"Wasn't why I came." Dar headed toward the escalator that led up to the ship's boarding gangway. The moving stairs were turned off this late, but she made light work of trotting up them, pushing her way out the back door and getting her first good look at the bulk of the ship. "Jesus."
She stopped in her tracks and leaned against the metal rail. The ragged, paint chipped surface was rough under her fingertips. Growing up on a naval base meant she'd seen her share and far more of old rusting hulks, ranging from fishing boats to destroyers. But the last vessel she'd seen in this condition was heading out to be sunk for an artificial reef.
Dar turned and hurried down the long walkway. Tied up or not, shallow water or not, having Kerry on board the damn thing gave her a hive and the faster she got her partner off the dangerous and, to her eyes, listing vessel the happier she'd be.
As she reached the entrance to the ship, she spotted Kerry heading her way. "What?" She turned as a man blocked her path, glowering at him until she realized he was just looking to see her ID. She held it up, and then brushed past him as Kerry cleared the inner door and came out onto the deck to greet her. "Hey."
"Hey." Kerry gave her a more than cordial grin. "I was just coming out to find you. You're early."
Dar took her arm and backed up until they were both safely on the metal gangway. Then she stopped. "Anyone else of ours on that thing? Hope not."
Kerry turned and looked, then swiveled back to face her partner. "Huh?"
"It's gonna sink."
"Oh, c'mon Dar, no it isn't." Kerry chuckled. "It's not really that bad inside. C'mon, let me show you around." She hooked a finger through Dar's belt loop and tugged.
"I'm not boarding that damn thing." Dar resisted the pull. "Did you see those holes? Look!" She pointed at the side of the ship, which did, indeed, sport several healthy sized gaps in its metal sheathing. "I've seen bathtubs more seaworthy."
Kerry leaned back against the iron rail. "Hon, it made it across the ocean." She reminded her. "I'm sure it's okay sitting here in the Port of Miami and besides, it's only forty feet deep here. Even if it did sink, I could sit on the pool deck up there and get a suntan while it was going down."
"Mmph."
"C'mon." Kerry gave her another tug. "It's really not that bad, Dar. Once you get used to all the chaos inside. I got a really nice tour of the ship, and honestly, it's better than I thought it would be."
"Uh huh." Dar allowed herself to be drawn toward the deck again. "And you have how many ships to judge this against?" She queried, with a wry grin. "How about letting me judge how scary this crate really is?"
"Okay, sailor girl." Kerry tolerantly led the way across the deck to the inner door. "How's the office?"
"Annoying as usual." Dar paused inside to look around. The air of tattered, tired elegance reminded her of some of the old beach hotels she'd occasionally wander into in her youth, with much of the same scent of age and disappointment.
They were in the center of the ship, a large, somewhat open area that extended up several decks now obscured in scaffolding and torn old wallpaper. There were water stains on the walls under the wallpaper, and the exposed girders were thick with rust. "Point one." Dar said. "Rain inside? Bad thing." She indicated the girders.
Kerry peered at them. "Can't that be from the humidity or the sea air?"
"No." Dar patted her on the back. "But that's all right, cause it means they need to rip all that drywall and plaster out, and that means we can get wiring in at a lower cost than if we have to pull it all."
"Hmm, yeah, I talked to the construction chief about that. He said they'd be ready in about a week to strip everything." Kerry agreed as they walked past worktables and through a propped open glass door at the back of the open area.
Dar found another half destructed space that had a few old desks and walls covered in the typical grunge you often found in office buildings. "Back office?"
"Uh huh. Want to see where they suggested we put the computer systems?" Kerry took her hand and led her forward, shoving open a half stuck panel just wide enough to admit Kerry's slim form and then stepping back. "Here."
Dar gave her a suspicious look, and then slowly poked her head in. After a moment, she drew it back out. "And the joke is?" Her voice rose. "Kerry, you couldn't fit our dog in here, much less what we're going to have to run this thing on, and there's no air conditioning."
"Right. It's a linen closet." Kerry agreed. She peered inside at the room, a scant three feet by six feet not including the hot water pipes running along one wall. "I told them we could use this to store spare parts, but only if they stuck a wall mount AC unit with a drip drain on that long part."
"Good answer." Dar shook her head as she watched Kerry shove the door shut again. "They have no clue, do they?"
"Nope." Kerry leaned against the door. "I told them we're going to need this room instead." She pointed at the larger space. "They freaked."
Kerry walked across the floor, looking up as someone called her name from the outside entrance. "Oh, hi Tally." She turned. "This is my boss, Dar Roberts. Dar, this is Tally. He's been showing me around."
She gave her new buddy a grin. "And watching me shock the pooters out of the construction guys."
"Hi." Tally gave Dar a brief smile. "Um, Kerry...listen, you really, really, really got the stripes mad about this room here." He indicated the space. "It's the Purser's office."
Kerry perched on the corner of one sad old desk. "And?"
"Ah." Dar scratched her jaw. "Pursers kind of run everything, Ker."
Tally turned on Dar with a grateful look. "You've been on ships?"
"Not this kind." Dar managed a half grin. "But yeah, enough to know the politics." She got up and put her hands on her hips. "But the problem is Kerry's right. We'll need about this much space for the system your owner wants."
Tally looked just aghast. "But the old system just fit under Drucilla's desk there." He pointed. "Honest!"
"Okay, let me give you some idea here." Kerry stood up. "First, we're going to put in two big switches about like this." She spread her arms out to either side, then raised one and lowered the other. "And like this."
Obviously lost, Tally merely nodded.
"And then, two racks of computer equipment about twice the width of a refrigerator and about that tall." Kerry added. "And that doesn't even include all the space for cables."
Tally sighed and sat on the desk. "I don't know what we're going to do. They won't give up this space; I'll tell you that right now. They've been talking for a month about how it's going to be redone." He looked around in a worried sort of way. "It's the biggest office on the ship."
Kerry paused in mid-step and peered around her. Then she looked at Dar.
"Okay." Dar said. "Then we'll give you the space this stuff's going to need, and your people can tell us where they want us to put it. We can't shrink any of it. It's just the size it is." She walked to the wall, glancing back to see another figure in the doorway. She took a marker from her pocket and drew an X. "The racks are from here." She made another mark. "To here. That's for the servers. Then the network core is here." She drew a large box on the wall. "To here."
"Why do we need all that?" The newcomer asked.
"Oh, hi Drucilla." Tally said.
"Your boss wants it." Dar told her. "Add this for consoles and monitoring stations. And you get this much space." With a flourish, she drew on the rest of the back wall, and then took six big steps into the center of the room. "Out to here."
"That's ridiculous." Drucilla came into the room. "We don't need all that! We work just fine with what we have, that NCR register system and my machine." She pointed at the drawing. "We don't have room for all that! What's it for, anyway?"