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I shook my head. “It was pretty quiet after I convinced my watch section that I wasn’t interested in an orgy on the bridge.”

Mel and Fredi looked at me strangely. Arletta was getting to know me well enough that she didn’t blink.

“And you were shocked that Cramer’s walking a little funny this morning?” Fredi asked after a moment.

“Well, I’m not surprised,” Arletta said. “They were being rather loud when I got back from watch.” She shook her head. “You’d think they’d be a little more discrete.”

Fredi surprised me by snickering and Mel just winked at me. It took me a tick to realize that Arletta was pulling my leg. Maybe.

“Well? Shall we eat?” she asked. “I can’t imagine the captain will break with his long standing tradition of skipping breakfast, do you?”

Mel shrugged and helped herself to the eggs, passing the dish along. In a matter of a tick or two, we all had eggs, bacon, and potatoes. A covered basket proved to hold buttered toast, and we passed that around as well. The whole experience struck me as a bit surreal and I didn’t say much over breakfast.

Mel and Fredi left just before 07:00, leaving Arletta and me with the leftovers.

“Welcome to the love boat,” she quipped gently. “Where you don’t need love, just lube.”

“I didn’t really believe it…or maybe just didn’t understand. Even last night on the bridge, when D’Heng started to strip down for a three way with Jaxton, it was unreal.”

“She what?”

“Long story, but the short version is I asked her to come to the bridge so she could help us clean. She thought I wanted something else. She didn’t seem to be too surprised with it all until I asked her to go to the janitor’s closet and get the cleaning gear.”

“You didn’t!” She gave me a wide-eyed stare.

“Why not? It needed cleaning and we needed something to do for six stans.”

“And they went along with it?”

“Sure. Why wouldn’t they?”

“Lemme get this straight. You sat and watched your helm and messenger clean the bridge for the whole night?” She was turned halfway around toward me in her chair as she spoke.

“No,” I said. “Of course not. I helped, and we were pretty much done by 03:30. I sent D’Heng down for coffee around 04:00 and we all sat around and admired our work until David relieved the watch at 05:45”

She sighed and turned back to her plate. “I hope you know what you’re doing.”

“How much trouble can I get in for cleaning the bridge?” I asked.

“That’s not the point, Ishmael,” she said with some exasperation. “You’re changing things and people who try to change things sometimes get their heads handed to them.”

“What? Just for cleaning the bridge? Or by not screwing my watch standers while on duty?” I asked, a bit exasperated myself.

“Both,” she snapped.

She stood and stormed out of the wardroom.

I blew out a long breath and shook my head. I hoped I knew what I was doing, but there seemed to be a lot of people who thought I didn’t. I picked up my dishes and stacked them in the tray before snagging one last piece of bacon and heading back to my stateroom to change for a workout. I hadn’t had a good run in days and the treadmills in the gym were calling my name.

When I got there, Betts was running alongside a tallish woman that I didn’t recognize. There were so many people aboard that I didn’t know. It was strange to think that the crew knew everybody because they saw them all, eventually, either on the mess deck or on duty. The wardroom kept the officers isolated. There were people in my crew that I’d never seen. That set me thinking, again, about what I’d let myself in for.

With the two treadmills in use, I stepped into the workout area and began a tai chi set. I started with some warm ups and stretching, then moved smoothly into a Wu Long Form. I was working slowly and deliberately through the form, focusing on breathing and hand tension. I felt myself relaxing into it as the pressures of the previous few days slipped away. About the time I finished the first set, the woman pulled up and stepped off the treadmill, leaving it empty as she headed for the showers.

I took advantage of it, stepping onto the machine and punching in a brisk pace. I lost myself in the pad-pad-pad of my feet on the fabric. Or tried to.

“Sar? What was that dance you were doing?” Betts asked from the other treadmill, his words coming in short pants between breaths.

“It’s tai chi, Mr. Betts.”

“You do that often, sar?”

“As often as I can.”

His treadmill beeped and slowed so he stepped down from the track, shutting it off as he went.

“That’s my ten klicks,” he said with a grin. “See ya round, sar.”

I watched him head for the showers and went back to my running. It felt good to be moving, and if it wasn’t exactly on a track, at least I was running.

When I’m running, I can think. Tai chi stops thinking. You have to focus too much on the now. Hands, feet, weight, balance, tension or release. It’s just not possible to think while you’re doing tai chi. At least not if you want to do it well. Running, on the other hand, got my brain into full motion. I wondered how much trouble I was going to be in by cleaning the bridge. If I’d thought about it before I did it, I might not have, but it just seemed like the logical thing to do. It had certainly been more pleasant afterward, and the displays did look crisper.

Thinking on it, my action could be construed as a criticism. I wasn’t sure how involved the captain or first mate really was, but I knew that Arletta was trying to keep a low profile to stay out of trouble. Mel seemed concerned for me, too, and Fredi just seemed scared. She was one of Alys Giggone’s officer recruits, so I suspected she’d spent at least some time as crew as well. I tried to imagine what a woman of her obvious experience and skill would be scared about in the wardroom. The captain was a bit of a pain, and the first mate was a dangerous man in his own way, but I had a hard time coping with the notion that he might actually harm—physically, at any rate—a member of the crew—his crew.

It just didn’t make sense.

C
HAPTER
N
INETEEN
D
IURNIA
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YSTEM
2358-
J
ULY-9

After the run, I went back to my stateroom to shower. I knocked carefully and listened before going into the head. It was my second shower of the morning and I wondered if Arletta was going to think I was some kind of weirdo with all the bathing. Still, after a workout, it felt good. Even with all that, it was barely 09:30 when I was finished so I set my tablet to wake me at 11:00 and lay down on my bunk for a quick nap.

Sleep was elusive, though. I generally didn’t have much difficulty falling asleep. I was usually so exhausted that the opportunity for a few stans sack time resulted in instant slumber. Something about being on that ship had my mind going, and it wouldn’t shut down. Maybe it was the tension. Maybe it was the smell. Maybe it was just that I was a boot third mate and in over my head.

Maybe the captain had a point, and I was working for somebody without even knowing it. The whole idea was preposterous, but the captain had raised a lot of valid questions. Why me?

I must have nodded off because my tablet bipped me out of a sound sleep. I slipped back into my shipsuit and, after splashing a little water on my face, slipped over to the mess deck for a cup of coffee. As I was filling the cup, Chief Vorhees came out of the galley with a grin on his face.

“Well, the coffee is a hit. Thanks for your help.” He said, studying his boots.

“It was my pleasure, Mr. Vorhees. I didn’t do much, though, just offered some suggestions to your excellent Ms. Cramer.”

“Uh huh,” he said with a wry grin. “That’s the way you wanna play it, that’s fine with me, sar. You’re making me look better and I appreciate it. Anything you need, lemme know, okay? I owe ya one.”

“Thanks, but I have to drink the coffee, too, and I’m just glad Ms. Cramer is such a quick learner.”

“I’m serious, sar. You need anything, just call. Okay?”

“Thanks, Mr. Vorhees. I appreciate the offer.” I raised my cup in a toast and headed for the bridge. It wasn’t time for my watch yet, but I needed to change out the removables to get ready for the next backup cycle before I relieved Mr. Burnside.

I cleared all my backups and made it to the bridge by 11:40. Mr. Burnside looked a tad more awake, but he didn’t smell any better. Stewing in a dirty shipsuit for six stans when you weren’t too clean to begin with, wasn’t a good idea. He looked at me with one eyebrow raised as I crossed the bridge to the duty station.

“You’re early,” he said.

“I was in the neighborhood. Had to clear my backups.”

“You had a busy night, looks like,” he said, waving his hand around to indicate the bridge.

“Not so much, really. The three of us made pretty short work of it.”

He frowned at that. “The three of you?”

“Yeah, I had helm and the messenger up here working with me to get it shipshape and Bristol fashion.”

“You cleaned alongside the crew?” His voice sounded flat.

“Well, yeah,” I said, not picking up the tone until it was too late.

He nodded toward the wing away from the helm, and we stepped over to the side of the bridge. He lowered his voice and said very precisely, “Mr. Wang, you are now an officer. You are expected to comport yourself like an officer. I know you’re fresh out of the academy, and that you’ve actually been a crewman and all, but you must learn to keep a professional distance from the crew at all times.”

He could have hit me with a stick, and I’d have been less surprised.

“I need to keep a ‘professional distance’ you say?” I tried to keep the disbelief out of my voice.

“Yes, Mr. Wang—Ishmael. I’ve seen it before in new, young officers. These people are not your friends. They are your employees. You are in charge, and it weakens your position…and the position of every officer on the ship…when you stoop to doing menial tasks like cleaning the bridge.”

He looked at me so earnestly that I realized he actually believed what he was saying. He stood there, smelling of sex and sweat and dirty uniform, and had the stones to admonish me about keeping a “professional distance” from the crew, and he was serious.

“Thank you, David. That’s valued advice, and I appreciate your taking the time to point out the problem,” I told him with as much sincerity as I could muster through my anger.

He seemed a bit nonplused in return. “That’s a very encouraging response, Ishmael. Most new officers don’t take that kindly to being corrected.” He smiled. “You’re going to go far on this ship, if you can keep that kind of attitude.”

“Thank you, David. I appreciate your candor,” I said sincerely.

I really did appreciate the candor. One of the important lessons was to know your enemy. He was giving me a lot of good information.

Ms. Jaxton clambered up the ladder to the bridge then and interrupted our little conference.

“Shall we relieve the watch and get on with the afternoon’s festivities?” I asked.

Mr. Burnside nodded with a small smile. “Yes, excellent. Nothing new and we’re on course. You can have it,” he said with a wave.

I replied formally with, “I have the watch, Mr. Burnside. Logged at 2358-July-9 at”—I had to check the chrono—“11:43 per standing order.”

Jaxton and Mallory swapped places and the two men vacated the bridge without another word.

“So? Any the worse for wear after your hot night on the bridge, Ms. Jaxton?” I asked her as I settled into the watch station.

She chuckled. “None in the least, sar, although Charlotte is suddenly very popular below decks.”

“I would have thought she was already quite popular,” I replied dryly.

“Well, news of the three way on the bridge during the midwatch appears to have spread, sar,” she said with a lot more humor than I found in the situation.

“How in the world has that story managed to spread so quickly? I mean I know the ship is small, and gossip spreads fast, but you were just teasing Mr. Mallory about it six stans ago.”

“I told you he wasn’t the sharpest tack in the box, sar. Apparently he and Mr. Apones had their heads together over breakfast and they’ve come to the conclusion that we made such a mess of things up here that we had to clean the bridge entirely to hide the evidence.”

I almost choked on my coffee. “They what?”

“I confess,” she said with a satisfied grin. “I told them I had to clean butt prints off the glass, sar. That probably fueled the frenzy.”

“But those prints were already there!”

“Well yes, sar, they were. You know that. I know that. Ms. D’Heng knows that. But I think we neglected to mention that to the rest of the crew.”

I didn’t know whether to laugh or scream. “Let me get this straight. The crew thinks that you and I and Ms. D’Heng had an orgy on watch last night? And that we spread—evidence—all over the bridge to the point where we had to clean it to hide what we’d done?”

“Well, not all the crew, sar. Just a few of the more gullible.”

I buried my face in my hands right there at the watch station.