evening chow Tanaka asked “Well Rafe, how’s he doing?”

“Mike,” he said with mock solemnity, “the best way to put it is as a ship’s engineer, he’d make a hell of a plumber’s mate.”

Mal had grinned in appreciation, glancing at bloody knuckles and cut-up hands but saying nothing. Pete choked off a laugh as Tanaka shot an inquiring look with his own ready smile starting.

“He can just about do what I tell him but he’ll never be able to run a ship without a good mechanic that knows his business. It’d be a kindness to put him in the way of hiring a decent one. I reckon any more time on the Black Gang would be a pure-tee waist of his time, and more importantly, mine. I’ll finish faster without him.” He’d grinned at Mal to take the sting out of the words and received a sketchy salute in acknowledgement.

“Right. Then might as well see how you’ll do as a pilot. Got any flying experience at all?”

“Six weeks of light engine flight training in the Army, skiffs and helos mostly.”

“Were you any good?”

“Above average but not outstanding I’d say. Didn’t get enough practice to ever get really good at it.”

“Well enough, we’ll try that tomorrow.”

It turned out that he was about average as a pilot on the shuttle and passable on atmospheric flight with the ship. Anyone could steer in the Black, once the course was laid in. He’d never make a navigator though. It required much higher math than he could handle and they just wouldn’t have the time to get him up to scratch. It wouldn’t have mattered as much if he intended to only fly the beaten routes but if you planned to work the rim of the system, you needed a by-god navigator to get you where you were going and back. Especially if you needed to avoid customs inspections and Alliance checkpoints while you were about it.

What it turned out he did have was a real head for the business of ship’s management. In part it came from learning how to run the ranch from Mama all those years ago. It seemed that calculating costs and profit and seeing the opportunity for trade came natural to him. After all those years as a non-com in the Army he could lead men and had an eye for tactics so that was pretty well covered. At meals Tanaka and Rafe would talk about their experiences running contraband before the war. Mal listened in fascination and drank it all in. It was an advanced tutorial in shipcraft and he wasn’t too proud to go to school.

He had been surprised at the Katana Maru. She was a Hoshiko-Marise Samurai class. Over engined for her class as the result of careful upgrades over the years, she was very fast but relatively small. She could never carry much of a payload but could operate with a crew of one and three would be a full compliment. One night the talk after dinner turned to the type of ship Mal should be in the market for.

“Samurai class is not for you, Mal. She’s too costly in fuel and too small. You and Zoe couldn’t run it with just one crewman and the payload’s too small to support the crew you’ll need. You need to be a lot more experienced at smuggling to make this small a payload support you.” Tanaka was speaking reflectively, almost thinking out loud.

“No.” Tanaka went on, “The boat for you is a Firefly.”

“I don’t know, Mike,” Pete chimed in. “I think pretty well of the Sirocco. It has maneuverability and a fair sized payload. Grauman makes a pretty reliable boat. She’d take a crew of four, no problem. And you could buy into one cheaper than a Firefly.”

“That’s because the Gerstler engines Grauman used on the Sirocco are crap. It’d cost him more to fuel her over the long run then to just buy the Firefly to begin with.” Tanaka shot back.

“Plus,” Rafe added in agreement, “the engine parts are too specialized for someone running their operation on a shoestring. Hard to get replacements on the rim if something folds up on you, most likely expensive if you could get them.”

Tanaka gave a grunt of agreement. “Firefly is a good design. Plenty of room for cargo and still take on passengers. Takes up to a crew of six but you can run her with two in a pinch if it’s a pilot and a mechanic. Runs on common fuel cells, get ‘em anywhere from the rim to the core. Same with the parts. Hell if you had to you could machine most of the parts yourself in a halfway decent machine shop. Platform support for two shuttles. Got a decent mechanic you could run a Firefly for a hundred years. Pilots like her too, she’s a responsive bird.”

Rafe continued to nod solemnly as he explained. “Midbook made fifty thousand of them before it converted to war production, thousands are still in service and the ones that aren’t are usually being parted out in salvage to keep the rest running. Nothin’ flash, ya understand. Just solid value at a reasonable price.”

“Not looking for flash.” Mal nodded in agreement. “I’ll remember. Midbook Firefly.”

One evening, after a bone tiring day, Mal was leaning on the counter in the small galley waiting for the coffee to brew as Mike and Rafe had schematics of the Katana’s electrical system spread out on the small table before them trying to trace an elusive fault in the ignition sequence. They were getting close to finishing the refit so Mal asked when they would be mounting her ordnance.

Rafe and Pete looked up in shock and Tanaka looked at him oddly for a minute like he was getting angry. He started to speak then closed his mouth with a sigh and said “Sit down, Mal. I guess we should have talked about this sooner but it just never occurred to me. It figures comin’ from the infantry you’d think in terms of artillery for protection, but it ain’t like that on a transport ship.”

Mal looked inquiringly at the older man and brought a cup of coffee from the galley to the table. Clearly there was something he wasn’t clear on here.

“The only use for ship mounted-armament is against a planetary target.” Tanaka looked up and caught Mal’s eye and made sure Mal was looking back when he said, “Man who uses a ship to mount an armed assault on a planet bound foe is already more than half-way to bein’ a Reaver himself. I’m a smuggler, not a pirate and I’ll not help the man who thinks to become one. If I thought you didn’t see the force of my logic I’d maroon you here or be forced to end you in space, did I come across you later. Is there an understanding between us?”

Although Mal didn’t cotton to the threat implicit in the man’s statement, it was clear he’d come up against some bedrock of Tanaka’s personal code. He understood full well about lines that couldn’t be crossed and he saw that this was one of those for Mike Tanaka and he’d learned to respect the man. So he contented himself with a nod of agreement, waiting for the logic to be explained to him.

“It’s like this,” Tanaka said as he rubbed his hand over his face. They had been humping long hours to get the ship space-worthy and it was obviously taking him a bit to put it in words for a landsman, which despite the best intentions in the world was still all Mal was. “No transport can mount enough armament to be any damn good against the cruisers the Alliance spaces. Those are behemoths. Big as a city. So your only defense there is for them not to want you. Not to see you. You got to fly under the radar and off their charts.”

Rafe added “I was a gunner for seven years Mal, and I’ll tell you this, those babies are ruinously expensive, they’re touchy, you need a huge investment in ammunition which seriously reduces your payload and is damn risky to have on board.—For what? You go up against an Alliance ship and fire off the kind of pop-gun a transport would mount, you, your ship and you crew will be vapor faster than you can say it.”

“The other risk is Reavers.” Tanaka said. Adding with heavy emphasis as he caught sight of the arrested look on Mal’s face. “Oh yeah, they are real. Not just bogey men to frighten naughty children.”

“Always figured there might be some truth to the stories, just never figured it would be something I’d ever have to deal with. Makes sense though, just hadn’t thought it through.” Mal said thoughtfully.

“I’ve come up against Reavers more than oncet and lived to tell the tale, there’s not many can say the same.” Tanaka said with a hardness not usually apparent in the older man. “You can fight ‘em in the world, but not in space. In space if they see ordnance they will target your ship and they won’t stop. It’s their way. They don’t care if they die, they just keep comin' until there aren’t anymore to come. They don’t shield their drives, gives ‘em all kinds of advantage. I don’t know why they are the way they are. Some say they used to be men oncet. All I know, they looked at the abyss too long and it looked back hard enough to devour their souls.”

Tanaka got quiet. He looked like he was looking inward at a sight he didn’t want to see, at something that populated his nightmares, as he said. “Reavers come upon your ship in space you wait ‘em out to see if they want you. If you turn tail and run before that they’ll always give chase, it’s their way. Sometimes they don’t want you. Ya just gotta wait and see. If they do want you, run like all the fiends of Hell are on your tail, ‘cause they are. And if they board, save the last bullet in your gun for yourself because if they take the ship, they'll rape anyone they find alive, eat their flesh and take their skins as trophies. If God is merciful, that will be the order they do it in. I saw a ship oncet where the crew weren’t that lucky.” Throughout the gruesome repetition Rafe Arreola had sat mute, nodding his head like a wise old mandarin with sad compassionate eyes. He spoke at last. “Your nightmares are of the Valley and the men you lost there, but those were lost to a cause, never mind how needless. Ships and crew lost to the Reavers are lost to no cause but darkness.”

Somehow it seemed an epitaph. The moment lingered before Tanaka visibly shook off the ghosts of what had been. “So no ordnance, dong ma?” He said with a straight look.

“Dong ma!” Mal replied without his usual levity, so Mike would see he meant it, realizing once again how much he had to learn about his adopted life.

After nearly two weeks of refit and test flight the Katana Maru was ready for the Black. Pete had come up the day before they were scheduled to lift, kneading his leg where the stump joined the prosthetic, cap in his hand.

“Got something needs saying, Mike.”

Tanaka looked up from the chart he had been studying and gave the younger man his attention. The words came in a rush, as if he had been planning out what to say, but was afraid if he paused for a breath he’d never get it out.

“Can’t fly with you this trip. Black, she ain’t home to me no more. Never thought I would, but I done set roots deep here and I’m thinking I can’t pull up stakes here like I thought I could. I know I owe you. I feel like go-se, but I just can’t!” After nine years on Verbena it was his home. He had a gal he’d been courting for years and they decided to make it formal. He was going to move to her people’s place on the other side of the settlement.

“It’s okay, Pete,” Tanaka said gently. “I got no mind to deny any man his own place. You don’t owe me a thing. Taking care of the Katy the way you did, we’re more than square. I’ll send your share of the take when we collect from Badger.”

Pete had looked up anxiously at that. “Aww, Mike, you don’t owe me anything from this job. I ain’t done nothing to earn it.”

“You surely did. If you hadn’t kept the Katy new copper bright we wouldn’t be able to make the deadline on the deal. You’ll need a stake to buy in to a new place, won’t want to be staying for long with your in-laws. That’s a recipe for disaster in any marriage.” Tanaka said with enough sincerity to make everyone in the room feel that he knew personally whereof he spoke.

“Don’t think I can accept it.” Pete said with all the stubbornness of the proudly independent poor.

“We’ll see.” Was all Tanaka said.

So the last thing they did before leaving atmo was take Pete and his gal up and marry them. Tanaka performed the service with becoming solemnity while Rafe stood up for Pete as his best man. The only others present in the tiny common room were the girl’s parents who seemed nervous at being in space and anxious to get back on solid ground. They set them down, wished them well, then set course for Boros.

Settlement of the Rim had been all but abandoned during the war, although some terraforming had continued on planets where the process was already well advanced. Now that the war had ended, the Core planets were looking to solve the twin problems of uncontrolled underclass population growth and demand for scarce resources by resuming large scale colonization of the Rim worlds. During the past fifteen months while Mal and Zoe had been interned, the Feds had been massing supplies in the form of hard subsidies on Boros as a jumping off point for colony ships. Boros had a good sized Federal presence and was conveniently located for a push to the outer planets. It was a ripe plum ready for harvest.

The deal proposed by Tanaka’s pre-war contact on Persephone was to boost a shipment of gen-seed and DNA herd scrip along with as much Grade A foodstuff supplement bars as the Katana Maru could lift and transport it direct to the Rim. There it would fetch a good price among those already settled in hardpan colonies which were currently being ignored by the Alliance because of their suspected sympathies with the Independents during the war.

Tanaka’s contact would supply the name of a man at the storage depot as would give them the entry to the goods and look the other way as the goods went out the door. In exchange Badger would draw twenty-five percent off the top. With Mal, Rafe and Pete each promised ten percent of the gross, that left forty-five percent for Mike, out of which he had to pay all expenses and refuel the Katy. Mike had grimaced as he explained the deal to Mal, upon Mal’s inquiring look he’d explained.

“Forty-five percent is awful lean to pay me and keep the ship in fuel and repair. Couldn’t do it on a regular basis. Doesn’t leave much for a safety cushion and practically nothing for me, lucky if I make five percent for my share. I always try to draw the line at fifty percent for me and the ship, even if it all goes to the Katy. But gotta get a stake somewhere and Badger’s likely to have other jobs to throw our way.”

“What’s his story?” Mal asked

“Little runt of a fella, originally from Dyton Colony. Started out before the war running guns out of Persephone. During the war switched to black market luxury goods. Got a finger in most pies on Persepone. Buys info from lots of sources sets up jobs for outfits like us and takes a percentage. All the profit, none of the risk.

“Sounds like a huckleberry, alright.”

“Well, there’s worse, I guess, though probably not many. With most of the folks you find yourself working for in this line, the best thing is to trust no one and always have a Plan B.” Tanaka had given the wolfish grin Mal was coming to recognize.

“I expect you always do have a Plan B.”

“That’s why I made it to be such an old man in a business where most die young.”

They used the three day boost to Boros to introduce Mal to the rigors of zero gee EVA work. Rafe had asked if he’d ever worn a pressure suit. After being informed there was little need for it in ranching cattle or shooting Alliance soldiers, he had given Mal an evil smile as he said “Well, you are in for a real treat then.”

The first thing he did was lay out the suit on the deck of the cargo hold and go over it with Mal inch by inch. Then he inflated it and left if on the deck for three hours. Satisfied it was impermeable, he took Mal through the tedious process of suiting up.

“Always buy the best suit you can. It’s no place to skimp. You’re going to be doing some serious work in the suit. You need one that will stand the gaff.” He explained intently, looking directly at Mal to emphasize the gravity of his words. “If you have to go out on the side of the boat to fix something it’s like to be a life or death matter in the first place but even if the ship isn’t dead in space any mistake in a p-suit will kill you in a very ugly way, dong ma?”

“Dong ma.”

Then he made Mal suit up and left him in the damn thing for twenty-four hours. Mal learned at uncomfortable first hand the joys of p-suit septic disposal and just how lukewarm water from a canteen nipple tastes when you’ve been suited up in your own stink for hours. Only after he’d been in the thing all day and Rafe had run him through countless drills in the cargo hold did they venture out of the ship.

Mal found zero-gee maneuvering a luxury after packing the suit and tank in normal gravity for over a day. It turned out he was going to be pretty good at it. He grasped very quickly the principal that very little effort was required to overcome inertia and once overcome nothing would stop the momentum but counter movement. Rafe had him maneuver massy objects of varying dimensions off, on and around the ship. When they came back in Rafe reported to Mike that he was a natural. Mal hadn’t felt so proud since the first time he got his sergeant’s stripes.

Tanaka and Rafe kept Mal so busy the three days were a blur of drills and EVA exercises, and then they were entering atmo at Boros and getting docking permission from the port tower. They touched down and powered down, looking for all the world like an innocent trader awaiting arrival of legitimate cargo.

Next Chapter--Subdue All Things