2352-APRIL-03
We had about two stans before Francis came back for the afternoon watch, so we had to work fast to come up with a strategy. Brill and I thrashed through the materials for about twenty ticks while Diane stewed at her station.
“You’ve done remarkably well, Ish,” Brill told me. “But you really don’t have the math skills for this yet, do you?”
“No, I don’t. I recognize it when I see it, but I’d be lying if I said I understood it.”
“Okay, let’s go for Plan B. Would you be happy with spec two?”
“I’d be happy with spec three. The Lois rates three spec threes and she deserves to be fully staffed.”
“Ish, do you know you talk about the ship like she’s a person?”
“Yeah.”
“Okay, just as long as you’re aware of it.” She glanced at the chrono. “We need to either get a plan or wait until he has the watch and go form a plan.” She headed out into the section and nodded for me to follow.
“Diane?” Brill said.
Diane stuck her head out from behind the number two scrubber. “I’m here. Just checking the matrix we put in last week.”
“We need a plan or at least a plan for a plan.”
Diane slammed the scrubber’s case closed and came over to us. “I’m in.”
“Simple is better,” Brill said. “First question, can we all pretend that we don’t know he did it?”
“I probably can,” I said.
“I don’t know if I’m up to that,” Diane said. “Under the circumstances, I can’t really fault him for resetting the bookmark. But I don’t like that he was riding Ish. That ain’t right.”
“Well,” Brill said, “if we take the short approach, Diane will only need to keep it together long enough for a quick gotcha. We’ll be done with him by noon. Is that doable?”
Diane started to smile. “Depends on whatcha have in mind, but yeah, I think I can.”
“Okay, here’s what we are going to do.”