Here is the
newest installment of my unfinished novel, The Man Who
Found Birds among the Stars, a fictionalized
biography of Capt. Robbin Nikalishin, the starship
Captain who made the first contact with
extraterrestrials in the 28th century (some 2.5
centuries before the time of The Termite Queen).
I'm curious as to how many of you are actually reading this series. I can't tell because I don't get any comments. Some of the episodes get a lot of page views, but nobody writes, "Enjoyed this chapter, can't wait for the next" or even "This is really a boring story -- why are you bothering to post it?" So give me some feedback -- please? Would you enjoy the story more if you were reading it in book form, without so much time between posts?
A list of the
previous posts, with links:
Prologue
Chapter
1 The Captain Eats Crow
Chapter
2
How Robbin Nikalishin Got His Name
Chapter
3 The
Captain Receives an Unexpected Assignment
Chapter
4 School
Days at Epping Academy
Chapter 5 The Captain Takes Command
of the Red Planet
In keeping with my method of alternate flash-backs and flash-forwards, Chapter 7
chronologically follows Chapter 5. We begin to know the Captain's first love, whom we met back in Chapter 1, and we get a bit further into the intricacies of his life and character.
CHAPTER 7: AN OLD LOVE AND ANOTHER ASSIGNMENT
(30 October-4 November 2766, Old Heathero
Flight Port)
When Robbie arrived back on Earth after the Red Planet mission, he walked into his quarters at Sloe Hostel and
knew immediately that something was different.
Even though Minie did not officially reside in Sloe, she had
managed to accumulate a lot of personal belongings in the Captain’s room. Now the closet stood open and every last
thread of female clothing was gone, along with the contents of the bathroom
cabinet. Then he saw a scrap of
plastipaper on the bed pillow.
Dearest Robbie redbrest, it
read. We both knew it was just a temperery get together. 3 month is to long without a socail life, and
something else came along. Ill never
forget you, though, wizzer – its been a hoot being a heroes trag for awile just
like I knew it would. Bye bye, duck
… Yours, with great memeries, Willemina
Dill.
Robbie stood perusing the note with a rueful half-smile on his face,
grimacing over the misspellings. Then he
sighed fatalistically, swung his duffel onto the bed, and started unpacking his
gear.
* * *
Robbie walked into the Old Fox’s Head about 1630h, waving a sheepish
greeting at the publican Ned Aftergood.
Robbie still got embarrassed at the recollection of what had taken place
in this pub last January.
“’Afternoon, Captain!” Ned called.
“We had a notion you’d be coming right along after Wilda showed up. She’s in the back there, at your usual
table.”
Archie Haskins, the barkeep, was thumbing the armholes of one of his
famous vests, in this instance a loud purple and yellow stripe. “So what do you think of this one,
Robbie? Are you comfortable with it?”
“Well … it kind of hurts my eyes, but I’d certainly never mistake it for
an asteroid.”
As a chuckling Robbie approached Wilda, she gave him a bright smile and
said, “Well, Capt. Robbie! So Minie
threw you over?”
“How’d you know?”
“A man doesn’t make a date with an old love as soon as he steps off a
spaceship if his girl of the moment is waiting for him.”
Robbie tossed the note on the table and while Wilda read it, he went and
fetched himself a pint. Dropping into a
chair, he took a tentative pull on his beer and shuddered. “Holy grief, that stings! Do you know, that’s the first drop of
anything with even a dash of alcohol in it that I’ve tasted since the Solar Wind?”
“Yeah, I was wondering.”
“Well, the terms of the sentence permit me an occasional social pint, and
they’ve granted me five days’ leave before I’m due to report to the estimable
Maj. Nwinn. And I feel like celebrating,
because this voyage couldn’t have gone better.
My rank is supposed to be nothing but an empty word during this ordeal,
but out there in space I was a real Captain again, Wilda. And it was wonderful!”
“Aw, Robbie, that’s great to hear.”
He gestured at the note. “Like
Minie says, our arrangement never had anything permanent about it. It’s not like I didn’t appreciate her being
willing to consort with somebody in my state of disgrace – actually I was more
grateful to her than she’ll ever know!
But the relationship was
getting a little stale lately, for both of us, I think. At least now I can shave in the bathroom
again.” Robbie messaged his naked chin
regretfully.
“When are you going to grow that beautiful beard back, Robbie?”
“Oh … not yet. Its absence kind of
helps me remember my humiliations – keeps me on the straight and narrow, as it
were. Besides, if I let it go a day and
check out the stubble, I can tell it’s gotten an awful lot grayer during this
last two years. Scares me a bit to think
that I might look like a proper elderly gentleman if I re-grew it.”
Wilda chuckled, but her demeanor was slightly serious. “Actually, I can tell from the bottom of the
sideburns … They’re getting pretty
silvery, Robbie.”
“Yeah … silvery … ” He took another pull on his glass. “Maybe you ought to commiserate with me rather
than help me celebrate, Wilda – here I’ve lost another girl and I’m getting
antiquated to boot. And you’ve got the
best shoulder to cry on of any woman I know.”
“And I’m always happy to offer that shoulder, Robbie. But I do need to get home by 1800h. My brood complains that Dickon’s cooking
isn’t up to mine, even if all we’re having is chop and tomatoes.”
“Even after all these years, I still have trouble believing he doesn’t
mind us meeting like this.”
“Well, he and I trust each other and tell each other everything. That’s why we had four babies together, more
than we’re supposed to. It’s just,
everything is always right between us.”
Robbie stared into his half-drained glass, swirling the contents. “That’s what she once said she wanted –
Feddie, you know. A settled life, with
children and a man waiting to come home to.”
“And there was no way that you could give her that.”
“Wilda, can you see me tied down to Earth, shuffling data for Ground
Command? I’d rather fly Lunar shuttles
or even atmospheric for the rest of my life than do that!”
“Well, I’ve known that from the beginning, you know.”
“Yeah, I know,” responded Robbie, sighing. “But I’ve always had trouble believing that
Feddie would really want that kind of life.
Have you heard anything about her while I was gone? I had hoped there would maybe be a message
… God, I’m such a fool, darlin’ …” He
stared moodily at the wedding band he continued to wear on his left hand,
rotating it with his thumb.
Wilda gripped his wrist and shook it a little. “Ellen and I watch the assignment rosters –
we like to keep up with what our old chicks from the hostel are doing. I checked out Fedaylia’s name a couple of
weeks ago, and she’d been posted as Second Com Officer on an Exploration Class
ship – the Eye of the Future, as I
recall. It was headed out on some big
scientific expedition to Venus and Murcuri.”
“There, you see now? She doesn’t
want to settle down any more than I do!
But I guess that fits with what she told me the last time I saw her –
that she was ready to try for the hero gig herself. This is a start on that, I guess. But I wonder … maybe she’s with somebody …
somebody on that expedition … I wish I
could get access to the crew manifest ... ”
Robbie’s right hand contracted on Minie’s note.
“Now, Robbie, don’t get all tensed up.
Fedaylia’s never filed a contract severance, has she? From what you’ve told me about her, I’m not
sure she’d hook up seriously with another man without severing the contract
first.”
Robbie laughed, but there was no mirth in it. “Yeah, she’s got principles, all right, and
she can be quite rigid in sticking to some of them.” He clenched the hand with the ring, then hid
it in his lap under the table. “But that
doesn’t mean she might not be with another man on a casual basis, like I’ve
been with Minie. I mean, it would be the
height of hypocrisy for me to expect her to be faithful to me when I haven’t
made the slightest effort to be faithful to her since she ran out on me. But she never supported me – she used me –
betrayed me … She never gave me any help when I needed it, the way I had
expected a wife would do … Hell, it’s
women that drive men to drink, Wilda.
All except you, that is … and … well, there are a few others ... ”
“Robbie, you’ve never loved any other woman the way you love Fedaylia.”
He drained his glass. “You’re
right at least about the way I love
her. It’s a lot more comforting,
darlin’, to just have the cozy kind of relationship that you and I have.”
She said again, “My shoulder is always there for those crying eyes, Capt.
Robbie.”
He sighed deeply. “You know,
Wilda, I’ve got this uneasy feeling that something big is about to happen in my
life.”
“A good kind of big?”
“Well, I don’t know. You’d think
I’d feel positive, what with this last assignment and all, but I’m not very
inclined to let myself be optimistic these days. When you’re young and naïve, you always
manage to feel invincible, but I left that feeling behind a long time ago. But I’m ready for the change, whatever it
is.” And he added, “I’m getting
impatient to taste the pineapple.”
“Huh?”
“Oh, never mind that. I only
meant, I’m ready for life to bring it on.”
“Maybe it’s just that you’re turning 37 tomorrow.”
“I am? Holy cry, you know, you’re
right! I’d completely forgotten about my
birthday -- again! Wilda, did I ever tell
you that in some parts of the Spainish-speaking world, people celebrate the
31st of October as a day when the dead are honored? El día
de los muertos, they call it. In
Mehik they make little skulls out of candy and pastry.”
She shuddered. “That’s a morbid
custom to connect with your birthday!
Robbie, I just wish I could talk you into having supper with Dickon and
me and the children tomorrow night.
There won’t be any skulls on the menu, but with Dickon working in …
ahem! … ‘animal protein distribution,’ I can get the makings for a mean steak
and kidney pie. And it goes without
saying I’d cook up the famous cake.”
Wilda was resigned to having Robbie turn her down, because in all the
years she had known him, she had never been able to cajole him into meeting her
husband. But this time he confounded her
by saying, “You know what, darlin’? I
just might do that – I think I’m finally ready.
Beats spending a birthday alone, that’s for sure. I can finally get a glimpse of what real
domestic bliss is like – what Dickon’s had and I’ve missed all these
years. Get a taste of home cooking for a
change. I’m not complaining about what
you and your staff do at Sloe, Wilda – you work wonders, what with the limited
resources they give you – but I have
been missing the Officers’ Mess. What
time would you like me to come?”
Wilda was gaping at him. “Well, I
never, Capt. Nikalishin! Did you really
say what I think I heard?”
Robbie laughed. “Yeah,
probably. Remember what I said just now?
– that something big was about to happen in my life? I guess this is it!”
* * *
Five days later, Maj. Nwinn kept Robbie waiting only 30 minutes and then
waved him into a chair almost before he had time to salute. “It seems the Board was satisfied with the
way you conducted yourself on the Red
Planet, because they’ve kept you on the stand-by list. Orders have been cut for you to take command
of the Hell’s Gate on 7 November.”
It was an unpleasant shock. “The …
Hell’s Gate? That’s not a Mars vessel. That’s – an Asteroid Class ship. An ore hauler.”
“Imagine knowing that, Nikalishkin,” said the Major sarcastically.
“Uh … an Asteroid … Isn’t that
Capt. Brindisi’s ship? What happened to
him? Did he slip in the shower or
something?”
“He’s been temporarily reassigned.”
“Temporarily reassigned?”
“I thought you heard me.”
“So that they could give the command of the Hell’s Gate to Robbin Nikalishin?”
An irritated Maj. Nwinn said, “I don’t have all day to deal with your redundant
questions, Mister. Here’s the info key –
it’ll tell you everything you need to know.
Dismissed.”
* * *
On his way back to Sloe, Robbie detoured through the Greenbelt that
surrounded the Command Officers’ Residential Sector. His former quarters were in those parts, but
last April, when his pay had been reduced and his assets impounded, his flat
had been placed in lockdown mode and he had been denied access to it. He liked to walk in this area occasionally,
to remind himself of what he might be allowed to return to if he successfully
survived his year of disgrace. Besides,
with its hundred-year-old lindens and oaks and its rowans and hazel bushes, the
Greenbelt was a welcome relief to the eye for someone fresh from the sterile reaches
of space.
And it was full of birds, even at this time of year. In the spring nightingales nested there, and
now sparrows were flocking around the concourse, demanding handouts from
passersby. Robbie always carried a
packet of birdseed in his pocket and now he paused to deal some to the
twittering beaks. The activity helped to
calm his mind, which had been seriously unsettled by the nature of this new
assignment.
Behind him somebody called “Captain?
I’d like a word with you!”
Turning around, Robbie was surprised to see R. Adm. Jivanta Soemady, one
of his friends on the Board of Command.
He struck a quick salute, barking, “A privilege, sir!”
“Oh, can it, Robbie,” she said.
“Save your starchy subordinate act for somebody who doesn’t know you as well
as I do. Besides, here I am in civvies,
out for a run, and it’s best if you don’t attract attention to us. Why don’t we take a ramble down this side
path?”
His curiosity piqued, Robbie fell into step with the petite, 55-year-old
Admiral. He was aware that this path cut
through one of the less frequented areas of the Greenbelt. “To what do I owe such an honor, sir?”
“It’s merely a fortuitous meeting, but I’d been hoping for this kind of
chance encounter, because there are things I’ve been itching to say to
you. What did you think of your recent
orders?”
“Uh … the Red Planet was
incredible – I never in my wildest dreams expected to be given the opportunity
of commanding a ship like that! Of
course, I missed my old crew, but Capt. Kastens’ crew was top-of-the-line, too
– I could get real fond of ’em all. I’m
perfectly aware that’s not to be, let me hasten to add, sir.”
“Ever feel the need for a drink while you were on board, Captain?”
“Oh, not once, Admiral, and that’s
the truth. And let me just say I can’t
thank you enough and I’d appreciate it if you’d pass that along to anybody who
might have helped to get me this mission.
But, uh … ”
“But today’s orders are a different kettle of fish, aren’t they? You’ve never served on an Asteroid Class
freighter, I believe.”
“Not even before SkyPiercer and certainly not since. But a bit of a pattern seems to be emerging
here. I’d never served on an ST-90,
either. Is that intentional? And is putting me in command of the Hell’s Gate the smartest thing you’ve
ever done? I mean, you know more than
you want to about Robbin Nikalishin’s relationship with asteroids … ”
“I certainly do.”
“So I guess I have to assume that
I’m being tested.”
“Well … we wanted to find out how capable you are these days at coping with
the unexpected. You know you have a lot
more to prove than just staying clean of booze.
By the way, we grabbed the Senior Officers of the Red Planet the minute they disembarked and debriefed them.”
Robbie eyed her sidelong. “Why,
Admiral … did you set them to spy on me?”
“Heavens, no. They had no idea
they were going to be debriefed until we called them in. I’m happy to report we did not receive a
single negative assessment – except from one character who shall be nameless,
who was disappointed that you weren’t more intimidating.” The Admiral laughed.
“I think I know the one you mean,
but I won’t say that person’s name, either.
I think that person would have liked it if I’d carried a whip.” Robbie laughed along with her, feeling some
sense of relief, but he couldn’t help wondering what all this was leading up
to. “So, uh … you decided a fine reward
for good behavior would be the command of an ore freighter.”
The Admiral cocked an eyebrow. “It
was necessary to take the next step.”
“Toward what, if it’s not too much to ask?”
“It is,” she said, and she changed the subject. “Did you know that Gen. Stepanek decided to
take early retirement?”
“No! You may recall that I’m
denied access to command info, Admiral, so I’m really out of the loop.”
“I think she got tired of bucking the Robbie Faction. She was one of your most implacable opponents
on the Board, you know.”
“Well, I always suspected as much.”
“I learned awhile back that it was Stepanek who suggested to our Base
Commander that Com. Wellspoon would make the perfect probationary monitor for
you.” Soemady sounded terminally
disgusted.
“Oh, she was! Bloody hell, she
liked me even less than I would have thought!
So who’s replacing her, or am I not allowed to know?”
“No, it’s common knowledge. Actually,
she departed about eight weeks into your sentence and Brig. Gen. Nigel Evens
took command of the EAFC operation here.
He’s a Brit who attended Old Heathero Flight Academy about ten years
before your time, but his entire length of service has been in the Western
Hemisphere. His last posting was as
Chief of Atmospheric Flight Operations at Habana in Kuba Prefecture.”
“And, uh … how does that change the complexion of the Board?”
“It helped your case a lot – we got a new ally. Without his support, you might not have
gotten a Mars Fleet command so soon. It
also didn’t hurt that Adm. Lekoa has been having a crisis of conscience.”
“Sir?”
“Let’s just say that in the beginning the Chief of Interplanetary Flight
Command couldn’t bring herself to allow an officer convicted of drinking on
duty to take the Bridge of any ship within her sphere of responsibility. That’s what really made that final vote on
your sentence touch-and-go”
“But now?”
“She’s seen the light. I’ve been
working hard to wear her down and I’ve finally succeeded.”
“Admiral, I don’t really understand what I’ve done to merit this
speeded-up schedule. Sometimes I feel
that I’m getting much less punishment than I deserve.”
The Admiral laughed. “Well, don’t
let anybody but me hear you say that, Mister!
You’re not out of the woods yet!”
Then Jivanta Soemady stopped walking and turned to face the
Captain. “You know we had to do something,
Robbie. Under the Code of Military
Justice the Board of Command had the legal authority to intervene in the
sentencing phase for your type of crime and to alter the prescribed penalty,
but your misconduct was so flagrant and so public that we couldn’t just slap
you on the wrist and let you off scot-free.
You should have heard the decibel level during that debate! Your opponents on the Board were itching to
impose the maximum penalty – demotion and dishonorable discharge and at least
five years in prison. But the ESC simply
couldn’t afford to squander your expertise, so the brass in New Washinten
exerted a little pressure that enabled the Robbie Faction to fix you up with
what you got. Now, does that surprise
you?”
“The brass in … They intervened for me?
Who? Why?”
“Mmm – that isn’t in the realm of ‘common knowledge.’ But it’s true, nevertheless. And surely you must realize that what really
turned the tide in your favor was that last minute guilty plea – the fact that you made no argument whatsoever
in your own behalf. When a man
acknowledges his misdeeds and takes responsibility for them, and announces that
he expects no mercy and will accept whatever is dished out to him and try to
turn it into something positive … well, it makes it hard to throw the book at
him.”
“Sir, I’m going to dare to ask another question. Why are you talking to me like this today? Part of the sentence was that I’m not
supposed to have contact with Senior Officers.
You shouldn’t be talking to me about so much as the weather, should
you?”
“Why do you think I dragged you down this obscure path? And I caution you not to mention this
conversation to anyone. But I just felt
you deserved a little encouragement.
You’re too astute not to suspect that something is afoot. That’s all I’m going to say at the moment,
and it’s more than I should. This second
assignment may be tough on you, Robbie, but if you can get through it in good
shape, I promise that after you return you’ll find out what this is all about.”
“Well, Admiral,” said Robbie, scrubbing the back of his neck, “that’s
tantalizing. It’s not going to help the
time go faster.”
She laughed. “Just don’t let your
supporters down, Robbie. I and your
other friends on the Board are once again staking our reputations on your
success.”
He twitched his head. “Holy cry,
you’re going to jinx me, Adm. Soemady!”
Again, she laughed. “Actually,
Capt. Nikalishin, it’s my opinion that you’ve handled this difficult experience
in an exemplary manner.”
“Well … I should be used to the taste of crow by this point in my
life. People who have a lot of obsessive
hopes and expectations … it seems like life has to keep knocking them down so
they always have something to reach for.”
“You’ve proved you’re a lot more resilient than people expected you to
be. I wish we could have given you more
consideration – taken into account all the adversity you’ve had to contend with
since ’61. But the military isn’t famous
for looking at the human side of things.”
“Respectfully, Admiral, I really don’t agree with what you say – that JAG
and the Board should have looked at me with some kind of special pitying eye. I lost my way and did some things I always
swore I never would, and I needed to redeem myself, no matter what mitigating
circumstances might have been factored into it.
Like I said when I made my guilty plea, it wasn’t right for me to try to
justify or rationalize what I did, or to blame anybody but myself. I learned young the necessity for
self-discipline and personal responsibility.
It’s just that I … well, I lost hold of the threads for a time there, to
speak metaphorically.”
Coming next!
Chapter 8: Robbin Nikalishin and Sharlina Graves
