Valor At Vauzlee (4 page)

"I enjoyed it as well, Zane. Goodnight.'

"Goodnight."

Lt. Commander Spence released her hand, turned, and walked away. Jenetta remained where she was and watched him go. As he reached the outer foyer, he paused and looked back. Jenetta smiled and waved. He returned her wave, and then continued on until he turned into the main thoroughfare and was lost from sight. She was filled with emotion as she turned towards the elevator. She wondered if this was what love was like.

Jenetta slept peacefully, her dreams filled with images of Lt. Commander Zane Spence.

* * *

The flight bay observation room window offered Jenetta an unobstructed view of the small ship from the Vordoth as it arrived and docked. Jenetta was waiting at the bottom of the ramp as Gloria stepped out of the airlock and descended to the deck. The two women hugged like dear friends that hadn't seen each other in months, when in fact it hadn't even been a week. At five-foot nine-inches, Gloria was presently taller than Jenetta. The one-hundred-twenty-two pound brunette, with an athletically trim body, had an easy way of carrying herself and a quick smile that made her face glow. Her smile was, without question, her most defining physical attribute.

When the Vordoth's captain was lost during an attack by Raiders, Gloria, in her official capacity as first officer, asked Jenetta to assume the role of captain. Although just an ensign at the time, Jenetta was the only Space Command officer on board the freighter. She had been trained at the Academy to command a ship under attack by hostile forces and the freighter crew desperately needed a leader with that skill just then. The unique tactics Jenetta employed as their captain successfully defended the ship, saving the freighter, its crew, and its cargo.

The women spent the remainder of the morning and a not unsubstantial part of the afternoon browsing in the shops that lined the concourse walkways, pausing only long enough to eat a light lunch at one of the many quick-food restaurants. Just after 1600 hours they walked to Jenetta's quarters so she could drop off her packages before they boarded the shuttle to the Vordoth.

Gravity in Operations Bay 2 was slowly increased as the small craft entered the Vordoth and settled onto the deck. As the enormous exterior hatch closed, Gloria engaged the magnetic skids to hold the craft firmly in place should gravity in the bay be decreased for other shuttle or tug operations. Rebecca Erikson, Charley Moresby, Leah Brewster, and Gunny Rondell watched impatiently from the observation room as the large compartment was pressurized. When the gauges moved into the green, they entered the bay and hurried to crowd around Jenetta as she emerged from the shuttle. She was immediately overwhelmed by their heartfelt congratulations for her promotion and medal honors. As a group, they all walked to the officer's lounge where they talked and laughed, as good friends do, until dinner was ready in the officer's mess.

Anthony, the gaunt, five-foot seven-inch officer's mess attendant with sandy hair and a permanent smile, had outdone himself with a combination of fresh and synthesized food, and the meal was almost as good as that served to Jenetta at Gregory's. After receiving the almost hijacked shipment of wine from the Sebastian colony, the grateful merchant gave Gloria several cases of the beverage. She brought out two bottles for the party. Jenetta limited herself to one glass at dinner, and one later in the lounge. She didn't want to risk being inflicted with the slightest impairment when she reported aboard the Prometheus in the morning. Mikel Arneu, the Raider commandant of the base where Jenetta's DNA was altered, had told her that she would become increasingly impervious to the effects of alcohol, but this wasn't the time to test his averment.

"I wish that we could attend the medal ceremony," Gloria said as they relaxed in the officers' lounge following their meal.

"I'd love for you to be there so you could share the moment with me," Jenetta said, smiling, "but I know that you can't take eight months or more off just to come to Earth to see me get a small chunk of metal pinned on my chest. I'm sure that the ceremony will be covered by the press."

"You can be damn sure of that," Gunny said. With his close cropped haircut, Gunny Rondell, a retired Space Marine Gunnery Sergeant who had just celebrated his fifty-seventh birthday, looked like your stereotypical Marine noncom. Standing about six-foot four-inches tall, he was still able to handle any three ordinary men stupid enough to take him on. He'd never had an opportunity to attend such a ceremony in person, but he'd seen one on a vid feed while posted aboard a GSC battleship. "It's been about twenty-seven years since the last MOH was awarded. I was just a PFC at the time, but I remember seeing the event on the ship's closed circuit vid. The Marine, I can't recall his name— Stephen something, risked his life to save a dozen of his fellows after their assault transport crashed during a training exercise on a planet in the Centrasia system. He had lost part of a hand in the crash, and been terribly disfigured by fire, but he kept running back into the small ship and dragging other Marines out until the fire got so bad that he couldn't get in anymore."

"That's
true
heroism," Jenetta said somberly. "Your story makes me feel guilty about getting the medal."

"Don't be
ridiculous
!" Leah said emphatically. Just twenty-seven-years-old, Leah Brewster, looked like a professional model. Six-feet-tall, with a glossy black mane of hair that fell almost to her waist, she exuded sexiness. She was also hopelessly in love with Gunny. "He only saved a dozen. You saved fifty of us. I'd be on my way to a slave brothel right now if you hadn't rescued me. And the others would either be headed for brothels, or slave labor camps on some miserable mining planet. You deserve the medal as much or more than anyone who has ever received it."

"And thanks to your efforts," Rebecca, the five-foot seven-inch ship's doctor, said, "Raider activity in this part of space has all but disappeared. Thousands, tens of thousands, of people are now traveling in safety." The attractive thirty-six-year-old brunette had been the one that awakened Jenetta after her life pod was recovered by the Vordoth crew.

"And the Galactic Alliance recouped the two battleships stolen from the Mars shipyard just days before they were to be turned over to Space Command," Charlie said. "I shudder to think what destruction those ships would have wrought in the hands of the Raiders." Moresby, at forty, was the Chief Engineer aboard the Vordoth. Of average height, with rugged good looks, he was that special person in Rebecca Erikson's life.

"And let's not forget that Jen saved both the Vordoth,
and
a Nordakian convoy on a desperate mercy mission to Obotymot," Gloria said. "Without those supplies, many thousands of Nordakians would have died before another convoy could be sent. Just because you weren't injured, doesn't mean that you deserve the medal any less than anyone else who has received it, even those to whom it was awarded posthumously."

"But Jen
was
injured," Rebecca said. "She suffered a broken arm while retaking the Prometheus. And then there was the torture and near starvation she endured at the hands of sadistic guards in the Raider Detention Center. And we can't forget the extremely painful DNA alterations that were performed on her, and which are still giving her problems."

"That's right!" Gloria said firmly. "So let's not hear anymore of this foolishness that you don't deserve the medals and other honors simply because you didn't repeatedly rush into a burning transport ship."

Jenetta smiled. "The best thing that I've gotten out of all this— is five wonderful friends."

At 2200 hours Gloria and Jenetta made the trip back to the space station, a Vordoth crewman piloting the shuttle because Gloria had imbibed sufficient wine to make her flying skills unsure.

The massive space station was a beautiful sight. Easily visible to the naked eye from the planet below, the station resembled an oval-cut, blue opal gemstone, surrounded by a sixty-kilometer long silver necklace. The necklace was the docking ring, of course, where dozens of massive ships could be docked with the station simultaneously. Roadway tunnels, connecting the station to the docking ring, appeared like spokes in a wheel.

The standard method of appending loaded cargo link sections to the rear of a freighter obviates the need for it to dock directly with a station. Although cargo is always accessible for inspection, it can't easily be offloaded through a freighter, except for the small, single hull ships or the gargantuan Space Command Quartermaster vessels, so space around the station was currently dotted with dozens of commercial freighters of various lengths. A few, those who had either just arrived or were preparing to depart, were maxed out at the legal length of ten-kilometers, but most were either having their cargo sections assembled or disassembled in preparation for their next run. Several enormous cargo ‘farms,' filled with link sections containing cargo in transit, floated a few hundred kilometers from the station, and some captains parked their vessels near one of them while loading or unloading, but most preferred to position vessels near the station so that crew members could enjoy liberty time within easy commutation distance. An entire ten kilometer long cargo section could be assembled at one of the farms and then towed to the freighter as one piece by company employees permanently stationed in civilian quarters aboard the station, or on lodging barges. So the main ship need never travel until it was time to depart the area.

Once inside the station, Gloria and Jenetta said their goodbyes. They hugged, promised to keep in touch, and then Gloria left. Jenetta watched until the shuttle disappeared from view, then returned sadly to the BOQ. She wondered when, or even if, she would see Gloria and her other friends aboard the Vordoth again.

‘
A life in space is so difficult on both romances and friendships
,' she murmured.

She wouldn't have much time to dwell upon it though. Tomorrow she would report for her new posting as second officer of the GSC battleship Prometheus.

~ February 22
^nd
, 2268 ~

At 0600 hours Jenetta released the handle of her packed spacechest and allowed it to settle gently to the deck just inside the entrance of her BOQ quarters. Her smaller cases were stacked on top The ‘oh-gee' capability of the large spacechest was more than adequate to lift anything she had to move. Housing would see that her possessions were picked up and delivered to the ship sometime during the day.

She remembered to call the base hospital and leave a message for Doctor Freidlander, informing him that she was shipping out. She thanked him for making the arrangements to grow skin for a graft that would cover the indelible mark imprinted on her chest, and apologized for the wasted effort. While the skin graft was important, nothing in the galaxy was more important to her than being aboard the Prometheus when it departed Higgins Space Command Base.

After enjoying a satiating breakfast at the officer's mess, Jenetta headed for the docking pier where the Prometheus was moored.

Two armed Space Marine sentries at the airlock entrance to the forward cargo hold braced sharply to attention as Jenetta approached. Word of her new posting had obviously preceded her. Her current celebrity meant that the OD, a young lieutenant(jg), didn't have to ask what business she had aboard ship as he gave permission for her to cross the airlock threshold. Nor did he feel compelled to see proof of identification. Her face would be immediately recognized by anyone at the space station.

As she entered the ship, it felt like she was coming home. The dull, recycled, and odorless air of the forward cargo bay could never smell more invigorating to anyone, she thought as she breathed deeply. Her months as captain aboard this incredibly powerful warship had instilled incredibly deep feelings in her. She couldn't think of a single posting in the entire galaxy that she would rather have, unless it was either as first officer or captain of the Prometheus. After being passed, she headed directly for the bridge.

Two Marine sentries, a PFC at the entrance to the bridge corridor, and a Lance Corporal outside the Captain's Quarters smartened their stance as she approached and passed them. Neither challenged her as she proceeded towards the entrance of the bridge.

As she moved within range of the portal activation sensor, the double doors slid open to reveal the ship's fourteen-meter by twelve-meter command center. The presence of only four individuals immediately reminded Jenetta of the day she had seized control of this ship at the Raider base. She paused briefly to glance at the commissioning plaque on the wall just inside the entrance and saw, to her great delight, that ‘Jenetta Alicia Carver, Ensign' had been inscribed as the first captain of the ship. In appreciation for her recovery of this vessel and its sister ship the Chiron, she would forever be officially recognized as the first captain of the Prometheus. It was an incredible honor. In the entire history of the service, no other ensign, indeed no officer below the rank of commander, had captained an active duty battleship.

Immediately beneath her name had been inscribed the name of the warship's
new
commanding officer, ‘Lawrence Frederick Gavin, Captain.' A lieutenant sitting at the astrogation station, stood, straightened his tunic, and approached Jenetta as she gazed at the plaque.

"Welcome aboard, Commander Carver."

Turning to face the young officer, she smiled and said, "Thank you, Lieutenant. I'm delighted to be aboard. Is the Captain here?"