One Protector was dead, and two others nursed wounds as they stood guard. Several civilians were being attended to, and the driver of the van was dead. Trexler sent the two wounded Protectors into the ship along with Nancy and watched as it disappeared into the clouds. Godfries sent another ship, and Trexler lifted for Andrews Air Force Base near Washington, DC an hour later.
* * * * *
Krys gave Trexler two days to recover, then visited him in the sick bay aboard the ship parked at Andrews Air Force Base. As always, Washburn escorted her. Trexler’s injuries, though painful, were not life-threatening.
“You seem to spend a lot of time in sick bay,” she said, her lips ticking up into a smile. “I just came from Nancy Shaw.”
“How is she?” he asked, gingerly pushing himself up straighter in the bed.
“Not well. She’s in a tank, so I was not able to speak to her. Take her with you, Ray.”
“I have a few things to clear up here before I go. It might be a couple of weeks. She could be well enough to stay here by then. Even if she’s not, we have cruisers here with every imaginable medical capability. There’s no need for her to go.”
“You mean there is no official need for her to go, don’t you?” Krys asked, smiling. He shifted uncomfortably, though she could not see it. “Where are you off to next, Ray?”
“Parsons’ World. Someone has to deliver the hypercom to Serge and his people. It’s been sitting around here far too long.”
“Akurea has made excellent use of her time. She’s ready to put it into production. The Queen will likely be there and she needs to see Akurea and Nancy Shaw.”
“Nancy? Whatever for? I can’t take Nancy from here against her will.”
Krys’ head tilted to the side in a question of her own. “What is it with you men? Tarn was just as unaware.”
“My Lady?”
She scowled. “Open your eyes, Admiral. Wars and battles are not all that matter, you know. She will gladly follow you anywhere. Officially, I had a vision of her. In that vision, she was with the Queen.”
Trexler blinked. “Nancy?” He blinked again. “What’s it about?”
“I have not been able to decipher the vision. I’m hoping Tarn will have better luck. Orion III is my next stop. I’ll pick him up and join you on Parson’s World.”
Trexler considered, shook his head, then remembered that Krys could not see his body language. How difficult that must be, he thought. Body language was an important aspect of communication, even to a large extent among aliens. “Plan on meeting us on Shipyard. I’m fairly certain that’s where the hypercom will end up, and Ellie will be there with it.” He stared at this blind young woman on whose shoulders rested so much. “It has been a great honor to have met you and to have gotten to know you. I hope you know that.”
“I would say the same,” she said, reaching out to him.
He took her hand, and she leaned over the bed to kiss him on the head. She never got that far. Her body stiffened, and she nearly fell into Trexler. Washburn caught her at the last instant and pulled her to her feet.
“My Lady?” Trexler asked.
“Hmm. Interesting. Sorry, Admiral. That one caught me completely off guard,” she said as she disengaged herself from Washburn.
“That what?”
“Nancy is no longer the only one with a vision to decipher.”
Trexler looked at Washburn in alarm, then back to Krys. “Me?”
She nodded and stepped back, her head cocked to the side reviewing the vision. “I only received words this time,” she said to him.
“Check, or checkmate? The Code is broken, ancestors have spoken. Emerging pride along for the ride.”
Silence prevailed as each of them considered the words. Trexler spoke first. “Is it always like this?”
“Pretty much. The words always come in the form of a riddle. Do you know what they mean?”
“Checkmate is a word I do not want to hear,” Trexler answered. “It’s part of a game, the part that means ‘game over.’ The rest is not clear to me.” He lifted an eyebrow to Washburn.
“Sir, I can tell you this much. Her visions are real. I’m alive because of two of them. I think all of us are alive because of them. I’ve watched Tarn work his way through these things. If I’ve learned nothing else, it is that each and every word counts. The words ‘check, or checkmate’ probably go together, and they form a question. Together, I think they imply that the game is not over if we do the right thing. However, in the game of chess, when someone is checked, it usually means that the number of possible moves is limited, very limited. Choose well, sir.”
“Choose from what? Codes? I didn’t know we had any codes at all yet.”
Washburn shook his head. “The visions I’ve seen do not apply to today, sir. They apply to the future. If this hypercom gets up and running, we’ll probably have to talk in code.” He turned away, deep in thought. It wasn’t long, though, before he whirled back around. “Sir, remember the Navajo code speakers in World War II?”
Trexler slapped the bed with his hand. “I do! Maybe that’s it.” He looked to Krys, even though she could not look back. “In World War II, we sent out Native Americans with certain units. They spoke their native language which to everyone else was an unbreakable code. We could do the same with the hypercom.”
“But in the vision, the Code gets broken.”
“Codes are pretty hard to break in this day and age, but your computers are smart. I don’t think the Navajo language is not based on mathematics the way regular codes are. Maybe that’s the key.”
“George is pretty good with languages,” she said. “Maybe we should run this by him. What about the rest of the words?”
Trexler reviewed them in his mind. “‘Emerging pride along for the ride.’ Hmm.” He looked at Washburn. “The only use of the word emerging I’ve heard is about an emerging world called Earth.” He grinned in triumph. “We can all take pride in our Navajo code speakers.”
Washburn nodded in agreement.
Krys was less certain, though what she had heard sounded reasonable. “You might be right, Admiral. I’ll feel a lot better once Tarn has done his magic on the vision.”
* * * * *
Trexler left the ship two weeks later, on a floater again with one leg straight out in front of him just as it had been after the battle at Aldebaran. This time, his left arm was also in a cast to the shoulder. His ribs bothered him the most. The healing properties of Empire medicine had worked wonders on the ribs – they only hurt a lot, not a whole lot.
The President welcomed him to the oval office with a strained look on his face. “I’m sorry, Ray. Is there anything I can do for you?”
“Yes, you can tell me what’s going on in the rest of the world. How hard are they taking this?”
“Lots of demonstrations. You made some friends out there. Actually, you made a lot of friends out there. We know who the terrorists were. Their organization is being dealt with on a global level, and we haven’t even had to call in any favors to get things moving. This will be the last hurrah for them, finally.”
“I need to address the public.”
“Are you up to it?”
“Yes.”
“What are you going to say?”
“I don’t know. I’ll think of something.”
The something turned out to be a call for peace. He insisted that the world start thinking big, start accepting change, because change was coming whether they wanted it or not. The Empire was not going to go away.
He would return. When, he did not know, but he would return, and when he did he hoped he would find the world had grown up.
In closing, he said as he looked directly into the camera, “Do not focus on terrorists. What happened to me is not important. Focus on coming together, focus on creating trading partners among the stars, focus on traveling to the stars, and focus on accepting aliens in your midst. There is no more need for terrorists: they are the past. The future
is opportunity. Do you want to find a place to practice your religion in safety and peace? The Empire can find that place for you, though you might find it’s right here on Earth if you look hard enough. Do you want to grow your rice without fear, to live with your extended family in peace? The Empire can find a place for you to do that, too, though again, you might find it’s right here on Earth. Do you want your children to stop starving, do you want them to grow up in good health? The Empire can help with that. But the Empire will not do it for you. You have to choose, and your leaders have to accept. We will talk more about this when I return.
“Know this: the soldiers and sailors from Earth that have been fighting on your behalf no longer refer to themselves as Americans, or Germans, or French, or Japanese, or Chinese. They refer to themselves as Terrans from the planet Earth.
“Goodbye for now. I have a war to win out there,” he said, pointing toward the ceiling, “where I will be fighting right alongside others from every part of Earth. Wish us luck, and please, pray to whatever god you worship for our success. We need all the help we can get. For our children and for our children’s children.”
Trexler was anxious to get aloft and check on Nancy, but he had one more meeting to attend. He guided his floater from the Press Briefing Room to the Oval Office where the President waited.
The President was brusque. “Are you up to a short drive?”
“I’m up to getting back to work,” Trexler admonished. “My time here is over.”
“Not quite yet. This won’t take long.”
Trexler rode beside the President on the way to the Pentagon. On the way, the President reached into his pocket and pulled out a shiny gold pin. “We created a new branch while you were abroad,” he said. “We’re calling it ‘Space Command.’ Everyone who goes or has gone into space to fight with you gets one of these, be he a ground pounder or an admiral. Godfries helped a bit and gave his final okay. Does it meet with your approval?”
“It’s beautiful,” Trexler agreed, looking at the pin. Resembling aviator wings and made of pure gold, two wings extended from a planet overlaid with crossed sabers. “I don’t see a shield or an eagle.”
“Nope. It’s not just for United States servicemen and women. It’s for everyone from every country. I’d be honored if you’d wear it.”
“I don’t think I can do it with one hand.”
“I’ll get if for you,” the President said, leaning over. “Where does it go?”
“I hate to give up my naval aviator wings, but if it’s a new branch, I guess it should replace them.”
“You’re in charge, you know,” the President said as he removed the old emblem.
“Sir, I’ve got a war to fight. I don’t have time for administration.”
“So delegate. The administration, not the fighting. You’re in charge.”
“Of what?”
“Well, let’s see. Including the latest batch, we’ve sent 5,000 men and women to wherever you’ve put them, also 300 Delta Force soldiers. You gutted them, you know. We’ve sent more special operations guys from other countries to beef them up. Where they went, I don’t know, but I’m told their training is conducted by the Great Cats. Space Command is a multinational force, of course, and Godfries told me I had to keep looking for more men. He’s going to put them to work training newcomers, then sending them to your fleets. Some guy named Serge Parsons is here. He’s helping us establish some impressive manufacturing capabilities. We’ve already upgraded some ships, and more are in the pipeline. More tugs are a high priority. Now that we can work on these ships in the open, it will go a lot smoother. We just have to develop the skilled workforce, and we are. It’s a global effort.
“We’re also developing more troops for Waverly, and we’re going to try to get them working together before they ship out. He’s sent some of his guys to get that up and running, and rather than trying to teach everyone English, he wants us to teach them this Galactic High Standard right from the start.”
“You might want to work on that yourself,” Trexler said with a grin.
“I might. I promoted Godfries. Did you know?”
“No, but he’s earned it.”
“He has. He’s a four-star now. We’ve sent boxes of new badges to your ship for all ranks. I would imagine there have been a lot of promotions earned out there.”
“There have. I promoted Waverly as well. I gave him a set of my old stars.”
“How many?”
“One.”
“I’m told he doesn’t need promotions anymore.”
“As a Knight, he doesn’t.”
“Well, he’s not just a Knight, he’s one of us, too. I made him a four-star. I hope that’s okay with you. I’ve personally signed other promotion papers, too. You just have to add the names and put your signature on them to make them official. I’ve also included papers with congressional approvals for the higher ranks. Obviously, those should be handed out carefully.”
“Don’t forget sir: I have people from all over the world. Have you included approvals from other countries?”
“Well, uh . . . no. We came up with a different plan. We’re here. I’ll tell you about it inside.”
They pulled up to the front door of the Pentagon. A fleet shuttle waited for Trexler out in the parking lot, dwarfing everything in sight. Trexler was loaded onto another floater and guided directly to an auditorium deep inside the Pentagon where a fairly large group of people awaited him. He immediately recognized the Joint Chiefs, a number of congressmen, and two Supreme Court justices. Looking harder, he discovered a number of foreign leaders he had met during the past few months.
“We had a big argument about who got to be in charge tonight,” the President said, bending over to speak quietly to Trexler. “I won.”
The President guided the floater to the front of the room. “It’s a new world out there,” he said to the guests. “We don’t know what awaits us, and we don’t know what our future holds. What we do know is that no organization or political entity now exists on the planet to lead us into that future, and I include here the United Nations. We know two additional things: the world is at war against these Chessori who attempted, and who may attempt again, to commit genocide against planet Earth. We know, too, that we do not yet have a voice among the leaders of the Empire.”
He looked to Trexler sitting on his floater with his leg straight out. “It falls on your shoulders, Raymond Trexler, to lead our armed forces ‘out there,’ to protect us, to lead us into the future, and to represent us before the Empire. I don’t know how you’re going to do it, and we don’t have a mechanism in place yet to support you. You’re going to have to figure it out on your own. I’m sure we’ll have plenty of discussions back here while you’re away, but history tells us we’ll fail to reach agreement. That said, we’ll give it our best shot. In the meantime, and without the support of the entire world but with the support of most of the world, I hereby appoint you Ambassador to the Empire. Don’t ask me who you report back to because I don’t know, and please try not to give away the store, but you’ve made a lot of friends during the past couple of months. We’re putting our faith and trust in your leadership and judgment.”
Trexler started to say something, but the President cut him off. “Hold still, Ray. I’m not done yet. Ambassadors don’t normally serve in the military, but in your case we don’t have a choice. Our understanding is that your military leadership is still needed out there, and it appears that you’ve done a pretty good job so far. Whether it be fortunate or unfortunate, you do not command warriors exclusively from the United States. Ray,” he said, continuing to look over at Trexler, “I lied a little while ago when I told you we’d created a new branch. We didn’t. What we did create with the blessing of many world leaders is a new military service, and you’re in charge. We haven’t figured out who you report to, and we need to get that figured out pretty quickly since we can’t be having generals and admirals running around unsupervised, but I can te
ll you who you serve. You serve Earth, all of Earth. Space Command is a multinational force that for the moment, and perhaps forever, reports to all of us in this room.
“Need I say that you hold our very lives, indeed the lives of everyone on the planet, in your hands? We watched that battle out in space, certainly not in the detail you did, but we saw enough to convince us that you and your men saved our world.
“We charge you, Raymond Trexler, with the responsibility of protecting Earth. Beyond that, we charge you with the responsibility of finding a way for us to protect ourselves. The resources of the planet are at your disposal. The world is at war. You command a multinational force that, at present, is in its infancy. It will grow just as fast as you can accept new recruits. We’ve created a new rank for you, and you may choose to change it, but for the moment we’re going to give you the title, and responsibility, of Admiral, Space Command. Raymond Trexler, do you accept our charge?”
Trexler had not seen this coming, and he was overwhelmed. How had so many leaders been able to reach agreement on an issue of such importance? Was the world learning, had they really heard his message? Did they truly understand the threat of the Chessori? He allowed himself to hope, just a little. He let his gaze roam the room, trying to get a feel for what these men and women were telling him. Was he the right man?
The President chided him. “Ray, we’re waiting. If you’re not the right man, tell us who is.”
Trexler lifted his chin. “I am that right man, sir. And titles bestowed can be taken away. I will not forget that, and I will not let you down.”
“Then by the power invested in me by everyone in this room, I hereby confirm your positions and bestow the appropriate rank.”
The President whispered as he pinned Trexler’s new rank to each collar, “Didn’t we just do this? It’s much easier now that we’re out of the car,” His new emblems of rank consisted of a circle of five small stars beside a planet that could only be Earth.
Voice of the Chosen (Spirit of Empire, Book Three) Page 9