Then he tore the scroll in half, and continued doing so until it was scattered into tiny pieces.
I stared at him blankly. “So it was all a game, and you toyed with me like I was a chump,” I said through slitted eyes.
“You really should read what you sign, before you sign it,” he said flatly.
“It’s all under your control anyway,” I said disgustedly.
“In both of those scrolls, you pled guilty and requested death by un-medicated vivisection, as penance for your numerous crimes,” he explained, looking at me like a grandfather who had found an unexpected treasure in his grandchild.
I blanched. That was cruel, even for the most hardened parliamentary judicial court and executioner.
He flopped a third scroll, along with a data pad, onto the table.
“Read these, sign them both, and press your thumb on this modified data slate, which will also take a blood sample,” he instructed.
“And what do these say,” I asked, pulling the scroll closer. This time, I actually started to read it.
“Even after everything I observed on your bridge tapes and private logs, I didn’t really expect you to sacrifice yourself for your men,” LePierre said.
“You mean you didn’t expect a Montagne to lay himself down before the executioner, when there was the slightest chance at survival; his men be hung?” I growled angrily. That choice was no choice at all: me, or my crew? The answer was plain as daylight, especially since I got them into this mess, and there was no way I was walking out of it no matter what I tried. It followed, that I might as well take the route which, at least, let them go back to their families.
“Yes, quite,” he agreed.
“So the deal,” I prompted, still reading and he made a moue of dislike.
“A man who would be honorable, must recognize honor even in his worst of foes, of which you hardly qualify,” he explained instead.
“Right, I’m more along the lines of a Scapegoat. I feel you there,” I said bitterly.
“You plead no contest to the charges, and your men walk free—all of them—even the ones who probably deserve to hang alongside you. Your remains will be transported back to your family. After you’re long gone, and all of this unpleasantness is behind us, I’ll see to it that your image is slowly rehabilitated to as close to reality as possible, and administer a pension to your mother,” he said, his face tightening when I snorted. “A college student, in over his head, who allowed some temporary power to blind him, resulting in a joy ride around the sector before coming to an untimely end,” he quoted, no doubt from some official document he was even now dictating for those many years in the future.
“So it’s to be blood money, and a historical rehab after the fact. How very…courteous of you,” I bit out. I had to force myself to keep the half dozen other (harsher) things I wanted to say from passing my lips.
“It’s the least I could do,” he replied, irony heavy in his voice.
I finished scanning the scroll and stared on the data slate, as sure enough, they both said the same thing: essentially, they elucidated just how badly, and promptly, I wanted to be hung.
“Won’t Pacifica protest my execution anyway, now that Planetary Piracy and the exploitation of helpless natives is off the table,” I asked as mildly as I was able to, not wanting to scram the deal at this late date. The last thing I wanted to do was guarantee my men a date with the executioner, alongside myself.
“The Right of self-determination is a cornerstone of Pacifica III’s society,” he looked at me quizzically before adding, “they will, of course, be horrified that you met your end by any method other than a hunger strike.”
“I think I’ll pass on that one,” I said, not liking the idea of starving to death.
“If you are seen to be seeking penance for your crimes, no matter how misguided they may think you are,” he rolled his eyes, showing just what he thought of Pacifica III and its culture, “they will respect it, and may actually gain respect for their own Committee Member, depending on how she plays it. Having the courage to grant you the ability to make your own decisions—no matter how distasteful—is likely to resonate with their culture for quite some time, and could gain their Committee Member significant local traction upon her return.”
“So for her, the entire affair went from a wash, to a loss, when I trounced your first charges,” I mused aloud. “Then, against all odds, it reverses to an outright slam dunk win for that particular member, now that I’ve signed my own death warrant.” I almost couldn’t believe the politics that were going on. Even now, these people were analyzing and maneuvering themselves around me, like vultures over a carcass, looking for a few choice scraps of meat.
“Her vote will come in handy later on…after I explain the ramifications of my independent actions here, and cash the marker in at a later date,” he said agreeably.
“I’m done with the whole disgustingly political lot you; let’s just get this over with,” I growled.
“Oh no,” he said, rolling up the scroll and slipping the data slate back into his pocket. “If we stopped the hearings at this point, anyone with the least bit of political insight and knowledge would cry foul. A decision this soon, out a Committee? Quite unheard of,” he said shaking his head, “we need at least another few weeks, to come to a fair and impartial decision.”
“Great, more getting beat up by the guards every time I go through a doorway,” I closed my eyes.
“We all have our burdens to bear,” the Ambassador said unsympathetically, “just keep putting on as spirited a defense as your fearsome little lawyer can manage, and irritating our Right Honorable Chairman almost out of his mind. Give it a few weeks—a month, at the outside—and I’ll talk with the Bailiffs to see if there’s anything that can be done about your…lack of physical coordination, shall we say.” He was all pleasantness and workmanlike satisfaction at a job well on its way to half done.
“Sure thing, Boss,” I quipped, folding my arms and tipping my head back, “you are in charge of this three ringed circus, after all.”
“Indeed,” he agreed, smiling pleasantly as he went and rapped on the door to get the attention of the Bailiff outside.
The door almost immediately opened. “Put the hood on and take him back to his cell,” LePierre instructed.
“My pleasure, Sir,” said the man in sparkling silver power armor, with the sigil of the UPN prominently displayed on his chest piece.
Sir Isaac started to turn, and then paused as if over some minor issue. “Oh, and guard, do make sure he gets back to his cell without mishap. Our little Tyrant’s been a good boy today, and deserves a small reward.” Despite the lightness of the tone, I could hear the iron hidden within, and I could tell the guard did also, because he stiffened and gave the Co-Chair of the Security Council a jerky nod.
“Your will be done, Mr. Ambassador,” he said.
“Indeed,” replied Sir Isaac, sweeping out of the room.
That was the last thing I saw before the Bailiff replaced the hood upon my head and everything went dark.
“Come on, you,” grumbled the Bailiff, no doubt irked at the fact that his fun had just been taken away.
It was a small victory, and of an exceptionally petty nature, but despite all my knowledge of these facts, I still smiled deep within the hood. It was the small victories you could take such petty vindictive satisfaction in, because with all the big ones, the price came far too dear to indulge in any gloating.
That’s why I gloated for all I was worth on the way back to my cell. Tomorrow, he or his replacement would probably start the same usual treatment all over again, but for now, I was good.
Chapter 29: Spalding to The Rescue!
Spalding and Akantha stood on the bridge looking down at the new message
“We are already halfway to Capria; now they want us to change course?” asked Akantha doubtfully. “Why would they wait to tell us until the Clover was leaving the system? Our spies could have been c
ompromised.”
“The clover you see, she’s not in Capria yet! There’s still time to snag her, and the Admiral, also,” Spalding urged.
“They say they are almost finished with repairs; we might beat them to Capria and catch them when they arrive,” she said, shaking her head.
“I don’t know about that, my Lady,” Spalding replied quickly, “not that I’ve been all that eager to go home to Capria with fire and fury in the first place, but diverting to Central might be the way to go,” he said cautiously.
“I have been inconsiderate to the point of insult; forgive me, Chief Engineer,” she said, looking genuinely worried about his reaction.
“It’s no matter, Lady Akantha,” he said gruffly.
“You are wrong; it is a matter, which is why I have decided to split the fleet,” she declared.
“Split the fleet?! Why, that’s lunacy—if you’ll pardon my saying so, your ladyship,” he hastily added.
She glowered at him for moment, and then almost reluctantly relented. “I suppose I deserve that, after almost asking a man to attack his own homeland without so much as a ‘by your leave,’ and Murphy only knows how many kin folk in the area,” she said after a moment to cool down.
“Now, my lady-” he started, only to be cut off
“I insist,” she said imperiously, “you will go to Central and attempt to catch the Lucky Clover. If you can take her, it will be a great accomplishment, and one which will bolster our forces at a time of great need.” Her voice became icy as she continued, “However, if it is as I suspect and you are too few, or she is too well repaired, simply follow her back to Capria. I suspect she will be there soon enough, and we will perform the necessary, once our fleet is reunited. I will have already had time to deal with this King James, and his never to be adequately accursed Parliament!” she finished, her tone starting cold and calculating, but ending as a white hot rage.
“I couldn’t possibly leave you in a ship as buggy as this Imperial Cruiser,” he declared.
“The hardware is good, you said so yourself. Besides, you fixed half of it already; I am assured that the problem is no longer the hardware, it is what you call…software, and as miraculous as you are with hardware, others can carry on this task for me. I must send one who I can trust to lead the other half of this fleet,” she said imperiously, and when she got her back up like this, Spalding knew it was almost impossible to talk her back down.
Still, he had to try. Splitting the fleet, why it simply wasn’t to be done!
“Of course you can trust me,” he allowed, but before he could continue with the main part of his argument, she cut him off.
“Then it’s decided,” she declared, turning away.
“Now hold on just a bloomin’ second,” Spalding said.
“I cannot!” she flared. “According to your translation of that second cryptic message in your hand, it doesn’t matter where the Clover is going next; Jason has been dropped off in this Central.”
“But the Clover,” he cried.
“Your loyalty to your ship is well taken,” she hastened to assure him, but he was feeling decidedly less-than-assured, “however, your duty is first to your Admiral and whether the Clover is there or already on the way back to Capria as I suspect, you can see to him either way.”
Spalding stared at her, barely able to throttle back the angry tirade bottled up inside. Giving some small vent to his fury, he activated his mini plasma torches and stomped the floor. His ship was so close that he could almost taste her; the thought of arriving in Central, only to watch as she floated away, with him impotent to save her, was more than he could bear!
“Please,” Akantha said, placing a hand on his arm, “it is not proper for a Protector to be rescued by his Mistress. It is…” she said awkwardly, unable to fully express this reversal of normal behavior, “simply out of the mode and…not done. It needs to be one of his own men to free him, and after such crippling losses and so few familiar faces remaining, I know he will take comfort that it is you who are the one to do so.”
When he saw the pleading look in her eyes, as she all but begged him to rescue the Admiral—her husband—he stopped in his tracks. How could he call himself a Spalding if he turned a blind eye to such heartbreak as he saw in her eyes?
“Find out if he is alive or dead, so that I may finally put this pain inside me to rest,” she said, placing a hand on her breast.
Something inside him broke, and he could resist no longer. Even the hardest of duralloy can be melted by a turbo-laser, he finally admitted to himself.
“Aye, I can go after him for you,” he sighed. Even though he had lost the Clover, the Admiral was by no means a bad sort…for a Flag Officer!
“Excellent,” she said, clapping him on the shoulder.
Then he rallied, knowing if he let her walk all over him too easily this time, that the next it would be ten times worse.
“But don’t think I’m going to let you pawn me off like this, with naught but a dinky little corvette,” he barked. Maybe there was some way to salvage her headstrong notion of assaulting Capria’s defenses head on. Even an Imperial Cruiser, with the upgrades he had installed, would fall well short of that particular challenge.
“You bargain like a fishmonger,” she glared at him.
“You send a man off to do a job, you give him the proper tools or don’t send him out on the repair in the first place,” he retorted, shaking a finger in her direction.
“Fine,” she snapped, and he could see calculation in her eyes about just how much ‘she’ thought she could give away while still making some kind of idiotic frontal assault on Capria’s defenses. He had tried telling her that the whole of the ‘fleet’ she had assembled was really nothing more than a glorified light task force. But did anyone listen to the man who knew the ship specs frontwards and backward? No, of course not!
“I’ll keep the Demons and this Cruiser—which I have renamed The Furious Phoenix, because it has risen from the ashes to smite our foes with a terrible fury—and you can have the remainder,” she said, placing a hand on the hilt of her sword and squeezing until her knuckles turned white.
“A terrible name for a starship,” he grumped, but went no further. When that woman started grabbing at her sword, a wise man knew it was time to count his winnings and beat a hasty retreat.
“I’ll just make one last tour of the engine room, and make sure she’s put to rights before I go,” he said, stomping over to the exit. His long, metal legs still made a faint hydraulic sound from the actuators, no matter how he fiddled with them.
“I trust your judgment,” she said, and it was almost enough to melt his wizened old spacer’s heart, to hear the ships commander say that about their Chief Engineer.
“Substandard equipment,” he grumped, instead of giving into emotion, “can’t believe they would install such terrible equipment on a Chief Engineer; it defies all reason!”
He was still muttering to himself when he stepped into the lift.
Chapter 30: Tremblay-ing Behind
“Hurry up,” he hissed, as he rushed them toward the shuttle he had arranged to get them off the ship. The Clover was departing, and if he was ever going to get rid of these interfering royalist busybodies, now was the time. This was even the perfect explanation: they needed to get in position to rescue the Admiral before the ship left system. It was so perfect, and it had practically fallen into his lap.
“I’m not sure about this, Lieutenant Tremblay,” Steiner said, sounding uncertain as they tore most of the dirty laundry off the laundry-cart.
“No, it’s perfect,” he declared.
“I’m not sure, and Heirophant feels the same way,” she said, shooting a look at the now glowering Tracto-an.
Tremblay had to suppress the urge to roll his eyes. “Now that all the rest of the old crew has been taken to the Dungeon Ship, we can’t drag him around anymore pretending he’s our prisoner. This is a great disguise; no one would ever suspect an honor-
bound primitive like him to be cowering inside a dirty laundry bin,” Tremblay waved at the nearly empty cart.
Heirophant growled and Lisa winced.
“Cowering? That’s really the word you want to use?” she asked, jerking a thumb in the former Lancer’s direction as he stood up and started towards Tremblay.
“I meant hiding,” Tremblay said, hastily backpedalling both verbally and physically, “no offense intended.”
“Offense was very much taken,” the gunner’s mate glared, still coming toward him.
Lisa hurried forward a step. “It really is a great way to smuggle you around the ship,” she assured Heirophant, placing a hand on the Tracto-an’s chest.
Heirophant clenched his fists, staring over the Com-Tech’s head and bestowed a look on the Intelligence Officer that promised this was not yet over.
Tremblay gulped, and then firmly reminded himself that Lisa already sounded halfway convinced. He knew that if he could get their little leader to go along with it, the battle was already halfway won, and he would almost certainly never have to see that scab ever again.
He just needed to get them moving, before it was too late and everything became academic!
The civilian freighter whose captain Tremblay had so easily intimidated, had been more than willing to loan out one of his shuttle craft, so long as Tremblay assured him that his ship would not have to undergo a complete inspection by the Caprian Intelligence Directorate. It was an easy promise to make, since there never had been plans by the Directorate to inspect the ship in the first place, thus neatly bypassing the problem of how to get these royalist loons out of his hair and off the ship at the same time!
Now, all he had to do was finish convincing them of that!
“Look, we’re already halfway there, now that we used that maintenance crawl space to get him,” he jerked a thumb in the direction of the overgrown meat castle that was the native scab, “here in the first place. We just have to keep going,” he said, fudging how close they actually were to the shuttle in the interest of making a point.
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