“Clear, Gunnery Sergeant.”
“Staff Sergeant Hinchcliffe,” the gunny said, looking at the assistant platoon leader. “Your team will start on securing the Wyverns. Each has to be loaded into their racks, locked down and secured. By the time you’re done with that, you’re going to be getting the next one if everyone’s working their ass off. The Wyvern has to be jacked up in its carrier and slid back in. It should be possible to hold it in place with one Marine. The other two then attach it. There are no idlers in this process. NCOs are going to be doing as much work as their troops. Is that clear to everyone?”
“Clear, Gunnery Sergeant,” Staff Sergeant Brian Hinchcliffe said. The brown-haired NCO had a round moon face and a chunky body but he came across looking more like a boulder than a marshmallow.
“Nobody on the teams has ever done any of this,” the gunny admitted. “Including me. And Wyverns are big pieces of metal that have a habit of getting away from you if you’re not careful as hell. So we’re going to do it slow at first and very much by the book. Let’s get started. Two-Gun, get in commo with Bosun Charles and ask for the first Wyvern.”
“Aye, aye, Gunny,” Berg said, touching his earbud. “Bosun Charles, this is Sergeant Bergstresser. We’re ready for the first Wyvern.”
“Glad to hear it,” the bosun replied. “I’ll get to you as soon as I have the last of the ardune torps loaded.”
“Uh, roger,” Berg said, looking over at the Gunny. “Gunny, Bosun Charles says he’s working on the ardune torps.”
“They were supposed to be already loaded!” Juda snarled. “We were after the missiles! Sailors! Everybody just cool your heels while I figure out what’s going on! Might as well be working with a grapping dock-worker’s union!”
“Commander Weaver,” the XO said, walking past Bill’s station with an armload of documents. “Get out on the hull and sort out the loading of the Wyverns. There’s some foul-up with timing. But the priority is the load-list, keep that in mind.”
“Yes, sir,” Bill said, nodding. “Will do.”
Up on the deck it was even more chaotic than in the ship. Exiting from the rear of the sail, he could see the argument in progress between a Marine gunnery sergeant and one of the base support bosuns. Both men were red in the face and activity had stopped around them.
“Gunnery Sergeant… Juda,” Bill said, looking at the Gunny’s nametag. “Bosun Charles. What’s the problem?”
“We got a late delivery on the ardune torps, sir,” the bosun said, obviously relieved to dump the problem on someone else. “They were supposed to load ahead of the SM-9s but they weren’t here so I went ahead with loading the SM-9s. The torps are here, now. So I need to load them. That’s the priority list. The Wyverns were supposed to follow the SM-9s but they’re just going to have to wait.”
“My team’s in place, now, sir,” the gunnery sergeant responded. “Our schedule calls for a max of twelve hours of loading. Then they have a four hour rest period. Then we’ve got more loading to do. I can’t have them sitting around with their thumbs up their butts for four hours while the bosun loads torps. This is our load slot.”
Bill looked at the overhead and frowned. There were two cranes but the other one was detailed as well. He thought about its load list but there wasn’t any way to bump anything.
“Load the torps,” he said after a moment’s thought.
“Aye, aye, sir,” the bosun said, trying not to smile in triumph.
“Sir…” the gunnery sergeant started to protest.
“Gunny, that’s the load priority,” the commander replied. “Period. Torps go before Wyverns. I wish we had another way to load the Wyverns, but I don’t think you want to belay them down by hand. And it would be unsafe even if you did. So you’re going to have to wait until the torps are loaded. Period. Bosun, expedite that loading, but with all due care. If one of those goes up, there won’t be a Newport News anymore. Or Norfolk. Or, hell, half of Virginia. Gunny, if you can present me with any viable method of getting the Wyverns from the dock,” he continued, pointing to where the Wyverns were standing in racks on a container, “down that hole and into the ship, I’ll entertain it. But it had better be functional and safe. I’ll be in the conn.”
“They’re loading the torps,” Gunny Juda said when he got down to where the loading team was waiting. “The astrogator made the call,” he added disgustedly.
“Commander Weaver’s a good officer, Gunnery Sergeant Juda,” Eric said respectfully. “If he made that call he had a reason.”
“Well, in my opinion he made it based on being Navy instead of Marines,” the Gunny said. “But that’s what we have to put up with. Get down to the magazines and assist with the ammo loading. But don’t get too involved. I’m going to bring this to Top and see if we can’t get our priority bumped up.”
Staff Sergeant Hinchcliffe watched the fuming gunnery sergeant stump off, then glanced at Berg.
“What do you think Top will say?” the staff sergeant asked.
“That if Commander Weaver made the call, that’s it,” Eric replied. “Staff Sergeant, in the absence of a higher authority, you obey the next orders you get. Could I ask for an order?”
“Go,” Hinchcliffe said.
“Could you order me to go investigate another method of getting the Wyverns into the ship?”
“Ahem,” Hinchcliffe said thoughtfully. “Sergeant Bergstresser!”
“Yes, Staff Sergeant?”
“While the rest of us are working on loading ammo, I think your time would best be served trying to find an alternate method to load the Wyverns. You are so ordered.”
“Thank you, Staff Sergeant.”
Eric climbed up on the deck of the sub and looked around. The starboard crane, the one that would be loading the Wyverns, was slowly and gently lowering a torpedo into a forward hatch. It lowered the torp, lifted away and then paused over the next one, waiting.
He hit the timer in his implant and waited. And waited. Finally the crane moved again, hooking up to a torpedo and lifting it into the air as the loading team reappeared.
Eric frowned and looked down the hole, figuring out how long it would take to pick up one of the Wyverns and drop it into place. He estimated the time it would take to move the crane back and forth and then headed over to the crane.
The bosun was controlling the movements of the crane from the dock and was standing with his arms folded, the latest torp having been dropped, when Berg walked up.
“Bosun, permission to speak?” Berg asked, more or less to the bosun’s back.
“Go, Marine,” Charles replied indifferently.
“Bosun, I note that there is about a seven minute idle time as each torp is loaded. I’m wondering if it would be possible to use that idle time to load the Wyverns?”
“I’m trying to figure out why I should do two loadings at once,” the bosun said, not looking around. “And I’m not going to wear my operator out running the crane back and forth. So, no, it would not be possible.”
“Thank you, Bosun,” Berg said. “Permission to withdraw?”
“Get the hell out of my hair, Marine,” the Bosun said. “Okay! Get the next one ready!”