“Well, that was special,” Smith commented. “What just happened?”
“At a guess, whatever was keeping the reaction stable was part of the overall matrix,” Berg said. “Californium is a very hot isotope. There was probably more in the chunk than necessary for critical mass. When we cut that bit out, it went critical.”
“So we were just right next to a nuclear explosion?” Himes asked. “That’s not happy making.”
“It was a very small nuclear explosion,” Berg pointed out. “A lot smaller than a grain of sand that actually blew up. The suits are barely reading the rads. And there’s a way to get the generators on these suits to do the same thing. And bigger.”
“Really?” Himes asked. “I so didn’t want to know that.”
“Neither did I when I found out,” Berg said. “Which was when an SF sergeant on the last cruise blew his up.”
“I’ve seriously got to find a new line of work,” Smith said.
“So we’ve got three survivors of an unknown alien species, a couple of pieces of wreckage from their ship and a blown up bit of what was probably a Dreen ship. Does that about sum it up?”
“Pretty much covers it, sir,” the XO said.
“But not the important parts, sir,” Weaver said. “There is another race out there, it seems pretty friendly, and it has an FTL drive. Of course, the Mreee seemed pretty friendly at first. These guys might just be Dreen slaves for all we know.”
“A happy thought,” the CO said. “And anyone but Dreen would tend to be friendly if they were rescued from drifting in space. Miss Moon? Anywhere on their language?”
“As I suspected, most of it is ultrasonic,” the linguist said with a note of exasperation. “The problem with compressing that down to where humans can hear is that it’s like compressing a voice down to bass. You lose a lot of timbre and intonation. Between that, their remarkable calm and the fact that I’m having to sort out the language from their general sonar functions… No. I’m not getting very far on their language. And we can’t even show them pictures. They are simply blind to us and we are just as blind to them. It’s very frustrating.”
“Well, keep at it,” the CO said, frowning. “It would be nice to be able to talk to these people eventually. Tactical?”
“We’ve been going over the traces that Astro pointed out,” the TACO said. “We think we’ve got a good algorithm to use the method in the future for tracking. Be that as it may, there’s a pretty clear path headed outward from the system. I’d suggest we just follow it, sir. They apparently are not in warp, or theirs works far differently from ours. I’m not sure of speed, but if they’re not in warp, we should be able to catch up to them fairly easily. Perhaps their main ship has some gear that will permit us to talk to them. Those are a lot of ifs, sir…”
“But that’s what being a Junior Spaceman is all about,” the CO said, nodding. “Sounds like a plan. XO.”
“Make it so, sir. Aye, aye.”
“The bunk is where the heart is,” Smith said, stretching out.
“I dunno,” Berg replied. “It was nice to finally get out of the ship.”
“Anything on that bit you grabbed?” Himes asked.
“Guzik said he was going to take it to the aliens we picked up and see if they could do anything with it,” the sergeant replied. “Get some shut-eye. We don’t know when we’re gonna have to get to work again.”
“Can I ask one question, Sergeant Bergstresser, sir?” Himes asked.
“Go.”
“Why do we always get point?”
“Because we’re the best team—”
“In the best platoon in the best company in the—” Himes muttered.
“In the best Corps in the whole damned Galaxy!” Smith finished, grinning. “But really, why?”
“Because Top hates me.”
“I thought Top loved you. You two are going to have children together.”
“With First Sergeant Powell, it’s a fine line.”
“First Sergeant? Moment of your time?” Gunny Neely said, knocking on the open door to Top’s stateroom.
“Come on in,” Top said, looking up from his computer screen. There was a projection of the alien device Berg had snagged on it. Offhand, it looked something like an electrical motor, except that there appeared to be no moving parts.
“First Sergeant, I’d like to discuss personnel usage,” the Gunny said, looking over at the SEAL who appeared to be asleep.
“Don’t worry about me,” Miller said. “I’ve heard more of these conversations than you’ve had hot breakfasts.”
“Go ahead, Gunny,” Powell said, spinning around in his chair. “Grab a bunk.”
“First Sergeant, with all due respect, on the last two missions First Platoon has always gotten the hot seat,” the Gunny said carefully. “And in three cases you’ve specified Bravo Team as the point. I know that you worked with Sergeant Bergstresser before and have… a high opinion of him. So do I, don’t get me wrong. He’s good. But…”
“But I keep putting him in spots where he’s liable to get killed,” Powell said. “And I don’t rotate that.”
“Yes, First Sergeant.”
“Do you know anyone else in your platoon who would have recognized that there was a subcritical explosion about to occur?” Top asked. “Or that the material involved was californium and, therefore, had the likelihood of going critical?”
“No, but—”
“Unfortunately, there is no ‘but,’ ” Top said definitely. “Berg is, alas, unique in this company. I don’t know that even I would have been able to determine the material. And the best bit of equipment we recovered was the part he snagged, just standing on the hull. I put Two-Gun out front because he’s incredibly knowledgeable and makes good decisions in the crunch. There are plenty of other Marines who make good decisions, don’t get me wrong. But they don’t have Two-Gun’s knowledge and experience. That being the case, until we can grow some Marines that have his abilities, figure that First is going to get all the hot deployments and Bravo is going to be leading the way. That increases the likelihood that we’ll lose that knowledge and experience. But if it had been, for example, Alpha First pulling apart the Dreen wreck, I think we’d be out a team about now, don’t you?”
“I see your point, First Sergeant,” Neely answered. “I also respectfully disagree with your conclusions. Among other things, it’s creating an appearance of favoritism. There are a bunch of bored and, at this point, grumbling Marines in the berths. Two-Gun and his team have gotten out and done stuff, First Sergeant. The rest of the Marines feel like they’re just along for the ride. Third Platoon spent a day wandering around ruins doing, as far as they could tell, exactly nothing. Berg’s team did the entry to the base and ended up rescuing the lone survivor. It’s all ‘Two-Gun, Two-Gun, what’s Two-Gun got to do today?’ I respectfully request that you spread the load a bit. One extremely salient point was raised by a Marine I request to remain anonymous. But he asked me, point blank, if you trusted anyone in the company but Two-Gun. I told him that you did, but I know I didn’t make my point very well because I wasn’t sure of the answer.”
“I’ll take it under advisement,” the first sergeant said, nodding. “We’ll see what the next mission is like. Good enough?”
“Yes, Top,” Neely said, standing up. “Thanks.”