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Metal Hearts
Metal Hearts
Metal Hearts
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Metal Hearts

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A deep space survey mission sets out to find a long lost wreck, supposed to be of alien origin.  With her minimal crew Julie Calvert has a lot to do and to prove, and she is equal to the challenge or thinks she is.  What the crew of the Polyphemus doesnt realize is that while they're looking for the mysterious something, that something looks right back at them.

LanguageEnglish
PublisherGabriel Darke
Release dateAug 19, 2019
ISBN9781393361947
Metal Hearts

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    Metal Hearts - Gabriel Darke

    Table of Contents

    Metal Hearts | by Gabriel Darke | Chapter One - Uncertain Loyalties

    Chapter Two - Regimen

    Chapter Three - Probes

    Chapter Four - Opening Moves

    Chapter Five - Incomplete Disclosures

    Chapter Six - The Report

    Chapter Seven - Division of Labour

    Chapter Eight - Water Magic

    Chapter Nine - Removing Hatches

    Chapter Ten - Making Mistakes

    Chapter Eleven - Day Off

    Chapter Twelve - Explorations

    Chapter Thirteen - Restorations

    Chapter Fourteen - Orders From on High.

    Chapter Fifteen - Ingratitude

    Chapter Sixteen - Work days

    Chapter Seventeen - Dust Up

    Chapter Eighteen - Isolation

    Chapter Nineteen - Cures for Hard Times

    Chapter Twenty - Birthday Girl

    Chapter Twenty-One - Storm Witch

    Chapter Twenty-Two - Three becomes Two becomes More

    Chapter Twenty-Three - Managing

    Chapter Twenty-Four - Sojourn

    Chapter Twenty-Five - Mountains

    Chapter Twenty-Six - Contrition

    Chapter Twenty-Seven - Diversions

    Chapter Twenty-Eight - Remedy

    Chapter Twenty-Nine - Cleaning Up

    Chapter Thirty - Arrivals

    Chapter Thirty-One - Examination

    Chapter Thirty-Two - Wedding

    Chapter Thirty-Three - Seat of Power

    Chapter Thirty-Four - Enemies and Allies

    Chapter Thirty-Five - Final Offering

    Chapter Thirty-Six - First Attempt

    Chapter Thirty-Seven - Intermission

    Chapter Thirty-Eight - Second Attempt

    Chapter Thirty-Nine - Expiation

    Chapter Forty - Dragon

    Chapter Forty-One - Sacrifice

    Chapter Forty-Two - Ambush

    Chapter Forty-Three - Final Desperate Acts

    The End

    The Mercenaries | by Gabriel Darke | Chapter One - A Change in Plans

    Metal Hearts

    by Gabriel Darke

    Chapter One - Uncertain Loyalties

    Danby crossed the bridge of ISS Polyphemus with far more than her usual energy, her body impacting the neighbour couch like an assault.  The alternate seat taken by necessity.  Marco retained use of the preferred platform until his shift’s end.  The grunt let go when posterior met cushion the only apology she was likely to give.  The nestling in after like insolence owing to the squirming, and capped by a chirrup of irritation when the comfort she arrived at wasn’t as good as that sought after.

    Marco, unaware what might be bothering his shipmate, made soft his breathing while listening for, but not turning to watch, what she did.  Danby had become as quiet as the surroundings.  Quieter, for the ticks, clicks and hums of a ship in operation but parodied silence.  Full silence in a starship was a dreadful thing, unless it be safely berthed in a harbour, or a wrecker’s yard.

    Marco was not surprised Danby was upset.  Agitation was become her normal condition, which he might have tried teasing her out of, except for the fact that every overture he’d tried had been either ignored or rebuffed.

    The technician vented a sigh.  Through a sideways glance he noted knotted arms, next the rigid features atop their stern embrace.  Angry she had to be, about something he’d done.  A masculine article left in feminine territory.  Washer lid left open or left closed.  Crumbs on console, table or deck.  Fingerprints, pocket lint, nose pickings.  Some small instance of negligence or neglect, done in ignorance or by accident, with no intent of causing harm or offence, and yet outrage had been the result.

    A larger breath than normal he consumed.  Marco was near his change of watch recitation, a requisite of the watch routine.  By his console squatted the imaging helmet and gloves he’d used during the forward half of his shift.  A sandwich wrapper was in his pocket.  The canteen he’d made use of had been returned to its receptacle.

    His gaze did not light upon any image, graph, block of text, or the woman sitting next to him.  The contents of every screen, and her looks, he knew well already.  Orbit is solid at seven-fifty kilometres, he began.  Planet dawn, His gaze touched the crescent of grey-brown hemisphere in the forward viewport, confirming gossamers of pearl-white cirrus lacing a bath of oyster blue, "was a little under two hours, fourteen minutes ago.

    The orbitals are experiencing no difficulties.  There’s a chance of a, ah . . . hum.  What he’d intended as a friendly look had stubbed its toe on something incongruous.  A ribbon, brilliant blue, large as his fist, nestled against the back of Danby’s head.  A–a dust storm is, ah, expected within, ah, the next eight hours, but that’s hardly extra–extraordinary.  She’d done something to make the decoration more.  Groomed her hair beyond the usual wash, dry and comb, the painful brush cut she’d come aboard with having grown out enough to allow sweet alteration.

    Marco stared with wonder at the voluptuous object as his tongue stumbled into a fresh tangle of consonant knots.  Ah, in, er . . .

    Danby did not release the steel encircling her chest.  Her gaze stayed on the text scrolling tightly in the neighbour screen.  The rest of what Marco felt obligated in include was delivered in a rush.  In short, the planet’s still where it is, we’re still where we are, and I’ve nothing else to report other than I think it’ll take a while for the numbness to leave my butt.  How’s your day going?

    Stick it, Pacini.  Chin dimple so slight that it might be represented by a single pencil stroke, eyes pale blue, minute scar by left brow—legacy of imperfect healing—and sweet flare to nostrils.  Her cheeks were a trifle gaunt owing to a strict regimen of diet and exercise.  The café au lait tan she’d arrived in was faded to pink.  Freckles in their legions grazed in those far lighter pastures.  Standing, Danby was a trifle above average in terms of female height and topped Marco’s own level by several centimetres.  Her body with few grams of extra.  An adulthood spent in three quarters SG ( Standard Gravity ) had been kind to high, full breasts.

    Owing to the lighting—his shift the third, the graveyard watch, when ship’s operations mimicked the activities of a sleeping cat—Marco had not noticed the extra softness which current scowling could not overwhelm.  None of her embellishments meant for him, he concluded after little extra thought.

    After so many weeks of isolation, Marco Pacini knew well his crewmates’ likes and dislikes, and that a better relationship with either was unlikely.  The necessities of shipboard routine left them with but snippets of time to get to know one another better.  They had failed to overcome the prejudices and misconceptions with which they’d started.  So they had continued three strangers on the bus, the two of them seeming to prefer the situation so.  Marco, having long ago put the stops to his discontent, found his companionship other ways and in other places.

    He would have to take this latest rejection and walk away, hands in pockets, chin down, eyes averted, having no choice.  Except he was of a sudden inspired—perversely, his inner voice assured him—to put himself in front of a breaking of ice or a limb.  Equal chance of both.

    Marco stood and administered a pat to the back of his couch, best sited, besides the Command Chair upon its dias, to serve watches from.  That high seat was always left vacant by the two of them, and never by Calvert.  I’ve kept our seat warm for you.  Don’t forget to log in.

    Since when have I ever forgotten to do that? Danby grumbled, her lips leaving their rigidity only to reply and, for an instant, better to view.  Corporal Elizabeth Leanne Danby had begun the voyage the least of the four-person security detail Polyphemus transport had been allotted.  For now she wore navy blue in lieu of olive drab.  When their friends returned, she would revert back to her old status and colour.

    Of course you haven’t.  Her auburn, he saw, was laced with brighter parts.  Marco was tempted to order a step up in illumination to see the lacing better.  Did you colour your hair?

    None of your damn business.  Having waited through necessary seconds for his shape and heat to dissipate from the Scanners couch, Danby exchanged one platform for the other.  Elbows on console, cup made of hands to plant chin on, face shown to screen.

    The bridge is yours, persisted Marco, determined not to leave until he got a sociable reply, which Danby seemed determined not to give.  She gathered a breath and held it, blinked once, twice.  Danby?

    What is it! she thundered.

    I said the bridge is yours.

    I heard you the first damn time.  She stayed with her straight-ahead staring, as if the sight of him was something she must at all costs avoid.

    Marco by now realized he stayed for the ribbon, which spoke volumes when the woman it adorned would not.  With its encouragement, he embarked upon an internal sifting through of themes, lighting in short order on one unlikely to offend.  It really is a shame how shorthanded we are out here.

    Her eyes sent a single spark in his direction as she grumbled something to her reflection in the monitor.  That strangled something kept him where he was.  I’ve been thinking there ought to have been at least one more of us.  You know, for, ah, so there should be more time to, ah, get to, ah talk . . .  His pause was for Danby to insert her reply.  When she didn’t, he resumed the conversational thread with, It’s a shame we don’t socialize much.

    Either of them with him, he meant.  The two women, as he, spent most of their time alone, which he’d learned through impossible to resist observation—don’t call it spying.  Which is okay.  We don’t have to talk, if you don’t want to.

    Danby shifted her attention to the grand view forward and its crescent of pale green, grey and brown planet, next to the twinkling taking place in the satellite status screen, now back to main Scans again.

    With so much time on my hands I’ve been hitting the manuals pretty hard, Marco continued.  Right now I’m doing my upgrades in System Electricals and Small Craft Maintenance.

    Exams, oral or practical, were required to confirm an improved level of competence for the purposes of advancement and increases in pay and available through simulations.  A representative image of a master tech, a sim geist, did the testing.  The results official.  Applicants were allowed three tries to achieve a minimum standard of 85 % proficiency, with progressively longer prep times mandated between an unsuccessful test and the next.  Marco had never failed to upgrade on a first attempt.

    I’ve been through the library ten ways from yesterday for things to try.  How’s about you?  Just the other day I found a reasonably interesting sim.  You start on a tropical island.  I’ve only done the preview so far.  Haven’t examined the specs, so I don’t know how extensive it is.  Pirates and cannibals maybe?  Not my usual thing.  All the same it appeals to me.  Maybe you wanna try it?  I could recite the code if you’d like?

    After a sweep for ungainly, unacceptable, incomplete, and out of date files for deletion, Marco had checked inside the pending partition for programs on hold and failed to find the island sim.  Grace periods on personal installs were usual.  Sims were expensive to buy.  Most people who could afford them, preferred to play out a sim thoroughly before inviting in the herd.

    A high quality sim of a sudden available for general use after months of just staples had been a welcome surprise.  Something gifted, he thought, likely by Calvert.

    Plenty of low quality stuff came in through the civilian channels in mass data dumps and were screened for worms and viruses during the buffering process.  Passed files remained in quarantine until they could be examined for appeal or utility, usually by Polyphemus, before they were made available for general access.

    One of the theatre manager’s duties was to examine all sims which had been passed and organize or delete them.  Since taking over all matters technical, Marco had deleted hundreds of low appeal sims, besides tuned the filters to keep out others of their tribes.  He might have blocked non-authorized receipts entirely except for the occasional good game and travel demos, newsreels and holo-movie trailers, which personnel in isolated stations appreciated for novelty and escapes from the tedium of their day by day routines.

    You must do workout sims.  Me too.  Run, hike, climb.  I wrestle.  He paused for a reaction until he confirmed none was forthcoming.  Can’t get enough of that . . . stuff.  Danby began to drum her fingers on the mildly canted surface before her.

    You ever do historicals?  You probably don’t, er.  He hadn’t meant to infer she hadn’t the smarts to appreciate the most sophisticated programs in the library—was she paying attention?  Her gaze stayed with the screen ahead of her.  Most people think historicals are a waste of time.  I’ve come across some pretty decent ones.  He’d sampled near everything the library had to offer.  There’s bias sometimes, which I like to fix.

    To reprogram a sim in order to produce an outcome that didn’t appear the creation of an idiot child, was far beyond the capability of most nuts and bolts technicians.  A great deal of creative thinking and advanced programming skill was involved, the best results merging seamlessly with the original work.

    "Most sim creators give you the outcome you ask for or want, no matter what’s true or not.  I’ve noticed sometimes, too, after a great beginning, a story will fall flat.

    "This one time I played Admiral Tunbridge at the Battle of Saint San Coeur.  Thanks to the tweak I put in, I was able to avoid sending the 46th Light Cruiser Squadron in to be slaughtered, and so I had a viable covering force when I needed one.  I still didn’t win, but I did manage to extricate my cripples without the rebs capturing most of them.

    I, ah, changed the outcome.  His boast was topped with a modest grin and rewarded with a sideways view of an ‘oh, really’ look.  Every sim should allow alternative endings.  Win the battle, instead of lose it.  He decided it no longer mattered if Danby wasn’t going to participate.  He warmed to his topic all by himself.  I’m gonna tune the base settings next.  So, during the Hyacinth Conference, if I tell Director Stanley he’s a fool not to press for a revision of the Dolman Accord, he’ll respond with other than a blank stare.

    Elizabeth Danby had put up with as much male static as she could stand.  To convey the biggest hint possible she wanted to be alone, she swivelled her couch to face the exit, thus putting the ribbon she’d entirely forgotten about between the two of them.  Until Marco left, she was going to tune him out.  Anything else he had to say was for the walls and furniture only.

    As for Ensign Juliana Marie Calvert, she’d be watching her step around that energetic bit of fluff from now on.  How had she gotten herseld talked into that crap?  Calvert had her doing things she would never have thought of doing to herself.  She’d have to figure out a way to deflect whatever else Calvert had in mind.  Politely, firmly, cautiously.  Calvert was Commanding Officer This Vessel and way up in naval society—no less than the Grand Admiral’s niece.  The lowly and humble watched their step when the high and mighty got weird ideas in their heads.  What in the hell?  Danby whirled about, catching him in the act.  Eyes closed, hovering over her, half smile on his lips.  He breathed her in, smelled her!

    Their gazes connected.  You! she spat.  You— he replied.  Since he’d indulged in an uninvited invasion of her privacy, Danby leapt up from her chair and with one shove put him on his ass.

    The cretin gazed up, eyes wide.  Danby felt a pulse elevated, breathing ragged, and thoughts in turmoil.  A warmth in her loins made a jab at her middle along the way to her cheeks.  The runt turning me on?  Not happening!  This now was not about to be a thing.  She’d heard all she cared for about Marco Salvatore Pacini.  Lady’s man.  Smooth talker.  Adorable mutt.  One of the sorts of men she’d avoided all of her adult life.

    Marco’s own condition was extreme enough to tent the fabric over his groin.

    Get up, she growled.  Get out!

    Give me a hand up?

    Get your own self up.  That damned tenting snagged her attention and so she put her gaze right the hell away from it.

    He pushed himself up and into her space.  Danby retreated to avoid contact, bumped the backs of her knees against her couch, and abruptly sat.  She next had to decide whether or not to resume standing and the high ground.  She was right where she was supposed to be, however, so maybe he’d catch the hint to be the same and be gone.

    I ought to monitor the orbitals a bit longer, Marco announced instead.

    You do,  She pierced him with her best ice-blue glare, and I’ll toss you out on your head.

    You can try.  Imagining her manhandling him evoked another pleasurable response.  Her mood and posture were far too serious, Marco realized.  The last thing he wanted was to antagonize her.  I was only kidding, he said, his hands with palms foremost, a fending off gesture.  If you want me to go, I’ll go.

    That’s what I want.

    All right.

    All right.  Danby resumed her screens.  A gunshot by the ear would not budge her now.

    Let her stew, Marco decided.  He’d done all he could to initiate a rapport.  He would have gasped out loud if he’d been any more blue in his thoughts or between the legs.  Eight weeks of ‘hi and how ya doing?’ had gotten him nowhere.  How could he unfreeze what was determined not to be unfrozen?  Another two months and his current duty cycle would be over.  Right after he’d put in for a transfer.  He’d no objection how their absent Captain, Senior Lieutenant Charles Hutchinson, ran things.  Hutch was an upright guy, but the only way he was going to get over his funk was through a major change in scenery.

    Commander Willard wanted him for his Cuirassier.  It was time he quit screwing around and decided what he do for the rest of his career.  A Weapons chair would be more than fine.  Captain Thorpe had offered him a berth in officer territory—no thanks.  He’d done with tight-ass training back when he was a kid, and was far too old to ply that spade again.

    Julie Calvert was sixteen!  He was twenty-seven.  By the time he made lieutenant, he’d be in his mid-thirties.  By twenty Calvert would have a classy little frigate to command, a competent officer installed at her elbow to do all the grunt work and make sure she didn’t crash the boat.  Hers would be a meteoric rise through the ranks.  His would dead end in short order.  Command of an aging transport plying a dick route A to B and back to A again.  Stick that.  He’d no interest in transport jockey work.

    Sure, it wasn’t fair.  Her kind getting all the breaks, going from one sweet post to the next, never doing much past shifting herself out of bed in the mornings.  His kind toiling in the shadows.

    Are you still here? Danby grumbled.

    Just leaving.  The lift doors parted at his approach.  Had he gained anything with his obstinacy?  Probably not.  Well, he had his sims and a tube of lotion whenever the urges grew too strong.  By the way, he threw over his shoulder, I like what that ribbon does for your hair.

    Her startled gasp stopped him cold.  Polyphemus, owing to a whim of her designers, was equipped with transparent lift plates instead of cars—innovation that took getting used to.  Looking down or up, sometimes from the very top or the very bottom of a transport well, one tended to pine for a nice box to ride in.  Marco stepped back from the lift well, and the doors slid along their rails back together.

    He’d the Command Chair between them and either Secondary Systems Access and Monitoring to slip into or Comm/Scan and Weaps/Tactical consoles to crouch behind.  The lift doors closed and Danby, cat-quick, sprang up and tore at the ribbon.

    Marco was astonished.  She’d forgotten she wore it!  Calvert must have fixed the decoration on—to do it up so neat would have defeated blind effort.  Danby appeared not to care if she injured the thing while tearing it off.

    He felt a voyeur as his crewmate plucked and pinched until the cloth came off and was hurled to the deck.  Marco decided he’d little choice about what he might do next.  Approaching the lift triggered its aperture to open.  He’d poised himself in the right orientation should she glance his way and, coincidentally, so he could view her reaction.  Comical.  Stumble and hop into her seat and then an industry that might have fooled a rookie fresh on the boat but no one else.

    Forgot something.  He came down past the Command Chair.  Apple.  Except no apple was there to pluck from the console top surface, the most likely place for one.  Marco guessed Danby remained too discombobulated to note an absence of fruit.

    You’re not supposed to eat in here, Danby muttered, too embarrassed to glance his way, her face obscured in a cradle of arms, back arched, breasts protesting her snug ship suit with bulging into it.  The discarded ribbon near where Marco stood.

    "Oh, I don’t eat in here, Marco replied as he directed a pretend disinterested gaze at the puddle of colour by his feet.  But I do eat in here."

    Is that supposed to be funny? came back muffled.

    No.  But unless either one of you is willing to sub for me so’s I can grab a bite when I need to, I don’t see any help for it.

    Humph.

    You can’t tell me the bulges in your pockets aren’t snacks.

    I don’t get crumbs over anything.  I eat above the step.

    I don’t either.  Leave crumbs, I mean.  I eat right in that seat though.  I think our circumstances warrant it.

    Her answering snort was flavoured derisive.

    Really, Corporal Danby, if you’ve something you’d like to say, then you ought to come right out and say it.

    Her head came up, dressed in a pretty blush.  Her mouth opened and closed again.  She’d neglected to turn up the bridge lights, an omission in routine for which he assumed his lingering was responsible.  Calvert liked midnight levels during her shift; Danby preferred a well lit working space.

    Danby curled her lip at her reflection in the scan monitor.  Next snarled soundlessly to it.  You drop this?  He picked the ribbon up and slipped into the couch next to hers.  Once again she would not look at him, even sideways.  Again mortified, her features configured themselves so tight they resembled the surface of a mask rather than the skin of a face.

    He offered the ribbon.  Here, ah—

    Brusquely she replied, Don’t want it.  Blush darkened.  Lip were bitten into.  Marco put what would become a cherished keepsake into his pocket.  Why are you still here? Danby demanded of the space in front of her nose.

    With sauciness, he offered dthe reply: Forgot my apple.  He’d have nothing but an empty hand to show if she challenged his assertion.  Have it if you want.

    No.  Go away.

    No problem.  Just came back for my apple.  See you later, huh?

    Sure.  He’d the impression she would have sung an aria if its screeching would drive him away.  And so Marco Salvatore Pacini left the bridge of the transport ship ISS Polyphemus in far better fettle than had he done so earlier.  He was very nearly convinced, as he travelled his usual route to his compartment, that one of them might have undergone a softening of attitude.  As the lift disc delivered him to Crew Deck Upper, the tech was humming to himself.  He might have made a louder, happier noise except Calvert was unlikely to appreciate being jarred from sleep.  Each of the crew had become considerate of the others’ sleep intervals, especially now that wholesome rest was hard come by.

    How he longed for a honest interval’s sleep!  If he was doomed to wander that damned nightmare yet again, he’d have to force in alterations: light for dark, warm for cold, cherubs for monsters.

    With the lighting at night-time levels all corners were shadow-splashed.  Marco padded along, the near new carpeting kind to his feet.  The yellow and black striped frame of an emergency hatch marked where cross corridors met.  His quarters were ahead, next to last before the canary yellow and black striped aperture that linked Crew Deck Upper to Secondary Engineering via the Secondary Engineering Access corridor.  He was about to cross the junction when he detected a commotion on his left.

    The Master and Commander of ISS Polyphemus had not dressed to suit her lofty status.  Milk white, diaphanous silk fluttered about a periwinkle blue peignoir.  Her legs were encased in sheer covers, also white.  On her feet were high heel slippers of matching periwinkle with ping pong poms.  Discovering him in her way, Calvert stopped and fumbled with her flimsy coat in an effort to secure a better grip.

    Good morning, Ensign Calvert.  Her scent was a fruit and flower mix of body wash and perfume.  Strawberries and roses.  Plain, unscented soap and shampoo were normal for space flight, being unlikely to offend olfactory organs grown sensitive to sharp stimuli.

    She did not return the courtesy, instead embraced herself harder in an effort to keep her wrap under control.  Juliana Marie Calvert was four months and three weeks shy of her seventeenth birthday.  Her father, Eliot George Calvert, was a respected senior captain and commanded the dreadnaught ISS Nostradamus.  Her uncle was none other than John Barry Richardson, Commander in Chief this Imperial Navy.  Her aunt, Antonia Olivia Richardson, served as Deputy Director for the Imperial Advisory Council.

    The Family Richardson had the distinction of being the most powerful family in the Imperium.  Its offspring was navy royalty, society darling and heir to immense fortune all in one small package.  Also a snob and a brat, and at present intensely annoyed to discover her technician where and when she hadn’t expected him.

    You’re late off watch, Technician.  Were there problems?  A query delivered, despite youth and small size, with high polish.  Julie Calvert’s unbolstered height was several centimetres less than Marco’s.  In heels it was equal to his, or a little more.

    No, sir, Marco replied cheerfully, showing his nonexistent apple.  I went back for my apple.

    Calvert was unamused.  Her eyes bright blue.  Her hands and feet although small were fine-boned and well formed.  You know you’re not supposed to eat up there.

    I beg pardon, sir?  If such was the hard and fast rule, she should inform Danby before the marine munched any of the snacks she carried in her pockets.

    You heard me.  Calvert’s hair made darts at her cheeks.  Her natural shade was honey blond, one assumed.  Presently it was the colour of ripe cherries.  A shade he might have liked except for the silver dapple.  And yet the combination was more pleasing to view than the neon blues, greens, reds and oranges she’d tried along the way to her cherries.  Marco’s buoyant mood dissipated.  An edict about to be imposed.  He protested, I was under the impression that since there’s no possibility of relief, that it was all right to snack.

    Your impression is wrong.  A snub nose was flanked by cherub cheeks that dimpled attractively when their owner smiled—something Marco rarely saw.  From now on you will conform your dining habits to times before and after watch.  Understood?  Eight hours was a long while to go without something in his stomach.  Pacini? was coupled to the authoritative toe tap intended to attract his drifted attention.

    Should he mention Danby’s trifling with the rule?  What about Calvert’s own habit?  She took snacks into the bridge as often as either of them.  He’d cleaned up crumbs plenty of times, as well as the aftermath of one spectacular indiscretion.  The issue of whether or not food might be consumed within the bridge prompted him to mention another matter whose boundaries had never been clearly defined.  "Sir, begging your pardon, but I’ve been wondering what ought to happen when I’m the one needs to use the head?"  He spelled Calvert once each watch so she could relieve herself.  She’d issued him with a memo saddling him with the obligation.  He’d managed so far to avoid an emergency, yet there had been times when he could have used a break if only to walk out kinks that long sitting accumulated.

    Calvert’s smile revealed the glimmer of perfectly sized and aligned teeth.  If you have to urinate you could use a bottle or something.

    Sir? preceded a gulp.

    Well.  She was imagining him attempting to defecate into a bottle and was about to voice an undignified giggle and covered her mouth with her hand instead.

    But you and Danby—I spell the two of you all the time.

    That’s different.  We couldn’t possibly do it up there.  Calvert realized she couldn’t be serious about the bottle.  The bridge’s surveillance system documented everything.  Hutchinson would not be pleased to discover she’d given Pacini leave to urinate into a bottle while on watch duty.  Still, if he really had to, Pacini ought to be able to disguise what he was about.  It would be very difficult for either her or Danby to do the same.

    Yet I’m supposed to.

    Calvert huffed her breath.  Why did he bitch about toilet matters?  He could hold it.  Males could hold it while females couldn’t.  It was a physiological thing.  He’d managed all right so far.  She put up her brow before delivering her ace-in-the-hole argument, one which could not fail to score a hit.  You know we’re shorthanded.  What else can you expect?

    Marco vented as much disgust as he could within a single snort.  He had hoped for sympathy despite time and again she’d demonstrated where he was concerned she had none to give.  Danby . . .  He’d been about to voice a complaint about the liberty the third member of their crew routinely took, and then decided he wouldn’t be so petty.

    Danby what?

    Nothing.

    Calvert twitched the itch from her nose when she would rather have rubbed it.  You volunteered to stay.  You could have gone with the rest.

    No, sir.  Somebody had to mind the ship.  Somebody who knew how the inside of a comm console was supposed to work, he could have added.  Hutch had called him before anyone else, to inform him, that of all the men and women under his command, he trusted Marco Salvatore Pacini most to look after his ship while he was away.  Marco right off decided he would stay.  He’d figured plenty of slack time, sack time and sim time.  He hadn’t even minded that Calvert would be left in charge, despite he’d known what a self-obsessed bitch she was.

    What the hell do you think I’m doing, Mister! Calvert’s protest exhibited a full shade more of anger than she’d displayed the moment before.  He had a nerve talking to her in such a way.  She was the goddamn captain!  He was a lousy crewman.

    What did she do? Marco was thinking.  Nothing besides stand her watch.  He’d made all the orbital adjustments, checked and documented dispatches, reviewed and logged survey results, programmed the menials, restocked the galley, and even stacked dishes.  Every little thing that needed doing, he did it.

    Well? Calvert asked, giving the carpet another tap of her foot, her robe parting as she did so to reveal a thinly wrapped breast and its standing nipple.

    A sight which pumped a litre of blood straight into Marco’s brain and into that other part of him simultaneously.  He inhaled his next breath through fog and hardly saw how pinched with anger she’d become.  The disagreement in views, call it the argument that it was, had been a long time simmering.  Calvert had acted from the first as though the ship was hers to do with as she pleased, and he the slave to do her bidding.  Not enough, you—

    How dare you!  She didn’t step at him, merely seemed to.  Julie Calvert possessed the ability to appear larger than herself when needed.  She was the niece of the Grand Admiral after all.  I do as much as you.  Petulance flavoured her reply.  I have the far greater responsibility.

    I fixed that console when you wrecked it.  She gaped at him.  She’d been damned stupid to set her coffee where it could spill, especially when he’d been in the midst of a faulty light element replacement and had unsealed the console to do it.

    Are you going to keep throwing that in my face!

    He had never mentioned the repair before.  This was well after the event.  Nor had she.  Not even to thank him.  Her spilled coffee reminded him of something else.  You could get your own stores out of the officers’ supply.

    That’s not my job.

    It’s not mine either.  She had goaded him into drawing every delicacy from the junior officers’ joint stock until practically nothing was left.  Just how was Calvert planning to explain what had happened to her peers’ fruits and desserts when they returned?

    I’m captain.  A captain doesn’t draw her own viands, nor prepare her own meals.

    When was she going to be practical?  He would have complained long distance to Hutchinson long ago, but hadn’t wanted to snitch.  Nor make her own bed, nor clean her toilet either?

    Calvert’s lips assumed a stone configuration.  You . . . I don’t . . .

    Another of those memos she loved to key required he supervise the cleaning of her quarters once every three days.  He hadn’t complained because he didn’t spend above twenty minutes each session, and menials did all the tidying, scrubbing and polishing.  All he did was set them to work.  Yet those twenty minutes came out of his off duty time, and he had a right to resent their loss.

    He’s being a prick, Calvert decided.  Complaints with no merit.  The things she’d asked him to do took no time at all.  You would have had to supervise the cleaning no matter who’d been left in charge, she countered.

    What about your shower drain?  The contents of which he dealt with by hand.

    Whuh-what?  You duh-duh-dint ‘spect muh-muh-me to duh-damn duh-duh-dit!

    He stared open-mouthed, amazed and amused.  The perfect Julie Marie Calvert stuttered!  Ensign Perfect not so perfect after all!  His gasp of amusement pulsed all the way to her cheek and, because its contact so offended her, she absolutely had to slap him.  The blow surprised girl as much as man.  She blushed crimson, attempting again to discipline her gown, which could not be comprehending its function, masking one moment what it unmasked the next.  I didn’t mean to do that, she said carefully so her pronunciation should have no hitch in it.

    Marco thought otherwise.  He was entitled to redress.  Theirs was the modern navy.  No officer might strike an enlisted man provoked or otherwise.  The situation demanded an apology.  Morale of the crew, half of which he was, was going to suffer as a consequence if she wouldn’t say she was sorry.  Savouring the burn in his cheek, Marco mentally calculated the compensation he was entitled to.  At the least Calvert had earned the reprimand auto-inserted into her career jacket.  He would record the incident, or not, depending on her response.  He set his brow to its most challenging posture.  She must be more considerate of his time and needs.  He was going to transmit incident particulars to Hutch otherwise.  She had struck him, she must apologize, she had no choice. Marco crossed his arms in anticipation of receiving satisfaction.

    Don’t think this lets you off the hook for anything, she said uneasily and took in a part of her lip to suck on.

    You hit me, sir, for no reason.

    I didn’t hit you.  She would deny it.  This to be her strategy.  To admit the incident took place would be embarrassing to herself personally and detrimental to her ship’s discipline in general.  No witnesses had been present, and no record of the blow existed as there were no recording devices in this part of the ship.  His word against hers.  She hadn’t struck him.  He had imagined it, no matter she felt the warmth from the reciprocal blow on her hand still.  She hadn’t meant to hit him.  Her hand had slipped.  A moment of passion.  These were justifications in themselves.

    You . . . Marco began as he identified the intransigence in her looks and the triumph in her eyes.  Calvert supposed she had the upper hand.  He knew as well as she no video or audio capture of the incident could have happened.  She could continue to insist she hadn’t struck him except for a single, unequivocal piece of evidence verifying she had.

    He snorted his disgust, which encouraged an uncertain squint to show itself.  I’ll just take an impression of the mark.  Sir, should you need me at any time within the next twenty minutes you’ll find me in med lab.  Her palm print, unique among the three of them, and the transfer of DNA that happened through the contact, was going to condemn her quite.

    Oh, she went, reconsidering options while parts of her warmed or cooled and her confidence leached away.  Damn him.  It had been wrong, Calvert realized, to deny what she had done.  She was sorry for it.  She ought not to have struck him.  It had been impetuous to give in to her emotions.  She’d striven hard to fit her role of Commander this Ship.  To lie was dishonourable.  Calvert directed her gaze to a spot behind him, about head height, and said to it: I apologize, Technician Pacini.  I hadn’t meant to strike you.  It was, ah, a spontaneous act.

    Still trying to weasel out of guilt, but he would allow it.  They weren’t square yet though.  Not by a long rod.  Apology accepted.  Now about the division of labour—

    I refuse to be blackmailed.  She would be careful about what she said and did for as long as it took her imprint to leave his face.

    Marco frowned demonstratively.  She accused him of extortion?  Sir, all I want is fairness.

    You’ve been getting that all along.  I haven’t asked you to do anything unreasonable.

    My taking food on the bridge?

    I’ll think about it.

    And relief?  Why not we spell our relief at mid watch for say twenty minutes?  Both women slept before their watch duty.  He slept after his owing to the obligation Calvert had saddled him with.

    If it’s possible.  I won’t promise anything.  Calvert felt she had responded reasonably to each of his requests.  That she intended not to change her position he would learn in due course of time and when it’s too late for him to do anything about it!  She almost grinned.  She’d a juicy revenge percolating, if he only knew.  Did he not have the run of the ship?  Hadn’t he all the sim time he could handle?  He’d certainly taken advantage of his opportunities.  He had absolutely nothing to complain about.  The little things extra she asked for and the rules she imposed were in order that necessary things got done.

    Julie Calvert recalled the sly looks directed her way, her roommates predicting what would happen after they’d gone.  They’d crooned over Pacini.  She’d not be able to resist his puppy charms.  That had been the greatest joke of all.  Who had those idiots thought they were talking to?  She’d no more interest in Marco Pacini than was he a bug to squish.  Squaring her shoulders and thrusting herself erect exploited the height advantage her heels supplied.  "Keep this in mind, Tech Pacini, Polyphemus is my command.  You are under my orders until we’re relieved."  She remained boss no matter what happened.

    Well then, thank you, sir, he said and turned to go back the way he had come.

    Whuh-whuh-where are yuh-yuh-you guh-guh-going nuh-nuh-nuh-now?

    She knew right well the place he aimed himself at, and what he might do when he got there.  Good night, Ensign, he called over his shoulder, not letting himself see her expression and so not letting her see his either.

    Calvert stared after her technician until he disappeared, her emotions in flux.  Horace Hilton cuh-cuh.  Stop, close her eyes.  She’d begun too fast and speed was the villain.  Horace Hilton canned consommé into puh-penny puh-puh-packets—shit, oh shit!  Stamp her foot.  She’d hoped to be cured.  The last slip months—no, more than a year ago.  She only stammered when upset.  Damn you, Pacini.  Damn you to icy black hell, she muttered.

    Marco travelled only a little way toward med lab before turning back.  He wasn’t going to make an issue of a slap, nor hold a grudge, though Calvert might.  He’d discovered how Julie Calvert managed to terrorize her roommates without getting caught.  She’d a mechanical accomplice, whom she’d consigned to a remote spot in the duct work.

    Her roommates stayed ignorant of who had arranged accidents for them, despite everyone else knew who had to be to blame.  Even Hutchinson had to know the identity of the Authoress of Shenanigans, making his decision to leave Calvert in charge of the ship a dubious one.

    What had they done to trigger her ire?  Not much.  Calvert seemed to be annoyed by very little things.  Certainly she was wired differently than the other officers he’d known.

    After a minute of lift plate travel he returned to Crew Deck Upper.  He jogged silently past the junction.  His cabin ahead and left.  Along the way Danby’s hatch was open as if for inspection.  After a minor hesitation, he went inside.  Drawers, cupboards, and lockers neatly closed.  Bunks stripped to mattress covers.  Posters gone from walls.  Everything neat, bare and honest.  He opened the nearest locker and found it empty.  As was the one across the way.  As were the cupboards and Danby’s small desk.

    Moved, he murmured.  His was the cabin after hers.  He’d been looking forward to their next encounter.  That they were no longer next door neighbours would make occasions for social intercourse harder to orchestrate.  Not much later, sitting on his bunk, undoing laces, loosening their sneakers, and kicking the covers off.  Moved.  He flopped backwards onto his bunk.

    Chapter Two - Regimen

    Chimes announced the start of Watch Interval.  Marco lingered abed, eyes half open.  Dread stayed with him.  It was not the vividness of the dream that bothered him so much.  Rather it was the feeling he’d been given something to do that couldn’t be done asleep or awake.  Something as crucial as saving a life.  Whose, he wasn’t sure.  Perhaps his own?  His thinking stayed muddled, although he’d the feeling matters would come clear eventually.

    What the hell? he wondered aloud.  He’d awakened feeling not in the least heroic.  If one of them was to be a hero, that would be Danby.  The marine had all the muscles in this family.  Grinning, he swept aside blankets.  A minute later he was padding along the corridor, smiling to lights on at daytime levels.  Hearing lift doors open ahead, Marco slowed to a walk.  Danby emerged from the lift well.  He waited for her at the junction, on his side of the emergency bulkhead.  Good morning, Corporal.  His greeting cheerful in both form and delivery.

    Morning, Pacini?  Danby stifled a yawn beneath the palm of her hand.  It’s afternoon by my clock.

    Morning by mine.  His Watch Third extended from twenty-four hundred to eight hundred hours ship’s time.  It was now a little past sixteen hundred hours.  No matter, morning to him was when he emerged from sleep.

    If you say so.  Danby stepped past him to go to her cabin, now down the same corridor where Calvert had hers.  By the way, unless you checked already, you’ve a new memo in your queue.  We now do mid watch reliefs.

    Oh? he went, his smile even broader.

    We relieve each other in reverse.  I relieve Ensign Calvert.  You relieve me.  She relieves you.  The two of you discussed the matter last night?

    Well, I’ll be damned.  A result well worth a slap.

    To my way of thinking, we ought to have be doing reliefs all along.

    She decided to be reasonable after all, he couldn’t help but say.

    Danby’s reaction surprised and pleased him.  A tired smile.

    I was curious . . . Marco called after her.  Restraint, and caution, kept him from commenting on her hair colour, revealed in full light as a rich chestnut.

    Danby looked back over her shoulder, hand on hip.  About what?

    Why you moved?

    That’s none of your business.

    Sure, you’re right, he said, backing away.  Forget I asked.  It seemed as though Danby might be about to say something else, but then continued on her way.

    An hour later Marco was regretting his decision to try the next level.  The first more powerful adversary, a Negro his own height, but ten kilos heavier and intensely muscled, had seized his right wrist, forced it behind his back, and was levering his other wrist to the same place.  To counter the move, the snugly built tech braced his toes into the mat and strained as hard as he could.  He managed to check the capture, but only temporarily.  Next both his hands were pinned and he was about to be flung to the mat.

    Program end, he gasped.  Adversary gone.  Varnished pine walls and dark blue mat gone in an extra eye-blink of time.

    Pale blue with granite grey gird lines now.  An instant of instability was endured before the null field adjusted to keep him from falling.  What next?  Climb?  Sky dive?  Stalk?  Surf?  Maybe sail.  He might assume the skin of his favourite pseudonym, Carl ‘Cat’ Walker, Captain of ISS Storm, and set off to combat outlaws in the Maor te Pleiasis Sphere of Operations.

    To allow him and his fellow Polyphemuses unsupervised play, he’d jimmied the protocols.  It was tricky to suit up without aid, but they managed.  Polyphemus monitored their activities and a red icon would appear and a chime sound within the bridge should a session go awry.  No problems thus far.  With just the three of them, and four booths, the opportunities for fantasy pursuits seemed limitless.  If only he hadn’t had to work, eat or sleep!

    Marco grinned behind his snug fitting mask.  Plentiful fun day after day was making up for the perverse whimsy of an adolescent commander.  He could endure as much as she dished out, as long as he had his sims to blunt edges with.

    Polyphemus, let’s try that tropic sim again.  Ah, les-see,  The list before his eyes was wall-sized and in decimetre-high, bright blue letters.  Blinking progressed the menu, code four-four-two-seven-alpha-romeo-nine-ess.  Sky, sand, surf and a little way off a hut cobbled together out of bamboo, palm fronds, and drift wood.

    The hut was nicely rendered, picturesque, but too fragile unless it was meant only to be seen and never used.  The shelter nestled cosily among palms.  Hot—too hot!  Polyphemus in her zeal to please, or from referencing a pre-set, had cranked the booth heat to an uncomfortable level.  Step back the temp, can’t you!  The temperature softened to what a city punk could tolerate.  Let’s have an offshore breeze, make it a cool one.

    Much better.  He appreciated sights, smells, and sounds.  Vegetation tramped joyously beyond the shore: ferns, begonias, coral plants, bluebell.  The hut, he decided, could stand a renovation.  Let’s give it sturdiness.  Add a veranda covered in orchids.  The driftwood and bamboo shack gone and a sturdy clapboard structure satisfying his personal sense of order took its place.

    Rattan chairs with foam cushions dressed in masculine oatmeal covers plus a matching love seat on cables were selected and settled.  This is nice, Marco said.  Ah, seabirds.

    What species? Polyphemus asked.

    Gulls and pelicans.  Keep the buggers out over the water so they don’t mess up my beach.  The cry of gulls was an immediate installation.  These hovered over ungainly pelicans riding waves, and well out from shore.  Marco gathered in the largest gulp of wet and salt his lungs were capable of.  Even further were specks where frigatebirds soared.  Something’s missingI need company.

    Specify species, gender, age—

    Homo sapiens, female.  Age twenty-five Years Standard.  Caucasian.  Blond hair, green eyes.  Regulations prohibited crew utilizing navy resources to create pornographic fantasies out of.  Illegal or unsanctioned play could be identified through the coding those types of requests generated.  Calvert, anytime she wished although so far she never had, might direct Polyphemus to examine his play history.

    The model was pleasing to view, but generic and uninspiring.  Marco knew what he really wanted.  Trembling, he ordered his initial request erased.  Gone in a blink the facsimile.  Access personnel records.  An electric itch started behind his ears threatened to go worse.  What he was about to ask for, he was not entitled to.

    Accessed, Polyphemus responded with mock sweetness.

    "Reconstruct facsimile to resemble Calvert, Juliana Marie, Commander, ISS Polyphemus."  He remembered a slap and a negligee.  A Julie Calvert to insult and abuse would be revenge and reward both.  A few minutes of fun and banish it to the oblivion it deserved.

    That which you’ve requested is disallowed owing to programming restrictions.   

    Marco knew of a simple way to circumvent the restrictions.  Easing himself back in his seat, he amended his request to: "Reconstitute facsimile to resemble Calvert, Juliana Marie, Commander, ISS Polyphemus, one millimetre shorter."

    Calvert’s slightly shorter twin appeared, in everyday naval uniform.  Dress facsimile in clothing more appropriate to the environment.  The uniform vanished.  The 3D reproduction appeared for a moment pink-skinned nude before it was dressed in a two-piece bathing suit, sunhat, flip flops, mirrored sunglasses, and gauze shirt.

    I think, Marco said, grinning ferociously, I’d like her in a transparent cape and negligee.  Calvert of the night before gazed blankly ahead.  He did not question the verisimilitude by which her garments matched those of the night before, notwithstanding how vague had been his request.  Marco settled himself better in his seat, and spoke the fatal words: Animate facsimile.

    The replicated Julie blinked rapidly along her way to awareness, as though needing to assimilate a large store of data over which she had next to set parameters.  Lips parted over a vague smile during the process adjusted to stern.  Why are you lazing about, Pacini?  Aren’t you supposed to be on watch right now?

    Halt program!  Polyphemus was high level AI.  The ship had to be punishing him for bypassing the restrictions.  Fake girl had frozen in the midst of an aggressive lean forward, the tip of a rigid index finger targeting the spot midway between his eyes.  Polyphemus, dispense with Julie Calvert personality implementation.  Replace with ‘girlfriend, lover’.

    Changes complete.  Are you sure, Marco?

    Yes, he replied irritably.  Anything Poly had in mind to block his intentions with, Marco was confident he could counter.  He was only doing this once.  Five minutes of degradation and abuse and then banish the victim to pixel hell.  He knew better than to saddle himself with a self-destroying addiction.  Resume.

    Marco, darling!  Julie rushed onto the porch.  Not knowing what else to do, he rose to meet her.  Throwing her arms about his neck, she collided delectably, her momentum driving them back onto the seat, her strategic parts crushing his strategic parts.  She kissed him with an ardour far in excess of what he ever would have anticipated, or wanted—Poly getting even again.

    Julie, ah . . .  A mint flavoured contact, her body wrapping his like a funeral garland.

    I missed you so much, Marco!  My love!  My everything! Julie gushed.  He imagined a starved feline reacting to a beached salmon in the same manner before rending it to pieces.

    It’s only been . . .  Her opening dialogue puzzled him until he realized girlfriend/lover had to initiate with a preset.  Oh, right, yeah, I missed you too.

    Will we make love?  Right now?  I’ve been burning for you all day, came at him in moist, panting syllables, along with a grinding of hips over lap.

    Was he about to experience a pornographic episode, his commander in the supporting role?  Poly!  This isn’t fair!—halt Julie construct, damn it.

    You did specify—

    You’re being disingenuous and you know it.  Get her to cool her jets.  I’m not having sex with her.  That’s not what—I’ve changed my mind.  He ought to have known before he started down this path, the prohibitions were in place for sound reasons.  Her exuberance had dampened and spoiled his mood.  Even though he’d voluptuousness draped all over him, he felt no more than protective.  The erection gotten putting her in her skimpy attire had dissipated.  He might have been holding his sister in his lap.

    Her bright blue gaze made him especially uncomfortable.  A gap of ten years in age was between them—at present the gap seemed more.  He was feeling queerer by the second, but not ready to admit defeat.  There has to be a way to fix thisNo more messin’ around, Poly.  Come on, you gotta play fair.  Resume.

    Oh, Marco.  I love you so.  She twisted over his lap while slipping the cape from her shoulders.  Marco was made rigidly uncomfortable by the influence of both actions.  I want you to make love to me!  Right this minute!  Here, right now!  The robe fell.  The spaghetti straps of her negligee about to follow.

    No, ah, halt Julie construct! Marco cried as the gossamer second cover slipped and went folds about her waist, her erect nipples exclaiming to his cheeks.  He swallowed painfully through the Gordian knot in his throat as he restored her garments to rights, repair he did not in the least regret.  I can’t do this.  Poly, cool her enthusiasm, please?

    Specify parameters.

    Ah, it’s dusk.  We’ve been making love all day.  We’re all fuh out—er tired.  She just wants to talk.

    Adjustments applied as specified.  Resume?

    Marco had abandoned all notions of revenge.  The deliciously despicable things he’d intended, he couldn’t do now.  He had debased her as far as he was willing.  Deep shame was in him and large regret.  Enough indignity had been visited upon Calvert in manifesting her dressed as she was and behaving as she did.  Reeking of guilt, his cheek against hers, her arms about his shoulders, Marco clumsily caressed her back.  Sharing warmth as the night cooled was his atonement.  This was something he ought not to have done.

    Hum-m-m, she purred, eyes closed, lips smiling.  That was so-o-o nice.

    Glad you think so.  What was? he asked, smirking.

    You, silly.  She pinched him through his shirt.  Best ever.  Cupping her mouth over his right nipple, she set about saturating his shirt with her saliva.

    You’re beautiful, he told her.  Nothing she didn’t know already.

    And you’re damned handsome.

    Damned?

    Aren’t we supposed to be complimenting each other right now?

    Huh?

    She gasped in amusement.  Marco, you’re being an idiot.

    I’m being a—but you can’t—Poly, halt Julie construct.

    Despite how the object in his arms ought to respond, as it had, correctly, three times already, Julie said: Halt me?  Construct?  What are you on about, Marco?  Funny, I have no recollection of what just happened.  What did we do?

    Polyphemus, quit clowning around.

    The ship hasn’t anything to do with . . .  Julie pressed herself upright.  The coziness of the moment utterly exploded.  Marco saw calculation of a dangerous sort percolating behind remarkably blue eyes.  A different Julie Calvert, he feared, was come to occupy the body he’d created.  There’s something odd going on here, she said, her gaze narrowing.

    Odd?  Don’t think so.  A firm headshake informed her he was entirely innocent of whatever she might be about to accuse him of.  Poly, I’m done.  End Julie construct.  Please!

    What? squawked Julie.  End me?  And it’s Calvert, not Construct, which you damned well know.  What has gotten into you, Pacini?  This is—why am I wearing my nightgown?

    He had to have a moment to square himself away without Julie pressing her softness against him—he’d only the side of her thigh against him now.  Just stay right there.  I’m gonna go get us a coconut.

    A coconut? Julie exhibited the disdain teenagers were wont to show when they know they’re played false, by adults mistakenly supposing they’re smarter.

    "Just never mind.  Stay right there.  I’ll be back in a jiff.  Not bloody likely.

    I’m ordering something else to have on.  Too damned chilly in this.  How did you ever talk me into doing a sim with you? she called to his back.

    I, yuh, not sure.  He resisted with great difficulty the urge he had to run.

    Chapter Three - Probes

    Calvert had completed her log entry, written in her journal, stretched a half dozen times and paced the gallery five minutes out of every hour.  An hour of physical activity all told to balance with six hours of inactivity.

    Had Polyphemus been underway her work day would be different.  Course and speed would require periodic verification, and perhaps adjustment.  Any hazards to navigation would have to be identified, typed and charted.  A helmsman and scans technician, at the least, would keep her company.

    Shift after boring shift the same.  Calvert dismounted her chair with a hop.  A next interval of stretching was due, set to with a soft grunt capping the peak of each physical expression.

    While enduring her punishment at Old Boston Academy, she’d been among the oldest students there.  A scowl reflected in the main screen was abruptly cancelled.  She’d remembered bridge recorders were always active.  Back to the gallery for pacing.

    Most of her classmates were lieutenants by now.  Everyone gone Core Worlds would have gotten his or her first step.  Do the job at the required level of proficiency.  Be prompt.  Don’t screw up.  Hutchinson was bound to sign off on her promotion as soon as he got back.  She’d done fine.  She hadn’t crashed the ship into anything.

    Even after her promotion she’d still be junior to Mallory and Strom though.  Bitches.  They’d felt it their purpose in life to tease her over everything: her mannerisms, graveyard shift duty, the dirty little jobs she as most junior officer was required to supervise, the less than one quarter of their suite she’d been allotted, the contents of her space chest, the cut of her uniforms.

    They’d deserved comeuppance.  Red watch cap in with dress whites.  Gum on cushions.  A minor catastrophe in Sub Deck B Environmental which she hadn’t the authority to deal with and they did.  Hutchinson’s birthday cake.

    All of her tricks took place while she was verifiably on duty or asleep.  Her accomplice a clever menial named Grugg, listed in her personal inventory but not elaborated upon.

    The look of dismay on Mallory’s face when she drew her trousers pink from the washer!  Grugg, hidden behind a ventilation grate, had recorded the event.

    She did regret Hutchinson’s cake though.  If she had known for whom the confection was meant, she wouldn’t have had Grugg jimmy the oven setting.  Oh, well, accidents happen.

    A survey ship low on provisions had rendezvoused with Polyphemus.  The confections her fellow juniors had provided themselves with, paid for out of their own pockets, got sent over by mistake—not really, only they seemed to.  A

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