by Michael Orr
He offered a slight smile that put her at ease. “Oh, I don't expect ta deprive ’em of your company permanently.”
“Are they in trouble?”
“Apparently.” He breathed a lighthearted sigh that gave Trish the impression sublieutenants were a constant comedy of errors. “But nothing that’ll stunt their careers. I can use this as a learning event.”
The shuttle quickly passed beyond the Grenadines and sped toward an immense wedge-shaped cruiser. They entered Arctica's airspace and landed in one of the center-deck bays. Nash handed Trish down from the shuttle and she stepped onto the smooth black deck, bracing her bare feet for the chill, but it was completely neutral.
Envirogel, she reminded herself.
Nash and a pair of armed guards led their delicate visitor through the cruiser to guest country amidst the stares of the remaining skeleton crew, who stopped dead in their tracks at the sight of her.
“They okay?” She was shocked at how differently these men acted. There was none of the glow her presence brought to the guys on Onxx. These acted more like drones, their eyes taking her in without giving anything back.
“You’ve never seen E.I.D.,” Nash surmised. “This’z the effect of extended patrols. Once they get some RnR they’ll be more like the others. Just a few more days.”
Trish was puzzled. “You seem t’be weathering it pretty well, Commander.”
“I’ve already had my leave,” he explained, opening the door to her quarters while she contemplated the ailing men. But the room completely hijacked her attention.
It sprawled out like a deluxe suite, complete with a salon and bar. The massive bed’s wall-sized headboard holo provided a bright and cheery tropical atrium complete with palm trees inside a whitewashed trellis. In the opposite corner, an open archway hinted at an ensuite bath and separate sitting room, but the pièce de resistance was the viewport taking up the far wall. Only slightly less expansive than her own, it looked out onto open space and framed two small escort ships shadowing the cruiser from a distance.
“I had no idea military ships were so luxurious!”
Nash smirked. “Your quarters on Asherah are less inviting?”
“Oh, pretty similar. But the Asherah’s supposed t’be.”
“Well, I’m pleased to offer you some unexpected comfort.” Nash smiled. “I’m told you’ll find whatever you need here to restore yourself t’the splendor we’ve all come to appreciate.”
“Am I...missing something, Commander?” Trish looked up into his busy eyes, still wondering what was going on in there. “I thought I was under house arrest for crashing your party.”
His smile gained traces of bewilderment. “What would give you that idea? You’re here at the invitation of Captain Yusuf, who requests your company at his table this evening. It wouldn’t do for him to slight such an auspicious guest.”
“The...captain?” Trish shrank at the prospect. She couldn’t possibly face a captain in her current state.
“And his senior staff,” Nash added, hoping to allay a woman’s concerns but only making things worse. “On a ship Arctica’s size, the table’s set for twenty.”
She swallowed hard. Twenty?
Nash’s smile grew at her reaction. “I'll come back, in say, an hour? Ta give you a small tour beforehand. Will that be enough time?”
“Um...of course.” What else could she say?
“You'll find an attempt at a wardrobe in the closet.” Nash swiped open the door to reveal a selection of gowns, some of them suitable for the most formal occasions. “I hope you’ll find something to your taste. And please don’t feel rushed.”
“Thank...you.” Trish recovered her social graces in the nick of time as Nash withdrew. She was left staring at all the finery. “Twen^ty...”
EFS ARCTICA – GRENADINES OF HEAVEN – JUN 30, 2371
Jerrett Nash was troubled.
After taking leave of the Thierry girl he sought refuge in his office to ponder the many feelings bombarding him. Feelings of pain, of regret, of wonder... There was too much going on to sort it all out. He’d seen her feeds and knew she was the darling of the fleet, so there was no mystery about the image of Trisha Thierry, but meeting her in person was like walking on his own grave.
Was it her face? Her presence? Something about her was reaching out to him. He sensed it in his deeper, less rational places. Not his heart. Not his mind. This came from his soul.
He brought up Arctica’s database and perused anything he could find on her.
Born to Bastien and Reah Thierry (both deceased), Trisha Nazanin Thierry had been raised at the prestigious SoCal Conservatory and groomed with honors for an artistic career. Besides dance, she excelled in the humanities — history, literature and so on — but was only middling when it came to math and science. Her EQ was extremely high, though her maturity scale was average. Like most people, she was muddling through life in the low sixties while Nash himself was a seventy-eight. Military discipline had that effect. Even if he never improved, it was still plenty for him to make admiral when the time came.
He glanced over Trish’s natal chart expecting a Leo’s raging thirst for fame, but it was Sagittarius’s wanderlust and passion for adventure that made this girl tick. No wonder she could spend a weekend with a few lieutenants and handle a transport full of lovesick boys. But there was a glitch when he looked up her Master Temperament Index.
The MTI was Prometheus Institute’s amalgamation of the major personality tests developed over the centuries. It provided a schematic of the self’s gearbox; but far from being an extrovert, Trish’s index showed she was at best equal parts extrovert and introvert — an isovert. And rather than being externally focused, she was a die-hard intuitive.
How could the outrageous Trisha Thierry be any of that? Someone with this girl’s flamboyance should’ve been a card-carrying hyper-extrovert with no inward tendencies whatsoever.
Whatever was going on with this girl wasn’t on the label. Hers was a rare temperament — only about one percent of the population — and Nash had never met one before. Her bizarre, inexplicable dichotomies yanked at him, pulling him in a direction he never wanted to go, and he didn’t appreciate the intrusion.
Solidly analytic Jerrett Nash was still just thirty-two and liked his trajectory. There was a captaincy in his future, and anything that got in his way stood to become road-kill. He wasn’t about to let some unexpected gravity well drag him off course.
And, he admonished himself, she’s too young.
A comm he was anticipating got him up from his desk and back into action. Trish’s hour was up and he had come to a conclusion: young Miss Thierry needed to be given wide berth.
30
* * *
EFS ARCTICA – GRENADINES OF HEAVEN – JUN 30, 2371
“Come in, Commander.” Trish answered the door resplendent in a flowing emerald gown that Nash swore had once been red-gold. But the gleaming green did wonders against her burgundy hair.
“Magnificent...” He studied the vision before him and Trish turned coy, gesturing at the many pairs of heels tumbled on the closet floor.
“I’d feel less undone with something on my feet, but none’a these fit.”
“Not to worry.” Nash held out Trish’s own crystal heels. “I had ’em brought up in anticipation of just such a crisis.”
The relief and gratitude on her face were unexpected rewards, and Nash decided she was indeed a category six navigational hazard. His best hope was to busy them both with the tour.
Arctica was a ghost ship during shore leave, but Nash still kept to sights nearest the central mover for security’s sake. No civvie would ask for different.
Trish took in the ship’s ambience and compared it to Asherah’s. There were similarities, but going to space felt different here. Back on Asherah, the decks and corridors were designed with a sense of openness and flair, even in the staff-only areas. Corridors were cylindrical and brightly lit, with splashes of color to break up the monotony. On Arc
tica, the corridors were squarish and mainly white, giving the ship a sterile feel that was only occasionally interrupted by black-and-yellow caution stripes or other signage.
No wonder these guys have issues.
Nash led her amidships to the cavernous hangar bays that were normally filled with shuttles. And later, he brought up a room-sized holomap that provided a real-time view of Arctica’s innards.
“I’m surprised how little room is taken up by quarters,” she commented. “From the outside, you’d think it was cram-packed with sailors.”
“Most of our internals are dedicated t’the airwing, with the majority of our crew overseeing the bots that keep our fighters ’n shuttles flying. As big as she is, Arctica only needs twelve hundred men — roughly four hundred for each shift, give or take. The rest’re ancillary.”
“And what’re you in charge of, Commander?”
Trish’s gleaming eyes reflected a nearby caution stripe, and Nash caught himself wondering if it was an omen.
“Oh...I’m Mission Coordinator. My section keeps the moving parts of any operation aware of each other and communicating. We’re the grease that makes things work.”
Trish blinked uncertainly. “Sounds hefty.”
“Well, not as hefty as what goes on in here...” He swiped at the armored bulkhead they were standing at and the wall parted, allowing him to gesture grandly at the scene within. “Miss Thierry, may I present Arctica’s soul.”
Before her spread a bi-level glass and chrome command center. A few steps up was a clear acrylic flying bridge serving as a pedestal for the captain’s chair and two senior officers. They overlooked a circus of sunken pits gleaming with holopanels staffed by young men who managed Arctica’s systems with single-minded focus. And surrounding it all swept a curved hemispheric viewport that seemed to welcome space right in. Everything gleamed with spotless military polish matched by the glittering stars outside.
“My god!” she gasped. “It’s...beyond.”
Nash smirked, allowing his guest a few moments to absorb it all.
“You called this the soul, Commander. Not the brain?”
“Oh no,” he insisted. “The AI’s the brain, which takes its cues from the soul just like the rest of us.”
“Commander Nash...” She eyed him. “A religious man?”
“Never in matters of the spirit.” He hoped his answer would suffice, but Trish clearly wanted more. “Religion knows nothing of the soul and spirit,” he said simply, seeing no reason to bring up Dr. Sukho’s Congress of Creeds when this girl was too young to remember it.
“’Kay.” Trish champed at the bit to go in. “Can I?”
“As Arctica’s on leave...” He gave her that small, smug inward smile of his and ushered her forth. “I suppose disruptions are inevitable.”
“Permission to enter the bridge?” he addressed the ensign standing watch deeper in.
“Uh...” The young man was helpless at the sight of Trisha Thierry.
“As you were, Ensign,” Nash prompted, noting the officer’s name on a mental tally sheet.
“Um, yessir. Perrrmission granted, sir.”
Trish stepped onto the main level, awash in her own fascination and the gazes of others.
“This way, Miss Thierry.” Nash resumed his formality and led the girl upward as Arctica’s captain rose from his chair. Tall and striking, his distinguished salt-pepper sideburns and Sikh-ish gravity were offset by eyes kindled with Trish’s irrepressible charm.
“Captain Yusuf...” She offered her hand and the steel-haired captain lifted it elegantly to his lips. Trish decided to play the ingénue. “It’s a great pleasure to finally meet you.”
“The pleasure is very much mine, Miss Thierry. And overdue.”
“It is,” she agreed. “I regret not being able t’meet you when I was last aboard, but I’m extremely grateful to your crew for making a second visit possible.”
“A blessing to us all.” He oozed charm. “And I’d count it a privilege if you’d dine with me and my senior staff this evening.”
“The privilege would be mine.”
“Then, may I present Arctica’s bridge...” Yusuf swept an arm around the impressive scene as if it were all hers to enjoy.
Trish wanted to take him up on it immediately, but there were pleasantries to deal with.
“I was telling the Commander just a moment ago how impressive this all is.”
Nash smirked. “I believe the actual phrase, sir, was: ‘it’s beyond’.”
“I’m sure Asherah has something very much like it,” The captain grinned in a gentleman’s way, reclaiming his chair.
Trish demurred. “I’m afraid I wouldn’t know.” Then she noticed the view outside from this elevated perch. “Is that the Grenadines?”
Yusuf nodded. “Mister Nash, would you do the honors?”
Nash led her out to the viewport, secretly longing for more dignity in front of his captain and crew as the bridge came to a halt in Trish’s wake.
“The entire cluster,” he answered stiffly.
She stopped to study him for a heartbeat. “You don’t let big moments pass ya by, do you, Commander?”
“I...”
“Don’t wish it over with before ya get a chance to enjoy it.” She felt a chill as she said it. They both did, and it was something Nash meant to put a stop to.
“See that twinkling star way off over there?” He pointed above the glowing Grenadines.
“Barely. The Asherah?”
“She’s the only thing lit up like that.” He glanced over at Trish. “There’s nothing else like ’er.”
“Not even this? The Arctica?” The jewel on the far side of local space held her eyes captive and Nash moved on.
“Ships of war serve a different purpose.”
“You should come over ’n let me give you a tour,” Trish chirped.
“I was thinking the same thing.”
31
* * *
EFS ARCTICA – GRENADINES OF HEAVEN – JUN 30, 2371
Trish waited with Nash at the stepped entry to Arctica’s grand hall. The setting for their banquet was quite an affair, and Trish took it in with a rush.
Grecian columns lined the walls, which appeared completely open to space and used the glittering stars themselves for a wall treatment. A checkerboard floor of glossy white and midnight-blue marble spread up to an imperial table surrounded by men in dashing dress whites and dress blues.
At the far end, sculptures in the classical style promised exquisite detail to anyone close enough to inspect them, and a recessed sitting lounge off to one side just beyond a row of columns hinted at ritual cigars and brandies and elevated discussions about matters of state. To her, this was very much a man’s world, but not of men given to armchair sports and idle pastimes; these were men engaging in the highest levels of Alliance intrigue. Everything she’d felt when first meeting Commander Nash was amplified a hundredfold here in this Olympian court.
At length, a young steward stepped forward to announce them. He was dressed according to his captain’s expectations, in coat and tails from an earlier time:
“Miss Trisha Thierry and Lieutenant Commander Nash.”
The sounds of haste signaled a room rising to its feet, and Trish took the steps carefully, gliding down on Nash’s arm with her gleaming emerald gown trailing on the rare midnight marble. She sensed disappointment from the table that she wasn’t as bare as some had hoped, but the fortunate duet of girl and gown was so stirring as to silence any objection.
“By every measure of grace, Miss Thierry,” Captain Yusuf expounded, “we war dogs have encountered nothing like you in all our lives.”
Trish offered her gloved hand again, smiling coyly while Nash took his place farther down the table.
“I can’t imagine it, Captain.” She forced her words out as if she hadn’t practiced them a dozen times. “The owner of this gown no doubt puts my attempt ta shame, leaving it behind like it’s the least of
her trifles. But I’m in her debt for the charity.”
Yusuf regarded her with open charm, though she was praising another officer’s wife. With obvious pleasure, he gestured around the table in introduction and she was greeted one-by-one as career men in spotless finery tripped over their tongues in the effort to become courtiers.
Most were majors or lieutenant commanders, but punctuating them on one side of the table was a lone commander, the ship’s exec, and on the other his warrior equal, a lieutenant colonel. Both men were polished to a fine rare sheen matched only by their captain, and Trish steeled herself for a withering night matching such practiced wits. These men were more than double her age. How could she hope to impress? Did she even dare try?
“I must say, gentlemen...” she started in while taking the seat a steward held for her, “I never expected such a welcome. Especially not in the condition I was in when I arrived. It’s almost as if I was expected.”
There were glances all around and a moment of political uncertainty.
“I see.” She tended to her napkin. “You knew about me from the outset, then?”
“As soon as the transport registered your bioscan, my dear.” Lt. Colonel Harriman owned up for all of them. “Perhaps a young lady might be persuaded to forgive a standard protocol built into every ship.”
“Oh, there’s nothing to forgive, Colonel.” She passed it off with a nod to the steward filling her water glass. “I’m the stowaway, after all. But there’re so many of you and so few of me. I wonder if someone would be good enough to tell me how it all works: captains and colonels and commanders and majors? The military presents such a mysterious face to the rest of us.”
Nash smirked at the girl’s opening move. It was comical to watch men rise to the occasion in pursuit of a teenager’s favor.
That’s unfair, he told himself. Why shouldn’t they want to impress a lady who can handle herself here?
“Well,” Yusuf got the jump on his men, “a captain like myself directs the overall operations of the ship he commands. But I entrust the men you see here with the details of that operation. The good commander beside you is my right hand regarding how the ship herself runs, while the colonel directs her weaponry and tactical aspects. The lieutenant commanders like your Mister Nash report to Commander BenKotch, and the majors report to Colonel Harriman.”
