Lt. Leary, Commanding by David Drake

“I shouldn’t be surprised to find insolence in Mr. Leary’s subordinates, should I, Mon?” Pettin said. “Well, for now you may tell your captain that the squadron has been fully refitted and will lift in twelve hours, not the thirty-six I previously estimated. If Mr. Leary has not returned by then, the Princess Cecile will lift without him, under your temporary command. Is that understood?”

“Yessir,” Mon said through clenched teeth. “I understand you very well, Commodore Pettin.”

“By God,” Pettin snarled, “for half a piastre I’d slap you in custody and put my third lieutenant aboard that grubby little corvette. Half a piastre!”

The transmission ended in an electronic click rather than the crash that Pettin obviously would have preferred if the technology permitted it. Adele smiled at the thought, then wiped her face blank lest Mon misunderstand her humor.

“If them buckets lift in twelve hours, they’ll all three of ’em lose antennas before we make Strymon,” Woetjans said. “They arrived here in crappy shape, and they don’t have the crews to make things right even in the three days Pettin allowed at the start.”

“He’s playing games,” Taley agreed, looking even more than usually as if she were following a coffin. “I wouldn’t want to be the Winckelmann’s machinist, I can tell you that.”

“Yeah, but how about us?” Pasternak said. “Can we find the captain in twelve hours? It’s six just to fly to where he was supposed to be, right?”

“Officer Mundy has a plan to get information from the Captal da Lund,” Mon said, his hands laced together so tightly that the fingertips raised white halos against the tanned backs. “We’re going to do whatever it takes to execute that plan.”

His face was savage. “Whatever it takes,” he repeated, but his voice had sunk to a growl.

“All right,” said Adele. Her wands twitched, expanding an image to full-display size. “Here’s a set of the builders’ plans for the Captal’s dwelling. You’ll note . . .”

* * *

The rattle of pebbles in empty ration cans wasn’t loud thirty feet away from the tent, but it was so different from the wind’s keening overhead that even before Hogg gripped his shoulder Daniel had awakened in a rush. He sat upright and slapped on the commo helmet, saying, “Unit, I’m going to look for an animal with Hogg. Nobody else leave the camp till summoned. Captain out.”

“Unit, don’t get fucking trigger happy, it’s me and the master out there in the woods!” Hogg rasped. His helmet would continue to broadcast on the unit push because he hadn’t closed the transmission. That was actually a good idea to keep the crew informed of what was going on. It was simply sloppy procedure on Hogg’s part, of course.

Daniel had slept in his boots, but he paused to slide the closures tight before stepping out of the warmth of the tent behind Hogg. Barnes rose onto one elbow; he’d be outside as soon as Daniel’s eyes were off him, joining his friend Dasi on guard.

It was the guards, Dasi and Sentino, that Daniel had been warning; the other spacers remained asleep. Spacers on a long voyage learned to sleep through any amount of racket and crowding, unless it was their name or their watch that had been called.

Daniel dialed his visor’s light enhancement up to daylight normal as he crawled along after Hogg. Sentino squatted near the head of the track, her impeller pointed up at a 45-degree angle to show that it didn’t threaten anybody. She lifted her left index finger to acknowledge Daniel; he nodded as he passed her.

The creature in the trap ahead of them was screaming. The sound was high-pitched and as loud as a saw cutting stone. It almost completely drowned the rattling of the cans tied to the snare.

The track curved around a bush whose branches dropped runners to the ground, completely blocking Daniel’s view of the camp—and vice versa. When he was out of Sentino’s sight, he drew his knife.

Hogg thrust the shovel into the base of a shrub with ghostly white stems, then lifted it with a twist of deceptively strong wrists. He flung the clump out of the way so that Daniel could squat beside him. Nobody whom Hogg had spanked would mistake him for a soft fellow beyond the curve of middle age.

Pages: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 51 52 53 54 55 56 57 58 59 60 61 62 63 64 65 66 67 68 69 70 71 72 73 74 75 76 77 78 79 80 81 82 83 84 85 86 87 88 89 90 91 92 93 94 95 96 97 98 99 100 101 102 103 104 105 106 107 108 109 110 111 112 113 114 115 116 117 118 119 120 121 122 123 124 125 126 127 128 129 130 131 132 133 134 135 136 137 138 139 140 141 142 143 144 145 146 147 148 149 150 151 152 153 154 155 156 157 158 159 160 161 162 163 164 165 166 167 168 169 170 171 172 173 174 175 176 177 178 179 180 181 182 183 184 185 186 187 188 189 190 191 192 193 194 195 196 197 198 199 200 201 202 203 204 205 206 207 208 209 210 211 212 213 214

Leave a Reply 0

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *