“Who knows? We haven’t met the navigator, weapons officer, XO or captain. One or all could be female.”
“A female captain. Hasn’t been one since Devilfish went down,” Pacino said.
“I’ll be the next one,” a female voice said, but a booming female voice that was an octave deeper than Pacino’s. Pacino looked over to see a petite woman in tight jeans tucked into ugly sheepskin boots, with a black sweater that clung to her well-proportioned figure under a black sport jacket. She had full and shining black hair that was combed straight and reached below her shoulders. She had conventionally pretty features, but there was something about her eyes. Her dark brown eyes looked normal one second and eerily wide the next, and when they went wide, she looked frantic or even crazy.
Believing her to be one of the department heads, Pacino reached out and shook her hand. “Ma’am, you’ve arrived at the table for the USS New Jersey wardroom. I’m Patch Pacino, oncoming sonar officer.”
She smiled at him. Her warm hand seemed strangely rough in his.
“I’m Lieutenant Commander Alyssa Kelly. Oncoming chief engineer of the New Jersey.”
“You’re the eng?” Vevera asked. “I’m Duke Vevera, MPA. This is Dieter Dankleff, DCA. Muhammad Varney, electrical officer. Over there is Don Eisenhart, communicator. These guys are the nubs, both named Cooper. That one’s Long Hull and he’s Short Hull. Short Hull is the PCU torpedo division officer and Long Hull is reactor controls officer.”
Kelly greeted the officers with a smile, shaking their hands and learning their street names, and all the while, her eyes kept up that normal-then-wide-eyed thing, as if she were flashing messages with her eyes. After a moment, Vevera became brave enough to ask her what her callsign was.
“I’ve had a few,” Kelly said. “Hated them all. Machinegun Kelly. Moose—that’s the one that’s seemed to stick the hardest, because of my stupid baritone voice. And my least favorite, Crazy Eyes. Any of you J.O.s ever call me Crazy Eyes, I swear I will write you up to the XO.”
“Eng,” Pacino said, feeling strange calling her ‘Eng,’ the usual name for the chief engineer of a submarine, since the Eng for him had been Elvis Feng Lewinsky back on the Vermont. He’d always think about Elvis every time someone said ‘Eng.’ “Do you know who is going to be the XO?”
“No idea,” Kelly replied. “I guess I’ll find out when you guys do. But I do know who the weapons officer is. River! We’re over here!”
Kelly motioned over a tall, slender brunette woman who wore a gray cashmere form-fitting dress that came just above her knees with tall black high heels. As she walked over, Pacino felt his stomach descend several floors. The woman was Wanda “River” Styxx. Before the Panther run, there had been a party for the Vermont officers at AUTEC — the Bahamas Atlantic Undersea Testing and Evaluation Center, the Navy’s version of Area 51—when Pacino had been awarded his full lieutenant bars by Vice Admiral Catardi, the commander of the submarine force, and been ordered to “drink his bars” by downing a large glass filled with rotgut scotch with his new rank emblems at the bottom. The scotch had gotten to him and he’d gone into a full memory blackout. When he woke up the next morning, he found himself naked in the bed of a beautiful and similarly naked woman. And that woman had been the aide to Admiral Catardi, Wanda River Styxx. When Pacino had arrived back at the submarine, the crew had doubled over in laughter. His face was covered with Styxx’s lipstick, from his nose to his chin and from ear-to-ear, earning him the ignominious nickname “Lipstick.” And now here she was.
She walked up to Pacino first, acting as if he were a mere acquaintance. “Hello, Patch,” she said. “I’m oncoming weapons officer, so you’ll be working for me.” She smiled brightly at Pacino and shook his hand, her hand warm and soft in his. He couldn’t help thinking that this was the hand that had been draped over his chest when he woke up that awful morning.
Pacino blinked and swallowed hard, becoming aware of the bug-eyed expressions of the other Vermont-ers who knew his history. “Good to see you again, Commander.”
“Please,” she said, “Call me River. Or, of course, Weps.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
She laughed. “And definitely no ma’ams.” She greeted the other officers, remembering them from meeting them during the party at AUTEC.
Fortunately, the next officer joined them at the table then, taking all the attention away from Pacino’s embarrassment with Styxx.
“What the hell?” Dankleff said, breaking into a grin and pulling the newcomer into a bear hug. “What are you doing here?”
Lieutenant Commander Elvis Lewinsky had sneaked up on the gathering, a grin on his features. He shook the hands of the Vermont-ers and introduced himself to the nub officers.
“Elvis, for fuck’s sake,” Dankleff said to his old boss. “Really, what are you doing here?”
“Ladies and gentlemen,” Lewinsky said, “you are looking at the USS New Jersey’s new navigator. Which reminds me, where the hell are we?”
“Great,” Vevera said. “Lame navigation jokes already. Elvis, if you’re navigator here, who’s taking care of the repairs to the Vermont?”
“Turns out it was a pretty easy decision for Naval Personnel Command. After we turnover with the PCU crew, the PCU guys — except for the Hulls here — are taking on the Vermont repairs.”
“It’s going to take me a while to learn to not call you ‘Feng,’ Elvis,” Dankleff said. “Man, a split tour as engineer and navigator. You’re going to be heavy as hell for your upcoming XO tour.” The term ”heavy” in submarine lexicon meant knowledgeable.
“I’d half hoped you were showing up to be the XO,” Eisenhart said. “You’re heavy enough now.”
“Oh no, that honor is reserved for a man I understand is a real bastard,” Lewinsky said. “You J.O.s better stand the fuck by. The new XO is a killer. He reportedly eats junior officers for breakfast.” Lewinsky looked at Styxx and Kelly. “And department heads for lunch.”
“Great,” Pacino muttered. “Elvis, do you know who he or the captain is?”
“I know,” Lewinsky grinned, “but I ain’t sayin’. But worry not, crew, because here comes the XO now.”
The officers all turned their heads to see who was approaching the table, and the Vermont-ers’ jaws all dropped when a man in falling-apart steel toed boots, ripped and stained jeans, a Grateful Dead T-shirt and an unbuttoned lumberjack fleece shirt over it walked up, smiling mischievously.
“Oh my God,” Dankleff said. “Bullfrog? You? You’re XO?”
Commander Jeremiah Seamus Quinnivan, Royal Navy, shook hands all around, looking quite pleased with himself.
“Well, of course, lads and lassies, I’m XO. Who did you think would be capable of running you scurvy, misbehaved and out-of-control misfits and pirates on a spec-op?”
“This is almost too good to be true,” Pacino breathed to Dankleff. “Now we just need to know who the captain will be.”
“If Quinnivan is XO, I can guess who the skipper is,” Dankleff said.
As if on cue, Commander Timothy “Scotch” Seagraves, up to then Vermont’s commanding officer, arrived at the table, nodding seriously at the crowd.
“Captain!” Vevera said, shaking Seagraves hand. “Just like old times.”