As we boarded the shuttle Otto kept a close eye on both Tyson and Catharinus, ready to step in if they sat anywhere close to one another. The skiff slowly moved away from the Kalitá with some grace and started a soft acceleration away. It was a good forty minutes, however, before we reached the starport itself, after picking up more passengers and crews from a plethora of other ships along the way.

Getting through security was more straightforward and it wasn't long before we were walking along the station's main concourse. The place was very busy, with stores and places to eat scattered up and down the side of the walkways, each tempting you in. After a brief walk up and then down the main thoroughfare we all agreed on an Astroburger and settled in at a table in the store.

James seemed to think that the meat was real, though how he could tell I was not so sure. Vat-grown more likely I thought. However, it was fantastic to be eating food that other people had prepared and that Annie didn't have to slave over or clean up afterwards. Whilst we were at the table talk turned to our next destination, and I put forward Moughas as a potential. With a higher local technology level I hoped to get a good computer and Astrogation program there, as well as find profitable cargo to take from Enope itself. The others agreed, especially when they realised Moughas was a water world, something that none of them, except James, had seen before.

With lunch over we paid and then headed out to start our business. Annie to start the search for passengers as usual, she already had Soon Ho Scarpa, one of our previous travellers in mind; Otto to look for spare parts for the power plant and circuitry; and myself and James to head out to find a buyer for our cargo.

The simple act of trying to find a buyer seemed more elusive that it should be. The starport was busy and most of the deals were being done by locals. I managed to find a few leads for those that might be interested in the textiles and the compounds, but making an appointment to work the deals would take a few days, with the hope that they would also have cargo to sell rather than having to spend more time to find another supplier.

Whilst I tried to find a supplier, James kept the conversations going on the side to see what he could learn about the goings on in the highport and what was happening on Enope. The whole search to even find brokers that were available took a good few hours and by the time James and I had finished it was nearly time for us to meet up again with Otto and Annie. James had found little out about Enope itself, much of the talk he said seemed to be about restriction of movement to Amber Zone systems with the latest being Knorbes being harder and harder to get a visa to enter the system. Fortunately, Knorbes wasn't on our current route, or at least not at the moment.

We caught up with Annie and Otto at one of the starport's bars and had a quick drink. Annie had tried to tempt Soon Ho Scarpa into continuing his journey with us, but he had turned us down. The incident with Tyson and Catharinus had put him off another journey and Annie was worried that any rumours might get out about the disturbance on the Kalitá, even thought it wasn't our fault.

Otto had been more fortunate, and managed to acquire a couple of spare power couplings from the shipyard and had found a price for spare parts that would service the Kalitá, even though she was an old thing. The problem was that the parts were expensive, at about Cr100,000 per dton. And by Otto's estimation we would need at least 3 dtons to resolve the issues with the sensors, the problems in the cargo bay, and to repair the M-drives back to their full potential. There was also hull damage as well that would need parts, and then there was the time that we would have to have the Kalitá in a dry dock to make the repairs. We may have to prioritise and do these repairs piecemeal to begin with.

As we started to head back to the security checkpoint and the shuttle Otto noticed some action over by the fixed landing pads just outside the starport. A large subsidised liner, with obvious damage, was being slowly moved into position by a tug. The ship had a pale green hull with a semi-random pattern of white shapes across it and large holo panels, now flickering on and off, some damaged forever, that we could just make out had been advertising for the Six Suns Productions and intersystem entertainment producers. From here we could just make out the name, "Garryvoe".

James quickly dashed off to one of the security team near the checkpoint and asked them whether the starport staff needed any medical assistance for the crew of the ship. There was a brief pause whilst the security guard made a radio call, but his response was that the starport authority had the situation under control. The guard declined to comment further on the situation.

We took the shuttle back to the Kalitá without incident. Back in my cabin I tuned into the local news station and found that the ship had been attacked by pirates. A system defence boat had managed to intervene, saved the Garryvoe and dealt with the pirates. There didn't seem to be any indication of how the pirates had been dealt with or whether this was an isolated incident, so we will have to be extra careful when we leave Enope.

#0001 — 025-1106 @ 1200 to 025-1106 @ 2300 IST Ω

In the morning we headed back to the starport via a short wait for a shuttle. We found a smaller booth at a slightly quieter part of the concourse and grabbed some breakfast. We still had another day to wait until the broker I had arranged to see was free so the main plan was for Annie to look for some passengers whilst the rest of us tried to find interesting things to do without spending any money.

In the booth we could see one of the many monitors that was beaming out the local news and celebrity interests. As the news turned to the story about the pirates we listened in attentively.

We were surprised at the news of a pirate base in the system. Otto mentioned that he thought there were a couple of military bases somewhere in the outer planets, so how a pirate base had managed to set itself up was hard to believe. There would, however, at least by an increased military and local security presence for the next few days so that when we finally did leave we could hopefully do so without incident.

As we sat discussing the pirates, however, we were interrupted by a pair of customs officials that came over to us and enquired if we were the owners of the Kalitá. After confirmation they started to discuss our cargo and the import duty that should be applied. I was about to start arguing that no duty applied for our cargo as we hadn't even begun to offload it, before James stepped in quickly to talk to the pair.

James explained how we were waiting on our appointment with the broker tomorrow and that all of the required duties and taxes would be paid for as part of the exchange. Even inviting the officials to accompany us to the meet if they so desired. Reluctantly, they backed down and sidled off down the concourse, likely to try to bother and swindle some other honest trader.

With our trade in mind I headed off to try to find a jump tape to Moughas, my mind made up on our next destination. They weren't that hard to find, although expensive. I had very little of my own money left, some Cr725 or so, but it didn't stop me a least looking in some of the shops, even if there was nothing really I could afford. Things would be different at the end of the month when we were paid.

Annie met up with us later in the day with the good news that she had found a full complement of passengers for the journey who all wanted to leave by or before 030-1106. If the negotiations with the broker went well and they had goods to sell to us as well as the purchases they made then we would be all good to go. We made sure we made an order for the high passage provisioning for the trip, which would be delivered tomorrow.

#0002 — 026-1106 @ 1100 to 026-1106 @ 2200 IST Ω

By the next day the newsfeeds had died down somewhat about the pirates and had gone onto more mundane items about the mining operations on the planet, the working conditions and the low pay. Despite the Caverns of Enope sounding a beautiful and rare sight to behold, it did appear that for the average worker on Enope, living and working within the sealed habitats on the surface for protection against the cold, was not that pleasant. However, there were billions of people that had made their home on the surface.

Most of the day passed peacefully, with a light lunch, before James and I headed for the brokerage to make our appointment. We started to look at what they had to offer and what deals we could make on the cargo we already had.

It looked like they needed the checical solutions more than the textiles, and we started to negotiate.

With a long discussion we finally agreed on prices for the chemical compounds and for the textiles. The broker was definitely won over by the fine quality of the cloth we had brought and the price was excellent for us. Once we had exchanged money I then enquired about the goods he had for sale.

There were a few items that looked interesting to trade across to Moughas. However, the ones that appealed the most to me seemed to be the finished components and equipment. I believed I could get a good price, and even if the sale on Moughas would not net much of a big swing, there would be a healthy profit.

With a full cargo bay and full passenger roster we were very happy and headed back to the ship to start preparations for the cargo to be taken and then new cargo delivered, as well as make ready for the passengers.

#0003 — 027-1106 @ 1100 to 027-1106 @ 2200 IST Ω

The tugs came to take away our cargo during the night. Otto and I oversaw the handling from within the cargo bay, dressed in our vacc suits, and using the loading belt to move the huge crates. The tugs swiftly departed with the stock and the components we had ordered were not too far behind before they arrived. The process went in reverse and we soon had a cargo bay nearly full.

Passengers started to arrive from 0900 IST, with our scheduled departure date of 1100 IST and the final pieces of their luggage soon after to leave the cargo bay stuffed.

I moved up to the bridge and started the preparations to leave. I informed traffic control of our departure and paid the final Cr300 of our berthing fees. At 1100 IST we pulled slowly out of our parking orbit and headed off towards our jump point.

For prudence, I asked the passengers to remain in the staterooms for the journey to the jump point, within easy reach of their softsuits and had the crew don their vacc suits in readiness. Although the immediate pirate threat had been dealt with by the authorities I was still wary about the story of a pirate base.

Heading out to the jump point we came close to a small express packet, the transponder identified as "The Big Lie", and I paused in my astrogation calculations to hail and greet them, wary of their intentions. They responded, politely, but kept their course and gradually passed us by without incident. In the brief conversation I had with their pilot they stated that they had seen no pirate activity, so at least that was welcome relief.

Whilst I continued the astrogation calculations James guided the low berth passengers through the cargo bay and to the port side of the Kalitá one by one and started the process of preparing the berths for the jump.

Intentionally I had set the Kalitá to arrive at the jump point late in the evening, so that we didn't have to have the Captain's Dinner after a long day. As we came to a stop, far out in the black, I gave the word to Otto to start preparing the drive.

After half an hour, Otto came back to me that everything was ready. With a quick alert to the passengers and crew, I dimmed the lights and the lanthanum grid flared up and we entered Jumpspace.

#0004 — 028-1106 @ 0400 to 028-1106 @ 2200 IST Ω