Midshipman's Hope (The Seafort Saga Book 1)

by David Feintuch

He shrugged, looking at me as if to ask, “What’s the use?”

  “Mrs. Donhauser,” I offered, “I think you make a mistake trying to contrast the Captain’s powers with United Nations authority. The Captain isn’t opposed to central authority. He IS that authority. Legally he can marry people, divorce them, even try and execute them. He has absolute and undiluted control of the vessel.” That last was a quote from an official commentary on the regs; I threw it in because it sounded good. “There was a ship. Cleopatra. Have you heard of it?”

  “No. Should I?”

  “It was about fifty years ago. The Captain, I don’t remember his name—”

  “Jennings,” put in Ibn Saud, his head bobbing in anticipation of my point.

  “Captain Jennings acted quite strangely. The officers conferred with the Doctor and relieved him of command on grounds of mental illness. They confined him to quarters and sailed the ship directly to Earthport Station.” I paused for effect.

  “So?”

  “They were hanged, every one of them. A court-martial found them mistaken in believing the Captain unfit for command. Even though they acted in good faith, they were all hanged.” A silence grew. “You see, the government is absolutely determined to maintain authority, even in space,” I said. “The Captain is the representative of the government, as well as the Church, and he must not be overturned.”

  “It’s a bizarre case!”

  “It could happen today, Mrs. Donhauser.”

  “And besides, that must have been a Naval vessel,” she said. “Not a passenger ship.”

  That was too much for me. You’d think people would know what they were getting themselves into. “Ma’am, you may be confused because Hibernia has a Naval crew, carries a full complement of civilian passengers, and has a hold full of private cargo. What counts is that the Captain and every member of the crew are Naval officers and seamen. Hibernia is a commissioned Naval vessel. By law the Navy carries all cargo bound for the colonies, but legally that cargo is no more than ballast. And the passengers, technically, are just extra cargo. You have no rights aboard this ship and no say whatsoever in what happens on board.” I spoke courteously, of course. A midshipman overheard insulting a passenger was not likely to do so again.

  “Oh, really?” She was unfazed. I decided she would make a formidable missionary. “Well, it just so happens we vote on our menus, we have committees to run social functions, we elect the Passengers’ Council, we even voted on whether to stop at the Celestina wreck next week. So where’s your dictatorship now?”

  “Window dressing,” I said. “Look. You have to be a VIP to afford an interstellar voyage, right? The Navy doesn’t go out of its way to alienate important people. All of us, officers and crew, are required to be polite to passengers and to assent to your wishes wherever possible. Because you’re valuable you get the best accommodations, the best food, our best service. But that changes nothing. The Captain can override any of your votes anytime he has a mind to.” I wondered if I’d gone too far.

  The feisty old battle-ax put me at ease. “You argue well, young man. I’ll think it over. Next time I see you I’ll tell you why you’re wrong.”

  I grinned. “I look forward to the lesson, ma’am.”

  I stretched, excused myself, and went back to Level 1 and the wardroom. Whatever arguments Mrs. Donhauser marshaled wouldn’t change a thing. The U.N. knew our world had had enough of anarchy. Central control was not imposed by the government on an unwilling populace. Rather, it was appreciated and respected by the vast mass of citizens. Brush-fire wars and chaotic revolutions had finally ceased; our resulting prosperity had powered our explosion into space and the colonization of planets such as Hope Nation and Detour. The Navy, the senior U.N. military service, was the U.N.’s bulwark against the forces of diffusion inherent in a colonial system.

  I stripped off my uniform and crawled into my bunk, trying not to wake Alexi. Lieutenant Cousins had set him over the barrel yesterday. Now Alexi had to eat standing, and he wasn’t sleeping well. One learned to live with canings, but I knew Alexi too well to believe he’d been insolent and insubordinate as the lieutenant had alleged. Cousins was having a bad day, or was looking for an excuse to assert his authority.

  According to regs any middy could be caned, but tradition held there was a dividing line. Alexi, at sixteen, should have been over the line except for a grievous offense. By statute Lieutenant Cousins was within his rights, but not by custom. Alexi was miserable but hadn’t complained, which was right and proper.

  I slept.

  4

  TWO WEEKS LATER THEY gave me another docking drill. It took me forever to plot our course. I labored an hour just to calculate our position, until even the Captain was fidgeting with annoyance. By the time I came off the bridge I was wringing wet, but I hadn’t wrecked the ship, though I’d bumped the airlocks together fairly hard.

  I went looking for Amanda to tell her of my accomplishment. I found her in the passengers’ lounge watching a holovid epic. She turned it off and listened instead to my excited replay of my maneuvers.

  Though I no longer sat at her table in the dining hall, Amanda and were becoming good friends. We took long walks together around the circumference corridor. We read together in her cabin. She told me about her father’s textile concern, and I told her stories of Academy days. Our only physical contact was to hold hands. I could have slept with her; it wasn’t against regs, and I lined up with the other middies for my sterility shot from Doc Uburu every month. But she didn’t invite me and I couldn’t push, not with a passenger.

  A few days after my success on the bridge I relaxed on my bunk, watching Sandy tease Ricky Fuentes, our ship’s boy.

  “C’n I try it? Please, sir? Please?” The ship’s boy reached for the orchestron Sandy held over his head, grinning. We all liked Ricky, a happy twelve-year-old. Even Vax was congenial to him. The youngster’s trusting good nature encouraged it.

  The ship’s boy roamed crew quarters, officers’ country, and passenger lounges with impunity. It was all part of his job as ship’s gofer. Ricky took messages, retrieved gear that crewmen or officers forgot, generally made himself useful. Every capital ship had a ship’s boy, usually an orphan of a career sailor. Traditionally, he graduated to seaman first class and usually made petty officer before he was twenty.

  Sandy gave him his orchestron. The boy selected harpsichord, French horn, and tuba, set down a bongo beat, and tapped out a simple melody on the tiny keyboard. He set it to repeat. Then he set up a counterpoint, using different instruments.

  Ricky listened to the orchestron develop the theme he had created. “Zarky! Real zarky!” I think that meant he liked it. I was only five years older than he, but joespeak changes fast. The machine burbled to a stop. “Thanks, Sandy, I gotta run. I’m helping in the kitchen tonight. I mean the galley. Bye, sir!” He ran off.

  At Ricky’s age, I was chopping wood for Father. I wasn’t outgoing and sociable, as he was. I never would be. At home Father and I didn’t talk often, and we certainly didn’t laugh.

  Sandy left, and I dozed.

  Sometime later Vax came and slapped the light on, waking me from a pleasant dream.

  I muttered, “Turn it off, will you?”

  He ignored me, undressing slowly.

  “Vax, turn off the bloody light!”

  “Sure, Nicky.” He slapped it off, managing to express contempt with the gesture.

  Perhaps it was the heavy dinner, or the lack of exercise. Drugged and lethargic, I fell instantly back to sleep.

  Sometime later I was aware of a complaining voice. “It’s cold. Turn the heat up, Wilsky.” I heard the rustle of sheets as Sandy dragged himself out of bed to dial up the heat.

  A few minutes later Vax started again. “Sandy, it’s too hot. Turn it down.” Once again the boy got up and turned off the heat. This time it took me longer to get back to my dream.

  “Turn the heat up, Wilsky!”

  I snapped awake, inwardly
raging. Alexi groaned. Sandy, who must have been asleep, did not answer.

  “Wilsky, you damned asshole, get up and give us some heat!” Now Vax was adding blasphemy to his boorishness. I heard the rustle of sheets as Sandy climbed out of his bunk and adjusted the temperature.

  I lay awake, debating. I wouldn’t protect Sandy from all Vax’s hazing, but there came a point when Sandy had enough. More would cause him emotional problems. For that matter, more would cause ME emotional problems. Where should I draw the line? And how could I do it without getting my head knocked off by the muscular gorilla in the next bunk, and permanently losing control of the wardroom?

  “Now turn it down.”

  “It’s fine in here,” I heard myself say.

  “It’s hot. That jerkoff doesn’t know how to adjust it properly.”

  “Get up and do it yourself, Vax.”

  He ignored me. “Wilsky, put your pretty little ass on the deck and fix the heat!”

  I’d had enough. “Stay put, Sandy. That’s an order.”

  “Aye aye, Mr. Seafort.” His tone was grateful.

  “What in hell are you pulling, Nicky?”

  I tried to sound authoritative. “Enough, Vax.”

  “The hell you say!” So much for my sounding authoritative.

  “Vax, turn the light on.” I waited, but he did nothing, forcing the issue. From the silent breathing I knew we were all awake. “Alexi, get up. Turn on the light.”

  “Aye aye, Mr. Seafort.” Alexi slapped the light switch, his eyes bleary, hair tousled. Quickly he sank back into bed, out of harm’s way. Vax sat up, glaring.

  I lay back in my bunk, arm behind my head. “Vax, please give me twenty push-ups.” I was in big trouble.

  “Prong yourself, Nicky.”

  I heard Alexi’s sharp intake of breath.

  “Vax, twenty push-ups. That’s an order.”

  “Don’t be more of an ass than you can help.” Vax’s challenge was now in the open. Give me orders? Enforce them—if you can. He had the right, according to custom. But a first middy wasn’t entirely without resources.

  “This is a direct order, Vax. Twenty push-ups, on the deck.”

  “No. You’re not man enough to give orders. Not inside the wardroom.” A wise distinction. His challenge was to my authority in the wardroom, not to ship’s authority in general.

  “Mr. Holser, put yourself on report at once.” That meant, go knock on the first lieutenant’s hatch and tell him I had written you up for insubordination. It would most likely cause him to be put over the barrel, even at his age.

  “You’ve got to be kidding. You know what that’ll do to you.”

  I knew. “Mr. Holser, go to the duty officer, forthwith, and place yourself on report.”

  “I will not.” Vax was taking a chance, but not a big one. He knew as well as I that a middy who called on an officer for help to run his wardroom was finished in the service.

  “Alexi.”

  “Yes, Mr. Seafort?”

  “Put your pants on, go to the duty officer, and tell him the senior midshipman reports a mutiny in the wardroom. Mr. Holser is written up but refuses to obey a direct order to place himself on report. I request a court-martial to determine the validity of my allegations.”

  “Aye aye, sir.” Alexi threw aside the covers and reached for his trousers.

  “Belay that, Alexi. You can’t do it, Nick.” Vax’s tone was urgent. “It’ll ruin you too. You’ll never get command if you can’t even hold a wardroom. You won’t even get another posting!”

  “That’s no longer your concern, Mr. Holser.” I remained icily formal; it was my only chance. “Mr. Wilsky.”

  “Yes, sir?”

  “Dress yourself. Go to crew quarters. Wake the master-at-arms. Have him bring an escort to the wardroom, flank. As for you, Vax, you are under arrest.”

  “Aye aye, sir.” Sandy was so nervous his voice soared into the upper registers. Frantically, he began throwing on his clothes.

  Alexi, dressed, headed for the hatch. Vax grabbed his arm in a huge hand. “Nick, call it off. This is a wardroom matter. Settle it here, among us!”

  I had him.

  “It’s too late, Vax. You ignored my order. Let go of Alexi.” I lay motionless, under my covers.

  “Hold off, Nick. Talk it through.” He hesitated. “Please.” Vax knew that I’d throw away my career if the two junior middies went on their errands. He also knew that he himself now faced court-martial and almost certain imprisonment in the brig, if not summary dismissal from the Navy.

  I made my tone reluctant. “Alexi, Sandy, sit down.” I turned to Vax. “I’ll turn the clock back, Mr. Holser. Twenty push-ups.”

  He stared, trying to read me. I looked away. I didn’t care what he thought he saw in my face. Apparently my indifference convinced him; he got down on the deck. “We’ll settle this later, Nick.” It was a growl.

  “Yes, we will.” I spoke with confidence I didn’t feel.

  He gave me twenty push-ups. Good ones, like the Academy taught in basic. At the end he got up on one knee.

  “Now twenty more.” This time I stared him straight in the eye.

  Having given in the first time he had little choice. Rigid with fury, he did twenty more push-ups.

  “Thank you.” I looked at the two junior middies. “Back to bed, you two.”

  Neither dared say a word. Vax was still a potent force in their lives. He stood up and yanked on his clothes. “It’s a good time for a walk, Nicky,” he spat. “Care to join me?”

  At that moment I regretted not letting him order Sandy in and out of bed all night, if he wished. Vax was twenty kilos heavier, a head taller, and a lot stronger than I was. And two years older, as well. I was about to get the tar beaten out of me, and I had no choice but to go through with it. I got out of bed and put on my pants, socks, and shoes. I didn’t put anything over my undershirt; no point in ruining a dress shirt or jacket.

  We strode in silence to the passenger exercise room on Level 2. At that hour, past midnight, it was deserted. He went in first.

  I knew the best thing was to circle while he stalked me, and try to avoid his lunges. He knew I knew that. So the moment I was through the hatchway I hurled myself straight at him, fists flailing at his face. I got in a few good licks before he got his cover up and held me off. I backed away.

  He came at me, livid with anger. I backed away again. He drove at me faster, and again I went right at him, hammering. He caught me a good one on the side of the head that made me dizzy, but momentum carried me past his guard and I was all over him, pounding at his stomach, chest, jaw. Then I unexpectedly dropped down and rolled away.

  He was disconcerted, as I wanted him to be. My only chance was to do what he least expected. He came at me warily this time, guard up. I went into karate position. He did the same. We both feinted. I fended him off, but he steadily advanced, pushing me toward the corner. I had no choice but to retreat.

  The next few minutes were bad. He got in a lot of blows, knocking me down, slapping my head back and forth, slamming me into the partition, raining punches on my chest and arms. I wasn’t strong enough to hold him off so I concentrated on convincing him he was hurting me more than he really was. It wasn’t easy, because he hurt me plenty.

  I staggered, apparently semiconscious, blood flowing freely from my nose and mouth. My legs buckled. He grabbed under my arms with both hands, holding me as I sagged. It was what I’d waited for. I drove my fist into his crotch with all the strength I could muster.

  Vax bent over in reflex, let go to clutch himself. I backed away, wiping blood off my face. Damn, he could hit. Vax leaned against the bulkhead, his eyes half shut, face white.

  My arms ached from the pounding they had taken. I didn’t have strength left to hit hard. So, clasping my hands together, I bent and, like a battering ram, ran straight at him. My shoulder smashed into his side. He went down. So did I. He was a rock.

  Vax scrambled to his feet, a murderous
look in his eye, fists clenched. I got up, put my head down, and rammed him again. This time he bounced off a bulkhead. My shoulder was numb. We both staggered to our feet. His nose bled from his impact with the bulkhead. I lunged again. He had both hands out, and fended me off. I put my shoulder down and dug in, straining to ram him.

  “Wait!” His breath came hard.

  I backed off. “Prong yourself, joey.” I lowered my head and charged. He tried to knee my face, but was too slow. I butted him in the stomach and he toppled over. I wondered if I had broken my neck. After a moment I managed to get up. So did he.

  “Enough!” Vax covered his stomach with both hands.

  I leaned against the partition, trying not to black out.

  “Truce.” He held up his hand as if pushing me off. I waited, trying to catch my breath enough to answer. “I can’t take you, Nick. And you can’t take me. Truce.”

  “No.” I drove at him again. I didn’t have much left but he was too busy clutching his aching ribs to fight back. He slid down to the slippery deck, then pulled himself back up.

  “For God’s sake, Nicky, enough! Neither of us wins.”

  I nodded. “Lay off Sandy,” I gasped. “You’re hazing too hard.”

  “Hazing’s part of it.”

  “Not that much. Haze him some, but lay off when I say.”

  He nodded reluctantly. “All right. Deal.”

  “I’ll leave you alone,” I said. “And you don’t look for trouble with me.”

  “Deal.” He swallowed. Cautiously, he tried letting go of his stomach.

  “And you don’t call me Nick in the wardroom.” If I didn’t get it this time, I’d never have another chance.

  “No.” He looked stubborn. “Not that.”

  I launched myself at him. He put out both arms to block me but my charge knocked him into the bulkhead. Instead of backing off I rammed him with my shoulder again and again, thumping his ribs and back. I wasn’t doing much damage but he was too exhausted to deck me.

  My vision went red. I heard grunting, his or mine, as I felt myself slip into total exhaustion. Then I became aware that he held both my arms in his big hands, holding me at arm’s length away from his body. I was braced against the deck, straining to get at him.