Decker took the opportunityto jump in. “If we ignore whatever this is now – our ignorancecould come back later to bite us on the ass.” Her use of thatparticular idiom elicited a frosty glare from Lindstrom, so sheimmediately amended it to, “I mean, we could come to regretit.”
“We would be enabling first contact witha new species,” Lateef ventured.
“Which is our primarymission,” added Kennedy. “We’re explorers, right?”
“The Engineering team atThe Rock would probably quibble with you about that being ourprimary mission rightnow,” Ramsey said. “They’ve been waitingfor years to gettheir hands on this much kiatilium.”
They all looked to Riccifor his opinion on the matter, but he gave no overt sign ofjudgment. Impassively, he inquired, “VICI, was there a family bythe name of Maddox on the generational ship Valiant?”
“There were four crewmembers with the family name Maddox: Agnes and Roger Maddox andtheir two children, Kyle and Abigale.”
A sudden wave of tensioncrackled through the room as Ricci asked the AI, “Was AbigaleMaddox among the missing?”
“No, the entire Maddoxfamily was accounted for.”
After a collective momentof silence while they digested that report, Lindstrom said, “Well,that does pose a question, Captain….” He glanced at Ricci with aknowing smile. “Do we make the prudent move of heading directlyhome with our kiatilium – or go chasing afterthis…ghost?”
“If only I knew howyou felt about thematter, Commander,” Ricci laughed. He looked at his chief engineer.“How long would it take us to reach the coordinates on the message,Ramsey?”
“They map to a small moonin the Zeta Leporis star system, so….” Carla cocked her head whileevidently performing some quick mental calculations. “…a littleless than two days.”
Ricci pursed his lips,nodding in thought for only a moment before announcing, “I’vealways held that knowledge is power; I believe we should check thisout. Besides that, Clemente could be right that somebody is in needof our assistance. And if not….” he paused to flash a quick grin,“…I’ve always wanted to meet a ghost.”
***
The next morning Ricci andLindstrom were finishing up their usual early morning debrief inthe captain’s spacious office. Lindstrom said, “Ramsey hasconfirmed that our journey to this so-called ‘Tolu’ won’t take usanywhere near a relay station.”
Ricci responded, “I thoughtthat might be that case. But we’re a week ahead of schedule so Idon’t think the folks at HQ will end up being too worried aboutus.”
“Yes, with any luck weshould be back in time to honor all of our commitments,” Lindstromsaid. “I believe you’re scheduled to address the new class ofcadets – aren’t you?”
“Am I?” After bringing hisschedule up on his screen, Matt said, “Yes, it appears I am. Iguess I’ll just give ‘em the standard—” He stopped short, noticingan unusual appointment on his calendar. “Did you put in a requestfor a service evaluation?”
In a formal tone of voice,Lindstrom responded, “Captain, do you realize it’s been over fouryears since my last official evaluation?”
Rolling his eyes, Riccianswered, “Yes, I do realize that – since you were the one who categorizedthem as a complete waste of your time. And told me that if you everweren’t performing at an exceptional level, you would know itbefore I did.” He raised an eyebrow at Lindstrom. “Isn’t thattrue?”
“Yes, it is. But perhapsthe time has come to…for us to talk about my career.”
His heart sank as itoccurred to Ricci what his first officer would most probablyschedule a formal meeting to discuss. “Nils, you can’t be thinkingof retiring?”
“I can’t? Whynot?”
“You’re only fifty-three!What’re you planning to do with the next fifty years of yourlife?”
“My current commitment tothe UDC expires early next year. That will mark thirty-three yearsof service for me, thirteen as first officer. That’s enough for me– more than enough. I’d like to use the intervening time to trainRamsey as my replacement…and to let you get used to the idea.”Lindstrom leaned forward and his voice dropped. “Frankly, I’m tiredof the responsibility – tired of having so many lives in my hands.”Ricci was struggling to come up with an appropriate response whenLindstrom urgently added, “My God, Matt, aren’t you at least alittle bit tired of it? You made first officer at what?Thirty-five?”
“Thirty-four, actually.”Ricci shrugged as he said, “I suppose, on the surface, seventeenyears in a ship’s Command Unit does seem like a lot.” He looked offto the side and then back at Lindstrom. “But too many of thoseyears were spent fighting a brutal war. We’ve only recently starteddoing what we signed on for – space exploration.”
Lindstrom leaned back inhis chair and rested his chin on his hand. “It’s true that ourgeneration bore the brunt of the war. But we also reaped the gloryfrom it, didn’t we? It’s no coincidence that our cohort broke allthe records – most decorated officer, youngest admiral, youngestcaptain….” He paused to wave a hand at Ricci. “…youngest firstofficer right here – no?”
“No. Grace Stein beat meby four months,” Ricci admitted with a smile.
“Because of all of thatrapid advancement, we’ve become the cork in the bottle, with regardto promotions. It’s high time we got out of the way so the nextgeneration can move up. They fought the war, too, youknow.”
“Fair enough.” Riccibriefly contemplated Nil’s supposition, while marshalling hisobjections. “But for me…I’m just not ready to let go of theLovelace.”
Nodding sagely, Lindstromobserved, “That would explain why you’ve been dodging the CommodoreQualifications, then. Since commodores are now expected torelinquish their ships after a couple of years at therank.”
His tone rising to matchhis spike of temper, Ricci said, “Who told you I’ve been dodgingthe quals?”
“No one. It was aneducated guess. There’s no other explanation for the fact that youhaven’t already been promoted.” While Matt was shaking his head andlaughing at himself at having been so easily duped, Lindstromadded, “I’m not completely dense.”
“That’s for sure.” He tooka deep breath before asking, “So what’re planning to do when youleave?”
“Rita wants to move backto her home on the South American continent and take a positionas…oh, I guess
