Episode 408: Resin, Part Six
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Wednesday, 16 Jul 2521
Joshua doesn’t waste time but gets right to the point.
Joshua: Look, we’ve proven that we’re not planning to stab you in the back the first instance we get. It would be nice if you could clue us in on what’s going on so we don’t feel like we’re gonna get shot in the back the minute all this is done.
And at that point, Joshua Reads Schweiss.
Dr. Schweiss: I don’t do that. I don’t stab people in the back.
He seems offended. Joshua Reads that Schweiss pretty serious and considers himself better than the sort of people who would shoot us in the back. In fact, Schweiss sees himself as more like a Robin Hood figure than a criminal ... except that he’s giving to himself, instead of the poor. Schweiss worked selflessly for a giant organization and got kicked to the curb by the Quarantine and subsequent Alliance pull-out. He’s understandably angry, feeling that he’d been cheated of his retirement and that his loyalty and skills disparaged. In his view, he’s doing something unexpected in a normally cutthroat world by letting us live after he’s done here. After all, anybody else in his position would just kill us after everything’s finished. He actually takes some pride in knowing we think he’s going to kill us—in fact, Joshua gets an image from the man wherein he has us lined up and orders us to turn around, and when we do with the full expectation of being executed, he’s going to slip away and leave us standing there. At the same time, Joshua senses a possible willingness to commit violence if provoked. So Schweiss isn’t a pacifist who’s bluffing, but basically someone who’s honest about doing what he has to do.
Joshua shuts down the Read.
Joshua: All right. Well, I think we’re going well as far as the work goes.
Dr. Schweiss: It is. I’ve just had some concerns about making sure that there’s enough to cover all the—My men have been making more demands recently than I was expecting. I may have to stretch this longer and take greater risks.
Joshua: I can talk to them, see if I convince them that—I mean, what are they getting? 5% ? 10%? 2%?
Dr. Schweiss: They’re each getting 10.
Joshua: Yeah, so I figure you’ve got … how much have you got now? 100,000 worth? 200,000?
Dr. Schweiss: Something like that.
Joshua: I could tell them I took a look at it, you talked to me to reassure me because I’m a disinterested third party and I can tell them that hey, look, their cut is going to be substantial. That it’s more credits than I’ve ever seen in my entire life, to be sure. I’ll see if I can get them working on board with this. Cuz like I said, all I want to do is get us out of here in time for us to get our pay.
Dr. Schweiss: It’s understandable. People start distrusting everyone and I want them to feel they can count on me and somehow they’ve got the feeling I’m going to betray them or something. See, this is where these things go wrong. There’s always somebody who gets greedy and decides to go crazy. I’ve seen it before on all the vids. This is what happens.
What? Vids? He’s making his game plan based on adventure vids? Seriously? Joshua sees an opening he can exploit.
Joshua: I know it. You’re exactly right.
Dr. Schweiss: I thought I had a stable group here.
Joshua: But in every one of those vids, happens is the leader goes out each of them individually, talking to them, letting them know what’s going on. You’ve been a little bit too far back from them. You gotta get in there and let them know that you’re just one of them and their share is as important to you as your share, as important as everything else. And I know you can do that, because you got that leadership quality about you. Seriously, you can do that and everybody can get out of here smoothly. They’ll get what they want, you’ll get what you want, and we get what we want. A win-win … -win ...-win. At least five wins out of that one.
Schweiss seems somewhat flattered by Joshua’s, well, flattery, and Joshua leaves him on that high note. Over the next few days Joshua goes around to the other men and talk to them on breaks, calming them back down from their near-mutiny. And while he’s doing that, Kiera approaches Schweiss in the mess hall to ask him a question.
Kiera: So, have you thought about it?
Dr. Schweiss: Thought about what?
Kiera: The fact that you’ve got a long-term investment. Not just the one-time small gain, but the long term.
Dr. Schweiss: (warily) How would this work? I mean, they own the land. How do we convince them that it’s—how would that work? Explain that to me.
Kiera: It’s very simple. We go back and tell them it’s completely worthless.
Dr. Schweiss: And how do you convince them of that?
Kiera: We do that. You’re all dead. Heck, we could find you, half-insane. Swearing it’s worthless. Infected. Reavers. Whatever you want to do, we take you back. You’re the scientist. You’re the expert sent up here. Meanwhile, I can contact a few people. They aren’t going to want to hold onto it. You can’t timber it, that’s all they want from it.
Meaning Burnham Corp.
Kiera: Burnham wants the timber. If they can’t have the timber, what good is this land? It will have obviously driven you mad.
Dr. Schweiss: Right.
Kiera: We bring you back and say you’re the only survivor of whatever disease you feel like sayin’. They’re not gonna think it’s worth keepin’. They can’t timber it. The trees are half rotted. It ain’t gonna do them no good. They’re gon’ put it up. Get a disinterested third party to pick it up—
Dr. Schweiss: So you’re saying—why do you have to go back for this? I’m not a very good actor.
Kiera: Well, fine. You can stay here.
Dr. Schweiss: Okay, so you’re saying the Prion disease got the locals, got us.
Kiera: It got all’a you. It was horrible. The trees are worthless …
Schweiss looks over at Daryl and asks him a question.
Dr. Schweiss: Was there enough time for the Prion disease to get at us?
Daryl: Maybe.
Dr. Schweiss: So Prion disease got us.
Kiera: Well the truth is, we could’a shot you anyway when you tried to attack us.
Oh no, not another convoluted scenario. Schweiss nails it down to the Prion disease/abandoned camp idea. All we would need to do is present proof that the camp is untenable for industry because of it Schweiss says he can provide proof for that. De’d been cultivating Prions for … well, he didn’t mention what for because Kiera jumps on the statement before he can finish it.
Kiera: See? You’ve been cultivatin’ it. The land will not be valuable to them. And they will be willing to let it go cheap. Then we bring you back in under better circumstances so you’re not inhalin’ 5 tons of this stuff. You’ve got primary claim on it, we’re willing to negotiate on it.
Dr. Schweiss: This is the part where I’m getting confused. You say you go back. You buying it? You have money to buy all this?
Kiera: No. But I know people who do.
Dr. Schweiss: So how is it that I end up getting all this?
Kiera: You’d have to be hired, of course.
A long pause. Then:
Dr. Schweiss: I’d be hired by…?
Kiera: Whatever corporation that was created to own this little parcel of land.
Dr. Schweiss: Now, see this is where I’m getting confused—.
Kiera: Now see you kinda me stuck because I don’t have the cotillions of lawyers cuz I can’t talk to anybody cuz you got me held hostage doin’ piddly bits of diggin’in hope you will make what? A hundred thousand credits?
Dr. Schweiss: That’s a lot of money.
Kiera: (snorts) Oh. Yeah. That will take you so far. I’m sorry. I’m used to dealin’ with bigger amounts.
Dr. Schweiss doesn’t bite. He sends us all back to work. Kiera grumbles that she was hoping to make him believe she could net him more profit going her way than his. She asks Joshua if he wants to work on Schweiss some more and Joshua tells her that to argue a man like Schweiss to agree with any plan, you have to show him concrete figures—not vague hints of money he doesn’t have or people offering to bail him out that he hasn’t met.
Kiera: (fed up) All right, Joshua, what do you want me to do? Write down company names? Give him a contract? I don’t have it. He’s not lettin’ us on the ship—
Joshua: I get it. I get it. I do. What I’m saying is the hundred thousand in hand is more money than he’s ever seen.
Nika: It’s more money than I can imagine.
Joshua: The twenty-five credits in-ship, in my pocket is the most money I’ve ever had. So you can see how telling him to ignore that hundred-thousand—my suggestion is to leave it be. I think he’s going to let us go after it’s all said and done. He’ll take off with his money.
Nika: (to Kiera) We’re not gonna say Word One about what was goin’ on up here but say we checked the whole area and say it’s clear. So if you contact someone and say, Hey, why don’t you buy this parcel of land, that’s on you. That’s nothing to do with us.
And really, there’s no need to lie about Prion disease or Reavers. We could just say it looked like the locals were using the property to distill alcohol. If Kiera had to buy the camp outright from Burnham Corp, she’d still turn a tidy profit regardless.
So that’s the plan. We’ll work for Schweiss until he’s ready to leave. Kiera’s still not convinced we can trust him to let us go, much less live, afterward. Joshua tells her that it wouldn’t hurt to play Schweiss up a bit, that he sees himself as a sort of modern-day Robin Hood and better than everybody.
Kiera agrees, though it kills her to sit on this. She can smell money, lots and lots of money to be made. And made by her. And she can’t do a damned thing about it. Just kills her. But she agrees to go along with the plan.
Nika declares she wants to get into the dropship. There’s a message waiting for us on our dropship and she has no idea who it’s from, but it would be real nice to know who it’s from. It’s the message Kiera spotted when she was captured. Nika also declares Schweiss is not going to let her on the ship because the risk of her taking off in it is too great. He’d never go for it. We have no choice but to stick to our non-plan of cooperating with the doctor and getting him what he needs.
The days pass. We get more cuts and scrapes from the lumberjacking, minor injuries that aren’t threatening but nonetheless cumulatively wear us down. Working in the cold and wet exacts its toll as well and we burn nearly as many calories staying warm as we do working. The food we’re given is good but there never seems enough to keep us warm, to keep us at top form. By the end of the working day we’re exhausted and numb and drop into our crude bunks to sleep like the dead, until we’re rousted the following morning to face the grind all over again.
Wednesday, 23 Jul 2521
Ten days after we’re captured we get the abrupt word to drop what we’re doing and come down off the mountain for the camp. We gratefully leave the chainsaws where we stand and shlep on down. Arden’s ears pick up the sound of what he thinks are ship’s engines through the muted roar of the rain hitting the canopy overhead. He passes the word to the rest of us.
Nika: Is it our ship or somebody else’s?
Arden: Couldn’t tell.
As we approach the camp we see that there is a relatively small ship—about 300 tons—parked on the ground past the bunk house toward the entrance gates. We see a man standing on the dirt near the ship, talking to the doctor. Arden’s nose for trouble gives him a twitch. He can’t quite be sure but he’s getting the sense that both the men downslope aren’t on the same page. Arden gives Nika a surreptitious nudge.
Arden: Something may be up. Be wary.
Nika: Wondrous.
Over our last ten days, we’d become somewhat more relaxed with our guards. By now they’re more like coworkers than our jailers, albeit coworkers who are carrying guns, and as we approach the central buildings upslope of the new ship, Joshua asks them what’s going on.
Joshua: What’s the deal?
Guard: We think it’s time to bugger out.
Joshua: So … you’re going to let us get onto our ship and bugger off?
Guard: I guess. That’s his plan.
Joshua: All right. Well, cool.
Because we really want to get out of the rain and if we never chop down another tree, it would be too soon. We round the corner of the last building and we can immediately see that something’s wrong. Kiera quietly suggests we get on our dropship and leave while the others are engaged in whatever is going on. We begin to mosey in that direction and the guards have no problem with it. As far as they’re concerned, our job here is done and we are free to go.
Beauty. Let’s book.
We bid them well and make tracks for Lagniappe. Nika takes the rear of our group, keeping an eye on what’s happening behind us with Schweiss and his contact. Joshua flanks her and does the same. The last thing he wants is for either of the two men down below to look up, spy us, and take exception to what we’re doing. He preps a friendly farewell and is ready to wave: thanks for everything, no hard feelings, see you later.
The stranger down below gestures for the rest of the men to move in closer. When he does, we get a glimpse of Schweiss’s expression and we go on alert: it is ashen and nervous. It looks like there’s a double cross going down, just as we’d feared it would. Kiera holds off saying “I told you so”—but only just. Arden asks the rest of us if we’re going to help Schweiss and at first it’s nearly a unanimous ‘no’. Joshua determines the man below does not have blue gloves, but that doesn’t mean the man isn’t dangerous. There’s also no telling how many people are waiting, possibly armed to the teeth, aboard that 300-tonner. Joshua intones we should go, just go. Now. Rina seconds him.
Rina picks up her pace to get aboard to warm the engines and to type in the password to release the flight controls. Arden and Kiera follow her aboard and Nika and Joshua slow their steps to keep an eye on what is going on behind them.
And it’s a good thing, too, because out of the corner of her eye, Nika sees the stranger draw his gun and shoot one of Schweiss’s men in cold blood, not a foot away from the doctor.
Oh, shite! Move. MOVE!
Nika grabs Joshua by the shoulder and hauls the both of them for Lagniappe. Kiera’s grabbing her gun. Nika gets our dropship warmed up for take-off and then dithers. Stay and help Schweiss? Because that’s the good guy thing to do. Or get the hell out? Joshua’s been trying to avoid a firefight for the past 11 days. He’s urging Nika to go. Kiera’s all for shooting something. Rina’s not sure what we can shoot them with, suggesting we dust everyone down with our backwash. Arden points out we have two assault rifles and Kiera’s big-assed shotgun. Right here in the gun lockers. See?
And he breaks out the party favors.
Nika: (drawling, now) If ya wanna hang out the drop ship and start shootin’, knock yerself out.
Kiera: That would be fine.
It occurs to Joshua he can do that using the abseiling suits in the lockers. Oh my God! Yeah! It would be awesome—sailing along on wires, shooting … erm. Well, wait. Not so much with the shooting. But the sailing along part sounds pretty awesome.
We realize that if we leave, Schweiss and his crew are dead as doornails. One of his men has already been shot point blank. They may have imprisoned us, forced us to hard labor, but they didn’t kill us at the end when they had very little reason to let us live. We can’t fly off and leave them to die.
Nika spins the engines down and hauls out of the pilot’s chair. We grab guns and go to Schweiss’s defense.
Nika: Joshua.
Joshua: (on it) I’m flying the ship.
Nika: Yup.
He parks his butt in the chair and readies Lagniappe to fly at a second’s notice. Rina’s aft with the engines to keep everything running smoothly. The rest of us scramble out of the drop ship and advance on the shooters. The shooters aren’t having it easy—after the first shot, everyone else scrambled for cover. By the time we get our feet on the ground, most have scattered into the cover of the buildings and bullets are flying.
On the bridge, Joshua hits a button and the message that was waiting for us plays, an announcer’s voice booming over the speakers.
Announcer: Feeling stressed? You need a robot servant to help you through your time—
Outside, the bullets are still flying and Nika ducks and runs and shoots—not backing down now, nope. Arden and Kiera are also somewhere in that mess, shooting and getting shot at.
On the bridge, Joshua listens to the entire junk message and thinks, you know? They’re right. He really could use a robot servant.
Announcer: Robodyne. We don’t have souls but we can soothe yours.
Joshua: How much does a robot servant cost?
Announcer: Purchase available on lay-a-way.
In the firefight, Kiera finally gets a shot off with her big assed shotgun and its booming roar—plus the damage it deals out—gets everyone’s attention. The shooters were certainly not expecting that level of resistance. In the stunned silence that follows, Nika yells to Schweiss to get clear! Schweiss is stunned bur miraculously unharmed by all the lead that had been flying. And as we run closer to his position, we hear the engines of the shooters’ ship spinning up. It lifts off and we let it go, having accomplished what we stayed for: getting Schweiss out of the firefight.
For his part Schweiss looks stunned and confused and small wonder. He was nearly gunned down by someone he believed was operating in good faith. He quickly pulls himself together and starts working to save the gravely wounded.
Kiera: So was that your friend?
Meaning the shooter who just flew on out of here. Schweiss is a too busy tending the wounded to answer. Nika tells Schweiss and his men that if they had any plans of getting out of here, now would be a good time.
Dr. Schweiss: But they have our … (gestures aloft: the other ship)
Arden: They have it?
Nika: It sucks to be you. Let’s go. Cuz they’re gonna come back and finish the job if you don’t get out of here.
While Nika’s convincing Schweiss to evac, the rest of the crew goes back to the bunkhouse and gathers up personal effects left behind in the rush to go. Rina gets her usual suspects back from the guards and kitted out in her vest and gun, with her pockets rattling with her tools, she feels like herself again.
As far as Schweiss and his men go, the shooters cleaned them out of the processed resin, leaving Schweiss with nothing to show for all the back breaking work. To say nothing of a shot-up crew. He is understandably upset over this turn of events.
Kiera: Dr. Schweiss, who was that?
Dr. Schweiss: I thought it was my partner.
Kiera: Yeah, but give me a name.
Dr. Schweiss: He, ah … is he someone you know?
Kiera: I might know. So far, your plan—this plan we talked about, obviously didn’t work.
Schweiss gives her a name which she doesn’t recognize. Not that it stops her mouth, no. While she’s not so subtly saying “I told you so” to the doctor, the rest of us are getting Schweiss’s four remaining crew aboard our dropship, two of whom are injured. We lay them prone in the rear cargo platform. They don’t have much in the way of effects to evac with them so getting everyone ready to leave doesn’t take long.
The flight back is subdued. The two doctors on board are sweating over the injured. Schweiss is still trying to make sense of how it all went wrong so quickly. As we approach Brisbane he stirs and asks us what we’re going to do with him.
Dr. Schweiss: So … you going to turn us over to the Sherrif?
Nika: What the hell for?
Dr. Schweiss: We did kidnap you and—
Nika: (eyeroll) Whatever.
Arden: (from the rear) The story in my opinion should be that some crazy survivalists up in the hills took us all hostage and we all just barely managed to escape.
Nika: Sounds like a plan to me.
And we’re still inside the two week deadline with Jarvis. There’s going to be money coming to us at the end of this, at least. It’s not a suitcase full of credits, but it’s something. Nika suggests to Schweiss that he negotiate with Burnham Corp a finder’s fee for discovering the resin. He could claim that he discovered it during his expedition and that he wants 25% for finders fee and a lab installed on site so he can study it. Schweiss gets to remain employed, he continues to get paid and he gets to make more of the resin. Meanwhile Burhnam Corp gets its camp back and not some worthless land with unharvestable trees, neither.
What’s not to like?
We end up helping Schweiss with his negotiations with Jarvis. Joshua and Kiera lend their considerable talents on Schweiss’s behalf, netting him a contract that stipulates his pay, his equipment, his percentage. Joshua periodically puts his hand on Jarvis’s shoulder, nodding as he follows the other man’s words—uh-huh, mm-hmm—and Reading him and subtly signaling Kiera of Jarvis’s intent.
At the end, there’s a handshake and a contract. Schweiss is set up at the camp with the shiny, extracting resin. We’re given 1000 credits’ worth in PDF scrip. 10% is taken off the top and divided equally amongst the crew for 20 credits each, Kiera included. We sock the scrip away and make tentative plans to find cargo for Boros so as to exchange the scrip into platinum or credits we can use.
Joshua goes to the Captain about purchasing the robot assistant. It’s expensive and there are payments and we’ll be in hock and …. Nika cuts an eyeroll and tells us she wants to know who sent that message and where it came from.
Rina: It’s from Rick.
Nika: We all know Rick is dead.
Rina: Then show me his body.
Nika: You know what? I’m not gonna let you make me hope. I’m not gonna let you do that.
Rina: Fair enough.
Kiera: Who’s Rick?
And that’s how our adventure on Meridian comes to a close.
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