Alikhan was waiting in his cabin to take his trousers, shoes, and uniform tunic for their nightly rehabilitation. “What are they saying in the petty officers’ lounge?” Martinez asked.
“Well, my lord,” Alikhan said, with a kind of finality, “they’re saying you’ll do.”
Martinez suppressed a grin. “What are they saying about Fletcher?”
“They aren’t saying anything at all about the late captain.”
Martinez felt irritation. “I wish they were.” He handed Alikhan his tunic. “You don’t think they know more than they’re saying?”
Alikhan spoke with the utmost complacency. “They’re long-serving petty officers, my lord. Theyalways know more than they tell.”
Martinez sourly parted the seals on his shoes, removed them, and handed them to Alikhan. “You’ll tell me if they say anything vital? Such as who killed the captain?”
Alikhan dropped the shoes into their little carrying bag. “I’ll do my best to keep you informed, my lord,” he said. He sealed the bag and looked up. “By the way, my lord. There is the matter of Captain Fletcher’s servants.”
“Ah.”
Each officer of captain’s rank was allowed four servants, whom he could take with him from one posting to the next. Martinez had his four, and so had Fletcher; but now with only one captain remaining, that left four servants too many.
“Are Fletcher’s people good for anything?” Martinez asked. “Anything besides being servants, I mean?”
Alikhan’s lip curled slightly, the long-serving Fleet professional passing judgment on his inferiors.
“Narbonne was a valet in civilian life,” he said. “Baca a chef. Jukes is an artist, and Buckle is a hairdresser, manicurist, and cosmetologist.”
“Well,” Martinez said dubiously, “I suppose Baca could be sent to the enlisted mess.”
“Not if Master Cook Yau has anything to say about it,” said Alikhan. “He won’t want that fat pudding of a man taking up space in his kitchen and fussing with his sauces.”
“Alikhan.” Martinez examined himself in the mirror over his sink. “Do you think I need a cosmetologist?”
Alikhan curled his lip again. “You’re too young, my lord.”
Martinez smiled. “I was hoping you’d say that.”
Alikhan draped trousers over his arm, and then the jacket over the trousers. Martinez nodded in the direction of the door that led to his office.
“Do you have someone sleeping out there again?” he asked.
“Ayutano, my lord.”
“Right. If the killers come by way of the dining room instead, I’ll try to shout and let him know.”
“I’m sure he’d appreciate it, my lord.” Deftly, with the hand that wasn’t holding Martinez’s clothing, Alikhan opened a silver vacuum flask of hot cocoa and poured.
“Thank you, Alikhan. Sleep well.”
“And yourself, my lord.”
Alikhan left through the door that led to the dining room. Martinez changed into pajamas and sat on his bed while he drank the cocoa and looked at the old dark painting. The young mother held her infant and the little fire glowed and the cat crouched with his ears pinned back, and it all took place inside a painted frame or maybe a stage.
He kept seeing the painting for a long time after he turned out the light.
In the morning Martinez printed a series of supper invitations on Fletcher’s special bond paper, and sent them via Alikhan to all the senior petty officers. He didn’t know whether Fletcher would have invited the enlisted to supper—he suspected not—and he was certain Fletcher wouldn’t have used the fancy bond invitations.
He didn’t care. It wasn’t his bond paper anyway.
The experiment began shortly afterward. The ships of Chenforce were linked by communications laser into a virtual environment, and while the ships themselves continued on their way, a virtual Chenforce maneuvered against a virtual enemy squadron of superior force, a squadron that was meeting them head-on at Osser, the system into which Chenforce would pass after Termaine. The system was largely uninhabited, with a pair of wormhole relay stations and some small mining colonies on some mineral-rich moons, but nothing else, nothing that would complicate an engagement between two forces.
Chenforce deployed the dispersed tactics that had been created by Martinez and Caroline Sula and the officers of Martinez’s old frigate,Corona . The ships were widely separated, maneuvering in ways that seemed absolutely random but were in fact dictated by a complex mathematical formula devised by Sula, the ships riding along the convex hull of a chaotic dynamical system.
The opposing force utilized the classic, formal tactics of the empire, tactics in which the ships were shepherded in a rigid formation so their commander could retain control of them till the last possible moment.
Tungsten-jacketed antimatter missiles exploded between the converging squadrons in glowing fireballs and hellish blasts of radiation. Lasers and antiproton beams lanced out to destroy incoming missiles, and the missiles jinked and dodged to avoid destruction. Ships died under waves of fast neutrons and blasts of heat.
Chenforce didn’t come through the battle unscathed: out of seven ships, three were destroyed and one severely damaged. Of the Naxid force, all ten were wiped out.
For the first time, Martinez commanded a heavy cruiser in combat, albeit a combat that took place only in simulation. The crew in Command were disciplined and well-trained, long practiced at their jobs and at working with one another, and they obeyed his orders with perfect understanding and efficiency.
Martinez ended the experiment pleased with himself and with his ship. The pleased feeling lasted until he returned to his office, where Marsden presented him with a vast number of documents, all requiring his attention, or his judgment, or at the very least his signature.
He ate his dinner at his desk while he worked his way through the documents, and sent Marsden to his own meal.
Chandra Prasad arrived half a minute after his dinner, as if she were waiting for him to be alone. He looked up at her knock, lowered his stylus to the desk and told her to come in. As she approached, he wondered in a curiously offhand way whether she’d come to murder him, but decided against it. The sunny smile on her face would have been too incongruous.
“Lieutenant?” he said, raising his eyebrows.
“The lady squadcom just told me that I was the new tactical officer,” Chandra said. “I guessed you had something to do with that, so I thought I’d come by and thank you.”
“I mentioned your name,” Martinez said. “But last I heard it was a temporary appointment. I think she’s going to try a series of people.”
“But I’ll be first,” Chandra said. “If I impress her, she won’t need the others.”
Martinez smiled encouragingly. “Good luck.”
“I’ll need more than luck.” Chandra bit her lower lip. “Can you give me a hint about how best to impress the squadcom?”
“I wouldn’t know,” Martinez said. “I don’t think I’ve managed it lately.”
She looked at him with narrowed eyes, as if trying to decide whether to get angry.
He picked up his stylus and said, “Come to dinner tomorrow. We’ll discuss your ambitions then.”
Calculation entered her long eyes. “Very good, Captain.”
She braced, and he sent her away and went back to reviewing his paperwork, and nibbling on his dinner in between paragraphs. He had no sooner finished both papers and the meal when Kazakov arrived with a new series of documents that, as executive officer, she was passing to him for review.
It was mid-afternoon before he finished all that, and went into the personnel files to acquaint himself with the petty officers he would be having to supper. They were as Kazakov had said: long-serving professionals, with high scores on their masters’ exams and good efficiency reports from past superiors. All received high marks from Fletcher—including Thuc, the man he’d executed.
Martinez then checked the documentary evidence that should have corroborated Fletcher’s good opinions, and almost immediately found something that appalled him.
