Ad Astra :: Star Trek Fanfiction Archive ^{Beam me up, Scotty.}

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The Star Beagle Adventures                                                
Episode 7: The Roundabout
Scene 3: Working in a Ghoal Mine

7.3
Working in a Ghoal Mine

“I’m afraid I’m going to have to ask for your weapons…”

Abelind had never been so nervous in his life. The tiny, self-described ferengi would have been unsettling enough. While Pel didn’t look like anything the mining director had ever seen, the ferengi did have the look of a grabler, a mythical magical mischievous miscreant… Some horrible little creature that had walked out of a fairy tale. But it was the six self-described marines that were truly unsettling. They looked too much like oeast or heethed. But really big, well fed, scary, heavily muscled and even more heavily armed heethed.

An orseld, Abelind had natural armor plating on his head, his back and his belly. His race were not really fighters, but they were extremely tough and difficult to harm. The expressions on the faces of the marines told him they were quite confident their weapons were more than adequate to the task of severely harming him in very short order. Abelind could not keep his thick, rubbery lips from quivering or his large, round eyes from watering.

“If you are afraid, then I suggest you ask them very, very nicely,” said Trader Pel. “And be prepared to take “no” for an answer.”

Abelind had no clue how to respond to this. The marines were not behaving in a threatening manner. Their rather nasty-looking weapons were clipped to the front of their uniforms and they were not brandishing them. But each marine was resting a hand on top of some sort of carbine and it was clear they could become deadly at a moment’s notice.

Pel turned to the leader of the marines, not the biggest, but decorations on their uniforms seemed to designate a hierarchy. “Lieutenant Pushkin, it is a little crowded in Director Abelind’s office. Could you designate one marine to stay with me and, perhaps, ensure our privacy from the outer office?”

Without breaking eye contact with Pel, 2nd. Lt. Iov Pushkin said, “Spike, stay.” He then turned and led the other marines out of Abelind’s office. 

The mining director was relieved only for a moment. The marine called Spike was the smallest of the marines and evidently female. But her relaxed stance and expression, the way she positioned her weapon, everything about her attitude screamed “KILLER!” in capital letters with an exclamation mark. He was far from certain that things had improved for him.

The minuscule ferengi businessman, by contrast, was completely relaxed. “Let’s talk elevators.”

“Elevators?” Abelind’s mind was on nasty-looking weapons and people who looked like they belonged as his inferiors behaving as if they were the apex predators in the galaxy. He was far from certain that they weren’t.

“Your workers drive large carts through narrow passages to carry massive amounts of ghoal up from your mines,” Pel continued. “They do this because the freight elevators break down every time you try to use them for the purpose they were designed for. Well, designed is probably too strong a word. Designated for.”

“The elevators are used for carrying workers, supplies and equipment down into the mines,” Abelind retorted. “They were never used for carrying payloads up.”

“Of course they were,” Pel responded. “They just kept breaking down every time because this particular mine is located on a moon, not an asteroid. So the elevators that are easily adequate for carrying raw ghoal in other facilities, are completely inadequate here. But what if they weren’t?”

“What are you getting at?” Abelind’s brain was slowly getting into gear. 

“Every 10th orbit of this moon around that gas giant out there…” Pel pointed at what appeared to  Abelind a random spot on one of the walls of his office, near the floor. Had he known it, he might have realized the small businessman was pointing directly at the current location of the planet about which this moon revolved. “Every 10th orbit, you load 7 freighters with raw ghoal. What if you were able to load 8 in that amount of time? Would that benefit you?”

Abelind’s feeble imagination went into overdrive. There would definitely be a reduction in the regular death threats from his overseers. And there was a bonus system in place that he would almost certainly benefit from. His eyes started to gleam a little and while he didn’t forget about the bored-looking, trained killer slouching against a corner wall in his office, she suddenly took up far less of his attention.

“Now I’m a deal maker, not a miracle worker,” said Pel. “What I want is one of your shuttles. In return for which, I will connect you with a team of people who will, within 5 orbits, rebuild your elevators with far greater tolerances. But they will want something as well.”

“Why isn’t a shuttle enough?” asked the suspicious, but newly ambitious mining director. 

“The shuttle is my fee for connecting you with these people. I am the gate keeper. Without me, there is no deal. But what they will want is different. They care about the condition of your workers. You will need to be prepared to reduce their hours, improve their living conditions and their diets, and provide some other concessions - but these people will provide you with the means to accomplish all of that and still improve your own living conditions even more…”

7.3