Inadvertent Adventures (36 page)

The third day, much to Ann's disgruntlement, was taken up almost entirely with press conferences and briefings. Fortunately, for both Ann and the reporters, the phalanx of Beloofte Presidential Guardians who surrounded Ann and Sterling kept things civil.

"Lords of Space, I'm glad that's over," Ann sighed as soon as the hatches were secured.

Sterling chuckled. "Never thought just talking could be so wearing, did you?"

Ann fixed him with a glare that would have blistered paint. "You could have handled some of it."

"They wanted the president, not some flunky." Ann glared in silence, so Sterling dropped the subject. "We have our departure window in eight minutes."

"Very well, Mister Stevenson. Navigator, is our course set for Farflung?"

"Yes, Ma'am," Denise answered. "As an exercise, I had Bart and Mandy do backup calculations. All three match to within one tenth of one percent."

"Very good," Ann answered without looking up from her own console. "Are the new crewmembers settling in?"

"Yes, Ma'am," Denise answered, also without looking up. "There was a little friction between Kat and Dihandri, but Mandy settled it."

"Oh?"

Denise chuckled. "Dihandri didn't think anyone as young as Kat could be a real starship cook."

Sterling murmured, "Oh, no."

Denise chuckled and shook her head. "Mandy had Kat make lunch. She chose to make that
'Ya Don't Wanna Know'
stew of hers. Two bites and Dihandri was demanding the recipe."

"Good enough. How about the rest?"

"Olaf has Elrika, Rauld, and Mijon standing watch with him, Thom, and Balder to get up them to speed. There's a bit of difference between the
Revenge
and most Beloofte designs. It helps that all three worked for the ship-fitters. They've seen a lot of different designs over the years."

"And Doctor Persoon?"

"Our good Doctor Persoon is of the opinion that Doctor Mandel was a quack. He's been ripping the med-decks apart and rearranging everything. It helps that he's ex-Navy. He didn't expect a full hospital with assistants. Did you know he was on a Survey Scout? Just him and one corpsman in a crew of a hundred and twenty, way out in the back of beyond."

"Sounds like Farflung," Sterling chuckled. "Yes, we knew his background. Admiral Van der Hoff suggested him."

"Who?"

"Commander of Nuwe Vaderland System Security," Ann explained. "We mentioned that our good Doctor Mandel quit in a huff, and he suggested Doctor Persoon as a replacement. By the way, Mandel raised a stink when he got back to New Frankfurt. He accused Countess Alexandra of lying to him about his place here. She didn't take it very well. I understand that he's now in a clinic at their South Pole Research Station. He was under contract with DA-CC, and couldn't refuse without forfeiting his sign-on bonus." Denise snorted in amusement. "That was our reaction as well."

"Departure in one minute," Sterling announced, and Ann hit the acceleration warning button.
"Prepare for acceleration. All personnel prepare for acceleration in one minute,"
echoed through the ship, and on the mark her thrusters pushed them away from the space station and toward the stars.

The long hyperspace transit let everyone get better acquainted. It wasn't long before the three new engineers were fully integrated, and just a little longer for the cook. Kat refused, very bluntly, to give up the kitchen entirely. As a compromise, she took over baking while Dihandri prepared the main courses.

* * *

During the journey the subject of Frisland was almost constantly discussed. A lot of the discussion was hypothetical, but some was practical. "We still haven't named the land masses or oceans," Olaf pointed out one evening.

Katrina looked around and spoke first. "I suggest naming the largest continent Stevenson."

The others looked at one another, and nods were shared all around. "That's fine by me, and I can't imagine Denise objecting. We'll tell Ann and Sterling later." Olaf grinned as the others chuckled.

"Larsson for the next," Balder suggested. When Olaf looked at him, he just laughed. "Well, there're two Larssons on the crew. It's appropriate."

Olaf shook his head in sorrow. "Denise is going to kill me. All right then, what about the others?"

"Draw straws?" CM suggested. When everyone who was present nodded, she went to the galley and came back with six coffee stirring sticks. She carefully cut them so there was a clear one-centimeter difference in length between each one and the next, then wrote numbers on them just to be sure.

Olaf had been busy with the briefing table holo-projector and had already added
'Stevenson'
and
'Larsson'
labels to the maps of Frisland's continents. "We need Thom, Bart, and Mandy if we're going to do this fairly," he said without looking up.

"I'll get them," Katrina volunteered, then disappeared from the wardroom. She was back in just a few minutes. "They're coming."

The sleepy, grumpy, dopey members of the crew stumbled into the wardroom and were met with fresh coffee and some of Katrina's coffee cakes. "This better be damn good," Mandy grumbled as she walked into the wardroom and was handed a cup of coffee.

"We're naming the landmasses," Olaf explained.

"Without Ann and Sterling?" she asked as she took a sip.

"Well, we named the biggest continent
Stevenson
," Olaf said with a grin. "We'll tell them about it later. Remember, neither of them had their names in the ballots when we named the planets. Ann probably would have tried to stay out of this as well."

Bart had casually wrapped an arm around Katrina's waist, and reached out with the other to grab a cup. "Serves them right for making us rich and famous." He smiled down at Katrina when she looked up at him.

"We're drawing straws for the rest, except
Larsson
," Balder said as he looked at the others. "Olaf and Denise got the second-largest continent."

Everyone shared a look before Olaf held up the straws. The visible ends were exactly even. "Since I'm out of this, I'll officiate. CM?" He held the straws out to her, and she pulled one.

"Number three," she announced, holding the straw so the number was visible.

"Mandy?"

"Number one," she announced with a smile.

"Kat?"

Katrina looked at hers and sighed. "Six."

"Balder?"

"Two," he announced in a surprised tone.

"Bart?"

"Five."

"Thom? You're last."

Thom pulled his straw and said, "Four."

Olaf chuckled. "Very well. Mandy, pick a place."

Mandy took a moment to study the hologram, then pointed. "That one. The big continent that straddles the equator." Olaf made the name
Carter
appear on the indicated land mass.

"Balder, you're up."

"Well, my ancestors were from Norway on Old Earth, so I'll take this one." He pointed to the northern-most continent. It was more than half covered in ice.

"So be it," Olaf said as he put the name
Pastulka
on it. "CM?"

"I'll go south. That one." She pointed to the southern-most continent. It was half the size of Stevenson, and almost one quarter covered by ice. Olaf put the name
Chanticlair
on it, though it barely fit at the current scaling of the image.

Thom shook his head and said, "The big island. Looks like a warm, friendly place."

"
Oslund
it is," Olaf said as he put the name on the island. "Yours is the only name that sounds like a land."

"It was," Thom replied with a shake of his head. "Long, long ago there was a place called Oslund." He smiled softly as he looked at Bart.

"I'll take that group of three large islands," Bart said as he pointed. Olaf added the name
Roberts
across them.

Everyone looked at Katrina, and she shrugged. "I'll take that big archipelago." She pointed to a group of seventeen islands grouped around three larger islands, and Olaf labeled them
Von Rubenstein
.

"And now I'm going to take advantage of the fact that I have the controls and do this." He centered the cursor on a group of islands near
Larsson
and put the name
Putin
on them, then chose a group of smaller islands and put the name
Brasov
over them. "Absent friends who gave their lives to get us here," he all but whispered. None of the crew objected. They knew the story of the
Jolly Jane
, and who William Putin and Jeremiah Brasov had been.

"Um, not to be petty, but-" Dihandri said from the end of the table.

Olaf looked at the six other Frisland stock-holders. "Any objections?" he asked.

Thom asked, "What about Ann, Sterling, and Denise?"

"I doubt they'll mind. We have a quorum anyway. Di, pick a body of water."

Dihandri pointed to the body of water west of
Stevenson
, and Olaf labeled it
Willems Ocean
. "You know, someone's got to go relieve the watch, and send Doc and Mijon up here as well."

"Point taken," Balder said as he and Thom headed for the door.

Ten minutes later the other four Beloofters were in the wardroom. "You get to name oceans," Olaf explained, and all four of them looked excited. "Rauld?"

"I think here," Rauld said as he pointed, and Olaf put the name
Trautmann Ocean
in the center.

"Rika?"

She watched the globe for a full rotation, then pointed and said, "Here, east of
Stevenson
." Olaf labeled it the
Verwoerd Ocean
.

"Doc?"

"This one, I think, but it looks more like a sea than an ocean," the doctor replied, and Olaf labeled it the
Persoon Sea
.

"Alright, Mijon, you're up."

Mijon shook his head. "Here," he said as he pointed to the body of water between
Stevenson
and
Larsson
. "And this also looks more like a sea."

Olaf labeled it the
Jooste Sea
, and then saved the changes to the image. "There's still a lot left to name, but we got the big parts. The rest will probably be named once Frisland is settled."

* * *

Their emergence into the Farflung system was met with a great deal of excitement on the part of the dozen or so ships that had been waiting for them to return. Admiral Meerhof was the first to contact them.

"
Admiral Ann's Revenge
, this is Admiral Meerhof on the CSS
Amsterdam
. Welcome back. Admiral Stevenson, you didn't happen to bring us some new orders did you?"

Ann grinned at Sterling before answering. "
Amsterdam
, this is President Stevenson onboard the
Admiral Ann's Revenge
. I have your orders from Admiral Gagarin. They will be attached to this message." Ann nodded and Sterling attached the order packet to the message and hit the transmit button.

"Someone's going to be very,
very
angry when they read those orders," Sterling commented.

"True, but some of the others are going to be delighted. We're only going to have five ships as a system picket, but I can't imagine any reason we'd need more than that."

"I can imagine several reasons," Sterling replied, "but they are highly unlikely. Fuel first?"

"Yes. Get in contact with the
Tivor Carva
and arrange it. And see if the
Tashmeryn
is in orbit yet."

"Aye, ma'am," Sterling answered. It was slightly more than three hours later that he announced, "Ma'am, we have fueling instructions from the
Tivor Carva
. Fuel rendezvous in six days, nineteen hours. Jarnsaxa is quite a bit closer to our current course than Frisland is.
Tashmeryn
has not arrived yet, according to Captain Kempler."

"Understood. Coordinate with the navigator and set course. How much longer..?" she looked at her chrono and shook her head. "Let's have Bart plot the course and let the junior section take us in. They should be here in about ten minutes."

Sterling and Denise both answered, "Yes, Ma'am."

The relief watch section, Bart, Mandy, and CM, arrived five minutes early to receive a pass-down from the watch, and took over on schedule. "Miss Carter, you have the ship. Set course to rendezvous with the
Tivor Carva
in Jarnsaxa orbit. It's six days and nineteen hours out. We'll see you in eight hours." Ann smiled as Mandy took the command seat.

"We have the watch, aye. Navigator, plot a course to Jarnsaxa. Helm, coordinate with the navigator and set course as soon as it's plotted."

Bart and CM answered, "Yes, Ma'am," as Ann, Sterling, and Denise left Control.

Ann and Sterling retired to their stateroom to begin reviewing the requests they had received. "Looks like more of the same thing," Ann commented as she scanned the messages. "Everyone wants three, five, even ten years free."

"So we say no. Any interesting messages?"

"Nope. I'm going to draft a standard message detailing twenty-five percent net from day one, and no exclusive rights."

Sterling sighed and stretched his back. "Fine by me." He went to take a shower, and wasn't surprised when Ann joined him a little later.

"Message composed, recorded, and sent. We'll see who responds tomorrow."

Sterling chuckled, and then started shampooing her hair.

* * *

Ten minutes before their watch was scheduled, Mandy contacted them. "Captain, a Mister MacDonald is demanding to speak to you. He is within com distance."

"MacDonald. That's the New Highland Enterprises rep. We'll be right up, Mandy."

Mandy replied, "Aye, Ma'am," then the com clicked off.

Ann, Sterling, and Denise arrived together, and Ann immediately took the watch. Ann checked her station and nodded in satisfaction, then turned to Sterling. "Mister Stevenson, open a channel to Mister MacDonald."

"Aye, Ma'am. Mister MacDonald is online, Ma'am."

"Mister MacDonald, have you considered our offer?" Ann asked.

"I have, and it's the most outrageous thing I've ever heard," the man on the viewer replied. "Twenty-five percent from the get-go? New Highland will not accept terms like that."