Well-Traveled Rhodes (Kinsella Universe Book 6)

by Gina Marie Wylie

  A woman of about thirty entered, wearing the green shipsuit of the Port Arm of the Fleet, with a stylized ship patch over her left pocket, and a lieutenant commander's single diamond on her collar. The only thing unusual was that there was a long black badge over the patch on her left pocket. The background was black, and there was a stylized golden suspension bridge that ran its width.

  “I was told your XO was here, Ensign,” the woman said. “I'm Lieutenant Commander Alisandra McVey.” She was a medium-height red-head, a fiery carrot top, with a solid mass of freckles across face, including on her forehead. It looked a bit like a red mask.

  “I’m the XO, Commander,” Cindy told her. “Ensign Cindy Rhodes.”

  For a moment the woman stared at her; Cindy was getting used to the expressions of people who were communing with the computer link.

  “I must say, I've never heard an AI with her panties twisted before,” the woman said after a second. She was laughing, Cindy thought.

  “I thought perhaps you were a bit young; your AI suggested perhaps I'd like to be shot for interfering with your duty. I thought about asking to see your captain, and was told I'd be shot twice for interfering with either of your duties. I thought about returning to my shuttle and was told that Marines are already en route to arrest me. Please, Ensign, could you tell them all to stand down?”

  “Pixie, what are you doing?” Cindy asked aloud.

  “The commander was thinking of ways to interfere with your duty; it is apparent to me that interference with your duty is a serious offense. I've called for help.”

  “Pixie, when the link was first explained to me I was assured that what I thought was private.”

  “Unless those thoughts would cause injury to the Federation or another person.”

  “And you did what when the Master Gunny threatened to paddle me? When Master Chief Shinzu threatened the same thing?”

  “Those were rhetorical devices; not intended seriously.”

  “I think you underestimate both of them,” Cindy said darkly.

  “I assure you, Ensign, that I've now read your public records and I'm fully prepared to do my duty,” the BuShips commander intoned.

  “I'm sorry, Commander... we really have had a lot of problems with Port officers who think their opinions trump our order authority.”

  “Ensign, your records indicate a BuShips lieutenant was shot for interfering with your duty... oh, yes, they had another explanation, but the interference was the proximate cause. A BuShips full captain was demoted and is on probation. Another misstep and he too will get the chop. I suggest we get to what we have to do and leave the rest of this discussion to off-duty hours.”

  Gunny Hodges and the other gunny came through the door to the compartment. The commander rolled her eyes. “Earthmen! I come in peace!”

  Gunny Hodges laughed. “Just checking. You know computers... they tend to get excitable.”

  “So I've noticed,” the commander said softly.

  “Commander, what is it that we have to do, to make this work?” Cindy asked, pointing at the blueprints displayed on the conference table.

  “I've had only a short time to review your ship specs,” the commander told Cindy, ignoring the Marines. “But you have a standard boom, so that makes most of this very straightforward. The defensive modules have standard boom attachments, so it's just a matter of hooking up the life support lines and the control runs. The magazines, you'll have two for each defensive module, hook up to the defensive modules.

  “The only big question I have is do you want the extra crew quarters attached outboard or inboard of the defensive modules?”

  “Extra crew quarters?” Cindy asked, unsure.

  “Of course. The defensive modules are designed to be attached to any standard boom; they have only minimal life support. The standard crew quarters module has that.”

  “Why do we need extra crew?”

  The woman's smile was strained. “Oh, you think your current crew can fly the ship and fire sixteen blues, and launch missile salvoes? Normal complement for a defensive module is a weapons control officer for each blue, and one for each four missiles, and a module commander. Usually, fifteen crew members for each module.”

  Cindy mentally gulped. She had come to know BuPers and what they'd think. There was no way they'd let thirty new crew members aboard without making sure that someone more senior than Captain Hall was put in charge -- and someone more senior to Cindy. So far most of her XO duties had consisted of reading and signing off on reports, but she knew there was a lot more to it than that.

  “Captain Hall, I need you in the main conference room. This is mission critical,” Cindy told the captain through Pixie.

  “I'm meeting with Captain Drake aboard Master's Game; do we need her?”

  “I think so. I know Admiral Gull is busy, but it wouldn't hurt if he was here too. The BuShips officer thinks we need to add thirty or so people to Pixie's crew to man the weapons.”

  “I didn't even think of that! You're right! Hold the fort! The cavalry is coming!”

  Cindy looked the lieutenant commander in the eye. “Sir, adding extra crew is outside the limits of my authority. I've notified my captain, and she's alerting Captain Drake and Admiral Gull.”

  The commander looked distracted again a second later. Cindy decided that if nothing else, she would use the time figuring out how to keep her face from showing anything. The big question was: could she do it when she was distracted? It was sort of a circular problem that she couldn't quite come to grips with a way towards a solution.

  The commander sniffed. “There's a first time for everything.”

  “Pardon, sir?”

  “I've never been in the dog house before. My boss wanted to know if I'd really been threatened with being shot -- I do think it was a credible threat. Then he wanted to know if it was true that in five minutes I'd managed to drag Admiral Gull into a question about crew size. I had to tell him yes. So, he too is on his way.”

  “I've been in the dog house even before I joined the Fleet,” Cindy told her.

  The commander laughed. “Obviously, looking at your record, it's time for me to try a new career strategy. It took you what, a week, to land the XO slot here?”

  “A few days less.”

  “You have to understand, I'd give my left nut to be out with the Fleet,” the commander told Cindy.

  Cindy coughed and sputtered.

  The commander laughed. “Well, I'd give it if I had it... isn't it the thought that counts?”

  “I guess so, sir.” Cindy hesitated. “Could I ask a question, sir? About the things that you said we would have to do to hook up the modules.”

  “Of course. It would be refreshing to get back to something I'm at least halfway cognizant of.”

  “You talked about life support and control connections to the new modules. What about power?”

  “The defensive modules are self-powered, in fact, they're over-powered in case of a malf in one of the reactors.”

  “But wouldn't a power connection to the ship be of use if a reactor on the ship malfed? Or in the other defensive module, or the other crew sections?”

  The commander turned a little pale, and was back to being distracted. “There are power connections, and they are adequate for the loads that might be required. It's just we never thought about them... the modules are self-powered. The ship is self-powered. Habitats are self-powered...”

  She turned and pointed. “About three hundred kilometers over there, if you had a visual, you'd see my boss going off like a volcano.”

  “Why?”

  “Because the power interlink is a simple, easy-to-modify fix that will increase the ability of defensive installations to handle malfs by several percent. Since normally anything that could reduce the impact of serious malfs is given extensive examination -- it makes these changes a no-brainer. Except of course for the fact that we have nearly eight hundred of these modules already installed.

 
“Oh well, it's not like anyone in BuShips ever gets days off anyway.”

  Commander McVey's boss turned out to be almost an older carbon copy of his assistant. A beefy red-head, with a broad wash of freckles and no sign of male pattern baldness. He was blunt. He pointed at Cindy and said, “I want her! I realize I can't have her until after Pixie egresses after this mission, but I want her! My staff is preparing a named draft as we speak.”

  “It won't do you any good,” Admiral Gull told him. “Captain Drake called first dibs, and if she hadn't I would have. But, we're all out of luck -- Ensign Rhodes' named draft for this mission comes out of President Van de Veere's office, through Admiral Nagoya. We can wish whatever we want, but like the rest of the crew, she'll be headed back to Earth after this is over.”

  The captain nodded. “Young woman, once upon a time we called the defensive units Z-modules; I was at New Cairo when David Zinder posited something like them. I was given the task of making it happen.

  “We were under threat of imminent attack; I knew I was working with boom ships and the first versions had no dedicated reactors -- we took power from the ships. That power connection was automatic.” He closed his eyes. “I was aloft on the Prinzessin Louisa when the attack came in, evaluating a number of the modifications the Louisa's crew had made. Prinzessin killed two of the attacking ships and destroyed two homing missiles.

  “By then it was over. New Cairo was gone, along with my wife and two sons. I tell myself that I did my duty; it's hollow comfort.

  “Then it was someone else's project; I'd already identified that we needed integral power. Somewhere along the line, probably to speed integration, the decision was made not to bother with the power links. I never thought about it.”

  He faced Admiral Gull. “We've thought about not nearly enough, in this war. I don't mean to demean anything Ensign Rhodes has said, but if someone with very little experience can notice such a glaring error -- it doesn't say much about those of us whose duty lies in avoiding those errors.

  “In truth, this isn't much. The connections are there, we just have to integrate them. We're talking about an hour per module, nothing more. I already have crews being assembled to make the required modifications on existing installations.

  “Odds are those power hookups will never be needed. If one chunk of a defensive array is hit, it'll have been hit by a gigaton weapon and there won't be any other chunks left. But you never know... you just never know.”

  He faced Cindy. “My great honor, Ensign. My very great honor. If you ever need the least thing, Captain Duncan MacRae is at your service.”

  She was startled when he stepped up to her and kissed her on each cheek, like some Europeans still did.

  The BuShips captain turned to Admiral Gull. “And then there's the crew thing. I take some mild satisfaction that it escaped Pixie's crew. But I don't see any way to avoid requiring more people, more weapons officers, to fight the weapons should it be required.”

  “I had just thought we'd put them on automatic,” Captain Hall said. “That worked for me on Dragon.”

  “One, maybe. But sixteen blues? A lot of missiles?”

  “We used automatics on a hundred and twenty-five blues, and nearly six thousand missiles.”

  Captain MacRae blinked. “That would be...”

  “An eighth of our weapons, sir. We took a debris hit in our weapons control bay; most of our people died when we decompressed. Granted, I wasn't the only survivor in the compartment, but in five minutes or so, we had all of the positions, except our personal posts, on automatic. Like I said, I just thought we'd do that here.”

  “This out of my area of expertise, Admiral,” Captain MacRae said. “I know what the regulations say, but obviously augmenting the crew with more than twice as many as there currently are isn't right either.”

  “How soon do you need a decision by?” Admiral Gull inquired.

  Commander McVey spoke right up. “Now would be good, sir. I've ordered two defensive modules and four magazines be diverted from originally scheduled deliveries; we'll lose about a day on our internal schedule because of that. The big hit will come from the fact that we have just six crews that work on integrating these modules and we're going to lose another three and a half weeks fixing the prior installations.”

  “Captain Drake, please unleash your genie on this at once.”

  “Master's Game is already working the problem, sir,” Captain Drake replied.

  A moment later, Captain Drake spoke again. “He recommends four additional crew members, sir. Two for each defensive module.” She laughed. “He says that they can be billeted in Pixie's sick bay; there are six beds there. If someone needs one of the sick bay beds, they won't be using their own; a form of hot bunking.

  “The main issue that I see is the almost all weapons control officers are junior lieutenants or more senior.”

  Admiral Gull turned to Captain MacRae. “I see that you're trying to usurp my authority, Captain.”

  “No, sir. You gave me extraordinary promotion authority to use as I see fit. To allow me to promote Fleet officers that I would not normally be permitted to promote on my own authority. I have exercised it here.”

  Admiral Gull smiled. “Let me tell you a little story. Once upon a time I shipped aboard one of the finest warships in Fleet Aloft: Nihon. I was to go out to Snow Dance and try to save the planet for the Federation. Admiral Fletcher gave me Evan Carlson for my flag captain, and a fellow whose name I cheerfully admit that I've long since forgotten, to be the XO. He managed to intersect his orbit with that of a load lifter before we left Earth.

  “Instead we lifted with Lieutenant Commander Evelyn Warner as the XO. Let us just stay that she behaved superbly on the deployment. When we got back, Evan submitted a recommendation to promote her commander. I had assumed I'd get to make the recommendation, and I favored a double bump to captain... except I didn't tell him either. So BuPers got a recommendation for her to make commander, so they promoted her commander. Then they got my recommendation a day later, and it went to a different person to deal with. That person, a dim Portie BuPers officer, didn't check her date of rank for commander and promptly made her a captain.”

  Admiral Gull grinned. “The next day, a BuPers captain, reviewing the records, noticed the dates and got exercised and took the matter to Admiral Litvink. Vassily isn't nearly as abrupt as Ernie Fletcher, nor as vindictive against Port officers. Besides, there were already three shift commanders on Pluto, rank of port captain, commanding the school crossing guards there. Flatware inventories were well in hand at the Yellowknife logistics base -- so Vassily sent him to the Hades Fleet base to be their personnel officer.”

  He smiled benignly. “Hades base is a research station about a hundred AU from a blue-white super giant star. They are hiding behind a three hundred kilometer rock, with only sensors facing the star. If their attitude control systems fail, they have exactly twenty minutes to go to High Fan -- if they come out of the shadow of the rock, they would evaporate in two or three minutes.”

  Admiral Gull turned to Cindy. “Let me be the first to congratulate you on your well-deserved promotions, Lieutenant Rhodes.”

  “Promotions?”

  “Well, yes. Captain MacRae promoted you junior lieutenant. I promoted you to senior; I imagine I'll have twisted more psyches at BuPers, but they need to have their whatever periodically twisted.”

  He turned to Captain Hall. “You will be augmented by four junior lieutenants, all weapons control officers of somewhat limited experience. We have, you see, a plethora of such; we are in the process of installing twenty thousand or so, give a take a few, defensive platforms. That's two hundred thousand weapons control officers. Fortunately, we are only a few percent of the way towards completion, but we do have ten thousand young people currently training for those slots. At this point, I certainly can spare four.”

  He waved at Commander McVey. “Is that satisfactory, Commander?”

  “I have a weapons wat
chkeeping certificate. I don't suppose I could appoint myself a junior lieutenant and go along, could I?”

  “Admiral Gull,” Captain Drake interrupted, “I have a mild note to add to your decision making process. A short while ago Master's Game's AI informed me that while Pixie's AI was quite adequate, he was better. He could, he told me, with only a few hardware modifications, be able to download a copy of his programming to Pixie. I have to admit, the thought of an AI volunteering for combat duty is a new one on me.”

  “No!” Cindy exclaimed, shocked. “Pixie is just fine!”

  “Absolutely not!” Captain Hall added. “Not going to happen; we're already integrated as a crew to Pixie. There is no need to do it again.”

  A silence fell over the compartment. After a few seconds Cindy recognized that she wasn't the only one who was working on perfecting a poker face for talking over the link. Who was talking to whom? She was now a full lieutenant? Wasn't she supposed to have at least one watchkeeping certificate to get promoted to junior lieutenant? More than one to reach senior?

  Captain MacRae broke the silence. “I know I promised; finish the Pixie integration, Commander and you can go. For heaven's sake, Alis! Be careful out there!”

  “I'll see to it, sir.”

  Captain MacRae left the compartment, following on Admiral Gull's heels.

  Captain Drake spoke to Captain Hall. “I don't see any need for us to shuttle back to Master's Game, Captain Hall. Let us resume our discussion on your bridge.”

  “Aye, aye, sir,” Captain Hall responded. Then she turned to Cindy. “XO, please finish up your work here, then prepare to take aboard four new officers by the end of the watch. I will gig you, if you are out of uniform at that time.”

  Pixie spoke to Cindy. “Chief Shinzu has heard about your promotions; she has informed Gunny Hodges. Chief Shinzu says wait a few and they'll take care of it.”

  *** ** ***

  Tam Farmer sank down wearily on her bunk. Who would think that eight hours of sims would be as tiring as running a marathon? She'd hardly put her bottom down on the mattress when that worm, Javier, appeared. Javier Soza was the wing commander's toady, a loathsome piece of work if there ever was one.