''Ensign here wants the warehouse fence mended.''
''I'll have to inspect it, sir. The warehouse is under my division.''
''Not anymore. The ensign has it all to herself, her and that freckle-faced boot.''
''Sir!'' Pearson didn't quite squeal. Kris had heard similar bureaucratic shrieks when her father shaved a sliver off someone's empire. She waited to see who wore the boondockers in this command.
''The girl has the warehouse. I gave you the other two ensigns. Maybe the three of you can finish your policies.'' The Colonel eyed the eggs, took another bite, then bit off a piece of bacon. ''This breakfast is damn good. New cook?''
''Yes sir,'' Kris cut in. ''Second-Class Blidon had some culinary training on the outside. She's willing to oversee the kitchen.'' Kris turned to Pearson. ''With the lieutenant's permission.''
''My toast tasted as good as always,'' Pearson sniffed.
''Well my eggs are the best I've tasted in too damn long. Ensign, you want the mess hall assigned to your division?''
''Not if you and the lieutenant don't want it that way, sir.'' Even a prime minister's daughter learned a little bit about tact.
''I want it that way. Also, see if you can't do something about the quarters. They're filthy. Pearson, turn the budget for them over to Longknife here, and let her run with it.''
''If you say so, sir.''
''I think I just did. Now, you two women get out of my face. I need a shave.''
Kris saluted and backed out of the way. Pearson stopped her in the hall. ''Just remember, Ensign Longknife, I'll be the one auditing your expenses, and people can go to jail for misappropriating government funds, no matter what their name is.''
''Yes, ma'am. I understand completely,'' Kris said and marched from the HQ. ''Nelly,'' Kris whispered, ''is there anyone unassigned with accounting training?''
''No.''
''Anyone have an accountant in the family?'' Some other scion was going to hate her for dragging them into a profession they'd learned to hate at their parent's knee. ''That's just life, kid,'' she whispered to whomever her next victim was.
Kris had Nelly inform her warehouse personnel to form division, under arms, at 0800. Uniform of the day was battle dress and rain ponchos. She passed up the temptation to put her five marines in battle armor. Somehow, she doubted heavy stuff had been landed for a mercy mission. Kris delegated the dining hall and quarters to Tom, which left her just enough time to interview a pair of third-class spacers who shared the same views of the accounting profession and their rarely home accountant parents. Tom and she flipped to see who got which. To loud protestations that ''I didn't join the Navy to count beans,'' Kris told Petty Officer Spens he'd be doing just that for her.
At 0800, Spens formed the division and marched them for the warehouse; if he'd ever learned drill commands, he'd forgotten them. Spens made up some pretty creative replacements to get the division moving; the troops got the message, even if they didn't keep in step. ''Count cadence, count,'' Kris shouted.
The ''one'' was pretty weak, mainly marines in the rear ranks. ''Two'' got stronger. By the second ''four,'' even the worst offenders had managed to get their feet in step with the others.
''Lift your heads and hold them high,'' sang out from the rear rank where the marines marched proud and tall, ''Space marines are marching by. One, two, three, four.''
Her spacers, heads thrown back and shoulders straightened by the cadence call, joined in the count from force of inexperienced habit, unaware that they'd just been had by the marines.
Spens was fully aware. He waited a short four beat before bringing on the same call, ending it with ''Your space Navy's marching by.'' Well, a bit of competition never hurt anyone, and the troops were starting to look a lot less like drowned puppies and a bit more like Navy. A very wet Navy, but Navy. Kris hoped the Colonel had heard them. Even he might smile.
Around Kris, civilians were out, hunched in upon themselves against the latest downpour. At the shouted cadences, their heads came up, too, some with mouths agape, others curious. A few took a good look and took off running, carrying what message to whom, Kris had no idea. But anyone spreading the word that a new day was dawning at the warehouse was fine by her.
There were shouts from the crowd already gathered at the warehouse fence as they approached; people milled around the gate and the hole in the fence. Others raced to join them from inside the warehouse yard. Apparently the building lockdown had been successful; the runners came empty-handed. Only as the divisions came to a halt did Kris have Nelly unlock the warehouses.
She turned to face her first real command. Some knew her; she'd done her best to get them out of the rain as fast as was humanly possible last night. Others were old hands, stationed here for up to a month…a long time to serve in hell. They looked at her like drowned rats, wondering if she might have a straw for them to cling to. Kris reran some of the pep talks she'd given campaign crews, did a quick edit, and began.
''Crew, I don't know how some of you feel about the work you've been doing. Maybe you're happy about it. Maybe you're not. That doesn't matter. Today, here and now, we start the mission to Olympia. There are hungry people out there. We've got the food. We're gonna see they get fed. Those of you who've been working at this for a while, you take the lead for these new hands. I'll be circulating most of today. You got a problem, see me. You got a solution, see me, too.
''Most of you are new to the Navy. If you'd drawn ship duty, you'd be someplace dry and warm.'' That drew a rueful laugh. ''You'd also be a small cog in a very big wheel, doing what you were told to do. Here, you're critical to saving people's lives.
''We are all in this together. I need ideas. You come up with a good one, you'll find I'm a good listener.
''Any questions?'' Kris spoke the inevitable end to these kinds of talks. Just as inevitably, there were none.
''Petty Officer, dismiss the division to workstations. See that those needing assignments get them.'' Oh, that sounded so easy. Maybe with a few good chiefs it would have worked. Her third-class petty officer was just as over his head as she was. Still, she left him to do a by-guess and by-God bit of detailing while she did her first of many walk-arounds in the mud and rain.
The warehouse area opened on a large bay; muddy, choppy water lapped at the seawall. A marine railroad on the left had hauled a large unmanned drop ship out of the water. It lay like a beached whale, open and half empty. Bags of rice and beans were getting soaked. A young spacer led a group of recruits in dropping hundred-pound food bags on waiting shoulders and lugging them to the nearest warehouse. Backbreaking labor; that couldn't be the way it was usually done.
At the break in the fence, people stood in the downpour. They needed food, work, too. She needed laborers to get the food to them. ''Nelly, can I hire local workers?''
''No, ma'am. There are not funds in this mission for local employees.'' Of course, Navy all the way. The more debited to the emergency appropriation, the more left over for the rest of the fleet. Kris had heard that some commands even kept an extra ship in commission, betting that enough expenses would be soaked up by emergencies to fund it.
''Ma'am,'' a quiet voice called to Kris as she walked toward the tom fence. Kris turned to face a thin, gray-haired woman in a slicker and kerchief. ''Are you the new person in charge?''
''Yes,'' Kris said; then, when the woman seemed unable to respond, Kris softened. ''What can I do for you?''
''My name is Ester Saddik. My church runs a soup kitchen. Lots of men lost their jobs when the crops failed. Families are going hungry. We're seeing they get one warm meal a day.''
''That's very nice of you,'' Kris offered to the woman when she seemed unsure how to go on. None too sure how to help, Kris at least could give the woman a listening ear.