Halo_ Evolutions - Essential Tales of the Halo Universe - Eric Nylund [172]
Seinmann opened his mouth as if to protest—then said nothing, and then finally, “Aye, sir.”
Nevel wheeled about and left the bridge.
Ensign Indara whispered, “I think Nevel has an antique slide rule tucked away somewhere if you run out of fingers to count on.”
Seinmann growled something unintelligible, grabbed a data pad, and stabbed in calculations.
After a minute of this, he looked among his fellow ensigns (all of whom were busy with their own work) until he spotted a young crewman—or rather the backside of a crewman that protruded from an open access panel to the oxygen recycling intake.
“Cole!” Seinmann barked. “Get over here.”
Crewman Apprentice Cole extracted himself from the narrow crawlspace, stood, straightened his gray coveralls, and ran a hand over his shorn hair (which was dotted with drips and spatters of grease).
The fresh-out-of-barf-school crewman looked alert and eager to please. His dark eyes met Seinmann’s and didn’t waver.
“Yes, sir?”
Seinmann shoved the data pad at Cole. “I need you to run an independent check on these numbers.”
Cole’s gaze moved to the data pad. He swallowed.
“In case you don’t recognize them, they’re parameters for a Shaw-Fujikawa manifold collapse.”
Cole nodded and took the pad.
“You do know what a Shaw-Fujikawa manifold is, don’t you, crewman?” There was a dangerous glint in Seinmann’s eyes.
Cole didn’t look up from the pad, still studying its contents. “Yes . . . sir.”
“Good. If you get stuck just look up the formulas on a workstation.” With no further explanation, Seinmann picked up his coffee mug and strolled over to Indara.
Cole took the data pad and sat at a nearby station, still not moving his stare from the ensign’s equations, but now frowning at them. He tapped in a few parameters, sighed, and erased them.
“You’re cruel,” Indara whispered to Seinmann.
“And in hot water if the lieutenant commander finds out you’re not doing your own work,” Handford added.
“Cruel . . . ?” Seinmann mused. “Isn’t that what crewmen are for?” He looked over at Cole. “Don’t worry about the lieutenant commander. I already have the rough calculation done.”
“So why pick on Cole?” Indara asked. “He gets his work done and doesn’t bother anyone.”
“He bothers me,” Seinmann said. “Never shows the proper respect. Did you see the way he looked at me? And he’s always got his nose in a library access terminal, too, reading ancient history or quantum field theory or stuff he couldn’t possibly understand. It’s so obviously an act.”
“I still think it’s unnecessarily cruel,” Indara said.
Lieutenant Commander Nevel stepped onto the bridge.
Seinmann instantly pretended to be double-checking the seed stock in Holding Bay 4.
The AI pedestal lit and Lorelei flickered upon its surface, the lines of her face smoothed into the features of someone just waking up. “Good afternoon, Lieutenant Commander. All primary and secondary neural links checked. Shaw-Fujikawa parameters calculated and three-times-three checked. All systems go. Season of Plenty ready for slipstream space transition upon the captain’s orders.”
“Very good,” Nevel said. He spotted Seinmann and added, “Oh . . . and link to Ensign Seinmann’s data pad and check his work, please.”
Seinmann strode over and whispered to Lorelei, “I thought you said you had to run a self-diagnostic.”
“I did,” Lorelei’s admitted, “but that’s not all I did. I’m not an idiot, Ensign.”
The AI blinked, and then announced to Nevel in a loud voice, “His calculations are correct, if not crude. The input parameters would have gotten the Season of Plenty there—albeit 160 million kilometers off course . . . and pathing through a brown dwarf.”
The lieutenant commander frowned at Seinmann. “Ensign, report to the captain that the Season of Plenty is shipshape and awaits his orders.”
Seinmann skulked off the bridge, but as he passed Ensign Indara, she whispered, “What about Cole? He’s still working.”
“Let him,