The Command Read online

  Ross took a breath, flexed his fingers on the podium. He didn’t look at the commodore. “Men are fitted for another task. Defending the home; and by extension, the homeland. There is a hard edge in us. Even, at times, cruel. It must be tempered by a warrior code. But in combat that ferocity makes it possible to win. Without it, defeat is inevitable. And the loss of all we’ve labored to win. Freedom. Democracy. Maybe, our very survival. The world may be at peace now. But as Plato said, ‘Only the dead have seen the last of war.”

  “My own career is ending. I have no desire to stay. I have only respect for Commander Lenson. He is a war fighter. Like Petty Officer First Class Thomas W. Horn, the ship’s namesake, he bears the highest decoration for courage our nation awards: the Congressional Medal of Honor. I wish him the best. But I don’t envy the task he faces, because it’s against Nature and God—to make warriors out of women, to ready a gender-mixed unit for battle.”

  Ross paused for a moment, gazing off over their heads. “Maybe I’m a stick-in-the-mud,” he said, almost softly. “What they call a traditionalist. But what was our navy built on? The traditions of honor, of confidence in our brothers in arms, and, ultimately, of victory. That’s what I learned off Vietnam, and on deployments to Westpac and the Med. From the men, the men, who went before me. Stretching back in a chain to Steven Decatur and John Paul Jones.

  “The navy’s downsizing. Well, we can build more ships the next time danger threatens. But without those core traditions, will we still have a force that can defend the land we love? Tradition unites us. It inspires us. It sustains us in the hour we face death. Without it, I fear for our future—and for our country.”

  He paused again, as if about to say more; then his eyes fell on Aronie’s. Dan saw no signal passed, not so much as a blink. But the captain’s face closed, and he ducked his head. “I will now read my orders.”

  While he read out the paragraph of terse navalese, Dan unfolded himself. He joined Ross and turned the page to his own orders. “Proceed to the port in which USS Thomas Horn may be and upon arrival, report to your immediate superior in command, if present, otherwise by message, for duty as commanding officer of USS Horn.” He faced Ross. Snapped his hand up in a swift and perfect salute. “I relieve you, sir.”

  “I stand relieved.” Ross returned the salute and shook his hand. Quickly, perfunctorily, without meeting his eyes. They both faced Aronie. “Sir, I’ve been properly relieved by Commander Lenson.”

  “I have relieved Commander Ross, sir.”

  “Very well. Congratulations, Carter. My best wishes to you, Dan.”

  When they sat, all eyes turned to Dan. Who stood shifting from foot to foot, presented with a dilemma.

  The spotlight at the change of command belonged to the outgoing skipper. The incoming CO was expected to confine his remarks to wishing his predecessor well. Yet Ross’s words required an answer. He couldn’t let the crew go with them ringing in their ears.

  Was Ross right? Were they trying to force something that in some deep way cross-grained how the universe was built? He absently pressed his ribbons above his heart, making sure they hadn’t come loose.

  He didn’t deserve the medal. The glances it earned him, the startled salutes. By tradition—that word again—every man in uniform saluted the wearer of the Congressional. But since the navy had awarded few decorations of any kind in the Gulf War, compared to the other services, Dan wondered sometimes if he’d gotten it to fill some ambiguous and unutterable quota.

  And the even more sobering story he’d had at third hand: that the U.S. Navy hadn’t put him in for the award at all, that he owed it to a personal nomination by General Norman Schwartzkopf, who’d ordered the Signal Mirror mission.

  He cleared his throat. Looked out over the sparkling river, the bay, imagining the sea beyond that. Its implacable fury. Its intolerance of human error, of weakness, of any lack or shortcoming. He didn’t want to face it with a divided crew. But he couldn’t insult Ross on his last day in command.

  To hell with it, he thought. If the guy didn’t want to get stepped on, he shouldn’t have brought it up. He snapped the book closed on his prepared remarks.

  “Commodore Aronie; Captain Ross; honored guests; officers, men, and women of USS Thomas Horn. Good morning.

  “We are here today to honor Carter Ross and to thank him for his service. A long service, going back to USS Morton, DD-948, on the gun line off Vietnam. A period that saw the vanquishing of the Soviet Bloc and the end of the Cold War, that he’ll now cap with an honorable retirement.

  “It is for us to pick up the torch he sets down and to carry it into an unfamiliar world. One without the old verities, the old enemies we knew for so long.

  “But constant change is the law of life.

  “Horn will lead in that change. Pursuant to legislative initiatives, we’ve been selected as the test ship for the Women at Sea program. This is a great honor, and due no doubt to the fine record you’ve all racked up under Captain Ross’s leadership.

  “I have a great deal of respect for Carter Ross, and for those who believe, as he does, in the importance of tradition. But in one respect I have to disagree with them.

  “Women have been serving at sea in tugs, tenders, oilers, for almost twenty years. Now they’re taking the next step. Horn’s been tasked with making sure the mixed-crew concept can work. And we will make it work. Because in combat, we have to fight together, as a team, or we’ll all go down. I’ve been there. I know it’s true.”

  Now the flight deck was quiet. No murmurs of agreement, but neither, he noted, of dissent. The women, who’d looked dismayed at Ross’s remarks, seemed to have gained heart.

  “All standing orders will remain in effect until further notice. Again, I look forward to serving with you.”

  There, that was enough. He pushed his sword behind him and perched again on the green baize-covered chair. Feigned attention as Aronie began his remarks, lauding Ross and going over the ship’s deployments and awards during his command. Keeping his back straight, looking interested, while his gaze roved over the audience. He caught the eye of the command master chief, Woltz. The senior enlisted man nodded slightly. Met next the glower of the outgoing engineering officer. Dan had already told him he’d be leaving. Other than that, they were strangers to him.

  They looked so young. Even the chiefs! What had happened to the grizzled, profane E-7s who’d instructed him as a fresh-caught ensign and sustained him as a lieutenant? The department heads looked like callow boys or self-conscious college girls.

  He blinked, seeing suddenly, in their places, the crew of Reynolds Ryan, so many dead in the icy North Atlantic. Of USS Turner Van Zandt, lost in the hazy Gulf. Of Bowen and Barrett and Gaddis and the other ships he’d served in. Just as young. Just as unformed.

  Did he have what it took to command them, to take responsibility for their lives?

  Aronie finished by presenting the outgoing skipper with the Meritorious Service Medal. The benediction pronounced, Hotchkiss dismissed the crew. Usually the ceremony was followed by a reception in the hangar, coffee and bug juice and a sheet cake cut with a sword. Instead, Ross and his wife left at once, passing down the line of sideboys as the pipe shrilled.

  Aronie lingered, talking to Hotchkiss. When Dan came over, they looked up. “Commodore,” he said.

  “Congratulations, Lenson. You’re making history.”

  “I hope so, sir.”

  “I’ve seen female soldiers on duty in Israel. They’ll do fine. And you’re taking over with enough time to get everyone used to working together before you deploy. I’ll be in touch tomorrow. We’ll discuss what has to be done before the joint task force exercise.”

  Dan said that’d be fine, he’d be aboard all day. Hotchkiss nodded past him, and a moment later bells pealed out. “DESRON Twenty-Two, departing,” said the 1MC.

  Aronie got into a sedan on the pier. And suddenly Dan was alone. A curious sensation, to be an isolate amid the bustle of the in-por
t quarterdeck. He caught furtive glances, swiftly averted as men passed. Woltz, and Camill, the operations officer; a young chief named Marty something. He wanted to say something to break the ice. Crack a joke. But he didn’t. His presence inhibited them. Perhaps even intimidated them.

  He wasn’t one of them anymore.

  Now he was the captain.

  2

  WHEN the chief broke them from quarters, the shortest sailor in the back rank took her hat off and wiped her forehead down, then her neck, and the back of her neck. The officers got to sit in the shade, but they put the enlisted out in the sun and made them stand for the whole thing. She’d sweated through her whites. Hobbling aft on her bad ankle, hoping to catch a breeze off the river, she could smell herself, and it wasn’t good.

  The kind of smell that took her back to boot camp. Where the same sweltering heat came up off the grinder.

  In Orlando, Florida. In August. Wearing two pairs of socks, dungarees, an undershirt, a long-sleeved shirt over that, the utility belt (holding a black raincoat, neatly folded and tucked, and a canteen of warm water from the barracks scuttlebutt), and to top it off, a black garrison cap. What better color to absorb heat. Same color as the asphalt, radiating back that Disney World sun. And the constant yelling. The sweat rolling down your body. Carrying your drill rifle in the same position, arm crooked at waist level for hour after hour till your shoulder bunched in excruciating cramps. To the point you dropped cadence on purpose, just to get dropped for push-ups on the hot asphalt. Even though it burned your hands.

  GSMFN, gas turbine mechanic fireman, Cobie Kasson had reported aboard Horn that morning fresh from gas turbine A school at Great Lakes. Or not exactly fresh; she’d managed a week at home with her mom and daughter in Lafayette, Louisiana. Kaitlyn was three now, a bundle of energy outdoors, absorbed with her new kitten in. The navy had changed Cobie so much it was a surprise to find her daughter almost the same; a little older, that was all. Her mom said she’d grow up fast once she started kindergarten. Hugging her frail body, her chicken-wing shoulders, Cobie had wished that would never come. Wished, too, that they could be together.

  That was her dream. To have her own place, not to have to live aboard ship or in a barracks.

  She’d never thought of herself as military material in school. Her first job was at a tire store. That was where she met Toby, when he came in for new mufflers for his Mustang II. After she had Kaitlyn, she got put on as night desk at the Econo Lodge. It didn’t take long to get fed up with that, especially getting held up by a crack-crazed asshole with a gun. Then the owners sold to a new chain. The maids and servers said new management would lay off all the desk people and rehire. And sure enough, she opened a paper somebody left in the breakfast bar one day and read an ad for her own job.

  The Gulf War started that night. The staff gathered in the lobby to watch the bombing of Baghdad. One segment was set in some kind of command post. Men and women watching flickering screens. Another segment showed women loading bombs onto planes. All at once her life seemed trivial. Making snap decisions about whether or not to send out for more breakfast bagels. Her grandfather had been in the navy. She had a picture of him in his sailor suit. He’d enlisted at sixteen, right after Pearl Harbor. So when they told her she’d have to reinterview, take a cut in pay, she’d gone downtown to see the recruiter.

  All of which made her first day aboard Horn a sick joke.

  She’d spent last night at the transient BEQ. Bachelor enlisted quarters—she was learning the shorthand that condensed everything down to initials. It was OK, almost like a motel, except people were yelling and playing music and carrying on all night long. She didn’t get much sleep, and her ankle hurt like hell even after she ate ibuprofen.

  She’d been running downstairs, Week Seven, when she missed a step and fell. Then that night they had to run a mile and a half. It wouldn’t have been so bad if they hadn’t had to stand for seventeen hours a day. All the girls in her company had swollen ankles. They told her she should see the doc. But nothing—absolutely nothing—was going to keep her from graduating. So she’d kept running, and ate Midol one of the girls smuggled in. But now even when she wasn’t on her feet the ankle still hurt. She hoped she hadn’t fucked it up for good.

  When she got on the bus, there’d been three girls on it already, sitting together. Ina, Patryce, with a Y, and Lourdes. Ina and Patryce were third class, senior to her. Cobie was glad there’d be other women in the engineering department. Ina said in a cute English accent she’d heard there were only about twenty women and three hundred men on the ship they were assigned to. Lourdes was a fireman, too. She was Mexican, and Cobie got the impression she didn’t understand the other girls when they talked fast or used slang.

  As the bus got closer, she saw the ships past a field of tall iron tanks. Like big gray buildings, with the sun flashing off their windows. The water, green and rippling in the sun. They pulled onto the pier, and Ina pointed out a canvas sign along the gangplank: USS THOMAS W. HORN. VALIANT MEN. She looked at it twice, then realized it must be the ship’s motto.

  The heavy girl, Patryce, said, “Think they named the ship after the guys?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Three hundred horny guys. Well, I get just as horny as they do. So horny Horn, look out. Here we come. Hell bitches in heat.”

  Cobie limped her seabag up the ramp into a blizzard of faces. The girls were shunted here and there, but none of the guys looked at them. In the passageways they twisted to slide by, like just touching them would infect them with something. Then Control, a big room with panels of gauges she recognized from the Hot Plant at Great Lakes. A chief told them this was home now, if they had a problem to come to him first.

  Deeper still, down and aft. To aft female berthing, 3-382-3-L. A huge fan coil unit roared just inside the door. Past that were many narrow metal bunks with blue curtains, stacked three high. Close-smelling, hot, with gray terrazzo decks and fluorescent lights hanging on springs. At one end an escape trunk led up. At the other, a head with two urinals, one toilet, and two sinks smelled like a truck-stop restroom. A sawed-off shell casing painted red, and a sign, TAMPONS HERE NOT IN THE SHITTER. YOU CLOG IT YOU CLEAN IT.

  Her own personal space turned out to be a top bunk with a bleed air line as big around as her chest suspended four inches above her face. A motor droned on the other side of the bulkhead, and an emergency breathing pack was mounted where her feet would go. A high school-type locker smelled like something had died in it. At the bottom lay a withered pack of Trojans.

  She suddenly felt trapped. Scared. The ship smelled like oil and paint and a heavy funk underneath, like some guy who sweated hard and didn’t shower enough. Guys were real territorial. She knew that from when she’d decided to clean out Toby’s Mustang. The berthing space felt safe. But outside of that she didn’t see any other girls, just one woman in khakis she’d glimpsed down a passageway. That reassured her a little, the woman officer.

  She ended up many decks below the last light of day or breath of air, down metal ladders and bangy gratings. In front of five hostile-looking jerks in scuffed boots and blue coveralls, sitting around in front of a worn console in main engine room number one, Main One. A tall stubble-chinned guy with hollow cheeks, a crew cut, and sweat circles under his arms stuck out his hand. He had dark eyes and looked at her out of the sides of them, no hint of a smile. “Petty Officer First Class Helm. You’ll be workin’ for me.”

  “Cobie Kasson.”

  “Where you from, Cobie?”

  “Louisiana.”

  “Yeah? Whereabouts?”

  “Lafayette.”

  “Kasson, that a Cajun name? You like that zydeco stuff?”

  “It’s my mom’s name. She’s from Idaho. She raised me after my daddy left.”

  “Lemme guess. Straight out of boot camp, A school, Hot Plant, four-year obligation, that right?” She nodded. “How’d you do in school?”

  “Eighty-two.”
/>   “That’s not too good, is it?”

  “I was UA for eighteen days.”

  UA was unauthorized absence, AWOL, going over the hill. The other guys looked up from polishing their boots, reading their comics. They went back to them when she said her daughter’d got sick and the navy wouldn’t give her compassionate leave. They’d restricted her for the rest of A school and docked her pay.

  “Well, they teach a lot of stuff at that school we don’t use here. See, this ship was built in 1977. How many cars you see on the road from ’77? The gens are shit, they gave ’em to us off the Haylor. And the waste heat boilers, I don’t know why they put those things on here. We have to make the parts, or buy ’em out in town.”

  “Well, I’m eager to learn all I can and start to—”

  A second class rattled down the ladder, saw her, looked away instantly. He said, riding over what she was saying, “Chief says we got to cough up another mess crank. That ditzy B-bitch got the monthlies so bad she can’t get out of her bunk. The em-dee-em-ay wants somebody else.”

  “Hell with him. We ain’t on the hook. If she’s sick, he got to go to another division.”

  “Bolo says he’s countin’ bein’ on the rag same as sick-leaved off. He wants another guy or none of us are eatin’.”

  Cobie felt her heart sink. Not mess duty. Not the day she reported aboard. But to her surprise Helm said, “Ricochet, get your ass down there. And wash your fuckin’ hands before you stick ’em in our food.”

  X-Men thumped to the gratings. “Fuck that, man! I just got off!”

  “You’re only back on till the … regularly assigned person feels better.” Helm smiled at her.

  Ricochet left, not looking happy. The first class got up and said casually he’d take her around, give her a tour of the space. When they were out of earshot, pulling themselves up the smooth greasy-feeling handrails to the next level, he said over his shoulder, “What’s wrong with your leg?”

  “Just twisted my ankle a little.” Guys didn’t want to hear about what was wrong with you. Your headaches or stuff. Toby sure never had.