SpecOps (Expeditionary Force Book 2) Read online

  "Baldilocks?" I laughed. "Who is that?"

  "United States Navy Lieutenant Williams," he explained.

  Williams commanded our four-man SEAL team, he had a shaved head, hence Skippy's nickname for him. Also, I'd already determined Skippy didn't like him. I knew that because Skippy told me so. Williams and I were not best of friends so far either, my impression was he thought I was completely unqualified for command of such an important mission, that I was unprofessional, uncommitted, too young and inexperienced, not taking my responsibilities seriously, and not much of a soldier. I disagreed with that last one. "Thanks for the warning, Skippy." I straightened up in my chair, and adjusted the iPad to the ergonomically correct position on the table, rather than in my lap where it had been.

  Williams knocked on the wall beside the door a minute later, the door was permanently recessed into the wall, I wanted to literally have an open door policy. "Colonel Bishop?"

  At the time, I was pretending to read something on my iPad, so he wouldn't know that Skippy had warned me he was coming. "Lieutenant Williams. Come in, sit down. How are you finding the Flying Dutchman?"

  "It's still a bit overwhelming," he admitted. "When we came aboard, I thought we would have somewhat of an advantage, because SEAL teams are accustomed to being deployed aboard ships. I'm finding that doesn't apply much here."

  We chatted for five minutes, him talking about how amazing it was to be in space, aboard a captured alien starship, me expressing gratefulness for how we'd been able to modify the Dutchman before we left Earth. Some of the ornate decoration in the bridge and CIC compartments had been toned down, or painted over. We now had a galley; a place to cook, serve and eat food, real food. And we had cargo holds full of food, enough to last seventy people for years. Maybe the best modification was the beds; sleeping compartments had been cut away so a full size bed fit inside; no more trying to sleep curled up in a cramped Thuranin-sized bed.

  Chang was supposed to come into my office soon, for our daily meeting, so I decided to find out that Williams wanted. "What's the issue, Lieutenant? I assume you didn't come in here to chat about the ship."

  "Sir, I appreciate the experience Sergeant Adams brings," Williams said, "and I welcome her advice. However, she is not familiar with SEAL, or Ranger, training standards. Or training methods of the British SAS, French paratroopers-"

  "You've made your point, Lieutenant," I interrupted him. Chang was my executive officer, second in command of the ship. Simms was in charge of logistics, and third in command. Desai was out chief pilot. Giraud was part of the French paratrooper team. And Adams, at Chang's suggestion, I had assigned to be in charge of training our SpecOps people about the ship, and the fancy new alien weapons they would be using.

  "You shouldn't be so cocky, Lieutenant Williams," Skippy added, "you weren't even the first choice to lead the SEAL team."

  Williams didn't flinch. "Sir," it wasn't clear whether he was addressing that remark to me or to the invisible Skippy, "I know I was the second choice-"

  "Fourth choice, actually," Skippy chimed in helpfully.

  "Fourth?" Williams asked, startled this time.

  "Lieutenant Jerome Hansen was the first choice," Skippy explained, "he turned down the assignment because he did not want to serve under Colonel Bishop. Hansen felt you were too inexperienced for such responsibility, Joe."

  "That's understandable," I responded. Probably most of the SpecOps people felt that way. Hell, I felt that way.

  "Lieutenant Williams here agreed to serve under your command, and was originally the second choice. However, he refused the secret conditions your military wanted to impose."

  "What secret conditions?" I looked at Williams sharply.

  Williams bit his lip, and explained. "The DIA guys wanted me to take over the ship, if I felt it was necessary, sir. I refused."

  "Yup, you did," Skippy added cheerily. "And the third guy they offered the assignment to also refused their condition, so they went back to you, and dropped their idiot idea of planning a mutiny. That's why, technically, you are the fourth choice to command the SEAL team."

  Williams looked back to me. "I didn't know that, sir. I think the mutiny idea was something DIA, and I suspect CIA, wanted."

  "I appreciate that you didn't come aboard intending to take over my ship, Lieutenant." My ship. I was now thinking of the Flying Dutchman as mine. When had that happened?

  "I can't promise that no one else has that idea. We have four other militaries aboard. And I can't vouch for the Ranger team, either, sir."

  "You make a very good point, Lieutenant Williams," Skippy said. "Colonel Joe, perhaps I should make an announcement over the intercom, and create a demonstration of what will happen, if any idiot troop of monkeys tries to take over the ship. How about I close and lock all the doors on the ship, and shut off the ventilation? Oooh, and I can kill the artificial gravity also, that will slow down any mutineers."

  "Skippy, you can't do that."

  "Huh? Clearly, I can, Joe. Oh, sure, I get it, you're right, I'll leave ventilation and gravity on in the bridge and CIC compartments."

  "That's not my point, Skippy! You can't, let me say this a different way, you should not do anything like that. If there is a plan for mutiny, I need to handle that myself. Having a shiny beer can do the work for me only makes me look weak, as a commander. I don't need any help here, Skippy, this is something you need to keep out of."

  "You sure about this, Joe?"

  "Hundred percent. You know about sciency stuff, I know monkeys, damn it, I mean, I know humans, people. Stay out of this."

  Skippy paused. "I'll make you a deal, Colonel Joe. I will stay out of this, unless there is an actual attempted mutiny. If that happens, certain monkeys are going to find out real quick that I am not always a friendly little shiny beer can. Anybody screws with me, they will seriously regret it. Ask the former Thuranin crew of this ship, if they have any questions about that."

  "We get your point, Skippy. Loud and clear." A potential mutiny is a subject that I needed to discuss with my command team; Chang, Simms and Adams. The entire idea of anyone trying to forcefully take over the ship is idiotic; without Skippy's cooperation, the ship was never getting home. "Williams, it is not my intention for Sergeant Adams to interfere with how you train your SEAL team, she will remain in charge of overall training. You and your team may have studied how to use armored suits and combots, you have no experience with them even in training. Bring your team to the training hold at 1300 hours, and I'll show you what I mean."

  Arranged along one wall, or I guess aboard a ship I should have called it a bulkhead, were ten Kristang powered armor suits, there were more of them in another compartment. We'd taken forty six suits from the Kristang troopship in Earth orbit, they weren't all in good condition, so out of the forty six units, we had forty two that were operational. The good news is that the troopship had equipment for modifying suits, we now had that equipment aboard the Flying Dutchman, and we'd been able to adjust most of the suits so that normal sized humans, anyone above five feet six in height, could use a suit. There hadn't been a whole lot of extra time before we departed Earth orbit, so I didn't have a whole lot of experience with the new suits, I did have way more experience than any of the new crew.

  In addition to powered armor suits, the Kristang troopship had provided us with plenty of rifles, ammo, and Zinger antiaircraft missiles. Except for Thuranin combots, we were equipped almost entirely with Kristang military gear, including zPhones for everyone, and night vision gear. The food, of course, all came from Earth.

  When I arrived at the large cargo hold we used for training, it was 1250 hours, and both Adams and Williams were already suited up in armor, with only their faceplates open. In the military, if you weren't early, you were late, so of course Williams and his SEAL team had gotten there half an hour early. Along with Adams was Giraud, the French paratrooper leader was checking Williams' suit and explaining its features. On the other side of the cargo hold,
Adams was going through exercises; bending over, easily jumping to touch the ceiling that was ten meters high, and spinning her unloaded Kristang rifle like it was a baton and she was a drum majorette. Generally, she was showing off, I figured she was doing it to intimidate Williams, and from the look on his face, it may have been working.

  Adams and Giraud showed Williams how the armor suit worked, and he went through a series of familiarization exercises. He was good, damn good, he caught on much faster than I had back when I put on a suit for the first time. When Adams and Giraud were satisfied that Williams knew enough not to hurt himself, it was time for the show. There was a large circle painted on the floor, Adams announced that the object of the game was like sumo wrestling, whoever knocked their opponent out of the circle won the match. They took positions opposite each other, toes touching the painted circle, and Giraud announced "Begin!"

  Williams, knowing Adams had more experience with powered armor, crouched slightly, then launched himself forward. He wasn't going to attempt any advanced hand to hand combat, he was going to rely on the suit's speed, power and mass to knock Adams out of the circle.

  Adams had a different idea. She stood in place, but as soon as Williams moved forward, a door in the bulkhead behind Adams slammed open, and a combot launched itself across the hold. The combot's feet never touched the floor, it flew through the air in the blink of an eye, crashing into Williams, knocking him to go skidding across deck. He struggled against the combot, but the Kristang powered armor was no match for the superior technology of a Thuranin combot. Standing in place and controlling the combot through gestures, Adams had the combot gently but firmly pick Williams up like a rag doll and held him against the far bulkhead.

  "Enough!" Giraud declared, and Adams gestured for the combot to release Williams.

  Williams popped his faceplate open, looked at Adams, and bowed. "Well played, Sergeant. You did warn me to expect the unexpected out here."

  "Everything is unexpected out here," I said. "Do you have any questions, Lieutenant?"

  To his credit, Williams wasn't insulted, he wasn't angry, he had an enormous grin. Getting familiar with powered armor, and combots, was going to be a bigger challenge than he thought. And special forces people absolutely love challenges. "No questions at all, Colonel," he said to me. To his team, he added, "People, this is going to be fun, so pay attention."

  I stayed in the training hold for an hour, taking the opportunity to gain time in a powered suit myself, it had been weeks since I'd used one. Fortunately, it quickly became familiar again, and I followed along with the SEAL team as Adams and Giraud put them through a series of exercises. It was good, I told myself, for the SEALs to see their commander knew what he was doing. The truth is, I was showing off, and I didn't care who knew it. Adams caught my eye a couple times, like when I jumped, touched the ceiling, did a backflip on the way down, and landed perfectly on my feet. That wasn't all skill, the suit's sensors detected the floor, and would have pulled me upright to land safely if I hadn't managed to do it on my own. After an hour of fun, I had to get out of the suit and leave, because my duty shift on the bridge started in two hours, and I wanted to grab a snack before then.

  Out in the corridor, I put my zPhone earpiece in. "Hey, Skippy, you call me Colonel Joe, you call Simms 'Major Tammy'. You call Chang 'Colonel Kong'," Kong was his given name, "or King Kong." Chang actually enjoyed being called 'King Kong', that nickname had totally backfired on Skippy. "You call Lt. Williams 'Baldilocks'. You have some sort of nickname for most people. But you only ever call Sergeant Adams, 'Sergeant Adams.' Why is that? Her first name is Margaret, why don't you call her Meg, or Peggy, or, hey, how about you call her Sarge Marge?"

  "Wow. I am impressed. I thought I'd seen the depths of your stupidity before, but you're setting a new record low for dumdumness. You have met Sergeant Adams, right?"

  "Duh, I met her before I met you. Oh, that was a rhetorical question."

  "Double duh. Sarge Marge, huh? Tell me, what do you think would happen if I referred to Sergeant Adams by that quaint nickname?"

  "Um, she'd kick your ass?"

  "Most likely. I seek fun, Joe, not suicide."

  "Ok, good talk, then."

  "Uh huh, sure. Hey, I noticed you showing off big time in the training hold."

  "Commander's privilege, Skippy. Besides, I do need to maintain proficiency with powered armor."

  "Why? You're the commander, you should remain aboard the ship."

  "No way. No way am I staying here all the time, Skippy. And are you absolutely certain there is no possibility that I will never need to use a suit, out here?"

  He sighed. "No, I can't say that for certain, Joe. Fine, you have fun, just don't hurt yourself. I won't always be there to protect you when you do something stupid."

  "Got it, Skippy, thanks."

  CHAPTER THREE

  After leaving the now-dormant wormhole behind, we had set course for another wormhole. Not the next closest wormhole, unfortunately the closest wormhole connected in the wrong direction from where we wanted to go. Despite Skippy's joke about setting course for a random blue star, we did have a particular destination planned. We made several Skippy-programmed jumps, then when we were in the middle of empty interstellar space, we programmed our own jump into the nav system by humans, our very first. My main hope for our first jump was that we didn't blow up the ship.

  I checked the main bridge display for the vital details of ship status, although I could see the same data anywhere on the ship with my iPad, it felt more real when I was sitting in the command chair on the bridge. The very bottom left corner of the display now had, in small script, the designator 'UNS Flying Dutchman'. Skippy must have added that while I wasn't paying attention. The same letters, much larger, were on a new brass plaque above the door to the bridge and CIC compartments. The crew, including me, liked that, it made us sound official.

  The governments that made up UN Expeditionary Forces Command suddenly decided, a few days before we departed, that they didn't like the name Flying Dutchman, and various other names were floated for consideration. I got the feeling their public relations people would have liked to run a worldwide naming contest on the internet, if they'd had time, and if the nature of the big star carrier hanging in orbit wasn't classified. Navy officers around the world protested that changing a ship's name was traditionally bad luck. Skippy cut the argument short by stating that he liked the name Flying Dutchman, that he controlled all data systems aboard the ship, and that the UN could name our captured alien star carrier the Good Ship Lollipop for all he cared, it wouldn't change anything. In the frantic days before departure, trying to get the ship loaded with all the people, gear and supplies we needed, I had no time for BS like caring what we called the ship. To our Merry Band of Pirates, it was always going to be the 'Flying Dutchman' anyway. When UNEF dropped the renaming idea, that was one less headache for me.

  Back home, I am sure the UN still has an international committee of highly-paid people studying the issue of our ship’s name. Don't worry, they will issue a report long before Earth's sun explodes. Probably.

  "Jump complete." Desai announced from the pilot's seat.

  "Are we clear, Skippy? No unfriendlies in the area?" I asked.

  "You tell me. You say you need to be able to fly this ship on your own, so look at the sensors yourself," Skippy said in a peevish tone.

  I wasn't going to argue with him, he was mostly right. The cold hard truth was that we did not need to be able to fly the ship on our own, what we did need was some sliver of hope that we might be able to fly the Dutchman on our own, after Skippy left us. Clinging to that tiny bit of hope was the difference between a high risk mission, and a suicide mission. The crew, including myself, had signed up for a high risk mission. Super high risk, admittedly. Risk of the if-anything-goes-wrong-we-are-totally-screwed level. "Pilot?"

  Desai answered more slowly than was optimal, and she knew it. "We jumped to the right place, within, seven h
undred, yes, seven hundred thousand kilometers." The tone of her voice was not filled with confidence. She let out a breath she'd been holding in. "Yes. Confirmed. Jump was successful," she turned in her chair to look at me, and gave me a thumb's up, with a weak smile. Desai had programmed the jump herself, this was the first jump Skippy had not loaded into the autopilot for us. Skippy had grumbled and complained loudly at the delay, then refused to check the numbers for us. "All I'll tell you is, you won't be jumping us into a star," is what he had said.

  His grumbling about a delay was understandable, Desai had programmed the jump into the computer yesterday, and we'd then spent the intervening time checking that the programming was correct. Three different teams of pilots and scientists had checked the programming, and that was after two days of analysis to decide what should be programmed into the Thuranin navigation computer. Skippy reluctantly had restored the original Thuranin operating system to the navigation system, running it parallel to his own access, making snarky comments about it the whole time. It wasn't the true original operating system, the Thuranin ship AI, it was a dumbed-down version that allowed humans access, and was simple enough for us to use. Skippy cautioned that if there was a glitch in the system, after he left us, we would have no way to debug or fix it. To which I had responded that, if there was a glitch anywhere in the navigation system software, that could only be Skippy's fault, for screwing up the programming, or missing something. That insulted his boundless ego enough for him to declare the software perfect, better than perfect, for he had loaded in his own maintenance and repair subroutine into it. I never let on that I'd played him, so I could use that particular trick again.

  "Sensors?" I called out to the people manning the consoles in the Combat Information Center, beyond the glass-like diamond composite bridge walls.

  "Nothing, uh, nothing on the scopes. That we can detect, sir," came the answer.