Total pages in book: 62
Estimated words: 57751 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 289(@200wpm)___ 231(@250wpm)___ 193(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 57751 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 289(@200wpm)___ 231(@250wpm)___ 193(@300wpm)
“Don’t threaten me with a good time,” she grinned, doing as she was told nonetheless, knowing better than to push ship’s discipline past its breaking point.
Taylor watched Jerri leave, his palm itching to meet the generous curve of her rear. She was a brat, and that was a rarity on an Authority ship. Jerri’s disobedience was rumor-fast becoming a matter of record—not just notations in log files, but an actual record, like in the Guinness book of brats. If the captain caught wind of it, Jerri would be hauled before a disciplinary hearing and might face expulsion from the ship.
The little blonde was cute as hell. Her hair was cut short around her chin, a fraction of a fraction of an inch above the cutoff for regulations. Jerri could not help but push the limits. Usually she knew what side to stay on, but every now and then she’d slip off the rails in a way that could not be tolerated.
What she really needed was a good, long whipping, though he hated that he was thinking that way. Taylor didn’t like the fact that corporal punishment was still in use on Authority ships. A lot of people believed it to be outdated, and a lot of captains forbade it on their ships. Not Captain Janus, and not the new commander either by all accounts.
“I thought Ensign Tessil was banned from the holobay?” Commander Atlas accosted Taylor as he was leaving the structure. Atlas didn’t know Tessil yet. He barely knew Taylor. As the newest officer on the Audacity, he was playing catch-up on a daily basis.
He had downloaded the ship’s disciplinary reports that morning. There were a hundred and fifty souls on board the Audacity. At any one time, according to Authority statistics, one to three percent of those people would be facing disciplinary action. That usually meant between one and two, possibly three people could be expected to have come to the attention of a superior for a reason that rose to the level of official censure on any given day. Authority ships ran on strict regimes. There was no tolerance for disobedience, or failure to perform duties to acceptable standards.
Ensign Tessil had immediately stood out in his initial disciplinary audit for the wrong reasons. She had received six demerits in the last quarter.
“She is.” If Taylor was uncomfortable, he didn’t look it.
Taylor had not come to Atlas’s attention before. Now he was very much on the radar, along with Tessil. A lieutenant should not be letting an ensign get away with infractions.
“So, what’s the punishment now that she’s disobeyed orders. Again.” Atlas folded his arms over his broad chest and waited for Taylor to admit that he didn’t have anything in mind. Several of the ensigns were starting to get out of hand thanks to lax discipline on the Audacity. Commander Atlas had been transferred for just that reason. He was second in command now, and setting about putting the vessel to rights. At first his attention had focused on the senior officers. They had been fairly easy to straighten out. Usually once that was taken care of, the lower rank and file would fall into line. They had, for the most part. There were only a few pockets of disobedience and rebellion left, and Atlas was in the process of stamping them out.
She’d gotten away with it. Of course. Taylor had no balls when it came to her. Jerri could do whatever she liked and get away with it.
“Ensign Tessil!”
Jerri turned around at the sound of her name boomed in rasping, rough tones. That was not a voice that had ever used her name before. She liked the way it sounded, the sibilant hiss sliding almost erotically through the syllables of her name.
It was an alien.
The alien.
Commander Atlas had set all the tongues wagging, a Kitari officer serving on a largely human vessel. The fact that the HMS Audacity was still over eighty percent human was a source of shame for the fleet. Technically they were in breach of several intergalactic defense treaties, which required all species of the alliance to be represented on any ship with more than a gigaton of firepower. The Audacity was well above that threshold, but they had difficulty attracting and retaining quality crew.
She’d given Atlas about three months when he first came aboard. He was nearing the end of his second month and still going strong, but you never knew when these aliens would crack. Sometimes they seemed fine right up until they stripped naked in the mess hall and started hurling pudding at anybody in range.
This was her first time seeing him up close. He was tall. Nine feet. About average height for a Kitari, but pretty stunning for a human. He must have a hell of a time bending under all the doors, which she knew for a matter of fact were set at a max of eight feet, five inches. The Audacity had been constructed before the Authority decided that vessels had to be fully accessible for all alliance species.