It took more hours to rig the turbine up the escape scuttle. Hours of pulling on the chain hoist, bent over at the waist above the drop with the hot air from below coming up in her face. She couldn’t do it for more than ten or eleven minutes, had to step back and let one of the guys take over. But finally the inlet end came up and Ina and Lourdes helped her rig another lifting point. Then Chief Bendt and the guys from the log room tailed on and they eased it on over and laid it down on a dolly and after that just rolled it down the p-way and out the starboard side of the ship.
It was much hotter outside now. She gasped at the heat and the dust. Gritty stuff you could feel scouring its way into your skin. Trails of it lifting from the streets. What a hellish fucking place. She went aft to the helo deck as a crane plucked a container off a beat-up truck and set it down next to her.
Standing there on the flight deck, Cobie looked down on a woman. At least she thought it was a woman. She was walking along the street where the pier ended. Completely in black. Completely covered. A meshwork mask so you couldn’t even see her eyes. The woman saw her, though. Cobie could tell. She stood with her arms folded and her wet skivvy shirt cooling in the dry air, suddenly conscious of how much she was showing. Did she see Cobie as a threat? A devil woman, come to seduce her men? Or as what her daughter might be someday, the way she thought sometimes about Kaitlyn? Cobie thought she probably couldn’t even imagine what the woman was thinking. She wished she could go down and talk to her. It would be like meeting an alien from another planet.
The mess decks were empty, two duty sections being ashore. She shoved her tray along and got pork chops and mixed veggies and bread and carried them around the corner. Most of the girls sat on the port side forward. Cobie got one of the plastic tumblers you had to drink from — the ship didn’t trust enlisted people with mugs — and filled it with weak coffee and got another glass of water to stay hydrated.
Patryce and two tough-looking cornrow-braided black girls were sitting at one of the four-man tables. Lourdes and two guys from Main Two were at the other one. The Mexican girl pointed to the empty chair, but Cobie put her tray down right across from Wilson. To her surprise Patryce said hi, like nothing had happened. Like she hadn’t been spreading stories about her. She acted friendly, but now Cobie was wary. She didn’t say any more than she had to, then went back and got pudding and ate it quick, standing up, turned her tray in at the scullery, and left.
Topside, Lieutenant Porter and Chief Bendt were looking at the documents that came with the new engine while Helm and the other guys were taking the leads and parts off their old one. Making sure they didn’t ship anything out they’d need. She asked the chief about the new engine. He showed her the log that came with it. It was an Allison 501-K17 like the old one, serial ASP-1188. She asked if it was new, and Bendt said no, they came out of a rotating pool. This one had been on
The replacement engine didn’t look ten years old. It looked shiny and nice. All the new stainless bleed air valves and polished tubing. It’d be a pain in the ass getting it back down the scuttle, but after that she was looking forward to firing it up. Getting power for the ship, so everything ran.
Lieutenant Porter came over and asked her if she was getting along okay in the department. Cobie said she was.
“The guys treating you okay?”
“They treat me fine.” She didn’t add most of her troubles were with the girls, not the guys. Porter asked how she was doing on watch station qualification.
Then she threw her one Cobie wasn’t expecting. “How’d you like to get out of Main One?”
“I know that. But I heard you asking questions. How would you feel about working in the engineering office? I need somebody who can keyboard and data process. Somebody who’s got a curious mind and can figure things out.”
