Emile and the Dutchman by Joel Rosenberg Read Free Book Online

brow for a moment. "Trouble is, I can't seem to find any paper on you before you showed up at Alton—either the data ain't onboard or I can't access it. You were a transfer from New Haven?"
    "That's right." In a manner of speaking. . . .
    "Asshole." Norfeldt smiled. "I thought you were a dumbass kraut, but now I know it."
    "Sir, I am not German. My family has been Austrian for more than two hundred years, sir."
    "And the transfer? To the CS? If that doesn't make you a dumb shit, what does?"
    I snorted. "I had a hell of a choice, Major. Either transfer or sit down at a Naval court-martial. I didn't think I'd like ten years at hard labor on Thellonee . . . so I picked the CS transfer."
    One moment of letting my anger loose . . .
    "Oh? Tell me about it."
    "I'd rather not."
    The Dutchman raised an eyebrow. "I'm sorry, Emmy. I guess I must be hearing things— you disobeying a direct order, shithead? " He jerked his head at my coffee cup. "Take a swig and start spewing it out. From the beginning, Mister."
    An order is an order.
    Of course, there are usually more ways than one to obey an order, unless the giver is very careful. "Yes, sir. To begin: my Grosspapa was born in Vienna—"
    "Shut up, Mister. A touch of white mutiny, eh?" He downed some more Chianti. "I wouldn't, Emmy, I really wouldn't. Start again, and take it from where you arrived at the Naval Academy."
    I thought it over for a moment. I could go into such detail that I'd never get past the first day, or . . .
    Oh, to hell with it. Why not? "Sure, Major. I arrived by copter . . ."

II

    A klick below, the grounds of the Thousand Worlds Naval Academy were white, green, and gold, clusters of low granite buildings spread out over the grass, cupping the sandy beach of New Haven harbor.
    I eased over the cyclic and gave it a bit more throttle as I banked the Hummingbird for a better look.
    And instantly caught a buzz on the comset.
    new haven control flashed on the heads-up display.
    "VNYC 401, we show you as deviating from your logged flightpath. Is it a wind gust, or are you having, ahem, 'autopilot difficulty'?" the firm contralto said, the voice carefully larded with just the slightest bit of sympathy, as well as the sarcasm.
    "Negative, Long Wharf. No problem."
    I switched off my throat mike and allowed myself a light chuckle. She must have been a pilot, too, and understood that I wasn't having any kind of difficulty at all. One minute after I'd taken off from Koch, the moment that radar showed that I was safely outside the cluttered VNYC approaches, I'd set the deadman on the yoke, then toed the bandit switch and put the copter on full manual, not the so-called "computer-assisted" version that only lets you think you're flying.
    I like fly-by-wire—as long as there's sufficient feedback to the stick—but copters don't need all that computerized stabilization gunk the way frontswept airframes or variwings do.
    Even if real flight was illegal, it wasn't really unsafe, no matter what the regs said. If, say, I suffered a stroke or heart attack—and never mind how an eighteen-year-old in perfect health is going to suffer a stroke or a heart attack—my hand would slip off the yoke, popping the deadman and bringing the Hummingbird's flight computer back fully online.
    In any case, as long as I didn't deviate too much from the flight path or exceed speed limits by too much, I'd be unlikely to be called on it. Even if I was, so what? I was reporting as a cadet candidate at the CS Naval Academy, and from the moment I'd left Graz I had been officially under TW military discipline; I wasn't subject to the laws of the North America Federation, and neither the NAFAA, the NAFBI, nor the local police could touch me; all they could do would be report me. The Navy would be unlikely to want to punish a pilot for insisting on really flying.
    Hmm . . . the ATC sounded nice; if she was as pretty as she sounded, it might be worthwhile to get her phone code.
    I turned the mike back