"Well, since we've settled everything so democratically and all," Aikawa said to Ragnhild after the laughter had faded, "suppose you and I cut cards to see who gets the other lower berth?"
Helen had just finished unpacking her toiletries when the com terminal chimed softly. D'Arezzo, still reading his book, was closest to the unit and pressed the acceptance key quickly.
"Midshipmen's Berth, d'Arezzo speaking," he said crisply.
"Good afternoon, Mr. d'Arezzo," a soprano voice said as an attractive, red-haired woman's face appeared on the display. "I'm Commander Lewis. I understand all of your fellow midshipmen have now arrived. Is that correct?"
"I think so, Commander," d'Arezzo replied, just a bit cautiously. "There are five of us present, at any rate, Ma'am."
"Which is our complete complement," Commander Lewis said with a nod. "I've just heard from Commander FitzGerald that he's going to be delayed for another several hours. Under the circumstances, he's asked me to formally welcome all of you aboard. Would it be convenient for you to join me on the bridge?"
"Of course, Ma'am!" d'Arezzo replied instantly, without so much as glancing at his fellow midshipmen. It was the first thing about the too-pretty midshipman of which Helen unreservedly approved. A "request" from a full commander, however politely phrased, was a direct command from God as far as any midshipwoman was concerned.
"Very well." Lewis reached out, as if to switch off her com, then paused. "Excuse me, Mr. d'Arezzo," she said. "I'd forgotten for a moment that you've all just reported aboard Hexapuma . Should I send a guide, just until you learn your way about?"
"No, thank you, Ma'am," d'Arezzo said politely. "I'm sure we can find our way."
"Very well, then," Lewis repeated. "I'll see you on the bridge in fifteen minutes."
"Aye, aye, Ma'am."
This time, she did cut the circuit, and d'Arezzo looked up to see all four other middies looking at him rather intently. Something like a ghost of a smile twitched at his firmly formed lips, and he shrugged.
"What?" he asked.
"I hope you know what we're doing," Ragnhild said dryly. "Because I know I don't have a clue how to find the bridge from here."
"Oh, I feel confident we could find it even from a cold start, if we had to," he replied. "As it happens, however..."
He slid his book viewer out into the center of the table, and Ragnhild bent over it. Then she chuckled suddenly and turned the viewer so the others could see it. It was a schematic of Hexapuma , and Helen felt her own mouth twitch in an unwilling smile. She still didn't care too much for the way d'Arezzo had buried himself in the viewer, ignoring everyone else, but at least what he'd been perusing so intently made more sense than the novel she'd assumed he was reading.
"As you know," Commander Ginger Lewis said, sitting very upright in the chair at the head of the table in the captain's briefing room immediately off of Hexapuma's bridge, "it's traditional for midshipmen and midshipwomen on their graduation cruises to be formally welcomed aboard their ships. Usually, that duty falls to either the executive officer or to the assistant tac officer, since she's normally the one who will serve as their officer candidate training officer for the deployment. Unfortunately, at the moment Commander FitzGerald, our XO, finds himself detained dealing with the yard dogs, and our ATO hasn't reported aboard yet. And so, Ladies and Gentlemen, you find yourselves stuck with me."
She smiled with a curious blend of impishness, sympathy, and cool command.
"I find myself at something of a disadvantage, in some ways," she continued, "because I never attended the Academy. I was directly commissioned, and they put me through OCS aboard Vulcan . As a result, I never made a snotty cruise, so this particular rite of passage is outside my direct personal experience."
Helen didn't move a single muscle, but she found herself studying Lewis much more intently. The commander looked young for her rank, even in a society with prolong. And now that Helen was paying attention to the medal ribbons on the breast of the Engineer's space-black tunic, she was impressed. They were headed by the Osterman Cross. The Osterman was about one notch below the Manticore Cross, and, like the MC, it could be awarded only for valor. Unlike the MC, however, it could be awarded only to enlisted personnel or noncommissioned officers. The Conspicuous Gallantry Medal kept the OC company, as did the red sleeve stripe which indicated the commander had been wounded in action and the additional stripe which indicated someone who had been mentioned in dispatches.
An impressive collection, Helen thought. And one which almost certainly helped explain Lewis' commission. The RMN had always had a higher percentage of "mustangs"-officers who'd been promoted from the enlisted ranks-than most navies, but it appeared Ginger Lewis was something out of the ordinary even for the Star Kingdom.
"Despite that," Lewis continued, "I do have a certain degree of secondhand knowledge of what you people are getting into. I've seen quite a few snotties come and go, even before I became a Queen's officer myself, and there are only a few points I'd like to make to you.
"The first is one all of you've already had made to you over and over again. But that's because it's an important one. This cruise, here aboard Hexapuma , is your true final exam. Every one of you will officially graduate from the Academy, regardless of the outcome of your cruise, on the basis of your academic record, barring the unlikely event of your committing some court-martial offense in the course of it. But ," she let her green eyes sweep their faces, and there was no longer any smile in them, "if you screw up badly enough aboard Hexapuma , you will not receive a commission in Her Majesty's Navy. If you screw up less than totally, you might receive a commission, but it wouldn't be a line commission, and you would never hold command of any Queen's ship. Remember that, Ladies and Gentlemen. This is pass-fail, and it isn't a game. Not a test you can retake or make up. I know all of you are intelligent, motivated, and well educated. I expect you to do well. And I strongly recommend to you that you expect-and demand-the same superior performance out of yourselves.
"The second point I want to make to you is that this is going to be hard . It's supposed to be. In fact, it's designed to be harder than it really has to be. Some middies break on their snotty cruises, and that's always a tragedy. But far better that they break then, than break in action after they've received their commissions... or after they've actually received a command of their own. So there are going to be times, over the next several months, when you're going to feel harried and driven to the point of collapse. But afterward, when you've survived it, you'll know you can survive it, and, hopefully, you will have learned to have faith in your own capacity to rise to challenges.
"The third point I want to make is that although you hold temporary warrants as Queen's officers for this deployment, and although your positions in Hexapuma's chain of command are very real, you have not yet even attained what a civilian might call 'an entry-level position.' In fact, Ladies and Gentlemen, a midshipwoman is what you might think of as the larval stage of an officer. Be aware of that. You face the difficult task of projecting authority over men and women much older than you are, with many T-years more experience than you possess. You must have confidence in yourself before you can expect those men and women to have confidence in you. And be assured that they will recognize any effort to bullshit them, just as they'll recognize petty tyrants in the making when they encounter them. But your self-confidence can't stop with the ability to make them obey you. It must extend to the point of being willing and able to learn from them without sacrificing your authority.
"And the fourth point is that unlike a great many other middies, you're making your snotty cruise in time of war. It's entirely possible Hexapuma will be called to action while you are on board. You may be wounded. You may be killed. And what is even worse, as I can tell you from personal experience, you may see those you care about-friends or those under your orders-killed or wounded. Accept that now, but don't allow it to prey upon your thoughts or to paralyze you if the moment actually comes. And remember that aboard this ship, you are Queen's officers. You may live, or you may die, but your actions-whatever they may be-will reflect not simply upon you, but upon every man and woman ever called upon to wear the uniform we all wear. See to it that any reflections you cast are the ones for which you want to be remembered... because you will be."