Dangerous Ground

9. DRILL TEAM

May 16, 2005

Atlantic Ocean

The obnoxious wailing woke Jerry from a dead sleep and for a moment he thought it was his alarm clock, but as he reached for it, he woke up a little more. It was loud, way too loud for his alarm clock. As his brain began to function, Jerry recognized the sound. It was the Collision Alarm. There was a flooding casualty somewhere on board the boat.

Berg and Washburn were already out of their bunks and pulling on their poopy suits. As Jerry got up, the alarm stopped and he heard the Chief of the Watch’s voice over the IMC announcing system. “FLOODING IN THE ENGINE ROOM! CASUALTY ASSISTANCE TEAM LAY TO THE ENGINE ROOM!”

Nobody in the stateroom slowed down, and Jerry rediscovered that quickly dressing in a cramped space with two other people took a lot of practice all by itself. He inflicted a nasty blow to Washburn’s rib cage when Jerry’s elbow stuck out a bit too far, and he almost put on Berg’s shoes. As he dressed, Jerry went over his assignment for the different emergency stations. For flooding, he was supposed to muster his division in the torpedo room.

Officers were pouring out of their staterooms like ants from a kicked-over hill. Jerry hurried toward the ladder and slid down the handrails to reach the torpedo room below. Most of the TMs and FTs were already there, including Senior Chief Foster. As he took stock of his spaces, Jerry thought to check his watch. It was 2:23 in the morning.

It was only a drill, of course, so there wasn’t a fountain of cold seawater endangering Memphis. FT3 Larsen was wearing the sound-powered phones that allowed him to pass information on to everyone in the torpedo room as to what was going on in the engine room.

Jerry was ready to sit tight and wait when Foster started grilling the torpedo gang. He pointed to the aft bulkhead. “Seaman Jobin, what do we do if water starts coming under that door? Petty Officer Boyd, how do we fire torpedoes if we lose the high-pressure firing air reducer?”

A door on the aft bulkhead led to a passageway on the lower level, but it wasn’t watertight, so there was little they could do to stop the flow of water. There were, however, emergency procedures for restoring high-pressure firing air, should the reducer fail.

As Boyd simulated setting up the starboard tube nest for a shot, Emily Davis came down the aisle between the torpedo storage racks.

“Is this your damage control station?” Jerry asked.

“What’s that?” Emily asked in return. She seemed nervous.

“The XO was supposed to assign you stations. Places where you’re supposed to go in an emergency,” he explained.

As he spoke, the lights suddenly went out. Battery-powered battle lanterns cut in automatically, creating cones of light filled with angular shadows. Jerry was a little startled, but Davis screamed and headed back toward the door.

“It’s all right!” he called. “They’re just isolating some of the electrical circuits to keep them from shorting out.”

Davis froze, either because of Jerry’s explanation or because the path before her was dark as well. “It’s just part of the drill.” It was hard to sound soothing without also patronizing her, but she was probably too scared to notice. She held her place between the racks, undecided about which darkness was less threatening. Finally she turned and felt her way back toward Jerry.

TM1 Moran brought over a sound-powered phone headset. “Here, ma’am. Maybe you’d like to listen in on the DC circuit.” He helped her with the headphones and the unfamiliar microphone. Moran then explained how the phones worked; that the energy of her voice created the current that powered the circuit. She grasped the principle instantly and was also interested in the activity on the circuit. “Just don’t press the ‘Talk’ button on top of the mouthpiece,” Moran instructed.

Just as Davis started to calm down, the lights came on, and the IMC announced, “Secure from drill.”

Another voice, the Captain’s, came on the IMC. “That was disgraceful. It took eight minutes for the Casualty Assistance Team to get on scene and twelve minutes to secure the flooding and begin dewatering. Do I have to remind everyone that there is only one watertight bulkhead inside the pressure hull?” It was one of the first things any submariner learned about the Los Angeles class. Only the forward bulkhead to the reactor compartment was fully rated to test depth. The Captain’s caustic reminder was more than a little insulting.

“This was a simple one. In a real flooding casualty, we would have lost vital systems, and the accumulating seawater would have taken out others. But if you prefer standing hip-deep in cold salt water, we’ll let you try it.

“So far, this crew has not demonstrated it is ready to respond to an emergency properly. Until it is, expect more drills. That is all.”

Hardy gave them forty-five minutes before hitting them again. This time it was the general alarm klaxon, followed by “FIRE. FIRE IN THE PORT AC SWITCHBOARD. ALL HANDS DON EABS!” The ventilation fans and lights died immediately, and Jerry had to fumble for a flashlight he kept by his bunk. Berg and Washburn also used them in what now seemed to be an even smaller stateroom.

Slowed by the darkness and the need to plug into an EAB manifold to breathe, Jerry found his division already mustered in the torpedo room. Larsen had the phones on again and Foster had started a training session on the emergency air breathing system. Jerry stood and listened carefully. Foster knew the ropes, and while he might hate Jerry, he took care of his men.

Emily came down the aisle again, carefully holding a flashlight so that it pointed at the deck immediately in front of her. “I asked Lieutenant Commander Bair,” she announced, “and he says I should report here, since this is where my…ROVs…are…located.” Her words trailed off as the light showed nearly a dozen men standing around with masks on. Her puzzled look told Jerry that she didn’t have a clue as to what was going on. Walking over to her, Jerry removed his mask and said, “Good morning again, Dr. Davis. If I may be so blunt, where is your EAB mask?”

“My what?”

“Your emergency air breathing mask, like this one.” Jerry held up his mask so that Emily could see it clearly. “There are two such masks in your stateroom: one for you and another for Dr. Patterson. If you hear the IMC announce ‘Don EABs,’ please take the mask out of the bag, put it on, and make sure you have a good seal. You then plug the mask into an air manifold that looks like this.” Jerry pointed up into the overhead at a red-colored pipe with four plugs protruding from it.

“I’m sorry. I didn’t realize I was to participate that much in the drills,” Emily apologized.

“The EAB system’s purpose is to enable you to continue breathing in a toxic atmosphere. That usually happens when there’s a fire on a submarine. You need to learn how to use the EAB mask properly so that you are prepared in case something does go wrong,” Jerry explained firmly. “In fact, why don’t you sit in on Senior Chief Foster’s training? He’s going over the basics right now.” Just as he was about to lead Emily over, it finally struck him that Dr. Patterson wasn’t here with her.

“Where is Dr. Patterson? What’s her emergency station?” asked Jerry.

“She’s still in bed,” answered Davis. “She says these drills are silly and refuses to have anything to do with them.”

“What?” exclaimed Jerry.

Everyone looked at Emily with as much surprise as their division officer. Even Foster stopped his instructions in mid-sentence. Nobody on a sub ignored casualty drills.

Hardy’s voice over the IMC announced: “Secure from drill. All hands remove EABs. If that had been a real fire, I’d be heading for the nearest port and hoping we’d make it. It took too long to isolate the circuit and once again the Casualty Assistance Team was too slow. Count on doing this again until you do it right.” The lights came on and Jerry wearily headed back to bed.

Hardy hit them with a reactor scram at five, and then an engineering casualty during breakfast. As that drill ended, Jerry heard the General Alarm and the IMC announcement, “MAN BATTLE STATIONS TORPEDO.” Jerry was the Officer of the Deck under instruction for this drill, so he hurried to the control room.

He came into the space on the tail end of yet another argument between Hardy and Patterson. “… tired of these games. I’ve got work to do, and these drills keep slowing us down.”

“Doctor, I will drill this crew until I am satisfied with their performance. If our only job is to get you north, then how I run my boat is none of your business.” He spoke calmly, almost casually.

“Captain Hardy, you will stop these pointless drills!” Patterson’s voice was more than firm.

Hardy paused before answering. For a moment, Jerry thought he was going to comply. Then his expression hardened. “Respectfully, ma’am, I refuse.” As Patterson started to protest, he cut her off. “And in the future, Doctor, for the safety of this boat, you will participate in any casualty drills.” She didn’t answer him immediately and he continued. “Do not mistake me, Doctor. It truly is the safety of the boat — and the mission — that is at stake here.”

Patterson, almost expressionless, looked at Hardy for a moment, then nodded silently in agreement. She turned and left the control room.

Jerry realized he’d been holding his breath. So there were limits, things even Hardy couldn’t be bullied into doing. It made Jerry a little more hopeful, but he wondered what price they’d pay for Hardy’s defiance.

The drills continued throughout the day, with Hardy mixing accidents, engineering casualties, and battle drills almost continuously.

Drills are a normal part of submarine life, but Hardy was merciless in his pace, as well as in his critique of the crew’s actions. Even the smallest infraction brought blistering condemnation. The best the crew could hope for was a plain: “Secure from drill.” If Hardy didn’t have anything bad to say, he wouldn’t say anything at all.

Jerry watched as the crew took grim satisfaction in the lack of praise. During one of the engineering drills, he overheard one of the nuke electronics technicians say proudly, “Even the old man can’t find anything wrong with that one.”

But if there was any criticism from Hardy, the department head and division officers echoed it, passing it down the chain of command. When the machinist mates didn’t deal with a feed pump casualty quickly enough, Hardy held a “washup” in the wardroom — for all the officers. After reviewing the casualty in detail and pointing out each and every thing that had gone wrong, Hardy laid into Lieutenant Commander Ho, the Engineer.

“Your people aren’t properly trained or supervised. You tell Jackson, Hughes, Train, and even Chief Barber that their performance is not satisfactory, nor is yours for letting it happen.”

Ho stood at attention in front of the entire wardroom while the Captain lambasted him for several more minutes. He managed to work in an “Aye, aye” or “Yes, sir” where appropriate, but Hardy never gave him the chance to explain or even apologize.

Jerry listened to it with the rest of the wardroom, embarrassed for Ho, and remembered how different his old squadron commander had been. He suspected that the difference in command styles was not because one was an aviator and the other a submariner.

After Hardy left the wardroom, Jerry watched as Ho turned on Al Millunzi, the Main Propulsion Assistant. His division maintained and operated the feed pump in question and had muffed the drill. “What were your people thinking, mister? Or were they thinking at all?” Ho spoke loudly, much more loudly than he had to, and Jerry saw him glance in the direction of the passageway, as if he wanted to make sure Hardy heard him berating the MPA.

Millunzi immediately came to attention and didn’t respond as Ho criticized his leadership, his technical knowledge, and even his dedication to the Navy. “I’ll expect nothing less than perfection from you and your men, mister. Now, go make it happen!”

The lieutenant, red-faced, nodded silently and left the wardroom. Jerry felt sure that Chief Barber and M division were next in line for “verbal admonition.”

As the crew demonstrated their competence with the basic drills, Hardy and the XO increased the complexity. Engineering casualties caused flooding. Toxic smoke from a simulated insulation fire in forward compartment middle level caused dozens of simulated casualties, including Jerry and his men, who were told to lie in place and wait to be treated.

The rescuers appeared quickly, all wearing EABs and their fire-fighting suits. As the leading “rescuer” reached down to pick up one of the casualties, the XO stopped him. “Wait a minute, Brown. Is your mask on properly?”

Machinist Mate Second Class Brown nodded, “Yes, sir.” His answer was muffled by the mask.

“Good,” the XO replied. “And can you see all right?”

“Yessir, as well as the mask allows,” responded Brown.

“Do you have a nifty with you?” Bair asked innocently. The nifty is the handheld Navy infrared thermal imager (NIFTI), which is used by firefighters to locate a fire in thick, obscuring smoke. It can also be used to find personnel casualties by their body heat.

“Uh, no, sir. The fire-fighting teams have both of them.”

“Well, that’s no good! This compartment is filled with toxic smoke. It’s not only poisonous, it’s nearly opaque.” Bair pulled out a small green trash bag and slipped it over Brown’s head. He then passed bags to the rest of the team. “Here, all of you put these on, just like Brown.”

As they pulled the bags over their heads, a muffled curse came from somewhere in the group. “I can’t see shit!” exclaimed an anonymous voice.

“I can’t see shit, sir!” the XO replied, amused. “If you can guarantee that fires will never have smoke, I’ll let you take off the bags.”

“Permission to proceed, sir,” Brown said in a tone that managed to mix frustration with proper respect for the XO’s rank.

Bair nodded approval, and then, remembering they couldn’t see him, said, “Proceed.”

The rescuers were required to actually “examine” each casualty, then bodily lift the “unconscious” man from the space and evacuate him to a safe portion of the sub. Stumbling, moving carefully to avoid the angular equipment that filled the space, the rescue team had only evacuated half of the casualties in the torpedo room when Hardy came clattering down the ladder from the deck above.

“What’s going on…” he started, but then stopped himself as he realized what the XO had done. He saw Bair checking his watch and asked, “How long have they been at it?”

“Ten minutes, sir. They’ve cleared five casualties so far.”

“Leaving the other five breathing toxic smoke for ten minutes,” the Captain said harshly. He pointed to the men, including Jerry, still lying “unconscious” on the deck. “Well, we might as well stop the drill, because these men are all dead.”

The rescue team did stop, and some of the men started to remove their bags, but Hardy yelled, “No! Belay my last! Leave the bags on and keep going. You obviously need the practice. Next time you might not have ten minutes.”

The crew had now been subjected to over fifteen hours of intense drilling, and both Bair and Master Chief Reynolds argued strongly for a break to let the crew catch its breath and have a meal in peace. Hardy deferred to the petitions of the XO and COB and allowed the crew to eat dinner without any interruptions, in stark contrast to both breakfast and lunch, and everyone welcomed the three-hour respite.

The meal, however, was not according to the menu that was listed in the plan of the day. Washburn apologized profusely to both the wardroom and the crew’s mess for having to serve sliders and fries, instead of the much-anticipated surf ‘n’ turf. His mess cooks just didn’t have enough time to prepare the steaks and lobsters with all the drill activity. Although there was a little grumbling, no one blamed the supply officer. Most of the crew was just grateful to have a quiet hot meal.

Half an hour after dinner, though, the drills returned with a vengeance. “FIRE IN THE TORPEDO ROOM! ALL HANDS DON EABS! CASUALTY ASSISTANCE TEAM LAY TO THE TORPEDO ROOM,” blared the IMC. Followed immediately by the BONG, BONG, BONG of the general alarm. Jerry grabbed the EAB mask on his bunk and started to walk quickly to his spaces. He had taken only a few steps, when he nearly collided with Emily Davis, who was exiting the wardroom. “Stay here!” Jerry yelled as he literally pushed her back into the wardroom. Confused by Jerry’s actions, Emily watched as he turned the corner on his way to the torpedo room. The other junior officers scampered by, going as fast as they could to their damage control stations. Not knowing what to do, Emily shut the wardroom door and sat down on the couch.

Jerry reached the crew accommodations just aft of the torpedo room and found a number of TMs and FTs in fire-fighting gear rigging a fire hose. He slipped on a Nomex flame-retardant jumpsuit and the protective headgear and gloves as quickly as the very cramped quarters would allow. Once finished, he moved up to the man with the sound-powered phones to report to control that he was in charge at the scene. But as Jerry got closer, he was surprised to see that it was FT1 Bearden manning the phones. Looking around, he saw no sign of Senior Chief Foster.

“Petty Officer Bearden, where is the Senior Chief?”

“I don’t know, sir. He should have been here by now.” Bearden’s response did not encourage Jerry at all. “I’m on line with control. Do you want me to report that you are in charge at the scene?”

“Yes, please.” As Bearden made the report, Jerry looked around the area and saw that the team was just about ready to make its entry into the torpedo room. He then noticed that the red ball cap that Bair was wearing, the “badge” of a drill monitor, had a Fokker triplane embroidered on the front. The XO also had a grin on his face that would do justice to the Cheshire cat. Jerry poked Bearden on the shoulder and asked, “What’s with the XO?”

Bearden turned, looked, and then Jerry saw his shoulders sag. Facing his division officer, Bearden said dejectedly, “Ahh shit, sir. We’re screwed.”

“What’s wrong?”

“The XO is wearing his Red Baron hat. It’s his way of telling us that this drill is going to be a ball buster. Every time he’s worn that hat, the drill has always been complex and hard. Very hard.”

“Wonderful,” replied Jerry sarcastically.

An unidentifiable rating then handed Jerry a training NIFTI. Actually, it was just a small coffee can with both of the ends removed and painted white, but it was good enough to keep one of the XO’s stupid green garbage bags off his head.

Positioning the hose team, jerry turned to have Bearden report that they were making their entry. Only, he wasn’t there. Looking frantically for his phone talker, Jerry spotted Bearden and Foster at the end of the line, apparently arguing about something, given Foster’s animated hand motions. Angrily, Bearden took off the sound-powered phones and handed them to the Senior Chief. It seemed to take Foster a very long time to get the phones on, adjusted, and checked back into control. Jerry figured that that little stunt had cost them almost a minute. The XO certainly didn’t look happy.

Once Foster finally reached Jerry, he ordered the senior chief to report to control that the team was entering the torpedo room. As Jerry opened the door, all the lights went out in the compartment and everyone, save Jerry, had a bag put over their head. Holding his coffee can up to his face, Jerry was allowed to see a flickering reddish light from the aft port side of the room. Great, thought Jerry, the fire is over by the warshot Mk 48s. I bet we only have a limited amount of time before the XO has one of the weapons cooks off. Bearden was right. This will be a ball buster.

Advancing slowly, crouched down and waddling, Jerry led his team up and around the center torpedo storage rack. As they came up to the weapons launching console, Jerry saw TM3 Lee lying on the deck. Jerry directed the last two members of the team to remove Lee from the torpedo room as quickly as they could. Foster grabbed another sound-powered phone set from its storage box and tried to find the jack; the first set he had been wearing wasn’t long enough to reach the fire’s location. Jerry reached over, took the connector, and plugged it in for him. The senior chief seemed to double-check the connection, but Jerry wasn’t about to be blindsided again and he rechecked the connection himself. It was secure.

Continuing on around the center stow, the team came across a red strobe light that marked the location of the fire. The only thing back in that corner was one of the AC power distribution panels. Turning to Foster, Jerry yelled, “To control, the fire is near panel P-4. Recommend electrically isolating the panel.” Foster repeated the report precisely and forwarded it to control. Jerry waited about fifteen seconds and then directed the hose team to shift to high-velocity fog and start fighting the fire. He waited the extra time to allow control to pass the word to isolate the electrical panel before he started spraying it with lots of seawater.

Bair walked over to the strobe light, increased the frequency of the flashes, and moved it closer to Jerry’s team. “The fire is getting worse and it’s starting to get really hot in here,” he said loudly. Immediately, Jerry yelled to Foster, “To control, the fire is getting worse. We need a second hose team.” Preoccupied with fighting the simulated fire, Jerry didn’t hear Foster’s repeat back. After about thirty seconds, Jerry became concerned that he hadn’t heard anything from control about sending in a second team. He was about to ask Foster if control had responded when the IMC roared to life, it was the Captain’s voice and he sounded agitated: “TEAM LEADER, CHECK YOUR SOUND-POWERED PHONE CONNECTION!”

Jerry spun around and looked over at the sound-powered phone jack. The plug was halfway out of the socket. Reaching over, he angrily screwed the plug back in. “Senior Chief, verify that you are back online with control and then pass on the word that we need a second hose team down here.”

“Yes sir,” replied Foster smugly.

No sooner had Jerry turned his attention back to the fire than the XO turned on a white strobe light and pointed it at the team. “It’s extremely hot in here. You can’t stand the heat any longer,” shouted Bair as he pushed Jerry’s team back from the strobe lights.

Jerry felt frustrated, as there was little he could do without the second hose team. The XO wasn’t cutting them any slack either, and unless Jerry took measures to protect his team from the heat, the XO would start having them pass out on him. With a hard sigh, Jerry ordered the nozzle man to select low-velocity fog. He then ordered the team to start backing away from the advancing fire. Moments later, the IMC announced, “SECURE FROM DRILL. ALL HANDS REMOVE EABS.”

Jerry stood up and ripped the EAB mask off his face. He was angry, very angry. He looked around to find Foster when Hardy came stomping into the room with Lieutenant Cal Richards in tow. “That was absolutely deplorable,” screamed Hardy. “If this had been a real fire, we’d be in three-section duty on the bottom with Thresher and Scorpion’’—a sarcastic reference to the only U.S. nuclear-powered submarines that had sunk with all hands.

“Mr. Richards,” ranted the Captain, “this team reacted so slowly to the fire that my grandmother with a garden hose could have done better. If you haven’t realized it yet, there were four warshots with six hundred and sixty pounds of high explosive each sitting in the middle of that fire!”

Turning toward Jerry, he continued to lash out. “What excuse do you have for your incompetent communication practices? You were out of touch for nearly two minutes! And in that time you let the fire get so bad, so out of hand, that the weapons in the racks cooked off!”

Shifting back to Richards, Hardy finished his tirade in typical form. “WEPS, I’m holding you personally responsible for this abysmal performance. It’s clear that you have been derelict in your duties as a department head, since these imbeciles are less capable than basic sub school students. I can only assume that you are gundecking your training!” Cal Richards was pasty-white with fright, as Hardy was using words usually reserved for courts-martial offenses.

“XO, you and the WEPS come with me,” Hardy shot out as he turned to leave. “We need to plan remedial drills for the Weapons Department. The rest of you, clean this mess up.” With that, Hardy and the still silent Richards left the torpedo room.

Bair let loose with a heavy sigh, looked at Jerry, and said, “Clean up and stow the DC gear, Mr. Mitchell. We’ll discuss the drill later.”

“Aye, aye, sir,” responded Jerry quietly.

Turning to leave, Bair gave Jerry a friendly slap on the shoulder and then headed off for the CO’s stateroom. As the XO slowly walked out of the torpedo room, Jerry sensed his weariness.

“Okay, folks, let’s clean up,” Jerry said as he reached down and unplugged the two strobe lights. He then peeled off his fire-fighting gear and gave it to TM3 Lee.

As the rest of torpedo division started to secure the phones and the rest of the DC gear, Jerry quietly made the rounds to see how his people were doing. Most were downcast, resigned to the inevitable additional drills. Some made jokes that a three-section watch rotation with Thresher and Scorpion would be easier than what they had right now. Bearden looked just plain mad.

Jerry was furious that the entire department was being forced to suffer because of one man’s bad attitude. While the thought of confronting Foster was not all that appealing, Jerry had to do something before he destroyed what little morale the division had left. Jerry, working hard to keep calm, said, “Senior Chief, can I see you a moment, please?” He held up a clipboard, as if he wanted to speak about some paperwork issue.

Foster followed Jerry forward to an unoccupied corner of the torpedo room. Speaking softly, Jerry said carefully, “You intentionally broke that phone connection, Senior Chief.”

“So?” retorted Foster. “I was just imposing another casualty.”

“After I’d double-checked the connection? And on your own?” He challenged Foster. “The XO decides what drills to run. Did he tell you to impose that particular casualty?”

“No.” The Senior Chief pointedly did not add “sir.”

Jerry was direct. “So why did you do it?”

“To see how you’d handle it. And you didn’t.”

“To make me look bad in front of the Captain seems a better explanation.”

“You can do that all by yourself.”

“But you don’t mind sticking out your foot now and then.”

“This conversation is over,” Foster announced in a voice loud enough to be overheard.

“Not yet it isn’t, Senior Chief! Not until I say it’s over,” countered Jerry forcefully.

“Give me a break.” Foster didn’t even try to speak softly. “You can’t hack it.” He was impatient with the conversation and turned to leave, but Jerry kept talking.

“I’d have a better chance of hacking it if you were working with me — or at least not against me. And we do have a mission to accomplish,” he reminded Foster.

“A junket for Broomhilda? This is one mission I want to fail. And why should you get a second chance? It’s just more politics.” Foster sounded disgusted with the word. “The only mission I’ve got is to make sure that you don’t stay in submarines, and better still, to get you out of the Navy altogether.”

“Well, Senior Chief, my mission is to obey the orders of a duly elected Commander in Chief and the chain of command, even if I think they are politically motivated. And if you do anything like this again, I’ll drag your ass in front of the XO personally. Is that absolutely, positively, crystal clear, Foster?” replied Jerry loudly and sternly.

Momentarily taken aback by the vehemence Jerry displayed, Foster smiled and said, “You don’t have the guts, flyboy.”

Foster threw that last sentence over his shoulder as he walked away from Jerry, past the rest of the division, and out of the room.

After the senior chief’s abrupt departure, the men busied themselves with their assigned duties silently. Jerry remained isolated and tried to understand what had just happened — and why. He had never seen such open insubordination before, and he certainly didn’t know how to handle it — short of officially putting Foster on report, of course. Jerry was pretty sure the XO would back him up, but given Richards’ present state of mind, he would almost certainly support Foster. Regardless, it would be very messy if Jerry tried to bring charges against Foster. And how would Captain Hardy react? Very likely negatively, and that would end his second chance for a naval career for sure. “Damned if I do, damned if I don’t,” muttered Jerry to himself. A sudden movement caught Jerry’s eye, breaking his concentration. It was FT1 Bearden.

“Sir, the guys have finished cleaning up and all the DC gear has been properly stored. May I dismiss the men who are not on watch?”

“Yes, yes, of course,” said Jerry with a slight smile. “Thank you, FT1.”

Bearden fidgeted about for a moment, reluctant to speak, and then quietly he said, “Mr. Mitchell, I never should have let Senior. ” Jerry sharply raised his hand, silencing the petty officer.

“It’s not your fault, Petty Officer Bearden,” stated Jerry sincerely “It’s not your fault. Understood?”

Bearden nodded stiffly as Jerry clasped his shoulder.

Drained physically and emotionally, Jerry started to make his way back to his stateroom. As he walked, he wondered if he had done the right thing. Well, he thought, that’s behind me now. For good or ill, the conflict between him and Foster was now out in the open. Right now, Jerry could only hope and pray that Foster wouldn’t call his bluff.