Federation Reborn 1: Battle Lines (16 page)

“Ahem, Lieutenant,” Nara said, starting to get annoyed.

When she touched the lieutenant, he finally reacted. First he blinked, then he looked at her in brief confusion. “Oh, sorry, I was checking my email.”

“What was that about?”

“What was what about?” the lieutenant asked, sounding distracted.

“What was the visit with the admiral about?” Nara ground out just as her inbox pinged. She frowned and opened it as she stared at the lieutenant. She found a memo in it from the junior officer addressed to her command.

“What is …,” she noticed orderlies and nurses looking up. They frowned and then started to look at her.

“Young man, come with me,” she said, taking the lieutenant by the arm. She hustled him past the other medics and into her office.

“Do you want to start telling me what the hell is going on? Since when do you issue commands to
my
people?” she demanded. “Last time I checked, I am the commanding officer of this department,” she said, tapping her finger against her arm meaningfully.

“Um ….”

“I'm waiting,” Nara stated, crossing her arms and tapping a toe. When her door opened and a nurse leaned in, her eyes cut over the lieutenant's shoulder to the nurse. “Not. Now,” she growled. The nurse gulped and retreated.

The bark in her tone got to him. Lieutenant Taylor straightened instinctively. “Um, the admiral wanted to discuss some changes. I'm sorry. Some of it I can't discuss, Doctor, patient privilege,” he stated.

“And yet, you felt it was necessary to broadcast it in a memo to every doctor, orderly, nurse, and medical technician in the star system?” Nara asked, voice rising slightly. She paused, got control of herself, and then looked at him down her nose like he was some sort of thing she wanted to squish.

“I was just doing as I was told …,” he said, shoulders hunching.

“And you didn't think to remind the admiral that he was jumping your chain of command? That
I
am your superior officer, and he needed to clear things with me before he passed on orders like that?” she demanded.

“Um ….”

“Well?” She did her best not to wince when her inbox and text chat got inundated by requests for clarification. She hadn't gotten past the header on the memo.

The lieutenant straightened once more and tucked his hands behind him. “Ma'am, a superior officer passed on an order and told me to execute it immediately. I acted on it, ma'am. I did what was right. But on further consideration I should have called you before passing it on to everyone.”

“Right,” she drawled. “Keep going,” she said expectantly. “I'm glad you've finally remembered a few points about military protocol,
Lieutenant
,” she stressed.

He winced internally. The doctor had been pretty freewheeling with protocol when he'd first arrived, going by doctor for professional courtesy. But now he was being brought up by his short hairs, and it wasn't pleasant. “I … won't do it again, ma'am?” he said weakly. He knew he'd screwed up.

Nara nodded, her scowl not breaking. “Good. Now I have to see whatever you just sent and deal with the list of questions people are forwarding me. You realize you just threw our entire department into chaos, right?”

“Sorry, ma'am,” the jig replied, now thoroughly subdued.

“Sorry he says,” she sighed, running a frustrated hand through her hair. “Forward all requests to me. Don't ever, ever,” she held up a warning finger to him, “jump my chain of command again. You are the new kid on the block. Don't
ever
forget it.”

“But, ma'am, I did my residency at John's Hopkins Station 4 and …,” he cut the spiel about his resume off when he saw her set expression. “Sorry, ma'am.”

“Right. For the record, nice job graduating. But I'm in charge here—not you. Get that through your thick head.”

“But, ma'am, what if he does that again?”

“Then you ever so politely tell him that he needs to speak with me about it, then move on. If he gets insistent,
call
me.”

“Yes, ma'am,” the jig replied.

“I know you got excited or whatever. We'll chalk this up to zealous disregard for protocol. Go attend to your duties while I clean up this mess,” she snarled, flopping into her chair.

“Yes, ma'am. Sorry again, ma'am.”

“Get out of here,” she said, resting her elbows on the desk. When he left she dropped her head into her hands. “Puppy. What am I going to do now,” she sighed. She took a deep breath and then let it out. She closed her eyes for a long moment but that only brought her implant HUD up. She couldn't escape the mess.

“Lovely,” she sighed, buckling down and getting to work. The first thing she needed to do was to read the new orders and figure it out. Then she could draft a response.

---<>---<>---

“Admiral Subert, a moment of your time?” the doctor demanded, sailing past Saul and into the admiral's office. “This won't take but a moment,” she told Saul as she closed the door behind her before he could object further.

Nara had spent all day dealing with the mess. She was thoroughly fed up and ready to wring some necks starting with the stiff jackass sitting behind the desk in front of her. Admiral or not she fully intended to read him the riot act.

“What is this, Commander?” the admiral asked, looking up from the report he was reading. The yard was finally starting to get cleaned up. It would probably be a few shifts, possibly a week before things got back to where he expected them to be though. The Veraxin commander had Ops under control and had even worked on some new drills for the bored pickets to perform. Everyone had to adjust and all that. He set the tablet down he had been reading.

“We have a problem,” she said. “Or should I say, you and I. Well, everyone right now since you are so busy kicking over anthills,” she stated. “Including mine now, it seems.”

“Doctor, I will endeavor to give you the respect of your rank and profession. But watch it,” the admiral said voice cooling as he looked at her pointedly. “I don't understand why Captain Logan put up with what he did. He tolerated a lot. I am not going to tolerate it. Is that understood?”

“Yes, sir. Sir,
I
am the senior medical officer in charge of the star system's medical establishment, both civilian and military. As your G-9, all orders to medical staff are to come through me as the chain of command dictates,
sir
.”

“And you are a little put out because I jumped the chain of command?” the admiral asked, sitting back. “Got your dander all up, is it?”

“Sir, I know you and Lieutenant Taylor have a history, but he is
my
subordinate now.” she clenched her fists in her jacket then straightened them a few times.

“You'd be well to learn from him, Doctor,” the admiral stated, cutting her civil tirade off. “He has quite a resume, which is what landed him in Lemnos to begin with. All present day doctors should strive to follow his example,” he said as she fumed.

“Now, I realize you don't like how I did it. I run things my way. Get used to it or leave, your choice,” the admiral stated as he picked up his tablet once more. She realized he was brushing her off. “Dismissed, Commander,” he said, looking back at the tablet.

Nara stared at him for one fulminating moment. Angry retorts danced in her mind and on the tip of her tongue but prudence made her keep them in. She was so angry over the changes and interference she stormed off. She brushed past Commander Garretaj in a huff and kept going.

A yeoman looked up, looked back the way she came and then ducked when the commander shot her a get-back-to-work look.

---<>---<>---

“Sir? What was that about if I may ask,” Saul asked cautiously as he entered the office a few minutes later.

“The good doctor didn't like something and wanted to call me on the carpet about it,” the admiral replied mildly. He snorted. “The very idea!” He shook his head. “She should have known better.” He tossed the tablet he'd been reading on his desk.

“Sir?”

“When I issue an order, I expect it to obeyed not questioned!” the admiral said tartly, still simmering. “So what if I jumped her chain of command. Tough. She'll probably sulk and pout for a few days. She'll get over it.”

Saul looked at him dubiously. “If you say so, sir.”

“And I do since I've got the gold star. Now, the yard is looking up. Once it's straightened out, I want to overhaul
San Diego
and the training facilities.”

“Yes sir,” the chief of staff replied with a nod. He hadn't anticipated the chaos the orders were going to unleash. The various departments were either dragging their heels or totally confused by his simple plans. He'd certainly explained it well enough for even a child to understand! He shook his head.

“Teague is handling intel, so we'll leave that alone for the moment. Has Commander Ch'n'x settled in at Ops?” The chief of staff nodded. “Good then. And Strongbirth is handling personnel. All the bases are covered.”

“Yes, sir. As best they can right now.” Saul wasn't so sure about BUPERS. He'd been so wrapped up in his own duties he hadn't gotten a good enough read into the department. He knew it was chaos though. Hopefully, the elf and the AI would get a handle on things soon.

They didn't have a lot of sleepers to go around. Four of the sleepers had been transferred to ship commands. Two more were slated for ship commands, and other than himself, Taylor, and the bug, the rest were engineers. That could be a problem he thought. A big problem if things got ugly enough.

“It'd better be or more heads will roll. I wasn't kidding when I said that before, and I mean it now too. I'll fire or demote anyone who can't handle the job. Period,
dot
,” he said. Saul winced. “They had better get with the program or get the hell out of dodge.”

“I think that message has been made, sir. But if we keep losing people we're going to have a lot of problems,” he warned.

“Then we'll deal with it.”

“Yes, sir.” Saul wasn't sure if the admiral was serious or if he understood just what he was starting. Or had started already he thought.

“Get your tablet and get ready to take some notes, Saul,” the admiral ordered. “Since today is Friday, I want to get this out of the way before Monday. That way they'll have it all on their desks ready to go. I have plans to visit the casinos on Anvil this weekend, so there better not be any more mix-ups or more heads will roll.”

“Yes, sir. Just a moment,” Saul said, ducking out to the outer office to get his tablet.

Chapter 9

Nara Thornby was so furious she stormed into her office and paced. She was ready to quit, and she hated that. She hated the idea; she wasn't a quitter. But what choice did she have? Resigning her commission would be messy. It would put a bit of heat on the navy; she knew that much. Decius's resignation was being handled by the public affairs and fortunately he wasn't making a big stink about it. He'd already been hired elsewhere and was moving on with his life.

She … she shook her head for a moment. She was about to think that she owed the navy to keep a low profile.
Owed
it to the admiral—her admiral, Admiral Irons. But he'd saddled her with … she shook her frustrated hands in front of her. “That Man!” she snarled.

“Bad day?” Horatio asked mildly. She turned to stare at him.

“Since when have you been here?” she demanded.

“I've
been
here. You failed to notice me,” he said, uncrossing his legs. “I heard you've been having an interesting day,” Horatio told her mildly.

“Yeah, you could say that,” she said, going over to her cabinet. She pulled out a bottle of whiskey. She detested drinking anything but wine and wouldn't do it on duty, but today had been a hell of a day. And she deserved a medicinal belt she reasoned.

“If you're pulling out the big guns, it really must be bad,” Horatio joked. She paused, then slowly set the glasses down. He snorted. “Go ahead, get it off your chest. Let's see if your version jives with the grapevine's,” Horatio stated as he took a glass from her.

She sat on the edge of her desk, poured them each a shot, and then took a hit of hers. She gasped as the raw lava burned down her throat. She took another belt, and then set the cap back on the bottle firmly.

“A double. You must have really been pissed,” Horatio observed dryly.

“Yeah, you could say that,” she said then chuckled. She laid it out to him—the little things, then the meeting with the Jig and the memo. Then her dealing with the aftermath and then going to call him on the carpet about it. She held up a hand to forestall him when he opened his mouth to object. “I was being polite. Pissed but I was trying to follow decorum.”

“And it didn't work,” he said.

“Pretty much. He snidely told me in not so many words to piss up a rope,” she snarled. “Get over it, and he can pass on orders however he likes to whoever he likes.”