Protocol by M M Holt

Author:M M Holt [Holt, M M]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2018-10-16T23:00:00+00:00

29

THE NEXT MORNING we gathered for Le Seaux to read her message from the Accord Commission.

Over two hundred personnel were present in the stateroom, including a hundred of the enormous Marines dressed in their combat uniforms and armed with the same heavy weapons.

Le Seaux and Chen were already there when I was brought into the room. Overnight, I'd been billeted in one of the other shuttles. The petty officers had take me to a cabin furnished in pre-Accord era style with a bed that had a canopy and four posts. The three petty officers warned me not to leave the room. 'No oxygen will be outside,' they said.

I hadn't slept, which meant I had no opportunity to return to the windy deck of HMS Vengeance to ask serious questions of its captain. Instead, I'd spent a long night mourning my mother, and of thinking through what had to be done.

'Where did you go last night?' said Chen with wink. 'Last we saw, you were alone with Octavia, Drusilla and the all-female Roman cheer squad.'

'You didn't say anything about the Accord did you, Lieutenant?' said Le Seaux, her green eyes accusing.

'Listen, we're in danger,' I whispered.

'Who is?' said Chen.

'The three of us, the Accord, the Earth.'

'What?' said Chen.

'The Romans are not what they seem.'

'They were OK yesterday,' said Chen, 'after all the Goth stuff.'

'No,' I said. 'They are not OK. We're going to be invaded,' I said. 'We've got to warn the Accord.'

Le Seaux looked at me as if she had been expecting something like this.

'No,' she said. 'We're going to speak about the values, Lieutenant. That's our mission. That is the first and last most important thing. Not only that, we're going to live those values, right here and now on this spaceship with our new allies.'

'They don't care about the values,' I said. 'They know all about them anyway. They know all about our system of government, our history, everything.'

'Address me properly,' said Le Seaux, 'or you'll have yet another Navy Spirit code violation to add to the pile.'

At that moment, I couldn't care less about Navy Spirit. My mother was dead. An invasion was threatened. Octavia was mad and wanted to imprison me. Worse, no-one else realized it. Not Le Seaux, not the military command, not the Commission.

'OK, sir,' I said, humoring her. 'They don't care about the values. The Admiral told me herself.'

'Keep your mouth shut, Lieutenant,' said Le Seaux. 'Until we get back to the Accord, you are to talk about nothing except Accord values and how much you admire them.'

'We've got to get off this ship and warn the Commission,' I said. 'We've got to get our forces ready to defend ourselves.'

'Warn them? About what?'

'An invasion.'

'Lieutenant.'

'I'm serious. Admiral Octavia told me last night. This is not a case of using more tolerance. Tolerance will just end up in our defeat.

'Lieutenant,' said Le Seaux again. I could tell she was fighting to remain calm. She wanted me to shut up, but she knew she couldn't shout with so many others in the room.

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