Free Oklahoma Salvage by Martin Wilsey

" We had no idea we
had prevented more deaths. We were just
trying to get by in this godforsaken desert. Now let me get back to
work."
    -- Solstice 31 Incident Investigation Testimony Transcript:
Harvey Reardon, Owner/Operator of Oklahoma Salvage, formerly known
as Reardon and Sons. Questioned regarding the origin of $220,000 in
gold found in his possession.
    <<<>>>
    Harvey Reardon recognized the sound in
the distance of an old 18-wheeler even before the perimeter
security drones notified him via Heads-Up Display (HUD).
    He got up from where he
was lying on the ground under an old PT-137 Quad shuttle and dusted
himself off. He lowered his shades, the ones that were more like
goggles, and started walking back to the shop. He was rolling the
stiffness out of his shoulders and grumbled as he
walked.
    “ I’m too old for this
shit…” he mumbled. It was then he realized that he had lost his hat
again. “Bloody hell.” In the fifteen minutes, it would take him
to walk back to get it, that cursed desert sun would turn his bald
head beet red. Alex would be furious with him.
    He paused and tugged at his white
beard for a moment as he considered turning back. He had already
walked past a few hundred planes, copters, and shuttle
fuselages.
    As he watched, his hat
blew across the road in the distance, taking flight in the dry desert wind. “Oh for sewers sake,” he cursed and kept
going. Grease and dust were all over his coveralls, almost completely obscuring the lettering on the back: “Reardon and
Sons – Salvage, Restoration, Sales, and Service.” It was
called Oklahoma Salvage now. There was a new sign out by the
highway to prove it. The new patch over his right front pocket was
not as sun -faded as the lettering on his back,
and all it said was “Harv .”
    As he entered the back
door of the main building, he dropped the aluminum panel
he had been using to
shade his cranium to keep it from burning.
He walked through his office, directly into the storefront behind
the counter of the former diner.
    “ You lost your hat again,”
Alexandra Reardon said without looking up at her great-grandfather.
She was annoyed.
    “ How the hell do you know
that?” Harv asked in his best crotchety-old-man voice. He slapped more dust off his
coveralls. He knew she hated it when he
did that in there. And she knew he knew.
    The sales counter was covered with electronic components, tools, and test
gear. “What’s all this?” asked Harvey. When she didn’t answer right
away, he glanced her way and drew in a breath. “We have customers
coming, and you’re wearing that?!” She wore an old, black
midriff T-shirt
with the sleeves cut off, cut-off jean
short-shorts, and
Chinese wooden flip-flops.
    She ignored
him.
    “ Hunter told me already.
It’s just Wendy. She’s coming for another catapult shipping
container. Have you got one ready?” She already knew that he did.
Hunter was the name of the yard’s Artificial Intelligence system
and it knew what was ready.
    “ I have eleven ready! You
should get off your ass and sell them, dammit. We are a bit light
on funds just now, thanks to all that shit Mark bought at auction
last month.”
    The truck could be seen
turning in from the road, r aising a cloud of dust as soon as it left the
pavement.
    “ So what is all this?” He picked
up a small device he didn’t recognize. It had dozens of wires
hanging from it, and it obviously had power because blue LEDs
pulsed on the main body of the tiny thing.
    “ I was hoping that I could
put together a Quantum Entanglement Communications Transceiver from
these ten busted ones. Hunter says it might work,” Alex said as she
touched one contact after another while watching for indications on
one of the displays in front of her. She sat on an old bar stool
behind the counter, just where the old cash register used to be. She had sold that register to a collector for
over six thousand dollars.
    All the original
bar stools were still there on the other