Dark Running (Fourth Fleet Irregulars Book 4) (74 page)

Jermane gave him an awed look, breaking into a grin as he realised that Alex was absolutely right.

‘Uh, well, yeah,’ he admitted, and relaxed, then, feeling a shift in his sense of perspective. He laughed, too, as a thought arose – if he had been told back on the Embassy III that within a few months he would be undertaking key-linguist role in first contact with Samart, he would probably have had a panic attack. ‘Thanks,’ he said, and sat a little straighter, giving Alex a nod. ‘Skipper.’

Alex gave him a nod in return, his
you’ll do
nod which was a commendation in itself. Then he shifted attention back to the rest of those gathered at the table, smiling briefly around at them.

‘So, are we all happy?’

They said that they were, and the briefing was dismissed, but Alex had seen the thoughtful look on Shion’s face – just a hint of reserve, there, which he recognised as a sign that she had something on her mind. He could not and would not neglect his care of her, with diplomatic responsibility over and above that of his duty of care towards her as one of his officers, so he invited her to join him for lunch.

‘You’re not back on duty yet, are you?’ Alex was startled to find that Banno Triesse was already in the daycabin with a hot trolley, setting the table, when he and Shion went in there about half an hour later.

‘No, skipper.’ Banno had flipped the dining top on the datatable, and got the condiment tray out of the trolley. Alex would never normally even let him do that, preferring to serve himself, and his guests. If he was eating lunch in his cabin at all, it was usually because he’d invited a guest or two, and those were always informal occasions. His notion of setting the table went no further than taking the tray from the trolley and putting it down in the middle of the table, leaving his guest to help themselves to cutlery, bread and condiments.

Banno, however, had other ideas. He’d unwrapped the cutlery and was placing it restaurant-style, bread basket and condiment stand artistically arranged. ‘I’m not working,’ Banno said, setting out glasses and a carafe of iced water. He met Alex’s steady look with a brightly innocent smile. ‘Just pottering around,’ he said.

‘Well, potter off,’ Alex instructed, with a severity which might have been more convincing without the grin. ‘
Thank
you, Mr Triesse.’ He intercepted Banno’s attempt to get the food trays from the trolley, and Banno laughed, giving him a play salute.

Alex sat down, shaking his head as Banno departed, and Shion sat down, laughing too.

‘I’ve got my money on Banno,’ she said, and as Alex raised an enquiring eyebrow, she chuckled. ‘On whether he’ll get you to let him do silver-service before we get back to Therik.’

‘You’ll lose,’ said Alex, and handed her a meal-tray.

Conversation was casual, while they were eating. Then Banno returned, bearing a plate of rather lurid-coloured discs.

‘Compliments of Mr Ireson, skipper,’ he announced, grandly, setting the plate down on the grav-panel at the side of the table.

‘Ah.’ Alex remembered giving permission, weeks ago, for Simon to teach Mako how to cook. Mako was already qualified to help out in the galley, where the most technical task he was allowed to undertake was the rehydrating and flash-cooking of bread rolls. Cooking in the interdeck galley was a whole different ball game, requiring a lot of study, training and tests before Mako could even begin to think about handling food. Apparently, he had now got to that stage. Alex looked at the papery discs, coloured a violent magenta. ‘And these are..?’

‘Macaroons,’ Banno informed him, adding with considerable pride, ‘I helped. They’re raspberry. We overdid the colouring a bit – Mr Ireson thought it said three millilitres and it should have been microlitres. Simon did howl a bit, but he says it’s all right, they’re perfectly edible.’

‘Thank you,’ Alex said. ‘Please tell Mr Ireson that I’m very appreciative of his efforts.’

‘Skipper,’ Banno acknowledged, and went off with the trolley, beaming.

‘You know,’ Alex said, regarding the macaroons with some trepidation, ‘there are times when I understand why the regular Fleet thinks this ship is a madhouse.’ He picked up a disc, flexed it and broke it in half, tasting just a nibble from one piece. ‘Actually, not as bad as I thought.’

Shion wrinkled her nose as he offered her the plate.

‘All I can smell is norbixin,’ she said, and seeing his lack of recognition, ‘The food colour. They’ve put a thousand times more of it in than they should have.’

She could, he knew, smell the different chemicals in food, and her palate was so much sensitive than humans’ that she did have to be careful about what she ate. She would have eaten one of these if Mako had offered it in person, out of politeness, but held up a hand, then, with a quick grin. ‘No thanks.’

Alex ate the rest of his, finding it chewy and rather bland in flavour relative to how virulent it looked, but not unpleasant.

‘All right,’ he said, and smiled at her. ‘So…’

‘So… nothing, really.’ Shion said, and at his quizzical look, spread her hands in a gesture conveying
honestly
. ‘There are… thoughts,’ she admitted. ‘I’m thinking things through – about how a culture defines itself and is defined by its beliefs, the inertia in that and how hard it is for them to see that there could be any other way to understand their cosmos. I’m not ready to talk about it yet – it’s not worrying
me,’ she reassured him quickly, knowing that he would consider it to be a serious problem,
his
problem, if she was anxious or upset. ‘I’m just, you know,’ she grinned, ‘thinking deep thoughts.’

‘Ah.’ Alex relaxed, with that, relieved to see that there was nothing he needed to be concerned about. ‘Well, share when you want,’ he said, and offered the coffee.

They had another two days of waiting, then, until the Samartians called.

Twenty Six

Alex knew what they were going to say as soon as the link was established. Dakaelin Jurore and Tell were superficially as impassive as always, but they were giving away micro-tells which Alex recognised even before he saw the analysis flag up on the advisory subscreen.

They were tense, but it was the self-important, grand tension of people who were aware that what they were about to say would make history.

‘It is our honour to inform you,’ Jurore said, ‘that the people of the World extend welcome to the Revellin, greeting you in amity.’

‘We greet you in peace,’ Tell confirmed, just as formally. ‘And pledge to treaty with you in peace, with all honour, to the benefit of both our peoples.’

‘It is my honour to thank you for your greeting, and your pledge of friendship, on behalf of our President and all the peoples of the League,’ Alex responded. ‘We pledge also a commitment to peaceful, honourable dealings between your people and ours, to the benefit of all.’

It would have needed superhuman acuity or very sophisticated software to see the joy on his face, but the solemn pride was evident enough in his tone, and got tiny flickering smiles from the Samartians in return.

‘It is our custom,’ Alex told them, ‘to celebrate such pledges of amity with a ceremony.’

He saw a little flick of alarm, and felt a wholly mischievous urge to assure them, ‘Don’t worry, we won’t make you dance.’ He was thinking of the Dance of the Lizard which the Gider had insisted on in celebration of their making friends with the humans – not something Alex was ever likely to forget.

‘If the customs are acceptable to you…’ he transmitted a formal invitation which specified exactly what would happen, ‘we would be greatly honoured by your participation.’

There was a slight delay, then Tell glanced at Jurore, who was looking rather frozen.

‘I will be honoured to represent our people,’ Tell said, and at that, just a glint of indignation showed in Jurore, lifting his chin millimetrically.

‘I, also,’ he said, very much on his dignity, and Alex inclined his head.

Arrangements were made for them to come aboard the Heron the following day, and once the link was severed, Alex solemnly shook hands with Davie, while the ship roared with thunderous cheering.

They were back at work within minutes, though, with an all-officers’ briefing on the command deck. It was agreed for the benefit of the log that they were all satisfied that this was indeed an official commitment made by the Samartian government, and that they would proceed on that basis.

‘Point of interest, skipper,’ Murg Atwood was not an officer, but she was standing with them round the table, raising a hand at the point where Alex invited contributions. ‘We’ve identified a latent gender bias – it appears that Samartians have traditionally believed that women are braver than men.’

She spoke with such bland innocence that none of the men around the table could really protest, though it was apparent that several of them wanted to. ‘The theory being that a woman whose children are threatened is biologically disposed to greater courage and ferocity,’ she said, and kept her eyes fixed on Alex as if oblivious to all the male eyes staring at her, and the female grins. ‘This is now regarded as old fashioned, reactionary thinking, and there is a stated commitment to gender-blindness in such things as assignments and promotions. But such attitudes tend to linger unconsciously, particularly in high adrenalin situations like this. In the light of that, I note that the officer they chose to send over to us was female, that they asked
for
a female officer in return, and that when they had what they felt to be very sensitive matters to discuss, they chose a male. The dynamic between Jurore and Tell also indicates that although he appears to do more of the talking and to speak more aggressively than she does, it is Tell who is actually dominant. What we just saw there was Jurore showing fear at the prospect of coming aboard our ship, then getting mightily indignant when Tell offered to come on her own. So I’d advise, you know, be gentle with him, skipper.’

That got a laugh, and Alex grinned, too, though giving her a nod. He’d noticed that little exchange, himself, but without thinking anything of it.

‘Thank you, Ms Atwood,’ he said, and singled out Jermane Taerling, then, also present as a member of the analysis team. ‘Mr Taerling,’ he said. ‘We’re about to move to finalising the offers and requests we will put on the table tomorrow. So are you still of the same mind, on our previous discussion?’

‘Oh – yes, skipper!’ Jermane said, at once. ‘Absolutely, I…’

‘All right,’ Alex said, cutting him off with practiced skill and a friendly grin. Others were looking puzzled, questioning, and Alex told them, ‘Mr Taerling has offered to stay and assist the Samartians with developing their linguistic skills.’

There was uproar. Even the discipline of briefing protocols could not stand against the exclamations of shock and disbelief which turned very rapidly into protests, out of which
you can’t leave him here on his own
arose as the strongest sentiment.

Alex held up a hand, and the clamour collapsed into silence, though faces were still eloquent of incredulity and dismay.

‘I agree,’ he said, ‘we can’t leave
anyone
here by themselves, that isn’t acceptable. But nor am I prepared to ‘ask for volunteers’, because it would not be fair, or reasonable, to ask anyone to volunteer for such a mission. What Mr Taerling has suggested is that, subject of course to the Samartians allowing it, that we set up a survival dome on an uninhabited world or moon. But anyone who stays will be stuck there for anything from eight to fourteen months, and it’s likely to be nearer fourteen than eight. So I am not going to ask for volunteers, I am just telling you that Mr Taerling has made this suggestion, and asking for your views.’

Three quarters of the people around the command deck immediately put their hands up, and Buzz just burst out laughing.

‘One to me,’ he said, and held out his hand, which Alex slapped in casual acknowledgement. When he’d discussed this with Buzz, in some concern at how unfair it might be even to lay it out there for volunteers, the exec had predicted that Alex would be fighting them off.

‘Oh, I
would
,’ said Martine, clearly torn, ‘if it wasn’t for Bud.’

Bud was her son, six years old and being cared for at the base on Therik by her own parents.

‘Well, let me make it easy for you,’ Alex said, ‘I won’t even consider people with kids. Arbitrary, I know, and you may even consider it unfair, so feel free to log a grievance, but I will not, I just will
not
, have to explain to a child when we get back to Therik why Mummy or Daddy didn’t come home with us and won’t
be
coming home for at least another year and a half. I know they’re spacer kids, they’re used to us being away for a long time, but they’re
Fleet
kids – when they see the ship come back to port they
will
expect their parents to be on it.’

‘Thanks, skipper,’ Martine said, and the others who had kids at the base nodded, too, recognising that the skipper was immovable on that issue, whether they agreed with him or not.