the security services I’d forgotten my ten codes, but it had probably been a while since she’d worked security for someone with my background.
I adjusted my cochlear implant, just enough to eavesdrop. “Yeah, I hear him now. Jesus. That's some Paleolithic caveman shit he's flinging. Are we sure it isn’t a particularly nasty chimpanzee someone released out of SciDiv?”
“…maybe if you'd allowed the baby's daddy to be in the picture, but you chose to be a single mother…” I rounded the corner, and he was there, looming over the SecOff, spittle suspended in the air before it smacked across the wall and the woman.
I stepped between them, and puffed out my chest to be sure the augmented reality sensors in his HUD would pull up my name and rank so he knew who he was dealing with. “Do I have to explain this situation to you, son?” His lip curled into a snarl he failed to hide. “You're being a dick; worse, you're being a misogynistic, irrational dick, and it's fucking with my morale. First off, you're going to apologize.”
“Like fuck I will.”
“You will apologize, or I will fire you out the nearest airlock for insubordination.” My HUD mapped the direct route to the airlock, and I shared it with his HUD.
Anger and surprise flashed across his eyes, and for a second I thought he'd take a swing at me. But he'd heard the stories, and realized that I was likely more trouble than the SecOff, so he mumbled a quiet, “Sorry.”
I turned to SecOff Santiago. My HUD pulled up too much of her psychological history; I hadn’t acclimated to having executive clearances, or maybe I hadn’t set my preferences properly. Before I could stop myself I read the words, “abusive father.” I thought that it put her reaction to being screamed at by this chauvinist prick in perspective, but I’ve known enough people with that history to know better than to think it’s that linear a correlation. “You’re dismissed,” I told her.
“I can handle this, sir,” she said, defiant.
“It’s not a security issue any more. It’s an administrative one.” Her eyes went wide. His didn’t, because he hadn’t the sense to be afraid.
She glanced at the Ensign, and I saw that for a moment I was sharing his file with her. He had no combat experience to speak of. She knew enough of my reputation that she didn’t query my files before deciding I could handle him myself, and walked away.
“Now I don't care if mommy was a bad lady with a weakness for swallowing the seed of the wrong kind of men, I don't care if the love of your life decided to get a sex change and start dating farm animals. The particular why behind your numbfuckery is beyond my purview, but you're going to have a nice long talk with the therapists about why you're such a fuckstick. Toddle on down to PsychDiv, or the next meet-up you have with SecDiv will include the press of boots in your neck.”
He gave the weakest salute I'd ever seen and spun on his heels. “Impressive as always,” SecDiv said over my implant. I'd forgotten she was still on the line.
“I should get a hold of PsychDiv, let them know to expect the 1400s knocking on their door.” There was the hint of a smile on her face, then a click as she ended the conversation and disappeared from my eyescreen.
The SecOff had made it around the corner and was leaning against the wall, trying to compose herself. “You all right?” I asked.
“I was handling it, sir,” she said. She wanted to punch me as bad as the Ensign.
“It's not your job to suffer fools.” She sighed, then noticed the tension in my jaw, and realized what I meant by that. She nodded, and kicked off the wall. I might have been worried, if she'd been heading towards the Ensign, but he was going the other way, scurrying back to PsychDiv.
I dialed our head head-shrinker as I started back down the hall. PsychDiv appeared on my screen, her long, strawberry blond hair tumbling messily over her shoulders. Our personality compatibility was third on the ship. Genetically we were an ugly match. Breeding might even require a few gene-therapy modifications. And if her hair were a little more strawberry and a lot less blond, I don't think that would have mattered in the slightest. There was a little part of me that thought it still mightn't. “Maggie?”
“Shouldn't you be calling me Lieutenant Allbright? Or at least Doctor?” she asked with a wry smile.
“Maggie, I've seen you naked.”
She flushed, and her cheeks more closely resembled the strawberry of her hair. “You do know this is an open channel, right? Into the entire PsychDiv wing.”
“No it isn't. And even if it had been, I'm not shy about seeing you naked. It was a fun day.” I let that linger a moment. “It was a trust exercise amongst the executive staff. Everybody saw everybody naked. They wanted to desensitize us, make the bodies of our crewmates less exotic and stigmatizing.”
“I thought that was why they poured us into these Lycra uniforms.”
“No. That was my request. Well, actually I requested corsets, stiletto heels and Lycra, but you can't always get what you want.”
“I am amused at the thought of you stumbling around on stiletto heels,” she let that linger, “but you didn't call me to banter, hopefully?”
“Are you saying you don't enjoy it?” I asked. She grinned, and I knew that was all I was getting from her. “But no, I was wondering about Williams, Martin, EngDiv Ensign. He just reduced one of my SecOffs to tears; certainly emotionally abusive, and I think had I not intervened, it might have gone physical. At which point the officer would have clubbed his eye out, because tears or no she's trained to grind the bones of men to make her bread, and he's trained to push a stylus around an easel and know math. But how'd that little emotion troll get on board my ship?”
“Let me see.” She waved her fingers through the air, and I heard the whoops and bloops of files being moved around on her HUD. “He was cleared by Sarah McCain. Not a doctor, but a psychiatric nurse. She has good credentials, slightly better than average behavioral prediction stats. I'm assuming he's on his way to me.” I nodded. “I'm pulling up his file. Yeah. She noted slightly elevated aggressive tendencies, potential issues with female authority, but low on the Allende scale. If he's developing a personality disorder it's either atypically fast or she missed something.”
“All right. Well, maybe he's just had an off morning. You're the professionals. But if you think it warrants an investigation, you have my backing to put McCain under the microscope. And, as it may come up, I threatened to fire Williams out of an airlock.”
“Which one?”
“Is that important?”
“It isn't medically relevant. I was just curious. For the last few hours we've had an excellent view of Rigil Kentaurus. If you have to be shot out an airlock, at least you'd have a nice view before you explosively decompressed. But is that standard disciplinary procedure?” she asked with a smirk.
“I was improvising. Though I think legally I'd be in the clear. I haven't finished going through the entirety of my orientation materials, but from what I have read it's scary the authority vested in my position.”
“I think you'll do fine.”
“I wasn't fishing for a compliment.”
“No. I just thought,” she paused, weighing her words carefully, “it's important you know that I trust you. We trust you. Heavy is the head, and all that. But there was an at least slightly democratic process behind your selection. We're here, most of us, anyway, because we trust you. Most days that won't matter at all, because we're the glorified cargo of a deep space scanning probe. But if or when it ever does-”
“Thanks. CC me your findings on Williams. Particularly if there's going to be the need for monitoring, discipline, or counseling.”
“Can't imagine him not needing counseling.”
“And I can't imagine him cooperating unless I can follow up and kick the appropriate asses to see it through. So let me know.”
“I will. Bye.”
I'd been on the ship just long enough that I no longer had to think about where I was going, and it wasn't until PsychDiv hung up that I realized
that I was walking onto the bridge, though I wasn't entirely sure why. I scanned quickly over the room, and noticed SecDiv was gone. “Where's SecDiv?” I asked no one in particular.
One of the middle-rank SecOffs had taken her place at the security panels, looked up and figured it was his job to respond to me. “I think she went down to debrief Santiago.” I tried not to think of one woman pantsing another… and failed. Though one of them being tear-stained made it more surreal than erotic or funny.
Bill Jacobs, EngDiv, leaned over my shoulder from his control panel, grinning wide. He was young, but didn't looked it. “Heard you sent one of my jackasses to time out.”
“He's lucky I'm in a charitable mood this morning. His behavior warranted a full jackassectomy.”
“Anatomically speaking, I'm not sure where the jackass is- though I'm assuming it's a gland- or how painful it would be to forcibly remove it outside of a medical setting. I'm presuming very.”
“Correct. But how's our baby doing?”
“NavDiv's fine,” he said. “Still a little cranky, I think he needs to be changed. And I'm pretty sure it's your turn.”
“Don't make me turn this ship around,” NavDiv said from his seat. “The whiplash would probably kill us all- and spill superheated plasma across several star systems. It would be pretty, though.”
“Nerds,” I mumbled.
EngDiv walked back to his panels, and glanced over to make sure
Selected Short Stories Featuring Cinderella Shoes Page 17
