The Long War

62

IN PREPARATION FOR the approach to Valhalla, the Operation Prodigal Son airships assembled a hundred worlds to the East of the target, hovering like low clouds over the empty shore of this version of the American Sea, the best part of a million and a half steps from the Datum.

When the Benjamin Franklin took its place, Maggie was immediately hailed by the Abraham Lincoln, visible on the horizon. The Lincoln’s Captain told her that Admiral Davidson, commander of USLONGCOM, was aboard, and wanted to see her in person. The two ships closed, and touched down. Maggie changed her uniform, and waited for the Admiral in her sea cabin.

But then she got a summons from Nathan. ‘You’d better get down to the access ramp, Captain. We’ve got a situation.’

When she got there, she found that Acting Ensign Carl the troll, wearing the armband that comprised his ‘uniform’, had been included in the party that had greeted the Admiral. Or maybe he’d included himself; that would be like Carl, always interested, always wanting to make new friends. Only now, Captain Edward Cutler, aide to the Admiral, was holding a gun to his head.

The Admiral himself, a spruce sixty-year-old, looked on with amusement.

Maggie made her way to Cutler and whispered in his ear. ‘What are you doing, Captain?’

‘Containing a dangerous animal. What does it look like?’

‘Captain Cutler, this troll isn’t dangerous. In fact—’ Before this steely, intense man, she found herself embarrassed. ‘Carl is a member of the crew.’

Cutler stared at her. ‘Is this some joke?’

‘No, Captain.’ Maggie showed him Carl’s armband insignia. ‘I deposited the appropriate forms with the fleet.’ That was true enough, though she’d done her best to keep the bureaucracy from focusing its attention on the situation. ‘An experiment in cross-sapient cooperation.’

Admiral Davidson was openly grinning now. ‘Call it symbolic, Ed.’

Cutler looked at Davidson, Maggie, the troll. Then he called, ‘Adkins.’

A lieutenant trotted up. ‘Sir?’

‘Send a message to the White House, by the fastest means possible. Tell President Cowley that we are hereby surrendering to the hobo and okie types who infest the Long Earth. And in the process we are handing over control of our vessels to trolls, raccoons, prairie dogs, and any other dumb animals we happen to come across.’

‘Right away, sir.’

‘But just before I resign my own commission I think I’ll put a bullet in the head of this little one—’

Maggie approached him again. ‘Cutler. Are you a parent?’

‘What? No, not yet.’

‘Well, Captain Cutler, Ensign Carl won’t hurt you whatever you do. But if you don’t lower that weapon I will kick you so hard that your chances of ever fathering a child will be pathetically slim . . .’

It was a relief to get the Admiral into the relative sanity of her sea cabin. An ensign – not Carl – served coffee, and closed the door, leaving them alone.

Davidson leaned forward. ‘So, Captain Kauffman.’

‘Sir.’

‘I’ve never been one to waste my time. You know that.’

‘No, sir.’

‘Let’s get to it, then. In the short time you have commanded the Benjamin Franklin you have treated the ship as if it were your personal property, going well beyond the already loose parameters of your orders – to put it bluntly, making up the rules of engagement as you went along. Not only that, you have allowed possibly dangerous creatures to run free in the ship.’

‘Yes, sir.’

‘Resulting in such incidents as the humiliation of poor Ed Cutler, out there, over a troll.’

‘Yes, sir.’

He grinned. ‘Well done, Maggie.’

‘Thank you, sir.’

‘Personally, I particularly liked the way you handled the situation at New Purity. Having the dead of the trolls placed in the same cemetery as those poor pioneers. That went down well most every place that saw the record. You’ve done a great deal, and very visibly, to promote the kind of ideals that I, and others in the military – hell, even some in President Cowley’s administration – believe should be guiding our behaviour in the Long Earth. I wanted you, all of you captains, to reach out your hand to these scattered new cultures. Not to wield an iron fist. Ours is not to police our people, or to moralize; our duty is to protect our own from external threat. But for us to do that we have to know who and what we are protecting, in this strange new landscape we face today. And for you to achieve those goals you had to be open; you had to listen, to learn. Which is what you’ve done. I could never have ordered you to do all this, Captain; you had to learn your way, which you have done, and I’m glad you did.’

‘Thank you again, sir,’ she said, uncertain.

‘As to the future – well, somebody with your experience and particular skills should not be utilized simply to babysit every colonial group that hasn’t read the manual. Captain, once this business at Valhalla is concluded, I’d like you to consider a new command: the USS Neil Armstrong II.’

Maggie caught her breath. The second Armstrong was a new dirigible marque, semi-secret, designed to explore the Long Earth far beyond the limits reached so far, even by the Valienté expedition, even by the rumoured Chinese venture.

‘Your primary mission, as you’ll understand, will be to seek out whatever became of the Armstrong I and her crew. We haven’t even been able to send a ship out to search. Well, now we can. After that—’ He gestured. ‘Out there. Of course you can select your own crew.’

She thought of Mac, and Nathan, and Harry – even Toby Fox. ‘That won’t be a problem, sir.’

‘I thought not.’ He glanced at his watch. ‘Well, we have a heavy duty to fulfil when we get to Valhalla. I think we’re done here.’ He stood. ‘But while I’m aboard, I think I would enjoy meeting your Ensign Carl, in a less confrontational situation . . .’

That night, Maggie lay half asleep in her bunk, lulled by the micro-sounds of the ship: every little click and creak and groan, so familiar after the voyage. Every sailor knew that a ship had a life of its own, an identity, idiosyncrasies – even moods.

She felt paws on the bed. She turned over. The cat’s face loomed in the dark, green eyes glowing bright.

‘You aren’t asleep,’ said Shi-mi.

‘You really are a genius of perception, aren’t you?’

‘What are you thinking, Captain?’

‘That I’ll miss this battered old tub.’

‘Yes. I hear congratulations are in order.’

‘You would hear that, wouldn’t you? And through you the whole of the Black Corporation, probably. In any event I haven’t decided. You hear that, Abrahams, whoever you are?’

‘You’ll need a cat.’

‘Oh, will I?’

‘Personally I like the Benjamin Franklin. But I wouldn’t mind roughing it with you. Think it over.’

‘I will. I promise. Now get some sleep.’

‘Yes, Captain.’