Akin had finished 8th in a graduating group of more than a hundred. His scores in arithmetic and language were perfect, his talents in the classrooms were praised by his teachers endlessly. It was peer to peer activities that tripped him up, sometimes literally. In the entire Coast Guard Academy, if working with peers was the primary graded class Akin may well have finished rock bottom. He would constantly volunteer to be in charge of tasks or team challenegs and would constantly fail to accomplish much of anything. If he wasn’t in command of the event he would drag his feet, almost pouting, and sometimes rule up an almost political kind of dissent among the rest of the group, compromising team integrity.
Generally speaking, a service that specializes in spending time on ships frowns upon those who try to inspire mutiny.
His peers considered him ruthless. His subordinates thought him ineffective. His superiors were split on the matter. On the one hand he was brilliant with knowledge based or logic rooted challenges, on the other he was a complete disaster if trusted with a team of people. It was recommended that he work with intelligence, anaylizing data and figuring predictive methods. Among those in Coast Guard intelligence, Akin was considered the most brilliant and very much the most cunning.
The Intel needs of the Coast Guard vary from year to year, it truely depended on what the politicians of coastal states thought was most important. Akin had figured out how best the appease those who controlled his budgets. He compared budget rewards to grades and simply aimed to please those senators and congressmen who tightened or loosened the purse strings. He crafted one of the first predictive model formulas that made guessing which container ships were likely carrying the most illegal goods. He helped to write a program that the NSA ended up supporting that sought out narcotic shipping and targeted smuggler boats.
But his best work by miles was how he had figured out how to schedule patrols in such a constantly shifting pattern so as to nearly dry up the illegal immigrants that came from the Gulf of Mexico.
And yet, here he was, 18 years later and still only a commander. His peers, the drunkards and undisciplined alike, had mostly surpassed him, either in uniform or in their own professional lives. His marriages had ended after only a few years, his promotions kept being passed over, his annoyance was the only thing that seemed to be progressing to a smoldering hate. During the Gulf Oil Spill he had been tasked with leading a small flotilla of water filtration craft, he had considered it his golden opportunity. He had fought and spent many favors for the chance to prove his leadership mettle, and it was a text book debacle. Two of the ships collided, he replaced his first mate half a dozen times, morale plummeted, and the mission was only barely accomplished…three weeks behind schedule.
When Akin’s voice came from the opener window of the ships bridge, it did not belie any of that previous trouble. It was merely the sound of an angry man.
“You were under for twenty minutes, you came back up with two compromised dive suits and two rednecks less! Lieutenants, what the hell is going on?”
Perry would have to have been considered the complete opposite of Akin in almost every way. The diver looked up from his bench, still dripping as two coasties worked around to help him she’d his gear, “We got jumped by something down there. Perhaps you want to go and check in on it yourself, sir.”
If Akin had a facial reaction, they couldn’t see it from where they were. Wells had kicked off his flippers and sheathed his survival blade, his face looking down to his equipment as he spoke to Perry.
“They looked like old diver suits, man, what the fuck kind of circus act is going on?”
Perry was still looking at the bridge, waiting for the response from Akin. Akin was checking his watch, crafting a backup plan.
Wells continued as his back sat up straight, free of the SCUBA rigging, “I counted four of them, but it’s dark. The one moved like a goddamn ninja when I went to jab him. I haven’t seen that kind of speed underwater since the war-tank.”
Perry recalled his own experiences in underwater combatives course, the war-tank. Perry had finished top of his class, he was a born fighter and he moved with the grace of a sword dancer underwater. That he had been snagged and compromised first was a travesty in his mind.
“We will suit up all available divers and send them down, the goal is to figure a way to keep the Brunhilde completely sealed so as to ensure no possible leak. Plan for dive in twenty minutes, the goal is to be headed port-side by dawn.” Akin spoke like a leader, but the divers knew what failures looked like. It looked like leaving two men behind. Not just leaving them behind, leaving them buttoned up in a steel sarcophagus beneath the waves.
Perry went to shout something backs but Akin had already gone back into the bridge, back to hide away behind his little control screen. Perry was sneering and he didn’t even recognize it.
Wells was helped to his feet by Ke, grunting as he spoke, “How many divers we got here?”
Ke half laughed her response, “counting me and you two? Me and you two.”