by Peter Grant
Steve frowned. “Gunnery Sergeant, do you think this criticism is justified?”
“I think there’s a certain amount of truth to it,” she replied judiciously. “However, I’d also agree that you should have high expectations of your people. If you train and prepare them to respond swiftly and professionally, then you have the right to expect them to do precisely that when the chips are down. I think a little more patience would be a good thing, offset against the need for efficiency and effectiveness. You’ll have to find the right balance for yourself.”
The last two days of OCS were given over to family visits (for those who had family on Lancaster), administrative matters, and preparations for graduation. Seventy–seven per cent of those who’d begun the course twelve weeks earlier had survived its rigors.
Steve spent an hour with a clerk in Personnel. He digitally signed the documents terminating his enlisted service with effect from the date of graduation, and superseding it with effect from the same date by appointment to commissioned office. They went through all his past records, making sure he had electronic and hard copies of everything important, and that all the loose ends had been tied off.
The military apparel vendors lining the street outside the OCS campus had stocked up on material and appurtenances in preparation for the graduation of the latest class. Steve had ordered rhodium–plated silver accoutrements and insignia of rank for his uniforms as soon as he was sure he’d graduate. That evening he attached new, parade–quality sets of combat and Expert badges to his doeskin uniforms, and set up his medals and ribbons. When he’d finished, he hung the jackets side by side against his locker, then stepped back to view them from a distance, checking that all their accoutrements were in order. The medals and ribbons made a splash of color on the left chest, offset by his Planetary and Space Combat Badges on the right, each bearing one star. Below them were his two unit award ribbons and three Expert badges, followed by his name–tag on the pocket flap. The epaulettes bore the single bar of Ensign’s rank. Like the jacket’s buttons, his name–tag and the Spacer emblem of a crossed sword and lightning bolt on each collar, it was silver in color.
Brooks interrupted his examination, walking in with a sealed suit cover over his arm. “Checking out your new uniforms, are you? I must admit, they look spiffy. The silver bits are really shiny! How did you get them that bright?”
Steve grinned. “I bought rhodium–plated silver versions of everything. They’re expensive, but I think they’re worth it for Number One and Number Two uniforms. They don’t tarnish, and they look better than standard–issue stainless steel.”
“They sure do!”
“Did you buy a new dress uniform?”
“Yes, I treated myself to one for graduation. I had it tailored at the shop Gunnery Sergeant Dixon recommended, just outside the gates.”
“Well, don’t just stand there — take it out and let’s see it!”
Marine Number One dress uniform was a single–breasted midnight–blue belted jacket buttoned to a standing collar, worn over lighter blue trousers. Both were identical in pattern to the Spacer Corps black–over–black equivalent. Brooks hung the jacket on his locker and attached his medal bar. The three awards were balanced on the right by three Expert badges below a Planetary Combat Badge. The single gold bar of Second Lieutenant’s rank gleamed on his epaulettes, matching the color of his buttons, name–tag, and the Marine emblem of a globe above crossed carbines on each collar.
“I wonder why they decided that Marines would always use gold insignia and accoutrements on Number One and Number Two uniforms, while Spacers would always wear them in silver?” Steve mused. “I mean, we’re all in the same Fleet, and we use identical insignia of rank for enlisted, Warrant and commissioned officers. Surely it’d have been easier to stock just one variation of each?”
Brooks shrugged. “I think Marines insist on gold because we’re more valuable than Spacers.” He dodged, grinning, as Steve launched a mock–kick at him.
Steve asked, “You’re off to Basic School next month with all the other newly–commissioned Marines, right?”
“Yes. After six months there I’m hoping to get a platoon commander’s slot. If I’m lucky it’ll be in a Marine Reaction Force battalion, although since they’re crack units they won’t give me a platoon right away. I’ll have to prove to them they can trust me with one. I’ll probably be an assistant platoon commander for a year or more, or perhaps an administrative officer.”
“You don’t want a platoon aboard a warship?”
“I’d love one, but they give those to First Lieutenants because they’re considered more demanding posts. The Corps reckons detached shipboard command requires greater experience.”
“Sounds like the Spacer Corps. It doesn’t allow Ensigns to act as primary watch–keeping officers aboard interstellar vessels. We have to serve as Assistant Officers of the Deck until we’re promoted to Junior Lieutenant.”
“Huh! Ever get the impression they don’t trust us as junior officers much more than they did as candidates in OCS? Still, we’ve got to find our feet, I guess. What about you? You’re off to the Deck Officer’s course, aren’t you? What does that involve?”
“It’s the Spacer Corps equivalent of the Marine Corps Basic School. In six months it teaches us everything we need to know — at least in theory — to serve as junior officers aboard a spaceship, including duties as Officer of the Deck. We learn what’s involved in each major console in the Operations Center and Damage Control Center, study shipboard organization and administration from an officer’s perspective, and practice command skills. Half of the course is planetside, with a heavy emphasis on hypno–study to absorb all the theory. The remainder is aboard a training ship, where we apply what we’ve learned.”
“I get it.”
Steve asked curiously, “What have you chosen for your specialization?”
“I’ve applied for Heavy Weapons. I like playing with things that make a big bang. And you?”
“Navigation, with a sub–specialization in Tactics.”
Brooks’ eyebrows rose. “Why Navigation? I’d have thought you’d pick something like Tactics or Weapons as your first choice.”
Steve shook his head. “We’ve got almost a thousand ships in commission at any time, but only about a third are warships — interstellar destroyers, cruisers and battleships, armed assault transports, and a few dozen intrastellar heavy patrol craft. The rest are all auxiliaries; communications frigates, freighters, transports, survey vessels, depot ships, repair ships, training vessels and so on. Almost all of them need Navigating Officers, but only warships need Tactics or Weapons Officers. Since there are two auxiliaries for every warship in commission, inevitably I’m going to be posted to auxiliaries for at least half my shipboard assignments. I want a specialization that allows me to do something useful aboard any or all of our ships, instead of being just a general dogsbody. Tactics is closely related to Navigation, of course, as far as space warfare is concerned. With it as a sub–specialization, I can be even more useful aboard a warship if necessary.”
“Makes sense when you put it like that. What are your chances of getting it, d’you think?”
Steve shrugged. “The top three students on the Deck Officer course are given preferential consideration for their choice of specialization, and first crack at entry–level courses in that field. I’m going to work my ass off to be one of them. If I don’t succeed, I guess I’ll have to trust to the luck of the draw. It’ll depend how many vacancies there are for Navigation specialists, and how many school slots are available. The most senior applicants get the slots, but I won’t have much seniority at all for quite a while yet! If I don’t get a slot on the first round I can apply to go on the waiting–list. I might get one after a year or two. If I haven’t secured one after a year as a Junior Lieutenant, I’ll have to choose another specialization, or let the Fleet assign one to me.”
“Knowing you, you’ll be in the top three, buddy. H
ow long’s the course?”
“It’s one of the longest entry–level courses — nine months, including two spells aboard training ships. That’s because both Navigators and Tactical Officers take the same basic course, so it includes material for both disciplines. You do the advanced material for your specialization when you tackle the second–level course.”
Brooks whistled. “They must cram you full of facts and figures if it takes that long! That means you’ll be training for the next fifteen months, if everything goes the way you want. Do you get a Navigator’s assignment right away?”
“Oh, heck, no! You do a tour as Assistant Navigator for a couple of years, then a planetside tour and more training, before they’ll trust you to be a Navigator in your own right.”
“Makes sense.” Brooks’ face sobered. “One thing, though, buddy. Wherever you end up, keep in touch, OK? I’ve gotten used to your ugly face.”
“I’ll do that, and you do the same. Who knows? We may get the chance to serve together.”
“I’d like that.”
They shook hands on it.
~ ~ ~
Graduation Day was a solemn, exuberant, awe–inspiring, happy occasion. Candidates with families or relatives on Lancaster invited them to attend. They didn’t have to invite their former enlisted comrades — the problem was rather to keep them from overwhelming the school’s facilities. It was a long–standing sport in the Fleet for their former colleagues to form long lines, forcing the newly–commissioned officer to return a salute from every one of them as they passed.
The guest of honor for the occasion, retired Admiral Methuen, spoke for half an hour about leadership, duty and the need to set an example, peppered with anecdotes from his experience. It was a very interesting speech, Steve thought, but the serried ranks of candidates, standing at Parade Rest, mostly listened in impatient silence, waiting for the big moment to arrive. They all wore Number One uniform, their epaulettes covered by matching cloth bands so as not to display their insignia of rank until they’d taken the oath of commissioned office and become entitled to them.
At last the moment came. The Commanding Officer of Lancaster’s Officer Candidate School, Marine Brigadier–General Hulton, intoned the words of the oath, phrase by phrase. Standing rigidly at attention, the candidates repeated it. There was a brief silence, then the General ordered, “Officers, display your insignia of rank!”
The cadets helped each other remove the bands of cloth covering their epaulettes, pocketing them. The bright gold and silver bars on their shoulders sparkled in the sunshine as the formation resumed its position of attention.
“Senior Instructor, dismiss the parade!”
It was a long–standing tradition that the Senior NCO Instructor, having welcomed the candidates during their first evening at OCS, should have the privilege of sending its graduates on their way. Master Chief Petty Officer Dumisane saluted the General. The NCO had more medals on his chest than any other person on parade. They jingled and glittered as he spun on his heel to face the newly–commissioned officers. His deep voice boomed out like thunder.
“Pa–raaaade… diiiis… MISS!”
The former candidates made a smart right turn, paused, and marched three paces; then their ranks dissolved into a mass of cheering men and women, tossing caps in the air, hugging one another, turning to face the stands as family and friends erupted onto the parade–ground.
Steve didn’t join in the general merriment — at least, not right away. He retrieved his cap, settled it firmly on his head, and marched towards Master Chief Dumisane. The Chief Instructor saw him coming and turned to face him, the glimmer of a smile on his face.
Steve stopped in front of him, and the Master Chief gravely saluted. With equal gravity, as smartly as he possibly could, Steve returned his salute.
“Congratulations, Sir.”
“Thank you, Master Chief.” They shook hands. “I wanted to take my first salute from you, and return it, to acknowledge that I don’t think I’d be here at all if you hadn’t supported me at the stream a short while ago. I just wanted to say ‘Thank you very much’.”
“Your decision at the stream was correct, Sir. That’s what earned you my support.”
“You’ve been an inspiration to us all, Master Chief, particularly to me. I’ll remember your example, and try to apply it.”
Taking A Round Turn
April–May 2845, Galactic Standard Calendar
Steve craned forward in his seat next to the cutter pilot, peering through the viewscreen. Their destination was looming larger through the plasglass, a long charcoal–gray octagonal cylinder flattened top and bottom and ending in blunt hemispheres at either end. Rows of brightly pulsating diodes lined her sides, top and bottom, warning other spacecraft of her presence in a powered orbit a hundred thousand kilometers above Lancaster. In the distance beyond her, he could see the lights of the other three ships of the Division.
“There she is, Sir — LCS Achilles,” the pilot informed him, grinning at the young officer’s obvious excitement.
“She was one of the first batch of Hero class destroyers, wasn’t she?” Steve asked, staring in fascination at the warship that would be his home for the next two years.
“That’s right, Sir. She’s a Flight I ship, built twenty years ago. Her refurbishment’s brought her into line with Flight II standards, and updated all her systems and weapons. She’s had the latest stealth coatings applied as well.”
As they drew nearer, Steve smiled to himself as he thought how disappointed a holovid entertainment addict would be to see a real warship, as opposed to those envisioned by the fertile imaginations of set designers. Theirs had aerials, antennas, turrets and other structures sticking out everywhere, offering multiple reflective angles and surfaces that would make them stand out like a searchlight in the dark to anyone looking for them using radar or lidar — an instant death sentence in combat. Real warships eschewed such nonsense.
Achilles’ surface was unmarred by visible protrusions except for her gravitic drive antennae and telescopic communication aerials, all of which were carefully shaped, angled and coated to be as stealthy as possible. Her powerful active and passive sensor arrays were layered onto her hull, which was a composite of steel, polymers and carbon nanotubes, carefully sealed with stealth coatings. It incorporated a Faraday cage that offered protection against radiation, and partial insulation against electromagnetic pulse effect. Her missile tubes and laser cannon barbettes were flush with the surface of the hull, revealing themselves only in action. Steve knew that if Achilles turned off her navigation and station–keeping lights and radar transponder, at anything but close range she’d be invisible against the backdrop of space, both to the naked eye and to radar and lidar. Only her own emissions would be detectable, and even those not very far away if they were kept to minimum power levels.
The sixty–ton cutter was dwarfed by Achilles’ sixty–thousand–ton bulk as she moved towards the docking bay near her stern. The pilot cut the gravitic drive and switched to reaction thrusters as the small craft approached the zone where her drive emissions might interfere with those of the destroyer. Steve felt his harness tighten around him as his body seemed to surge upward with the sudden removal of weight as the vessel’s internal gravity field cut out.
The pilot steered to within a couple of hundred meters of the docking bay, turning his craft to face away from the ship. He cut his reaction thrusters as soon as indicator lights on his control panel informed him that the bay’s tractor and pressor beams had locked on to her. The beams pulled her gently stern–first into an open berth. Docking arms connected with her hull and locked in place while a trunk extended concertina–like from the rear of the berth, sealing itself around the collar of her rear ramp. Conducted through the metal of her hull, Steve heard a clunk, then a faint hiss as the sealing joint inflated. He felt weight return to his body as the ship’s artificial gravity field extended through the docking arms to encompass the cutter. Th
e lights over the rear ramp changed from red to amber, indicating that airtight integrity was being established, then flickered to green as a chime sounded.
The pilot announced, “Airlock and gravity field operational. Opening rear ramp.” He pressed a button on his console, and the ramp folded down into the trunk, opening a deck–to–deckhead gap spanning half the rear bulkhead. “Clear to disembark and unload.”
“Thank you, PO Hyun.” Steve unbuckled his harness and stood. In the load compartment behind and below him, a liberty party of spacers from the ship did likewise.
“My pleasure, Sir.”
Steve walked down the ramp, through the trunk and into an airlock, followed by the spacers. The hatch on the far side of the airlock admitted him to a brightly–lit, freshly–painted foyer. It seemed small compared to those on the freighter, transport and depot ships aboard which he’d previously served. He knew that was because a destroyer carried far fewer small craft — only two cutters, plus a gig for her Commanding Officer — and didn’t have nearly as much traffic, in terms of either people or cargo. There were only four airlocks in the docking bay, plus a replenishment dock providing an access point for resupply missions by larger cargo shuttles.
He came to attention and saluted the Commonwealth flag, hanging from a polished staff mounted halfway along the central bulkhead, beneath the ship’s crest. The latter portrayed a Greek warrior of the Bronze Age standing on a mound, legs apart, back straight, head raised beneath a helmet topped with a large arched crest of red–dyed horsehair, eyes staring into the distance. His upraised right hand clutched a great spear, its butt grounded, the leaf–shaped point high above his head. His lowered left arm supported a round bronze shield, its decorative pattern matching those on the armor protecting his legs, groin, forearms and torso. The circular image was surrounded by a yellow–golden rope, with a scroll at the top reading ‘LCS Achilles’ and another at the bottom with the ship’s motto, ‘Fortiter in Re’.
