First Casualty (12 page)

Mattim smiled. “Long before the frontier planets decided humanity needed a redistribution of the wealth, various individuals took it upon themselves to try their hand at it. We only had a four-inch gun, but I wanted it to make hits early and often. That was usually enough to scare unidentified ships away. Chief Aso was on the gun the one time we had to burn our way through a persistent one.”

“Aso. He's leading the deck crew,” Guns mused. “Good man?”

“Best.”

Guns blew out a long breath. “Listen, Captain, this doesn't come easy for a Navy type like me, but it looks to me like we're about thirty-six hours away from a live fire exercise. I want to use your fire control, but I want an experienced gunner on it.”

Sandy looked about to come out of her chair. And Mattim was not about to have anyone on sensors but his Jump Master. There had to be a win-win solution to this. The bridge was big enough. “Ding, could you rig a second station beside Sandy's?”

“If the admiral keeps us at one gee, it shouldn't take but a couple of hours.”

“Commander Howard, I've wanted someone from gunnery on my bridge. You willing to move your battle station up here?”

Guns laughed. “Saves me from having to beg. XO, you do that. I got some guns to straighten out. At least one of them needs a new turret lead. Chief Aso's crew is under engineering.”

Mattim tapped his comm. “Ivan, mind losing chief Aso to gunnery?”

“That's where he belongs, Matt.”

“Guns, I think you got yourself a new man.”

“Thank you, sir.” But Guns did not leave. “When the politicians decided to keep merchant shippers on the converted cruisers, some Navy types were a bit worried.” Did his eyes wander toward the XO? “I won't talk for other ships, but we got a damn dinkum good skipper here.” Guns' salute was the same Mattim had given his father. Not the day he was commissioned, but after he'd commanded a ship for a year. After he'd learned just how tough the old man's job was.

Mattim returned the salute with the same feelings. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw the bos'n of the watch talk into her comm. What was happening here would be throughout the ship in a matter of minutes.

Guns and he had taken a major step into welding the Navy and merchant halves of the boat into a single crew, into turning the collection of bolts, chips, and flesh that rode the
Sheffield
into a living, breathing ship. Good!

The rest of the voyage out was drill and hard work. The
Sheffield
was as ready as any green warship by the time the big jolt came.

“Captain,” the exec reported. “We are at the jump point.”

“It's not there.” Sandy cut her off.

“Of course it's there. That's the buoy,” Ding snapped as if Sandy had called her a liar.

“That's the buoy, but I got three atom-laser gyros hunting for the gravity variance of Gamma jump point. It's supposed to be where you see the green dot. None of them are pointing there. The damn thing's wandered.”

Mattim hit the comm. “Anything from the flag?”

“Nothing sir, not a peep.”

“Sandy, find it for the admiral.”

“But, Matt, if Smiley boy can't find the jump, no battle.” Mattim didn't back down from his order; Sandy turned back to her board. “With us all dressed up, it would be a shame not to go help those poor marines.” Then she grinned. “And to see Smiley's face when a merchie tells him where his jump has wandered to.”

“What do you mean, wandered?” Guns asked from his new station at Sandy 's elbow.

“This jump point is a category A risk. It's going to swallow one ship out of every thousand through it, maybe more if you don't treat it with respect.”

“The Navy hasn't lost a ship in fifty years. Technology has improved so there is no risk to ships.” Ding gave a textbook quote, which was all she probably knew. In peacetime, the Navy contracted for Jump Masters.

Today, Sandy wasn't buying a textbook answer. “We haven't had a war in fifty years, and the Navy, like most shipping lines that want reasonable insurance rates, only use G and H jump points, and go through them at a few klicks a second.” Sandy raised a questioning eyebrow to Ding. Right?”

The puzzled look was back on Ding's face. “I guess so.”

“And you'd guess right,” Sandy assured her. “Even as much as Matt here wants fast voyages, he steers clear of anything higher than an E. Now, this damn war comes along, and we're trying to support marines on the wrong side of an A. Wonder if anybody gave the damn politicians a basic primer on jump point safety.” She turned back to her board. “Anyway, low jumps tend to wander, and this baby is a real pilgrim. Didn't anybody record where that help message came from yesterday?”

“That's impossible. It's in orbit around the star.” Suddenly Ding stopped and her eyes widened. Sandy grinned, but said nothing. “Which star is it orbiting?” Ding almost whispered. “This one, or the one on the other side?”

“You got it, sister. We didn't make these suckers. We just use what we found. Most dance to the gravity of two stars. This one's got three, plus another ten percent. It's a real gypsy.”

“Another ten percent?” Guns asked. Mattim took the moment to check the bridge. The squadron continued decelerating at 1 gee, following the admiral who still hadn't admitted he didn't know where he was going.

“Yeah,” Sandy went on. “Add up all the vectors from both stars and you should be able to figure an orbit. G's and H's you almost can. Pick your average E and no matter how hard some college professor does the math, you're missing at least ten percent of the vectors. This SOB is over twenty percent. Damn, I wish we understood these things better.”

“In history class, they said we lost one of the first three ships that jumped out from Earth,” Ding said. “Is this why?”

“I don't know how they lost that first one. Earth's one jump point is such a docile little H that you'd have to try to get lost in it.” Sandy tapped her comm. “Ivan, honey, I need your atom laser.”

“It's all yours, best friend.”

“I'll thank you tonight.” She switched off and made a fourth display appear. “With our broadside to the jump, I need a longitudinal baseline. Ah, there she be.” The green dot went red. A new one appeared with numbers next to it. “Five thousand kilometers in just thirty days. Honey, you got to pay your rent. You can't keep toddling around like this.” Sandy looked up. “Do we really have to tell our little admiral?”

Mattim glanced around his bridge. Ding and Guns took the question for a joke. Mattim knew Sandy was serious. “Yes.”

Sandy took a deep breath and let it out slowly. Then she mashed her comm button. “Comm, send my board to flag, with the captain's compliments.”

* * * *

Sergeant Mary Rodrigo slipped past the hospital's front desk. They were busy, and Lek had told her which room the LT was in; Lek'd even hacked his medical charts. Reading was not the same as seeing, so the platoon had asked her to check up on him. Everyone hoped he was getting better treatment than they were.

The people passing Mary in the halls, whether patients or staff, all wore cloth. Since the hospital was buried fifty meters under the crater's floor, she guessed they were safe. Still, she was in battle armor, helmet under her arm. She'd learned not to take chances.

She also hadn't had a bath since the battle. People passing her tended to speed up, even those hanging onto intravenous packets on rolling stands. Since Mary had a map of the hospital layout, she didn't ask directions. Since the people were nonthreats, Mary ignored them. Crashing relativity bombs and sparkling lasers—those she paid attention to. What could not kill her, she ignored. It was amazing how simple life became.

She paused before a closed door. For a moment she froze. What if” the lieutenant had forgotten them, like some in the platoon said? What if they were a part of his life he wanted to forget as quickly as he could? The rest of his life was going to be screwed up. She hesitated, but only for a moment. You don't read your mail, you never know what's happening.

She slipped through the wide door.

The LT sat in bed, his nose in a reader. He glanced up. “Mary!” His broadening grin left no doubt she was welcome.

“Hi,” she answered, giving him the best salute she could.

“Don't waste that on me.” He tossed it off with a wave of his left hand. “Save it for some dumb lieutenant who still thinks it matters. Tell me, what's the platoon up to?”

“Not much, sir. No colonials have tried to take our pass. We're doing what we're told.” No need telling him what that was. “What's been happening with you?”

“I got my first lieutenant promotion.” He beamed. “And the Navy Cross, or so they tell me.” Mary glanced at the sheets covering him; his body under them stopped too far from the foot of the bed. She didn't know what to say; the LT helped her.

“They couldn't save the legs. Too much damage and too long before the docs got me. But I'm getting a new set real soon. In a month they'll insert neural leads in both stumps, then attach prosthetics. I've seen vids. I'll be good as new.”

Mary didn't hear much depth in his cheerfulness. “Will you be coming back to the platoon then?” she asked.

“No. Worse luck. It's staff duty for me. Just because a Sthet can run doesn't mean they want you in combat.” He scowled and looked away. When he faced her again, he'd round his smile. “So tell me, what's the platoon been up to? They got you and Cassie out telling everyone how it's done. Lek a warrant officer, running battalion communications. Talk to me.”

There were too many things Mary couldn't say, so she mumbled. “We're doing okay, sir. Some of us missed you, and they wanted to know how you were doing. I hitched a ride back on a supply run. I got to be getting back or they'll leave me.”

As she talked, the lieutenant's eyes went from crinkled smile to hard and angry. “Damn it, woman, don't start treating me like some stranger. You folks were there for me when I was up to my neck in dirt and bleeding to death. I may have been a standard issue shit-for-brains second louie most of the time, but I got my act together that day. So did all of you.” His voice ran down. “Don't start treating me like I don't exist.” He glanced around, seemed to take in the whole hospital at a glance. “There're enough people doing that. Don't you do it too.”

Then he looked her hard in the eye. “Something's wrong.”

“Not really wrong, sir. Just everything back to normal, I guess. The whole company's up and we're kind of under-strength what with you gone and others. We got the detail of cleaning up the mess we made, collecting the busted-up rolligons, artillery, that stuff.”

“You didn't have to bring in the bodies?” the LT whispered.

“Somebody had to. Captain said we should since the other platoons were on full alert.” The first night after the battle had been bad—on Mary and a lot of others. After looking the corpses in the eyes, lugging them to the trucks, Mary wasn't the only one who took herself off net each night. No need to wake everybody when she came awake screaming.

“Mary, let me see the back of your helmet,” the lieutenant said softly. She flipped it over; he glanced at it. “You've still got NCO markings on it. I put you in for a battlefield commission. They haven't given my platoon to another LT?”

“No, sir.”

“Is Captain Spoda including you in staff meetings?”

“Staff meetings, sir?”

“Okay.” The lieutenant glanced away, fixed his eyes on the picture on the wall. Mary stared at it; ocean waves rose up and tumbled onto yellow dust. She'd seen vids of oceans; all that water made her uncomfortable. She looked away. The LT got her attention when he mashed a button beside his bed.

“Yes, sir?” came a cheerful woman's voice.

“Doctor Mardan should be about through his rounds.

Could you ask him to drop by my room? It's a matter of urgency.”

“Yes, sir. Uh, your vitals are a bit elevated, but nothing to set off alarms, sir.”

“This is a military matter, not medical.”

“Yes, sir.” The voice clicked off, sounding puzzled.

“Sir, I really have to get back to the supply truck,” Mary said, edging toward the door.

“Mary, you and I both know a supply run never arrived back on schedule. And now that I know what you people were scrounging, I'm damn glad of it. Whatcha after this time?”

“Anything we can lay our hands on. Pickings are getting slim, and it's kind of hard to find good trading stock. Dumont always had the best luck when he took a few of the younger girls in the platoon. But lately ...”

The lieutenant chuckled. “I heard someone ran a ship in here loaded with booze and women and set up shop.” He studied Mary for a moment. “Haven't any of you had a shower in the last month?” Mary backed away; she hadn't meant to bother him.

“No, no, you get back here, woman. I spent a week on jungle survival, and boy, did I stink. What is happening to you? The platoon's got a support van assigned to it. You can get a hot meal and a shower. Why aren't you?”

“The captain's got us in reserve. We're back a couple of klicks from the pass. The other two platoons are dug in close. We dug the command and support vans into the rim. They're solid, but ours is sitting out in the open. Ain't nobody getting out of armor, not even Dumont 's kids, no matter how horny they get.”