by R. M. Meluch
Badly as Farragut wanted to keep his captured ships, he could not afford to hold them near Merrimack or Monitor for very long. The Roman ships carried too much enemy equipment, which meant too many chances of singers, homers, snoopers, and remote detonations. Too many ways Rome might turn the situation back around again.
Anything that had been in Roman possession was a liability and must take a separate path.
Boarding Monitor was like boarding a mausoleum. The ship was spooky. A giant, frozen, empty Merrimack.
This is what we would look like dead, thought Kerry Blue. Her lamp threw hard shadows into all the black hollows. Everything was jarringly familiar, jarringly alien in its abandonment.
Commander Carmel led the way, floating up the hatch into Monitor’s lower sail, followed by Commander Bright, then Lieutenant Commander Medina, with Kerry and the dog soldiers in the rear.
Robots had already deloused the ship, making several searches for Roman bugs, traps, and screamers. Au tomatons had also cleaned out the remains of the Roman techs who had died in the vacuum. Those had been bagged, tagged, and loaded aboard the Mack for delivery home to Palatine before the ships split trails.
Still it looked like a place you would expect to meet a corpse. The boarding party’s lamps made a poor substitute for ship lights, sickly illumination pushing the blackness back only as far as stark shadows.
The light, the shadows, the crust of frost made what should have been a friendly ship into a haunted place where all intruders should die horribly one by one.
The only sounds Kerry could hear were her own breathing in her suit, and the occasional observation, spoken softly, over the com link in her helmet.
Then herself, saying, “Cheese and rice, it’s creepy.” Hadn’t meant to send that. And to Commander Carmel’s turnaround glare, she added, “Sir.”
Calli Carmel could dart daggers with those almond eyes. But this time the knives sheathed and the commander’s soft murmur sounded in reply, “Yeah.”
They floated past Carmel’s stateroom. It should have been Carmel’s, but the nameplate read: NAPOLEON BRIGHT. Weird and comforting at once. It didn’t look right, but it was like that moment in the nightmare when you realize none of this is real. This was not the Mack. The Mack was whole and light and noisy, full of people and armed to the bloody teeth. This was only Monitor.
Napoleon Bright’s stateroom stood bare, stripped to the vents. So was Captain Forshaw’s, his safe drilled, emptied of all his keys and codebooks, data slips, and manuals.
The Romans had also popped the safes in ops com and in the missile control room. Kerry guessed she sort of knew they would.
The enemy techs had scoured the ship clean of any portable equipment, small arms, splinter guns, stunners. Hydroponics had been harvested to the last pea, to the last root of the last pea plant. Uniforms, boots, space suits, torpedoes, cleaning bots, bedding—the wolves had taken all of it.
And the Swifts. They’d taken the fighter craft. Kerry’s chest tightened to see the slot for Alpha Six empty, where her Swift should have stood at clampdown. Hers.
Funny how the anger rose, even when she knew this was not her ship, this was not her fighter slot, and she should have known the wolves would remove the fighters from the battleship. They’d probably done that first.
The lifts were all disabled. We did that. But without grav it was easy enough to glide hand over hand up—Along? Down?—the ladder the four hundred feet from bottom sail hatch, through eight decks of fuselage and all those equipment compartments in the sails, to topsail hatch. Carmel, Bright, Medina, and Merrimack’s chief—the Og—eyeballed everything in between. Scanners were well and good, but most booby traps were still found by those who knew what things ought to look like and what didn’t belong.
The Marines were there in case the lookers found something.
As satisfied as she was ever going to get, Commander Carmel finally ordered reestablishment of atmosphere by means of some dumb generators from the Mack. Monitor, of course, didn’t have any.
Found out Monitor was not airtight either. Kerry ended up pulling maintenance duty, assigned to plugging little pea holes in Monitor’s hull. Damndest things. Neat, perfectly round, and there were a whole bunch of them arrayed in perfect straight lines clean through all of Monitor’s bulks and interior partitions. Like someone had taken a laser drill and bored three times through the entire 570-foot length of her fuselage, bypassing the engines.
Kerry pictured Roman techs shooting up the ship for sport. Maybe Rome’s answer to Cowboy Carver had done this.
For himself, Cowboy was supposed to be helping patch holes, but he was too busy trying to aim a splinter through one whole row of them with his sidearm.
When Monitor was airtight again, Calli Carmel tried again with the atmosphere. It worked this time. And she ordered the LRS rigged to provide minimal grav. Enough to give you a sense of up and down.
Helmets came off. Commander Carmel ordered the dogs in—the real ones, with four feet and cold noses—for yet another inspection: a bloodhound named Nose, and the chief’s dog, a big, smart standard poodle named Pooh.
“What the hell is that?” Napoleon Bright’s already craggy face went distastefully askew.
Someone had shaved Chief Ogden Bannerman’s dog and if the Og ever found the baboon what done it, he’d nail him up by his foreskin, by God.
The baboon had given Pooh a poodle-do, with shaved face, floofed-out chest, and pom-pom ankles. Pooh had enough intelligence to look embarrassed about it. Hung his head as he passed under Commander Bright’s scowl.
“That would be a dog, Brighty,” Calli said.
Cowboy Carver stood there beaming like an altar boy, and Kerry Blue had a fair idea which baboon’s foreskin was on the block. Would have been. But Kerry knew for a fact that Cowboy didn’t have one.
The dogs did their sniffing, and at last the space suits came off. Underneath hers, Carmel wore dress-down khakis—the Navy issue color charitably called khaki—a kind of dirty sand or baby shit or dried mud kind of no color color. Didn’t matter, because anything looked like a designer creation on Calli Carmel. Captain Farragut was on the real good-looking side, too, but Carmel? Carmel just wasn’t fair.
If you had enough money the surgeons could make you look like Carmel, but they couldn’t make you stand like Carmel, move like Carmel, be like Carmel.
Commander Carmel hauled on a zippered jacket as well. At the best of times—and this wasn’t—atmosphere on a naval vessel was not cruise ship grade. Running on batteries, this one was damned cold, and the burbling grav made it so drafty it moaned like a haunted castle. Unsecured hatches somewhere below decks flapped and clanked like dungeon chains. One slammed shut. Boomed through the ghost ship.
Kerry was grateful for her scratchy black pullover.
Then there was Napoleon Bright—decked out for the White House—overdone in full dress blues with all his medals—not just the ribbons—every bauble from every dustup he’d ever been in hanging on his chest. Ten years older than Commander Carmel, Commander Bright had a lot of crap there.
Nobody dressed like that underway. Yeah, it was what he’d been wearing when the Romans threw him back like a dead carp, but Commander Bright had been given normal clothes his size back on the Mack. And he’d been wearing ’em. Looked really fruitcakey here in all his geegaws.
The pooch patrol returned for treats, and Carmel pronounced the Monitor secure. That’s when the wheels came off the mission, and Kerry had to draw her sidearm.
That’s when Commander Bright turned to Commander Carmel and said dismissively, “Thank you, Mr. Carmel. I will take it from here.”
PART THREE
Firing Squad
10
KERRY HELD HER BREATH. That sure sounded like Brighty had just dismissed Commander Carmel.
No one else around her was breathing either.
Calli Carmel’s beautifully tapered eyebrows lifted, surprise. She gave a bemused smile that silently sai
d What?
Commander Bright ignored the look. “Lieutenant Commander Medina, begin start-up routine.”
It sounded like Commander Bright had dismissed Commander Carmel, because he had dismissed Commander Carmel.
So there was the reason behind all his chest froufrou. The better to look like the master of this ship. Brighty was due for captain’s stars. Overdue. He had ten years on Carmel. Nine on Farragut.
Looked like iron. Might have been handsome, but he was too hard. Jaw of iron. Eyes of volcanic rock. His hair was black as outer space. He could be as frightening as one of Kerry’s stepdads.
Still, one thing Kerry had learned in her two years with the Fleet Marines: you don’t ever want to get on the fang side of Commander Carmel.
Calmer than Kerry Blue would have been, Commander Carmel said, “Belay that, Mr. Medina. Brighty, get serious.”
“You are free to disembark my ship, Mr. Carmel.”
Oh, hell. Oh, God. Kerry felt herself shift into combat mode. As if she had jumped clear of her skin, and now floated above, watching, hyper aware, moving her body by remote.
A Marine’s duty altered according to the demands of the situation. Kerry’s Wing had been trained on twenty-odd different scenarios.
This was not one of those scenarios.
Commander Carmel did not so much as change her breathing. She had that luxury.
She has us.
And just in case there was any doubt which side the Marines were on, Flight Leader Hazard Sewell popped his holster strap, and stepped forward with hand on the butt of his sidearm to close ranks with Commander Carmel.
May have just blown the bottom out of his career there.
Nothing like sticking your dick way out there, Hazard.
But it was decisive. That’s what separated the Hazard Sewells from the Kerry Blues. There was nothing like knowing which side you were on when fur this size flies.
“Mr. Carmel, contain your Marine.”
But what Carmel told Hazard was, “Carry on, Flight Leader. Patrol, fall in. We are going back to the LRS.”
“Dismissed,” said Commander Bright.
“Oh, no, you’re coming too, Brighty,” said Carmel. Like he was still a friend. Like she could pull this skat out of the fire before it ignited. And to the lieutenant commander, “Come on, Jorge.”
Commander Bright struck that wide, lord-and-master stance. “Mr. Carmel, you will not give orders to my officers on board my ship.”
Officers? He had an officer. Used to have. One. Lieutenant Commander Jorge Medina, who froze.
Carmel turned and let Brighty have it. “Commander Bright, you lost your ship.” Then softer, to his wide eyes, “You made me say that.”
“I am XO of the Monitor,” said Napoleon Bright flatly. “What is your rank, Carmel?”
Carmel was tired of playing this game. “Mr. Bright. This is not a battleship. It’s salvage in tow. We cannot power her up. Anything that has been in enemy hands is suspect, you know that. And for that matter, you’re not an active officer; you’re a returning POW.”
“I never surrendered,” said Commander Bright. “I did not relinquish command of this ship simply by being absent from her deck for a period of time.”
“Brighty, I have no assurance that you haven’t been altered in your captivity.”
“Your MO found nothing.”
“Absence of evidence—”
“Is no evidence.”
“I’ve got a reasonable suspicion, growing more reasonable as we speak. Anyway, Brighty, I’ve got my orders. This is my mission. This ship stays dark.”
“You may have orders from John Farragut, but John Farragut does not have authority over me or authority to reassign my ship to you or anyone else. Lieutenant Commander Medina, begin start-up procedure now.”
Carmel countered, “Lieutenant Commander Medina, you have my order.”
There was a man with his balls in the pincers.
For herself, Kerry’s duty was clear enough. She was a little fuzzy on Naval chain of command, but even if Commander Bright won this pissing match, Kerry could not sink below her nostrils in it by following Hazard Sewell’s orders. She was pretty sure her chain of command didn’t change just because she was standing on someone else’s deck.
Lieutenant Commander Medina was in the hanged if-you-do shot-if-you-don’t seat. At those command ranks, wrong decisions were fatal. Sometimes the right ones got you shot, too.
Jorge Medina hesitated. That narrowed it down to one choice now. Since he was belaying Mr. Bright’s order, he damn well better decide to keep belaying. If he decided to execute Bright’s order now after a pause that long, no one would ever follow him to the head let alone into battle against a Roman legion. Officers just don’t get that long to think.
Lieutenant Commander Medina spoke, “No disrespect, Commander Bright, but it is my understanding that Commander Carmel has command of this mission.”
Napoleon Bright’s hard lip curled into a grisly smile. “No disrespect, Jorge. I’ll have you brought up on charges of mutiny at Fort Ike and have you shot.”
“Aye, sir.”
Carmel gave Medina a curt, “good man” type nod, then aloud to present company announced, “In the very remote event that Mr. Bright’s charges have any merit, I take full responsibility for actions taken here.”
“That bullskat absolves no one,” Brighty declared. Made eye contact with each and every Marine, “You are sworn to the Constitution to do your duty—”
“Just so,” Carmel cut him off. “Mr. Sewell, remove Mr. Bright.”
The court-martial will be interesting, thought Kerry. Whoever wins, we get to watch a really big kielbasa go down.
The Marines stepped forward, hesitant to touch Commander Bright, the uniform, that formidable rack of braidage on his cuffs. To their silent question, Carmel added, “As polite as you need to be.”
To be polite meant, in the words of John Farragut, “Beat the blue peaches out of ’im if you have to.”
Hazard acknowledged, “Aye, sir!”
Dak Shepard and Hazard Sewell took up a position on either side of Commander Bright.
Cloaked in his command invulnerability, Brighty vowed, “You touch me, I’ll have you mutineers shot!”
“Take him,” said Calli.
Hazard and Dak grabbed the commander’s arms and started hauling. That put Brighty in a position you don’t ever ever want to be in—with two guys named Twitch and Cowboy at your back with shockers.
“Lieutenant Commander Medina, draw your sidearm!” Brighty roared.
Lieutenant Commander Medina’s sidearm remained at his side.
“Lieutenant Commander! You fail to carry out an order of your CO in wartime, the sentence is death!”
“I am aware of my duty to my CO, sir.”
Calli accepted Medina’s allegiance, and signaled everyone to return to the LRS.
Kerry Blue never ever thought to be walking with her weapon trained on a back of Navy blue. Next to captain’s sky, and the red, white, and blue of Old Glory, that was the color of God Almighty.
Brighty did not go as quietly as Colonel Lu Oh had. Brighty was bigger. Fell harder.
The medics on board the LRS put him under. Gave him a transfusion and a blood wash, then put his blood back in him. It didn’t sweeten him up any, the blood wash didn’t sift out any Roman motes. Brighty woke up just as mad as he went under.
“Put him out for the duration,” Carmel ordered.
Suited Kerry fine. She knew sure as squid spit who would pull guard duty if Brighty were put in detention awake.
Carmel turned to Medina, “How are you feeling?”
“Am I being put under, too?”
“I asked how you were feeling.”
“Like crap, frankly. But do you mean did the Romans alter us? I don’t think so.”
“They did something to Matty and Brighty. This isn’t like them.”
“It’s not unlike them,” Medina said, a reluctant conf
ession. “Matt Forshaw was proud and he was tough. But when he lost Monitor—he was dead before he pulled the trigger. He died before he ever got to the Mack. And the XO is an arrogant dick. I don’t mean that in a bad way. That’s just the way Brighty is.”
“This went beyond arrogance, Jorge. Brighty just drove a class four torpedo through his foot.”
“If he shows up at Fort Ike with his ship in somebody else’s control, he can forget about ever commanding anything bigger than a supply barge. To a man like Napoleon Bright, that’s a fate worse than death. So he had nothing to lose by trying to get his deck under his boots.”
“And you, Jorge?”
“I’d like to stay awake and serve. Do you want this?” He offered his sidearm, stock end out.
“No.”
Perhaps Medina did not trust himself, or did not expect to need it again, but he gave the splinter gun over to the nearest Marine, Flight Sergeant Kerry Blue, who stowed it in the weapons locker.
They shouldn’t be needing weapons. As long as they kept Monitor dark and ran silent, the ships were as detectable as a hole in the vacuum. The voyage should be nothing but tedium from here to Fort Ike.
If anything happened underway, it was going to happen to Merrimack.
Something very small, very fast, belted through John Farragut’s command center. The crew heard it pierce the hull, zing through and bang out the opposite side all at once. It seared the air with its passing.
“Ho! Skat! What was that?”
Farragut lifted his com. “Systems. Farragut. We just had an incident. What was it?”
The techs on the command deck came out of their stations to inspect the bulkheads. They found a pea-sized hole in the fore partition, and a matching one in the aft. Neat. Perfectly round. It had been too fast to leave any tearing in the metal edges.
Farragut bounded off the platform and into the adjacent compartment to see if there were matching holes there. There were. “Nice hole! Turn on the outside lights.”
