Chapter 2

Tom rubbed his face. "Back to the salt mines. AI, Tania needs a skinsuit. Warm up EVA Pod Two as well as One." He eyed Tania. "Don't kill me with the thing."

"I'll try not to." Tania headed for the replicator.

Tom headed for his cabin. The place was a shambles; he was embarrassed about it, but NOBODY EVER entered it but him, so... "I guess she can clean it..." Tom suspected that the AI made things disappear periodically, one way or another, but he didn't know how, exactly. Maybe it was having nannites absorb old uniforms through the deck or something. As long as she didn't bitch about it, having someone pick up after him wouldn't be a bad deal. Tania sounded like she'd been largely unappreciated -- but aside from weird shit like whether the AI was male or female, she seemed fairly easy to get along with. He slid into his skinsuit, wondering how long she would be able to put up with him -- and vice-versa.

If he could have read Tania's mind, he would have been surprised! Don hadn't been terribly attentive, and it had been SOOO clear who was Head Girl -- Tania had more or less been picked up because she was there, and Don just didn't have a whole lot of interest in her. Tom wasn't smooth or polished, but that was a good thing -- when he said something, Tania was pretty sure he wasn't putting some spin on it. He'd been up-front about never even having considered taking on a black woman, even just for a sexual liaison -- but he seemed pretty happy with her efforts at fellatio and he seemed satisfied with her looks -- again after admitting that he generally had nothing to do with black women and even had some general issues with them. If he HAD issues, they seemed to be with the whole idea of sharing his personal space with another -- especially a woman. He'd been burned or something, at some point -- that was the only guess that Tania could come up with. 'I can make this guy happy, ' Tania insisted to herself. 'He's ... simple. He likes things that way. He's not stupid or anything, he's just focused, and a lot of things are unimportant to him. Well, I want to be important to him -- but I want it to be a good important, not a bad important. I want to be a priority with him -- but I don't want that priority to be escape from me. I want him to want me around -- even if it isn't all the time.'

That peanut butter and jelly sandwich thing had been revealing. "AI, what does Tom eat?" The AI presented a list of about a dozen items. "Do you have any idea what he might like that he doesn't eat?"

"One can extrapolate," the AI replied. "There have been three mentions of items not on his standard menu that he apparently enjoyed." Three items appeared on the list. Tania eyed it; there was nothing there that wasn't simple or couldn't be eaten without paying the least bit of attention to it. Food wasn't a priority with Tom -- oh, he ate, but it was fuel, not something he paid attention to.

"What does Tom do while he eats?" Tania asked.

"Sixty-three percent of the time, he reads. Sixteen percent of the time, he watches the news. Twelve point seven percent..." The AI rambled.

"That's fine -- I get the picture," Tania cut it off. 'I was right. You don't taste what you're eating when you're reading or watching TV, ' she mused.

"Hey, are you ready?" Tom yelled from somewhere aft.

"Coming!" Tania got out of her bikini and into the skinsuit in record time.

The EVA pods looked somewhat like something out of the old movie, '2001: A Space Odyssey' -- except the manipulators were bigger and there were more of them. There were two pods, one on either side, just forward of the 'ventral attachment area' of the tug. The tug had two 'attachment areas' -- one at the bow that it used to push with, and one along the ventral surface that it would connect to smaller craft or containers (or missile pods) to become the power plant for them. The engines -- which were aft -- could be reoriented to a certain extent to adjust for a cargo or a tow attached ventrally -- there were special struts in the frame of the ship designed to take the variable load as necessary. Tom waved Tania into Pod Two and made sure she was sealed in properly -- since she only had sleep training, he wanted no accidents -- and then entered Pod One. The AI deployed the pods and the pair went to work reconnecting the utilities to the power plant and environmental and habitat pods. Mostly, this consisted of butting together broken cables or conduits and letting the nannites sew them together -- something MUCH simpler than hacking out chunks of frayed this and that and replacing it and connecting every wire, one by one. The nannites knew what went where; initially, the mergers would look a little clunky, but in a couple of days, you would never know where the break was, and in the meantime, the connections worked.

Water COULD have been worse, but at over two hundred degrees below zero, the water lines plugged themselves with ice until the heating and insulation could be re-established. Tom and Tania had to hack off the excess ice with force blades, but that was no big thing as long as you were careful. They worked for four hours before Tom called a halt and they returned to the Mississippi Queen.

Commander Cheney's answer to the situation, delivered by return drone, was simple: "You're on the ground, Foster -- fix it. You have the concubine, who, from reports we have from Don Baxter, is thoroughly competent in plant operations, and you're already in place. If you get things moving by the time the African Queen arrives next week, we'll only be a dozen mines behind. We'll ship you out some better sensor equipment and some defensive missiles and particle shielding, but you own the manufacturing plant for now." Cheney's image leaned forward. "It wouldn't hurt for you to take on this concubine -- you need to learn to work and play with others and to take on responsibility and leadership. Besides, you rescued her, so she's kind of a Chinese obligation. You'd be a Gunny or a Sergeant Major if you weren't such a lone wolf -- or if you just HAVE to operate physically alone, you could make Ensign or Lieutenant and be a Squadron Leader for the tug squadron, but you've gone as far as you're going to, looking out only for yourself. Get a family going and accept a little responsibility for others at a level a little more personal than Fleet or the human race -- you need to move forward." Cheney grinned at the camera. "You know, the great thing about sending this kind of thing by drone is that I can't see you stand there and sputter ... Cheney out."

Tania knew instinctively that she needed to be elsewhere for a time; she got out of there while Tom was still turning purple and went to the head to shower and wash away the sweat that built up over the four hours in the pod -- not to mention the couple of days she'd been trapped in an upended pod. As for Tom, well, he had a temper tantrum -- and it wasn't pretty. He ranted and raved and threw things and acted like a ten-year-old for nearly thirty minutes before finally winding down! Finally, slumped in his acceleration rest, he muttered, "All right, AI -- what do YOU think?"

<Commander Cheney is correct, > the AI replied. <For your personal growth, you need to interact with others and assume leadership roles. Some practice of self-discipline is also indicated... >

" ... Which means I just made an ass of myself -- like I don't know that!" Tom grunted. "I'm not interested in being planet-bound -- on THIS Hell-hole, especially!"

"Push back," came a feminine voice from the doorway, startling him. "Tell Cheney that you will get the place up and running, but he needs to send a replacement crew. You'll probably need some kind of argument that you're more valuable out in space..."

"Tom whirled on Tania, "You scared the shit out of me!"

"Sorry!"

"I'm just not used to..." She was in that bikini again. If anything, it made her look hotter than being naked, and she looked pretty damned good like that. Tom opened his mouth to tell her to put on something drab that went to her ankles so he wasn't distracted, but he needed distraction -- besides, it was supper-time. Beckoning her forward, he thought a moment and directed, "AI, dinner number six."

Tania held up a hand. "If I may -- AI, dinner number thirteen."

Tom frowned. "There is no dinner number thirteen!"

"There is now. The veal cordon bleu, please, AI -- two portions."

Tom blinked. "Where did that come from?" Tom liked cordon bleu -- a lot -- but it had never occurred to him to ask for it.

I asked the AI to give me a list of foods that you like but don't eat regularly," Tania replied. "Variety is the spice of life."

Tom eyed her. "I have my routines..."

"You need to break out of the box sometimes."

"YOU need to not tell me what to do!"

"Yes, Sir." Tania appeared properly penitent.

Tom waved it off. "Bring dinner. I generally read..."

"Yes, Sir." Pushing Tom at this point would only piss him off. Bedtime was coming; Tania planned to make a few points there. Meanwhile, he needed a dose of the familiar. The cordon bleu thing might not have been a good idea with him still smarting from Cheney's transmission. Tom wasn't going to embrace change easily -- not up-close. Tania needed to have a whole bunch of carrots to offset the kinds of things Tom considered to be sticks.

Unknown to Tania was the fact that she was already forcing a change in Tom's habits by being there -- he usually read porn while eating -- and jerked off...

After dinner, Tania faded into Tom's cabin while he ran system checks. The checks were not required -- the AI handled such things on a constant basis -- but Tom didn't trust the AI to have his welfare firmly in mind, so he double-checked things. He also had a tendency to check the various sensors that produced those status reports, as they could be faulty and sending erroneous information. From a ship's maintenance standpoint, Tom's was the best in the tug fleet...

... but his quarters were arguably the worst...

Tania went around picking up scattered piles of clothing and other detritus -- including discarded tissues that missed the recycler and smelled suspiciously of semen. Tom had a refrigerator in his cabin -- and it had real bottled beer in it; there were a few empty bottles rolling around, too. She changed the bedding, reflecting that at least she didn't have to do laundry. Then she climbed into his bunk and settled in to read a romance novel.

Tom finished his evening sweep and showered in the head, then headed for his quarters, wondering vaguely where the woman was. But he found her, in his quarters, asleep ... IN HIS BED! "What the fuck are you doing there?" he roared. "That's MY bunk!"

Tania blinked and shook herself. "I was waiting for you!"

"What for?"

"What?" Still half asleep, Tania considered THAT answer to be obvious.

"Uh, yeah, right. I'm overreacting a little, huh?"

"You've had a hard day. Come to bed."

"I'm not used to..."

"I know. I will move if you want me to -- after..." Tania threw back the covers. She was naked.

Tom put other considerations aside and dropped the towel he'd come in wearing. 'I want a piece of this, ' he thought. 'Things have been fucked up all day, but this has been on my mind from the minute I first saw that ass... ' If Tania ever got around to finding Tom's porn stash, she was going to discover that he had a few videos where the women -- usually black -- wiggled plush asses covered in baby oil for the camera, making one side jump and then the other or rolling the cheeks or whatever; Tom liked plush asses. Tania had one and it was high time that Tom rewarded himself by playing with it!