Kris Longknife's Bloodhound, a novella

by Mike Shepherd

  Ruth, a farmer born and bred, even looked the stereotype today. Her long black hair was braided into two pigtails and she wore a calico dress with full skirt.

  How much she looked the part of the contract farmer for a light cruiser, providing fresh fruit and vegetables from hydroponic gardens between the ship’s ice armor and main hull, had been a hot topic between husband and wife that morning. However, since the Navy Department only just started this crazy farm program, no one was too sure what the proper appearance of a ship-based farmer was.

  Ruth had dressed as she wanted.

  Trouble, who’d never lost a firefight, was getting used to losing to his bride.

  Whatever her appearance, Ruth could talk farming. And she was talking Uxbridge’s ears off about hydroponic agribusiness and her need for additional tubing, tubs and pumps. She was laying it on thick. So thick, no one would mistake her for an Alcohol, Drug and Explosives Enforcement Agent.

  Even a part-time one.

  At least that was what Trouble and Ruth fervently hoped.

  A waitress showed up. Ruth interrupted her monologue long enough to order a beer; both men followed her lead.

  Trouble noted that the conversation between the two men in the booth seemed to be getting more heated, but they kept their words too low for him to make them out over Ruth’s voice. He rested a hand on her knee under the table, hoping she’d take it for a request for a pause.

  She brushed his hand off.

  Did she really think he’d make a pass at her right now? Still, this was her show. Captain Umboto had made that clear as they left the Patton this morning.

  Ruth leads; Trouble follows.

  But Ruth, love, do you have any idea where we’re going?

  The drinks arrived. As Trouble reached for his, he noted the booth’s conversation was on pause as one of them answered a phone. Was there a twitch of a nod in their direction?

  Uxbridge was seated with his back to the booth. Was he looking at Ruth, or beyond her to something in the mirror? Trouble started to turn, to check the mirror out, but Uxbridge was lifting his glass in some kind of informal toast.

  Trouble raised his mug, glancing at Ruth, who was smiling as if she had good sense. The commander was smiling, too, kind of smugly.

  Movement at the corner of his eye drew Trouble’s attention.

  “Honey, I think we got a problem,” he muttered.

  His bride ignored him . . . a habit developed since saying “I do.”

  She missed the pistols coming out across the room.

  “Down,” Trouble growled – and upended the table.

  Their drinks went flying, adding little to the heavy aroma of yesterday’s brew, smoke, sweat and more exotic odors.

  “What are you doing?” Ruth screeched, and made to follow Commander Uxbridge as he headed for the back door.

  Trouble kicked the chair out from under Ruth, unbalancing her enough that he could pull her down beside him – just as two rounds from across the room filled the air where her head had been.

  “Huh?” Ruth came out of her fixation on Uxbridge to glance around. “What’s going on?”

  “A friendly exchange of joy dust for cash seems to have gone wrong,” Trouble offered as he edged his head above the upended table, and ducked fast as the two people across the room squeezed off more incoming in his general direction.

  “Assuming it was what it looked like, and not cover for your friend’s withdrawal.”

  Ruth’s automatic was out of hiding from its rather nice place that Trouble enjoyed roaming in quieter times. Set for sleepy darts, she squeezed off two rounds at Uxbridge as he disappeared out the back door.

  “Darn,” she muttered as she only added more chips to the bar’s battered motif.

  Trouble edged his own service automatic around the table top and sent a few of Colt-Phizer’s best toward the erstwhile entrepreneur and client. He glanced around for the bartender, but she had made herself scarce.

  To call the local constabulary?

  Not likely. Trouble had noted a distinct lack of New Birmingham’s uniformed finest as he and Ruth approached the “friendly watering hole,” the commander had suggested.

  Trouble ducked as another couple of rounds shoved the table against his shoulder and showered plaster from the wall above him. He tapped his commlink.

  “Gunny, I could use some help here. Where are you?”

  The pause that followed was decidedly longer than Trouble expected.

  “Stuck in traffic, sir,” finally came back.

  Marine NCO’s are people of few words – but they pack a lot of meaning into what syllables they do speak, just as the Corps packed a lot of power into its chosen few. What Trouble heard was straight information underlain with rock-solid determination, overlain with more embarrassment than he believed possible to a Gunnery Sergeant.

  “You wouldn’t believe the traffic here, sir.”

  Trouble would. Raised by the Corps at bases around the rim of human space, this was his first venture deep into the overpopulated heart of humanity. From orbit, New Birmingham was one glowing orb, whether in daylight or darkness.

  “We’re fifteen blocks from you, sir. Should I get the crew moving on foot?”

  The image of four combat-loaded marines double-timing through this industrial area, even in the camouflage they’d dummied up for today, made Trouble cringe worse than the next burst from across the room.

  He glanced around the lower corner of the table.

  The two were running -- one for the front door, the other for the back.

  “They’re bugging out,” he shouted to Ruth. He snapped off a three-round burst at the back of the one headed for the front door. Ruth tried for the other.

  Both got solid hits.

  And the rounds just stuck there like darts on a dartboard.

  “Body armor,” Trouble spat as he stood, dusting plaster from his one set of civilian clothes. But he was talking to himself.

  Ruth was up and headed for the back door.

  Trouble caught her elbow and swung her back around. “You’re not sticking your pretty head out that door until all concerned have had a few minutes to reflect upon their evil ways.”

  “But Uxbridge is getting away.”

  “He’s got away, Ruth. Diamonds to donuts, there was a car waiting for him out there. And his driver knows how to get around this damnable local traffic. All that’s out there now is a buddy of our gun-toting trader from across the room.”

  Trouble waved at the now-vacant table.

  “Oh! Yeah, I guess that’s how I’d do it.” Ruth looked around, probably taking in the pub’s decor for the first time.

  Imitation wood paneled the walls in dark swirls. Blinking signs for local brews and sports teams paled in the full light of day. Now the bartender wandered out from the bathroom.

  She noted the situation with an unconcerned eye and asked if they wanted fresh drinks. Trouble declined, righted the table and chairs, settled their tab and led Ruth cautiously out the front door.

  A half dozen people in working overalls passed them going in. It was as if an Open for Business sign had been turned on. A dozen more in pairs and trios followed.

  A moment later a cab drove up.

  Gunny piled out to report as the other three marines took point, covering 360 degrees around them.

  The idea was for them to be inconspicuous today, since New Birmingham had its own police force . . . however invisible . . . and strong gun-controls laws . . . that seemed less than perfect in their application.

  The Marines’ body armor was covered by their new, multicolored sweat suits, making them look for all the world like a child’s crew-cut, hard-eyed, teddy bear. Their guns were hidden in bags, making them only slightly less conspicuous.

  “Sorry about the delay, sir. Next time I do this, we use one of our own drivers.”

  “I agree, Gunny. Let’s get out of here.”

  The cabby had no trouble delivering them quickly to the space e
levator. An hour later they were up the bean pole and reporting to Captain Umboto in her day cabin on the Patton.

  “He got away, Izzy” Ruth blurted out.

  Trouble gritted his teeth at his wife’s familiarity. He’d spent much of his two months of married bliss trying to introduce Ruth to the Navy Way.

  He hadn’t been all that successful.

  She had finally acquired the ability to identify rates and rank. The wardroom still chuckled at Ruth’s initial effort.

  Standing in line at the Navy exchange at High Woolamurra, Ruth had proudly told Trouble, “That one’s a captain, ‘cause he has four stripes. But what’s five stripes?”

  “Five stripes?” Trouble asked, puzzled as he followed Ruth’s gaze . . . to two chiefs. One, with over sixteen years in the navy, sported four gold hash marks. The other, with twenty plus years, had five.

  Trouble spent the rest of the wait in line trying to stop laughing as he explained the difference between officer rank stripes, that encircled the sleeve, and enlisted service hash marks that angled up to cover part of the sleeve. Undaunted, Ruth shared with the entire wardroom over supper that night how she’d made her latest discovery.

  Half of the officers had almost laughed up their chow.

  The skipper surprised him; she’d nodded understandingly at Ruth. “Learning all the secret handshakes of this bunch is a bitch,” she muttered encouragingly.

  The skipper surprised Trouble again today. She just nodded at the announcement that the bird had flown the nest and changed the subject. “Better get the farm ready for fluctuating gravity, Ruth. We’re clearing the pier in two hours.”

  “Orders, Skipper?” Trouble asked.

  “The yard at Wardhaven finally thinks they’ve figured out the spaghetti that passes for wiring in our main system. We’ve got a week’s reduced availability there.”

  Trouble and Ruth both knew the truth behind those words. The Patton was one of many hasty war conversions from merchant vessel to light cruiser. The yards had rushed the ships into commission paying attention to only what would make them fit to fight . . . and wasting little time on minor things like system standardization.

  Thanks to that haste, the Patton had damn near ended up a permanent fixture at the end of a pier. Trouble wouldn’t have minded that, except he and Ruth about then were in slavers’ hands, growing drugs on a stinking, hot planet named Riddle.

  The work was bad; the supervision was worse.

  Slave drivers stalked around with whips in their hands and rape on their minds.

  Ruth and he had risked their necks to help an invasion fleet show up.

  But those were yesterday’s problems. Today, the Patton was in the best shape she’d ever been and the skipper had a tiger grin on her face.

  The call to Wardhaven came from the people who made planets shake.

  When they talked, people died.

  Hopefully, it wouldn’t be anyone Trouble knew personally. With a salute and a shrug, the Marine officer went to prepare his detachment to get underway.

  TWO

  A week later, Ruth galloped up to the captain’s gig. Trouble was waiting for her, his face the mask it became when he was busy being Marine. Catching her breath, Ruth glanced around. Good, Izzy wasn’t there yet.

  She flashed her husband a proud grin, which he ignored as he always did when he was in Marine mode. Still, she had a right to be proud.

  She’d heard Trouble grouse, and other naval officers, too, that every civilian considered themselves a brevet admiral . . . and acted accordingly. Ruth was doing her darnedest to be their obedient servant . . . and act accordingly. Although it was none too easy to meet their expectations. Take this situation, for example.

  All Ruth’s life, she’d been taught to defer to her betters, to let her elders enter a room first and take their preferred seat before she and the other kids started squabbling over who got what was left.

  Always, age before beauty.

  But not now, not the Navy Way, as her husband had done his best to make clear. Here, the junior entered a vehicle like the captain’s gig first and God help her if she didn’t guess what seat the senior wanted and avoid taking it.

  “It’s madness,” she insisted.

  “No,” her new husband would remind her, “it is neither the right way nor the wrong way. It is the Navy Way.”

  Movement caught Ruth’s eye. Izzy and the new exec were entering the docking bay. She flashed Trouble a quick grin and entered the captain’s gig first. Taking the measure of the eight seats available to her, she picked a middle one on the right. That left seven free for the three officers to squabble over.

  Her husband entered right behind her, took the seat across from her and began belting himself in. The XO entered, took a quick side step and let Izzy pick her seat.

  Smart man, he’d go far in any Navy Ruth ran. She shrugged internally, doubting any Navy operated that way.

  Izzy settled down in the seat ahead of Ruth. “How’s it going, Ruth?” the captain asked as her hands automatically belted herself in.

  Ruth was still trying to figure out the five-point harness the Navy used and didn’t look up until she heard her name. “Oh fine, Izzy,” Ruth said and watched both Trouble and the exec blink at the familiarity.

  Well, darn it, I’m a civilian. There have to be a few advantages to that disability Ruth did not say.

  “How are the farmhands working out?” Izzy asked, settling back in her seat, all harnessed in.

  Ruth was still struggling. Trouble popped his one point release and reached over to help. Another time, his hands’ feathery touch on her breasts and inner thighs would have been a turn-on. Today, it just added to her frustration as he inserted tab A into slot B with an ease that eluded her.

  Then again, he was always good at getting his tab A into her slot B. Trying not to blush, Ruth concentrated on Izzy and let her husband strap her in.

  “They’re catching on fine,” Ruth assured Izzy. “Chief Yellin and Petty Officer Dora grew up on farms. They’re fast learners, and they pass it along to the rest very quickly.”

  Actually, retired chief and petty officer, but you don’t tell captains what they already knew. At least that was what Trouble insisted.

  “You’ve been eating our produce for the last week,” Ruth pointed out.

  “I know. I signed the pay chit before we docked. I mean the other hands.”

  Trouble flashed Ruth just a hair of a raised eyebrow. He’d warned her that nothing happened aboard ship without the captain knowing.

  “We were expanding the tanks,” Ruth began as methodically as she could while the gig went zero gee and pulled away from the Patton. “We were back at High Woolamurra station, and where I grew up, a farm wasn’t a farm without the farmer’s wife.”

  “So you hired on Chief Yellin’s wife,” Izzy finished.

  Ruth nodded.

  “And kids?” the XO asked.

  “No, sir,” Ruth shot back. “They’re all grown and on their own.”

  “Although if this experiment of yours works out,” Izzy went on quoting almost verbatim from what Ruth was thinking, “the youngsters on your farm will want to bring along their wives and they will want to have kids.”

  “I’m housing them in the farm area, between the ice armor and the main hull, and I’m paying for their rations, same as any other of my contract labor force.”

  “And if we have to fight?” the XO led on.

  “The ex-crewmembers will report to their battle stations. Chief Yellin has identified a very safe area near the ship’s core for me and the wives to report to.”

  The Exec turned to Izzy for The Word. If Ruth’s eyes weren’t deceiving her, the skipper was sporting a sliver of a grin.

  “Someone with too much time and too little brains back at the Navy Department decided it was cheaper to lose a ship or two rather than keep full crews aboard in peace time,” Izzy said. “Some other dunderhead decided the planet-bound farmers were charging too much t
o provide certified bug- and fungus-free fresh fruits and vegetables for the ships. I figured I could combine both directives and give the Patton a farmful of willing hands only too ready to down tools and race back to battle stations.”

  Izzy stroked her chin as entry gee’s built up. “Should have realized I wasn’t the only one with an imagination. Whose idea was it, yours or Chief Yellin’s?”

  “Mine,” Ruth said.

  One thing she’d learned fast from Trouble . . . and his troubles . . . was that when higher ups asked who was responsible, the only answer was the senior officer present.

  At the farm, that was Ruth.

  Izzy’s grin was pulled down at the ends. Ruth hoped it was by the extra gee’s they were under. “Hope you’re just as creative for what we’re getting into.”

  After that, the captain lapsed into thoughtful silence. The others followed suit.

  Ruth raised an eyebrow to Trouble. What are we getting into?

  His almost imperceptible nod added nothing to her growing sense of apprehension. What kind of nut farm have I signed on with?

  Until a few months ago, Ruth had never been off Hurtford Corner, the planet of her birth. Since being drugged and dragged into the filthy hole of a slave ship, she was up to five planets now . . . four in the last month alone.

  It was nice seeing new places with Trouble’s arm comfortably around her. How pleasant Wardhaven could be would have to wait for a time when Trouble wasn’t being so darn Marine.

  Once the gig landed, a government limo was waiting for them. Ruth quickly entered and took a jump seat, Trouble right beside her. A civilian had attached himself to their group sometime during the walk from gig to limo. Izzy actually broke into a wide smile at the sight of him and made a point of entering ahead of him.

  “Woman, I’m a civilian now.”

  “And a deputy minister, if I’m not mistaken.” Izzy shot back. “This is your get about, isn’t it?”

  “Rita refuses to have anyone assigned a limo. Good woman. Trying to be as tight a skinflint on the nonessentials as her husband would want.”

  “How is she?”

  “More pregnant every day. And the happiest woman on ten planets since her husband made it back.” The civilian reached a hand across to Ruth’s husband. “Trouble, isn’t it? I see you’ve got your captain’s bars back.”