William Brian Porter was young, dark-haired and of average height. He seemed pale, a little robust and the skin around his face, especially under his nose, looked like it had flaking skin from some kind of rash. His uniform was another story being wrinkled and well, he just looked generally unkempt for a serviceman let alone an officer.
“I’m Ensign Collins,” Mike said and added, “I believe I’m your roommate.”
“That’s great,” he said as he got up and headed to the door in a rush.
Mike didn’t move and stood in the doorway blocking his path.
“Which bunk is mine?” he inquired as both beds were a mess and he was unsure which side of the room was his.
“Oh, the one on the right side,” Porter answered trying to get by.
Collins held his ground, “Your right or mine?”
“Ah ...” he started and looked back and pointed with a finger, “that one.”
“Thanks,” Mike replied and turned sideways to let him pass.
“Got to get to breakfast,” he said squeezing by and then mumbled, “they stop serving by nine.”
Collins stepped into the room and the door slid shut. Surveying the room, he let out a sigh.
“There’s no place like home.”
The place was a mess, to say the least. Both bunks were in disarray, looking as if they had been recently slept in and were covered in stray clothing. A coffee mug and empty drink cups covered both nightstands. Assorted crystal memory chips and vid sticks litter the floor along with a civilian model palm pad with a visual interface headset. Other trash including bags of snacks and personal items littered the entire area.
“Who is this guy?” he wondered out loud as he struggled to find a clean spot to put his space bag and duffel down.
“Ensign William Brian Porter, recent Star Academy graduate, birthplace New York City, planet Earth,” Pallas answered believing his question was for him.
“How could this guy be a Star Academy grad?” Mike said in disbelief. The military is all about discipline, rigor, and order. A military academy graduate eats, breathes and lives those three things for four years. Then you are off to basic officer training and then your specialty schools.”
“His personnel file say’s that he graduated in the middle of his class with no special distinctions or honors,” the A.I. reported.
“The last part I believe, it’s that part about him graduating that I find hard to comprehend,” he commented.
“His files don’t list any demerits or reprimands from his time at the Star Academy,” Pallas said.
The Star Academy was the most prestigious military college that a prospective midshipmen or cadet could attend. It was unlikely that anyone could get through any of the service academies without getting demerits or some kind of reprimand let alone a slob like Porter.
Mike had wanted to apply to the Star Academy as his father was a graduate but his father had strongly insisted that he apply to Harpers Academy instead. Initially, Mike didn’t quite understand why he wanted him to go to a distant frontier planet and to an unheard-of school, that is until he got there.
Whereas some of the national military academies and the Star Academy were better known and admittedly excellent service academies, Harpers Academy had something they didn’t. Namely, Captain Sir Randolph Hawkins Hope also known as the Hawk. The old warrior was an inspiration to all of the school’s young middies, not to mention a genius of military tactics. He also assembled a support staff of officers that were not only experts in their fields but who had been battle tested. He would never regret going to Harpers Academy and could proudly call it four of the best years of his life.
“Ensign Collins,” Pallas said breaking him from his train of thought as he busily tossed his roommate’s clothes and trash over to the other side of the room.
“Mike,” he replied.
“What?” the supercomputer said confused at his response.
“You can call me, Mike,” he instructed.
“Thanks … Mike, you have a scheduled class starting in fifteen minutes,” the A.I. announced.
“What!” he exclaimed in surprise having just stripped the soiled bedding from his bunk and wrapped it into a ball.
“Your name was just added to a class roster for a ship’s orientation class,” the computer said.
“I just got off duty and someone put me in a class starting in fifteen minutes without telling me,” he remarked thinking that he had definitely made some enemies on board the battle carrier.
“You now have fourteen minutes,” the computer said.
Mike rushed to the door still carrying the bundle of bedding. He remembered that he had seen a laundry bin access chute in the wall of the hallway when he walked down the hall earlier. He paused for a second and quickly dropped the bedding into the bin.
“Where is this class being held?”
“Conference Room 12, Deck 8,” Pallas answered.
Running to the door he sprinted to the lifts. Reaching them, he found one had just arrived and its door had just slid open as he made it to the door. Stepping inside the lift, it started to move even before Mike could give a verbal command.
“Thanks, Pallas,” he said knowing that the supercomputer was helping without being asked to.
“You are welcome, Mike,” it replied sounding like it was happy to finally be of help to someone.
“Pallas, do you have a nickname or another name that you use?” Collins asked and then explained, “If someone hears me using your ship name it might seem suspicious.”
“I’m also called, the Spear,” the A.I. revealed.
“Spear?” he repeated as the doors open and he rushed down the corridor to the conference room.
“Yes, I’m named after Pallas, the Titian of Battle and the word Pallein is Greek which means to brandish a spear,” it informed.
“Hence the nickname,” Collins said and added, “but that isn’t a very personal name.”
“What would you suggest?”
Mike didn’t answer right away as he hurried by other crewmen and some custodial droids in the hallway. Reaching the door to Conference Room 12 he paused before he entered.
“How about Pal?” he said and then entered the room.
As he stepped inside he heard the A.I. say, “I like it.”
The conference room had numerous long tables with seated crewmen and women sitting behind them. It looked as if they had just sat down and Mike moved to a nearby empty seat. Scanning the room, he saw Lt. Friar, the Commodore’s Dog Robber talking to a Lt. Commander standing at the front of the room. She was pointing down at his palm pad and looked as if she was arguing with him. Collins concentrated on hearing them as he focused on the two officers.
“Lt. Friar, I’m telling you that I just checked my class roster of new personnel for this class and there is no Ensign Collins on the list,” he said not liking taking flak from an officer below him let alone from the Commodore’s aide.
“Check again,” she said and then added, “sir.”
Both of them were looking at the list and neither of them had noticed that Mike had entered the room and had taken a seat.
“See, there is his name,” she said in triumph pointing at the pad.
The Lt. Cmdr. frowned, unhappy that she was right.
“They must have just added it,” he said still not liking such last-minute changes.
“And he has missed this mandatory class, so make sure you write him up,” she said still smiling as she looked up from his palm pad.
As she looked up and across the room, her smile quickly faded as she saw the young ensign in question sitting by the door. Mike, in turn, smiled back at her and even gave her a little wave.
The instructor saw the encounter and the exchange, forcing himself to suppress a smile of his own. He had quickly caught on that this officer was on the Commodore’s shit list or at least his aide’s list.
Lt. Friar frowned and turned away, heading to the rear of the conference roo
m where she slipped out of a back door.
Mike let out a sigh, thinking that it was really nice that she was so concerned and that with more comrades in arms like her he wouldn’t have to worry about the Karduans at all.
On the upside, the Lt. Commander in charge of the class gave him a slight nod of approval.
The class was three hours long and included ship protocols, operational areas, and a full review of the restricted areas of the battle carrier. At the end of the class, they learned that there would be two more classes this week and two more the following week. These classes would review deck plans, take their group on several walking tours of the ship for familiarization as well as having a personnel file review. The last would take care of the morbid but necessary tasks of updating Wills, Powers of Attorneys, and next of kin notifications.
When the class was over, Mike had to admit he knew a lot more about the Pallas as well as being dead tired. Heading back to his quarters he was not looking forward to the mess that was still remaining in his room.
Walking down the corridor to the central lift, he suddenly smelled something wonderful. It was food, some kind of beef smell that was emanating from somewhere down the hallway. It had been at least fourteen hours since he had a real meal and he was hungry. Following the aroma, he let his nose lead him to the mess hall.
Reaching the mess hall, he saw that it was an officers’ mess. On the Star Wolf, they had only one large mess hall and officers and enlisted crewmen ate together. Mike liked it that way he felt it gave them more shared comradery but on most ships and facilities the various ranks ate separately. On some larger ships, multiple mess halls were needed as well as the need for space to accommodate their large numbers of personnel and various ranks. Enlisted didn’t want officers around them every minute of the day and the same could be said for officers. He knew that most ships and bases even had dining facilities for just non-commissioned officers and when they didn’t they sometimes had separate sitting areas within their enlisted mess halls.
The place seemed vacant when he entered the dining hall. There was no one around and all of the tables were empty. He realized that he was probably getting there just ahead of the lunch crowd. Moving over to the cafeteria’s computer terminals he took a second to look at the menu options on the computer screen and then tapped out his order on the touchscreen. It probably had a voice interface but he took a little pleasure in tapping the screen.
A moment later, the computer flashed the word denied as its vocal interface said, “User not recognized!”
Once more his biometrics were not recognized by the computer interface. There was no kitchen staff around to complain to and he was pretty sure that most of the food processing was done by automated or robotic units. Letting out a sigh he was now getting tired of this.
“Hey Pal, are you there?” he asked out loud as he was all alone in the mess hall.
A second later he heard a voice in his head via his subdermal implant.
“Hi Mike,” the voice said.
“It seems this computer terminal isn’t recognizing me or that I’m authorized to get food,” he said.
“That is odd? I imputed your biometrics parameters when you accessed your quarter’s door hours ago,” Pallas replied.
“Well, this food dispenser didn’t get the message,” he replied as his stomach growled in hunger.
A moment later, the food processor indicated with a flash that it was ready to take his food order.
“Thanks, Pal,” he said.
“It seems that someone has removed you from the identification roster,” Pallas informed and then added, “It looks like the crew roster has been updated several times over the last few days and you have not appeared on the roster. These new updates removed you even after I had added you.”
“Let me guess where the updates have come from,” Mike remarked.
“No need to guess, the updates came from the Commodore’s office,” the A.I. responded.
“I’m not really surprised,” he commented as he tapped the several options on the food processor.
Walking down the aisle, he collected his tray of food as it appeared out of an opening in the side of the meal distributor.
Looking down at the food he smiled, “Thanks, Pal, I’m starving.”
“You are welcome, Mike,” he responded.
Ensign Collins scanned the empty room and picked a table on the far side near the rear exit. Sitting down he looked at his meal. Beef stroganoff over noodles with green beans, a roll and butter. Cold milk for his beverage and for dessert he had chosen a slice of cherry crumb pie. It smelled good and his stomach once more growled in agreement with him.
As he started to dig into his meal, the main doors slid open and dozens of officers entered the mess hall. They were loud and quickly filled the lines to the food dispensers. Mike glanced up as they had first entered but only took in that there was a lot of them and that they were in a hurry to get fed.
Continuing with his own meal he pulled out his palm pad and checked his schedule. Examining his schedule, he noticed that besides the ship orientation class he was also scheduled to attend officer basic course classes. He shook his head and frowned as he chewed.
After they stole the Star Wolf and escaped Austro Prime, Captain Hope had started classes for all of the midshipmen and the newly commissioned officers from Harpers Academy. Mike had completed his Officer Development School program and had even completed several programs as a division officer.
He guessed that Commodore Essex must have decided that they along with his specialty training as a pilot and commando were invalid. He was sure that Lt. Friar probably had him enrolled to repeat this training. Well, at least he already knew the programs and had already passed the exams once before.
Mike was still thinking about this when he noticed that three men had approached his table. They were all wearing pilot jumpsuits with name tags, rank insignia and shoulder patches of their Carrier Star Wing.
Looking up from his palm pad, he continued to chew the mouthful of stroganoff he was enjoying.
Two of the officers were lieutenants junior grade and the third was an ensign. They were all holding trays of food and looking down at him. From left to right they were Lt. Wilson, who was of African ancestry, Lt. Hiraoka, who was clearly Japanese and a very pale ensign who had the most common European name of Smith. All of them had something in common in that they were young and all looked a bit angry. Collins couldn’t say much about their ages as he was probably the same age as they were.
“You’re sitting at our table,” Lt. Hiraoka said.
Mike continued to chew as looked them over. He wasn’t some first-year midshipman and such attitudes were not appropriate in the fleet.
“There are plenty of seats,” Collins pointed out with a wave of his hand towards the empty seats and tables.
“This is our table,” Wilson replied.
Mike took a bite of green beans and shook his head.
“Lieutenant, this is an officers’ open mess and I don’t see any place cards.”
“He is not wearing wings,” Ensign Smith pointed out.
“This is a pilot’s mess hall and only Carrier Star Wing pilots are allowed to eat here,” Hiraoka informed him.
Mike wiped his mouth with his napkin and then moved his slice cherry pie a bit closer.
“Funny, I didn’t see any sign outside the mess hall or hear of any mess restrictions during my orientation briefing.”
“Only members of Carrier Star Wing Groups 47 and 64 are allowed in here,” Wilson said.
“And who are they?” Collins asked taking a bite of pie.
Ensign Smith turned his shoulder to show him his shoulder patch. The insignia was that of a gray cat with its mouth open baring its fangs. Next to the cat’s face, it had its two paws up with their claws extended.
“We’re part of the CSW 47, the Wild Cats,” he informed with more than a bit of pride in his voice.
“And the other Star Win
g?” he inquired taking another mouthful of pie.
“CSW 64, the Hell Sharks,” Smith answered.
Taking another bite, he made a comment, “Never heard of them.”
“We fly SF-15 strike star-fighters,” Lt. Wilson informed sounding angry.
Mike calmly took a large sip of his milk before he spoke again.
“So how many star fighter kills do you all have?” he asked wiping his mouth with his napkin.
The three star pilots glanced at each other.
“We don’t have any star victories yet,” Hiraoka admitted making a face and looking away.
“Ok, so how many battles have you taken part in?” Mike inquired finishing his milk.
“The 34th Attack Fleet hasn’t been in battle since Commodore Essex has taken charge,” Ensign Smith revealed.
“Right, well it has been nice talking to you gentlemen but I’m done with my meal so the table is all yours,” Collins said standing up, picking up his tray and walking away. He didn’t look back, not that he was scared that he be turned to salt but that he didn’t want them to see that he was smiling.
Returning to his quarters, he found his roommate was still absent but his side of the room was once more a mess. He definitely knew why Ensign Porter had been in a room all by himself. Cleaning up the mess, he resigned himself to cleaning the entire room and throwing away any thing that looked like garbage and trash.
The next few days were more of the same. He’d work the night shift, report to orientation classes and then attend officer basic course lessons. Every day he had just enough time to get a few hours of sleep and then to get up do it all over again. He did have several advantages to the situation, the first being that for the last five years of his life he had lived just this kind of schedule. His four years at Harpers Academy was no cake walk. The last year of his life had been spent in combat or preparing ships for combat. If the Commodore or his dog robber thought they could wear him down this way then they were badly mistaken.
His other advantage was that as a Kazad Altered he had enhanced strength and stamina. He was sure he could go several days with little or no sleep. In fact, when he helped save the crew of the ISS Alamo and freed the crew of the ISS Mammoth he had done just that.
Wolves at the Gate Page 8
