The younger officer took an ineffective swipe at the sweat accumulating on his forehead. "Captain, I need to tell you about something that happened during the attack…."
"I know, Dix. You're okay. We'll talk about it later."
The damage was less than it might have been, and far less than she had visualized. The bridge had been spattered with a bucketful of high-velocity metal fragments from the exploding Exocet. The heavy composite materials of the superstructure had absorbed most of them. A couple of the smaller chunks were still embedded in the bridge windscreen, each surrounded by a gray, bubbly patch of heat-marred acrylic. The spray door leading out to the portside bridge wing had been blown inward, spraying the interior of the wheelhouse with flying shards of thermoplastic. Half a dozen flatscreens had been smashed and the deck was crunchy with bits of safety glass. The control consoles themselves appeared to be more or less intact, barring a couple of impressive shrapnel scores. Less could be said for some of the personnel who had been manning them.
The first thing Amanda saw when she entered the bridge was her exec holding a blood-soaked first-aid dressing to the side of his face as he leaned weakly against the chart table.
"Ken, are you all right?"
"Yeah, I'm just cut up a little."
"Let me have a look."
"Honestly, Captain. I'm all right."
"Damn it, Ken, Misa will give me hell if I bring you back any less pretty than you were. Now, let me have a look!"
Amanda eased back the dressing and winced inwardly at what she found. "You're going to start a fine collection of stitches there. What about the rest of the bridge crew?"
"Minor stuff except for the helmsman. Robinson's working on him now." Hiro painfully nodded toward the farside of the bridge where a cluster of people were hunkered down around a motionless form.
Hospital Corpsman 1st Class Bonnie Robinson was a quiet and rather plain black woman from Detroit, Michigan. Now, though, as she worked over her wounded shipmate, her intensity and concentration gave her a kind of knife-edge beauty that onlookers would recognize only after the fact.
The subject of her attention had already been eased into a basket stretcher, his blue uniform coveralls laid open and a mass of blood-soaked gauze packing taped down across his chest. His eyes were closed and he was still except for his labored breathing. A cannula fed oxygen into his nostrils and an IV bag was tucked under his shoulder, its contents being pressured into his arm by his own weight.
Amanda recognized him as she knelt down by his side. Petty Officer 2nd Something-or-other Erikson, twenty years old, from some little place in South Dakota. He had come aboard at Pearl just prior to this cruise. As usual, she had talked with him a bit when he had signed on, and probably hadn't exchanged a dozen words with him since. He had seemed to be a good kid with a good record.
"What have you got?" she asked.
"I'm not sure yet," the Corpsman replied curtly. When she had her hands on a serious patient, Robinson tended to let all thoughts about military formality slip from her mind. Her captain understood and made no comment.
"He was unconscious when we got here and he's shocky as all hell. There's penetrating chest trauma, and I think there's some shrapnel in there. There's no sign of hemorrhaging from the lungs, but I'll bet we've got some going on in the chest cavity. As soon as he's stable enough for it, we'll hump him down to sick bay and I'll get some X-rays. We'll know more then."
Amanda held back all of the trite little phrases like "Do the best you can" and "Keep me informed." She simply gave an acknowledging nod and got to her feet.
She looked down into the young seaman's pale face for a moment more and a strange chill rippled through her. She stepped back abruptly and took a deep and deliberate breath. She had seen wounded before, as well as the dying and the dead. There was no sense in its getting to her now.
She went back to the bridge captain's chair and jacked her headset directly into the MC-1 circuit.
"All hands, this is the Captain. Here's the situation. We have been attacked without provocation by aircraft of the Argentine Air Force and Navy. We have sustained minor damage and a couple of our people have been wounded. Two of our attackers, one-third of the enemy strike force, have been destroyed. For our first action, we have acquitted ourselves well.
"At this time, we do not know what triggered this attack or what the current political situation is between the United States and Argentina. You will be informed as soon as we learn anything further. Until then, we must assume that we are at war and we must act accordingly on that assumption. From here on out, ladies and gentlemen, it's the real thing."
20
Amanda was alone in the wardroom. All other hands were still at general quarters as the ship fled southward toward the weather fronts.
Her instincts were to remain in the Combat Information Center, hovering over the radar repeaters. However, she had forced herself away. Her command headset would give her an instant link with events there, and she must trust in her crew and her systems.
She heated a mug of water for tea in the countertop microwave and spread peanut butter on a piece of toast. Then, with great deliberation, she sat down and began to eat.
She wasn't particularly hungry. In fact, there was a massive leaden knot where her stomach should have been. She couldn't afford to yield to that, though. From this point on, she would have to run maintenance on herself, just as she would on any other key ship's system. She dare not squander her reserves of energy and mental focus.
She took another sip of the strongly brewed tea without tasting and stared down the length of the table without seeing, mentally following event probabilities into the future.
"Begging your pardon, ma'am?"
She glanced up to find one of the CPOs from Weapons Division and an enlisted man standing just inside the open wardroom door. She recognized the EM as the gunner's mate who had been on the forward Oto Melara mount. He was now holding a rather uneasy parade rest beside his chief.
"This is Gunner's Mate Second Danny Lyndiman, ma'am," the CPO said, shooting an ominous You're gonna catch hell now glance across at the younger man. "Mr. Beltrain said you wanted to talk with him."
"I do," Amanda replied, pushing her chair back to face the two men.
"Well, Lyndiman," she said, lowering her voice just enough so he had to concentrate on her words. "You scored a very spectacular one-shot kill on that Rafale this afternoon. Would you care to tell me how you went about it?"
The lean young gunner shifted his weight uneasily. Everywhere else he had ever served, when the CO got loud, things got bad. On the Duke, though, when "The Lady" got quiet, that's when you started to worry. Suddenly, his brilliant improvisation didn't seem quite so brilliant.
"It was like this, ma'am. When the Argys started using laser-guided ordnance on us, I figured why not use it right back at them."
"Go on."
"When that first Rafale flight illuminated us like it did, it occurred to me that if we had the chance to fire one of our own laser-guided rounds back up their designation basket, our shell would ride their own beam right back into the illuminator pod. Then, when the second flight started to come in, the angle looked good, so I took my gun out of the Aegis loop, went over to manual control, and reloaded with laser-guided munitions. I got it set up in time and I took the shot. I guess it worked."
"I guess it did," Amanda replied softly. "Did you clear the change-over with the tactical action officer?"