Metal Boxes (5 page)

Stone spoke to the
lieutenant, again precisely as regulations dictated. “Good morning, sir.” The smile Stone wore was also regulation issue.

The man almost walked past as if completely ignoring Stone
. Then he stopped and spun back around. “Midshipman Stone?” he asked.

Stone froze in mid-step, the ele
vator doors closing in his face. He quickly choked down his apprehension at being called by name and his disappointment at barely missing the escape for ice cream. He smartly snapped to attention, performed an about face and spoke in a clear, firm but pleasant voice trying to do everything as regulations dictated. Or rather, that was his intention. He barely stopped his eyes from rolling and he stumbled over his own feet as he turned around.

His voice took the opportunity to break as he stammered. “Yes,
sir, I am Midshipman Blackmon Stone, third watch warehouse three-whiskey.”

“Third
watch, huh?” The lieutenant grinned. “You must feel like it is the middle of the night.”

“Yes
sir. It does seem that way,” Stone nodded. Stone glanced at the man’s nametag. “Oh, Lieutenant Aldamani, I have been meaning to call. I did meet your parents on Lazzaroni Station, sir.”

“Yes,
you are that Mister Stone,” the lieutenant smiled. “That must be why your name sounded familiar to me. They did mention you had done them a favor. It seems you single-handedly backed off a gaggle of marine officers?”

“Not really backed them off,
sir.” Stone smiled back at the man. “I just gave them an amusing moment and they decided not to pound me to a puddle. Sir, I am sorry for not dropping by sooner, but-.”

Aldamani waived a dismissive hand. “Pish! I’ve been busy myself. Think nothing of it. Even in the best of positions this ship takes some getting used to. And if I had
to work third watch again, I would be grumpy as an old bear.”

“
Yes sir, a ship this size does take some getting used to. But, the position is fine and the hours aren’t as bad as they sound.”

“Ah, youth! Mister Stone
, I am glad you are taking it well. I hear you have Second Lieutenant Vaarhoo as your supervisor. I know he can come across as a bit of a hard nose, but I hear good things about you from him. You’re doing a good job; keep at it.”

The
lieutenant’s beast was held loosely by a cord tied around the neck. It stretched the length of the cord and sniffed at Stone’s crotch. It pulled at the cord and jumped up at Stone. The lieutenant held the creature back not more than a hair’s breadth from Stone.

The woman with the
lieutenant stifled a laugh, covering her mouth. She leaned down and patted the creature sitting at her feet. The woman’s creature was sitting as if nothing was going on, but Aldamani’s creature kept straining to get at Stone.

Stone wanted to back up
, but he had already backed against the bulkhead. He was not sure he could even win a fight with this creature. It seemed to be all teeth, claws and hair.

“I can see the
Admiral likes you,” Aldamani grinned.

Stone looked confused. “Sir? I didn’t even know the
admiral knew I was on board.”

The woman laughed. She did
not even try to cover her amusement.

“Not that
admiral, Mister Stone. This one,” Aldamani said with a grin. He pointed at the creature still straining to get at Stone. “He seems to like you.”

“Sir, I don’t know how he could
,” Stone said, shaking his head. “He still looks like he is trying to get his first bite to taste.”

Aldamani
’s grin widened. “Well, he has been known to bite. All dogs do, no matter what their owners say.” He glanced at the woman. “Isn’t that right, Sheila?”

“I don’t know whatever you mean,
Lieutenant. Dorothy hasn’t ever bitten any one.” Sheila patted the creature at her feet.

Aldamani amended, “Yet.” He yanked the creature’s cord gently
and called to the creature. “Admiral.” The creature immediately stopped pawing in Stone’s direction, sat on it’s hind quarters, raised up it’s front legs and waved one paw in the direction of it’s fangs in a bizarre attempt at a salute. It dropped back to all fours and looked up at the lieutenant. “Good boy. Midshipman Stone, may I introduce you to Admiral Fatbelly Stinkybottom?”

At the word
admiral, the creature again rose up and presented his imitation salute.

Stone did
not know what else to do, so he returned the salute with his best parade ground manners. “Good to meet you, sir.” He looked at the lieutenant, “Sir, may I ask a question?”

“Of course,
Midshipman, that is the only way we learn.”

“What is it?” He pointed at
Admiral Fatbelly Stinkybottom.

“First, Mister Stone, ‘it’ is a ‘he’
,” the lieutenant had not lost his grin. “Old Fatty here is a beagle. That is one of the last pure Earth breed dogs known.”

“Thank you
, sir. So, it is some kind of dog. That is good to know,” Stone replied with a nod.

“Of course it is a dog, Mister Stone
,” Sheila snorted. “What did you think he was, a Sarcasian Canruth? How do they let some of these people into midshipman’s school?”

Aldamani waved her down, “Enough,
Ensign. Different folks have different upbringings from different cultures on different planets.”

“No offense, Mister Stone. I just haven’t ever heard of a planet that didn’t have dogs of some sort
,” Sheila said.

“So, Mister Stone, how about it? Didn’t they have dogs on the planet you c
ome from?” Aldamani asked.

“Sirs
,” Stone replied to both officers. “I didn’t grow up on a planet. I grew up on a ship and Grandpa said pets were just a waste of air, space and time. Grandma said pets always require cleaning up after. So, we didn’t have pets of any kind.”

“But there are
dogs all over this ship and on every station I have ever been on,” Sheila replied. “Surely there are dog owners near your quarters, Mister Stone.”

Aldamani nodded, “Yes, but Sheila, you must have forgotten that it is kind of an unwritten rule that
midshipmen try to limit themselves to smaller pets that demand less attention than dogs. Isn’t that right, Stone?”

Stone limited himself to a quick “Yes
sir.” He didn’t want to mention his only attempt at a pet since coming on board the ship. He had splurged as a present for himself on his sixteenth birthday. He had gotten a small fish at a station pet shop, but it had gone belly-up before the required permits from the Periodontitis were approved.

“Remember Sheila: fish, birds, tribbles, small rodents and the like?
” Aldamani asked the ensign. “If you think about it, Fatty and Dorothy have to be taken to the dog park in tower one or the small park up on deck forty-seven, at least twice a day to run around and do their business. Plus, we have to feed them a couple of times a day, give them baths, brush their coats and what not. That certainly would take away from a midshipman’s study time.”

“That’s right
, sir,” Sheila agreed. “I guess I have had Dorothy so long I forgot, plus she is such a sweetie the extra time just flies by. Still, Mister Stone, surely you have seen dogs before.”

“Yes,
Ensign,” Stone nodded. “But I guess all I have seen are the small fuzzy things in pet shops and the huge guard dogs around shipyards. I didn’t know they had an in between stage like this. When do they grow to be big and mean?”

Aldamani laughed outright. “Mister Stone. You are a hoot. We are really going to have to get together sometime. These two beagles are as big as they are going to get. Look up dogs in you
r personal assistant database, okay? Not a command study subject, but someday you might get promoted beyond midshipman and you are going to want to get a good pet. Dogs are good pets. They come in lots of sizes, shapes and colors.”

“Yes
sir. I will certainly look them up,” Stone replied. Silently he agreed with Grandpa. Even if he was authorized to have a pet, that did not mean he had to get one. From the sound of it, they were certainly time consuming and expensive.

Aldamani nodded. “Mister Stone, y
ou just let me know if there is anything I can do for you. We are late for a meeting, so you had best scoot off to wherever you were headed.”

Stone watch
ed the officers walk away and pressed the down button again. He was puzzled over his first encounter with a reasonably pleasant, superior officer. Not to mention now he had to find out what the heck an ‘old bear’ was and why they are grumpy!

He was still puzzling over his first encounter with a reasonably
, pleasant superior officer when, just a few steps from the officer’s wardroom, he walked into a bulkhead. He was mildly shocked to realize that it was not a bulkhead, just an unusually large and unmoving human being.

CHAPTER FIVE

“Damn
,” Stone stammered and glanced up into the face of First Lieutenant Vedrian. “Oh, sorry, Lieutenant.”

The woman laughed. “Sorry for what? Saying ‘damn’? Mister Stone, I hear worse than that during prayer time before breakfast. You are surely not sorry about bumping into me, because I didn’t even know you had done that until you spoke. A little bit of a man like you don’t hardly register on my bump-o-meter.”

“Man?” Stone asked in surprise. “Thank you, Lieutenant. I think that is the first time anyone has called me that, even if it was prefaced with ‘a little bit’.”

“
Man is what I said and I said what I meant, Mister Stone,” Vedrian said with a twinkle in her eyes. “You don’t live with Momma no more, do you?”

“No,
sir.”

“You are making your own way in the universe, aren’t you?”

“Yes, sir. Well…me and the entire Emperor’s navy, anyway.”

“Close enough. You earned legal adult status when you joined the
navy, so it is up to you to succeed or fail. You pee standing up, don’t you?”

“Most of the time,
sir.”

“You got me there
,” Vedrian laughed. “Besides, I done it that way myself a few times, so I guess that isn’t much of a standard for being a man. But then, I have been accused of not having very high standards anyway. So, in my book, you are a man, a bit young for an old grunt like me, but a man none-the-less and as such, you don’t have to apologize for accidently bumping into me…unless you did it on purpose to get my attention?”

“No,
sir. I mean yes, sir. I guess I mean that I apologize for the interruption.”

Vedrian laughed again.

Stone found the hearty laugh quite appealing for some reason. It certainly wasn’t a girlish giggle or any sort of dainty twitter. It was a laugh of open amusement.

Vedrian said, “You can’t interrupt me, Mister Stone,
‘cuz I wasn’t doing nothin’. I was just headin’ into this officer’s mess to stoke the internal fires after a couple of hours locked in a small room with a gaggle of office weenies. Hey! Why don’t you join me for lunch? I am supposed to meet some friends here, but we can always make room for the man that made Hellboy back down on Lazzaroni Station.”

She laughed again. “I owe you anyway. That story has gotten me more than my fair share of free drinks at the bar.”

Stone bowed at the waist as he mother had taught him. “Sir, if it would not seem too forward, I am sure the lieutenant’s beauty and grace won her far more drinks than a story about me ever would. However, as honored as I would be to join you for lunch, I am on third watch, so this is like the middle of the night for me. I was just going to drop in for a snack before going back to bed.”

“What? Sorry, I quit listening
,” Vedrian said with a wide grin. “You lost me after ‘grace and beauty’. As a ranking officer, I am going to make it an order, Mister Stone. You will join me, even if you only sit and watch while I fuel up.”

“
Lieutenant Vedrian, I had ice cream in mind and I couldn’t think of a more pleasant way to miss a few hours sleep than to eat ice cream with a pretty woman…marine or not.”

“
‘Pretty!’ Well, crap. Just a few seconds ago I was ‘beauty and grace’. Now I just get ‘pretty’?”

Stone stammered a bit, not knowing how to respond. Dad and Grandpa had tried to tutor him in how to speak to women, but it did
not appear they had expected him to run into someone like Vedrian.

“Just kiddin
’, Mister Stone,” she winked slyly. “I’ll take it either way and not even consider how full of it you really are. You do run a smooth line, even if you are easy to knock off track. One thing before we go in here. You gotta start callin’ me Allie.”

“I would be honored, Allie. I would respond in kind, except my first name is Blackmon, so I kind of prefer Stone most of the time. If it is okay with you
, we could just drop the rank or the mister.”

Allie nodded. She shook her hair back and wildly exaggerated fanning her face with fluttering fingers. “Come on then, Stone. I am wasting away to nothin
’ here. If I don’t eat soon I will catch the vapors and just faint dead away.”

Stone
followed her into the wardroom and then angled away to the ice cream station. He felt almost decadent for taking a second small scoop. He ate ice cream at almost every opportunity, which hadn’t been often before coming on board the Ol’ Toothless. Grandpa did not like ice cream so it was not stocked in their ship’s freezers except for special occasions. Grandpa always said that ice cream lost its flavor after the third spoonful anyway, so no sense in scooping out more than that.

Stone stood politely near the end of the buffet line waiting for Allie as she built a small salad near the beginning of the line. He
looked around the large wardroom. There was seating for a hundred or more officers with everything from large communal tables, small private booths and even quiet glassed off meeting rooms. The room was about half full with officers coming and going, eating and working, and just plain goofing off.

He didn’t see any
marines, so he assumed that either Allie’s friends had not arrived yet or they were not coming. He was hoping they were not coming. Allie was scary as women go, but she was definitely attractive. Stone knew she was not interested in him in any romantic fashion, but he still thought it would be nice to sit alone with a pretty woman for a while. He glanced back at Allie and was shocked.

She had moved beyond the salad. Her tray now held a small mountain of steaks, roast, chops and green vegetables. She was eyeing the dessert table as if calculating how much more she could balance on the tray. She finally shook her head and moved beside Sto
ne.

“The cake looked good,
” Allie said. “Stuff like that goes right straight to my thighs. And Stone, you keep your eyes up here. You don’t be ogling my thighs, hear? Now, where…there they are! Follow on, Stone.” She spun and moved across the wardroom.

Stone followed. He tried as hard as he could, but he was unable to keep his eyes from dropping to her waist and then to her hips and thighs. Her utilities were baggy, but not enough to hide that she did
not have any extra baggage in her hips and thighs. She moved as if she were all muscle and coiled springs.

They stopped at a large table occupied by a
navy full commander sitting at the head of the table with a half dozen second lieutenants and ensigns scattered along both sides. Everyone at the table was raucous, as loud talk, laughter and buttered rolls flew back and forth.

Allie turned and leaned down to whisper in Stone’s ear. “You check
ed out my backside on the way over here, didn’t you?”

Stone immediately blushed to a deep red. He started to stammer a reply, but nothing came out of his mouth.

Allie took that exact moment to turn to everyone at the table and shout. “Okay. Shut it, you navy types. This is Stone, a particularly good friend of mine. Be nice to him or the wrath of the Empire’s marines will come crushing down on your puny, underfed navy bodies.” She turned to Stone and in a formal voice introduced the commander. “Full Commander Danielle E. Wright, may I present Midshipman Blackmon Stone. Stone, this is the Goat-girl.”

Stone stared at Allie. Had she really dared call a
commander ‘Goat-girl’?

“Pardon me?”
he managed to ask.

Commander Wright glared at Allie in mock indignation. “Insults, that is all I get. Insults.” She looked over at Stone. He was attempting to stand at attention, but he was not sure what do with his ice cream.
She pointed at the seat next to her, directly on her left.

“No pardons, Mister Stone. That is not my department
. Religion is on deck 13 and legal on decks 24-29. Sit next to Skippy there and dig in before your ice cream melts. Of course, I like my ice cream all melty, but that’s just me.”

Allie put her boot against the chair of
a second lieutenant sitting on Commander Wright’s right. She gave a shove, sliding two lieutenants and two ensigns far enough down to make room for a chair. She grabbed an unused chair from a partially occupied table and plopped herself down. Without comment, she began to eat.

“Well, sit do
wn, Midshipman,” Wright looked up at Stone. “Skippy won’t bite. He really is quite docile after he’s been fed. I will admit that he does smell rather bad right now, but then most of us do.”

“Busy day, Danielle?”
Allie glanced up from her plate.

Wright shook her head, “Busy yesterday, busy all last night and still busy. We are just taking a break. We have to hit it pretty quick. That is why Skippy still smells. Normally
, we all shower and clean up before going out in public, but we just didn’t have time. I thought about having lunch sent over to tower one, but we just needed to get out for a change of scenery.”

“Change of scenery!
” Allie snorted. “You run the prettiest part of the whole ship and you need a change? If you want a change, then just drop by the marine transient barracks. It is so ugly and so smelly they make this bunch smell like fresh mowed grass.”

Wright smiled. “I said change. I didn’t say better or worse, just a change. And don’t think I forgot about you calling me Goat-
girl in front of my crew. I just got them stopped calling me that from the last time they heard you. By the way, how do you like the roast goat you are shoveling down with such wild abandon?”

Allie pointed her for
k at her plate. “That’s goat?” She speared a chunk of the meat, sniffed it and popped it in her mouth. “Hunh, well, I definitely ate worse. I remember one time on Avalon where we ran out of rations and had to eat three day old-”

She was interrupted by a chorus of moans and a hail of buttered rolls. She snapped a hand up and caught one of the rolls and took a bite. “Philistines! Danie
lle, you should have left these animals to graze and brought your goats with you. The goats have better manners.”

Stone dredge
d up enough courage to ask, “Commander Wright? You really have goats on board? And people eat them?”

“Yes, Mister Stone, the goats are my particular favorites, but we have cattle, water buffalo (the Asian kind, not the African ones), bison, horses, sheep, tardles from Tenchion, gammoths, chicken, ducks, turkeys, hardoms, wardins from Thrisbeeye, rabbits, dogs, and…what am I forgetting?”

“Pigs, Doc. Lots and lots of pigs,” Skippy answered.

Wright nodded, “Too damn many pigs for my taste, pun as intended. If it weren’t for the bacon, ham, spareribs, pork loin roasts, sausage, tenderloin and the chops
, we could get rid of the pigs altogether.”

“Yeah, what about the snout sandwiches,
chitlins and the pickled pig’s feet?” Allie asked.

“You mentioned them, you can eat them. That’s just disgusting
,” Wright said. She turned back to Stone. “Speaking of pig’s feet, Mister Stone, when you walked up I noticed that you had your socks on the wrong feet.”

Stone looked startle
d and slid his chair back from the table to check his socks. A roar of laughter around the table brought him up short. He sighed as he realized socks do not fit on specific feet. He blushed, but joined in the laughter.

Allie laughed and said to Wright, “See, I told you he was cute, especially when he blushes.”

“You told me…?” Wright said. “Oh, this is the Stone that single handedly backed down a gaggle of combat veteran marines?”

A round of applause broke out around the table. Skippy pounded Stone on the back.

Stone shook his head. “I don’t know what you’ve heard, but-”

“Never mind what we heard
,” Wright said. “Allie tells that story every chance she gets, especially if Second Lieutenant Heller is round. Strange thing is, the story gets better every time I hear it.”

Allie slammed her fist on the table. “It’s the truth. I swear. I was there and saw it all.”

Wright laughed, “Sure you did. I believe you, but let’s wait for a month to see how this story grows.” She turned back to Stone. “And a question for the man-who-eats-marines-for-breakfast, how did you like your goat, Mister Stone?”

“All I had was ice cream
,” said Stone, looking confused.

“Did it taste good?”
Wright asked.

Stone nodded, “Yes, not quite as sweet as some I have had on board, but the best flavor I have tasted so far.”

“It’s not really ice cream,” Wright said with a grin. “It is a sorbet made from goat’s milk. This is the closest officer’s wardroom to the cross tower corridor near my office in tower one. So, we come here a lot. The head chef is a senior chief petty officer that grew up on a farm somewhere. He really knows how to use what we grow.”

“What you grow, Commander? This is vat grown substitute?” Stone asked.

“Heavens no, Mister Stone,” Wright replied laughing. “You must not have been over to tower one yet. I am really just a commander in name only. I am a veterinarian and all of tower one is my farm.”