Here is the third part of Beer Run. We are only doing the first thirty pages, per my publishing contract. If I’ve gotten your interest, the full book is available on Amazon here: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0BLSVRZN5  

***

Years Long Past
“Stiltson, please explain to me why you
thought this was sufficient.”
Commander Krieger looked at the
electronic pad displaying Bill’s schematics
for the next shuttle with an elevated
contempt. Bill looked quizzically at the
same mechanical drawings. The other
officers in the room just looked at each other
and snickered as Krieger wound up another
lecture against Bill.
“I don’t understand, sir,” Bill said. “I
ran a simulation. That model works.”
“I know it can fly, Stiltson,”
Commander Krieger said. “This might shock
you, but I expect a little more of that from
my acting Ensign.”
Why Krieger would expect anything
in the field of spacecraft design from a
fourteen-year-old boy with a made-up title
was anyone’s guess, but Bill thought he’d
done pretty well.
“Stiltson, I believe the purpose of
this exercise was to design a shuttle that
could withstand the radiation from inside the
corona of a star, was it not?” Krieger asked.
“Yes, I believe that’s what we’re
doing,” Bill said.
“Is anything about this model you’ve
created designed to do that?”
“No, I didn’t think the design of the
ship itself would accomplish that. I assumed
the shields would be the primary line of
defense.”
“You assumed? So, you made an ass
out of you and me, is that what you did?”
The young officers in Krieger’s crew
started to openly laugh at Bill. His cheeks
burned bright red.
“Let them laugh, it’s funny. So, you
concluded that there was nothing you could
do to insulate the ship from radiation in
terms of the structure?” Krieger asked.
“I never thought about it. By the time
we’re relying on the structure, that means
the shields have failed and anything you
could put in the hull of the ship would be a
last gasp measure.”
“A last gasp measure that could save
a man’s life, Mr. Stiltson!” Krieger shouted.
“These schematics are worthless to me! Try
again and this time, think about what you’re
doing!”
Krieger pressed a button on the
electronic pad and deleted the schematics for
the shuttlecraft.
Back to the Present
Bill woke up. Another bad memory
expressed in dream. Just seeing Krieger
brought back the trauma. Bill shook his head
and looked at his clock. Eleven a.m. Shit. He
slept in, past the time for the auction. By this
time, the good stuff was likely gone. He
rolled out of bed, threw on some jeans and a
collared shirt, and ran out of his apartment.
As soon as he got out the door, he had to
shield his eyes from the blinding light
coming from the lunar dome’s projector.
The artificial sun put out by weather control
was a little bright today. He’d filed a
complaint with the city about turning the sun
down a few months ago, and he got a form
response from the city council about taking
his concerns very seriously.
Bill scrambled down the stairs
outside his apartment and into his car. He
pulled down the sun visor. He programmed
the address of the park where the auction
was being held into the car’s computer. The
vehicle lifted off the ground and floated in
the direction of the road.
Fifteen minutes later, he jogged
through the park on what would normally be
a beautiful Saturday morning, trying to get
to the auction to see if anything could be
salvaged. Green grass. Lush trees. Birds
singing. A blue sky. Tough to believe this
was all man-made. Bill’s father showed him
pictures of the surface of the Moon outside
of the terraformed bubbles. It was a desert at
night.
Bill spotted the stage where Scott
Ross, the local bankruptcy trustee, banged a
gavel on a podium next to a large fermenting
tank. At the foot of the stage, a crowd of
Bill’s local competitors conversed with each
other as Ross closed the auction. Jimmy and
Zota waved their hands in the air. Bill
walked over to them.
“It’s all gone,” Zota said. “Mr. Ross
has disposed of the inventory.”
“I can see that,” Bill said, watching
helplessly as his competitors gobbled up the
last of the equipment from the dissolution of
Over the Moon Brewing. “Well, Jimmy,
you’ve learned something today. Set an
alarm.”
Jimmy took out a notepad and
actually wrote the advice down. Bill would
have told him to stop, but his train of
thought was interrupted by someone poking
him on the shoulder. He turned around and
found Scott Ross, a squat pig of a man with
pepper gray hair.
“Sorry, I couldn’t hold off the
auction,” he said. “It wouldn’t be fair to the
other bidders.”
“No, this is what happens when my
past comes back to haunt me for an
evening,” Bill said. “I should have just stood
that ghost up.”
“That’s a shame. Because there’s a
special item I have that would be right up
the old Bill Stiltson’s alley.”
“You’re not going to sell me that
canning machine?”
“No, I’ve got something else
actually,” Ross said, lowering his voice to a
whisper. “Not from the bankruptcy. I found
it in a junkyard yesterday.”
Ross motioned his head in the
direction of his car. Bill knew Ross well
enough to realize this likely involved
something illegal. The last time Ross offered
him a deal on the down-low, it was five
cases of Latinian Rum, which had been
illegal for eighty-six years under the
embargo. It might seem odd for a
bankruptcy trustee to be involved in such
shady practices, but Ross was the kind of
Yankee hustler who built the Moon and it’s
not like the DUP could find anyone else who
knew how to get top dollar for a bunch of
dented brewing tanks. Bill decided to at least
take a look at the illegal merchandise. As
long as it wasn’t drugs, it couldn’t get them
into too much trouble.
“Stay here,” Bill told Jimmy. “And
do as I say, not as I do.”
Bill and Zota followed Ross to his
ancient car, covered in scrapes and duct
tape. Ross popped the trunk. Bill looked
inside to find a human face looking back at
him. Blue eyes, red hair, pale skin, female
features. The face was human but lifeless.
Bill snapped his fingers in front of the
human face. Unresponsive.
“It’s inactive,” Ross said. “Doesn’t
work.”
“I figured,” Bill said. “If it worked, it
would be reporting you to the Intergalactic
Navy via its internal server for stealing it.”
“I stole nothing. As I said, I found it
at the junkyard yesterday.”
“It’s illegal for private individuals to
own androids,” Bill said, rolling his eyes.
“Given the possibility that they are sentient,
supposedly it’s slavery. I guess it’s okay to
be enslaved by the government.”
“I think they normally call that
conscription.”
“Or imprisonment, which is what we
could be facing if we’re caught. I don’t think
federal agents will believe that someone in
the IN would just dump an android in a
junkyard and run.”
“That’s the only story I have,” Ross
said. “No, really, it is. Will you take it?”
“How would I use it? Even if I got it
working, it would report me.”
“Not if you wiped its memory. I
assume you can do that.”
Bill looked at Zota and bit his own
tongue.
“Can I speak about this with Zota
alone?” Bill asked.
“Sure.”
Ross walked over to Jimmy to shoot
the breeze with him. Bill turned to Zota.
“What do you think? Could we use
the extra help around the brewery?”
“Another helping hand? Always, but
can you fix this thing and wipe its memory
like Ross claimed?” Zota asked.
“I can do both. My dad taught me
how to fix a positronic brain before my tenth
birthday. However, even with the memory
wiped, I’m still worried about getting
caught.”
“How would we get caught? Ross is
right. This looks like a human woman. I
mean, to me at least. Like I said last night, I
can’t always tell humans apart.”
“So long as you don’t look too
closely, it looks like a real woman,” Bill
said. “Why would someone in the IN just
leave it?”
“It’s defective. It doesn’t work.”
“When androids stop working, the
IN has a place to fix them. They’re
constantly offering me a job. Whoever threw
this android away could be court-martialed.”
“I mean, it’s a mystery, but I could
use some help beyond what Jimmy can do
working part-time. It’s your call.”
Bill looked deeply into the android’s
lifeless blue eyes. A flash of memory
crossed his mind: his father fine-tuning
in his workshop, A-1 getting up and walking
across the room, A-1 singing the scales, A-1
learning to dance. He hadn’t spoken to A-1
in a while. Last time Bill checked, A-1 was
still teaching in Cambridge.
“No, I hate to leave it like this,” Bill
said. “I grew up with androids. They’re
almost like little people to me. Just leaving
her broken doesn’t seem right.”
Bill noticed that he referred to the
android as ‘her.’ He was beginning to get
some of those old feelings again. To hell
with you, Krieger. Let me show you
disappointment.
Zota went to Jimmy and told him to
bring the car around. Jimmy did just that,
backing the car up to Ross’s trunk. When
Jimmy came out to help Bill move the
android, he freaked.
“Shit! Is that…?”
“No, and you never saw it,” Bill
whispered. “Now help me get it in the back
of the car.”
Jimmy nodded. Bill lifted the
android by the arms while Jimmy got it by
the legs. They transferred the body from one
trunk to the other discretely. Bill felt slightly
amazed at how light the body was. A-1 was
made from much heavier metals.
Once they had the android moved,
Bill whispered to Jimmy, “I’ll explain later.”