Strength and Honor by R.M. Meluch Read Free Book Online Page A

their force fields, their engine containment shields. Same with the long-range shuttles and the space patrol torpedo boats.
    All personnel reported to the hospital in rotation for full nano scans. That included the ship’s dogs.
    Also to be scanned were the houseplants, the livestock, the hydroponic gardens. Innocuous systems—air, light, emergency light, the lifts—were all refitted with virgin programs. Decks were evacuated and sealed off one by one, opened to vacuum and sanitized.
    Scrubbing for nanoparticles, you got to know how really big the Mack was.
    She measured four hundred feet red light to green light, eighty-four feet of that across the beam. She was four hundred feet topsail tip to bottom sail tip; five hundred and seventy feet nose to engines, then add another ninety feet onto that for the engines.
    “What’s that in nanometers?”
    “Shut up, Dak.”
    Steele began to wonder if those instruments couldn’t read his thoughts. Absolutely nothing else was private. Steele thanked God he’d never stashed away any images of Kerry Blue in his quarters. Nothing was left unscrutinized down to the nano level.
    Harvard educated xenolinguist Patrick Hamilton apparently wasn’t smart enough to purge his stash before the searchers hit his quarters. Something turned up in his quarters not meant for wifely eyes. Whatever it was, it didn’t cause the security team any concern, but Doctor Pat’s wife was the Hamster, third in command of the space battleship Merrimack. Those were her quarters too. If Patrick Hamilton didn’t think a find like that wouldn’t get back to her there must have been a stupid contest running.
    Made Steele feel like a fog trucking genius.
    Captain Farragut took a walkabout of his giant ship. Not that he could see nanoparticles, but if anything were out of place on his Merrimack he could sense it.
    The tap tap tap of a basketball drew him to the maintenance hangar. He recognized the cadence of the dribble. The ball’s bounces had a feminine sound. The footsteps following the ball were barely audible above the other ship sounds.
    As Farragut entered the cavernous compartment, the lone player circled under the basket with a light tread. She jumped. Landed lightly and corralled the ball that bounced off the rim.
    She was five foot one and light boned.
    Hamster was just plain light.
    She played one-on-herself in the maintenance hangar. John Farragut would have joined her, but it was probably not a good idea for him to play one-on-one of any game with Mrs. Hamilton.
    Glenn Hamilton wore her auburn hair pulled back in a ponytail. She dribbled the basketball, jumped, and shot. And missed again. Caught the rebound.
    “You know there is something ridiculous about you with a basketball.” Hamster glared toward the hatch. Saw John Farragut leaning in the entranceway. “Shut up,” she said. “Sir.”
    Farragut strode in. He beckoned for the ball. She passed it to him, rather strongly.
    He bounced the ball twice, took a shot. Missed.
    Hamster collected the rebound, jumped and made the shot. “Gypsy wasn’t on deck when you called me to the command deck, was she?” said Farragut.
    Hamster had to think back to the declaration of war. It seemed like a year ago since the balloon went up, even though it was scarcely enough time to count in days. More like hours.
    She remembered the words she’d used to summon Farragut to the command deck in the middle of ship’s night without mentioning war.
    Gypsy’s hair.
    “Hell no, sir!” she answered.
    Commander Gypsy Dent’s hair was an elaborate nest of serpentine dreadlocks detached from Gypsy’s head and exiled to her cabin until Gypsy got off duty, when she reattached it to her head hair by hair.
    Gypsy was very proud of her hair, and she had given Captain Farragut an order: “Speak not of the hair.”
    No one else would have made the connection, even if they had heard Farragut once describe Gypsy’s hair as “a war zone.” But Glenn Hamilton and