Free Eden's War (A Distant Eden) by Lloyd Tackitt

and we can all eat breakfast. Then we’ll fire up the chopper, go to Corpus and get a lift to Hawaii. You and I are going to be at the front line when this first battle goes down.”
    Two and a half days later, Adrian and the Admiral were at Pearl Harbor boarding a Navy cruiser. As soon as they were on board the ship shoved off and headed for the enemy fleet. They would soon catch up to the explosive boat carriers that had launched two days before. The cruiser could easily attain thirty knots and was highly maneuverable.
    “How soon will we be in range of the enemy Admiral?” Adrian asked. He was already a little queasy from the rolling of the ship. Adrian always got seasick, he’d had the experience more than once.
    “A day-and-a-half to two days Adrian. You look a little green.” The Admiral said with a small smile. “Don’t tell me you’re going to have to carry a bucket around with you? Need some pills?”
    “I’m sure I’ll provide plenty of amusement for you and the crew. I always get seasick and it never gets better with time either. No pills though, they don’t help and make me sleepy. And yeah, I’ll probably be needing a bucket pretty soon.”
    “Let me take you on a tour of the boat and then show you to your quarters. You might as well lie low until we get closer.” With that the Admiral took Adrian for an extended tour of the ship, showing him everything from the engine room to the control room. “This” said the Admiral “is the control room, this is where we’ll be for most of this voyage. This is the heart of the combat operations.”
    Adrian looked around at what to him was a smallish and crowded room. All of the walls were lined with instruments and large panels. The room was shrouded in soft blue light with the instruments lit up with their own individual lights. It was a meaningless and complicated array to Adrian. He knew that every single instrument meant something important to the men operating the room, but they were Greek to him. In the center of the room was a waist-high panel with a large round nearly horizontal display surrounded by toggles and switches. On the round display were various symbols. To Adrian this appeared to show ships’ locations in relation to each other, a kind of living map.
    “Admiral, this is no doubt where you need to be, but I’ll just be in the way; I’m already afraid to be in here. I have no doubt that I’ll end up puking on something important, and I can’t tell hide from hair on what I’m seeing. I’ll be up on the bridge where I can see and be in communication with you. I’ll have a bit more room for my bucket up there.”
    “As you wish, Mr. President.”
    Adrian laughed, “I know you don’t approve, but trust me on this. You don’t want me down here getting in your way. I’ll know as much as I need to from your reports. We’ll both be a lot happier if I am not under your feet in here. When the time comes to start sinking the Chinese ships, I want to be out there in one of the helicopters to see the engagement with my own eyes anyway. I need to see how the explosive boats work out in real time.”
    “We’ve had this conversation, Adrian,” the Admiral said with a grave tone. “It’s extremely risky. The helicopters are too vulnerable.”
    “You’re going to send at least one out anyway to get a visual report, aren’t you?” Adrian asked.
    “Of course. But losing a helicopter and crew isn’t on the same level as losing our Commander In Chief! Jesus, Adrian, how many times do we have to talk about this?”
    “Look Admiral” Adrian replied with sudden steel in his voice. “I won’t lead from behind. I need to see the action for myself, see if there are problems or improvements to be made. I can’t do that sitting and watching radar screens. I won’t stay out there for the whole battle, but I have to be out there at the beginning of it in case I see something I haven’t considered. I need to know what the actual work of