Making a Dollar or Two- BOOK THREE

[Confused Scientist]

Making a Dollar or Two

Introduction:

Fifty years after the nuclear fires wiped the last great nation-states from the face of Kerbin, and the survivors banded together into the United Kerbin, it was time to reach for the stars again. No kerbal had left the home planet since the astronauts had returned from Minnmus Exploration Mission Two and, upon seeing the dead planet, knew that Kerbin was never meant for Kerbalkind. They fired off their last five rockets on an ill-fated colonization mission to Laythe- only to hear a signal from the survivors two hours after the escape burn was completed. They perished when their aerobrake at Laythe proved to be too zealous- and since then nobody had left Kerbin. Now, Station One had been completed, and it was time to bring back the bones of the colonization party...

Twenty-five years after that, Station One was practically a derelict floating in orbit. The only kerbals who were still there were either hustlers, smugglers, gamblers, or anyone else who thought they could make a quick buck. Some of them did, some of them didn't, and some of them just sat around the distillery and had another ale. However, they all had one thing in common: At one time or another, they had all been down on their luck- with one exception.

Hudson Kerman knew that he was the luckiest kerbal alive when he got off the Number Nine shuttle to Station One and saw the sign advertising Jeb's Dropship Services. It said, "No questions asked." And that was why Hudson had come to the station in the first place. 

Edited April 5, 2019 by Confused Scientist

[Confused Scientist]

BOOK ONE

Chapter 1- Station One

Jeb floated in Centrifuge 4. Only number two still spun, and the station managers had even had to turn that back. Business had been slow for months; ever since the Colossus II injection station had opened, passerby had decreased even more than usual. The Number Nine shuttle would be the first vehicle to visit in quite a while, and it would only carry three passengers- and two of them were just along for the ride before the shuttle went to Colossus II. Jeb wondered what the deal with the other kerbal was- after all, the only thing that wasn't smuggled into the station was money.

He spun around and floated up the ladder. Bill and Bob were waiting for him at the distillery. "How's the ship?" he asked Bill.

"Why should I care? It doesn't have anywhere to go," he replied. Jeb sighed. It didn't cost very much to live at the station, but they hadn't gotten a customer in months. With Munbase Two construction booming, all of the big tug and dropship companies were expanding, building, and improving. The truth was, nobody needed Station One anymore, and nobody came. Even the Number Nine shuttle only flew to deliver spare parts to the rundown station. The shuttle was somewhere out there, and it must be closing fast, if it was going to-

A bang echoed through the station. Jeb recognized the sound as the old docking port, whose retraction systems had broke and now caused excess noise every time it compressed- which, at this point, was once every few months. There was no official schedule for the Number Nine shuttle anymore, and soon it might stop running entirely.

The new arrival would be crawling through the hatch right about now. Rumor had it that he was an engineer whose job it was to survey the station and find a reason to decommission it- it was costing the United Kerbin an obscene amount of money to keep it up and running. However, that might not be true- as Jeb rounded the bend in the centrifuge, he could see the shuttle unloading a Mark 15 lander and maneuvering it to an adjacent docking port. Clearly, it belonged to the engineer- What is his name?- and he wanted to go to the Mun. And Jeb could tell just by looking at it that it didn't have enough fuel for the transfer.

He was sprinting toward the docking module to intercept the passenger on the way out. On the way there, he was mentally rehearsing what he would say to that engineer to get him to choose Jeb's Dropship Services. There were other kerbals at this station who wanted to steal his business, and Jeb wasn't about to let that happen. He would intercept that engineer- Hudson, that was his name- and convince him that this kerbal he'd never met before was the best option to get away from this station as soon as possible. He'd have quite a time convincing Hudson to be his customer- after all, they'd never met.

Which is why Jeb was so startled when he heard a strange voice say, "Jeb Kerman- just the kerbal I was looking for. Do you have any dropships that can make the trip to Munbase Two?"

Edited August 1, 2019 by Confused Scientist

[Confused Scientist]

Chapter 2- Settling the Bill

Jeb, Bob, Bill, and Hudson sat at a computer terminal in Centrifuge 3. "So, Hudson, before we get started, we have a few things to get out of the way," said Jeb. "Although we do not ask questions, we are allowed to search your spacecraft and inspect any cargo you may be carrying at any point in the flight, and if we see something we don't like we can call the police- and then they can do the question asking. However, more often than not we'll just cut your craft loose during transit-  spacecraft coming out of Station One are subject to extreme suspicion from the cops. Now, let's take a look at your spacecraft."

Hudson nodded. "I am flying a mk15 lander, gross mass 17 tons. It has enough life support for the Munar transit, although it's a bit cramped. Normally, it has one and a half kilometers per second of delta-V, but because I'm carrying some heavy cargo I need your services to get down to the surface."

Bob said, "I see. And what is your cargo?"

Hudson winced. "Uh... five hundred kilos of plutonium."

Jeb flew out of his seat- literally. "What! Why do you have that much plutonium? Where did you get it? I'm actually not sure that's even below critical mass for fission to start."

Hudson sighed. "Relax- it's all contained. In case you didn't know, there's a massive market for plutonium on the Mun- RTGs and reactors need topping off, and right now it's still cheaper to get it imported than to mine it."

Jeb accepted this. "Okay. What is your flightplan?"

"I need to get to Munbase in under two and a half hours."

All three crewmembers stared in disbelief.

"Well, I won't ask you why you need to get there that fast. That's why you chose Jeb's Dropship Services. However, you are going to have quite a bill to settle, once we get a course figured out. Bill?"

"On it. The sooner we leave, the better. No matter what, we're going to be burning all of our fuel and getting some more at an orbital depot."

"I see. And Bob? Get started powering up the tug. Do a complete systems check, and then after that, start pumping some fuel onboard- we're going to need it."

Bob floated away as Bill tapped at the computer. "Okay, I got us a course, but we burn 94 percent of our fuel capacity on the way down, we're going to be suicide burning for something like fifteen minutes, and the whole thing in general is kind of risky. And we don't even land- Hudson, could your lander handle it if we dropped you, say, ten kilometers above Munbase while traveling at 350 meters per second?"

Hudson replied, "Yes, I can kill the velocity in time. Now, how much is this going to cost me?"

Jeb thought for a minute. "Well let's see... there's the price of the fuel, for starters, and then the price for the upkeep of the spacecraft, a fee for crew operations, and then we start adding on to that. We begin with our personal base price- after all, you're paying extra for our 'No questions asked' policy. Then there's a ten percent increase for risky operations-"

"What's so risky about it?"

"We burn up almost all of our fuel to tow a craft filled with plutonium right above Munbase. If either spacecraft has an engine failure, there's going to be a new crater for the geologists to pore over. Which, by the way, brings us to another ten percent increase for hazardous material transport, an extra five percent for giving us short notice before departure, and then there's a five percent spaceport tax on top of that- which gets split between Station One and the crew. That all comes out to..." Jeb tapped at a calculator. "Four hundred twenty-nine thousand, eight hundred thirty-two kerbobucks." Today is going to be a real payday, thought Jeb.

Hudson didn't like that. "That's highway robbery!"

Bill tried to reason with him. "None of the other tugs can get you to Munbase in time. Face it, you're just asking too much." Bill wasn't a very good businessman.

Jeb, however, knew how to sell a deal. "Tell you what- agree to this price, and we'll throw in our passenger cabin for free- you don't have to ride in your lander." In reality, this would barely cost Jeb anything on a three-hour voyage, and everyone at the table knew it.

"Fine," said Hudson. He took out his credit card and stuck it into the reader.

"Good," Jeb said after he confirmed he was four hundred thousand kerbobucks richer. "Now go and move your lander into position at our tug- we need to leave as soon as we can."

Hudson floated away toward the docking adapters. "Jeb," Bill began, "What in Kraken's name do you think his deal is?"

"No idea," the pilot replied. "No idea at all."

"Maybe he's a government agent. After all, he needs secrecy, so he comes to us. And by leaving from Station One, he can avoid other kerbals and the larger dropship companies. Finally, he needs to get to the Mun in a rush, and he comes with a ton of plutonium-"

"What are you implying?"

"I think there's someone on the Mun who better watch out."

Jeb stared at his crewmate for a moment. Then he floated up. "Come on, we've got a lot of work to do- thinking won't get us anywhere." Indeed, it had never gotten anyone from Station One anywhere.

Edited June 5, 2019 by Confused Scientist

[KSK]

Oh - now this is getting interesting. I like the writing and I like this particular take on the Original Three.

Looking forward to more!

[MiffedStarfish]

This is really good. Loving the kerbal hard sci-fi. Looking forward to the next chapter!

[Skylon]

Very good so far! Will definitely follow; I love the sci-fi

[Confused Scientist]

Chapter 3- Krakensbane

A kerbal who has never been to space has no idea what it's like up there. For starters, it's quiet. Even though you're zipping along at over six times the speed of sound, it's quiet. It's also calm; ocean scenery is best viewed from two hundred kilometers. And in some ways, it's very eerie- even the dead ships still float along, with all their crew at their stations. Some still have automatic programs still running, and occasionally a ghost ship will dock with a space station or even land at a spaceport- and often the ground crew will have no idea what's happening. They'll open the hatch, and the crew will be sitting at their consoles, looking as if they had just fallen asleep...

Indeed, space can do strange things to one's mind- experienced pilots call it 'krakensbane.' Jeb and company had their share of krakensbane, but luckily they were able to spend their time in at least partial gravity and avoid most of it. The less lucky ones float around for years at some orbital depot, until they lose first their bodies and then their wits. In rare cases, the ones stationed at the Mun, Duna, or even Laythe go crazy, and it's cheaper to send replacements than it is to rotate out crew to prevent psychological breakdowns. At least, cheaper in a financial sense; there is no cure for krakensbane.

Jeb, Bill, and Bob knew this all to well, and for years they had been hoping to return to Kerbin. However, the slowing economy aboard Station One was a death sentence. Still, the most experienced prisoner can escape any punishment, and escape was what the three had on their minds as they floated away from the station. "I've looked at the profits, and I have good news and bad news," Bob said.

"Well, give us the news in the logical order," commanded Bill. Bill was very levelheaded, to say the least. Jeb might have minded, but this way they didn't need to buy an AI for their computer.

"If all goes well, we're going to have enough money to get seats on the Number Nine shuttle back to Kerbin," Bob said. "However, we'll have to hurry home- the shuttle that's docked at Station One now departs in three days, and who knows when we're going to have another sent up."

"Whatever," said Jeb. "We don't need to buy any more fuel after this- we literally have money to burn."

"Actually, nuclear engines don't burn," said Bill.

The dropship flew on through the black. All kerbals have all of Wikipedia's knowledge stored in their memory, which is never accessed unless they are transported to twenty-first century Earth.

Edited June 5, 2019 by Confused Scientist

[Confused Scientist]

Chapter 4- Full Throttle

"One hundred kilometers up, and falling fast," said Bill. "We need to start our suicide burn in just over a minute. Hudson is in his lander, he's got all systems powered up- whatever he's got to do on the Mun, he's doing it on time."

"Good. Speaking of our passenger, it's time to make an announcement," said Jeb as he grabbed the intercom. "Attention, Hudson, we are going to begin our suicide burn in one minute. We will start counting down ten seconds before releasing your craft- be ready to start thrusting at any time. At five seconds light up your engines, we will have enough time to abort then if something goes wrong with either spacecraft. After we cut you loose, it's up to you- hope you're a good pilot. However, anything can go wrong- there's a reason you paid in advance."

"Okay, Jeb, I've got my hands on my controls and I'm ready for your countdown. Thanks for the ride."

The crewmembers in the cockpit didn't have any more time to worry about their passenger. "Burn coming up in three, two, one, mark!" shouted Bob. Nothing happened. "Oh, kraken! What's wrong?"

"No idea!" screamed Jeb. They were moving at over a kilometer per second; if their engines couldn't start the best they could do would be to cut Hudson loose and let him save himself. "Full manual override enabled, throttles at full!"

A hundred feet behind him, twelve nuclear engines lit up and made the Munar landscape begin to glow. "We only lost a few seconds," explained Bill. "We'll stop at eight kilometers, and we'll use up even more fuel- but we've got enough reserve."

"It's good enough," replied Jeb. For a full forty seconds the craft slowed even more until it was traveling at just four hundred meters per second, twenty kilometers above Munbase. Like all of the giant spacecraft, it had a sluggishness that made the landing seem like it was happening to someone else- it rotated slow, it accelerated slow, and so surely it couldn't be your spacecraft- after all, you're stuck inside a rattling tin can! Indeed, Jeb felt like he was just sitting back as Station One as he gave Hudson his countdown.

"Ten, nine, eight, seven, six- light up your engines, Hudson!- four, three, two, one, release!" And just like that, Hudson's lander fell away from the dropship. It would be his responsibility to get down safe on a Munbase pad- the three kerbals aboard the tug were preoccupied with turning their spacecraft around.

"Rotating through ninety degrees, we have just about cancelled our vertical velocity," announced Bill. They were traveling sideways at one hundred meters per second, facing broadside to their velocity vector. "Engines are realigning, here we go!"

It took nearly a minute to get up to orbital velocity. On the way there, Jeb took manual roll control and rotated the ship so the windows were facing down, so the crew could survey the exciting landscape they were flying over. Munbase Two was located among a crater field- millions of years ago, asteroids had deposited the materials here that made mining in this corner of the Mun so profitable. There was iron, nickel, uranium, helium-3, and even water. The Munbase Two approach and liftoff patterns especially flew over some interesting landscape, and so everybody in the cockpit had their eyes glued to the viewscreens.

Therefore, it was no surprise that they had a good view of Munbase Two's explosion.

Edited June 5, 2019 by Confused Scientist

[Confused Scientist]

Chapter 5- Postmortrem

The tug was berthed at an orbital depot, and its crewmembers were inside, doing what kerbals have been doing after crises since time immemorial: refreshing the news.

"Still nothing new... wait," said Jeb. Everyone else looked at him. "It says here that officials have reason to believe the explosion was caused by a large amount of mishandled plutonium."

"Mishandled plutonium? I sure hope we didn't-" said Bob, until Jeb kicked him under the table. "I mean, I hope they can rebuild quickly."

"Well, there's a good chance of that," said Herbalda Kerman, director of the depot. "There's no damage beyond the pressure sphere- unfortunately, that was enough to kill everybody- and, of course, the pad the explosion originated from."

Jeb, Bill, and Bob would have loved to be alone, but there wasn't enough space aboard the depot for that and it would seem suspicious if they went back to the tug before it was fully refueled. However, Bob had an idea. He sent Jeb and Bill texts saying Let's talk via KMS. Soon, they were inconspicuously looking at their phones, pretending to be checking the news, and instead holding a whole private conversation.

Bill: If they find out we took all that plutonium to the surface, then what?

Bob: No idea. We could get off free. We could be banded as co-conspirators, even as terrorists who were too cowardly to take our own lives.

Jeb: Punishment for the worst-case scenario?

Bill: Death, probably. The government wouldn't even have to take a reputation hit to kill us- they could just say things go wrong all the time in space travel.

Bob: We need a plan.

Jeb: As soon as the tug is fueled, we leave. If they don't want to punish us, we go to Kerbin. If everything goes wrong, we head to Duna or maybe even Laythe at full speed.

Bob: Why?

Jeb: They're pushing for independence, right? If we went there, the government might not be able to chase us down, and if we did it right, we might even be able to get a whole lot of money from our sanctuary by starting a revolutionary war!

Bill: You're crazy.

Bob: You're crazy.

Bill: No, like, seriously. You're crazy.

Jeb: Okay, okay. My point is, we can't stay here.

"Hey, did you see this?" asked Herbalda. "They think all that plutonium was shipped there by a lander that got down right around the same time you did. Say, didn't you-"

But there was no one around to answer her question. Jeb, Bill, and Bob had started running for their ship.

Edited June 5, 2019 by Confused Scientist

[Kerbinchaser]

I love that you don't add pictures. It really adds imagination. Great work!

[Confused Scientist]

1 hour ago, Lo Var Lachland said:

I love that you don't add pictures. It really adds imagination. Great work!

Thanks! Actually, I just didn't want to make an imgur account. Not really sure why. Also, I fooled around with doing this in KSP a few months ago, and the ship was ugly and it can't do any of the things I have it doing in the stories. So no screenshots (especially seeing as I play on something that's not quite a toaster, but not quite an oven.)

Although Station One turned out quite nice.

Edited July 18, 2017 by Confused Scientist

[Kerbinchaser]

1 hour ago, Confused Scientist said:

I just didn't want to make an imgur account.

I use flickr.  

[Confused Scientist]

Chapter 6- Orbital Mechanics is Easy Doable

"Undocking in three, two, one!" said Jeb. "Full thrust astern, and get us pointed south! We need to get away from orbital settlements!" Jeb's Dropship pulled away from Munar Depot 17 and began accelerating out of the equatorial orbital plane.

"Okay, any spacecraft that want to intercept us are going to have a long, hard chase," said Bill. "Now what?"

"Get us on a trajectory to either Duna or Laythe. Preferably Laythe."

While Bill made all the calculations to get an intercept with one of the Planetary Territories, Bob was busy scanning the radar and the airwaves for anyone who might want to shoot them down. "Hey, guys," he said, "someone's hailing us."

Attention, all crewmembers of the dropship Kraken's Spit! You have five minutes to surrender yourself to the Interplanetary Authority for the crimes of contraband transport and terrorism before their ships arrive to engage your spacecraft in combat! If you surrender, you will be entitled to a fair trial under the discretion of the United Kerbin! You may surrender using the standard Spacepulse frequency.

"That guy sure uses a lot of exclamation marks. How long until we leave?"

"Twelve minutes," said Bill. "That will put us on a course that will eject us to Laythe, via Eve and then Kerbin. It's a modified Whistance trajectory, which will get us to Jool in four months."

"Start the burn as soon as you can- I feel like to outrun the Interplanetary Authority we're going to need a big head start," said Jeb.

Even a twelve-minute headstart wasn't enough. Three IA cruisers arrived from a higher orbit and, using their fusion engines, rendezvoused with the Kraken's Spit in seconds. Meanwhile, the engines on the dropship were still struggling to get onto a Munar escape trajectory. "Surrender now, or else we open fire!" yelled one of the cruiser's captains.

The Kraken's Spit silently accelerated.

"Open fire in five, four, three, two,-"

Inside the Kraken's Spit, Jeb powered up every RCS port and twisted the stick hard to the left. In only a few seconds, he was bearing directly on the cruisers, which moved out of the way. "Bob, open up the auxiliary solar panels!" he shouted. Just as they opened up, he rolled to the right. All of a sudden, the cruisers, which had originally been a safe distance from the dropship were smacked with the solar arrays. "Nice one!" said Bill.

Fusion engines were still experimental, and the cruisers' captains didn't feel like taking a lot of damage. Just like that, they turned tail and started heading back to the Interplanetary Authority's Munar base- they could always catch a second-generation tug later if they felt like it.

Aboard the Kraken's Spit, there was no time to celebrate. "Jeb, cut the throttle!" wailed Bill. Jeb slammed his hand down on a large red button, and the acceleration dropped to zero. "We don't have enough fuel to continue with this burn," said Bill.

Jeb wasn't in the mood to give Bill orders when they both knew what had to be done. "Well, work a little magic and break the laws of physics," he grunted.

"I keep telling you, gravity assists are perfectly logical. Just think of the planet as a truck, and the Kraken's Spit as a tennis ball-"

"And I keep telling you, they speed us up without spending any fuel. If that's not magic, I don't know what is."

"Okay, we'll loop around Kerbin twice. We'll catch the Mun on one orbit, and then Minnmus on the next. It will keep us in the IA stronghold for longer, but we save a lot of fuel this way."

"Sounds good. When do I start the throttle?"

"One minute from now."

Jeb smiled. "Okay, everybody, take a thirty second break. You've earned it."

Edited June 5, 2019 by Confused Scientist

[Skylon]

Moar! This writing is great, and very exciting. I love it!

[Confused Scientist]

Thanks, everybody who likes this- and demands moar! Unfortunately, a few weeks from now, in August, there will be a one-week long downtime where I may not be able to post- but don't worry, more are on the way! (Also, I'm writing a sci-fi novel- seriously, I am!)

[Kerbinchaser]

MOOOOOAAAAAARRRRRR!!!!!

 

[KSK]

5 hours ago, Confused Scientist said:

Thanks, everybody who likes this- and demands moar! Unfortunately, a few weeks from now, in August, there will be a one-week long downtime where I may not be able to post- but don't worry, more are on the way! (Also, I'm writing a sci-fi novel- seriously, I am!)

No worries - we'll still be waiting when you come back.  Thanks for the heads-up though!

 

[Confused Scientist]

Chapter 7- Last Exit to Kerbin

A lone dropship floated through the Kerbin system. With its cloaking devices activated, it was invisible to radar, and the crewmembers didn't have to worry about the Interplanetary Authority's dominant grip that was so strong there.

"We have left the Munar sphere of influence," said Bill. "We will arrive at the Minnmus SOI in nine days."

Behind them, Kerbin presented a full disk to their windows. Jeb, Bill, and Bob all knew they might never set foot on that planet again. Indeed, this might be their last glimpse of it ever. Jeb pressed his face against the window, trying to memorize every last detail of the continents, the ice sheets, the clouds... all gone forever, to be replaced by either red dust or- hopefully- a terraformed beach on Laythe. Laythe was now fully habitable without an EVA suit, and it was a tropical getaway for Kerbin's elite. Still, Kerbin was where Jeb was born, and where he had lived the first half of his life. And now, he had gotten so close- the money from this mission would have got them a ticket back home- only to have to go on the run. With all these thoughts bouncing through his mind, he craned his neck to look at Kerbin one last time before it disappeared forever behind the Mun.

By the time the Kraken's Spit came out from behind the Mun, Kerbin was too small to make out any detail. Instead, the crew focused on their final stop before Duna: Minnmus. Bob had went to Minnmus a few decades ago, and it was where he had lost all of his money in a harebrained mining scheme. Still, Bob maintained that it was one of the nicest spots in the Kerbol system: the Mun and all of those other asteroid-things were ugly, and until recently, Laythe was cold, but Minnmus! The mining station Bob had worked at was at the edge of a large plateau, and he had a scenic overlook of the largest flats in the solar system. As a captured comet, Minnmus also had a very tenuous atmosphere, and at sunrise it would glow in majestic rainbow colors as the subzero geysers greeted the dawn. Now those days were gone, however, and the only place for the crew was in the interstellar void.

With all the sentimentality of leaving their home planet, none of the crew remembered how a major Interplanetary Authority base- complete with radar that could not be fooled by cloaking devices- had been established on Minnmus just two months ago.

Edited June 5, 2019 by Confused Scientist

[Confused Scientist]

Chapter 8- Sabotage

Sometimes, orbital warfare is carried out the exact way you hope it is- two ships with engines at full, performing daring maneuvers and risking everything to gain a tiny advantage in kerbalkind's most advanced battlefield. This was not one of those times.

Instead, the IA corvette drew silently up to the Kraken's Spit without any sound and rendezvoused, waiting for Jeb and the crew to notice. A few minutes later, some thrusters lit up on the side of the dropship's fuel tanks, and Harriet Kerman knew it was time to act before her prey got away. She nodded to her first mate, who solemnly reached to his right and pressed a large red button.

"Kraken's teeth!" Jeb shouted. "We've lost all electrical power!" Inside the darkened cockpit of the Kraken's Spit, all the crew knew was that their voyage was about to come to an abrupt end. Still, the corvette carried no guns, and Jeb started to wonder what their strategy was.

Bob figured it out. "We've been hit by an EMP!"

"What's an EMP?" Jeb was skeptical.

"EMP stands for Electromagnetic Pulse. Normally, it would fry our electronics, but we've got pulse guards to protect from radiation. Still, it's going to be an hour before we regain control, comms, navigation, anything."

They were silent for a minute, before Bill piped up. "We were firing our thrusters when we lost our nav platform, right?" Jeb nodded. "Well, aren't they still firing?" Bob had the best hearing of anyone onboard, and he said, "Yeah... I hear something."

Jeb swore. "We've got maybe five minutes before we spin up to dangerous rotation velocities, and maybe twenty before we dump all of our propellant overboard through the RCS ports. Is there anything we can do?"

"Well," Bill began, "there are manual cutoffs... but they're located on the ship's exterior, next to the RCS ports themselves. It would be a tricky EVA, but... I could do it."

"Great," said Jeb. "Suit up."

Harriet Kerman started to get worried when she saw the kerbal jump out of the Kraken's Spit airlock. Were they abandoning their ship before it tore apart under its own rotational stresses? She watched as Bill grabbed onto a ladder and made his way to the first stuck RCS port. Soon he was at the bottom of the ladder but the port was still a good two meters away. Now came the tricky part, for he would have to use his jetpack to match the ship's rotation and open up a panel to close the valves, all the while avoiding the hot gases being expelled from the port. Still, Bill was a fantastic spacekerb, and within two minutes he had the port shut down. He even left an automatic valve so he could turn the port on and off from the cockpit if a similar situation arose again. Bill repeated the procedure for the other three ports, and then flew back around to the other side of the dropship, where the airlock was. Therefore, it wasn't too much of a stretch for Harriet to assume he'd gone back inside.

But Bill hadn't gone back inside. Instead, he kept a low profile as he refueled his jetpack and crept toward the corvette. Every ship has externally operated fuel valves for use while at a spaceport, and Bill carried the end of a refueling hose across the void. The other end was already attached to the Kraken's Spit, and now he had to get this end over to the IA ship. Compared to shutting off the RCS ports, hooking up the refueling hose was easy, and in under an hour his ship had a full load of fuel. However, Jeb and his crew weren't cruel- they had made sure the corvette would have enough propellant left to return to the Minnmus base before the life support systems failed. For although they were now fugitives and thieves, they were not murderers.

Edited June 5, 2019 by Confused Scientist

[Skylon]

Wow, this continues to be brilliant

[Confused Scientist]

20 hours ago, Skylon said:

Wow, this continues to be brilliant

Thanks. I guess I've just had a lot of practice writing stuff- after all it's not rocket... wait.

[KSK]

Hah - Grand Theft Spacecraft - I like it! And the sneaky refueling job fits very well with the tone of this story.  

[Confused Scientist]

Well, originally, Bill was supposed to have also brought a servicing harness with him- servicing harnesses are used to service spacecraft when they're in a spaceport with gravity- and as the corvette turned on his engines, he'd have to work like he was under gravity! But I didn't think that would work too well.

[Confused Scientist]

Chapter 9- Galaxy Trucker

In the early days of the space program, before it was wiped out along with everything else during the Great Purge, spare parts from junkyards and refineries were used as fuel tanks. Trash cans were turned into boosters, defective docking ports were turned into structural elements, and the first rocket to go to the Mun- Jeb couldn't quite recall the crew's names, even though he thought they were quite familiar- even flew with an oil barrel as the service module prop tank.

Even though twenty-seven consecutive missions failed, on average, before one successful one back then, the old space program had the right idea. "Has all of the fuel been pumped from tank 5A?" asked Bob.

"Yeah, it's empty," said Bill. "Sealing off Bulkhead 19 now."

For three weeks, the crew had been living in the standard cockpit at the front of their rocket. Now, with two more months to go until the Eve gravity assist that would shoot them off to Duna, they needed more space. Bob had the idea years ago, and gradually with the spare time and spare parts abandoned at Station One, Bill turned it into reality.

"Well, open the hatch," Jeb said. He was eager to see how it would work out, as all of the life support equipment had been soaking in fuel for years. However, there was one easy way to get the fumes and residue out: open a window and let the big black take care of it. After two hours with the empty fuel tank open to vacum, it was finally habitable and it would not cause the crew of the Kraken's Spit to lose their healthy green color.

"Atmospheric readings are normal, time to start checking the equipment." During the next hour, Jeb checked the module's life support equipment, Bill checked the recreational equipment and computers, and Bob checked the stores of fuses, snacks, toothbrushes, laundry, science, garbage, rubbage, refuse, junk and trash.

"It all looks good," said Bob. "This thing was a great idea."

Jeb nodded. "Nice thinking, Bob." Jeb couldn't even guess at the secret that only Bob knew.

Edited June 5, 2019 by Confused Scientist

[Confused Scientist]

Big things in store!

Edited May 19, 2018 by Confused Scientist