Loyalty to the Cause (TCOTU, Book 4) (This Corner of the Universe) (32 page)

*  *  *

Heskan
entered
Hussy’s
main engine room in search of
Müller,
it having never occurred to Heskan to look elsewhere for the enigmatic
engineer.  Over the last weeks, it had become apparent to all that Müller’s
life centered solely on
Hussy’s
engines.

“
Guten Tag,
Kapitän,”
Müller greeted formally.  “The life support system has completely recovered.”

Heskan nodded and answered, “I’m pleased to hear that, Mr.
Müller.  Hussy will need it for her next voyage.”

The engineer took a filthy rag from atop
Hussy’s
main power
line and wiped his hands with it.  “Where are we headed,
Kapitän?
  I am most interested in what we
will do next.”

“You’re
headed to Aurelios.”

Müller smiled wistfully, “
Nein
, I cannot go there.”

“You can with Hussy,” Heskan declared.  “If you return the ship,
won’t that satisfy your contract?”

Müller’s eyes widened at Heskan’s words.  He stared blankly at his
engines as he softly asked, “You would permit that?  I could go home?”

“How
long has it been, Joachim?”

“Seven
years since the pirates took
Das Flittchen
, but ten years since I have
been home,” he answered.  “My son is a man by now,
Kapitän.
”

Heskan
shook his head and smiled.  “You’re the captain now, Joachim.  Go home to your
family.”

Lieutenant
Vernay lightly rapped on the door to Heskan’s quarters before poking her head
in.  “You wanted to see me, Captain?”

During
his time on
Anelace
and
Kite
, he became accustomed to being close
to the ship’s bridge but being directly adjacent to it was still unsettling. 
Having the bridge immediately outside his door made it difficult to relax. 
“Come in, Stacy.”

Vernay
entered the small room and closed the portal.  “This is it, isn’t it,
Captain?”  The Hollarans had finally left
Hussy
.  Only the twenty-three
Brevics and Joachim
Müller remained on board.  There
had been considerable scuttlebutt that a decision about what would happen next
was coming soon.

Heskan nodded.  “We have a couple options I need to tell the crew
but I wanted to discuss them with you first.”  He waved her over to his desk
and pointed to the screen.  “What do you know about the Seshafi corporate
system?

Vernay looked curiously at the monitor.  She quickly reviewed the
general information regarding the star system and recent news of the
conglomerate that controlled it.  When she was finished, she leaned on the
desktop and said, “It looks like they could use some help.”

“Samanta De Luca has offered to turn us into privateers. 
AmyraCorp would hire us.”

Vernay frowned in disappointment.  “Mercenaries,” she said with
distaste.  “Fighting another person’s war for the highest bidder.”  She
sighed.  “I’ll never again be a government’s mass murderer.  How do we know this
isn’t another Republic?”

“They don’t use fusion weapons, Stacy.  In fact, by the
Independence Agreements, no corporate system does.  I’ve looked over the
history of that region and all the corporations seem to be more like branches
from the same family tree than bitter rivals.”  He shrugged while admitting,
“Their warfare is strange, short and oddly personal.  AmyraCorp is enlisting
the support of a syndicate of privateers called DAC for the current conflict.  DAC
actually fought
against
AmyraCorp and
for
IaCom two years earlier.”

“But now they’ve switched sides?” Vernay asked.

Heskan nodded.  “What’s more,” he continued, “AmyraCorp and IaCom
were allied together eight years ago when they skirmished against the
mega-corporation controlling the Lagrin star system.”

“So it’s one, big mess,” Vernay summarized.  “And we’d be throwing
ourselves right into the middle of it.”

“It doesn’t have to be like that, Stacy.  The more I read about AmyraCorp,
the more I like it.  It doesn’t have indentured contracts.   Its people aren’t
employees; they’re citizens.  They even have a constitution.”

“So did we,” she said wearily.  “Garrett, I’m just tired.  I’m
tired of fighting, tired of death.”  She looked down toward the deck.  “I just
want to find a peaceful corner of the universe I can call my own, maybe even
settle down.”

Heskan placed a hand on her shoulder.  “I do too, Stacy, and this system
might be a corner worth fighting for.  AmyraCorp offers landed contracts.  When
we negotiate our contract, we could request land be included in the final payment.”

Vernay’s mouth turned upward, her eyes following suit as she
looked at Heskan.  “Actual terra firma?  With a house?  A home to call my own?”

Heskan
saw hope begin to burn inside her.  He smiled in triumph as he thought,
It’s
time for the coup de grace
.  Spinning to his desktop, he quickly entered
commands.  “Watch this.”

*  *  *

Twenty
minutes later,
Hussy’s
crew stood facing the enormous wall screen in the
freighter’s middle hold.   Heskan, pacing at the front, summarized the options
available to them.  “You can decide to stay in the Commonwealth or take passage
to any part of the galaxy that you wish and make your new beginning there.  Or,
you can come with us to the corporate system of Seshafi.”

“To
another war?” a voice called out from the crowd.

Heskan
looked out at the people he had grown to love and nodded.  “Another battle,
yes,” he said honestly.  “I can’t make any promises for your safety.  I’m not
telling you that happily ever after is around the corner, but I believe this
system is worth fighting for.  I choose to live with a purpose, and I believe that
purpose is in Seshafi.”

He walked
along the wall screen as he confessed, “Of course, it’s not without risk.  You
can’t fight a war without losses, but these people need help.  They are not the
aggressors, a rival corporation called IaCom is.  We would be defending their
homes and because of that, AmyraCorp will offer us a home in Seshafi with them.”

The tone
of his voice turned cold as he thought of Salus.  “Think about the last battle
you fought for the Republic.  Are you proud of what we did?  How many of our friends
died for that cause?”  Heskan paused as he saw tremors ripple through the
pilots.  “But what about defending your own home even if it is a new one, with
your neighbors by your side?  Would that be a battle worth fighting?”

Ensign
Gables’ voice rang over the crowd as she asked soberly, “Captain, would our new
neighbors be worth my life?  Are they people worth defending?”

Heskan
motioned to Vernay, who activated the holo-vid.  On the large wall screen
behind Heskan, a geriatric, rail of a man walked unsteadily to a podium.  He
placed his datapad on top of the lectern and reached a shaking hand toward his
suit pocket.  After withdrawing reading spectacles, he slowly, deliberately
opened them and placed them upon his birdlike nose.  Dark circles under his
eyes hinted at a weariness but the manner of his speech evoked a great resolve.
 His voice carried over the hold’s speakers.

“Turning
now, and this time more generally, to the question of IaCom’s complaint, I
would observe that there has never been a period in all our century of
existence when a more absolute guarantee of impending invasion could have been
given to our people.  IaCom’s
casus bellum
is unequivocally clear.  Further,
there will be no intervention by The Courts; there will be neither a stay of
hostilities granted nor dispensation offered.”

The
statesman glanced away from his datapad and looked over the throng of media he
was speaking to before continuing.  “But I have full confidence that if every
citizen does their duty, if nothing is neglected, we shall prove ourselves once
again able to defend our system and to ride out the storm of war.”  A tone of certainty
entered his voice.  “At any rate, that is what we are going to try to do.  That
is the will of the entire corporation and her people.  And so, the Amyra
Corporation and her allies, linked together in their cause, will defend to the
death the Seshafi star system, aiding each other like good comrades to the
utmost of their strengths.”

A
wrinkled finger flicked across his datapad to advance the page.  “Our system’s
position is not new or unique.  Many others have faced tyranny and oppression
before us.  We stand in the shadow of those giants who have shown throughout
the course of history that the efforts of a few can have lasting and meaningful
consequences for all.  I speak here, on this fine morning, to answer IaCom’s
casus
bellum
, as I am required to do by corporate law and the rules of war.  In
the spirit of those departed giants, whose words and actions stir such
inspiration, I would channel them and tell our invaders that ‘We shall not flag
or fail. We shall go on to the end. We shall fight at the tunnel point, we
shall fight near the outer planets, we shall fight with growing confidence and
growing strength at the twins.  We shall defend our planets, whatever the cost
may be.  We shall fight in orbit, we shall fight in the atmosphere, we shall
fight on the landing grounds and in the seas and we shall
never
surrender.’”

Heskan
detected the briefest moment of awestruck silence before
Hussy’s
hold
erupted in cheers.

*  *  *

Heskan
needed all twenty-three berths allocated to him on the passenger ship sailing to
Vica Pota.  New identities in hand, every Brevic sailor had elected to follow
their captain.  The three days in tunnel space were a welcome relief compared
to the prior stress over the uncertainty of their futures.  Now that each
sailor knew what lie ahead, even if it was to be combat, they could sit back
and focus on their future knowing that at least it was defined and of their
choosing.

Most
of the pilots continued to study the crafts of their assigned stations on
Hussy
. 
Nine of the sixteen pilots, like Ensign Gables, had cross-trained into aviation
and resumed their previous naval roles.  The seven  pilots whose only training
had been naval aviation were scrambling to learn a new rating.

Heskan
and Vernay spent most of the time preparing to assume command of the snow
waiting in Vica Pota.  The squadron of the now four Colossus-class snows had
been ordered to delay their departure by nineteen hours to allow
Elathra’s
new crew to come aboard.  Heskan poured through all the information Samanta De
Luca provided on the snow during most of his trip.  His only respites from his
personal crash course on the Hollaran warship were the meals he shared with his
crew.

The
dining on board the passenger liner was fantastic.  The short duration of its
usual route ensured the ship was always well-stocked with the freshest of
food.  Heskan placed his new, Hollaran datapad on the table as he sat down and
greeted his companions.

Vernay
and Selvaggio nodded with full mouths while Truesworth said, “Evening,
Captain.  You’ve got to try this fish.  I have no idea how to pronounce it but
it’s better than Titan’s alvacour.”

Heskan
quickly entered his dining request and looked around the table.  He nodded as
he acknowledged Selvaggio and Truesworth with “Lieutenants” and then grinned
unabashedly at Vernay while greeting, “Commander.”

During
the creation of their new identities and subsequent “buy-up” in The Foster
Fifteen, Heskan had arranged increases in rank for his crew.  Additionally,
Heskan surprised his first officer with an additional jump in rank to full
commander.  Not only did she deserve it, he rationalized her higher rank
guaranteed that she would remain his first officer.  Finally, his three
enlisted men had stepped up in rank, with Chief Brown being elevated from E-8
to E-9 only after his blanket refusal to accept a commission.

Next
to Heskan, Vernay blushed at the mention of her new rank.  “It’s ridiculous,”
she said.

“Ridiculously
awesome, you mean,” Truesworth corrected.  “I’m a full lieutenant after only
two and a half years!  At this rate, I’ll be an admiral before I’m thirty,” he
joked.  “The only problem is that our files just state our rank and not our
date of rank.”  He glanced playfully at Selvaggio.  “Now we’ll never know if I
out-rank you.”

“—I’ll
always out-rank you.”

“—She’ll
always out-rank you.”

Selvaggio,
Vernay and Heskan burst out laughing and Truesworth good-naturedly shrugged in
resignation.  After the laughter died down, Truesworth said, “Commander-Stacy-ma’am,
I’ve been reading a lot about the battles fought in and around the Seshafi system
and this privateer gig may not be so bad.”

“What
do you mean, Jack?” Vernay asked.

“Well,
AmyraCorp has been involved in three supposedly major conflicts in the last ten
years.  Each of the battles has curiously short casualty lists.  In the latest
skirmishes with IaCom, only three ships were lost in total, none with all hands
on board.”

“AmyraCorp
lost only three ships the entire battle?” Heskan asked suspiciously.