Space Exploitation Ch. 01

Huge thanks to Selena, fellow author and editor, for not only finding my errors but also saying what she liked and encouraging me. Also thanks to Leah for reading and giving me feedback.

Not much sex in the first chapter, and mostly near the end, sorry. Trying to establish characters. More sex in chapter 2, and if you want to see any pairing or trio feel free to leave it in the comments.

Victor looked down at the window again and flinched. Whoever said that the view of Earth was amazing hadn't been in a cylinder rotating fast enough to provide gravity. Not that the gravity was anything close to Earth normal.

He caught a glimpse of the gate, the massive ring of metal and ceramics. In space there is no good sense of scale, but he knew that the ring was over 30 feet thick, and the "donut hole," was 280 feet in diameter. Six million cubic feet of interior volume, so large that much of the living quarters and support structure were just built into the gate. And the cost of the gate itself was dwarfed by the cost of operating it just once. At $10,000,000 per pound, moving a single 100 lb woman through the gate cost a Billion dollars. Men were even more expensive, and judged less useful for colonization work (creating the next generation of workforce for the new planet anyway).

Which was why he had spent 3 months at the Lagrange Point living in a tenth of a G, taking special drugs and a tailored diet to trim 50 pounds of muscle off his frame. He was currently 142 lbs, the last 2 were proving stubborn, but one of the doctors had told him they would just skimp on his food for the trip. Victor hoped the doctor was joking. The women had come to station Betamax (some sort of joke about old data storage tech?) two months after he and the other men had. 884 men, 5327 women. This colonization effort was going to cost more than the US GDP, and a lot of the taxpayers said it was a vanity project.

Still, Russia and China were trying to raise the funds to use the gate while complaining bitterly of greedy cheating capitalists. Germany had entered into a partnership with Switzerland, England, Denmark, and the Scandinavian countries to try to put together the horrendous cost, Japan was looking into mortgaging their stagnant economy for a colony, and a consortium of southern European nations was also trying to raise the funds (and rumored to be talking to the Saudis). The US had picked one of the best of the colony world sites, relatively close to Sol, while having a planet with near Earth gravity, temperature, and atmosphere. The equator would be uninhabitably hot, and the atmosphere was only technically safe to breathe, but as near Earth bodies were concerned, it was one of the best.

The "return gate," would not be as large. The Mayflower was half the size of the gate (in order to safely fit through), and a third of the ark ship's volume was devoted to landing craft. Victor's children would probably help expand the new gate to proper size, and perhaps his grandchildren would use it. Right now it was just going to be large enough to send a three woman crew back to Earth to report success, since light would take 142 years to reach home with any message.

Some idiot would have to be responsible for the mission, in charge, a military dictator for the first three years of the colony's life, and likely to be looked to for leadership even once the plan for democracy was phased in. The folks in charge had looked for a military officer with a technical background, and found Victor. Commander Victor Strange, USN, formerly captain of the USS Sioux City and the USS Zumwalt, along with a brief service as CO of the Constitution. Victor still wasn't sure why he had "volunteered," for the duty. Still, one of the youngest Commanders in service at 34, with combat experience in the battle of the South China Sea, and the silly medal they gave him for keeping his cool in the Tahiti incident, well, Victor figured they could have done worse.

The rag tag group they were saddling him with, geeks and techs and professors, he was pretty sure he'd be the only guy on the planet with a medal of honor. It was supposed to be a US colony, but sometimes it felt like a colony of California. Of course, almost half the volunteers for colonization were from the one state, and when you looked at the screening process, heavy on engineers, technicians, folks with PhD's in history, agriculture, ecology, anthropology, and every other -ology you could imagine, well, the west coast had an advantage in the techies and science geeks too.

Victor thought 'well, the East coast was settled by folks who wanted to get away from Europe, for religious reasons or second sons wanting land or whatever, but a lot of those folks made their new life and settled, and their G'G'G'G'G'G'G' Grandsons and daughters still live there now. The Midwest was settled by folks who wanted to get their hands dirty, who wanted land and jobs. The folks who still had wanderlust or wanted privacy ended up in the Rocky Mountains. Only the crazies kept going west until they ran out of room, and so they stopped in California. Spend some time in California (or Alaska, where folks who were willing to freeze off toes to keep going west ended up) and you will know I'm right about Californians. Space was the latest chance for those crazies to keep going, keep moving, to get away from civilization and everything they were used to, and try once again to make things better by making them different.'

Victor would let them try that silliness in three years, but first they would get basic infrastructure up, including domes and something to start fixing the air.

Helen still wasn't sure why she had volunteered. Both of her specialties dealt with children, and she didn't expect to see any for some time. Still, a Pediatrician was still an MD, and a Developmental Psychiatrist was still a mental health doctor. Heck, she could step in as a third surgeon if pressed. And the colony had specifically listed Pediatrician as a required job, because the we would be swimming in kids in 2 years if all went well.

OK, so she still was amazed, honored, fascinated with the idea of being one of the first people on a new planet, taming it, discovering new wonders. She was just grumpy from the caloric restrictions. She knew her breasts would re-inflate once they landed and could eat properly again. The shrinkage of her hips was welcome, but she suspected that also would go away once she could eat properly. The buzz cut was annoying, but she supposed paying for transporting hair would be a foolish cost for vanity. She had made sure to squirrel away some research that promised to quadruple hair protein accumulation - once they were on the ground.

She wasn't sure about sharing men, perhaps she would just find someone who could get her pregnant every two years and leave her alone the rest of the time. Between kids of her own, and her work, she probably wouldn't have time for romance anyway.

She had walked to the aft end of Betamax, and watched the great gate spinning. Of course, the visible spin was as much from her space station as the gate itself. Einstein would say something about general relativity, but she just admired the works of man. She couldn't really see how large it was, but she knew. Larger than any other structure off planet, and likely to stay that way for a generation. Heck, she had been told it was the third largest structure made by man, larger than the building Airbus used to assemble planes, or the NASA hanger for the space shuttles used to ferry up the materials for this giant.

April put her head in her hands, no longer even trying to hide how she felt. Granted, she was grumpy with hunger, but this argument, like so many others, had her fuming... She felt like shouting "it's just grass people," at the two terraforming techs arguing in front of her. OK, so technically clover isn't grass, but it was being argued for the same reason as the tundra grass Phillip was asking for. It wasn't even that they would only plant one, both species would be going to terra nova or whatever they ended up calling their new home, but the question of "which should be planted first," was apparently of great importance.

To them anyway, April was the one in charge, she'd run the simulations, looked at all the variables, and frankly the choice of tundra grass or clover was a rounding error. "OK, just shut up," April said, then made a great show of pulling a dollar coin from her pocket. She flipped it up, caught it, and slapped it on the top of her hand. Looking at Phillip she said "Call it."

He looked like he was going to protest for a moment, but the look on her face stopped him. "Heads," he grumbled.

April showed both of them the coin, before looking down at the statue of liberty herself, "Clover it is then. Now if you will excuse me I have more planning to work on."

As she stalked off, she admitted to herself that there really wasn't anything pressing, she just didn't want to listen to the argument any more. Honestly she wanted to sleep. Between the caloric restrictions and the physical training, she had lost twenty pounds, and she hadn't weighed much to start with. The medical types had argued some about how much weight she should take off, finally gi ing her a target weight of 82 pounds. She currently weighed 79 and felt like crap.

She wandered to the galley and got her tray. Each tray was individually tailored to the tastes and nutritional needs of the colonist, and would be until they had been on planet six months to regain the lost weight and muscle. She was glad they would have robots to do much of the initial planting and building, she doubted most of the crew would be worth squat for hard labor until then. It wasn't until she got to her table that she saw the treat, a large slice of chocolate cake. She saw the hunger in the eyes of the other women at the table. Not that any of them would try to steal it, but...out of pity she ate it first. 'I really must be under weight,' she thought. The rest of her food was eaten regretfully, as it washed the taste of the chocolate out of her mouth. Still, when she was done she saw a bit of frosting stuck to her plate. She scraped at it with her fork and relished the flavor as she took her tray to the galley.

Patricia "Trish" Gonzalez was the daughter of a Mexican illegal who had been deported right after bringing her obviously newborn child to a LA hospital, making Trish a legal US citizen. She lived with her mother until she was 12 and then used her citizenship to get back to the states. If was rough for a few years, but after a while she was recognized as the person to go to for cheap repairs. It didn't matter if you wanted to fix a car, a microwave, or a computer, just give her a meager budget for parts, 3 hours, and some cash for her time and your machine would be working again.

Trish reflected on her choice wryly as she prepared for the trip away from the nation her mother had risked so much to get her into. Still, without her mother getting her to the US, she would have had no chance at getting to space. It was a dream even before she could remember. There were a lot of candidates with more degrees, more experience, more documented skills, but she had applied anyway, and the testers had been both pleased and amazed at her ability to get things working while the other candidates were still testing. The Engineering Chief didn't think much of her, but to be fair, she didn't think much of him. They stayed out of each other's way, he would give her a task, and she would get it done. No complaints, so he left her alone.

Which led to her latest task, with everyone finally moving onto the Mayflower from Betamax, all the life support tech had to be at 100% capacity. Well, 115% of needs as she thought of it. She figured she could have cut it to 110%, maybe even 108% and not lost any colonists, even if some disaster happened, still the folks with fancy letters after their names had insisted. And one of the scrubbers was showing a noticeable lack of efficiency.

As she walked towards the area, she was hit by a hunch. If it was caused by consumption instead of inefficiency, the mass would amount to...900 Kilos? That would be like, 10 men? Better safe than sorry. "BetaSec, this is Gonzalez of Engineering. Can I get a couple guys for an escort on the Mayflower? It is probably nothing, but if you have someone bored and willing to humor me..."

"Better than watching chicks bitch about the diets," the voice responded from her wrist implant, and she waited at the gate for two guys in hard suits to join her. Her soft suit was easier to move in, with her helmet clipped to her waist she almost looked normal, but if a section lost pressure, having a suit meant not dying. Their hard suits were tougher but less comfortable, rumor had it that the Security suits were meant to hold up against small arms fire or up to 4 seconds of laser. They also carried needle rifles, firing a low velocity round filled with knockout juice, or a high velocity kill round. The needle rounds had a special endcap that would patch any holes they put in a wall or suit, so they were considered "space safe."

Victor got the ping about security being called to the Mayflower, and like any good/paranoid captain, he read the logs (such as they were). Worried repair tech? Well, may as well check it out too. He wouldn't be able to catch up to her shuttle, but if he suited up quickly he could send the other shuttle early and catch her at site.

He slapped his sidearm on his suit too, just in case, and as expected, reached the gate two minutes after the security types had gone through. He called up a passive feed of their comms.

Trish waited until the two security folks caught up, then led them to the buggy scrubbers. Most of the sector was (comparatively) open, but if she were hiding on the ship there was a spot she would choose. Most space on a ship was used carefully, open space was at a premium, but the scrubbers needed space between filter rings. The irony was that it was exactly the spot she would need to start her check even if her hunch was wrong (which she hoped it was). She motioned the security to silence, and then tapped a code on the panel (the O2 scrubbers, for obvious reasons, were restricted access).

Just as she tapped the code, another realization came to her, if the folks had the security access to open the space, would they have access to the comms? She dove out of the way, just as two bursts of flechette rounds tore into the two security troops. Suddenly her comms got funny, a static blast that she couldn't hear over. She ran down the L corridor, hoping to get away. The two guards were still up, firing into her scrubbers, which would not be good for them. Looks like she would need to do maintenance anyway - if she survived.

One last glance behind her, she saw one of the security troops slumped on the floor, the other one had moved a few feet in her direction and was firing furiously, giving her time to escape. That's when she slammed into another body, knocking her to the floor.

Victor was listening to the security chatter, when suddenly a tone indicated that the communication channel was down. He quickly switched to the general security channel, it was also off. Fortunately, as CO, he had his own channel, unidirectional. "Captain Strange to all security personnel, intruder alert, Oxygen scrubber 2C-as in Charlie- One one seven tack two three tack one four. Request armed personnel to investigate."

If he was smart, that would be the point that he would retreat back through the shuttle to Betamax and let the professionals take care of it, but he couldn't send men into danger he was afraid to face, besides, at least one tech was in there, a non-combatant that shouldn't be in harm's way. Dashing down the corridor, he spun around the second to last bend, and slammed into a woman. He barely kept his feet, and grabbed her off the floor, throwing her behind him around the corner, and looking at the combat, just in time to see the helmet of one of his security troops shatter. As the man went down, three figures moved into the corridor, looking his way. He ducked around the corner, and shot a few bolts blindly from cover.

The tech was sitting on the floor, looking up at him with doe eyes, "You saved my life," she chattered. She climbed to her feet, and moved next to him.

"Get back to the ship, I'll hold them off as long as I can," he snapped at her, then he sent two more shots blindly down the corridor. He suspected the attackers didn't know reinforcements were coming, and if so, they would believe that killing the two of them was their only way to keep their plans hidden. That meant a charge, which meant he needed to be able to retreat, which meant she needed to run first.

He glanced behind, and saw she was close to the end of the corridor. He risked peeking his head out, and hastily ducked back as a spray of needles shot into the far wall, looking like porcupine roadkill. There were five men halfway down the corridor the tech had fled. He stuck his hand around the corner for some covering fire, and then stifled a scream as a needle tore into his wrist. His pistol clattered to the ground in full view of the hostiles.

He turned and started sprinting, 'Five corridors, each only 100 meters, I can do this.' What he wasn't counting on was how sluggish his malnourished body would be, or maybe it was the blood leaking from his wrist. He caught sight of the tech twice in the first three halls, but the goons were gaining on him. 'At least she'll be safe,' he thought. As he turned another corridor, he felt a lancing pain in his right leg. He skidded into the wall, and looked down at blood fountaining from his calf.

"This way," he heard, there was the tech, and a large group of Security, maybe he would live after all. He crawled towards his rescuers, but saw them form up short of him, into a firing line. 'Aim high fellas' he silently urged.

As his five pursuers skidded around the corner, they were too busy aiming at him to notice, but a stern "Ready," alerted them. Surprised, outnumbered, and outgunned, there was really no choice, guns clattered to the deck. Victor wanted to watch the interrogation, but the corpsman took one look at his leg and wrist, and hurried him to medical - wrapped in quick bandages. Ironically, he later learned that the blood loss and tissue damage finally got rid of the stubborn 2 pounds he hadn't managed to lose by dieting.

Once he was fixed up, he limped to the holding area in Betamax, wondering how these folks had made it up to space, much less onto his ship. Five of the stowaways had died in the fight, but the other five were prisoners, and he hoped to get answers. The security system being hacked was especially worrisome. He was about to observe the interrogation when two strangers came to the same place. "We will be taking the prisoners into custody now." They informed the security guards.

"Nope, you won't." Victor calmly contradicted them.

"Sir, we have full authority to take charge of these prisoners."

"Yes, but you need permission from the captain to remove prisoners from a vessel. Space law is the same as sea law."

"Very well, we will contact the captain and get his compliance." The older of the two sneered at him. "Guard, contact the Captain and have him come down here."

"OK," the guard turned to Victor, "Sir, could you please come down here?"

The two strangers turned red, but pressed on, "Captain Strange, we have authority from NASA to take these prisoners into custody."

"I heard you say that before, when I am ready to release them, you can have them, but first I will find out how they got on my ship."

"I'm afraid we can't allow that sir." The younger stranger spoke for the first time.