DONUTS (part 2 of 4)
or
_101 Things to do in Jump Space_
The only living thing on the ship bigger than Gertie was the
Aslani. We called him Hyl, which was short for his whole name. He
actually wasn't a bad sort for an aslani once he mellowed out some.
He was a bit a problem early on in the voyage, and MC and Haakim were
ready to space him. He wouldn't relinquish the pilot's seat to anyone
for six jumps when we started out. He wouldn't even leave the bridge,
slept in the pilot's chair, talked to Haakim as if Haakim were a female
aslani, made the bridge stink...
He had been in the chair so long that he started making
mistakes. Gertie, being a groundpounder, didn't know enough about ship
ops to kick him off the bridge; and MC, who knew better, was still
ticked off that Gertie was commanding, and she wasn't going to
volunteer that info to Gertie. So when we chased the corsair and blew
it full of holes, Hyl had pushed the engines too hard. The insertion
into jump was bad, really bad. Even MC and Sean lost their guts along
with the rest of the crew. That finally gave MC the lever she was
looking for: at the next command meeting she rearranged the crew
rosters to her liking, and gave Hyl a piece of her mind for good
measure. It was quite a sight - short little MC spitting venom and
invective, and great big huge Hyl hanging his head and taking it.
After that episode, Gertie and MC came to an understanding, and
Hyl started comporting himself better with the rest of the bridge crew.
MC and Hyl developed a very polite working relationship, though they
are too far apart culturally to ever be great friends. But this really
isn't about how the crew almost killed each other on the way out - this
is really about Gertie and her donuts.
You see, Hyl does have a sense of humor, though the crew
doesn't understand it most of the time. Hyl does pull a winner from
time to time though. In the middle of the donut heists, Hyl decided
that he was going to play too.
So he showed up in the mess one morning and stood at the head
of the table where Gertie was sitting and eating her donuts. I think
that was his way of giving Gertie the opportunity to notice his
presence. Sure enough, she looked up, said good morning, and went
back to reading. He studied her, he studied the plate of donuts, he
looked around at everyone in the mess. Everyone else in the mess was
looking back at him (when Hyl does something unusual, people
_notice_). He flipped his ears, smoothed his mane back, strutted
behind Gertie, and snagged a donut on the end of a claw as he passed.
He then stuck it on his tail and waved it behind him as he walked out
past Gertie's table. When he was sure he had her attention (and he
had - no one there had missed the lift of the telltail blond eyebrow),
he paused, swung the tip of his tail to his mouth, and took a nibble.
MC almost fell off her seat from laughing too hard, and the marines
stood up and applauded.
Gertie? She just shook her head, and went back to reading,
muttering under her breath.
- ---------------------
MC decided to get involved in the donut heists. She spent
three days down in engineering (always a sign of trouble), and then
appeared one morning in the mess with her computer on her arm. It was
unfortunate that almost all of the rest of the crew showed up too.
Gertie finally showed, looked around, and smelled trouble in the air.
MC was actually sucessful at nibbling at her bowl of whatever and
looking like she was reading the display on her computer. Truth be
told, she was looking at her display - she had the mess displayed in
map view.
Gertie approached the pastry box with great caution. She
inspected it. She inspected the contents. She inspected the occupants
of the mess. Everyone was trying very hard to look innocent. She took
out a plate and piled donuts on it, and then placed it at her usual
seat. She inspected the chair. She inspected the table. She
inspected under the table. She inspected the occupants of the mess
(again). Everyone was trying very hard to look innocent (still).
Finally, she sat down and took a bite from a donuts. She
watched the crew. The crew watched back, everyone except MC and
Thilia. MC was looking at the computer display, and of course, Thilia
is blind and can't watch anything. While Gertie was watching the
crew and the crew was watching back, the plate of donuts floated up
a few centimeters, floated in back of Gertie, and settled down quietly
by her other elbow. Someone snickered.
At that, Gertie checked the donuts and took a doubletake to
discover them on the wrong side. She left them there, and went on to
reading. All was fairly quiet for many minutes. Gertie would look up
every now and then, only to find people fairly quiet and very
attentive. Then, the plate floated back to its former location, and
when Gertie went reaching for the next donut, the plate wasn't where
she had left it.
As the sound of laughter rippled through the mess, Gertie
lifted the plate and removed the grav disk affixed to the bottem. The
only people not laughing were MC staring at her display, and Thilia who
had seen none of it. Gertie got up, walked over to MC, and thrust the
grav disk under MC's nose.
"I believe this is yours?" The sarcasm was unmistakable.
"Oh yes," MC showed remarkable control, and took the disk while
maintaining a straight face, "thank you." She could have been thanking
a shop clerk or a junior officer. Gertie just gave her an eyebrow, and
turned away muttering "I'll get you for this, Norris."
MC allowed herself a small self-satisfied smile, and put the
grav disk into her jumpsuit pocket. And then Thilia leaned forward
across the table, and demanded to know what was going on.
- -------------------
next weekend, part 3, where Sean the engineer gets in the
act, and MC gets blamed for it...