Free Guardians of the Galactic Sentinel 1: The Deimos Artifact by Phillip Nolte

are pretty well stable for the time bein'. It should be okay down here for an hour or two. I just have to get back here and double check the sublight drive systems before we try an' use 'em. Let's go see how good a cook you are!"
    The two men arrived at the galley of the Capri and Zack demonstrated that he could indeed do a commendable job of preparing something edible, not that there was anything in the galley that was going to require any particularly sophisticated culinary techniques. Sandwiches were one of Zack's specialties anyway. He got out a sleeve of Lehman's starbread, and put four of the pre-sliced rounds in the flash toaster.
    Lehman's starbread was made from a proprietary strain of genetically modified, vat-grown yeast and was a starship staple. The stuff had decent texture, would keep forever and actually tasted pretty good, especially if you toasted it. He slipped the bread out of the toaster and did his best to doll up a couple of sandwiches with the limited supply of ingredients and condiments available, neatly slicing them in half before serving. Cliff was about halfway through his sandwich when Zack sat down with his own plate and joined the engineer. Cliff waited until Zack had taken a couple of bites before starting a conversation.
    "Your uncle put a lot of money into this ship over the last few months. We were gonna get the thrusters overhauled next, but then he...got killed."
    "It's a bad business."
    "I'm really glad that you didn't decide to sell this ship out here at Haven."
    Zack stopped just before taking another bite of his sandwich, "You knew that I was thinking about selling the ship?"
    "I ain't stupid, Zack. I know I can't keep this gig forever. Thing is, if someone had decided to do a full inspection on her out here, there's a good chance that we could have gotten into some...legal issues. "
    So Cliff suspected that the ship might be up for sale? Zack felt a measure of relief upon having crossed that bridge so easily, but what was this other stuff? "What do you mean by legal issues?" asked Zack, mildly concerned.
    Cliff looked a little troubled himself but was shrewd enough to know that the new owner of the ship needed to know exactly what he had taken ownership of.
    "One of our last stops was a spaceship wrecking yard out near Titus V," he said, "You can get systems for your ship there that aren't exactly...conventional if you've got the proper connections and the right amount of cash."
    "What are you getting at?" asked Zack, his concern intensifying.
    "Look, Zack, your uncle and me took this ship to some pretty rough places in the last couple of years. More'n once we were only able to get out of a bad situation by good timin' and better luck. Marv wanted be able to protect himself so..."
    "So, what?"
    "He had a war-surplus pulse beam cannon system mounted on the top side of the ship, aways aft of the bridge."
    "A cannon system?" asked Zack, "How can that be? I didn't see anything on this ship that looked like a weapon."
    "You wouldn't have. It's a twin projector system in a retractable turret. It was originally designed to be mounted on units like planetary patrol craft and such that had to operate part time in atmosphere. When it's retracted, it sits flush with the hull and you can't see nothin'. Marv had them top it off with the round section of hull plate that they cut out to mount it in the first place. If you know what you're lookin' at, you can see the seam. It looks more like some kind of a special cargo port than anythin' else."
    "Until a couple of weeks ago," said Zack, "I was the commander of a Mark VII Marine hovercraft. Before that, I was the back-up gunner. Legal or not, I'd really like to see this gun system!"
    "You're a real-live gunner?" replied Cliff, eyes wide, "That's fantastic!" The little engineer appeared to be lost in thought for a moment, "There's more, Zack; I don't think the weapon has to remain illegal."
    "What do you mean?"
    "I think that Marv had the guys out at