And if that hadn’t been obvious before, it certainly was when Silvie came on to the command deck.
‘Oh.’ Alex saw her swinging out of a ladderway and felt a stab of alarm. ‘I wouldn’t…’ he started to say, but it was already too late. Silvie had seen him. And even at that distance, even with all those other people around, she could see the state that he was in.
‘Alex!’ The happy greeting which had been on her face vanished instantly and she came rushing over to him, oblivious to everything else. ‘Oh, you’re hurt!’
He was, too. Medication was keeping acid indigestion under control but there was still a heavy, uncomfortable sensation in his belly. He had a low level but persistent headache which he’d got so used to over the last week or so that he’d almost stopped noticing it. And he ached all over with the build-up of toxins caused by overwork, a highly inadvisable diet and not nearly enough sleep.
‘I’m fine,’ he said, and then corrected himself as he was never less than completely honest with her, ‘Well, I will be fine – give it a couple of days, Silvie, and…’
He broke off as he saw with dismay that her eyes were filling with tears. He could feel her distress, too, the grief she felt at seeing him so worn down. She was crouching by his chair, putting her hand over his and looking up at him with a glycerine tear spilling unheeded onto her cheek.
‘How could they do this to you?’ She asked. ‘Humans are so cruel…’
Alex took her into a hug, as heedless as she was of the shocked stares of everyone on the command deck.
‘It’s all right,’ he said, and his tone made endearments like ‘sweetheart’ unnecessary. It was very obvious even to observers with no empathic ability whatsoever that Silvie was his darling, the child he had taken to his heart and loved as his daughter. It was equally obvious that he had no thought for anything at that moment beyond the need to reassure and comfort her. ‘Daft!’ he said, with bracing fondness, hugging her close and dropping a light kiss onto the top of her platinum hair, ‘I could have quit,’ he pointed out, which was true enough – his medical condition would certainly have justified a drastic reduction in his schedule over the past week, if not putting him on stand-down altogether.
‘Daft yourself, then!’ She gave a watery chuckle at that, leaning back a little so as to look into his face. ‘And you have the nerve,’ she pointed out, ‘to say that we do stupid things.’
‘I’ve never said stupid,’ Alex protested, and as she quirked a silver eyebrow at him, ‘But all right, yes, fair point.’ He gave her another feather light kiss, this time on her forehead. ‘Sorry.’
‘So I should think,’ she had learned the expression and the scolding tone from humans, and got to her feet, then, assuming a rather comical, motherly authority. ‘You,’ she told him, ‘need looking after.’ That made him laugh, at which she folded her arms, regarding him with stern appraisal. ‘What do you…’ she started, and then, drawing on her knowledge of human physiology and recall of Rangi Tekawa’s instructions in similar circumstances, ‘Ah! I know!’ She stepped back a little and addressed him with a didactic air, ‘You need to go to bed!’ She told him. ‘You need to rest without anyone disturbing you, drink lots of water and no more coffee.’
Alex broke into an appreciative grin. ‘Yes ma’am!’ he said, which made her laugh too.
‘I mean it, though,’ she said, and he could see, by the considering look she was giving him, that she was on the verge of taking him by the hand and taking him off to the aquadeck to take care of him herself. She was, however, distracted by Shion’s arrival on the scene, turning her head to look over her shoulder as the Pirrellothian approached. ‘Look what they’ve done to him!’ Silvie exclaimed, drawing Shion’s attention to Alex. ‘Tell him, Shion – he needs to go to bed!’
Shion laughed. She was tall, slender and elegant even in the far from flattering shipboard rig. Her features were regular, with a high upsweep of cheekbones and delicately arched brows. Her skin was burnished ebony, her hair a fashionable geometric crop. Only when you looked into her eyes was there any sense that she was anything other than an attractive human woman. Her eyes were so dark they appeared black, with a depth of something… someone… wonderful looking back at you.
‘Oh, I know,’ Silvie responded to the feelings she could sense, with no need for Shion to voice them aloud. Her own manner was a little impatient. ‘Command hierarchy and all that.’ Even Silvie understood that it was not possible for Lt Shionolethe to give Captain von Strada orders. ‘But just tell him as a friend.’
Shion’s answer was to put her hands behind her, balancing her weight comfortably on both feet – the Fleet’s attention stance, designed to be achievable aboard ship even in rough conditions. And with that, she looked at Alex, brimming with mischief.
Alex made the noise which could only be described as a snurge, a helpless, half-stifled guffaw.
‘Oh…’ Silvie glanced from one to the other, seeing the joke that they were sharing, even though she didn’t understand it.
‘All right – I’m told!’ Alex said, with a slight tinge of colour rising in his cheeks as he became belatedly aware of all the people staring at him. He wouldn’t have minded this kind of incident at all on the Heron, where everybody knew him, Silvie and Shion so well that they’d be laughing their heads off as well. Here, though, the stares were ranging from amazed to horrified, and nobody was laughing. He had turned his back on Min as he’d turned to hug Silvie, but looked back at her now and was relieved to see that she at least wasn’t looking appalled, merely thoughtful and interested. ‘I am,’ he observed, just a little self-consciously, ‘being ganged up on.’
Min smiled. ‘If I knew you a little better,’ she said frankly, ‘I’d be joining them.’
There was a moment, one of those breath-held half-seconds in which everybody seemed to freeze. And then, as both Alex and Min started to laugh, so did everybody else.
Silvie laughed too, though looking around with an air of bafflement at the sudden burst of hilarity all around, and giving the little shake of her head which meant Humans – bonkers, the lot of them.
Alex got to his feet, still chuckling deeply as he gave a nod of acknowledgement to Min.
‘I am,’ he declared, with a pointless attempt at dignity, ‘going to have an early night.’ He inclined his head. ‘Goodnight, all.’
On the Heron, he would have left the command deck to a burst of applause. The Assegai’s command deck crew had rather more restraint, but all the same Alex felt the goodwill, even admiration, as he left the command deck. And he heard, too, the further burst of laughter as Silvie slapped high-hands with Skipper Taylar and told her, ‘You rock!’
Six
When Alex woke the following morning, he felt lousy. He’d been in bed for more than ten hours but asleep for hardly more than half of it, the headache had settled in malignantly at the base of his skull and it felt as if he’d been eating lead ball-bearings.
And he really, he decided, detested these quarters. He wanted to be waking up in his own snug cabin on the Heron right now, not in this ostentatious room with its dark, heavy furniture and a gold-framed holo of Admiralty HQ.
He felt… odd, he realised. Disconnected. Never having experienced homesickness before, he couldn’t identify the strange, restless feeling of being in the wrong place, but it felt wrong. He had deliberately refrained from looking at the Heron as the Assegai departed, or of making any last moment calls. He had already said his goodbyes, and to be gazing backward at the frigate as they left would have been embarrassingly sentimental. But he was thinking of them now, feeling the gulf not so much of the ever-growing distance between them but of the time it would be till he saw any of them again. Because it wasn’t the ship, he realised, it was the people – his people.
And realising that, he forced himself to get out of the over-sized bunk and head for the shower, giving himself a stern talking-to as the hot, high-power cycle helped to revive him. Focus on the positive, he reminded
himself, and dutifully did so. He was not alone here, he had people here too – Silvie and Shion, of course, and Min, who’d already become a friend. Then there was Janus Onwudiwe, with the simple pleasure of a mug of tea and a friendly goss in engineering to look forward to. There was Dan Tarrance, too, and several other familiar faces round the ship… he was not on his own. And it wouldn’t be long, he knew, till he did feel quite at home here. It was just first-day nerves, exacerbated by the run down state of his health.
And, he decided, these truly depressing quarters. He would take Min up on that offer to find him something more comfortable elsewhere on the ship. Even a flip-out emergency bunk in an airlock, he thought, would be better than this.
As it turned out, Min had rather better options available than that. He found an invitation to breakfast with her on his comm, and so crossed the passage into her quarters.
They could not have been more different. Exactly the same in layout and only slightly smaller in size, these had been fitted out to Min’s own orders, which the Fleet allowed skippers to do at their own expense. The result was both light and warm, with copper and cream furniture in a slim-line, minimalist style Alex liked. There were actual paintings on the wall of her private lounge/diner, too, not holos but original works, semi-abstract landscapes.
‘My son,’ Min informed him, seeing his interest in the paintings, and then, with quiet but obvious pride, ‘He’s at art college.’
‘I like them,’ said Alex, and meant it. He knew very little about art, though he’d trailed around any number of galleries on many different worlds, looking at the famous pieces that were on the ‘must see’ list for that planet. On the whole, he’d found it a mildly interesting way to spend an hour or two of shoreleave. But every now and again he would be struck by a piece which for some reason seized his attention and made him look, really look, with both an emotional and intellectual response. These paintings were like that, bold in outline, muted in colour, subtle in detail, with a strong sense that they had a good deal more to say than merely depicting city scenes.
‘Well, me too,’ Min said, then admitted with a smile, ‘But I’m biased, of course.’ She indicated the small table where breakfast was already set out ready for them. ‘Shall we?’
Alex thanked her and sat down. Whoever had provided the meal for him was clearly working to Rangi Tekawa’s diet sheet, as it was the detox Rangi had told him he would need to go on after a month of gorging on super-rich food. There was a little fruit, a little bland protein, a large glass of water and, yes, even a cup of herbal tea. It was, Alex recognised, one of Rangi’s own blends, the one which looked like anaemic urine and tasted like wet straw.
It was ridiculously touching to see that Rangi had even sent over tea for him – so touching, in fact, that Alex felt obliged to drink the stuff. Min, having a light breakfast of rolls and fruit juice herself, was sympathetic.
‘We’ve had very specific instructions in looking after you,’ she told him. ‘Your Dr Tekawa has put the fear of God into Dr Payling, that’s for sure.’
Alex poised with a morsel of grilled tofu suspended on his fork, looking at her with disbelief.
‘Dr Tekawa?’ he queried. ‘My Dr Tekawa?’
Min laughed. ‘He gave me quite a lecture,’ she commented. ‘And I believe he went down to the galley, too, to talk to the catering staff. But by the time he’d finished with Dr Payling the poor man was just terrified. Apparently…’ she gestured at Alex with the butter knife in her hand, flicking him a grin, ‘you are an appallingly difficult patient, a self-disregarder who will run yourself to the point of collapse and bulldoze over any attempt to give you medical advice. And I believe he also made it very clear to Dr Payling just what ramifications there would be – in the Admiralty, the Diplomatic Corps, the Senate and the media – if you are allowed to make yourself seriously ill through ineffective medical supervision. And having made it clear that that’s all on him, I gather, Dr Tekawa handed him a box of herbal teas and told him, ‘Good luck.’’
Alex considered that and his astonishment morphed into a broad grin. He had seen for himself how much Rangi had changed from the dreamy-eyed visionary to an assured take-charge officer. He had learned a lot from Simon, too, and not just radical surgical techniques.
‘Well, well,’ he said, and at the thought of the young medic striding around the Assegai giving them what-for, he could only laugh. And it felt good, too, knowing that Rangi was still taking care of him, albeit by remote. ‘I would say sorry,’ Alex observed. ‘But you can only respect his dedication.’
‘Yes, that’s what I told Dr Payling,’ Min agreed. ‘But if he seems a little over-anxious in his care of you, Alex, that’s why. And yes, yes, I know,’ she went on, reading the protest on his face, ‘you’re fine. You’re on the verge of exhaustion, your digestive system is in meltdown, your liver is inflamed, your brain is flooded with stress neurochems and there’s more lactate and toxins in your muscles than if you’d just run a marathon, but you’re fine, of course you’re fine, no reason at all you can’t do a full day’s work.’ She grinned at him and he just had to grin back.
‘If I close my eyes,’ he commented, ‘I might be listening to Buzz.’
‘Well, I may have had some advice from that quarter too,’ Min admitted, and then, seeing a furrow start to form on his forehead, ‘Dear boy.’
The gathering frown fell away with a reluctant grin.
‘In fact,’ Min went on thoughtfully, ‘I don’t think there is one member of the Heron’s company who has not, at some time, told some member of our company – quite informally, of course – something along the lines of, ‘We’re lending him to you, okay, but you take damn good care of him and bring him back to us safe, well and happy, or else.’’
Alex had to laugh at that. ‘I’m not sure,’ he confessed, ‘whether to find that heart-warming or impertinent.’
‘I’d go with heart-warming,’ Min advised. ‘But seriously, we are all mindful of the fact that you are in our care, and as you are, undeniably, run down just now, I have to ask you to be understanding of us wanting to look after you, however irritating and unnecessary you may feel that to be.’
Alex shook his head, ruefully.
‘I am not,’ he stated, and genuinely believed it to be true, ‘in any way a difficult patient, Min. I don’t know where people get this idea that I drive myself to exhaustion and disregard medical advice. I work to my limits, sure, but I know my own limits and I always follow medical orders, no argument.’
Min had the sense not to burst out laughing at that, but merely grinned and let it go.
‘Well,’ she said, ‘I can’t give you orders, obviously – but if I might be allowed to advise…?’
She let that hang in the air until Alex nodded, trying to do so with as good a grace as he could manage, and not sigh out loud.
‘I would suggest,’ said Min, on a practical note, ‘that you take today very easy. Meet with the Samartians and the trainee group, of course, but I don’t think there’s much you need to do there. We have an orientation programme worked out for Jarlner and Bennet, subject to your approval, of course, and the trainees have more than enough study material to keep them busy for a while. So I’d suggest that you might like to take a stroll around the ship – mug of tea in engineering, maybe go for a swim. Which reminds me – quarters. Obviously you’re not going to be comfortable over the way…’ she nodded to indicate the flag suite across the passage. ‘So there’s a cabin ready for you on the training deck – nominally an office but you can move in there if you like, no problem. And there’s a cabin on the aquadeck, too, which I dare say Silvie will show you. You don’t have to choose – use them both, and the flag quarters, however you like.’
‘Thank you.’ Alex said. ‘That’s perfect – and very thoughtful, Min.’ He saw the flicker of merriment which crossed her face at that, and light dawned. ‘Ah.’ He said. ‘Buzz?’
Min nodded. ‘I would have offered you your own choice of quart
ers, obviously,’ she said, ‘but Buzz came over – at my request, I should say – to advise us on what you’d need in the way of facilities and personal staff. He said it was important that you spent the first night in the official suite – some issue, I gather, of perceived resistance to the dignities of flag rank.’
She was teasing him with that, Alex could see. She knew very well how controversial it was within the Fleet that he continued to be addressed as ‘skipper’ by his crew. ‘Skipper’ was no colloquialism in the Fleet, it was a definite rank – Min’s own rank, of course, that of Shipmaster, traditionally addressed as ‘Skipper’. For Alex to retain it was just as bewildering as an officer promoted to Commander insisting on still being addressed as Lt. The Captain’s rank – the lowest flag rank in the Fleet - had been forced on him by circumstances, before either Alex or many at the Admiralty felt that he had truly earned it. There were strong suspicions in the Admiralty, though, that his refusal to be called by the rank was not due to modesty but was an expression of disrespect towards the Admiralty itself, not wanting to be regarded as one of the Establishment Old Farts.
‘Fair enough,’ Alex conceded, recognising that there was an important difference between him spending at least one night in the official quarters before moving on, and flatly refusing even to make any use of them at all.
Min smiled. ‘As for staff,’ she went on, ‘You have your own steward, of course, and the Admiralty sent over Mr Forley to be your adjutant…’ There was a questioning note in that, as Min evidently did not feel that the raw and nervous Sub could be of any help whatsoever. ‘Buzz said that would be fine, but I know you are used to working with a team… a high powered team,’ she qualified, reflectively, and she wasn’t wrong, either. Alex had a small but very effective team of Diplomatic Corps personnel aboard the Heron, headed up by a cultural attaché who was Alex’s assistant in diplomatic affairs. He also had an officer-adjutant who handled the bulk of his correspondence as well as a petty officer PA.
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