First Command (9 page)

      
“Ma’am, how do you prefer to be addressed?
 
Do you prefer ma’am or General or something else?”

      
Irina thought about it for a bit then said, “ General or ma’am will do for now.”

      
Terri looked at her terminal and said, “Yes, ma’am, your first appointment is in 30 minutes.
 
Your company CEOs will be here for a meet and greet in the executive conference room.
 
Here are their bios.
 
There will be coffee, tea, water, and a small selection of pastries.
 
It’s scheduled for an hour, and there will be no presentations at this time.
 
Over the next five days, they will come in individually and brief you on their operations.
 
They’re scheduled one in the morning and one in the afternoon from tomorrow to Saturday.”

      
“Excellent,” Irina said.
 
“Now sit down.
 
There are some things I want to let you know, how I want my days organized, and what I will expect from you.”

* * * * *

      
Andrew and Moira Blake caught the daily shuttle from Gagarin to Armstrong.
 
They hadn’t seen their son since his assumption of command.
 
Moira wanted to see her baby, the newest and youngest ship captain in Scout Force and the Fleet.

      
Admiral Tom Craddock, Scout Force Commander, received a call from Andrew, asking if it was all right for them to drop in and see their boy.
 
The Admiral could hardly say no to the inventors of FTL communications and the transporter gates.
 
They were also personal friends.
 
He invited them to stay at his quarters if they wanted to make it a longer stay.

      
LTJG Tammy Nielsen, Kelly’s friend and daily shuttle pilot, messaged to inform him of their departure from Gagarin.
 
She recognized them from having met them at Kelly’s assumption of command ceremony.
 
The Admiral’s call, telling him to come by at 1800 for dinner, followed Tammy’s message.
 
Kelly apologized to the Admiral for his father’s uncharacteristic spur of the moment visit.
 
Admiral Craddock said not to worry, he always enjoyed the Blake’s visits, even if this one was unannounced.
 
He told Kelly to come casual and he would see if he could get Candy down from her mountain aerie for the evening.

      
Kelly checked his calendar for tonight and tomorrow and found no conflicts.
 
The ship was being loaded for his upcoming patrol, but that would close out well before 1800.
 
He told Chief B and Connie his parents were coming to visit, and he would be having dinner with the Admiral tonight.

      
Kelly met his parents at the Military Spaceport Operations Building.
 
They were glad to see him, but had something else on their mind.
 
He drove them directly to Admiral Craddock’s house, where the late summer plantings were just as spectacular as those from the early spring.
 
Candy’s mom was a master gardener.

      
Amy Craddock met the Blakes at the door, warmly greeted them, and showed Andrew and Moira to the guest room.
 
Kelly waited in the den while they got settled.
 
Mrs. Craddock walked into the den and asked if Kelly would care for anything.
 
He politely refused, saying that he just wanted to make sure his parents were all right.
 
He still had to return to the Vigilant and change for dinner.
 
She assured him that they were fine and he should go and change.

      
He left when the transport arrived and returned to the Vigilant, then showered, shaved, and put on a shirt and slacks that he and Candy had shopped for on the southern continent.
 
At 1720, he left for the Craddock’s house.
 
He arrived a few minutes early and Candy met him at the door.
 
She must have just arrived, as she was still in her pinstriped office suit.
 
Mind, it looked very good on her.

      
Her face lit up when she saw him.
 
“Kelly, I’m so happy your folks dropped in.
 
I get to see you again.
 
You haven’t been as much fun since you assumed command.
 
Come in.
 
Would you like some wine?”

      
Kelly took her hand and gave her a peck on the cheek.
 
“I’d love some wine, thank you.”

      
He followed her to the bar and she poured him a glass of their favorite vidal blanc.
 
Kelly took a sip, smiled, and pronounced it excellent.
 
Andrew came up to the bar and asked for a glass as well.

      
Candy poured him a glass, then kissed Kelly on the cheek and excused herself to change into something more comfortable.

      
Andrew watched Candy leave almost a little too long and asked, “Are you two getting serious?
 
Your mom sure would be happy if you produced a couple of grandkids any day now.”

      
Kelly laughed and said, “Okay, Dad, anything to make Mom happy, but don’t you think I should be married first?”

      
They both broke out laughing.

      
Moira walked in to find out what all the laughter was about.

      
“Dad was trying to get me to produce some grandchildren for you without the encumbrance of a marriage.”

      
Moira hugged Kelly and said, “You could hurry, you know?
 
We aren’t getting any younger.”

      
Candy walked back into the room wearing a black silk shirt and a matching set of black silk jeans. The shirt set off her bust and the two undone buttons showed off her impressive cleavage.
 
The pants clung to her legs, emphasizing their length and tone.
 
High heel pumps accentuated the effect.
 
She came over and hung off Kelly’s shoulder, probably to dissuade Andrew from leering.
 
It didn’t work.

      
They had a lovely dinner punctuated with friendly conversation.
 
Afterwards, Moira and Andrew asked Tom if there was someplace they could speak in private.
 
He directed them into his study.
 
After a few minutes, Admiral Craddock stuck his head out and motioned Kelly in.

      
Kelly walked in, was motioned to a chair and heard the admiral say, “Moira, repeat what you just told me, please.”

      
Moira said, “We didn’t come here to see you, Kelly, sorry.
 
We have detected a large espionage cell on Shepard and Gagarin.
 
It’s intertwined into almost all functions on Shepard.”

      
Admiral Craddock asked, “What makes you think that, Moira?”

      
She sat up straight and continued, “We knew when we designed the transporter gates that we had something transformational.
 
It would put all other civilizations, especially the K’Rang, at such a strategic, operational, and tactical disadvantage that they would have to steal it.
 
Therefore, we took certain precautions.”

      
“We designed the gates in three pieces, built in three separate assembly lines.
 
We kept the design sheets to the absolute minimum.
 
We put extra components in the rings that are functional, but excess to needs.
 
We have a controller that uses some components one time and different components the next.
 
If the sequence is wrong or the wrong component is used, the system shuts down and has to be reset by hand with a code available only in a special office in Defense HQ on Earth.”

      
“That is what we did to keep the gates’ hardware secure.
 
We also put some sniffers in our network and nondescript surveillance gear around our research center, the factory, even in Defense HQ.
 
The feed from the sniffers and surveillance gear flows into a computer we designed, and it searches for anomalies.”

      
“We can identify an agent on our staff that has been trying to learn our private language.
 
There are two agents in the main factory that have been trying to gain access to the design sheets.
 
A yeoman and a civilian admin assistant in Defense HQ have been trying to gain access to the copy in that safe.
 
A colonel and a sergeant major in Defense HQ have been trying a little too hard to get assigned to the reset office.
 
We haven’t determined if they are spies or just angling for what they consider to be a plum assignment.”

      
“Our former research assistant, Valeri Yestepkin, has two agents working for him, trying to turn him against the Republic.
 
It won’t do them any good.
 
He doesn’t know enough to help them build a ring, even a rudimentary one, plus he’s a good guy.
 
You may remember him from our demo in your conference room.
 
He was one of the assistants helping to bring in the rings.”

      
“He’s involved in a research grant, developing a new weapon on the basis of an offshoot of our technology.
 
He’s developing a series of disruptor weapons that make things disappear permanently.
 
He’s already delivered a prototype weapon to Fleet Ordnance.
 
His weapon design alone is worth stealing.”

      
“We’ve also noted some instances of poor security at some of the factories building the components.
 
We noticed excessive copying of specification sheets, design sheets, CAD/CAM files, and assembly instructions.
 
It’s as if someone is trying to build a gate from the bottom up.”

      
The admiral looked at the two and asked again, “Why have you come to me with this and not your supporting Fleet Intel Field Office?

      
Moira replied, “Because we don’t trust them.
 
They’ve been compromised.
 
We don’t know specifically who it is, but one of the security officers has been turned.
 
We’ve seen data on the rings leave their office network.
 
Remember those data devices you found that had our design info on them?
 
We think the security shop on Gagarin is where it originated.”

      
Admiral Craddock stood up and walked over to his desk.
 
He picked up his communicator and contacted CAPT Hasselrode and had him call a meeting with CDR Timmons, CDR Johnson, and Kelly at 0800 hours tomorrow morning.
 
He instructed Hasselrode to cancel all his other morning appointments.

      
He turned back to Kelly and said, “Your next mission just got a lot more complicated.”

* * * * *

      
Tom Baker was lead construction foreman on segment two of the ring system.
 
His team had been catching hell for trouble with aligning his segment to segments one and three when the system was assembled at Tereshkova.
 
He studied the drawing, looking for the mating plate dimensions, suspecting that the setting on the milling machines had drifted off during the milling operation.
 
His machinist insisted he had the right dimensions, but Tom wasn’t sure.

      
Tom was also not feeling right.
 
He was pretty sure his lunch from the gut truck was bad in some way and he could feel his insides churn.
 
He was alone in the plan room, but the security guy was just outside if he had to leave suddenly.
 
No sooner did the thought enter his mind than he felt an uncontrollable surge.
 
He jumped up, running out the door for the men’s room at speed.
 
He yelled for the security man to lock up the plans as he ran out the door.
 
Unfortunately, the security man had stepped away for a chocolate bar from the vending machine down the hall and wasn’t there to hear him.
 
A janitor walking by did hear him.
 
Realizing the opportunity, he snatched at the door before it closed and locked, and went in.

      
There it was before him, one of the three plans, the Holy Grail of espionage.
 
He quickly pulled out a camera and collected page by page until he had them all.
 
He left the room as he found it and hurried away.
 
The security man came back, found the door locked and no one inside and got a case of the jaws.
 
He would write up the foreman for a security breach.
 
He thought to himself it was a good thing he came back when he did.

      
The janitor hurried to the maintenance room, quickly disassembled the camera, and hid it in various spots around the room.
 
He took the data device and uploaded it to a special hidden folder on his pocket terminal and encrypted it.
 
The data device went into a special pocket in the tongue of his shoe.
 
Now all he had to do was wait for normal quitting time.
 
There was no need to do anything out of the ordinary when he had just scored such a coup.
 
He was sure there would be something extra in his pay this month.