Jessica sat in the now quiet office of StarQuake Engineers, Inc. The sign on the building said, “Union Certified Starship Engineers. Redesigns, Upgrades, Repairs: No Job too big. No job too small.” Mornings here were chaos. Jack and his Uncle Henry, who everyone called Hank, organized work crews for the various projects on starships in orbit. Well, they called it organizing. Jessica only saw the chaos, but what did she know? This was her first job since returning home to Benara-3 from college on Etron. She busied herself with the next pile of estimates that Hank left for her to do. Jessica much preferred it when young Jack was around. While she took a break to get some java she ‘wandered’ through Jack’s office. His degrees were on the walls in nice black frames. That is where his sense of organization seemed to crash and burn. His desk was awash in papers and drawings. A picture of Jack’s parents barely peered over the stack of papers in front of them. They had been killed in the Jag wars. Hank told her that it was still heavy on Jack’s soul and a subject to be avoided at all costs.
Uncle Henry’s desk, on the other hand, was much more organized. It wasn’t exactly clean, but everything certainly had its place. There were books in strange alien languages on his bookshelf next to some equipment catalogs. And then there was that small crystal dragon. It sat out of the way where most people would not even notice, but it reminded Jessica of why her father had warned her that old Henry Morgan “did not have both oars in the water.” She had to admit that he was certainly a very odd person, but he was very nice to her and never said anything at all to make her feel uncomfortable. He was incredibly intelligent. All of the starship engineers trusted his technical advice absolutely. In fact, she had answered calls from some very exotic places for Hank’s expert advice. Even so, there was that crystal dragon… and that workshop door with the padlock on it. Hank didn’t even trust the office computer for its security. Now that was odd.
“Jess?” she heard the call come in from Jack.
“Yes,” she replied across the room to the videophone on her desk.
“I ran into a problem here. I need you to get me these supplies.” The list was already printing out.
“Can you do that?” His dimples deepened when he smiled at her. She blushed.
“Of course, I can. I have an Engineering degree, remember?” She recovered.
“Of course, you do. Okay, I need it on a shuttle up here as soon as possible.” The screen went black.
What was going to be Jessica’s quiet morning turned back into chaos as she now pressed suppliers for equipment and fast deliveries. None of them was used to taking the orders from her. They wanted word from Jack or Hank, but she stood her ground and got her supplies.
It was late afternoon before she knew what time it was again. Crews were beginning to come in. That was a bit odd too. The work crews were made up of humans, not androids. Why were humans doing heavy labor in this day and age? It certainly wasn’t necessary. And they all seemed to call each other by some very odd nicknames. She was sure that she had heard them refer to Jack as ‘One-Eyed-Jack’ despite the fact that he obviously had two perfectly fine eyes, at least by Jessica’s observation. There were a few women amongst the contractors, but it was mostly men. Except for the reprogramming jobs, work aboard the starships was mostly hot, heavy, dirty, dangerous work. The contractors were all milling about, talking and laughing and filing their job reports and time sheets. Chaos began all over.
In the midst of this chaos, a woman in dirty green millwright coveralls and grease on her face made her way through standing groups of men to Jess’s desk.
“Hi, Calamity!” Jess greeted her when she looked up. Her real name was Laura Jane, but everyone called her ‘Calamity.’ Calamity leaned down so that only Jessica could hear her.
“He’s up to something,” she whispered to Jessica. “He has been all smiles all day… and he was busy making all these private phone calls. He’s asking you out. It’s just gotta be.”
Jess smiled. “That would be nice.”
“Yeah, look at her get all blushy-faced. ‘That would be nice.’ Okay. See you later.” And with that, she left.
Hank came in and went right to his office. Jack arrived about an hour later. Jess was getting the routine down now. When there were ships in orbit, it was going to be a long day.
“Thanks for staying late,” Jack said to her when things had once more quieted down. “Would you let me take you out for some dinner? It’s the least we can do for keeping you so late.”
“Sure. I would like that.” She smiled at him. He smiled at her. Then they left for dinner.
Hank watched them leave.
When they were gone, Hank unlocked the door to the private workshop and closed it quietly behind him. Consoles and equipment led the way to a flat panel display in the corner. Hank looked at the display very carefully for some time. He referred to an alien book for some time before turning out the lights, locking up and heading for home.