by Various
He held up his hand to forestall a comment from the other and continued on. "There are conditions for everything, commander. Men react according to certain patterns, given the proper circumstances. It is characteristic of the sort of men you will encounter on your new ship that they are unlikely to take the initiative in such matters, partly from their early training and partly from their association with a CO who pretty well dominated them. However, they will readily condone it if somebody else does take the initiative in their behalf. Particularly, if that man has some official authority over them, and there is always somebody like that. They will not only condone the action, they will positively be happy about it, because it will tend to bolster their sense of security--such as it is. You know the sort of thing--father hunger. Somebody to take care of them the way their old CO did."
The captain sighed. "So you see, commander, you are going into a double-edged situation. Everything in it that can accrue to your advantage, could also get you promptly killed."
"I see. First I fight with my men," the commander said bitterly. "And if I win that battle, I will be permitted to fight the aliens with a thirty-two per cent possibility of living through the first encounter of that."
"It's always been that way to some extent," the captain replied sympathetically, "in every command situation since the world began. Only right now is a little worse than anyone can remember."
* * * * *
The commander departed. But about a month later, ensuing circumstances brought one Lieutenant Maise to the same office building. He was not, of course, ushered into the august presence of the captain, who was seeing more important people than lieutenants that day.
Maise had been there for several hours every day for the previous three, and he went immediately to the desk of the Special Reports Officer. The SR Officer was a lieutenant also, a combination of psychologist and writer, whose business it was to make sure that Special Reports on morale matters were presented in the properly dramatic fashion so that that indefinable aura of reality, customarily omitted from official historical documents, could be included. The Evaluation Division, back on Earth, was very fussy about that "aura."
"Ah, good afternoon sir," the SR Officer greeted him. "Glad to see you again."
Maise nodded curtly and took a seat beside the desk.
"I think we are pretty well finished now--"
"We better be," Maise interrupted. "My ship is pulling out in four hours."
"Right on the button, eh?" said the SR Officer. He fumbled in a desk drawer and withdrew a bulky folder, from which he extracted a smaller manuscript, and handed it to Maise. "I think you will find it complete and suitably expressive, now, sir."
Maise scowled as he accepted the document. "It makes no difference to me. I didn't want to get involved with the report in the first place."
"I know," the SR Officer nodded agreeably. "But don't worry. Nobody is going to prefer any charges against anybody in any case. What they want back on Earth is all the information they can get on morale problems, so that they can more effectively implement their planning. You know how it is."
"How would I know?"
The SR Officer snapped, "I can understand your sentiments, but don't blame me. Remember, I'm just a lieutenant, and I just work here in Morale."
"Sure," Maise said, cracking a grin on his stiff lips. "Sorry. I know it isn't your fault."
He opened the report, and commenced reading.
* * * * *
TITLE:
SPECIAL CONFIDENTIAL PSYCHOLOGICAL REPORT, prepared in collaboration with Lieutenant E. G. von Wald, Special Reports Officer, Mars XLV Base.
TO:
COMMANDING OFFICER Psychological Study and Evaluation District Central Command Authority Unified Human Defense Forces
FROM:
LIEUTENANT ALTON A. B. MAISE Executive Officer Space Combat Device LMB-43534 Seventh Space Fleet
SUBJECT:
ATTEMPTED BACTERIOLOGICAL POISONING OF COMMANDER THOMAS L. FRENDON, recently assigned captain of above-mentioned Combat Device. As per Special Order PSIC334349, dated 23 July 2013.
On 17 October 2015, Space Combat Device LMB-43534 was detached from the Seventh Fleet and returned to the Martian XLV Docks for general overhauling and refitting with new equipment. This period extended for two months, and was followed by a seven-day course of rechecking by the crew.
I was assigned to the ship as Executive Officer on 21 November following detachment, and was in command of the ship during most of the above-mentioned operations. The men were extremely hostile toward me, owing to their fear that I was a Psi Corps officer acting under a special commission in the SCS, but no overt signs of mutiny took place, perhaps because we were still in port. Needless to say, I was very glad when the message arrived informing us of the assignment of Commander Frendon as captain, inasmuch as the situation made clearly evident that I could not expect to be able to assume tactical command of the ship myself when it was returned to combat, the attitude of the crew being what it was.
Almost immediately upon receipt of the message, some of the animosity toward me lifted, but hardly enough for me to consider myself accepted as a member of the crew, although there was a good deal more work done after that.
* * * * *
Six days before our scheduled departure date, Commander Frendon arrived. I was in the control cabin with Lieutenant Spender, Third Officer, when Lieutenant Harding, the Astrogator entered. He limped around the little room a couple of times and then slumped dejectedly into a chair. "Well," he said, "we've had it, boys."
Spender looked around at him quickly, saying, "What's that?"
"I said we've had it. I just saw the new CO, walking over from the Operations office."
"What about it?" I asked sharply.
Harding shook his heavy, balding head, staring at the floor. "It's written all over him," he said bitterly.
"No!" muttered Spender.
"Yep," Harding growled. "Just wait until you lay eyes on him."
He stood up and faced me, his expression bleak and cold. "A sickman, Mr. Exec," he snarled. "Just as sure as death."
As previously noted, discipline was very lax, but I had been trying to restore it as much as possible. So I said, "I don't know whether the new CO is a member of the Psi Corps or not, Harding, but cut out this nickname of 'sick.'"
Harding mumbled: "That's what everybody calls them. I didn't invent the name. But I think it is plenty appropriate."
"Well cut it out."
Harding glared at me. "I suppose you're glad to have one of the guess-kids running this ship."
"Nobody wants to be involved in any guessing games, but we're not running the war here, so stow it."
Spender broke in then with his customary cold, quiet speech. "A sickman, eh? Then we have approximately one chance in three of living through our first encounter with the enemy when we leave here. That is according to the statistics, I believe. But to the best of my recollection, our previous captain brought us through eighty-eight skirmishes before anyone got hurt." He shook his head and thoughtfully contemplated the big, raw knuckles of his hand.
As is perfectly obvious from the above, the situation was ill-suited for a new officer to take command of the ship. I would have liked to settle the matter a little more before he got there, but there was nothing I could do about it then. Besides, it wasn't my worry any more, I realized gratefully. The problem of loyalty and confidence was now the business of the new CO. I did not envy him his job, but it had to be done.
* * * * *
At the very first glance, you could see what Harding had been talking about. Commander Frendon was the absolute epitome of every popular physiological cliché associated with people of unusual psi endowment for the past century that it has been known. At least ten years younger than any of the rest of us, he was of medium height, extremely skinny and nervous, his eyes glancing about with a restless uncertainty. It seemed almost too obvious on him, I thought, and wondered who had been r
esponsible for assigning him to anything at all in the armed forces.
He grinned slightly at us when he came in, dearly unsure of himself, and made a valiant but artificial-sounding effort. "Hello men," he said. "My name is Frendon. I'm the new CO."
"Yeah," muttered Harding, "we see that you are."
"What's that lieutenant?" Frendon's voice was suddenly sharp, and the wavering grin had vanished.
"I said, yes sir," Harding replied sullenly. "Welcome aboard."
Frendon nodded curtly, and glanced around at the rest of us, at no time looking anyone directly in the eyes. I stood up and held out my hand. "Maise, here," I said. "Your Exec." And naturally I added the traditional welcome.
Spender introduced himself, and as he was speaking, the remaining crew man walked in to find out what was up. He took one look at Frendon, understood, and turned to leave again.
"And the man in the lead-lined tunic is Lieutenant Korsakov," I said quickly. "He's your engineer."
Korsakov sullenly said hello and waited. And Frendon also waited, all the time standing stiff and sensitive. One got the impression that he was in a nervous agony, but unable to help himself or to receive help from anybody else. When the introductions were long since completed, Frendon still stood uncertainly, and an unpleasant silence developed.
"Sit down, captain," I suggested. "How about some coffee?"
Frendon nodded and jerkily moved to the seat I had vacated. The eyes of the other men followed him, studying his uniform. Although it was clear by now that he was wearing the ordinary insignia of the SCS, nobody was particularly reassured, because we had all heard of the new arrangement under which the Psi Corps operated.
So Frendon sat. The silence continued. Everybody stared at him, and he looked helplessly around. I worked up what I felt was a friendly grin, and his gaze finally found itself on me and stayed there, almost pleading.
"You'll have to forgive us, captain," I told him. "We're an old bunch of mangy veterans, and it's going to be a little strange for a while having a bright new captain."
"Certainly," Frendon said, his voice hardly above a whisper. "I understand." He hesitated and then added in a quick defensive rush of words, "But, of course, you must understand that this isn't the first ship I've commanded, and I've been in combat before too, and so I don't see why I should be so doggone strange."
That's what he said. Doggone.
"Well," I murmured and cleared my throat. "Of course, captain."
* * * * *
Harding broke off his steady, hostile glare, and fumbled in his pocket for a cigarette.
"Captain," he started, a little uncertainly, which was unusual for Harding, "can I ask you a frank question?"
"Huh?" Frendon looked at the Astrogator blankly. "Why ... why, er, certainly, lieutenant. Harding you say your name is? Certainly, Harding, go right ahead."
Lieutenant Harding carefully lighted his cigarette. Then he said, "Captain, will you tell us whether or not you are a sickman--I mean a Psi Corps officer?"
"Why?" Frendon leaned forward tensely, then relaxed self-consciously. "Why do you ask that, Harding? Aren't you familiar with the insignia of your own branch of service?"
"Yes, sir," Harding replied blandly, "but there have been a number of reports that they were going to assign a sick ... I mean a Psi Corps officer to the command of all new Combat Devices, only they would be wearing SCS insignia. Since we have been outfitted fresh and all, we probably come under the heading of new Devices."
"What if I were a Psi Corps officer?" Frendon demanded truculently, his long, skinny frame taut with excitement.
Harding considered that question, or rather statement, and puffed thoughtfully on his cigarette. Finally he shrugged. He reached over and meticulously crushed out the cigarette in an ash tray.
"For the benefit of you, lieutenant"--Frendon's bitter gaze swept the entire room--"and the rest of you, I am not now nor have I ever been a member of the Psi Corps. Does that satisfy you?"
"Yes, sir," I said quickly. Nobody else said anything.
Frendon stood up and stalked tensely to the door. There he spun around and said, "But there is a branch of the military service designated as the Psi Corps, and if you wish to discuss it in the future, kindly refer to it by its official title or abbreviation, and not by that atrocious nickname of 'sick.' I am sure the Central Command Authority knows what it is doing, and if they did intend to assign such personnel they must have very good reasons for it. Understand?"
There was a general nodding of heads and a scattered, sullen, "Yes, sir."
"Now then, you may call out the ship's company, Mr. Maise," Frendon said to me.
"Well, captain," I replied, "we're all here." Then sure enough, Frendon made us all stand at attention while he read his orders to us, just like it says in the book at the academy. After which, happily, he went to his cabin, and let us go back to our work.
* * * * *
That was the introduction of Commander Frendon to the crew. He made a distinct impression. Entirely bad. Veteran small-ship personnel in this war have shown themselves to be extremely clannish, at best, deriving their principal sense of security not from the strength of the fleet which they never see and rarely contact, but from their familiarity with and confidence in each other's capabilities. Now these men had a new CO who was not only a stranger, but one who they felt sure was a member of the feared and mistrusted Psi Corps, a sickman, a man whose battle tactics were reputedly nothing but a bunch of blind, wild guesses. Previously, I had been the unwanted and suspected stranger, so I knew how Frendon would feel.
The situation developed rapidly, probably because we had only six days before our scheduled departure into the combat zone. That afternoon, Korsakov and Harding were supposed to be checking the wiring of fire-control circuits. Base mechanics had installed the gear and tested it, but it is standard operating procedure for the ship's crew to do their own checking afterwards, the quality of the work by electronics mechanics on planetary assignment being what it is these days.
I found them sitting on the deck, engaged in a desultory, low-voiced conversation. They had stripped the conduit ducts of plating, but there was no sign that they had done anything further.
"All right, you guys," I said. "Get up and finish that check. We may have to use those missiles one day soon, and I'd like to be sure they go where they are sent."
Korsakov looked up at me, his broad, thick mouth spread in an unpleasant toothy grin and his bushy eyebrows raised. "What difference will it make, my friend?"
"None," supplied Harding. Then he added, "As a matter of fact, it might even be better to leave them scrambled. If we strike an alien, our new captain is going to close his eyes and punch buttons at random, probably. Why shouldn't we leave the fire controls at random, too?"
"They might," Korsakov said, still grinning inanely, "even cancel out his error."
"Cut it out," I said. "You know better than that."
"Maybe you do, Maise." Harding replied, "but we don't."
My face must have telegraphed my mood, because he lurched to his feet and quickly added, "Now wait a minute, Maise. Don't get excited. You're not in command any more, so you don't have to stick to that authority line now. Oh sure, I know you're the Exec, but what the hell, Maise."
I stared at him for a moment, then said quietly, "Come on Kors. On your feet, too. Get that work done."
"Ha," said Korsakov, but he stood up.
* * * * *
Harding moved closer to me. "Confidentially, Maise," he said, "what do you really think?"
"About what?"
"You know--Frendon."
I shrugged. "What am I supposed to think?"
"You know as well as I do that he's a sickman."
"I told you not to use that nickname around me," I replied with annoyance. "Naturally you're going to mistrust them if you tie them up in your mind with a name like that."
"Do you trust them?"
I suddenly wasn't sure myself, so I
evaded by saying, "Frendon told us he wasn't one, anyway."
"Did you expect him to tell the truth?" Korsakov sneered. "After going to the trouble of getting an auxiliary commission in the SCS? He knows what we think."
"Sickman," Harding repeated, watching me carefully. "And I'm plenty sick of having the brass hats handing us junk like that. It used to be that the worst we'd get would be fouled up equipment that we'd have to check and rewire ourselves, like these fire controls. Now they give us a fouled-up captain."
"Look," I said. "I want you to cut that talk out, Harding. That's an order. And if you think I can't pour it on you guys, just try me once."
Korsakov, who had been staring morosely into the wiring duct, turned around to face me. He had that nasty grin on his face again.
The best thing I could think of to do at that moment was to pretend I assumed that they would obey and go on back to the control room. I knew they wouldn't pay much attention to the order, but the stand had to be taken. I was still pretty much a stranger myself, but I wasn't going to let them think they could sell me their friendship at the cost of the captain's authority.
One thing I did accomplish, however, was the completion of the fire-control checkout. There was a lot of rewiring to do, but they had it finished in two hours, and everything was perfect.
Frendon went off to the city that evening, and didn't show up the next day except for about an hour. Apparently, he had been talking to a Psychological Advice officer or somebody like that, and now proceeded to interview each of us in private, quite obviously trying to gain some kind of rapport with us. It didn't work. Even if it hadn't been so obviously what it was, it wouldn't have worked. The men couldn't stand simply having him around, and their conviction that he was a Psi Corps officer merely grew stronger.