John Ringo - To Sail a Darkling Sea

“What was I supposed to do, sir?” Faith asked, angrily. “Bat my fucking eyes at him and go get him his fucking drink?”

“Lieutenant,” Wilkes said, coldly. “You are being officially counseled on what actions are becoming of an officer of the United States Naval Service. In addition, since you don’t know shit from shinola about being an officer, let me add that you don’t get to use a disrespectful tone or disrespectful language to the officer that is counseling you. These are articles of the Uniform Code of Military Justice, Lieutenant. You can be charged with conduct unbecoming for your recent actions. You also can be charged with disrespect to a superior officer for that outburst. Do you understand that, Lieutenant?”

“Yes, sir,” Faith said.

“Do you understand that an officer of the United States Naval service does not start a brawl because someone asked her to get them a drink?” Wilkes said.

“Yes, sir,” Faith said.

“And that an officer of the United States Naval service does not put someone in a chokehold, especially a major Hollywood executive?”

“Yes, sir,” Faith said.

“In addition, while you have had to, of necessity, spend a good bit of personal time with your Marines, when off-duty, when it is possible as is the case here on the Alpha , your place is with the officers, not the enlisted. There was an officer’s table in the saloon. Spend your time there.”

“Yes, sir.”

“You’ve had a trying few weeks,” Wilkes said. “You really shouldn’t have been sent out on a functionally independent mission given your age and inexperience. I will try to keep this incident from being reflected on your FITREP. But you had better start learning conduct becoming an officer or I will not be able to avoid reflecting that. Understood?”

“Yes, sir,” Faith said.

“I’ll go smooth things over with Mister Zumwald,” Wilkes said. “You should probably go to your cabin and get some more sleep. Understood?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Dismissed.”

Faith went back to her cabin, avoiding the saloon, wrapped herself around Trixie and cried herself to sleep.

“Get some sleep, LT?” Januscheitis said the next morning.

They were gearing up for clearance. It took some time.

“Some,” Faith said, tonelessly. “I really hate the Alpha . Clearing the Alpha gave me more nightmares than clearing the Voyage . And… ” she shrugged.

“Ghosts?” Bearson said.

“There’s no such thing as ghosts,” Faith replied.

“I don’t know, LT,” Derek said. “Every ship that’s lost people has ghosts. They call ’em ‘phantom watch standers.’ The Cole had ghosts. I’ve seen ’em on the Iwo , plenty of times.”

“Quit trying to freak your LT out,” Faith said. “It’s not working.”

“I’m not sure if I believe in ’em or not, LT,” Januscheitis said. “But… Pretty much everybody sort of knows about ’em. I don’t think they’re trying to freak you, LT. The ghosts on the Cole are just sort of there. Like they call ’em, watch standers. Almost comforting.”

“The ones on the Alpha aren’t comforting,” Faith said, tightly.

“How bad was the Alpha , ma’am?” pagliaro said. “You can see it got banged up, but… ”

“If you haven’t heard about what happened on the Alpha , ask somebody else,” Faith said. “I’m not going to talk about it. It was… bad. It wasn’t the fucking zombies, it was the people that had it before the zombies and what they did. I don’t like the Alpha . And if you’re serious then, yes, ghosts. They fucking talk to me when I’m sleeping. The women, anyway. They cry. I can hardly sleep on this fucking boat. Okay? On the other hand, I’ve got my own stateroom and my own shower. That makes up for a lot.”

“I heard you had a little incident last night, ma’am,” Januscheitis said. “Probably not the best change of subject… ”

“I was counseled by Captain Wilkes on conduct unbecoming an officer,” Faith said. “I now understand that one does not overreact and get into a brawl in public. And since it’s an officer thing, I’d like to drop that, too.”

“I heard the dude grabbed you, ma’am,” Kirby said.

“What part of drop it did you not get, PFC?” Januscheitis said.

“Sorry, Staff Sergeant,” Kirby said.

“Hopefully, despite being an ‘officer of the United States Naval service,’ I’ll be allowed to kill some zombies today,” Faith said, racking her Saiga. “Because I seriously need to kill somebody. And that’s all we need to talk about that.”

“Lieutenant?” Gunny Sands said, sticking his head in the compartment. “Captain wants to have a word with you?”

“Captain Wilkes?” Faith said, wincing.

“Captain Smith,” the Gunny said.

“Oh, joy,” Faith said. “I guess I’ll need to derig… ”

* * *

“Faith, there’s a couple of things we need to talk about,” Steve said, waving to a chair.

“Yes, sir,” Faith said.

“The first bit is about what happened last night.”

“Yes, sir,” Faith said.

“I know you in mulish mode, daughter dear,” Steve said, drily. “When all you do is say ‘yes, sir’ it means you’re not actually communicating. Nothing’s coming out, so nothing’s going in. I’ve spoken to several people about what happened last night. You should not have been grabbed. Not just as a lieutenant but as anyone. Mister Zumwald was totally out of line in ordering you around, as was his language.”

“Tell that to Captain Wilkes,” Faith said, crossing her arms.

“Lieutenant,” Steve said. “I am not speaking to you as my daughter, here, I’m speaking to you as a Lieutenant in the United States Marine Corps, one of my junior officers. And I will not have you say anything disrespectful of your superiors. Understood?”

“Yes, sir,” Faith said.

“Faith,” Steve said. “Eye contact. What I tell Captain Wilkes, what I discuss with him about the incident, is none of your concern. Do you truly understand that?”

“Yes, sir,” Faith said. “It’s just… ”

“There is no ‘just,’ Lieutenant,” Steve said, calmly. “If, and I said if , Captain Wilkes may have done something wrong in handling the situation, that is between Captain Wilkes and myself. This is the tough part about being in the military. You do not show, by word, action or deed, disrespect to a superior. Ever. Even, or especially, when you think he’s a cowardly fucktard that’s got his head up some Hollywood executive’s ass.”

“Oh, you have met him,” Faith said.

“Lieutenant, that is exactly what I was warning you about,” Steve said. “You may think those things, true or not, but you do not ever express them. Ever. You need to seriously learn that, or we might as well drop this experiment and you can go do something other than being a Marine officer.”

“I’ll try,” Faith said.

“Okay, first of all, that would be ‘sir’ and second, you cannot ‘try’ at something like this,” Steve said. “This is one of the most important aspects of military discipline. Even if you think someone is an awful superior in the military, and Wilkes is not by any means as awful as you think, you simply do not express it. Not in any professional environment. You can’t go questioning a superior’s competence. Not to a subordinate, especially. Just as if you have, say, an NCO you think is not competent, you cannot express that to his or her subordinates. When the shit hits the fan, the men have to know that they can trust the orders they’re getting. If you, who is looked upon as more competent than you actually are as an officer, express resentment or lack of trust in Captain Wilkes, even by body language at which you are a past mistress, that will spread. Then people will start to second-guess the Captain. Which we absolutely cannot afford.