Rogue Galaxy, Episode 1: The Captain and the Werewolf Read Free Page B

newly infected during an away mission by a werewolf bite; the day he'd realized that he might be surrounded by people who feared his Jennifer and wanted to kill her.
    His friendly, boyish, outgoing exterior had not changed much. But that rage was always there now, determining his actions.
    “Really?” he said. “Are you sure?” Lieutenant Beach fidgeted almost imperceptibly in his chair, his jaw flexed. “Speak up, Lieutenant Beach.”
    Finally Beach said, with as much defiance in his tone as he dared, “It's not protocol, sir.”
    “What isn't protocol?”
    “For the science officer to supervise the exit from hyperspace, sir.”
    “Ah.” True, the helmsman usually did that on his own—but who cared? Farraday knew this kind of petty squabbling was due to general resentment of Jennifer, and that the way he was acting now would only fan the flames—but, again, he couldn't help it. “Lieutenant Beach, I always thought protocol was to obey the captain's orders on his own bridge. Am I mistaken about that?”
    “No, sir,” said Beach, eyes down, cowed.
    “Good. Just wanted to get that straight. Now, carry on.” He looked at Jennifer and nodded her towards the helm. Reluctantly, she returned there.
    Seeing that reluctance, the anger evaporated out of Farraday (for the moment, at least), to be replaced by regret. He surveyed the rest of the bridge, caught the resentful looks being surreptitiously passed back and forth.
    I'm the one who's going to wind up getting her killed.
    The thought left him drained almost of the will necessary even to sit up straight, and he slumped in the captain's chair like a melted man.
    He remembered that awful day: he'd sent Jennifer down onto the surface of Cygnus VI along with the envoy, sent to interview the legendary Cygnian mages and sorcerers to see what secrets they might be coaxed into divulging to Galaxy 's science department and astro-mage corps. That was the mission he'd been given by Admiral Bayonne—seek allies and useful knowledge till the return of the Fleet. At that very moment, a hundred light-years away, Bayonne and the rest of the Fleet had been entering the Bubble of Fakkalohn to escape the Provisional-controlled forces. Secretly Farraday's heart skipped a beat every time Jennifer went with an away mission, but they'd expected no special danger from this one. But then Jennifer had been bitten by an escaped werewolf that had been rampaging through the Sorcerers' City.
    Farraday had met the shuttle in the docking bay—he'd been frantic, almost unable to control himself. He remembered the shock of that first sight of her, shivering with the preliminary attack of were-rabies, and he remembered his guilt at having sent her planetside—never mind that no werewolf had gotten loose in the Cygnian Sorcerers' City for a hundred years. And then, two days later, while he was still waiting for word from Dr. Carlson and Witch Walsh in Sickbay on whether Jennifer would make it, then had come the order from the new Canadian Provisional to destroy her. That was the last direct contact Farraday had permitted with the current Earth government.
    He was still grateful to his crew for having stood by him when he'd refused to acknowledge the Provisional's authority. But he knew that many thought Admiral Bayonne might have given the same order, and he couldn't help but remain wary of them.
    If the crew, or a strong enough contingent of it, ever decided that it wasn't up for the hardships of rebellion, that the rest of the Fleet was never going to emerge from the Bubble of Fakkalohn, and that it was time to ask to be taken into the fold of the Provisional Government, the first thing that government was likely to do would be to require them to follow that standing order, and kill Lieutenant Jennifer Summers. And never mind that the werewolf threat could be neatly contained, by always keeping a planet between themselves and its moon, and by never transporting Jennifer down to a surface where