Chapter One
Container Ship Machpeh
The corridor was empty as she made her way down toward the engine room. The massive container ship was largely vacant. Her footsteps echoed as they clicked on the metal flooring. The tablet tapped against her thigh as she moved.
Theoni Conner scowled at life in general. She now had her hair cut military short but with some bangs in front. She had a swath of her blond locks dyed blue that hung down close to her right ear. Her body was muscular and had a well-endowed chest because of some recent unasked-for surgery. The modest jumpsuit she wore looked just as frumpy on her as it did on the rest of the small crew of this crappy cargo hauler.
She paused and looked at her reflection as she passed a cargo pod vid panel. The face she saw was still unfamiliar. The transformation too new, and the pain associated with it too raw. Clenching her left fist, she snarled at the reflection. But growl she may but go she must. Turning, she continued down the hallway.
Upon arriving at the panel for cargo container 247, she turned and checked the status. Since the third day of the journey, this one has been reporting issues. She has already done a spacewalk to check the connections with the ship. The clamps and linkages were solid, and all the indicator lights were green. There was no way to enter this unit in flight.
Customers could have three different connection types. This was a beta class cargo connection. This meant that the ship's computer monitored the container to ensure the safety of the contents without the ship’s crew being able to enter the container. Alpha type only monitors the container's status of connected or disconnected. Gama gave full access to the crew. A hatchway joined the ship to the storage pod and they could enter and check on the load during the journey.
Beta class connections were the most popular. The captain said this particular connection was problematic before and the monitor just needed occasional resetting. The interface restarted when Theoni entered the access code and the device override command. Indicators above the panel changed from red to a happy green color.
Leaning her head against the wall, she sighed in pleasure as the metal felt cool against her forehead. Only two more weeks for this leg of the journey. Then she could get paid and off this damn ship. The Machpeh was a scow of a vessel. They told her that the name meant freezer in an old earth language. Somehow the company running it had named all of its vessels after archaic domestic storage devices. Weird but they were hiring with no questions asked about backgrounds. Having no outstanding warrants was good enough.
The Machpeh had a forward section containing the bridge crew quarters, mess hall and recreation area. These sections stacked on top of one another. This connected to a large two decked tube that ran back to the engine room, life support module, air scrubbers and maintenance facility.
The long tube’s top level was a trapezoid with container connections on the ceiling and two walls. This was the only place that could access all three classes of units. The second level of the tube was an express elevator that transported a pair of people from the bow of the ship to engineering in the stern. There was no direct access to containers attached in that area. There were lower insurance costs for cargo stored there as the coverage was non-existent. It was an at-risk arrangement.
She checked their progress on her tablet. It was a decent commercial grade one and similar to her former military issue. They were still within contact range where direct messages weren’t too painful to use. In a few clicks she accessed the support page for Exfinite Cast Communications Limited, the manufacturer of the connectors and monitoring systems for the ship.
The captain, Edward Wharden, had given her all the registration information after the first incident. He gave her a pitying look and warned her that customer support was a dead end that would crush hope and grind away patience. She rolled her neck in anticipation. She never had use for civilian tech support before. The military had someone assigned that you turned in faulty equipment to for repair. With a flip of a finger, she tried to connect.
A video window opened, and a connecting image appeared. Small spinning icons displayed over the image that read, “Thank you for contacting ECCL Technical Support. A service specialist will be with you momentarily.”
A second, smaller window opened next to the first with the captain’s face on it. “Holy shit, Theoni, you are trying tech support?”
The captain had access to any external communication stream from the ship. Apparently, his job was boring enough he was monitoring traffic. His face bore a smirk of amused disbelief.
“Johnson, come here and watch this. It should be good.”
On that note, Theoni’s scowl deepened, and she swiped the captain’s window off the tablet closing that connection. She knew they would monitor, but at least she didn’t need heckling while she was doing it.
Johnson was their engineer. It wasn’t his real name. He claimed the nickname was bestowed upon him because of the impressive size of one of his appendages. Captain Wharden said it was because the guy was a dick. After a few days into the mission, she believed the captain.
The icon kept spinning for another ten minutes. Then it changed to a new message, “You call will be answered by Troy, Representative Number X54213. He'll assist you momentarily.”
That seemed promising. A pleasant and relaxing tune was playing in the background. One that was designed to put people at ease. Somewhere a study was done that some music relaxed those who were anxious. This was one of those tunes that didn’t quite have the desired effect. It was so repetitive that it soon became annoying.
Another seven minutes passed before the screen refreshed again and a dark-skinned male with black hair and a blond beard answered her call. He wore a khaki uniform with the ECCL logo embroidered on the chest. The cubical background had a picture with a beach scene on it that had moving waves crashing upon the shore. It was a pleasant, light blue.
“Thank you for contacting ECCL Technical Support. My name is Troy. This conversation may be recorded for customer service training purposes. How can I help you today?”
“Yes, I am having difficulty with the connector sensors between a type Seven-Ninety cargo container and our ship. We are getting a failure to confirm lock alert from the panel. When we reset the thing, it clears up for a few minutes.”
The figure on the screen frowned sympathetically before responding, “I see. Have you tried resetting the panel?”
“That is what I just told you. That was the first thing I tried. It works for a moment then the error comes back up again.”
The face on the screen brightened. “Excellent, so restarting the panel resolved the issue. Is there anything else I can help you with today?”
“Wait, what? No, that didn’t fix the issue. It still happens. I am getting the error now. The panel lists it as error code Delta-Delta-Niner-Foxtrot-One-One. Restarting didn’t help.”
The face changed back to the frown from before, “Oh, I am sorry to hear that. I thought you said it works. Did you refresh the panel?”
“Yes, I refreshed the panel. That didn’t work either.”
“I see. Will you allow me to have remote access to release and reset the locking mechanism? This should resolve the problem.”
“What! No, absolutely not. We are in deep space and it we will lose the container. Don’t do that.”
The figure on the screen placed a hand on his chin in thought, “If we cannot release the clamps remotely, we cannot get the diagnostic data we need.”
“You’re telling me that the only way to figure this out is to cost my company ten million credits by dumping a paying customer’s cargo into deep space?”
The hand left his face, “I’m not sure what you are asking me. Do we have permission to release the clamps?”
Theoni’s face turned red in anger, “NO! You do not have permission.”
The figure now held its hands up in front of the camera in a calming gesture. “There is no need to get heated. We are trying to help you resolve your issue. Under guideline seven-zed fifteen of the FUP articles regarding on-line support across systems, a valid customer service representative doesn't continue working with a hostile customer.”
Using her left hand, she rubbed her face and attempted to control her voice. “I’m not being hostile. Please don’t release the locks. Is there any other way to diagnose the issue?”
He lowered his hands, “Let me check on this for you.”
The figure looked to his right and his hands moved over some control surface outside of the camera angle.
He brightened as he turned back to the camera, “Ah, I see you have the extended customer service warranty. We can provide you with an update to the locking claw BIOS and install it on the ship?”
Immediately, the captain’s image came back on with a worried expression, “Don’t do it. That update will power down all the connectors and release all the cargo containers!”
“Um, can you send me the BIOS update, so I can apply later?” Theoni asked.
“The terms of your service agreement prevent the unsupervised installation of any software upgrades to secure ECCL intellectual property.”
Something was off. Theoni’s blood started to get hot again.
“Excuse me, where are you located?”
“Why, in my office?”
“I mean, where is your office located? I like the picture behind you. Is the shot live or a recording? I would love to vacation there if you can give me the location.”
The image on the screen stopped for a moment. Before it could respond, Theoni pressed on.
“Hey, why are there so many songs about rainbows? If purple monkey dishwasher had a cow, would its name be George? Who's buried in the unknown troopers tomb?”
The image froze again then went black with a signal lost message. Through her scowl, Theoni smirked.
“Damn, it was just an AI. Captain, I thought you said the company paid for a technician to respond to support requests?”
The captain was now laughing. “Oh shit. Purple monkey dishwasher? Rainbows? Where did you come up with that crap? That was beautiful. Yeah, we paid for it but legally we can only get redress if we can prove the connection went to an AI instead of a live technician. You came close to breaking it. Then they pulled the plug on the conversation before we could pin them.”
“I guess they just can’t get good help. Would they have released all the cargo containers?”
He took a moment before speaking. “Yes, they would have. Part of their service agreement states they aren’t liable for any losses incurred during the debugging of issues. So, they would only be responsible if the latch failed in transit and if we didn’t seek their help. Now they have recommended a fix we couldn’t take, they can’t be held accountable if the thing fails. We must apply it the next time we are in port. Aren’t you glad you signed on for this cruise?”
End Sample
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Copyright © 2019 CN Stoesen
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This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the author's imagination, obtained with permission of use, or are used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without prior written permission, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the author's imagination, obtained with permission of use, or are used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.