“What fun,” Berg said, trying not to sigh. He’d slipped the chip into his computer and scanned the course load while the CO was talking. It looked like a couple of semesters in college to him. “I mean, aye, aye, sir.”
“That’s the spirit,” the CO said, grinning. “If you want to blame somebody, blame the President.”
“He gets blamed for enough, sir,” Eric replied. “When do we start?”
“Fourteen hundred. You need to read the first portion by then so you’re prepared.”
That was barely three hours away. Berg looked at the mass of paperwork he had to catch up on and the courses he had to take and mentally kissed sleep goodbye.
“Aye, aye, sir.”
Bill whistled to himself quietly as he went off watch. He knew he’d have to be back up in a couple of hours, given that he was going to be busy when they got to Cheerick working on arranging the dragonfly fighters they were picking up. Not to mention integrating the Cheerick riders. But being XO had some privileges. When he’d done previous cruises he’d been bunked with three other officers. This time, he had his own…
He paused and swore as he entered the corridor to his quarters. The damned door was missing. Of all the things the Space Navy was bringing over from the sub service, why did it have to be this?
It was a game the crew played. Sometime in the first week of the cruise, somebody stole the XO’s door. Thereafter, the game for the XO became “find the door.” Since the XO was supposed to know every nook and cranny in the boat, surely he could find one door?
Right then, Weaver swore he was going to win. The XO rarely did. Crews were ingenious at hiding the door. But he was, by God, going to Find the Door.
In the meantime, though, he had to go find a spare blanket.
“Get the ball,” Red said, tossing the ball down the corridor, then turning back to the pump. “Jesus, when’s Miriam’s shift?”
“I dunno,” Sub Dude said, pulling the pump out and looking in the pipe. “But I hope it’s — ”
“Mraow!” Tiny said, dropping the tennis ball.
“Damn, this thing’s fast,” Red said.
“What in the hell…” Chief Gestner said, his eyes wide. “What in the hell is that thing? It looks like a four legged Mreee!”
The felinoid Dreen slave race had tricked humanity, early in the war, into believing they were friends. Closing the Dreen gates, however, had required putting a planet buster bomb through a gate that led to their homeworld and as far as humans knew, wiping them out. Only on the last mission had it been discovered some still survived. Human attitudes towards the Mreee varied, with most pitying them. From Chief Gestner’s expression, he apparently wasn’t a Mreee fan. Or maybe he just didn’t like cats.
“His name’s Tiny,” Sub Dude said, tossing the ball down the corridor. “He’s the ship’s mascot. We got infested with this weird rodent sort of thing on Cheerick the last time we were there. The only way to keep them down is Tiny here.”
“Oh,” the chief said, blinking. “So it’s a cat?”
“Yeah, Chief,” Red said. “It’s a cat. It’s a Savannah. You’ve heard of them, right?”
“Oh, sure,” the chief said, clearly having not a clue. “Well, carry on.”
“Will do, Chief,” Gants said. As the chief turned the corner he let out his breath. “Grapp me. We’re so grapped.”
“Nah, I think he bought it,” Red said.
“Bought what?” the COB asked, coming from the same direction the machinist chief had passed.
“Uh…”
“How’s Tiny?” the Chief of Boat asked, taking the ball and tossing it down the corridor.
“Just fine, COB,” Sub Dude said, his eyes wide.
“Don’t worry about the yowling,” the COB said, taking the ball and tossing it again. This time he bounced it off two bulkheads but the cat caught it in midair and spun on the floor hammering back. “He’ll get used to maneuvers.”
“Hope so, COB,” Red said.
“If he’s getting in the way of your repairs, send him over to Camp Watch. He hasn’t got much to do.”
“Will do, COB,” Sub Dude said.
“See ya.”
Bill paused as he entered the missile room since he nearly got hit in the head by a ball.
“Sorry, XO,” the petty officer on missile watch said. “Watch out for — ”
The ball bounced off the deck and hit the bulkhead just over the hatch, bouncing again towards the port bulkhead. A white streak went by Weaver’s face and caught the ball midair, hit the bulkhead by the hatch with four feet, then launched off at least ten feet to land in the middle of the large compartment. Two bounds and it was at the end of the compartment, dropping the ball at the Camp Watch’s feet and wriggling its butt in preparation for the next run.
“…Tiny.”
“What in the hell… ?” Bill said.
“He’s for rounding up those rodents we picked up on Cheerick, XO,” the Camp Watch said stonily.
Bill recognized the petty officer as a veteran of both missions of the Blade, one of about sixty crewmen who knew darned well they hadn’t picked up any “rodents” on Cheerick. The ship, as much as possible, maintained quarantine on alien worlds for the express purpose of avoiding picking up a possibly pestiferous alien species that could be a problem on Earth. An alien version of kudzu, much less rats, would be unwelcome in the extreme.
For that matter, the Blade II had been made from scrap of the Blade I. There was no way in hell “space hamsters” had somehow gotten from one to the other.
So he had one of two choices, one of two types of XO to be. The first choice, since they were barely nine hours from Earth, was to report that they had an unauthorized pet onboard and turn the ship around. Hell, they could space the thing, he supposed, but he knew that would be a disaster on many levels.
The second choice was to go along with the cover story. Obviously, nobody who knew that there weren’t any alien space rats on the ship had reported the presence of the massive cat. And at least he no longer had to worry that there was a serious structural issue with the Blade II. He now knew where the sound like bending metal had come from. And he suspected he knew who had smuggled the massive creature onboard.
“How’s he doing?” Bill asked.
“Haven’t seen any chee-hamsters in days, sir,” the Camp said.
“Glad to see he’s earning his way,” Bill said. “Secure the missiles for landing on Cheerick.”
“Aye, aye, sir,” the Camp Watch said, tossing the ball then hitting the switches that ensured that no matter what a missile could not fire. “Missiles secured.” He picked up the ball again and tossed it.
“Carry on,” Bill said, exiting the compartment. “Chee-hamsters,” he added with a giggle. “Chee-hamsters…”
“Colonel Che-chee,” Captain Prael said. “Welcome aboard the Vorpal Blade II.”
The Blade had been to Cheerick several times since returning from the mission where she met the Hexosehr. After the first few missions, the powers-that-be had determined that there were, in fact, no major hostile organisms to be picked up on Cheerick, including chee-hamsters, and had relaxed the once strict quarantine. Thus the greeting party had been able to meet Lady Che-chee on the underbelly ramp the Blade II sported.
“Ig keek, Che-Chee,” Miriam squeaked. “Ikki keek, Vorpal Blade Two.”
“Englik unkertank,” the massive rodentoid squeaked. The Cheerick were bipedal, rotund chinchillalike beings of about human height but significantly higher mass. “Skeakink uk… uh… hu-arker. Keek eek krik skeek kree.”