As we walked out of Gold Duck, Strife was adamant that we take this job. He kept telling me that this will give us an exclusive find.
"Rover, just do me a favor and join in" Strife told me.
"No, I can't" I replied.
"Why?"
"I don't work with people I'm in a relationship… I have my boundaries."
"Excuse me?" Julia questioned.
"It's not gonna happen now, but maybe later it will" I replied to her.
"I really don't think you're my type." Julia insulted.
"Rover if you could listen to me I can give you one good reason." Strife inserted himself to convince me.
"One reason. Go" I said with a smuggish attitude.
"We get to explore uncharted territories. And I mean untouched by anyone"
"You'll be in a documentary, about space scavengers. Specifically you'll be the documentary. My network allowed me to get permits on Sima Gaia." Julia added.
"See, Sima Gaia… Only rich smugs get to play there. And those smugs are clueless and easily scammed. So what do you say?" Strife tried to add fuel to the flame.
"Maybe next time." I said as I hailed a cab.
The cab arrived. I opened the door to get in. Strife blocked me.
"How about two reasons?" Julia announced.
I mouthed the cab driver to wait. Removed my hand from the door. I then crossed my arms. "If one of them is, us dating… I might give it a go."
"No" Julia swiftly rejected me. She held out her hand, showed a finger counting one "You'll received 50,000 credits". My face showed disapproval. She showed her second finger counting two "You get to keep what you found, and sell it to how much you want to." She smiled.
"You had my curiosity. Now you have my attention"
Both of them smiled. "So you coming?" Strife asked me.
I smiled. "Of course I am. It's still my ship remember?"
We both laughed. The three of us boarded the cab, Strife sat on the center. I instructed the cabbie to take us to the docks. He took us there.
"So Sima Gaia? How did you pulled it off?" I asked Julia.
"My network did a documentary about why the planet has the same temperature throughout. It's one of our highest ranking piece and it's pretty educational really" She replied.
"Cool"
"The things you said at the bar. Were they true?"
"Yup" I pulled out my holowatch and pulled out the news regarding M'Khari. "All of it" I smiled.
As we arrived to the docks, we followed Strife.
Strife led us to where he parked my ship, The Carpenters. I grinned, so did Strife. Julia however had a different expression. She was left in awe of our ship. She took out her camera and started to record.
"This is amazing." She said in awe. She looked at Strife. "Is it okay if I record here."
Strife and I looked at each other. "Documentary right?" I questioned Strife.
"That's what she told me" Strife answered.
"This is the Carpenters. It's our ship, well technically mine. Long story. Not relevant" I said, Julia took it as a que to focus on me.
"The Carpenters, just like the Swift, is named after my mother's favorite artists back on earth. The Carpenters is bigger than the Swift. Oh, and yup I have another ship" I smiled. "You might be curious what the Carpenters looks like."
I walked closer to the Carpenters.
"This ship is a modified General Navigation model 6 or GN-06. Successor to the Swift's model, the GN-05. This looks like a sea turtle with four front flippers, that are obviously wing and thrusters. They provide a more sophisticated maneuverability. As for the technical side of this ship, the engine is your typical hydrogen reactor but added a quartz-lined warp charger, just like the Swift. But unlike the Swift, Strife installed carbon converters." I smiled in awe remembering the performance of the ship.
"That said converter, converts the carbon from the exhaust into an even denser air which makes the ship go faster than any other ships."
"This is about the same size as the Swift. 600 square foot wide, 4 meters height and is divided into three main subsections. But it's about half ton lighter. Obviously since this is a much bigger ship. The engine is placed on a seperate section." I begun my MTV cribs tour of this ship.
I nodded at Strife, he opened the ship's rear entrance.
"Let's start up the lower level. I like to call it 'Lab' but Strife insist that this is called 'lower level'. The back of the ship opens up, that's where we'll start. As I mentioned earlier the back opens up, and that serves as ramp and a garage for lightweight cars and hover bikes. Directly ahead is a division of glass wall which is an enclosed space that serves as the lab for Strife." I pointed at the wall. We entered the lab.
"The lab has a center holotable on it, under the table are drawers filled with power tools. And of course a more advanced multi-printer, this is like a 3D printer that prints any material. On the side is a different section filled with medical equipment; centrifuge, microscope, along with some surgical tools." I said pointing at the right.
I moved to the wall on the left and pointed out everything there. "There's also a section where we keep finds from previous jobs. Strife calls them 'Souvenirs' while I call them 'McGuffins'. This place has the potential to be messy but Strife keeps them clean and polish every time he's here… Oh and before I forget, there's a spiral stairs there that will give us direct access to the second level but, we'll come back after it." I pointed out to the stairs.
"Right here is a door, which gives us access to the engines" We entered and saw the engines. "That's all the things that makes the ship run, electronics and all. I've already told you all about this so moving on."
"Who maintains all this?" Julia asked.
"Us. Well mostly Strife. I just do most of the field work. Which evens out our work load dynamic here." I replied. At the nose of the ship, where the engines are, there's an access stairs leading upward. "Now going to the top." I walked to the stairs and guided Julia to the area the stairs leads. "This is the top level which I call 'Work' and Strife calls them 'Upper Level'. The first thing you'll see when you're here is the cockpit which house two seats for the pilot and co-pilot. Both of them has a two screen computer for navigation and other computery stuff… Also the chair is upholstered in a nice leather finish." I walked up to a tiny steps that leads to the innermost parts of the ship.
"Door's are placed on both sides. Right ahead of us, those two waist level pillars. That's the Captain's spot. We opted for a minimalistic approach here. Removing the chair entirely" I walked to the spot just to give her the idea of how things looked like. "Oh and these pillars aren't for holding, it's a holoprojector that shows what the pilots are seeing."
I walked towards the rear of the ship. "This is the 'Cabin' as Strife would like to refer. The first thing you'll notice is the giant table in the center. That serves as the dining table-slash-extended work space. Everything that are displayed on the lab can be mirrored here. And if you mind looking up. We have accessible sun-roof."
"If you look to the side, there are bathroom on both sides. They're not that big but enough to do your business and take a shower. After the shower is the bunks. Two bunk beds on both sides, which allows four people to sleep tight. In the end, towards the rear, are lockers stacked on top of each other. Each locker corresponds to the bunk besides it." I said as I pointed out. I also slid the privacy binder on each bed.
"And lastly on the stern part of the ship near the exit, on the left is the Laundry, which is the washing machine and dryer combo. On the right is the fridge, which is full of tea, other drinks, foods, and of course... Instant ration packets. Oh! And right over the end, parallel to the cockpit is the kitchen. It's a two burner induction stove, with a microwave oven. I usually 'cook' here in a loose term of the word. Strife handles the kitchen and other task." I said as I looked at her.
"It seems like Strife is doing all the work here." Julia stated.
"Well I do the field work. Which if we were to film it, is much more dangerous." I reasoned.
"And I hope our audience will not be disappointed."
"Sure." I confidently stated. I saw the spiral stairs. "Oh, and that one is the first stairs that we encountered… So yeah. That's the ship tour."
Julia ended her recording. The three of us looked at each other. Julia sighed "So, let's talk business." She said with a smile.