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A Call To Arms: Chapter Fifteen

Last updated: Saturday, September 26, 2015 19:31 EDT

“Lieutenant. Long?” the gruff voice echoed down the passageway of HMS Phoenix. “Sir?”

Travis came to a reluctant halt, taking the calming breath he’d taught himself to do at times like this. Senior Chief Osterman was a major pain in the butt, on a ship much of whose officer corps and enlisted personnel seemed to take a special pleasure these days in competing for honors in that position.

“Yes, Senior Chief?” he replied, catching one of the passageway handholds and bringing himself to a floating stop.

Osterman was about twenty meters away, moving from handhold to handhold toward him, deftly avoiding collisions with the other crew members also moving through the narrow space. Phoenix had its share of first-tour crewmembers bumbling awkwardly in the zero-gee, but long-time veterans like Osterman made it look quick and efficient.

At the moment, though, Osterman didn’t seem to be putting much effort into the quick part of that solution. In fact, now that Travis had stopped she seemed to be taking her time closing the rest of the gap between them. Travis waited, cultivating his patience and resisting the urge to order her to snap it up. He’d been on the other side of the line once, back when he was enlisted, and remembered all too well what it was like to have officers barking at you.

Finally, after a few seconds, and in her own sweet time, Osterman reached him. “I just wanted you to know, Sir,” she said in a voice that skated the same not-quite-insubordinate line, “that Captain Castillo wants to see you.”

Travis frowned, glancing at his uni-link to make sure it was active. It was. “I haven’t heard any such orders.”

“That’s because he doesn’t know it yet, Sir,” she said calmly. “But I guarantee he’s going to.”

So even Osterman’s department had heard. “Ensign Locatelli brought it on himself,” Travis said firmly.

Or tried to say it firmly. Even in his own ears the edge of defensiveness was painfully obvious.

Apparently, it was obvious to Osterman, too. “It was one of three separate tracking sensors,” she reminded him. “The next shift’s diagnostic run would have spotted it in a minute.”

“That diagnostic run was two hours away,” Travis countered. “What would have happened if you’d had to fire one of your autocannon sometime during those two hours?”

Osterman raised her eyebrows. “At…?”

“At whatever Captain Castillo decided needed shooting.”

Osterman’s expression was worse than any raised eyebrows could have been. And, to be honest, Travis couldn’t blame her.

Because, really, there wasn’t anything out there for Phoenix to shoot at. There were no invaders, no enemies — foreign or domestic — and the last boogieman who’d shown himself around these parts had vanished into the stardust nearly a century ago. There were supposedly pirates out there, but aside from the incident at Secour nine T-years ago none of them had so much as shown their noses.

There was the so-called “Izbica Incident” a couple of months ago, which the local newsfeeds and ‘faxes had had a field day with. But the truth was that the freighter’s theft had been more along the lines of a hijacking than genuine ship-to-ship piracy. As far as any sort of outside incursion went, Manticoran space was about as secure as it was possible to be, and everyone knew it.

Still, what had happened to the Izbica ought to serve as a wake-up call for everyone involved. If one ship could be hijacked in the Star Kingdom’s space, so could a second…and the only thing standing in the way of such a recurrence was a Navy staffed with competent people and equipped with fully functioning systems. If anyone could understand that, it really ought to be Osterman.

Besides, men and women who wore the RMN uniform were supposed to care about their jobs.

Osterman might have been reading his mind. “And you think you’re the only one who’s getting it right, Sir?” she asked politely.

“No, of course not,” Travis muttered. “But…”

He was saved by the twittering of his uni-link. He keyed it and raised it to his lips. “Long,” he said briskly.

“Bajek,” the voice of Phoenix’s Weapons Officer came from the speaker. “Report to the Captain’s office immediately.”

Travis swallowed. “Aye, aye, Ma’am.”

“Commander Bajek?” Osterman asked knowingly as he keyed off.

“Yes,” Travis said sourly. Was the smug Chief always right? “Carry on.” Turning in the zero-gee, he gave his handhold a tug and once again launched himself down the passageway.

“Learn to play the game, Lieutenant,” Osterman called quietly after him.

Travis glowered. Play the game. It was the same advice everyone else in the universe seemed ready and eager to give him. Learn to play the game. Never mind whether the game was good or bad or clean or rigged. Learn to play the game.

Like hell he would.

Osterman watched Long go, not sure whether to be angry, frustrated, or sympathetic.

With a Senior Chief’s ability to walk the balance bar between officers and enlisted, she decided to go with a combination of all three.

Long was a decent officer — no doubt about that. He had the knowledge and the ability, and he knew regulations like nobody’s business.

But he needed to learn how to choose his battles and his opponents. Ensign Locatelli, for all the alluring fatness of the target, wasn’t one of them. Which Long was presumably about to find out.

He also needed to learn how to understand people. He’d been radiating annoyance like a reactor exchange coil as she worked her way toward him down the passageway, clearly assuming she was dawdling specifically to exasperate him. Apparently, it had never even occurred to him that she was timing her approach to let everyone else clear the space so that the two of them would be alone when she delivered her unpleasant news.

That was a blindspot she wouldn’t have expected from someone with his prior enlisted experience. Obviously, he wasn’t what her father used to describe as “a people person.”

In some ways, that was probably a good thing. Osterman had a high regard for officers who actually tried to do their jobs rather than letting things slide. But there was a balance required, and Long tended to be as subtle as a hammer when it came to accomplishing that. He seemed more tone deaf than most where other human beings were involved.

Even worse, he seemed completely oblivious to the way certain family connections were affecting his own position. Chancellor Breakwater’s successful extraction of two of the Navy’s corvettes for MPARS hadn’t sat well with anyone in the RMN, and the fact that five more were slated to follow sat even more poorly. Phoenix’s officers and crew were no exception to that reaction, and the fact that Long’s half-brother was one of Breakwater’s staunchest allies had resulted in a noticeable cooling in overall attitude toward the young lieutenant.

But unlike everyone else aboard, Long didn’t seem to have made that connection.

Of course, the true irony here, though Long would never know it, was that his insistence on Locatelli keeping all three tracking systems up and running was exactly the same attitude that had gotten the Ensign himself into trouble back on Salamander.

With a sigh, Osterman twisted herself around and headed back toward her duty station. Long was terrific at reading the lines of manuals and regs and orders.

Now, he needed to learn how to read between them.

The lift ride through Phoenix’s spin section, as usual, was more than a little unpleasant, the rapid shift in effective gravity triggering Travis’s sensitive inner ear. He kept his eyes straight ahead during the trip, thinking evil thoughts about whichever law of physics allowed stress bands that could create and mold huge gravitational fields, and compensators that could zero-out more than two hundred gees, but were only just now figuring out how to get a measly one gee pointed toward a warship’s decks. Having a half-gee rotating section to live in was better than having to eat and sleep in weightlessness, but floating around the main duty stations like air-breathing fish was a royal pain in the butt.

Bajek was waiting in Captain Castillo’s office when Travis arrived. “Come in, Lieutenant,” Castillo said, his voice and expression stiffly formal. “I understand you want to write up Ensign Locatelli.”

Travis was opening his mouth to answer when the phrasing of the comment suddenly struck him. No, he didn’t want to write up Locatelli. He’d already done so.

Or so he’d thought. “Yes, Sir, I do,” he said carefully. “Is there a problem?”

For a tense second he thought the question had put him over the line. Castillo’s expression didn’t change, but Bajek shifted her weight slightly in what was, for her, an unusually demonstrative show of discomfort.

“You’re aware, I presume, that Ensign Locatelli’s uncle is Admiral Carlton Locatelli,” Castillo said. It wasn’t a question.

“Yes, Sir, I am,” Travis replied. For a brief moment he considered asking what Locatelli’s genetic makeup had to do with following procedure, but decided he was in deep enough already. Besides, he was pretty sure he already knew the answer.

He was right. “Admiral Locatelli and his family have had a long and distinguished history of service with the Royal Manticoran Navy,” Castillo said, in a way that reminded Travis of someone reading from a script file. “His nephew is this generation’s representative to that line. The admiral is anxious that he achieve something of the same honor and distinction as his forebears.” Castillo raised his eyebrows, forming exactly the same expression Travis had gotten from Osterman a few minutes ago. “Do you need me to spell it out for you?”

Travis took a deep breath. Unfortunately, neither he nor anyone else in the RMN needed it spelled out for them. “No, Sir,” he said.

“As you may be aware, there’s a strong and growing movement in Parliament to gut the RMN even more than it already is.” Castillo’s tone was a bit sharper and his eyes were quite a bit harder than Osterman’s had been. Apparently, despite Travis’s assurances, the Captain was in the mood for a spelling lesson. “Men like Admiral Locatelli and their allies are the ones standing up for our jobs. Standing up for your job, Lieutenant.”

Which would mean a double handful of nothing, Travis thought blackly, if the cost of that protection was staffing the Navy with political animals who either couldn’t or wouldn’t do those jobs.

But that, too, was part of the spelling lesson. “Understood, Sir,” he said.

“Good,” Castillo said. “You have a promising career, Mr. Long. I’d hate to have it cut short for nothing.” He pursed his lips briefly. “And bear in mind that there are other ways of dealing with incompetence and neglect, ways that don’t involve the recipient’s permanent record. You’d be well advised to learn them.”

“Yes, Sir.” In fact, Travis did know those other methods.

Sometimes they worked. Sometimes they didn’t.

“Good.” Castillo looked up at Bajek. “Is he still on duty?”

“Yes, Sir,” Bajek said, never taking her eyes off Travis.

Castillo nodded and looked back at Travis. “Return to your station, Lieutenant. Dismissed.”

The rest of the shift was tense, but not as bad as Travis had feared it would be. None of the men and women in his division said anything, though he did catch the edge of a couple of whispered conversations. Locatelli himself had the grace not to smirk. Never ascribe to malice what can be explained by stupidity, someone had once told Travis, and it was just barely possible that Locatelli wasn’t so much arrogantly indifferent as he was a really slow learner.

Travis hoped it was the latter. Slow learning could be corrected with time and patience. Arrogance usually required something on the order of an exhibition bullwhip.

Still, by the time he started his final check of the systems under his watch, he was feeling more optimistic than he’d been earlier in the day.

Or at least he was until he discovered that the primary tracking sensor for the Number Two forward autocannon was once again miscalibrated.

Maybe, he thought as he headed wearily back to his quarters, it was time to go hunt up that bullwhip.

“Freighter Hosney, you are cleared to leave orbit,” the voice of Manticore Space Control came over the bridge com.

It was an interesting voice, Tash McConnovitch thought, holding shades of both excitement and regret beneath the official tone. Excitement, because in a system where visitors typically dropped in only once or twice every T-month a Solly freighter was a welcome break from the drab routine of the controller’s job. Regret, because with Hosney’s departure the boredom would settle in again.

Patience, McConnovitch thought darkly in the controller’s direction. You’ll be begging for boredom and routine before we’re done with you.

Or possibly not. The last data file Jeremiah Llyn had received from Axelrod’s spies had put Manticore’s fleet at somewhere around ten warships, with at most a single battlecruiser poised and ready to face combat.

But that data had been old. Dangerously old, as it turned out. For reasons McConnovitch had yet to pin down, King Edward had launched into an ambitious program of pulling RMN ships out of mothballs and pushing the Casey-Rosewood boot camp and the Academy to churn out enough warm bodies to put aboard them.

Still, Edward’s revitalization was a work in progress. While the RMN might look impressive on paper, none of the newly refurbished ships were even close to running at full strength. They should still be no problem for the Volsung Mercenaries.

Though of course the Volsungs themselves might not see it that way.

Fortunately, none of that was McConnovitch’s concern. His job was simply to deliver the data to the rendezvous system where the mercenary task force was assembling. That snide little man Llyn was the one who would have to make the actual go/no-go decision.

“We’re clear of the lane, sir,” the helmsman announced. “Course laid in.”

“Good,” McConnovitch said, and meant it. He was more than ready to show his kilt to this grubby, backwater little system. “Make some gees, Hermie. We wouldn’t want to keep Mr. Llyn waiting.”

“Admiral on the bridge!” the petty officer at Tracking called.

Captain Allegra Metzger swiveled around in her station at the forward end of HMS Invincible’s bridge. Admiral Locatelli had just entered and was pulling himself through the zero-gee in her direction.

“Admiral,” she greeted him, reaching for her straps. Usually when he came to the bridge unexpectedly it was to take over.

Not that taking over right now would be all that exciting. Invincible was on a shakedown cruise, with a bunch of new spacers and petty officers who were just barely starting to learn the ropes. About all Locatelli could do — and all Metzger herself was doing — was to ride herd on the junior officers and make sure no one did anything fatally stupid.

Apparently, the admiral agreed. He waved Metzger back to her position, floated past her, and braked himself to a halt behind the helm station. “You have a position and vector for Phoenix?” he asked without preamble.

“Ah — yes, Sir,” Lieutenant Tessa Griswold said, her hands moving across her board. “One moment, Sir. There she is. Bearing –”

“Yes, I see her,” Locatelli cut her off. For a moment he studied the plot, then gestured to the com officer beside her. “Com, signal to Phoenix. I want to speak with Captain Castillo, personally and in private.”

“Aye, aye, Sir.”

A minute later, the com officer had made contact with Phoenix’s bridge and relayed the request. Three minutes later, Castillo was there.

“Good day, Captain,” Locatelli said. “You’re alone, I trust?”

“Yes, Sir, I’m in my cabin,” Castillo confirmed. “And I have my contingencies files laid out.”

Out of the corner of her eye, Metzger saw Locatelli smile. Castillo was a good commander, and smart enough to suspect that two ships meeting like this was unlikely to have happened by chance.

“Very good,” Locatelli said. “You’re hereby authorized to open Order Number Seven. Here’s the password.” He read off the fifteen-character code. “Let me know when you’ve read it.”

“Yes, Sir.”

The com went silent. Metzger counted out twenty-six seconds —

“Understood, Admiral,” Castillo said. “May I also say that congratulations are in order. This is the first time in years that I’ve heard of anyone being actually preauthorized to spend a missile. Even a practice one.”

“I credit the Izbica Incident,” Locatelli said. “I’m expect the Exchequer’s new-found generosity will fade with time. Do you have any questions?”

“No, Sir,” Castillo said. “But I do have a request. One of my junior officers is very good with book learning, but I see a certain disconnect with real-world situations. I’d like your permission to have him on the bridge during the exercise and perhaps let him make a call or two.”

“That’s rather an odd request, Captain,” Locatelli said, a frown in his tone. “This is partly a test of your bridge crew. It’s not going to be very useful in that regard if someone else is giving the orders.”

“If I may respectfully disagree, Admiral, the bridge crew will be functioning exactly as they normally would,” Castillo said. “I’ll be the only one who isn’t being tested. Unless that’s a specific and important part of the exercise, of course.”

“It’s part of the test, but not a vital part,” Locatelli said. “Otherwise I wouldn’t be giving you this head’s-up. Rather a deep end of the pool to throw a junior officer into, though. I assume he shows promise?”

“Yes, Sir. If a couple of his rough edges can be knocked off.”

“What’s his name? Do I know him?”

“Only by reputation, Sir.” Castillo’s voice had gone a bit dry. “Lieutenant Travis Uriah Long.”

There was a long, rigid silence. “Lieutenant Long,” Locatelli repeated, his voice studiously casual. “That Lieutenant Long?”

“Yes, Sir.”

“In that case, Captain,” Locatelli said, “by all means, let’s give the young man some real-world experience.”

“Thank you, Sir,” Castillo said. “I think it’ll do him some good.”

“Let’s hope so,” Locatelli said. “Return to your bridge, and let’s make this happen. Invincible out.”

For a moment, the admiral continued to float behind the helm station. Then, giving himself a gentle push, he floated back to Metzger.

“Captain, I understand you once served with Lieutenant Long. Is that correct?”

Metzger braced herself. This had the potential to get very awkward. “Yes, Sir, I did.”

“Is he as big a prig as he seems?”

“He’s very much by-the-book,” she said, choosing her words carefully. “But he also has a great deal of ingenuity and the ability to think outside the lines.”

“Always thinks he’s right, does he?” Locatelli asked. “Thinks he’s got all the answers?”

Metzger frowned. That wasn’t what she’d said. Was that what Locatelli had heard? “I’m not sure I’d put it quite that way, Admiral,” she said.

“Well, we’ll see if he’s as clever as he thinks he is.” Locatelli settled beside Metzger’s station in a posture that suggested he was going to be there awhile. “Prepare to call battlestations. Let’s see how good this new crew of ours is.”

Travis had finished unsealing one of his boots and was starting on the other one when Fornier, lolling on the top bunk of their tiny cabin, finally emerged far enough from the depths of his tablet to notice he was no longer alone. “There you are,” he commented as he peered over the edge of the bunk. “Bajek have you on extra duty today? Or were you just starting the celebration early?”

“What are we celebrating?” Travis asked.

“Our upcoming R and R, of course,” Fornier said. “Don’t tell me you’re not looking forward to a couple of weeks groundside.”

Travis shrugged. “Depends on if the Number Two autocannon tracking sensor is slated for replacement. If so, yes. If not, not really.”

“Mm,” Fornier said. “At least you’re not blaming Locatelli for that anymore.”

Travis winced. No, he wasn’t blaming the young ensign for the sensors’ foul-up. At least not directly.

“He still should have spotted the problem and either fixed it or reported it.”

“Uh-huh,” Fornier said, an annoyingly knowing tone to his voice. “How many people in your section, Travis?”

“Nine, including me.”

“And how many of them are useless political appointees like Locatelli?”

Travis made a face. It wasn’t hard to see where Fornier was going with this. “Maybe two.”

“Maybe two,” Fornier repeated. “So let’s call it one and a half. One and a half out of eight — make it nine, since you’re not political and I assume you consider yourself non-useless. That comes to about seventeen percent. All things considered, that’s really not all that bad.”

“I suppose not,” Travis conceded. Though Fornier was conveniently ignoring the fact that the political problem seemed to get worse the higher up the food chain you traveled. With Breakwater’s faction still pushing to defund and dismantle the Navy, the political animals who’d joined for the honor and glory were scrambling to claw their way up the ladder to the coveted command ranks before the rug was pulled out from under them.

Maybe King Edward would turn that around. Certainly his “refit and recruit” program was showing progress. Having the battlecruisers Swiftsure and Victory back in service was certainly a good sign.

But Travis had seen other such efforts fizzle out over the years. He wasn’t really expecting this one to do any better.

And in the meantime, there were way more earls and barons in the command structure than anyone needed.

Maybe that was the end vector of all armed forces during protracted peacetime. Maybe the trend always drifted toward the political appointees, and the people who couldn’t figure out what else to do, and the coasters who figured such service would be an easy and comfortable way to wander their way through life. Maybe the only way that ever turned around was if there was a war.

Still, much as it might be interesting to see how those three groups handled a sudden bout of real combat, Travis certainly didn’t wish a war on the Star Kingdom. Or on anyone else, for that matter.

“Trust me, it’s not bad,” Fornier said dryly. “Certainly isn’t a travesty or anything.”

Travis glared up at him. “Not you, too,” he growled.

“Sorry,” Fornier said, not quite suppressing a grin. “It just suits you so well, that’s all. How in the world did you pick up a signature phrase like that, anyway?”

“It’s a long story,” Travis said, returning his attention to his boots.

“Okay, fine — don’t tell me,” Fornier said equably. “But seriously, take it from someone who did two years in retail before joining up. You keep track of every vendor, tradesman, bureaucrat, and official you meet during your two weeks groundside. I’ll bet you a hundred that you’ll find way more than seventeen percent who are jerks –”

Abruptly, the heart-stopping wail of the ship’s klaxons erupted all around them. There were two seconds of full volume, and then the cacophony abruptly dropped to a relative whisper. “General quarters, General Quarters!” the voice of Commander Sladek came sharply over the alarm. “Set Condition Two throughout the ship. Repeat: set Condition Two!”

There was a thud as Fornier hopped off his bunk and landed on the deck. Travis was already at the emergency locker; pulling out the vac suits, he tossed Fornier’s to him and started climbing into his own. “Hell of a time for a drill,” Fornier said with a grunt.

“If it is a drill,” Travis warned.

“Sladek didn’t say it wasn’t.”

“He also didn’t say it was,” Travis countered. “Either way, Bajek will skin us alive if we’re late, so move it.”

Four of Travis’s eight men and women were ready at their combat stations when he arrived. Ensign Locatelli, he noted darkly, wasn’t one of them.

“Diagnostics?” he asked, floating over to them in the zero-gee of the ship’s bow.

“In progress,” Beam Weapon Tech Second Tomasello confirmed. “Number Two’s trackers are still coming up twitchy –”

“Long!” Bajek’s voice boomed through the cramped space. “Lieutenant Long?”

“Here, Ma’am,” Travis said, moving out from the partial concealment of a thick coolant pipe.

“Captain wants you on the bridge,” Bajek said shortly.

Travis felt his eyes widen. “The bridge, Ma’am?”

“The bridge,” Bajek confirmed tartly. “I’m taking over here.”

She fixed him with a dark look.