“Excuse me!” Aldaine yelled, marching forward until she stood three feet from him. “You’ve done enough talking. Now’s your time to listen.”
Brows drawing down, Husher studied the young woman, marveling. “Ms. Aldaine, do I need to remind you that I captain this—”
“Humanity is finished owning the floor!” Aldaine said, voice ringing over the crowd as she spread her arms and walked backward to join her fellow protesters in a line. They linked with each other, arm in arm. “Now’s your time to shut up and listen to marginalized species and their allies. It’s past time. Your hiring practices say you favor humanity over the other species, and your other actions scream it.”
Husher opened his mouth to respond to that, but the protesters began a chant they’d clearly rehearsed, led by Aldaine:
“Say it loud, say it clear, humans are done talking here! Say it loud, say it clear, time for them to open ears!”
A strange mixture of bafflement, anger, and anxiety made its home in Husher’s chest. His hands balled into fists as he waited for them to stop shouting, but it soon became clear they had no intention of stopping, until either he left or they keeled over from exhaustion.
He didn’t have time to wait for that to happen. He spun on his heels, slammed the hatch’s access panel with his palm, and strode through, double-checking to make sure it was secured before marching deeper into the crew section.
Back in his cabin, he leaned against the mirror, gripping both sides of it and studying his own lined face. Am I biased against the Gok? Did I use what happened to me to justify destroying that ship? He didn’t think so—he’d often reminded himself that the Gok who’d killed his daughter weren’t representative of their entire species—but now he was filled with doubt.
He’d always cared deeply about doing the right thing according to his principles. According to what was best for the galaxy. Always, he’d believed that meant preparing for war.
But lately, he felt like he was losing focus.
Chapter 7
The Quince Engagement
For most messages, Husher had configured his com not to vibrate or make a sound, but for messages designated “Priority,” it beeped harshly until he checked it.
That happened now, three hours into a sleep that, so far, had been blissfully dreamless.
The message was from Ensign Fields, the Coms officer currently on watch in the CIC. “Captain, I’ve just received word that Admiral Connor Iver has transitioned into the system through the Feverfew-Caprice darkgate and intends to meet with you aboard the Vesta. Accounting for transmission lag, we can expect his arrival within four hours.”
The moment Husher finished the message, he dashed across the chamber and into the cramped head, to splash cold water on his face. Pausing with fingertips on his upper cheeks, he studied the lined face that peered back at him from the glass.
Readying to receive an admiral would require no small amount of preparations, and before anything else, he used his com to send orders to several different departments. Then, while his ship was no doubt jumping to an even livelier state than usual in the corridors and chambers outside, he opened his wardrobe, swept aside the clothing hanging there, and folded down the ironing board from the back, extending its single leg to stabilize it against the deck.
Fesky’s usual admonishments about his uniform rang in his ears as he carefully creased his pants. “I’ll show her,” he muttered as he dug his black polish out from the back of the wardrobe and gave the boots some elbow grease.
Forty minutes later, he was finished, admiring himself in the mirror. “Still got it,” he told himself, straightening his midnight overcoat. Although, it shocked him, sometimes—to see the lightly creased face surrounding his bright blue eyes. His hair was now iron-gray, a shade that almost matched the Vesta’s hull.
As he stepped into the corridor outside, his XO happened to be rushing by, feathers rustling as she stalked forward on talons that clicked against the gray metal of the deck. When she saw him, she turned, eyeing him from top to bottom.
“Notice anything?” he said, unable to suppress the grin that curled the corners of his mouth.
“I do,” Fesky said. “You forgot your medals.”
His smile drooped.
“This is an admiral of the fleet you’re meeting with, Captain, not your dogsitter’s second cousin.”
“I don’t own a dog,” Husher grumbled as he opened the hatch to his quarters and went in to pin the medals above his overcoat’s left breast pocket.
When he reemerged, Fesky was still waiting, and they strode down the corridor together, toward whatever last-minute business awaited them before the admiral’s arrival.
“I haven’t spoken with you since you confronted the protesters,” the Winger said. “How did it go?”
“Not well.”
“I gathered that. Based on the growing agitation on the narrownet, anyway.”
Husher tried not to sigh. They marched on toward the conference room, to ensure everything was ready for the admiral’s arrival.
To Husher, it seemed like no time at all before his officers were gathered around the conference table, all seated and chatting softly amongst themselves while they waited for Iver.
The hatch hissed open, and everyone in the room rose to attention, turning toward the entering admiral and saluting as one.
“At ease,” Iver said after returning their salute for a couple of seconds, and everyone sat. The admiral joined them, sitting at the end of the table opposite Husher. Iver wore a thick mustache that, at his age, had either been dyed black or made to look that way using an overlay. Given the general tendency among military personnel to avoid overlay use to alter their own appearances, Husher would have put his money on dye.
“Welcome to the Vesta, Admiral Iver,” Husher said. “It’s an honor to have you with us.”
“It’s an honor to be here,” Iver said, his tone almost raucous in its forced joviality, “though I wish more pleasant circumstances had led to my arrival.”
“I’m guessing you’re referring to the engagement with the Gok carrier that we underwent in this system several days ago.”
With a curt nod, Iver said, “That, as well as an engagement that happened around the same time, in the Quince System. The galactic government received word of both engagements almost simultaneously. The Quince engagement involved the Ceres, and her crew faced a much bigger Gok force.”
“Was the Ceres’ battle group accompanying her?” Husher asked, wincing. The Ceres was another supercarrier, and one of the eight capital starships that formed the backbone of the Integrated Galactic Fleet.
“It was, though the Gok still managed to…well, I’ll show you. Orient yourselves, everyone—I’m about to take over your Oculenses. Anyone have any particular objections to that?” No one spoke. “Very well.”
Suddenly, Husher found himself in space, perched on the starboard hull of the Ceres. He surmised that he was about to witness the Quince System engagement from the perspective of one of the supercarrier’s visual sensors.
Indeed, light flickered twice in the star-speckled dark, followed by fire that flowered then shriveled just as quickly, choked by the vacuum of space.
“That was the Constellation getting blown apart,” came Iver’s voice, cutting through the void. “A good ship. It was a destroyer named for the one that the Tumbran, Piper, boarded at the end of the Second Galactic War. The one he used to trigger the wormhole collapse that wiped out the Ixan fleet.”
Husher shook his head, which caused his view of the battle to jostle back and forth. Before this, it had been seventeen years since the last time they’d lost a vessel in combat. Seventeen years of peace. More than I would have expected, but not nearly enough. It’s never enough.
The Agron was next to go, followed by the Pronax. After that, the Gok battle group assembled themselves into a loose formation, swooping toward the Ceres and concentrating their fire on her starboard hull.
Hush
er winced away from the missiles that screamed through the blackness toward him, and when they battered the high-yield steel hull all around him, he yelled, his heart hammering in his chest.
Abruptly, the Gok vanished, and so did the stars, and the explosions. Husher was no longer a visual sensor on the hull of a supercarrier, but Vin Husher, who captained a supercarrier of his own.
Everyone sitting around the conference table was staring at him, with expressions ranging from confusion to concern.
For his part, Admiral Iver looked slightly annoyed. “Captain?” he said, his head tilted to one side. “Are you all right?”
“I…sorry. Yes, I’m fine.”
“I can hardly think this is your first time viewing a panoramic recording of a military engagement.”
“It’s not. It’s far from my first, Admiral.”
“Were you playing some sort of joke on us, then?” Iver’s eyed narrowed.
“No, sir. I’m honestly not sure what came over me.”
“Are we clear to proceed, then?”
“Yes, sir.”
Iver resumed the recording, during which the Ceres took significant damage before bringing its considerable arsenal to bear in wiping out four Gok ships, causing the remaining three to scatter, which was very unusual for them. Husher had often wondered whether the Gok even considered retreat an option, and yet here they were, fleeing before the Ceres’ might.
He managed to get through the rest of the footage without any more visible or audible reactions, though blood rushed through his ears, and sweat oozed from his pores, dampening his uniform in several places.
Isn’t this exactly the sort of thing Doctor Bancroft plans to expose me to? Probably it was, but instead of a controlled therapy environment, he’d been thrust into it without warning.
Of course, as the admiral had pointed out, such viewings were standard, and they’d never given Husher much trouble before. That said, recording technology had improved by leaps and bounds since the last military engagements had been documented, and maybe that explained the difference in his reaction.
“Galactic Congress is extremely reluctant to issue a declaration of war,” Iver said once the recording had ended, his gaze lingering on Husher. “If it can be avoided, they’d rather not throw away a peace that’s lasted almost two decades, and I can’t say I disagree with them.” Iver coughed into a balled hand, then continued. “You’re currently the capital starship closest to the Gok seat of power, and records show that you have in Cybele at least two galaxy-class diplomats—the Kaithian, Shobi, as well as the Winger named Bryson. Can you verify their presence, Captain?”
“I’ll see that it’s verified within the hour.”
“Very good. Your mission is to transport those diplomats to the Gok home system, to see whether they can’t uncover what’s causing the Gok to become so agitated. Their primary objective will be to renew the peace we’ve enjoyed since the Gok Wars, but if they’re able to entice the Gok to join the Interstellar Union, they’ll have considerable latitude to do so. The chances for accomplishing that are projected to be higher than they have been—the Gok government has been getting better on respecting sentient rights, lately, and their government seems to grow less regressive with every passing year. Is everything I just said understood?”
Husher joined the chorus of “Yes, Admiral,” but he had to stop himself from shaking his head. The Gok attacked us twice, and the Union’s still trying to stay friends.
In one sense, he supposed it was a noble sentiment—they had lived in peace for this long, so maybe regaining that peace was possible. But it did make him worry about what the Union’s reaction would be when the Ixa’s creators returned. There would be no chance of quarter, then.
Chapter 8
Feeling Unsafe
Husher crouched inside a sniper hide they’d fashioned from the fourth story of an apartment building on the outskirts of Larissa, the capital of Thessaly. He hadn’t gone to sniper school, so it was his job to watch the sniper’s back by looking through the other windows for insurgents and keeping an eye on the apartment door.
The hide his task unit’s best sniper, Rogers, had put together consisted of two mattresses stacked on top of a folded-out futon, atop which Rogers lay, eyeing the streets below through his scope. Even here in what the locals termed Larissa’s outskirts, the buildings below were so tightly packed that it wasn’t possible to cover the streets for more than a few blocks.
“I have a military-aged male who appears to be moving tactically toward our location,” Rogers whispered into his com. Husher couldn’t hear what the reply was, but the sniper didn’t fire, so he guessed that it wasn’t a go-ahead.
An RPG hit the building they were in, obliterating the wall between two windows and sending shrapnel tearing through the apartment. Miraculously, Husher was untouched, but through the smoke and debris he could see that Rogers had been tossed against the wall and looked to be unconscious.
Keeping an eye on the outside, he scrambled across the plaster-littered apartment toward Rogers, shaking the sniper once he reached him. Blood trickled down the side of Rogers’s face, and he didn’t react. Husher heaved the slight man up, slinging him over his shoulder, and started toward the apartment door.
Another RPG hit—this one made its way to an interior wall, right next to Husher. The explosion threw him to the floor, and he dropped Rogers. Looking down at himself, he saw that his own leg was missing below the knee. He screamed.
The Larissa apartment dissolved to reveal Doctor Bancroft’s office, as well as Bancroft herself, who wore an expression of professional concern.
“Here,” she said, retrieving an unopened bottle of water from the mini-fridge built into her desk.
“Thanks.”
“It’ll get better as you’re exposed to more stimuli.”
“Yeah.” He picked up a cloth sitting on a metal table nearby and used it to wipe his brow. “Although, that didn’t feel much better than yesterday.”
Bancroft’s eyebrows climbed toward her hairline. “Yesterday?”
Nodding, Husher explained the type of footage Admiral Iver had shown them, without getting into the particulars of the engagement.
“So you started your therapy without me,” Bancroft said with a prim smile, and Husher forced a chuckle, figuring it was her idea of a joke.
“I guess so,” he said. “It’s a bit strange to me, though. Both simulations that triggered this reaction were of military engagements. But the day my daughter died…that wasn’t an engagement.”
“Well…” Bancroft said softly, “It was a military action, arguably. And the basic stimuli—explosions, fire—are the same.”
“I guess you’re right.”
“Are you okay to continue pursuing this line of treatment, or would you prefer to try the SSRIs?”
“Let’s keep trying this.” It’s way too early to switch now, he reflected. Especially given the effects the drugs might have on my performance. “Next simulation?”
“Captain, before we continue, there’s a concern I wanted to raise with you.”
“Oh?”
“I’m not sure how else to say this. I’ve gotten…reports from some crewmembers who say they’re feeling unsafe aboard the Vesta.”
“Unsafe,” Husher said, and sniffed. “I mean, this is a military vessel, but for now we’ve been sent on a diplomatic mission. Yes, we’ll be negotiating with a power that attacked us twice in the last week, but I’d argue that this is around as safe as it gets aboard a warship.”
“Their feelings don’t have anything to do with a particular mission.”
“I see,” Husher said, pausing to study Bancroft’s face. “I’m afraid I’m at a loss, Doctor. What’s causing them to feel unsafe?”
“They say it’s the general atmosphere in the crew section of the Vesta. Your refusal to undergo Awareness Training, and the fact that most of your human crew hasn’t undergone the training either…it speaks to attitudes that aren’t pe
rceived as particularly friendly by members of nonhuman species.”
This time, Husher paused for much longer. At last, he said, “How many of these reports have you received?”
“I’m afraid it would be a breach of doctor-patient confidentiality to tell you. The only circumstance under which I’d be required to break that confidentiality would be if a crewmember’s diagnosis rendered them unfit for service, and that isn’t the case, here.”
Nodding slowly, Husher said, “I promise you that I’ll give careful thought to what you’ve told me, but I think you should know that Awareness Training has been proven to only worsen—”
His com beeped stridently from his hip, and he snatched it from his holster to read the displayed message.
It was from Mayor Chancey: “Captain Husher, your presence is requested in the main city council chamber at once. Cheers, Dylan Chancey.”
Husher’s fingers tightened around the device, and he forced himself to relax his grip. His eyes met Bancroft’s. “I’m sorry, Doctor, it looks like I’ll have to cut our session short.”
Chapter 9
Scapegoated for Wrongs
“We’re here, Captain Husher,” Chancey said as the last councilor filed in, “to require every human in your crew to undergo Awareness Training as soon as reasonably possible. That includes you.”
Husher narrowed his eyes. “Wait, is the council just pasting protester demands straight into the agenda, now?”
“Those demands arise from legitimate concerns,” Penelope Snyder said from across the room. As usual, she wore an ostentatious garment that exposed a midriff toned by digital artifice. “The fact that you refused to take the Implicit Association and Bias Test only tells us what we already knew: you are prejudiced against the Gok, Captain. We would have prescribed Awareness Training for you regardless, but we agree with the demonstrators that extending the training to your human crew is the logical next step. As you’ve been the one in command of the Vesta since it was first commissioned, I find patently absurd the suggestion that the environment in her crew section isn’t toxic.”
Ixan Legacy Box Set Page 5