Gastongay wiped mock perspiration from his brow. "That," he said earnestly, "is the kind of list we pray for around here."
"I assume that ye included the change order for the new mop handles in Hamper K, Station J-eighty-one, Lieutenant Brim," Calhoun said sternly.
"To tell the truth, Cat, I did leave those out," Brim admitted, touching the bridge of his nose in mock anguish. "I thought I might substitute something like a request for a launch to replace the one that got carried overboard when that torpedo part hit us. What do you think, Rab?"
"Well," Gastongay said, joining the spirit of their easy banter, "I've spent enough time in the Fleet to appreciate the importance of the proper mop handles-but I think I'd probably put replacing that launch a mite higher on my priority list." He frowned for a moment, scratching his head. "Unless, of course, you don't mind jumping a couple hundred c'lenyts between starships out there in intragalactic space. We get crews like that from time to time, you know."
"Not us," Calhoun said. "But sometimes young Brim here does try to land the ship with no Verticals. I'll bet that's almost as exciting...." Abruptly, he focused his eyes between the two younger men toward a neighboring gravity pool and frowned. "Who," he said at some length, "is that?"
Gastongay glanced for a moment over his shoulder, then grinned. "That's Claudia," he responded with a chuckle. "She manages this division of the Yard-really something, isn't she?"
Curious, Brim also turned-and confronted a startlingly beautiful young woman whom the term "something" didn't even begin to describe. She was small and almost the perfect antithesis of Margot Effer'wyck. She wore her dark-brown hair almost to her waist in gently flowing waves that framed a countenance graced by wide-set brown eyes with long eyelashes, an almost, but not quite, pug nose, generous lips, and a strong chin. She was gorgeous! She also had an ample bust-neither emphasized nor obscured by the snug, fashionably short pelisse she wore that revealed a modest waist, perfect legs, and tiny feet in old-fashioned, high-heeled sandals. As she approached, she looked Brim directly in the face with the half-smile of a woman who is quite accustomed to having a sizable impact on men.
"... may I present Lieutenants Calhoun and Brim?" Gastongay was saying when the younger Carescrian forced himself back to his senses. He half heard Calhoun respond with some magnificently gallant-meaningless-words. Then the laughing brown eyes were on him again.
"I, ah, didn't catch the name," he stammered helplessly as he reached out to take the tiny warm hand she extended in Standard Avalonian greeting.
"Claudia," the woman said squeezing his fingers in a perfect feminine handshake,
"Claudia Valemont."
"l am honored, ma'am," Brim said, starting to regain his senses.
"I think it is I who am honored, Lieutenant," she demurred. "You are the famous Carescrian Helmsman, are you not?"
"1 doubt if I am all that famous," Brim responded, feeling his face bum, "but I am a Carescrian...."
"Even if he fails t' sound like ane," Calhoun teased.
Claudia smiled warmly. "We Haelicians usually can't recognize accents anyway, Commander Calhoun," she said in a soft voice that sounded like sunlight. "We hear every spaceborne dialect in the Galaxy-but never listen for them." She then turned toward Defiant with a professional eye. "So that's the new class of light cruiser," she remarked with a suddenly professional air. "Fine lines for such a large ship. Rumor claims she's fast, too."
"Very fast, m'lady," Calhoun answered.
"But she needs a new launch," Gastongay interjected.
"I noticed that," Claudia said, frowning. "According to the drawings, she should have two of them abaft the bridge. I only see one-and the dented area of scorch. How did that happen, Lieutenant Brim?"
"We got a bit too close to some jettisoned torpedoes," Brim explained. "When they went off, part of one hit us."
Claudia squinted up at the sunlight. "Yes." she said. "I can see the path it took. The Hyperscreens are cracked there above the large dent where the damage starts."
"When do you suppose we are going to find another launch for these people?"
Gastongay asked. "I don't remember any coming in with the spares."
"If one did," Claudia said, "I'd personally kill the person who shipped it. We need that kind of room for important goods-like more spares." Then she laughed. "But we do indeed have a launch here. Remember, Rab?"
Gastongay frowned and cocked his head. "From one of the wrecks, maybe?"
"We probably would find a few launches if we searched the wrecks," she agreed. "But I wouldn't want to vouch for the condition they're in." Her eyes sparkled in the sunlight as she smiled. "No, the one I'm thinking about came in for I.F.S. Intractable almost a year ago.
Remember it now?"
Gastongay shut his eyes and grinned. "Oh, that one?" he said with a guffaw.
"That one," she said, sighting over her thumb toward Defiant. "I'll bet a bottle of e'lande it'll fit right there when we get those dents out. She's got a bit of room on her boat deck."
Gastongay scanned Defiant's boat deck, too. "Yeah," be agreed, wrinkling his nose.
"You're right; it probably will fit, but..."
"But what?" Brim broke in warily.
"Well," Claudia laughed, "it is sort of an unusual launch."
"Actually, more what you might call an attack launch," Gastongay added with a smile.
"An attack launch?" Calhoun demanded. Then he shut his eyes and snapped his fingers.
"Of course-I.F.S. Intractable, the attack transport! In fact, she was headed here when she hit that space mine, wasn't she?"
"That's the one," Claudia acknowledged. "They originally built her to capture the orbital citadels at Lazenwold. She wasn't very big, but she could carry four hundred fully armed space troops-I saw her the one time she made landfall here."
"But an armed launch?" Calhoun asked. "What would she need something like that for? If I remember right, she carried a few 125-mmi disruptors herself."
"That's right," Gastongay interjected. "But she also had all that hullmetal freeboard." He laughed. "She showed up on detectors like the Desterro Monument in Avalon-flame sculpture and all. Boffins at the Admiralty built the launch to make up for it. They designed her to barge into the vicinity of the forts without being recognized, then cause enough confusion and damage to let the mother ship land her troops."
"A single launch can do all that?" Brim asked incredulously.
"Not just any single launch," Claudia assured him. "This one's got a pair of experimental spin-gravs that can take her to .95 LightSpeed in less than fifteen cycles, if I remember correctly. And, I think, she mounts a 75-mmi disruptor, too."
"Spin-gravs?" Brim gasped. "With power plants like those, it's no wonder they expected to generate some confusion." He shook his head. "You say she's still here at the Atalanta Base?"
"I passed her only yesterday in one of the deep warehouses," Claudia said. "That's why I remembered. We kept her ready for combat months after Intractable got herself blown up-figuring the Admiralty would need it for the replacement they built. But I guess plans changed, because a couple of months ago they sent Queen Elidean to take the citadels out completely. And after that, the launch sort of lost its mission."
"We've tried to give her away a couple of times since then," Gastongay admitted. "But we've had no takers so far."
"What's wrong with her?" Brim asked.