A Greater Interest: Samair in Argos: Book 4 (35 page)

              Tamara raised an eyebrow.  “Soon?  And what exactly do you think it is that the Councilor is going to be needing?”

              “I’ve told you before,” he said with exaggerated patience, though clearly his was coming to an end.  “I’m going to need the suite, actually possibly another as well for conferences.  We’re going to need daily access to at least one of the conference rooms.”

              She crossed her arms over her chest.  “Now you’re getting ridiculous.  This isn’t a hotel.  I’m more than willing to accommodate some of these requests, but you can’t have two of the three suites.  You can have one.  I want to keep two available in case they’re needed.”

              “But they are needed,
Captain
Samair,” he said, his tone slightly condescending.  “You need to make it available for official business for the councilor.”

              “I’ll discuss it with Ms. Moreetz, my Operations manager for the mine.  Which brings me to my other point,” she said, giving the man a stern look.  “I’m not giving you or your councilor anything.  You’re going to pay for everything that Councilor Hroth uses.”  She held up a hand.  “I’m not saying it has to come out of anyone’s pocket directly, but I want payment vouchers or payment directly from government accounts to cover these expenses.”

              The man spluttered.  “But that’s ridiculous!  This is a member of the administratory council and her staff!  You can’t expect them to pay like transient crewmembers coming aboard the station for liberty.”  He was beyond offended at the very thought.  “I am not going back to the Councilor with that, an invoice by the stars.”

              Tamara shrugged then.  “I see.  Well, if that’s your final answer, then you, your Councilor and all of her staff can stay aboard the ships she’s going to be riding out here and she can conduct any and all business from there.”  She spun on her heel and walked to the hatch, ignoring his gasp and halting stutters.

              “Wait, that’s it?  No negotiations, just ‘pay up or ship out?’” he demanded.  “That’s outrageous!  Everything is subject to negotiations.”

              She turned back.  “No, sir, I’m sorry.  Not this time.  This is not a government installation, it’s a civilian one owned by a civilian corporation.  The government is currently our largest client and that does buy you a measure of good will and even favors that I wouldn’t normally allow, but that doesn’t mean you can just decide that you’re going to overrun the facilities here because you think you are entitled.  So,
if
you want the accommodations, fine, but you
will
pay for them.”

              He stared at her, flabbergasted.  “I’ll have to discuss this with Councilor Hroth before I can commit to any kind of payment arrangement.”

              Tamara nodded.  “Of course.  This is why she sent you out here, after all.  To iron out all the details before her august presence arrives.”

              Several moments later, Tamara was in one of the small offices and Magnus’s porcine visage appeared on her HUD.  “Was that wise, Samair?”

              She sighed, setting down her stylus.  “I don’t know.  Probably not.  But I want it understood up front that the council does not own this facility and pissing me off is only going to get me to dig in my heels.”

              He grunted, nodding.  “If you annoy them too many times, though, they may just decide that this whole station, the company, everything needs to be away from people like you and just take it.”

              “Just take it?  Steal company property?  For doing things they should be doing in the first place, like paying for a room they intend using?”  She scoffed.  Then after a moment, she sobered.  “I’ll try and tone it down a bit, but that little prick just made me so
angry
!  And it feels as though they keep sending just the biggest assholes out here to deal with me, as though they’re going to wear me down, or their incredible charm is going to magically make me change my mind or my ways.”

              “All I ask, Samair,” Magnus went on, “Is that you don’t get things too difficult out here.  I don’t want to have to be breaking up fights on my nice orderly station.”

              She smiled.  “I’ll try, Magnus.  And despite appearances, I don’t want to be starting fights either.  But they just keep pushing me.”

              He nodded again.  “Oh, I have some good news for you.”

              Tamara gave him a grimace.  “I could use some right now.  But this better not be another joke.”

              “
Mondragon
is back.”

              She brightened.  “Now that is good news.”

              “We’re approaching the gas giant, Captain,” the sensor officer reported.  “There’s a
lot
of activity going on in nearby space and in orbit.”

              “Yes, I see that,” Leicasitaj answered, his facial tentacles twitching.  “Is that debris?”

              “Yes, sir,” the officer replied.  “Though I’m seeing several tugs trying to police it up.  There’s a large collection of it out of the way on a different orbital track than a lot of the construction.  I think that the company is putting it there to move it to the new industrial that I’m seeing in orbit.”

              “Commander Samair built another furnace?” he asked, impressed.  Then he stopped.  “Wait, where are the defense ships?  I’m seeing the new destroyer there, but where are the corvettes?  I don’t see any of them.  And are those government ships there?” he asked, pointing at the display.

              “Yes, sir, they are: the Navy destroyer
Curroth
and two of their corvettes.”  The sensor watch checked his displays, pressing a few keys.  “I’m showing no signs of any of the FP defense corvettes, sir.”

              “What in the name of the hell happened here?” Leicasitaj demanded.  “We’re gone for less than three months and everything goes all crazy.  Why would the company move all the defense ships and bring in Navy vessels?”

              “Actually sir,” the sensor watch said, swallowing hard.  “The company didn’t move the defender ships.  That cloud of debris contains remnants of at least two different ships, the
Eridain
and the
Cavalier
.”  She brought up two different images of debris, one of them showing torn hull fragments, one of which had the letters
RIDAI
printed on them, though it was clear that there were missing letters on either side.

              The Romigani slumped back into the command seat.  His head was spinning.  “What the hell happened?” he whispered.  Then his resolve seemed to return.  “Comms, see if you can get Commander Samair on the line.  We need to find out the situation.”

              A moment passed while the comms watch contacted the the various ships and finally the Kutok mine, until finally the watch stander turned back to him.  “I’ve got Ms. Samair, Captain.”

              Leicasitaj pushed a control on the arm of his chair, bringing up a display.  “Commander Samair.”

              “Captain, I have to say it is very good to see you and your ship back here,” Tamara replied, looking relieved.  “But where is the rest of the delegation?  Was there a fight?  The station’s sensor net is not showing any damage to your ship.”

              He waved one hand.  “No ma’am, the Councilors just sent me on ahead to report.  Oh, they’re working out some sort of trade deal with the government of Ulla-tran wherein First Principles will sell them a huge load of fuel.  So when you can get Captain Eamonn and
Grania Estelle
out here to tank up, we’ve got a buyer.  I’m sending you the contract with the Ulla-tran government.”  He pressed a control, sending the data packet.  “Councilors Chakrabarti and Kly wanted to make sure that you got them.”

              Tamara smiled wryly, though it was clear from his still somewhat limited understanding of human facial expressions that the woman was both amused and shocked to hear what he’d said.  “Well, it seems I anticipated the request. 
Grania Estelle
left here four days ago on route to Ulla-tran.  I’m surprised you didn’t see them.”

              “We must have just missed them before they jumped to hyperspace, ma’am,” Leicasitaj said with a shrug.

              “Mmm.  But I have to say that I am shocked to hear that Councilor Kly had anything to do with getting a business contract for First Principles.  He hates my guts.”

              Leicasitaj gave a watery chuckle.  “He’s not too fond of me either, ma’am.  Made me turn over the gadolinium shipment we brought.”

              Tamara froze, her face growing dark with anger.  “And I’m
sure
that he didn’t make any repayment for the large amount of the gadolinium I had you bring along.”  When the Romigani didn’t immediately respond, she cursed.  “I don’t know what I was thinking, letting you bring that much with you.”

              “You were trying to build bridges between the two systems, Ma’am,” Leicasitaj said, though it wounded lame even to his ears.

              “Ha!” she barked humorlessly.  “You’d think so, wouldn’t you?  So I suppose the Council members just appropriated my gadolinium, they’re lauded as heroes and I’m out a ton of credits.”  She took a moment to get herself under control.  Then she looked off to the side, out of pickup range.  “All right, this contract looks okay, price is a little lower than I would have liked, but it’s still good.  Vincent doesn’t know about it, of course, since he’s already jumped for Ulla-tran, but he’s a big boy and he’s got Stella and Ardeth to back him up.  Should make a decent profit on this run.  Hopefully he’ll be able to bring back things of equal value or at least some goods so the holds won’t be totally empty on the way back.”  Tamara paused.  “And why do they want our fuel again?  Not that I’m complaining.”

              “There was some civil unrest,” the captain of the warship explained.  “Apparently the fuel baron decided he didn’t like being excluded from the trade negotiations and released a lot of political blackmail onto the communications net.  The politicians wouldn’t stand for this, so he cut off their fuel.  So they sent in ships to deal with it, but when
Mondragon
left the system, they’d lost a good number of their fuel collectors, so they need the He3 we’ve got.”

              Tamara nodded.  “That’s only good for us.  Hopefully we’ll be able to maintain this gig for a while.  A nice regular trade in He3 fuel would do wonders for our accounts.”  She looked away, thoughtfully.  “What does Ulla-tran have that we want that might fill up the
Grania Estelle
for return trips?”

              He gave a gurgle, his race’s equivalent of clearing his throat.  “Ma’am, perhaps that is something for a later meeting?”

              Tamara chuckled.  “Yes, of course, Captain.  Bring your ship in, we’ll have a full debrief.  I’m sure your crew could use some time off the ship.”

              “Yes, ma’am, they certainly could,” he agreed.  “We weren’t allowed off the ship.  We were stuck on board the ship performing patrol duties.  Useless ones, as my tactical officer pointed out.”

              “I can’t imagine Colonel Gants was thrilled having you with his task force, despite your orders to follow him,” Tamara pointed out.

              “No, ma’am, neither he nor any of the councilors were truly happy to see
Mondragon
, despite the slight increase in firepower we brought.”  He grunted.  “Though truth be told, the Colonel seemed to resent our presence altoghether.  He deliberately kept us away from the planet, other ships, basically anything that might have caused… what’s that human word?  A ruckus.  Yes, anything that might have caused the slightest disruption to the mission, we were kept away from it.”  His voice held more than a touch of bitterness.  “Oh, but our… orders specified that we also stay close enough that we maintained easy communications contact.”

              “I can’t say that’s really a surprise, Captain,” she said with a sigh.  She waved a hand.  “It was probably a mistake sending your ship along with the trade delegation.  Obviously my thoughts of showing the leaders of Ulla-tran that there was more than one significant player in this system backfired, really only succeeded in pissing off our own illustrious leaders.”  Tamara shook her head.  “Right, like I said before, you can give me a full brief.  Bring your ship in to the new tank farm, Captain.  I’ll get shuttles sent up for resupply and if you like, to have some of your crew come to the mine for leave.”

              “Thank you very much, ma’am,” Leicasitaj replied, seeing looks of relief and pleasure on the faces of the bridge crew.  He thought about chastising them for a lack of discipline, but it had been a long mission and they deserved the moment of levity.  “And you, ma’am, have a lot of things to talk about here as well.  Such as what the hell happened and why are my sensors detecting pieces of some of the defense ships?”

              “It’s a long and unhappy story, Captain.  Take a shuttle to the mine, when you get here, I’ll tell you the whole thing.”

              “Hyperdrive is secured, Captain,” Oberst reported, pressing a few controls on the helm console.