'Don't worry,' Connally repeated. 'I'm the best shot on the station. Ask anybody. Carrying the weapon's just a requirement. I don't intend using it.'
The idea of Connally using her weapon hadn't occurred to Paul at all. He spent a moment wishing he could discuss this with Sheriff Sharpe, then bade farewell to the special agent.
Paul returned to the ship, trying to forget about the little disc concealed under his collar, and therefore unable to stop thinking about it.
It was early afternoon before he saw Captain Hayes again. Hayes was standing in a passageway talking to the chief engineer. Paul flattened himself to the maximum extent possible to squeeze by without inconveniencing the senior officers, but Hayes stopped him at mid-point with a quick gesture. 'Did you take care of that thing for me?'
'The legal thing, sir?'
Hayes cupped his hand to his ear as if he hadn't been able to hear, then nodded. 'Yes.'
'I'm on it, Captain.'
'Good.' Hayes waved him on.
About ten minutes later Paul realized that Hayes' gesture to his ear had very likely been a tip-off that Hayes knew Paul had a listening device planted on him. If so, at least the NCIS agents had proven true to their word on that matter.
It was getting on in the day before Paul realized something else. He'd been avoiding talking to Pullman or Moraine. He'd been evading the job he'd agreed to do. Not that the extra time had helped him plan any conversational gambits. His mind stayed so stubbornly blank on ways to steer any conversation around to the right topics that Paul realized he'd have no choice but the wing it and hope he could improvise.
He went to his stateroom, the fabled 'ensign locker' which he shared with Brad Pullman and two ensigns but which was nonetheless the closest thing to an oasis of quiet and privacy for him on the ship, and concentrated on remembering all of the possible topics that Special Agent Connally had shown him.
He'd only been at it a couple of minutes when Brad Pullman entered, sat down heavily in front of his small desk and yawned. 'I had the mid-watch inport last night. I think if you look up 'terminal boredom' in the dictionary it'll refer you to a mid-watch inport on Franklin.'
Paul smiled ruefully, thinking that was how he would've reacted to Pullman's comment normally. That is, if he wasn't hyper over the need to steer the conversation and record whatever his room-mate said. 'You got that right. Uh, how's your turnover with Kris Denaldo going?'
Pullman waved one hand. 'Piece of cake.'
'Really?' Paul thought about the long hours of work Kris had put in as communications officer, even when she'd had the help of Senior Chief Kowalksi before he'd transferred off the ship. 'No worries?'
'No worries.' Pullman leaned back. 'No problems. I can handle the job in my sleep.'
'Brad, there's a lot of things about being in charge of communications that can trip you up.'
'Sure. I know that.' But Pullman's dismissive tone didn't match the words. 'Really, Paul, I can handle it. Don't sweat it.'
'Okay.' Brad is sharp. I know that about him. Everybody says he's really smart. And Kris hasn't complained to me that he's slacking off at all. As a matter of fact, I haven't seen Brad slacking off at anything. He's a hard worker from all I've seen. So relax about that and do the unpleasant job you said you'd do, Paul Sinclair. 'Hey, Brad, mind if I ask you something?'
'Shoot.'
'Have you ever looked into investments or anything? I'm building up a pretty good nest egg.' Paul hoped he still sounded casual.
Pullman scratched his ear and appeared to contemplate the question. 'A little bit. It's kind of cool watching the pay pile up while we can't spend it on much, isn't it?'
'Yeah. So, any advice?'
'Not really.' Pullman looked mildly apologetic. 'I've just sort of skimmed a few things. My money's picking up interest in my savings account and that's all. Investment stuff just isn't my thing. I've got enough money to get what I need, and if I can stick out the Navy long enough, I'll have the retirement package, so I'm cool.'
'Oh. Okay. Just thought I'd ask.' Paul let disappointment show, though he actually felt relief. Pullman obviously wasn't concerned with having too little money and certainly wasn't acting like he had more than he should.
'Why'd you bring it up?' Pullman asked. 'Because you're getting married?'
'Yeah.' Did that sound sincere? 'Jen and I'll be both pulling in income, and with my orders to Mars I won't be spending much for the next couple of years, either.'
Pullman shook his head. 'They really screwed you, man.'
'Tell me about it.' Paul hesitated, then deliberately brought up another one of the NCIS agents' topics. 'How could they do that? I'm plenty unhappy.'
'With the Navy?'
'Yeah.' Paul waited, certain that Pullman wouldn't take the bait but still trying not to show tension over simply dangling the bait before him.
As Paul had expected, Pullman just spread his hands in a helpless gesture. 'You're not the first guy. Remember that joke about how being in the Navy guarantees regular sex, because you get screwed every day? Sorry I can't help. You can always punch out after Mars. By the time that's over your obligated service will have been completed and then some.'
Paul pretended to agree, since he was keeping Herdez' offer secret to everyone except Jen. 'Maybe I will. It's not like I'm getting major rewards for what I do.' He hadn't meant to say the last, but it slipped out in what he knew must have been a slightly bitter tone.
Pullman just nodded again. 'You've got to be smart, Paul. Smarter than the people calling out the orders.'
'Like you?' Paul asked sarcastically.
'Yup.' Pullman grinned. 'Like me.'
Paul couldn't help grinning back.
Commander Moraine scowled at Paul as he stood in the entry to her stateroom. It was getting late, and Paul simply couldn't afford to put off talking to her any longer. 'You should have all the files from my division that you've asked for, ma'am,' Paul reported.
Instead of replying directly, she picked up her data pad and began punching keys to check. Paul waited with outward patience as the minutes dragged. Finally, Moraine put down the data pad and nodded several times quickly. 'It looks like it. Why is that new tracking software labeled as being in degraded status?'
Paul knew Moraine had already been told the answer because he'd been present when Senior Chief Imari explained it to her. But Moraine had looked distracted and had kept fiddling with her data pad and other objects, so Paul had been pretty sure his new department head had been so busy concentrating on other details that she'd missed the one being explained to her. 'It's not handling all tracking functions up to specifications, ma'am. It occasionally drops an object, which we have to manually reacquire to restart tracking, and sometimes creates false echo tracks of real objects that we have to delete to keep the system from confusing itself.'
Moraine stared at Paul, one eyelid twitching slightly. 'Why is it doing those things? How can we fix it?'
'Uh, ma'am, Ensign Taylor believes the dropped objects are being caused by the anti-countermeasures subroutines being too sensitive and misreading real detections as fakes. She thinks the false echoes are being caused because the tracking subroutines are hyped up to be so sensitive that it's generating false targets from scattered indications off of real ones.'
'I don't want our tracking system software degraded! How can we fix it?'
He decided to try to defuse things, because he would have to work with Moraine for some months, unless she was led off the ship under arrest for espionage, which event Paul was looking forward to seeing more and more with every minute. 'Ma'am, Taylor suggested we target the anti-countermeasures subroutines against the detection subroutines and let the software fight it out.' Instead of smiling, Moraine just stared at Paul. Well, that didn't work. 'Commander, we're not allowed to modify the software in any way. The contractor has to make changes. We've been told the changes are being worked on.'
