Coffee cups clinked together, and we all drank. The cups didn't actually make a clinking sound, as they were plastic, but they had the official UNEF logo on one side, and 'UNS Flying Dutchman' on the other. If by some total freakin' miracle, we ever returned to Earth, I could definitely see these plastic cups getting smuggled off the ship and becoming a much-prized collector's item. The six of us started catching up, because most of us didn't see much of each other between the time we left the Dutchman, and the few days before departure from Earth orbit. None of us had time to talk much during those frantic days of loading and preparing the ship, after the governments on Earth had finally made the forehead-smackingly obvious decision to send the Dutchman back out. Every single survivor of the original Merry Band of Pirates had volunteered to take the Dutchman back out again; after a lot of discussion, argument and thinking, and a whole lot of politics among the governments involved, I had only accepted the five sitting with me in the galley. Although all the survivors volunteered to take the Dutchman back out, they didn’t all need to come with us, and their governments were keen on having some of them remain on Earth, for the knowledge they had. Many of the survivors had injuries, Giraud still had his arm encased in a Thuranin healing sleeve, and Chang's ribs were still tender. Doctor Skippy’s prognosis was for Giraud to have his arm out of the sleeve and fully healed in two more days; that was not soon enough for the French paratrooper, because he said his arm itched like a thousand ants were biting him. Skippy said that was all in Giraud’s head.
This trip, I firmly believed, was a fool's errand, a suicide mission. The original Merry Band of Pirates had pushed their luck to the limit already, to expect more from them was crazy. I'd been forced to argue, using, let's say, strong language, with Sergeant Adams, trying to convince her not to come with us. She didn't have anything to prove, I'd told her, she had sacrificed enough. What I didn't say what that, although we'd both been prisoners of the Kristang and scheduled to be executed, she had also been tortured. I'd seen her scars. Man, she laid into me for that, practically shouting that I was only saying that because she is a woman, that if she was a male Marine, I wouldn't pamper her. She was wrong about that, she also hadn't let me get a word in while she berated me. "With all due respect, sir, you wear colonel's eagles, but we both know you're a buck sergeant. You need me."
She had been right, one hundred percent, and I was damned glad to have her. I was glad to have all of them, people I knew and trusted. Our new crew were all-stars, to be sure, they were also people I didn't know. Before launch, I had deliberately avoided gathering just the six of us, as I didn't want the rest of the crew to think I favored my old comrades. Although of course I did. There were other pilots aboard with vastly greater experience and qualifications than Captain Desai, pilots who had flown the hottest jets, test pilots, top guns. And not a single one of them were allowed to touch a single button of the Dutchman's controls, unless they were under Desai's supervision. Any of them might be able to be trusted to pilot an alien starship, Desai was trusted. Skippy felt the same way. Regardless of each pilot's official callsign before they came aboard the Flying Dutchman, Skippy began by calling all of them 'FiNG' for Fucking New Guy, or Girl. We had to explain to the new pilots that Skippy was actually being pretty nice, considering, you know, Skippy. One pilot, who I won't name, pissed Skippy off enough that his new assigned quarters were an airlock. That required me to intervene, although I could see Skippy's point. That pilot's new callsign instantly became 'ALliGator' for Air Lock Guy. It's a pilot thing.
"What do you think of the new crew?" I asked to no one in particular.
Chang spoke first, after diplomatically taking a pause to sip coffee. "It will be an interesting exercise in international cooperation."
Giraud nodded, then shrugged. "We will see."
Seventy people aboard the ship. Twelve of them were scientists, civilians. Of those, seven were women, and five men, their specialties covered everything from medicine and biology to physics. Competition for a berth aboard the Dutchman had been fierce among scientists, a bit less so after I explained that I did not realistically expect us to ever return. If it had been entirely up to me, we would have taken zero scientists along. We didn't need scientists to achieve the mission objectives, and they would be only more people dead if we couldn't return to Earth. It had not been up to me, governments around the globe had insisted we bring scientists along, the original list had several thousand names on it. Limiting us to twelve scientists had been the best compromise I could get, my final criteria for who came with us, and who stayed home, was less about pure scientific ability, and more about ability to get along with other people. What we did not need was a bunch of genius brainiacs, or, as Skippy referred to them, slightly smarter monkeys, who had massive egos and became a pain in the ass during a long trip aboard the Dutchman. That was part of the reason we had more women scientists than men, too many of the male candidates had failed UNEF's 'gets along well with others' psychological tests.
"International cooperation." I repeated the phrase slowly. "Our original crew cooperated well," I pointed out.
"We had to," Chang said, "and our mission then was to rescue Earth. We were all highly motivated."
"Our crew back then was whoever was available, right there," Giraud pointed out. "I was only at the logistics base because my commander sent me, to find out why supplies were so slow getting to us."
"We sent what we had at the time," Simms said defensively.
Giraud nodded. "Yes, I realized that when I got there, Major. My point, Colonel, is our original crew had a sense of great purpose, we were thrown together, unexpectedly, to rescue our entire planet. Our new crew has no such sense of purpose."
"And these special forces all think they are special," Adams remarked sourly over her coffee. "No offense, sir," she added to Giraud.
"None taken," he laughed. "Some of them intimidate me," he admitted, and Renee Giraud had been an elite French paratrooper even before we went to Paradise.
"You too?" I asked. "They all intimidate me. My concern is these rivalries may get out of hand." Rivalries not only between nationalities, I also had to worry about how US Army Rangers and Navy SEALs would get along. Professionally, I hoped.
Adams bumped fists with Giraud across the table. "Don't worry, sir, we'll get them straightened out." Chang had assigned the experienced Giraud and Adams to get our new special forces units squared away, and to set up a training regimen. The new people had to learn about the Dutchman, the Flower and dropships for basics. Then they would move on to familiarizing themselves with Kristang powered armor and combots.
What I was really worried about was our elite, gung-ho, intense special forces troops becoming bored. Before we departed Earth orbit, I had assembled the entire off-duty crew and scientists in an empty cargo bay to explain, once again, that my sincere hope was we saw zero combat action. That we saw nothing interesting along the way, that a successful mission, in my opinion, would be for us to find Skippy's magic radio, drop him off somewhere, and for the Dutchman to return uneventfully to Earth. Or, in the all-too-likely scenario of the Dutchman breaking down somewhere after Skippy left us, of us being stuck in interstellar space, with food running low, and me having to engage our self-destruct. When I told the crew that, I could see special forces nodding grimly. I also saw in their eyes they didn't fully believe it. They were trained for action, and action is what they expected. I hoped to disappoint them.
Our new mission continued to use the UN Expeditionary Force command structure, the scientists came from many nations, but the military forces were drawn from only five countries; America, China, India, Britain and France. Each country provided nine special forces soldiers, except that America had only four Rangers and four SEALs, because an American commanded the mission. Each country also provided two pilots. Giraud and Desai were in the special forces and pilot count, that left me, Chang, Simms and Adams rounding out the fifty eight military personnel aboard.
I dr
ank the last of the coffee in my cup, and got up for a refill. The coffee pot was almost empty, I drained the dregs into my cup and got the pot started on brewing more. There wasn't any breakfast available yet, other than do-it-yourself toast. "Whose turn is it in the galley today?" Details like that were Chang's decision as the Executive Officer, I should have known anyway. There was a duty roster somewhere. Like, on my zPhone, that I was too lazy to look at.
"China." Chang replied. "We'll get started in an hour or so."
"That's fine, I'm not hungry yet," I said. What was a Chinese breakfast like? I was eager to find out. Our crew was scientists, pilots and special forces. We had no cooks, no mechanics, none of the usual support personnel. Each day, one nationality among the military forces would handle cooking in the galley, with the scientists making up a sixth team for cooking duties. The food situation was going to be interesting, culinary skill had not been a prerequisite for assignment aboard the Flying Dutchman, although I knew we could count on the hyper competitive special forces to do their best. With a fresh half cup of coffee, I headed toward the door. "I'm going to hit the gym," I announced. Getting there early hopefully meant I would be working out by myself, without being surrounded by SpecOps people who were all in better condition than I was. Maybe I needed to be concerned about my own ego, too.
CHAPTER TWO
When I was done working out in the gym, I needed a shower. It was a lung-burning, muscle aching workout that left my legs like jelly and my arms shaky. Literally, my arms were so weary, my hands were shaking. Even my fingers hurt. And the six Chinese SpecOps guys who were in the gym while I was there had been doing a tougher workout. They were already well into their exercises before I got to the gym, and when I left, they were headed out of the gym to run sprints down the Dutchman's long spine corridor. I felt like collapsing.
In the shower, I had to kneel down, because it was a Thuranin-sized shower, and we hadn't been able to fix that when we refitted the Dutchman in Earth orbit. Beds had been lengthened to human size by cutting away cabinets we didn't need, adjusting showers had not been on the priority list, in the short time we had before our pirated star carrier had to depart. My shaky fingers missed the shower controls several times, and I cursed out loud.
"Something wrong, Colonel Joe?" Skippy's voice had an undertone of genuine concern. "You seem especially clumsy this morning."
"Especially? Thanks a lot, Skippy."
"I meant no offense, Joe. A clumsy monkey is a dead monkey; when you're swinging from trees in the jungle, the clumsy monkey falls and gets eaten by a leopard."
"Ha!" I had to laugh at that. "Not many leopards in this part of the galaxy, Skippy. My arms are tired, that's all, I did a tough workout."
"I know; I was watching you. Don't you think you're overdoing it a bit, Joe?"
"Hell no. Those SpecOps guys, and the women, hell, especially the women, are super high speed, Skippy. Damn it, I'm in good shape, and I'm younger than most of them, and they're kicking my ass already. I'd like to train with them, but the first time one of them throws me to the mat without breaking a sweat, I think I'd totally lose their respect."
"Wow. You truly are a dumb monkey. How can anyone be so clueless? Joe, those SpecOps people are completely intimidated by you, they have a huge chip on their shoulders about you. And about the other members of the original Merry Band of Pirates."
"What?" I sputtered under the cascading water. "Give me a minute to rinse off." With a still shaky hand, I pressed the button to shut off the water, and backed out to stand up carefully to reach for a towel. "How do you figure that? Those people have gone through the toughest military training there is, they're the best, they're all completely, super confident."
"Super confident about most things, probably, yes. About you, no. Think about it from their point of view, Joe. When UNEF went offworld, they stayed behind. For one reason or another, they were left behind, they missed out on all the action. Right there, they all think they have something to prove, to you, Chang and the others."
"Huh. I guess you're right, Skippy, I hadn't thought of that."
"That's just the beginning. You not only went offworld, you captured two alien starships, brought back priceless intel, and rescued your entire species from the Kristang. Joe, these SpecOps people are completely in awe of you, you and all the original crew. Yes, they have passed an extremely rigorous selection process that requires incredible physical and mental toughness. However, what have they actually accomplished? What are the odds, that, during their entire military careers, they will accomplish anything anywhere close to what you did? The answer is about zero, Joe. And they all know it. Joe, they all think you look down on them."
"Crap." He was right, I had been utterly clueless. I'd been thinking only of myself, and not considering how the new crew might think of their situation. Back when I was in the US Army 10th 'Mountain' Infantry Division, and our battalion first went into Nigeria to boost the 'peacekeeping' efforts in that region, I had been in awe of the guys in the battalion that was rotating out. They had been there, they had lived it, they knew the territory, they had been in combat. They'd done it for real, I'd only been briefed on it. You could see it in their eyes, too, they knew that many of the guys in our battalion, including me, were green and had never carried a rifle in a hostile area. It made a difference. And when it was our battalion's turn to pull out and go home, we'd changed, all of us. We'd been there. We knew.
The SpecOps people now aboard the Flying Dutchman had not been there, had not been offworld, had likely never seen an alien in person. They'd been put through hell on Earth by the Kristang, I'd been spared that experience, still, I had served in UNEF on Paradise, and they hadn't. Many special forces units had not made the trip to Paradise, the Kristang hadn't especially wanted them, and governments on Earth may have been hedging their bets, keeping most of their elite combat power close to home. At some point, if the Dutchman hadn't appeared in the sky for Skippy to stomp the Kristang like bugs, maybe the SpecOps people would have at least tried to hit the Kristang. It would have been a futile gesture to attack the Kristang in their bunkers, and impossible to attack them aboard their ships in orbit. Any SpecOps action would have been a measure of pure desperation, to make a last stand, for the sake of human honor and nothing else. I didn't often think about what life had been like for people on Earth while I was offworld. It must have been horrible, terrifying. On Paradise, we'd dealt with the reality that all of our supplies, especially food, had to be brought from Earth by the Kristang, and we'd seen supply shipments getting thin toward the end of my stay there. That had been bad enough, to gradually come to the realization that we were fighting on the wrong side of the war, that our 'allies' were oppressing our home planet, that if UNEF didn't follow the Kristang's every command, the lizards could starve us by halting food shipments.
It must have been worse, much worse, on Earth. On Paradise, we had been worried about the survival of the Expeditionary Force. People on Earth knew the stakes were much higher, not only the fate of billions of humans, the survival of our entire species could have been at risk. When we went offworld with UNEF, we hadn't known what we were getting into, but we expected it to be bad, very bad. On Earth, people at first considered the Kristang to be saviors; aliens who looked like big, ugly lizards, still, our saviors from the invading Ruhar. The Kristang had saved Earth from the Ruhar. So when the Kristang began pushing their weight around, interfering in human affairs, taking territory, taking rare minerals and other materials, at first people figured that was the price of supporting the war effort, the price of keeping the Ruhar from conquering our home planet and enslaving humanity. When was it that most people on Earth gotten the uneasy feeling that they'd made a bad bargain, that the Kristang, who by then had total control of the planet, were as bad as we'd imagined the Ruhar would be? I didn't know, that was something I should ask the new crew about. They probably wanted to talk about it, needed to talk about it. Needed to talk about it to someone who hadn't
lived through it.
"You're right, Skippy, I should have thought of this. I'm the commander, I'm supposed to know what's on my people's minds. I-, hey, wait a minute. How do you know what they're thinking?"
"From listening to them talk, duh. Damn, you're a dope sometimes."
"Skippy, you can't do that. People need privacy."
"Joe, I can't not do that. I monitor every system on this ship in real-time, that includes video and audio inputs. You already know I watch you sleep, I watch you in the shower, I watch you eat-"
"Yeah, I know. Kinda creepy there, Skippy."
"Uh huh, as if I care what you monkeys look like naked. You're just as ugly with your clothes on."
"Fine. Whatever. What you can't do is tell me, or anyone else, what you heard people say in private. We must have at least the illusion of privacy aboard the ship. If people know you watch everything they do, that's something they can deal with, because you're an alien AI, and to most people you're part of the furniture, an invisible ship system. If people know their fellow crew members, or their commander, are spying on them, using details of their private lives for gossip, that could destroy morale. Do you understand that?"
"I don't see what the big deal is, Joe. Sure, I won't tell you or anyone else what I see or hear. One question: what if I find out someone is planning to do something stupid that would harm the ship, or the mission?"
"In that case, you do tell me, only the details I need to hear. Got it?"
"I think so, yes. Damn, you monkeys have such complicated social rules, for a species so low on the development scale."
I just got to my office, a converted storage closet close to the bridge and Combat Information Center compartments, when Skippy gave me a warning. "Uh oh, Colonel Joe, heads up. Baldilocks is on his way to see you."
SpecOps (Expeditionary Force Book 2) Page 2