Dremiks (25 page)

Brett leaned over to kiss his sister-in-law on her cheek before taking his seat. Her eyes twinkled with malicious delight at something. He refused to indulge in her game by worrying what caused such sick glee.

Oh, yes, so totally over her.

Chancellor Trell raised his glass in salute to the captain once they were all seated at the small table in his quarters. “Felicitations on another successful jump, Captain. I do believe your crew has the hang of it, now.”

“Thank you, Chancellor. We are ahead of schedule again. At our current rate of travel, we should reach Rhyse station a week ahead of our planned arrival time, perhaps more.” Brett sipped his water; he carefully watched the other three people at the table.

What is it about our speed that worries you so, brother? And why do you think you can hide your unease from me, of all people?

“I will be so happy to reach Dremiks and get our agriculture station started. I’m growing tired of frozen meats and dehydrated vegetables.” Marissa took a delicate bite of flaky, parmesan crusted, cod and made a face. “I suppose there are some things we just won’t be able to reproduce.”

Chancellor Trell’s laugh shook his frame. “I will ask Dr. Fortunas to start a row of cocoa plants for you, then, at least, you ladies can have your chocolate.”

While Marissa sneered and made a condescending comment about common folk and their sweet tooth, Brett’s thoughts drifted.

She’ll be off bridge watch in a few hours, and it’s been at least a month since Chi reported food stores missing again. She’ll curl into a chair with one foot under her, shake that ridiculous hair of hers and giggle like a ten year old. I don’t know why she thinks she can hide her pilfering from me.

The captain didn’t realize that a smile softened his features. His sister-in-law looked at him sharply, wondering what it was that mellowed his thoughts. She was working so hard to irritate him, but he seemed oblivious. He was becoming too complacent, too
happy
with his ship and crew. She needed him off balance. She
wanted
him disoriented and constantly fighting to hold back the savage protective instincts she knew he possessed. A focused Brett Hill was far too dangerous.

With calculated cruelty, Marissa stood and stretched, emphasizing the roundness of her belly. “I’m sorry gentlemen; you’ll have to excuse me. Being a mother is so tiring.”

Brett’s reverie had left him with images of the laughing, sweet, Cassie Ruger. Comparing the gentle doctor with the snide harridan in front of him only made him feel pity for his sister- in- law.

“Dr. Ruger says you are past the half-way mark now, Marissa, and doing remarkably well.”

“Does she tell you everything?”

Brett’s lips quirked, but there was no softness to his expression this time. “This is my ship. I know
everything
that goes on.”

Sadly, neither Marissa or her husband rose to his bait. After she left the room, the conversation droned on with mundane discussion of the colonial plans. Brett finished his dinner only half listening to the other men. His mind was working through why Ryan would worry about the
Hudson
arriving at Dremiks ahead of schedule.

***

Dr. Ruger checked the computer screen in front of her and shook her head. The colonist in her office had no obvious signs of vitamin deficiency or hormonal imbalance. Her blood sugar was with-in the normal range, and her weight was fine. Technically, there was absolutely nothing wrong with Colonist Delorna. Cassie knew, however, that telling Sissy Delorna that her current state of malaise was only psychological would not help either of them get through the next few hours.

“When was the last time you had any chocolate?”

“Chocolate?”

Cassie smiled warmly, relaxing into what she liked to think of as “friend mode”. Her patient needed a sympathetic ear right now, not an un-caring medical professional. “Yes, chocolate, in any form.”

“Well, I don’t know. I burned through my personal stash rather quickly. I have a horrible sweet tooth.”

“I had a feeling you did.” The doctor glanced over her shoulder to the empty medical bay behind her. Sissy was her last patient of the evening. “Do you have anywhere you need to be for the next two hours?”

Thoroughly confused by the doctor’s change in demeanor and questioning, Sissy shook her head in the negative. She watched in bemusement as Dr. Ruger spun in her chair, shut down her files, undocked her tablet—which she slid into her coat pocket—and motioned to the door.

“Come with me. I think I have the perfect treatment for you.” Cassie bustled down the hallway, confident that the other woman would follow. Sissy’s confidence in that assumption, and in the doctor’s mental well being, began to wane the further they traveled through the ship. Instead of heading toward the exercise facilities—Sissy was long acquainted with doctors telling her that exercise produced mood boosting endorphins—or even the colonists’ mess room, Cassie moved into what the military crew termed “officer country”. Sissy had been there once on her initial tour of the ship. She had no reason to return and couldn’t understand how Dr. Ruger intended to help her by touring military officers’ quarters and mess areas.

Cassie sailed into the officers’ mess and grinned broadly at her roommate. “I brought a friend.”

Maggie turned around from looking down at something on the counter top. She returned Cassie’s smile and shrugged her shoulders. Cassie nodded in greeting to Petty Officer Kinsey and Dr. Fortunas’ assistant, Clara. “This is Sissy Delorna. She needs a bit of a pick-me-up and has unfortunately consumed all of her own contraband.”

At the term “contraband” Sissy’s head snapped sideways, and she began to sputter a protest. Clara laughingly interrupted her.

“I’d be bloody disappointed if she hadn’t. Isn’t human, leaving chocolate uneaten for months on end.”

Maggie added a theatrical shudder. “Welcome to our once monthly meeting of the Ladies Chocolate Auxiliary. Brownies on the counter over there.” She waved a hand in an arc that did not quite point in the right direction. Her other hand was busy tearing off a chunk of dark chocolate brownie and moving it toward her mouth.

Sissy’s mouth watered. “How did you get authorization to make brownies… for yourself?”

O’Connell shook her head and swallowed a large bite. “Not myself. Obviously sharing my bounty, as benefits a benevolent leader.” Her grin expanded to new lengths. “Command privilege. Have to keep the senior pilot happy and on an even—”

“Semi-even,” Cassie interrupted, her own mouth already full.

“—emotional keel.” Maggie narrowed her eyes at the civilian. “Stop looking gift officers in the mouth and dig in, woman. I don’t intend to wait for you!”

For the first time in what felt like weeks, Sissy laughed. She edged around the table and chairs and cut herself a brownie from the pan. Still slightly aghast at her good fortune, she only took a conservatively sized helping. O’Connell noted this as she sat down and rolled her eyes. Cassie laughed. Clara leaned back in her chair and began to give a very animated account of Dr. Fortunas’ latest outrage.

Within fifteen minutes, Sissy’s unease was gone. She threw back her head and laughed at Cassie’s snide retort to Maggie. The women around the table, three other enlisted women joined them, had shed all military and social rank. They were bonded by their shared separation from friends and family and their basic need for feminine understanding.

The door slid open. Sissy choked on a bite. Captain Hill, accompanied by Dr. Fortunas, strolled in. The captain was dressed, as he always was, in an impeccable uniform without a button or crease out of place. His posture and expression, however, more closely matched the rumpled, carefree, appearance of the older man with him. Ben’s shirt collar was unbuttoned, his vest completely undone. He shoved his hands in his pockets and slouched slightly.

“Good evening ladies…. and Commander,” the captain said.

Sissy turned her head to see Maggie’s reaction to this small verbal dig. Maggie’s eyes narrowed. To Sissy’s great surprise, the commander’s nose wrinkled slightly, and she appeared on the verge of sticking her tongue out. Appearing to think the better of it—Captain Hill’s left eyebrow had arched at the pert expression she’d given him—Maggie unfolded her lithe frame from her chair and walked to the counter.

Clara ducked sideways as Fortunas tried to rumple her hair. She glared at Cassie. “I suppose
you
told them we were in here?”

Before Cassie could proclaim her innocence, Maggie snorted. She turned around, brownie in hand. “No one told them. The captain knows all. It’s part of his omniscient majesty of command. He’s come here for his ritual offering and in return won’t hand us over to the mess techs when they find their brownie mix gone.”

The room fell silent. The women around the table held their breath; Fortunas watched the commander with a bemused expression on his face. The captain smirked. His blue eyes danced with mischief as Maggie approached him, offering in hand. The rest of his expression and posture were rigidly perfect. The mirth turned to pupil-dilating surprise when Maggie stopped as she came toe to toe with him and then reached around him to give the brownie in her hand to Dr. Fortunas.

No one moved or spoke as O’Connell completed her show of defiance by turning her back on her captain and curling back into her chair. She tossed her head back and met his look with a small smirk of her own. Seated as they were, no one else in the room could see the captain’s expression when he walked over and leaned down, one hand on the back of Maggie’s chair. Sissy thought she heard the captain whisper “good show”, but she couldn’t be sure. She did notice Maggie’s cheeks flush before she averted her gaze.

O’Connell gasped in outrage when the captain used his other hand to pluck her brownie off her plate and slide it into his mouth. He winked at her and nodded his head to the women around the table. “Have a good evening, ladies.”

As the door swung shut behind them, Ben laughed. “You don’t even like brownies.”

“Nope.” Captain Hill looked over at the doctor and smiled. “But I can’t resist tweaking her temper. It keeps her in fighting spirit—a very valuable state for a pilot and senior officer.” He didn’t add that he was happy to have the commander speaking to him, and taunting him, once more. They had resumed their normal state of exasperation with each other and avoided all-out warfare.

“Oh, yes, I’m sure you do it for purely professional reasons.” Ben laughed, but the laughter did not reach the calculating glance he gave the captain as they walked away.

Back in the mess, Maggie glared at the door. She slouched in her seat and groused “Remind me to lock the door next time.”

Cassie, determined not to let her evening be spoiled, giggled. “You say that every time, and every time he finds where we are and sets you off.”

“Mm hm. I’m having the next meeting in the bathroom. Let’s see him follow me in there.”

Cassie murmured a soothing “Yes, dear” while Clara sputtered her mirth.

***

The officers’ mess was empty, lunch having ended several hours before. Coffee still percolated nearby, the machine turning the brew over and over. Left for much longer the mixture would start to over-aerate and take on the consistency of flat soda water. Packages of energy bars, freeze dried fruits, and flash sealed carrots were available in the Plexiglas front cabinets, should an officer develop the munchies.

It was the large, spotless, table that had drawn Ensign Robertson to the room. He sat down in the middle of the table and began to spread his star charts before him. The reinforced, easy fold, paper greedily ate up the space. Not even the chart table on the bridge offered so much surface area.

The solitude was nice too.

Nate twisted the top off a soda bottle—he preferred his caffeine cold—and replaced the cap in its inverted, siphon-valve, configuration. He didn’t want to risk spilling the sticky liquid on his charts. No-spill soda caps were, in his estimation, one of the greater inventions of mankind. The young ensign took a sip and leaned over the table.

He moved a small glass rectangle over the map. The glass was etched with markings that he noted on his tablet. A computer program with advanced AI and several billion lines of code could do all of this in seconds, but Nate liked the simple beauty of the charts, calculator, and his own brain. Plus, he had a suspicion that the computer program, having been written by Dremikians, wasn’t quite as precise as his human calculations.

And Nate didn’t trust Dremikians.

He found them likeable enough, the few he’d met. His father’s position in the government of Earth’s largest surviving nation allowed the young officer a greater than usual chance to interact with their alien guests. Individually the Dremikians seemed open, humorous, and eager to please. Taken as a whole, however, there was a hesitancy about them that bordered on shiftiness.

Nate worked quietly. He barely noticed Dr. Fortunas as the old man entered the mess. While the scientist sniffed the coffee pot with a suspicious expression, Robertson rearranged his charts. When Fortunas pulled a small bag of cranberries from the cupboard and walked out of the mess, Nate was re-working a calculation. He might have paid greater attention to Fortunas, if he’d noticed the scientist’s brown eyes attentively studying him.

Unaware of the interest he’d engendered, Nate made a note on his chart and nodded with satisfaction. He rolled the collection of maps with a slight smile stretching his narrow features.

***

The
Hudson’s
engines hummed to full power. Lieutenant Price slid his fingers along the power controls while the navigational computers adjusted their course. At the end of the small galaxy where the ship currently flew—there was no human name for the system, since no human had ever seen that far into space—the next jump conduit waited. Their mission parameters allowed for several days travel through this particular galaxy. They could have spent the time mapping the star systems it contained, or merely traveling at a sedate pace while Lieutenant Guttmann ran engine diagnostics, but the captain was in a hurry.