Dana didn’t relieve Milan straight away. The Captain had suggested she prime the young man for command. The best way was simply to teach him all the so-called tricks she’d collected over the years and drill him on the theory. He was nice enough — about ten years her junior — with a desire to learn and good instincts.
After about fifteen minutes of busy work, she decided to send him on a break. Before he vacated the chair, Dana casually announced, “By the way, you’ll see a nice pay upgrade shortly, Lieutenant Milan.”
She smiled at his disbelief and nodded affirmatively. He left the bridge elated. She wondered if Dawson would react quite so excitedly. He was about the same age as Milan, but much quieter. Technically, Mansfield was the one to pass on the good news, as Dawson’s superior. In his absence, the First Officer should. Since Nichols was on the mission team, Dana decided to take it upon herself. She tapped him on the shoulder, but jumped away when he reacted nervously.
“Just wanted to tell you the good news.”
He stared. “You mean about Mister Mansfield?”
“No, Mister Dawson, about your promotion to Weapons Specialist-First Class… The Captain just authorized your promotion.”
He took the news stoically.
Dana mumbled her congratulations and walked back to the computer console, grumbling about how rudely he’d responded.
McHale returned just before shift change, limping more noticeably than Dana remembered. He nodded in her direction and called, “I have the con, Mister Cartwright?”
“Aye, sir.”
In a whisper, he continued, “Aren’t you going to be late?”
“Not going, Commander,” she quietly responded.
McHale frowned disapprovingly and crossed the bridge to confer with her. “What happened? The Captain’s a fool for not taking you to guard his back.”
Dana took that as a compliment.
“Makes me wish I was going,” he added solemnly.
Knowing his history with Janz Macao, Dana guessed he was worried.
“Who pulled your spot?”
“Bryant…”
McHale glanced toward the navigation console then around to communications. “So, you’re my second?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Well, that’s not so bad then.” He glanced at the chronograph time. “Why don’t you see the team off…”
She shook her head.
“Go ahead,” he insisted, “one of us should.”
She paged Milan back to the bridge. As she waited, Communications Officer Nishada received a message
“Incoming from Mission Ops, coded for the Captain. Eyes only, sirs,” Nishada said.
McHale snorted. “Our C-O-C can deliver it to him. Mister Cartwright? Please…”
She agreed and let Nishada copy the message to a padlet, placing the seal upon it, before she took the unit.
Milan stepped off the lift just as Dana quickly stepped on. She couldn’t help wondering what was in the message, with Lancer on a mission and effectively under radio silence. It had to be important.
Men and gear crowded the MAT area. Janz Macao lounged back, leaning against the wall overseeing the process of sending over the last of it to Karis. Kieran had already MAT’d over, apparently.
The Captain looked alarmed when Dana walked in.
“From Ops,” she said, offering the padlet.
He gave the team a last glance, decided against replaying the message with so much confusion, and took it with him out to the corridor, presumably to a quiet niche.
Dana lingered within the MAT station, helped with a particularly cumbersome crate of Doctor Grant’s equipment.
“Careful with that; it’s the spinal weaver!” Grant cautioned.
Dana nodded, easing the crate onto the MAT pad, and then assisting Sam Ehrmann at the controls.
Sam looked glum. “You’re not coming? I suppose this means I’ve lost my bet after all,” he confided to her.
Dana merely shrugged.
“I was counting on you,” he mumbled.
“I was, too,” she answered, stepping away, straight into the Captain’s path.
“Outside, now,” was all Macao said, but the urgency in his voice instantly put her on guard.
He checked the corridor in both directions before handing her the padlet.
“Looks like your mentor in the Star Service has finally caught up with you. Your assignment to Lancer has been revoked. You are not to be exposed to any combat situations between now and your transfer back to Station Four.”
“What?” She wondered, “Who ordered it?”
He gazed directly into her uncertain eyes. “Ankara, Chief Surgeon Jake Ankara.”
She looked away in embarrassment.
“There’s nothing I abhor more than nepotism. Alpha’s full of it!”
“I am not related to Doctor Ankara,” she protested. “Last time it was Sessions. The time before was Takahashi. It’s someone… higher.”
“It’s still favoritism.”
“It’s not my fault. I’ve tried to find out,” she moaned.
“Our friend in SSID…” Macao bit off the rest because Gordie and two of his security officers arrived.
Dana wondered how much they’d overheard. She looked to Gordon, but received only a cold glare in return. True to character…
Macao nodded to the Security Chief to proceed inside. When he and Dana were alone again, he seemed calmer. “When I get back from this mission, I will help you find your mentor. I promise.”
“Be careful, sir,” Dana countered. “Watch your back…”
Macao said quietly, “Watch yours…” He bent down to kiss her cheek, but stopped just short of it. “Shalee says she’s disappointed.” They locked stares.
Dana blinked first, looking down at the deck.
The Captain turned and hurriedly entered the transporter room without another word. She listened for a very long time to the sound of Big L, too stunned to do much more. She felt uncomfortable thinking about Janz Macao’s parting gesture and warned herself not to misconstrue his meaning.
She even tried to convince herself that she’d be back on the shuttle deck at Station Four soon, bored but better off. Lancer would be nothing more than a page or two in her journal and a memo somewhere in her personnel records. She returned to the Main Bridge.
McHale had the command chair, watching the forward view-screen. He turned and gave her a questioning look.
Dana deliberated a moment before stepping down beside him. She handed over the message from Star Service Operations. “You should review this, too, Commander.”
“Important?”
His eyes were trained upon her when she announced, “It’s my reassignment orders.”
McHale frowned. “Coded? From Operations?”
“It’s a long story,” she said, shaking her head, hoping he would catch her meaning and not press for a further explanation.
He seemed ready to, but Ken Nishada announced, “I have the Captain, sirs.”
McHale fingered the receive button on the command chair. “McHale here, Captain.”
“Karis is ready. Log the mission start as 0602. Commander McHale, you have the con. You will immediately review computer file ‘Chameleon’ with Acting First Officer Cartwright and follow the orders therein to the letter. Should Karis fail to rendezvous with Lancer at the appointed time and co-ordinates, you will proceed to Station Four, report the team lost in the line of duty, and request further orders from Star Service Operations. Any questions?”
“None, sir,” McHale responded formally.
“Then we’re off,” Macao announced.
“Aye, sir, and good luck.”
Dana added her, “Good luck, sir,” as well.
“Macao out,” was the Captain’s final offering.
McHale fingered the ‘off’ switch. “Chameleon? Hmm,” he muttered, “interesting choice.” He gave Dana a sidelong glance then returned his attention to the view screen, as the Karis made
a turn about with maneuvering thrusters then sped directly away from Lancer and faded to a tiny pinpoint of light lost amid the star-field.
McHale jumped up and invited, “Mister Cartwright, shall we use the Captain’s ready room?”
Dana followed him, slowing her pace to match his limping walk.
File ‘Chameleon’ held few surprises. Captain Macao basically wanted Lancer to be visible in the quadrant, but to menace no one. McHale summed it up as, “hang around and be at the rendezvous on time.”
Dana groaned. “I hoped for routine. Looks like we’ll get it.”
The only thing at all of interest was Macao’s caution to keep the little trader ship flight worthy and to keep long-range scanners on full alert.
“Playing it safe,” she guessed.
McHale gave Dana the next shift off and she realized, checking her chrono, that Yeoman Mackenna would be expecting her dictation shortly. She hadn’t even begun it.
As she started for her quarters, she encountered Doctor Patel. He had a supercilious look upon his face and gloated, “I told you he’d find a last minute excuse to keep you off the mission.”
The way he said it reminded her distinctly of Jim Mansfield. She wasn’t going to give him the last word this time.
“Doctor, I see you haven’t heard the news. My reassignment orders arrived just moments ago. The Captain had no choice. I’m off Lancer the minute we dock at Four.”
She smiled into Patel’s frown then kept on walking. The incident was little more than an annoyance she could have done without; it downed her mood so that unconsciously she snapped at Mackenna when she turned the corner and found the Yeoman and two security officers at the door to her quarters.
“What’s going on here!”
Mackenna rushed to tell her. “I came down to get your dictation and found someone’s ransacked your quarters, ma’am.”
Dana pushed past them and bolted inside.
Ransacked! The word was too mild for the chaos she found. Pages from her treasured books fluttered about the floor. Pieces of shredded uniform cloth littered the bunk. All items from the desk were strewn about the room.
“Don’t touch anything,” she barked at Mackenna as he moved to begin cleaning up the mess.
She critically eyed the disaster and announced, “There’s only one thing of value missing.” It was the leather bound volume of Macbeth — the one with the secret compartment. It was gone.
Dana gritted her teeth to fight off an overwhelming sadness. The destroyed books had been gifts from Kieran, and the sentimental value made their loss more severe.
She called upon the security officers, “Inform Commander McHale what’s happened. He’s on the Bridge. I’ll stop by security later to file a report.” She dismissed them all with a nod.
“I’m not going to have my dictation ready, Mackenna. I’ll get it to you tomorrow.”
He sighed. “Please let me help.”
“No, I need to do this myself.” She thanked him for the offer, started to apologize for being so rough, but showed him out the door without saying another word.
After it closed, Dana Cartwright did something weak and decidedly female.
She cried.
Commander McHale paid Dana a visit just as she jammed the last of the tattered books into a stuff bag for the recycle chute. He watched in silence, sitting upon the foot of her bunk, absently scratching the slight growth of beard on his chin.
When she sank down despondently into the chair at the desk, he asked, “Did they find what they wanted?”
She thought about the concealed stiletto before answering. “No, sir, they didn’t.”
“I suspect they’ll be back then.”
“I don’t,” she returned, knowing two of the three men who knew about the stiletto were on the mission.
McHale questioned her answer. “Can you be certain?” He ventured an answer, “Oh! They’re on the mission. That’s what you’re thinking?”
She nodded.
“We should alert the Captain.”
She didn’t respond. How could she dare suggest that she suspected Janz Macao and Jay Gordon were in on it? She had no evidence — just suspicions.
The new jewel which had appeared on Macao’s life-star was the one Gordon had obviously pilfered from Karis. How many of the others were thus acquired?
Janz Macao so blatantly abhorred favoritism — but what crimes did he sanction?
She studied McHale. The Captain had spoken highly of the Commander. Could she trust him? Should she?
McHale intently studied her in return then he blatantly asked, “Are you SSID?”
She flashed him a puzzled look. “If I were, wouldn’t I be on the mission?”
“Maybe…Maybe not… Perhaps there’s already another SSID officer there. Agents don’t necessarily work solo.” McHale conjectured further, “You were, after all, a last minute replacement for Neville Brandt. You took the Captain out in the shuttle to lure in Karis. Captain Tighe happens to be on the mission. Now your reassignment orders come through because your job is done and you’re not the circuitry officer Lancer needs.”
Dana listened without comment as McHale tried to support his theory.
He ended with, “They were searching here for evidence to prove you are SSID and didn’t find it.”
She couldn’t help chuckling at the prospect. “I suppose you also think I caught Jim Mansfield as part of the trap?”
He had forgotten that detail, but decided, “It all fits, Mister Cartwright.”
Dana mulled over the situation and decided not to counter McHale’s notion. “You’re very perceptive, Commander.” She would let him believe what he wanted to, even though he was so very wrong.
Then she added fuel to his argument by conjecturing, “Karis will not rendezvous with Lancer on schedule; we’ll return to Four, report everyone lost, and you’ll probably get a promotion to captain.”
McHale jumped to his feet, suddenly very angry. “What do you mean, Karis isn’t going to return?”
Dana reminded him, “The Captain already told us as much in his last words. His life-star is nearly complete. You’ve seen it. His life debt will be paid. It’s worth a fortune.” She lied, “All of the suspected traitors are aboard Karis. All but one... And I’ll arrange it so that he’ll be with me when I take the little trader in a last ditch effort to find the lost Karis. Janz insisted we get her space worthy for just that reason.”
It all fit together, Dana thought to herself. There were still many holes in the theory, enough that you could swear a meteor shower had passed through.
McHale turned away from her and pounded his fist angrily on the desktop. “Why didn’t Janz tell me all this?”
“Because he knows your hatred for spies; and you might blow the whole game plan.”
McHale believed that. “None of them will be heard from again?”
“It’d look better. Star Service wouldn’t want to have to court-martial any member of this crew. It would destroy morale. The rest of the team members will go undercover with Captain Tighe to complete the real mission.” Dana could hardly believe what she was saying.
McHale believed her. “And what is the real mission?”
“It should be obvious, Commander, if you reviewed the Groomsmen file. The influx of hybrid’s… They aren’t human-hybrids. They’re undercover intelligence agents, smuggling Imperial defectors into free space, in exchange for information from behind the border zone.”
McHale’s face went blank as he strode for the door. He didn’t look back, didn’t say another word.
Dana guessed he was far too upset to worry about seeming ill mannered.
When the door closed, she lounged back in the chair, staring at the barren closet, all the while silently repeating, What if I’m not wrong?
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
Cartwright faced the necessity of carrying on by asking Mackenna to visit supply and order replacement tunic uniforms for her, while she went on to security t
o report the loss of her valuable collector’s edition books as over two thousand credits.
The ensign in security was less than helpful. She left thoroughly frustrated by the red tape and disgruntled over the inconvenience. Reimbursement for the loss would never fully compensate for the value of the books destroyed; at least the thief didn’t get the stiletto.
As Acting First Officer, Dana realized the need to be on the Bridge frequently and mentally shuffled around the duty roster to allow for it. She stopped off at personnel to enter the changes.
Mackenna was at the terminal and was only too happy to be of service. In contrast to the treatment she’d received in security, he was a sweetheart.
She wondered aloud, “Mackenna, why are your talents being wasted down here?”
He sheepishly admitted, “I had a little problem with a superior officer on my last…cruise.”
She couldn’t imagine it. “What’s your specialty?”
“Computers, of course.”
The coincidence did not surprise Dana. “I’ll bet you’d like for me to spring you out of here?”
He kept an honest face. “There isn’t a computer system aboard I can’t handle. I would like a second chance.”
Dana got the picture. “Mister Mackenna, Captain Macao permits no favoritism. I’ll check you out. If you’re worthy, I’ll give you the opportunity to redeem yourself. However, I make no promises.”
“A second chance — that’s all I ask,” Mackenna pleaded.
As Dana left, he was smiling.
On the Main Bridge no one smiled, especially not McHale as he vacated the command chair and passed the con to Dana.
It’s a man’s chair, she thought as she settled in. She could think of a dozen or more names for it, but ‘hot seat’ fit her conception best. She found herself watching the chronograph, biding the time until the watch was over.
By the end of her first full shift as Acting First Officer, Dana was uncharacteristically overcome with a sense of foreboding. The team was at six hours, fifteen minutes into the mission. She estimated them to be within scanning range of the Fabre system. What caught Dana was the sense something had gone wrong.
Dana Cartwright Mission 2: Lancer Page 18
