Till the Conflict Is Over

by Michael A. Hooten

  “How could I tell if I did?” I said.

  “Good point.” Galloway turned to his screen. “Now it’s time to work on your stuff, though. I’m going to play back what you told me, and you tell me how it sounds.”

  Chapter 3

  We spent all afternoon going over presentation and diction, and I would have lost my voice except that Galloway had a ton of experience, and knew just how much to push me. He used a lot of examples of other interviews to show me what to do and not to do.

  Meyers reappeared at 1745 and said, “Time to go to.”

  Galloway stretched and said, “Yeah, I ought to get some chow, too. I’m not invited to this thing tonight, am I?”

  “Not this time. But you’re on for the cotillion on Saturday.”

  “Cool,” Galloway said. “I’ll have to polish my brass.”

  I followed Meyers out of the studio and into an elevator. He swiped his tablet across the controls, and a voice said, “Family quarters.” The motion pressed me against the floor as we moved, but it only took a minute or so before we slowed.

  “Have you ever been to a gravity ring?” Meyers asked as we exited.

  “A few times when I was in school,” I said. “They liked us to do workouts there a few times a month, said it helped us, but it was hard to get time scheduled.”

  “Sure, that’s a lot like went I was in school, too,” he said. “But the family quarters are always in a g-ring. Kids do even better than pollywogs when they have to fight a little gravity.”

  “So it’s for the children?”

  He shrugged. “Out here in the deep black, everything is for the children. Having them, raising them, getting them to have more. No kids, and your space program doesn’t last long.”

  “Like the Chinese.”

  “You got it.” He gestured to a ladder well. “You go first. You’ll feel the pull slowly, but be careful. You’ve been in zero gee long enough that it might catch you off guard, and cause a bit of panic.”

  I’m glad he warned me. The pressure on my chest and shoulders came gradually, but I had to fight the fear it brought, like some invisible elephant had decided he needed a piggy back ride. Meyers watched me closely as we got to the outer levels, but I waved him off. The weight of my own body felt weird, but somehow familiar, like a homecoming.

  And then Hernandez found us, and his bear hug made everything spin for a moment. Meyers said, “Dude, if you kill him, you’re going to do the paperwork.”

  “Damn, man,” he said. “You don’t have to make threats.”

  “He's turning purple.”

  “Oh. Right.” He put me down, and while I caught my breath, he said, “Sorry about that. I forget that not everybody gets to have gravity time every day.”

  “No problem,” I said.

  “Come on, then, I want you to meet everyone.”

  He led us to what was clearly a dining hall. A long steam table lined one wall, emitting all kinds of wonderful odors, and several cafeteria style benches dominated the space. About thirty people broke into applause at my appearance, which made me feel somehow unworthy. Hernandez’s wife, a petite dark haired lady, hugged me first, much more gently than her husband, and his three kids latched onto my legs. I just stood still and tried to accept all the praise and affection, but I had to wipe at my eyes a few times. Meyers just watched it all with a small smile. I worried that he was going to be completely ignored, but a few of the adults engaged him in conversation.

  There seemed to be kids everywhere, and all between the ages of three and ten. But two of the women carried babies, and they all seemed pretty well behaved. I couldn’t keep all the names straight, but everyone had names on their coveralls, so I wasn’t at too much of a loss.

  After ten or fifteen minutes of introductions, handshakes, and hugs, an older man with the air of a chief stood up and cleared his throat. Everyone turned to him expectantly. “As ranking member of this fine company, I’d like to welcome our guests. And if Petty Officer Chamberlain would offer a prayer for us, we can get to the food.”

  Chamberlain stood up and gave a brief, generic blessing on the food, and the kids immediately lined up to eat, plates in hand. The rest of us followed more slowly, and Hernandez stayed close by my side without being too overbearing. He seemed much more retrained in that group, and I asked him why.

  “Well, you know,” he shrugged. “My wife doesn’t want me to set a bad example.”

  “For the other sailors or for the kids?” I asked.

  “Both, of course,” he said with a grin.

  His wife ducked under his arm and pulled it around her. “He’s a good man,” she said, looking up at him. “Just boisterous, that’s all.”

  “Mrs. Hernandez—” I said.

  “Please, call me Elisa,” she corrected me.

  “Elisa,” I continued. “Thank you for inviting me.”

  “How do you know it wasn’t me?” Hernandez said with mock offense.

  “Because we’re not at the bar,” I said.

  “Well, yeah, that’s true,” he said.

  “Thank you,” Elisa said, “But it wasn’t really me, either. It was petty officer Madsen over there.” She indicted a thin, bearded man helping two younger children get their plates.

  “And his wife, I’m sure,” Hernandez said.

  “Well of course,” Elisa said with a smile. “None of you lunks would be able to find your steel suits without us.”

  The playful banter continued between them as we filled our plates. It all looked wonderful, and so different than shipboard grub. Of course it wasn’t in plastic bags, which was the most obvious difference, but everything looked homemade, too. And from all over. Tamales, barbequed chicken, and spaghetti dominated the smells, but I also saw salad, several varieties of vegetables, and some kind of potato casserole. And then there was a chocolate cake, an apple pie, and a peach cobbler for dessert. I worried about how I was going to get to sample it all without being sick.

  We took our plates and sat near Madsen. His rating badge indicated he was a Seabee electrician. He looked up at me and smiled, but was immediately accosted by the little girl on his right, who wanted to know if she had eaten enough of her green beans to earn her desert yet. Another Seabee sat down on the other side of him, and her coveralls also said Madsen. “Hi, I’m Clorinda,” she said, shaking my hand across the food. “This is my husband, Alphy.”

  “Alphy?” I said.

  He looked up at me. “It’s short for Alpheus.”

  “I understand that you guys arranged this wonderful meal for me.”

  “We hope you like it,” Clorinda said.

  I took a bite of tamale. “That reminds me of home,” I said.

  “Thank you,” Elisa said, blushing.

  “That’s right, you’re from Texas!” Hernandez said. “Man, we should have done a whole Tex-Mex spread for you.”

  “No, this is awesome.” I took a bite of spaghetti. “Everything tastes better when it’s not recycled.”

  “Ain’t that the truth.”

  Clorinda was watching me while I ate, casting occasional glances at her husband. He was feeding their baby, and he straightened suddenly. “I think we may have a situation,” he said.

  She looked over at the stroller, and the smell hit us all about the same time. “Uh, that reeks of cataclysm,” Hernandez said.

  “Yep.” He stood up and arranged a blanket over the gurgling little girl. “I’ll go back to our rooms and take care of this,” he said. “Could you ah, handle things here for a bit?”

  “Will do,” Clorinda answered.

  “Be back as quick as I can,” he said, and nearly sprinted for the door.

  “She’s still a bit sick?” Elisa said.

  “Well, we thought it had passed,” Clorinda said.

  “Nope still being passed,” Hernandez said. When the women rolled their eyes, he said, “What? Like I wasn’t going to go for the obvious joke?”

  I laughed, and it seemed to relieve them all
.

  “We’ve been passing around a little stomach bug,” Clorinda explained. I just nodded. She looked like she wanted to say more, but then Chamberlain came over with Meyers, and a few children took Elisa’s attention, and I just watched it all, feeling a deep contentment at such normal family stuff.

  “You doing okay?”

  I almost jumped, but Alphy appearing suddenly at my elbow didn’t jar me quite as much as some, because he was so soft spoken.

  “Yeah, I’m alright,” I said.

  “Good, good.”

  He seemed hesitant to continue, so I said, “Why did you invite me to this wonderful meal?”

  He smiled. “You indicated at the Religion Center that you wanted to meet the local LDS leader. That’s me.”

  “LDS?” I said, a bit confused.

  “Mormon. LDS stands for Latter-Day Saint.”

  “Oh, right,” I said. “Look, you could have just emailed me or something.”

  He shook his head. “The rules are very specific for us. We are not allowed to give even the appearance of proselyting, so a big get together, with several faiths represented, seemed the best way of handling things.”

  “What is prosel… what did you call it?”

  “Proselyting. Trying to get people to convert.”

  “Oh.” The idea hadn’t even been on my radar. “Ok, well, I was just worried about one of my shipmates.”

  Clorinda joined us right then. “EN1 Otewa, right?”

  “Yes,” I said. “I don’t even know where he is, but I wanted to make sure his family… I don’t know…”

  Clorinda placed her hand on my arm. “He’s on his way home, just like the rest of your crew. Your home base was Port Rickover wasn’t it?”

  “I guess.” The whole thing was feeling off-kilter again. “I joined the ship on route to Juno.”

  She pulled me into a long hug. “You’re safe, you know.”

  “Yeah, I know,” I said, but the tears just streamed down my face.

  Alphy put his hand on my shoulder. “We’ll give you updates. I’m pretty sure you want to be there for the funeral, even if it’s just over the net.”

  “I—thank you.”

  “No problem.”

  Clorinda let me go, looked at me long enough that I had to look away, and finally just nodded. “Anything you need,” she said. “Even if it’s just to talk.”

  I nodded, and fortunately Hernandez was there, steering me back into more light hearted talk with some of the other Seabees. I felt pretty lucky to have so many people looking out for me. And every now and then, I saw Meyers, with that inscrutable expression, hovering at the edge of things.

  The dinner wound down, I said my good byes, hugged half the children and all the women, shook hands with all the men, and exchanged another bear hug with Hernandez, and we headed back to the enlisted quarters. “Did you have fun?” I asked Meyers.

  He shrugged. “Wasn’t too bad. Home cooking is always a nice change.”

  “Beats the mess decks.”

  “Sure does.”

  The silence felt kind of awkward as we headed to our quarters, but I didn’t worry about it too much. Meyers was tough, competent, and stoic. I just figured that’s the way it would always be. Besides, I didn’t want to talk, either.

  Chapter 4

  The next morning, Galloway said, “We need to take a break from interview prep and get you ready for the cotillion instead.”

  “Yeah, about that,” I said. “All I know is the scuttlebutt. What are they really like? And what is going to be expected of me?”

  “Well, the good news, from a squid’s point of view, is that you are probably going to get laid.”

  I brushed that aside. “And the bad news?”

  “The bad news is that no matter how gorgeous and intriguing the woman is, it is nearly guaranteed it will be a one-time thing.”

  I sighed. “I’m a stupid kid from Earth. Explain it slowly, so that I understand.”

  He grinned. “It’s all about the children, right?”

  “I had this conversation with Meyers yesterday.”

  “Right.” He started twirling a pen in the air. “Well, space needs kids. We’ve got the people, but sailors are never in port, and the ships are sex segregated. Follow me so far?”

  “Yeah, okay.”

  “Well, the enlisted ranks have socials, and other ways of meeting members of the opposite sex, but that’s too crass for ossifers.” Galloway grinned. “Well, a lot of them. Some like going bar hopping just like any of us, and ending up with who knows who—”

  “Cotillions?” I prompted.

  He snapped back to the present. “Right, sorry. Well, cotillions are a way for professional parents to meet and hook up with appropriate candidates: single officers.”

  “That sounds cold.”

  Galloway shrugged. “They tend to be structured, elegant, and very formal. But the goal is to get some young lady pregnant, which is a good thing overall. That’s why you need some instruction. You’re going to be watched closely, and judged by what the ladies see. But don’t worry, someone is going to want you.”

  “How many have you been to?” I asked.

  “I don’t know, about a dozen,” he said. “Nice women. Most of them are very good at getting what they want. But that’s not you. It’s your jizz.”

  “So why not just jack off into a cup and call it good?”

  “Not as fun, and definitely not as ego boosting,” Galloway said. He got up and said, “Follow me. We’ll go to the ballroom, and maybe it’ll make more sense.”

  We went a few levels up, and into what looked like just what he called it: a ballroom. White pillars, round tables and chairs, and lights in ornate fixtures. But instead of a dance floor, there was a crystal sphere in the middle of the floor, a good thirty feet in diameter. “What’s that?” I asked.

  “The dance ball,” he said.

  “Ask a stupid question,” I said.

  “Well, you have been in space a while,” he said. “And there are always vids.”

  “I tend to listen to music, not watch vids.”

  “That’s cool. But now you get to learn about how this works.” He looked around. “Hmm. There’s supposed to be a dance instructor here, but I guess I can walk you through the basics...”

  He led me around to the far side, where a small ramp led up to a circular opening just wide enough for a tall man to go through without ducking. “There will be a procession, and ten men will come from the port side, and ten women from the starboard side…”

  “I’m here! Sorry I’m late!”

  We turned to see a blonde woman in a long flowing gown hurrying across the ballroom. She came up to us and shook our hands in turn. “PS3 Leslie Turner. Which of you is the noob?”

  “That would be me.”

  She flashed me a dimpled smile. “Great! Have you ever danced before?”

  “Not intentionally.”

  “Even better,” she said. “A blank slate is easier to work with.”

  “Do you need me here?” Galloway asked.

  Leslie had pulled out her tablet and was swiping across the screen. “Huh? Oh, yeah. You might learn something. Things have changed recently, you know.”

  “The Waltz?” Galloway asked.

  “Oh? You’ve heard of it?”

  “Did it a couple of weeks ago. Not my favorite.”

  Leslie nodded. “It’s very popular in O country, so it’s a given that’s what’ll be danced on Saturday.” She turned to me. “Any questions before we get started?”

  “Yeah,” I said. “What rating is PS?”

  She gave me that dimpled smile again. “Personnel Specialist. And my specialty is socials, cotillions, and making sure everyone is prepared as much as possible. Oh, speaking of which, put these on.”

  She pulled out a pair of Underwood gloves. “But these aren’t tuned to me,” I said.

  “Nah, they’re training gloves. Teach you what the signals mean, without having
to get the connection between people.” She slipped on a pair as well, form fitting, reaching to her elbow, and shimmery like satin. Very elegant.

  She turned on some music and had me approach her and lead her up the ramp. We spent an hour going through the basics, which were not that easy. I thought that dancing upside down would be disorienting, but that wasn’t too bad. The biggest problem is that you never dance with one person for very long, and the transitions are hard to learn with just two. She promised she would have a few more instructors next time.

  The gloves were another matter entirely. The signals they give you can be pretty subtle, and easy to miss when you’re concentrating on where to put your feet on an essentially invisible surface. I asked why they weren’t stronger, and Leslie laughed. “The idea is to know who is attracted to you, but not in a way that it shows on your face. They say the first ones gave you a shock like strong static electricity, and people would pull their hands away instinctively. Kind of the opposite of what you want when you’re trying to get people together.”

  “So they only work when they touch?”

  “Yep.” She took my hand in hers. “And remember: you can only control your own reaction, not the other person’s. If they are attracted to you, but they don’t want you to know, you won’t. It takes some concentration, though. You, as a noob, are probably going to have a harder time controlling yourself. The good news is, when you feel that tingle on your wrist, you’ll know that it’s mutual. A good match.”

  We made a few more turns while I thought about it. “So there are layers to the dance…”

  “Always have been,” Leslie said. “We just have another technology added to the game.”

  “Right…”

  We went through it some more, and she triggered the Underwood gloves a little differently each time, so I could get a feel for it. The strength of the signal gave you an idea of mutual attraction, but there were also some variations to give you some idea how good the match was. Very complicated, and very odd to me. But everyone else considered it perfectly normal.