Free Impulse by Dave Bara

responded.
    I stopped and looked around again at the luxurious surroundings of the galleria. No doubt my cabin would be of a similar class.
    â€œActually, Poulsen,” I said, handing him my shoulder brief, “why don’t you go on ahead and take care of things in my cabin for me. I’ll be along after I meet with Captain Zander.”
    â€œBut . . . sir . . .” stumbled out Poulsen as I handed him the brief. “I’ve got a dress green uniform laid out for you in the cabin, sir. Your size was sent ahead. Proper attire and all that.”
    I looked down at my QRN uniform: dark blue with gold piping, Cochrane family crest of three boars’ heads, orange chevrons, and Southern Cross. I decided I’d make my first impression on the captain of
Impulse
wearing my own family’s colors.
    â€œI’m afraid that my Quantar blues will have to do for now, Ensign. Just point the way to the captain’s cabin and take the rest to my suite. I’ll be along after the meeting.”
    â€œBut, sir, standard duty uniform aboard
Impulse
is Carinthian green. You don’t want to meet the captain—”
    â€œActually, Ensign, I do want to meet him, just as I am. Now point the way, and carry on.” The way I said it left no room for further discussion. Poulsen reluctantly obliged with directions and I headed off to a portside lifter as Poulsen made his way up to officer’s country. He only paused once to look back and I waved in a friendly manner. No doubt part of his orders were to get me properly introduced to the Carinthian Navy way of doing things. I smiled a bit as the lifter doors closed. Captain Lucius Zander would just have to meet with me for the first time on my own terms.

    I knocked firmly on the real wood door to Captain Zander’s cabin. More precisely, I knocked on one of the
two
wood doors to his cabin. Again, it seemed the Carinthians had spared no expense. The door was opened from the inside by an ensign. I nodded at him as I proceeded through into the largest shipboard room I had ever seen.
    It was a good twelve feet up to the ceilings, something that would have been regarded as a tremendous waste of space aboard a QRN ship. The walls were full of wooden bookcases stuffed with leather-bound editions. What wall space wasn’t taken up by bookcases was filled with portraits, again of the Grand Duke and his wife, along with a hunting party scene and a portrait of an unidentified lady, possibly Mrs. Zander, I surmised. A large cabinet full of naval souvenirs and brass sailing relics, complete with a large supply of liquor, took up nearly one whole wall.
    An intricate and oversized map desk flanked by Carinthian and Union Navy flags filled the back third of the room. In front of me in the center of the room was a sitting area with a formal sofa, coffee table and two leather chairs on either side, all facing a simulated fireplace burning with a soft orange glow. The sitting space was pulled together by an exotic Persian rug full of muted greens, reds, and yellows, the colors of the Carinthian flag. I stood at the front of the room near the doors and snapped to attention, feeling as if I could have been naked, I felt so out of place.
    The man seated in the center of the sofa put down his coffee cup on the table and stood slowly and with purpose, acknowledging me with a nod and then waving me forward in a welcoming manner.
    â€œCome in, my boy. And at ease,” said Captain Lucius Zander, all five and a half feet of him. He was wiry and slight, with exceptionally long blond-white hair. By looks I placed him in his mid-fifties, but I couldn’t be sure. His gravel-sharp voice made him sound as if he were twice that age.
    I stepped forward, tucking my navy cap under my arm as I came. Zander reached out to shake my hand and then clasped it with both of his when he took it. “Good to meet you, Lieutenant Commander Cochrane. Good to meet