"It's been a while. Back then you could walk from South America to Africa. Oh, occasionally the land-bridge would flood at high tide, but that just added to the excitement of the outing. The continents have drifted much farther apart now, of course, so that little walk is gone the way of the wholly mammoth. Speaking of which, did I ever tell you about my childhood pet? We called him Harry. Sort of a pun, you see."
Jen laughed this time. "Please. No more. Thank you for the advice, Commander. Next time my department head finds me snoozing away, I'll send him to talk to you."
"My office is always open," Sykes assured her, waving his hand around the wardroom as if staking claim to the entire compartment. "Though tomorrow it will be dedicated to Thanksgiving dinner. See the decorations?"
Paul looked around curiously. "No, sir."
"Of course not. They're virtual decorations. When the display projector works. Which, at the moment, it does not."
Jen grinned. "And it's not going to be working soon. We're remanufacturing the control box to try to fix it. Maybe it'll be done in a few weeks."
"Take your time, Ensign Shen." This time Sykes shook his head. "The officially-approved, nondenominational, interfaith decorations, guaranteed inoffensive to any human regardless of personal mindset, are truly horrible in their bland mediocrity. You may take a moment to give thanks tomorrow that the projector remains broken."
Paul smiled. Okay. That's one thing to give thanks for. That and the fact that Commander Sykes cared enough about what happened to run Jen down and give her that talk. Like Jen told me, he's a good pork chop. And a better officer than I'd realized. I wonder what they're going to serve us for Thanksgiving? Something special?
"Hey, Suppo." Jen held up her portion of turkey loaf, which had been so heavily processed and reprocessed that its texture resembled tofu. "The scuttlebutt was we'd have real turkey for Thanksgiving."
Sykes smiled. "Ensign Shen. Ensign Shen. Close your eyes, young lady. How many real turkeys do you see? That's how many we have on this ship."
"Is it too much to ask that this crap actually taste something like turkey?"
"Yes." Sykes smiled again. "When you joined, the Navy promised to feed you, Ensign Shen. But it didn't promise how often it'd feed you, nor how well."
Carl Meadows swallowed a portion of his turkey loaf with evident difficulty. "Just be grateful they served us this and not one of those lamb roasts."
Lieutenant Sindh choked momentarily. "Why did you have to mention that? Those so-called roasts taste so gamey they ought to be banned under the chemical weapons treaty."
"Where do they come from, anyway? I can't believe that meat is actually from a lamb."
"Well, technically maybe not." Everyone eyed Lieutenant Bristol suspiciously. "They've really improved the solid waste recycling end products and-" Bristol made a futile attempt to dodge the turkey loaf packets hurled at him. "It's a good thing there's no bones in that stuff."
"Oh, I bet there's bones," Jen groused. "Ground up along with damn all everything else."
"Maybe they use something like the turbines, Jen," Paul suggested. "You know, feed a turkey in one end-"
"Feathers and all?"
"Feathers and beaks and all, yeah. Grind it all down and package the end product."
Lieutenant Sindh choked again. "This food is disgusting enough without you guys making it worse. Serves me right for getting stuck eating with the junior officer shift."
Bristol smiled. "You'd prefer eating with the senior officers? Present company excepted, of course," he added, bowing slightly toward Commander Sykes.
"No. No way. Present company excepted, of course." Sindh mimicked Bristol's gesture to Sykes.
Sykes smiled in return, unbuckling his seat strap. "It's nice to receive proper obeisance, but I must leave prior to the dessert course."
"Why?"
"Discretion is the better part of valor. Please just keep in mind that I was not allowed any input to the menu. It was fixed by the gods of supply, loaded onboard in prepackaged lots, and I am merely the messenger who delivers it."
"Suppo." Jen snagged Sykes as he tried to pass her. "What's for dessert?"
"I wouldn't want to spoil the surprise."
"Spoil it. Please. Sir."
"I believe the dessert is commonly known as cannonballs."
"Cannonballs?" This time Paul choked. They were an infamous dessert at the Naval Academy. Officially an apple baked in pastry, cannonballs were actually small portions of apple locked deep within thick doughy shells. Anyone foolish enough to actually consume one ended up with their stomach feeling as if they had ingested a cannonball in truth.
"Get him!" Meadows howled, but Sykes had already slipped away from Jen and swung expertly out the hatch. "Never mind. We'll never catch him now. Suppo's pretty agile for an old guy. Is anybody going to eat their dessert?"
"Are you kidding?"
"No. I just figured we could sort of deliver any leftovers to Commander Sykes' stateroom." Carl looked inquiringly at Bristol. "Which we could do, if we could get the help of a certain assistant supply officer."
"Say no more." Bristol shook his head in mock horror. "Cannonballs. This is a crime against humanity." He turned to Paul. "Correct, ship's legal officer?"
"I'm sure it must be illegal under some provision of the Uniform Code of Military Justice. Or international law. Or something." Paul spent the next half-hour mostly listening and laughing as his fellow junior officers spun ever more fantastic plots to dispose of the cannonball desserts. So. Happy Thanksgiving. And I am thankful for something. As bad as things can be, at least I've got some shipmates who are literally in the same boat, and together they make things not only endurable, but sometimes even fun. At the moment, the investigation of the incident with the SASAL ship and the threat of whatever awaited them back at Franklin seemed very far away. And that was fine.
The next few weeks passed in the odd limbo of underway time. The ship's interior lighting cycled on and off to mark the passage of human days, but Paul's life remained defined by the hours spent on watch and a ship's workday which seemed to cover most of the time not devoted to watch standing. Sleep fell where possible into the cracks of that schedule. With morale on the ship sinking lower with every kilometer covered on the way back to Franklin, holiday celebrations normally constrained by tight spaces and lack of materials for decoration received even less attention than usual.
One morning, Paul stared at his personal calendar for long minutes before realizing that December 25th ought to have a special significance beyond another processed turkey meal. It's not like I could go out shopping for presents or anything. Moments later his data link beeped, announcing the arrival of a sentimental e-card from one of the other officers. Hey, that's cool. Paul called up some of the card formats in the ship's data base, hastily crafting his own card as other beeps announced the receipt of further holiday cards from other officers in the wardroom. Later, he spent a fairly happy half-hour, clicking through his collection of received cards several times as if they represented a pile of gifts under an elaborately decorated tree.
New Year's Eve didn't quite sneak up the same way. Paul, due to go on watch at 0400, decided not to stay up to mark the moment, instead choosing to grab a few precious hours of sleep. Unfortunately for Paul, Senior Chief Kowalski had other plans.
"Mr. Sinclair! On deck, sir!"
Paul hastily shrugged into his uniform, blearily checking the time. Half an hour to midnight. What the hell does the senior chief need me for right now? Poking his head out of the stateroom hatch, he saw Kowalski floating nearby, holding an object in one hand. "Is that a fruitcake? A real fruitcake?"