grinned. "Worked my way though Spacer College grilling beef groundside," she replied with another laugh. "There was a time when I couldn't stand the smell of this place, but now it's one of the things I miss the most."
"Maybe you can clarify this for me then, if you would, Captain," Sterling said, looking at Captain Denise with his head tilted to the side. When she nodded her assent, he continued. "Why did we bring in embryos if beef cattle do so well here?"
"Mutation," she answered. "The cattle do well, and can eat the local flora, but it causes a change in them. After three generations they are born sterile. The embryos are from Terra or New Argentina, and are replacement stock for the infertile heifers. That's what the females are called. The embryos are selected to be mostly female. One bull to a hundred heifers keeps the line going."
They finished their meal in silence. The meat was accompanied by cornbread, beans, and something called “spuds” that had absolutely no relationship to Terran potatoes. Captain Denise finished first, sitting back and sipping her beer while her crew cleaned their plates. When all of them were sitting back with their beers, she addressed the group.
"This was a good trip. Silver has proven himself a capable navigator and is flexible enough to be permanently granted partnership. Dissent?" She looked around at the three older members of her crew. When no one said anything, she looked at Silver. "You've been on probation, Silver. If you hadn't proven adaptable enough we would have left you here. Since you did, you are entitled to ten percent of the profit, minus your cost. That leaves you with just five hundred and fifty-six credits. Next trip should be better."
Silver raised his eyebrows as he looked at her. "You'd have abandoned me here?"
"Yep. The Jolly Jane is too small a ship to have a crewman who doesn't fit in. It wouldn't have been too bad for you. Your papers are sufficient to get you a place on another freighter, and you wouldn't have been totally broke. I still would have paid you your share."
"It beats what you had back on Hobson's, doesn't it?" Olaf asked and Silver had to nod.
"It does indeed. So what's next, Captain?"
Captain Denise smiled serenely. "We'll be taking a shipment of beef to some small outpost. We make this trip twice a year, bringing in something small and taking beef out. We're just big enough to haul a profitable mass to out of the way places where the big freighters don't want to go."
They returned to the ship to find a message packet waiting for them. Captain Denise opened it and smiled. "Contract to deliver thirty-six metric tons of beef to Fredrick's Station in orbit around planet Germanicus in the Von Habsburg System. Contact the Arvantan Beef Cartel rep for acceptance. Germanicus, huh? Silver, go look it up. Start plotting a course and look for anything unusual about the planet that we should know. I'll contact Arvantan and accept the shipment."
"Yes, Ma'am," Silver snapped and sat at his navigation station to review the charts. Germanicus was the fifth planet of the Von Habsburg system, and was only a six parsec trip. That was four light years closer than Hobson's Planet and his old life. The planet was a lifeless, rocky body with no atmosphere. Fredrick's Station was the orbital shipping port for the automated mines that extracted the abundant minerals from Germanicus' crust. Orbital and planetary population was listed as nine hundred and sixty-three. He paused and considered that for a moment. Why ship in thirty-six tons of beef for less than a thousand people? Something about that seemed wrong to him. He shrugged and plotted the course. It was the captain's business what they took where.
The intercom at his elbow crackled to life and Olaf's voice said, "Silver, finish the plot later. The shipment's coming up the dock and we need you to help load."
"On my way," Sterling answered, pushed the button to lock in the course, and then headed