A Call to Arms

by Bradley Hutchinson

  The reprieve from oblivion allowed him to try and send a distress signal – to no avail. No surprise, the N’xin were jamming all the comm frequencies, and James didn’t have the equipment or the expertise to try and get around it.

  “I am not dying here,” James vowed to himself – he only had to last another thirty seconds, but those would be the longest thirty seconds of his life. Even so, his rear sensor told him that none of the cruisers seemed to be interested in him, not even the newest arrivals – fighters were beginning to complicate the battlefield.

  The urge to join the battle gnawed at James, but it was a foolish, suicidal urge: leaving aside his complete lack of combat training, his shuttle had no weapons with which to fight, and only particle shields to protect against natural space-based habits. Short of a kamikaze run at a N’xin vessel – which would easily be deflected by their own defence screens – there was nothing he could do to help, except be afraid and die as target practice.

  After a lifetime of waiting, the FTL drive reached its charge, and James slammed his hand down on the activator, letting out a huge sigh of relief as the stars elongated into a tunnel of light and engulfed his shuttle.

  He felt exhilarated, and for a moment, he was confused as to why. Then it dawned on him: despite the danger, the risk, the near-death experience, that had been fun… in a rather lethal sense. It was an interesting contrast… one that was both perplexing and troubling.

  “Fuck, that was fun,” he said to himself, letting out a nervous chuckle as he wiped away at his brow. But as the gravity of what had happened began to sink in, his levity evaporated. How many people were dead or dying behind him? How many more would die?

  “Don’t dwell,” he said softly, echoing what his mother would say. “You can’t undo what happened.”

  Despite his reassurance, his hands wouldn’t stop shaking… and for some reason, as he wiped even more sweat from his brow, he felt like a coward.

  *

  “It isn’t like you ran because you were afraid, James.”

  Jennifer leaned against the glass door that led back inside as she gazed at her husband. James was standing at the railing on the balcony, his back to her, posture rigid straight – almost military-like. So military-like, in fact, that one could be mistaken for assuming that’s where James had picked it up from.

  Except that James has no interest in the military. Jennifer frowned. Given James’ recent brush with death, that attitude may have been in a state of chrysalis.

  “I know that, Jen,” he said softly. He’d been acting strange – distant – ever since he’d arrived home two days earlier. He’d been distant and closed to everyone, even Hector, who had taken to sleeping in the spare room instead of at the end of their bed like he usually did. Jennifer had given James his space, but longed for him to speak out about how he was feeling… or to just have a normal conversation with him, period. “But I just can’t get those images out of my head…”

  “James, you’re not a fighter.” In all the years Jennifer had known her husband, she had rarely seen him get angry, much less get close to being violent, and the thought of her husband toting any sort of weapon in a gunfight was almost laughable… except that this was no laughing matter. “Nor were you in a vessel capable of fighting.”

  “Maybe that’s my problem,” James said cryptically. Jennifer frowned, unsure she wanted to contemplate what his vague statement was meant to convey. Surely he didn’t mean what the statement implied…

  “At least the colony was saved,” Jennifer pointed out, trying a different tact… not that it was of much comfort. The two warring sides had mutually destroyed each other, and Menacor was more vulnerable than ever, despite what the news services were trying to sell – the next attack by the Hegemony would be successful.

  Of that, she had no doubt.

  She kept that to herself, though: the thought was depressing enough, and would only serve to aggravate her husband’s moodiness, which was already near the lowest he’d ever seen.

  “I have to go,” James said, spinning on his heel and breezing past her – no hug, no eye contact. “I’m due in court… got arraignments to handle, subpoenas to issue.”

  Jennifer fell into step behind him. “I was thinking I might start work on the spare bedroom… y’know, the refurbishment and whatnot?” She took a deep breath and, as James was opening the front door, plunged in. “I was thinking of turning it into a nursery.”

  “Whatever you want, hun,” he said as he turned around, leaning in and giving her a kiss on the forehead. Without another word he left, the door sealing shut silently behind him.

  Jennifer remained rooted to the spot for nearly a minute, before stalking over to the little window that was next to the door, taking in the view James had abandoned: it was still early morning, and there was a stillness to the air that as punctuated by the morning rush of air traffic past the apartment buildings.

  “You can’t push him, Jen.”

  Jennifer started, having almost forgotten that they weren’t alone in the apartment. Rebecca Gold – Patrick Hunter’s last wife and James’ mother – was slouched against the kitchen counter, her hands coiled around the steaming mug of coffee that always seemed to be in her hand.

  Rebecca was a renowned psychiatrist, and had been divorced – amicably – from Patrick for almost twenty years. She’d lived on Earth for the last nine years and – despite being comfortably well-off in her own right – had accepted James’ invitation to stay with them while she was on Bastion for a series of medical seminars. She was due to depart in a few days.

  Due to living on Earth for the last fifteen years, she didn’t see much of her only sons, despite them being on relatively close terms. She was a tall woman, though shorter than Jennifer, with long platinum blonde hair (thanks to genetic modifications) and high cheek bones. James and Troy didn’t much look like their mother, save for the eyes: like her sons, Rebecca’s eyes were such a dark brown they were almost black.

  “I just want him to talk to me,” Jennifer said sullenly, her posture deflating as she threw her head back, as if she was going to scream at the ceiling. “I need him to know that I am there for him… that he isn’t alone.”

  “He knows that, Jen. Even if you weren’t in the picture... and you are… he’d have Troy, or his father, to talk to, and they’d probably find it just as hard as you are in getting him to open up. He’s always bottled things inside of him… sometimes he’s his own worst enemy when it comes to dealing with emotions.”

  “Yeah, he doesn’t exactly wear his emotions on his sleeve like Troy does.” Jennifer murmured. “You mean, he’s never confided in you?”

  “Not really… but I’ve ever been as close to my kids as they would have liked…” She frowned. “As I may have liked…” She shook the thought away, her voice carefully modulated to keep the regret out – at Jennifer’s wedding, Rebecca had confided to her that she wanted to be closer to her sons… but wasn’t sure how to make her wish a reality.

  It didn’t help that she moved halfway across the Commonwealth to start a new life away from her ex-husband.

  “War changes people, Jennifer,” Rebecca said carefully after her moment of vulnerability. She would know: she’d spent much of the last night describing the sorts of horrors some of her patients – wounded soldiers, dislocated colonists and the like – were going through. “But James has never been one to really open up to people… unless he’s near his breaking point.” Rebecca nodded at the spot James had been standing. “He’s not quite there yet.”

  “Still, he’s hurting…” Like a wounded animal, Jennifer finished silently.

  “I think he’s coping remarkably well… Troy would be in pieces, by now. He hates conflict, and he’s always had a fear of his own mortality.”

  “True,” Jennifer murmured, and the two women fell into silence.

  “How long have you wanted kids?”

  Jennifer laughed at the abrupt change of subject, but was grateful for it �
� she was getting more than a little morose, dwelling on the

  “A year, or so, I guess,” Jennifer said. “We’ve been married for twelve years now, but I haven’t really been pushing for it. We’ve only discussed it once… and James and I both agreed we were not ready.”

  Rebecca smiled, her eyes sad. “He will, eventually. He’s just determined not to make the same mistakes Patrick made… and continues to make.”

  Jennifer arched an eyebrow in confusion. Although her own family’s fortune paled in comparison to the Hunter’s, by all accounts, James should have had a more-than-adequate upbringing. “What mistakes would they be?”

  Rebecca chortled mirthlessly, and Jennifer wondered if some of the mistakes she alluded to were the reason she hadn’t renewed her marriage contract with Patrick. Although Rebecca and Patrick still considered each other friends – Rebecca was an infrequent guest at the Hunter’s family Christmas parties – there was, on occasion,

  “Not many, but the ones he has made… Patrick’s mistakes are the result of being absent too much, both physically and emotionally, pursuing wealth at the expense of his family life.” She shrugged, apologetic. “Not that those mistakes are unique to Patrick… but James grew up mindful of his father’s absence, and I think he’s terrified of repeating them.”

  Jennifer considered this for a moment. “I didn’t know he felt that way.”

  “I’m not surprised. You, of all people, know how close to the chest he keeps things.” Rebecca smiled grimly, her eyes drifting back to the past. “He was never resentful of his father… but he’s determined not to follow in his footsteps. He went to law school to please Patrick, but became a prosecutor, and not a lawyer for HB&S, like Patrick wanted. It’s why he waited so long to get married…”

  “So… you’re saying I have to be patient?”

  Rebecca laughed gently. “That’s sound advice with any man, Jennifer… but yes, with James, you cannot rush him, or he’ll cut himself off from the outside world, and you’ll be spinning your wheels for nothing.”

  Jennifer glowered. “Wonderful.”

  *

  “I don’t think that planet has ever looked so beautiful.”

  Celina Yuen couldn’t really disagree with the assessment of her First Officer as the world of Elysium spun lazily along its orbit. It had taken the better part of three weeks, and it was now well and truly into the year 2422, but the evacuation of Wiseman’s Rest – a remote fringe colony where a lot of secret experiments were conducted – was finally at an end.

  The cost was extraordinary though – Yuen had been sent a taskforce of twelve vessels to evacuate the scientists, their families and as much of their equipment and resources as she could manage. Departing the planet on December 20, Earth time, her group had been pursued, and preyed upon, by the dogged and determined advancing N’xin assault fleet.

  Now, Yuen had only half her ships left, with her flagship, the Cordova, still undergoing some minor repairs, and that meant they’d lost half of the people they’d rescued, and much of their cargo. It was far from a ringing success, and was par for the course for the Commonwealth war effort for the last two years – engage, retreat; engage, retreat. If not for the fact that the losses were somewhat minimal – after all, the N’xin were targeting the most extreme fringes of the Commonwealth, for the most part, sites that were sparsely populated – than morale would be considerably worse than it currently was.

  What we need is a victory – any victory.

  As it was, it was a minor miracle that they’d made it back at all – if not for some rather impressive evasion tactics during the journey back – manoeuvres that had added nearly a week of travel time as they

  “Elysium Control has cleared us for orbital approach,” her First Officer, Lieutenant Commander Greene, continued softly, stepping up to the command chair. “They’ve got medical teams on standby at Landry Starport.”

  Yuen nodded once – they’d managed to patch up most of the wounded they’d incurred in their flight to safety, but there were a few cases that their limited medical facilities couldn’t handle; thankfully, the afflicted individuals had advanced enough cybernetics to, with the help of the shipboard medical systems, keep them alive long enough to get to more capable facilities.

  “Get the wounded to the shuttlebay, then,” she said. “I want the most critically wounded off the ship before we dock.” Even as she spoke, on the viewscreen on the forward bulkhead, the spindly station that was one of the main drydock facilities in orbit of the planet came into view over the horizon, the Elysium sun glinting off its silver hull; half of its dozen births were occupied: two cruisers and a frigate undergoing retrofits and upgrades, with a third cruiser being repaired and rebuilt, with a pair of newer frigates undergoing final outfitting, and a destroyer being partially rebuilt, its starboard wing and engines completely gone.

  “Already on it, ma’am,” Greene said, somewhat testily – or smugly – and Yuen supressed a surge of annoyance. As proficient as her Exec was, he didn’t do much to hide his discomfort – or disapproval – at being around Yuen, whose reputation among the rest of the fleet was as the woman who started the war.

  In truth, much of the crew under her shared the same sentiments, and the string of losses the Commonwealth had sustained had done nothing to improve her standing among the officer ranks, especially considering that the Cordova – under Yuen since she had replaced Captain Elsbury – had been involved in some of the heaviest fighting – and with each loss, Yuen’s standing sank just a little more.

  “Very good,” Yuen said robotically, glancing at the helm officer. “Ensign Carcaterra, take us in to dock once we’re given the all-clear.”

  Carcaterra was one of the few bridge officers who didn’t seem to harbour any resentment towards Celina, but as a junior officer, that didn’t really amount to much of a vote in confidence. A small man of Eurasian descent, he’d been a survivor off the old Reverent – despite his apparent loyalty to Yuen, she’d been unable to promote him to a more senior position on account of a lack openings on-board… and for some reason, he refused to accept a position on another vessel.

  “Aye, Captain,” Carcaterra said, his hands flying over his console.

  Blind loyalty is admirable, even noble, she thought, but it’s a career dead-end. The military was more political than one might think, and rallying behind those who were unpopular tended to get left behind.

  “We’re receiving a transmission from High Command,” Lieutenant Hargreaves said – another one who wasn’t a fan of Yuen, although he was a little subtler about it, at least trying to maintain an air of respecting the chain-of-command and military etiquette. “We have new orders, including a crew rotation… and a transfer of command.”

  Yuen did her best to ignore the almost-hopeful expression Greene threw her way – it wasn’t a leer, so much, as a triumphant look, like one would give a vanquished foe. Greene wasn’t close to having his own command, but surviving on a ship longer than your CO was a sure way to getting a promotion to the grade above you without having to exert yourself.

  “Who are we getting?” Greene asked, being decent enough to at least hide his enthusiasm. Yuen decided not to bring him up on the breach of protocol, since it would fall on deaf ears; even a comment in his service jacket would likely be ignored if it bore her signature.

  “Captain Hawthorne, ma’am,” Hargreaves said, and Yuen wasn’t sure if there was genuine sympathy in his voice as he said it. Yuen was grateful that the communications officer was at least making more of an effort than Greene was.

  Yuen knew Hawthorne, only by reputation – he was very capable, had survived the battle at New Haven, and was now set for a position among the admiralty if his star didn’t burn out early. At least I’m not being replaced by an incompetent.

  “Any idea on where I’m going?”

  “There’s a signed data package for your-eyes-only, Captain.”

  Yuen heaved a sigh as she rose from the command chair. Typical
, the High Command would announce her being stood-down as a routine information packet, but wouldn’t inform her of her new position so publicly.

  “I’ll take it in my quarters, Lieutenant.”

  *

  “For what it’s worth, I’m sorry.”

  Jeremy Hawthorne smiled apologetically as he gazed out the viewport that lined the portside bulkhead of Yuen’s quarters. He’d come on board a few minutes earlier, and had insisted that he come straight here, and not to the bridge.

  “That’s very kind of you to say, Captain,” Yuen said sincerely.

  “Your record is very good,” he continued with a frustrated growl, his dark bushy eyebrows meeting together over the bridge of his nose. “I was at New Haven. I know the N’xin presented you with no other choice.” He wrinkled his nose. “This is just political bullshit. The idiot Senators need a scapegoat to hang out to dry to excuse their incompetence, and you’re their sacrificial lamb.”

  “And if we were winning this war, that’s probably how it’d be presented.” Yuen shrugged. “Alas, I chose to start a war against a foe we can’t seem to beat…”

  Hawthorne grimaced, and waved a hand dismissively as he tugged at his waistline – it seemed he had put on a bit of weight recently, if the holograms in his file was anything to go by. “Wallace IV is a cesspit in the ass-end of nowhere,” he continued, and Yuen smiled at his assessment. Guaranteed, she’d be spending quite a while as the commander of the garrison on Wallace IV. “It’d be kinder to just discharge you.”

  “That’s true, but like they’d want to give me a pension… and that doesn’t really change the fact that this ship is now yours,” Yuen said, gesturing to her packed cases on the bed – she’d packed before she’d even read her orders. Even if she had been bumped down to the position of XO on the Cordova that would mean a change in quarters.

  “Yes, I suppose,” Hawthorne said, his dark eyes smouldering. He extended a hand, and she took it. “Good luck, Captain. I’ll do what I can to make sure that you don’t stay on that backwater, Celina.”