by John Ringo
“Ah, good,” the man said. “I’m Carmen Mansour, Vice President for Hospitality and Protocol of the Apollo Corporation. You are, I believe, what is refer to as enlisted persons?”
“Yes,” Barnett said, smiling thinly.
“If I could ask you to spread out?” Mansour asked. “Perhaps a few over by the table with the bird of paradise on it? Two more near the bar. Two others by the purple dendrobium. A mix of male and female as much as possible with this group?”
“Okay...?” Barnett replied. “And we’re doing this because...?”
“It permits anchoring as the more important guests arrive,” Mansour said, smiling. “Sorry, but that’s how it is. People will tend to clump. By spreading persons initially, it creates a more free-form gathering.”
“Mutant, Velasquez,” Barnett said. “Palencia, Parker. Benito, Thermal, Me. Team one, the...whats?” She pointed to the first table but clearly couldn’t remember the name of the flowers. “Team two, other table. Team three...we’re hitting the bar.”
“That will not be, strictly, necessary,” Mansour said. “The waiters will be happy to serve. Simply near the bar if you don’t mind.”
“All teams,” Barnett said. “One glass of standard mix, which means wine, beer or mixed drink single. After consumption, minimum of one hour soft drink until second consumption. Sip, do not slam. Are we clear?”
“Clear, Chief,” Mutant said. “Done the drill.”
“We understand as well, Chief,” Palencia said. “There are, sorry, cultural aspects to take into account as well. There will be toasts. You are expected to drink your full drink.”
“Then after you have one, order fruit juice, not a carbonated beverage,” Barnett said. “The first person who shows signs of inebriation will be escorted back to quarters.”
“I’m on all fruit juice, then,” Dana said, grinning.
“All teams, spread out,” Barnett said.
* * *
“Why us?” Dana asked.
“The most beautiful woman with the most handsome man?” Palencia said.
“Pal, I will have your ass back in my hands when we return to the Therm,” Dana said.
“Ah, and such sweet surrender it would be,” Palencia replied.
Dana shook her head and giggled.
“God, I hate that sound,” Dana said.
“I find it delightful,” Palencia said. “Sorry, this is the first time since our conversation on culture I have seen you look the slightest bit unassured.”
“And since this is your sort of thing you’re taking some delight in that.”
“A bit,” Palencia said. “A bit. On the other hand, you are, as you pointed out, going to have my ass back in your very capable hands soon enough. So you will understand that I’m going to do my best not to rub that in.”
“Thank you,” Dana said. “What can I expect?”
“More junior people will arrive soon,” Palencia said. “By that I mean the Navy and Apollo personnel. Most of them will be military officers and managers. I suspect that they will more or less ignore us. We are beneath their notice. We serve, basically, as decorations and I would guess we’ll be given various ‘hey, you’ tasks. When all the pawns, rooks and knights are in place, the kings and queens will start to arrive. Probably last will be Mister Vernon. While my father might argue the respective importance of Mister Vernon versus the Foreign Minister, he is clearly the highest level DP short of a Prime Minister of one of the Group of Ten. So he should arrive...”
He stopped as Vernon walked in and looked around the still nearly empty room. Not surprising Dana at all, he was wearing a tuxedo. She was starting to feel like a slob.
The Apollo guy scurried over and Vernon listened to him for a second, nodded, and made a beeline for her.
“Hey, Dana,” Tyler said. “Hey, uhm...” He was looking over his shoulder at the Vice President who had followed in his wake.
“Mansour,” Dana whispered.
“Mansour? Can I get a whiskey sour? Thanks.” He turned back to her and grinned. “What, no champagne?”
“I’m on fruit juice tonight,” Dana said as a waiter floated over with a tray of champagne glasses and one whiskey sour.
“EM Parker will take fruit juice next,” Tyler said, taking the glass. “Thanks. How you doing?”
“Good, sir,” the waiter said. “Bit different than my usual job.”
“We had to recruit some of the better class of welders for this,” Tyler said, winking at the waiter. “Getting a lot of personnel into the system this quick was going to be tough. Most of the stuff was produced by Granadica. Heck, the string quartet are mostly from the Night Wolves.”
“And let me tell you, it took some doing,” Granadica said, a hologram of a Glatun head popping up. “I work better with steel than wood.”
“Granadica, Mister Vernon, this is EM Palencia, one of my division.”
“Hey,” Tyler said, sticking out his hand. “Hear you guys absolutely kicked ass in engineering on that last MASSEX. Good job.”
“Thank you, sir,” Palencia said.
“You’re the one who’s dad is with the Argentinean Foreign Minister,” Tyler said. “What’s that all about? I’d figure you for whatever your version of Annapolis is called.”
“Strangely enough, it’s called the Naval Military School, sir” Palencia said, smiling. “Given our limited space fairing ability and lack of fundamental experience, the decision was made to send persons who could be looked at as potential future leadership, sir.”
“Damned good idea, whoever thought of it,” Tyler said.
“Thank you, sir,” Palencia replied. “My father was one of the team which recommended the program.”
“I’ve been told there’s some point to having officers having been enlisted before they get frocked or whatever,” Tyler said. “Something like that?”
“Something, yes, sir,” Palencia said.
“That something cultural with South Americans?” Tyler asked.
“Not...normally, sir,” Palencia said.
The room was slowly filling up as others drifted in. Dana started to get really nervous looking at all the rank in the room. She stopped counting total “O” levels when it passed a hundred.
The various commanders, captains, and admirals were clearly trying to figure out why Tyler Vernon was already at the reception and spending his time talking to two enlisteds. Which just meant she was the target of more and more glances.
There was a flurry of activity at the doors and the Argentinean Foreign Minister, followed closely by the Chilean Foreign minister, entered the room along with the rest of the South American contingent.
“Sir,” Granadica said. “The Argentineans and Chileans have boarded.”
“Ah,” Tyler said, draining his drink and handing it to Palencia. “Gotta go make nice. Dana, don’t go anywhere.”
“Wasn’t planning on it, sir,” Dana said. “Woof,” she added as he strode away.
“And you still maintain you are not friends?” Palencia said, looking around for somewhere to put the glass.
“I’ll get it,” Granadica said. The glass lifted out of his hand and headed for the nearest waiter.
“And you did that...how?” Dana asked. “I mean, grav, obviously.”
“Just a matter of knowing how to use it, kiddo,” Granadica said. “I have to move everything in the fabber with grav, obviously. If I couldn’t figure out grav equations I couldn’t do my job. I said I could be the only waiter at this reception but they wanted guys in white coats. Which were a bitch to produce, by the way.”
“I take it you didn’t produce the flowers?” Dana said.
“Nope,” Granadica said. “And they had to bring up the wood. I did the rest.”
“This is a very good replica,” Palencia said, examining the table.
“Thanks,” Granadica said. “I said tough. Compared to most of the stuff in a Myrmidon, it was a piece of cake.”
Dana looked over at the group
around Vernon and saw another Glatun head hovering nearby.
“You’re carrying on two conversations at once?”
“More than that, kid,” Granadica said. “Got a shuttle on its way to the Naval Acceptance Yard under remote, two more over there, arguing with the Navy, producing parts for the next fabber, talking with Vulcan about issues producing Lud, in a meeting with some of the Night Wolves and I’m still running all my lines. It’s called being able to multi-task.”
“And making you laugh caused a fault?” Dana said, quizzically.
“Said triggered my humor circuit,” Granadica said. “That requires that I be using something other than rote action and response. Most conversations are action and response.”
“So you’re actually talking to EM Parker and using a Turing response program for discussions with the Argentinean Foreign Minister?” Palencia said.
“Right now I’m using a rote action and response to all the conversations except the one with the Night Wolves,” Granadica replied. “Including that response. I’m being asked questions that were easy enough to program in advance. This sort of meet and greet rarely gets beyond rote action/response.”
“That is...” Palencia said then frowned. “Absolutely true. At least at the meet and greet level.”
“Just figured that out, kiddo?” Granadica said, hissing in Glatun laughter. “I knew that when Amerigo Vespucci got lost finding Argentina.”
“He didn’t get lost,” Palencia said.
“Bet you a dollar?” Granadica replied.
“And that was all rote response,” Dana interjected.
“Figuring out what will get an emotional response out of an Argentinean is like figuring out if a flipped coin will land,” Granadica said, chuckling again.
“Granadica,” Dana said. “Please don’t start any bar fights.”
“Why?” the fabber replied. “You and the Chief are here. Don’t worry, kiddo, I’m being on my very best behavior. Whoops. Gotta go.”
“Is that really her best behavior?” Palencia asked.
“How should I know?” Dana replied. “This is the first time I’ve dealt with her except a short conversation when we were in the docking bay.”
“I keep having a hard time remembering that she is older than my nation,” Palencia said.
“It is a bit tough, isn’t it?” Dana said, handing her barely touched champagne glass to a waiter and accepting the proffered fruit juice. She wasn’t sure what kind of fruit but it was tasty.
“I’m being signaled by General Benito,” Palencia said.
“And I think people are spread out enough,” Dana said. “I’m going to go gang up with the Chief. Do not get me in trouble.”
“Won’t,” Palencia said.
“Why don’t I believe that?” Dana said, making her way through the crowd to the bar. “Oh, because it’s never been true before!”
* * *
“What were you discussing with the AI?” General Benito asked.
“Several items, sir,” Palencia said. “The most important of which was that the AI is using a pre-programmed rote response for its various conversations at this reception.”
“That is...” the General said, frowning.
“The AI pointed out that most such conversations are rote response, sir,” Palencia added. “Such as this one. I anticipated that would be your first question and had the response prepared. Extrapolate that for an AI and it’s obvious, sir. She also had a list of all the conversations and actions she was engaged in at the same time. The fabber...” he stamped his foot slightly. “You can feel it is still running. The AI talking to...” he looked around, “Seven different groups is also running the fabber. Rote response makes sense.”
“I suppose these things are pretty much rote response, aren’t they,” the General said, chuckling. “Very well, go get my son and Velasquez. We have some things to discuss that are not rote response.”
“Yes, sir,” Palencia said.
* * *
“You should probably stay with your people, EM,” Captain DiNote said as she approached the group from the 142nd.
“They’re not my people tonight, sir,” Dana said. “It’s Sud versus Norte tonight. And, with all due respect, sir, they’re not ‘my’ people even when we’re on the Therm. I’m responsible for them. That’s not the same as being a team.”
“Understood,” DiNote said. “Any idea what they’re talking about?”
“From experience, how they’re going to hang my ass, sir,” Dana said.
“Bitter much?” Barnett asked.
“Excuse me, Chief,” Dana said, slapping herself slightly. “Attitude adjusted.”
“The following was not said,” Captain DiNote said. “Because I became aware of some of the issues with a former subordinate whom I hold in high regard, I had a quiet chat with a friend in NavSpacPers. We were at the Academy together and we both worked NavSpac. Different offices. He’s in a position to have had... ‘too much’ as he put it to do with the issues with the 143 and to know the inside scuttlebutt having to do with the...issues with assigned American personnel.”
“You mean that a lowly EM has a string of ‘reply by endorsements’ that go across the Secretary of the Navy’s desk, sir?” Dana asked.
“Don’t be bitter,” DiNote said. “Seriously. I have to do some more back check but what Barry said was that at this point they’re mentally giving a set of points to the people with the most of them. As in promotion points. Because they’ve noticed that the people with a lot of complaints are the ones who are actually getting something done.”
“I got the same thing,” Barnett said. “Chief’s phone. There’s a lot of negative vibes being directed at the people who were in place before the new arrivals. Because they don’t seem to have done anything and the new arrivals did.”
“That’s because they were in the wrong positions,” Dana said. “Megadeath can’t be everywhere. I think he tried when he was first assigned but... He couldn’t. And like I said to the Chief, sir, the only way I get anything done is by being up the butts of four people. Tell me to do the same thing with a full flight and it’s not going to happen.
“I don’t know how to say this, sir, but... I don’t think that it’s really going to work. I mean in a great big ‘this Alliance isn’t going to work’ way. What people are seeing is the tip of the iceberg of how screwed up things are.”
“It is, however, the hand we’ve been dealt,” Captain DiNote said. “Can you keep playing it?”
“Right up until something bad happens, sir,” Dana said. “Things happen. You know that, sir. The first time they can actually hang something on me, or make it look as if it’s on me, all that ‘attaboy’ is out the window. It’s not getting the division to work that’s stressful. It’s wondering when I’m not quite good enough or somebody figures out a way to make me really look bad that’s got me worried. Don’t be confused by the smiles, these guys seriously want to drive a knife into my back in a very real and literal sense. And now I’m being rated. My rating officer is Diaz and to say that we don’t get along is an understatement.”
“And this is space,” Barnett said. “Accidents happen.”
“Which is why I spend a lot of time checking my suit,” Dana said. “And never use the same navopak twice or set up a pattern.”
“Anything?” DiNote asked.
“A...couple of times there were things that weren’t the same about my suit as when I’d checked it last, sir,” Dana said. “Doubt it would have killed me but it would have made me look sloppy. But I keep it pretty secure and as long as it’s in private areas, Leonidas has my back. But I can’t rack it in an open zone. And it doesn’t help that the Pathans absolutely flat hate my guts. I don’t go into the common areas at all. There are always Pathans around and if they get their hands on me... I’d rather have my suit sabotaged. Deciding to get my mad out by kicking their ass at jungleball is looking like a short term answer that created a long term problem.”
“Anybody but Leonidas have your back?” Captain DiNote asked.
“I think Velasquez and I have sort of bonded, but... No, sir.”
“Jesus Christ,” Thermal said, shaking his head. “Sir, we need to figure out an extract.”
“With due respect, EM, I’m handling the situation,” Dana said. “And I consider it to be good training as well as an important mission. But it’s good to get into breathable even if it’s sort of...” She looked around and giggled. “Thick.”
“Feeling like you’re in the Big Dark?” Mutant asked.
“Hey, I found my way back when my coxswain got hit by a micro-meteorite, right?” Dana said, grinning. The “Big Dark” was being far enough into space there were no good visual navigational references. It had confused Dana at first because in space, without the filtering effect of atmosphere, the sky was practically a wall of stars. Which you stopped noticing the first time you had to try to find your way without navigational aids.
Back when she was a lowly Engineer Recruit the Flight NCO had decided to test her knowledge of celestial navigation by an “accident” where a micro meteor had “killed” him and destroyed the navigational controls of their shuttle.
Finding the Troy again had been...good training.
“And then squirted blood all over the flight compartment which I had to clean up.”
“Do you feel like you’re in the Big Dark?” DiNote repeated.
“I’m not doing a Dutchman, sir,” Dana said. “Not to swell the Chief or Thermal’s heads any more than they already are, sir, but I’ve got this great big nav beacon called ‘What would the Chief or Thermal do in this situation?’ ”
“Heh,” Barnett said. “Wait until the day that you suddenly look up and realize that you’re that person.”
“I don’t understand, Chief,” Dana said.
“You will,” Thermal said, chuckling.
“When I finally got a pretty full grasp on the situation, I realized I could do two things,” Dana said. “I could coast and ignore the fact that the shuttles were broke, and thereby make my chain of command happy and not have to battle my engineers every day. Or I could crawl up their ass and get the shuttles fixed. Which took more than crawling up their ass. They are not natural engineers, even Palencia who has a degree in it. So it took training them, as well. More or less starting from ‘these are ERs, whatever their rate tabs say.’ Which is what I figured the Chief would do.”