Chapter 5 - THE APPROACH OF THE SENIOR CHIEF
The mess hall was still noisy around them.
Near the window, four operators were arguing about football. Near the soda machine, Mercer was leaning against the stainless-steel counter, laughing loudly with two other officers, his polished boots crossed at the ankles, completely oblivious to the sudden change in the room's atmosphere.
Rhodes began walking again, his heavy combat boots falling softly against the gray epoxy floor.
He did not walk like a senior enlisted officer coming over to discipline a junior lieutenant. He walked with the slow, tentative care of a man stepping onto a field he suspects is full of unexploded ordnance.
Amelia felt him approaching.
She didn't turn her head, but her hand stopped near her water glass. Her hazel eyes shifted two degrees to the left, tracking his reflection in the polished side of the steel pillar beside her.
Rhodes stopped two feet from her table.
"Lieutenant," Rhodes said softly.
His voice was entirely different from the loud, booming tone he used on the grinder or the obstacle course. It was low, raspy, and stripped of all administrative rank posturing.
Amelia turned her head slowly, looking up at him. "Senior Chief."
Her voice was cool, clear, and perfectly flat. It carried no trace of resentment over the boot incident, no anger, no seeking of sympathy.
Rhodes looked down at her left shoulder. The collar had settled back into place, hiding the small black patch once again beneath the Woodland camouflage pattern. But Rhodes didn't need to see it a second time. The image was burned into his memory.
"Commander!" Rhodes called out, raising his voice just enough to cut across the noise of the room.
Across the dining hall, Mercer stopped laughing. He turned around, holding a paper cup of coffee, his dark eyebrows raised in mild annoyance. "What is it, Senior?"
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Rhodes didn't look back at Mercer. His eyes remained locked on Amelia's face.
"You might want to ask where she served before you ordered her onto her knees," Rhodes said, his voice ringing with a cold, terrifying clarity that instantly silenced the surrounding three tables.
