Last Voyage of Delilah, Episode 105: Beaumonde Shell Game, Part 4
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The two men still on the boat start firing. Valentine dives for the dock, dragging Selezneva down with him. Poco ducks around the truck, using it for cover, but not before he gets winged by unfriendly fire. Rachel is hidden in the perimeter and stealthily moves closer to the dock, looking for a better shot.
Poco's wounded and pinned behind the truck … but he's got the Baron. The gun roars into the night as he pops around and shoots once … twice … And suddenly Celia is standing all alone on the boat. She's got a gun of her own but she freezes, shocked at how quickly the tables have turned on her.
Valentine rises. Black Rose is up, sights set on Celia.
Valentine: Drop the gun.
Celia's gun makes a loud clatter on the deck. Before anyone else can move a muscle, Celia dives overboard into the river. Abandoning her friends, both alive and dead. Valentine turns his back on her. She's no longer a threat.
He hands Selezneva up from the boards of the dock and then inspects the boat. He finds the real crew tied up below decks. Outside, Poco is alternately dragging on his cigarette and swallowing his screams as he clutches his bullet graze. Rachel comes out of hiding, tucking her weapon into her pocket. She draws her knife and frees the tied-up crew. Valentine finds a med kit on the boat and walks over to Poco.
Valentine: Are you feeling okay to disarm the dead man's switch? I would prefer not to hold this radio any more than I have to.
Poco: (through his teeth) Just turn the other radio off.
Valentine: Thank you.
Click.
Poco: I'll be all right.
Valentine checks Selezneva.
Valentine: Are we still delivering the cargo to the folks on the boat?
Selezneva: To the boat, yes. And if you could be a distraction for when they get here, to give us a chance to get away in the boat.
Rachel: They who?
Valentine: I figure they've got more coming, whoever they are.
Selezneva: Yes. I'm also expecting some people from New Melbourne to—
Valentine: The Fisheries people are after you? The FU?
Selezneva: Yes. Do you know them?
Valentine: (sighing) Yes.
Poco: How the hell're we going to distract them if they know it's going to be on a boat?
Selezneva: It won't be on the boat for long.
Rachel returns to the truck and starts patching up Poco. She slaps a makeshift field dressing on his arm. She figures as long as Poco can smoke, he's doing well enough.
For sure he's really sucking down that cigarette to nothing.
The crew that Rachel cut free is busy rolling the cargo aboard their boat. Thanks to the wheels, it's relatively short work. Meanwhile, Poco assiduously hunts down each IRP package that got kicked out and tosses it back in the truck. He chucks one in. It bounces off the rear wall, 12 feet inside. Poco bends down for another one, hissing as his arm hurts. Valentine watches a moment and then lends a hand.
Valentine: Do I want to know? No, I don't want to know. I'm sorry I asked that question.
Poco: Well … (drags, blows) … Tinkerbell got mad at me the last time I threw her shit in the mud, so … (throws, winces) … I'm tossin' it back.
Valentine: Good work, Poco. Good work. Don't aggravate that wound.
In the decoy truck, Vikki sighs and puts the radio down. She's not able to get in touch with Valentine and his party. Have the men on the shuttle found them and taken them, like they nearly took her and Tian? Or have they done something … fatal?
Back in the swamp, the shuttle roars in overhead just as the boat shoves off. A voice booms from the shuttle's PA: Stop that boat!
The boat doesn't stop.
Shuttle: Stop that boat or else!
Valentine: (yells) Or else what?
Small arms fire stutters from the boat, muzzle flare flashing on the deck. Whoever's manning the mike on the shuttle seems taken aback at the boat's response.
Shuttle: …Uuhmm …
Valentine: (yells) Or else what? Anything else? No?
Valentine knows he can't be heard over the shuttle's engines but he's having fun with it anyway. He and his crew lean against the truck and watch the show. If only someone had thought to bring the popcorn, cuz it's damn near farcical, really. The shuttle flies after the boat for a little ways, booming empty threats to the gunfire from the boat.
Rachel: I guess they're gonna buzz them a lot. Hey, weren't we supposed to be the distraction so they can get away?
Valentine: Seems like they're a pretty good distraction on their own.
This goes on for a bit and then it looks like someone gets on the radio to the shuttle because the shuttle just … shuts up and flies away, heading back to town. The boat travels on unmolested. They watch the boat until it's a speck in the distance, then pile into the truck and go home.
Once they get closer to town, the comm crackles to life. Rachel picks it up one handed and drives.
Tian: Oh, Jesus God is anybody listening?
Rachel: Yes, honey. What?
Tian: Are you guys, okay?
Rachel: Uh-huh.
Tian: There's a shuttle heading your way.
Rachel: Pffft! Been here and done gone.
Valentine: Wounded incoming.
Tian: How bad?
Poco, sitting at windowside, blows smoke in Valentine's face.
Valentine: (grins) He's smoking, so I'm going to guess he's okay.
Once everyone's back aboard, Tian treats Poco in Delilah's infirmary as Valentine fills her in on the events at the drop site. He finishes the tale with:
Valentine: Actually, to be honest, it went smoother than I thought it would.
Poco: That was smooth? (reconsiders) No, actually, you know what? It was pretty smooth.
Valentine: It's all relative, Poco. All relative.
A little later, the crew receives a couple of waves. One is from Katerina Selezneva, thanking us and telling us everything went according to plan. She'll be happy to work with us again.
Valentine: Thank you. My boss? Let him know.
Selezneva: I will. The tyranny of the New Melbourne monopoly on sturgeon has finally been ended.
Valentine signs off as the crew kibitzes in.
Poco: Did I just get shot over some damned fish?
Tian: Apparently so.
Valentine: Fish eggs, eventually.
Tian: Wow. I knew it was about caviar.
Vikki: Oh, but caviar's good. And good for you, too. All those essential fish oils and vitamins.
Poco: What is a … a cavalier?
Tian: Caviar. It's fish eggs. Like pate, they make it into a delicacy. It's kinda gross.
Vikki: No, it's wonderful.
Tian: (Russians!) They eat fish eggs.
Vikki: It's like eating stars from the ocean.
Poco: Sounds disgusting.
Vikki: Says the guy who smokes coffin nails. Yeah, right.
Valentine gets on the second wave. It's from the IRP. They want to know our status. They were expecting to hear from us on Anson's World. He puts them on hold on the pretense of getting Tian, buying time to figure out what he can tell them.
Poco: You can tell them we're really good at throwing out their supplies.
Valentine: No, no. It's all about terminology. We're "distributing" medicines to the local environment.
Tian: Spin it, Spin Doctor.
Rachel: I'm getting' dizzy.
Tian takes over the wave from Valentine and tells them that they'd encountered difficulties on Anson's World. It did not respond well to vaccination attempts and so they've moved on to other worlds. The ship they were on was heading for Kalidasa and so they remained on board in hopes to find better prospects. At the moment, they're on Beaumonde. She's careful to be vague enough to hide our non-IRP activities but yet include enough information for IRP to understand that she's still on mission. The IRP responds back with a request: At nearest convenience, they would like her to go to a settlement on Newhall in Kalidasa.
Tian confirms the request and ends the wave.
Tian: Are we staying on Beaumonde? If we're staying, we can take our stuff and land in several small towns here and see if they're willing. If we're not, where are we going?
Valentine: At some point I need to go back to Paquin and report to my boss. He's going to know that everything went okay, thanks to Selezneva, but I should at some point go back and tell him myself. As a show of respect, if nothing else. That said, it's not a rush. If you need to stick around, that's fine. Is that what you want to do?
Tian: If we have a day or two, I would like to go to some of the outlying towns—other than this one—and see what we can actually do.
Valentine: I have a day or two.
Tian: In the midst of all this, I actually have a job.
Valentine: Understood.
Tian: In the meantime, the IRP would like us to go to Newhall.
Valentine: Newhall?
He wasn't privy to that part of the conversation. So this is news to him. Good news, actually, once he looks up the location. Newhall orbits the same gas giant as Beylix which is where Valentine wants to go.
Valentine: I would like to go to Beylix, so you going to Newhall would be an advantageous coincidence.
Tian: I'm not entirely sure it's a coincidence, given … (waggles her hand)
Valentine: I'm pretty sure they're not sending me to Beylix to scrap my ship on their orders. So yes, there may be something else going on.
Tian: (grim) Yeah, like with our other cargo. But in the meantime, I would like to go out to the more outlying towns with the medicine while we're here.
It would take some going out there and she could go even father into the back of beyond if she were willing to go without her clinic. Tian decides to take her bag and a case or two of vaccines and use the air car to reach the hard to reach places.
Poco: Shouldn't someone go with her?
Valentine: Yes.
Poco is volunteered for the job. Rachel saunters past them, all dolled up, saying she's got port fees to negotiate.
Rachel: See ya tomorrow, boys.
Valentine: (nods) Tomorrow then.
Vikki: Have good sex!
Valentine: I don't think that's an actual greeting.
Poco: (grins) No, no, I've heard that one before.
Vikki: I was just wishing her well.
Rachel: Tink, remind Poppa Bear to fix the brakes on our girl here.
Vikki: 'Kay.
Rachel leaves. Everyone else gets back to work. Vikki and Poco drive out to the drop site to see if they can appropriate the car and the van. The vehicles are still there. They drive the smaller car into the bigger truck for transport and while one drives the truck, the other drives the van. All three vehicles go back to Poco's friend Finny. Given the crap we put the truck through, Poco thought to smooth things over with two extra vehicles for Finny to fence—er, spruce up for sale.
Valentine lines up a job that will take us to Beylix. Nothing glamorous. We'll be hauling tons of junk to Beylix to the scrap yards there. Despite the fact that we'll be hauling junk, Valentine managed to get us a decent wage to do it. Combined with our payment for successful delivery of Selezneva and her cargo, we're actually well heeled for money. Maybe even well heeled enough to scrap our ship once we land on Beylix.
Isn't that what Valentine's been burning to do ever since Persephone? Valentine stares at the ledger balance with amazement … for about three seconds before he realizes that he also has to pay the crew their wages. He also owes Poco that bonus he promised him, in appreciation for putting himself in danger multiple times when he didn't really have to.
Valentine deducts the crew pay and the bonus from the balance and comes away with somewhat less toward the eventual scrapping fees … but he's still a damned sight closer to his goal than he was 48 hours ago. Besides, the dip in funds isn't permanent. There's the possibility of finding more work once we get to Newhall and payment will be waiting for us on Beylix upon delivery.
Of course, if we're to land on Newhall, much less Beylix, we'll need to fix the braking rockets. Rachel and Vikki pitch in on the work and together with Poco they do a really good job. Poco is grateful for the help as he's got a bullet wound to recover from. Tian keeps a sharp eye on Vikki, as concussions and head wounds could turn on a dime into something nasty. Luck seems to be on the young woman's side, however, and Vikki continues to recover without lasting detriment.
In the end, Tian determines that Beaumonde is not in need of her clinic services and once Rachel and Poco and Vikki return from their various tasks, Delilah takes off in the daylight hours of the 21st.
Next stop, Newhall. ETA 2 days, February 23rd.
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