The Odyssey and the Iliad (Kinsella Universe Book 7)

by Gina Marie Wylie

  “I’ll put in a good word for you, Cliff. I doubt there will a lot of cadets eager for I-Branch. The beaching is common knowledge in the Fleet.”

  “I don’t want any special interest.”

  “Me? I’m in no position to command special interest!”

  “That, then.” He wheeled and left and Steve had to shake his head.

  Later he reported to Commander Booth and mentioned Cliff Maitland. “He’s a dirty-foot, commander, but he was outraged when he heard why you beached those people. I’m willing to bet he’s the first to volunteer for any duty whatsoever.”

  “Admiral Merriweather was adamant. I’m to have at least four cadets per phase. If I see any good ones, I can keep them the entire deployment.

  “In the meantime, you have the syllabus I gave you. Work on that until 0800 Monday. You will get the introduction and then a double dose of Swensons, then your first hour of watchkeeping, lunch, then be here at 1300 for my briefing. I can hardly wait.

  “After the briefing, we’ll start seeing officers for the department. You’ll talk to them first; I don’t want to see anyone just marginally qualified and particularly any of the dunces.”

  “Yes, Commander.”

  “And the briefing. I may not know the subject yet, but the President of the Federation, a Federation senator, Admiral Fletcher, Admiral Cloud and Admiral Merriweather are going to be there. You and I will be the junior officers at the meeting. You will see to any refreshments for our guests and anything else they wish.”

  “Yes, Commander.”

  “Good! Get busy! I have a number of record jackets to plow through in the meantime.”

  *** ** ***

  Steve got to see Yolanda for an hour on Sunday evening; all they did was hold hands and talk about inconsequential things.

  Monday morning, he was at the auditorium early. He got a number of odd looks from the cadets, but he ignored them. Captain Mikklejon spoke to the assembled students.

  “As stated, you are participating in a new program to shorten even further the Academy course of instruction. You get the added bonus of the Swensons’ courses. You will also be standing real watches on a warship.

  “Some of you may think of this as on-the-job-training. A far more clever person than any of us corrected that -- this is an apprenticeship. Your training officer will be your department mentor.

  “I can’t make choices for you; you are expected to pick a department to serve in. Another person, cleverer than most, cautioned a fellow cadet to check out the first fighter transition class. And it’s true -- I was there. You will need to pay attention to that history.

  “The deployment is going to come in three phases. The first and last phases will be assuming our patrol position, then exiting. Those phases will take weeks. The middle phase will take as long as it takes. We plan on staying at least as long as the other phases.

  “Thus you can choose a department for each phase, or stay at one, subject to your training officer’s concurrence. You have until Friday to choose; you will need to choose faster, if that is your choice, faster next time.

  “Now, I will recognize cadets one at a time for questions. Raise your hand if you have one, I’ll point to you, then stand and ask your question. I don’t want to hear your name and I don’t want any talking except by the person asking the question. I want you to feel free to ask any question you want.

  “At the end, first-year cadets will report to the Admiral Swenson you are assigned to. Second-year cadets have an assigned class schedule.

  “Now, questions?”

  The first was a woman. “Sir, what certificate level are we prepping for?”

  Captain Mikklejon smiled. “This was a planted question; that’s my younger sister.

  “We are thinking of having another layer of professional certification -- apprentice watchkeepers. You are eligible to apply for any department’s apprentice watchkeeping certificate -- including the bridge watchkeeping certificate.

  “We’ve determined that you don’t need to be able to repair a fusion power plant, rewire a fan, calculate an orbit, and you certainly don’t need to be a rocket scientist to fire a Blue or shoot a missile. Some general familiarity with other departments is needed, of course, but not the detailed knowledge that has been required before.

  “Next question.”

  The same hand went right up. Captain Mikkeljon laughed. “Hoist by my own petard! Deidre...”

  “I want the bridge department!”

  “If more than fifteen people from a class volunteer for the bridge department, we will hold a lottery when the number goes over fifteen for your class. Right then. Admiral Merriweather says she has work for thirty cadets on the bridge. I’ll put your name on the list...”

  There was instantly a forest of arms raised. Captain Mikkeljon chuckled. “The entries in the lottery will close after lunch today. Sorry, Deidre.

  “Anyone else have a question?”

  “Are there any other departments limited?” was the next question asked. Steve hid a smile, as that was Cliff.

  “I-Branch is limited to four. The last deployment, the department head beached all but two officers in her department; that’s Bethany Booth.”

  Steve stood up, but didn’t say anything, but Captain Mikklejon recognized him next. “Lieutenant Yardley is one of the two I-Branch officers who weren’t relieved. Lieutenant Yardley.”

  “I-Branch officers will undergo an interview; Commander Booth will pick the four best for the initial phase. All are welcome to apply, and there won’t be a lottery. You be given a reply at once.”

  “Thank you, Lieutenant.”

  Captain Mikklejon looked at Steve for a moment, then went on. “Lieutenant Yardley might look a little young, but he returned thirty Marines to Federation control by going alone to board the ship where they were being held. That is the sort of thing you will be getting into in I-Branch.”

  Steve resumed his seat.

  Later, he sat down in Trudy Swenson’s classroom. She entered a minute early and started on the hour. “This class is a practicum. If you don’t know what that means, bend over and kiss your ass goodbye.

  “The class will consist of this orientation session, five class periods where you will do independent research, followed by four periods where each of you will give a ten-minute briefing and then defend it for ten minutes from questions from your classmates. I may have a question or two myself.

  “Usually you are required to turn in a written report as well. One of your fellows briefed a group of admirals, with about thirty stars between them, and took questions. She did brilliantly -- but she had the luxury of using a transcript of her remarks for her report. You may do so as well.

  “A practicum is individual research. Any topic you think you can convince me to accept. Original research. You can schedule appointments to apprise me of your research topic up until 2200 tonight. Brevity is the soul of wit.”

  Steve was startled. He’d been drifting along, thinking about a topic. Admiral Swenson pointed a finger at him. “Yardley! You may not use a work product!”

  He was startled, and then startled again when tried to read her. There was nothing there! She had the most tightly controlled mind he had ever read. He could see her aura, but beyond that, the admiral was repeating over and over in her head the same phrase: Mary had a little lamb, its fleece was white as snow.

  Still, he could figure out an answer without prompting. “Admiral Swenson, we’d have to shoot the whole class if I did. I will spare you all that fate.”

  Trudy Swenson laughed. “Now, there is a clever man! I had thought to exclude myself, and Lieutenant Yardley included me anyway!

  “Do you have a topic, Lieutenant?”

  “I will speculate on the impact of Union bio-tech to the Federation.”

  “Topic approved! The rest of you need to get topics to me by tonight. See how easy it is? As I said, brevity is the soul of wit.”

  In his next class, Steve learned as so many
others had over the years, the discussion of logistics by Thor Swenson was impressive.

  Thor Swenson ended the class with a sobering thought. “We now have a limited picture of the alien astrography. Our solar system is near the outer edge of a spiral arm, close being a relative term. The aliens are further spinward around this spiral arm, and much closer to the edge of the arm.

  “It is thought they are relatively recent arrivals -- about the time we discovered Benko-Chang -- in this spiral arm. There is a gap of nearly a thousand light years between arms. That’s three years on High Fan!

  “There are stars in the gap, don’t get me wrong! But they are going to at least be picketed and probably some of them will be held in force.

  “This explains some of the anomalies we’ve seen so far in the war. Evidently sometime ago a fleet of alien ships was sent to reinforce those already here. We wiped them out in the Big Battle. They seem to make a habit of going all-in, when they haven’t scouted ahead of them.

  “It underscores the importance of the early battles at Gandalf and Fleet World.

  “Our scout ships take two or three years on deployment. To get to the other side of the arm, it’s going to take something like a decade. Which is why it is important that Fleet officers have a working knowledge of the issues surrounding logistics.”

  Last but not least, Steve found his way to his certificate classroom. Except for the instructor, Steve was the only one there.

  “Call me Eli, Lieutenant.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  The man smiled thinly. “I didn’t say ‘sir.’ I said Eli.”

  “I was taught to always assume someone was an officer if I wasn’t certain, sir.”

  “Always assume someone in any kind or any part of a uniform might be an officer. Someone in civvie street dress shouldn’t be accorded the privilege.”

  “Yes, Eli.”

  “I understand you will be helping with crew selection, Lieutenant.”

  “Yes, sir... er, Eli.”

  “What the first thing you should look for?”

  “Personal integrity, Eli.”

  “Define that.”

  “I know it when I see it. I’m a skilled at micro expressions, Chief.”

  “And what makes you think I’m a chief?”

  “I’ve met several; you carry yourself like they do. I haven’t been an officer long, but you don’t carry yourself like an officer. You are too old to be a noob like me.”

  “What about personal integrity? Do I have it, or not?”

  “Of course, sir. You are here on temporary duty; limited to what? Six months?”

  “That’s personal.”

  “Your wife is handicapped -- a paraplegic, I expect. Someone very senior imposed on you to do this. They guaranteed you that there is no risk to Thebes, and they gave you a definite cutoff date.”

  “And you get all of that from micro expressions?”

  “Yes, Chief.”

  “Baloney sauce! You have one of the AIs to hand!”

  “No, Chief, I don’t. Have you heard about the London incident?”

  “You busted a murderer in an afternoon after Scotland Yard had no luck with finding in weeks.”

  “The warship, Chief. We had another AI go rogue -- fortunately, no one was killed this time. The Federation wouldn’t let an AI get near a ship like Thebes.”

  “Ah, Sherlock Holmes! Interesting!”

  Eli turned to the subject at hand. “Commander Booth asked me to give you cues to what makes a good intelligence officer. Putting together many varied, seemingly disparate clues heads the list. It is something that most people have to practice and practice, and some never are able to get a handle on it.

  “Dogged persistence is another important trait. The ability to make yet another run at a problem while at the same time keeping an open mind is extremely important. We used to give a test to new recruits where we hid a ‘secret’ message in a wall of locked boxes, each box having a different lock. The students were given all the keys -- unlabeled keys, I might add.

  “We would analyze the psychological profile of the student and hide the message in the place we assumed the student would look last. It was a great test for students and instructors both. The former guessing where the message was, the latter trying to determine the likely methodology in advance. There were five thousand possible locations.”

  “You said ‘used to give,’” Steve said.

  “Indeed, because with practice the instructors got very, very good. The test was taking too long, and there were too many frustrated students. One day one of the students arrived at the test, went right to the wall, and used an excellent adhesive, attached a pull point to the wall, attached to a confederate’s shuttle craft. The entire wall came off. The student searched the rubble and found the message in an elapsed time of less than six minutes -- a new record.”

  “I’m surprised no one stopped him.”

  “The instructors were no more fond of the time wasted on the test than anyone else.”

  Steve got a chuckle from that. For the remainder of the hour they went over other criteria.

  When Eli dismissed him for lunch, Steve spoke up. “Eli, when we reach our patrol location, you will be permitted to send a message to your wife. There is a Union habitat, rather far from Earth, but so far not attacked. They have a full Union medical suite and, very quietly, the Federation is sending patients and medical staff there to observe how things are done. They can repair virtually any damage to the body -- even re-growing limbs.”

  “That is special interest, Lieutenant.”

  “Sometime in the next year the techniques will become generally available in the Federation, with a priority given to the more seriously disabled patients. When we are ready to egress our patrol station, you could ask to join her.”

  “Goodness! You sure know how to offer a bribe!”

  “It’s motivation to train me up fast, because in a hour they will announce to the senior staff that I am the Action Officer of this op -- and a very important op it will be. We won’t have much time, and I need to learn a very great deal in a very limited period of time.”

  Eli nodded. “It’s true, I’m bribable with an offer like that. But then, you knew that.”

  “I know that I know enough to be dangerous.”

  “I’ll fix you right up, Lieutenant!”

  Steve went to lunch, although he ate only sparingly. Yolanda was there and that raised his spirits.

  Then it was time to assemble for the meeting. Admiral Fletcher watched the people gather while Steve had a little private meeting with him beforehand. Then Steve started with the president to see if he needed anything.

  Admiral Fletcher was quick to stop him. “Lieutenant Rosen, you are the junior officer. See to the refreshments.”

  Admiral Merriweather was quick to respond. “I was going to make Lieutenant Rosen my representative on the team.”

  Admiral Fletcher smiled. A small smile that would have curdled milk. “If Commander Booth thinks we should use the Action Officer for that function... Rosen can do it just as well.”

  Emily hopped up and saw to the refreshments, and was quickly back.

  “Admiral Cloud is the convener and will have the ultimate responsibility for this operation. Admiral Cloud,” Admiral Fletcher said, and then sat down.

  Admiral Cloud stood and walked around to the podium. “First, background, then the initial operation details. The last operational details will be most closely held; just myself and the Action Officer are aware of them at this point.”

  She drew herself up. “In the opening days of the war, there was an incident at Campbell’s World. Several ships appeared that said they were part of the ‘Campbell’s Patrol.’ Then the aliens attacked and we found that those ships were armed with nuclear weapons.

  “The ships were destroyed in the attack. Still, the admiral at California Base at Campbell’s knew a hot potato when he saw one, and alerted the Federation Council.

  �
��The two Federation senators from Campbell’s were questioned; one was shot and the other ejected from the Senate. Subsequently, Vice Admiral Charles Gull was sent out to military governor of the colonies in the area, including Campbell’s.

  “He had a number of Marines and a number of warships, including Nihon, the first Blue-armed ship. He federalized the port and fabrication facilities of the Patrol and that was that, we thought, for the Campbell’s Patrol. Admiral Gull threw, we thought, a scare into Richard Merriweather, the autocrat head of the Campbell’s government.

  “Jump to the present time.

  “You all know about the story of the hijacking of the survey ship Alabama. Miss Yolanda Ruiz exploited a back door into the Alabama’s computer and took control of the vessel in minutes. Minutes.

  “Miss Ruiz was a deep-cover agent for the Union and was escaping a murder plot that had already claimed her mother. The ready force was dispatched to either capture or destroy Alabama. They caught up and paced the ship.

  “Admiral Fletcher was key in ending the incident peacefully. He determined that Ruiz was an indeed a Union agent and indeed had reason to fear for her life.

  “We were negotiating with Union representatives at the time. Alabama and the ‘shuttle’ Mad Hatter were directed to meet Thebes and the Union delegation.”

  Admiral Cloud nodded at Admiral Merriweather. “Admiral Merriweather was justly concerned about letting someone aboard Thebes who could possibly take control of the vessel. She called in her Electronics Department head, a Commander Nishnamurti, and instructed him to get with Miss Ruiz, learn the exploit and terminate it.

  “The commander was disbelieving; in spite of Miss Ruiz assuming control of the Thebes’ computers, he remained convinced it was a trick. Duh! Of course it was a trick!

  “Admiral Merriweather quite properly relieved her on the spot. The exploit has been removed; all ships of the Fleet who had Drake AIs of any vintage had been compromised. All Fleet ships are once again fully operational.

  “In the meantime, Commander Nishnamurti was brought to Fleet Headquarters in Maunalua Bay under close guard. It was planned to beach the officer -- kick her out of the service.”