Partners: Book Two, page 51
She straightened up a little and reached up to make sure her insignia were adjusted correctly, just as they got to the door to the mess and passed inside.
There were a bunch of people inside. April and Mike, Doug and Chester, wearing a plas bandage and an arm sling, Brent and Tucker, Elaine, all the ops personnel who had been with them on the rescue and the return.
“Hi,” Elaine said, as soon as the door closed, and the low hum of conversation died. “So, Jess, I got bushwhacked and asked about burns.” She got straight to the point. “As in, when can we get them.”
“Ah.” Jess understood now what was up. “I see.” She perched on one of the tables, regarding the small crowd. “So what’s the question?”
April cleared her throat. “We’d like to get our first.” She indicated Mike and herself. “And our partners wanted them too.”
“I explained techs don’t get them,” Elaine said. “It’s not reg.”
“Well.” Jess folded her arms. “It used to be reg,” she said, in a mild tone. “Back in my dad’s day, apparently.”
“His ghost come back and tell you that?” Elaine replied, in an equally mild tone.
Jess chuckled. “No. We saw the doc with his shirt off. He’s got them. And matter of fact, Dev’s got one, too.” She regarded her partner, who had quietly taken a seat at one of the tables. “I think if it’s going to be a tradition, it should be one for everyone who thinks it means something, not just agents. Techs do scary things and get hurt too.”
Doug positively beamed at her. Chester pointed at his arm in silence.
“That your call?” Elaine asked. “You’re senior.”
They all turned to Jess and waited.
Jess kicked the floor a bit with her boot. “You know,” she said, not looking at anyone, really. “We all took a big hit in the trust department here lately. For a little while, I wasn’t sure of anyone. That’s a really crappy feeling.”
“Was crappy for us, too,” Brent said from the corner. “What Josh did colored all of us.” He indicated himself and Tucker. “Everyone looking cross at us, wasn’t fair.”
“No, it wasn’t,” Elaine said. “We knew that.”
“Probably got some people killed,” Tucker said, quietly. “Sure got Sandy killed. I did the recon on her comp spool. She took the stick from Nappy. Didn’t trust him flying and it bit them.”
Jess nodded. “I think some of what was really going on was an attack from within.” She felt her way with a slight hesitation, the ideas forming unexpectedly. “Separating techs and agents. Making the culture different. Stopping that.” She touched her arm. “Making agents compete.”
“Huh,” Elaine murmured. “Fractured.”
Jess nodded.
“I felt isolated,” Elaine said, suddenly. “Especially after what happened with Josh. But you’re right, Jess. It started before that.”
“Right. So.” Jess straightened up. “Well, what we just went through, when we were in there, anyone think about trusting?”
April and Mike looked at each other, then at their techs. “We trusted you,” April answered. “And I don’t really have an explanation for that, because we barely knew you, and everything was going to crap.”
“Sometimes, I guess, maybe, you just trust the gut check,” Jess acknowledged. “Like I did with Dev. I had no real reason to believe. It was ridiculous. A tech given the knowledge in a week that you all get in years in field school.” She looked at her partner. “But something in me said, yeah, okay. This is all right.” She reached over and ruffled Dev’s hair. “And Dev went all in.”
Dev cleared her throat, slightly embarrassed by the intense attention.
“So anyway,” Jess said. “If you want a mark, get one. For that last one, we should all get the same.” She unfastened her jumpsuit at the neck and peeled it down off one arm, exposing the marks there. “I’ll go first.”
Elaine stood up. “I’m in,” she said. “And I know Jase will want one.”
Jess looked at Dev.
“Absolutely,” Dev responded, with a smile. “That was amazing work.”
“I want one.” Brent leaned on the table with both hands. “I always did,” he added, with a slight flush. “And y’know, maybe people like Clint might want in, too.”
Jess smiled, as the group closed in on her. “Get on comm then, and ask him.” She glanced at Dev. “Give your buddy a buzz. Long as we’re all being crazy, he might want in for old time’s sake.”
“Better go to med and grab a tub of cream then,” Tucker said. “Gonna need it.”
IT WAS COLD and raining outside. Dan Kurok stood quietly watching through the blast proof glass portal as the shuttle very slowly settled itself into position on the pad ramp. The rockets fluttered closed, and the locks fastened, off-gassing filling the space around the shuttle as a team of bio alt mechs started forward with ground umbilicals.
He sighed. It was hard to quantify really how he felt. In one sense, it was good to know that things had stabilized and he felt satisfied to go back to station and get on with things.
In another sense, though, he had grown, again, unexpected roots in this place and there was a part of him that really didn’t want to go.
Dev was part of that, of course. But the truth was, he now admitted privately, that as long as he’d spent on station, and how rewarding that career was, it had never developed any sense of family in him anywhere near what the feeling was he’d experienced in the last few weeks here.
A sound behind him made him turn, seeing the inner security hatch open and a crowd of bodies appear. Jess was in the lead, her arm draped over Dev’s shoulders, but around and behind her were all the techs and all the agents, and behind them, the sets and mechs he’d led in his small part in the battle.
Dev slipped free of Jess’s grip and ran to him, throwing her arms around him and giving him a ferocious hug. “Oh, Doctor Dan! I wish you weren’t leaving. I’ll miss you.”
He returned the hug, his eyes meeting Jess’s over Dev’s shoulder. “I’ll miss you too, Dev.” He released her, but kept an arm around her as she turned and the rest arrived. “And I’ll miss the rest of you, too. It’s been quite an experience we shared.”
Jess had her hands in her pockets, her black duty suit outlining her tall frame. “You should come visit again soon,” she said, a smile shaping her lips. “Or maybe we’ll come visit you.”
“I think that would be an excellent idea,” he said. “Especially when we start developing the advanced programming for Dev’s successors.” He glanced fondly at her. “Though we’re going to have to really work at matching you.”
Dev smiled in obvious delight. “Please say hello to everyone at the creche for me.” she said. “Especially Gigi.”
“I will.” He promised. The outer hatch unsealed and opened, and a blast of cold, wet, salty air tinged with rocket fuel gusted against them. A man in the bright blue oversuit of the interspace crew entered, looking around. “Kurok, Daniel J?”
Doctor Dan waved at him. “That’s me.”
“Please board,” the man said. “We are off schedule.”
“Ah. I see the customer service is as spectacular as always.” Doctor Dan released Dev and started forward, only to be intercepted by the gang of Interforce personnel, each of whom offered a hand shake, or a pat on the arm, or from the anxiously waiting sets, a timid embrace.
It was almost overwhelming, and it ended with a swirl of motion and then Jess was closing her arms around him in a rush of energy new, and strange, and yet echoing with remembered familiarity. “Both of you take care,” he said softly. “You hear me, Jesslyn?”
“You too,” Jess answered, as she released him and stepped back. “C’mon. We’ll walk you onboard.”
The interspace loader scrambled out of the way as the gang of them filed through the hatch, out into the icy rain falling around the shuttle, escorting his passenger until they reached the ramp, and he went up alone, pausing at the top to turn and wave goodbye before he disappeared inside.
Dev sighed, her eyelashes blinking to shed the raindrops. “Bye, Doctor Dan.”
Jess gave her a one armed hug, then turned and motioned the crowd to go back inside. “We’ll see him again,” she said confidently. “Maybe sooner than you think.”
The hatch closed behind them, and the rest of the crowd dispersed, but Dev and Jess went to the window and stood there, watching until the shuttle’s engines fired, and it rumbled back off the ground into the sky.
IT WAS STILL raining, though the darkness kept it to just a sound on the edges of the dome overhead as the assembly space filled with bodies.
The ramp doors were open, and everyone was wandering in, a mixture of ranks and specialties in a swarm of colored uniforms.
The mess had been restored to the point where it could offer crocks and basins of the basics, and just to one side of the food line was a cluster of black and dark green clad bodies, sprawled on the multi-level stone platforms that led up to the dais.
The newcomers sent from HQ mixed with what was left of Base Ten’s ops teams, personalities already emerging and polite conversation devolving into mild trash talk that even so, barely had a sting.
Jess and Dev, along with April and Doug, Mike and Chester, Elaine and Tucker, and a carefully wrapped up, and still pale, Jason and Brent were in a crowd of newcomers.
A stir got their attention, and across the room Bensen Alters was walking up to the podium as the lights brightened a little to focus the attention on it.
Jess sat up and swung her legs off the platform, bracing her hands on the edge of it as Dev scooted over a little. “So now let’s see what we’re in for.”
Alters had been acting commander for the week, and proved himself to be a calm and laid back presence, who focused on returning the citadel to functionality and handled the logistics of the repair teams and materials that had been flown in.
Jess found herself hoping they made his a permanent assignment. She didn’t know who the other candidates might be though. HQ and Alters had left her pretty much alone the whole week, as though hoping it would all fade into the past and let normality take over again.
It was almost a bit of a letdown kind of feeling. She’d at least expected to get a request to submit a report, or something.
But no, nothing.
Maybe they’d reviewed everything again, and decided she was a cock up after all. That she should have seen through Bain earlier, or something.
Alters cleared his throat and the sound in the room died down as everyone turned to listen to him. “Good evening, people,” he said. “I’ll make this brief since this is a time to relax and celebrate for a few hours.”
That didn’t sound so bad. Jess picked up her mug and took a drink from it. Maybe they hadn’t decided about anything yet.
“I’ve just got a few announcements,” Alters said. “First off, a final assignment of command has not yet been made here. So you’ll be stuck with me for a while longer.”
Jess chuckled. “Bet they want to see how he does.”
“Secondly, it has been decided that North base will not be revitalized at this time.” He went on. “At least until we have more personnel available. The recent past has left us a little shy of that.”
“So until any of that changes, this facility will be the eastern vanguard, and as such, the decision has been made to do a refresh of the battlements, and add some new weapons systems now under development.”
“Ah. Good.” Jess nodded. “I like that.”
Alters cleared his throat again. “HQ has informed me commendations and citations are in transmit. Likely those of you affected will have something in queue by tomorrow morning.
“However, I would like to announce just one of them now.”
The ops group all turned and looked at Jess. “If this isn’t for you, I’m limping out.” Jason said. “Dripping blood all the way back to my quarters. I swear it.”
Jess shrugged. “I don’t need any useless commendations.”
“That’s not the point. Take the respect,” Elaine said. “Don’t be an ass.”
Jess didn’t particularly think she was being an ass. So many people had pitched in, she didn’t feel her own role had been that important. But she waited in silence as an officer brought a box up to Alters, and put it on the podium in front of him.
“Oh ho, bet I know what that is,” Jason joked weakly. “Definitely for you, Jessie.”
“Crap.” Jess sighed, as she realized what he was talking about. “Shoot me now.”
“In the long tradition of Interforce,” Alters said, “we only have a few physical citations. We mostly like to give you all comforts and bonuses, as you all well know.”
Now everyone was looking back at Jess, as she covered her eyes with one hand, a faint hum of chuckles rising in the room.
“Two of our physical citations are posthumous.” Alters looked across the platforms with the start of a smile. “The third is the oldest, and can only be given to an active member. Its purpose is to acknowledge not number of enemies destroyed, or successful missions, but instead to celebrate the ideals of gallantry, of nobility and the old fashioned notion of heroism.”
“Please tell me this isn’t happening,” Jess muttered under her breath. “Someone call an alert.”
Dev looked profoundly confused. “Is something wrong?”
“Oh, Jessie. You poor thing.” Jason was leaning against the wall, holding his arm to his side, but grinning at her.
Alters cleared his throat again. “This citation is remembered best for its first recipient, and though it hasn’t been given in at least four generations, we’ll award it to that recipient’s direct blood descendant. Jesslyn Drake, please c’mon up here and get this thing.”
Jess wasn’t really sure how to react. She could hear the thunderous applause, and feel the hands patting her back and pushing her forward. She got control of her body and shook off the hands, but kept her own grip on Dev. “C’mon. You’re coming up there with me if I have to go get it.”
Dev had absolutely no idea what was going on, but she obediently stayed at Jess’s side as they climbed up to the top platform amidst the cheering crowd.
Alters opened up the box and took something out of it. “I know you probably want to kill me,” he muttered.
“No one wants to have to live up to this,” Jess muttered back. “It’s a millstone.”
“Maybe.” Alters carefully sorted out the bright metal chain and stepped forward. “But I didn’t argue with them when they said to give it to ya.”
With a silent sigh, Jess ducked her head and felt the links settle over her neck, as Alters gently laid the medal on her chest. She could see the delicate lattice of the background, and the stolid five pointed star, and the ring of letters around the edges of it.
She felt Dev shift and looked over at her, finding her inspecting her new decoration.
“It’s pretty,” Dev said after a moment. “Why do you think it’s incorrect?”
“Tell ya later,” Jess muttered.
“Try to bear up under the horror of it all, Drake,” Alters whispered. “Say thanks, and go and get drunk.” He patted her on the shoulder, then faced the crowd. “People, I give you our history’s sixth recipient, and the fourth of the same name, of the Star of Valor.”
With a long exhale, Jess turned and faced the room, accepting the applause and the whistles, and trying not to think about how red her face had to be. She clasped her hands behind her back and waited for the noise to die down, then cleared her throat self-consciously.
All those eyes looking back at her. “So I guess the first round’s on me, huh?” Jess said, before she could really think of what she wanted to say. She let the resulting laughter relax her though, and then felt a touch on her arm that was Dev and that made her relax even more. “I don’t think I did anything for this that everyone else here didn’t do,” she said. “I was just the unlucky one whose name was on the reports. So thanks.” She considered. “Let’s go party.”
Another roar of applause, and then she was free to leave and she did, tugging Dev along with her as she escaped back to the platform and a big mug being held out to her, hands slapping her back, and a big crowd gathering to admire her star.
She would spend the night in self-deprecation and hopefully get drunk enough to forget about it. Jess accepted the clink of mugs against hers. Maybe later, though, there’d be a moment for her to look at herself in the mirror with the damn thing on and not feel like such a dork about it.
Maybe.
IT WAS LATE. Dev leaned on her folded arms as she looked out over the sea, feeling the wind ruffle her hair. It had stopped raining, at least for the moment, and the seas were calm and only lightly white capped.
She drew in a deep breath of the salt air and enjoyed the faint spray as it hit her face, leaving a coating of salt on her lips that she tasted. “It’s so pretty.”
Jess came over and handed her a glass, already full of the rich, golden honey mead. “So are you.”
“It’s very nice of you to say that.” Dev held up her glass, and Jess touched it with her own. She’d learned about this curious habit and felt it was a little strange, though harmless. “And it’s true I find you a lot more attractive than the water.”
They both took a sip of the liquor.
“So here we are.” Jess leaned on the rock shelf next to her. “Here’s to hoping your second month in service is less insane than your first was.”
“I think the best part of it was meeting you,” Dev said. “Flying the carrier was good too.” She paused again. “And those shrimps we had.”
Jess started laughing. “Glad you’ve got your priorities straight.”
“And it was awesome rescuing Doctor Dan,” Dev said. “But you were still the best thing.”
“I feel the same about you.” Jess leaned against the wall, facing her. “Ready for some fish?” She indicated the portable griller behind her. “I know it’s late, but it smells good, doesn’t it?”
