Captain Zanella didn’t put it bluntly, but what he was saying was that Eric wasn’t ready for prime-time. It was not a comforting thought.
“Berg!” Miriam said, walking into his quarters.
“Jesus,” Berg said, pulling up his sheet. He’d been lying in his bed doing the unending reading the CO had assigned and was wearing only underwear. “Knock for God’s sake.”
“I’m bored,” Miriam said. “I’ve been going crazy. Then I thought to myself, ‘Eric’s an officer, I can talk to him!’ ”
“Miriam, I love you like a sister,” Eric said. “But the CO’s on my ass right now and I’ve got a bagillion tons of homework and paperwork to do. I just don’t have the time. I’m really sorry.”
“I can help,” Miriam said, picking up a book. “Ick. Military stuff.”
“I didn’t think you were prejudiced against the military,” Berg said, surprised.
“I’m not,” Miriam replied, setting the book down. “I just get bored by it really quick. Tell me a story?”
“Once upon a time there was a lieutenant who got busted because he got several crappy evaluation reports,” Berg said. “Because he didn’t do the homework the CO required.”
“That one’s boring,” Miriam said.
“It’s also going to be my life story if…”
“I can take the hint,” Miriam said. “There has to be somebody on this ship I can talk to! Something I can play with!”
“I thought that was why you brought a cat,” Berg said as she stood up.
“Oh, that rat,” Miriam said, frowning. “He’s always off playing fetch with the crew. He hardly stops by anymore, the traitor.”
Tiny tossed the creature through the air, bouncing it off the port bulkhead and then pouncing on it again as it squeaked in distress. He’d discovered they tasted terrible and gave him a tummy-ache, but they were more fun to play with than a ball, which he never would have believed.
This one, though, had quit playing. So he carried it to the head, expertly operating the lever handle, then dropped it in the commode. Hitting the lever to flush, he watched the weird purple arthropoid spin round and round, then down the drain.
He flushed the toilet a few more times, just to see the water swirl, then got bored.
They seemed to always be where it was dark, so he set off down the corridor, searching for more. One of these days he was going to figure out how to open the hatches with the round wheels, but they were harder. There were probably lots of the little creatures in there.
“Morning, sir,” Sub Dude said, sitting down by the XO. All the rest of the mess was keeping as far away from the officer as possible.
“Morning, Gants,” Bill said, taking a sip of coffee. Navy coffee was almost legendary in its wholesome goodness. Chief Duppstadt had even managed to grapp that up. “This is…”
“Awful,” Gants said, taking a sip. The coffee managed to be both weak and bitter: a tough combination. “Yep, that’s a Dumpstadt special, all right. I swear he gets up for each shift just to ruin the coffee.”
Green eggs. Scrambled eggs oxidize upon contact with the atmosphere, causing the green coloration. But it takes a certain amount of time. Which meant that the eggs had been prepared at least an hour beforehand and kept warm instead of “just in time” in which case they would have been yellow. Well, white and yellow and runny, but not green and brown and runny.
The bacon appeared to have been given a brief glance at a griddle and then dumped into a pile of grease. There was toast, if you could call the stale, rocklike hardtack toast.
“Am I gonna have to get in there and run the damned kitchen myself?” Bill asked.
“Probably, sir,” Gants said, eating the green eggs and horrid bacon with if not relish then at least determination. “Chief Dumpstadt apparently knows what sailors want, and this is it. You ever had his spinach fandango?”
“Please,” Bill said, his stomach turning more at the thought. “I think I’ll just have cereal.”
“Isn’t any, sir,” Gants said. “Seems someone has been pilfering it. The chief’s cut it off until we catch up on stock levels. This is breakfast, take it or leave it.”
“I’ll see about that,” Bill said, standing up with his nearly untouched platter of food. “It seems that the chief and I are going to have to have another talk.”
Bill decided that the only choice was to change the venue, which was why the next conversation was in his office.
“Chief, I think we have a failure to communicate,” Bill said, having failed to offer the chief petty officer a seat.
“What’s wrong now, sir?” the chief asked angrily.
“Well, let’s see,” Bill said, ticking off items on his fingers. “Green eggs that were runny and cold, bacon that was so underdone you could hear the squeal from the pig and toast that could be used as a throwing weapon. Oh, and did I mention the coffee? How do you get it unpalatably bitter and so thin you can see your spoon to the bottom of the cup? That, I’ll admit, was genius.”
“The guys like their bacon rare,” the chief said plaintively.
“I think we have a different definition of rare, Chief,” Bill said. “Rare means it has at least hit a griddle, not been waved over it to get the frost off! And I doubt that you took a poll before letting that inane comment slip from your lips. By the commanding officer’s order I am now taking every meal in the enlisted mess, Chief, until you can actually learn what has apparently escaped you in ‘over twenty years’ which is to cook a palatable meal! And you’re going to do that, if I have to sit in the kitchen and help you turn flip the damned burgers! Are we clear on this, Chief? Do you understand me? Am I getting through to the two brain cells you might actually have? Because if I’m not, I will find the lowliest cook and put him in charge of the kitchen and I am morally certain than he could not do a WORSE JOB! I’ll be back for lunch, which I see is fried chicken. Try to read a cookbook between now and then or by GOD we will be having this conversation again and it WILL be reflected in your evaluation!”
“Conn, preparing to EVA through Hatch Seven.”
“Go EVA through Hatch Seven,” the COB replied, hitting the remote control. “Depressurizing.”
“Seals good. Prepared to EVA.”
“Opening outer doors.”
“Tallyho to the beasts!” Colonel Che-chee said, the Hexosehr translator in her suit transforming her words into high-pitched English.
Even the newer Blade had to stop from time to time to “chill.” Space was a poor radiator of heat, being vacuum, and the Blade II built up heat slowly despite the astonishing efficiency of the various Hexosehr systems. A human nuclear power plant got less than ten percent of the actual power the plant produced, the rest turning mostly into waste heat. Thus the need for massive cooling towers and a nearby source of water. The Hexosehr He3 fusion plants translated 98% of their total output into useable power, which was considered theoretically impossible prior to meeting them.
However, even two percent of the energy of a fusion plant was a lot of heat. The Blade had exterior vanes that radiated some of it and a glaseous heat-sink that collected more. But from time to time the ship still had to stop and “chill.” The “chill” was not as extreme as the original Blade; the engine stayed up, providing artificial gravity and some way. But the output of the plant was dropped to only two percent of full power and in an hour or so the ship cooled off in the cryogenic conditions of deep space.