Chapter 7
Rachel
Who the hell did that Silas jerk think he was? I wasn't some enlisted punk from a backwater county in Mississippi. I was Rachel Berenson, protector and savior of Planet Earth. While he was in Cadet School or whatever, I was battling full-grown Hork-bajir. I was bleeding and dying, and now he wanted to give me orders? I was looking for the nearest escape pod until Marco hit me with some words of wisdom (which never came out of Marco's mouth.)
"Rachel, honestly. I know you're mad – I can see it." He cut off my protest with a very swift hand motion. "The Admiral didn't mean to dismiss you like that. He knows you're more of a hero than he'll ever be. He's just trying to do his job the best he knows how. You don't get pissed off when Jake gives you an order, and that's because you respect and trust him. You don't have to respect Silas, but you've got to trust him. I do – to a certain extent. We're all just going to do our best here, and then we can go home. What do you say?"
I started back with a retort to tell Marco to shut the hell up, he didn't know what he was talking about. I actually stopped and thought about it, and I realized that he did know what he was talking about. Silas wasn't messing with me. He wasn't trying to get a rise. He was just doing his job. He wasn't a part of our war, and he didn't share the bond of respect that me, Marco, Jake, Tobias, Cassie, and Ax had for each other. He didn't have the slightest clue as to what we were all about. He was ignorant of it all, and me getting mad at him wouldn't change that.
"You're right," I said grudgingly. "Silas may be a jerk, but he's just doing his job. I'll do mine."
Marco looked a bit worried as he paused at the pilot ready room's panel. "I'm the commander, Rachel. You will follow my lead, won't you?"
"Yeah, I'll follow your lead. But I'm not taking anybody's crap, either," I said as I slapped the wall panel that opened the door.
I'm not really sure what I expected when I opened those doors. I guess I halfway expected some crack-trained, silent-and-waiting-for-orders military unit waiting for me and Marco's orders. I sure wasn't expecting this.
Two guys in Voodoo Squadron flight suits were having a vicious but apparently friendly knife-fight. A girl with short, blond hair and blue eyes was taking a shot with a humongous man of a man. The rest were playing cards by a small viewport which was showing Z-space. Marco shouldered past me and cleared his throat. They all turned to look, and not one of them had a receptive expression on their face.
"My name is Marco, and I'm your new commander. Line up by rank," Marco said in a very commanding, professional tone of voice. I was impressed – I guess the rest weren't.
The huge guy killed his shot of the amber substance in the glass and stood. "The commander, eh?" he said in a very Austrailian, very combative tone of voice. "And my Aunt Sue is the queen of England." The rest of the squadron burst out in laughter, and my automatic irritation circuits kicked in.
"Hey, asshole, he is the commander, and I'm the second-in-command, so you'd better shut you're dumb-ass mouth and open your big ears," I challenged him. He flushed and stepped forward, but the blond girl grabbed the front of his flight suit and pushed him into his chair.
She sauluted Marco and I and said, "Leiutenant Vieri, at your service. The squad is a little rough, sir, but we'll do our job."
Marco laughed and motioned first at the two guys who had paused their knife fight and then to Vieri and the Australian jerk. "If those two idiots don't carve each other up first, and if you two jokers aren't wasted for our first mission, then we might have a chance. I said line up by rank!" he bellowed.
Reluctantly, all ten of them did as ordered. As they called out their information, I ascertained that there were five Americans, two Italians (Vieri included), the Australian named Kevin Hand, a Japanese guy, and an Irishman. "This is like a bad joke," I said in not-quite a whisper, and Kevin bowed up again.
Marco called him out. "You seem to be the only one disinclined to pay attention to rank. Why is that?"
He smiled. "Because I'm the best pilot on this ship." His statement was met with several muttered curses.
Marco smiled back, but it was filled with menace. "Well, we'll see about that very shortly. We're going to the simulators so I can see all of you fly, and then I'll set you up by wing pairs and flight groups."
Vieri spoke up again. "But, Commander, we already have been assigned these."
"Well, I'm going to change them up some. Need I remind you that Rachel and I are the only ones who've seen actual space combat? I think I know how to better array my pilots than some tactician or computer. Double time to the simulator facilities." As the pilots left the room, he whispered to me, "So, how'd I do?"
"Fine. But I think I'm going to introduce Hand to my grizzly morph in about five seconds," I growled. Marco laughed as we started to the simulators.
"We'll light him up in the sims. That should make him chill out a little. We're going to need him if the Kelbrid have their starfighters operational by the time we get there. We're going to need everybody."
