Chapter 6: New Friends

-- February - Week 8 --

Lee had another great week.

Her little crew worked very well together. Terry seemed to fit right in, Army crew-cut and all. Since he had started to get over his hero worship and treated her just like everyone else, she found she enjoyed his company.

He had a dry wit and was a bit of a practical joker. He and Jim both being of a similar age to her, they seemed to complement each other and had become fast friends. It was more common than not, for one of them to be with her during the shift.

They often found excuses to go with her if she had to go to other areas of the ship outside engineering and the workshops. If she didn’t know better, she would think they had become her protectors. They hadn’t let her wander off alone since the incident with Essco.

At first, Lee had thought that Sean had put them up to it, but she decided that that was fanciful. As she could whip both their asses in about two heartbeats, and she would most likely have to protect them.

Lee remembered one time she had tried telling Jim that he didn’t have to come along with her. She had been asked to go to the kitchen to fix the bread oven for Juanita. One of Juanita’s duties aboard ship was to make bread, bread rolls and pastries when she wasn’t needed for grunt duties. And she was a bloody good baker too.

Jim explained that a Knight could not go off to do battle without her favourite squire, and so, she had to let him go with her. It turned out that his brute strength came in handy. They had to lift the very heavy oven to remove the lead. It had been jammed under it on one of the jumps before the compensators had been fixed.

The use of the oven had slowly melted the cable until it shorted out. Once the cable was free, Lee was able to replace it easily enough. So, she stopped worrying about why the boys wanted to go with her and simply enjoyed their company. She decided she liked having friends and she spent a lot less time alone these days.

Rodger had also noticed that he never saw Lee alone anymore. At first, he had planned to try to lock her in somewhere again. Even though this method hadn’t been successful, so far. Lee’s chaperones would also make further attempts redundant.

Rodger had thought of several other ways that he could hurt her without anyone knowing he was responsible, but he’d had to discard many of them too. Witnesses didn’t suit his plans.

He was still racking his brains on how to make her pay for his lost testicle.

Lee soon found going to the gym after work in the morning to exercise with the Army grunts, was very satisfying.

Jim and Kyle had also started to turn up earlier in the week. A couple of days later, Debora, Sandra and Dave had joined them too. With eighteen of them in the gym, there wasn’t much room for anyone else to be in the open workout area.

So, most other people soon learnt not to turn up to use the gym, until after Lee’s ‘classes’ had finished or they got their exercise in earlier.

Kyle had worked out with Lee before on other jobs. He did it more to keep her company than to really exercise. She had taught him a simple kata to help keep him fit. She had even convinced him it would improve his bed aerobics.

Kyle also knew that for the jobs they did, it was better to keep up their fitness rating to improve selection on the better ships. He just liked to give Lee a bit of stick about her making him do exercise.

While the Grunts were combat trained, most of this team had not particularly trained in specific martial arts or fighting style. With the exceptions of Sean, Terry, Gary and Juanita, her friends and the rest of the grunts had bugger-all experience. And to Lee’s consternation, they watched far too many ‘Kung Fu’ vids from the archives.

Being from an Engineering core, most of the Grunts were of the opinion that as long as they could run away and shoot back, all was good. Many of them felt that they shouldn’t ever get into a bad situation where hand-to-hand combat was necessary.

Juanita, Terry and Penny wanted Lee to teach them some of her moves and even Gary insisted he wasn’t too old (at all of thirty-six), to learn some new tricks. So, Lee suddenly found she had been elevated to being the instructor with Sean as her 2IC (second in command).

Lee spent the first couple of mornings focusing on their general fitness and exercises that increased their strength and flexibility. Later she moved into teaching them how to fall from simple throws.

As she told them, in most cases, they would be the victim if attacked. If they didn’t learn how to fall correctly, then they would stay the victim. The class was amazed by her ability to slow motion the moves so they could see exactly what she did and how Sean reacted. She also talked them through each step.

When commented upon, she pooh-poohed the idea. Saying that while she and Sean had slowed the throws some, if they seemed even slower, it was because they ‘the class’, were interested and paying attention.

But no one believed her. Even Sean, who knew he never hit the mat, as hard as even he thought he should have. His woman was a hell of a lot stronger than she looked.

She taught the class very simple, but extremely effective moves to immobilise an attacker. She emphasised that height and weight were not critical for these moves, and anyone could do them.

She even teamed the girls up against the biggest guys to prove it. It was not long before they all agreed she was the best bloody instructor any of them had ever had.

Lee generally used poor Sean as her victim. He, in turn, found himself with his back on the mat many times. But as he liked the view, he never complained. After all, wrestling with Lee was one of his favourite past-times.

One time, when Jim and Terry had been practising one of the moves, they had gotten in a grappling session as Jim wouldn’t let Terry drop him on the mat (Jim topped Terry by 30cms (12”) and 25kg). Terry ended up falling badly. Fortunately, his ego was bruised more than his butt was.

When Lee had asked them, “What fucking move, was that?”

Terry had cheekily snapped to attention and replied, “A fuck-up, General Lee.”

There had been a lot of giggles, and Lee ended up with a new nickname. Gary had taken it one step further. He taught the civilians how to salute a ranking officer like a General.

So, by the end of the week, everyone had perfected their parade quality line up. At the start of the sessions, they now snapped to attention and saluted Lee when she came in before bowing.

While Lee was not totally amused, Sean thought it was hilarious. He also had decided she made an excellent General. With the way she approached problems and quickly and effective provided solutions, he would follow her into battle any day.

While a Captain himself, he understood the importance of good leadership. Lee tended to find a following wherever she went, even if she didn’t realise the effect she had on others.

Sean had been promoted before the deployment. He had kept the title of Lieutenant to save the confusion of having two Captains aboard. He had deliberately left what the civvies believed was the higher rank, with Captain Clark.

As far as the civvies were concerned, Clark was in charge as long as they were on the ship. For Sean, his soldiers knew who and what he was. He had never really been stressed about rank, as long as his people showed respect when it was required and followed his orders.

It was one of the reasons they rarely saluted him on the ship, and he didn’t encourage them. He had found the engineering corps tended to be a bit more relaxed than other branches when it came to saluting officers when on light deployments like this one.

Since Lee now didn’t get to bed until around 09:30 hours or a bit later if Sean could inspire her otherwise, she didn’t tend to get up until about 17:00 hours. Sean also altered his hours a tad, so he didn’t come back to the room until 17:00 hours. This was so Lee could get enough sleep unless of course, junior dragged him there earlier.

He enjoyed nothing better than crawling into bed with Lee after sorting through the endless meetings aimed at planetfall. He also hated dealing with the various shipboard disputes and arguments. He put up with the chore because it took a lot of pressure off Captain Clark.

This left the Captain free to worry about getting them to their destination. Sean also tried to direct as many of the relationship issues to Ulani, because she was also a trained marriage counsellor and far better qualified to deal with domestic disputes.

In the dinner, the Goldsmith’s, Veselovsky’s, Cheboi’s and Nick and Sung sat at a table that paralleled Sean’s table and the two tables often interacted. The rest of the Grunts had also moved to a table that was close to Sean’s and Lee.

In deference to the night shift workers, the groups tended to eat later at the 19:30 hours sitting rather than at the 18:00 - 19:00 hour, sitting. It was probably just as well. The three groups tended to linger over dinner, and they could be a bit rowdy.

Sean had found that since he could now team up with Philip and Ulani, most of the discord was kept to a dull roar. He was amused by the outcome of one dispute that happened early in the week. Sean had the ability to see the funny side of situations.

Sean was disgusted with the petty behaviour of the two of the scientists. He had threatened to confine one of the scientists to a week of confinement in the pigpen. So, he could learn how to get on with others. The pigs had better manners than they did, he told them.

The solution, when revealed, had become an effective deterrent to not pissing him off in future. Especial with the way gossip flew around the ship at faster than the speed of sound. Sean was very amused by the solution, even if some of the other ship personnel weren’t.

He had told his dinner companions what he had said, and they provided the solution. Dave, Terry and Jim bolted Lee’s old bed-rack to a wall. It was at the back of one of the as-yet empty pigpens. They put the bunks back on it.

They had then put beside the beds an ‘outhouse box’, built by Bones Tyson the night-shift welder. It had a hole in the top and a bucket underneath. ‘Pisser & No .2’s’ was marked on the little door, and a roll of toilet paper was attached to the side of the box.

The collaborators had even gotten Little Bear and Bones to make two sets of shackles with chains. They bolted them to the wall beside the beds and then they had taken a picture of the setup.

Debora had it blown up and put it on the community notice board. It had ‘BRIG’ typed in big red letters across the top and ‘Pigs have better manners’, along the bottom in pink and purple layered text. They had even encouraged Miss Piggy with Lee’s help, to sit in front of the bunks for the picture.

The picture had been on the board for two days before Sean saw it. He had wondered why things had been quiet for a few days. Gary had finally placed a copy of the picture in front of him at dinner. He asked Sean when he had gotten the ‘Brig’ built?

Gary was elected as the representative as everyone was just dying to see Sean’s reaction and had decided he was taking too long to find out what they had done.

The table had ended up in hysterics at his, “What the fuck!” reply. It also didn’t take him long to work out who the instigators of the practical joke were.

The interesting side effect was, as far as the rest of the ship’s personnel, who hadn’t been in on the joke were concerned, it was a real Brig. They didn’t relish spending a night shackled to a bed in a pigpen even if it was clean, simply because they couldn’t sort out their own petty problems amicably.

The Captain had even taken Terry and Jim aside and told them to leave it there for the time being. He was enjoying the peace and quiet it had created. Sean and Ulani both had to agree.

Professor Essco had taken ‘the Brig’ as a personal affront. He believed Sean had it built as a warning to him to leave them and the walking pork chop alone or that was where he would end up.

Essco was fully convinced that Sean as the effective Law Officer or as the Americans said, ‘the Sheriff’, as he had heard Sean being referred to, wouldn’t hesitate to use the brig if pissed-off enough.

Rodger also was not impressed. While Lee hadn’t told the crew what he had tried to do to her, he felt that she was just biding her time. He never did ask Kyle if Lee had killed the last guy who tried to rape her, as he had totally believed her.

He just stayed well away from her, only watching her from a distance. He didn’t want to end up in shackles either. He had just spent the most painful weeks of his life as a result of that bitch, not acting, as a good woman should.

It had been four weeks since she had broken his jaw and rib and ruptured his testicle. And even worse, as far as he was concerned, he now had a bent dick. He had not had an erection since, and it still sometimes hurts to pee.

Dr Yates had said that he must have landed very badly, to rupture a testicle and cause a penile fracture. The doctor thought he had been masturbating when he fell off the bed. He assured Rodger the operation should help, but it may take him several months to regain full function in his nether region.

The broken jaw had been complicated by the rough jumps. It was still wired up, and Rodger was still drinking soup through a straw. Hopefully, in a couple of days, he would have the wires moved so he can eat and talk properly again.

He had even lost a rear molar, and he hated the hole it created in his mouth. He had always been proud of his straight white teeth and no fillings. Not being able to brush them properly or floss also annoyed the hell out of him.

One good thing about his confinement was that he, Frank, Essco and Ben had become good friends. They all agreed that women had their place. That God had put them on the Earth to serve men and there were some real uppity bitches on this crew.

Rodger didn’t tell them about what happened with Lee, but they all agreed she was one of the worst. He had also learnt that Essco and even Ben to a degree, as well as being down on the place for women, and what they were good for, were also bigots. Essco, in particular, had a real thing about inter-racial coupling and gays.

While Rodger really didn’t care, he was happy to support Essco and Ben as he liked having friends for a change. He was glad to agree to about anything, as long as others agreed with his views of the world.

He had thought about sharing the payout with them if they helped him get rid of Lee. But he decided it was better if he did it himself. He really wanted her to suffer for what she had done to him.

Essco and Ben had also confided to Rodger that they had built the still. They had even managed to get several brews bottled before it was discovered. While the alcohol wasn’t as good as an aged whisky, it at least took the edge off.

They had kept a small flask filled for Rodger, to help with his pain during his first weeks of confinement. He was now up and around but still not fully recovered. Ben had put him on light duties and assigned him to the dayshift, even though he didn’t do much.

Ben was quite happy to leave the other two crew alone as he didn’t get any complaints from them and they always did the work he left for them. Even Isha’s afternoonshift team was working very well now that Roger wasn’t in charge of them.

Ben had not given Rodger a specific job, so he was free to roam the ship at his leisure. This suited Rodger no end, as he hated hard work. It also made it easier for him to monitor Lee.

Eventually, Rodger had become Ben’s and Essco’s errand boy, and he liked his new job. With Ben’s leg still in a foam cast, Rodger became his legs, even if it was with a slow and gingerly walk. His other new job was looking after the still.

The other men had removed the still three weeks before from where Sean had stored it. Ben had found a new location on level nine. He had disabled the access so that the central computer logs didn’t record the hall and the doors to the area being opened.