Chapter 3 - The People on the Schedule
The first transport truck arrived at four forty-two, eighteen minutes early. Its driver had a sunburned neck, a wedding band carved by years of work, and a printed order telling him exactly where to park.
Mara stood in front of the gate with Ortiz and waved him down.
“Sorry,” the driver said through his open window. “I got a slot. I'm not paying for another overnight.”
“You won't lose the slot,” Mara told him. “But you can't enter this section until Range Control clears it.”
He pointed at the sheet. “Says green.”
“It's wrong.”
“Yeah, well, someone needs to tell dispatch. They're sending two more.”
Ortiz was already on the phone. Mara leaned one hand against the truck door and watched a line of ants moving through a crack in the pavement. She had shut down a test in front of an admiral. Now she was trying to stop three trucks and an invoice from becoming everybody else's problem.
She took the dispatch number and called herself. The dispatcher, a woman named Janine, asked for an updated written order before she could reroute anything.
“Can I give you my name?” Mara asked.
“I need a number on a form, honey.”
Mara looked toward the command trailers and almost laughed. People imagined authority as a voice that made doors open. Here it was a person hunting a document while a truck idled in ninety-eight-degree heat.
By five fifteen Decker arrived in a government SUV. He stepped out, looked at the parked trucks, and rubbed his forehead.
“I told logistics to hold,” he said.
“Someone didn't hear you,” Mara replied.
“I sent a note.”
“A note to whom?”
“My deputy.”
“Was Janine on it?”
He stared at her. “Who's Janine?”
“That would be the problem.”
Decker looked away toward the range. He had been in the Navy long enough to know she wasn't being clever. It was a fair criticism, and he hated that it landed in front of Ortiz.
“Commander,” Ortiz said, “I can get this sorted if I have your revised schedule signed.”
“Fine. I'll send it.”
“Today?” Mara asked.
Decker's look was icy. “In the next ten minutes.”
Inside the logistics office, Bell was sitting beside a vending machine with an unopened turkey sandwich. Mara pulled a chair over. It scraped loudly on the tile.
“Tell me exactly what you touched yesterday,” she said.
He put the sandwich down. “I'm going to get fired, aren't I?”
“I don't know.”
“You could say you approved it.”
“I did approve the maintenance work. I didn't approve leaving it off the log.”
“You told me we'd catch it up.”
“Yes.”
“Then why do I feel like I'm the only one in trouble?”
Because he was younger, she thought. Because a man who needed his paycheck couldn't afford to sound angry. Because she'd used her own deadline as though it were everybody's problem.
“You aren't the only one,” she said. “But I can't make that answer feel better.”
He pressed the heel of his palm into his eye. “My wife says I always say yes at work. I told her that's how you keep a job.”
“What does she do?”
“Teaches fourth grade. And she's pregnant, so this has been a terrific week.”
Mara didn't offer reassurance she couldn't guarantee. “Go home at six. Write down what you remember while it's fresh. Don't talk yourself into details you aren't sure about.”
Bell nodded. As she rose, he said, “There's one thing.”
She waited.
“When I finished, the indicator looked normal. But when the unit cycled later, it hung a fraction off center. I told Ortiz.”
“Why didn't you tell me?”
“I tried. You were on the phone with Washington.”
Mara remembered the call. Hale's staff had wanted three versions of her presentation: one short, one very short, one suitable for a ship's crew. She'd taken it in a hallway and waved Bell away when he approached.
“What did I say?” she asked.
He stared at his sandwich. “You said, 'If it's not on fire, write it down.'”
The words came back so clearly that she wanted to sit again.
Bell had written it down. Not where anyone had looked.
The last truck was rerouted just before sunset. Janine called Ortiz to confirm that the drivers had received revised instructions, then called again because one driver had left his radio charger in the temporary staging lot. Ortiz borrowed a cart and went looking for it. Mara offered to help; Ortiz waved her off. “Go get some sleep, ma'am. The charger isn't going to change the test result.” Mara stayed long enough to help the driver find the thing under a seat. It was cracked and held together with tape. He thanked her by offering a bottle of lukewarm soda. She took it because declining felt more troublesome than drinking it.
At six, Mara drove toward her rental apartment in Ridgecrest with the air conditioner blowing warm for the first several miles. The sky above the mountains had begun to soften. Her father called just as she stopped at a light.
“You coming over Sunday?” he asked.
“Maybe.”
“You sound terrible. Eat something.”
“I did.”
“What?”
“Coffee.”
“That isn't food, Mara.”
He waited for her to tell him what was wrong. She didn't. He'd worked thirty-one years as a machinist in ship repair, and he had a habit of asking questions in a way that stripped excuses down to bolts.
“You still there?” he asked.
“Yeah.”
“Then I'll make the meatloaf whether you come or not.”
After the call, her phone chimed. The incident report portal had returned her first draft for revision. Under personnel conduct, she'd written a short, factual line about Hale's canteen.
The reviewer had highlighted it and added: Please clarify whether physical contact occurred and identify all witnesses.
Mara had named the admiral.
She had not named Decker.
She put the phone in the cup holder and stared at it until the light turned green and a car behind her tapped its horn.
May you like
At home, she opened the report again and entered his name.
Then another message arrived, this one from Decker: We need to speak before that report goes forward.
