Dead Star Dockyards

Titanyana's ears perked up at the mention of the evacuation. It wasn't a secret per se, but everyone involved, the Terrans, Sanctum, Holifanians, and Prince Merndil, had all expressed some desire to avoid exposing it. Each had their reasons, all of which she could understand, and yet Diana had elected to reveal this to Morizo, a merchant, someone who lived in the realm of information just as much as commerce. 

Why?

Morizo was a stranger, someone who might turn out to be an enemy. Why would she reveal something like that to him without confirming his personality and intentions? Was she just that confident in the word of Manama about her father?

". . . my apologies, Lady Diana, but could you please elaborate upon what you mean by 'evacuation'?"

"I think it would be more suitable if Lady Tempest told you herself." Titanyana froze. "I do not want to misrepresent her plight, and I believe she would appreciate having her position as Queen of the Nekh respected."

So Diana was following social convention. That still didn't explain why Diana had started this conversation in the first place.

"Queen?" Morizo turned to Titanyana. "My apologies, your highness. I was aware you had received a title, but I did not know you were a Queen."

"I-it was a recent development."

"Oh . . . I am sorry for your loss." Manama's smile turned into a frown while Morizo's mood mellowed.

"I'm fine. I've already gotten over it. I only wish I had gotten the chance to tell him that I succeeded in finding someone who would help us." Titanyana bowed her head, now was not a time for tears. "I suppose I should have seen it coming though. It's not like we had much time left anyways."

"Hmm." Morizo once more took a puff from his cigar. "Call me morbid if you please, but you've piqued my curiosity. Why are you evacuating? What are you running from? Is it a war?"

"No. I'm rather embarrassed to admit it, but our planet, Nekh, is, um, well, dying? I think that's probably the shortest way I can put it . . ."

"Dying . . . how, how do you mean? Is there some sort of rare disease attacking your plants? Has the soil been poisoned somehow? Is the air turning bad?" A few shotgun guesses on Morizo's behalf were likely the result of stories he had heard of about specific territories. 

"The levels of ambient Split on the surface of her planet are dropping below the bare minimum threshold necessary to support life." Donovan interjected on Titanyana's behalf. "The hypothesis we are operating under is that there is something fundamentally flawed about their star which has gradually caused it to weaken over successive generations. We have no way of knowing how to identify and fix this flaw, and chances are that even if we did, we simply don't have the time to fix it. A generous interpretation of our current projections suggests a complete loss of life within the next three to four years."

Donovan had left nothing to be misunderstood by the befuddled merchant. He adequately addressed the problem, what they believed to be the cause, their inability to identify and ameliorate the source of the problem, and a best case scenario with a naturally implied 'worse than that' case.

"To my knowledge our progress in terms of individuals transported is only a ship's worth of people, a measly twenty five. We expect to push that number into the millions, but we don't know what hiccups we will encounter upon the way."

". . . millions." Morizo was obviously trying to do some math in his head. That was a big number, probably bigger than he ever had to worry about. "Do you even have a fleet that big?"

"Not at the moment, no. I do think you are underestimating the carrying capacity of our ships though."

"But you said one ship of people equated to 25."

"I never said it was our ship though." Donovan tapped a finger on the table. "We aren't the only ones. The Holifanians are committing a portion of their fleet and we expect some merchants from the Bulsarzian Empire to lend a hand at the behest of a friend we have there. Do you have any interest in helping out? Every hull counts."

Titanyana let out a suppressed sigh of relief. Donovan had navigated this doozy for her. Was this what Diana had planned?

- - - - -

Diana thought the bridge of Donovan's foot was looking rather desperate to have a heel dig into it, but she let the urge to commit domestic violence subside. She had not sufficiently communicated to him her intent to aid Titanyana's development, so punishing him for it was unacceptable. Donovan was the type of person to hijack, interrupt, or extricate himself from a conversation if ever he felt it was stalling or becoming counterproductive.

"We would be willing to provide compensation, of course." Diana abandoned her plans to drag Titanyana into the conversation, now that Donovan had made a move she had to ensure he didn't screw anything up. "We would have to negotiate in the presence of our sponsors, but I think everyone involved would welcome the additional assistance."

Morizo put an elbow on the table, hand to his face, rubbing his lips with the side of his index finger. Diana didn't doubt that he was thinking hard about it, performing a difficult calculus in his mind. He was a merchant, a job which came with commitments to his current and developing customer base, so it would be impossible to devote the entirety of his fleet to anything, it would be hard to justify any at all. At the same time, he was being put in a bit of a tough spot here. He wasn't an amoral person by any means, and it would reflect poorly upon him to ignore the plea of the person who saved his daughter and grandson, so he couldn't exactly send nothing either.

The question he had to ask himself wasn't a 'yes or no', that much had been decided for him before he even arrived, he needed to determine 'how much'. What was the minimum number of ships he needed to do what was expected of him? How many extra would be required to ensure that everything went smoothly? Diana had to imagine he could afford a moderate expansion of his fleet considering how affluent he was, but would he be willing to do so for essentially no return on his investment?

"I'll . . . see what I can do. I haven't exactly prepared for a situation like this."

If Diana wanted to secure his support, she would need to sweeten the deal.

"What sort of support would you need to make this happen?"

"It's not a matter of support really, I just can't afford to lose too many of my ships these next few years. There are going to be a series of grand events roughly situated around the Sanctum's Malannum Celebration these next few years, events my customers won't tolerate being stiffed on."

"So you'll be busy?"

"Swamped. I'll need all hands on deck to deal with it."

Hmm. That would be problematic. 

"Would it be possible for you to purchase a few ships crewed with less skilled individuals and send them to us for training?" Donovan spoke what was on her mind. "We could cover the crewing and maintenance costs for the duration. Would that be a possibility?"

"Heh. I would love to expand my fleet, but there's a problem. There aren't any ships for sale." Morizo shook his cigar, leaving a shaky trail of smoke. "I mean, there are a few ships, you can always find someone willing to sell their vessel. They are hard to find and tend to charge an exorbitant price, but you can find them! Unfortunately I'm not willing to fork over that kind of cash, and trust me, you aren't either."

"So its a supply problem . . ."

Diana raised an eyebrow in Donovan's direction. He was thinking. Not an uncommon thing for him to do, but he was thinking pretty hard for where he was.

- - - - -

Why the fuck is it always a supply problem?

Donovan cursed the cavalcade of problems he had been faced with, almost every single one of them a problem with supply. He wasn't surprised that supply was his biggest enemy, his time studying logistics informed him that the only possible issue for a military was supply, but he wished that they would be faced with an issue of demand every once in a while. He just wanted to have the problem of 'too much', not the problem of 'not enough'.

For a moment he lingered on the amusing thought that he might actually have a demand problem, he had too many problems! Of course, the reality wasn't that he didn't have too many problems, he didn't have enough solutions. What do you know! Another supply problem.

Discarding the hairball that was everything else for the moment, Donovan focused in on the one he found to be most pressing. Where could he find ships for Morizo to purchase? The Holifanians were the first to come to mind, though he tossed them in the bin almost immediately. They had already committed, taking ships from them would be a net negative long term. Commissions for construction also came to mind, but a new ship wouldn't be completed in time. The Holifanians made that clear. Would the Bulsarzian Empire be willing to part with a few of their older vessels?

If they were, they probably wouldn't sell to Morizo based solely on Donovan and Diana's relationship with the crown prince. 

There had to be somebody somewhere with an abundance of vessels who has no need for a portion of them, right? Wasn't that how this worked? These were not modern vessels by any means. They would have relatively low maintenance costs when mothballed, and you would need a lot of them to fight a war. In fact, you would probably need so many of them to launch an invasion that you would have to keep a sizable fleet in reserve.

At the same time, the economic situation of a nation was probably in constant flux, shifting as the socio-economic policy of rulers altered. There had to be some polity which prided itself on military might or expansion and was currently struggling through something of an economic downturn. Surely they would see the merits in reducing their debts with a sale as well as having one of many budget items taken off the list, wouldn't they?

The only question, then, was who? Who in the galaxy would fit those conditions? Donovan didn't know. He didn't know enough about the galactic situation or the players involved. He wouldn't even know where to start. 

Donovan's foot started tapping beneath the table. He looked up to judge the faces of everyone else, to see if they might have had an idea.

Diana would have spoken up about it, as would have Morizo, so he ignored them. They held a direct interest in the expansion of the fleets available to them and lacked any incentive to keep quiet about it. Titanyana and Petunia were in a similar boat with regards to their presentation of an answer. They didn't have ships, they didn't know who would have ships. The Nekh were the ones looking for ships.

Donovan then shifted to Manama. He had a suspicion that she knew quite a bit about the workings of the world through gossip she collected here, but would ships be among that number? Maybe one or two of her old and retiring customers? It wasn't like any nobles came through on a regular basis, and as far as he knew they were the primary holders of such items. 

"Rize, do you know anybody around here that might have a ship or two for sale?" Morizo asked his grandson outright, chancing that he might be familiar with a few of the local merchants.

"There isn't anybody who would be willing to sell for a reasonable price. Business tends to be pretty good on the Sanctum, regardless of what type of good you work with."

"A shame." Another dead end.

Mildly annoyed, Donovan performed a quick sweep of the tavern with his eyes. Unfortunately, nobody present struck him as the type of person who would be in possession of a vessel . . . and yet still he felt like he was missing something. Ignoring some of the inquisitive stares boring into his neck, he brought his fingers to his temples.

Who was it? Who had ships to spare? Who could possibly afford to part with such valuable assets?

- - - - -

The Arboreal Maiden reclined further into her sofa, tablet propped up on the table in front of her. Right now, she was taking a break to watch television, a phenomena occurring with increasing frequency as the days passed. She felt a little bit guilty about them given how hard her subordinates both direct and indirect had been working at her behest, but there really wasn't anything for her to do at the moment. The closer Donovan and Diana got to leaving, the less she had to work to prepare for them. 

Now that the Pegasus was in the final stretches of completion, orders for materiel had stopped. They had pretty much everything they needed cargo-wise as well, and she had been working tirelessly with Arc to transfer what information she deemed to be of desperate importance for their immediate future ever since she had access to a tablet. At this point, there wasn't much left for her to do.

So, she had resorted to putting her feet up and watching a few episodes of 'the Suite Life of Zach and Cody' to pass the time. It wasn't the most entertaining show, not by a long shot, but she had grown interested in the concept of children's entertainment. By any standard she was what one might consider media illiterate; she wanted to fix that. The best way to do that was probably to go through the process Terran children did, children's entertainment. 

There was always an element of curiosity for the Arboreal Maiden, but she found herself developing in interest in children as well. Not children of her own, Terran children. Would Donovan and Diana let her near their kids? Would they let her be friendly with them? What did kids like? Toys? Games? Could she become something of an aunt or grandmother to them? 

The prospect was nice, but she couldn't see it happening. Her own position aside, they were likely to be hyper protective of their children. They probably wouldn't let them travel outside of their nation's borders, something she wouldn't be able to blame them for. What little they had done thus far was all the evidence she needed to know they would have many enemies, enemies that might not be as respectful of the Sanctum's neutrality once their position ahead of the pack becomes known.

ding

She read the notification from a distance, less than eager to give an immediate response.

". . . the Merchant deserves time to sleep like the rest of you, doesn't he?"