Chapter Eight

"Maintenance? You expect me to believe that the Imperial Guard, the personal bodyguard of the Emperor, the top mages of the Empire, have a maintenance department."
"Yes, we do the plumbing, the heating, the lighting, the killing, the gardening, and we make the beds. If you're good they let you do the laundry."
He stared blankly at the clearly insane man before him. The rest of the men exchanged incredulous glances as a wary silence settled over the room.


"Did you say you do the killing?"
"And the laundry, it's less fun with the new emperor; he's really picky about his clothes."
"Let's talk about his Imperial Undies later, you said you do the killing?"
"It's more complicated than that. We aren't assassins, we're maintenance, we maintain things."
"So, political assassins?"
"No, we contract that out for increased government intrigue. We just do the important ones, ex-guards, cults, corrupt nobles; the ones that actually matter."
Hamaf stared at him. If he wasn't crazy he'd have to be a guard, no one else would be so blunt about how little any of the politicians or news figures mattered.
"Fine," Collin stepped forward, "If you work in maintenence then you have files on those people right?"
"Somewhere, probably; they don't just go telling us everything."
"Then who am I?"
Peter sighed, "You're lucky the captain thought of this before hand. Collin Harmensky, first sergent, A company 'the stone wolves', third batallion, tenth regiment of the Imperial regular Army Corp. You were born in Crasen, in the Ilkhen province, to Mary and Pafun Harmensky. Your mother died from complications and your dad was hopped up on stimulants, so your brother Denis was responsible for most of your upbringing. He was the one who taught you to be a pickpocket, which in turn lead to your arrest and your sentence to twenty years minimum in the service. The captain here seleected you to join his team after seeing your skills as a pathfinder. Under the Merit system he runs you attained the rank of sergent, a rank you still hold. But we both know that's not true, don't we?"
"I'm sorry captain, I couldn't.."
"LADY Collin Harmensky, illegitamite heir to the late Phillip Crasengan. Your mother did indeed die in childbirth, but it was not your brother who taught you to pickpocket. It was nessecity, because your father refused to acknowledge you publicly and you were left unsuported. When you reached the age of sixteen you chose to slip up and get caught in order to force him to recognize you. The shock of seeing you turned criminal killed him, and you were left trapped with your sentence."
He brushed a bit of dirt off his fingernails, making no noticeable difference to his cleanliness.
"Just as well really, we're sitting on Crasen now. If it hadn't been for your boneheadedness you'd be a bloodied pulp somewhere under this ship. By all rights this ship and whatever can be made of it are yours. But not until you finish your sentence and get properly lorded. Which is why I'm we're next year, before you can lay claim to it."

"So all the rush is because Collin technically owns the place?"
"Yes, that and the Disaster recovery efforts. Publicly we're here trying to rescue survivors, giving us the right to close down all roads and transit through the area. This keep people from realizing what's actually going on here. Which is why I'm here, we're going to keep pressing on and find the ship's command center. One of my coworkers will be assisting a second company in finding the propulsion, and a third will be exploring the rest. Everyone else is trying to remove as much of the hull as possible in order to air the place out a bit and..well we'll just get to that later."