The Sirens of Space
Page 11
Still unsure of himself, Jeremy paused, until Cook’s consternation forced the issue.
“Well?”
“How about Enterprise?”
Cook mulled it over silently. The name had a sporty ring about it, with the perfect hint of purpose to quash any notion of frivolity. The more he thought about it, the better it set in his mind. With hopes high, he turned to the computer, and his heart sank.
“One CosGuard frigate, a military cargo carrier, thirty-seven merchant haulers, a hundred twenty-two freighters, a few hundred schooners, two dozen garbage scows—and that doesn’t count the forty pages of pleasure boats, or— ”
“Captain....”
Cook shook his head. “Good name. Pity it’s been used before.”
“Captain..., ” Jeremy began again, for the fortieth time in the last half-hour.
“I won’t hear of it, Jeremy,” Cook snapped. “There is enough beauty and grandeur in the far recesses of the English language to find one name for a single crystalline hunk of ultrynium. We will find a proper name if it takes until the Cosmic New Year. You remember, of course, what Makinen said....”
“Who?”
“Neoclassical poet, twenty-first-century Earth: ‘Poetry weds Science, and Man’s imagination soars a thousand years.’”
“But— ”
“That’s enough. Now think.”
Jeremy saw that arguing was useless, and leaned back in his chair trying to look thoughtful. He was not prepared when Cook suddenly bolted upright and banged his desk with his fist. Jeremy’s head hit the floor as he fell backwards, his chair shooting toward the far wall. Cook paced resolutely behind his desk, tapping it several times with his fist. Seconds later, when he turned from the computer to face his standing but embarrassed first officer, triumph flamed in his eyes.
“D’Artagnan,” he announced proudly.
“I beg your pardon?”
“We’ll call the ship the d’Artagnan.” Cook smiled self-contentedly, sitting back in his chair. “I like it—it has panache—élan. A certain joie de vivre.”
Jeremy winced.
“Well?”
“You’re the captain,” Jeremy said diplomatically. Part of a first officer’s job was to protect the captain from his own follies, but naming a ship was not covered in the rule book. Besides, he felt foolish enough, even without revealing his ignorance.
Cook, however, was not completely obtuse. “What’s wrong with d’Artagnan?” he sighed.
Jeremy scratched his beard, looking very uncomfortable. “Well,” he said sheepishly, “it might help if I knew what a— what a— ”
“D’Artagnan.”
“Yes. It might help if I knew what one of those things was.”
Cook nodded knowingly, smiling the charitable smile of one trying terribly hard not to seem patronizing and failing miserably in the attempt. It made Jeremy feel like a dullard, and a particularly useless one at that. “From the old historical novel, The Three Musketeers,” Cook explained professorially. “Late nineteenth-century romantic period, written by one of Old Earth’s most prolific writers and set amid one of the various French-English conflicts of pre-Napoleonic Europe.”
By now Jeremy was hopelessly confused.
“D’Artagnan,” Cook continued patiently, “was the hero—a dashing, swashbuckling sort, ready to cross swords with any enemy who dared cross his path, ready to storm the parapets of Hell to rescue the woman he loved.
“In short,” he dead-panned, “he was kind of an Old Earth Commander Cosmo.”
Jeremy couldn’t keep from laughing—and once he started, he found it nearly impossible to stop. Tears welled in his eyes, and when he looked to see Cook’s own eyes twinkling merrily, he started laughing all over again.
Cook merely chuckled, his controlled exterior never revealing how refreshing he found it to find a first officer with a sense of humor. The captain hoped that his ability to laugh would help his new first officer bear the news that he’d have the responsibility for drilling the bridge crew. And for the tyro officer’s small craft proficiency tests as well.
“D’Artagnan,” Cook repeated, setting his first officer off again. “Perfect name for a starship.” He engaged the computer and entered the name on the ship’s registry, then turned to face Jeremy again, his eyes gleaming with mischief.
“You know, Jeremy,” he smiled, leaning back and locking his hands behind his head. “Beards are a tad non-regulation.”
The ship’s new name was quickly posted on bulletin boards throughout the ship. The crew’s reaction was unanimous.
“What kinda sissy-face name is that?” drawled a dark, young yeoman named Hogan, walking down the portside artery on the conning deck. He was short and stocky, his North American accent as thick as his waistline. “Ask me, it sounds like some weird I-sissian spider.”
“Naw,” said the taller greenshirt beside him, another Earther named Andersen, the ship’s second yeoman chief. “I asked the librarian. It’s from an Old Earth book by a guy named Dumb-Ass, about some puff-shirted dandy strutting around in tights and a cape.”
They stepped aside to let a crewman pass. She was pushing a gravity cart loaded with electrical equipment for the molecular transmitter. Like most of the female redshirts, she was solid and sturdy; the willowy types on ships of the line tended to be officers. But she had a pretty face and dark, sensual eyes. She winked at Anderson as she passed; they’d served together before, keeping close quarters on a convoy frigate in the Valhalla sector. It was a welcome treat to find an old friend on a new ship; CosGuard lore held it an omen of good fortune.
“Know her?”
“In a manner of speaking,” replied Andersen, but discussions were cut short when Yeoman Chief Conners appeared, turning the corner from the inner corridor.
“Chasing red again, Chief?”
“Ah, rot!” muttered Conners, flashing a grimaced smile as he stopped to exchanged greetings. “It never fails. Give me an old ship, an’ a crew that’s put some sweat into her. That’s what we need. A crew that’s pained themselves over a hunk o’metal will scarce take her for granted. Then ye can come on with the peach-faced tyros an’ never come to grief. But take one fresh from the mint an’ half the crew turns into lounge lizards. I’m runnin myself ragged, tryin to get the duty roster straightened out, an’ half the redshirts on board won’t leave the recreation area unless I fetch’em myself. Been here less’n a week an’ I’m sick of it already.”
“Cheer up, Chief,” said a grinning Hogan; he never could resist needling his superiors. “Remember—the tyros are due any day now.”
“You like the name d’Artagnan, Chief?” asked Andersen, trying to head off another outburst. The last thing Conners needed now was a reminder of problems on the horizon.
“A name’s a name.” Conners scratched his beard pensively, trying hard to convince himself. “Besides, Skipper’s job is spacin, not siftin through registry books. Ain’t his fault he couldn’t find a better one.”
After a few more pleasantries, Conners excused himself and continued down the hall. He knew his problems were only beginning. The ship was in chaos and the crewmen were already scattering like pollen in the wind. To top it off, he’d spend the next tour of duty trying not to flinch whenever a pub-house rounder asked the name of his ship. The Skipper should’ve thought twice before sticking them with a moniker like that one, he thought; the wags would have a field day. But he consoled himself with the prospect of greeting the tyro ensigns. Knocking the lot of them down to size after officer’s school inflated their ego enough to dwarf a red giant was among a greenshirt’s most treasured duties, relished by yeoman throughout the long history of the Cosmic Guard. And a good hazing was all he needed to lift his flagging spirits.
* * *
cc: 142-8905.7
FILE: Log
ACCESS: Command.
SECURITY: Standard
OPERATIONAL STATUS: Repairs in Progress
LOCATION: SB 114, Ishtar Command/Dry Dock
Lack of experienced personnel impedes progress on all fronts, but the trickle of trained technicians has accelerated to a full-fledged dribble and the rest of the officers should arrive at any time. Nevertheless, I plan for the ship to be starworthy by the end of the current Cosmic Year, despite the deteriorating discipline caused by overwork due to Fleet delays in filling my personnel requisitions. Once our full complement arrives, many problems should vanish. However, I plan to sequester the ship and crew until repairs are completed and the ship is ready for final pre-launch inspection. While this may cause additional morale problems, on-base distractions appear to be causing greater problems, albeit of a different sort.
Capt R Cook
Cook pressed the entry button on the portable computer dangling in the air above him and recorded the entry. It was the sixteenth log entry he’d made as captain of his ship—one each day, every ten cosmic hours since he’d formally assumed command. And, he’d remarked to himself more than once, each one said the same thing: problems, problems, problems. There seemed to be no end in sight, and the problems kept coming. Yawning, he placed the machine in its stand on the wall by his bed.
Suspended above his bed by the antigrav relay, Cook stretched himself and stared at the ceiling, using the handholds on the wall to steady himself as he floated over his bed. Old Captain Boyle had warned him about mint-fresh ships: more bugs than a jungle on Demeter, he’d said; and you’ll wait forever for your crew. Cook was coming to appreciate his first skipper more with each day he spent pouring over progress reports and specifications.
Ship-shaping the Constantine was bad enough, what with the engine adjustments and navigation overhaul she needed before they left port. But the headaches his old cruiser caused could not compare to the migraines that d’Artagnan delivered daily. First the elevator doors started sticking, randomly trapping crewmen as the lift cages floated on endless journeys through the bowels of the ship. Then the food processors fritzed out—no great loss in itself, but it forced Cook to send out for meals for the crew. Cook hated assigning a half-dozen or so redshirts to waste time better spent working on the ship, waiting for the commissary to finish fixing “three hundred forty-seven to go.” If they didn’t ready the galley by the time the rest of the crew reported, he’d have to make restaurant detail a full time duty, and that was a step that he was reluctant to take. He wouldn’t lack for volunteers, of course, but he’d already noticed a tendency for those assigned to food procurement to gain weight at an alarming rate.
But the small glitches and petty problems they faced were dwarfed by the sheer size of the job ahead of them. The ship was twice the size of a cruiser—fully four hundred meters across—and every cubic inch had to be brushed up to CosGuard trim. Cook felt lost in a sea of details with no end in sight. To top it off, he had only three officers to supervise a half-complement of crewmen. The more he thought about it, the worse it made him feel.
Sick of the problems, and realizing that it would be quite some time before his mind would relax enough to let him sleep, he took the port-a-comp from its stand again, and decided to call the file dossiers of all his senior officers onto the small screen. Except for Mendelson, of course; he already knew her better than he should, and well enough to write her biography. Still, hers was the first name he called onto the screen, and he lingered over her file for several minutes before moving on. Though only Jeremy Ashton and Bruce Van Horn had reported for duty, the rest of the senior staff was due any day now. No matter what state of chaos prevailed in the rest of the ship, Cook thought, he would know every one of them inside out before they met.
***~~~***
Chapter 11
MASON MCGEE PLOPPED onto his bed and kicked off his shoes. The gray walls felt roomy beyond measure, and he’d almost forgotten the simple treat of feeling real gravity beneath his feet. The soft whisper of the ventilator lulled his senses and he imagined himself on a sandy Demetrian shore, with the breeze wrapping around him and the warm sea lapping gently on the beach. He was twelve when his parents died and his brother pulled him off into space, but he remembered the feast a real planet gave to the senses. Some day he’d return, he pretended, though he knew the tug of space would always haunt him.
“So howwuz the trip, Macey? Bring back a trinket or two for the house, or did ye let Cyrus curse ye for squand’rin the family fortune?”
Mason turned his head to see Janey, the housemate he and Cyrus shared. They’d gotten her from a Ceresian trader bound for home after making his fortune supplying the frontier with all manner of contraband. Mousey brown hair hung lifelessly from her head and her plain, round face had known little joy. But her eyes always perked up whenever she and Mason were alone, and he could remember long nights together, sitting and watching the stars spin overhead. Frontier life was hard enough on a man, he thought, It must be unbearable to be the only woman for parsecs around, with no company but two dust-bitten spacers who were rarely home, and who did little but complain when they were there.
“Hello, Janey,” he smiled, beckoning her to sit on the bed beside him. “Think I’d forgot about you?”
He reached into a sack on the floor beside the bed and pulled out a large blanket of finest Rositer goarstwool. He’d gotten it at the IshCom bazaar from a dealer specializing in scalping the spacers. It cost a small fortune, and if Cyrus had been sober enough to see it, he’d have whooshed it out the airlock just to teach his brother not to waste his money on frills. Mason didn’t mind being overcharged, not when he could watch his woman’s eyes light up like fireworks.
“It’s—it’s— ”
She gave up trying to find words. She’d been snatched from home as a teenager and never finished school, so she found it hard to express herself. But she flung herself into Mason’s arms and gave him her warmest hug, the kind she never gave his brother.
“Now if you don’t like it, I’ll take it back right now. The ship should be ready to go in another day or two.”
“Don’t ye be a-funnin me, Mason McGee,” she laughed, suddenly tickling Mason’s ribs, and sending him into fits of laughter himself as they wrestled on the bed. “Not unless ye wants t’see how cold it can get, alone on a rock in space.”
* * *
The Milky Way splits the night sky over Covington almost in half, rising from the northwest horizon and arching across the heavens like a translucent mask. In Spring, Old Sol, the star of Old Earth, sets too early to cast its faint glow on Terra’s capital before nightfall, and by midnight the distant star Deneb shines fiercely on the eastern horizon, like a beacon calling through the eerie silence of alien skies. Halfway to overhead and slightly to the north, too dim to be visible through the vast expanse of space, the reddish clouds that dominated the discussions of diplomats far to the east swelled beyond the consciousness of most Terrans early in the year 2551, looming large in the minds of a select few.
Hollenbach was breathing heavily. The walk up Woodhouse Ridge was taxing to a man of his girth, and his breath was visible in the night air. Above, the moonless sky was alive with stars; below, the city lights lined the river, and on Capital Hill the Senate bathed in the floodlights that would keep the double dome aglow until dawn. Hollenbach found the view from the ridge enchanting, as he paused to recover his wind. He wondered why he came to enjoy it so rare
ly.
But his mind soon returned to the matter at hand. Two o’clock in the morning rarely found him in the mood for contemplation, and the meeting awaiting him needed all the concentration he could muster. Duncan Heathcoate wasn’t the brightest man in the Senate, but he’d learned the art of discretion well. Over the last few weeks, Hollenbach had wondered whether he’d underestimated the man he privately chided as “Old Bluff and Bluster.” Schiller was smart, but Schiller didn’t know the Senate. If the Tories realized how precarious their hold on power would be—Hollenbach could deliver a majority, all right, but with just two votes to spare—they’d have leverage that Hollenbach had tried very hard to prevent. Someone with savvy had gone over the possibilities very carefully, and a sinking feeling in the pit of his stomach told Hollenbach that the someone would be standing before him quite soon.
The wind shifted to the north, bringing a strong gust down the crest of the hills overlooking the Mendenhall. Hollenbach shivered; he’d worn a thin jacket, and the wind knifed through it as if through paper. But he didn’t shiver alone for long. He was busy cursing himself for listening to the local weathermen when a familiar voice called to him.
“Emerson?”
Hollenbach looked to see Schiller standing twenty yards away, at the top of a gentle swell in the earth. A few feet beyond, a faceless companion stood in the darkness, his silvery hair catching the distant city lights like a ghost. The companion said nothing, but Hollenbach knew at once who it was.
* * *
Music blared over the speakers in the repair shop, only to die in the sound-absorbing panels of the walls. Wires and knobs littered the floor and an open tool box teetered on the workbench, its grimy contents scattered around the room. Mason McGee tapped his foot in time with the song, oblivious to all but his work and the music. He’d even failed to notice when his brother had left.