Pursuing Dreams (The Young Soldier Book 1)

by MK Clark

Don sat and turned toward the front. He was quiet. There were things he wanted to know from the captain, but he did not know how to ask them.

  “So tell me about yourself,” the captain said.

  Don shifted. He was unaccustomed to talking about himself. “What do you want to know?”

  “Anything will do. We’ve time to kill, and I’m curious about you.”

  “Well, I’m seventeen now, but you knew that, didn’t you?” The captain waved him on. “Obviously, I elected to become a pilot.” Don paused, then said, “I don’t really know what to say. I’m pretty self-explanatory. Most of my life has been spent moving around with my father, then Basic, then training, and now the Morning Star.”

  “No goals?” Captain Hendricks asked. “No aspirations?”

  Don shrugged. “Not really. I always wanted to join the Space Jumpers. I only achieved that a few months ago. At the moment, I’m just trying to be a pilot.”

  “Of course, you’re still young. Tell me, though, why the Space Jumpers?”

  Don frowned and looked away. He wasn’t quite comfortable enough to explain his revenge obsession. Tyson was the only person Don had ever told.

  “What about you, sir? You already know quite a bit about me, without me having to say anything. I know nothing of you.”

  Captain Hendricks sighed and leaned backward in his chair. “You’re right,” he said, acknowledging the change in conversation. Still, there was a sharpness in the captain’s eye that made Don think his clumsy dodge was well noted. “I’m sorry. I should have shared first. I’ve lived a bit longer, so I think I’ll be selective in the telling.”

  Don nodded his assent, and the captain began. “I grew up in a colony on the outskirts. I had four brothers; I am the third child. Both my older brothers excelled in school.” He smiled a little. “I never quite met the standard they set. That sort of education wasn’t my style, to my mother’s chagrin. I never attended any sort of higher learning. I spent my young adult years doing nothing worthwhile, and everything I could do to get into trouble.

  “I was spending some time in the joint when the Zarweans hit the first time. Some big shot from the military came to us soon after and offered us pardon in return for our service. I accepted. Somehow, I survived the chaos of those years. Many did not. When my contract came up for renewal, I left. I got out fast and stayed out. I had training as a pilot, knowledge on some strategy, how to navigate space and the A-Stream, and I was ready to use it.

  “I convinced a merchant to hire me out, and after saving up much of my salary and all my bonuses awarded for the dangerous jobs, I bought me a ship. Not this one, smaller. Charlie was my first acquisition after that. Why she’s stayed with me this long, I don’t know. Other crew came and went. The first time I met your mother was after I’d had the ship for a few years. We bumped into each other a couple more times after that. I found Dukes when I got Mina, and Jillian came onboard a few years ago. We had some others, but they’re gone now, home or otherwise.”

  The captain sat up a little. “That’s about it. Fifty-two years of life.”

  Don nodded. “What did you do to get thrown in the joint?”

  Hendricks laughed. “Of all the questions to ask.” He shook his head, but answered willingly enough. “I was working as a mercenary, and our crew got caught. Not a very glamorous beginning, aye?”

  “No, sir.”

  “But mine, nonetheless. Now you know who I am. I should like to hear more about you. Tell me, what is the meaning behind your orders?”

  “Orders, sir?” Don questioned, wary now for the first time.

  “Yes, your orders,” the captain replied sharply. “Your mission parameters. I assume not all your missions are as unevenly assigned as this one.”

  Don folded his hands together as he contemplated how to answer.

  “I have been wondering about this for some time,” the captain said into the silence. “Your second lieutenant is obviously in charge, and yet those of you in her flight have hardly participated. I was informed that your flight would assist where needed, but I hardly expected this. I can’t say I was, or am, happy with this unnecessary delay.”

  “Begging your pardon, Captain,” Don interrupted, “but Chip’s team needed some time to recover.” He felt sick as he spoke, knowing he was defending orders he didn’t believe in.

  “Oh, I understand that, son. What I don’t understand is why your flight could not escort while they rested.” Don could feel the gaze of the captain on him.

  “Sir, these were our orders.”

  “And you have no inkling as to why they were given?”

  Don sighed. “We have our suspicions, yes.”

  “We?”

  “Captain, surely you do not think you are alone in spotting this peculiarity.”

  “And yet you are all bound by the same law that demands your obedience without question.”

  “Yes, Captain,” Don answered, relieved. It was one thing to talk with his comrades, but it was another thing to disrespect his superiors to outsiders.

  “Then I shall guess what you cannot say,” Hendricks continued. “We have time.”

  Don could not argue with that.

  “Obviously, your flight has incurred the wrath or displeasure of a superior, which narrows things down quite a bit. Either all of you are at fault, or one of you is. I would normally say it was your second lieutenant, but then, normally it is not Don O’Hara sitting in front of me.”

  Don nodded. As he suspected, the captain already understood the motive beneath it all. What he didn’t know was why the captain had wanted Don to say it.

  “So it is you.”

  Don made no move to confirm or deny, and the man continued.

  “This action comes as no surprise to you, then?”

  “What action, sir?”

  “Your mission parameters.”

  “No, sir. They are not surprising, but they are an improvement.”

  Hendricks did not say anything for a while. He frowned, deep in thought. Finally, he shifted a little. “An earned improvement, or one from necessity?”

  “How can something be earned, if never given the chance?”

  “Which would leave necessity, but what I don’t understand is why you are here. Why not just send the others? Why bother sending your flight, as well?”

  Don frowned. He didn’t know why. Kyomo had said Laudon could not keep them grounded forever. Someone must have forced Lauden’s hand.

  The captain watched him as he thought. “You see,” he said, “sometimes it is informative to question, silently, if not aloud. Don’t you think?”

  Don frowned. “You said you had given this thought for a while now?”

  “A little while, yes”

  “Forgive me, but why?”

  The captain leaned back in his chair. “You know, son, I am of a double mind with you. There are times when I wonder if you are perceptive enough, and then there are times when I almost wish you would not ask.” He waved Don silent and continued, “Because I genuinely care about you, or rather, I cared about your mother. So I have a special interest in you. I am not so noble as to have made some promise to look after you when she was gone. Yet, now that you are here in front of me, I feel as if I should at least understand you and try to help you.”

  There was a bitter taste in Don’s mouth as he listened. When the captain finished, he tried to carefully phrase his question. It was the question that had been haunting him since their first conversation. “Who were you to my mother?”

  “Not that,” Hendricks answered quietly, “never that. It is true that I loved your mother, but so did many people. I would have followed her to the edges of space, as would hundreds, if she had asked. But I never tried to take her from you or your father, and if I had, she would not have stood for it. She loved both of you very deeply. No, I was merely a devoted follower.”

  Don tried to slow the beat of his heart as he listened. “A devoted follower? What do you mean?”

 
Hendricks frowned.“You must understand, Don, your mother was different―”

  “Forgive me, Captain," Don snapped, "but I don’t understand." He was on the edge of his seat. He wasn’t quite sure where the anger had come from, but it was here now. “You have told me almost nothing!”

  “And yet more than anyone else.”

  Don fought back a growl as he clenched his fists. “If you did not intend to give me any real information, then why did you seek me out? If you did not intend to answer my questions, then why have you alluded to truths and not stated any of them? Surely you knew this conversation would pique my interest.”

  Hendricks looked across the bridge. His face gave away nothing of what he was thinking. “You do not know what you ask.”

  Don sat back in disgust: more vague answers.

  “I suppose I have beaten around the bush because I am afraid. I have wanted you to understand without really understanding. That would be easiest. You see, I am afraid you will not like the answer to your question.”

  “Captain, please, just tell me what you know.”

  “Haven’t you wondered why you never hear anyone speak of your mother?”

  Don did not reply, afraid that if he did, the man would stop.

  The captain turned back toward him slowly. “Yes, I said your mother was loved by many, but when you are loved like that, you are sure to have enemies. Your mother had them, just as your father has them.”

  “What does he have to do with this?” Don asked despite himself.

  “Everything! You see, he is loved and respected by many, just as your mother was. The difference lies in their loyalties. Your father is a military leader, a tool of the government. Your mother was a leader of the people. She lived for them. Those who loved your father hated your mother, and vice versa. In other words, your mother’s enemies were your father’s greatest supporters.”

  “I don’t―”

  “It’s hard to hear, I’m sure, but I warned you.”

  Don felt numb. “Who was my mother?”

  “In the beginning, she was a sort of ambassador for the military, for the Council, really. She was very charismatic, and being the wife of your father, perfect for the job. If there was something the Council needed done, she could convince the people it was right when no one else could. She was light and joy, and when she spoke, you wanted to do what she asked. But it was more than that. She was also able to make the voice of the people heard to the Council, and many times she succeeded in swaying many of the councilmember votes. The people loved her for it.

  “Your mother did a lot of good for the people during this time. However, some bureaucrats didn’t approve of her actions. She was always at odds with them, and it made enemies of them.”

  Don sat riveted to his seat. Never, in the decade he could remember, had he heard his mother spoken of. It had been almost as if she had never existed. From the captain’s telling, and the devotion in his voice, Don knew he could not have been more wrong. Yet the joy that should have come from hearing these things was dampened by what he had already heard.

  “During these years,” Hendricks continued, “your mother was privy to quite a bit of information ordinary civilians would not have had clearance to see or hear. It changed her.

  “She became aware of things she did not, could not, approve of, and being who she was, she acted. She rallied support, quietly at first. She was very aware that what she was doing could be considered treasonous. In a way, she became a kind of double agent, although I would never have called her that. She merely wanted peace. It was always her goal.

  “It was dangerous, what she did, and eventually your father’s people caught on. That’s when everything turned sour. It broke your father’s heart to hear. I think he loved her despite it. She died not long after that.”

  “What are you saying?” Don asked, his voice barely a whisper.

  “Merely that your mother was an amazing woman who stood for what she believed in. And just as she was becoming a force to be reckoned with, she died.”

  Don choked the next words out, determined to hear everything. “If this is all true, why haven’t I heard any of it before?”

  Hendricks let out a low sigh. “I cannot say why your father has never spoken of her to you. It is, perhaps, too painful for him. As for everyone else? They are either forbidden, or they simply do not wish to remind the people of her.”

  “Forbidden?”

  “Aye, the easiest way to defeat those who followed your mother is simply to help them forget she ever existed. She cannot be completely wiped from the minds of the people, but if she is never spoken of, if her existence is never acknowledged, eventually her memory will disappear. At least that’s the idea.”

  There was a long pause as Don digested this information. He couldn’t quite believe it all. He didn’t want to believe it.

  “Many have been waiting to see how you would grow up. Would you favor your mother or your father?”

  Don looked up in shock. “Sorry?”

  “Oh, yes, son, both sides of this little conflict are eagerly and nervously waiting to see what you become. Both sides are trying to sway you. Just to be able to claim you would be a small victory, let alone to be able to use you.”

  Anger welled up in him again. Anger over what the captain was implying, anger over what he’d already said. Don could not accept it; he would not.

  He stood, unable to sit any longer. “What is this? Some kind of joke? Just because I don’t remember everything? I don’t like people toying with me, Captain Hendricks.”

  “I can see that, and I would never try,” the captain said neutrally. “But perhaps we should move on to a different subject?”

  Don shrugged irritably and turned to lean on the rail. True, the captain’s words bothered him, but it was more than that. He absentmindedly rubbed the scar on his hand as his mind drifted to the not-so-far-off memory of his days in Basic. The words from both Streets and Suits alike had left him unnerved back then; now they frightened him. They seemed to confirm what the captain had said.

  “Who was on my mother’s side?” he finally asked.

  “That is an easy question to ask, but the answer is not so straightforward.”

  Don’s eyes flickered over to where the captain sat.

  “You could say that your father was on her side, even though he worked for those who weren’t. I suppose you could also say that anyone who disagreed with the Council was on her side.”

  “So the Freemen,” Don stated bitterly.

  “Perhaps, and yet, no.”

  Don turned to face the captain, perturbed.

  “The Freemen are not so easy to win over, but yes, she believed she could help them come to peace in the end.”

  “The Freemen don’t want peace,” Don spat. “They want freedom from the Council. That will never be allowed. My mother was naive.”

  “No, Don, your mother was very intelligent. She had a plan, a well-organized one, and she believed that the Freemen, as well as everyone else, could receive what they wanted from it. In the end, if it had worked, the war would have ended.”

  “How do you know all of this?”

  “I told you, son, I was a devoted follower.”

  “When she died, what did you do?”

  “I went into hiding,” Hendricks answered truthfully. “The Council was desperately searching for those who had helped your mother. They wanted to crush anyone who remained.”

  “And they are still searching?”

  “Not actively, no.”

  Don did not speak, pausing once again to grasp everything he had heard. He felt severe disappointment at the revelation of who his mother had been, and anger that this knowledge had been kept from him for so long. A very small portion of him felt indignant that the captain had done nothing for his mother’s cause after she died and yet still claimed to have been devoted to her. He pushed it all aside. There was still more to this conversation.

  “As a soldier, I have a duty to t
urn in those who defy the Council.”

  “Yes, son, you do.”

  “Then why would you tell me all of this?”

  Hendricks didn’t answer for a long time. “Because you asked, and because I believe it is important for you to know who your mother was.”

  “A traitor.”

  “No,” Hendricks said fervently, “a symbol of the people, and what the people wanted.”

  Darkness seemed to press in on the bridge as Don chased thoughts around in his head. “How do I choose?” he asked. “How do I choose between my parents when I have never known one of them?”

  “You knew her.”

  “But I don’t now!" Don exclaimed. “I can’t even remember her.”

  “Then don’t.”

  “Don’t what?”

  “Don’t choose,” the captain answered. “Don’t choose between your parents. Just live how you would live, and love your parents for who they were. No one said you had to pick a side.”

  “I don’t understand,” Don said slowly. “You said everyone was waiting for me to pick a side.”

  “That is correct, but I never said you had to.” The captain leaned forward to rest his elbows on his knees. “I merely wanted you to understand that, despite the quiet over these years, both sides are still out there ready to pounce. However, just because they are there, it doesn’t mean you have to play by their rules.”

  Don laughed humorlessly. “In other words, I can be simply a well-educated observer.”

  “If that’s how you want to think of it, yes.”

  “I doubt that’s an option for me.” The captain said nothing, but his face questioned, so Don continued. “Things in my life have a habit of becoming a little complicated. This mission, for example,” he said, and the corner of his mouth twitched a little. “I could have been assigned to any of the other ships and remained in ignorance, but I wasn’t. I was assigned to the Mina, captained by the man who shattered the poorly constructed image of what I had been allowed to believe about my mother.”

  “Ah,” the captain said and looked a little embarrassed. “I’m afraid that would be my fault. I asked for the opportunity to have you aboard.”

  “Not chance, then.”