A bit of shopping.

Dillgar left the diner several credits poorer than he had planned. He didn’t feel too badly about it though. His tool bag was worth far more than Bruno could have eaten.

“Thank you so much for Lunch sweetie.” Angel had a big smile on her face as she reached out to shake Dillgar’s hand. “And good luck with your interview. If it doesn’t work out try and find me here again later and I’ll introduce you to my captain. I think he wanted to add another engineer to our staff.”

“Thank you for lunch Dillgar” Bruno was careful not to squeeze Dillgar’s hand too tightly. “Be careful around here. It can get kinda dangerous at times.”

“I’ve noticed that.” Dillgar smiled back at Bruno. “It was a pleasure meeting you both. I hope to see you again”

They both smiled at him and waved as the turned and walked thru the entrance to the private dock area.

Dillgar gathered his things and chuckled as he looked across the walkway where the merchant was still cleaning up after the ballistic thief had come flying into his tent.

Taking a deep breath he walked forward into the dock area. As he entered the first thing he noticed was how busy the facilities were. There were cargo movers with containers on them going every which way. They number of people was amazing. This place was far more crowded than the main starport facility.

He suddenly stopped dead in his tracks as a cargo mover went past him with six heavily armed and armored troopers guarding it. In the rest of the city weapons were not allowed unless you had the correct permits, and even then the weapons that these troops had would never be allowed. They looked like state of the art assault weapons. The one up front had his visor up and looked like he meant business. His keen eyes watching the crowd as he moved thru them. The armor they were wearing was a mottled grey in color and looked incredibly tough. On the shoulder of each of the troopers was an emblem that resembled a six pack of cans. “That’s a strange thing to have for a unit emblem.” Dillgar thought. He let them pass before he started to breathe again. Now as he looked more closely at the people around him he realized that almost all of them were carrying some sort of weapon. There were swords, daggers, pistols, rifles, and a few larger weapons too. Dillgar suddenly felt a bead of sweat forming on his brow as he realized that he was completely unarmed. If one of these creatures wanted his belongings they could merely point the weapon and take them.

He took a deep breath and pushed on. Ahead of him was a wall, of sorts, with several bulletin boards on them and a series of computer terminals. He approached one of the terminals and punched in a query for the ship that he was to meet. He noted the bay number and looked at the time. He still had over an hour before he had to be at the interview. He was very anxious but didn’t want to arrive that early. They might think he was desperate for the job. While that may be true he didn’t want them to know that.
On the bulletin boards were all manor of things. There were notes for lost shipmates to find their ship which had moved, job listings for deliveries, and postings for crew requirements. Dillgar looked through them quickly to see if there were any engineering slots open. There were many listed but none of them was for an entry level type of person. All of them required years of starship experience. He didn’t even see the job he was going to interview for listed there. That seemed a bit odd to him. Dillgar suddenly had a sinking feeling that this might just be a fishing expedition by the ships captain.

He decided to try and take his mind off of this train of thought by doing a bit of shopping as he walked to the interview. Each of the docking bays had a small area set aside for the guests to use as a shop. Dillgar found the variety of items being offered to be staggering. There were tools, weapons, clothes, food, drink, bulk containers of seed, and starship parts. This one caught his eye and he wandered over. The person minding the shop looked up at him as he approached but maintained the conversation he was having with the customer he had in front of him. The customer looked like the same monkey creature that had been in the diner earlier today. He was looking at a power converter and asking the salesman questions about it. The guy behind the counter sounded like your typical used starship parts salesman. “This part came fresh out of the crate. Never even been used.”

The Monkey looked skeptically at him. “May I test it?” he asked the salesman.

“Sure go right ahead.” He replied.

The salesman opened a port on the device and the monkey pulled out a minicomp and plugged it in. Dillgar could see that this device was definitely used. He could see some odd coloration on one side of the device that the monkey couldn’t see at the moment. The coloration was barely noticeable anyway but it caught Dillgar’s eye. This device would be next to useless in an emergency. It would most likely blow the first time it had a high power load pass thru it.

“Excuse me, but you don’t want to buy that item.” Dillgar said to the monkey as he moved closer.

“And why is that?” The salesman asked with an attitude.

“Because it’s been used and looks like it won’t last much longer, that’s why.” Dillgar shot back with the same attitude.

“What are you talking about boy?” asked the Monkey. “The tests seem to tell me that the device is sound.”

“Try using this to test it” Dillgar pulled out another type of scanning device and plugged it into the converter. As it went thru it’s testing it started to list problem after problem with the device. The list began to scroll down as there was not enough room on the screen to show all of the problems.

The monkey stared at the device in disbelief and the salesman’s face started to turn red with anger.

“Unplug that thing right now!” The salesman was furious.

“No problem” Dillgar replied.

“What kind of scanner is that?” asked the monkey.

“It’s just a normal scanner with a modified scan program that my father and I wrote. We use it all the time to troubleshoot power devices in the plants that we work in.”

The monkey was examining the scanner more closely. “You wrote this program?”

“Yes, with my father’s help”

“Get out!” the salesman was looking straight at Dillgar as he said it.

“I guess we aren’t going to do any business here.” The monkey said to Dillgar as he handed the scanner back to him.

“I suppose not.” He replied with a grin. “My name is Dillgar.” He extended a hand to the monkey.

“My friends call me Maki” the monkey replied as he shook Dillgar’s hand. “Which ship are you with?”

“I’m not with one yet but I do have an interview in a little while” he replied.

“Well, if it doesn’t work out let me know. Here is a call number you can use at one of the terminals to reach me.” Maki handed Dillgar a small card about the size of a business card. On it was just a bar code and his name.

“Thanks, I’ll let you know either way.” He tucked the card in his pocket.

“No. Thank you for helping me out in there. I might have bought that piece of junk.”

“I’m glad I could help”

“Hey, listen, even if it does work out with this interview do you think I might be able to buy a copy of that program from you for my scanner?”

“I’m sure we can work something out Maki.” replied Dillgar.

“Great. I wish you the best on your interview and look forward to talking with you more later.”

“Thanks. I’ll contact you after the interview.”

With that Maki turned and walked back toward the entrance to the private docks. Dillgar looked at his minicomp and saw that he had wasted enough time. He headed down the ways to dock number 57.

When he got there the outer door was locked. He rang the buzzer and waited. After a minute or so he rang it a second time. Finally a voice came over the speaker.

“Can I help you?”

“I have an interview for the engineering position. My name is Dillgar Zephris.”

“You’re early.” The voice didn’t seem to have a problem with that though. “Come on up to the ship and enter thru the main airlock.”