Circumnavigating the room’s sleek, black desk, the captain took his seat in a plastiform chair and eyed the tall blond man seated opposite him. “Welcome,” he said, “Mr.—”
“Mullen. Lieutenant Commander Steven Mullen. It’s a pleasure to make your acquaintance, sir.”
The man spoke in a clipped, efficient voice. A distinctly military voice, if Shumar was any judge of such things.
“Likewise,” the captain responded.
He brought up Mullen’s personnel file on the small screen built into the desk. It showed him everything... and nothing.
“You’ve got a degree from West Point,” said Shumar, reading from the file. “You graduated with honors. Then you signed up with Earth Command, where you flew seventeen missions against the Romulans.”
Mullen nodded. “That’s correct, sir.”
Shumar read on. “At the Battle of Aldebaran, you took command of the Panther after your captain and first officer were killed. Despite your lack of experience, you destoyed two enemy warships, not to mention a major Romulan supply depot.” He looked at Mullen. “It says here that you were given a Medal of Valor for that action.”
“That’s true as well,” the blond man replied solemnly. “But it was the crew who deserved that medal, sir. I just gave the orders. They’re the ones who carried them out.”
Shumar studied Mullen. “Do you mean that, Commander?”
The man’s forehead puckered. “I beg your pardon, sir?”
The captain shrugged and leaned back in his chair. “Every Earth Command officer I’ve ever met gives his crew credit for his success. It’s an unwritten code, I think.”
“Perhaps it is, sir,” Mullen answered earnestly. “But in this case, I mean it. My crew was responsible for that victory.”
Shumar liked the man’s approach. And Mullen’s record was impeccable. There was only one more thing he needed to know.
“Tell me something, Commander,” said the captain, “and for heaven’s sake, please be honest.”
Mullen nodded. “Of course, sir.”
Shumar leaned forward again. “How would you feel taking orders from a man who’s never commanded a starship?”
The blond man seemed to mull it over. “I don’t know, sir,” he said at last. “I suppose it would depend on the man.”
The captain considered Mullen’s response. Then he stood up and extended his hand. “Thank you, Commander.”
Mullen stood, too, and shook Shumar’s hand. There was a trace of disappointment in his eyes. After all, they had only conversed for a couple of minutes—normally not a very good sign.
“Thank you for your time,” said the commander. “And good luck, sir.”
“My luck will depend,” the captain told him.
Again, Mullen’s brow puckered. “On what, sir?”
“On you,” said Shumar. “I’d welcome you aboard, Commander, but I don’t have a ship yet. All I have is a first officer.”
Finally, Mullen allowed himself a smile. “Yes, sir. I’ll do my best not to disappoint you, sir.”
The captain smiled back at him. “I’m sure you will, Commander.”
Cobaryn scanned the personnel file displayed on the screen in front of him. “You have quite an impressive résumé, Mr. Emick.”
The sturdy-looking, sandy-haired man on the other side of the table smiled at him. “Thank you, sir.”
The Rigelian regarded Emick for a moment. The fellow was pleasant enough and his transport piloting credentials were clearly first-rate. What else could he possibly need to know?
“I am not the sort of person who requires a great deal of time to make a decision,” Cobaryn declared. “I would like to sign you on as my primary helmsman.”
Emick’s smile widened. “I’d be delighted, sir.”
Cobaryn smiled back at him. “Excellent. As soon as I know when and where you must report, I will send word to your superiors.”
“Thank you, sir,” the helmsman said. He got up to go, then stopped and looked back at the Rigelian. “May I ask a favor, sir?”
Cobaryn shrugged. “Of course.”
“I’d like permission to exceed the weight and size parameters allotted to personal effects by about thirteen percent. That is,” said Emick, “if it’s not too much trouble, sir.”
The captain looked at him. “Like you, Mr. Emick, I have never set foot on a Christopher, though I cannot imagine that a deviation of thirteen percent will be a problem. But if I may ask... what is it that you have in your possession that is both so large and so precious to you?”
“It’s a book collection,” the man told him. “You see, sir, I like to read a lot—and I like it even better when I can read from an actual volume and not a computer screen.”
Cobaryn nodded. He had heard that there was a movement of bound-paper book aficionados on Earth. Apparently, Emick was one of them.
“Do you have any special interests?” he asked.
“Quite a few, actually,” the man told him. “Antarctic zoology. Aboriginal music. Religious art. Organized crime.”
The last subject piqued the Rigelian’s interest more than the others. “Organized crime?” he echoed. “What is that?”
“A phenomenon of Earth’s early twentieth century,” said Emick. “Some of Earth’s larger urban centers were plagued by a number of illegal and often violent organizations.”
Cobaryn absorbed the information. “I see. And you are in some way attracted to these organizations?”
The man recoiled. “No, sir. I’m appalled by them... of course. But they’re still fascinating when viewed as a subculture.”
The captain didn’t see the appeal. “I suppose I will have to take your word for it.”
“Or,” Emick suggested as an alternative, “you could borrow one of my favorite books on the subject—Chicago Mobs of the Twenties, by Billings and Torgelson. Then you could judge for yourself.”
Cobaryn effected another smile. “It would be my pleasure to do so. And by the way, your request for additional storage space is granted.”
The helmsman’s eyes crinkled at the corners. “I’m grateful for your understanding, sir.”
“You and I and the other members of our crew have a lot of hard work ahead of us,” the Rigelian noted. “I want us all to be as comfortable on our vessel as possible.”
“I will certainly be more comfortable knowing I’ve got my books around me,” Emick assured him. “Thank you again, sir.”
“Think nothing of it,” Cobaryn told the fellow graciously. “Consider yourself dismissed.”
He watched Emick leave the cubicle. Then he sat back in his plastiform chair and tried to imagine an Earth overrun by men dedicated to violence. It just didn’t seem possible.
But then, in that same century, humans had supposedly inhaled the smoke of burning vegetation, built habitations on geological faults, and destroyed herbivores for sport ...so he had to concede that anything was possible.
Matsura felt funny as he stepped out of the shuttle pod and waited for the woman who had accompanied him to do the same.
Her name was Martha Megapenthes and she was the leading candidate for the job of chief engineer on his ship—a position formerly held by a man named Warneke, who had opted for retirement once the war was over.
Normally, Matsura would have conducted the woman’s interview entirely in a room back on Earth, where he had conducted all his other interviews. Nor was he the type to break with convention very often. But in this instance, he felt circumstances demanded it.
As Megapenthes extracted herself from the pod, she looked a little out of place. But then, she had spent the war teaching warp theory at a university back on Earth.
“Looks interesting,” she said of the shuttle bay.
Matsura smiled and gestured in the direction of the exit. “This way.”
He led the way out of the bay and into the corridor beyond, which took them to the nearest turbolift. As soon as both of them were inside the compartment, Matsura pressed the button that would direct the lift system to take them to their destination.
Megapenthes looked at him as the compartment began to move. “Begging the captain’s pardon, but you haven’t told me where we’re going.”
“It’s no mystery,” he said. “We’re headed for the supply room on Deck Six. That’s where we keep—”
“The ship’s complement of containment suits,” she finished for him. “I know that. But—”
“But why are we going there?” Matsura asked. “Actually, I want to test your abilities as an engineer.”
Megapenthes looked confused. “In a supply room?”
He nodded. “In a supply room.”
“But my qualifications—”
“Are impressive,” he told her. “You know warp field physics as well as anyone I’ve ever met. But it’s been my experience that good engineers are good with their hands, with fixing things that are broken—because on a ship like this one, things are breaking all the time.”
“I see,” she said.
Matsura felt a bit of a jolt as they reached Deck Six. He waited for the doors to open, then emerged from the lift compartment and turned in the direction of the supply room.
Megapenthes didn’t ask any other questions as they followed the curve of the corridor. Obviously, he thought, she was trying to figure out what the captain had up his sleeve.
When they reached the supply room, Matsura tapped the pad on the bulkhead and the titanium doors parted for them, revealing two rows of goldcolored metal lockers. The door to one of the lockers was ajar.
The captain pointed to the open door and turned to Megapenthes. “Can you fix that?” he asked her.
The woman looked at him, a smile tugging at the corners of her mouth. “You mean the locker...?”
“I know,” Matsura said. “It sounds like it should be easy compared to something like warp core physics. But that locker hasn’t closed properly since we got knocked around in the Battle of Cheron. Nobody—I mean nobody—seems able to get it hung correctly, including the guy who was chief engineer on this ship for years before I got here.”
Megapenthes advanced to the locker and took the door in her hand. She swung it back and forth a few times. Then she eyed the captain.
“Let me get this straight,” she said. “If I can fix this locker, you’ll make me chief of your engineering section?”
“That’s the offer,” Matsura confirmed.
She studied his face for a while, then shook her head from side to side. “No. There’s got to be a catch.”
“No catch,” he assured her. “Can you do it?”
The woman laughed. “Well, yes... of course I can.”
“Good. I’ll see to it that you’re supplied with tools. Then I’ll check back in... say, an hour?”
That was fine with Megapenthes. “Piece of cake,” she told him.
Unfortunately, even after an hour had gone by, the door to the locker still didn’t close right. Megapenthes was at a loss to explain it, but there it was, as uncooperative as ever.
And Captain Matsura was forced to return to Earth to try to find another chief engineer.
Stiles went over Elena Ezquerra’s file as he had gone over more than a dozen others that day.
He took note of the time she had put in on the Timber Wolf and the Wildcat. He saw the commendations she had received for bravery and initiative over the last couple of years. And he read the glowing praise that Captain Renault had heaped on her.
When Stiles was finished with the file, he looked up at the petite, dark-haired woman. She looked eager to see what he thought of her.
“I like what I see here,” he told her. “I like it a lot.”
Ezquerra’s eyes lit up. “Very kind of you to say so, sir.”
The captain shook his head. “It’s not kind of me at all, Lieutenant. In fact, it’s downright cruel.”
The woman sat back in her seat. “I beg your pardon, sir?”
“It’s cruel,” he explained, “that despite all your considerable qualifications, I can’t bring you aboard.”
Ezquerra looked perplexed. “I’m afraid I don’t understand, sir.”
“It’s very simple,” Stiles told her. “Starfleet has put a cap on the number of Earth Command people we can take on as officers—and I’ve already filled my quota. So the only way I can add you to my crew is if you accept a demotion, which I would never ask you to do.”
The lieutenant’s shoulders slumped. “I see,” she said.
But it was clear to him that she didn’t like it. And for that matter, neither did he.
“There’s one other thing I can do,” Stiles said. “I can recommend you to one of the other captains in the hope they’ve still got room for you.”
Ezquerra smiled a halfhearted smile. “You don’t have to do that, sir.”
“Actually,” the captain replied, “I do, Lieutenant—because the alternative is to go track down my superior and vent my considerable frustration on him and maybe get myself court-martialed in the process. And as you can imagine, I don’t see that as a viable option.”
The woman took a moment to figure out what he had just said. When she was done, she nodded. “In that case, thank you, sir.”
“It’s the least I can do,” Stiles told her.
Then he tapped the communications stud on the side of the desk and put in a call to Matsura.
Dane walked straight into his bedroom and hit the sack without even taking his boots off.
For a while, he just lay there, his mind reeling after an entire day spent staring at strange faces and personnel files that had begun to blur together all too quickly.
If Dane had needed further proof that he had no business in Starfleet, he had now received it in ample supply. How was he supposed to know who would be a good officer and who wouldn’t? By making small talk for a few minutes? By counting the commendations in a damned computer file?
In some cases, he had picked the candidates with the most experience. In others, he had gone with a gut feeling. And as the day wore on, he had simply picked anyone who could do the job.
Dane was pretty sure that wasn’t the way it was supposed to work. He was certain that none of his fellow captains had handled it that way. But then, he wasn’t anything like his fellow captains.
Which is why, years from now, they would be flying the Daedalus and her sister ships . . .and he would be back in his Cochrane escorting cargo tubs through the worst neighborhoods the galaxy had to offer.
“Captain Dane?” came a voice, jolting him out of his reverie.
Dane swore under his breath. “That’s me.”
“This is Captain Fitzgerald in Earth orbit. I’ve got orders to turn the Maverick over to you at your earliest convenience.”
Dane grunted. The Maverick, eh? Was that his uncle’s idea of a joke?
“When should I expect you?” Fitzgerald asked.
Dane swung his legs out of bed. “Now,” he said.
There was a pause. “Now?”
“Now,” Dane confirmed. “Or, to be more accurate, as soon as I can get to a working transporter platform.”
“Transporter? I’m afraid I don’t—”
“I know, it sounds crazy. But the eggheads here have developed a transporter that can reach ships in orbit.”
It had actually been designed for the Daedalus. However, Dane didn’t think Fitzgerald needed to know that.
There was another pause—one that seemed to reek of resentment. “Acknowledged, Captain. Fitzgerald out.”
In the silence that followed, Dane actually felt nervous. His heart was beating harder than it should have and there was an unfamiliar weakness in his knees. But it didn’t stop him.
He made his way out of his quarters, followed the corridor to another corridor and then another, and finally found the facility’s main transporter room. It was manned by a single operator, a muscular man with dark, neatly combed hair.
“Can I help you, sir?” the man asked Dane.
“You can indeed,” the captain told him. “You can send me up to the Maverick. She’s in Earth orbit.”
He stepped up onto the transporter disc and waited for the operator to comply. But it didn’t happen.
“I wasn’t notified of any transports this evening,” the man said.
Dane looked at him. “So?”
The transporter operator frowned. “My orders require me to follow a schedule, sir. You’re not on my schedule.”
Dane came down off the disc and crossed the room. “Let’s see that schedule you’re talking about.”
The man pointed it out on his monitor. “You see, sir? There’s no mention of any transports this evening.”
“That’s funny,” said Dane, punching in a little-known access code and then tapping his name out. Letter by letter, it appeared on the screen. “It looks to me like you’ve got a transport scheduled after all.”
The operator read Dane’s name. Then he looked at the captain, amazed. “How did you do that?”
Dane smiled a thin smile. “I’ve been doing it since I was ten. It’s one of the perks of growing up a Command brat. Now are you going to transport me or do I have to do it myself?”
The dark-haired man hesitated for a moment. Then he said, “I’m ready when you are, sir.”
“Thanks a bunch,” Dane told him.
Crossing the room again, he stepped up onto the transporter disc. A moment later, he saw the operator go to work.
In less than a minute, the captain’s surroundings vanished—and he found himself in a much smaller chamber. He recognized it as the transporter room of a Christopher-class starship.
How about that, he thought, I’m still in one piece. Guess those eggheads knew what they were doing.
There was a tall, balding man in a black-and-gold Earth Command uniform standing beside the control console. “Welcome to the Maverick,” he said. “I’m Captain Fitzgerald.”
His tone told Dane that he wouldn’t have minded waiting until morning to bring his replacement aboard. In fact, he probably wouldn’t have minded waiting until the millennium.
“I imagine you’ll want to see the ship,” Fitzgerald said.
Descending from the disc, Dane made his way across the room. “Look,” he told his predecessor, “I know my way around a Christopher. You don’t have to hold my hand if you’ve got something better to do.”
He had meant it as a magnanimous gesture. If it were his vessel, he would have hated the idea of giving his successor a tour.
But Fitzgerald obviously didn’t see it that way. “It’s my duty to show you around, Captain. I’m going to see that duty done.”
Dane shrugged. “Suit yourself.”
Together, they left the transporter room and headed down the corridor to the nearest turbolift. En route, they passed a couple of lieutenants who acknowledged Fitzgerald but didn’t so much as glance at Dane.
“Friendly crew you’ve got here,” he noted. “I guess they’re no more thrilled about giving up their ship than you are.”
Fitzgerald shot him a stern look. “Frankly, it’s not just a matter of giving up the Maverick. It’s that we’re giving it up to someone who’s never worn the uniform.”
Dane stiffened at the unexpected arrogance behind the rebuke. Who did these Earth Command types think they were? A superior species?
“It’s funny,” he said, refusing to rise to the bait. “I seem to hear that sort of thing a lot lately.”
“And how do you respond?” Fitzgerald asked.
“Is that meant to be a gibe?” Dane countered bluntly.
“No. I’d really like to know,” said Fitzgerald, allowing only the merest note of irony to creep into his voice.
Dane opened the doors with a tap of the pad on the bulkhead beside them. “Usually,” he said in a matter-of-fact tone, “I tell them to go to hell. But that’s only when they’re not performing a life or death service like playing tour guide.”
Fitzgerald’s eyes became daggers as the doors finished sliding open. “Understand something, Captain. This vessel saw us through the worst of the war. If I hear you’re mistreating her, I’ll personally shove you out a missile tube.”
Dane tried to keep a lid on his emotions as he entered the lift compartment. “Let’s make a deal,” he said as calmly as he could. “You don’t make any more stupid threats and I’ll treat this ship better than you ever did. I’ll bring her flowers twice a week, wine her and dine her, bring her chocolates, the works. What do you say?”
Fitzgerald reddened. “That’s not what I meant.”
“Oh?” said Dane, feigning surprise. “Then what did you mean? That I was purposely going to bounce her through an asteroid belt?”
The other man scowled, accentuating the lines in his face. “I meant this ship is a whole lot more than you deserve.”
“Maybe so,” Dane replied evenly. “But then, the galaxy seldom plays fair, Captain. As someone who’s fought a war all by himself, you should appreciate that.” He indicated the inside of the turbolift with a flourish. “Care to join the tour?”
Biting his lip, Fitzgerald stepped inside and pressed the stud that closed the doors. Then he punched in a destination.
But before he could send the lift on its way, Dane canceled the command and instituted one of his own. “Let’s go straight to the bridge,” he said. “That’s the part I’m really looking forward to.”
Fitzgerald didn’t say anything—either at that moment or any other—as the lift made its way to the Maverick’ s command nexus. When they arrived, Dane took it on himself to open the doors.
As they slid apart, he absorbed the sight of his new bridge—a gold enclosure full of sleek, black consoles. Of course, it looked a lot like the bridges he had seen on a half dozen other Christophers in his lifetime. But there was something about this one that made Dane’s heart skip a beat.
“Captain on the bridge,” someone announced.
Dane didn’t know if the man was talking about him or Fitzgerald. What’s more, he didn’t much care.
“At ease,” he said, speaking up before his counterpart could.
There were eight officers on the bridge. They all looked at him—none of them with the least bit of kindness.
“This is Captain Dane,” Fitzgerald pointed out dutifully. “The new commanding officer of—”
“They don’t care who I am,” Dane interjected. “They’re like you in that regard, Captain. They just want to know me well enough to hate me for taking their ship away.”
The bridge officers stared at him disbelievingly. Obviously, they had never heard anyone speak that way to their superior.
“So let’s do everyone a favor,” Dane went on. “Now that Captain Fitzgerald has given me my tour—and let me tell you, what a splendid tour it was—why don’t you all take a last look around the ship? Go ahead. I can handle the bridge by myself.”
Fitzgerald glared at him. “You’re out of your mind. This is a Christopher, man. If something goes wrong—”
“I’ll take my chances,” Dane told him. “And unless I’m mistaken, it’s my option to do that ...since this vessel officially stopped being Earth Command property the moment you slipped into orbit.”
The muscles worked furiously in Fitzgerald’s jaw. “That’s exactly right,” he conceded. “I commend you on your grasp of protocol, Captain.”
“Please,” said Dane. “You’ll give me a swelled head. Now go. Get out of here, all of you.”
The officers glanced at Fitzgerald, who nodded reluctantly. Then, little by little, they filed into the turbolift. It took two trips for the compartment to take them all away, but eventually it did its job.
When the doors slid closed on the second group, Dane walked over to the captain’s chair and sat down. He looked around at the empty duty stations, both fore and aft, and imagined them full of the officers he had signed a few hours earlier, their faces turned to him for orders.
Dane wouldn’t have admitted it out loud, but he had never been so scared in all his life.