Starship's Mage: Episode 1 by Glynn Stewart Read Free Book Online Page B

inner area of Ring Seven where he’d been staying and the layout of the Rib was straightforward – each floor had a single corridor down the center, and the mess hall spread from one side of the hull to the other at the end of that corridor on Deck Two.
    There was no one in the mess hall when Damien entered it, giving him a minute to take in the plain, lightweight table bolted to the floor, and the similarly lightweight magnetized chairs. One of four mess halls on the ship, this one had enough tables and chairs for sixty people – half again the number Jenna said would live on a rib, and almost three-quarters of the crew.
    There was a kitchen, set up to function in gravity but be easily secured for zero-gravity, and a number of reasonably high quality food prep units. They were glorified vending machines, but they happily spat out a sandwich and a cup of coffee for Damien with only a little coaxing.
    He was half-finished his sandwich when someone else wandered into the mess. A bulky, dark-skinned man with a black turban wrapped around his head, the newcomer flashed bright white teeth at the sight of the gold medallion on Damien’s throat.
    “So! The Captain did find us a Mage!” the stranger boomed, stepping over to Damien and offering his hand. “I am Narveer Singh, First Pilot aboard the Blue Jay . May I join you?”
    Damien shook the big man’s hand and gestured to the several empty seats at the table he’d taken.
    “Feel free,” he agreed. “I’m Damien Montgomery – the new Ship’s Mage, as you guessed.”
    “The Captain, he is a lucky man!” Singh boomed as he conjured a stew-like dish from the food prep units. “Rumor I heard was that the Governor blacklisted us!”
    “I had my reasons to ignore that,” Damien told him. “I also never officially heard about it, so I don’t think it counts as breaking it.”
    Singh boomed laughter, echoing off the previously sterile and silent walls of the mess.
    “I like your style, Montgomery!” He told the young Mage. “It isn’t disobedience if you didn’t hear the order – ‘communications failures’ are good for that in shuttles!”
    Damien was about to ask about the ‘First Pilot’s role when the ships public address system clicked on with a slightly noticeable, almost definitely artificial, buzz.
    “Now hear this, now hear this,” Jenna’s voice rang clearly throughout the ship. “We have confirmed loading times with Sherwood Prime Docking and will have a twelve hour loading shift commencing at oh-nine hundred OMT. Please secure all items for zero-gravity.”
    “I repeat: we will have twelve hours of zero-rotation in the ribs starting at oh-nine-hundred Olympus Mons Time tomorrow. That is all.”
    Singh pumped his fist exuberantly. “Brilliant!”
    “What is?” Damien asked, thinking through the announcement. It made sense, though he’d never thought about it, that they’d have to stop rotating the ribs to load the cargo. The Blue Jay ’s ribs were two hundred meters out from the ship’s center, which meant they rotated around the ship three times every two minutes, preventing anyone from attaching cargo to the central keel.
    “We have a cargo – with the blacklisting, we might not have found one,” the dark pilot explained. “The Captain, he is brilliant!” He paused, swallowing down some of his spiced stew. “I’ll need to check on the shuttles,” he continued after a moment. “We’ve been using them to help with repairs, but we’ll need to get the beasts set up for cargo handling again.”
    With a shudder at the thought, Narveer Singh started inhaling his food so he could get started. Damien simply watched in amazement and nodded goodbye to the pilot as he left, charging towards the aft of the ships and the shuttle bays.

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    “And this is your working area of the ship,” Jenna told Damien as she drifted up to a handhold near another hatch. They’d started their tour of the keel of the ship at Singh’s shuttle bay at