"Oh wow," Sarah said as she stopped and stared at our newly-upgraded captain.

Rebecca tried to ignore the engineer's reaction, but she had a small smile on her lips and a faint blush on her cheeks.

I grinned at both of them, "That was pretty much my reaction when she climbed out of the pod this morning. She was even more 'wow' without the clothes."

The cute blonde pouted, "Well now I'm sorry I didn't get up early."

The boss rolled her eyes as she took her seat. Sarah got herself some coffee then set the table, while I prepared breakfast. The three of us were dressed now, in the sort of 'working clothes' the captain favoured for this world. Mostly that meant boots, pants, and side-arms. Sarah and I were wearing cute tops while Rebecca had a tight t-shirt that did absolutely nothing to hide her curves or her muscles.

It didn't take long for me to get our morning meal ready, and within a few minutes I served it up for the three of us.

"Thanks cutie," Sarah smiled at me.

I smiled back as I took my seat, "Sorry it's nothing special this morning. We need to get some fresh supplies again."

"And we haven't had our regular visit to Gilly's yet either," I added.

Sarah shrugged, "You still work wonders Amanda, even with the goop that comes out of the autochef."

Rebecca nodded in agreement, then added "We'll swing by Gilly's for dinner. And I'll make arrangements to get the ship stocked up again with fresh supplies."

"I need to give the grav-sled a proper check first," our cute engineer reminded the boss. "At least one of those guys yesterday was shooting HVP rounds. When we were cleaning things up I counted a half dozen holes in the sled, and a few more in the hold and some of the cargo containers. We just got the Demeter patched up too."

Jenny commented, "There's no mechanical or structural damage to the ship. At least, none that the internal sensors can detect."

"That's just luck," Sarah scowled. "I'm pretty sure I saw a hole in the secondary cargo hold doors. If we had to depressurize the main hold I bet the secondary would lose pressure too."

The boss sighed, "Ok so our first priority after breakfast is a thorough inspection of the main hold and the grav-sled. We'll patch any new holes, and if the grav-sled needs work we'll take care of it. Then I'll deal with the port fees and get the ship refuelled, and make arrangements for a load of fresh supplies. Last thing is I need to find us a new customer or cargo."

"Will that be a problem, considering we killed the last customer?" our AI crewmate asked.

Sarah and I exchanged a look, and I could tell she was thinking the same thing as me. It hadn't occurred to either of us that we might have trouble finding a new customer after the last one died in a gunfight in our hold.

"Not really," Rebecca shook her head. "The only people who might hold that against us would be friends of his. Assuming he had any."

I pointed out, "I remember you said you didn't want to get complacent, but we're not desperate for work right?"

The boss shook her head again, "Not even close. Even after the repairs and maintenance costs we're still sitting pretty after all the profit from the Hammersmith salvage. It almost makes me want to get into the salvage business full-time? Except windfalls like that are few and far between."

"So we look for regular work, but keep our eyes and ears open for any wrecks we can salvage?" Sarah suggested. "If I remember right, you and Tamsin both said something about big ships being lost to those mines was a fairly common occurrence."

"Not common enough for us to park the Demeter there and wait for it," Rebecca responded. "It happens every other year or so. Maybe every two to three years? And we're not the only ship in the sector that can do salvage. The Demeter's not even the biggest at that game. It's mostly just a question of luck."

Our engineer nodded, "So our best bet is to find regular freight work, that lets us travel through that part of the sector on a regular basis."

Jenny asked, "Bearing in mind we may still be under threat from Lebeau's employer, perhaps we should consider simply leaving the sector completely? Since we're not desperate for work, we can presumably afford the time it would take to transit to a new sector and get established there."

"Not a bad idea," Rebecca replied, "But there's one big problem. All our money is in ecks. Ecclestonian Dinars aren't going to be accepted as currency outside this sector. There's money changers who'll exchange it for other kinds of currency, but the fees and exchange rates can be painful."

She added, "And granted my information is a few decades out of date, but when Gabe and El and I left the Imperium forty years ago, we spent a few years tramping through other frontier sectors before finally stopping here. We picked this one as the place to be specifically because the whole sector takes ecks. Other sectors around here, every world has its own currency and it's a nightmare for an independent ship to operate. You get paid on one world but can't buy fuel on the next, at least not without paying outrageous exchange rates."

"At the other end of the spectrum are sectors where all the worlds are under the same government," she continued. "You have the benefit of one common currency, but it's like dealing with a mini-Imperium. And there's less opportunity for outsiders and independents, since they usually have their own systems already in place to handle shipping between worlds. Or you have to pay licensing and registration fees, so you're working at a disadvantage from the start."

Jenny nodded slowly, "I see. So for now at least, the Gorath sector remains our best bet."

Everyone was finished eating by that point, so I started gathering up the dishes.

As I did that I reminded the others, "There's still the question of that lab at Fuminja Epsilon, and the Imperium's involvement. I don't even want to think about what they'll do with it if they manage to perfect that research. It won't be good though, and I don't think anywhere will be safe from them. They'll use it to expand into frontier sectors at will."

Rebecca sighed, "That's a nightmare I'd rather not think about. But you're right Amanda. The question is whether or not there's anything we can do about it. Or more accurately, anything we can do that doesn't result in our own immediate and untimely deaths."

"Maybe we should have talked with Tamsin about it?" Sarah asked. "She's a local, and Rolandan-2 is a civilized world. I'm not saying she'd have a solution for us, but she might at least have some suggestions? Or maybe she could point us to someone else who can help?"

"I've been here long enough I'm pretty much a local too," the boss pointed out. "I'm not a citizen of any of these worlds, but I've been around here long enough to know how things work. And nobody has any kind of jurisdiction over that place. Even if what they're doing is outlawed on most worlds in the sector -- and I don't know that it is -- they're operating in their own private sovereign space."

That left both Sarah and I frowning, while Jenny had a thoughtful look on her face.

After a few seconds the AI commented quietly, "That works both ways. If they are their own lawless domain, then should something unfortunate happen to their research there'd be nobody they could turn to for recourse. No-one else would be interested in investigating or prosecuting, since it's nobody else's business what happens there."

By the time she was finished the rest of us were all staring at her, and she cringed slightly.

"What are you suggesting exactly?" Rebecca finally asked. "You know we're not a warship. The Hammersmith or Kennington might be able to destroy that facility, but the best we could do is break their dock."

Our AI shook her head, "I'm not suggesting violence, I was thinking about digital warfare. When I connected to their systems on our first visit there I noted there was a second, secure system that I avoided? That was a long time ago, and I've learned a great deal since then. There's risks of course, and I don't think we could do this without being detected, but I could probably get into their protected system and destroy their research and records. Depending on how integrated the facility is, I could probably destroy the backups too, and even the manufacturing set-up where they're producing the nano-tech."

We were all quiet again for a few seconds, until Sarah asked "How'd you come up with an idea like that? I thought you said you were a healer, not a warrior."

Jenny grimaced, "I've been studying history, along with the computer and networking courses. Specifically I've made a point of studying the war in this sector that my previous ship was built to fight in. That was almost four hundred and fifty years ago, and I think almost everyone apart from university professors and history buffs have forgotten the details of that conflict."

Our engineer looked like she had another question but Rebecca cut her off, "Thank you Jenny."

I thought I caught something in the boss's expression as well as her tone, but it was gone before I could be sure.

Meanwhile she continued, "Even if we destroyed all their research they could just start over. The people behind the project would still be there, they'd still know how to do this."

"Yes they could start over," our AI agreed. "But it would likely set them back several years, if they were starting from scratch without any of their notes or records. They'd potentially have to rebuild their equipment too. And all that's assuming they could afford to do it."

The captain had a thoughtful frown on her face as she seemed to be seriously considering the idea.

"It'd be even harder for them to restart that project if they also had to restart every other project," she finally responded. "Rather than destroying one department, if you could get into their secure systems maybe you could purge the whole thing? Wipe all their records, destroy all their files, burn the backups, and destroy whatever hardware you can access. That'll set them back even further, maybe even bankrupt the whole organization."

"If that's what you think is best," Jenny replied in a calm quiet voice. "If I can get into the secure system then I could destroy everything just as easily as one project or division."

After a few more quiet seconds Rebecca got to her feet as she decided, "Ok. We'll keep that in mind as a possible course of action. It might still get us all killed, but it beats any ideas I could come up with. Right now we need to inspect and maybe repair stuff down in the hold, then there's supplies and fuel and port fees to deal with. Not to mention finding a new customer or cargo."

Sarah and Jenny got up from the table too, and I had the dishes cleaned up and put away so I was ready to go as well. We ended up spending the rest of the morning below deck, as it turned out there were quite a few holes that needed fixing.

Fortunately nothing penetrated the hull or hit anything important, but there were three holes in the doors between the main and secondary hold, a half dozen holes in the wall panels, and a couple floor panels were damaged. And I was unnerved to realize a couple of those bullet holes were in the wall near where me and Sarah had been hiding.

Rebecca took care of patching most of the holes, with Jenny acting as her assistant. Meanwhile I helped Sarah with the grav-sled, which was also in need of repairs. Most of the damage it sustained was cosmetic, but it took two hits to some important parts under the hood, and those definitely required our engineer's attention.

Fortunately we had some spare parts in the workshop to replace some of the damaged components, and Sarah was able to come up with workarounds to address the rest of the problems. By early afternoon she announced that the grav-sled was finally good to go.

Rebecca started to discuss our plans for the afternoon when Jenny suddenly spoke up.

"We've just received a signal from the MV Persephone," our AI crewmate announced. "Lady Magniveen would like to meet with you again captain. She'd like to know if she can come by in the next half hour?"

Rebecca sighed and glanced at me and Sarah. After a few seconds she shrugged, "Fine. Jenny please let her know I can spare her an hour, tops."

"Very well captain," the AI responded. There was a longish pause, then she reported "Lady Magniveen has acknowledged, she says she'll be here presently."

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