by Dave Bara
“I understand you’re fully certified on the longscope,” he said. “Our previous ’scopeman wasn’t up to the task at Levant. I’ll be asking you to do better.”
“Of course, sir. I am certified on the ’scope, sir, but Mr. Tralfane requested I stay off of it until his updates are complete,” I said. He waved his hand dismissively.
“I’ve already spoken to the Historian. The ’scope is free for you to use. His updates can wait.” This surprised me, as Tralfane had been quite insistent I stay off the apparatus. I wondered if he would take this opportunity to “look in” on me and monitor my session. Zander continued.
“As you may expect, my main concern now is getting this ship ready to go back to Levant. We still don’t know what generated the rogue displacement waves. It wasn’t us, and from the look of the surviving Levant system society it wasn’t the natives either. It was something, or someone, else,” Zander said. I mulled over his words in my mind, then came up with a question.
“So what’s our next move?” I asked.
Zander eyed me very seriously. “I want to find out why my ship was blasted, Commander, and why twelve of your Quantar countrymen died in those shuttles. That’s our first mission, and why I’ll need an able longscopeman.”
“I’ll give you nothing but my best, sir,” I said.
“I’m sure you will, Mr. Cochrane,” he replied. I understood him better now, and I decided Lucius Zander was one tough little bastard. Still, my secret orders from Wesley about betraying him hung over me like a circling vulture.
“Sir, about this mission back to Levant,” I started. He cut me off with a wave of his hand before I could voice my concerns.
“I know some of your people are against it, son, but Union Navy Command has approved the mission, and that’s the last I’ll hear of it,” he snapped.
“Yes, sir,” I said.
Zander motioned to the ’scope, at long last. “A demonstration of your skills, if you please, Commander,” he said.
I stepped into the brass-railed ’scope covey, a circular extension of the captain’s deck, then took off my duty cap and set it aside before closing the rails behind me. I placed my thumb over the thermal panel reader and the ’scope louvers descended down to my eye level from their stowed position. I placed my hands at the control rods on either side and leaned in under the hood. The hood closed behind me, enclosing me to the waist to keep distracting light from interfering with the displays. After a few minutes of calibrating the equipment to my preferences for contrast and brightness, the ’scope read my vision, which was 20/15, and adjusted itself accordingly to match my prescription.
“Ready, sir,” I said via the com. I didn’t know for sure, but I believed a man like Zander would have a test for me. I was right.
“Please scan section two-point four by four-eight, azimuth seventy, and tell me what you see,” he said.
I took my hands from the calibration rods and engaged the infrared, keyed in the location, and then activated the wave beacon. The display went out of focus for several seconds as the ’scope adjusted for distance and time displacement. I fine-tuned the instruments as I waited for the display to firm up, trying to seem as professional as I could under the circumstances. This was my first full-duty shift on the longscope, and I hoped my inexperience wouldn’t show.
After a few more moments the visual display painted in. I scanned the field in a series of interlocking triangles, as I’d been trained to do. In the lower left corner of the third triangle I spotted the first anomaly, an elongated black-gray dot. It could be metal, it could be natural, I wasn’t sure. Wanting to stay ahead of the game I brought up the infrared display and then refocused on the anomaly while my sweep continued to run in the background. Infrared indicated it was artificial, so I bounced a low-density H-wave off of the object. The returned albedo clearly indicated a metal and crystal structure, the crystal probably from standard navy-issue carbonized glass. The Hoagland ping downloaded shape, size, and mass data into the ’scope and I ran an analysis by loading the object specs into the navy database. The result came back with a positive ten seconds later.
“Object number one is a Carinthian Navy bulwark shuttle, Werder class. Capacity of twelve when active, ten passengers, pilot, and copilot. Shuttle is currently powered down and on systems standby. Distance is one-three-point-four-five AUs from present location. Give me another minute and I’ll have her registry information,” I said confidently.
“Unnecessary,” said Zander. “Send a longwave with the following code, encrypted: alpha, delta, one-five omega, seven-niner seven, tetragrammaton.” I entered the code and sent the longwave communications packet. “That will start the shuttle up so she’ll be ready to go when we get to her,” said Zander. “Now, find me my other anomaly, Commander.”
I returned to the ’scope and picked up my field search again. After several minutes of scanning I had found nothing. Except for the shuttle, the coordinates as given by Zander were clear of objects, anomalous or otherwise. Clearly, this was going to be the tough part of the test. I considered the possibility that there was no second object and Zander was merely trying to test my mettle. Would I stand up to him and stake my reputation on a clear field?
“The rest of the grid shows clear, Captain,” I said, not taking my eyes from the ’scope as I continued to scan the various displays for something I’d missed.
“Correct, Commander. But I still want my second anomaly,” said Zander. I looked at him on my bridge view display as he confidently took another sip of his coffee. “Improvise,” he said. This was clearly the test he truly had in mind. Many could be trained to use the ’scope, but few had the intuition and logic skills to make it more than a tool, to make it an extension of their own personalities. I’d heard veteran ’scopemen call their instruments “she,” or even use a proper name for it.
I ran through the navy catalog and my displays again and then found what I was looking for, an observation satellite in the same triangle area as the bulwark shuttle. Logic and intuition told me Zander was a man of intent, and with the rest of the grid clean the second anomaly must be in the same general area as the shuttle.
I bounced a longwave off the satellite, embedding a request for visual and infrared scans of the area around the shuttle. It returned my ping in approximately ten seconds with the second anomaly. Zander had said he wanted to recreate the incident at Levant exactly, and he meant it. The second object was tucked in behind the bulwark shuttle in the same plane relative to Impulse. A purely visual search wouldn’t have found it.
“Second object is a light personnel carrier, Matilda class, complement of thirty-two with crew and passengers, sir.”
“You feel no need to verify this finding?” asked Zander. I opened the hood and released the ’scope, stepping back and facing my commanding officer. Commander Kierkopf now stood beside his station.
“No, sir,” I said. “Shuttle is the same class and displacement as the one lost at Levant, sir.” Zander put down his coffee and stood up.
“Thank you for the demonstration, Commander,” he said. “And well done.”
“Thank you, sir,” I replied.
“But there is something else we need to address, young man, something unsatisfactory,” he said. I was at his station in a few short strides.
“Yes, sir?” I said. Zander motioned me closer and I joined him and Commander Kierkopf to make a closed rank of three.
“Mr. Cochrane, I’ve been meaning to discuss something with you, and I’ve been letting it slide, but I find I cannot ignore it anymore,” he said. I cocked my head slightly at this, showing interest and, I hoped, respect.
“Sir?”
“It’s the issue, Mr. Cochrane, of your uniform.”
I swallowed hard, not wanting a confrontation but firm on my grounds for defending my country’s honor. “Sir?” I said again.
Zander cle
ared his throat and then raised his voice loud enough for the entire bridge to hear. “On this vessel, Mr. Cochrane, we all wear the same uniform. It is a sign of our unity.”
“Yes sir.”
“And that unity is essential to a well-run ship, wouldn’t you agree?”
“Yes, sir.” Next to me, Commander Kierkopf shifted her weight, obviously uncomfortable with where this conversation was going.
“So why do I find you on my bridge not wearing the duty uniform I issued to you?” Zander demanded.
I looked him straight in the eye. I knew my answer would set my course permanently on this ship, either upward or downward. I decided to be brave.
“With all respect, Captain, to be asked to wear the uniform of another world is not a reasonable request. I swore an oath of service to my world long before I swore one to the Union Navy. Additionally, being asked to not wear my country’s uniform would dishonor the memory of my countrymen from Quantar that were lost at Levant. And, at any rate sir, the uniform issued to me is not the USN standard. It is Carinthian.”
At this Zander raised himself up, barely coming up to my chest. When he spoke his voice was even louder than before. “And so you refuse to honor this vessel and those who built and man her, those who toiled with your countrymen in a crisis, by wearing the uniform of Impulse?” That shook me up. I had expected a private conversation and now this seemed more a confrontation designed to embarrass me. I stiffened both physically and in my resolve.
“The uniform I wear honors those countrymen and their sacrifice, Captain. I do not wear it to dishonor you or Carinthia. I do it out of respect for my forebears, my brother, who was lost in Union Navy service, and my oath.”
“That is unacceptable,” said Zander flatly. “We must all wear the same uniform, Commander. If you do not comply your name will see the bottom of my report on a daily basis. You will accumulate enough fleet demerits that you will never see a promotion, or for that matter even shore leave.”
This time I didn’t hesitate in my response. “If you so choose, Captain, I cannot argue with you. But I cannot change a stand I have taken on principle.” I was rigid as a bulkhead now, my whole body tense. Zander sighed and placed his hands behind his back.
“Is there no compromise in you, boy?” he said. I hesitated.
“There is, sir, I believe,” I responded. Now Zander crossed his arms in front of him.
“Well go ahead, I can’t wait to hear this,” he said.
“We could all wear the standard issue Union Navy whites, sir. Then there would be uniformity among the crew, sir.”
“Navy whites?” Zander boomed. “Navy whites?” He stepped forward to the deck rail and yelled out to the crew below. “Does anyone here want to wear those damnably ugly navy whites?”
“No, sir!” came the chorus from the bridge crew. I also noticed a good deal of snickering now and hushed conversations. I began to relax as it dawned on me: I’d been had. Again.
“No damnable whites!” Zander screeched in his gravel tones. This was greeted with cheers and clapping all around. Commander Kierkopf nudged me with her elbow.
Zander turned back to me. “The crew is having nothing of the damned whites, Mr. Cochrane,” he said. “And since you won’t wear the green of Carinthia, then I guess your current uniform will have to do.” This was greeted with a smattering of cheers. “As has always been the policy of this vessel under my command!”
The crew roared with laughter and whooping in my direction, and I could feel the flush of my skin. Commander Kierkopf patted me on the back patronizingly.
“Well done, young lad! You’ve succeeded in maintaining standard ship’s policy!” she said. I began to smile.
“Mr. Poulsen!” said Zander to Claus Poulsen, stationed at Propulsion. “We’ve had our fun, now I believe you owe me twenty crowns!” The crew broke into laughter again. Poulsen pulled the coin from his pocket and passed it to Zander, who held it up to me.
“He bet me he could get you into the greens,” he said, laughing. “But I knew better! You’re a stubborn one!” Now I laughed with the rest.
“Duly noted, Captain, Commander,” I said, nodding to each in turn, then stepped forward to the rail myself and pointed at the rabble. “But the rest of you lot just remember, I’ll have duty station on this deck often enough, and plenty of you will be serving shifts under me!” There were good-natured jeers at this. Zander waved the crew back to their duty stations.
“Commander Cochrane,” he said, “the XO and I will be having lunch in the officers’ lounge. In the meantime, Commander, you have the con. Don’t break anything.”
“Acknowledged, sir. I have the con, sir,” I said. It was hard to contain my excitement. Less than an hour on duty and I’d already run my first longscope sequence and now was about to get the con. It was more than I could have hoped for. “Thank you, sir,” I said as he departed with Commander Kierkopf.
I looked down on the nav and con stations, my hands on the rail of the captain’s deck. The crew looked up at me expectantly.
“Let’s look alive now!” I said, then barked out my first orders in command of a Lightship.
Underway
At 0700 the next morning I stood on the captain’s deck next to Dobrina as Zander held court from the center seat. We were untethered from Candle and moving slowly away from the station on a general heading for Quantar’s outer-system jump point for the crossing to Levant.
“Commander Kierkopf, please set our course for the shuttles and prepare to load them in the landing bay for the traverse to the jump point. And activate the Hoagland Field,” said Zander to Dobrina, but loud enough for the entire bridge crew to hear. This was clearly a man who loved the pomp of command. Commander Kierkopf turned to me.
“Execute, Lieutenant Commander Cochrane,” she said.
“Aye, XO,” I responded. I was curious about the request to activate the Hoagland Field. Usually at sub-light speed in friendly territory the field was off. I stepped forward and put my hands on the railing, looking down to George Layton. “Helm officer, set course one-one-eight, mark four. Propulsion officer,” I said, turning to see my adjutant Claus Poulsen on duty, “engage the impellers and charge the forward Hoagland Field. Take us out at zero-point zero-seven-five light.”
“Zero-point zero-seven-five light, aye, sir!” snapped Poulsen. The sub-light impellers were useful for any travel under one-tenth light speed. Beyond that the Hoagland Drive was far more efficient, even if it did demand that we use the accompanying field to cut a swath through normal space.
I stood at the railing acting as if I expected my orders to be carried out swiftly and flawlessly. In reality I was as excited as any officer on his maiden voyage into deep space would be. I looked to the longscope, wishing I could be under the hood, calculating time and distance to some forgotten First Empire world, or a relic like an Imperial Dreadnought, or some other fascinating discovery. But for now all I could do was watch and wait for my next opportunity.
“Main display forward,” commanded Dobrina.
“Display forward, aye, sir,” responded Layton. I sighed as the main plasma display switched on to show us nothing but dark space sprinkled with crystal stars ahead. Now the adventure truly began.
“Lieutenant Commander, may I have a word?” It was Zander, and it broke my momentary reverie. I was at his station in a few short strides and sat in my duty chair when I saw Dobrina do the same.
“Yes, sir?” I said. Zander shifted in his seat and put down his ever-present coffee cup. He spoke quietly, almost in a whisper.
“I’m calling the staff together at 1000 hours,” he said. “I expect you and Commander Kierkopf to keep my bridge in suitable shape and get those shuttles stowed by then. From here on out I believe it’s critical that we move with both pace and deliberate intent, without any advance notice of our next move. Do you understand?”
I looked to Commander Kierkopf. She was clearly already in the loop on these operating instructions. “I do, sir,” I said. “Are we expecting trouble before we reach the jump point?” Zander looked put out at my question, but answered it nonetheless.
“I expect nothing, but I suspect everything, Commander. Now carry out my orders, and be on time for the staff.” With that he was up in a flash and headed for the lifter. “I’ll be in my cabin, XO. You have the con,” he said loud enough for the whole bridge to hear.
“Acknowledged,” said Kierkopf, “I have the con, sir.” And with that, Zander was gone, Commander Kierkopf moved to the center seat, and I was left with more questions than answers.
A few minutes later, once things on the bridge had progressed to my satisfaction, I joined Kierkopf as she sat in the captain’s chair.
“What did Zander mean about ‘pace and deliberate intent’?” I asked while pretending to scan reports on my tablet display. “And what’s with the Hoagland Field?”
“If he had wanted you to know that rather than just carry out his orders, don’t you think he would have told you?” she said without taking her eyes from the main display.
“I’m just trying to get a handle on him,” I said. “He’s not the easiest man to understand.”
“I will give you that,” she replied. “But I also know he won’t tell you anything until he’s ready to.”
“Obviously you trust him fully.” I stated.
“I do,” she said. “He recruited me from Minerva to Impulse based solely on the recommendation of my former captain. When I got here he tested me in multiple roles and kept advancing me. I owe him a great debt for my career, but I also respect him as military man. He knows what he’s doing and he cares for everyone aboard Impulse.”
“I understand that. It’s just I haven’t learned his . . . idiosyncrasies yet.”
“One thing I will say, Cochrane. If he didn’t believe in you, you wouldn’t be sitting here.”
