by Glenn Smith
“Then why are you so...”
“Why am I so pissed off?”
“To be blunt, yes.”
“Because I just found out that our friend, Mister Eric Richards, has been identified as that Dylan Graves character who’s wanted by Solfleet.”
“What?” Galloway exclaimed. “Are you kidding me?”
“I wish I were, Nate,” she replied. “I really do. We had him right under our noses and we didn’t even know it. All because I never got around to reviewing the arrest warrant. Damn thing had his picture right on the first page.”
“I’ll be a son-of-a-...”
“Do you have any idea what that makes me look like in the eyes of Central Command, Mister Galloway?” she asked. Then, without waiting for an answer that probably wasn’t coming anyway, she added, “And that’s not even the worst of it!”
“What is the worst of it?” the commander asked her as they stepped into the lift.
Leslie waited for the lift doors to close, then answered, “Admiral Westbrook decided to pull us off the search and assign someone else to go after him.”
Galloway looked at her. “The search? You mean they let him go?”
“Bridge,” she instructed the lift controls. Then she answered him. “That’s right. No one at Saturn Station made the connection either. He and his friends just healed up, got their ship fixed, and flew off into the sunset.” She drew a deep breath and sighed. “Actually, they flew off away from the sunset,” she clarified. “Headed for Trident Jumpstation.”
“So they’re long gone by now,” Galloway concluded.
“What the hell am I, Nate, a military officer, or a mindless idiot? Is that why I’m assigned to command a ship that never leaves our own solar system? Because I can’t handle any serious responsibilities?”
“I don’t believe that for a second, Denise, and neither should you.” She looked up at him. Using her first name was something she couldn’t remember him ever having done before, and she wasn’t real sure what she thought about it. “First of all,” he continued, “patrolling Earth’s solar system is a serious responsibility, and as the Sentinel’s commanding officer you bear the brunt of that responsibility square on your shoulders. Secondly, we only had Eric Richards, or Dylan Graves, or whatever the hell his name really is, for a matter of hours. Saturn Station had him for what? A week or so?”
“Two weeks,” she told him as she looked over at the deck indicator.
“Two weeks,” he parroted. “Two whole weeks in a major Solfleet medical facility where they could have examined everything from his fingerprints to his retinal patterns to his D-N-A signature, and apparently no one there even thought to verify the identification he provided them with. If you ask me, Captain, I think their mindless idiocy overshadows ours by a fairly large margin. Wouldn’t you agree?”
She looked at him again, hesitated for a moment, and then said, “Stop trying to cheer me up, Commander.” But the way she said it, with a slight grin showing itself, let Galloway know that his effort to do just that, to cheer her up, had paid off... at least a little bit.
“So, if we’re not going after the fugitive, then what are our orders?” he asked.
“Oh, we’re going after him,” Leslie told him.
“But... I thought you just said they headed for Trident Jumpstation.”
“They did,” Leslie confirmed, “but just because they headed that way doesn’t necessarily mean they actually went through. For all we know they might be hiding somewhere right here in the solar system.”
“And Admiral Westbrook’s orders? You mentioned that she pulled us off and assigned someone else.”
“Yes I did, but I never said I let her get away with it.” She looked up at him once more and explained, “I have a few friends of my own at Central Command. I went over her head.”
Galloway smiled, feeling rather proud of his captain, despite knowing that Westbrook would be very unhappy about that when she found out. “Well, even though that’s probably going to go over about as well as a lead balloon, good for you, Captain,” he said.
“A lead balloon indeed. You should have seen the look on her face when I told her that I’d found someone to pull rank and countermand her orders.”
“You already told her?”
Leslie nodded. “And she was fit to be tied.”
“I can imagine. What did she say?”
“She said, and I quote, ‘I don’t care what your friends at Central Command say, whoever they are. It’s your fault that Dylan Graves got away, Captain. You had him right there onboard your ship, in your hands, and you just let him go, like the incompetent excuse for an officer that you are.’ End quote.”
“She really said that?” Galloway asked her as the lift slowed.
“Yes, she really did.”
“What a flaming bitch!” Galloway quipped as the lift doors parted.
Leslie grinned when she saw pretty much the entire bridge crew turn their eyes toward her and the commander as the two of them stepped out of the lift. No doubt they’d all heard the commander’s comment and mistakenly believed that he’d directed it at her. She thought about leaving it at that, but then decided that she would prefer it if her crew didn’t think that was what Galloway truly thought of her. “Don’t worry, people,” she said as she and the commander took their seats. “He didn’t mean me. Did you, Commander?”
“Of course not, Captain,” he replied. But there was an irony in his tone that, had he been anyone else, might have made her doubt the sincerity of his words. But it wasn’t anyone else. It was Nate, just being Nate, having a little fun with her and the crew. She looked over at him and smiled as everyone else turned quickly back to their individual stations. Lowering his voice and setting all jokes aside, he took the opportunity to ask her, “So who did Westbrook assign to look for our fugitive, or didn’t she tell you?”
“Are you kidding me? She made a point of telling me. Hell, she couldn’t wait to tell me. She assigned the Katana, along with some major from Security Police Special Assignments they had to pick up at the Mars Orbital Shipyard and take along with them for the ride.”
“The Katana?” he asked. “Why the hell would she assign the Katana to a fugitive search detail? That’s one of our newest Olympus-class starcruisers and they just came off the front lines. They’re due for a month’s R-and-R.”
“Why?” she asked him in return, brows climbing her forehead, errant lock of hair falling across her eye. “Because that new Olympus-class starcruiser’s commanding officer is none other than Commodore Zebulon Kihoe.”
“Kihoe,” Galloway repeated to himself. The name sounded very familiar to him, and it only took a moment for him to remember why. “Isn’t he the S-O-B who...”
“...who tried to prevent me from being assigned to command this vessel?” she finished for him, looking him in the eye. He nodded, and then she answered the question with a simple, “Yes, he is.” Then, feeling the need to say it aloud, she added, “And just because she knew that it would annoy me, Admiral Westbrook has assigned him and his starcruiser full of troops who are due for R-and-R to the search.”
“Hmm. Talk about a gross waste of resources,” Galloway commented. “Not to mention a crushing blow to troop morale.”
“Like she’s ever cared about troop morale.”
Galloway thought for a few moments, then said, “Captain, in response to those rhetorical questions you asked me in the lift a few moments ago, I’d like to suggest that we’re not the ones who have a problem handling serious responsibilities.”
She snickered and grinned again. “Commander Galloway,” she said, “I do believe you’re absolutely right.” Then she raised her voice and said, “Helm, prepare for departure. Let’s go find our fugitives.”
“Again,” Galloway added.
Chapter 63
Deep Space, Three Days Later
Earth Standard Date: Monday, 6 June 2168
Through the first few days out of Saturn Station, Stacy
had remained quiet and reserved, spending almost all of her time in bed. As he was the only one onboard besides her with no other responsibilities to the ship, Dylan had continued taking her meals to her and had often eaten with her, mostly to ensure that she actually ate, talking with her about this or that. Actually, he’d done most if not all of the talking, but she’d paid attention and that was good enough. The others had spent whatever time they could with her as well, seeing to her needs or just talking with her for a few minutes at a time, but until they’d put a great deal of distance between the Star Eagle and Saturn Station, passed through the Trident Jumpstation, and slipped deep into jumpspace, they’d spent the majority of their waking hours with their eyes glued to the sensors and scanner screens watching for signs of pursuit, or babysitting the ship’s newly repaired systems.
As the days continued to pass—three more, putting them roughly halfway to the Caldanra star system, where the Excalibur would show up somewhere from one to two weeks later—Stacy began to open up a little again, slowly. She started spending a little more time out of bed each day, seemingly trying to act as though nothing had happened to her, and Nicole insisted that no one mention anything to do with the incident if there was any chance that she might overhear. Dylan didn’t know if that was the healthiest thing for Stacy. According to all those head-shrinks he’d had to talk to after he was wounded, it was always healthier for victims of violence to face what had happened to them and to deal with it head-on. But, feeling as he did that what had happened to Stacy was all his fault to begin with, he kept his opinion to himself and honored Nicole’s request along with everyone else.
On this particular morning, as a way of thanking him for having taken such good care of his little sister, Geoff had promised to show him how to pilot the ship after breakfast, hiding his gratitude, or trying to, under the guise of wanting to teach him the basics so that he could spend his fair share of time monitoring the systems up on the flight deck and give him and the others a much needed break. So, glad for the opportunity to fill some of his time and to learn something new in the process—he could only read for so many hours per day and all the idle downtime was starting to take its toll on his sanity—he’d climbed out of bed just a little bit earlier than usual, anxious to get started.
He turned off the water and stood under the air drier for several minutes, then stepped out of the shower, got dressed, combed his hair—it was growing fast, he noticed as he gazed into the mirror, starting to get a little longer than he was used to wearing it—and then headed forward to the galley to start breakfast for everyone.
“Good morning,” he said when he found Nicole, Verdai, and Carlos sitting around the table eating already. Geoff would be above, as it was his turn to sit and monitor. He selected a breakfast pack—French toast—and prepared it, poured himself a cup of coffee, and then took a seat at the table across from Nicole. “Where’s Stacy this morning?” he asked.
“Still in bed,” Nicole answered. “She didn’t feel like getting up when I woke her.”
“Mmm,” Dylan responded, disappointed. He hadn’t noticed her in bed after he took his shower—not that he’d made a point to look—and he’d thought she was doing so well, too. The fact that she’d chosen to stay in bed seemed like a step backwards. “Has she had her breakfast?”
“She asked me to ask you to take it to her again, and to eat with her,” Nicole replied.
That being the case, why hadn’t Nicole said something before he prepared his own food and sat down? “That doesn’t sound too good,” he commented instead of asking her that question as he lifted his coffee cup to his lips. “Do you think she’s sinking back into herself a little bit?”
“Actually, she’s fallen in love with you,” Nicole answered evenly.
Dylan choked on his coffee and coughed, then asked, “What did you say?”
“You heard what I said, Eric.”
He set his coffee down and paused for a moment to stop coughing and catch his breath. “You’re right, I did,” he then confirmed. “But what makes you say that?”
“I had a long talk with her while you were in the shower. She told me how much it meant to her that you’d been giving her so much care and attention.”
“But, I felt...”
“I know,” Nicole interrupted. “You felt responsible for what happened and you’ve had a lot of time on your hands. And, I knew you blamed yourself, so I allowed you a lot of time alone with her. That was my mistake, so I share in the blame with you for making her feel the way she does about you.”
Dylan sipped his coffee again and considered, then asked, “Are you sure she meant what she said? I mean, she spent practically the whole first day out of Mars flirting with me, flaunting herself in front of me... It seemed like a game to her.”
Nicole shook her head. “This is different. I’m telling you, Eric, as much as any seventeen year old girl can truly fall in love with anyone, Stacy has truly fallen in love with you. She told me as much.”
Dylan’s gaze fell to the plate of food in front of him as he drew a deep breath and sighed. He didn’t know what else to say.
“It gets worse,” Nicole told him.
He looked up at her again, wondering how it could possibly get any worse.
“She believes you feel the same way about her.”
Well, that was one way. “What makes her think that?”
“The same thing that led her to fall in love with you. All that special care and attention you’ve been giving her.”
“I was just trying to help her cope,” he explained, pleading his case.
“I know that, and you know that.” She gestured toward Verdai and Carlos. “Geoff and these two know that, too. But Stacy thinks you’re in love with her.”
Dylan exhaled loudly. “I guess I’d better go talk to her.”
“Do you really think that’s wise right now?”
“I don’t know, Nicole,” he answered honestly. “Is it any more wise to wait—to let her go on believing that I’m in love with her?”
Nicole appeared to consider that question for a moment, and then admitted, “I don’t know either, Eric.”
Dylan sipped at his coffee as he thought it over. He’d slept with Olivia, but at least she’d known from the beginning where she stood. She’d known that he was just passing through and that she was going to be little more than a one-night stand. On the other hand, he’d slept with Nancy and left her in the middle of the night without explanation while she slept. No doubt she’d woke the next morning surprised and disappointed to find him gone. He’d most likely hurt her and left her wondering how he felt about her and why, and for that he still felt bad. He put his coffee down and stood up. “She deserves to be told the truth,” he said. Then he prepared Stacy’s breakfast and headed back into sleeping cabin.
“Please, try not to hurt her,” Nicole pleaded at his back.
It was no wonder Dylan hadn’t noticed Stacy lying in her bunk after his shower. She had hunkered down low, facing the wall, and pulled her blankets up over her ear. She’d slept in her underclothes every night since the incident, ‘shielding herself on a psychological level from the possibility of being brutally violated,’ the counselor had said, but she hadn’t buried herself in bed like that in days. It had seemed as though she was breaking out of her cocoon, so to speak.
“Good morning, Stacy,” he said to her, unsure as to whether or not she was even awake.
She rolled her head across her pillow to face him and opened her eyes, then tugged her blankets down off of her face and said, “Hi.” Then, noticing the tray of food he was holding in his hands, she slid halfway out from under her blankets—Dylan silently gave thanks for the fact that she was wearing a tee shirt—sat up and propped her pillow up against the headboard, and then scooted back to lean against it. Then she accepted the tray from him and set it down beside her. “Did Nicole have a chance to talk to you?” she asked quietly as she folded her hands in her lap and stared down at them.
“Did she tell you... Did she tell you that I’m in love with you?”
“Yes.”
Still staring down at her fidgeting hands, she asked, “And, do you have the same feelings for me that I have for you?” When Dylan didn’t answer right away, she looked up at him. Then, apparently mistaking his silence for indecisiveness, she reached out to him and gently pulled him closer, then leaned out and kissed him softly on the lips. For the sake of her feelings and to avoid embarrassing her—at least, that was how he rationalized it—he didn’t pull away. Had he been honest with himself, he might have admitted to himself that he didn’t want to pull away.
She opened her eyes and looked deeply into his as she released him and sat back. “You don’t, do you?” she asked, shaking her head slightly, though it came out as more of a statement than as a question.
There was no question. She knew. “I care about you very much,” he told her. That much, at least, was true.
“But you’re not in love with me.” Also more of a statement than a question.
He shook his head almost as though he regretted the fact and told her, “I’m sorry, Stacy.”
Until he’d confirmed it she had appeared to be all right, but now tears were beginning to well up in her eyes. “Why can’t you love me?”
“I can love you as a dear friend,” he told her, hoping that it didn’t sound as hollow to her as it did to him. “I do, in fact.” ‘Dear friend’ might have been a little strong, considering the fact that he’d only just met her a few weeks ago, but he had to give the poor girl something. “But romantic love? I’m sorry, Stacy, but it couldn’t work between us.”
“Why couldn’t it?” she asked him directly, wiping away a tear that flowed freely down over her cheek just then.
He drew a deep breath and let it out slowly. He really didn’t want to have to list a bunch of specific reasons why a romantic relationship couldn’t exist between them. Especially when he wasn’t even sure that he believed them himself. Nevertheless she had asked him, and right now, in addition to being a teenage girl with all the inherent emotionalism that that implied, she was particularly vulnerable He had to give her as much of an explanation as he could.