Tempered, page 7
part #1 of Space Chef Series
Half the room just stared at me until Chef Johnson and Sous Tomas started clapping. As the others joined in, I smiled. Grabbing the large stack of chips from my bag I scattered them on the table. “Grab you one and get started. Practice makes perfect. We’ve already announced to the crew that all meals today would be of an experimental nature except for breakfast food. That will be prepared by Chef Johnson, Tomas, and me. We can spare a bit of time to make eggs to order if it gives you training time. Remember, when in doubt, ask. There is no such thing as a wrong answer. With food it’s all about creation. Now scoot and try not to burn the ship down!”
There was a bit of a mad scramble, but all the chips were taken. It was a good collection. Recipes collected by both me and the chef I’d mentioned to them.
Chef VanNorman had been a culinary instructor once upon a time for more than a decade. Financial issues forced him into the Navy and inexperience with rules and regs drove him to the rim. Reading his record, I’d seen that even with his prior experience, he’d started out at the very bottom as Class zero cook. Zero meant he was only assigned dishwashing and cleaning duties. Any advancement from that level was internal, through training. Even now there weren’t many chefs that would take the time with a zero. The Confed Navy could be pretty fucked up in places, but that was low even for it. Digging a bit deeper, using resources the Admiral called to my attention, I found the true story.
VanNorman had run afoul of what some called one of the Noble Lords of the Navy, and was demoted. Exile was better than outright death. With any society, there are those in high positions and those in low. The Confederation is no different. Even with much of my own history hidden from the navy classification system, I was still considered middle to upper class. Half a noble. If only they knew… Those that had and those that didn’t. It sucked to be poor. My old sergeant back in boot camp used to say that only the strong survive. He was mostly right.
“These are pretty good,” Chef Johnson said as he eased his way up to my table with his tablet open.
“It’s standard for my lessons. Hoarding what works and what doesn’t defeats all of us.” I waved my hands at the many cooks. “Every ship is different. ‘Officer culture’ is how Admiral Hawthorne explained it to me. We all revolve around the tastes of those who control us. If the captain hates the food...well, you get the picture. Every chef should have a recipe ready and waiting for almost any occasion. Do you want to know my favorite?”
Johnson cut his eyes in my direction slightly nodding. I snorted. Dropping a smile on the man, I told him. “Lemon bars. It was something my mother tried to teach me that I perfected on my own. My first cooking assignment after joining BuShips, actually. That was an experience.”
“Were you always a cook?” he asked me.
Thinking back to the hell I went through to just get into Special Operations and then what I’d done to exit it, I shuddered slightly. Cooking was an escape. Something I’d only done on leave to relax. My lemon bars were like magic. If it hadn’t been for them, I’d have been killed by military police units years ago. Prison would not have been an option. Not after what I’d done. Embracing my smile, I caught the Chef’s eye. “No. I wanted to be a pilot. The Confederation had other plans for me.”
“Almost everyone changes their MOS in boot camp,” Johnson replied.
I only nodded. He didn’t need to know the story behind what I’d said. No one did. Only the Admiral knew the entire truth, and even then it wasn’t written down anywhere. Let’s just say that my hopes and dreams were changed at an early age when psych evals found I had a certain flexibility when it came to morality and sense of being.
“What about you? Was the culinary world your goal?” I asked Johnson.
“Nope. My dad was a tanker back when there were actual Confed ground pounders. I’d learned every dirty story and every mission from him before I was knee high. Knowing how to fix floaters and all things mechanical was in my blood. Such high hopes for a mud rat on Winfield VII. BuShips took one look at my test scores and sent me to SDF,” Johnson mused. “You should have seen me. All elbows and knees, trying to scrawl up under all the machinery you can imagine at a Self Defense Force base out on the rim. Talk about patience, they didn’t have any with me. Dad might’ve been a great mechanic, but that didn’t make me one! Lug nuts? What lug nuts? You really should’ve seen the sergeant’s face when all the locking nuts for the commander’s personal shuttle vanished. I’ll swear on any stack of books you can find that they were right there…” Johnson mimed, pointing down at the table. “...before they weren’t, of course. I got bumped after that. Line troop. Pretty much gun bunny duty. Point and shoot, but I couldn’t even get that one right. You shoot one officer in the ass and your life is ruined. Let me tell you. But the gods of space hooked me up. Three months of peeling vegetables and scrubbing the galley actually taught me something. Zero to hero in less than a year.”
Johnson’s file was impressive. The man was exaggerating a bit, but most of the facts were true. He’d been assigned janitorial duties. If his unit’s chef hadn’t died suddenly, his skills might not have been noticed or needed. Working your way back from the hated SDF to a main line unit was something short of a miracle. The Navy didn’t believe in miracles, though.
He was another of my assignments this trip because I didn’t believe in miracles either.
Follow the Yello Brick Road
“Your mission is a go, Master Sergeant. Take the chiefs first before locking down the compartments. Try and keep casualties to a minimum if possible. Every death is one less paycheck, after all. The mines won’t dig themselves,” Captain Vaslov chuckled over the comm system. After months of planning and following stupid Confed orders, it was now time to go his own way. Every part of his plan was in place now. All he had to do was take the ship and meet up with the Brotherhood fleet, a nice paycheck and he’d be sitting on a beach somewhere laughing. “XO, let’s wrap this up, shall we?”
With a smile, the executive officer gave the captain a jaunty mock salute and waved at the two marines guarding the deck. Pulling out a hidden handgun, he stepped up behind Jones, the helmsman, and stuck it in his ear. Raising his voice, he announced, “Get your fucking hands up!”
Every officer except Jones smiled. Now was the time. Between the XO and the Captain, they’d managed to fill the crew with their own people. But not everyone, as Lt. Jones was finding out.
“Sir?” Jones exclaimed even as the two marine guards yanked him out of his chair and onto the floor. He barely had time to say another thing before he was hooded, bound, and dragged from the room.
“The time is now, my friends,” Captain Vaslov said. “Time to tell the Confederation to fuck off and time to get rich quick! Lock the ship down and go stealth. Keep a close eye out on the jump points and notify us immediately if anything changes. Understood?”
“Sir, yes, sir!” All the officers present answered as if still at boot camp. For most of them, this was to be the last hurrah. A chance at millions of credits for so little work. Treason was easy if you weren’t committed to patriotism, as most of them weren’t. Once Vaslov knew what revenge he would bring down upon the Navy, he’d used all of his contacts to find the lowest of the low, officers and marines that were inches from prison. Criminals and cowards who’d slipped through most of the military cracks were taken in hand and promised many things. All they had to do was a single job and then they’d be free.
“Excellent. My contacts should be here soon, if everything goes according to plans. Once that happens, you’ll have your money and revenge. We have an entire hanger deck filled with transport out of here. We have only to hold our positions,” Vaslov exclaimed. Locking eyes with Watson, the XO, he jerked his head toward the ready room. “Helmsman Orlando has the deck.”
“Aye, Captain, Orlando has the deck.”
Inside the captain’s ready room, both officers smiled at each other.
Vaslov yanked open a drawer in his desk and pulled out a crimson bottle. “Time for a hit. This stuff will put some hair on your chest.”
Watson smiled back but waved off the offer of alcohol. “What now? You haven’t said who this is we’re meeting. When you hired me back on Oracle Seven, I assumed you were in contact with one of the other empires, but now I’m not so sure. With a ship like this, we could be in Zanzibar by now. I was thinking dancing girls and all the hashish I could smoke. Trust me, a million credits will get you a LOT of fun in that place. I know the Zanzibar navy would want the Washington as well.”
Drinking straight from the bottle, the captain slugged back about half of it. Wiping his mouth with his hand, he answered, “Navy Intel would figure that shit out so fast your head would still be spinning as they shot you. Uh, uh,” he tapped his head. “I’ve been in the navy too long, captained too long, without not having learned some things. Zanzibar, Hong Kong Two, and even Grand Tortuga are riddled with Confederacy spies and operatives. How else do think they’ve managed so long without an outright shooting war? I’ve been to the rim and some of those out-of-the-way sectors. Dropped off quite a few special operations teams as well. I know better than that. This is the big score. More money than you’ve ever, ever, seen. Trust me, I’ve thought it all out.”
Watson waved his hand. “You still haven’t said who. You mentioned Grand Tortuga. Is it pirates?”
Vaslov smiled and shook his head. Taking another slug of wine, he slammed the bottle down. “I’ve gotten us this far. You have to trust me.”
“Fine, fine, your plan and all that. A man has to worry about some things you know,” Watson muttered. Going back to jail or being killed wasn’t in his own plans, either.
“The organization that’s coming doesn’t like loose ends or loose lips. It’s much safer for the both of us that you don’t know who’s coming. The money is there, though. I’ve seen it, felt it, all but made love to it. I was advanced a tiny portion to hire you and the others with some of it. It’s real, and once we turn this ship over to them...we’ll be kings. They say that revenge is a dish best served cold. Well I’ve been out in the cold for almost a year now, and I’m ready. This will hurt them,” Vaslov explained. Tapping a couple of buttons, he switched on the ship’s internal display. “Stick to the plan. Draven and his bully boys should be picking up the chiefs right about now. Once they’re secured, we’ll use the fire suppression system to lock the ship here, here, and here.” He made slashing motions across the ship map. “Those bulkhead doors are more than fifteen centimeters thick. There’s no way the crew we have left can cut through it. As long as we keep them away from the bridge and out of the engine room, we’re golden.”
“We still have to corral them, though. It’ll take more marines than we’ve brought to do it,” Watson remarked. Using the controls, he marked the sections of the ship where they planned to close off. He peered closer at the conduits and utilities channels then looked back at the captain. “And these? They could go through them.”
“Part of the plan. The chiefs are the key. When re-staffing the ship, I had to keep a few people who could fix things on the fly. Newly repaired or not, I couldn’t risk an accident in transwarp. All other essential personnel are transfers. Remember, the Admiral was supposed to take over next week. The ship was to be fully staffed at that time. With those that know all the systems locked away… It will be chaos down there.” Vaslov smiled. “Newbies and cooks. Not a one of them sailor enough to stop us.”
Watson rolled his eyes at Vaslov’s plans. As if a megalomaniac could make ones that made sense. There were things he needed to know though. Clearing his throat, he asked, “How do we get the crew out of there?”
“Gas,” Vaslov answered him.
“Gas?” Watson asked.
“Gas.” Vaslov smiled again. “We use the navy against itself. The Washington is considered a flagship. Because of that, there are certain measures and tricks added to it that only the captain knows about. Things such as anti-mutiny measures and self-destruct systems.”
“Are you saying this thing has a bomb on it?” Watson asked in shock.
“Don’t be a fool. Everything above a cruiser has a self-destruct system. That’s a holdover since the last interstellar war. You can’t let the enemy know how to find your resupply points. Every captain was supposed to detonate themselves if caught,” Vaslov snorted. “You can imagine how much that was used. Prison camps were better than fiery death. No, what I plan on using is knock-out gas. All capital ships are equipped with systems to use in case of mutiny or invasion. The flag deck, above us, can be sealed off and used as a life pod, or a safe room. I’m not sure who at BuShips thinks up these things, but they’re effective and creative.”
“And the chiefs, they know how to turn it off or something?” Watson asked. The renegade officer frowned as he put all the information together. Only days away from jail, he’d been recruited by Vaslov from the outer sector, most of his crimes buried deep in former commanders’ files. It took a criminal to find a criminal.
The captain gave him a stern look. “You should know the basics of this. I know for a fact they teach a class at OCS about putting down mutinies. Things must have gotten really slack out on the rim of known space. We have work to do. Get with Master Sergeant Draven. I need his boys to lock down engineering and secure the bridge. Between you and me, I trust the rest of our officers about as much as I can throw this ship.” Vaslov motioned to Watson. “You and I need to be a team here. The fewer officers and marines we have, the bigger our cut is.”
More money meant more time at the tables and brothels. For Watson, that sounded like the thing to do. Right after he bought himself a planet or small asteroid. King Thomas was what he planned to be called. Or maybe he’d just convert it all to coin and swim around in it. There was an old Earth vid that showed that. Clicking his heels together he snapped off a textbook salute. “Sir!”
Vaslov shook his head and chuckled. “Stop being a Dorothy and do your damn job.”
“Orders! Now we live up to our costly paychecks,” MST Vince Draven yelled at his gathered marines. He, like the captain, felt wronged by the Confederation as a whole. The sergeant spent his entire life and three wives battling whomever, and whatever they told him, to no avail. Two of those wives he’d buried himself when the worlds they occupied were overrun with the enemy. And what did those in charge say? Nothing. Not a word was spared for dependents. “Just win the war for us,” was all he’d heard.
Vince tried to do things properly, though. He’d worked his contacts in the fleet and marine command. They either didn’t care enough, or were scared to rock the boat. Rebellion wasn’t treated well in the Confederacy. Those in control would disappear you and your whole family. There were reasons most line troops kept their kin away from the core worlds. Packing up and running was far easier on the rim. The breaking point for him, though, had been the death of wife number three, Heather. She was supposed to be safe with a full third of the corps surrounding her on base. But she died anyway. Accidental discharge was the official reported reason, but Vince didn’t believe it one bit.
He’d had to burn up his entire bereavement leave, but he’d finally found the real story, in a bar of all places. Military bartenders were the gossip queens on most Confed stations. They’d heard it all from the officers and men who’d come to them to drown their sorrows. The story was hushed up but not completely, and her killer tried to drink himself to death.
According to the man, it was a case of mistaken identity gone wrong. Armed drunken officer in search of his cheating girlfriend got the house wrong. And they covered it up! It paid to be the son of an admiral.
Vince got his revenge, though. Being a marine meant something. He caught the officer in question alone and took care of him permanently. None of it brought his wife back, but deep down it soothed some of the pain.
None of that mattered now, though. Vince had a ship to capture and a future to experience. Nearly unlimited funds would secure it for sure. He and his men set out for the mess hall and the engine room.
Trouble
“Does everyone understand the recipes now?” I asked the kitchen staff. Breakfast shift was in full swing and those members of the crew who were off duty were diving into it. Normally on a ship like this there were multiple facilities, and more than three shifts on duty. It depended on what the mission was.
Because of the tests the Washington was running, BuShips had cut the personnel by more than half. More like down to a third if Chef Johnson’s figures were correct. Easier for us, but harder for the ship’s company in general. The admiral did explain it to me before I was assigned here. It was a trial period for the Washington. Taking more than a year to complete, the construction crews replaced the engines, most of the weapon systems, and life support. But glitches happen. There was always the chance of gremlins in the system that could kill the crew. Better to space with a fraction of a crew than take a chance on a whole one. Or that was at least the theory.
Getting everyone on the same page in the kitchen was actually easier than normal, due to the competence of the cooks. Many of them had more world experience than I was used to. Only the best for one of the three flagships of the fleet. It gave me something to look forward to at the end of my deployments. If all the side jobs for Admiral Hawthorne didn’t kill me, I could just transfer to one ship. Wouldn’t that make the admiralty spin? Those old fogeys in charge of the Navy were still a bit pissed they couldn’t have me take a stroll outside in space sans suit. Too fucking bad if they can’t take a joke. Special Operations ruled!
