He Who Dares: Book One (The Gray Chronicals 1)

by Rob Buckman

  “Are there any question, Gentleman?” The Prince asked, a slight smile on his face. There were, like why had they heard a weapon being cocked on the flight deck of the shuttle, but no one had the courage to ask at that moment.

  “I take it from your silence that you are all in agreement then?” The King asked. A quick survey found all the General and Admirals nodded in agreement.

  “...And so, with great personal courage and acting without regard to his personal safety did save the lives of his men, and his Majesties representative, namely Prince Richard, Prince of Wales.” An enthusiastic round of applause punctuated the summation of his exploits, and Mike was thankful they didn’t know the whole story.

  “It is in recognition for such gallantry that I am pleased to present the Victoria Cross to Sergeant Michael Grayson, late of the Royal Marines.” The Prince stepped forward then, as did the footman carrying the decoration on a scarlet pillow. He took the medal and pinned it over Mike’s right breast pocket, then shook hands.

  “Thought I’d forgotten about you, didn’t you.” He grinned. “I’ve been keeping this warm for you.”

  “Um, yes, your Majesty.”

  “It’s still Richard, and I’ve kept your little present cleaned and oiled for you.” Mike smiled, remembering the stub-nosed machine pistol he’d loaned the Prince.

  “That’s alright with your Majesty, I have another one now, so you can keep that one.” He smiled. “Let’s call it a fair exchange.” He said, looking down at the medal. The Prince nodded and held his hand out.

  “Congratulation, Sergeant Grayson.”

  “Thank you, Sir.” In spite of himself, he had to grin. He was about to turn and step back, when he saw the Chamberlain shake his head.

  He then read out another set of life and death heroics, but this time he kept it thankfully short and to the point due to the security aspect of the mission. After that, the King stepped forward to pin the second medal on his chest, alongside the first.

  “I’m looking forward to hearing more about this other little exploit, Michael.” He murmured softly. The King shook his hand and congratulated him again before stepping back. Mike gulped, and gave him a weak smile in response.

  “Yes, your Majesty.” Words were spoken, something about heroes and the Empire’s need of them, but he couldn’t remember much. Mike didn’t think of himself as a hero, just a naval officer doing his duty and nothing more, or a Marine in a desperate situation doing what he had to.

  After, he walked back to his quarter and ordered a stiff drink, feeling a little pleased with himself. He might not have been so happy had he was at the meeting that followed the ceremony.

  “What do you think of our Mr. Gray, Charles.” The King asked as he sat down with a cup of tea, eyeing the group as he spoke.

  “To tell the truth, sir, I don’t know what to think.” Admiral Rawlings answered, looking pensive.

  “Oh! Something bothering you?” The Prince of Wales asked, ready to jump to Leftenant Gray defense if necessary.

  “No, not really, just that I wonder if his little escapades aren’t just a flash in the pan. And why he chose to change his name after leaving the Royal Marines and joint the Royal Navy?”

  “I suspect there is a personal reason for that.” The King interjected.

  “He didn’t identify himself as coming from Avalon when he enlisted in the Royal Marines, and that makes me suspect he was running away from something.” The Prince answered, looking pensive.

  “A criminal maybe or something worse?” Was Admiral Rawlings observation.

  “Not if he’ from Avalon.” The Prince put in. Everyone looked at him and he shrugged. “If you know anything about the Avalon justice system, you’d know that was impossible.”

  “How so, Richard.” The King asked.

  “You of all people should know the answer to that.” The King raised one eyebrow, looking at his son. He nodded.

  “I think I read somewhere that um… criminals are treated different there than anywhere else.”

  “He might have run before they could catch him.”

  “Not possible on Avalon. He’d would never have got off planet if it was something serious.” That comment got each of them thinking of what they knew about the Avalon justice system.

  “I think his Majesty is right. Whatever the reason is for him to leave Avalon, it has nothing to do with a criminal activity, but that is not the question. He has proved himself several times, both as a Marine, and as a Naval Officer.”

  “A couple of lucky shots so to speak, huh?” The King asked.

  “Yes, sir.” He answered, seeing the look on the Princes face.

  “So, for the moment, leaving aside, the reason he departed Avalon we need to find out if he is capable of carrying out his duties on a consistent basis.” The King answered at last.

  “How would you propose we do that, your Majesty?”

  “We need to put him in a position where we can find out what he is capable of, and hopefully prove himself.” The King said, helping himself to more tea.

  “With that is mind, sir, as you requested, I sent him off to Davenport to finish up a little outstanding business down there.”

  “Too much is at stake for us to guess wrong, Charles.”

  “I agree, sir, but we have to start clearing the deadwood out eventually.” Both turn and looked at the fourth person in the group who sat silently as they spoke.

  “Don’t look at me.” Jimmy Bettencourt laughed, “I’m biased.”

  “That’s not an answer, Jimmy.” The King murmured, gruffly.

  “Uncle Harry, I’ve already made my mind up, he’s a comer and should be given every opportunity to move up the ladder as quickly as possible.” Jimmy Bettencourt sat back lazily, his long lanky frame seeming relaxed. Admiral Rawlings knew it for the act it was. A seeming indifference covering hair trigger reflexes.

  “Bit of a jump on just a short acquaintance, Jimmy, not like you at all.” The King said, giving him a long look.

  “I know uncle, but it’s not only what I’ve seen of him in action, it's how the men under him react.”

  “Come on, Jimmy, spit it out.” The Admiral sighed.

  “Take CPO Conner Blake, he has a general mistrust of everyone, and officers in particular, and who can blame him, yet from the moment he and Mike met he trusted him implicitly.”

  “Is that all?” The King asked.

  “No, sir, it was the same with all the man on that shuttle.” Jimmy stood up and stretched before helping himself to a second cup of tea.

  “Most of the crew and Marines were dead beats. Or at least according to their service record, but they believed in him and his ability to get them home, and performed way above their usual lackluster norm.”

  “That’s the conclusion I came to, Father.” The Prince of Wales added.

  “And you concur with Jimmy’s assessment?”

  “Yes, I second what he said, but I get the impression he doesn’t know what he’s doing half the time.”

  “You’d better explain that one, Richard.” Jimmy looked darkly at him, eliciting a smile in return.

  “Got you both, you all misread what I said.”

  “And what did you say.” The King asked, hiding a smile.

  “I said he’s not even aware of what he’d doing. He acts according to some inner logic, usually right, and people around him react to that,” he paused, “and yet, he seems unaware of his effect on people, including me. I had no doubt he’d get us out of there, yet looking back, I shouldn’t have.” He pulled his ear lobe a moment, looking slightly embarrassed.

  “I’m hard pressed to think of a worse situation to be in. At the outset, the prospects of living even a few hours were rather remote, especially when you consider I was trapped under several hundred tons of broken concrete.” He shivered visibly, his eyebrows pulling down, remembering the horrible feeling of being trapped.

  “Then, seemingly out of nowhere comes this specter, crawling through t
he rubble. It was as black as the ace of shades down there, yet he had no problem negotiating his way through the rubble. He finds me and casually lifts a hundred ton block of concrete out of the way, free me and leads me back out.” He shook his head, as if he still couldn’t believe it.

  “Your point.” The King asked.

  “Just this. After he got me out, I felt like I’d jumped from the frying pan into the fire.” He shook his head a moment and smiled. “And yet he came up with an escape plan on the fly and made it happen, and damn it if I didn’t believe it would work myself.” He heard Jimmy chuckle and looked around at him.

  “I dug up and read the after action report, and on face value I would have said your goose was cooked Jimmy.” Prince Richard added, hearing Jimmy laugh.

  “You weren’t exactly looking very healthy when our Mr. Gray showed up either, Richard.”

  “True, but did you have any doubt that he’d get you out?” The Prince asked.

  “Come to think of it, no I didn’t.”

  “See what I mean.”

  “I wish we could find more officer and rating like Gray and Conner Blake and start moving them into position of authority.” The King added.

  “But, your Majesty, if we move too fast, the forces against us will certainly move to block us, and as yet we don’t have sufficient people in place to stop them.”

  “I know, Charles, and I’m doing my best to get people in the right place to help. For one, I’ve managed to get a few of our people into some important position at the Admiralty.”

  “Arr, now that is good news.”

  “Oh, they are only minor positions at the moment, such as refit and supply, design, research and development.”

  “Good lord, if we could just make a few changed in those departments it would be a god sent.”

  “How on earth did the Admiralty and Navy get so apathetic in the first place?” Jimmy asked, shaking his head.

  “Time and stupidity, Jimmy.” The Admiral answered, thinking back on the proud history of the Royal Navy, wondering if anything could saved from its self-destruction.

  “Yes, until this trouble started, the Royal Navy was nothing more than a ceremonial force, usually a playground for the upper class. It attracted the worse instead of the best, so now we inherit that legacy.”

  “I’d just as soon take the lot of them out and shoot them and put them out of our misery.” Jimmy commented, morosely.

  “A bit drastic don’t you think?” The King chuckled. “We just have to find the right people and start retiring as many of the others as fast as we can. I’ve already given a few of them Knighthood’s and bump them into the ‘Home fleet’.”

  “The sooner the better for most of them, I’d say.”

  “Let’s get back to the subject at hand, our Mr. Gray, any ideas on what we should give him next?”

  “Not at the moment, sir, but I have a few things that need taking care of, small but significant.”

  “Clearing up some dirty laundry, Charles?”

  “Yes, most of them are dirty jobs, but I couldn’t find anyone I trust to take care of them until now.”

  “Good, we’ll give him a few months down at Davenport and see what he works out there, and let the fervor and outrage of his promotion died down, then sent him off.”

  “Knowing Admiral Rawlings propensity for cleaning up outstanding accounts, I just hope he doesn’t get killed doing it.”

  “That’s what we have to find out, Jimmy, whether he can cut it.”

  “In war, men died, that's a simple fact. Let’s just hope he has the luck and guts to survive.” All four lifted their teacups and toasted that.

  *******************

  Mike heard that the Lady Ann was in the Palace, but didn’t get a chance to see her as he spent the rest of the day meeting people. In all, there were six other young Leftenant’s here, and they’d set up an impromptu mess in the basement where they could get together without being under the constant gaze of the Palace staff. He met them one by one first and received an invite to the ‘Mess’ which he accepted, somewhat reluctantly. Someone thrust a drink into his hand as he came in and he found himself a seat, and self-consciously sat there sipping some unknown liquid.

  “So, Mr. Gray, how are you holding up?”

  “Fairly well under the circumstances Mr. Owen.”

  “Call me Taffy, as the only Welshman here, I claim the rights to the title.” He said with a laugh.

  “You’re not in the habit of breaking out into song are you by any chance?” Mike asked, thinking of another Welshman he knew.

  “Oh, I like him already.” This came from a sleepy eye individual that lounged back in his seat as if he owned the world. “By the way, I’m Seaford, and we haven’t met yet.” Mike raised his glass in greeting.

  “Good to meet you, Seaford.”

  “Same here, old boy. Congrats on the double header, we haven’t had one of those in many a long year.”

  “Yes, congratulation. I looked it up, and would you believe, the VC hasn’t been awarded for over one hundred and twenty six years!”

  “Not that we’ve had that many war in all that time.” Seaford chucked.

  “Yes, but we have had a few minor conflict.”

  “Just not too many heroes that’s all.”

  “I’m no hero, that's for sure. Just a man doing his job is all.”

  “Oh no, not another modest one.” They all laughed, but with him, not at him, and it felt good.

  “I hear you have made the acquaintance of our Lady Ann?”

  “Yes, we met on my last, um, mission, if that’s what you can call it.”

  “Arr yes, the one you got one of the medal thingy for, good show that.”

  “Well, if you can survive a mission like that and her Ladyship, you deserve it, for either.” Taffy chuckled.

  “She was a bit of a handful.”

  “A bit, good god, you should see that way she bags young Naval Leftenant’s, you’d think someone had declared open season on them.” Seaford got the bottle of wine and made the rounds filled everyone's glasses.

  “Here, she’s worse, she had a tongue like a rapier and a mind to match.”

  “I didn’t find her that bad.” Mike said, rushing to her defense.

  “Probably because she was out of her element, but here, she has the home court advantage.”

  “That doesn’t sound good.” Had he misjudged her that badly?

  “I’ll say, she’s bagged several braces of young naval officers to date.”

  “I think she’s over the hunting limit for this year.”

  “Don’t believe it, where she is concerned there is no limit.”

  “You might say, we six are the survivors, Charles Hawkins here.” He said, leaning over to shake hands. “Just call me Charlie.”

  “But what's the point?” Mike murmured. “How come a mere King’s messenger had that much clout?” All of them gave him a funny look.

  “There isn’t one, her Ladyship is a… um… a member of the Royal court and just likes to cut bold young Leftenant’s down to size. She does it just for the sheer pleasure of being able to.”

  “Damn! I hate to have to marry someone like that, I pity the poor man.” Taffy moaned.

  “If she does marry.”

  “Well, she’ll have to eventually.” Seaford interjected. “You know the old saying about heirs and a spares.” He’d lost Mike with that comment, and the sly look Seaford gave him, but he wasn’t about to admit it.

  “Yes, that’s true, but I don’t see anyone waiting in the wings willing to risk life and limb in such a venture.” Charlie Hawkins added.

  “Maybe Mike should step forward and claim the prize.” That brought a laugh from the group.

  For a moment, Mike thought it was a jab at him, then realized they were laughing with him, not at him. Being accepted by a group of the fellow officers felt odd, having suffered under them for too long. Yet, the old suspicion lingered. It would be some time before
he was ready to trust them completely.

  “No, I think I’ll let someone with greater courage than I take that chance.” He grinned. “Despite having two of these.” He said, tapping his right pocket.

  “Good boy! I knew we could trust you.”

  “Oh, you thought I was here to, um...” That brought a laugh from the group.

  “There have been a number of bold young officers who came here under the impression that this was a golden opportunity to try and her bed.”