The Oncoming Storm Read Online Free Page A

deployment. As always, the yard dogs had missed things that only experienced crewmembers would have noticed, while other items or problems simply didn’t show themselves until the starship was run at full power for the first time. He looked at the pile of paperwork on his desk—the captain’s desk—and sighed to himself. The room would have to be cleaned before the captain laid eyes on it . . .
    No, he told himself. There isn’t anyone who can be spared from more important work.
    Leaving the office behind, he walked through Officer Country and into his own cabin. It was smaller than the captain’s chambers, but it suited him, even though the bulkheads were still bare and utterly untouched by any paintings or moving images. A handful of old-fashioned paper books sat on a bookshelf, each one very well thumbed. They’d cost him a month’s salary apiece, but they’d been worth it. There was something about a paper book that was never quite matched by anything on the datanet.
    He stripped down rapidly, then pulled his white dress uniform over his underclothes and glanced at the mirror. His homeworld hadn’t possessed any form of rejuvenation technology until after they had made contact with the Commonwealth and it showed. Naval personnel were offered rejuvenation treatments as a matter of course, but his hair was already starting to turn gray, even though he was only sixty. He had a good seventy years of life left in him, he knew, assuming he wasn’t killed in the line of duty, yet he looked old. And he wasn’t vain enough to use cosmetic surgery to make himself look young.
    Besides, he thought, looking old makes it easier to get younger crewmen to pay attention.
    He keyed his wristcom. “Inform me when the captain is five minutes from arrival,” he ordered. “And then hold any calls for me unless they’re priority one.”
    The thought made him smile. Everything was priority one right now, with yard dogs crawling over the cruiser’s hull and countless problems popping up every day that only the CO could solve. Captain Falcone was going to jump right into the deep end, as soon as she assumed command. But, as a good XO, he would take as much of the weight from her shoulders as he could.
    “Aye, sir,” Lieutenant Ross said.

    Kat felt, at times, as though she belonged in space far more than anywhere else. Space was simple, governed by a set of cold equations that even the most advanced technology in existence couldn’t thrust aside completely. If one made a mistake, one died; it was far simpler than political or social struggles on the planet below. She pressed her face against the porthole as the shuttle rose out of the atmosphere, feeling nothing but relief as the planet fell away behind them. In space, she was free . . .
    Or as free as I will ever be, she thought, sourly. Her father’s influence followed her everywhere, ensuring that no one would ever think she’d earned something on her own merits. They might even be right. Her father didn’t have to pull strings overtly to ensure that some toadying admiral would try to flatter or promote his daughter, all in hopes of pleasing Duke Falcone.
    Maybe I should just run.
    It was rare, she knew, for a member of the aristocracy to simply abandon her title and walk away, but it did happen. There were even legends of one particular aristocrat who had cashed in his trust fund, bought a handful of starships, and set out to build a trading empire of his own on the other side of the Dead Zone surrounding Earth. Others, more practically, found places to live on the other worlds and allowed the universe to pass them by. But Kat knew she was too ambitious to ever abandon her dreams and just walk away. Besides, she knew she’d done well at Piker’s Peak. She was damned if she was throwing her achievement away because of a fit of pique.
    “We’re passing the StarCom now,” the pilot called back. “Any last messages?”
    Kat snorted, then turned to stare at the giant