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She gave one of those exasperating pauses then and I didn’t know if I was supposed to speak or if she were just catching her breath.

“Thank you for looking into it, Captain,” I said.

“I asked Ernest not to hire you. I wanted you to hear it that from me.”

“Thank you, Captain,” I said, but I had trouble getting my brain untangled from that.

She looked at me with an odd expression like she was not sure why I was thanking her. She waited for several heartbeats, but I could not imagine what she was waiting for.

“That’s all you have to say, Mr. Wang?” she asked. “Thank you, Captain?”

“Yes, Captain. I’m a bit confused, but thank you for telling me directly.” The roaring in my ears made it difficult to concentrate.

“You’re welcome, Mr. Wang,” she said with an amused little smile.

We sat there and she looked at me as if expecting me to do something. I began to panic a little. “Is there anything else, Captain?” I asked.

She laughed. “You’re not going to ask, are you?”

“If the captain wants me to know, I’m certain I’ll be informed.” The words sounded stiff.

“You have so much faith in me?” she asked, cocking her head to one side.

“Yes, Captain, of course.”

“Thank you, Mr. Wang,” she said after a few moments.

“You’re welcome, Captain.”

After another long pause she asked, “Tell me, Mr. Wang, have you ever considered the academy?”

I laughed. Her question was so unexpected and on top of everything else it just burst out. “I’m sorry, Captain, it’s just that I’ve been asked that a lot lately.”

She didn’t seem offended that I had laughed. She seemed amused. “Really? Who else has asked?”

“Mr. von Ickles brought up the subject during the last testing period, Captain. He’s been quite insistent that I think beyond the immediate difficulties of attendance.”

“Has he?” she asked. I could see her making the mental note and I hoped I had not gotten him into trouble.

“Yes, Captain. He really seems to think I should go.”

“What do you think, Mr. Wang?”

“Seriously, Captain?”

“Please, I would like to know what you think.”

“First I thought he was crazy—meaning no disrespect to him, of course,” I added.

“None taken,” she said with a little laugh. “Please continue.”

“I don’t know what I expected but I didn’t realize the academy is a college.”

“Yes, and a good one.”

“I was expecting something more like boot camp,” I said. “College is…well college. I’ve grown up with the university as my neighbor, so I’m pretty familiar with how they work.”

“Well, there’s a certain boot camp aspect as well, so if you’re disappointed about that I can assure you from personal experience that you’re wrong.”

I had to laugh again at that. “No, Captain, I’m not disappointed but colleges are expensive. This one is not any more expensive than most, but I had a hard time thinking I could justify spending that kind of creds on a college.”

“Had a hard time? Have you changed your mind?”

“Well, not exactly, Captain. I just realized I wasn’t looking at it from a long term perspective. One thing I know is that having an education, and the credentials that back it up, is pretty important. I’m young and stupid, but my mother-the-professor taught me that lesson.”

“So where does that bring you to?”

“Well, money aside, I’ve had the most fun of my life since you coming aboard at Neris. I’ve learned a lot and made friends like I’ve never had—ever. The
Lois
has become like a family to me.” I knew I had crossed the line at some point, but she did not frown, so I plowed on. “These last few days, starting with the news that I was being bumped, and through that whole mess with the EMP and the scrubbers and all, I really began to think I belong out here in the Deep Dark.”

“But you have some reservations?” she asked.

“Yes, Captain. I’ve been aboard less than a stanyer. Will I still feel this way at the end of my contract? Will I want to renew? I don’t know,” I said with a small shrug. “Sitting here today, I can’t imagine that I wouldn’t want to continue, but what if I’m wrong and it’s just the novelty of it that I’m enjoying.”

“That’s a fair question. How does that apply to the academy?’

“The academy is a huge commitment in both time and money. I’m never going to be a hundred percent certain, but right at the moment, I really don’t know, and I don’t have sixty thousand credits to gamble on it.”

She smiled. “Let me just see if I understand this. You’re not worried about whether or not you can be successful at the academy, you’re just worried that you’ll get through it and decide you won’t like being an officer?”

“Well, nothing against officers, Captain, but I’m more concerned that I’ll get tired of being out here and I’ll have spent the time and money to get qualified for a job I might not like in the long run.”

She sat back in her chair and looked at me hard. “I think I see, Mr. Wang. So, how will you address this uncertainty? How certain will you need to be?”

“Well, Captain, I have a contract that expires in something over a stanyer. If I’m still having as much fun then as I am now, then I’ll feel a lot better about trying to scrape up the necessary creds to attend.”

“I think you would qualify for financial aid, Mr. Wang,” she said with a grin. “If you have any further thoughts on the academy, would you share them with me?”

“Of course, Captain, but I hardly think I’m going to come to any world-shaking decisions in the next couple of days,” I said with probably more bitterness than I intended.

She smiled at me and said, “Thank you, Mr. Wang. Dismissed.”

I stood to leave and she said quietly, “Have faith for just a couple more days, Ishmael.”

“Of course, Captain. I know I’m in no immediate danger.”

She threw back her head and laughed loudly as I closed the door behind me.

She was definitely up to something. I was not sure what, but I did trust her. I just hoped she could pull off whatever it was. We had to be close now or she wouldn’t have posted the pull out schedule. That reminded me of another problem and I headed down to environmental to check on Diane.

When I got there, she had her head in the back of number four scrubber. I tried to shuffle my feet and make noise so I wouldn’t startle her but it wasn’t enough.

“Having problems?” I asked.

She jumped and banged her head. “Sludge monkey!” she said with her head still in the scrubber.

“I’m sorry! I tried to make enough noise that you’d hear me.”

She pulled her head of the scrubber and rubbed the front where she’d bumped it. “Are you, lost little boy?” she asked with a wicked grin.

“Yeah, I think so.” I grinned back. “You going to take me to your house and feed me candy?”

“Honey,” she said with a wink, “if I ever get the chance to take you to my house, it ain’t gonna be to feed ya candy!” She laughed. “What’s up?” she asked more seriously, reaching back into the scrubber.

“
Audrey Moore
docked this morning. They have an EV3 slot open.”

“Another one?”

“Same one. Gregor got arrested for fighting in Dunsany.”

“Figures. You gonna apply?” Her voice echoed from inside the scrubber case.

“I’m trying to give the captain a chance to keep me aboard.”

“Time’s running out, Ish,” she said, backing out of the scrubber. “Bastard,” she spit.

“Who? Me?”

“No, CC. Look at this.” She held up the swab she had used on the field collection plate.

“Ick, looks like it needs cleaning.”

“Colby claims he took care of it.”

“What?”

“This was scheduled for his watch last night. He said it was done, but this is what I found on the collector plate.”

“Back up. Last I heard he wasn’t doing the maintenance at all.”

“Yes, but I wouldn’t let him get away with that and told Brill. She had a little talk with him and the upshot is that he hasn’t passed off any maintenance for me to do, but he said he performed scheduled maintenance on the field collection plate on the number four scrubber and when I checked this is what I found.”

“Maybe he got the numbers wrong?”

“I hadn’t thought of that,” she said, and bolted off to look.

I followed along behind and peered in as we checked them out, one-by-one. None of them looked like they’d been cleaned as recently as the previous watch, even if it was late in the day.

“Bastard,” Diane repeated. “Now what?”

“You find Brill and tell her. I need to see a man about a bag of sneaky, I think.”

“A what?”

“Nothing,” I said. “I need a little more information and I think I know who to ask.” I pulled out my tablet and bipped Mr. von Ickles.

The reply came almost instantly. “Ship’s office.”

David ben Dour had the messenger duty and was sitting in the office with Mr. von Ickles when I got there. “Excuse me, sar, but could I have a little talk with you about a personal matter?”

David was a good guy and took the cue. “I’ll just go grab some coffee. Maybe see how Rhon’s doing.”

When he’d gone, Mr. von Ickles asked, “What is it, Mr. Wang? How can I help?”

“Well, sar, it’s the new guy. He’s causing some problems down in environmental and I need some advice. Maybe I need somebody with some specialized training in sneakiness to help me.”

He grinned at that and said, “Pull up a chair.”

I gave him the two tick recap of the situation that I’d observed in environmental and concluded with, “and I don’t think this is the first time he’s had a problem.”

“You’re not just trying to discredit him so we dump him, are you?”

“No, sar. Lois wants him aboard.”

He blinked at me. “Lois wants him aboard,” he repeated.

“Yes, sar. We have to keep him from killing anybody or getting killed himself.”

He paused and looked hard at me for about half a tick. “Finish your story,” he said at last.

I told him what CC had told me about his last ship and how he had been injured and left behind.

Mr. von Ickles eyes narrowed about half way through and I could see he was tracking the same rabbit I was. When I got done, he sat for two heart beats and said, “You don’t think he slipped.”

I shook my head. “No, sar, I don’t. Head trauma, concussion, he probably doesn’t remember much. If they were careful, he might not have seen it coming. So when he came to and found he was lying in a pool of water from the drippy scrubber with a head ache, he might have just assumed he slipped.” I shrugged. “Solicitous shipmates take you to the hospital and leave you there.”

He chewed on that mentally for a bit before focusing back on me. “So? Why isn’t this Brill’s discipline problem? And what kind of sneaky were you thinking about?”

“How desperate would they have had to been to clock him in the head with a spanner?”

“Assuming it was a spanner, but I take your meaning. You’re thinking that they’d tried all the normal kinds of things and he was still putting them at risk to the point where they were willing to physically harm him?”

“Before he killed them, yes, sar.”

“Why not just fire him?”

“I don’t know, sar. That’s one of two things we need to find out.”

“What’s the other?”

“Whether or not we’re right about it being the crew.”

He looked startled at that, but nodded. “Okay, but why bring this to me. Why not Mr. Kelley?”

“We will need to eventually, and the captain, too, but I need help getting the ducks lined up here, so that I’m not accused of trying to discredit him so I can keep my job.”

“Ah, that’s the kind of sneaky you need.”

“I think so, sar. Have I missed anything?”

“I don’t think so, Mr. Wang. Why do you ask?”

“Well, with our lives on the line, I think I’d like to have a second set of eyes,” I told him with a grin.

“Why, Mr. Wang,” he said with mock surprise, “you were listening.”

We settled down to strategies and tactics then. I was gratified to notice the pile of unopened computer parts till tucked away in the office, but I focused on the task at hand. In less than half a stan, we had ironed out the list of questions we needed answered and I left him to start tracking them down.

As I was leaving the office, he said, “You know the
Audrey
has a berth?”

“Yes, sar, but I don’t believe I’ll be applying for it any time soon.”

“No? Why not?”

“I never developed a taste for bunk-bunny.”

He was chuckling into his tablet when I closed the door.

The afternoon was gone by that time and I had duty in the morning, but the ship was leaving the day after so I had to hurry. I headed back to environmental to see if Brill and Diane wanted to go out to eat. It would be one of our last opportunities on Betrus. I was pretty sure I would be leaving with them, but I was not above playing the pity card to get two good-looking women to dine with me. I would have asked Beverly too, but I hadn’t seen her in days and when I checked she wasn’t aboard.

When I got to environmental, Brill and Diane were still discussing CC. Brill was saying, “But if he says he did it and he didn’t that’s falsifying logs.”

“True, but what are we going to do about it?” Diane asked.

“Document, document, document,” Brill replied. “And in the mean time, we need to figure out what’s his story.”

“Well, I heard one version from him,” I told them. “I’m trying to confirm it.”

“The slipped on the leaky scrubber tale?” Brill asked.

“Yeah, that’s the one.”

“You don’t think it’s true?”

“I think he may well think it’s true, but I’m not sure he knows.”

“How could he not know?” Diane asked.

“If somebody hits you from behind with a big wrench, and you wake up having people telling you that you slipped and fell, what would you think?”

“What?” Brill asked.

I shrugged. “It’s possible that they were at the end of their collective ropes with him. Either afraid that he was putting the ship in danger or just tired of cleaning up his messes.”

They both gaped at me. “Do you think somebody would try to hurt him?” Brill asked.

“Would you, if you thought he was putting the ship in danger?” I asked.