Episode 407: Brisbane Ghosts, Part Two

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No joke.

Sheriff: (quietly) Like Reavers?
Nika: Ehhhnn …
Sheriff: Cuz people’ve talked about gettin’ signals now’n then when the weather’s right or the moons are in place.
Nika: Yeah. Basically. Sure sounds like it.
Sheriff: Like a Reaver camp up there? Do they camp, do they live and—We didn’t see any people—
Nika: Most people’s guesses are as good as anybody else’s guesses, so … You know, I … Here’s the thing. Reavers live on ships together, so they gotta be able to form some form of community. So, maybe a camp wouldn’t be out of the realm.
Arden: And if their ships stop working …
Nika: Then where do they go? Right.
Arden: They could have crash landed, or …

Reavers taking to territory on land? Now that’s a scary wrinkle in the landscape. The Sheriff pulls the topic of conversation to something a little more pleasant, thanks.

Sheriff: So, you did have business here?
Nika: We’re bringing medical salvage that we thought Doctor Fong could use, so we’re bringing it up here to the—
Sheriff: So you weren’t hired up here by Jarvis.
Nika: Who’s Jarvis?
Sheriff: David Jarvis. The guy from Burnham Corp. The new owners of the camp.
Arden: No one hired us. We’re bringing things here hoping to trade for ourselves.
Nika: We knew Fong had his hospital up here and we had some medical salvage we thought he could use.

Rina speaks up.

Rina: Burnham Corp? You mean after the Burnham Quadrant?
Sheriff: Yeah. We’re roughly in Burnham Quadrant.
Rina: Oh, so what’s Burnham Corp do?
Sheriff: I reckon they’re like a lumber corporation. I think they do more. This guy has Core Suit written all over him, but when the Thompson people stopped I guess payin’ their loans, the bank took possession of their gear. These people bought out them and so as near as I can tell it’s all upright and legal. Such as legal is out here, they own that stuff.
Kiera: And they ain’t sent nobody out here to see why—?
Sheriff: They did. Those people just disappeared. And they haven’t since.

Speaking of sending people …

Nika: How often are you gettin’ supply ships in here?
Sheriff: You mean supplies for us?
Nika: Yeah.
Sheriff: Not often enough. We’ve been on our own pretty much for some time.
Kiera: Now if I were investigatin’ somethin’ and I’d lost a group of people to it, then I’d be sendin’ a larger group of people this time.
Rina: With guns.
Nika: And grenades.
Rina: Yeah. I keep telling you.
Sheriff: I got the impression that this wasn’t super high priority with them. Well, for example, if you got prion disease spread out in an area, you might be worth just declaring it a loss and a tax write-off. Of course, that sort of thing is more complicated now that the system’s independent.
Nika: Yeah.
Sheriff: Like, by the time the ACDC people were up there, there wasn’t any ACDC here anymore. Just hangers-on who decided to stick around but they weren’t getting any support from the Alliance.
Nika: So are any of those people still around?
Sheriff: They went up there and disappeared.
Nika: And just never came back.
Sheriff: No. But Burnham is still in town if you’d like to meet him.
Nika: Yeah. Maybe.
Sheriff: Dr. Fong perhaps might be very interested. He has money. There was just nothing to buy.
Nika: I need to contact him. Like I said, we came across a salvage supply and he could probably use it here. As for the rest, we can probably get you a supply run in here at least. Get back to the main city and get you some food and relief supplies, at the very least.
Sheriff: We’re all survivin’. We’d gotten a couple—the PDF had sent a couple of ships down here at one point to check us out, and they helped. They had some’a these nutra-bars that’re supposed to last a month. But you know they don’t really go that far.

Oh, those things. One bite can last a man all day. More, if you don’t like your kids too much.

Nika: Let’s meet up with Fong and Burnham and go from there.
Sheriff: Okay.

Nika she says it might be prudent to do a fly-by of the camp when the weather lets up. Get an idea of what we’re dealing with. We can take the dropship. As to the matter of the dropship, Rina mentions that she’s got armament, just no ammunition for it. Which would blow chunks if anyone shot at us while we were flying it.

That’s assuming anybody’s still alive to shoot at us, Joshua warns. Let’s not put the cart before the horse.

Nika: I’m more interested if the folks are still alive. I’d like to go ahead and get you guys to listen to the radio transmission. You might be able to clean it up a little more.
Rina: (rising) Okay.
Joshua: I’ll let Rina do that.

Rina grabs her data book and busies herself with the recording. Our flatbed still not fully repaired yet and the Sheriff offers us a ride to see Fong. The Sheriff takes us to what amounts to a construction site. The foundation’s poured and plumbing sticks out of it and going by the framework that’s standing on-site, it looks like it’s going to be a five-story hospital when it’s finished. Something really shiny for the area.

The Sheriff leads us through a series of trailers to Dr. Fong’s offices. He’s surprised to see us when we walk through the door and he rolls down his sleeves, quickly making himself presentable.

Fong: Oh. Ah, yes.
Nika: Dr. Fong. How are you?
Fong: Captain Earrrr—
Nika: Earhart.
Fong: Earhart. Good to see you. It’s been some time. I wish I could say things were better for us since you have left.
Nika: I heard things weren’t going so good.
Fong: Well, for a while it seemed to be better. The threat—well, I was no longer a prisoner. Unfortunately, the city is poorly designed with not a very diversified work force. They are all dependent on the river for the lumber trade coming down. When the Thompson mill ceased to produce lumber that was a hit but they could absorb it based on the other camp above it. But when that stopped, when they refused to send things past the mill, things have slowed down dramatically. They’ve been managing somewhat living off the land with their small farms and their goats and things but they haven’t been doing well. Nika: Sounds like it.
Fong: Unfortunately, yes, I’ve also been in the situation where I’m not able to pay enough people to keep building at this time. I have money of sorts. I stopped getting platinum from the PDF when they gave us payment vouchers. Unfortunately they need to be redeemed at Meridian starport or elsewhere. And my people are unwilling to work for such things. If you have cash, I’d be willing to trade you with a favorable transaction rate. If you wish to take money away from the good people of Brisbane.
Nika: How about a straight one-to-one transfer? But I also have a load of medical salvage that might be of use to you as well.
Fong: If you’re willing to accept scrip for it, I might be able to purchase it.
Nika: I think we may be able to work something out, sure.
Joshua: Yes.
Rina: Do you have anything that needs fixing?

Oh, please say yes. Getting her hands on some unfamiliar machinery and gadgets would be something Rina would very much appreciate.

Fong: Not at the moment. I think everything is functional. It’s just that things are at a bit of a stand-still.
Nika: We’re sorry to hear that. It looked like you were getting along real well with this hospital comin’ up.
Sheriff: I don’t know what to do, I’m not a superstitious man, but … a lotta people who live out here, especially country folk … you know about Reavers and you know about diseases and you could say that this disease can wear out of people eventually and when it doesn’t seem to do so, people start thinkin’ it might be somethin’ else. Possession or ghosts or who knows what.
Nika: I know.
Sheriff: You don’t believe in ghosts, now?
Nika: Not bloody likely.
Arden: Ghosts? What phenomena’s been described as—?
Sheriff: Some people think that what we’re hearin’ up there ain’t livin’ folk.
Joshua: Really?
Sheriff: That it might just be the spirits of those that died.

Rina sends a look Joshua’s way. If there were ghosts, wouldn’t he be able to pick up on it? Like what happened on Orcus? At Shepherd’s Hope?

Kiera: And so we’re hearin’ a radio channel to the dead, huh?
Nika: (skeptically) And the dead are settin’ out mines.
Sheriff: Well, those mines might be old ones left by the Thompson mill.
Rina: So we were just listening to … ah …?
Nika: Yeah.
Joshua: The dead can scream.
Nika: No.
Sheriff: As I say, I don’t believe in that stuff either, but people say it a lot and it gets people nervous, gets harder to get a posse up there.
Kiera: Now, see, that’s why you need get a posse. You need an exorcist.
Joshua: There is that.
Sheriff: Well, you got an exorcist for me?
Kiera: It depends on what you want exorcized. I mean, most people just need to believe you got an exorcist. Make’em feel better. Cuz if you don’t believe in ghosts—
Nika: Quite frankly what you need to make a bunch’a country folks stay away from your business is to make them believe you got ghosts.
Kiera: Mm-hm.
Sheriff: But there ain’t no business goin’ on up there.
Nika: Ehhnnnn …. not so sure about that.

After all, if you haven’t been able to take a look around up there, how can you tell?

Nika: Been hearin’ up there there’s been ships comin’ in at random intervals.

Joshua asks if Fong is willing to buy our medical salvage. If he is, we’re willing to accept his PDF scrip for it on a one-to-one basis. Kiera looks pained at the prospect but bites her tongue on whatever she thinks of it. We exchange the meds for about 500 in scrip. Fong also asks to consult with Arden on the patients he has and Arden agrees.

Joshua asks the Sheriff if there’s anything else we can do and the Sheriff tells us that they aren’t destitute, exactly. They are sitting on a decent supply of cash in the form of scrip. They’re just having trouble getting anyone who lives here to accept it as legal tender. And that’s the paradox with legal tender everywhere—it can be made of anything but it will only work if everyone trusts it will work. We’re trusting it will work, 285 of it in actual platinum for scrip at a one-to-one and 306 in medical salvage, netting us 591. Fong graciously rounds it up to an even 600 to make the math easier on everyone. That done, we just need to find Mr. Jarvis.

Joshua: You don’t know where he is? Do you have any idea?
Sheriff: Not at the moment but he’s probably over at the Inn. I can send word to him so if he wants to contact you, he can.
Nika: That would be great. I don’t want to keep you away from your business any longer than we have to either. We appreciate you bringing us over.
Rina: Thank you.
Sheriff: Okay. Well, I appreciate you helping out the town and all that. It’s good stuff. I’ve only been Sheriff for a couple’a months and it’s been a—
Rina: What happened to the other one?
Sheriff: He got killed up there the first time we had problems.
Nika: He never came back. The last time we were up there.
Rina: Oh, geez. I mean, the last we were up here was …
Nika: That was when the Sheriff went missing.
Rina: That was over a year ago.
Nika: I know.
Sheriff: Not a lot of volunteers for this job.
Rina: That was February 20.
Nika: I realize that. Your point?
Rina: This has been going on for a while.

We get back to the Gift. Joshua crunches the numbers, is relieved we can still eat, and arranges to have the medical supplies lowered to the ground and delivered. Kiera buttonholes Nika.

Kiera: So I’ll ask the stupid question—are we volunteering to stick our nose in their business and seein’ what the heck’s goin’ on up there?
Nika: I’m thinkin’ on askin’ Mr. Jarvis what’s goin’ on.
Arden: I’ve thought about it. I’ve thought about it. I’ve thought about it again. It still didn’t seem like anything I want to get involved in. However, I think we’re all going to want to check into it.
Nika: You know what?
Arden: What?
Nika: We took this ship, what was the first promise we made with this ship?
Rina: That we do good with it.

No brainer.

Nika: Thank you.
Rina: You’re welcome.
Arden: I got shot and I’m all upset with the Verse.
Nika: (to Rina) Backhand him.

Fwap! One swat to Arden’s arm delivered. He rubs it, laughing.

Rina: Oh darn. I should have used my wrench.
Arden: You didn’t listen to my entire statement.
Nika: Um-hm.
Arden: I said I thought about it and then I thought about it again, and then I thought about it a third time and then we probably should look into it.
Kiera: Mm-hm!
Rina: And people call me slow.
Kiera: Mine’s just sheer curiosity and a desperate need to use my new gun.
Nika: I say we go to the Inn. You guys wanna have dinner?
Rina: Let’s take a walk.

So who’s going? Arden declines, deciding to go to the hospital to help Fong. Joshua makes sure he’s clear on the details: yes, Arden will join us in town after he’s done with his rounds of Fong’s patients. Dyson elects to come to town, releasing Joshua to come along with us too. Rina is ready to go and she’s wearing her usual suspects: knife, gun, vest, and three extra clips. Kiera readies to go with us with her shiny fancy-type gun.

Nika: You are not bringing that shotgun into town.
Kiera: I know but it’s cool.
Nika: I know. But no.

Kiera sighs and leaves her new toy behind, opting to take along the two pistols she came to us with and tucks two knives in her boots. And her tranq patches, since they’ve come in handy before.

No one stays behind to guard our girl. It being a back of beyond place, it’s unlikely someone will come by and steal her. Although that’s been known to happen.

Rina: And how many times did we get our ship stolen out from under us? Twice.
Joshua: (to Rina) Do you want me to stay behind again? Cuz I don’t mind.
Rina: I could rig up the—

She’s thinking of the gravitic/microwave trick she’d pulled on Beaumonde.

Nika: Just lock it. We have got to stop doing this.
Rina: Doing what?
Nika: This, this ultimately paranoid ridiculousness. It’s time to stop.
Rina: But—
Arden: I haven’t noticed anything out of the ordinary.
Nika: We’re done with the cloak and dagger. We’re done.
Joshua: I wasn’t paranoid.
Nika: (pointing) She is. I was referring more to her than us.
Joshua: Perhaps you shouldn’t use the royal we, then.
Arden: I don’t think she’s being paranoid. I think she’s being realistic.
Rina: Thank you, Arden.
Nika: And I think she’s rubbed off on you in ridiculous fashion in the past six months or so. God help us.
Rina: I have not.
Arden: I’m basing my behavior on the observed characteristics of the Universe as they’ve happened to me.

And we’re arguing this as we lock the doors and go down the airlock stairs. And as long as we’re talking about stealing ships, how many ships have we stolen in the past year, hmmm? Oh, let’s see … Blue Sun shuttle? Check. A certain dropship sitting on our hull. Check. Kiera says the only thing she’s stolen was that dropship but it wasn’t really stealing, it was salvage. And so saying, we make it to the Inn.

The Inn has a western saloon look to it and it looks like it’s seen better times. There’s the man in the corner with piano, a scant finger’s worth of sludge at the bottom of his glass. There’s the obligatory bar with the bottles ranged on shelves behind it. The various pictures of scantily clad beauties. The drinkers and the card players and the checker fiends. The spittoons and the stains on the walls and floors around them. The well-worn tables and chairs survivors of countless brawls. Several bowls with pretzels and peanuts grace the room here and there. There’s likely a fly at the bottom of the ubiquitous vinegar cruets, too.

However, there’s one person there who stands out from the rest. He’s dressed in a grey suit that screams of fine Coreside tailoring. He has a couple of data pads, three smart paper screens in front of him, and a stylus tucked behind one ear. He seems to be going over some technical specs. We spot him right away.

Nika: That’s our guy.

David Jarvis is looking haggard these days, less polished. He’s wearing fine clothes but he’s got a couple days’ worth of beard on him. Jarvis might indeed stand out from the crowd here but his mood matches that of the room—which is saying there’s not much of a mood at all, there being little to have a mood about, save being glum. The other people in the room are like Jarvis, looking for a distraction from their troubles and finding little relief. Unemployment grinds on them, souring the atmosphere. When we walk in, all eyes look us over than drift back to whatever business they’d been engaged in.

We don’t look that impressive, to be sure. It’s still raining outside and we’re soaking wet. The barkeep looks annoyed at our coming in all wet and dripping, but lets it go after a beat. There’s little point—everyone came in tonight in a similar state, apparently.

Rina’s fingers twitch for her coveralls zipper to get her gun. Joshua takes her by the arm and steers her onto the bar floor.

Joshua: Table. Table. Table.
Rina: (murmuring) If you want me to dance on the tables, you’re going to have to get me drunk first.
Joshua: (to Nika) Do they serve food? Do they serve anything here?

At that, the bartender’s mood improves.

Bartender: Come on up. What can I get you folks? You got hard currency?
Arden: Yes.
Bartender: Then you’re welcome here.
Joshua: All right then.
Nika: Just a beer.
Arden: I actually want food.
Nika: Do you have a menu?
Bartender: I can fire up the, ah—what do you want? We gotta protein texturizer, we can get you whatever you want.

Um. No. We’ve lost our appetite for TSE, thanks. Not that we say that. That would be rude.

Joshua: I think we’ll just have shots all around.
Bartender: We don’t have a whole lotta stuff. If you got money I can send the boy around to kill a chicken or somethin’. We could roast it up for you.
Arden: No, that’s okay.
Joshua: (undertone to Arden): I’ll feed you something when we’re back on the ship.
Kiera: We got pretzels or … pretzels and peanuts. Peanuts and pretzels.
Joshua: Beer’s good.
Rina: I’ll take a beer.

The bartender snags a couple of the pretzel bowls Kiera mentioned and puts them on the table, then get busy with our beer order. Arden peers dubiously into the pretzel bowls and holds one of the dried specimens on offer up. What are these? Soy nuts? No, old old soybeans. Some of the nut husks seem to have legs attached to them … and we stop looking through the bowls at that point. Luckily the bartender arrives with our order and we have a legitimate reason to look up.

Bartender: So you were on that ship that came in?
Arden: Yes.
Bartender: Some impressive flyin’.
Kiera: Really?
Bartender: Shook my windows. It’s good to have strangers in town. Bring some cash in.

Kiera laughs delightedly. The bartender puts the beers down in front of us.

Arden: Impressive could mean … anything.
Joshua: (stung) Heyyyy…
Arden: I said it could mean. I didn’t say it did. In my humble opinion, your flying today was—it could only mean one thing.
Rina: Drink your beer, Arden. Just drink your beer.
Nika: He learned from me.
Arden: That wasn’t the one thing.
Joshua: No, it wasn’t.

Arden takes up his beer and says into it.

Arden: The one thing was—you need more practice.

Kiera laughs again.

Kiera: Yeah. I was thinking as far as surgery, that’s called starting at the wrong end.
Arden: Like going through the back for an appendectomy.
Kiera: (toasts Arden) Yep.
Arden: You can do it, but why?
Kiera: It ain’t pretty.
Rina: (to Arden) I can do that with my boot, right here, right now. Bend over.
Arden: Are you making a pass or are you just making conversation?
Rina: (to Kiera) Gee, you know, I need to brush up on my threatening tone of voice. You see, that’s just sad.
Kiera: You see, your voice is more sexy than you thought it was. Either that or he’s more horny than you gave him credit for.
Rina: Now that’s scary.
Arden: We just had the goats. I’m not that bad off.
Kiera: I know. Now what did you do to the goats again?
Arden: Don’t ask, don’t tell.
Kiera: Well, they can’t talk.
Arden: That’s a plus.

Nika rolls her eyes at our gutter-talk and takes herself and her beer over to Jarvis’s table.

Nika: (quietly) Mister Jarvis.

David Jarvis looks up and then looks startled to be singled out by the pretty blonde pilot and he straightens his tie.

Jarvis: Are you from the Company? You don’t look like you’re from the Company.
Nika: No, sir.
Jarvis: Ah. Well, what can I do for you?

It’s hard to tell if he’s disappointed or relieved.

Nika: I’m not sure but I was wondering if there wasn’t something we can do for you.
Jarvis: Is there something you had in mind that’s specific?

The rest of us catch this conversation and fall quiet and pay attention.

Nika: Well the last time we came through her, it was when Fong got picked up and brought home. We hadn’t been back through here until now and come to find out that it’s not going as well as it seemed to be when we left. And here you are, the owner of the camp up there.
Jarvis: Well, representatives of the owners, yes. Unfortunately I’ve had trouble getting together another group interested in going up there. These are colorful group of people here, but they are sadly a color not conducive to getting things done.

And what color would that be? Is he implying … yellow? We say nothing and let him speak on.

Jarvis: Like much of the Rim, sadly. Yes, if you think you might be able to go to this camp and prove there’s nothing there.
Arden: What if we’re proving something is there?
Nika: Well, here’s my question—By nothing, do you mean that you don’t believe our men and overseers are not up there anymore?
Jarvis: I don’t know I’m sure how to explain …
Nika: Why don’t you give it a shot for me?
Jarvis: Well, they’re not my overseers. It was a science team and a couple of trail hands to do the required land survey to make sure the prion disease—
Nika: I understand that the mill was still running.
Jarvis: Well, no…
Nika: They refused to ship down past the camp.
Jarvis: Oh! No, that’s not ours, up above. We are the owners of the former Thompson camp.
Nika: Ohhhh….my misunderstanding. Gotcha. The one up above that is not yours. I thought the both of them were yours.
Jarvis: No, sadly. We are just now seeking to expand our holdings in this area. Now that it appears that things have stabilized on the political and legal front, we’re more confident to do that. It was the team’s job to secure things with the local government to send employees up there.
Nika: Mm-hm.
Jarvis: They didn’t come back and there are hundreds of possible explanations. They could have gotten lost. We were told there was some unexploded ordnance. Perhaps even some improvised explosive devices. I would hate that to be the case but I suspect it to be probably the most likeliest solution.
Nika: Given the last time I’ve been up that path, I’d say you’re probably right.

No joke.

Jarvis: They were in one vehicle. If they hit one of those mines, they could have all died and that would be it. Now when the Sheriff went up there they, apparently with their active imaginations, believed they heard other things. Perhaps … other people still up there…. I think this seems highly unlikely. Perhaps they saw a … wolf or something.
Nika: But I gather you didn’t join the team yourself to go find out.
Jarvis: This thing isn’t my sort of thing.
Kiera: Has anybody done a fly over to see what you can see from the air?
Jarvis: Well the tools in this delightful hamlet are somewhat limited, as you may have seen. Your ship is the first one we’ve seen in some time. We’ve had PDF vessels, supply ships that have come by. One of them I was able to find out said it was getting some unusual radio signals, it decided it wasn’t going to stick around because it wasn’t armed well enough for confrontation. Again, who knows what that is?
Nika: And who owns the mill up above your camp?
Jarvis: The mill above is owned by a gentleman by the name of…(consults smart paper) It’s a consortium. Lilac Consortium. Based out of Lilac, I suppose. I can’t believe they’re based out of Lilac but I suppose they’re colonial.
Joshua: What sort of frequency did your scientific team use. I assume they kept in contact with you. What frequency did they use?
Jarvis: Sadly, we weren’t able to keep in constant communication with them because of the terrain.
Joshua: Yes, but what frequency?
Jarvis: I’m sure the Sheriff might know, but I don’t have that information. It’s really not my area.

Jarvis tries to explain.

Jarvis: I’m … I’m a businessman. I will admit I’ve made a few mistakes in my life. I ended up being sent to this hellhole. This time I’ve …. Fortieth story office overlooking the bay in Londinium and now here I am. So you can see, I haven’t done everything perfectly but I do believe that this is not my fault.
Joshua: Sure, I can see that.
Jarvis: I am in a position to offer considerable compensation if you can demonstrate either the truth or the falsity of these claims that there’s anything going on at the camp.
Kiera: Not with scrip.
Jarvis: Well, no. I wouldn’t be paying in PDF scrip, of course. What I have at my disposal are Alliance credit notes. Which as you may know, we’re not in an Alliance area, so you’ll have to go to an Alliance world to—I would be willing to compensate you considerably.
Kiera: How about electronic transfer? Instead of notes, we’ve got exchange.

Oops. Won’t work. We have Cortex in Blue Sun, true, but the Cortex doesn’t extend beyond the borders of Blue Sun. Unless we can contact an Alliance world via the Cortex from Meridian, there’s no electronic transfer happening with those Alliance notes. In fact, the credit notes don’t even register an amount until they are taken to an Allied world where everything is electronically monitored. The closest world we can ‘cash’ in those Alliance notes would be the Allied world of Boros, the next system over in Georgia. The other alternative would be to travel to the Core itself and then make the exchange.

Joshua: (to Jarvis) Considerable compensation is a rather vague amount and it wouldn’t work very well in any sort of contract. So what do you think?
Jarvis: Let me think. (a beat) If you can secure the site …
Joshua: Secure the site. Okay. Go on.
Jarvis: I believe that I could, within a reasonable amount of time, say… two weeks. Is that a reasonable amount of time for you to get up there?
Kiera: Do you have a sheet of paper you can write this down on?
Jarvis: Sure.

Jarvis taps one of his pads and dictates to it.

Jarvis: Record. Contract. Standard form 105. Subcontractors.

And zip! up comes this 800-page document on his screen.

Jarvis: We can fill in all the particulars but if within two weeks you can secure the camp, I might be willing to compensate you to the tune of … 1000 credits.
Kiera: Define secure.
Jarvis: So that you have absolute control over it and we can travel there safely.
Kiera: So we have to secure the route, too.
Jarvis: Yes.

Well …

Jarvis: Within reason. If—
Nika: And if we can verify the fact that the site has in fact been overrun and it’s essentially a loss?
Jarvis: Well then, I would be of little value to you at that stage.
Nika: Yeah. But it’s still my time.
Kiera: And effort.
Rina: And risk.

No joke.

Jarvis: So what would you want for that?
Arden: Half.
Kiera: Mm-hm.
Nika: Half.
Jarvis: And how would you verify this?
Nika: We can bring that by video footage if you want it.
Kiera: Mm-hm. Or you can give us fifty percent up front and considering we’re either dead or ran off with the money.
Nika: And call it even.
Jarvis: As it stands there has to be a certain amount of trust between us anyway. I will give you the notes and I assure you they are 100-credit notes. Or I will write you a legal document to that effect.
Nika: IF the site is overrun and there is no way for a force this small in securing it, then there’s no point in dying trying it. So. What would you consider proof in that regard, then? We could bring you video footage, which could obviously be faked, however.
Jarvis: I might need to see it myself.
Nika: Well, obviously you’d see it yourself—
Jarvis: No, I’d see the actual site itself.
Nika: I see. You’d want us to come back and take you up so you could look.
Jarvis: Perhaps.
Nika: That’s certainly a reasonable request. Absolutely.
Jarvis: You have a shuttle or something?
Nika: Yes, sir.
Jarvis: All right. I think that … I don’t know if that’s worth half. That’s 500 credits. A substantial amount for no work. So I’d say …
Joshua: The danger is what you’re paying for.
Rina: Hazard pay.
Jarvis: 350 and I will pay for any hospitalizations necessary. Here in town.
Kiera: And medications.
Jarvis: Here in town.
Nika: Done.
Jarvis: As a result of injuries sustained from the—
Nika: Absolutely. As a result of injuries sustained only in this regard.
Jarvis: And that’s only in regard of it not being retrievable. Otherwise a 1000 is going to have to cover all that.

And if we secure the camp at serious injury to ourselves, we better hope that thousand will cover our hospital bill.

Arden: (to Nika) So is your decision made?
Nika: Yes.

Kiera insists on reading the contract before we sign it. There’s 500 pages of it. The only glitch she can find in it is that medical clause. The medical indemnity only happens in the event of we’re not successful. If we’re successful in securing the campsite but at the cost of injuries—even if only one person in our party survives to come back or if everyone else is hospitalized—our medical bills will not be paid. We would have to use our 1000-credit payment to cover those expenses.

Jarvis will be paying us in credit notes that will become active as soon as we enter a Core world or Allied territory. And we will have this contract and as soon as we are near a Cortex, it will confirm that Jarvis is an authorized signator of Burnham Corp. If he doesn’t pay, it’s the equivalent of Burnham Corporation defaulting. As which point we can throw the lawyers at them.

Nika: Oh well. You know. It is what it is.
Joshua: Sure.

Joshua holds out his hand to shake on the deal. Jarvis visibly pauses and gives Joshua’s hand a once-over as if it’s not expected to be clean enough to touch. And then he shakes and the deal is struck.

It’s official. We’ve just landed a job that will pay us for our nosiness. How about that? We take our leave of Jarvis and wait until we’re safely aboard our girl before discussing this further.



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