Last Voyage of Delilah, Episode 107: Junkyard Dogs, Part 2
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Valentine: Once again, I'm sure you'll end up costing yourself more in food and four square walls.
Yu Yang: We might find you useful.
Valentine: I see.
Is that a monetary gleam in her eye? Or is it just a leer?
Perhaps.
Yu Yang pulls out the numbers for him. It adds up to a sum a little more than what Valentine is expecting. He can see, however, that though she's a by-the-book person, she also has delusions of grandeur and perhaps is somewhat smitten and may be easily flattered. Perhaps he can charm his way out of this? He decides to try to play on her sympathy: You can see what I was flying in, how horrible it is. He also flirts with her a little bit: I'm sure we can come to some arrangement. We could do this over drinks. There's no reason for this to be unpleasant or otherwise ugly.
Valentine: People of lesser quality would have shot us on sight. Or shot us down in the air. And so I feel lucky to have run into you.
Valentine manages to play on her attraction to him and appeal to her softer side. He manages to talk down the bill to an amount just below what we'll get paid for the cargo we've delivered. It will leave us just enough to refuel but no funds for anything else. Valentine is relieved—he'll be able to get off this rock.
Unfortunately for him, he's not quite able to conceal his feelings and Yu Yang picks up on it. She's understandably miffed—this is her home, for pete's sake.
So …
Yu Yang: We did get an advisory that there might be some dangerous cargo. We'll have to send a team aboard.
Valentine: That's understood but I thought you've already searched the ship.
Yu Yang: Oh, yes, but that was just for dangerous people.
Valentine: (squarely) Have you seen our ship? I don't think our ship can carry dangerous cargo without us blowing up or getting lost in space.
Yu Yang: You can unload your cargo and then we'll do our scan.
Valentine: Okay. Be warned. You do have suits of some sort—you won't be searching without some sort of radiation protection, right?
Yu Yang: We have radiation suits. You have a leak?
Valentine: Well, we are—I'm sure you're aware from your papers that we are flying under a Hazardous Waste Notice. I wouldn't want your folks to get something. You know, we're kinda used to it at this point and we've all accepted that we're going to get cancer but I wouldn't want your men or women to be harmed so I hope it's not going to be as thorough as you're suggesting.
Valentine takes her measure for bribery. He doesn't think she's susceptible to it but flattery might still appeal to her … if he hadn't already burned that bridge. What she says next makes it appear that he might not have.
Yu Yang: Once the cargo is off, we'll take a look. If you're still around.
Valentine: Very good.
Yu Yang: If your ship can't leave, we'll still have to …
Valentine: Search, yes. Understood.
Yu Yang: Or remove it.
Valentine: Understood. I appreciate you making everything clear.
Yu Yang: With that Hazardous Waste Notice, the recycling charge will be significant.
Valentine: Trust me, I'm used to taking significant charges with this ship. (sincerely) Thank you so much for your understanding and professionalism.
She signals him to leave and he quickly returns to the ship. The cargo is unloading, albeit a touch slower than he'd like, and he takes Rachel aside.
Valentine: Can we be ready to spin up, basically right as the cargo's off.
Tian is nearby and breaks into the conversation before Rachel can reply.
Tian: What did you do now?
Valentine: I didn't do anything. But basically I was just told that if we are still on the pad after this cargo gets unloaded, they're going to have to perform a full search of the ship.
Tian: Why?
Valentine: Cuz there's a notice, an advisory going out to the various planets.
Tian: Oh shite …
Rachel is going through her memories of places she's been and people she's met. While United Reclamation owns the entire planet, they don't control every blessed inch of it. There are pockets on the map where UR's reach doesn't go. She vaguely remembers an independent operation called "Trash Town" about 1000 kliks away. She pulls up a map to verify it—yup! there it is!—and calls Valentine to the bridge. He arrives, she points.
Rachel: Val, honey, could you come over here and look at this map? If that still exists, which it should, it's Trash Town and it's a helluva lot more friendly. If you're runnin' under the radar and they're not company.
Valentine: It's not here, right?
Rachel: It's not here.
Valentine: Then I'm sold. Because we do not want them searching our ship.
Rachel: Searchin'. What's she gonna search the ship for? Didn't you smile at her? You're momma didn't teach you nothin'.
Valentine: I did. I got us out of this without having to give up our cargo and we didn't have to pay—(names her the price)—We didn't have to do that because I smiled.
Tian: (coming up behind) But you offended somebody, cuz …?
Valentine: It wasn't that I offended anybody, well maybe a little bit, but I'll tell you this—.
Tian: Jesus.
Rachel: Your daddy would have gotten us with a night at a hotel.
Vikki: (coming behind Tian) Now, that's not fair.
Tian: Yes it is.
Vikki: No.
Valentine: No, my daddy wouldn't have done that because my daddy is dead. It's really hard to get rooms while you're one of the undead.
Rachel: You got a chip on your shoulder, son. That's all I can say. Work on it. You gotta learn to smile, turn that frown upside down. Smile.
Valentine: The important thing is there's an advisory out about potentially dangerous weaponry or dangerous cargo or dangerous whatever-it-is, so they're gonna search the ship. Basically they want us off this section of Beylix and to be honest, I'm happy to do so. So once the cargo's gone if you could spin us up and head us to Trash Town—
Tian: That sounds inviting.
Valentine: (continuing) As soon as that last pipe is off.
Rachel: (into the comms) Papa! Get ready to spin her up when I give you the signal.
There's no answer. Rachel goes to the railing at the hole in the deck and yells down for him.
No answer.
She and the rest of the crew go down to the engineering deck. Rachel sticks her head in the engine room. Looks. Sees.
No Poco.
She leans over the rail and hails one of the men below offloading the cargo. He squints up at her and scratches his head.
Cargo Hand: Oh, he's not here. A couple of his buddies, I guess, and him went off to have a drink.
Rachel: Oh, we need him to spin the ship up. (looks at Valentine) Don't wanna leave him behind.
Valentine: No, we definitely do not want to do that.
Rachel: (to man below) Thank you, honey! Thanks for lookin' out for him. Could ya move this cargo off a little faster?
Valentine: At this point, we don't need to move it faster. We need Poco to come back before we finish moving it off.
Rachel: No, we're going to find him.
Valentine: Then maybe we can encourage them to move it out a little slower while we're looking.
Rachel: Slower, faster. Faster, slower. You gotta work with that, boy.
Cargo Hand: Yeah, it'll take as much time as it takes.
Rachel: You want me to stand and supervise or do you want me to find—
Valentine: No. Go find him. Thank you.
Rachel: (sighs) At least I know he's got pants on this time …Tink, you wanna come and see if you can help find him? I don't wanna take Tian away from that poor little girl.
Valentine: (to Vikki) Go on.
Vikki: Thanks.
Vikki grabs her bag and makes sure her gun is at the bottom of it. Normally upbeat and optimistic, Vikki's also someone who's grown up on the wrong side of the tracks. She's seen this particular situation played out far too many times to be sanguine about the outcome.
Vikki: You say he's lucky if he has his pants on. I say he's lucky he has his balls. How much you wanna bet that the people he went off to drink with are actually people who want to take it out of his hide?
Rachel: But that's just who he is, honey.
Vikki: (sighs) Not saying that's not who he is. I'm just saying that it's highly unlikely he went with these guys willingly to have a drink, is what I'm saying.
Rachel makes a face at the young woman and keeps on looking for Poco. Vikki's knowledge of the wrong side of the tracks helps their search. The fact that she's the perkiest and purty-ist thing the men hereabouts has seen in months also helps. She's the new young thing in town and they don't get far before there are plenty of offers to have a drink, to sit and not leave for a spell. Rachel and Vikki negotiate through the offers and get a solid lead on Poco's location. Someone tells them that two guys left with Poco heading toward the southeast trash fields.
Rachel: In the fields? Now why would he go off into the fields?
Man: I gotta confess, those two guys didn't look like they were in a good mood.
Rachel: Aw, hell, now I gotta go an' see if we can rescue Poco.
They thank the men and they leave.
Vikki: (wryly) Like that's a surprise. (off Rachel's look) I told you even before we left the ship that this was probably the situation but—(sighs)—sorry.
Rachel: He can take care of himself. (sighs) I reckon we oughta go back.
Vikki: We should go back and tell the Captain first. We're not that far away.
Rachel: Yeahhhh, I got in trouble for not tellin' him stuff before.
Vikki: You know his mantra: The more information he has, the better he can decide.
Rachel: C'mon, Tinkerbell. See if you can keep up.
Rachel may be an old woman but she's got some long legs on her. She covers the ground in a deceptively easy stride. While Vikki's no bitty thing like Tian, she does have to move smartly to keep up. Valentine hasn't moved far from the ramp where the women have left him, keeping his own eye out for the engineer's return.
Valentine: Rachel.
Rachel: It seems Poco's gone for a walk in the trash heaps but not necessarily cuz he wanted to. So we need to go fetch him back.
Valentine casts an eye on the cargo being offloaded. It's pretty much all off. He eyes the status of the hidden weapons. Not as hidden as he'd like—a fair amount of junk and such that had kept them hidden has now been shifted around due to the offloading. Rachel follows his look and latches onto his train of thought.
Rachel: Well, we could see if Tink can spin up the engines and I can get us on out of here and we can come back for him.
Valentine: I'm pretty sure if we come back—
Vikki: There's nothing left to come back to.
Rachel: Yup.
Vikki: I mean, Poco's brilliant, I'll give him that, but he's made a lot of enemies. (to Rachel) You know how you have friends in every port? I think he's got people gunning for him at every port.
Rachel: He needs to be nicer to people.
Valentine takes Rachel and Vikki with him to the infirmary where he asks Tian if she can leave Nuri for a little bit.
Tian: Nuri's all right.
Valentine: Then I need the three of you to go and see if you can find Poco and drag him back here. I'm going to stay here so if the search does happen while you're gone, I might be able to diffuse or derail it. If you come back and there's nobody here, then you'll know I'm in jail and that you'll need to go somewhere else.
Tian: Considering the fact that you've apparently offended somebody, I'm not sure leaving you here alone is a good plan, either.
Rachel merely licks her thumb and smoothes back Valentine's hair.
Rachel: Smile, for once, and be purty for her. Be nice to her.
Valentine: (swatting her hand) I do smile. They were just a little unhappy about us having wasted their super-expensive missiles.
Rachel: No, baby. That girl liked you and you blew her off, didn't ya?
Valentine: I didn't blow her off, I just …
Rachel: You didn't take her advances.
Valentine: I did take her advances, I just—
Tian: You weren't even polite about it.
Valentine: It wasn't that I wasn't polite about it—
Rachel: (pinches Val) She's not a comely girl but give her the come-on. We're gonna leave anyway. Make her think she's gonna get somethin'.
Valentine: Why do I bother talking? (shoos them off) Go!
Vikki: Bye! Good luck! Shine her on! (pecks Val on the cheek) Have good sex!
Most of the workers have quit for the day, leaving the conveyors stopped in their tracks with junk still on them. There's no one to object to the women going where they wish to comb the trash fields, which is not as glamorous as it sounds. It's not all metal trash. There's some nasty stuff there, too. Tian is from the Core and she's picking through the mess as neatly as she possibly can, trying not to get grungy from the activity. Vikki keeps her eye out for Poco but she can't help noticing that she could use that part and that other part over there and oh, that one looks nice …
Vikki: It's like a candy store. The whole planet is like a candy store.
Rachel: Stop. You gotta pay for it.
Vikki: Yeah … (sighs)
Back at the ship, Valentine sits on the cargo ramp in case Poco shows up on his own. Poco doesn't show but four guys in haz-mat suits drive up in an air truck. They park at the ram and climb out, carrying devices that look like very large pricing guns. Valentine stands to greet them. He peers at their faceplates but can't quite make out their features.
Valentine: Gentlemen, or ladies, if there are ladies.
Haz-Mat Suit #1: An## as####
Valentine: Ah, right.
Looks like their faceplates aren't the only things that aren't clear. Their throat mikes are kinda … scratchy. Valentine nods quizzically. The lead man in the suit makes an adjustment and tries again.
Haz-Mat Suit #1: Anything you want to declare before we scan?
Valentine: We have two members of the IRP on board and they have medical equipment that I would prefer you be very cautious with scanning. I don't know how those scans will react with the vaccines. I'll show you where that is and I'll open it up for you so you can see the vaccines. You're welcome to scan the rest of the ship although I would be careful around the engine. It's the source of the Hazardous Waste Notice, so just be cautious. Oh, wait. (points to the deck overhead) Mind the hole.
And Valentine rattles off a long list of things they need to be careful of and cautious around.
Valentine: Over there you're going to want to watch the railing because we've only roped it off. If you go there, you're going to think there's a stair there but there's not. I almost fell down that one…
Valentine gets the impression that this is not the first ship in horrible disrepair that the team has been on, as they pretty much ignore him as they run the scans. He notices that they're getting awfully close to the place we've hidden the stolen weapons. Valentine will need to distract them. Given that the ship is held together by spit and baling wire, he figures that nothing is screwed down tight. Arranging a spontaneous accident wouldn't be hard. He picks a pressure release valve on the fuel tank in the cargo hold and gives it a turn.
Hydrogen starts filling the compartment. Scanners beep an alert.
Valentine: (over the noise) What is that? I'm not familiar with it—
Haz-Mat Suit #1: (to team) Exit the ship immediately.
And not a moment too soon, either. One of the team has his scanner pointed right at the hidden weapons cache and is looking at the readout … but he lowers it and hauls ass out of there when he hears the order to evacuate.
After all, hello! Hydrogen! Ka-BOOM-able!
Valentine stealthily shuts the valve. Lefty-loosey, righty-tighty. He joins the others on the tarmac.
Valentine: Sorry, Gentlemen.
Haz-Mat Suit #1: We'll be back in three hours.
Valentine: Great. Okay.
Valentine sees them off and enters the ship again to throw open all the hatches. Time to air out the house, y'all. He has to work quickly to avoid being overcome by the hydro fumes. Task completed, he takes refuge on the open cargo ramp and sucks down the cleaner air. He's bought Tian, Rachel, and Vikki a little more time to find Poco and lift off.
In the trash yards, the women are still searching for Poco. Vikki muses aloud as she looks.
Vikki: If you're going to torture a refund out of somebody, you've got all this stuff to work with … How about metal shredders or crushers? It's a great place to dispose a body, so why not just beat him up there and toss his body into the machinery and be done with it?
Luckily for Poco, there's no such machinery in the trash yards where they're looking. At one point Rachel steps in something repulsive, making her jump back only to bump into something else equally vile … and she's ready to throw in the towel. Everything's got her on edge now from distaste. There is a silver lining, however—keeping her eyes peeled to avoid the nasty has her looking more closely at everything. As the light falls and darkness descends, she finally spots something in the distance.
It's the beaten unconscious Poco. He's bruised, contused, and pretty much pulped. His face is swollen horribly and one counts it a blessing he's passed out. Rachel lightly slaps his face and when she gets no reaction, she calls the others over. They come running, Tian foremost with her med bag.
Vikki: (sees) Oh no …!
Tian: God … Let me see what we've got here … Jesus...
Vikki: Rachel, did you bring your gun?
Rachel: Yeah. I got it in my boot.
Tian goes into calm collected medic mode as she examines and patches Poco up to move. He's got broken ribs and has been used as a punching bag … for a gorilla. Meanwhile Vikki puts her hand in her bag for her gun and starts looking for a pipe (or something) to use as a club. The younger woman hasn't ruled out the possibility that whoever beat Poco might still be around to finish the job. Rachel isn't as twitchy.
Rachel: I reckon they done gone since.
Vikki: I can rig up a stretcher.
Rachel: Yeah but I gotta ask ya: Can you shoot with both hands?
She mimes holding the stretcher with one hand and shooting with the other, then swaps.
Vikki: I've never done it before but I can try it.
Rachel: Poco's gonna take two of us on the stretcher unless we do a drag stretcher. Two of us can't carry him unless we put him on a dragger.
Vikki: You mean a travois? Sure, I can do that. All I need are two poles and two button-downs …
And she starts unbuttoning her shirt. She buttons the shirt up again on its own, finds two poles and runs them through the torso and long sleeves of her buttoned up shirt. Rachel sees where Vikki's going with this and gives the woman her shirt as well. The shirts make a hammock between the poles and they get Poco into it. They decide to carry it instead of dragging it to spare Poco further injury. Tian's a tiny woman, five feet if she's an inch, but Vikki and Rachel are of a height and taller. They take the stretcher and Tian takes point with a gun. Somehow, they get Poco back to the ship. They find Valentine waiting for them on the ramp.
Tian: Why are you sitting outside?
Valentine: I think I got all the hydrogen out of the ship—
Tian: What?!
Valentine: But you might want to carefully smell as you make your way to wherever you're going inside.
Vikki: And you left Nuri inside with all the hydro?!
Valentine: No, it's all been vented.
Rachel: Val, honey, you know that hydro ain't got not smell.
Valentine: Yes, it does. It has additives. So, they're coming back … (checks watch) … in 35 minutes. Get on board. It doesn't look like he's going to spin us up. (to Vikki) So you spin us up. We're going to move soon because they definitely had an eye on our cargo.
And you can definitely hear the air quotes on "cargo". Rachel pats the cargo ramp frame.
Rachel: Do you think this thing's gonna spark when you close up?
Vikki: We'll find out. It's been how long?
Valentine: Two hours, twenty five minutes.
Vikki: Hydrogen's a lighter gas than oxy … (heading for the engine room) … It'll be in the top part of the ship anyway even if it's still on board. The engines are in the lower sections so yeah, they should be fine ….
Valentine: (at Vikki) … Thank you.
Rachel: (at Valentine) Here, take the other end of this and hit that button so I can go up to the bridge.
She hands him her half of the stretcher and climbs for the upper decks right behind Vikki.
Rachel: (calling down) At least the lift works.
It does, but at the expense of the shipboard AC. It's hot work muscling the stretcher to the lift and then riding it up two decks to the infirmary. Thanks to Nuri's presence in med bay, conditions there are crowded. Valentine exits to give Tian the room she needs to work. He dashes off a quick note on paper, apologizing that he has to take off so quickly, but urgent business has called him elsewhere … He sticks it in an envelope and puts it in the message drop on the landing pad for her to find.
Rachel climbs onto the bridge.
Rachel: It's damned hot in here. Mortimer, where the hell ar'ya?
Marines! We are leaving!
Vikki manages to figure out how to spin up the engines and they come right up, pretty as you please. Valentine comms her from the copilot seat.
Valentine: Thank you, Vikki!
Vikki: Welcome … !
Rachel: (to Traffic Contro) This is Delilah, we're taking off, blah-blah-blah, thank you.
And she lifts the ship off the pad smooth as silk. No one chases us or shoots at us as we leave. That's a mercy.
It's a quick and uneventful trip to Trash Town. On approach, we can see it's like a smaller version of the UR installation we left behind, albeit it's all on the ground. There are piles of sorted trash with roads through them and a handful of buildings in a rough circle around a bare patch of dirt, forming a town square of sorts. It's too small to land our ship in but we can see there's a larger cleared space a little removed from the settlement. A small ship, possibly a shuttle or some such, is already parked to one side of the make-shift landing pad. Valentine peers out of the bridge windows at the scene.
Valentine: So you've been here before?
Rachel: Oh yeah. Been a while.
Valentine: I'm reasonably certain that my dad's either helped somebody or owes somebody. There's no inbetween with him.
Rachel: I don't remember. It was last year, or the year before last, or the year before the year before last ...?
Valentine: Okay, now you're starting to get into the year before the year before the year before last.
Rachel: It might have been the year before the year before the year before last.
Valentine: There's got to be a shorthand way to say that—oh yeah, four years ago.
Rachel: Whatever. Now did you not give that nice woman a—
Valentine: Yes, I didn't.
Rachel: Yeah, cuz you don't know how to work around women. What's wrong with you, Boy? I cannot believe you went off and—Get the hell off'a my bridge.
Valentine: But I left a very nice apology note.
Rachel: Oh. You did?
Valentine: I did, yes.
Rachel: Oh, okay, then I won't kick you out off the bridge then.
Valentine: Remind me to leave a little wine in your cabin.
Rachel: Aww …
She might need it, too, after landing. It's full night outside and that landing pad isn't what you'd call well lit. It's barely lit at all.
Valentine: I'll lean out the window and hold the flashlight.
Rachel: (laughing) It might help.
Valentine: At least we have one that works.
Rachel: It's more than what I'm getting' off our bottom lights.
Valentine: Should be fun.
He actually leaves to find a flashlight but by the time he comes back, Rachel's set our girl down nice as you please. The flames off our engines do a good job of lighting the pad up as well as melting the closest bits of trash.
Oops.
Welcome to Trash Town, y'all. In fact, we can see on one of the nearer warehouses that someone's actually taken a torch to the metal siding and burned the name "Trash Town" into it. Rachel sees it and sighs happily.
Rachel: Much more friendly. Better bar.
In fact, music and assorted sounds from the local bar, the Qīngdǎo (roughly translated: "The Dump"), drifts through the night air.
Valentine checks on Tian in sickbay and tells her we've landed. As for the matter of dirtside liberty …
Valentine: Do you want to bring your patient?
Tian: I'm sorry?
Valentine: Do you want to bring your patient? (off her look) How old is she?
Tian: (groks now!) She's sixteen.
Valentine: It's close. This is more of a Can-we-trust-her-to-go-and-see-the-experience rather than Can-she-hold-her-liquor matter.
Tian: Yeah, I don't think she should be drinking.
Vikki: (butting in) Can she even walk?
Tian: (annoyed) Yes.
Vikki: Okay … (ducking) … Sorry.
Valentine: I think she'd might like to see it.
Tian: Jesus God …
Valentine: Why don't we ask her?
They ask Nuri, who's shifted to one of the crew bunks to make room for Poco. She's definitely interested.
Nuri: I've never been to another planet before.
Valentine: This world's not the most impressive-looking planet, mind you. It's basically a big trash heap. But we're gonna go to the bar and look around and if you want to come and see …?
Nuri: Okay. (to Tian) If it's all right?
Tian: It's perfectly fine if that's what you want to do.
Rachel: Yeah, baby. It's fine. C'mon.
Tian: I would recommend that you turn down offers of drinks from anyone besides the crew who makes the offer.
Valentine: (to the crew) And none of you offer a drink.
Tian: It can lead to … (how to put this?) … um.
Nuri: Oh, I know what the effects of alcohol are.
Tian: I'm more concerned about the effects of you. You're quite lovely. And I'm pretty sure they haven't seen a pretty girl in a while.
Nuri blushes.
Nuri: You think I should wear the hijab here?
Tian: That will be your choice. It's not something I would in any way ask you to do. That is your choice, it is your faith.
Nuri: I should.
Tian: In my opinion, in any situation where you are uncertain of the reception you will receive, modesty cannot hurt.
Nuri: Okay.
She does and makes ready to go. Poco is not going anywhere. Rachel fetches a beer to sit ready at Poco's bedside when he wakes.
As they go to the bar, Valentine is aware of the fact that Rachel's been everywhere and knows a lot of people. And that a lot of people would know her and the ship she flies. Would it cause trouble for them? Would it net them a job? They confer about it quietly as they walk toward the lights and music of the bar. Rachel mulls the prospects for trouble and jobs over.
Valentine: I hope we get a job. We're low on funds. I had to spend it all to get us fueled.
Rachel: I'll see what I can do.
Valentine: It doesn't have to be much. Just keep an eye out.
Rachel: I don't know if necessarily Trash Town will have any jobs but I'll ask.
Valentine: Maybe somebody owes Dad a favor ...
The Qīngdǎo is quite the place. Not only is it the bar but it's a grocery and a secondhand store, with a feed store tacked on at the side. So there's food and drink for man and beast, there's trinkets and needful things for sale. It's one large building run by a little old lady. She welcomes them when they enter. There's a fair sized crowd of 45 or so, drinking and playing cards and hanging out.
Valentine buys the crew a round from the bar, minus Nuri, for whom he buys something non-alcoholic. After the crew settles at a table, a man comes in. Decked out in a straw hat, he's old, tall, and pale with a long beard. He looks like an Amish farmer and he looks angry. He's obviously looking for someone, scanning the crowd and seething. In fact, he looks like he's here to kill somebody.
Farmer: Where is he? Where's Quick?
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