by Ric Locke
Peters nodded. “Gell’s ready for us to go aboard, sir.”
“About time.” Bolton adjusted the angle of his cap, looked over the scene of enlisted sailors loading seabags and boarding the other dli, and followed Gell through the hatch. Peters fell in behind when Mannix gestured, and the First Class brought up the rear as they worked their way up the aisle.
Gell turned to speak over his shoulder when they’d reached the operators’ compartment. “I’m feeling lazy today,” he said. “Commander Bolton will take the operator’s seat, and you’ll take the left, Peters. Then I can sit back and relax.”
“I’m not sure that’s a good idea.”
“I’m in charge here,” Gell said in a tone more amused than irritated. “Don’t argue with me.” He gestured that Bolton should take the pilot’s chair, took the port aft seat, and assumed a pose of exaggerated relaxation.
“What’s this?” Bolton asked.
“Pilot Gell says that he understands you are an extremely experienced pilot, sir. He says for you to take the right front seat, that’s the command chair, sir, and I’ll be in the left front so I can translate easily.”
Bolton stared for a long moment, then shook his head, adjusted his hat again, and sat. He scanned the panel for a long moment, then looked up. “All right, sailor, what’s first on the checklist?”
“Well, sir, first is the activator. Button just to the right and down from the right-hand instrument, sir.” Bolton found the control and looked at Peters, who nodded. “Yes, sir, that’s it,” he confirmed. “Hold it down ‘til the meter just above it’s all the way to the left, sir.”
“That got it?”
“Yes, sir.”
“He’ll probably want to turn down the compensator,” Gell interjected. “It takes more experience than he has to operate a dli on full compensation.”
“Yes, I was about to offer him the choice.” Peters turned back to his CO. “Sir, most folks need to be able to feel the motions of the ship, ‘specially in atmosphere. If you want to do that, you should turn the, ah, Gell calls it the compensator, you should reduce the power setting to it, sir.”
“And how do I do that?”
“Buttons here, sir. Top one increases, bottom decreases. The meter just above ‘em shows the level, sir, but backwards to what we’re used to.”
Bolton looked over his shoulder at Gell. “If this thing’s like the planes, full power’d mash us flat. This compensator thing reduces that effect?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Could we get something like that installed on the airplanes?”
“I don’t know, sir. I’ll ask Gell.”
The Grallt pilot raised his eyebrows when the question was passed. “The compensator is part of the zifthkakik.”
Bolton’s eyebrows went up at that. “Do tell,” he murmured. “Apparently we weren’t told everything… what setting should I use?
“Ms. Collins ran the dli with it set to about half, sir,” Peters advised.
“I’ll go with that.” Bolton thumbed the button until the meter was near the middle of its range, then glanced back at Gell. Peters took a moment to do the same, finding the Grallt sprawled in his seat, eyes slitted, a secretive smile playing across his face.
“That’s it for the startup procedure, sir,” Peters advised. “Now it’s just take the andli, the arrowhead-shaped thing there, and fly it, sir.”
“I see.” Bolton grasped the andli, a bit more gently than Collins had the first time. “Straight up to clear the landscape, then forward, right?”
“That’s the way all the Grallt I’ve watched did it, sir.”
“Then we’ll try it.” Bolton gingerly operated the control; the dli leaped vertically, stopping to bob a bit at about a hundred meters altitude. “Touchy,” the commander remarked, and very carefully began to feed in forward motion. That was more successful; after a moment he echoed Collins: “It’s flying. That’s better.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Next problem: how do we find the ship?”
“Right now we don’t, sir.” When Bolton looked at him Peters flushed. “First thing is to get up real high, sir, then we can start lookin’ for the ship. At the speed these things go, it don’t take long to get where you need to go, sir.”
“I suppose not. Commander Collins said the left-hand instrument was the navigation reference.”
“Yes, sir, the left-hand cross shows the way to whatever zifthkakik it’s set to home on, and right now that’s Llapaaloapalla, sir. But it only shows the straight line, and the dli ain’t powerful enough to go there in a straight line.”
“I see.” Bolton eyed the cross. “If I read this thing right, we’re a little off course to the left and the ship is above us.”
“Yes, sir, so if you just go on the way you’re goin’, by the time we get around the planet it oughta be just about right.”
Bolton grinned, an expression Peters had never before seen him assume. Suddenly he looked more like a mischievous kid than a Naval officer. “Handfly it to orbit, eh? Well, I’ll be damned. You should have seen all the calculations we had to go through to get the planes up to the ship. Ten decimal places and split-second timing.” He looked at Peters, then back at Gell. “Hold on, sailor. I’m going to try some things.”
“Some things” included left and right turns of increasing steepness, Dutch rolls around the axis, and finally one revolution of barrel roll with a large enough diameter that they were simply pressed into their seats, even at the top. The sky around them went darker and darker, the stars came out, and the horizontal bar of the navigation instrument flipped from top to bottom.
Peters looked around when that happened, but Gell was apparently asleep. Mannix wasn’t; his eyes were wide and his face pale, but he didn’t say anything.
Peters tapped the nav instrument. “That’s got it, sir. Now we coast for a while and wait, sir.”
Bolton nodded, released the andli, and leaned back in his seat. “Nadine told me,” he mused, then looked over at Peters. “Commander Collins told me it’d be more a case of getting flying instruction from you than it would be you translating. I see she was right.”
Peters flushed. “Well, sir, it ain’t really all that hard to fly one of these things,” he demurred.
“Obviously not.” Bolton scanned the panel. “Commander Collins also quoted you as saying you’d never landed one on a planet.”
“That’s right, sir. All I ever did was spell the pilot of the freight hauler while we was salvagin’ the pirate ships, sir.”
“Including landing in the bay?”
“Yes, sir.”
“How many times did you land it in the bay?”
“Three or four times, sir.”
There was a long silence. At last Bolton said, “How do we know if we’re close?”
Peters nodded. “What you do, sir, is pitch the nose up and down, with the course needle centered. If you know you’re at about the right altitude, when the needles cross you’re pointed right at the destination, sir.”
“And from there you can figure out what to do next.”
“Yes, sir.”
Bolton stared at Peters for a long moment. “You’re pretty fluent in the Grallt language, aren’t you?”
“I get by, sir.”
“I beg to differ, sir,” Mannix put in. “I’ve seen him in action. Fluent is precisely the correct description, sir.”
“So I understand.” Bolton grinned, with less amusement than before. “You’re fluent in the language, and you know how to fly a spaceship. Chief Joshua says you’ve been hobnobbing with the ship’s officers; he gets pretty indignant about it, in fact.”
Peters nodded, a bob of the head, but kept his eyes squarely on Bolton’s.
“You’re dressing pretty sharp these days, I see, and I hear you and your buddy have been living pretty high on liberty. You care to discuss where the funds for that are coming from?”
“Yes, sir, we been workin’ some for the Grallt in ou
r off-duty hours, sir,” Peters said cautiously. “Which is legal, sir, I done it before when the ship wasn’t on deployment, sir.”
“Peters, this detachment’s orders put it on the same status as a deployment to a combat zone,” Bolton said with a little heat. “You don’t have any off-duty hours except when you’re on liberty.”
Peters ducked his head again. “Beggin’ the Commander’s pardon, sir, but my orders ain’t the same as yours, sir.”
“Oh, yes, the famous screwed-up orders.” Bolton leaned forward slightly, his face stern. “This isn’t the time or the place for it, but you’d better believe that those orders, and this whole situation, are going to be looked at real close when we get home. In the meantime I’m going along, because the people we signed the agreement with insist on it, but United States Navy Space Detachment One has a mission out here, and as commanding officer I intend to see that mission accomplished. Do you know what that mission is, Petty Officer Peters?”
“Yes, sir, I do, at least in general terms, sir.”
“‘In general terms.’” Bolton twitched, calling attention to the tension in his shoulders and neck. “Specifically, Petty Officer Peters, the mission of SPADET ONE is to establish commercial relations with other peoples, and to earn foreign exchange for the U.S. Government so it can participate in those relations.” He paused; when Peters started to speak he made a jerky quelling motion and continued, “And from where I sit, it looks a lot like you are blocking me from accomplishing that mission for personal gain, and I don’t intend to let that happen. Do you understand me, Petty Officer Peters?”
I reckon if there’s a blockage it’s on your end, Commander, Peters thought, but he only said, “Yes, sir,” without dropping his eyes.
“And with all due respect, sir, he’s just recently pulled the unit out of a fairly tight situation,” Mannix put in.
“I’m almost completely persuaded of that.” Bolton twisted to look at the First Class, then turned back to relieve the strain. “How much do you know about that situation, Mannix?”
“Not much, sir, just that Peters and Todd managed to deflect something pretty nasty. There’s speculation going around, but no details, sir.”
“There better not be,” the commander growled. “If it gets to be deck scuttlebutt, heads will roll, you real clear on that, sailors?”
“Yes, sir,” both enlisted said simultaneously.
The commander glanced at the navigation instrument before meeting Peters’s eyes once more. “I will be keeping an eye on you, and that is a personal guarantee,” he commented, his face and tone still tight. “You ever think about jumping ship, Peters? No, don’t answer that.”
“Aye, aye, sir,” Peters said softly, holding eye contact.
Bolton broke it, reaching for the andli to start the dli in a smooth pitching motion. “About time to be hunting for the ship, isn’t it?”
Peters glanced around, checking the sun angle. “Yes, sir, it is. There, sir, it just went by.”
“I got it… you suppose we’re in visual range?”
“I reckon we ought to be, sir… yeah, there it is, sir, dead ahead and a little up. Looks like a star, but it moves.”
“So it does… from here it’s just like coming back from a furball,” Bolton noted. “Bar the different set of controls, that is. No real problem.” He manuevered the dli into an approach path, then brought it in for a landing in the ops bay, not as smoothly as Gell would have but an entirely creditable performance. “Not too bad,” he observed when they were sitting on the skids in the bay.
Gell applauded slowly, soft handclaps that didn’t make much noise. “Excellent,” he said. “Not that I expected anything different. Whatever else your superior may be, he is certainly a skilled ship operator.”
“Yes.”
“What’s that?” Bolton wanted to know.
“Gell says you’re good, sir.”
“Eh? Well, of course I’m good.” This in the tone he might have used to say, “of course the sky is blue.” “I’m a Navy aviator.” He stood, and Gell used the opportunity to reach around him and press buttons while Bolton adjusted his headgear. “Very interesting flight,” the commander commented. “Tell Gell thank you. And keep in mind what I said.”
“I will, sir.” Peters watched as Bolton disappeared aft, then told Gell, “Commander Bolton says thank you for the opportunity.”
The Grallt nodded and took his seat, waiting for his passengers to offload before taxiing the dli into the hangar. “My pleasure,” he said. “When will you be available to teach me your language? It looks as if it will be useful in the future.” He grinned and looked sidelong at Peters. “I would have very much liked to be able to follow the intense discussion just finished, for instance.”
“Ssth. I can summarize that in a few words. Commander Bolton considers me so low in the precedence structure that I cannot make contributions and can barely commit significant errors. He warned me against mistakes, obliquely because he can’t conceive of my doing anything effective.”
“Yes, but are you cynical enough?” When Peters choked at that, Gell went on, “I’m still interested in learning. Perhaps I would have a different interpretation.”
“Look me up when we’re in High Phase.” Peters added his compartment designation.
“I’ll do that.”
“Well, that was interesting,” Mannix remarked as he and Peters made their way down the aisle. “I believe the Commander was quite taken with you, now that he’s met you in person, as it were. It would seem that you are destined for even greater things.”
Peters snorted. “Hmph. I reckon that ain’t quite the interpretation I’d put on it, and anyway I could’a survived without bein’ the apple of the Commander’s eye.”
“Oh, I’m quite sure you could.” Mannix surveyed the ops bay, glanced out the aft door at another dli on approach, then looked back at Peters. “It’s well to remember what happens to the apple that gets selected.”
“I reckon the best thing for me to do’d be to see if I can’t sort of squirm down to the bottom of the basket.”
Mannix shook his head. “That might be a worthwhile strategy for some, John, but my prediction is that in your case it’s doomed to failure.”
Chapter Thirty-Three
“Halt,” Peters called out in a fine ringing voice. “Who goes there?”
“Petty Officer Hale,” came from the gloom.
“Advance and be recognized, Petty Officer Hale.”
The other stepped forward. It was indeed Hale, one of the Machinist’s Mates who kept the airplanes shipshape; not someone Peters knew well. “You’re recognized, Petty Officer Hale,” Peters advised in a lower but still businesslike voice. “The challenge is Bubblehead.”
“And the countersign is Carson.” Hale’s voice was amused. “I don’t know who thought up these passwords, but that set’s fairly appropriate. I relieve you, Petty Officer Peters.”
“And I stand relieved.” Peters handed the M22 over and began shucking out of the duty belt. “All quiet. Nothin’ to report.”
Hale nodded and handed the weapon back so he could buckle on the belt. That done, he took the helmet, set it on his head, accepted the gun once more, and adopted the pose Peters had been using: feet slightly apart, weapon grounded, left hand at the small of his back. “I’m not sure whether to be glad or sorry nothing ever happens on these watches,” he remarked conversationally. “It gets pretty boring.”
“Borin’ is good,” Peters advised, an aphorism the sailors attributed to Warnocki.
Hale grinned. “In the normal case you’re right. But five hours of standing here like this isn’t anything that needs thought to prevent excitement. It’s just boring.”
Peters scanned the hangar bay. Planes sat in more or less random orientations, several of them with panels open or removed, but most of the overhead lights were off and there was nobody stirring. What light there was spilled from the catwalks above their heads and across the bay, making
the space gloomy and spooky and giving more meaning to the challenge and response of watch relief than any of them were accustomed to.
That, and the fact that Commander Bolton and the other officers occasionally stopped by to check up, were the reasons they played it straight and formal. The zifthkakik they were guarding were safe in the crates the Grallt had provided—five times per watch they made sure of that; Peters had just checked, and Hale would check again as soon as Peters left—but they were the most valuable thing the detachment had, and having them guarded, by guards, seemed to most of them to be entirely sensible. There was of course no credible threat around, but that had nothing to do with it. Like almost all sailors, Peters had taken his turn guarding objects that didn’t look all that dissimilar, in front of an armored, combination-locked door three decks down in the middle of the ship. This was exposed in the wild by comparison.
And besides, it was Navy. So were the bow and stern watches (equally futile), manning the duty desk in the detachment offices, and the recently restored desk in the aft EM quarters access. Not everyone agreed, but most of the sailors felt that after a year and a half of bizarreness they needed the rituals to keep themselves grounded. Dershowitz, second on Retard Two, had even produced a bosun’s pipe and shamefacedly confessed a taste for archaism; now there were three of them who could blow it—not well—and they were piping the watches, like would have been done a century and more ago.
Dershowitz was doing that as Peters rounded the hangar access into the ops bay, the different tweedle of “To Colors.” Two dozen or so sailors were standing around, and a few of the officers were out and about. Peters stiffened to attention; the notes died away, and everybody saluted, facing midships, approximately where the flag would be if Llapaaloapalla had sported such a decoration. They held the pose for a few beats, then somebody called “Stand at… ease” from across the bay. That’d just started recently. There was talk of making it official.
Peters approved. He and Todd had been making a concerted effort to blend in, keep their heads down, merge with the group. So far it seemed to be successful. Todd was still Collins’s plane captain; Peters still led Retard Three, to the extent that leadership was necessary. The detachment had had three mock-battles and gone on liberty once since what he thought of as the time I rode with the Commander, and another liberty was coming up. He’d not been called on to perform the duties of a zerkre; his kathir suit was still in its Navy-blue pattern. They’d stood watches, one ande every five-ande “day” or a little more often; the Chiefs took their turns at bow and stern, as advertised, but they didn’t do desk duty or zifthkakik watch, and the only real effect the impressive gesture had was to leave more night watches for the rest of them.
