“Close enough,” Bradford proclaimed, and passing a suddenly horrified Min-Saakir, or “Minnie” the female bridge talker, Courtney Bradford sounded the general alarm. Amid the raucous cries of a duck being burnt alive, he twisted the switch for the shipwide comm and spoke into the bulkhead microphone. “Merry Christmas, everyone,” he said in a kindly tone, reproduced as a snarling shout. “Yes indeed, it’s Christmas Day! Joy to you all!” He released the switch with a satisfied expression.
“God… dern it!” Kutas moaned. “Seventeen minutes early for morning GQ! The Skipper’s going to s me for your stunt!”
“Piffle!” Bradford said, suddenly a little hesitant. “What is seventeen minutes?”
“It’s a quarter hour for tired destroyermen, Mr. Bradford!”
The ship quickly came to life on the black sea, under the purple-smeared sky. Fire controlmen scampered up the steel rungs to the platform above, and drowsy lookouts joined those on the bridgewings, who’d remain at their posts until the sun was fully up. They were no longer cramped by the torpedo directors that hadn’t pointlessly made the trip. Dark shapes shuffled quickly to their posts on the fo’c’sle below, on the number one gun, and Earl Lanier’s distinctive bellow came from the galley just aft, demanding that the men and ’Cats “line up, straight and smart, and wait your goddamn turn! No, it ain’t ready yet; you got a date?” A few minutes later, taking longer than usual, Captain Reddy trotted up the metal stairs behind them, looking at his watch.
“Caap’n on the bridge!” Staas-Fin (Finny) cried loudly.
“As you were,” Matt said. “Report, Mr. Kutas.”
“Fire control, engineering, an’ lookout stations manned an’ ready, Mr. Kutaas,” shouted Minnie, her voice high-pitched and soft as usual, but touched with a note of anxiety.
“Uh, calm seas, northwesterly winds, no casualties or contacts, Captain,” Kutas said.
“All guns manned and ready,” Minnie squeaked.
Matt looked around, nodding at Courtney where he stood somewhat defiantly near the captain’s chair. “Merry Christmas, all,” he said amiably, then glanced at his watch again. “Thing seems a little off today.”
“I ah, doubt it, Skipper,” Norm said with another gruesome grimace. Chief Gray and Commodore Harvey Jenks appeared on the bridge together, followed quickly by Carl Bashear and Sonny Campeti, both comparing watches.
“All stations report ‘manned and ready,’” Minnie said, looking at the captain. He’d obviously figured out what happened and turned his gaze to Courtney.
“Mr. Bradford, you’ve been with us long enough to know I’ll tolerate no interference in the normal operation of this ship. If you ever pull a stunt like that again, you’ll lose all bridge privileges indefinitely. Is that understood?”
“I only wanted-”
“Is that understood?” Matt demanded. Courtney finally nodded, and Matt strode to his chair. “Very well. Pass the word for Juan…” He paused, remembering his indomitable Filipino “steward” was still recovering on New Scotland. “For ‘Tabasco,’” he amended. “Coffee.”
“Aye, aye, Skipper,” Norm said, clearly relieved.
“What is ‘Kis-mus’?” Lieutenant Tab-At, or “Tabby,” asked Spanky McFarlane when the skinny exec cycled through the air lock into the forward fireroom. Just as Spanky had been elevated from his beloved engineering spaces, the gray-furred ’Cat-a full member of the “elite” and bizarre fraternity of “Mice” created by the “originals,” Isak Rueben and Gilbert Yeager-had been raised to take his place as engineering officer. The terrible steam burns she’d once suffered were healing nicely, and fur was even creeping back across the ugly, gray-pink scars.
Spanky handed her an akka egg sandwich, and perched on a battered metal stool, nodding benignly at the other ’Cats in the fireroom. There was only one boiler in there now, number two, the rest of the space devoted to a massive fuel bunker. Number two was their current “problem child,” though, and his arrival with an egg sandwich-Tabby’s favorite-had become a morning ritual wherever he suspected she’d be applying her greatest attention. It was his way of “keeping in touch” with engineering in general, something he considered necessary despite Tabby’s professionalism, while at the same time proving to her and himself that they could still be “friends.” Spanky loved Tabby like a daughter, niece, or something, but it was no secret the onetime ’Cat version of a pinup in a fur suit was crazy about him in a more… uncomplicated way.
“It’s a religious day where I come from, ’mongst lots of folks,” he said, munching his own sandwich. “Celebrates the birth of Jesus Christ. Folks would give each other presents and try to be nice for a day.”
Tabby looked at her sandwich. “I heard of that ‘Jeezus’ fella, from Sister Audry. She said he washed away all the bad stuff people do with blood.” She brightened. “Kinda like we been doin’ ’gainst these damn ‘Doms’ lately!”
Spanky shifted on his stool. “It ain’t exactly the same…” Spanky was a nominal Catholic, and no matter how “backslid” he considered himself, the utterly twisted and perverted version of Catholicism the Dominion was trying to cram down everyone’s throat in a “convert or die” manner hit him very personally. He knew the new “Bosun of the Navy,” Chief Gray, felt the same. “Jesus died for our sins, washed ’em away with his own blood,” he said.
Tabby was silent a while, as were the other ’Cats. The only sounds in the fireroom emanating from the blower, the rush of water past creaking plates, and the trembling roar of hellfire in the boiler. “Well… we ain’t gonna do that,” she said decisively. “We gonna drown their sins in their blood… or the goddamn sea!” She finished her sandwich and looked at Spanky with suddenly liquid eyes, her ears to the side in a submissive… seductive way. “Thanks for the ‘Kis-mus’ saammich, Spanky,” she said softly. “You gave me a present. I be nice to you all day!”
His face reddening, Spanky stood. “Well,” he said casually, “I guess I’ll check the other spaces before I see the Skipper. I’m OOD for the forenoon watch.” He paused. “Carry on,” he added, before cycling through to the aft fireroom.
Courtney’s hideous breech of protocol had been largely forgotten by the time the sun gushed over the horizon and bathed the limitless, purple sea with an achingly clear and sharp radiance. Not a single cloud marred the sky, and visibility seemed infinite. A cool breeze circulated through the pilothouse, and the group that gathered there earlier mostly remained. Courtney had eagerly broached the subject of what they might encounter-besides the enemy-as they neared the Americas, a subject that until now, only he had seemed interested in. Now, with that coast less than a week away, everyone seemed curious, and Jenks did his best to answer their questions. As an explorer and something of a naturalist himself, he was able to make some interesting observations.
“But that still doesn’t explain why they seem so… single-minded,” Matt said, referring to a virtual procession of “mountain fish” they’d spotted-and duly avoided-the day before. The ridiculously huge beasts were notoriously territorial, and none of the “Americans,” human or Lemurian, had ever seen two in close proximity, certainly not the apparent dozens they’d seen, dotting the horizon like a distant ind chain.
“I can’t explain it,” Jenks replied. “Particularly since it’s not an annual event that might be explained by migratory habits. It seems continuous. All I know is that, year round, occasional groups of the devils are observed, traveling through these comparatively barren seas, always on an easterly course. There are collisions, usually in the dark, but they seem disinclined to attack vessels as they sometimes do in the west.” He shook his head. “As I mentioned before, the shallow bay between what you call the Baja peninsula and the mainland is referred to by the Doms as ‘el Mar de Huesos,’ or the Sea of Bones. That may provide some explanation, given study, but I’ve never ventured there. The Doms claim it, and even in less… hostile times, I’ve never been allowed entry.”