Chronicles of Athena Lee (15 page)

“Commander Arthur, I am ordering you to follow me to the boat bay. Are you refusing a direct order?” The engineer shook his head no.

“Then come with me. All will be explained. Lieutenant? Finish up with what you were doing and have your crew meet us in the boat bay.”

“Sir? I need to leave one man in life support.”

“Leave Midshipman Bartleby, I think he can handle it.” Commander Arthur visibly started.

“Midshipman? That man is no Midshipman! What nonsense is this, Sir.” Arthur was now waving his hands and getting red faced again.

With a sigh the XO pointed toward the fore of the ship. “Boat bay commander, NOW!” Arthur and the XO left, the engineer was still arguing with the commander.

“You heard the commander, wrap it up. It looks like you might keep that rank Bartleby.” I smiled at my team as they kicked it into gear and closed up all the consoles.

Off to the boat bay. I whistled a faint tune that had to do with hills and woods. My team rolled their eyes at me.

Reaching the boat bay we slid into the back and stood along the wall. Most of the rescue group was already here. Commander Arthur’s officers stood under light guard near the temporary hospital. Most of the civilians had already been evacuated to the James Cook. Commander Wang stood in front of the small crowd.

“If I may have your attention please.” The room quieted. “Thank you. We will be towing the Happy back to New Reno. Everyone should prepare for extraction in one hour. Our Captain wanted me to relay his thanks for all of our hard work. Be assured that you will be rewarded for it. Now let’s get ready to go home.” Everyone got to work breaking down the hospital and stacking equipment.

I caught the XO’s attention. “Sir we found two auxiliary generators, so we can disconnect the shuttle and pinnace from life support. Something funny about one of them though.”

“How so, Athena.” Wow, he used my first name. I giggled in my head.

“It has writing on it saying that it was the
Property of the EOS Oneders.
I checked and that ship disappeared on a routine patrol last year. The other one is interesting too. I have never seen such an old model, how did they get on board?”

Nodding the XO agreed with me. “I too have noticed some inconsistencies with this ship. The Gilmore G. also. You will have to fill out your AAR and get with me later.”

“Sir, about Commander Arthur? Is he in trouble because of my actions sir?” I asked while glancing at the now sweating Chief Engineer.

“Don’t worry about him Athena. Just get your team ready to leave.” He walked over to the marines.

My team disconnected our ship from the Happy's life support system and reconnected it to the back-up generators. We then boarded the shuttles and returned to the James Cook.

Chapter 9

Stirring an ant hill with a stick is the only comparison that I can think of for the events that transpired upon our return to the James Cook. Organized chaos reigned all around us. Too many inconsistencies with the two ships and odd occurrences with the survivors. My link pinged that there was a captain’s conference at 0900 hours. I had orders to be present. Great. More fun. Leaving the shuttle I made sure that my engineering team had gotten back in one piece. I assigned Midshipman Bartleby to stow all of our equipment in its proper location. Excluding their regular duties I informed my now former-team to take the rest of the day off. They'd earned it.

When my personal pain-in-the-ass alarm went off at 0700 with Wilson playing weird music singing 'about doing something', I was grouchy to say the least. The day before had been a very long day. I cleaned up, how I got bits of ash in my hair while inside my suit I will never know. Space pixies or something.

“Space pixies! Athena you need to call Geraldo about that, he loves pixies.” Wilson was in rare form today.

“Geraldo? What's a Geraldo? Wilson, what are you blathering on about?” He was starting to get annoying. He needs a project.

Dressed in my best and only clean uniform, I proceeded to the Captains conference room. The two armed marines at the hatch stepped aside at my entrance to reveal the Captain seated inside. Captain Gorshin was an enigma to me. The rarely seen captain had a well known history both with the former PPL navy and the current EOM. We had only met just the one time, when I first reported aboard the ship. Entering the conference room I saw all the top ranked officers on the ship. Other than the stewards, I was the lowest ranking officer in the room.

“Nice of you to join us Lieutenant Lee.” I jumped in surprise. Commander Wang was standing behind me.

“Find a seat, somewhere near the front. This conference is about the intelligence that was found on those two ships.”

“Lots of juicy stuff in the data-banks about what they found over there Athena. Interested?” Wilson was enjoying himself.

“NO! Shut up! I need to listen.” My comment to Wilson was just a bit loud. The commanders sitting beside me must have heard me because they started looking at me funny. Great, talking to myself, now everyone will think I am insane.

Captain Goshin brought the room to attention. “Be seated people. This will be a round table discussion concerning yesterday's events on board the Happy and the Gilmore G. We will start with a report from Commander Wang. Commander?”

“I wanted to begin with commendations for our rescue personnel. When we boarded the Happy life support was at 18% and falling, only quick decisions by the engineering team led by Lieutenant Lee halted that decline. Our med team braved the fire quite literally and saved many lives in disregard for their own. Commendations are being placed in your records.” He glanced in my direction. “Discoveries by the engineering team led to further areas by our intelligence group. These ships were not the victims of pirates as we previously believed.”

“They are the pirates!”

The officers in the room began to murmur to themselves. “Quiet down please. Our marine team, along with intelligence, helped to secure the gunship: The Gilmore G. It was a hostile boarding. When the crew on board saw marines, not the expected med personnel, they attacked with small weapons fire trying to escape. While not our intent we took the ship by force. A data dump of their computers showed falsified reports and evidence of pirate activities. The ships were owned by two brothers, Jervis and Morris Tetch. They were on the bridge of the Happy and were killed during the attack. The rest of the crew shows up in our files as having criminal records. Our engineering team on the Happy found equipment on board that came from at least one navy ship, the EOH Oneders. That ship was reported missing two years ago in sector 10.The Intelligence personnel have begun interrogations of the crew. Captain?” Sighing Commander Wang then sat back down, nodding to the Captain.

The now stern faced Captain looked in my direction “Lieutenant Lee? Can you discuss the damages to the Happy please?”

Like a deer in the headlights I was caught with my finger in my ear. Oops. “Yes sir. The damage to the Happy was caused by War Shot. Either early Earth tech lasers or later pre-war colony copies. Some of the shots were direct hits on both the bridge and engineering. Opened to space, everyone on the bridge was killed instantly; only a few even had on skinsuits. In engineering, hits damaged life support and severed a plasma line. Leaking plasma started a fire that spread to the engine room. Little or no maintenance by the Happy's crew allowed the fire to engulf the engine area without any of the fire suppression systems kicking in. By the time we got there the crew was spraying water on a plasma fire. Surprisingly no one was killed. They didn't think to deploy the foam system. The engine is a total loss. Life support is currently running on an Auxiliary generator.”

“Lieutenant, how did you repair the life support system? Commander Wang said that you did something non-standard.”

My face began to get a little red. “Sir, I cross connected the conduits to our shuttle craft and rebooted the system. Essentially our ship was the life support system and the freighter was the pump.”

“That is something that I have NEVER heard of doing, in both the navies that I served. How is that you thought of it on the fly like you did?”

“Sir, I had used a similar set-up on Firefly station when life support failed due to a bad connection.” Not that I'm going to mention that I had been the one who connected something wrong and almost killed myself.

“If it's stupid and works it isn't stupid, my own father used to say that. Write it up. I will submit it to fleet for you. That could prove useful in another situation like this one. That brings us to another issue that has come up.”

The Captain turned to the Master-at-Arms. “Commander Arthur our Chief Engineer is under arrest along with most of his officers. The charges range from cowardice to malfeasance. He will face Court Martial proceedings along with several of his officers. That leaves a giant hole in engineering.” Both the Captain and the XO looked at me. “Lieutenant Lee step forward please.”

Crap. What now? Anxious and very nervous, I stepped forward.

“While you are only a lieutenant, you are the best engineer we have. I would like you to take over engineering on a temporary basis, just until a replacement can be sent from Fleet HQ. We have already given a 'battlefield commission' to one of your crewmen that will stand. He gets to keep the rank. Select one more to help you run the department.”

Without a second thought I said “Crewman Jacobs sir. He was a huge help on board the Happy. If not him then Ellery, sir.”

“OK, either I or Commander Todd will get with them and see if they want the rank. For now get down to engineering and get started. Use my name or the XO's. Send anyone who objects to see me. Understood? Dismissed.”

Wow, I'm in charge. Holy cheese balls! I danced a little jig in the corridor as I exited the meeting.

Chapter 10

The entire time I've been aboard the James Cook engineering has been the personal fiefdom of Commander Arthur. He ruled our section like a feudal lord. His cronies enjoyed pushing off all of their work onto other crewman, namely me. I enjoyed the work even though I had lots of extra duties. It was fun to take things apart. Even with the extra duties I treated it as a learning experience. With the 'Lord of the Manor' in jail it was time to see what the peasants had been up to.

“Wilson?” Silence. “Wilson!”

“Yes Athena?”

“See if you can get into Commander Arthur's computer, without alerting security, and find out what he has been doing in engineering. Please?”

“Yippee, I almost can't contain my glee.” Such a weirdo, that AI.

Heads barely turned when I entered engineering. Lt. Commander Heed was supervising the crewmen in the scheduled engine take-down and cleaning.

With a sneer the commander turned to me. “It's about time you reported in. Hope you had fun slacking off over on those ships. The Chief left a long list of...chores for you to do. For starters you can take over here. I have other more important things to do.”

Typical. I kept still and for half a minute just stared at him.

“Well? What are you waiting for? Get to work! I see what the Chief means about you being a waste of space.”

“Commander Heed, the Captain and the XO have sent me down to take over engineering. Chief Engineer Arthur has been placed under arrest.”

“You, YOU are in charge? Nonsense, I am the superior officer here!”

His pompous attitude was getting old. “Sir, Commander Wang told me to inform you to report to either him or to the Captain, for your new assignment and orders.”

“We will just have to see about THAT!” The officer stormed out of engineering slamming the hatch behind him.

The various crewman all stared at me with big eyes.

“Regardless of what Commander Heed thinks, as of 0900 hours I have been placed in command. We need to get this section shipshape as soon as possible. Both Jacobs and Ellery have accepted a promotion to midshipman, Bartlby gets to keep his rank. Things are going to be different around here, I promise.”

Rubbing my hands together, I turned toward the engine take-down. “Let’s get finished and get to work.”

Lt Commander Heed and Ensign Parker from night shift were reassigned. Other than being snobby, no actual charges were laid against them. Digging around the former commander’s office was a heavy job. Investigators from security had already been through there and it was a real mess. They had left instructions to the effect that if I found something 'hinky', to let them know. Checking the master repair list I found that it had not been completed, except by me in several months. Just what had Arthur and all the other officers been doing all this time? My new midshipman took to their new jobs like ducks to water. When I exited 'MY' new office small teams were fixing and repairing all the systems and equipment in the bay. Awesome.