John Ringo - Emerald Sea

“And they get angry when they’re hungry,” the chief said.

“They’re too sick and nervous to be angry now,” Jerry said.

“But when they’re over being sick and nervous?” the chief prompted.

“I wouldn’t put an arm though the bars,” Jerry admitted.

“With all due respect, sir, I’d suggest feeding them. Even though they puke it up. As you can see, now, we can clean that up easy enough.”

“Agreed, Chief,” the warrant said, then grinned. “Ever thought of being a rider, Chief?”

“Not on your life, sir,” the NCO replied. “I’ll tell you the truth, I don’t even like climbing the rat-lines. I’m so afraid of heights it’s not funny. I’d rather eat dirt for the rest of my life. How’s the commander?”

“You mean Joanna?” Jerry asked. “She’s not sick, except at the smell. She’ll be glad to get the area cleaned out.”

The chief looked at the deck overhead for a moment then smiled.

“I wonder if she minds rain?”

They moved forward to where the dragon was curled up, looking at the bedlam with a beady eye.

“Commander Gramlich, we’re going to get this area cleaned out,” the chief said. “But it will be a bit and it will get messy. I was wondering if you might be okay with moving to the landing platform.”

Joanna looked at him for a moment then rustled her wings.

“I weigh nearly two tons, Chief,” she answered after a moment’s thought. “I notice that the ship tends to… move when I do. That’s why I’m placed damned near the center of the ship. Won’t the skipper have something to say about that?”

“Well, ma’am, as it happens, we’re in the process of moving some weight aft…”

“And I’m a nice mobile weight?” she asked with a chuckling hiss.

“I’d not put it like that, ma’am,” the chief said with a smile. “But we can lower the ramp easy enough, even in this sea. The toughest part will be opening and closing the hatch. But if you were to nip through quick-like…”

“Be sure to tell the skipper and then, yes, I’m game,” Joanna said. “Anything to get out of this damned hold.”

“Annibale, Bodman,” PO Singhisen said. “Fall out for a working party.”

It felt like Joel had just gotten his eyes closed. With the storm he’d been in the galley getting the fires put out and making sure everything was lashed down. So had Bodman, for that matter, who was one of the mid-watch cooks.

“I just put my head down, PO!” Bodman protested, trying to roll over and go back to sleep.

“Fall out,” the PO said, sharply. “Now.”

Joel rolled off his bunk and pulled on his clothes. The wind was still strong but the ship seemed to be riding better.

“What are we doing?” he asked.

“The damned dragons had as much trouble last night as the rest of the crew,” Singhisen said, shaking her head. “We’re going to go get their compartment cleaned out.”

“Oh, fisking joy,” Bodman whined. “Why can’t the riders do it?”

“Because there’s only two that ain’t officers,” the petty officer explained as if talking to a small child. “And officers don’t clean up shit and piss. It ain’t their job.”

“Join the Navy,” Bodman complained as they made their way forward. “Join the adventure.”

Fortunately they didn’t have to make their way on deck and the dragon deck was almost uncomfortably warm.

Singhisen had gotten more than just the two of them and there was a group of deck-apes waiting in the wyvern deck when they arrived.

“Okay, McKerlie. Take your team and man the hose pumps. Mbonu, your people are on the outfall pump; you know how to operate it?”

“Yes, PO,” the lead seaman said, waving her group over to the pump that was at the forward end of the compartment.

“Annibale, Bodman, you handle the hoses,” she continued, waving around the room. “We need to get these decks rinsed down. Then we’ll swab everywhere but in the occupied cages. Then we rinse ’em down again.”

“Thanks PO,” one of the riders said, coming to the aft of the compartment. “I’m getting my riders up here; we’ll try to keep the wyverns from taking anybody’s arm off.”

“Is that a real problem?” Singhisen asked.

“I dunno,” the rider said, shaking his head. “They’re not in the best of moods.”

Joel unreeled the hose and set to work as the deck-apes pumped. The… material on the floor was unpleasantly solid and splashed when the salt water hit it, throwing chunks of material around the compartment. He had to get down to a low angle to get it moved and that tended to splash more onto him. He’d wondered why the two stewards were doing the, relatively, lighter job of using the hose but he decided quickly that it was the worse of the two evils. Score one for the deck-apes.

The material did move, though, sloshing back and forth and forming an ugly puddle at the forward end of the compartment as the team there pumped it out. The riders were sliding around in it, moving from cage to cage and trying to calm the hissing wyverns. One of the latter got a muzzle through and took a swipe at him as he was spraying under the edge of the cage, trying to get a lodged chunk of… something sort of greenish yellow, worked free. The female rider, who had sergeant stripes instead of a PO’s chevrons, whapped it on the nose and it pulled back into its cage. He gave the sergeant a nod, washed the chunk of… whatever loose and kept spraying.

Finally, when he and Bodman had the compartment more or less clear the PO got the deck apes on the outflow pump working with mops. It didn’t get long to get everything but the cages clean and by spraying under them they even got most of the crap out of those.

It was a nasty, disgusting, job and not one he wanted to repeat any time soon. In his professional opinion, dragons belonged on the land and not in a damned ship.

He was really gonna have to have a long talk with Sheida when this mission was over.

In no more than twenty minutes Joanna was ensconced on the landing platform. The chief had even rigged heavy ropes so that she could hold on; since the rear of the ship was still bucking up and down it was necessary. After a bit she thrust a couple of talons under the ropes, curled in a ball, closed her eyes and appeared to go to sleep.

“Dragons, wyverns for that matter, tend to sleep a lot,” Jerry yelled as they headed back down to the quarterdeck. “They use high energy when they have to and try to sleep most of the rest of the time.”

True to Herzer’s mental prediction the wind seemed to be moderating and with it the seas. And with Joanna’s weight to the rear of the ship, along with whatever stores had been moved, the bows were now sweeping over the waves instead of digging into them.

They headed down into the hold again where a team of sailors, with Vickie and a female PO directing, were cleaning out the wyvern stalls. With the materials available the sketchy cleaning didn’t take long and Jerry directed the feeding afterwards as the hands, most of whom were probably from an off-duty watch, walked out of the compartment grumbling. Some of the wyverns barely poked at their food but most of them ate as if they were starving. Some of their distress must have been hunger because by the time they were done most of them had settled down. And, just as Jerry predicted, those that had fed almost immediately tucked their heads under their wings and, swaying with the ship, went to sleep.

“Good,” Jerry said. “That’s the first decent rest they’ve gotten in two days.” He frowned at Chauncey and Yazov, both of whom had ignored their food. They were still mewling piteously although they’d quit the metal-bending shrieks.