A Just Determination (14 page)

The quarterdeck area never felt large. With the burial party assembled in it, and with everyone trying to leave at least a small gap between themselves and the body tube holding the remains of Petty Officer Davidas, it felt tight enough to induce claustrophobia. Paul squeezed in next to Kris Denaldo, who smiled briefly in wordless greeting before turning a somber gaze back on the body tube. Carl moved farther forward, close to the body tube, where he joined the enlisted members of the burial party.

"Attention on deck." Everyone stiffened to the best of their ability as Captain Wakeman and Commander Herdez wedged themselves into the crowd. Wakeman, looking decidedly uncomfortable, muttered "at ease" and gestured toward Herdez.

The XO cleared her throat. "We are here to commit the mortal remains of Petty Officer Michael Davidas to the depths of space. His family has indicated their desire that he be cremated within the Sun's own fires. Upon completion of this service, his body tube will be fired on a trajectory which will, in the course of time, bring it to that end." She consulted her data link, then began reciting the Burial Service. As the words came out, Herdez' voice softened and took on a lilting cadence, drawing surprised glances from most of the officers and enlisted present. Ending, Herdez put away her data link. "Now, I invite you to join me in the Navy Hymn." She began singing, also softly, as the others on the quarterdeck joined in raggedly.

* * *

Eternal Father, strong to save,
Whose arm hath bound the restless wave,
Who bidd'st the mighty ocean deep
Its own appointed limits keep;
Oh, hear us when we cry to Thee,
For those in peril on the sea!

* * *

Eternal Father, King of birth,
Who didst create the heaven and earth,
And bid the planets and the sun
Their own appointed orbits run;
O hear us when we seek thy grace
From those who soar through outer space.

* * *

The singing tapered off, then Commander Herdez looked around

the quarterdeck at those present. "The Navy Hymn was originally written in the 1860s. The verse speaking of those in space was added in the 1960s. Sailors have always faced peril, and not always come home. But Petty Officer Davidas is part of a endless line of explorers and seafarers stretching back for untold centuries. Now he has gone to join them, and their ranks are surely brightened by that." Herdez nodded to a bosun mate who placed his left hand on the controls of a portable stereo. "Hand salute."

Everyone somehow managed to find the room to swing their arms up and hold their best salutes.

The bosun hit the Play control on his stereo, and the slow, mournful notes of Taps echoed softly through the quarterdeck until the last, long measure trailed off into silence.

"Two."

Everyone dropped their salutes.

"That is all. Thank you for coming."

"Wait a minute." The beginnings of movement halted as Captain Wakeman finally spoke again. "I wanted to pass on some good news on this solemn occasion." A nervous smile flickered across his face. "As some of you know, we've been watching a South Asian Alliance ship for some time. He's been hugging the edge of our area, but he's just taken the plunge and he's coming right through without requesting permission. We're going to intercept that ship! Who knows, we may even have to seize it. It's a great opportunity, and, well, let's get after him!" Wakeman ducked out the hatch, leaving silence behind him.

Paul watched Commander Herdez' face as she eyed the Captain's departure, her expression revealing no emotion.

After a brief pause, Herdez glanced around once again. "Dismissed."

Paul held himself in place, waiting for a few moments while others tried to wedge themselves through the hatches instead of fighting the crowd himself. His gaze settled on the body tube and the four sailors standing beside it along with Carl Meadows, ready to transport it to the launch tube from which it would be fired into space.
Another ship, coming through this area and apparently deliberately defying the U.S. claim to this part of space. Does it know we're here? We might have been detected when we sent in the investigation report
. Rumors of Q-ships came back to haunt him.
Is it armed, a warship in disguise, maybe planning to surprise us and take us out before we can defend ourselves? Are we going to be in a shooting engagement before all is said and done?
He watched the body tube, wondering if it would be merely the first of many he'd see on this trip. Wakeman's enthusiasm seemed not only inappropriate, but also thoughtless.
I need to take another look at our orders
.

The other ship stood out easily against the backdrop of space, but then most objects did. Like all warships, the USS
Michaelson
carried a wide variety of eyes with which to scan the heavens for items of interest. Some were devoted to watching for natural objects that might pose a hazard to the
Michaelson
herself by blundering through the same location in space at the same time as the ship. Others watched for human artifacts, which could generate hazards of a different nature.

"Space is cold." Jan Tweed pointed at the read-out beneath the symbol representing the intruding ship. "Look how much hotter that ship is than the temperature of space around it. It's like seeing a campfire in the distance."

"Do we have any visual yet?" Paul leaned closer to the display as if that could somehow resolve details on the distant ship better.

"Just background occlusion." As objects moved through space they might not be directly visible themselves, but their movement could be spotted by watching them block the view of stars behind them. "Nothing detailed."

"Strong temperature variation and background occlusion. Then it's not a warship."

Jan shrugged. "Or it is a warship, and he's turned off his can't-see-me system and is broadcasting vented waste heat instead of recycling it."

"I guess that could be true, couldn't it?" Paul glanced upward, as if he could somehow see the sophisticated system which made the
Michaelson
and other warships so hard to spot. Almost the entire outer hull was covered with micro-lenses interspersed with video displays. Anything a lens saw on one side of the ship was looped 180 degrees to the opposite side of the ship and displayed on a screen. With all the lenses and screens working, all you saw when you looked at the
Michaelson
was whatever the lenses on the opposite side were seeing, just as if the ship weren't there at all blocking the view. Effectively, the
Michaelson
bent light around her and remained invisible inside her cocoon. It wasn't a perfect system because small gaps existed in the lens/screen array, but you had to get pretty close to spot those gaps. With waste heat disposal minimized and directed out along an empty vector away from the ship, neither visual nor infra-red sensors had much chance of seeing the Michaelson from a distance.

"Yup." Tweed eyed him dubiously. "Did you read the intelligence assessment on Q-ships?"

"Yeah. 'Insufficient evidence exists to either prove or disprove the existence of Q-ship type combatants, so caution is advised when approaching other ships.'" Paul quoted. "That's a lot of help."

"Sir?" Paul turned at the question, seeing both enlisted watch standers eyeing him and Lieutenant Tweed. "Sir, we've heard these Q-ship things mentioned a lot. What are they?"

Jan made a deferring gesture to Paul, who ordered his thoughts before speaking. "The basic idea's been around a long time. You make a warship look like an innocent merchant ship, and when your prey gets close enough you drop the disguise and open fire."

"I saw a video where pirates did that," the bosun mate of the watch offered. "Way back when, with sailing ships and stuff. How come they call 'em Q-ships?"

"Because that's what the Brits called them during World War One. They had a serious problem with enemy submarines attacking their merchant ships, so they made these ships they called Q-ships as sort of a secret name. If a submarine approached on the surface to sink what it thought was a helpless merchant, the Q-ship would try to surprise and sink the sub."

"That's a nasty trick. So that guy we're heading to intercept might be that kind of trap?"

"It's . . . possible. There's no proof any Q-ships actually exist in space."

"Ships go missing," the quartermaster of the watch insisted. "Just gone."

Lieutenant Tweed smiled indulgently. "Accidents. Unfortunately, they happen."

"Well, maybe, Ma'am." Plainly unconvinced, the quartermaster exchanged glances with the bosun mate, then the two enlisted watch standers launched into a whispered discussion of the pirate video one had seen.

"I don't think you convinced them," Paul muttered.

Jan smiled crookedly. "I know a little bit about fear, Paul. I don't like that we don't know more about this other ship, I don't like the way he's heading straight into our area so brazenly, and I don't like all the rumors about covert warships."

"A lot of rumors are just garbage. Totally wrong."

"How many rumors do you have to bet your life on them being garbage?"

"Not a lot." Paul tagged the ship's symbol and read the associated data as it scrolled by. "They think it's a South Asian Alliance ship?"

"That's what they think."

"The South Asians have been pretty aggressive lately, back on Earth.

"I read the same intelligence reports you did, Paul. If you're trying to reassure me, you're doing a lousy job."

"Do you think he knows we're here? If our transmission of the death investigation report betrayed our general location, why would he have decided to make a dash inside our sovereign claimed area?"

"You said the SASALs have been aggressive lately. Maybe knowing we're here is why that ship decided to come in. The timing's about right, anyway."

"But, why . . . ?"
That's what a Q-ship would do, wouldn't it? If it was looking for a victim to come running up to it. But it's also what any other ship trying to challenge our sovereign claim would do. If we didn't react to the incursion when we had a ship nearby, it would make a stronger case that we hadn't enforced our claim
. "I really don't like this. I hope we handle this intercept real carefully."

"Why don't you let the Captain know that?" She smiled briefly to rob the words of offense, then rushed to change the subject. "You ready for the zone inspection?"

"The zone inspection?" Paul rubbed his eyes. "I've hardly thought about it. With everything going on . . ." His voice trailed off as he caught the look on Jan's face. "The XO's just going to check our spaces, right? She's going to walk through and see how clean and well-maintained they are. I'm sure Chief Imari—"

"Have you talked to Chief Imari about it?"

"Uh . . . I think I did."

"Paul, the XO is death on zone inspections. You better make sure the spaces you have responsibility for look good." She checked the time. "Not that you'll have much chance to fix them if they're not. The inspection is half an hour after we get off watch. Maybe you ought to give Chief Imari a call?"

"Yeah. Maybe."
But I've been doing so much extra work for Herdez on this legal stuff, and that's one of the reasons I didn't remember to do more preparations for this inspection. Surely the XO will take that into account. Still, I guess I better check with Chief Imari anyway
. Paul was reaching for the comm pad when their watch reliefs arrived. It wasn't until he was leaving the bridge that he remembered the aborted call to Chief Imari.

As it turned out, Paul wasn't able to locate Chief Imari before having to join Commander Garcia and Commander Herdez, who were ready to begin the inspection. "Where's Lieutenant Tweed?" Garcia barked, a question which now tended to instantly generate a headache in Paul. Fortunately, Jan Tweed rushed up a moment later, apologizing for being last in a swift, low voice and looking away rather than face Garcia and the XO directly. Breathing a silent prayer, Paul followed the others as the inspection party trooped through the Operations Department spaces assigned to the Operations Specialist Division.

For the most part, Herdez remained silent as they went through Tweed's spaces, occasionally checking a detail up close or nodding in brief approval over some well-maintained equipment. A gleaming knife-edge on an emergency hatch actually drew a few words of praise.

"Mr. Sinclair." Paul winced inside at the XO's tone as she pointed at a similar but tarnished edge in one of his spaces. "Unacceptable." His guts got tighter as they proceeded and Herdez issued head-shakes and frowns over discrepancies in cleanliness and maintenance.

At the end of the excursion, Herdez faced the others. "Good job, Lieutenant Tweed. Ensign Sinclair, your spaces need considerable work. I will conduct another inspection of them at fourteen hundred tomorrow. I expect them to meet standards by then." With a nod to Commander Garcia, she turned and headed away.

Garcia, his face darkening more with each passing second, waited until the XO turned a corner before rounding on Paul. "What the hell excuse do you have for not properly preparing for that inspection?"

A million possible answers flooded through Paul's mind, even though he knew only one answer would not only keep him from being verbally ripped apart but also be true. "I have no excuse, sir."

Garcia glowered, raising both hands in a threatening gesture he converted to a single finger not far from Paul's nose. "You will make sure your spaces are ready for the XO's reinspection tomorrow. There will be no discrepancies. Is that understood?"

"Yes, sir."

"If you ever fail a zone inspection in my department again, I will make sure you wish you'd never been born. Is that understood?"

"Yes, sir."

Garcia seemed to be on the verge of saying more, but choked off whatever it might have been then left, somehow managing to stomp even in zero g.

Paul took a deep breath, shuddering slightly. "Damn."

Jan Tweed, her head slightly lowered, was looking at him out of the corner of her eye. "You made Garcia look bad, Paul."