I reported for watch each day, sometimes with Mr. Cousins, occasionally with Ms. Dagalow. With Lieutenant Cousins I sat stiffly, hoping to stay out of trouble. Ms. Dagalow, though no Dosman, chatted about puters, as she often did.
Though I didn’t share her interest, I enjoyed her company and did my best to please her by learning what I could.
The next week I was transferred to engine room watch.
There Chief McAndrews tried to teach me the intricacies of the fusion drive. I discovered that I had little aptitude for it.
By now I’d shown myself impossibly slow at astronavigation, thoroughly muddled as a pilot, and hopelessly inept as a drive technician. Vax was older, bigger, and stronger. Both Vax and Alexi were better able to handle the crew. I was proving incompetent at navigation, pilotage, engineering, and leadership. An ideal midshipman.
Except for chess. I could concentrate on that; I didn’t feel our thirty-second limit as pressure. I always looked forward to my afternoon game with Lieutenant Malstrom. But one day when we set up the board his manner was subdued. I led with queen’s pawn, and before I knew it I had trapped him in a fool’s mate in five moves. He was not a good player, overall, but he was far better than that.
We started to put away the pieces. “What’s wrong, sir?”
I had known and liked this man for months now, but nonetheless I’d taken a daring step. A middy does not ask a personal question of a lieutenant. It is not done.
Lieutenant Malstrom looked at me without speaking. He began unbuttoning his shirt. He pulled it out of his pants, rolled it up from his waist. He turned, showing me his side.
Just above his hip was an ugly blue-gray lump.
I met his eye. “What is it, Mr. Malstrom?” By not using his rank I was getting as close to him as I could. We were friends.
He said the words so quietly I could barely hear him.
“Malignant melanoma.”
“Melanoma T?”
“Doc thinks it might be.”
My breath hissed. The disease was an occupational hazard.
In Fusion, it was impossible to shield ourselves from the Nwaves that drove the ship, and over time N-waves transmuted ordinary carcinoma to the virulent T form that grew with astonishing speed.
Like all of us, Mr. Malstrom had shipped interstellar as an adolescent, and should have been nearly immune.
“At least they’re not sure, sir.” I tried to look on the hopeful side. Most forms of cancer were easily cured nowadays, hardly worse than a bad cold. But the new strain of melanoma didn’t respond well to drugs. The treatment of choice was still amputation of the affected part, where possible.I asked, “Have you been treated?”
“Tomorrow morning. Radiation and anticar drugs. They caught it early; Doc Uburu says I have a good chance.”
“I’m very sorry, sir.”
“Harv.” He caught my look. “Here in my quarters. My name is Harv.” He must really have been shaken. I forced myself to say his unfamiliar name.
“I’m sorry, Harv. You’ll be all right. I know you will.”
“I hope so, Nicky.” He tucked in his shirt. “Don’t mention it to the others.”
“Of course not.” The Captain would know, of course.
Perhaps the other lieutenants. But the middies need not be told, or the seamen.
“I’ll go on sick leave for a few days, in case the anticars get me down. You can come give me chess lessons.”
I grinned as I stood at the hatch. “Every day, sir.” I snapped him a salute. It was a sign of affection and he knew it. He returned it and I left.
“Lord God, today is January 2,2195, on the U.N.S. Hibernia.We ask you to bless us, to bless our voyage, and to bring health and well-being to all aboard.”
“Amen,” I said fervently. Lieutenant Malstrom was absent. Amanda and I were again at the same table. This time I was thrown in with a colonist family of five journeying to a new life on Detour, our port of call beyond Hope Nation.
The unspoiled resources of these newer colonies attracted many like the Treadwells, eager to escape the pollution and regimentation of overcrowded Earth. At home we had Luna, of course, and the Mars colony. But some people weren’t attracted to dome or warren life. They sought open space and fresh air that was ever harder to find.
Not everyone could emigrate, certainly. Only the wealthy could afford it. Though I admired the quest that was taking them sixty-nine light-years from home, I wondered how the Treadwells had managed it. She was a gaunt prim woman whose hands darted restlessly. Her husband, squat, swarthy and muscular, looked more a laborer than the habitat engineer the manifests showed him to be.
Their oldest children were twins poised on the edge of adolescence. Paula, wearing a shade too much shadow, and Rafe, all awkward knees and elbows, seemed so vulnerable they recalled my own painful thirteenth year, roaming Cardiff with my best friend Jason. I stirred uneasily, recollecting my discomfort at his hand on my shoulder, aware of his acknowledged sexual proclivity and dubious of my own. I also remembered, at Jason’s casual touch, Father’s silent look that spoke volumes of reproach.
Both Rafe and Paula seemed awestruck by Naval life and in love with anyone who wore the uniform. Rafe pestered me for information, as he had Doc Uburu and Ms. Dagalow before me. Paula asked about joining up, what Academy was like, how old you had to be to enter.
Ms. Treadwell frowned. “The Navy’s no place for a lady.”
“Oh, Irene.” Paula’s voice dripped with condescension.
“What about Lieutenant Dagalow, at the next table?”
I tried not to wince. I couldn’t imagine calling my own father anything but “Father” or “Sir”.
“Look into it when we get to Detour.” Their mother flashed me an apologetic smile. “You can’t enlist in the middle of a cruise.” Their faces fell. Another fantasy gone.
I tried to cheer them up. “That’s not quite true, Ms.
Treadwell. The Captain has authority to enlist civilians as officers or crew. It’s almost never done, but it’s possible.”
The Captain also had authority to impress civilians into service in an emergency, but I didn’t mention that.
The twins fell to talking among themselves. They decided to persuade Captain Haag to let them join up, with or without their parents’ permission. Their younger sister Tara, six, said little. We adults drifted into another conversation. Jared Treadwell asked, “Is it true, Mr. Seafort, that this ship is actually armed?”
“All U.N. ships have weapons, Mr. Treadwell.” I smiled.
“It’s an odd and ancient precaution. There’s nobody to use them against, except now and then a few planetside bandits, and the ship’s lasers are not designed for antiguerrilla operations. They’re like male nipples: standard equipment, but useless.”
My sally drew a nervous laugh from his wife. Groundside attitudes were fairly straightlaced. It was fun to scan old holovids about the Rebellious Ages, but I couldn’t imagine a young couple who showed up unmarried with a baby, or even tried to swim naked on a beach. Of course modern birth control has separated casual copulation, which is tolerated in any combination of sexes, from casual reproduction, which is not.
The next day all four middies had astronavigation drill with Lieutenant Cousins. I worked my problems as well as I could, while Mr. Cousins shook his head in disgust at my mistakes.
Vax got everything right, as usual. Then Alexi fouled up a really easy problem and put the ship dead in the middle of a hypothetical sun.
Lieutenant Cousins glared at Alexi’s console, withering contempt dripping from his every word. “You incompetent child! God damn your eyes, Mr. Tamarov, you’re hopeless!”
That was too much. Alexi knew it. So, belatedly, did Cousins. Even Vax caught my eye and slowly shook his head.
Alexi got to his feet, nervously drawing himself to attention. He had opened his mouth to speak when Mr. Cousins forestalled him. “I apologize, Mr. Tamarov.” He glanced around. “To you and to all present. I spoke out of anger and not intent. I mean no disrespect to Lord God.”