Chapter VII
Eight bells had just been struck and Lieutenant Alamimo was relieved by Mr. Closton. The watches were a little short handed but Amelia had still decided to reduce them all to just four crewmen and an officer in order to let the remainder of the crew sleep. They had all been hard at work the previous night and it was questionable as to when they would be able to rest like this again.
Alamimo decided she was more than ready to retire to the little cabin she shared with Anamaria. It was through shear force of will that she did not slump off to a dark corner as soon as the last bell was rung. Instead, she stepped deliberately down the bridge ladder to the main deck, mindful that she kept herself neat and erect. She was trying to style herself on the manner in which Commodore Amelia performed her duties. The young Pajakian was just turning for the main hatch when she spied an extra hand on deck. He was dressed in the canvas duck trousers the Commodore had requisitioned from the Chief Administrator but his shirt and shoes were civilian make and very fine. She would not even have noticed him save that he was bent over one of the L48s as though he were trying to work out how to fire it.
"What are you doing there?" Alamimo demanded a little sternly. She hadn't meant to come off quite that way but she was tired and a little cranky.
The spacer turned to face her and as soon as he saw her uniform he snapped to. His eyes flicked over her quickly but when they got to her face they stopped. He lost any expression at all except that his pupils dilated and he turned a little more green across his forehead. His mouth slackened a little, too, but could that really be called an expression?
"Well?" Alamimo demanded again. It was clear that she had caught him off guard but why was he looking at her that way?
"Um..." said the young man. He saw her eyes narrow on him and found his voice. "I was just looking at the gun, Miss."
"Miss?" Alamimo bristled. "I am a lieutenant, Mister! You are a spacer third class and may address me as either Ma'am or Lieutenant. Is that clear?"
"Yes, Lieutenant!"
"Now tell me why you were looking over this gun instead of sleeping." Alamimo was feeling a little cross with this neophyte. Miss, indeed!
"I... I've never seen one before, Ma'am. Not up close like this," said the spacer.
"Why are you not on the berth deck sleeping with your mates?" she demanded, still crossly.
"My mates, Ma'am?" He was clearly bewildered. Then, with sudden understanding, said, "Oh! You mean the other spacers. I'm sorry. I thought you meant... Um... Well, you see, Lieutenant, Heliwr don't sleep. Sometimes we have to rest if we've been pushing ourselves but mostly we don't even need to do that. At least not until we get particularly old."
"I see," Alamimo relaxed a bit. Amelia had mentioned this young man to her. She had said that he was a complete novice and would bear watching. As usual, the Commodore was right. "Fortunately for you there is no power to the guns at the moment. That lever you were leaning on is the trigger. You could have killed somebody."
"Oh!" the Heliwr said, his eyes going wide. "I'm sorry, Lieutenant. I didn't know."
"There will be instruction on the weapons before we go into action," Alamimo said. "It will serve you well to pay attention. I assume you have no skills with sails and rigging so you will very likely be posted to one of these weapons as your battle station. Learn your tasks well. The ship depends on the skill of every one of the crew. I suggest you study your knots until your watch comes on duty again."
"Yes, Ma'am," Intepere said and remembered just in time to knuckle his brow before the lieutenant strode away. He was still watching her when he felt a warm hand on his shoulder. Turning he found Mr. Closton eyeing him narrowly.
"She's an officer, lad," Closton said.
"Yes, sir. I know," Intepre said a little confused about why the bosun should feel it necessary to point this out.
"Ah, lad," Closton chuckled softly. "She's out of your class. At least for the moment. Until the war is done or you quit this crew, you're just a spacer."
"Eh?" Intepere was truly confused now.
Closton blinked at the young man. Could he really be that thick? Yes. Closton shook his head then turned to the L48 Intepere had been examining. He reached under the breach and flipped a small switch. Instantly a hologram appeared above the gun.
"You want to learn about one of these, sonny?" Closton said stepping aside so that the young Heliwr could get a look at the globe of light. "Study this here manual. It has all the basics. You'll learn the real lesson once we start warming them up. This will at least get you started. Have any questions, come see me when I'm not busy."
"Aye, sir!" Intepere said with gratitude. "I will, sir. And thank you."
In spite of her weary condition and the long hours she had just put in, Alamimo was finding it difficult to get to sleep. She tossed and turned a few times in her bunk, finally settling on her most natural position with her front legs folded under her and her torso and head laying flat down across her mattress. She lay like that for some time before she rolled onto her back once more. She sighed loudly and crossed her arms behind her head and sighed again.
"What's wrong, Alamimo?" Anamaria asked sleepily. The Pajakian's restless movements had wakened her.
"Hmm? Oh! I'm sorry, Ana," Alamimo said coming to herself with a jolt. "I didn't mean to wake you."
"It's alright," Anamaria said rolling onto an elbow to look across the small cabin at the Fleet officer. "Is everything alright?"
"No. I mean, yes! Everything is fine," Alamimo said almost crossly.
Anamaria narrowed her eyes. "Something is vexing you. What is it?"
"Nothing, really," Alamimo said uncertainly. "It's just that rich-boy politician's son. The one that joined the ship from the Glorious."
"What about him?" Anamaria eased back on her bunk hoping that the shadows would hide her smile.
"He called me 'miss'." Alamimo half raised herself from the mattress. "I worked very hard to earn my rank. He joins this crew and calls me 'miss'. What does he think he's doing here, anyway? Doesn't know the first thing about military discipline. Doesn't know anything about a ship's guns. No experience in rigging."
"Which one is he? I don't really remember him," Anamaria said untruthfully. She recalled the tall, slim alien very well. Who could have missed him in such fine clothes as he wore?
"Oh, I'm sure you noticed him," Alamimo grumbled. "Tall, slim, good looking, shades of green all through his complexion."
"Tall, slim, good looking?" Anamaria asked innocently.
"Well, yes." Alamimo dropped heavily back into her pillow. "His good looks won't do him much good out here. This isn't a holiday cruise or a state dinner. This is a fighting ship. We need hands that can lay and splice. We need fighting men. What's he going to do? Flash that pretty smile of his and blink those all-too-perfect eyes? Then get himself run through for the trouble of it? Calling me 'miss' and then staring at me that way! He has a lot to learn. That's all I'm saying."
"He stared at you?" Anamaria goaded.
"Right there on the deck at the change of the watch." Alamimo snorted out a word Anamaria didn't understand.
"On the deck? At the change of the watch?" the Earth girl asked. This was getting interesting.
"Looked at me as though he'd never seen an officer before," Alamimo grumbled again.
"And then he called you 'miss'?"
"No. He did that first." Alamimo rolled onto her side facing away from Anamaria. "'Miss', indeed! I lined him out right quick, I can tell you. Stare at me like that. Who does he think he is? And then he blushed when I told him to call me ma'am or lieutenant. Why's he blushing, I wondered? Probably embarrassed that he got a dressing down from a woman. Miss!"
Anamaria had to stuff the corner of her blanket in her mouth to stifle her laughter. She was grinning from ear to ear and was more than grateful for the darkness of the room. Alamimo had never reacted like this to Jack. Maybe there would be more interesting things going on aboard the Smollette than just another rescue mission. Alamimo fell silent and soon the two young women were both sound asleep. Alamimo slept fitfully while Anamaria had a pleasant little dream that she found difficult to recall but knew that it centered around a certain brown haired young man with haunting eyes.
Jack woke at the ringing of the fourth bell of the first watch. He reached for the bottle under his pillow and dragging the cork free, he splashed some down his throat before he even bothered to sit up. This bed was comfortable! How utterly wonderful to have such a fine mattress as this. And there was something to be said for clean sheets. Looking down at them now in the faint light from his window he knew they were no longer clean, but he had enjoyed the feeling for at least one night. He swung his legs out from under the covers letting his feet touch the floor. A nice little mat lay just so. Jack smiled. What a ship this was. Then he reached for his boots where he had dropped them the night before. He reached some more. And then even more. Suddenly, he found himself sprawled upon the floor in a less than dignified manner. He blinked. Where had his boots gone? Groping through the dimness of the room he found the lamp at the head of the bed and fumbled with the little lever that would cause it to glow. With the warm light pervading the room Jack looked about. His boots were nowhere to be seen. His hat wasn't where he had left it either. Nor was his coat, sword belt or even his waistcoat. The bleariness that had afflicted his just-roused mind now faded away to be replaced by irritation and a small bit of alarm. Had someone come into his cabin while he had slept?
"Bugger!" Jack growled as he crossed the floor to his cabin's door. "Locked?"
He turned the key back and forth a few times to be certain but the door had, indeed, been locked. What was going on here? Still in his bare feet Jack stepped lightly to the cupboard built into the bulkhead. Opening the door he discovered his things. Or at least he discovered everything except his boots. His hat had been tucked into the narrow shelf at the top of the cupboard while his waistcoat, frock coat and sword belt were all hung on pegs. He did not remember doing this. It would be very unlike him to be so careful of his clothes. While Jack valued his appearance, he felt that a certain amount of scruffiness was important in a scoundrel. A pirate had to balance the scale very carefully when it came to looking the part. Too much care and you weren't believable. Too little and people didn't take you seriously. A fine line that Jack prided himself on maintaining well.
"If I were a pair of boots," Jack mumbled to himself. "Where would I be?"
After a few minutes of rummaging around in this drawer and that cubbyhole Jack finally found his boots hanging upside down in the small cabinet beneath the little magic tea service. At least that was what he called it. Doppler had called it an auto... alto... ulterior? No. Automatic brewer! That was it. Pleased at having remembered the real name of the thing Jack found himself halfway across the little cabin to his bed before he thought to wonder how his boots had ended up in that small space and why? It didn't seem the right place for boots. Not the right place at all. They should have been kicked to the middle of the floor with clothes piled upon them so that he could find them when he went to get dressed. Odd. Very, very odd.
Once properly accoutered Jack stepped out of his cabin to have a word with Mr. Grugh. He found the Chief Wright in the tool locker where he had spent much of the previous day.
"Mr. Grugh," Jack said entering the small space. "Has anyone been into my cabin aside from meself?"
Grugh shook his curly horned head. "Not to my knowing, sir."
"Would anyone besides me have a key?" Jack asked more or less casually.
"Yourin be the only key, Capt'n. None but ye would be needin' of one." Grugh squinted at Jack. "Is somat the matter, sir?"
Jack described the state of his things when he had attempted to clothe himself.
"Ah! Now that is peculiar, sir." Grugh rubbed his hands together as though warming them up before doing some delicate task. "See, Capt'n, last evenin' me and a lad was workin' in here on gettin' some of the new crystals cut and shaped to fit this here Procyon cable work. Regulation Fleet crystals are all the wrong size, see? So we got all of our measurin' done and had all of our notes taken. Then we laid out what tools we'd be a needin' for the work today. Well, when I come in this mornin' I found all put away neat as neat. I couldn't find the crystals anywhere. Since the war began there's been quite the black market for crystals, as ye might imagine. Before I got anyone in trouble, though, I decided to have a look 'round. Ye'll never guess where I found them, sir."
Jack waited expectantly for a moment then realized that Grugh was actually waiting for him to make a guess. Jack frowned and made a motion with his hand.
"Oh! Sorry, sir," Grugh said shamefacedly. "They was all in the waste hopper over there. Stacked up neat and proper. Not one was a missing. Just put in there like they was nowhere else for them."
"Like there was nowhere else for them?" Jack mused. He reckoned that in his cabin there had been nowhere to put his boots except for the little cabinet. That made some sense but how had the boots gotten there? And how had anything else gotten to where it had been?
"Mr. Grugh," Jack said in a low voice. "Keep this bit of news just between you and me for the moment, eh? Don't want to spook the lads with it until we're clear out of port with nowhere for them to go. Savvy?"
"Aye, sir," said Grugh. "If ye think it's best."
Amelia was going over her star charts working out the best route to take and the best course of action as well. She was worried about what she had seen here at Mhoth. At least it partly explained why there were so few ships on the convoy routes. She wondered what the rest of the war effort looked like. She wondered, too, about the lack of officers and men. What had become of all those spacers and ships? Clearly this was part of the reason that Baron Fforio had given her this commission. Her thoughts were interrupted by a knock at her cabin door.
"Ah! Lieutenant Lh'aer'ri, come in," Amelia said as she opened the door to admit the young officer. Lh'aer'ri stumped in on his metal leg taking off his hat as he did so. "I wanted to speak with you about something."
"Aye, Ma'am?" Lh'aer'ri asked wondering if he had done something wrong.
"With Captain Sparrow's new command he has need of an able officer," Amelia began, handing a glass of her claret to Lh'aer'ri. "He has Mr. Grugh, but frankly I don't yet know enough about that man to trust a ship to his guidance and I don't know how up to date he is with our signals and codes. I don't want Captain Sparrow floundering about in the middle of a fight wondering what I want him to do."
"So ye want me to be the first officer of the Witch, Commodore?" Lh'aer'ri asked evenly.
"Just so," Amelia said going to her chart table. "I think it is best if our vessels have experienced military personnel on board. It will help counter balance the number of untrained civilians. I hate to waste her but I believe I shall be assigning Lieutenant Alamimo and a few more of the crew to the Morsa. Alamimo isn't an experienced combat officer but she is well versed in military doctrine and knows the signals back to front. Frighteningly efficient, she is. Tougher than she looks, too."
"Aye, Ma'am, she is," Lh'aer'ri agreed. "May I make an observation, Commodore?"
"Please do."
"Would it not be wiser to place Lieutenant Alamimo aboard the Witch?" he asked. "She and Captain Sparrow seemed to have worked well together during our time on Azha and he does have more spacers with at least some military background. Also, the charts for the Witch are all in Procyon. Lieutenant Alamimo might be of greater value there than I will be."
"Those are good observations, Lieutenant," Amelia told him approvingly. "However, I noted on more than one occasion that Alamimo... Shall we say, she was distracted by the Captain? I think it were best not to place that temptation on either of them. I find it unlikely that they would act inappropriately but I would not wish for them to be made uncomfortable. As for the charts, my husband has already translated more than half of the calculations and should complete the remainder by the time we reach Situla. He'll be able to input the translation algorithms well before we need to worry about the Witch getting lost."
"I understand, Commodore," Lh'aer'ri said with a firm nod of his head.
"How do you feel about serving under a pirate?" Amelia asked.
"He's no pirate out here, Ma'am," Lh'aer'ri said staunchly. "He's just a good man."
The Commodore raised an eyebrow and smiled a little before she said, "I do hope so. I believe he is, at any rate. Here's to your promotion, Lieutenant!"
They both raised their glasses and drank the toast. Lh'aer'ri thanked Amelia and strode out feeling ever the slightest bit more pleased with himself and somewhat anxious about his new posting. The anxious feeling increased when he saw Captain Sparrow's new flag.
