Atk. Butterfly: Rust Bucket

I reported immediately, unsure of what I was needed for. Jim motioned me into the boss’s office and had a smile on his face when he did. Whatever it was, I knew it was pretty good news. I walked into the office and saw the Sarge for the third time in that shore leave of mine. Rather than acknowledge him first, I paid attention to my boss who was the one who asked for my presence. “Yes ma’am,” I answered.

Penny said, “Sit down, Dave, after you shut the door.”

I turned and closed the door and then took the seat she had indicated.

“Good,” she said. “As you know, we’ve been conspiring behind your back to help you and you haven’t disappointed us a bit. We can only do one more thing for you, but we need to know if you intend to stay with the Thurman if it’s drafted.”

“Ma’am, I just heard on the news that it is being drafted,” I replied.

“You might have heard it on the news, but it hasn’t been announced officially in orders to me that I know of,” she said while she held up a sealed envelope from the Navy Department in her hands.

Sarge spoke up, “I think you should go ahead and let Penny know of your decision, Dave.”

I said, “Well, ma’am, I was thinking it would be nice to get the commission that I worked hard for. After all, when the war is over, I’ll probably be able to become inactive and return to work here, a little more knowledgeable and valuable to the company.”

She said, “That’s good, Dave. So, am I to take it that you’re going to definitely stay with the Thurman?"

“Dave,” said the Sarge, “Penny needs a definite yes or no answer. That’s going to determine what she does next.”

I answered, “Yes, ma’am. I’m not running out on my ship.”

She smiled and seemed relieved at first. Then she opened her desk drawer while she asked, “Let me have your badge, Dave.”

I was shocked. For a moment I thought that I had given her the wrong answer. I unpinned my upgraded badge and handed it over, feeling that I had let her down. When she had the badge, her other hand pulled out an officer’s badge and passed it to the Sarge. He reached over and pinned it on my overslicks for me before he took my hand and congratulated me on being the Thurman’s newest navigational officer and senior gunner.

“Now what do you say, Dave?” asked the Sarge, who seemed to sense my shock. “By the way, you can call her Penny now. She’ll probably give you the boot if you don’t.”

“Thank you, Penny,” I managed to stutter out.

Penny said, “No, the thanks is all yours, Dave. You got us two ships, even if it was the same one twice and you kept our other ship whole or nearly so. You put forth the effort when others didn’t and you didn’t buckle under to minor setbacks such as having to walk around naked for two days. You’re the kind of person we can trust to take care of our property while it’s in the hands of the Navy. Being an officer of ours will give you a little more weight and authority. It’ll also give you a chance to get a real commission from the Navy and not just a temporary one based on your civilian rank. After that, it’s your decision and your life. Meanwhile, you’re still on board one of our ships and helping to protect our assets, so you’ll continue to receive a partial pay from us until the Thurman is returned.” She then opened the envelope and remarked, “Oh my, oh my! Isn’t this something! The Thurman has been drafted by the Navy and is to report in two weeks for duty. Isn’t it lucky that you were promoted before the official orders arrived?”

Sarge and Penny both laughed. I finally understood how they had just helped me beat the system partially. Now it was up to me.

As a newly commissioned company officer, I also got to take them to dinner, along with Marsha and Jim. I was now on a first name basis with the company officers and managed to pick up a little more information about the Sarge which only made me more curious about why he wasn’t in space. Evidently, he had been in space before and done a number of things for a number of people. But it didn’t answer why he wasn’t in space now. Before the dinner was over, Sarge whispered to me that I should also take Sarah out as my date and some of the other crew members for a dinner tomorrow. I promised him that I would, especially since I had to report the day after to the naval base for additional orders and instruction on the Navy way to do things while the Thurman was being finished.

I did take Sarah as my date along with other members of the crew to a dinner the following evening and found myself awarded the Pennyweight Best Buns award by my friends before the dinner was over. Someone had thoughtfully taken an image of me during the time that I was naked for two days and put the image on an engraved plaque.

I learned that night that a lot of the crew were switching over to the other gun ships along with, to my surprise, all of the other officers including the Captain. In Sarah’s case, I could understand her reasoning for not wanting to be involved in more bloodshed. The Captain and some of the officers, I learned, weren’t going because the company didn’t want to give up its most experienced officers. The company was hoping that I would stay on board because I would represent their interests and the Navy transfer would be to my benefit as well.

So, technically, I was going to be the Captain of the Thurman for the last two weeks of repair until a Navy captain took over from me. Between the reports that I had to do at night and the training I attended during the day, my last two weeks were full. There was no longer any time for me to see anyone other than waving at them as we passed while going about our tasks.

I received my temporary commission as an ensign in the Navy the day the Thurman was drafted. Only already assigned officers could receive a commission, so the subterfuge that Penny and the Sarge went through was well appreciated by me. I was a half-year behind my classmates, most of whom were now lieutenants of one degree or another. Only a few of them were still ensigns.

Two weeks later, I turned over the command of the ship to a captain who had only been a year ahead of me in the Academy, but about three hundred positions below me in grades. I felt fortunate that he didn’t realize that I knew about him, having taken the time to research each person assigned to the ship. He didn’t bother looking up my background or he might have felt suspicious of my date of rank. He might have even taken steps to block me. As it was, regular naval personnel took over almost all the bridge functions. I went back to being in charge of the ship’s weapons systems as well as being the best gunner on board.

The only difference was that I was then an ensign and had to do things the Navy way. The single most important thing about the Navy way was that “battle stations” didn’t mean that I could start firing as soon as I saw the enemy. I then had to wait for the Captain to order fire before my gun or any of the other guns could open up. Fortunately, most of the time, they announced it as “man your battle stations,” so I didn’t forget myself and start firing as I had been in the habit of doing.

Of the forty men and women who used to man the Thurman for Pennyweight, only ten of us were still with her. About the only thing we had in common with the regular naval personnel was that both groups called the Thurman a rust bucket because of the outer coating of rust. I think that we would have had to go out and scrape the rust off and paint the ship had there been time. However, the public was screaming to have combat ships on the line in space. Rust was apparently a minor inconvenience that the higher ups weren’t going to wait on for removal. Also, the captain didn’t get both groups to mix well, leaving the showering schedule as his first officer planned it which meant that all of us from Pennyweight were sharing our showers together.