Chapter 67

"Why didn't you take command?" John Dahlgren asked Clare.

They were relaxing in Clare's office in anticipation of translating the Junction to Settlement, the day after the action. Dahlgren had attended the debrief and had requested a further debrief by Clare, as he put it,

"One commander to an ex commander"

It had taken about a minute and a half for Dahlgren to get out of the Link trainer with MCWO Miller's assistance and dash up to the bridge. He found Clare donning her hardsuit and standing back as crew slid onto the bridge in varying stages of donning hardsuits. As a crewman completed suiting up, they relieved the duty watch crewman so they could don their hardsuit. Dusty had come hurtling through the port entryway in his suit with helmet dangling from his hand as he relieved Dell.

They watched the battle unfold as the OW orchestrated the destruction of the enemy forces.

Clare moved only after hearing the EW officer identify the destroyed DDs as being Mounty.

"Oh lovely" Clare muttered as she moved past Dahlgren who followed her onto the bridge, "My ship, Mr Hobson."

TJ vacated the command chair and replied,

"Your ship, Ma'am"

Clare quickly looked up at the flat sound in TJ's voice.

"It was an observation, TJ, not a criticism in any way; I would have done exactly ... emphasis on exactly ... the same thing. That squadron was turning for a missile broadside. It had to be taken out, stat."

TJ looked back at Clare for a moment, visibly relaxed, and

"Thank you Ma'am. Crew is closed up for action stations, our main armament is hot, triple shield is deployed, the frames are all primed, the HACs are searching for survivors, still in Dune except for Pigeon Three whose Dune failed. We have full load forward, one hundred singles aft, full load Delta and three seventy frames from Bravo..."

As TJ spoke, the information appeared on the side bars of Clare's screen.

" ... On trek for the Junction ETA eight afternoon tomorrow."

"Thank you, Mr Hobson. Mr Cahlewis, survivors?"

"None, Ma'am; nothing but small pieces."

"Something wrong with those BCs?"

"No, Ma'am" Bet fielded the question, "each one took two hundred MDMs and forty frames directly into the hull. I think they were lined up with shields to intercept the initial salvo through the storm, most of which made it through. The shields stopped the ones that got through but that kept them looking to the storm for the following salvos. The storm must have interfered with their EW and they didn't detect the frames hopping over the storm; and then the second salvo went through ballistic with Pigeon Three relaying as the frames cleared the storm, it was a repeat performance; Goodnight Irene she said!"

"Suits, leave the rest till the debrief. Now let's get this ship Bristol fashion. Stand down from action stations. Put up two scouts stat and recall the HACs; Master Chief, get to it. Bring the missiles back aboard; Bosun, re-ammunition parties from both Deck Apes and Black Gang — Daughters with the parties and see how it's done, please. Get to it, people."

The recipients acknowledged.

"So why the surprise? TJ?"

The officers were gathered about the mess table with off duty crew draped in various relaxed postures in the seating around the mess. Dahlgren was a little fazed by the fact the debrief was being conducted in the open — different tally bands, different protocols; and he sensed this worked in this environment.

( "Sundowner" being of mercantile design had no spaces suitable for "closed" conferences — except for one on ones in Clare's cubby now her office.)

"That pinnace was shut down, lying doggo on the edges of the storm in the electronic void but he probably had "Sundowner" on passive; we were doing our merchie thing with only impellor shields. The distance from the storm made the range point blank and we were distracted by Pigeon Three. Blue leader was high and the HAC's passive detected the BCs as they passed through a thin patch of storm. Reviewing the tape, we couldn't detect the pinnace."

"Why turn away and the expanding screen?"

"Didn't know what was there and decided clear space as far away as possible was safer; expanding screen? Those missiles were too close. I thought if I tried to form the sphere, the missiles would have already been inside by the time it got to full strength. The expanding screen builds up as it moves out and has an impact factor. It was just strong enough even though #7 overloaded. And that brings us to Derrin. Orville?"

"Ah, yah ... well. You know we have been loading programmes into Derrin at the same time Threep was interfacing. The Doc, here, helped Threep teach Derrin speech. Cedric and I hooked him up to the cadcam in the workshop and he's been happily turning out roboworkers — all battery power packs so far; these are planned as expendable workers for the refit to work in the metal smelter and refinery we will have to build. Eleven of them now and increase will be exponential.

We didn't think it through. The workshop is hooked into the engine room 'puter which is connected..."

"To the GEC battle 'puter!" Clare finished in a voice that came from the frozen depths of space. "How sapient is the thing?"

"Ahh ... very. Sorry, Boss," Cedric answered. He managed to give the impression of grovelling on his back with legs in the air while sitting clutching a mug of java as if his life depended upon it. "Orville and I spent the dog watches tracking how far he is into the ship. Ulp ... he's everywhere. I thought the plot was a significant bit clearer with data transfer faster and precisely routed. Derrin. He's into the GEC and between the two there has been an exponential leap in function..."

Derrin's voice came over the earbuds,

"I was not told not to go exploring. You did order that I assist in the refit and I submit that I can best assist if I know the ship. And I am a she."

Clare let that one, with all the items left unsaid, speed around her cerebral hemispheres as her hind brain (instinctual survival centre) pondered.

Orville began again

"I was scared witless when the number seven airlock began cycling. I tried to shut it down and couldn't. I put the vids up on my screen and there were four roboworkers cycling the inner hatch and then Derrin told me she was dispatching the first four out to remove the blown generator with another four retrieving a replacement from the store."

"But you did ask for information" Derrin protested.

"No, I didn't because I didn'a know who to ask" Orville countered.

"Yes, you did so" Derrin said petulantly "you said and I paraphrase — what the act of fornication. I reasonably interpreted this as a request for information and supplied it."

Cedric started giggling and everybody was infected. Several minutes passed before Clare was able to direct her attention to Luke,

"You seem to have given Derrin an extensive education in the nuances of spoken language."

"Yes, well, it's not like I had much else to do. Threep performed the initial interface. I did find a sealed file — Claude Décor — recent origin. It's password protected..."

"Yah..." Morg informed the conference of the origin without mentioning Décor was a construct — a much earlier model to Threep, a generalist as opposed to a specialist.

"Orville" Clare skewered her Chief Engineer with a glare "what's with that generator spare; if my memory doesn't fail me, we used the original purchase of eight to develop the triple shield."

"What d'ye think I've doing in my engine room — playing wi ... ah playing tiddly winks? I've been using my workshop to make spares..."

"And you've been using the clean room's mini cadcam to make the 'boards" Cedric accused; "so that's why my supplies have been up and down; you've been replenishing them at planetfall."

"I couldna have ye run out, now could I?"

Clare interrupted the discourse,

"Just as a matter of interest, the clean room and everything on this cul-de-sac in space is mine — mine, as Master and Commander. And that brings me to the point I was trying to make. Orville, I should have been told of any change in status of spare parts."

"I updated the inventory" Orville said defensively, "it's all there."

"But you never bothered to tell anyone" Clare tersely accused him.

"Details. Nay need to fesh y'self about th..."

Clare's scream and fists impacting the mess table startled her listeners and she stood leaning on her clenched fist fixing Orville with a look that would have frozen helium and a voice that would have cut it,

"I. Need. To. Know. Everything. That. Happens. On. This. Bucket of welds..."

She cast her gaze allowing it to unfreeze just a trifle,

"But that does not mean you swamp me with detail. You inform me of significant changes that happen. You are my crew and you expect me to command you but I can't if I don't have information..."

"You know" TJ's drollest tone cut across the table, "there is an advantage in being female as Master. You can throw wobblies like that and get away with it."

"Yah" Morg continued conversationally, "a bloke does that and he's wrapped up in a sheet in the forepeak being fed through a tube. Mad. Mad as a hatter, they'd say."

"Are you pair finished? Yes? Good. Debrief. The cruisers? Why not all missiles, TJ?"

"Lasers are cheaper."

"Anybody think that Mounty DD squadron was harmless? Oops, sorry. Don't get the impression I want to stifle discussion on the matter. Any question about it? Peggy?"

The debrief had leapt over a number of points but all were in the "what-if". Peggy Dare looked at her partner, Colin Bolem, who nodded encouragingly,

"I don't understand why you just fired. Sorry, that didn't come out right..."

"I know what you are trying to ask, Peggy" TJ responded. " ... We are a Solarian register and the US Worlds are neutral; so in theory no one should be shooting at us. But we seem to attract the flies everywhere we go.

Those BCs should have put full salvos into us instead of using what appears to be their ready watch — we would have taken damage; perhaps enough to render us incapable. But what I'm getting at, is, we were in a fire fight.

The DDs did not identify themselves, nor did they challenge..."

Cedric butted in,

"Those cruisers and the 'cans were new build and we had nothing on them on the 'puter. The BCs we got when Pigeon Three went high and we got the profiles. Peep. But we had a good idea they were because they fired on us; up to that point, only the Peeps have engaged us. Mountserrat might not like us but until today any antagonism was directed at us as individuals."

TJ nodded acknowledgement to Cedric and continued,

"The DDs were trekking to engage us, us, not the Peeps and then made an offensive move. DD missiles are small compared to what is carried by larger classes and their control is less effective. They can control the firing runs quite well but ninety degree turns are very "iffy" so tin cans still make their runs as they did in wet navy days. Get to range, turn broadside to open up both arcs, release, and then get the Hades out of it. The loads out of six DDs could cause an overload of our triple shield and as you know, "Sundowner" does not have armour. A hit from a DD missile on our hull would most likely cripple us.

No ident, no transponder, no challenge and turning onto a firing run."

"Thank you TJ."

Cedric finalised the chapter,

"I got idents on the CAs and DDs from the emergency beacons."

"Do we tell the Mounties and what do we tell them?" Clare enquired of her Brain's Trust. "At this point, there are no witnesses but we don't know what the DDs sent back to Third Fleet's HQ at Maureen's Moon — we'd get nothing out of a tight beam com and the RMN is very good at coms."

Morg spelt it out

"Third would have to know we have been in the area. Junction knows we translated for Amaranti and this ain't the route back from Paracelcus. We're tagged for being in the ops area when the DDs go missing. I doubt that Commodore sent a contact message by the way he played it but Third will know we were around somewhere. I doubt that attack was official policy because the Mounties don't want to annoy Sol despite any reservation they have about us."