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“That was my thinking, too.”

We split up at the office door and I only got a glimpse of Ulla Nart’s hopeful, but tear smeared face before Arletta closed the door, and I headed for the mess deck.

When I got there, every head turned toward me and I just stood for a heartbeat. They all knew I had something to say. I saw it in their faces. Juliett and Charlotte were sitting with a couple of the engineering people. Apones and Mosler were at their usual table and the engineman I’d seen with Mosler outside the flea market was sitting with them.

“Ms. Davies has been found. She’s getting medical treatment right now. She’s too badly hurt to be rejoining the ship, but a replacement attendant is checking in now.”

It was a brutal recitation, but there wasn’t anything to be gained by beating around the bush. I saw Juliett and Charlotte bite their lips and reach out to hold a hand. Most of the crew had expressions of shock and dismay. Only Mosler and Apones didn’t seem surprised, and the extra engineman—I suddenly remembered his name was Xiang—flashed a look at the two of them. He didn’t look happy.

John Vorhees stepped out of the galley when I started speaking, and heard the whole thing. I walked up to him and we moved back into the galley. Karen was standing there, not looking much better than Ulla Nart in the swollen eyes and red nose department.

“Mr. Wang,” he said. “Do they know…?”

I shook my head. “No, John. I’m sorry,” I said. “They found her less than a stan ago. She’s in the can up in medical and she’s getting treatment. The officers said she’d been beaten and left on the Oh-eight Deck. They found her this morning on their lost-person sweep.”

His eyes narrowed and he said, “They found her less than a stan ago, and we already have a replacement.”

It wasn’t a question.

“Yeah. Mr. Burnside went to the Union Hall himself to get us one.”

“That was nice of him,” he said with a growing hardness about his mouth and eyes. “And I’ll assume that the said fortuitous replacement happens to be female, young, pretty, blonde, and fills out a shipsuit?”

“Close,” I admitted. “Brunette.”

“What are the odds, sar?”

“Astronomical,” I replied.

He took a deep breath and I watched him calming himself by sheer strength of will.

“So,” he said at last, just the one word.

“So,” he repeated.

His eyes were focused elsewhere and his mind was racing, by the look of him.

“We need to have a little talk with our new lambie,” he said softly, “and I’m afraid Ms. Cramer gets wardroom duty.”

I clapped him on the shoulder. “Strength, John, we don’t know. We have no proof. It looks bad, but we don’t want to lower ourselves to their level.”

Under my hand I felt the starch leach out of the man. He closed his eyes and struggled for control but eventually said, “Yes, sar. I know you’re right, but—” he raised his eyes to mine—“she was my crew, sar.”

“I know, John,” I said with a sigh. “Believe me, I know.”

There wasn’t anything else to say, so I got out of his way and headed for the office.

C
HAPTER
F
ORTY-TWO
B
REAKALL
S
YSTEM
2358-
S
EPTEMBER-21

By the time we were nine days out of Breakall, things had reverted to what passed for normal on the
Billy
. The good news was that Mr. Vorhees took to his new spice locker with some amount of gusto. After being grateful for “warm and filling” for so long, I found it gratifying to look forward to something approaching “tasty” as well. The bad news was that the crew had been shocked back into fear. The afternoon study sessions had all but disappeared, and the condition of the ship slowly degraded. Burnside and first section continued to purposefully leave a mess on the bridge. So stupidly petty, it became something of a joke among the bridge watch. That was good. Otherwise it would have been demoralizing.

According to the standing orders, the mandatory ship’s drills for gravity, hull integrity, life boat, and general quarters were scheduled for the day before the ratings tests. Knowing how long these drills took, I wasn’t really sure how we’d schedule all of them in a single day, and I had serious reservations about the utility of announcing them in advance. Every time I tried to bring it up with Burnside, he either ignored me or denigrated my concerns.

“We’ve been doing this a lot longer than you have, Mr. Wang. Watch and learn.”

Burnside called me to the bridge at 13:30. “Well, Mr. Wang, are you ready to learn how we do drills on a real ship?”

False camaraderie had been a hallmark of his behavior since getting underway from Breakall. Maybe he’d always been that way, but I only found it grating after the events there. I couldn’t be sure.

“Pray, enlighten me, Mr. Burnside. I can’t wait.”

“What’s the first drill, then, Ishmael?”

“Hull breach,” I said.

He crossed to the ship’s address system and punched the hull breach button. The warning klaxon was barely audible on the bridge and I wondered what it would be like down below. He then proceeded to read the required announcement for a hull breach drill from his tablet. As soon as he was done reading, he punched the button to shut off the klaxon.

“See?” he told me with a sneer. “How long did that take?”

I looked at him dumbfounded.

“How many people got into their protective gear?” I asked.

He looked at me and laughed.

Even Mallory snickered.

“You don’t think we’re going to waste good suits on that, do you?” he said when he’d gotten his humor under control. “I don’t know if you’re aware of this, Mr. Wang, but once you use a suit it has to be refreshed.”

“Yes, actually, I am aware of that.”

“Then you know that refreshing is expensive, and we have better uses for money than wasting it on stupid drills.”

He crossed to the watch log and made a notation.

“There! Hull breach drill complete. What’s next, Mr. Wang?”

He had me read out the drills to be done, and then he proceeded to ignore any and all practical applications of them. Within less than a stan, we’d run through all the quarterly drills required by the CPJCT. After each one he logged it as being completed.

When we got to the end, he dusted his hands and gave me his supercilious smile. “
That
, Mr. Wang, is how you do it on a real ship.”

“
That
, Mr. Burnside, is how you kill people,” I said.

Mallory looked startled at my outburst.

“What do you mean by that, Mr. Wang?” The tone in Burnside’s voice made it perfectly clear that he knew exactly what I had meant.

I told him anyway. “I mean that by neglecting these drills, you are dooming the crew to die should we have an actual emergency. You’ve prevented them from getting the practice they need to be able to find, and get into their suits, in the case of a hull breach. If the day comes when we need to abandon ship, crew members will perish when they fail to get to the correct boat on the designated deck in time. By taking this attitude, you are behaving in a criminally negligent manner.”

“Perhaps you’d like to take this up with the captain, Mr. Wang?”

“No, Mr. Burnside. I will take it on faith that since the captain has been sitting in the cabin all this time, listening to this travesty of quarterly drills, that he is involved in what can only be referred to as a criminal conspiracy to violate the rules and regulations under which we all hold our licenses. Taking me down to the cabin to have him assure me of such is unnecessary.”

“Are you familiar with the term insubordination, Mr. Wang?” he asked with a wolfish grin.

“Yes, Mr. Burnside, I am. Insubordination occurs when a subordinate willfully and deliberately disobeys a legal order.”

“And you do not consider this behavior insubordination, Mr. Wang?”

“No, Mr. Burnside. It would be insubordination to refuse to answer your questions fully and accurately. The simple fact that you do not like my answers does not constitute insubordination. Furthermore, my failing to point out this violation of the rules, regulations, and common practices associated with quarterly drills might be construed as dereliction of duty, which would make me liable to being charged for infractions more serious than a claim of insubordination.”

Mallory took this all in. His eyes never left the helm display but I saw it in his face.

Burnside must have twigged that he had a witness present as well, because his expression lost some of its confidence.

“That will be all, Mr. Wang.”

“Aye, aye, Mr. Burnside,” I said and left the bridge.

I wondered if I’d survive to see Diurnia. A lot of accidents can happen in the Deep Dark. I put it out of my mind as best I could. There wasn’t anything I could do until we got back to port. I’d probably already said too much, but the
Billy
was a catastrophe that was just waiting to happen—and already had happened to Penny Davies.

When I relieved Arletta for the midwatch that night I asked her, “Have the drills always been like that?”

“More or less. I think he was pushing the point a bit, just because you had made such a big deal out of it.”

“He’s a menace,” I grumbled. “Treating drills like that is a dangerous practice.”

“Ishmael,” she said with a patient tone, “he’s always been a menace. He was a menace before you came. He’s still a menace. And unfortunately he’s the first mate. There’s not a whole lot you can do to him out here.”

“True,” I agreed. “Even a boot third knows that, but I can file a complaint when we get back to Diurnia.”

She looked aghast. “You can’t!”

“Why not? The logs are legal documents. He’s certified the readiness and safety of the crew in them. And the CPJCT’s specifications on drills are clear. You must have them every ninety days. You have to actually hold the drills!”

“Yes, I know,” she said with a concerned look, “and you’re right. His slapdash approach is dangerous.”

She looked at me carefully to make sure she had my attention. “Do me a favor? Look up the pertinent chapter and verse in the CPJCT regulation? See what it says about drills?”

“You think he’s right?” I asked.

“No, I think he’s wrong, Ishmael,” she said, “but I think he’s legal. It’s stupid but true. Check before you do anything really rash, okay?” She held me in her eyes until I had to look away.

“Okay, I’ll look it up on watch tonight.”

She smiled. “Good man. And in that case, ship is on course and on target…”

I sat there with the Deep Dark all around after she had left. Juliett picked up on my mood, no doubt, because she had no comments for me. Even the redoubtable Ms. D’Heng had little to say. They were going over their last minute studying. The deck and steward divisions would test first and then engineering and cargo the following day according to the published schedule.

There were no cargo handlers aboard so that part of the testing would be easy, but before I could deal with scheduling the rest, I needed to see if what Arletta had said was true.

It took the better part of a stan to excavate the pertinent appendix from the
Handbook
, a kind of a everything-you-need-to-know about being a spacer guide, but eventually I found it. The drill needed to consist of a presentation of the correct audible alarm or signal, followed by the prescribed text, and ending with “this is a drill.” Rating and evaluation of performance during the drill was left to command discretion. The drill needed to be repeated every ninety days.

I read it three times in disbelief.

According to the CPJCT that travesty of crew safety had been perfectly legal.

I wondered if Burnside had known that at the time.