Stormcrow, page 14
“Had that little spell when she woke up, too,” Tony added, frowning at the memory.
“What spell?” Lincoln asked.
“I asked her what her name was,” Tony explained as he discarded one blood sample and began checking another. “She looks at me and rattles off 'Jess T, three-one-one-five-seven'. I think?” he looked at Meredith who nodded.
“Anyway,” Tony continued. “When we looked surprised she said she had told us her name, Jessica Travers. She hadn't, but she was absolutely certain that was what she had said. It's odd,” he shrugged, switching samples again.
“This whole day has been like that,” Meredith sighed. She was hurting and it was starting to show. Tony pulled a hypo and began to fill it.
“No,” Meredith held up a hand but Tony had a swab and was already moving.
“Doctor's orders,” he told her flatly. “You're going to be in bad shape for at least a day or two, Captain, and probably more. You need this to help you get through it. I won't give you more than I think you need and never enough to endanger you, but you need to be able to concentrate. You've got more than one headache to sort out, don't forget.”
“She does?” Linc asked. “You do?” he looked at Meredith. She was lowering her trousers again, very carefully as every move she made sent spikes of pain up her spine.
“I'll want to scan your spine later,” Tony told her as he gave her the injection.
“Is that really necessary?” she asked, fastening her pants back and sitting down carefully.
“Yes,” Tony nodded firmly.
“What are the headaches?” Linc asked. “Or should I not ask?” he frowned slightly. “I'm not trying to butt into your Captain's business, I just want to catch up,” he promised. Meredith sighed.
“Tony would you excuse us a moment?” she asked. Enough was enough.
“Can't, Captain,” Tony shook his head. “Promised Sean I'd be here until he was out. I'm not going back on that. Soon as he comes out, provided that Linc doesn't show any distress, you can have the run of the place.”
“What does Galen being in the shower have to do with you being here?” Linc asked, puzzled. “I mean it's none of my business what you guys get up to, so just tell me to butt out if I-”
“Oh, God, no!” Tony almost howled with laughter. “No, one of us per ship is enough, thank you,” he chuckled.
“What?” Meredith asked, frowning. “Are you telling me that Sean is-”
“Sean?” Tony frowned. “Hell, no. He's straight as an arrow. I'm talking about Faulks of course.”
“What?” Meredith looked almost angry.
“Faulks?” Tony repeated. “Tall woman, terrible haircut, terribler attitude. Is terribler a word?” he frowned. “I don't think it is,” he decided before Meredith could answer. “Worse attitude, then.”
“Faulks?” Meredith scoffed. “You better be careful making those kind of accusations,” she warned.
“Not an accusation Captain,” Tony shrugged. “And I won't lose any sleep over the threat of Faulks,” he added. “I saw her myself. Not my business of course, and I'm certainly not fit to judge anyone else on the company they keep.”
“You saw her what?” Meredith asked, glancing at Lincoln.
“You know, I'm not really sure I should be talking about someone's private business like this,” Tony decided.
“You started it, so finish it,” Meredith ordered. “I'm getting tired of people on this ship taking my orders as 'suggestions'.” Meredith was in pain, she had had a long and difficult day, her husband had been grievously injured, she had a man on her ship that was capable of tremendous violence that hated her security officer and maybe her as well, a passenger that shouldn't have been able to decide which seat was the pilot's had taken her ship into the black and then on course without knowing how she knew how to do that, the list rolled on and on and she had finally snapped.
Unfortunately, she had chosen the worst possible target and that included Sean Galen.
“Well, Captain, if you insist,” Tony sneered. “I saw your friend Faulks coming from a well-known brothel on Dry Common the morning that all this bullshit of yours got started. She was in the company of a familiar looking woman and it took me a while to figure it out. The whore she was with looked exactly like you. Same height, same weight, same haircut, roughly the same age.”
“Now, since I happen to know for a fact that you and Lincoln were going to stay in town that evening before, it obviously wasn't you. Since I also know for a fact that it wasn't you because I could see the woman clearly as I passed by on my way to the boat, and since she was handing Faulks her bag which she had obviously left behind her when she left the brothel in question that morning, I just naturally jumped to the conclusion that Faulks played for the other team. But of course I could be wrong,” he added, his voice scathing and practically dripping with sarcasm.
Meredith sat very still, stunned at the revelation. She looked again at Lincoln who was lying very still, giving her a neutral look that was impossible to read anything into.
“Be careful when you make demands,” Tony finished quietly. “Be sure you want the answer.” Once more Meredith was prevented from answering as Sean Galen emerged from the shower, hair wet and shirtless. He'd obviously not expected Meredith to be still sitting there as he hastily pulled the towel he was carrying around his torso but not before Meredith got an eyeful of the scars and markings on his body.
“Sean, what in the world?” she asked, aghast at what she'd seen.
“I didn't know you were still here,” he said rather than answer. “I apologize.” He stepped back into the bath cubicle and a silent minute passed before he emerged again, fully dressed this time.
“Good to see you awake,” he said to Lincoln, ignoring the question that Meredith had almost asked. “How you feel?”
“Like I got kicked in the head,” Lincoln snorted then winced in pain. “Man I think my hair hurts,” he complained.
“You took a pretty good beating,” Sean nodded. “You're tougher than you act, Linc,” he added approvingly.
“Just hard-headed,” Linc tried to grin. “I understand I have you to thank for keeping me from whatever end I was looking at. Thanks, Sean.”
“Doc did most of the hard stuff,” Sean nodded toward Tony. “I did tote you back to the boat, though.”
“For which I am truly grateful,” Linc nodded carefully. “Seriously, Sean. Thank you.” Linc was quiet and sincere. For some reason that seemed to resonate with the engineer.
“Glad I could do it,” Galen nodded finally. He looked at Tony. “Check all that blood yet? Am I gonna be okay?”
“Blood?” Linc asked.
“It's clean,” Tony nodded. “Amazing. I would have assumed it would be crawling with pathogens. I'm glad it wasn't.”
“Can't always make assumptions,” Sean nodded.
“What blood?” Linc asked. “I'm so far behind,” he added helplessly.
“I got blood on me at the Station and Tony was making sure he didn't have to innoc me against something or other,” Sean told him. “Doctors love needles.”
“Hey, man, I was looking out for your best interest,” Tony objected.
“I guess I'll be in my room,” Sean said suddenly. “I'm at loose ends at the moment so I'll stay out of the way,” he said to Meredith. He gathered his gear and belongings and departed without further comment. Tony watched him go then turned to look at Linc's monitor.
“Well, I'll leave it to you as well,” he announced. “You're looking okay, Linc. Your eye should start to ease down in a day or so.” He took an ice pack and broke the capsule inside, wrapped it in a towel and placed it gingerly to Linc's head.
“Try and keep that in place as long as you can,” he ordered. “Should help with the swelling. Call me if either of you need anything. I'll be in the kitchen.” With that he departed, pausing only long enough to remove the gloves he'd been using and dispose of them. Soon it was just Meredith and Lincoln.
He looked at her, waiting for whatever she was going to say. He assumed she was going to bring him up to speed on the day's events.
“I've had enough of your treating me like I'm your boss,” she said instead, surprising him. “I don't like it.”
“Then don't act like it,” he shrugged carefully. He wanted things to be like they had before, but he wasn't going to take any more crap. From his wife or her hired bully.
“I was doing my job,” Meredith defended.
“You went way over the line of doing your job when you started delving into that man's personal life,” he corrected gently. “His family life. That was completely out of line. You can defend it any way you want and it will still be wrong. I tried to stop you from making a mistake, Meredith. You slapped me down, ignored my warning, and went right ahead with what you were doing.”
“That led to our engineer leaving the boat, which put us on the station to get hijacked the way we did. Which led to your being hurt and molested, and me laying here wondering if my vision will ever clear up again or if I'll spend the rest of my life looking at the world through a haze.”
“You're tired of me treating you like my boss?” he went on. “Well, let me tell you what I'm tired of. I'm tired of you treating me like a hired hand. I'm tired of your tame gorilla being in my face and in my business all the time. I'm especially tired of her trying to create a wedge between us. You may not see it, but everyone else does. I've taken her shit all this time because I know she's close to you, but no more.”
“You ever treat me like that again and I'm gone,” he said finally. “I toted an ass-beating like I've never received today. . .it was today, wasn't it?” he paused to ask. When she nodded he continued.
“I toted an ass-beating that you keep Faulks around to prevent, or so you say. Now that you've got some independent confirmation, I expect an apology for doubting me in the first place, but I assume that hell will freeze solid before I get it, so I'll settle for you telling her that she either gets her shit together in one sock or she's gone.”
“If you want to choose her over me then I'll accept that and go quietly,” he finished, laying back on the pillow, winded by the long speech.
“Are you finished?” Meredith asked, her voice testy at best.
“It looks like it,” Linc sighed, seeing that he hadn't made a dent in his wife's attitude.
“Sean Galen is apparently some kind of Freeborn assassin,” she told him flatly. “The man who had us knew him. Knew him well, in fact. He called Galen 'Stormcrow'. I don't recognize the name but Faulks did and almost blew a gasket. She tried to attack him as soon as he freed us.”
“Figures,” Linc snorted, then winced.
“Galen's attitude has changed considerably since then,” she went on. “He has become extremely difficult to deal with, especially where Faulks is concerned.”
“Imagine that,” Linc's sarcasm was easy to spot.
“Do you recognize that name?” Meredith asked, trying to keep reign on her own temper.
“Yes,” he surprised her. “I had no idea that's who he was though. You seriously don't recognize it?”
“Seriously,” she nodded.
“Well, if he really is Stormcrow, The Stormcrow, then he is definitely dangerous and Faulks should be sweating bullets about now,” he smiled at the idea. “The Stormcrow was probably the most wanted Freeborn assassin there was during the war. The bounty on his head was somewhere around one hundred thousand creds at the end of the war, as I recall. No one was ever able to collect it. More than a few died trying.”
“Is he still wanted?” she asked.
“No idea, but as far as I know all bounty warrants were recalled at the end of the war,” Linc replied. “And if you're even thinking about trying to collect it after what he did for us then-”
“Can you at least give me the benefit of the doubt?” Meredith's voice was just short of scathing.
“What do you think I've been doing?” Linc asked tiredly. “What do you think I always do,” he added. “You know what? I don't want you to answer that, because I'm not sure I can deal with the answer. The fact that you felt like you had to ask means that I've gone wrong somewhere as a husband. You are the one person I was sure would never have to ask me something like that. Anything like that.” He closed his left eye, still holding the ice pack to his swollen right.
“I'm tired,” he said finally. “I'm going to try and sleep, I think. Would you mind asking Tony to fix me something to eat when he gets time? I'm kind of hungry.”
“Linc, I don't want this to keep hanging here between us,” Meredith was alarmed by Lincoln's abrupt reversal. That wasn't his normal way of doing things.
“Well, I don't want to be laying here with the shit beat out of me, either,” he told her without opening his eye again. “Just like I don't want to be on a ship with someone who snipes at me every chance she gets without a word from you to back me up. You made this mess yourself Meredith and got mad at me for trying to stop you, at least long enough to think about it.”
“I've done all I can do,” he added tiredly. “All I'm going to do. Will you ask Tony if I can have something for pain? I'm really hurting.”
“I'll call him,” Meredith nodded absently, still reeling. She was losing everything in spite of all her attempts to stop it. She left the infirmary without another word, going to the kitchen to relay Linc's requests. After that she visited the head, cleaned up, and went to the cargo bay.
It was obviously long past time that she and Faulks had a pointed conversation.
Meredith walked out onto the landing above the cargo bay, looking down to where Faulks was working out at her weight bench. Faulks had never liked the machine in the lounge, choosing free weights instead.
Meredith had just left Tony, informing him that Linc was in pain and was requesting pain relief as well as something to eat. Doing that had allowed her to think over what she was going to say to Carolyn Faulks. So far she was coming up short.
It was painfully obvious to her now that Lincoln's warnings had been completely accurate. He had told her time and again that Faulks had a 'thing' for her and she had ignored it, believing that the woman was just clingy because Meredith had saved her life. While saving her life might have been the root of the issue, it was becoming clear that 'clingy' wasn't the exact term to use.
She made her way carefully down the stairs, grateful now for the shot Tony had insisted she take. It made her walk easier.
Faulks saw her coming and practically leaped up from the weight bench, toweling off rapidly as Meredith approached her.
“How you doin', Cap'n?” Faulks asked.
“I've had better days,” Meredith admitted. “And this has been a long one. Sit down,” she pointed to the bench. “We need to talk. Actually I need to talk and you need to listen.”
“Yes ma'am,” Faulks nodded, taking her seat. She patted the bench beside her indicating that Meredith should join her and suddenly everything became crystal clear to her.
“Faulks. . .” she started, then paused. How to start this? Strong and stay that way? Try to be easy with it? No, she'd tried easy and it hadn't worked. Had in fact helped create the situation between herself and her husband. It was time to try something else.
“Faulks, things are going to change around here, one way or another,” she said firmly. “I've allowed you pretty much free reign aboard this ship because of our service together. In hindsight I see that was a mistake. More than that, it's caused me a lot of problems that I've allowed to fester because I didn't pull you in before.”
“Ma'am?” Faulks looked worried now.
“Your antagonizing of my husband ends now,” Meredith said firmly. “It's become obvious that your reason for doing so, at least one of them, is some kind of attraction to me,” she lowered the boom. When Faulks' eyes went wide Meredith knew she'd hit the mark and that Lincoln had been right all along.
“That's not going to happen, ever,” Meredith said firmly. “I could say I'm flattered, but I'm not, Faulks. I'm married and what you've apparently been trying to do has hurt my marriage. Damaged my relationship with my husband. I'm the one to blame for not seeing it and not stopping it sooner, but I'm telling you now that it ends today.”
“Your bullying of the crew stops today as well,” she continued without let up. “I've tolerated much more of that than I should because of your loyalty, which I mistakenly thought was loyalty to me either from prior service or because of my helping you aboard the Celeste. Again it's apparent that while some of that might have contributed to your loyalty, it wasn't the true cause. I've asked you time and again to dial it back, to tone it down, and you've refused. So today I'm telling you flat out; change your ways or you're off my boat.”
“I've made some serious mistakes over the last few days,” she admitted. “Those mistakes are my own, but they were compounded by my slackness in dealing with you over the last three years. That put a strain on things that, had it not been there, might have kept this from blowing up in my face. I'm still to blame for that because I allowed you to keep treating people like shit, including the man I'm married to and love more than life itself.”
“So you either get with the program or decide where you want to get off and I'll take you there,” Meredith finished, her voice ringing with finality.
“Cap'n, Galen is-”
“I don't care,” Meredith cut her off. “I don't care who he is, who he was or what he did. Today he saved your life, my life, and the life of the man who means more to me than anyone in the galaxy. That's what I care about. Your problems with Galen are yours. I don't want them on my boat. If you can't deal, I understand and will take you to whatever port of call you desire and provide references for you to get work somewhere else. Though I doubt anyone else will tolerate your bullshit the way I have,” she added.
“This,” she motioned between the two of them, “isn’t happening. Ever. If I somehow gave you the idea that it was, it was accidental and I'm sorry. I don't think I have, but you may have read something into my behavior that wasn't there. If you did that's on you and not me. I've made it as clear as I can. All of it. Are we clear, Gunnery Sergeant Faulks?”
