Retief and the Rascals (31 page)

            "You got to hand it to Cap," Blatski
confided loudly to Magnan. "He got a iron gut on him: he can swill that
Groaci near-rum all day, and straighten up in a second when old
Ruppy's
board
lights up!

            "Aye, sir!" he continued. "All
batteries laid and all personnel at action stations. Just like it says in
Section I: 3a!"

            "Hold your fire, Chief," the captain
growled. He glared at Magnan as if seeing him for the first time. What are
these civilians doing here at such a moment?" he barked.

            "What sort of moment was that,
Captain?" Magnan inquired earnestly. "We're from the Embassy; we're
observing Gorm Festival, of course. Quaint native customs are one of my chief
subsidiary interests."

            Muldoon jerked his rumpled tunic straight and
patted his braided lapels, glancing at the array of screens showing war vessels
on all sides.

            "Looks like an ambush to
me!"
he
barked. His eyes went to the battle-board. "She's lit!" he yelled.
"I don't know how, but old
Ruppy's
ready to take on all comers!
Start with that yellow Groaci thousand-tonner doing a sneak away from the field
of Battle, Stan," he ordered.

            Blatski hesitated looking uncertainly at Magnan.
"But, Cap'n, sir," he bleated. "Mister Magnan said— I mean, it's
not what it looks like! The Groaci are our chums now! They're helping us
celebrate Gorm Festival, like Mister Magnan said! I'd hate to be the one—"

            "You'll hate to be Superchief Stanislav
Blatski if you don't get on the ball, you damn fool!" Muldoon told him
harshly. "Do it, now! Are you a trained fighting man, or what?"

            "You bet, Cap'n sir," Blatski
confirmed eagerly. "I been through the old NCO school at Annapolis and
everything! Flunked chumship, though," he confessed. "That's why I'm
not a admiral now.

            "Lucky," Muldoon dismissed the plaint.
"Admirals— and captains, too—hold responsibilities that the rank and file never
dreamed of! Like me: I've got to figure out how to keep
Ruppy
in one
piece, and at the same time pacify that Embassy Johnny who was bugging me a
moment ago!" He looked left and right. "Where'd he go?" he
yelled. "I'd like to give that damn bureaucrat a piece of my mind!
I'll—"

            "He's standing right behind you, sir,"
Blatski got in hastily. Muldoon spun and stared down at Magnan.

            "Don't pussyfoot around my power deck—if
you don't mind," he amended more temperately. "I've got too much on
my plate, right now, to be trying to keep up with snoopers poking their noses
in where— Shaddup!" he ordered his mouth. Magnan was jotting busily in a
spiral-bound pad; he looked brightly at Muldoon.

            "Pity," he murmured. "I didn't
catch that, Captain. The noise from the screens, you know."

            "That's OK," Muldoon assured him.
"Just highly technical stuff a da—civilian wouldn't understand Now,
Blatski," he breezed on. "Just ease
Ruppy
over among those
garbage scows there, and—"

            "That's the Cluster Defense Force, sir,"
Blatski explained. "Meanest bunch o' privateers in this or any Arm."

            "Tell 'em to heave to," Muldoon
grunted. "If they hesitate, take out the one with the big red Coke ad on
the side. Damn stuff gives me gas!

            "That'd be the flagship, sir," Blatski
informed his captain. "Fella name o' Powerful Pete aboard her. He ain't
noted for his patience."

            "Bother his patience!" Muldoon
bellowed. "Hit him hard!" Just then the putative target did a neat
one-eighty and swelled on the screen, coming close to
Ruppy's
mighty
flank. Muldoon motioned urgently to Blatski.

        "Oh, I wouldn't,
sir," Magnan twittered.

            "Sure you wouldn't!" the captain
agreed. "But you're not Clarence (Typhoon) Muldoon! Stan! Do your
duty!"

            "Well, sir," Blatski replied as if
unwillingly, "I can't see her on my screens right now. Whereat is
she?"

            "She's got in my dead space!" Muldoon
yelled. "Can't get at her with the main batteries, and too high for the
anti-personnel charges to clear out! We've got to do a snap-roll. Blatski,
order all hands to secure f
or
a Fido!"

            "Jeez, sir!" Blatski protested.
"That's liable to mess up everything! Last time you did that, Chief Ying
never did get the chow sorted out again. Spaghetti and lobster sauce ain't too
good, sir!"

        "Blatski—!"
Typhoon started.

            "Bob Ying's the best cook inna Navy,
sir," Blatski reminded his captain. "How's about we just skip the
Fido?"

            "Well, I was only kidding," Muldoon
relented. "We'll do a dead slow instead, and blast 'em when they scoot out
ahead of us!"

            "That's some better," Blatski
muttered, "but when I brake, all the loose gear aboard is gonna hit the
bulkhead like a avalanche."

            "Got to do something," Muldoon pointed
out, "or they'll have a prize crew aboard here before you can say, 'Man
the lifeboats'!"

            "Uh-oh," Blatski said hoarsely,
cocking his blunt head to watch a series of yellow lights flashing on the Hull
Integrity panel. "They're aboard sir! What'll I—?"

            "Just step back away from that
battle-board, Chief," the rasping voice of Powerful Pete supplied.

            All heads turned. The rangy CDF chief was
standing in the entry, holding a 2mm casually aimed at Muldoon's knee.
"Cap," he addressed Muldoon, "you better go lay down on the Duty
NCO's cot. I got to have a few words with Blatski. Hi, Retief," he
interrupted himself. "Sorry if I'm butting in, but—"

            "No problem," Magnan assured the
dacoit. "We— Jim Retief and I—were just doing a little job of salvaging a
Chief Inspector's career, nothing important. Now, what do you think we should
do, to prevent these fellows from savaging each other—and us, too, in the
process—to the detriment of peace and order here in the System?"

            Pete's eyes went to the battle-board. "Lit
up like Macy's Christmas tree," he murmured. "I heard ... What you
waiting for, Chief?" he demanded of the Master Gunner.

            "Well, these fellows"—Blatski
indicated the civilians—"said—"

            "Don't pay no mind to Ben Magnan,"
Pete growled. "He's only interested in saving water while the house burns
down."

            "We got plenty water," Blatski
blurted. "Tanked up to the max back at depot!"

            "He's not talking about water, Stan,"
Muldoon contributed. "What he means is,
Ruppy's
board's lit, and
we've got ideal targets out there, and you're qualified as a Master Gunner! So
... what's the delay?"

            "Hold it!" Retief said as Blatski
turned to the fire-control panel. "I'm going to talk to Buck Promo."
He went to the com cubicle with its array of lighted dials and selected Promo's
frequency.

            "Admiral Promo," he called. "This
is the flagship talking. I want you to form your command in a space'nlike
manner and escort Colonel Switchback's units to the designated parking
area."

            "Yeah, I hear you," Promo came back.
"That
is
you, Muldoon, I guess. Well,
I'm
admiral here, and
I say—"

            Retief punched a red button on his panel, and
broke off as a thunderous detonation drowned Promo's voice.

            "What—?" the admiral blurted when the
echoes had faded. "Hold on, Typhoon!" he yelled. "I'm doing it,
as fast as I can, ain't I!"

            "Heavens!" Magnan twittered.
"What do you suppose—?"

            "I just used the special-effects circuit to
startle him a little," Retief explained.

            "That man's a deserter!" Muldoon
barked. "But he's still trying to come on like an admiral! I ought to put
him under arrest! In fact—"

            "Later," Retief suggested as the now
cold-sober captain opened his mouth to precipitate disaster.

            Muldoon subsided. Then, "Don't let him get
away, now I've got him under my guns," he muttered. "The rest of
these jaybirds, too! I can round up the lot of em and make points at
Headquarters!"

            "The matter is well in hand," Retief
soothed. "Just lie down, now, sir, and let Chief Blatski get on with his
work." He led the confused officer to the alcove where the Duty NCO cot
waited and the portly skipper flopped on it and went to sleep.

            "Well!" an irascible voice spoke up
from the direction of the union-mandated coal bunker. "I
do
declare!
Such a scene of disorder I've never witnessed." Heads turned; a small, not
to say stunted fellow in a pale puce CDT early late mid-morning dickey-suit was
advancing, brushing coal-dust from his seat. "Just look at that screen
there!" he squealed. "It's war, open and notorious! What are you
going to do?" His remarks seemed to be addressed equally to the chief
inspector, the diplomats, and Chief Blatski.

            "It's Reggie Mascot," Magnan whispered
audibly in the mounting silence. "Jim, he's known even to his fellow
sneaks in the Division of Inspections as an insidious nosy parker and
tell-tale!"

            "Indeed?" Reggie chirped. His eyes
went to Pokey.

            "And what have
you
to say to that
assault on our noble division, sir?" he demanded.

            "Easy, Ben," the chief inspector
urged, advancing toward Mascot. "Why, Reg, old boy, whatever were you
doing in the coal-bin?"

            "Not in compliance," Mascot muttered.
"Almost empty." He jotted further, mouthing the words, "Chief
Inspector indifferent to slurs cast on revered Inspector of Inspectors
..."

            "We don't use no coal," Blatski
pointed out defensively. "That's just the union ..."

            "The Union," Mascot declared loudly,
"has a well-financed lobby, which has secured legislation requiring not
only a coal-bin and coal, but a coal-heaver aboard all capital ships of the
Navy!"

            "Everybody knows that's just for the
union," Blatski muttered.

            "Chief Inspector countenances breaking of
regs, as well as offering insult to the Inspector General," Mascot
muttered as he jotted.

            "That's a damn lie!" Pokey yelled.
"I never said word one about that old basilisk!"

            " 'Old Basilisk'," Reggie scribbled
and closed his notebook with a brisk
snap!
He looked around greedily,
like a canary-fed cat looking for his next snack. "You, there, 'Blatty' or
whatever that name-plate says," he barked. "Now you get over there
and rearrange that anthracite. It's untidy in the extreme!"

            Stan looked mournfully toward the alcove where
Muldoon's snores had ceased abruptly.

            "No damn civilian is going to put my master
gunner on detail!" the captain's voice roared as he thrust out past the
stiff GI canvas curtain shielding the cubbyhole.

            He stamped across to thrust his face into
Mascot's. "And who in nine hells are
you,
Mister?" he shouted.

            Reggie retreated like a paper cutout caught in a
sudden gust. "Why, as to that," he squeaked "I'm Reginald P.
Mascot, CDTO-1, working directly out of Sector, and I'd like—"

            "Stan," Muldoon addressed the non-com,
"put this little pipsqueak in irons, if you've got any irons; I don't know
what the union has to say about irons."

            "Says we got to have 'em aboard, sir,"
Blatski supplied. "But Navy regs say they hafta be locked up in the
captain's safe, sir!"

            "Oh, yes, I remember seeing them last time
I had to splice the main brace," Typhoon agreed nodding. "I'll go get
them."

        "Sir, permit
me!"
Blatski offered.

            Muldoon shook his head. "You don't have the
entry codes, Stan," he reminded his subordinate.

            "Sure, I do, sir!" Blatski corrected.
"After all, us crew got to splice the main brace once in a while,
too!"

            "I thought the classified supplies were
dwindling a little faster than personal consumption could account for."
The captain nodded. "OK, you go get the irons, Stan, and I'll try to find
out what this nosy little sucker is doing on my Secondary Command deck in the
middle of a ba—Gorm Festival," he offered.

            " 'Gorm Festival'?" Mascot blurted.
"Do you mean to suggest that this war is only—"

            "Steady, Reg," Snail put in quickly.
"We wouldn't want these good people to gain the grotesque impression that
we, as inspectors, are inadequately briefed as to local customs."

            "Local customs?" Mascot asked in a
tone of Total Disbelief at the Impossible (1091-b).