All That Glitters Ch. 21

Their hosts took the assembled group for a tour of the ship, which actually wound up impressing the hell out of them. They had been on many private yachts before, but never one this large, or this well organized. There were seventeen decks some of which had double (the open gym for space training) or triple (the two shuttle decks one behind the other) the height of the average deck at 3m 90cm.

Anna noted that though the crew wore civilian style uniforms with The Wanderer's crest, they kept the navy's rank structure. She was positive that the crew was made up mainly of ex navy ratings, all of crew seemed quite competent. Including the rather formidable Capt. Noor. The VIP staff were the only members of the crew that didn't sport navy rankings, but they were specialists in their fields.

On deck one, the ship's theatre, which doubled as a briefing room, was impressively large and was able to hold more than 500 people. The crew loved the cooks and caterers in the combined mess and showered affection and praise on them. The mess was a holdover from the original ship and could easily sit 500 people at a time. Raymond had said that the crew totalled just shy of 400, so the mess could functionally feed all the crew at once which, because of rotating crews, never happened.

The second deck contained many of the crew quarters, which the ensemble did not go into. It also contained the Captain's Ready Room, just behind the upper door to the bridge. Because of its automation, the ship required a minimum thirty-three ratings per shift to function properly, but they generally had between forty and fifty. With 163 ratings, they had the numbers they needed.

The bridge was impressive and quite functional. Even though they were in a parking orbit, all stations were fully manned, with an OOD sitting in the Ex O's seat. The crew was constantly communicating with each other in a very professional manner.

The third, fourth, and fifth decks were VIP staterooms and included the VIP staff quarters some with designated function rooms (the masseurs, the Barber, etc.). The Third deck included the VIP dining facility, the very well appointed combined VIP theatre/conference room/comms room, the two Master Staterooms, and staterooms for their aides in the rear. The fourth deck had more rooms for VIP specialists and several more guest staterooms as did the fifth deck which also included the VIP gym. Though well appointed, the guest staterooms were smaller than those of the master staterooms, but larger than those of other private yachts on the market.

The sixth, seventh, and part of the eight floors had various rooms of various sizes dedicated to building and repairing items for the ship. The forward part of the seventh floor contained the ship's impressive infirmary. The forward part of the eighth floor was the upper extension of the large forward gymnasium room, making a large room at 7m 80cm, which was used primarily for EVA training but also used for team games played in a gravity free environment.

The ninth floor contained the large crew gym, aft of the large room, and the track which ran down each side of the ship and crossed over fore and aft to provide a one km running track. The tracks original purpose had been to move missiles/torpedoes from the aft magazines to the forward ready racks. Aft of the gym and forward of the impressive engineering section, was the engineer's quarters.

The engineering section ran from top to bottom of the ship and included the large FTL generator and access to the ship's sub-light engines. The engineers primarily had access to the plasma generators that fed the engines though working in that part of the ship required specialized protective suits.

Just forward of the impressive engineering section, running from the third floor all the way down to the tenth deck, were massive storage areas that once contained the mines that would have been deployed by the NS Korman. The rooms still existed but were now used as storage for the new ship. The guests were shown some of these rooms but not all of them, especially those that did in fact still contain mines. After all, The Wanderer was not supposed to be an armed ship...

The tenth deck contained more crew workshops and quarters and included those quarters that were currently not assigned. The Wanderer had quarters for 500 but currently did not have those numbers of crew.

The eleventh, twelfth and thirteenth decks contained the two, three level, shuttle bays one behind the other and forward of the engineering section. At a height of 11m 60cm and a length of 125m each, the shuttle bays could hold almost any small vessel up to and including a Whippet Class escort vessel or an old Tung Class escort all of which had now been decommissioned and most of which had been converted mostly to private yachts.

Ahead of the shuttle bays on all three decks were rooms dedicated to shuttle maintenance and the EVA suit changing/maintenance rooms.

The fourteenth and fifteenth decks contained large storage rooms including two rooms dedicated to the purification and storage of the ship's water resources. The ship did have three 25m by 10m pools and five smaller wave pools used for exercise but primarily dedicated to rehabilitation.

The sixteenth and seventeenth decks contained the plumbing of the ship and was virtually dedicated to the engineers. There, things like oxygen scrubbing/regeneration, the storage of gases and other things necessary that allowed for a ship to function in space occurred under the watchful eyes of the assigned engineers.

All in all, the guests were very impressed with the ship. And that was before they began to party.

****************

Rudolf Hildebrand was not much of a partier anymore. He had been in his younger years but had outgrown it. Still, when you're a Hildebrand, you are expected to be part of the official party scene. He attended but usually chose not to imbibe and requested apple juice as a preferred beverage.

As normal, he woke early and headed to the crew gym, which he had scoped out last night. He was surprised to see so much of the crew in the gym and on asking, was told that this was normal routine before the crew went on shift.

He started working out on the weights and was surprised to see one of the hosts, Raymond Clark there working out as well. He knew that his sister had taken the man's arm last night and departed the party none too early, so Rudolf was surprised to see the man in the gym, without his sister.

He heard the pounding of many feet and saw a large group of people running into the gym, a tall black woman in the lead. The woman had muscles on her muscles and the way she moved raised the hackles on Rudolf's neck. Intuition told him that this woman had serious combat time.

It was the smaller woman though, who took over from the taller woman and began to break the large group into more manageable groups for unarmed combat training.

The two women moved back and forth among the groups encouraging or correcting people as the went through their routines. The surprise for Rudolf though was seeing the other host, Liea Samson, among the groups of combatants working just as hard as the crew.

Eventually, the taller woman called Liea and another woman forward and gave each of them two combat sticks. The two women began to go through a rather vigorous routine of combat that Rudolf knew was not being faked for his benefit. These women were seriously trying to win points against each other, twisting, turning, lunging and striking with sticks, feet, and legs. Liea even put a serious hip-check on the other woman at one point! But it was the other woman who won the bout, knocking Liea's feet out from under her and thrusting one of her sticks into Liea's throat, stopping just shy of causing injury.

The watching crew gave out a cheer as the other woman was declared the winner, and Liea was informed that she owed a lap around the track as the loser. The two women shook hands and Liea ran out of the gym, supposedly to do her punishment lap.

Rudolf felt eyes on him, turned to note Raymond Clark wiping sweat from his face. He gave Rudolf a wink and walked out of the gym. Rudolf would see him later in the combined mess, his sister Anna on Raymond's arm.

Conference Room One, Liramor-23, Piscium System

The daily brief had just finished when Fiona received a note from the Leonard Hart, the CFO, she asked him to come to the conference room and brief those in attendance.

"I've just received a note from LMC HQ on the repairs for the platform," the CFO began. "We are to receive two billion credits for the repairs to be made and, in addition, a second two billion credits to expand the platform.

"Liramor Holdings agrees with the assessment by the TUSN and Director Fiona Marsh that we will likely see an increased flow of personnel not related to mining within the year. Funds have been provided to enlarge the outside dimensions of the platform by 100m.

"I received this in the mornings dispatch and noted that I had not received a call from you on the issue, so surmised that you might not yet be aware of this, ma'am," the CFO finished.

"Thank-you Leonard," Fiona acknowledged. "Please leave a copy with me and I'll hunt down the relevant documents.

"I know 100m does not sound like much, but that means this platform will expand its width and length by 200m. Most of the quarters on board are only ten meters square, so 200m meters adds up to a substantial increase in living space. I'm sure that Liramor Holdings will send us design specifications soon, so the next thing we need to do is get the ovens up and running. We can't afford to bring in all of the material as that will substantially eat into the budget. We will have to produce much of the material here.

"First priority will be to confirm the intent. Is Liramor Holding going to make this upgrade for workers, for scientists, or for others? We will be housing a much larger number of Navy personnel, and possibly be acting as the contact point for alien life forms. All things considered, we will have our hands full for the next year and more," Fiona finished.

Fiona found the dispatch waiting for her in her office. It confirmed what the CFO had already told her. She would have to go to Liramor Prime and talk to the powers that be.

The Wanderer, Green's World, Harn System, Twenty Light Years from Terra

The Wanderer flicked into existence above the gravity well of Green's World, they were there for the centenary of the first humans on the planet, not long after the great expansion began.

The ship made it's was slowly into the orbital plane of the planet moving into orbit as directed by planetary control. Some of the crew were still overcoming their collective hangovers from the Octoberfest and were moving gingerly as they went about their respective chores. There had been very few issues with the crew while in party mode at Neues Deutschland, which pleased Raymond, Liea, and Noor.

The ship was sent a request from the local Liramor Prime Embassy to pick up two passengers, from Malihan Regional Hospital. Noor had agreed but had advised the embassy that they might not be returning directly to Liramor Prime.

Liea took the Delilah down to pick up the passengers which, ironically, she met at the same shuttle site that Annette had previously picked up Dr. Heyya. When she walked into the waiting room, she was surprised to see who was waiting for her.

"Sean!" Liea screamed and launched herself at the big man. Murphy laughed as he caught her, lifting her up and swinging her around.

"By the Gods! Liea Samson! It's so good to see you again," Sean exclaimed. "I never thought it would be you who would pick us up."

"Us?" Liea asked, looking at the diminutive Asian woman by his side.

"Liea Samson, this is my Fiancé, Ayesha Seito," Sean said, pride evident in his bearing.

"Oh! Sean! So many women will be so disappointed to hear that," Liea said with a giggle. She had always teased Sean about his shyness around women.

"Behave, Liea," Sean growled, but with a smile on his face.

"Ayesha took over from Heyya as my private nurse after she earned her medical degree," Sean told Liea.

"Heyya is back on the platform," Liea informed him, "she now runs the new trauma unit there and is the defacto CMO of the platform since Dr. Ronda had his breakdown."

"What?" Sean asked, perplexed. "Ronda had a breakdown?"

"You didn't know?" Liea asked him. "The platform was hit again by pirates and this time we took many casualties. Many of the hospital staff were initially captured by the pirates leaving Heyya to fend for herself for several hours. Heyya became a hero working non-stop to treat the injured. Several of the medical staff had breakdowns after, including Dr. Ronda. Heyya's experiences as a senior nurse helped her overcome everything and the other staff tended to gravitate to her for support. They insisted that they would follow her as CMO until a more qualified person could be brought on board."

"Wow, I knew Heyya was strong," Ayesha said, "but I didn't expect her to be a CMO this soon in her career."

"Ayesha is studying to become a doctor," Sean said with a burst of pride, "but she is at least a year behind Heyya in her studies. We are hoping that she will be able to find employment on the platform if we go back there."

"You shouldn't have a problem there," Liea stated, leading them out of the waiting room. "The platform is in need of medical staff right now."

Liea took them down a long corridor to a door marked 'Customs'. They had their bags cleared and they were taken about the Delilah.

"This is my ship, PV Delilah, from the old Terran story 'Samson and Delilah'," Liea informed them with pride. "She is a Princess Class fast ship, and only the second ship of the class.

"Annette Liramor owns PV The Princess, the first of the class, Raymond Clark owns PV The Valiant, third of the class and Fiona Marsh owns PV The Valour, fourth of the Princess Class but now technically the first of new "Valour Class" due to modifications that were made to her."

"So you will be taking us back to Liramor Prime on your ship?" Ayesha asked.

"No, not immediately," Liea replied. "We are here to participate in Green's World's centennial event, so we will be here for just shy of a week. We will then go directly to Liramor-23 from here before returning to Liramor Prime. You do intend to return to Liramor-23?"

"Yes, if we can get employment for Ayesha," Sean confirmed.

"That shouldn't be a problem," Liea told them. "The platform is growing and is in need of more doctors and nurses. We can send out an FTL probe to confirm your positions before we go to the platform."

"Are we to spend time on your ship then?" Ayesha asked, pointing to the rather small looking vessel.

"Yes, and no," Liea told her with a smile. "Why don't we board the Delilah, and we can show you my other little surprise."

Twenty minutes later, the little ship was docking in one of the largest ships that Sean had ever seen.

"Welcome The Wanderer," Liea said, with evident pride in her voice.

"We are short of medical staff, so we can give you some employment during your voyage," Liea told Ayesha. "And there is always a need for a skilled spacer on board," she said with a smile to Sean.

The Delilah docked and a boarding ramp swung down to close over the hatch. Liea led her astonished guests aboard where they were greeted by Raymond Clark. Sean had met Raymond on several occasions, though he did not know his backstory.

Raymond grilled Ayesha thoroughly on her qualifications as a nurse and grudgingly approved her working in the infirmary until they arrived at LMC-23.

*************

Jennifer Roust was a pretty woman of thirty-eight and a Petty Officer First Class working as a backup Comms O. She hadn't been feeling well for several days now and didn't know why. It worried her.

Jennifer was doing her run before evening shift change when she was expected on shift. She made the requisite five rounds of the track and was heading into the gym when the nausea hit her hard. She ran to the nearest head, and forcibly pulled another rating from the door in front of her, just making it to the head before forcing up the contents of her stomach.

After a few minutes, she tried to stand but was unable to, as the nausea had now turned into disorientation. Mbibo came up to the door and noted her condition and asked for the corpsman to attend her in the gym.

A few minutes later, Jennifer was in the infirmary undergoing an extensive exam to determine the cause of her condition. Corpsman James Wiccan was unable to make a determination of the probable cause of her sickness. He called in the new nurse to help.

Ayesha came in and did a thorough exam of her own, noting the high degree of nausea and disorientation. The patient could hardly raise her head for fear of vomiting, and James was loath to give her anything until such time as he could determine a cause for her condition.

"Did you draw blood?" Ayesha asked him.

"Yes, ma'am," James admitted. "The vials are over at desk three. I have already run through the standard tests and come up negative on all."

Ayesha went to the desk and started doing tests of her own, noting the results from Wiccan's work. It was very thorough. She was impressed. But she new a few tricks that most did not. It wasn't long before she had her answer and she had to call the captain and the two owners down to the infirmary.

Noor was the first to arrive. She noted CPO3 Dan Polit sitting on the examination bed with PO1 Jennifer Roust who was wrapped up in a paper gown. The two of them had the look of children having been caught doing something bad but determined to stick together against the adults regardless of the outcome. She hadn't seen that since, NO! The thought raced through her head and she turned immediately to the new nurse, who simply shook her head and motioned her to wait.

Raymond and Liea arrived together and came in to take seats at the little gathering.

"Capt. Noor, Raymond, Liea, I asked you all her because the answers that these two give will possibly determine new ship policies, and you need to be aware of that," Ayesha began.

"PO1 Roust is pregnant," she told them all. "And before you ask, no her Mideral implant is still functioning and not due again for three years." The Mideral implant was a long term contraceptive given to all women in space. Most ships, platforms, and stations in space did not have accommodation for families. So long term contraceptives were a necessary precaution. Typically, they were implanted every four years.

"How is that possible?" Noor asked.

"Do you want the technical explanation, or the pornographic one?" Ayesha asked with a quirky smile.

"No! I mean..." but Noor was quickly cut off by Ayesha.

"Sorry, captain, but I had to lighten the mood a little, even if it was at your expense," Ayesha quipped.

"Well, ma'am, I'm sure that the person who gave you your implant also informed you that, like other contraceptives, Mideral is 99% effective. Well, Jennifer is one of the one percent we warn about.

"Sgt. Wiccan was unable to confirm a diagnosis because the Mideral was still active and supressing the normal hormones produced during early pregnancy. However, with the Mideral interfering with normal hormone production, it inadvertently contributed to Hyperemesis Gravitas, or sever morning sickness. The difference being that it will hit the mother at almost anytime of the day and is very debilitating in its effects, thus not true morning sickness.

"Which brings me to the next question that needs to be answered," Ayesha turned to the two people hugging themselves on the exam table. "Jennifer, Dan, I need to know, do you wish to keep this baby?"