I’ve just pushed the publish button for this novella. It’s available for pre-order, now, from Amazon and will be available on February 7th, 2020.
Please help an old writer and tell your friends. Spend $0.99 and have a good read.
Ping-Ping, Ping-Ping! The alert woke Captain Charles LeMont of the buoy tender CNAS Halcyon, a naval auxiliary ship. He slapped the link on his wrist to shut off the pinging and sat up in the dimness of his cabin. His eyes felt gummy; he rubbed them, trying to remove the sleep grit that had accumulated since he had gone to bed.
“Go ahead, Comm.” LeMont’s head throbbed. How long had he been asleep? Not long enough for his nanites to purge him of the effects of a hangover.
“Barrington Light is offline, again, Captain. We’ve received another maintenance call,” the communications watch officer announced via the ship’s interlink. “Mission order sent to your link.”
LeMont yawned. Geez, again! “Roger,” LeMont replied. “Give me five minutes for a shower. Please have coffee and breakfast sent to my cabin; following that, contact Dundee Orbital Control for a departure time-slot for…” His head was pounding. Oh, hell. The Engineer was there last night, too. “Check with the Engineer first. Tell him I want us ready to undock in two hours. If two hours creates issues, have him call me.”
“Uh, Captain, System Control wants an ETA and estimate to repair.”
Idiots! We just got the mission order. “Tell them they’ll know when—no…tell them we’ll provide one as soon as we can.” LeMont calmed down. The hangover boosted his irritability level to new heights.
“Aye, aye, Captain.”
“Oh, tell Dave Fuentes I’ll meet him on the bridge in half an hour.” David Fuentes was the Halcyon‘s First Officer.
“Will do, Captain.”
The Halcyon was just coming off a thirty-day R&R—Refit and Replenishment. The traditional crew party, marking the start of their next cruise—or the end of R&R depending upon your perspective, ended only a few hours ago.
“Lights, fifty percent.” LeMont suspected he wasn’t the only one waking to a pounding head. He headed for the ‘fresher feeling his medical nanites dealing with his hangover as the cabin’s overhead brightened.
