Mike started laughing himself. Truth be told, perhaps even semi-hysterically.
“It gets better!” whooped Simpson. “Christian is most disgruntled. He tells us—no fool, that man, he’s already figured out he’d better not burn any more bridges behind him—he’s willing to go along with whatever this Geneva Convention business means but—”
Now, the admiral was almost dancing a little jig.
“—but not unless we quit cheating.”
Weakly, still shaking with laughter, Simpson handed the sheet to Mike. “See for yourself.”
Mike’s eyes ranged down the page until he came to the end.
—CANTRELL CLAIMS FORGOT SERIAL NUMBER. WE ARE MOST SUSPICIOUS. WILL KEEP HIM AS PRISONER, FOLLOWING WHAT HE CLAIMS ARE YOUR RULES. BUT MUST INSIST HIS SERIAL NUMBER BE GIVEN TO US. ABSOLUTELY INSIST.
CHRISTIAN IV, KING OF DENMARK
“Of course,” chuckled Simpson, “he’s just covering the Old Bastard’s ass. Navy takes care of its own. He didn’t forget his serial number. I never thought to provide people with any.”
Mike stared at him. Simpson shrugged. “What can I say? I screwed up. Guess we’ll have to figure out a serial number system. Can’t use social security numbers, of course, the way the old Navy wound up doing.”
“To hell with a ‘system,’ ” proclaimed Mike. “Later for that. Right now, we’ll just have to wing it. Eddie needs a number right away.”
The cheering crowd in the ballroom was starting to spill into the hallway. Mike knew he’d be surrounded by well-wishers in seconds, burying him.
Think quick.
He did. But—
Is Eddie bright enough? Stupid question.
Will he get reckless? That’s the real problem. Ah, what the hell. He’s lost a leg, what can he do?
Um. Eddie? Stupid question.
Piss on it, Mike. Go with the ones who got you here.
Just do it.
Pulling his ever-present notepad and pen from the inside pocket of his fancy clothing—another reason he’d insisted on his own modifications—Mike hastily scrawled a message. He just had time to hand it to Simpson before the mob swept him back into the ballroom. Dignitas be damned. Let’s have a party!
Simpson didn’t read the message for perhaps half a minute, until he was sure he had himself back under control. When he did read the message, however, he promptly burst into laughter again.
LT CANTRELL DECORATED NAVY CROSS. CONGRATULATIONS.
LT CANTRELL REPRIMANDED FORGETTING SERIAL NUMBER.
INSIST REPRIMAND BE GIVEN HIM. WITH SERIAL NUMBER.
THUS NO EXCUSE REPETITION OF INCIDENT.
LT CANTRELL SERIAL NUMBER 007
Afterword
by Eric Flint
It is one of the pieces of accepted wisdom in fiction writing that stories written in collaboration are almost invariably weaker than stories written by authors working alone. Since I enjoy sticking my thumb in the eye of accepted wisdom, I like to think I’ve done it again with this book—as well as a number of others I’ve written in collaboration with several different authors.
I’ve never really understood the logic of this piece of “wisdom,” beyond the obvious technical reality: until the advent of computer word-processing and online communication, collaboration between authors was simply very difficult. I can remember the days when I used to write on a typewriter, and had to spend as much time painfully retyping entire manuscripts just to incorporate a few small changes in the text, as I did writing the story in the first place. (And I’ll leave aside the joys of using carbon paper and white-out.) Working under those circumstances is trying enough for an author working alone. Adding a collaborator increases the problems by an order of magnitude.
That’s the reason, I think, that authors for many decades, even centuries, generally worked alone. And where exceptions did occur, they usually did so because of special circumstances. Two, in particular:
The first is where one author basically does all the writing. The input of the other author might have taken the form of developing the plot outline, or, not infrequently, simply lending his or her name to the project for marketing purposes.
The second generally involved married couples, or people who were otherwise in position to work in very close proximity. To use a well-known instance from the history of science fiction, just about everything written by Henry Kuttner and C. L. Moore after their marriage was, in fact if not in name, a collaborative work.