“Let’s just say that I’m not sure who to trust.”
“Do you think we’re walking into a trap?”
“The thought has crossed my mind,” he admitted.
As he walked into the mess hall, Nathan immediately noticed something was different. Not only were there more diners there, but the place was actually clean. The chaos of the last week, combined with a drastic lack of crew, had resulted in an eating environment that had been in dire lack of attention. It wasn’t that the crew were slobs, it was simply that no one had the time.
Apparently, the stranded workers from the harvesting team had the time and had taken it upon themselves to give the room a thorough cleaning after they had finished prepping all the molo. Nearly all of the surviving workers were sitting down to eat, as were nearly a dozen of the crew. In fact, Nathan couldn’t remember the last time he saw so many of his crew in one place, other than in the main treatment room in the Medical section.
The room smelled inviting as well, with the smell of what had to be a molo-based dish of some type wafting from the galley to the left of the mess hall. Nathan made his way over to the service window, nodding at diners as he passed.
“Good evening, Captain,” the Volonese woman said to him from behind the serving counter. “Would you like some stew?”
“Yes, please.” Nathan watched as she dished up a hefty bowl of steaming hot stew. There were big chunks of what he recognized as molo, along with a few other vegetables that Tug had provided. It was all swimming in a dark-brown broth that smelled quite pungent as she handed the bowl to him.
“Kala bread?”
“Huh?”
“Would you like some Kala bread?”
“We have bread?”
“Of course,” she said, a smile on her face. “You can’t have stew without bread,” she told him as she handed him a roll bigger than his fist.
“Thank you,” he said, placing the warm roll on his tray.
“Nathan.” Vladimir stepped up next to him at the service counter. “I heard our guests were cooking something,” he exclaimed as the woman handed him a bowl of stew and a roll. Vladimir took a long sniff of his stew. “Oh, I tell you, after eating the food on Haven, I was not looking forward to eating more escape-pod food.”
Nathan and Vladimir left the service counter and made their way across the room toward an empty table in the corner of the mess hall.
“So, how are the repairs going?” Nathan asked.
“Fine. Not too much was damaged during the last battle. Lost some more rail guns, got some more holes in the outer hull. The inertial dampeners are still not up to full power. But all the main systems are working. Propulsion, power, life support, maneuvering, they are all good.”
“I’d really like to get the torpedo systems working again.”
“Nathan, you only have two torpedoes left. We can manually load them into the two undamaged tubes and fire them manually if need be. There are more important things to work on.”
“Such as?”
“Most of my people are working for Doctor Sorenson, making sure the jump drive is working properly. She is most concerned with the telemetry from the emitters. She claims that having to make jumps without knowing how many emitters are working is giving her gray hairs. The rest are working with Allet to get all rail guns working at better-than-original specifications, thanks to Allet’s improvements.”
“Well, that’s good news, at least. We’re probably going to need them.”
“Why? Where are you taking us now?”
“Someplace called Corinair. It’s on the other side of the Pentaurus cluster.”
Vladimir continued to devour his food at more than twice the rate of Nathan. “What is there?”
“Apparently, they have some sort of rebel base there. And get this, it’s inside an asteroid, no less.”
“Inside?”
“Yeah. According to Tug, we can fly right in and park. They have some kind of repair and refit facility there.”
“Interesting idea,” Vladimir said as he tore off a piece of his roll and popped it into his mouth. “So, you are considering using this facility?”
“Yes. I gotta tell you, though. It makes me a little nervous.”
“Why? Because you have to fly into a cave?”
“No, because it could be a trap.”
“You are being paranoid, Nathan.”
“You trust them?”
“Of course not. But if they wanted to capture the ship, they could’ve done so long ago. This ship is not as secure as everyone seems to think it is.”
“Well, that’s comforting.”
“My point is, I do not believe their intention is a hostile takeover.”
“I hope you’re right. I sure wouldn’t mind fixing the hole in the bow. Flying around with a hole in our hull just doesn’t sit well with me.”
Nathan noticed Tug and Jalea entering the mess hall, along with both of Tug’s daughters. “It’s got to be hard for them,” Nathan commented, gesturing toward Tug and his girls. “Losing their mother and their home all in one day.”
“Deliza seems to be handling it pretty well,” Vladimir said.
“Really?”
“She was following me around engineering, asking me questions for more than an hour. She said she was bored sitting in her cabin. She’s a very smart young lady. And she is much easier to understand than Allet.”
“Maybe you should put her to work.” Nathan said, only half joking.
“I just might,” Vladimir said in between spoonfuls of molo stew. “I can use all the help I can get down there. And who knows, she might teach me some new tricks, yes?”
Nathan had to smile at the image of his larger-than-life Russian friend taking lessons from a demure sixteen year-old girl on how to fix the ship’s systems.
“You know, this molo stew, it is not too bad,” Vladimir commented as he finished the last of his serving, sponging up the remaining broth with his roll.
“That’s good, because we may be eating a lot of it for awhile.”
“More stew, sir?”
“Yes, please,” Vladimir exclaimed, his mouth still full of bread as he leaned back to make room for the Volonese woman. She filled her ladle and deposited its contents into his bowl. Vladimir admired the woman’s ample bosom as she deposited a second scoop into his bowl, then looked at Nathan, his eyebrows bouncing up and down twice in rapid succession as a grin formed on his face. Nathan just shook his head slightly, smiling back. Despite all that had happened to them over the last week, Vladimir hadn’t changed a bit.
“My compliments to the chef,” Vladimir exclaimed. The stew, it is Ochen vkusna.”
“Spaseeba,” the woman answered.
Vladimir’s mouth dropped, as did his spoon. “You’re Russian?” He was as excited as a little boy on his birthday.
“Nyet,” she told him.
“But you speak Russian?”
“I speak many languages,” she stated proudly. “Sadly, though, my Russian is not very good.”
“I will teach you, then,” Vladimir promised. He quickly brushed off his hands on his pants before offering it to her. “I am Vladimir. What is your name?”
“Naralena. My friends call me Nara.”
“Then I may call you Nara?”
“We shall see,” she answered coyly.
“Ah, there is hope,” Vladimir exclaimed victoriously.
“You have an interesting accent, Naralena. Where are you from?”
“Volon, Captain. The same place you pretend your ship is from.” She suddenly dropped her accent and started speaking in what Nathan recognized as perfect Angla. “The accent was more for the benefit of your friend. I can use many accents.”
“That’s an unusual skill.”
“I was a translator before I was sent to Haven.”
“Really? How many languages do you speak?”
“At last count, I believe it was eight.”
Nathan almost choked on his stew. “You speak eight languages?”
“Fluently, yes. But I can also communicate in several others, only not as well.”
“That’s quite impressive.”
“Thank you, Captain. But it is not as impressive as you might think. I was genetically skewed to have a talent for languages.”