Chapter 11

Lee stopped talking, concerned about the silence in the passenger seat. It was unlike Chip to listen without comment. He should have interrupted Lee any number of times by now, with some insightful, intelligent comment on the information that Lee was sharing…

He glanced over at his friend. "You're awfully quiet…" Oh, boy… He could see the telltale marks in the slump of normally ramrod straight shoulders and the droop of the head. "Okay, look. It's past. No need to apologize. God knows you have reason to think we might leave you in the dark."

"No excuse." Chip raised his head and targeted Lee with anxious blue eyes. "I was at best disrespectful, at worst insubordinate. It was inexcusable, Lee."

"We were not on the boat, and we were not at the Institute. We were in your home, and you were being sent upstairs like a misbehaving child." Lee returned his attention to the road, noting the sudden insight into his friend's sometimes inscrutable behavior. He hated to admit it, even to himself, but he had followed the admiral's lead far too many times, and there were definitely times when the admiral treated his highly efficient, highly intelligent XO a bit like a child... Possibly because the two had known each other so long. Twenty years, Chip had told him once. Twenty years in Admiral Nelson's inner circle had to have been quite a ride. "It was perfectly understandable. So we're even." He shifted gears, zooming along the highway. "Did you even hear a word I said?"

"Lee…"

"Not another word." Lee thought about that, and grinned. "Unless you're going to say something about what I told you. With carte blanche from the Admiral, in case you were wondering. I suspect he's worried that you're not a hundred percent, so he doesn't want you involved… But he doesn't want you in the dark, either." He took a hand from the wheel to forestall a comment. "What do you think about this admiral that Admiral Nelson is protecting?"

For a moment, he thought silence would be his only response; he really should have known better. Chip hardly ever spoke without thinking things through first. This time was no different. But instead of sharing his thoughts immediately, he answered a question with a question, something Admiral Nelson did on a regular basis. It irritated Lee no end, but it also illustrated how much the XO had unconsciously modeled himself on Admiral Nelson. Sometimes Lee wondered if the older man had ever noticed that. "How much do you know about the first time that Pem… interfered with us?"

Lee contemplated that for a moment. "I know he aggravated Nash's illness by feeding his paranoia. Will's exact words, by the way. And I know he apparently killed us." He paused, considering that. "And I know there was an ulterior motive for both of those… murders that weren't." But the admiral hadn't been forthcoming about anything else. He'd insisted that Lee was only a sideline, that the real target had been Chip and that therefore Chip was the one with need to know… He glanced at his passenger again. "I take it you know a little more than that."

Chip frowned, staring into the past with hooded eyes. "Not much more." He thought a little while longer, and his scowl deepened. After a moment, he turned his head to capture Lee's intent gaze. "You might want to watch the road."

Lee grinned and took the turn into the Institute's long drive at top speed. He had dreamed about being a race car driver once, before his father's death had changed his dreams. He still cultivated speed for speed's sake, but he knew what he was doing. Accidents were always possible, but he knew how much he could push the envelope. It was a skill that had served him well on the ONI missions he undertook. "You've got something. Time to spill."

"Pem's intention, as far as the admiral could figure out, was to wipe someone from the timeline. He speculated that it might have been one of my descendants."

More than speculation if Lee knew Admiral Nelson. "His reasoning?"

"Admiral Nelson seemed to think I was the target all along, that you were simply the bait to make him go back in time, and change the circumstances…"

Chip stopped talking as Lee paused at the gate, rolling down his window, and exchanging small talk with the guard. After a smile and a wave, he drove on, giving Chip his attention again. "A bit of overkill – if you'll pardon the pun – just to make the admiral do what he wanted, don't you think?"

"He didn't share everything with me, but he did let slip in a later conversation something about an admiral who was – in his words – too damned young." Chip contemplated that for a moment, as Lee pulled up before his bungalow.

"Interesting… And you're thinking this could be the same admiral?" Lee reluctantly put his car in park, and patted the dash affectionately. "Sounds reasonable." He paused, thinking it through, and grinned. "You do realize that this might mean one of your descendants actually becomes an admiral?"

"I'm fantasizing that he's the youngest admiral in the history of the Navy," Chip said with a perfectly straight face, lifting an eyebrow at Lee's delighted laugh. Trust the XO to comment with a dry sense of humor that was most often kept buried where no one ever saw it.

But the humor didn't last. Chip waited for Lee's laugh to die out, before he went on, using words thoughtfully, spending them carefully. "If Pem's here, and Admiral Nelson is protecting someone…" He paused and gave Lee an intense stare. "Then I would say my descendant is also here somewhere."

Lee nodded, having come to the some conclusion. "And Pem may still be trying to eradicate him from the timeline. Which means…" He shook the thought away. Best not to go there, but he was beginning to understand why Harry Nelson had rearranged things so that Chip would be here in Lee's bungalow, under Lee's thumb much of the time. He smiled an easy, deceptive smile and changed the subject. "Admiral Nelson doesn't want you to meet your descendant. I wonder why?"

Chip's eyes narrowed; clearly he had already figured the problem out for himself, but he went along with the change of subject, easily enough. "It would muck about with time, something they're probably not supposed to do."

Lee nodded and opened the car door. "Let's get you settled in my guest room." He went around to the trunk and lifted out Chip's bag. "You travel light, my friend."

"It's an art." Chip closed his car door and reached for the bag, frowning when Lee shook his head. "I can carry the bag, Lee."

Lee hefted it speculatively and shook his head again. "Will said nothing heavier than five pounds, tops. I'd say this weighs around eight."

"That restriction was weeks ago!" Chip reached for the bag again, but Lee tugged it out of reach and shook his head a third time.

"And it hasn't been lifted yet." Lee smiled his most innocent smile, knowing how much he himself would hate the restrictions, but determined to impose them, anyway, sure that Will knew what was best. "I know you didn't think that staying with me meant that you didn't have to do what Will said." The words were light, but a clear warning.

"Of course not," Chip answered coldly, his face carefully expressionless. "But it is my bag. And it's nowhere close to eight pounds. I packed it. I should know."

"So we're going to stand here in my driveway arguing about who's going to carry your bag?" Lee had to laugh at the absurdity, glad when Chip, too, reluctantly smiled. This opportunity was unlooked for, but he would use it to pry some information out of his quiet, unassuming XO. He already knew a lot, but it wouldn't hurt to learn more; it would help him read a nearly unreadable man even better, and he doubted there were any real skeletons there. A lot of heartache maybe, but no skeletons. He smiled at his friend and led the way into the house.