20 Million Leagues Over the Sea

by K. T. Hunter

  "Perhaps when this mission is over, then, you might be Admiral," Christophe replied with a wink. "Your examinations did get higher marks than mine, after all."

  "Well, not all of us are gifted with a redundant memory, amigo. I had to beat you somewhere."

  "If I had my way, you'd get your own CDV's and be promoted right away. But I would hate to lose the best first mate in the fleet."

  "I am the only first mate in the fleet," Cervantes snorted.

  "Don't let Old Artur hear you say that. He's got plans for you, my friend!"

  "Speaking of Admiral Thorvaldson, I noticed he didn't ride up with you to see us off. Was he even at the Launch Coil? Is everything all right?"

  "I received a wireless from him yesterday. Urgent business kept him in Luxembourg City, or else he would have been here. He sends his regards, though, and wished us luck."

  "It must have been some business to keep him away from the most important launch in history. Perhaps there is news on the construction of the next ship? Maybe they are finally getting started on it?"

  As they exited the lift, Christophe said, "I don't know. But if we were a real navy, we'd wait and send a fleet, not just a single ship."

  "We are a real navy. Just a private one. Unlike a government, the TIA has a profit margin to maintain. Which explains why they are sending us with one dropship instead of two. How we are supposed to collect the spoils of war with that dinghy? There's enough room left over in the cargo bay to have brought your little canoe with us."

  "If only I could," Christophe said as they approached the bridge entrance. "But I still look forward to the day I salute you."

  ~~~~

  Gemma

  Gemma jerked awake. Some unseen alarm jangled her nerves. She pulled the cord on the headboard's lamp and looked about for the source of the clamour. A bosun's whistle screamed through the small speaker in the corner of the ceiling. She was lost in a haze of confusion. Brightman Girls normally woke up precisely when they meant to, without reliance on clocks or alarms. However, she had been in so many time zones in the past seven days that her body wasn't sure what hour it was.

  She snapped her attention back to the matter at hand. Rapid focus was an ingrained habit, and one that was vital to survival in her occupation. She reminded herself that this was not Guildford. She was on a ship, many miles above Guildford. The thought made her a little dizzy. She checked the small stateroom clock; it was six A.M., ship's time. That made it five in Guildford, also, she supposed, since the ship was on Luxembourg City time. Naturally, it would be at the same o'clock as the TIA headquarters.

  She made a trip to the head. She found it quite bizarre; why in the world did they need speaking tubes and storage closets in the loo? She peeked into the storage cabinet and found jugs of water and packets marked "Cold Rations". There were also boxes of Lister's Towels, which made her sigh with relief (she could only fit so many in Old Dependable) until she did a quick calculation in her head. Even with only a handful of women on board, there weren't nearly enough in the closet for their expected journey. She hoped Frau Knopf had more down in the cargo bay. There were other boxes on other shelves, but she would have to save that prying for later.

  She dressed in one of the several sets of dreary blouses and skirts that awaited her in the wardrobe. It was easy to dress without aid, as the uniform apparently did not allow for a corset. She breathed a secret sigh of relief.

  Score one for the Rational Dress Society, she thought.

  She checked the schedule that Frau Knopf had left for her. Breakfast was already in progress. After that, they would be preparing for the launch. She made up her bed and tidied up a little, in case Frau Knopf decided to pop in. Mrs. Landry had taught her well; the housekeeper had always bounced a shilling on the bed to check Gemma's work. She straightened the wrinkled top of the unoccupied bed as well, though she did not remember disturbing it during her unpacking.

  She set off down the empty corridor, which was quiet except for the scratching sounds behind the walls that she had heard the day before. Wooden ships squeaked and creaked, and even steamships had their groaning; perhaps the Fury had her own version of complaining. Gemma's stomach grumbled along with the sounds and reminded her that she had eaten little from Frau Knopf's tray the night before. Dr. Pugh's response to the name of her particular school had upset her digestion quite a bit. She could not afford Discovery so early in her journey.

  In this particular case, she could not afford Discovery at all. There was nowhere to run.

  After taking a few wrong turns, she found the mess hall with her nose. Thankfully, it was on the same deck as her stateroom, outside the fortress of Ladies' Country. She selected a tray and queued up with the crewmen. Being the only female there, she received many admiring looks. She ignored them as she poured her tea. The odour of fried sausages and potatoes, mixed in with that of shoe polish and McCoy's English Pomade, was overpowering; and her stomach growled again as she carried her tray to the seating area. The long tables had benches on either side, and she was uncomfortable with the thought of sitting amongst her admirers or climbing over a bench in her long skirt.

  She was the object of many stares and more than a few whistles as she walked the line of tables. Some of the men -- she assumed they were non-commissioned officers -- barked at the others to stop gawking at the skirt. The room was a cornucopia of nationalities and accents, and men of many colours donned the same blue uniform. Amongst various flavours of English, she detected notes of Paris, hints of Venice, flecks of Berlin, with a seasoning of Peking, Seoul, and Bombay, along with others that she did not recognize.

  There were few grey heads in the hall. Most of the sailors appeared to be her age, or just a little older. She silently wondered how many of them were Orphans. How many of them had eaten misery in the years since the Invasion, those poor souls that had not the good fortune to enjoy the shelter beneath Mrs. Brightman's wings? How many of them were here for revenge instead of adventure?

  She continued down the line to the end, which was sparsely populated. She detected a feminine note in the noise of the crowd. One person in a hunter green jacket -- a blade of summer grass in a field of navy blue -- turned around, saw Gemma, and waved at her with a bright smile. Gemma realized with a bit of a shock that this was no man, no matter how short the hair. The young lady gestured for Gemma to sit next to her.

  "Come sit here, love," she said. "Name's Caroline McLure. You must be Gemma!" She leaned over with a conspiratorial wink. "Frau Knopf told me we had a new member for our little knitting circle." She pointed at the man across the table from her, who was also wearing hunter green. "And this one won't bite, neither. Look, Nigel, it's our Miss Llewellyn!"

  Gemma returned the girl's greetings and nodded at her companion. Caroline was about Gemma's age, perhaps a little younger. Her nut-brown hair was so short that it stunned Gemma. It fell straight from the crown, cropped short at the nape of her neck. In fact, from behind, she looked like a young boy. Gemma had had no choice in her own hairstyle; the job at hand determined her appearance, not her own desires. Still, she could not dream of wearing her own hair so short.

  Except for the different colour, the young lady wore the same uniform blouse as the men, with only slight allowances here and there in the shirt for her more feminine shape. Normally, Gemma would not be able to do her own job without her lace and corsets. She glanced down at her own drab outfit and remembered the relief she had felt not an hour ago at the lack of those encumbrances.

  The gentleman across the table appeared to be slightly older than Caroline. His horn-rimmed glasses and wedding ring gleamed in the overhead lights. His face was clean-shaven, lacking the TIA-encouraged muttonchops and handlebar moustache sported by many members of the crew. A book rested on the table next to his empty plate. The page bore diagrams as mysterious as hieroglyphs.

  The young man stood up and bowed. "Chief Warrant Officer Nigel Davies, at your service, madam. Welcome to the Fury. Yeoman McLure has be
en looking forward to meeting you."

  She inclined her head as she studied him. He sat down and returned to his book as Gemma picked up her fork.

  "So, you're one o' them eggheads in the Cohort," Caroline said, pointing to the badge on Gemma's arm. "What branch, love? Astronomy? Chemistry? You into that Black Smoke inquiry?"

  Gemma sliced the sausage and pricked it with the end of her fork.

  "Geology," Gemma replied.

  She placed the bite of meat into her mouth and hoped the young lady would leave it at that.

  "You muck about with rocks?" Caroline asked. She picked up a sausage link from her own plate and popped it into her mouth. She asked while she chewed, "What the hell do you want to go all the way to Mars to look at rocks for?" She shoveled some fried potatoes into her mouth and winked at Gemma. "Don't we have plenty of 'em back home? Thought we were going to kill Martians, not study boulders."

  Mr. Davies looked up from his book. "Manners, Caroline," he said in a low tone. "Remember your manners. Not everyone here is from Cheapside."

  "I hear Glasgow's pebbles are lovely this time of year," Caroline giggled through bites of potato.

  Gemma began to regret that she had not brought her copy of Hartley's Ladies Book of Etiquette, a text that bordered on the sacred for Brightman Girls. Caroline certainly needed a chapter or two of its instruction.

  "And what is your department, Mr. Davies?" Gemma asked.

  He removed his spectacles and placed them on the table. Pointing to the badge on his shoulder, one with a brass gear on its shield, he replied, "Informatics."

  "We're Booleans," Caroline chimed in a she licked the grease from her fingers.

  "Booleans?" Gemma asked. "Dr. Pugh mentioned that word yesterday. What are Booleans?"

  "Oh, surely even in the ivory tower of science you've heard of Booleans," Caroline said.

  "It's just a bit of jargon, Miss Llewellyn," Mr. Davies said. "It's what the crew calls us. We write code for the Engine."

  "You work on the Oberth engines? It's launch day. Shouldn't you be on that deck already?"

  Caroline guffawed. "Aw, no, not those bloody monsters. The analytical engine, love. We call it the A.E. Totally different."

  "Napkin, Caroline," Mr. Davies said just as Caroline was about to wipe her fingers on her jacket. He pushed a cloth in his companion's direction. "Remember what Frau Knopf said regarding grease on the uniforms. Besides, you never know when Mr. Wallace may be lurking about. Miss Llewellyn, you may have heard them called difference engines in other circles. We run the data you scientists cook up through the gears, sum it all up, and then let the wireless blokes send it back home. It's one of the more expensive jobs, more gears than they used in all the new ACS Engines put together by far. It is based on the designs of one Charles Babbage. Oh, and of course on George Boole's principles of logic. They'd been working on that since long before the Martians came along. The Invasion just gave us the incentive to build them. It's too bad Mr. Babbage didn't live long enough to see his creations come to life."

  "Did they die in the Invasion, then?"

  "Did who die?" asked Caroline.

  "Messers Babbage and Boole."

  "Naw, 'em blokes was pushin' up daisies long before the tentacle-heads took a notion to pay us a visit," Caroline said. "But the TIA was keen on usin' Babbage's schematics. Guess the chaps wanted something that was human built on the ship."

  Gemma frowned. "It sounds like most of the credit belongs to Mr. Babbage instead of Mr. Boole, then."

  "Well, there's Lady Lovelace, too," Caroline said. "She was what's-his-name's daughter."

  "Lord Byron," her companion said. "The poet."

  "Yeah, that's him! She worked with Babbage. Knew all kinds of mathematics. Translated an article someone wrote on his engine and added more of her own ideas that we're still using! I think of her as the first true Boolean. But it's all in the name. Lovelace ain't bad, but who wants to be called a Babbage? I mean, honestly?"

  Mr. Davies nodded. "True enough. I can only imagine the ribbing we would take. Well, the additional ribbing, at any rate." He turned to Gemma. "Rumour has it that you took the last tender with the captain himself. So, what is your opinion of our fearless leader?"

  "He seems very--"

  "He's just like Lancelot, isn't he?" Caroline asked.

  Mr. Davies returned to his book with a sigh at that. Caroline continued chatting, and Gemma was more than happy to let her. In the meantime, nodding at appropriate moments, Gemma examined the rest of the mess hall. Posters and bills covered most of the back wall in a wash of colour. One read "Lights of Blue, Go to the Loo! Lights of Red, Keep Your Head!" Gemma wasn't sure she wanted to know what that was about. An illustration of Sophie the Steamfitter grinned down at them with a curve of seduction in her lips. She informed the reader that "The TIA wants YOU to help combat the Martian Threat!" The icon leaned against a smokestack in her standard outfit: black corset, miniscule skirt, and garters that held up long silk stockings.

  Gemma wrinkled her nose. The corset barely contained the woman's generous bosom as it pulled her waist into an impossibly tiny circumference (even by Brightman standards). One muscular leg bent to rest her foot flat against the smokestack behind her. A bowler perched on her head at a rakish angle; her hair was nearly as short as Caroline's. One of her eyes was frozen in a permanent wink. Sophie brandished the welding torch like a pistol with its barrel pointed overhead and a tiny flame poking out the end. A rather scandalous and silly outfit, Gemma thought, for such a powerful tool. Which, she supposed, was the point.

  She had worn less, herself, in the Cirque du Lune. It had been under a bit of duress -- she preferred to leave the best of her bits to the imagination -- but she had accomplished her task and gotten the attention of a certain professor of chemistry, who had preferred dancers to computers. It was unfortunate that she had been called away from that particular venture. She had been in her dressing room when she had received her summons to report back to Brightman. She had even had the correct dose of sleeping powder for the job measured out into her favourite hollow ring. She blinked when she realized that she didn't remember where she'd left it once she'd changed into her traveling clothes.

  Too late to worry about that now, she thought.

  That mission was done; there was no sense in fretting over spilt absinthe, as Mrs. Brightman would have said.

  Gemma stared at Sophie again. Some of the sailors stopped to kiss Sophie on their way out, and the poster was slightly wrinkled from their attentions. Someone had posted a newspaper clipping declaring the winner of a horse race from the week before. Other bills simply cried "Terra Vigila" and "The TIA - Defender of the Earth" to the passersby. Gemma also noticed what was missing. She wore the only brown uniform in the entire room.

  "Mr. Davies, where are the other members of the Cohort? Surely they eat as well."

  "Oh, they tend to breakfast in their conference room on the Research Deck. One of the cabin boys carries pastries down there so they don't have to come by the galley."

  "They don't frat with us much," Caroline said. "Nice of you to come here to eat, though. Say, where are you going to be during the launch? You busy?"

  "Our first meeting is scheduled for after the launch," Gemma replied.

  "You don't have any rocks to look at yet, then?"

  "Um, no. Not yet. When is the launch, exactly?"

  "It's just under a couple of hours from now. Oh, you can watch it with us!" Caroline offered. She looked at Mr. Davies and bounced in her seat. "Oh, Nigel, can she come with us? Please? It'd be wicked fun to watch it with a scientist. I can show her the A.E.! Informatics is just off the bridge, with a window that'll let us watch it all up close. You'll be in the front row!"

  Mr. Davies pulled out his pocket watch, checked the time, and replaced it. "You are certainly welcome, Miss Llewellyn. Caroline is right; you won't have a better view of history in the making. I suggest we leave now, though, as we need to get the rest of Informatics s
ettled first."

  "I would be delighted to join you," Gemma replied.

  Mrs. Brightman had charged her with watching the captain. They were correct; this would be an enormous opportunity. How kind of them to save her the trouble of contriving a way to access the bridge.

  Caroline led the way to the tray return. Gemma realized with horror that the young lady was wearing true trousers, not the convertible skirt that Gemma wore. She had seen women in trousers before. But they were always wide-legged, and their blouses always covered their backsides to avoid giving the local Ministry of Culture consulate a complete conniption. Could Caroline really prefer to look like a man?

  The yeoman must have noticed that her legs were the object of study. She pulled at the fabric on her thigh.

  "Oh, these. Just want to blend in with the mates, love. You'll find out over time that they just make the job easier. If they think of me as just another bloke, they don't get distracted. Learned the hard way."

  "Crumbs, Caroline," Mr. Davies said as he pointed to some wayward bits of toast on her uniform.

  Caroline chatted all the way down the corridor and all the way up in the lift. Two decks later, they walked down another long wide corridor, passing a window on the left that opened onto a chamber filled with men in hunter green busy with teletype keys. Mr. Davies pointed to it as they passed.

  "Wireless Operations," he said. "You'll want to visit with them later."

  A few yards away was a door guarded by two crewmen, who greeted Davies with a sharp salute. He returned it and waited for them to open the door. A second door loomed just inside that one, but they did not enter it. The new corridor curved away to either side, and they took the right passageway. It stopped at a blank wall, with two doors on the right just before the end. He opened the second door, labeled "Informatics", and gestured them through.