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  In a split second, three of the four cadets stood over Stone. Their suits seemed to be bigger than they had been when he shot them. Suddenly, one of the three reached out an arm and slapped the back of Stone’s helmet. The force of the blow pushed him forward into another cadet. That cadet pushed Stone back, slamming him into the bulkhead. Stone was sure the suit would protect him from most serious injuries, but being slammed around still hurt. His chest was already hurting from the explosion on deck twelve and now his backside hurt even more.

  The booming voice continued, “All cadets are to report to their respective training bays on the double.” The command was followed by the entire bulkhead opposite the armory hatch rolling up like an automated warehouse door. It opened on to the exercise field at the Empire Naval Training Base on Lazzaroni. The cloudless, sort-of-bluish sky covered the semi-greenish grass.

  All four of the cadets in the intruder suits spun on their heels and jumped through the open space, ignoring the fact they must have been forty-five meters from the ground. Stone marveled at the sight for a nano-second. He clamped his jaw shut and he prepared to jump to the ground. He willed himself to keep his heartbeat level and not start the infernal shaking he was prone to when he was scared. He certainly did not want to start the mumbling he caught himself doing when he was nervous.

  It was not that Stone was afraid of heights. He had jumped from twice this height, but that had been indoors. It was all of that outside that made him nervous. There was too much openness. He knew if he gritted his teeth he would be able to make the jump, but only because he was in a combat suit. He would not have been able to go into the open air if he had been dressed in just his cadet utility uniform.

  The thought of all of that open sky made him queasy. He had been born on the merchant space ship, the Platinum Pebble. His parents had transferred to another family owned freighter, the Golden Boulder when he had been about ten. He had not seen open sky with his own eyes until he was thirteen. Growing up in freighters and on space stations, he had moved from one metal box to the next. Trips to the surface of a planet were not necessary in his family’s space freight business. He could not imagine why people went outside; it just was not natural. It put him into a cold sweat when there was not a ceiling over his head.

  All morning he had been inside what was lovingly called ‘Ol’ Dirt Bottom’. He had been inside the training ship many times but this was the first time he finished a training session in an outside corridor or on an upper deck. The facility was designed to emulate a hundred different versions of naval vessels. It could be configured so cadets could train on battle cruisers, patrol boats, carriers, garbage scows or anything else in the navy’s vast array of ships. All of the outside bulkheads rolled up out of the way for easy access and egress on the top seven decks. The bottom seven decks were below ground; accessed by a series of tunnels to various other buildings on the base.

  Stone was about to follow the intruder cadets when the Senior Chief’s voice blasted out of his communications unit. “Stone, hold where you are. I am coming down there.”

  Stone let out a silent sigh of relief. His time at the training base had been difficult. So far, he had managed to put his fear aside; it was easiest to do when they were training in suits.

  He watched streams of cadets bolt out various hatches and connecting passageways to run out into the open and drop to the ground. He could not recognize any of them. About half of them were in standard issue suits and the other half were in an odd assortment of intruder suits. Some of the intruder suits were configurations he had seen, others were not. He knew none of the other cadets could recognize him either, but a few of them waved a hand as they rushed past. A few of the cadets saluted him with an upright middle finger. Either way it did not matter to Stone, he waved back and smiled whether they could see the smile behind his visor or not. Most of them were gone before he could wave back, but he did it anyway.

  The streams of cadets slowed to a trickle and then stopped all together before Senior Chief Tsosie marched into the corridor. He was dressed, as always, in immaculate shipboard utilities. He was following three officers: two lieutenants and a full commander.

  One of the lieutenants gestured to the open bulkhead. He turned to Senior Chief Tsosie. “Senior Chief, no sense in letting the rest of the base eyeball this mess. Shut ‘er down.”

  The Senior Chief replied. “Aye, aye, sir.” He spoke quickly into his communications pick up and the bulkheads came down with a slam.

  When the four men were exactly three meters from him, Stone snapped to attention. The visor on his helmet shot up, revealing his face to the men.

  Generations had grown up in awe at the pictures of rank upon rank of navy, marine and army personnel standing perfectly still at attention in perfect rows. Most of the viewing public did not realize standard issue suits came with an ‘at attention’ button. Stone could stand for hours without moving, or rather, he could lounge around while the suit was standing at attention for him. The visor would remain down when at attention in the ranks. When personally addressed, the visor was always opened by a quick flick of an almost motionless finger. He was able to drink, eat, or watch a video. He could talk or even play a few video games with any others while at attention if their communications were not being closely monitored.

  The Senior Chief gestured at Stone’s helmet. “Lose the headgear, Stone.” The tone of his voice was almost conversational.

  Stone popped the helmet off and let it clang to the deck. He remained at attention, but now he had to keep his face rigid.

  The commander looked up at the hole and back at Stone. He poked at his personal assistant data pad a few times checking schematics. Finally he spoke, “This is the first time I have ever seen that. You are…?” He looked at Stone.

  “Sir, Cadet Blackmon Stone, sir.” Stone replied in a loud, not shouting, voice.

  The commander looked at Stone. “Who told you to put a hole in Ol’ Dirt Bottom, Cadet Stone?”

  “Sir, no one. It just seemed like the most direct route to get to my duty station, sir.”

  “Yeah, it rather was at that," the commander nodded. “Didn’t you give any thought to damaging my ship, Cadet?”

  Stone replied, “Sir, no. I mean, yes sir. I did think about it. Nevertheless, I thought that if I didn’t get to the armory before the intruders then the ship might be lost completely, so a little damage would be acceptable. I also kind of hoped that if the ship can repair and change bulkheads that it would be able to repair decks, too. Sir.”

  “Well, it doesn’t repair decks,” the commander shook his head. He turned to one of the lieutenants. “Better get a crew down here to fix this and the locks on the armory. The armory locks we expected, but the hole…” His voice trailed away. He looked at the hole, back at Stone and at the hole again. Finally, he just shrugged his shoulders and walked away, followed by his two lieutenants.

  “I don’t know what to do with you, boy,” Senior Chief Tsosie looked at Stone. “You were half a step from getting kicked out of this place. Your math skills are abysmal. Your shooting skills, until now, have been horrid. You don’t even seem to fit into the group dynamics, although we can attribute that to young age. I was going to discharge you after training today. I planned on telling you to go home for three or four years to mature a bit and to brush up on your math skills. Then you go and do something like this.”

  Stone was shocked. He knew he was not doing as well as he hoped, but he had not imagined he was doing so poorly they were going to kick him out. He wanted to say something, but there was nothing to say.

  “The commander is right,” the Senior Chief continued. “I haven’t seen anything like this either. Okay, Stone. Here is the deal. You just brought yourself a reprieve from getting the boot out of here. But, you find someone to help you build some math muscles in your brain, at least enough to get passing grades. You got me?”

  “Yes, Senior Chief.”

  “You have two more months before your
final exams and before you can move to the graduated class of cadets. Then you wait for a possible assignment to the fleet as a midshipman. That is, if we can find a commander who will take you. I will let you graduate if you can keep your act together that long. But I will be watching you closely, Cadet. If you screw up just once, you are gone from here and can go back to whatever stink hole you escaped from.”

  CHAPTER TWO

  Midshipman Stone nervously looked around the Lazzaroni Space Station Class B boarding area/waiting lounge. He was not nervous about the upcoming shuttle flight or even being on a strange space station. He had been born in space to a space-going, merchant family. All of that was second hand. He was nervous about being seen for the first time in public wearing his new United Empire navy midshipman’s uniform.

  He saw a navy full commander sleeping quietly in a chair. The woman had the blood red stripe along the seams of her trousers. That marked her as the captain of a combat vessel. She was protected by a phalanx of junior officers. Stone did see a couple of midshipmen among them, but they were much older than his fifteen years, with openly displayed service badges on their uniforms. That was quite unlike Stone’s new uniform. It was only adorned with brand new rank insignia, his name plate and nothing else. It also seemed everyone in that small group knew each other.

  Stone saw a quite a few other officers scattered around from all of the Empire’s military services. Most of the officers were napping, reading, or even trying to work. Even though he was technically a naval officer, he had been told at great length, that he was an officer in name only. As a lowly midshipman, he was a worm. True, he was a step above enlisted worm food, but he was at the bottom of the officer food chain. Being an officer, even in name only, did give him access to the Class B boarding area on this station.

  He might as well have been invisible to the other officers around him. Stone grabbed an empty seat near the arrivals and departure display. He sat back to watch the coming and going of the ships and passengers. His duffel bag sat in the seat next to him. It was stuffed with everything he owned. Everything except his shares of the family trust he had left in the care of his mother.

  The Class B area was nicer than Stone was familiar with using. Family policy was that when someone was waiting for transport between family ships or just travelling anywhere on business, if it did not help generate revue for the family, then it just was not done. Not that his family ever relegated any of their business travelers to the free Class E lounges. It was normally deemed sufficient to wait in the food court until your flight was called or pay the minimal charges for Class C or D waiting areas, depending on the length of the anticipated wait.

  Stone felt almost decadent sitting in the overstuffed chair. However, he had been assured by the station’s automated information attendant that his status as an officer, no matter how lowly, would gain him access to any lounge except Class A. That rarified waiting area was maintained for the truly wealthy and those with ranks of admiral and higher.

  Arrivals and departures were grouped together as ships tended to cluster into convoys. It provided only minimal protection against Hyrocanian raiding parties. Any type of naval movement collected a cluster of attendant ships hoping for whatever protection the navy could offer. Stone’s shuttle was delayed as his ship, the United Empire Navy ship Periodontitis had arrived in the system, but it had not yet reached the docks.

  Stone was only slightly disconcerted to be sent to a ship named after a disease. With hundreds of thousands of naval ships in the Empire, it was only a matter of morale that they bothered to name their ships at all.

  He was really glad to have been assigned to a ship. He would have been equally happy to have been assigned to a station. He would have accepted a posting to a planetary station. He would not have been happy about an open air assignment, but he would have gone. Anything was better than being passed over for an assignment.

  A cadet ‘graduated’ from midshipmen training upon passing all classes and courses. Then a cadet had to be accepted for an assignment. A cadet stayed in training until he got a posting if there was not an available assignment. Sometimes the bottom of a class could languish in a completed but graduated status for months. Stone had been at the bottom of his class. He had fully expected to continue to repeat classes and training, working to improve his scores while he waited until some commander was willing to take him. Senior Chief Tsosie seemed to be more surprised than Stone when he graduated with a shipboard posting ahead of most of his classmates.

  He stretched and looked around; realizing the waiting area was becoming full, but no ship arrivals or departures were on the callboard. There were very few empty seats left. He was sure if the Class B waiting area was full, then C and D would be even tighter. Class E did not have seats to begin with so it must be a complete zoo by now.

  He spotted a small group of marine officers swagger into the area. True to marine type, all four of the officers were huge, with massive necks and well defined muscles barely contained in their marine black utilities. Stone had not even considered joining the marines as his five foot seven was well short of the height minimum of six foot two.

  A marine major led his three companions straight toward Stone. The major was the shortest of the four, but by no means was he the smallest. The female marine officer was well over the height requirements, but not quite as massive as the others, still she was almost twice Stone’s size.

  Stone grabbed his duffel and set it on the deck next to his feet. There were not two seats together in the whole waiting room, much less four. The marines did not split apart. They stopped directly in front of him and the elderly couple setting next to Stone.

  The major dropped into the seat Stone had just cleared of his duffel. He smiled coldly at Stone, but said nothing. The other three stood quietly looking down at Stone and the old couple.

  Stone looked up at the female first lieutenant towering over him. She did not say anything. Stone stood and stretched. Smiling up at the woman he said, “Lieutenant, it seems I have been sitting far too long and have gotten a little bit stiff. Perhaps you would care to take my chair?”

  The woman folded herself into the seat with a snort. She replied, “A little stiff is all a shrimp like you could manage anyway, Midshipman.” She managed to spit the rank out as if it were an insult.

  The two remaining officers were both second lieutenants. They continued to stare at the older couple, who began to gather their belongings together.

  “Major, I protest the actions of your men,” Stone said.

  The nearest second lieutenant spun to face Stone and began, “Excuse me? I don’t-”

  “Enough, Heller,” the major interrupted. “This young man is an officer, not much of one, but an officer none-the-less. Let’s give him enough rope to hang himself.”

  The old man started to stand up, but Stone waived him back down. “That is alright, Signore. You and your wife’s seats will not be taken from you. You may remain comfortable.”

  He read each officer’s name tag and turned back to the major. “Sir, I voluntarily gave my seat to First Lieutenant Vedrian as she appears to be delicate and in need of a rest.” This brought loud laughter from everyone nearby listening. The loudest guffaws came from the major and the two second lieutenants.

  First Lieutenant Vedrian smiled, but it was a tight lipped smile.

  “However, Major Numos,” Stone continued. “I must point out that Second Lieutenants Hammermill and Heller are attempting to procure seats through intimidation. That is unacceptable behavior. Certainly considering that both of your companions appear better able than this couple to park their backsides on the deck. Don’t you agree, sir?”

  The brief laughter in the area was stilled by glares from the marines.

  “I do not agree,” Major Numos replied. “As marines in the service of the Empire we place our lives on the line to protect these civilians, young and old. We deserve a little comfort and respect.”

  “Major Numos, I agre
e whole heartedly,” Stone nodded. “Believe me, I do respect anyone who has lived long enough in the marines to achieve the rank of major.” He smiled shyly at Lieutenant Vedrian. “Even the rank of first lieutenant is an achievement I doubt that I could attain. However, sir, I believe comfort and respect should be given in gratitude. They should not be taken from those who are weaker.”

  The old gentleman levered himself slowly out of his seat. “I don’t want to be a bother.”

  “Good,” Heller said. “Then get out of my way. My feet hurt.”

  “Stop it, Second Lieutenant Heller,” Stone said in the loudest parade ground voice he could muster. “This couple is under my protection and they shall retain their seats.” Unfortunately his voice took the opportunity to crack.

  The marines laughed.

  Heller turned. He was almost a foot taller than Stone. “What are you going to do about it, Midshipman? I am outranked by the major, by Vedrian and by Hammermill, but I outrank you by so far you can’t even see me. Not to mention I could pound you to hamburger before you could bat an eye.”

  “Maybe you could pound me and maybe you couldn’t,” Stone smiled easily up at the marine. “Someday we may have to see, but not right now.” He turned his back on Heller and faced the major. “Sir, can you can keep your dog on his leash for two minutes?”

  Major Numos grinned and glanced at Stone’s uniform checking the nametag, “Why not? Heller, we give Midshipman Stone two minutes. If we are not both satisfied he has a right to those two seats then you will have my express permission to beat the ever-lovin’ bejeezus out of this young pup. How does that sound to you, Midshipman?”

  “That will be fine, Major,” Stone grinned. “If I don’t convince you that I have a right to those two seats, then I will try not to hurt Second Lieutenant Heller too badly. But, I should only need about half that time.”