Double Helix 03_ Red Sector - Diane Carey [1]
Screens around the cockpit flashed views of all six lander pads with irritated civilians scooping dirt out of huge potted plants and dumping it on the ship’s pads. So much for respect. “Are they throwing rocks?” Stiles asked.
“It’s garbage.” Eying the same screen, Perraton stood up and pulled on his torso armor, buckling the padded vest over his chest. “Some of ‘era are throwing balls of mud from those pots.
Stiles straightened. “Secure the coach and scramble the evac squad. Nuts, Oak One. Remain in your cockpits. Do not get out, understood? Sit tight and let Oak Squad flush the dignitaries. I’ll escort Ambassador Spock personally.” “They’re pushing on my struts. Our light-stun phasers can-” “Negative!” Stiles broiled. “Let’em crowd you. Keep finger shields activated in case they touch the wings. And all of you shut up! I don’t want the ambassador to hear the slightest disrespect.” “Oh, we respect you. Don’t you respect him, Cashew?” “I drip respect.” “As you were!”
“As I was? Did I change? I like me this way. Did you change, Acorn ?”
“Animals;’ Stiles grumbled. “I’d like to get you disrespectful slugs on starship duty for five minutes, just five minutes….” He buffed himself in padded insulation as he pulled his flak vest over his head, then slipped into his gauntlets, adjusted his sidearm, and led Perraton out into the coach’s main seating area.
Here, six other members of Oak Squad were already suited up and looking at him from inside their red-tinted helmet shields. Travis Perraton, Jeremy White, Bill Foster, Dan Moose, Brad Carter, Matt Girvan-the familiar names and faces swam before his eyes like a manifest, and for a moment he thought the blood was rushing out of his head. Midshipmen and ensigns, all in training for what would eventually become specialties, for now they were assigned to Starbase 10 in the Security Division, under their senior ensign-Stiles. At twenty-one, Eric Stiles was the old man of the outfit. Perraton was next, at twenty years old and forty-two days junior to Stiles’ ensign stripes. Knowing that they had heard the ribbing he took from the wings, Stiles felt his face flush. He had to lead the mission. He’d gotten himself into this on purpose. He had to address them as a commander. Nobody to hide behind. They’d seen the landing. His dream of a crisp textbook military approach and regulation landing had gone up in an ugly puff. Now the squad members were blushing and snickering, burying grins, trying not to look right at him-that was hard to take! “Heads up.” His voice cracked. “There’s a riot going on outside. Some kind of local political trouble. The embassy is beam-shielded, so we have to go in the security door. As we approach, the guard will drop the door shields. We’ll have to go in and come out in single file. We’re going to put the dignitaries between us, at two or three in a row. there are about twenty of these people, so the seven of us’ll be just about right. I’ll go last, with the ambassador right in front of me. He’s the primary person to guard, and if he gets so much as a hangnail, somebody’s gonna answer to me in a dark alley. After we get-shut up, Foster!” “I didn’t say anything!” Bill Foster protested. “Quit snickering! This is… this is- “Serious,” Perraton supplied. “I know, Eric;’ Foster muttered. “You call me ‘Ensign,’ mister!” “Aye aye, Ensign Mister.”
“I want this mission to go like clockwork! I don’t want a single twitch that isn’t in the rule book! Don’t snicker, don’t slip, don’t do anything that isn’t regulation!”
A hand was pressed to his shoulder and drew him backward a step on the plush carpet.
“Everything’ll go fine, Eric,” Perraton mildly interrupted. “We’re ready when you are.” His short dark hair was buffed under a white helmet with Starfleet’s Delta Shield printed on the forehead, now